Biola UniversityEpisode Transcript
Sean McDowell: [upbeat music] A showdown in Maine that may signal the future of biological males competing in female sports. A debate emerges over whether first cousin marriage should be legalized. Is America moving towards a theocracy? And a new debate over religious liberty emerges in Washington. These are stories we'll discuss, and we'll take some of your excellent questions. I'm your host, Sean McDowell, joined today by Biola and Talbot professor Thaddeus Williams, sitting in for the one and only Scott Rae. This is the Think Biblically weekly cultural update, brought to you by Talbot School of Theology, Biola University. Thad, you ready to go, buddy?
Thaddeus Williams: Let's do it, brother. Let's dive in.
Sean McDowell: All right, my man. As always, these are some fascinating stories. This first one feels like it kinda signals a watershed moment we are at in some of the conversation about transgender rights, in particular, as it relates to sports. So this story was in the Wall Street Journal last week, but up until, like, an hour before we recorded this, local news stories are still filling in and discussing it. Evidently, last week, the Maine House of Representatives voted to censure Republican Representative Laura Libby for posting photos of a transgender high school athlete on Facebook. The teenager, who previously competed in boys' track and field, switched to compete in the girls' pole vault this year, winning the Class B state championship. Libby wrote, "This is outrageous and unfair to the many female athletes who work every day to succeed in their respective sports." And again, she included a photo of this athlete. Now, the criticism on the other side, I pulled this from an article in Portland to try to indicate what the criticism of this is, and it says: "Supporters argue that the censure was not about silencing anyone or even about the rights of transgender athletes. The party-line vote focused only on the appropriateness of thrusting a child into an online environment where they could be subjected to abuse," is what they claimed. Now, this intersects with politics. My point is not here to make [chuckles] politics, Thad, as you know.
Thaddeus Williams: Yep.
Sean McDowell: Trump has passed an executive order on transgender athletes, and he says schools or educational institutes that receive Title IX funding, quote, "cannot deny women an equal opportunity to participate in sports," end quote. The order notes that allowing transgender athletes to compete in women's sports is, quote, "demeaning, unfair, and dangerous to women and girls." Now, there was a confrontation between the governor of Maine and between Trump, and the Attorney General, Pat- Pam Bondi has warned that if Maine doesn't get in line with the new understanding of Title IX, they will lose funding. There'll be repercussions. So there's, there's political drama around all of this. Again, not the point I'm leaning into, but a couple other things about this, and I just wanna know your reflections on it.
Thaddeus Williams: Sure.
Sean McDowell: There's a Maine Human Rights Act, the state's anti-discrimination law. It prevents a person at an ins- educational institution from being excluded from extracurricular activities based on their sex, sexual orientation, or gender identity. So there's this historic understanding of Title IX coming into tension with this Maine human rights issue, Maine... Sorry, Maine Human Rights Act, which I think is symbolic of the kind of tension we're gonna see played out here in the next few months and years. Now, the New York Times did a poll, which is fascinating, and they found that only perce- 18% of Americans polled, including 31% of Democrats, believe that transgender girls and women should be allowed to compete-- only allowed to compete in female sports. In other words, biological males should not be able to compete in female sports. And the recent Gen Z study, by the way, showed that a majority of Gen Z-ers actually hold that view as well. Now, this is heating up. Last thing is some supporters of what, of trans rights showed up outside her home, of governor, of the, of Libby, the congresswoman, and they were protesting against this. This is symbolic of where our cultural moment is at. Your take on this, Thad?
Thaddeus Williams: [lips smack] Yeah, I mean, let's just take a step back and acknowledge what a massive sea change this is in the culture- ... Where, you know, Title IX, under the Biden administration, was read, interpreted in such a way that if you barred somebody who identified as female but biologically wasn't, from a sport, you would find yourself in violation of Title IX. And now, under the new administration, under the Trump administration, that's completely inverted, and with his executive orders, I think he even said at the State of the Union the other night, that, as a country, we will only recognize male and female, only two options, when it comes to gender. So just recognizing how quickly these things have shifted is really... You almost gotta catch your breath.
Sean McDowell: It's jarring.
Thaddeus Williams: It is, and I would say, you know, since we're talking about how to think biblically, bringing this to the text, that the opening chapters of Genesis, God is creating distinctions. So the very first line, right, you get, "In the beginning, God created," so you already have a creator-creature distinction, and then he creates the heavens and the Earth, so you get another distinction that Go- that God calls tov, or good. You see a distinction between the waters above, the waters below, between the waters and the dry land. As God is creating these distinctions, he's calling them, the Hebrew tov, which could be rendered beautiful, good, and then eventually you get to the first malediction in the Bible. God doesn't say a good word. He says, "Something's not good for man to be alone," and so Creation Day Six, he creates woman, and you get the gender binary.... And it's that day, God says it's, some translations, exceedingly good. So understanding the- ... Theology underneath the cultural moment is significant for us as Christians to see this as more, you know, like you said, it's not merely some kind of political, kerfuffle. There's something underneath it that we need to recognize. The minute we want to enshrine laws that erase fundamental distinctions between male and female, that's the moment we're erasing something that God Himself calls good and beautiful. Now, one more thought.
Sean McDowell: Yeah.
Thaddeus Williams: It's fascinating to me, sort of the tactics here of some of the trans activism that we see happening in Maine. I've had my finger on the pulse of this issue for years now and seen many interviews, many shouting matches, and along with the cultural shift, there's a tone shift I've detected that something like, you know, a commentator, a host brings up transgenders, competing in sports. Do you believe biological men should compete in female athletics? And again, the numbers, like you cited, 80% of Americans agree. That's a massive... That's a walloping majority agree that, biological men should be completely out to protect the integrity of female competition. Now, the folks making the argument, some of the more activist side of this back and forth, the tone change I've detected is something like this: instead of a bold defense that, you know, these, young people are going to be committing mass suicide, so as a culture, we need to jettison the bigotry and the hatred and the phobia, the new tone is something like this: "Well, this isn't really a very big issue. Americans don't really care about this. They care about the economy, they care about inflation, they care about X, Y, and Z." So it's fascinating to see that now the approach seems to be downplay it. It's not a big issue. And my problem with that is you can sort of use the argument inverted upon itself, which is to say something like, "Well, who are you to say that the lived experience of these women," you know, women like, Riley Gaines, who have all their childhood and hours and hours and months and years to winning a medal stripped away by William Thomas, by Lia Thomas. Who are you to say that's not a big issue? Do you have their lived experience? Have you been a female, practicing your craft, your sport, only to have it stripped away when somebody in the 11th hour decides they're gonna compete now in the female category? So there's a sense in which the shoe is on the other foot here. When people try to downplay it's a major issue in California, where sh- where you and I are, Sean. Somebody can identify as a female, who has XY chromosomes and a penis, and he can, be relocated into a female prison. What about the lived experience of the woman who's a rape victim, who now all of a sudden has to share a cell or a cell block, with somebody who can profoundly re-traumatize and do harm to her? And so I think it's important, to recognize that when we break the structure of reality and we ignore these beautiful distinctions between male and female, reality has a way of breaking back. And so I would, I would point our listeners to, a phenomenal ministry by, a friend of ours, Walt Heyer. Walt Heyer, lived 17 years as Sarah Jensen, and he's got a lot of profound insight into these questions. You can find him at waltheyer.com, H-E-Y-E-R, or his main site, sexchangeregret.com, sexchange regret.
Sean McDowell: I wanna point out to our listeners what you're doing. Number one, you're saying, "All right, we've got this cultural debate that's kind of timely right now," but like Jesus did when he was asked about divorce in Matthew 19, he said, "What was originally written? What did God first say about this? Let's go back to the creation norm at the beginning." And what that means is the way God set things up, which are good, is for our human flourishing. It's for our flourishing, not to ruin our fun, not to control us. It's actually set us free because our maleness and femaleness, even though there's differences about maybe how we culturally live that out and what that means, is that our sexed natures are a part of who God has made us to be, just like gravity is built into [chuckles] reality, and we have to recognize it for human flourishing. It is interesting, and this is for another time, but we're starting to see more and more studies come forward, especially with students, that are saying, "Time out." This... With young people, this transgender-affirming care or gender-affirming care actually doesn't help in the way people thought-
Thaddeus Williams: Yeah
Sean McDowell: ... And it hurts.
Thaddeus Williams: Yep.
Sean McDowell: So the narrative that if, you know, you don't affirm your child, they're going to commit suicide, I think some of the reasons that narrative has shifted is because more and more data has come out to challenge it. Now, as Christians, I just wanna say, there is a political element here and a cultural element that we need to speak into for the good of society, but amidst that, let us not think that, A, every person with [chuckles] gender dysphoria or who's transgender has this big, qu-... Cultural agenda they're trying to push. Most have the same needs and desires you and I have to find security, and happiness, and freedom, didn't ask for this gender dysphoria, and find themselves in a real difficult circumstance. So let's not forget what it looks like to love our neighbors around us, and not just turn this into a political issue, even though, again, Christians need to speak into that political issue.
Thaddeus Williams: Sure.
Sean McDowell: I think both are at play, and let's, let's not forget that. But good take. We're gonna be tracking this story. I think we're gonna see something emerge [chuckles] and signal, because Maine is obviously such a left-leaning state, hence, we're seeing this story play out. So it will signal for other left-leaning states, and for the rest of America, where things are headed moving forward. So we will track with this.
Thaddeus Williams: Yeah, let me just build on, one thing you said there, Sean-
Sean McDowell: Okay
Thaddeus Williams: ... That I think is really helpful. We tend to, because of the glowing rectangles in our pockets, our consciousness, sort of our liturgies, what trains our minds, our habits, our... What shapes our interior life, tends to be what is the latest headline, and what's all the rage about, what are people debating? You know, whether it's, Zelenskyy in the Oval Office, and everybody's gotta have an opinion on that, whether it's fill in the blank, to the point where we begin seeing issues purely on the superficial level as cultural or political issues. And one of the things we try to do at Think Biblically is to... What is the issue underneath the issue underneath the issue?
Sean McDowell: Amen.
Thaddeus Williams: And when we do that, and we go back to Scripture, we see that most of the, quote-unquote, "political questions" of our day, at the deepest level, are theological questions. And this is something that, one of my heroes, Francis Schaeffer, stated in the opening pages of his brilliant book, Christian Manifesto. He's criticizing the Christians of the 1980s, and he says, "If there's one problem, if there's one critique I could make, it's that we see things in bits and pieces." We think, "Okay, there's the abortion controversy over here, and okay, there's, in the '80s, pornography, there's that question over there, and then there's the question of communism, and socialism, and capitalism over there," and we see things as these disconnected bits and pieces. And Schaeffer says we need to start seeing things as wholes. See, see the big picture, what's going on here, and when you do that, you begin to see there's a fundamental clash, a face-off, a showdown between two mutually exclusive worldviews: one that starts with God and takes His Word seriously, and one that starts with the autonomous individual- ... As the starting point, the ultimate meaning maker in reality. So that's the issue behind all the headlines we talk about today, or any episode, for that matter.
Sean McDowell: Love it. Good stuff, man, and that applies to this next story, which was not on my bingo card of something I thought was gonna pop up.
Thaddeus Williams: [chuckles]
Sean McDowell: And before we dive in, I want... Like, I don't know that I've said this to our audience, I spend a good amount of time reading articles on Twitter, and in The New York Times, and The Wall Street Journal, and Christian publications, and when I see certain stories emerge, and multiple stories in different outlets the same week, it gives me pause, and I think, "Okay, is there a larger trend happening here?" And two stories popped up this week, one from a [chuckles] conservative publication, answers it one way, one from a left-leaning publication answered it completely differently, both related to the topic of incest. So this was in the Institute for Family Studies, and apparently, Delaware's legislator is debating a bill to recognize first cousin marriages performed outside the state. The bill's sponsor is a Muslim progressive, and a quarter of the people in her district were born overseas. "It's an issue for my community," this representative says. She also applies the love is love language. "I don't feel like the government should be in the business of telling people who they should marry," to promote her bill. So you see this Muslim kind of background coming into play here, but then you see this modern kind of American love is love language. Very interesting, these two ideas. Now, what's called consanguinity is marriage or reproductive relationships between two closely related individuals. It's more common in Muslim and Arab countries. For example, this blew me away, Thad, that more than-
Thaddeus Williams: Yeah
Sean McDowell: ... 50% of marriages in Saudi Arabia, Pakistan, involve first cousins.
Thaddeus Williams: Yeah, I had to read that stat again. I was like- [chuckles]
Sean McDowell: I did, too!
Thaddeus Williams: ... "Is there a typo here?"
Sean McDowell: I couldn't imagine that. Now, in Britain-
Thaddeus Williams: Yeah
Sean McDowell: ... Because there's been an increase in Muslim immigrants, they estimate that more than 50% of British Pakistanis are married to first cousins.
Thaddeus Williams: Yep.
Sean McDowell: So this raises a challenge for American conservatives who value the sanctity of marriage, but this seems to be redistributing and understanding what marriage is. Now, this article's-
Thaddeus Williams: And I didn't even realize... Real quick, I didn't even realize-
Sean McDowell: Yeah
Thaddeus Williams: ... That it's already legal in certain states that have a heavy, Muslim immigrant population. Marrying a first cousin is legal in New York, New Jersey, Virginia, and Massachusetts. That was news to me.
Sean McDowell: Right, totally. So that's, that's where this article goes, and they point out... I was not aware of this, too. It says, I guess it was to- first cousin marriage was tolerated during colonial and founding times, but it hasn't been the norm that it was in the Islamic world. 23 states banned it in the US between 1858 and 1940. Texas banned it in 2005, Tennessee as early as [chuckles] 2024. I didn't even know-
Thaddeus Williams: Wow
Sean McDowell: ... That was a topic there.
Thaddeus Williams: Wow.
Sean McDowell: Now, some states either allow it or recognize first cousin marriages when people move in from a different jurisdiction. You know, that's a whole separate-
Thaddeus Williams: Yeah
Sean McDowell: ... Topic.... Now, it, they're estimated that 0.2% of American marriages are between first cousins, 0.2%. So that's probably tens of thousands, I guess, if you do the math. You're right, it's way higher in states that have the highest Muslim populations, like New York, New Jersey, Virginia, et cetera. The article- the arguments people give against it are eugenic reasons, that there's more likely to be infertility. That's a topic that's been discussed. And yet, in this article, they talked about how the basis of any society is trust, and first cousin marriage and incest break down societal trust. And I just hadn't really thought about it in this level. Like, even a banking system, they say is loan criteria rooted on, like, a family, somebody I know, and it creates this unhealthy family dependency versus trusting others outside of the family. You give the example of military and how much can break down in military trust because of things like first cousin marriage. That blew me away. Now, we don't have to fully go into this, but there was an article in Slate, let's just say is far more [chuckles] left-leaning, and this is just kind of a question to the editor. And this person describes having an affair with a married woman who became pregnant with his child 20 years ago, and then finds out... He says, "Two weeks ago, I found out that my niece, my sister's daughter, is engaged, and the groom-to-be is none other than my biological son." [chuckles] So [chuckles] he just-- your response is exactly right.
Thaddeus Williams: Yep.
Sean McDowell: And he said, in this article, he said, "I asked her," referring to the biological mom, I think, "what she planned to do to stop the wedding, and she said she's doing nothing. Our son doesn't know anything, and according to her, cousin marriage is harmless."
Thaddeus Williams: [chuckles]
Sean McDowell: That's what this article says. And then the response by Slate is basically, "The risk is low. Live and let live." How do we biblically think about this? 'Cause I suspect this is just the beginning of what we're gonna hear about this topic in the time to come.
Thaddeus Williams: Yeah. So I remember, the famous Windsor case that went to the Supreme Court, I think that was 2014, and then the Obergefell case that fell right on its heels. The first one overturning the California Prop 8 that defined marriage between a man and a woman. The second one, the Obergefell case, making a sweeping ruling across the nation that, recognizes the legality of, same-sex marriage unions. And I remember at the time,
Thaddeus Williams: paying attention to the ping-pong match, the back and forth, the arguments, and there was an argument that, you know, this is just kind of a one-off issue. We should let men marry men and women marry women. And the other side was saying: Don't you realize we're on a slippery slope here? And so take somebody like the Roman Catholic ethicist, Ryan Anderson. Ryan Anderson had a very straightforward argument. He says, if there's a meaning to marriage, if it has a telos, if it has a reason for being, and it-- if it's something more than just a human projection into the void, then you have to identify what are the marks that make something count as a marriage, as opposed to just a friendship, as opposed to just a business partnership or whatever else. And he says there's a couple identifying marks. One of them is permanence, the "till death do us part" component. He says one of them is exclusivity, the sacredness of the marriage bed. And he says one of them, is male-female complementarity. And he says, once there is no essence of marriage or no telos or built-in definition, if we're willing to budge on one of those, then all of them go down the toilet, essentially. So, he sort of prophesied, culturally, that what would happen is if we ditch, male-female complementarity as a condition for what counts as marriage, then what's gonna go next? Why the permanence requirement? And so Ryan Anderson was proved correct, that ultimately-
Sean McDowell: That's right
Thaddeus Williams: ... In the wake of Obergefell, you had the concept of a wed lease, right? If the "till death do us part" thing is too scary and too intimidating, we can just lease each other for... You know, let's make a two-year commitment. If things are going okay, we can sort of re-up the lease. If not, there's sort of a sunset clause built in, we can opt out. And why the exclusivity part? If, if it's all up for grabs, if it's purely a human construct, why not say, we have a, quote-unquote, "open marriage," which is a contradiction in terms, or let's have polyamory? And so having paid attention to that conversation, as it's played out over the last 10 years, I did not see this one coming, Sean. [laughing]
Sean McDowell: [chuckles]
Thaddeus Williams: But this is a whole new angle to that. I was anticipating we're gonna see more and more polyamory normalized.
Sean McDowell: Yeah.
Thaddeus Williams: We're gonna see more and more wed leases normalized, instead of couples, throuples, and things like this. But it's this fascinating confluence of cultural factors, where now you have in Islamic countries, again, like Saudi Arabia, 50%, that number still just blows my mind.
Sean McDowell: I agree.
Thaddeus Williams: Fifty percent of Saudi Arabian marriages are two first cousins. And so as you have an influx of more Muslim families into the West, this is going to be the new angle that it takes. And, and I think just like, the strategy-... That led to the overturning of straight America, to borrow the terms of, Marshall Kirk and, Hunter Madsen. These were two, gay activists in the '80s. 1987, they wrote a little, article that later blossomed into a big book, uh-
Sean McDowell: Passing
Thaddeus Williams: ... Called After the Ball.
Sean McDowell: Mm-hmm.
Thaddeus Williams: And it's... Yeah, you can just see they had their play card. They just lay it out. The article's called Overhauling of Straight America, and they laid out, in the '80s, the following steps. I'll hit them quickly. Step one, talk about gays and gayness as loudly and as often as possible. Why? Because almost any behavior begins to look normal if you're exposed to enough of it. The way to benumb raw sensitivities about homosexuality is to have a lot of people talk a great deal about the subject in a neutral or supportive way. Step one. Step two, portray the gays as victims, not as aggressive challengers. Step three, give protectors a just cause. Kirk and Madsen clarify, "Our campaign should not demand direct support for homosexual practices, but should instead take..." And this is the same playbook that's gonna be used on first cousin marriage, mark my words. It should take anti-discrimination as its theme. That if you're opposed to this, you're bigoted, you discriminate against Muslims. It, it's Islamophobia or something like that. Fourth, make gays look good. That is, the campaign should paint gays as superior pillars of society. Fifth, make the victimizers look bad. This is so important to understand the playbook, on these kinds of questions. This is the way they put it: "At a later stage, the media campaign for gay rights, it will be time to get tough with remaining opponents. To be blunt, they must be vilified. Our goal here is twofold. First, we want to replace the mainstream self-righteous pride about its homophobia, but second, we intend to make the anti-gays look so nasty that average Americans will want to dissociate themselves from such types. The public should be shown images of ranting homophobes whose secondary traits and beliefs disgust middle America. Show them all as bigoted Southern ministers drooling with hysterical hatred." And their final step, solicit funds. And so I would not be surprised, Sean, to see, as this is kind of the new issue, which is important, 'cause as Christians, oftentimes we lag behind the headlines, and we're playing catch-up. But if we're trying to sort of read the tea leaves or see the writing on the wall, first cousin marriage is going to be, I think, a big cultural controversy to come, and as Christians, we wanna be wise and see the kinds of strategies that will be used will be very similar to those that normalized, same-sex marriage 10 years ago.
Sean McDowell: I think you're right about that. It's really interesting. In this Slate article, the response is to this person who is trying to figure out if he's gonna break up this marriage of his son with a first cousin, and he's... He has this natural sense of like... He says, "I don't want my niece to live in incest because of my past mistake. Please help." There's this natural sense that something's not right here, and the question is, when culture moves forward so much, does that just get kind of rooted out of people over time?
Thaddeus Williams: Yeah.
Sean McDowell: That's a fair point, and the response is-
Thaddeus Williams: [clears throat]
Sean McDowell: ... There's an elevated risk of genetic disorders, but it's really small. Two young people in love and planning to make a life together, I think you should let that be.
Thaddeus Williams: Yeah, the really small line really reminds me of in the transgender debate, "Oh, the hormone, therapy, there's a very small risk," or, "The puberty blockers, very small risk." it's the same kind of just baseless claim. "Don't be afraid. The one thing you're worried about here, it won't happen." I would question what is her science behind that conclusion?
Sean McDowell: [lips smack] Well, that's fair, especially today, though, with genetic tests like 23andMe, people are going to do tests and figure this out oftentimes, and then how are they gonna feel about the dad who knew this 10- ... 20, 30 years earlier and didn't tell them? That's where this just kind of, "If they love each other, let it go," can be dangerous. I mean, if- I would ask this person who wrote live and let live, "If you were going to get into that marriage, would you have at least wanted to know and make that decision for yourself?" And I've... I think that person would. Now, I go back. I realize if I'm bringing us to Leviticus 18, this raises a million questions about its applicability to today. I would argue that these prohibitions do, but I'm not gonna lay out that case here. But what's amazing, Leviticus 18, which is a chapter almost entirely on sexual promiscuity and sexual immorality, that the nations even outside of Israel are committing, which tells me these were not just commands for Israel- ... Like to not wear two fabrics, so to speak. Verses 7 through verses 18 are laying out specifically the kinds of ancestral relationships that Israel was to avoid. Now, one way to look at this again is to just say, "Oh, my goodness, it's such nitpicking," and I look at that and go, "Wait a minute." We are told in Deuteronomy chapter 10 that the law was given to Israel for its own good. God's commandments are for our good. So this poor fellow had a... Not poor fellow, like I feel bad for him, but obviously he has agency. He didn't intend this incident to happen, where he has to deal [chuckles] with incest, but this is a downstream consequence of sin.... That's what God's commands are for individually, but we also see this for society. And that's why I appreciate this article in Institute for Family Studies saying, "Wait a minute, this isn't just about live and let live for an individual." This has massive societal implications for the banking system, for the military, for families, probably in ways we can't even imagine. And I'd hate for us to look back later as we have on other issues and thought, "Oh, why did we pull that fence down that Chesterton talked about putting up-
Thaddeus Williams: Yeah
Sean McDowell: ... Without asking why was it there in the first place? And so ton more could be said about this. Again, we'll keep tracking this, and we'll come back to it, but this was-
Thaddeus Williams: Let me give-
Sean McDowell: ... Not on my bingo card
Thaddeus Williams: ... 60 seconds. [chuckles] I'll keep it real short. But this reinforces the point I was trying to get at earlier when we were discussing, transgenderism and what's going on in Maine. The issue behind the issue behind the issue is God sovereign? Is he the-- is he the ultimate meaning maker, or are we? Do we get to define the meaning of our biology, or, is God the sovereign meaning maker of our bodies? Do we get to define, in this case, the meaning of marriage, in which case it really is a free-for-all? Anything you wanna construct and slap the sticker marriage on it is equally valid because it's just human projections, or is God the one who designed marriage in certain ways that create thriving and flourishing and bring Him glory? And so, again, I hope our listeners pick up on that sense of the issue behind the issue with all these headlines. Is God, or are we pretending to be sovereign ourselves?
Sean McDowell: Framed well. Now, this next question is different, although once again, it's gonna intersect with political issues, but I'm not raising [chuckles] this for politics. We hear this come up a lot, and it occurred to me reading a few articles that popped up this week because of how radically the administration, the Trump administration, is shifting things. I hear more and more voices of people talking about a theocracy. So I thought, well, one way people can think biblically about this cultural conversation [chuckles] is to kind of address what is a theocracy, and as Christians, should we be in favor of a theocracy? So this commentary is called "Trump and Musk are Moving America Towards a Theocracy," and in this article, which is just one voice that we're discussing, i- they describe kind of this cultural, autocratic, oligarchical moment, as the closest thing to a theocracy we in America have ever seen. They describe it as a dictatorship, and it's just referring to certain moves that Trump is making, in terms of dismantling larger organizations, people that he's hired, his foreign aid policy, et cetera, which is somewhat second here. Now, this article points out, they said, "Many of us in religious communities are rereading the work of Dietrich Bonhoeffer about the importance of resisting the state." And I just thought of reading this, I somewhat chuckled. We did an interview with an expert on Bonhoeffer because that movie that came out in 2024, and he made the point that people from all political backgrounds all the time [chuckles] take Bonhoeffer to defend their political views. So we've seen this against Trump. We've seen... I'm not taking sides on this. We've seen a book about Bonhoeffer from Eric Metaxas making the opposite point, and so all of us have to just pause taking somebody like Bonhoeffer, make sure we do our homework, and not just slap it on whatever issue is our favored position. So- ... Rather than weighing in politically on this, what is a theocracy, and-
Thaddeus Williams: Yeah
Sean McDowell: ... Should Christians be in favor of a theocracy, biblically speaking?
Thaddeus Williams: Sure. I think it's hugely important here, Sean, to draw a distinction between a word's denotation and its connotation. A denotation is what the word actually means, and what theocracy actually means, theos, God, and then kratos in Greek, rule, power, government. And so historically, theocracy has been used to describe when God's law equals the law of the land, where you have a rule by priests or imams or some kind of religious leadership who claims to have a direct line with God or, the rules of some sacred book, be it the Quran, be it the Torah, be it, the Old and New Testaments. And so that's the denotation of the word, and I'll dive into that briefly and why maybe that's not the best idea for us as Christians in the 21st century. But I wanna speak just briefly on the connotation of the word. The connotation isn't what it actually means. It's the effect it has when it hits people's eardrums. And so we need to understand the way theocracy is used in this political moment as it's as what we might call an amygdala igniter. Amygdala, that's the center of your brain. It's this little almond-shaped structure, in your medial cortex that triggers your fear and anxiety response, your fight or flight response. And so the word theocracy is used as a scare tactic, as an amygdala igniter, because if I'm not a Christian, and I hear that, oh, this or that policy by this or that politician is really an attempt at theocracy, establishing the rule of God, my amygdala is gonna light up like a Christmas tree in Times Square, right? Because now, oh, those Christians are trying to jam their religion down my throat. Another term that is almost, the perfect analog to it these days is the combination of Christian with nationalism.... Christian nationalism can-
Sean McDowell: Yeah
Thaddeus Williams: ... Be used to say, anytime a Christian is seeking to have a voice in the public square, Christian nationalism.
Sean McDowell: Mm-hmm.
Thaddeus Williams: What, you wanna live in some kind of theocracy? Now, let me be crystal clear. There is a version of Christian nationalism that exists in our country at this moment that I think is profoundly unbiblical, that is profoundly problematic and out of sync with historic Christian orthodoxy. So I don't wanna pretend there's nothing that these terms actually referred to, but I'm more interested in how people use these two as bumper sticker slogans or as weighted conno- weighing in on the connotation of the word to, galvanize people for or against a position. Having said that, to the denotation, what does the word actually mean? Again, the rule of God. God's law becomes the law of the land. We si- we see this in the Old Testament. You see the judges, the kings, the priests were the ruling class, and so if God makes a law, you have a whole slew of the 613 commands in the Old Testament. Of those 613, a huge chunk of those are how did the ancient Jews live as a faithful theocracy under the rule of God? That theocracy, however, no longer exists, for all kinds of important theological reasons. But let me just, again, think biblically with our audience on this. When Jesus comes on the scene in the first century, his apostles keep hearing all this talk about the Basileia tou Theou, the Kingdom of God, and they hear it as politics. "Okay, Jesus, so when are you going to overthrow our Roman oppressors and set up the theocracy and set up, the kingdom?" And Jesus will tell, like, 10 parables about the Kingdom of God to try to show them that what he's talking about is not a political kind of event. And they say, "Oh, that's great, Jesus. We, we love the stories. We love the one about the farmer and the seeds. Great stories, but when are you gonna set up the kingdom again? When are you gonna overthrow Rome again?" And you could just almost picture Jesus slapping his forehead like, "Let me tell you another five parables about-
Sean McDowell: [laughing]
Thaddeus Williams: ... What I'm actually getting at with kingdom." And then it just over and over and over, this plays out, and Jesus trying to get it through their thick skulls that what he's up to is not, setting up a theocracy back in the first century. I would add to that if you look at the Gospel accounts of, particularly in Luke's gospel, of the satanic temptations that Jesus had to withstand. One of the temptations is Satan takes Jesus to a high point and shows him... The, the Greek is the Basileia tou Kosmo, the kingdoms, the political kingdoms on Earth, and Jesus resists the temptation. I'm just th- floating this as a thought for our audience to consider. Are we, as Christians in the 21st century, trying to take Satan up on that offer? In other words, are we trying, are we pushing for something that Jesus himself, that he would be promised complete political authority over all the kingdoms of the world, are we pursuing something that, in our own sacred text, is considered a satanic temptation? And so there's, there's a lot more that could be said, but I would just say theocracy is, it always has been, a terrible idea because at the end of the day, Jesus is the only one qualified to run a theocracy. And so when he returns, that will be the government structure. God's law will be the law of the land, but in the meantime, we're fallen, and so we try to pull off a theocracy, and be- 'cause we aren't Christ, it goes all kinds of... All kinds of mayhem gets unleashed.
Sean McDowell: That was a great distinction between connotation and denotation, what a word means and just how it lands and strategically moves-
Thaddeus Williams: Yeah, what it does
Sean McDowell: ... An audience. That's really helpful to be aware of. So just like if somebody asks me, "Hey, do you believe in evolution?" My question is, what do you mean by evolution? Do you believe in justice? What do you mean by [chuckles] justice? Biblical justice, as you've written well on, is different than what's often called social justice. Well, theocracy, people are dropping the word around, not even knowing what it entails. It is rule by God. God's rules, so to speak, are blended with the rules for the state. Jesus did not show up to create a state or an organization like that would rule the land legally.
Thaddeus Williams: Yeah.
Sean McDowell: He created a church. Now, with that said, Christian principles can and should influence and shape the government because all of creation is God's creation. Abraham Kuyper was like, "There's not a square inch of creation which is not God's." So for government to flourish, it needs to be influenced by Judeo-Christian ideas, like equality and human rights and justice.
Thaddeus Williams: Yeah.
Sean McDowell: It needs to, by the way, but that's different. Now, from somebody on the outside who doesn't know what a theocracy is, I was watching Trump's speech. I'm like, "You know, there is another shift." He's up there speaking, and on his left is JD Vance, who's a Catholic. On his right is Mike Johnson, Speaker of the House, who h-
Thaddeus Williams: Yeah
Sean McDowell: ... Is a conservative evangelical. [chuckles]
Thaddeus Williams: Yep.
Sean McDowell: Given that Trump has gotten a lot of people into positions of influence, certainly more so in the past, that are more conservative theologically, I could see why somebody could look at this, who doesn't understand theocracy, and think, "Oh, my goodness, we're moving towards a theocracy."
Thaddeus Williams: Yeah. Yeah.
Sean McDowell: But I just... You know, in conversation with somebody, just say, "Tell me what you mean by theocracy."... What is it? And we can point towards the example of the Old Testament and how different the project of Jesus is. So to me, more so than making a political point, this is an opening to engage people and say, "Okay, wait a minute. Here's a whole article and a ton of people saying this is a theocracy. Well, what is a theocracy?"
Thaddeus Williams: Yeah.
Sean McDowell: "What does the Bible teach about this? What did [chuckles] Jesus come for?" I see that as an opening, uh-
Thaddeus Williams: Sure
Sean McDowell: ... Amidst other things. Now, d- you know, one-
Thaddeus Williams: Two, two quick thoughts on that.
Sean McDowell: Okay.
Thaddeus Williams: Go ahead. I don't wanna cut you off.
Sean McDowell: Yeah, no, go for it.
Thaddeus Williams: Go ahead. So what's fascinating is, think back on Inauguration Day, when the... I think she's Episcopalian, if I'm not mistaken, Pastor, Mariann Budde, delivered what made the headlines. It was in the news rotation for about a week, where everybody was either applauding her for speaking truth to power, and she delivered this prayer and saying, you know, "President Trump, please just think of the disenfranchised and the immigrants and the oppressed." and what's fascinating to me is how the very folks who would cry theocracy if somebody who's maybe more politically right is trying to advance their cause- ... Is simultaneously, out of the other side of their mouth, going to applaud, Mariann Budde when she says something, appealing to Scripture to advance her ideology. So it's, it's a kind of critique that, for some reason, only seems to cut one way. The second and final thought on it is if theocracy... I, hope our readers are picking up on the common thread here through every article we've discussed. If it comes down to who is God, the creator or the creature, that's at play here in a really profound way because I lay out in one of my last books, Don't Follow Your Heart, how the issue behind the issue behind the issue is Genesis 3. Genesis 3:5, the temptation is, the serpent says, "You can be like God, knowing good and evil," and I do some homework with the Hebrew there to show that the first temptation is, you get to be the makers, the sovereign definers of all of reality. And so on that view, self-worship is a faith. It's, it's a form of theocracy to say, "I am the sovereign meaning maker. I define the meaning of my gender. I define the meaning of marriage, and now I'm going to enshrine my deity in law in ways that, you know, advance, say, a transgender ideology or something like that." So I wanna be careful that we don't create this false asymmetry between, oh, there's those religious Christians out there trying to get their faith enshrined in law, and then there's these neutral secularists who wanna have a clear divide between rigous- religious dogma and legislation. No, there are religious dogmas like, follow your heart, religious dogmas like, be true to yourself, religious dogmas like, be hashtag authentic, and you create your own reality, and you justify yourself. Not... There's not a neutral square inch in the world of politics. Underneath all of it is going to be either creator or creation worship.
Sean McDowell: It is interesting that either we should be able to apply biblical principles to the public square, left and right, or we shouldn't be able to do at all.
Thaddeus Williams: Yeah.
Sean McDowell: That's an area of fairness, and I think we should. But if we're going to do so, we've gotta go back to the text and see what Jesus and Paul and the Bible taught, not what we want it to teach.
Thaddeus Williams: Sure.
Sean McDowell: So in some ways, we should welcome when people of different political parties bring in biblical ideas and say, "Great!"
Thaddeus Williams: Yeah.
Sean McDowell: "Let's talk about what the Bible says. It matters, but let's go back to the context-
Thaddeus Williams: Yeah
Sean McDowell: ... And not use it to fit our political position, whether it is on the right or whether it is on the left."
Thaddeus Williams: Yeah, and recognizing that they're bringing their own religious convictions, even if they aren't Christian, to the question.
Sean McDowell: So last one, I just want your quick take on this one, 'cause I know you've done some work on religious liberty, and this one popped up, and at first I didn't think it was that significant, but the more I read it, I thought, "Oh, this is a pivotal issue." So Washington State is having... Lawmakers in Washington State are advancing legislation that would require clergy members to report, even in circumstances that violate the sacrament of confession, which is a central tenet of the Catholic faith. So legislators have attempted to pass similar legislation in the past, but there were exemptions for individuals, not just Catholics, who didn't have to report, for example, things like, you know, sexual abuse that people shared with them in the privacy of what it means to be a parishioner. Now, this article that we're referring to here says, "The bill applies to any ordained minister, priest, rabbi, imam, elder, or similarly religious person, or anyone of a spiritual community." So they're required to report in certain kinds of circumstances tied to child abuse and neglect. Now, of course, I think this is a really interesting example where you have the need to protect children with the rights of religious liberty really come into tension because everything inside of me wants somebody to report when a child has been abused. I wanna say to a clergy, "For the sake of that child, report it." But on the other hand, I also realize that this idea of, you know, secrecy of somebody's sins with a parishioner-... Goes way back to, like, the fourth century, and this is not a modern idea to protect religious liberty. And what got me in this is when certain senators said, quote, "Bishops and other religious leaders na- need to change their doctrine and their rules." That's where I'm like, "Oh, man, time out."
Thaddeus Williams: Yeah.
Sean McDowell: Have we gone too far? So I know a ton could be said here, but maybe just give us your quick take on this one.
Thaddeus Williams: Yeah, this one's tricky. This was a bit of a brain twister for me. On the one hand, you look at passages like Matthew 18, where Jesus says that anybody who causes a little one, a child, to stumble- ... Anybody who inflicts harm on a kid- ... Or stumbles them, tie a millstone around your neck and jump into the Mediterranean Ocean-
Sean McDowell: [chuckles]
Thaddeus Williams: ... And sink to the bottom and let Monstro eat you, kind of thing.
Sean McDowell: [chuckles]
Thaddeus Williams: And so Jesus has a strong... And, and you said, you know, that's what resonates with you in this story, and me, too. If there's a kid who's, being abused, and the abuser confesses to a priest, and the priest doesn't report it, and the abuse continues, man, I think Jesus would have very strong words with that priest and with the abuser. I would combine that with, Romans 13 is the famous passage in the New Testament clarifying the divinely ordained role of government. [lips smack] And unlike the Church, the government bears the sword in Romans 13, meaning part of the government, if it's a good, godly government, living up to its ordained reason for being, it will strike fear into the heart of the evildoer. And so to bear the sword, to punish wickedness, is, by the Spirit-inspired Paul's standards, part of what, government exists for. And so I get, I get pretty sketchy on, using religion, and religious liberty that obviously is essential, but the min- it seems like that crosses a line the minute you have, the government's ability to wield the sword against a child abuser-
Sean McDowell: Yeah
Thaddeus Williams: ... In the name of some kind of sacrament. Oh, man, all kinds of alarm bells go off for me. And in the article you cited, it mentions, you know, Santeria, this, Caribbean, Afro-Caribbean, religion that practices animal sacrifice, and that that went against the grain of certain laws. I forget if they were in Connecticut or somewhere.
Sean McDowell: Sure.
Thaddeus Williams: And so you get these places in which we don't wanna give religion free reign, this is such a hard thing to say, but to break the nation's laws. There, there needs to be some kind of, again, if we're gonna stay true to Romans 13, that let's say the Santerians sacrifice children instead of cats. I think we'd all be willing to say there are limitations on religious liberty to the extent that they violate, from a Christian perspective, God's-
Sean McDowell: That's a good point
Thaddeus Williams: ... Clear commands. So it's- ... This is a tricky one, but that's sort of where I'm at now. How about you?
Sean McDowell: That's a really good point. I feel like maybe we'll come back to this and explore it in more depth. We just had a discussion with Frank Beckwith, just wonderful Catholic scholar from Baylor, about the state of religious liberty, and this seems to be one of the big issues that's brewing. I would say, before we move on, take a couple questions, we've seen this with the Catholic Church, with Southern Baptists, and others: if there hadn't been so much sexual abuse-
Thaddeus Williams: Yeah
Sean McDowell: ... Amongst church leadership, this would land differently.
Thaddeus Williams: Yep, 100%.
Sean McDowell: So in some ways, the Church is reaping what it sowed by- ... Failing to protect those, and deserves [chuckles] the mill that you described for not-
Thaddeus Williams: Yeah
Sean McDowell: ... Protecting kids. So we'll track this. We'll see where it goes, but let's, let's take a couple questions that came in here. One of them is really a question about: How do you discuss delicate matters with people who consider themselves followers of Jesus, but who are in opposition to scriptural and church teachings? And the reference is to someone in particular who's a progressive Christian in the estimation of the person who's writing this. How do I talk to them? Really quickly, I would say I've had multiple conversations with progressive [chuckles] Christians on my YouTube channel, trying to model for people how you can ask good questions, get to the heart of the issue. And so one of the reasons I do it is so people can kinda watch it and say, "Oh, maybe this would help." So if you search progressive Christian [chuckles] and my name, some videos will come up with Colby Martin and Brandon Robertson, and maybe one or two more. That might help. But I would just say ask a lot of questions, and like you've said a few times today, Thaddeus, try to get to the root of the issue.
Thaddeus Williams: Yeah.
Sean McDowell: Where is the key difference? And at its core, you're gonna find a difference of authority that's at play here, whether it's scripture, my feelings, culture, science. Ask questions, get back to it, and just clarify, "Here's where I think our differences are and why."
Thaddeus Williams: Yeah.
Sean McDowell: Anything you'd, you'd add to that?
Thaddeus Williams: Yeah, that's great. I'm a hearty amen to all that.
Sean McDowell: [chuckles]
Thaddeus Williams: I would add, This is gonna sound so simple, like, why even bother saying it, so obvious, but in the way you respond to them, don't sin. And, and what do I mean by that? The way we debate questions of progressive Christianity, and all that's wrapped up in that, your view of sexuality, your view of gender, your view of abortion, and things like that, in my book, Confronting Injustice Without Compromising Truth, I identify something called the Newman effect, which I won't go into detail, but it's basically the idea that if somebody disagrees with me, I'm going to paint their view in the most cartoonish-... The most damning, the most inflammatory way possible. So, an example I give in Confronting Injustice is, you know, when we were under COVID lockdown, and somebody says, "You know, I think we should, shelter in place or mask up." Well, the Newman effect kicks in, and all of a sudden it's, "Oh, I get it, so you must hate freedom, and you just love totalitarianism." Or in the opposite direction, if somebody says, "You know, I think these, lockdown orders are silly. I think they do more damage than they do good. I think it is a totalitarian play by the state," then the Newman effect kicks in, and it's like, "Oh, I get it. You must really hate grandmas and want more of them to drop dead," right? [chuckles] This is, this is the way we have these conversations, is what's the worst possible motive that I can project onto your view? And so if you have some friends at church who, [lips smack] are leaning progressive on questions of gender, like Sean said, ask good questions to clarify where they're actually coming from, rather than projecting a whole political, caricature on them. Because when we do that, the reason I said, "Don't sin in the way you respond to them," is you're bearing false witness to accuse somebody of the worst possible version of their belief. You're slandering, which the Bible bans, and you're violating the second greatest commandment, to treat people... To love your neighbor as yourself. And so I think if you want the conversation to elevate, to escalate into a shouting match, just make all kinds of assumptions that, you know, they've gone- they've turned into social justice warrior snowflakes, and they're just a bunch of, you know, neo-Marxist, hacks or anti whatever. Stay away from that. Have the honest conversation, ask good questions, but also, as Sean was saying, know your stuff and know how to be biblically informed on questions of gender and sexuality.
Sean McDowell: Final question that should be pretty easy to answer comes from a doctoral student researching the various ways parents hand down their faith to the next generation and how they can do so more effectively. "Do you have a book or resource recommendation that could help me in my research?" Well, it turns out that I actually co-wrote a book on that very thing with J. Warner Wallace, cold case detective, and also an adjunct professor here at Talbot. It's called So the Next Generation Will Know. We have an entire chapter in there where we find some of the top research and data over the past, probably 20, 30 years, on why parents do pass down their faith and why they don't, sociologically speaking. So that chapter would point towards all the research that I'm aware of, called So the Next Generation Will Know, written with, J. Warner Wallace. By the way, a note to you, if you do write or research on this, send me your data when it is out. I would love to see it and share with our audience here if you come across some new data or new angles on how parents can successfully pass down their faith. All right, we really appreciate Thaddeus joining us for this one. We will have you back, my man, for sure.
Thaddeus Williams: [laughs] Anytime, man. Anytime.
Sean McDowell: This has been an episode of the podcast Think Biblically: Conversations on Faith and Culture, brought to you by Talbot School of Theology, Biola University. We have master's programs in person and online, Old Testament, New Testament, marriage, family, spiritual formation, education, and of course, where I teach, apologetics. Please keep your comments and questions coming. You can contact us at thinkbiblically@biola.edu. And I would strongly ask you to consider writing a review for us on your podcast app, and please consider sharing this episode or another one with a friend. Please join us on Tuesday as we have part one of my conversation with Preston Sprinkle, where we have a friendly debate and dialogue over whether or not Christians should use preferred pronouns. And then the following week, we will talk about whether or not Christians with same-sex attraction should use and refer to themselves as gay Christians. Don't miss that, coming out on Tuesday. In the meantime, remember to think biblically about everything. [upbeat music]
