Weekly Cultural Update: Botched Execution of Christa Pike; Cornell Rape Allegations & the Sexual Revolution; Secularization Among Evangelicals; Gen Z & Anti-Semitism

Episode Transcript

Sean McDowell: [upbeat music] Christa Pike regains consciousness after a botched execution last week. Did the sexual revolution lead to the Cornell sexual assault incident? New data suggests evangelicals are secularizing more than might be expected. And in a new study, the strongest predictor of anti-Semitic attitudes among Gen Z is the belief that God's covenant to the Jewish people has ended. These are the stories we'll discuss, and we'll also address some of your questions. I'm your host, Sean McDowell.

Scott Rae: I'm your co-host, Scott Rae.

Sean McDowell: This is the Think Biblically weekly cultural update, brought to you by Talbot School of Theology, Biola University. Scott, this one is fun because we're at a Talbot retreat up at Forest Home Camp, snuck away from a meeting to talk about this because some of the stories that dropped this week are so interesting and timely, and I think important that we try to help people think biblically about them. And a couple of these stories are so uniquely in your lane in terms of the work you've done on moral choices and thinking ethically. So let's jump into this story that's kind of been captivating the nation, so to speak, for a while, but the story just dropped earlier this week. It says, this title is Christa Pike regains consciousness after her failed execution. So the death row inmate in Tennessee received two doses of a lethal injection drug last week, but lived. She was taken from the execution chamber in an ambulance. Now, what's so crazy about this is not just that she was attempted to be executed, which we can talk about, but that she is the first person who has survived this, and they didn't know if she was gonna stay in this comatose state, but has come out of it apparently so. So the ethical questions here are all over the place. Their lawyers, of course, are arguing that, you know, she's a survival, recovery one day at a time, and, she's been hos-hospitalized since the execution attempt on September 30th. She had been unconscious, on a ventilator in recent days as medical staff worked to rid her body of the drug. Although she sustained serious burns, other injuries to her arm, remained handcuffed and shackled to her bed. Now, there's some more details about this, but Scott, I don't know that I've seen a case like this that I can recall in my lifetime of a botched execution. For this to happen today with all of our medical technology just seems something that would have expected to happen fifty years ago or two centuries ago, and yet in twenty twenty-six, we can fail to put somebody to death. What do you make of this? How can we think about this biblically and ethically?

Scott Rae: Well, let me... Be-before we get to the biblical part, Sean, we have a way to do this quickly and painlessly. It's called euthanasia.

Scott Rae: And I I'm sure, I'm sure they're out there, but I'm pretty up to date on this stuff, and I have yet to hear of a case of failed euthanasia.

Sean McDowell: Interesting.

Scott Rae: And even with assisted suicide, the patient takes the life-ending dose of medication that stops their breathing and heartbeat. Now, to be fair, she was a challenge to find a vein to inject the lethal combination of drugs that was gonna end, were gonna end her life. But the In my view, this happens all over Canada and Europe thousands of times a year without a hitch. And, you know, physicians have a I think, a relatively foolproof way of administering euthanasia and to do it, you know, both quickly and painlessly. Now, one of the ethical issues, which we'll get to, we'll get to more of that in a minute, but the American Medical Association takes a very dim view of doctors participating in executions, and they generally don't, which leaves the system, which I think was the case here in Tennessee, without the medical expertise to actually carry it out successfully. So that's one, that's one part of it. Obviously, I don't believe doctors should be forced to participate in executions if that violates their conscience. But, you know, the fact that there, you know, there is... She really only got good medical attention after the execution failed, I think that speaks to some of the problematic issues in the, in the procedure with the way this is done. So more, there's more on, more on thinking biblically about this because this has called, this has called into question the death, the whole morality of death, of the death penalty as a whole. So I'm interested to hear your take on this, and then I've got a little bit more to say about that.

Sean McDowell: Yeah. I would just say I have a family member who's an anesthesiologist, and I asked him how frequently this happens, and he said, "We know how to do this. With the right drugs, with the right procedure, it's not a problem." He could do it, but he's like, "I don't wanna do it." But I think you're right. It raises questions. Is it the problem with the death penalty, or is it the problem with the way it's being carried out? And the irony, I hadn't thought about that, is that with euthanasia, where doctors are involved, you don't have the same kind of problem. And it almost would seem like, and I... You know, somewhat thinking out loud on this one, because I think the death penalty is just and I think euthanasia is not, if doctors were going to be involved in any one of these, it should be the death penalty, not euthanasia, but we have it backwards.

Scott Rae: Well, S-Sean, I think, you know, to think biblically about this, I I don't think there's anything intrinsically wrong With requiring life for life in what I would call egregious cases of premeditated murder. Now, the Bible in Genesis 9:6, written before the law of Moses, indicates, I think, that this is appropriate in some cases. And it's premised on the notion of human beings being made in the image of God, and the idea of life for life, I think, is to highlight the value of life by offering the strongest possible deterrent to the taking of innocent life. And that, in my view, that's a, that's a hard question for people who want to abolish the death penalty, and that is what is intrinsically, not procedurally, what's intrinsically wrong with requiring life for life in at least some cases? Because the people who want to abolish the death penalty want to abolish it for everything.

Scott Rae: Now, I think there's a, there's another question that's raised that that's, that sort of, I think, has something to do, I think, with the theological part of this, and that's for those of us who support the death penalty in principle. Now, I've got grave reservations about some of the procedural ways in which it's carried out.

Sean McDowell: Sure.

Scott Rae: And you're, and you're right. That's... You're right to make a... That's a helpful distinction to make between for the principled view of it and the procedural components of it. But for the, for those of us who I think have no principled problem with the death penalty in some cases, this botched execution raises, I think, a hard question that we have to answer, too, and that is what do we lose by having a life sentence instead of the death penalty? Because if we have a life sentence, we don't have anybody who's innocent, be sentenced to death row, be sentenced to execution, and we know from the introduction of DNA evidence in the past that we've, we have had far more people, who have been executed who were later proven, later exonerated than we'd all like to admit. Perhaps, I think, maybe a full sense of justice for the family of the victim maybe. And I think for... I would say for certain cases such as mass murder, terrorism, you know, Timothy McVeigh, who bombed the Oklahoma City Federal Building, life in prison doesn't, in my view, doesn't quite seem to satisfy the demands of justice. The New Testament doesn't really speak to this per se because it was a moot point in the first century with Israel under the Roman Empire and the early church under the Roman Empire because the Romans controlled capital crime and capital punishment, not the Jews. And so, you... We would expect that the New Testament probably wasn't going to address that directly like they did in the, in the Old Testament. It, I mean, it was carried out for a number of different crimes in the Old Testament, which I think shows that, if God ordained it in the Old Testament, even if it's under the Mosaic law and it, and that's not part of what is directly applicable to us today, it still shows that there's nothing intrinsically problematic about requiring life for life. Because if there were, and God mandated it for some things in the Old Testament, then I, in my view, Sean, we'd have a much bigger theological problem than we'd have an ethical one.

Sean McDowell: And I wanna make sure people are tracking with your point about the in principle case for the death penalty is a matter of justice. It's a moral in principle, and of course, that's rooted in Exodus chapter 21, and of course, they get the Ten Commandments shortly before this, nation of Israel, you know, 1400 centuries before the time of Christ, and they're given the Mosaic law, and it says, "Eye for an eye, a tooth for a tooth." And of course, if somebody knocks out your tooth, it doesn't mean take them and knock out their tooth. It means that the punishment needs to fit the crime, and that's actually... We take that for granted, at least in principle, in America and beyond, but that was a radical idea for its time. But that's the biblical idea and the foundation of our justice system. So what's lost, to ask your question, if we just move towards life in prison? And I can think of two things. One would be justice for the families. I mean, if this woman is 50 years old and she committed the crime about 30 years ago, I mean, this family has been dragged on forever about this, and so has this woman in some ways. You could make the case putting somebody [chuckles] on death row time after time after time and dragging it out is injust to the very person who deserves to be put to death in a timely and fair manner. I mean, what a life for three decades to live through that, I think is obviously difficult. The other thing would be the question of, that we probably don't have time to go into, would be deterrence. Does the death penalty deter people from these kinds of crimes? Those are the two questions that obviously we could wrestle with. My question for you would be why extreme or egregious cases? 'Cause if it's an eye for an eye, tooth for a tooth, and I just take and murder somebody, why does it have to be multiple people in a terrible way to justify it?

Scott Rae: Well, for one, the eye for an eye and tooth for tooth was designed to limit the criminal punishment, and it was... And in Old Testament times, often the family of the victim was authorized to carry out the penalty. And they... Given that that was the case, it was not hard to envision how justice morphed into revenge and retaliation pretty quickly. And so, the eye for an eye was actually to limit ... Criminal punishment to something that was proportional to the crime. I I have, I don't, in principle, and again, I would go back to Genesis 9:6, which grounds this in human beings made in the image of God. But in principle, I would, I don't have any objection to that, Sean. The reason I hesitate on that is I'm nervous about some of the procedural elements-

Sean McDowell: Gotcha

Scott Rae: ... In this. I'm nervous about, you know, the the notion that, you know, somebody who is innocent of a crime, be put to death. I'm nervous about the the unreliability that's been shown recently of eyewitnesses.

Scott Rae: I'm concerned about some of the, some of the racial bias that's been shown to be the case in the past that's affected African Americans. So I would, I would say in some of these extreme cases where there's no doubt that justice is not being served, if for a, for a mass murderer to, you know, to go on living and breathing, but I'm just, what I'm not what I would call a procedural abolitionist. I still think there's a place for the death penalty to be retained, but I'm, I'm just, I'm cautious about applying it more broadly for those reasons.

Sean McDowell: That's fair. I had a, I had a back and forth with Carmen Imes maybe six or eight weeks ago, Old Testament professor at Talbot, and I think she kind of expressed some of the reservations that you have here. Holds them maybe a little bit more strongly than I do, but they're fair reservations, and yet was like, we can't get around the Genesis 9:6 principle, which is rooted in creation before the Mosaic law, and so it is arguably a transcendent ethical standard, just like when Jesus talks about marriage, roots it in creation. And so I think the principle is hard to get around. I think in her case, you know, some people, because it's so terrible what happened to Christa this week, I mean, my goodness, how jarring would that be to like wake up at that moment and realize, "I'm not dead"? I mean, I don't even have any [laughs] I don't know how to make sense of that. Like, is this the afterlife? Why am I still here? Why do I feel this way? It's a crazy thing. But she was, it was in 1995 when the victim, who had come to Tennessee from Florida to pursue her interest in computers, her, Miss Pike, along with two other classmates, lured her into the woods where they tortured and killed her, and it was a brutal crime. Now, what it doesn't mean is eye for an eye means now we should torture her with a boxed execution. [laughs] That does not follow from this. That's beyond it. But I still think... I mean, do you think they should try again in this case? What do you think they should do moving forward if you had to like consult on this procedure in Tennessee?

Scott Rae: Well, maybe what they should do and what they will do I think will be two different things. I think she will be commuted to a life sentence-

Sean McDowell: Oh

Scott Rae: ... Without parole.

Scott Rae: I think there's, gonna be a lot of pressure on the State of Tennessee not to try that again. So I I think you could probably make an argument that, a botched execution constitutes something akin to cruel and unusual punishment. And so I'd have to think really hard about trying that again.

Sean McDowell: That's fair. Very fair. [laughs] Difficult one that I definitely did not see coming. Anything else on this one, Scott, before we jump to the other huge story this week that people are talking about?

Scott Rae: No. Well, just one thing. I think the, point you made about, in Genesis 9:6, and the intrinsic nature, the principled nature of the death penalty, the way the Bible treats that, I think that is the, that is the hardest part for the Christian abolitionist to come back against. Because you I think there, you don't have, there's no way around that, in my view, except to discount the biblical text- ... On that.

Sean McDowell: I think that's right, and just quickly for record, there's no inconsistency in my mind with, you know, being pro-life and holding that because it's the nature of committing a crime and sacrificing your right to life is very different than taking innocent life.

Scott Rae: Right.

Sean McDowell: All right. Let's go to the other story this week that people have been talking about is this alleged Cornell University gang rape. Now, what's happened is prosecutors in central New York say they are reopening the investigation of an alleged, quote, "gang rape" at a Cornell University fraternity, which was in 2024, after a civil lawsuit filed earlier this month sparked outrage about the incident. So Cornell's Chi Phi chapter, where this took place, was barred from campus after the alleged October 19th, 2024 incident, though none of the individuals allegedly involved faced criminal charges, according to the DA. The DA said his office did not bring charges in 2024 'cause the woman's statement to authorities did not allege she was drugged without her knowledge or that she did not engage in sexual activities. So in part, this is reopening because some, a new lawsuit has been filed by her, and then the DA is saying, "Wait a minute. We were not given all the information here." Now, there's a lot of different wrinkles to this story, but I've seen at least three stories drop this week in The Wall Street Journal, in The New York Times, and what they've specifically kind of said is this is the natural fruit, so to speak, of the sexual revolution. In other words, given that we've been talking about forbidding anything you want to do that feels good and somebody gives consent to is a moral wrong, we actually should be surprised that an incident like this occurs. Now, you and I have thought that way for a while-

Scott Rae: Yes

Sean McDowell: ... But to see this appear in The Wall Street Journal, in The New York Times, to hear voices that maybe traditionally have been more pro-sexual revolution and liberation give pause here. And I think the key is, and I'm gonna throw it over in a second, is it's brought into, it's brought into question the value and efficacy of a moral ethic rooted in consent. It's questioning that. And I saw this, and I love that this has come out of this horrible incident, that people are starting to think about, do we have a robust sexual ethic in our culture, and is consent sufficient? Give me your thoughts on this one, Scott.

Scott Rae: Well, first of all, I think you're right to say, Sean, it's a bit confusing on

Scott Rae: this, because it appears to have started out consensually, and that, according to the best evidence that I've seen, it appears that she sought it out initially.

Sean McDowell: For the first

Scott Rae: Two

Sean McDowell: ... Arguably.

Scott Rae: Yeah. But, you know, although they were all drunk, and there were drugs involved, and so it it started out consensually until it wasn't. And where the line got crossed is, I think, a little harder to say. And then, you know, it started out consensually until it became something akin to gang rape, and the text chain that followed encouraging others in the fraternity to join in, that's where, that's where it, I mean, it way over the line at that point, if not before. And, you know, I think what it, what it... It made the, it made the guys sound even more callous than they were originally made out to be. Now there, you know, Sean, I read two of these pieces. One was in the Free Press, the other one in in The Wall Street Journal, and both, I think, have... It I just, I just, I'd just like to read some of this because the account-

Sean McDowell: Do it

Scott Rae: ... That they give of this is chilling in how some of this follows from the sexual ethic that emerged from the sexual revolution. This is, this is from, Louise Perry in The Wall Street Journal. "This is what we ask of young people at a fraternity party in the post-1968, post-sexual revolution world. Both boys and girls are encouraged to have sex, including with strangers, including while inebriated. The only rule is that everyone must consent at all times, which sounds simple enough. But for a young man, this simple rule demands a fine-tuned social judgment. His libido urges him to seek out as much sex as possible, as do his fraternity brothers, and the young male mind goes a bit askew when he's part of a pack." Here's, and here's the point of this that I thought was so revealing. "He must seek out certain proof of consent from young women whose signals he can't reliably read." "Is this woman he's never met before too drunk or just drunk enough? Does the body language indicate a no, even if she hasn't said as much?" And Sean, we're asking young men, and and I'm not, I'm not excusing this in any way at all. But we're asking young men to read those signals when empirical studies have shown that alcohol impairs a person's ability to distinguish between a woman's friendliness and her sexual interest. And there, and so I think what this shows is that the moral absolute of consent is not nearly good enough in cases like this, which is not, which, you know, it's a little hard to say how much of the norm this is. But there's another piece which I'll get to in just a moment-

Sean McDowell: Sure

Scott Rae: ... From the Free Press, which describes what a young, a mother counsels, how she counsels her daughter who's about to go to college in this. Here's, what, she was counseled. "When my daughter arrived at college a few years ago, her cohort, like students everywhere, had to go through a variety of sexual harassment and consent workshops." And here's the point. "The basic premise was this, how to hook up... Here's how to hook up legally. Like permissive parents who let the kids have parties in the basement, colleges seem like libertine enablers." Christian colleges would be, I think, the the rare exception to the general rule on that. "Convinced that every college kid is there to drink to excess and engage in debauchery and promiscuity, so we might as well give them the condoms." Cornell, I would point out, even advertised sex as, quote, "The great stress buster"-

Sean McDowell: Oh, wow

Scott Rae: ... For students. The parent goes on to say, "Absent was even the suggestion that some kids may choose to get through college on a more sober path.

Scott Rae: Jane Doe was misled by the sexual landscape that insists that women don't need strategies to manage the churning and unpredictable elements of sex. Jane Doe was sent into the battle with no preparation, no warnings, as if the myriad of risks unleashed by the sexual rep- revolution had been wrapped up as neatly as a birth control prescription." Now, Sean, the article also points out that both men and women, particularly men, with their viewing of pornography, have been accustomed to women or seeing women in these extreme sexual situations. And the women have come to expect that men see that as the norm. And so there's, you know, the porn aspect certainly plays into this in a really significant way. So I, didn't feel like I could say this any better than the article did itself. And so for others, forgive me for reading so much of that at length, but I think it just makes the point so eloquently. I know you have a take on this too.

Sean McDowell: [laughs] I'll take that as a compliment that you know I have a take on this one, and I do. I wanna I'm gonna read part of this, 'cause I want people to see how the piece you just read from The Wall Street Journal, Louise Perry, who's written a wonderful book, The Case Against the Sexual Revolution, and she was not a Christian when she was writing that at first. I believe she's become so now. I think that's the case. But she came to her conclusions that the sexual revolution was bankrupt, not through a biblical lens and analysis, but simply looking at its effects on society and individuals and relationships. Now, this piece in The New York Times starts off with a line that I think is remarkable. It simply says, "Non-consensual sex is always wrong, but that doesn't mean consensual sex is always right." That's exactly right. So here's a New York Times article recognizing that consent is necessary for sex to be moral. So if you ever have non-consensual sex, even if you're married, that's immoral. But the mere fact that you give consent doesn't in itself make it moral. Simple but profound point that shows the bankruptcy of the sexual ethic that this generation has been raised to think about, not to mention, like you rightly said, Scott, just pornified in terms of what they think a girl actually enjoys and what is okay and permissible and ethical behavior. The article says this. This is back to The New York Times article, and they're right. They said, "Regardless of where one falls in that debate," exactly where consent was given and where it wasn't. She said, "We should all be able to name the way a 20-year-old sophomore was treated by her peers as degrading and perverse, deserving of sanctions regardless of the legal outcome of the case." And I wanna say amen. Thank you. Just because somebody may... Let's assume she did give consent. Is it still okay for seven guys to come along and use her as they see fit? I think all of us, it gives a certain pause, even if somebody's not a Christian, that says, "Wait a minute, human beings shouldn't be used this way. They're not objects." And she makes the point that consent is a legal criterion, not an ethical one, and that's really important. So the law needs a certain level of way you prosecute somebody or you don't. But something is not ethically wrong 'cause it's legal. It's not ethically wrong 'cause it's illegal, necessarily. We can think of exceptions to that we don't have to go into. And so she walks through how culturally we don't have language to speak about these things because we've lost the sense of what the good is. Consent is literally just don't harm somebody. If they say okay, it's fine, but there's something deep in our hearts and our moral intuition that says, "Wait a minute, we owe one another more than this." And the New York Times article also points out, it says, "Consent doesn't help us account for the power differentials of age, gender, experience, or intoxication," and that's exactly right. And so she asked this question, Scott, that you and I think about and talk about all the time. This is at The New York Times article. It says, "What do we owe each other? Is there no higher standard to which we can hold ourselves?" I read that, I'm like, "Yes, we have rights. We have dignity. There's a higher ethic. Jesus gave it, which is to love one another." That's the Christian ethic rooted in the teachings of Jesus versus this minimalist ethic rooted in the sexual standard of consent. And the last thing that this Jane Doe says, and sadly, her name has been leaked online and her image, but she says, "I was a sex doll for all intents and purposes," which is sad. Bottom line, she says, "I was used and dehumanized in this experience." And we all look at this and know something's wrong with that, and we owe each other more than that.

Scott Rae: That's a great take on that, Sean. That's really insightful. Let me, let me add just a couple things-

Sean McDowell: Please

Scott Rae: ... Before we move along.

Sean McDowell: Yeah.

Scott Rae: I would say, first of all, the reason, the reason consent is not sufficient, in addition to the bigger question of what do we owe each other, is because consent is compromised when the person's impaired. And, that I think is widely, we fail to recognize that because the the colleges don't let people off the hook for consent when they are drunk. I mean, they assume that you can, you can give adequate consent when you are impaired. This case, there was, there was alcohol, there was ketamine, all sorts of things. And to say that, to say that consent was given, I think even initially, I think is a stretch. Even the-

Sean McDowell: And really quickly

Scott Rae: Yeah

Sean McDowell: ... Sorry to jump in

Scott Rae: Yeah

Sean McDowell: ... But that goes both ways. The men's-

Scott Rae: Exactly

Sean McDowell: ... Ability to read consent and her ability-

Scott Rae: Exactly

Sean McDowell: ... To give

Scott Rae: Yes. Exactly

Sean McDowell: ... Is what messes with it, but keep going.

Scott Rae: Second, the the impact of the sexual revolution has been, I think, to cheapen sex. Because the the sexual revolution encouraged this kind of sexual experimentation. It encouraged busting of traditional boundaries. It encouraged having sex outside of a committed relationship. It encouraged sex simply for the pleasure of it, and it was often compared to other normal bodily functions that didn't require any kind of relational context. So that, I think that sexual experimentation, it got put on steroids by the way pornography has magnified that. But I think that... And this is what we're seeing, from our colleague, Jennifer Morse with the Ruth Institute, and, you know, her ministry has shifted in more recent years to ministering to the victims of the sexual revolution, and she has seen repeatedly how women are being hurt, and, men are I think, are being hurt by this, too, though not, though not as much, by this idea of sex becoming cheapened. And I think then this is where the Biblical notion that sex belongs in the context of a relationship. You know, I remember your, you know, your dad saying that most sexual problems are relational- ... Not physical. And yet, you know, who knows how many of, for these women, how many of these are, these early sexual experiences when they're in high school and college, when they're, when they're basically just hookups, who knows what that has done to their emotional state? Now to be fair, too, some I mean, lots of people navigate the sexual stuff through college successfully, but the ones who don't end up having their lives ruined in cases, their reputations ruined. You know, there are no winners in this Cornell case.

Sean McDowell: I think that's right. Last thing I'll remind folks of is when cases like this come up, even in 2026, it's still the resources to make sense of this are found within the Scripture. What do we owe one another? Love. Why? 'Cause we're made in the image of God. We don't use somebody as a doll for our own pleasure. We love them 'cause there's a God who's made us in our image and called us to do so. Islam doesn't have the resources to ground a sexual ethic. Christianity does. And so I just think it's amazing. And Jennifer Morse is right. One of the things she's pointed out is that part of the sex revolution is that sex is just not a big deal. It doesn't really matter. And in a book she wrote probably 15 years ago, she said, "If that's the case, why when somebody has a bad sexual episode is it such a big deal? If sex doesn't mean anything, why isn't it like, well, I just had bad tacos?" Well, we all know a bad sexual episode [chuckles] is different than having bad tacos. Why? Because it does mean something, and you're baring your body and your soul with somebody. And so I think all of this brokenness, as sad as it is, and I hope there's healing for her in so many different ways, just points out that the solution is found in the Scriptures and the commandments to love one another.

Scott Rae: Amen.

Sean McDowell: All right, let's keep going. This article I saw, we bring up a lot of articles from Ryan Burge, who's been a guest on our Tuesday episode podcast, arguably the leading demographer on religion and faith in America and beyond. And this piece caught my attention because he said, it was from last week, he said, "Are evangelicals holding the line against secularization?" Fascinating question. Now, he points out that evangelicalism is roughly the same size as it was back in 1972 in terms of percentage of the population, although other groups like mainline Protestant have gotten smaller. So evangelicalism has roughly remained the same. Now, when you look at numbers, though, at least a quarter of every generation from Silence to Gen X, but, are roughly, the same, and then Millennials drop off to 19% identify as evangelical. Gen Z, it's dropped off to 16%. So over age, we're not losing a ton of people not identifying as evangelical. But the younger generations, we go from Silence through Boomers through Xers through Millennials through Gen Z, we see less and less a percent of the population identifying as evangelical. Now, what's fascinating is from Boomers down to Millennials, roughly 56% went to church every weekend. Now for every generation from Boomers and younger, so Boomers, Xers, Millennials, et cetera, there's a big dip in church attendance. It's dropped 6 to 9%. So now a majority of evangelicals, and this is those who identify as evangelicals, are not showing up every week at church, a majority. Now, what the study doesn't distinguish is, are they going twice a month? Are they going three times a month but not every week? So some of that is not fully cashed out here, but we're seeing a significant drop. He also shows for every generation evangelicals is more ideologically conservative since 2007, which is kind of fascinating on another level, I think culturally and probably politically. But here's his conclusion at the end: "As a whole, evangelicals take their faith very seriously." They are more religious than other Christians, and by that he'd mean mainline or Catholics. He said, "But, we're not really pushing back against secularism." Why? He says, "Evangelicals are declining more slowly than other Christians, but we're not staying flat while everybody else decreases. So we're decreasing less in terms of the population, but we're not [chuckles] staying the same as others decrease. So we're still decreasing." Bottom line, he says, "Evangelicals aren't immune to secularization. They're just secularizing more slowly than Christians around them." Now, one quick point that I... Actually, you know what? Before I make any points, jump in and tell me what you make of this, Scott.

Scott Rae: Well, Sean, I have, you know, the stats on the evangelicals, generationally. I think we've talked about that plenty. But I'd wanna, I'd wanna say, what are the signs of secularization? What are the, what are the indicators of that? Now, the... As I read the piece, it was essentially taking faith less seriously as measured by, self-reporting of its importance, church attendance, and belief in God. Or how certain are you that God exists? But I wonder, Sean, are those the right signs of secularization? And I, in my view, the question I wish, that I would have liked to have seen explored is, do evangelicals look more like the surrounding culture than previous generations? What are the... And it begs the question, what are the signs that we look more like the culture? Okay, I would say for one, it would be increasing support for issues on which the Bible has spoken clearly. So, for example, things like, things that the things that the Bible has spoken clearly about either negatively or prohibitive.

Sean McDowell: Mm-hmm.

Scott Rae: Things like, you know, you know, no-fault divorce, for example, sex before marriage, materialism, callousness to the poor, support for abortion, same-sex marriage, even what we talked about a few weeks ago, Christian support for polyamory. I mean, there's lots more that you could, that we, that you could suggest. I'd say underlying all of these, I would say is an eroding respect for biblical authority. And that I think, that would've been a really interesting fourth question to add, you know, about in addition to the self-report of its importance, church attendance, and belief in God. You know, to what degree do you accept that the Bible's the inerrant word of God? But I would like to see a a little bit more robust, indication of what he means by secularization and what are the indicators of it. Now, I, what I gave was just, you know, that's just off the top of my head. And I'm surely an incomplete list, but it seemed to me those are some of the areas that are relevant here.

Sean McDowell: I think the way you framed it is helpful because we're asking the question, what are the indicators that we're becoming more secular? Well, one of them is brought out in this study, which is less church attendance. So why are we going to church less than previous generations? That question is really interesting. It could be youth sports. It could be less importance. It could be other reasons. Maybe people are watching online more than previous generations, which is not necessarily a positive sign, but might not be the same as going, not going for different reasons. So I think if we really wanna know how deeply secular we're getting, we've gotta look at our behavior, which could include how people are spending their money, which could include how- ... People are spending their time. Are they going to church? Those questions, but also beliefs are a key indication here. And I think that's one limitation of this church because as a great colleague who we had on as a guest a couple weeks ago, J.P. Moreland, talks about secularism is a thesis about epistemology. It's about knowledge, and it's a belief and a movement shifting culture away from religious authority and practices in a more secular, non-religious direction. So marriage, for example, that shift that we saw in twenty fifteen with Obergefell, is not a shift to include same-sex marriage. It's a shift away from sexual difference being relevant to the nature of marriage. So we shifted from a, what's typically called a religious view of marriage, which you and I believe we could ground in natural law, to a secular view. Well, how many young people support and adopt that would tell us a lot about where they're getting their authority from. Like you said, is it in the scriptures and in the Bible, or is it in the culture? So I thought this was enough to give us pause and say, "Okay, wait a minute. This behavior is one indicator," but like you said, there's a lot more at play underneath this in terms of what we really believe. And even those studies can only reveal what people say they believe.

Scott Rae: Right.

Sean McDowell: That's why to really know, I think we need both of these together.

Scott Rae: Right. And I think, Sean, I wanna remind our listeners, too, that how strikingly countercultural the early church was- ... When it came to the Greco-Roman world. And most of the things the church stood for were at odds with Roman cultural traditions. And in fact the way they were viewed was that these cultural traditions were so important to bring down, bring down the blessing of the Roman gods, so that opposing those traditions was actually viewed as treasonous by the Roman Empire. But the early church opposed, you know, gladiator spectacles. They opposed infanticide. They elevated the status of women and children, and they were no longer property. They treated servants as made in God's image and treated their work with dignity. They stopped the practice of pedophilia. Now they introduced the notion of consent for sex, right? Although, you know, granted consent, that's not everything like we just mentioned.

Sean McDowell: Exactly.

Scott Rae: But for the Greco-Roman world, that was a huge step forward, because it assumed that women and children were not property. They were, they were full human beings.

Sean McDowell: Good stuff. I love that. I think that's really important. A reminder to parents or grandparents or teachers, if we wanna resist this with our own kids, get involved in a church. Prioritize that with your time and your money. That shows values, and we need to be intentional about teaching our kids in a, in a biblical worldview. That's why we believe in what we do here at Biola-

Scott Rae: Amen

Sean McDowell: ... Wanna help, obviously, young people do that. I believe deeply in ministries like Summit Ministries. I mean, this is something that doesn't happen by default. It's something that needs to be very intentional. So it's our practices and in terms of our beliefs. All right, speaking of beliefs, Scott, there's a study out. You sent me this. I found it really fascinating. This is in The Christian Post. And, what it says is, the title says, "Church attendance didn't predict antisemitism. Theology did." Now, any time you and I hear a study that says one's theological beliefs shape how they live, our ears perk up big time. And this study says more than 1,000 young Christian men, 18 to 30, four or more of them, church attendance did not predict antisemitic attitudes. So the amount you went to church played no factor on whether you were more or less antisemitic in this study. What made the difference? They said what these young men believe about God's promises to the Jewish people did. This is so fascinating. The strongest predictor of antisemitic attitudes was beliefs that God's promises to the Jewish people have ended. This is the article. When I compared the factors together, these beliefs were about four times as strong as a predictor as political conservatism. So that's one of the most interesting points about this, Scott, is that it's not just whether you're politically conservative or not that shapes your antisemitic types of behaviors, but whether you believe there's still a promise that God has for Israel is more significant. But again, church attendance, by contrast, did not predict antisemitic attitudes in the study. That means, according to this article, churches, what churches teach matters. Christians need to ask a basic question: What does Scripture say about God's faithfulness to the Jewish people? Now, they make a case here in this article, but they also talk about a number of online influencers now that are shaping people as well. And this is something you and I have talked about a little bit, but some online influencers, they cite people such as, for example, Nick Fuentes, Tucker Carlson, Candace Owens, and asking the question, are people who identify as antisemitic tending to listen to them, or are they being shaped by them? And this study doesn't play that out, but they talk about the significant role that some of these type of figures play, arguably, in the beliefs of this younger generation. I've got a few more things to say, but give me your take on this.

Scott Rae: Well, Sean, this reminds me of, the episode in a, in a classroom not too long ago, several years ago. But, one of our philosophy students was recounting a history professor of, it's a modern European history prof at, I think Cal State Fullerton or one of, one of the, one of the Cal States or UC schools. And the professor just exclaimed in class that said, "The Holocaust would never have happened without Christianity." And what he meant by that was that, it was, it was Christian theology is what generated the Holocaust. Now, I think, I think the article is right to suggest that this is more typical of young men than our generations, and especially combined with media figures that are clearly antisemitic. And so I think it's helpful maybe to, for our listeners to know that there are theological views that make the claim that, the church has taken over the promises of God that were made in the Old Testament to the nation of Israel,

Scott Rae: and that Israel, by virtue of its rejection of their Messiah, forfeited those promises. So I would say, but I think the thing is, you know, I think you and I both know lots of people who hold that theological view that won't... That don't express even the slightest hint of antisemitism.

Sean McDowell: Exactly.

Scott Rae: And so I'm a little reluctant. I found this really interesting among the younger generation. I'm a little reluctant to universalize this more broadly 'cause I just, I don't see it in folks who were, you know, well theologically educated, but on a different view of what we call eschatology. They were... Their view, I... Some would, fall under the heading of amillennialism. And I think some of the, some of the postmillennial views, I think, also lean in this direction. But, there, I think to think about it theologically, the reason we hold the view that we do, that God still has a plan for the nation of Israel, is because of His promises to them in the Old Testament and the unconditional nature of those. And Paul in Romans 9 to 11, I think validates that there is still a future. God still has a future for the nation of Israel. And it, and I think it's, what's important is that Israel in the Old Testament prophets and in Romans 9 to 11 returns both to the land, which 1948 could be significant for that- But they also return to the Lord. And both of those things have to take place prior to the Lord's return. So it's not just... There's nothing particularly special necessarily about Israel being back in their land, though I think it, I do think it was somewhat miraculous that they ended up there and survived. But it's also, it's the return to the Lord that is the significant part- ... That often goes unstated.

Sean McDowell: I think you're right in terms of somebody obviously could be amillennial and not be antisemitic. I would invite anybody who's a Christian to just read the Gospel of John and ask the question: How does it portray the Jews? Well, first off, you know, we have showing up Jesus, who's Jewish, who's a Messiah first to the Jewish people. John the Baptist, who is a hero in the Gospel of John, is Jewish. His disciples are Jewish. And you have some very sympathetic Jewish figures, by the way, such as Joseph of Arimathea and, Nicodemus. And you also have, like, the Jews showing up in John chapter 11 at the death of, Des- Lazarus, and they're mourning with Mary and Martha. So if the point was to demonize Jews, the Gospel of John, written last likely, by the way, with enough theological reflection, and they had undergone some tension with the Jewish people. By this time, both James had probably been martyred and maybe many others. If that was their goal, they did a really lousy job. So I think it's this belief about whether or not there's still promises for Israel in the future that kind of acts as like a linchpin of somebody who doesn't have that theological depth and really read through that lens, eschatology aside, to see where they land. So one of the figures they mention is Nick Fuentes, who's a young, brilliant social media podcaster, and he identifies as Catholic. And I was listening to his podcast dozens and dozens for a while. I was gonna do a reaction video to it. I just decided not to. But one of the things that bubbles up is by antisemitism, there's always or almost always a trace back to the Jews behind the scene that are causing this, and they are the problems. That is the kind of antisemitism that is being talked about here. But I've heard him on his show specifically go after the idea that God has a plan for Israel in the future. And so those who listen to him and are shaped by that, by that, where he doesn't give the depth that you and I are talking about here, where somebody could be an amillennial and not be antisemitic. So I think this kind of functions as an indication of the depth of somebody's theology, where they stand. Anyways, any- we could make a case for this. I would go also not only Romans 11, but I think God's promises to Abraham in Genesis 12:15 and 18 are unconditional to the end of time, unlike the Mosaic Covenant, but we don't have time to establish that here, but that's where I would go. Anything else in this one before we hit the questions?

Scott Rae: Nope. Yeah, let's hit the questions.

Sean McDowell: All right, let's do it. So here's a great one for you. It says, "From pro-life perspective, which upholds that conception, from conception, the baby's unique, invaluable human life, how do we respond to the claim, 'Why do you not prosecute every woman who has an abortion for murder?'" Feels like there's an inconsistency here.

Scott Rae: Well, [clears throat] the reason I wouldn't do that, Sean, is because I think the cause of the unborn, which we are, which is the ultimate goal of the pro-life movement, it would not be advanced by prosecuting every woman who had an abortion for murder. I think it would, it would be, it would turn the culture so against the pro-life movement and so against the the unborn that I, that in my view, this would be incredibly counterproductive toward the, to the interests of protecting the unborn in the future.

Sean McDowell: That's a good simple answer. And this one, this is a complex... Simple, I mean, to the point, is this issue has kinda divided a lot of the pro-life community, and there's a ton of debates going on right now about how, where people should land on this one. And, you know, maybe at some point we should do a full episode really breaking this down because we've gotten questions about this a few time. And there might be a difference between why do you not prosecute every woman and why do you not prosecute some women? These are some of the nuances that we would have to work through, but I think that's fair insofar as it goes. Okay, in my conversation with J.P. Moreland, or our conversation, it says, "The topic of the soul came up. Made me wonder the importance of the difference between dichotomist and trichotomist views of the person. In other words, is human being just a body and soul or body, soul, and spirit?" Now, I think you're pretty qualified to answer this one, Scott, 'cause you wrote a book called-

Scott Rae: Well-

Sean McDowell: ... Body and Soul. So weigh into this one.

Scott Rae: Well, I Here's the way I'd put it. We are, we are body and soul, and the spirit is a capacity of the soul. The spirit, and I think the spirit's capacity is, in particular, a capacity of the soul that enables us to connect with God. The soul does, has lots of other capacities, that are crucial to our biological and physical development, but the spirit, I think, is the one that uniquely connects us to God. So I would say a a dichotomist view, but I would not see the spirit and the soul as being synonymous.

Sean McDowell: And the important distinction is that the body is physical. It takes up space. It's material Whereas the soul is immaterial, it's not physical. And the spirit, being a capacity of the soul, would also be immaterial and not physical. So humans are dichotomous in the sense that we're material and immaterial, physical and non-physical. Adding the soul doesn't add any new kind of substance, so to speak, beyond what we are. It's like, in some ways you might say if it's like a faculty or capacity of the soul, well, so is the mind, so is our moral conscience, so is our creativity. These are capacities of the soul, not distinct third or fourth parts of who and what we are. So all right, one last question. This one is great as well. This person says, "Our culture has shifted away from religion 'cause it's considered outdated, and we supposedly move beyond it in our modern life. I'm concerned that many Christians quickly dismiss a lot of the Old Testament 'cause it feels like back then and not relevant to the New Testament. But should we have concern that somebody also might do the same thing about the New Testament? So what prevents Christians from agreeing with the culture on this if much of the Bible's only for back then? How do we make our case without seeming like we are picking and choosing what we like?"

Scott Rae: Well, I don't think we're, well, I don't think we're actually picking and choosing, Sean. This is, this is actually pretty... This is a very complicated hermeneutical question, too, about the difference between the Bible being relevant for us, which all of it is, and the Bible being, and parts of the Bible being directly addressed to us, which we'd say that the law of Moses is not directly addressed to the church, but it still has relevance that requires an interpretation. I would, you know, I, again, the early church and nation of Israel were so counter-cultural. And the idea that, somebody would

Scott Rae: use a view of scripture to justify agreeing with more and more of the culture, I think is, would, is profoundly different than the mindset that both the Old and New Testament writers had about what they expected, how they expected their works to be read and applied. So I you know, I think we have to be careful in how we live because sometimes it may look like we're picking and choosing based on how we live, but that's a matter of application and consistency, not so much in terms of picking and choosing the things that we view as authoritative.

Sean McDowell: That's great. The key point that I would make is that the Old Testament anticipates a new covenant that would come. That's Jeremiah 31:31-34. But Hebrews makes it very clear that we're under a new covenant because of what Christ, who's the sinless, you know, divine Messiah, does on the cross through his death for us. We can access the Lord, and now he intercedes for us. We no longer need a high priest. But the way we understand who Jesus is and his mission is through the story of the Old Testament. So it might apply differently than the New Testament, but we certainly shouldn't unhitch it from our understanding of who Jesus is and his identity. I think Jesus made it very clear in Luke 24 when he says to the two disciples in Emmaus, "Don't you know that the scriptures spoke of me?" So I think Christians should resist getting rid of the Old Testament because it's outdated, and the New Testament, 'cause that's the ethic the apostles had, that's the ethic that Jesus had, and that's the ethic that we've had for 2,000 years in the church.

Scott Rae: Welcome.

Sean McDowell: All right. Good conversation, my friend.

Scott Rae: Good stuff.

Sean McDowell: Always enjoy it. 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. This week from Forest Home, just for fun, recording here. We have programs and masters, and Scott, you and I heard an update from our dean, Ed Stetzer.

Scott Rae: Pretty amazing.

Sean McDowell: I was blown away. I didn't realize the accomplishments of our faculty, how much we've grown, the programs that we offer. Like, the future is exciting and bright. I've been on Team Biola and Team Talbot for a long time. This gave me goosebumps to be a part of this team. And so if you've been listening to this podcast for a while and thought about doing theological training, now is the time to do it. We have two campuses. You can come on campus in Phoenix, and you can come on campus in LA, or you can get a full degree online that is top quality. That's for sure. We would love to have you. To submit questions or, comments, please email us at thinkbiblically@biola.edu. And please please take a moment to give us a rating on your podcast app. Seriously, every one helps. If this helps you think biblically, doing that podcast rating is gonna help us expand our reach to help other people think biblically. We appreciate you. Until next soon. We'll see you Tuesday when I sat down with a conversation with Stephen Meyer, one of the leading philosophers and cosmologists and apologists today, talking about the case for God from the Big Bang and a response to some of the big naturalist objections to that. We'll see you then Tuesday. And in the meantime, remember to think biblically about everything. [outro music]