Weekly Cultural Update: French Riots, Michel Foucault's Centennial, Texas Higher Ed, and UK Porn Laws

Episode Transcript

Scott Rae: [upbeat music] Rioting erupts and continues in France and spreads to other parts of Europe. The influential French philosopher Michel Foucault would've turned 100 this week. Texas puts limits on what professors can and cannot teach, and Britain revises its laws on pornography. These are the stories we'll cover today, and we'll answer some of your questions, excellent questions, as usual. I'm your host, Scott Rae, and sitting in for Sean this week is my colleague in theology, Dr. Thad Williams. This is the Think Biblically weekly cultural update coming to you from Talbot School of Theology, Biola University. Thad, welcome. Great to have you with us. I don't think I've had you as a partner on this yet, but, I think we're a little, we're overdue to weigh in together on this.

Thaddeus Williams: We are indeed. It's a joy to be with you, brother.

Scott Rae: All right. Here's the first story. Last weekend, riots, protests, and looting took place in Paris, France, and spread to other parts of the country, including the cities of Lyon, Limoges, where a historic city building was destroyed, Marseille and Bordeaux, and then spread to other parts of Europe, including Spain, Portugal, Albania, and Italy. It began in late September with protests from students, mainly high school and college students, about school conditions and teacher shortages, and I think probably part of it, too, the lack of employment opportunities for them after their education was finished. It spread to general protests about the high cost of living, especially housing costs, what they, what they considered inadequate government services. It ended last Saturday around the country with roughly 500,000 protesters, mainly in Paris, and it degenerated into looting of stores and shops. 3,000 businesses around the country were damaged or looted. 8,000 people were arrested. Thad, though it began with students, it didn't end with them.

Thaddeus Williams: Sure.

Scott Rae: As best I can tell, a coalition of radical Islamists, far left, what what the government call anti-fascist instigators, radical environmentalists, and pro-Palestinian groups, called sort of the the, quote, "red-green coalition," apparently had been planning this and at least co-opted the students' protest movement. Further demonstrations are planned for this weekend. French law enforcement was overwhelmed by the number of rioters and provided little support to besieged store owners as their shops were looted and their property destroyed. Curfews were instituted last week throughout the country, and law enforcement vowed to be better prepared for this coming weekend. The government blamed what they call opportunistic criminals and ultra-left activists, denying that immigrants were actually part of the problem. All right. So Thad, I'm interested to hear your take on this. There's a lot to this. I think a lot to talk about on this.

Thaddeus Williams: There is.

Scott Rae: But,

Thaddeus Williams: Yeah

Scott Rae: ... Give me, give me your take on this.

Thaddeus Williams: Yeah. So many angles that we could take here. I was reading, what The Atlantic had to say about it, and there was one phrase that just jumped out of the article. The Atlantic described this as a case of what they called nihilistic resentment. Nihilistic resentment. The thing that jumps out at me about that is, like, this isn't our first rodeo, like if we were in Paris, our first rodeo of widespread demonstrations, this kind of thing. Let me frame it this way. If we hopped in a time machine and we went back to the year 1792. In Paris, you had a young actress, 14 years old, named Mademoiselle Candé, and the Parisians dressed this teenage actress up as the goddess of reason and marched her down Parvis de Notre Dame along the Seine River there and into Notre Dame Cathedral, and they installed her at a high point, and [chuckles] they actually began singing hymns to this 14-year-old girl as a symbolic act that this is our new religion. Reason is our new religion. Now, Scott, if we were to walk down those same streets in September of that same year, we would've been ankle deep in the blood of the French Revolution. How quickly the Age of Reason devolved into the Reign of Terror. And so Paris has a long history of these sort of tumultuous worldview shifts, and I think we're just seeing history repeat itself. And so maybe it's not an attempt to install the goddess of reason. Maybe now it's an attempt to install, you know, the goddess of equal outcomes. Maybe it's a, an attempt to install the goddess of social justice, or some kind of neo-Marxist ideology. And I think what we're seeing is what we've seen again and again through the history of revolutions. I think it was John Stonestreet who said, "Ideas have consequences, and bad ideas have victims." And so that's my question is, what is the idea beyond just the looting part? I get a lot of free stuff real fast. Is there any kind of cohesive, compelling, beautiful story uniting the protesters? And I think that's the key problem, is that they're falling for different ideologies that don't paint a particularly bright picture of the future. I think just a closing thought on this, and I'll kick it to you. In 1968, the streets of Paris were also full of student protesters, and one of the most prophetic voices in the evangelical world at the time was the late, great Francis Schaeffer. And so Schaeffer, in his, brilliant book, I would, I would heartily recommend to our- Listenership. It's called The Church at the End of the 20th Century. Church at the End of the 20th Century. And so this is Schaeffer writing to similar riots in Paris but decades ago. He says, "Here then is the context in which the student rol- revolt can be understood. This is how we came to be where we are." And he goes on to say, "Society has reaped the rewards of its escape from reason, from modern science to modern science that denies God, from denying that man is made in the image of God. So now man is a machine, from freedom within form to determinism, autonomous freedom." And it goes on. The point of it, Scott, is he's diagnosing the issues underneath the issues, and saying behind the riots, there are fundamental worldview questions that at the end of the day, Christianity gives the best answer to. And so he goes on and says, instead of just a flat out critique of the rioters, he says, you know, these... Whether the free speech people or the hippies, their sentence was, we live in a plastic culture. And so recognizing that a lot of the concerns of people, you know, burning and, pillaging their way, along with other protesters who are not resorting to violence, we need to recognize that they're trying to scratch a deeper itch than in the final analysis, only the gospel, only Christianity can scratch so.

Scott Rae: Yeah. Thank you, Thad. That's a great take on this. I so appreciate the go, going straight to the worldview that underlies this. Now-

Thaddeus Williams: Sure

Scott Rae: ... I think there are probably several different worldviews underlying these-

Thaddeus Williams: Yep

Scott Rae: ... Different groups of protesters. But I think what they have in common, I think, is a rebellion and a disillusionment with the overwhelmingly secular state that was founded when the goddess of reason was enthroned.

Thaddeus Williams: Yep. Exactly.

Scott Rae: And I think to be fair, I think you know, France, the issues they face don't have easy solutions. As the Wall Street Journal that talked about this pointed out, you know, policies have consequences. Not just ideas, but policies have-

Thaddeus Williams: Yeah

Scott Rae: ... Consequences. And I think there's... And I'm quoting the article here, "Ridiculously high levels of public spending and heavy market regulation, labor market regulation have made it nearly impossible for the French economy to grow. At least not at the rate necessary to guarantee the students the futures that they want. The French habit of cramming immigrants into ghettos has created a time bomb of social unrest." And so I think there's, you know, the the idea would be to, you know, to grow your way to prosperity out of this. But the, you know, the the French government has a huge debt.

Thaddeus Williams: Yeah

Scott Rae: ... Over 50% of their GDP goes to government spending in one way or another.

Thaddeus Williams: Yeah.

Scott Rae: So now I think you could probably make an argument that how that's distributed, may be inadequate for things like education that will prepare students for the future, things like that.

Thaddeus Williams: Yeah. What, what's fascinating, to interject real quick,

Scott Rae: Yeah

Thaddeus Williams: ... I was, I was doing some homework on this. You know, France ranks very low on the free market index. As you said, over 50% of their GDP goes to, social spending. The whole catalyst for this, at least the story goes, is education and underfunded education. And [chuckles] I did the homework on it. It's $223 billion, with a B, dollars that the government already spends on education. And so that's part of the problem, is it's like, well, what more, you know, if our new goddess is, say, equal outcomes, it it exposes that problem that you have a false idol at the center that can never ultimately satisfy.

Scott Rae: Yeah. Well, I think there is... There's probably some debate, Thad, over the degree to which immigration has played a role in this.

Thaddeus Williams: Sure.

Scott Rae: The government, the French government denies that, immigrants had much role in this. I think the reality on the ground, I think, is hard to, that's hard to deny-

Thaddeus Williams: Yeah

Scott Rae: ... That immigrants had a, had a significant role in this. Now, I think they've, you know... The rioters came, I think, mostly from, a group of, you know, radical environmentalists, ultra-left, what we call anti-fascist activists,

Thaddeus Williams: Yeah

Scott Rae: ... Pro-Palestinian supporters, that sort of, that red-green coalition.

Thaddeus Williams: Yeah.

Scott Rae: The you know, the green part refers to, I think, the pro-Palestinian, faction of that, which is largely, I think, fueled by immigrants who have come to France from North Africa and the Middle East. And so what I want to point out, I think, is that immigration is really different in Europe than it is in the, in the US. And it goes back to the worldview that you're, that you're referring to.

Thaddeus Williams: Yeah.

Scott Rae: And I think with most immigrants to Europe who come from the Middle East and North Africa, they have a largely Islamic worldview, whether it's fundamentalist or more moderate, that, at least on the, on the more radical side, I think it's fair to say that their radical Islamist worldview is incompatible with most democratic institutions, which fuses nicely with the radical left and the radical environmentalist groups that

Thaddeus Williams: Yeah

Scott Rae: ... Basically wanna tear down the structures of democracy and other democratic institutions like our market-based systems.

Thaddeus Williams: Yeah.

Scott Rae: That's markedly different than immigrants coming to the United States, mostly from Latin America, from at least, if not, if not Catholic, they were raised with a more Catholic worldview that is, I think, is much more compatible with democracy and market capitalism. And

Thaddeus Williams: Yeah

Scott Rae: ... The estimate in France from one of these articles I read pointed out is that 13% of the population are foreign-born. I think most of that would be Born in the Middle East and North Africa

Thaddeus Williams: Yeah

Scott Rae: And another 12% are second generation of foreign-born parents. So a quarter, 25%, of French society, let's just say with a, at the, at the least, a deep ambivalence about living in the kind of colorblind secular republic that France has been committed to, as you point out, since, you know, the late 1700s.

Thaddeus Williams: Yeah.

Scott Rae: And I think the, you know, definitely that 25% would want to dethrone the goddess of reason-

Thaddeus Williams: Yeah

Scott Rae: ... And replace her with something else.

Thaddeus Williams: Exactly.

Scott Rae: I think a worldview that I think is considerably less compatible than what we, than what we see in most of the rest of the West.

Thaddeus Williams: Yep. Well said.

Scott Rae: So anything else you want to add to this?

Thaddeus Williams: No, that's great. I think-

Scott Rae: Okay

Thaddeus Williams: ... You nailed it.

Scott Rae: Now, the second story I think has a really interesting connection to the riots in France. But yeah, this is from our friend Carl Truman in First Things, and he's describing perhaps the most influential thinker that you've never heard of, who would've turned 100 years old this week. Michel Foucault, the French philosopher, who passed away some 40 years ago. And though his contemporaries, I think at the time, have faded from relevance, he remains highly influential in the academy, and I think by extension, in the culture at large. Now, on the positive side of his contribution, we are, we are much more aware of how cultural factors shape what constitutes knowledge. We're more sensitive to how histories of the past serve and are shaped by political purposes in the present. We're more suspicious of how power is pervasive and sometimes invisible, and why challenging power, to resist that in any final decisive way is really difficult to do. Now, he also, on a not so positive note, he also paved the way for the LGBTQ movement with his denial of sort of the essential, biolo- what we call biological essentialism, that, there is such a thing as an intrinsic biological sex, just to male and female. He's considered one of post-modernism and its assault on objective truth and morality, all in the service he alleged of main- people maintaining power. Now, to be fair, he also had a dark side, and his personal life reflected the nihilism that his philosophy led him to, mainly a deep skepticism of truth and moral values. He immersed himself in the sexual excesses available to him back in the 1970s and '80s, sadomasochistic sex, the gay bathhouse scene, allegations that he knowingly infected others with AIDS. He had, a handful of suicide attempts, some mental breakdowns as well. So he was definitely a very mixed bag here.

Thaddeus Williams: Yeah.

Scott Rae: As we would say, he's, you know, he created an image of God, but deeply fallen and broken,

Thaddeus Williams: Yeah

Scott Rae: ... And I'd say a product of his philosophy. He was not, as the article puts it, he was not a particle physicist who engaged in some of these sexual excesses on the side. The the things that he took to excess, I think were direct outgrowth of his nihilism and his philosophy of life. So why don't you know, Thad, sort of summarize his contribution to where we are today culturally.

Thaddeus Williams: Sure.

Scott Rae: You've made reference to the nihilism that, has come out already in these riots. I think they have our friend Michel Foucault and maybe earlier Friedrich Nietzsche,

Thaddeus Williams: Sure

Scott Rae: ... To thank for those.

Thaddeus Williams: Yeah, absolutely. It's really difficult, Scott, to underestimate Foucault's impact on the Western world. I mean, you think of, I've read some studies that he is the most cited scholar in the humanities, second only to, Richard Posner, the judge and philosopher. And I think the order is, Foucault, number one, Richard Posner, number two, and, Richard Dworkin, number three. So it's hard to, overestimate his impact. And when you dive into his work, he is very much, as you nodded to, a Nietzschean in his orientation. And for Nietzsche,

Thaddeus Williams: reality is a zero-sum power game. Nietzsche, in his transcendence of right and wrong in, Thus Spake Zarathustra and many of his works, he describes reality as... Think of it this way. If reality is 1,000 power units, if I want more than like three, the only way to gain power in a Nietzschean worldview is to take it from somebody else. And so Foucault comes around and builds on that and begins, Foucault's term is unmasking. Unmasking. So you take, he His original book that sort of put him on the map was about, the healthcare industry and hospitals and stuff like that, and he argued that what we call disease and how we treat it is not as objective as it seems. Like, here's a disease, here's a medication, here's a treatment. No. What we define as disease itself is a power play, and that, it becomes almost a universal acid that eats away any discipline because it can be deconstructed or unmasked for what it really is, just a blind pursuit of power. Now, the, one of the problems here, and you'll hear that in your English departments, you'll hear that in your social sciences departments, it's crept into some theology departments And what it leads to at the end of the day, because it's a universal acid, there's nothing to keep that style of deconstruction from deconstructing itself. In other words, if everything's about power, so is my contention that everything's about power. And so now I can break the whole world down into identity groups and say it's this tribe versus that tribe, and that leads to now the only way to change a system or bring about policy change, it has to be the raw expression of power. So the echoes of Foucault and his philosophy are making their way through the streets of Lyon and Paris and cities around Europe these days. So there's something deeply nihilistic and sad about everything's power at the end of the day, and honestly a prime opportunity for Christians to step in and say, "No, there's more than power. There's something like saving grace. There's something like the goodness of God. There's something like objective meaning that's more than a power play that comes from on high." So there's my two cents.

Scott Rae: Yeah, and there's actually things like, you know, loving your neighbor-

Thaddeus Williams: Yeah. [chuckles]

Scott Rae: ... That, you know, that people can actually do from the heart. Now, I think it's fair, it's fair to suggest that there's probably some aspect of self-interest that tends to pollute some of our altruistic aims.

Thaddeus Williams: Sure.

Scott Rae: And we're not, we're probably not as 100% altruistic as we think we are.

Thaddeus Williams: Yeah.

Scott Rae: But it... But this, that, confuses a byproduct with a motive.

Thaddeus Williams: Sure.

Scott Rae: And the, you know, the motive and the byproduct are not necessarily the same thing, and certainly don't deserve to be equated.

Thaddeus Williams: Yeah. Well said.

Scott Rae: So that's... I think that's part of my assessment of his work. I think his main contribution was to show how concepts of truth and morality are socially constructed, and they are not objective in any real sense. Although it's not as clear to me that, he denied, and I think this is true of some of the other postmodernists, that he denied objective reality ontologically.

Thaddeus Williams: Yeah.

Scott Rae: He more, I think, denied that it, how how it's knowable-

Thaddeus Williams: Yeah

Scott Rae: ... In terms of its epistemology, I think is what he questioned. And how we, how we actually know that is so, is so clouded that, and so clouded by our desire for

Scott Rae: all practical purposes, the concept doesn't exist. Is that a fair way of viewing that?

Thaddeus Williams: I think so. I wouldn't see his view that all... You know, unmasking, his project of unmasking is to take any objective claim and peel away the exterior to show what's really lurking, what's hiding beneath is a power play. And I think neither of us would wanna reduce, you know, all morality to a power play. But to me, Scott, [chuckles] I wanna look at, and this is a point Truman draws out in the article, how did that work out for you, is a good question with any worldview.

Scott Rae: Mm-hmm.

Thaddeus Williams: How how'd that really work out for you? Reducing everything to power dynamics and power differentials and then later building on Foucault, let's break everybody into oppressor and oppressed groups like, critical theory owes a lot of its legacy to Foucault and Derrida and Sartre and a lot of these other, you know, Parisians, a lot of these other Frenchmen. That French philosophy really began sweeping through American universities in the '60s and into the '70s. And I wanna look at, how livable was it at the end of the day? And you look at sort of the big names in postmodernity. Derrida, described himself as a miserable Mediterranean macho man and had, completely alienated from his kids, just a lonely, sad soul.

Thaddeus Williams: You look at, Michel Foucault and as you pointed out, and as Truman draws attention to in the article, he was suicidal throughout his life, throughout his adult life. A miserable human being, knowingly infected people with HIV. There, there's a nihilism in the pit of the soul of a lot of these guys. Jean-Paul Sartre described himself as gaga, that he's not stupid, but he's miserable. And so I wanna look at that and say, well, how many of the young rioters and how many of the young folks out there are feeling that nihilism because they take these guys seriously? [chuckles] Like 52% of Gen Z, Sean and I talked about this last time I was on the show, 52% of Gen Z describes themselves as experiencing, quote, "An existential crisis of meaning." Now, as Christians, we can, you know, clutch our pearls and throw our hands in the air and say, "All is lost." Or, Scott, we could say, "What a beautiful moment, what a providential moment to be on planet Earth with all this Foucault-style nihilism permeating the culture. What a beautiful moment to be able to be alive, to love Jesus, and point people to the ultimate meaning found in Christ."

Scott Rae: Yeah. Hear And I think the I love the way Truman puts this at the end of the article that, I think what Foucault is maybe most known for is he said he's making an idol out of nothingness.

Thaddeus Williams: Yeah.

Scott Rae: And at the, at the end of the day, that sense of despair comes from the eradication of objective truth, morality, beauty, and goodness.

Thaddeus Williams: Exactly.

Scott Rae: And I think this is one... This is where I think, you know, our colleague Greg Ganssle is right, that, the gospel meets our deepest desires.

Thaddeus Williams: Exactly.

Scott Rae: Our deepest desires are for truth and goodness and beauty.

Thaddeus Williams: Yeah.

Scott Rae: And the gospel is what satisfies that.

Thaddeus Williams: Yeah.

Scott Rae: And the, you know, the things that are erupting in In France and other parts of Europe today, I think are an outworking of that nihilistic philosophy.

Thaddeus Williams: Yeah

Scott Rae: That if people, if people have, you know, don't feel like they have anything valuable to live for, that's what, I mean, that's what, that's what an existential crisis of meaning is.

Thaddeus Williams: Yeah.

Scott Rae: Then they resort to all sorts of things to try and fill that void.

Thaddeus Williams: Yeah. Really quickly-

Scott Rae: And the void-

Thaddeus Williams: Yeah. Go ahead

Scott Rae: Yeah. The void will not remain unfilled.

Thaddeus Williams: Yeah The human heart abhors a vacuum every bit as much as nature abhors a vacuum. We'll find something, some small god to put on the pedestal of our soul. But real quick, not to give a shameless plug for Biola University and Talbot School of Theology, but at the same time, to give a plug for [laughs] Biola University and-

Scott Rae: No, that's not shameless, so it's okay.

Thaddeus Williams: [laughs] Just yesterday, I was on campus, beautiful day on campus. It was raining, which was a much welcome change from the blazing heat we've been through the last couple months. And I was teaching one of my classes, and laying out here's different schools of apologetic thought. So here's the evidential and classical school with luminaries like J.P. Moreland and

Thaddeus Williams: Sean McDowell, and Kyle Strobel happened to be walking down the hall, so I brought him into the classroom and, "Hey, didn't your dad write a book about evidential apologetics? Anybody ever heard of it?" And you know, here's presuppositional apologetics and here's this way of approaching it. But I was lecturing yesterday and saying, "You know, I think there's another form aside from the presuppositional evidential school that I really see having a bright future, particularly in this Foucault-inspired day and age." Like what you were talking about with Ganssle. Dr. Ganssle, you know, his book, Our Deepest Desires, is more of what we could call an existential apologetic, that this isn't so much let's talk about cosmology and the origin of the universe or even fine-tuning or even, what are the requirements for rationality or a transcendental argument, but just pointing people to the fact that all of those soul deep itches that no political ideology can reach, the infinite God can. God can scratch your existential itch for meaning, for justification, for hope, for purpose, for community, for creativity, and all the rest.

Scott Rae: That's a good word. I appreciate that. That's sort of... That's a drop the mic moment here.

Thaddeus Williams: [laughs]

Scott Rae: But don't, but don't drop yours.

Thaddeus Williams: This mic is way too expensive. There's no way.

Scott Rae: Let's don't drop yours.

Thaddeus Williams: [laughs]

Scott Rae: All right. Here's a, here's a third story we want to look at this week is that the state of Texas has put limits on what can be taught in colleges and universities. This fall semester and started last spring. Public universities in Texas, including, University of Texas at Austin, Texas Tech, and Texas A&M, those are the three largest ones, asked faculty to submit their syllabi and course material to a portal for assessment. At Texas Tech it's known as the course content review process. To make sure that they are compliant with new laws in Texas that recognize only two sexes, and the resulting prohibition on advocacy or promotion of race or sex-based prejudice. At Texas Tech, the assessment was actually performed by AI, which raised other issues. But some examples of what got eliminated is that medical students no longer learn about race-based inequalities in healthcare. One course, had the removal of Plato's Republic from the reading list-

Thaddeus Williams: [laughs]

Scott Rae: ... For Plato's views on gender roles and homosexuality, readings from LGBTQ advocates in a political history course. And at the University of Texas at Austin, more than 100 courses had been flagged for removal from the core curriculum, primarily ones relating to slavery, race, gender, sexuality, and the environment. They also removed or shut down majors in Africana studies, Mexican-American and Latino studies, women and gender studies, and race and migration studies. Now, this is consistent with past move in the last probably five, six years to limit the teaching of critical race theory, limit teaching of LGBTQ themes, close, diversity, equity, and inclusion, DEI offices, and to limit shared governance in universities that would've given faculty the right to have a say in what's included in the general overall curriculum. So those, you know, granted faculties still have a lot of freedom to teach what they, you know, what they feel is appropriate, but there are, there are definitely limits being put by the, by the president and provost of the universities, following guidance from the state of Texas from the governor's office. So, I'm really curious to see, Thad, what you think of this. I know you're a big fan of academic freedom, and here at Biola, we have academic freedom, but we also have a doctrinal statement, a confession, which being a confessional school. So we have, we have limits within the parameters of our doctrinal statement about what faculty can and cannot teach about.

Thaddeus Williams: Yeah.

Scott Rae: Like you and I, you and I would be asked to pursue employment elsewhere if in our classes we denied the resurrection of Christ-

Thaddeus Williams: Yeah

Scott Rae: ... Or the authority of scripture or any of the foundational doctrines that are in our articles of faith and statement of biblical principles.

Thaddeus Williams: Yeah. [laughs] there's a lot here, but let me try to keep it short and sweet. I'm a, Let me approach it sort of out of left field. Take evolution, which had nothing to do with the story you just read. That was about critical theories and so-called, quote unquote, "woke ideology." But-

Scott Rae: Yeah, actually some of the things that are the legacy of Michel Foucault.

Thaddeus Williams: Yeah, exactly.

Scott Rae: Yeah.

Thaddeus Williams: Exactly. See, there's a, there's a through line. There's a common thread, man.

Scott Rae: There is.

Thaddeus Williams: We put some time into this. We make sure that all this stuff, fits. So evolution You know, America famously went through the Scopes Monkey Trial, and,

Thaddeus Williams: it's a live question here of what can the government dictate is teachable in a classroom in a way that, I spent a lot of time, during my PhD work and over the years in Europe, and the same kind of, political sort of cor- culture war battles that we have over curriculum don't exist, in many European contexts. And one of the reasons... I'm a big fan, Scott, of Abraham Kuyper's concept of what he calls sphere sovereignty. And for listeners out there who aren't familiar with sphere sovereignty, Kuyper, he was the Prime Minister of the Netherlands around the turn of the 19th turning into the 20th century. Brilliant theologian, just a polymath, a renaissance man, and has one of the most well-thought-through Christian political philosophies of anyone in modern times. And so he articulates sphere sovereignty, and the basic concept is something like this: that God, in his supreme sovereignty, has designed society as such that you have these independent spheres, and each sphere has its own telos, its own reason for being, and you don't want one sphere interfering with or, encroaching on what God designed a different sphere to do. So for example, Kuyper started, the university where I got my PhD years ago, the Free University, and people think, "Well, free from what?" it's not free from tuition, unfortunately.

Scott Rae: [laughs]

Thaddeus Williams: [laughs] but the free in Free University was something revolutionary in its day- ... Free from state control. Most of the universities were under church or state control, and he wanted to start a genuinely free university that was its own independent sphere. And so in sphere sovereignty, business has its sovereign sphere, the arts have their sovereign sphere, education has its sovereign sphere, and politics, government has its sovereign sphere. And where we run into problems is when that sphere sovereignty breaks down, and all of a sudden the government steps in and is like, "Okay, here's how you're going to do, education. Here's what you can and can't teach." And so that was one of the red flags that went up for me reading through that article was, man, I just don't know, because now we're opening Pandora's box to whoever defines, you know, falsehood or a dangerous idea given their worldview presuppositions. Are we opening up a door here to now a form of government indoctrination that I don't think anybody wants?

Scott Rae: Yeah, because, you know, the next, the next governor might-

Thaddeus Williams: Yeah

Scott Rae: ... Actually be the atheist-

Thaddeus Williams: Yeah

Scott Rae: ... Who

Thaddeus Williams: Says Christianity is bigotry and hateful-

Scott Rae: That's right

Thaddeus Williams: ... And unacceptable in any classroom. It's just a, I think, a door to, we don't wanna open.

Scott Rae: I hear-

Thaddeus Williams: Your thoughts

Scott Rae: ... I think to be fair to this, I think the diagnosis of essentially leftist indoctrination at state universities-

Thaddeus Williams: Yeah

Scott Rae: ... I think is essentially on target.

Thaddeus Williams: Agreed.

Scott Rae: And I think anybody who's been in those environments in the last 20 years, I suspect would say an, "Amen" to that, especially if you've been studying in the humanities or the social sciences.

Thaddeus Williams: Yeah.

Scott Rae: Maybe less so in the, in the hard sciences or in business or tech or things like that, but-

Thaddeus Williams: Yeah

Scott Rae: ... You know what I'm saying?

Thaddeus Williams: Jonathan Haidt documented a 14 to one ratio, [laughs] 14 to one liberal professors versus conservative professors in fields like psychology and the social sciences. So yeah, I get where the law's coming from, trying to remediate a problem that does exist, no doubt.

Scott Rae: Yeah. And I think the you know, the cure, I think, raises the questions that you've suggested already.

Thaddeus Williams: Yeah

Scott Rae: ... And I think you know, where we are today is the result of a long-term trend that I think began probably in the '60s of secular colleges and universities moving progressively more to the left, and with some faculty and some majors, I'd say to the far left.

Thaddeus Williams: Yeah.

Scott Rae: And I think... It seems to me... I'd be interested to hear what you think of this. I think the answer is genuine full-on diversity.

Thaddeus Williams: Yeah.

Scott Rae: Not just of race and sex, but of viewpoint diversity as well.

Thaddeus Williams: Viewpoint diversity, yes. 100%.

Scott Rae: And I think this is one thing I so appreciate about the statement on, free expression and diversity of thought we have at Biola.

Thaddeus Williams: Yeah.

Scott Rae: 'Cause we recognize that within... We... Though we have theological parameters that define our institutional identity, our students' faith is best equipped for the, for the long term if they are exposed to some of the ideas in the, in the, that are rampant in the culture under faculty critique and supervision.

Thaddeus Williams: Yeah.

Scott Rae: And I think the in addition, I think you would appreciate this too, given your emphasis on general revelation and common grace, I think that means that nobody is wrong about everything.

Thaddeus Williams: Yeah, exactly.

Scott Rae: And nobody's 100% right about everything too. You know-

Thaddeus Williams: Yeah

Scott Rae: ... Marx was, Marx was not wrong about everything.

Thaddeus Williams: Yeah. Just most things. [laughs]

Scott Rae: I mean, we have to... I think most... Well, I think... And I think he was wrong about the really important things.

Thaddeus Williams: Yeah. [laughs]

Scott Rae: And so, you know, Sigmund Freud was not wrong about everything. Now, again-

Thaddeus Williams: Yeah

Scott Rae: ... I think he was wrong about some really important things too. But I think our view of general revelation means that we have things to learn from lots of folks who don't name the name of Jesus.

Thaddeus Williams: Yeah.

Scott Rae: And here's... I would say, you know, this viewpoint diversity is the kind of diversity that really matters.

Thaddeus Williams: Yeah.

Scott Rae: And I would suggest here's the measure... One of the measuring sticks I would use is how many theists do you have in your philosophy department?

Thaddeus Williams: Yeah.

Scott Rae: How many- ... Theologically conservative faculty are in your religion department?

Thaddeus Williams: Yep.

Scott Rae: Probably not very many.

Thaddeus Williams: No.

Scott Rae: How many political conservatives do you have in sociology department?

Thaddeus Williams: Yeah.

Scott Rae: How many women faculty do you have who are pro-life?

Thaddeus Williams: Yeah.

Scott Rae: How many African American faculty do you have who think affirmative action was a bad idea? One of the things I was gonna suggest, you got faculty who are, have traditional views of marriage and sexuality. That may be, that may be a bridge too far for some folks in the-

Thaddeus Williams: Yeah

Scott Rae: ... Secular university. But I'm wondering, you know, how many medical school faculty do you have who think that gender-affirming treatments for minors was premature?

Thaddeus Williams: Yeah.

Scott Rae: And... Or who are skeptical of people that change one's gender identity simply by proclamation?

Thaddeus Williams: Yeah.

Scott Rae: So I think that's what... That's, in my view, that's more the answer to that.

Thaddeus Williams: Yeah.

Scott Rae: And part of the, part of the... You know, you know this 'cause you were a graduate of our philosophy program. One of the goals of our philosophy program was, as JP Moreland put it, to reclaim lost intellectual real estate in the university.

Thaddeus Williams: Yeah, exactly.

Scott Rae: And we've probably... We've sent over 200 of our graduates onto PhD programs at places like the one where you studied.

Thaddeus Williams: Yeah

Scott Rae: ... And, my guess is we're probably getting close to 100- ... Of our of our philosophy grads who are in secular teaching positions. And some in some pretty notable ones too.

Thaddeus Williams: Yeah.

Scott Rae: So I think tho- you know, it's it's rough sledding, I think, for those who are, you know, who are trying to follow Jesus and be faithful to scripture and to do it with academic integrity in some of these settings. To say that the road is challenging for them, I think, is probably an understatement.

Thaddeus Williams: Yeah.

Scott Rae: But we have good, we have good examples. You know, our friend Robert George-

Thaddeus Williams: Yeah

Scott Rae: ... Who's a, you know, a Catholic philosopher who's been at Princeton for many years. And then I think there are, you know, there are lots of others who are, I think, you know, holding the cause of Christ but doing it with grace and with

Scott Rae: with gentleness and respect, like the Bible calls us to do.

Thaddeus Williams: Yeah. Well said. Just fast-

Scott Rae: Yeah

Thaddeus Williams: ... Robbie George anecdote. So [chuckles] Sean and I were, recording a little while back, and I was trying to reference Robert George of Princeton, and instead I said Robbie Prince of Georgetown.

Scott Rae: [laughs]

Thaddeus Williams: And we just... [laughs] We... It was, it was probably the hardest I've ever seen him laugh. We, had to cut, had to take five minutes to regain ourselves. But I will say,

Scott Rae: Hopefully you told Robbie about that. [laughs]

Thaddeus Williams: I I [laughs] haven't had the chance yet, but I will. But one of the things I loved about, again, not trying to turn this into a commercial, but studying at Talbot and Biola was I remember taking, some of your ethics classes, you know, bioethics and stuff like that, and I'm sitting in a room right now surrounded by some of the textbooks you assigned then, and it was things like, The Soul of Politics by Jim Wallace, who I think is much further left than either of us would be, on board with. I remember taking JP's philosophy of mind class where I'm reading, Yewon Kim, and I'm reading Paul and Patricia Churchland, and there's some... Like, I would've been at a huge loss if California stepped in and said, "Nope, you can't assign anything by Yewon Kim or Paul Churchland because they disagree with a certain worldview presupposition." That was the best... One of the best parts of my education was being exposed to this stuff and then learning, as the moniker of the show is, how do I think biblically about these ideas that are occasionally compatible-

Scott Rae: Yeah

Thaddeus Williams: ... With a Christ-centered worldview, and often incompatible, but if I'm banned from them, man, that's gonna backfire.

Scott Rae: Right.

Thaddeus Williams: So.

Scott Rae: I suspect you probably have volumes written by Peter Singer as well-

Thaddeus Williams: I do

Scott Rae: ... Who I assign, who I still assign for our students. All right. Here's-

Thaddeus Williams: Two feet away from me. Yeah.

Scott Rae: Here's the last story. There's, I may disclaimer here at the beginning, this may, this may not be for kids who in fact, I'm pretty sure it's not for kids who might be listening in. And so parents, if you have kids listening with you, I would encourage you to either skip over this story or listen to it at a time when the kids are not around. This week, the UK revised its laws on pornography applicable in England and Wales and in effect, taking effect in early November of 2026. The, then the law has been changed to prohibit the possession or publication of pornography that features choking or incest, essentially normalizing all other types of pornography, and child pornography's already illegal in the UK. The rationale goes something like this, and I'm quoting from the article here that described... It's a quote from one of the government officials who was involved in the law. And it says, quote, "Viewing or producing pornographic materials is not in itself a problem as long as everyone involved is a consenting adult. But particular types of pornography are liable to form vicious habits in people, encourage them to act badly toward others in the real world, and so these must be restricted." Now, they did not wanna criminalize what one government official called harmless sexual preferences, but thankfully did wanna normalize sexual violence against women. Now, of course, I think the notion that, quote, "normal porn is, porn is harmless" is open to significant debate to say the least.

Thaddeus Williams: Yep.

Scott Rae: So give me a, give me your quick take on this.

Thaddeus Williams: Yeah. Just to set it into context, this is some research I did for for a book a little while back. Pornography is a $97 billion industry. There was a study in 2018 that more than 5.5 billion, with a B, hours of pornography were consumed on just one porn site, 5.5 billion hours, 33.5 billion visits just on that one site. Internet Watch Foundation found that recorded child sexual exploitation, which is, otherwise known as child porn, is one of the fastest growing online businesses. And just... I know the story's set in Britain, but in the US, 624,000, child porn traders have been discovered. That's just the ones who we know about, 624,000. And then they looked at 50 most popular pornographic videos. An analysis found that 88% of scenes contained physical violence. And so [chuckles] you have just the scope, the size, the magnitude of this problem. But then to your point, Scott, this law, as much as we can applaud, you know, cracking down on choking and incest videos, there is the naivety underneath it that like, let's draw an arbitrary line between the harmful kinds and the unharmful kinds. What studies show is that there are clear links between pornography and human trafficking, between pornography, tends to correspond to higher rates of rape in the culture, higher rates of domestic violence. And there's a lot of... There's a mountain of research on impaired brain function, broken relationships, and depression. And so I think that the use of the harm principle in this law, while I'm happy that, there's a crackdown on porn, I think we need to follow the logic further and recognize the harm that it's doing, even in what the power brokers of this particular, policy are pretending is harmless. It's anything but harmless.

Scott Rae: Yeah. The, side effect of this law is to normalize the rest of

Thaddeus Williams: Yeah. Yeah

Scott Rae: ... And treat

Thaddeus Williams: That's the problem

Scott Rae: ... Treat it as morally neutral-

Thaddeus Williams: Yeah

Scott Rae: ... As long, as long as everybody's consenting. And as Sean and I pointed out last week, we were commenting on the Cornell rape case.

Thaddeus Williams: Yeah.

Scott Rae: That, consent, we both agreed is a very low bar for a sex [chuckles] for a sexual ethic.

Thaddeus Williams: Yep. Amen.

Scott Rae: And it's porn, I think, that has conditioned young men, and by extension, the young women who want to be accepted by them, of sexual extremes becoming more acceptable, and your statistics bear that out.

Thaddeus Williams: Yeah.

Scott Rae: And I think as the Cornell case has exposed for us, that when drugs and alcohol are involved, recognizing consent becomes much more challenging and can easily be misread. In fact, the studies have shown that men who, under the influence of alcohol, routinely misread a woman's friendliness for sexual interest.

Thaddeus Williams: Yeah.

Scott Rae: And in addition, I think what's so, what's so striking about this is the admission that women someti- what I would say, sometimes sort of consent when they realize that saying no could actually, could maybe not actually, but possibly lead to violence against them at the hands of their partner.

Thaddeus Williams: Yeah.

Scott Rae: So in my view, this is a a part of the fallout of the sexual revolution that's personal autonomy driven.

Thaddeus Williams: Yeah. Exactly.

Scott Rae: And how limiting the excesses, I think, is really challenging. And managing the excesses, I think when sex has been declared, in effect, as meaningless-

Thaddeus Williams: Yeah

Scott Rae: ... I think is really difficult to do. And of course, I think a sexual ethic that limits sex to committed partners in marriage takes account of what the notion of consent plus, which is not just saying yes to sex, but considering the emotional and wellbeing and flourishing of your partner, is trying to do. It's precisely what, loving your wife as Christ loved the church is exactly trying to do.

Thaddeus Williams: Yeah, exactly.

Scott Rae: So anyway, there's, I think, a lot to talk about about this, and we'll see, we'll see if the UK give... Brings any further limits on pornography.

Thaddeus Williams: Yeah. I really hope our listeners out there pick up on a, on the through line in all this, a common thread, which is, can be still, be distilled down to just Christianity just tells such a better story. That when it comes... I mean, you look at some of the work of, Glen Scrivener wrote a brilliant book, The Air We Breathe. The atheist historian Tom Holland has done a lot of work in his dominion to show that Christianity started the original sexual revolution in the first and second century, which dignified women and elevated them and protected children from the rampant pedophilia that was normalized in the Roman Empire. And man, we need to get back to the original Christian-inspired sexual revolution because as many of the stories today have shown, the other sexual revolution that Foucault helped inspired has, we're inheriting the wind with that. The-

Scott Rae: Yeah

Thaddeus Williams: ... We've run the experiment time and time again from all these statistics and all the, all the heartbreaking headlines we're learning. Between the two sexual revolutions, we should [chuckles] go back to the Christian sexual revolution.

Scott Rae: Yeah. This is, this is why the atheist, well-known atheist philosopher Richard Dawkins has been-

Thaddeus Williams: Yeah

Scott Rae: ... Been well known to say he doesn't believe any of it to be true, but does not want to live in any other kind of culture-

Thaddeus Williams: Exactly. Yeah

Scott Rae: ... Other than it has Christianity at its roots.

Thaddeus Williams: Well said.

Scott Rae: All right. Let's answer some questions. Before we do, we wanna give you all some encouragement to come study with us at Talbot at both of the graduate and undergraduate level. We got programs in Bible and theology. If you're at the undergrad program, you get to study with profs like Dr. Williams here. And grad programs in Old Testament, New Testament, spiritual formation, marriage and family therapy, philosophy, apologetics, science and religion, pastoral ministry. And we, and we have campuses now in La Mirada and in Phoenix, as well as cohorts that are getting started in other cities around the country. If you wanna hear a little bit more, visit biola.edu/talbot if you wanna find out a little bit more. All right. Scott, we have some great questions today. And we're gonna have to... I think we're gonna have to keep our answers short and sweet on this.

Thaddeus Williams: Sure. [chuckles]

Scott Rae: But, just a couple questions on the, on what Sean and I talked about a week ago on the public live streaming of the execution of, Nidal Hasan who convicted of the shooting of soldiers at Fort Hood. Let's just say, we're not gonna address this any further, just to say that, we are hardened by the decision to cancel the live streaming. In our view, the the death penalty, I think, is deserved here, but the turning a something as somber a moment as the taking of life into a public spectacle that's live streamed is, in our view, a bridge too far. So in any case, and, you know, in terms of, you know, there were some examples from the Old Testament where executions were public, but I think just because something was done in the Bible doesn't make it a norm necessarily or a requirement for today. All right, here's a really good question. I love this. This is from a listener who's 10 years old, about to turn 11. I love this part. Says, "My dad helped me learn about your podcast and how you help people think about their faith." I, how... Here's what he wants to know. "How old were you when you became a Christian or when your faith started to become your own? What's your favorite Bible verse? And what advice would you give somebody his age who wants to go closer to Jesus?" So probably just maybe a phrase or a sentence on each one of those.

Thaddeus Williams: Yeah.

Scott Rae: And we'll help this young man. So encouraged that, he's listening and is asking us questions.

Thaddeus Williams: I love that, yeah. 10, 11 years old, that's a beautiful thing. I got saved when I was 14 years old. I was really sad and realized life is meaningless without Jesus, and then Jesus saved me at an altar call, in 1993. Favorite Bible verse and one I would wanna pass on to this listener is in John 17, where Jesus says, he's talking to God the Father within the Trinity, and he says, "Father, you loved them even as you loved me." And I think, I want all listeners out there to ponder that. How does the Father love the Son within the Trinity? He loves the Son infinitely, irreversibly, irrevocably, unapologetically, with the full weight of his divine perfections. And so to our young listener out there, take that passage in John 17 to heart, that you are loved even as the Father loves the Son. So you, young man, are loved infinitely, irreversibly, unapologetically, with the full weight of divine perfections. Scott, what do you got?

Scott Rae: Good stuff. So much for a phrase or two on that, but that was well worth, that was well worth the extra.

Thaddeus Williams: [laughs]

Scott Rae: And, I came to faith when I was 16 in the ministry of Young Life, because I was looking for some place to base my security, and Jesus was the answer for that, and has satisfied my deepest longings. My favorite Bible verse is one you may not have read before, but it's in the book of Zephaniah, chapter three, verse 17. It says, "The Lord your God is with you, the mighty warrior who saves. He will take great delight in you. In his love, he will no longer rebuke you, but will rejoice over you with singing."

Thaddeus Williams: I love it.

Scott Rae: That's a, that's a vivid imagery of our relationship to God. Thad, one short, brief bit of advice you would give to this young man who wants to grow closer to Jesus.

Thaddeus Williams: Ask the Holy Spirit to fill you up with the fruit of the Spirit every single day, 'cause he's strong enough. Say, "Spirit, fill me up with love and joy, peace, patience, and kindness," because he will answer that prayer.

Scott Rae: And he also, he also has a question, "How should I handle a question about Jesus when I don't know the answer yet?" Let me suggest to have some humility and admit it, but promise the person who asked the question that you'll dig deep and find the answer for them.

Thaddeus Williams: Well said.

Scott Rae: All right, here's a second one. "If we set aside the scientific discussion of creation, isn't the evolutionary model a theological problem, even if God initiated it or involved, in it?" Okay?

Thaddeus Williams: Yep.

Scott Rae: What do you, what do you make of... What do you make, essentially, of theistic evolution?

Thaddeus Williams: Since you want me to keep it short, I don't buy it. [laughs]

Scott Rae: Okay.

Thaddeus Williams: I think it just runs into, yeah, way too many problems, not only theologically. I think there's just a deep tension between, natural selection and mutation. I find that difficult, if not impossible, to square with what we know about how a diversity of species emerged from the scripture. There's my short take.

Scott Rae: Very good. I think there is a major theological problem because sin and death entered at the Fall.

Thaddeus Williams: Exactly.

Scott Rae: And the whole, the whole history of evolution is the, is the death of all kinds of species through natural selection.

Thaddeus Williams: Yep, exactly.

Scott Rae: So I do, I do think there's a reasonable theological argument, but I also think there's there are good scientific grounds on which to raise questions about the validity of sort of the standard evolutionary model, particularly the one that doesn't include any kind of designer in the process.

Thaddeus Williams: Yep.

Scott Rae: All right, here's one that I think you'll appreciate. What is the one area of theology you think is most neglected, misunderstood, or misrepresented?

Thaddeus Williams: [laughs]

Scott Rae: An area... And I, and I also wanna know what's an area that you are particularly passionate about that you think more people need to study and appreciate?

Thaddeus Williams: Oh man, [laughs] there's no way, there's no way I can give a short answer to that, but I will do my best. If the producer needs to, you know, cut my mic, I would understand. But for me, it's the triune God. He's the center of everything, all of life. God is way bigger than we can imagine. I would say 99.9% of the church's problems can be traced back to a small view of God. So that's why I'm deeply passionate about how do we recover the most frequent command in scripture, which is to fear the Lord, reverence. How do we have a reverence for God? Because if we fear Him, if we revere Him more than the spirit of the age or what people might think of us, you solve a lot of problems right there in one swoop. If we have a high view of Jesus and we're really worshiping Him, we should expect to become like Him as we worship Him, and that's gonna impact our intellect, and our emotions, and our imaginations, and our relationships, and everything else. And if we have a high view of the Holy Spirit, we're gonna rely on Him to kill the sins in ourselves rather than resorting to some kind of self-powered spirituality that's doomed from the outset. So spirit-powered sin killing. So yeah, that's what I'm passionate about, is how do we return the church in the 21st century to the Father, the Son, Spirit, one God in three persons.

Scott Rae: That's great stuff. I'm most passionate about the area, what I would call moral theology. And I think the And that's an area that I think is still widely misunderstood and misapplied. So that's an area that I I would like more people to study about and to appreciate. And, you know, I've actually published some things in this area, so that will... That constitutes, I think, a shameless self-promotion.

Thaddeus Williams: [laughs]

Scott Rae: But,

Thaddeus Williams: It should be shameful

Scott Rae: ... And I know you, and I know you've... Well, I know you-

Thaddeus Williams: Yes

Scott Rae: ... And you've published stuff on moral theology as well.

Thaddeus Williams: Yeah.

Scott Rae: As well as things on the Trinity.

Thaddeus Williams: Yeah. Well, let me ask you real quick.

Scott Rae: Yeah.

Thaddeus Williams: I know, I know we're-

Scott Rae: Yeah

Thaddeus Williams: ... Coming up against a hard out, but as a... You won't toot your own horn, but as, it's safe to say, one of the leading moral theologians of our age with, a long list of books and academic work behind you, what do you see as the connection between what I'm passionate about and what you're passionate about? How does the Trinity factor into your moral theology in a way that would cast a vision for our listeners?

Scott Rae: Yeah. I think for one, I think the the Trinity is fundamentally a relational view of God, and that, there are a number of things that fall out of that. One is that

Scott Rae: we were, we were created by a relational God for a, for in real life community-

Thaddeus Williams: Yeah

Scott Rae: ... As opposed to the digital or chatbot community that, sometimes I think functions as a substitute for that.

Thaddeus Williams: Yeah.

Scott Rae: The other thing I think is to recognize, and this helps us appreciate, that God's love for us and our desire to follow Him, is that because, God God was self-contained in the Trinity relationally, He didn't need to create human beings to satisfy-

Thaddeus Williams: Exactly

Scott Rae: ... His penchant for relationship.

Thaddeus Williams: Yep.

Scott Rae: And realizing that He didn't, He didn't have to create us out of any necessary reason, but He chose to do so out of, out of love for us. And I think that's a different view, I think, of sort of the foundation of our moral theology, that we obey God not because He's commanding us, not because, not because we fear judgment, but ultimately because we don't wanna hurt somebody who has loved us like this.

Thaddeus Williams: I love that. I love that. So the chorus line of our whole conversation for the last hour is Christianity tells the better story, right?

Scott Rae: Yeah.

Thaddeus Williams: With all these depressing headlines that we cover on Culture Update, I hope the listeners take that away, that there's really something true, good, and beautiful about good old-fashioned Christianity that we certainly need-

Scott Rae: Right

Thaddeus Williams: ... In a world of bad headlines.

Scott Rae: That's a great way to end this off. So Thad, thanks so much for being with me today. Great having-

Thaddeus Williams: Always a pleasure

Scott Rae: ... Great having you, great having you with me, and, really good stuff.

Thaddeus Williams: Thanks, my friend.

Scott Rae: This has been the Think Biblically Weekly Cultural Update, coming to you from Talbot School of Theology, Biola University, offering lots of programs in Southern California, in Phoenix, and online. Visit biola.edu/talbot in order to learn more. If you wanna submit comments, ask questions, make suggestions, email us at thinkbiblically@biola.edu. Please give us a rating on your podcast app and share it with a friend, and join us on Tuesday for our regularly scheduled episode. In the meantime, thanks for listening, and remember, think biblically about everything. [upbeat music]