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“Praxis” is when you put theory into practice, and this is something we try to do at The Winsome Conviction Project. On today’s episode, Tim and Rick talk about a recent praxis experience involving two religious universities. This spring, Biola University hosted faculty and students from Brigham Young University for a series of constructive dialogues on points of agreement and disagreement between Christianity and Mormonism. Tim and Rick discuss three ways the dialogues were impactful, and they also discuss points for application for listeners.


Transcript

Rick Langer: Welcome to the Winsome Conviction Podcast. My name is Rick Langer, and I'm a professor emeritus at Biola University, and I've also served for many years as the co-director of the Winsome Conviction Project as we talk about some of the challenges of uh public discourse and Christian discourse in our current time. And I love doing that with my good friend Tim Muehlhoff, uh, who's joining me here on this podcast. Tim, what have you got for us today?

Tim Muehlhoff: Well, Rick, one of the things I learned in grad school that I thought was helpful was this term praxis, which was taking theory, which is incredibly important, but putting it into practice. Like, like, what good is theory if we don't actually do it? So, what I love about Biola University, what I love about the Winsome Conviction Project is we don't just talk about engagement. We actually try to set up times that people with very different perspectives can open lines of communication rather than close them. Now, we've often talked about the Pomona dialogue, and I'm proud to report that we've done this five years in a row with Pomona College, a very progressive liberal college, but they come here to our campus, we go there. But we just did our very first iteration of the BYU Biola uh dialogue, Brigham Young University, right? Church of Latter-day Saints.

Rick Langer: Um, different kind of controversy, right?

Tim Muehlhoff: Different, very different from Pomona. A lot of similarities. It opens up a whole lot of common ground, but there are some really deep differences. So, my friend, Dr. Andrew Reed, um, we co-taught a class together via Zoom. Uh, Biola students, we zoomed in uh for seven weeks, and then because they have money, they came here. We fully support that. Uh, they came here, they brought all Rick, they brought all 25 students, three faculty and one dean, all came out for three days of face-to-face interaction. It it was amazing.

Rick Langer: If Biola was paying for that, we would have had to walk out there. Yeah, I don't think we ever I don't think it would have worked.

Tim Muehlhoff: Yeah, it would not have it would have taken a lot longer, that's for sure. But um, you could on one hand say, what's the point? I I mean the Church of Latter-day Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, they have very strong convictions and intractable convictions. There's certain things they believe about Jesus, they believe about God. Like, for example, they do not buy the Trinity, they believe in three separate gods. Um, they also believe that Jesus um was created. Uh I mean, obviously they revere Jesus just like we do, but but there are certain beliefs about Jesus that we're not gonna sign off on. We we believe that Jesus was eternal, right? The Logos. And and they just don't believe that. They believe that there was a beginning where Jesus uh became uh um God. Uh we can talk about that a little bit in a second. So on one hand, you could say, why bother? Like, why come together when you know Biola University, we've been around for what, 115 years? They've been around since 1830. You we're not gonna change on fundamental disagreements about who Jesus is. So, from a communication standpoint, uh can we really influence each other? Can we impact each other? And what I want to share in this episode, Rick, there were three ways that we really impacted each other, and it opened up really interesting conversations. And uh, one took me totally by surprise, but it was very powerful. So I thought I would mention them, get your thoughts, and then we can kick those around and maybe even make applications what we could do in our personal relationships, in our churches, in our uh communities.

Rick Langer: Here's the first that sounds great, Tim. Yeah, let me make just a quick comment on that. I think the number one thing I have heard from people over the last eight to ten years where we've been doing this, and this my most vivid example of this came from a time before we had even started the project, but I was doing something with Braver Angels at the time. And I was just talking to a person about what I had done, and it was very much of a red-blue discourse, people who are conservatives, people progressive talking to each other, and nobody's gonna change your mind, but you're talking. And the person just asked me point blank, what is the point of doing that? That just sounds like a waste of time. And I think it's a uh it can be a snarky question, but it's actually a really good question to stop and think about. So I'm glad you're bringing this up. I can't wait to hear what you got, man.

Tim Muehlhoff: Well, here's the very first thing we did. Dr. Reed's awesome. Um, he he's he's the right temperament for this, right? He's not backing off on his classic LDS beliefs, nor am I. But we just get we laugh, Rick, which is so missing in today's public discourse, is we would just laugh, and we both mutually hate Duke University, we hate Duke basketball. He's a fan of UNC Chapel Hill. So we would laugh, but here here's a really cool thing that we decided to do is we would present each other's beliefs, right? This is called the method of the dialectic. So I would present um the LDS view of who Jesus was, right? And there's like eight different stages that they believe pertain to who Jesus is, and some of them are quite complicated. We don't need to go into all the nuances, but I really did my homework. I did as best as I possibly could. I went to their sources, the Book of Mormon, the work of Joseph Smith, Doctrine and Covenants. I went to the Pearl of Great Price, um, quoting their theologians. Um, so I put together a LDS perspective of who Jesus is, and then I presented it, and all the BYU students are sitting right there. I mean, they're all listening, taking notes. And then we finish, and I said, responses from our BYU friends. And Rick, it opened up such a great conversation. Virtually every one of them started this way. Thank you for putting so much time and attention and work into that. That took a lot of work. You really did a nice job presenting the mystery of our faith, the complexity of it, and you're quoting our original sources. Uh, first off, thank you for putting time and attention into it. And when Dr. Reed got up, did the exact same thing, presented who we believe Jesus Christ is. He started with the Jesus mural that is very biology known for. And he said, This is who evangelicals believe Jesus is, and did a really admirable job, mentioned the Trinity, that he's part of the Trinity and all this kind of stuff. And then a funny moment happened. Okay, he finishes, and then he goes, Okay, Biola students, how did I do? Rick, a biola student in the front goes, I think that was perfect. I wouldn't change anything. And we just start laughing because the BYU students had things that they would change a little bit with mine. So Andy just laughed out loud saying, I think, I think we're done. No, but to take the time and attention and roll up your sleeves and dive into another person's perspective, be it political, theological, uh, social, and just say, is that right? And then invite for them to comment. Yeah, that was really, really good. I so appreciate you mentioned that. I might they basically want me to reorder some things and order of importance, but to a person, and then later the faculty even commented, hey, that was a really good job you did with our belief about Jesus. What a great lesson for all of us. Roll up your sleeves, don't judge the perspective right out of the gates, but make sure you're presenting what the other person would say, wow, thank you. I I think he got, I think he got the nugget of what I really believe.

Rick Langer: And talk to me about how that experience was for you. Digging into uh the writings of, you know, Pearl of the Great Prize, Book of Mormon, things like that, trying to formulate a doctrine of the of Christology, of who Jesus is. I I don't know if they use Christology as part of their language or not, but the point is, how was that for you? Was it challenging? Was it interesting? Was it weird? Uh what was what was that like?

Tim Muehlhoff: Well, so there are basically different stages of Jesus' existence, right? I think there was, I'm looking at my notes right now, there were six different stages. Okay, admittedly, and even their theologians would say this: stage number one is by far the most complex, the most difficult to understand. Joseph Smith had this idea of something called the intelligence, that everybody comes from this intelligence. LDS doctrine teaches that all beings, including Jesus, existed first in an eternal, uncreated intelligence. That comes from Doctrine in Covenants chapter 93, verse 29, states that intelligence was not created or made and has always existed. Well, even LDS theologians would say, okay, that's hard to understand exactly what Joseph Smith meant. So I said, hey, listen, in fairness, go grab the average Biola student or the average uh Biola faculty member who wasn't in our Bible department and say, hey, could you very quickly explain the Trinity to me? I I think most of us would stop and go, oh, okay, ooh, boy. All right, hang with me. This is my best attempt to explain the Trinity. So that's what the faculty commented on later is, hey, thank you for agreeing that the Trinity is a pretty hard complex because they ultimately disagree with it. But thank you for equating that with what we call the intelligence. And all three of these faculty said, yeah, you were we're in the deep end of the swimming pool when it comes to LDS theology. So I think they appreciated me trying to go there and to try to understand it as best I possibly could, and then try to present the complexity as well as the other stages. That I think we, you know, um, stage number three is that Christ had a mortal body. He was born of the Virgin Mary. Stage five is resurrection and glorification. Um, and stage six is a current exalted state, right? So these are things that were more in my wheelhouse, but I decided to go after the most complex one, which they would agree is stage number one. So again, I think that's my willingness to give it the best shot at me understanding some of your most complex theological points and then opening it up for input and critique.

Rick Langer: And did you find things in that reading process or thinking process that were challenging to you or your views, or did it just seem like, well, that's weird, you know, easy to dismiss the differences?

Tim Muehlhoff: Well, you go into it with the attitude of, I'm not going to critique this. I'm going to seek to understand. That's a really wild way to approach it, Rick. Is that, yeah, my antennas would go up, obviously, like, hey, I don't think we're buying this intelligence thing, right? This sounds very Gnostic-ish to me in some ways, but my goal here is to understand it, not critique would come way too quick. I first wanted to show them. And then I'll say this about their theologians. I was at a meeting in Salt Lake City with uh evangelical theologians and LDS theologians, and we were all given a book by a theologian named Underwood explaining um Mormon theology. And Rick, it is really well written, and it is very complex. So they have their A-team. We have our A-team. And then you probably have, you know, the JV, the sophomore teams that give very popular versions of things. I was trying to give the A-teams understanding of very complex, and and they are scholars. I mean, they've really rolled up their sleeves to try to present very confusing concepts. And so when I tried to honor that complexity, but it was an education, Rick. I honestly didn't know much about the LDS faith heading into this. And I felt like I got a more robust understanding. And where this is a great phrase you love, where the disagreements really are, to pinpoint those is a really great exercise.

Rick Langer: Yeah. No, that and that that is one of those things I think that is worth it because I think for a lot of us, we have a pretty quick intuition that they deny the Trinity, but that doesn't tell you much of anything about what they affirm by definition. Yeah. And it also leaves you with kind of a very vague sense of where our disagreement. I mean, obviously that's a disagreement, but as you already pointed out, we have so many illustrations of the Trinity that are actually heretical. Oh, that's not actually the Trinity. That's modalism. That's right. You know, it's it's whatever heresy, because most of our illustrations really are that way. I think I think uh that issue saying so it's fine to say they disagree with the Trinity, but what does that tangibly mean? Um, and this sounds like a good exercise for helping to put your finger on some of that.

Tim Muehlhoff: And you know what I came away with, Rick, those three days with the faculty, there were two from the Bible department, and then one was not from the Bible department. So when I finished giving that presentation and interacting with the BYU students, I went back to uh be in the back with them because now students would talk about the two presentations and tables. I went back there and and a Bible uh one of their Bible profs looked at me and said, Hey, thanks. That was good. And I was like, wow, that's awesome. Like that's a real imagine saying that to a neighbor that you really disagree politically with each other, right? And you say, Okay, help me. Is this what you believe about this? And you finish, and the neighbor goes, Hey, uh, yeah, thanks. That was good.

Rick Langer: That that's man, that's a great there's an interesting sense of achievement with that, right? Uh okay, good. Now now we've got some.

Tim Muehlhoff: All right, you add other parts here. Okay, so that was the intellectual part. Here's a different part that was really personal and deeply moving to the BYU students. So we made a public commitment to each other. Remember, they came here on a scouting trip last year. They came to Westmont, Us, and Azusa, and uh spent a day with each other. And so we we organized that day. And then at the very end of that day, I said, hey, what if we made a commitment to each other that we not make fun of each other's communities? We don't feed into air uh easy stereotypes. And if our friends do that, then let's just step up and say that that's just not um acceptable. Let's not do that. So, Rick, I I think I told you the story uh that it honestly, the very next day a person walked in my office and made a joke about uh he said, uh, did you ask about their magic underwear? And they walk out of my office. And I felt the conviction of the spirit immediately. I mean, Rick, it wasn't even 24 hours. I made that pledge. So I went and grabbed uh that person and said, Hey, could you refrain from that? Because we kind of made that right, made that promise. I shared that story. I can't tell you how many BYU students came up and said, you know, it's really a slur to call them underwear. These are sacred garments, and and they they represent a pledge that we've made to the Heavenly Father. And it is a reminder, like you might carry a cross in your pocket. These are sacred garments that have been blessed and are a constant reminder of my fidelity to the Heavenly Father. And uh to call them underwear is like walking up to a Jewish student with a yarmulke and saying something like, Hey, does your little hat keep you warm? Right? I mean, we would look at that and say, Whoa, dude, what are you doing? So the fact that we would stand up for each other's sacred core, this this is James Davison Hunter from his book, Culture Wars. Each community has a sacred core. And when you defend another person's sacred core, not necessarily agree with it, but say, hey, that is sacred to a community, and I'm not gonna belittle that. I'm certainly not gonna make fun of that. That really made a difference to these BYU students. And I would get emails periodically. Uh, I've received at least three or four emails from students after they left saying it really meant a lot to us that you would do that.

Rick Langer: That's a great example. Uh, you know, uh we hadn't talked about that particular issue. And as I think about, I realize that is one of those things that comes up a lot when uh I hear evangelicals talking about Mormons and weird things about Mormon belief that they would disagree with. Yeah, that is, and it is an interesting thing to think. I I've never even asked the question of myself for what do they actually think about this quote underwear thing? I I just I have no concept and it's batted around as an easy way to you know make make fun of something that you know may be very significant for them. The the Yarmaka analogy is a good one. I Catholics will have rosary beans, uh other things like this that you can mock, and it kind of betrays oftentimes it's born of a lack of understanding. We haven't taken the time to understand it, but also kind of a little bit of a sense of malice or mockery towards the other other tribe, so to speak. So, anyhow, that's interesting.

Tim Muehlhoff: So, you know what I did now? I uh I I preempted with my friends. I preempted with them saying, Hey, I just want to uh say to you, uh, I've made a pledge to uh these LDS students, these faculty, not to just let sarcasm or whatever. So just be mindful of be mindful of that. Like don't make me have to confront you. But I think that's great to create these relationship rules. Because remember, you and I have talked about there's the pre-conversation, there's the conversation, there's the post-one. And we've actually said that we've struggled a little bit with the post-one of how do you talk about people you disagree with in your in-group? I think this is one little step of addressing the in-group, saying, let's not make fun of the president anymore like that. We can we can disagree, of course, but let's let's up the respectfulness a little bit. I think it takes Hutzpah to do, but I think we got to start doing that.

Rick Langer: Yeah, well, and it sounds like an interesting uh that's a great analogy in terms of that, that kind of almost serving like a spiritual discipline to make you aware of the kinds of things that go on in your in-group and the danger that is for the kind of momentum it gets for creating a culture of contempt or things like that that is not conducive. And this is totally different than do we agree or not? It's simply an issue of saying um, do what kind of attitudes are we cultivating towards people to who are made in God's image, who are called to give an answer with gentleness and with respect, you know, all of that kind of thing. These are the people and how am I doing when I program myself this way? And it works perfectly well. In fact, even as you were talking, I resonate more of that with some of my political others. Yeah. And the kind of things it's really easy to drift into that because that probably gets more reinforced every day. And it's so that much easier to just kind of go down that road if you don't intentionally commit to saying, you know what, I'm not going to say things like that.

Tim Muehlhoff: Uh yeah, and I think we need to start we we have to start doing it. Hey, I th I thought I just literally thought of an illustration from one of my favorite shows, The West Wing. Do you remember you remember the West Wing? Yeah. Okay, absolutely. My middle son and I watch it nonstop, and I usually butcher these illustrations and he corrects them later. But let me give you one that is amazing. So, President Bartlett um is is progressive, and somebody on his staff actually critiques one of his decisions. Like they actually do it publicly. Okay, so they're brought into Leo McGarry's office. This is the chief of staff of the president of the United States, who isn't overly thrilled that you publicly criticize the boss's boss's boss. Okay. So this woman sits down, here's Leo McGarry, and uh Leo takes her, you know, he he says, This is not acceptable, do not do it again. And she goes, Am I being fired? And he goes, No, you're not. And do you know why you're not being fired? And she goes, I have no idea. He goes, Because in your critique, you referred to him as President Bartlett, not just Bartlett. If it would have been Bartlett, you would have been fired. But you said President Bartlett and gave him the due respect. So let's let's let this water be under the bridge. But thank you for respecting the president. That's kind of wild, right? Yeah, that's interesting. I mean, it is President Trump. You can say whatever you want, but it is Secretary Clinton, right? It is First Lady Melania. And I think we've lost that decorum. And I think we need to get the decorum back a little bit in our respectful disagreements. What do you think?

Rick Langer: Yeah, you know what? I uh we've we've done a few things with debate things, both at Biola kind of in conjunction with uh uh kind of a grant that that we've been participating in, and I've had a few of these other structures in the course of time we've been doing this. And one of the things that people do is say address the chair, you know, Mr. Chairman, right? Or things like that. The way the language that you use to address the other person has a pretty powerful impact on the attitude that you follow up with. And it's hard to be as snarky as you might want to be when you're referring to the other person in kind of a pre uh in a honorific or dignified intentionally explicitly respectful manner.

Tim Muehlhoff: You know, my first week at Biola, a student asked the question, and they uh the question was like this. And again, this is a little bit California culture. Uh the student said, Hey, dude, on the syllabus, and I said, Uh, excuse me, it's Dr. Dude. Right? And everybody laughed. Do you know I got an email from him later that day that said, Dr. Muehlhoff, I'm really sorry. I did not mean to be disrespectful. And I said, you know what? Thank you for the email. I really appreciate that. But it is Dr. Muehlhoff, right? So we don't have to go crazy and attack people because we feel slighted. That that little bit of humor, you know, documents.

Rick Langer: That goes a long way with that. It does. Yeah.

Tim Muehlhoff: It does. And we've kind of forgotten that. Okay, my last one, Rick. My last one. All right, I'm ready. You know, we're contractually obligated to mention C. S. Lewis every podcast.

Rick Langer: We are No, I don't know.

Tim Muehlhoff: We are yes, he's one of our biggest sponsors. So I I dropped a C. S. Lewis quote on him, and it's a it's a very famous quote about friendship that friends look in the same direction. So I I just said to him, you know, this whole three days together, or the or the seven weeks we did Zoom once a week, it this can't just be about what we get wrong. It's gotta also be about what we get right together. And so I really affirmed the students in front of everybody saying, um, I was at that uh meeting in Salt Lake City, and they had two lawyers get up, an evangelical lawyer and uh a Mormon lawyer. And the evangelical lawyer said, Listen, you enjoy religious freedom today, and there is no stronger uh advocate for religious freedom in this country than the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. They put money, time, scholarship, and they have protected our religious freedom of everybody: evangelical, Mormon, Muslim, uh uh, the Jewish community. Um, then we had another group get up on addressing the welfare of children across the world. Again, it was an evangelical and uh uh somebody who represents uh social justice within the LDS Church. And the evangelical said at that meeting, he said, Listen, um, the LDS Church cares about the rights of children and cares about women, and we can certainly work together to try to protect these women. So I thank them in front of everybody saying, Man, thank you so much for doing neighbor love. It is the second great commandment, and you have provided us a great example of what that looks like in action. And thank you so much for doing that. So it wasn't just us disagreeing, let's go back to the Trinity one more time and restate our disagreements. It was finding ways to complement each other and talk about those areas of agreement and even admiration, if I can use that word. I think that's really important to do in the midst of family relationships, co-workers, neighbors. It just can't always be us butting heads with each other.

Rick Langer: So let me ask you a follow-up question on all of this. Did you have a time where you like stood at the whiteboard and said, okay, let's lay out fundamental disagreements that remain after all of this, are unlikely to be changed, and are of sufficient magnitude that we might actually doubt the other person's eternal salvation.

Tim Muehlhoff: Um we had done that for the seven weeks. We had talked about our different views of scripture, Jesus, we talked about the Trinity. And so I think during those three days, it became pretty obvious where the big disagreements were. And again, we would give them communication tools and then say, okay, now let's use that tool and talking about our different views of who Jesus was, and that's when we did the method of dialectic. So I think we finished the three days with people mostly walking away saying, we both revere Jesus, but we really have different perceptions, theological perceptions at the core of who Jesus is. And then we identified the Trinity that they just do not buy the Trinitarian concept of God. They believe in three separate gods. So yeah, I think at the end of those three days, we walked away saying we've identified at least two really big differences of opinion.

Rick Langer: So let me just make a couple of comments about that. One is that I think there's kind of a parallel in terms of the understanding that you would find of Jesus among Mormons and among Muslims. Um, not in terms of the de theological details and affirmations. They would, you know, a Muslim would never use the language of Jesus being a God, whatever, however, many other gods or whatever. That's just not happening. But what I'm saying is that they they view Jesus fundamentally differently than we do. But generally speaking, they would be uh uh affirming, respectful, and would view Jesus as kind of an exalted honored prophet, perhaps analogous to the way a Jewish person might view Moses that never call him God, but they certainly aren't thinking, eh, that old Moses dude, who cares about him or something? You know, there's this high regard. And I think the Muslims would abs would very much include Jesus with this package of prophets. It includes people like like Moses and Abraham and you know all of these other folks that are part of their uh scriptures too. But they have in instead of a Book of Mormon, they have a Quran that uh you know transcends, I don't want to say it displaces because they don't throw out all the other scriptures, but you know who's in the in the key place. And I think it's important. I so having said that, I think the average Muslim would quickly agree with that both both that, yeah, yeah, we do respect Jesus as an honor prophet or whatever. On the other hand, we absolutely disagree with this issue about God, and there's no question that we view the theology and the destiny of people's eternal souls as departing down two different roads because of that difference. I think one of the tensions that has has come up with uh the Mormon context is that that becomes sometimes less clear. Um, I'm not necessarily saying that this is true of people who are Mormon theologians, uh, you know, LDS, you know, the the the careful theology of it, but kind of at a popular level, there's kind of a sense of, oh, what's the big what's the big deal? Right. What's the big difference? And so I think these things are always a danger. You and I have been at a couple of these contacts where we've had, uh I remember one in particular, you'll probably remember too. I won't give it the name, but where where people are talking about religious differences and you know, Muslims, Hindus, all this, and you have this weird feeling like, hey, we all have a faith and we all desire good things, so we're all doing the same thing. And I'm kind of like, well, no, no, and no. No, it just doesn't work that way. Yeah, and so we've got to get better at being forthcoming about the honest disagreements. And I appreciate you guys making efforts to to articulate some of those things, and I just kind of want to underscore for me the how important that is for doing healthy um conversations across convictional divides.

Tim Muehlhoff: Yeah, and so you know, when we did the method of the dialectic, we asked the students to comment, but Andy and I commented. And here was my comment about Andy's view of Jesus. I said, Andy, thank you for mentioning the Trinity. Like that that's really important. But I I I think you need to understand it is from the Trinity that everything flows. Like it's not a tag on, it it is the relationship of the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. And from that we understand who God is, God is love. So that is a central part of the evangelical position. And a couple of students from BYU afterwards said, okay, that we didn't realize it was exactly that. So that's such a great moment to say, no, guys, I'm sorry. The disagreement is probably even deeper than you think and more significant than you think. That's a nice way to tighten things up between the two communities.

Rick Langer: Yeah.

Tim Muehlhoff: Yep.

Rick Langer: Yeah. And it and it's important with it to be able, uh, I get one other thing that I'll say before we wrap up here is that one of the things I hear a lot uh in broader public discourse are things like, oh, so you're sending somebody to hell because they don't believe this thing or that thing or that kind of language. I I would add that to my list of things like you were talking about before, making jokes about magic underwear. There's some of that that I'm saying, I'm not sending anyone to hell. I have no illusion that that is my power. I'm simply saying that God has ordained a certain path to get to him. He, we haven't found our way to God. God has found our way to us. Yeah. And so it's very much like, you know, saying, hey, you know, God's up on top of a mountain. There's a million ways to get up to the top of the mountain. I'm like, yeah, but what if you're lost on a mountain and you're trying to get home? How many ways are there to get home? Right. At some point, the bottom line is you can't say, oh, we'll just go down the west side, it doesn't matter. No, your house is on the east side. And you, if you go down the west side, you'll you'll have to walk all the way around the world. And I'm guaranteeing you, those extra 25,000 miles are gonna keep you from successfully completing that trip back to your house.

Tim Muehlhoff: Yes.

Rick Langer: Uh you've got to get that road right. And I think those kinds of things are what we are saying and what we actually conflict about in the religious context. And I'm saying, right.

Tim Muehlhoff: Two last comments about that. Even in our disagreement, can we still help women, children, and protect religious freedom? I think the answer is yes.

Rick Langer: Second is absolutely yes.

Tim Muehlhoff: Absolutely. And second, this we we hope this dialogue continues, like the Pomona dialogue that's in its fifth year. So we didn't want to resolve, I mean, you know what I mean? This conversation's gonna continue between two great universities and two great faith traditions. So we want to keep the communication climate strong and keep this conversation going. You and I are gonna teach a class on the Israel-Palestine disagreement. Well, when you bring together all of that, this is a long, complex conversation. So uh we can't get impatient to want to wrap everything up in three days or in seven weeks of zooming in uh once a week.

Rick Langer: Yeah. Yeah, that's that's right. Well, hey, there's been great talking about this, Tim. Uh, and I'd like to thank all of our listeners for joining us. We want to thank you for being with us and love to have you be a regular listener. Please subscribe on uh Apple Podcasts or Spotify or wherever it is that you'd like to get your podcasts from. Um, and we'd also encourage you to check out the Winsome Conviction website. There's lots of resources there. Um, and uh you'll find both past copies of the podcast, but also a lot of other things we've done over the course of these last several years. So we'd love to have you uh be that, and we'd love to also give you some rating on Apple Podcasts. If you uh listen to us regularly, uh please uh put in a good word, and that's a wonderful thing for helping uh get the word out about the Winsome Conviction Project. Thanks again for joining us.