We all want to be against racism and injustice. Leading voices in the culture today tell us that to be "antiracist" and to work for social justice, we need to embrace a neo-Marxist ideology called "Critical Theory." This theory hides under the attractive label "antiracism," but beneath that hides a whole list of interconnected causes, including but not limited to Critical Race Theory (CRT), Gender Theory, Queer Theory, and so on. Unfortunately, many well-meaning Christians turn to these cultural "solutions" without knowing their deeply anti-Christian roots. Sadly, many of these Christians soon find themselves giving subtle support to socialism, abortion, and transgenderism. In this episode, we discuss the danger posed by the new woke ideology and encourage Christians to pursue biblical unity at a time of increasing division with our friends at the Center for Biblical Unity.
Everything you need to know about this episode: Landing Page
Website: Disciple Nations Alliance
We all want to be against racism and injustice. Leading voices in the culture today tell us that to be "antiracist" and to work for social justice, we need to embrace a neo-Marxist ideology called "Critical Theory." This theory hides under the attractive label "antiracism," but beneath that hides a whole list of interconnected causes, including but not limited to Critical Race Theory (CRT), Gender Theory, Queer Theory, and so on. Unfortunately, many well-meaning Christians turn to these cultural "solutions" without knowing their deeply anti-Christian roots. Sadly, many of these Christians soon find themselves giving subtle support to socialism, abortion, and transgenderism. In this episode, we discuss the danger posed by the new woke ideology and encourage Christians to pursue biblical unity at a time of increasing division with our friends at the Center for Biblical Unity.
Everything you need to know about this episode: Landing Page
Website: Disciple Nations Alliance
I think we've got to help people get out of the race conversation and into the ideology conversation, because that's really the divider.
Luke:Hi friends. Welcome back to another episode of Ideas Have Consequences. As Christians our mission is to spread the gospel around the world to all the nations. But our mission also includes transforming the nations to increasingly reflect the truth, goodness, and beauty of God's kingdom. Tragically, the church has largely neglected the second part of her mission and today, Christians have little influence on their surrounding cultures. Join us on this podcast as we rediscover what it means for each of us to disciple the nations and to create Christ honoring cultures that reflect the character of the living God.
Scott:Hello, and welcome to Ideas Have Consequences, the podcast of the Disciple Nations Alliance. My name is Scott Allen and I'm president of the DNA, along with Luke and coworker Tim Williams, and a couple of wonderful, very special guests today. We have talked with these folks before, but it's been too long, so I'm so happy to have them back with us. Monique Duson and Krista Bontrager with the Center for Biblical Unity, a fantastic organization. One that's been such a huge encouragement to me, to us, and to so many in these these times that we're living in right now. And so guys, thank you for taking time to spend and hang out with us and, and just catch up on what you've been doing and topics that we have a similar interest in.
Krista Bontrager:Happy to be here.
Monique Duson:Thanks for having us.
Scott:Yeah, it's great. Great to have you back. I've been following your ministry. And it just seems like things have been really growing and opportunities are abounding. And you've been traveling around a lot, including to my hometown of Bend, Oregon. And so yeah, hey, maybe before we get into this, I've got some questions. But just catch us up on on your work. What's been happening and what are you excited about? And how has the the travels and the events that you've been doing? Have they been going?
Monique Duson:Things have been going well. it's very busy.
Krista Bontrager:Monique loves being on the road.
Monique Duson:I love being on the road. I could literally be on the road every week. I find it to be fun to travel, to meet people who are—you know, according to Scripture—brothers and sisters, so I completely enjoy it. I think one of the things that I am noticing when we're on the road is the conversation of race and how the conversation of race is also hooked to so many other conversations that we're seeing in the culture. And I'm sure we'll get into all of that. But just being able to meet new people to have helpful, hopeful conversations with people. Conversations that don't have to end in, you're just fragile because you're white, or you're just forever a victim because you're a minority. Having biblically hopeful conversations is awesome. And then I think what I'm looking forward to is reconciling our curriculum on ethnic and like racial unity, and what it means for the believer, for the believer to be reconciled to one another. That's actually going to come to print at probably mid summer. And so it is a digital curriculum that's available right now. But it will be available hardcopy in just a few months.
Krista Bontrager:A few weeks.
Monique Duson:Few weeks. Yeah. Well, yeah, weeks.
Krista Bontrager:I think another thing we're noticing while we're out on the road is, everywhere we go there's conversations about race generally, but it often shows up different depending on where we are. So having race conversations are is different in Seattle, versus Minneapolis, versus Birmingham. So yeah, people are engaged in the race conversation, but it shows up differently.
Scott:Can you explain that a little bit Krista? How do you see the differences? I'd love to hear. I'm very curious.
Krista Bontrager:Yeah, I think that what we see is every city has its own unique communities, and different ethnicities, different histories, different cultures. So for example, in Minneapolis, they have a very large Hmong culture. And the Hmungs started migrating there in the early 80s. And has still... a lot of them work in high tech industries, but they still live together in their own cultural community for the most part. But there's also a very large Somali presence there in the Minneapolis area. And the historically white Lutherans who are from Norwegian, Scandinavian descent. And they're all kind of mixed up. They're together. And a large African American community. So you have a lot of diversity in there, in middle America, whereas when we go to Birmingham—Birmingham is ethnically diverse, it's more of a black/white dynamic, but one of the more ethnically peaceful places that we've gone to. Which surprises people, because historically, Birmingham has not been that way. And we really enjoy Birmingham quite a lot. We've been there a couple of times now and greatly enjoy it. Where we live here in Southern California is extremely diverse. Our neighborhood is very diverse. We've got practically every group imaginable just in our little neighborhood. I think that the mixture, like everyone lives side by side here in Southern California, whereas other parts of the country, people tend to still be in groups. So no matter where we go, we're just always looking, observing, studying and seeing how race and culture shows up for that particular community.
Scott:Guys, it's interesting, I think you're right about how important these differences are in the different communities. I noticed up here in the Pacific Northwest—I'm from Phoenix and Phoenix, like LA, is pretty diverse. It's not maybe as diverse as LA, but it's pretty diverse right now. But when I come up here to the Pacific Northwest, one of the things I noticed is that it's not nearly as ethnically diverse, it's very white. But it's interesting. It's also one of the hotbeds for critical race theory and support for Black Lives Matter. People up here are very passionate, you see a lot of signs, even to this day, out in people's front yards supporting the woke ideology and Black Lives Matter. I noticed that very strongly up here, in a very white community that doesn't have a lot of personal experience like you would in Birmingham, for example, of actually living together. So it's something I've noticed as well, I think it's kind of an interesting thing.
Monique Duson:I think it also leads to a conversation of ideology, and where we find different ideologies around America. And so you know, definitely on the West Coast, we find an ideology or framework that leads more I'll say, quote, unquote, race—leftist, (not racist, leftist,) if we're thinking politics. But even as far as Christianity goes, I would say this whole West Coast tends to lean a little bit more progressive in their theology and things like that. At least in my experience, from our travels and things like that. But the ideology doesn't necessarily correlate with ethnicity or race, so to speak. What we're finding is that you can get your white upper middle class suburban house mom, who's ready to rally with BLM. And you can also see your conservative, maybe socio economically lower middle class, a black man who's ready to rally with the Republicans. So I think there's a lot of dynamics that are shifting just across our nation overall, but things are not staying as they maybe once work.
Krista Bontrager:I think we've got to help people get out of the race conversation and into the ideology conversation. Because that's really the divider. I know the media wants to divide us according to race. But in our experience, that's actually not the actual divider. It's the ideology.
Scott:Absolutely, Krista, I completely agree with that. Guys, we're jumping right into what I wanted to talk with you guys about today, which is just to get your sense of kind of the lay of the land, especially after you've been traveling around. But let me just give folks a little bit of background if there are new listeners to the podcast, in terms of who you folks are and what our connections been. A couple of years ago, I was very alarmed as the leader of a ministry that focuses on the power of biblical truth to bring transformation in broken communities. Just very alarmed at what I was seeing in terms of the rise of this kind of Neo Marxist "woke", what we now call I think pretty commonly, this"woke" ideology. I was just seeing it, not only in the culture but also in the church. Really could see that this was a conflicting, in many ways unbiblical worldview that was very destructive. It was very divisive. And you know, I thought, man, if this ideology continues to gain ground in the culture, we're just going to come apart. It is just going to tear everybody apart. Almost like the tribalism that many of our DNA friends around the world are familiar with in other parts of the world like Africa. So I wrote a book,"Why Social Justice is Not Biblical Justice" to try to remind people what biblical justice is and how it's different from this ideology that likes to use the word justice to describe itself. And it was in the process of, of launching that book that I came across the Center for Biblical Unity and Monique. I just was really looking for other people who are thinking like I was, because even in the church, I was noticing there wasn't a lot. A lot of the key leaders in the church were either dabbling with woke ideology, or in some way directly or indirectly supporting it, which became very alarming to me as well, like, this is not right. So I was thinking, Gosh, who are the folks that are in the church that are in the Christian community, Evangelical community, who are speaking out, and that's where I came across you guys, and really began to see you guys are providing an incredible leadership in this movement. And really, in some ways, are on the front lines of kind of pushing back against critical race theory. It caused me to think here recently, if you go back a couple of years, almost nobody would know what you were talking about if you use that phrase, critical race theory. Maybe they would, in terms of "woke", but very few people had any kind of understanding of what this was. Now, I think we changed a lot, there's been a great kind of learning, a lot more awareness. Would you guys agree with that? It seems like there's been a pretty big change over the last couple of years, in a positive way, but I wanted to get your sense of it, as people in a ministry that's really doing the same thing. It's trying to help people understand what the Bible teaches about issues of justice and issues of just how do we live together as brothers and sisters in Christ, regardless of our skin color, right? I mean, that's the Center for Biblical Unity. Feel free to describe your ministry, by the way, to our listeners, but then I'd love to just get your sense of where do you see us at after a couple of years of pretty intense focus on this issue, I would say?
Krista Bontrager:Well, the Center for Biblical Unity... Our motto is "One Race, One People, One Savior." And so our focus is on helping people have Biblically centered, biblically focused conversations related to racial unity and biblical justice. And really trying to... Well, one of the things that we learned in 2020 was a lot of Christians just really didn't have a very robust framework for how to think about race and justice in a biblical way. And they were just kind of getting swept up in whatever the culture was telling them. Here's some words. Here's some ideas. Here's some books. Not recognizing, like, hey, look, the Bible was out in front on these conversations 1000s of years before candy, and so you know, there's some things that we can learn there. And I think in 2019, would you say, we couldn't pay people to pay attention to critical race theory? We were trying.
Scott:Well, you guys were definitely ahead of the curve.
Krista Bontrager:We had made several videos in 2019, trying to get people to pay attention. I saw the issue from the beginning from an apologetic standpoint, because I've worked in apologetics for 25 years. And I kept trying to sound the alarm, starting in 2018, telling all of my colleagues in apologetics—and I knew some fairly prominent apologists—everybody that I could get an ear with? I would tell them this is the next big apologetics threat, like we need to be prepared for what is coming. And I had a very difficult time getting people to pay attention. I was told that,
Monique Duson:Yeah, people didn't know what to do. I think what are you even talking about? I've never heard of this. This Krista is definitely given a very clear description of what is just a fad. Don't worry about it. And so I thought, well, if I we do, who we are. I think, for me—yes, we definitely want to can't get people to pay attention, I'm just going to start making videos on my small channel about it. So I have Christ centered biblical conversations around race, bamboozled Monique into helping me out.
Krista Bontrager:This is our videos had like 30 views, 50
Monique Duson:It's true. justice and unity. What we're seeing, though, is that, as we views. I couldn't get people to pay attention. And then when are the Center for Biblical Unity, our unity is in Christ George Floyd happened, it just kind of all blew up and then first. And so we also have conversations about things that people needed resources. keep us unified in Christ. Once we're clear on the fact that our ethnic unity is solidified through the writings of Paul in Ephesians, and the prayer that Jesus prayed in John 17, and things in Colossians. Like once we get that, we are also free to have other conversations. We have conversations about things like diversity, equity, and inclusion, or social emotional learning. How things are showing up in the realm of education that will bring division between parent and child. How do you maintain unity even in your home? How do you protect your child from the divisive frameworks that are seeking to steal your kid away, to a degree, and steal them away from the historic Christian faith? How do we unify around the queer agenda or critical child theory? How are we unifying, not just around critical race theory and making sure that we have an apologetic for critical race theory, but how do we have an apologetic for life and apologetic for why these social theories are of no match or answer to what the Christian has?
Luke:Hi, friends, thanks again, for listening. We're so thankful that you're joining us for this relevant and important discussion today. If you'd like to learn more about the great work that the Center for Biblical Unity is doing, you can find them on Instagram, Facebook, Twitter, and YouTube, and the website is the centerfor biblicalunity.com. Throughout the episode, we discuss a lot of fantastic resources that can help anyone who is interested in learning more about biblical unity and justice. I'll have those all linked in the show notes at the end of the episode. One resource I'd like to share with you real quickly, though, is "Why Social Justice is Not Biblical Justice (An Urgent Appeal to Fellow Christians in a Time of Social Crisis)" by Scott Allen. This book does an excellent job of not just recognizing the problem of the new woke social justice, but more importantly, addresses how Christians can lean into the Bible as our foundation for any solution to injustice we face. Lastly, if you enjoy listening to Ideas Have Consequences and want to help us share it, please consider sending this episode to a friend and while you're at it, go ahead and click that follow button on Apple podcast or wherever you're listening.
Scott:Amen. Yeah, I'm so glad you guys are out there. Because this again, the ideology is is so... I call it toxic. It's so destructive. I feel like it is an acid that just tears apart relationships. And the Bible, as you were saying, Monique and Krista, it really does—it's very powerful message of unity—and diversity actually, it affirms them both—and because of that, it allows you in a way that no other worldview does, it allows for this really powerful, healthy kind of society. But I think a lot of Christians don't even know what we've got. Whereas the woke ideology is to me, it's pushing kind of this very divisive ideology that kind of wants to reduce you to things like skin color, or gender, and then pit you against one another in kind of, one group is an oppressor and the other group is a victim of their oppression, kind of way.
Krista Bontrager:I want to clarify that we oppose the critical social theories, not because they come out of academia or because they have connections academically or intellectually to Neo Marxism. That's not why we oppose the critical social theories. We oppose the critical social theories, because the foundational core tenets of those frameworks are in opposition to the Christian worldview. So the straw man that people make about us is that well, you just oppose these things because you don't like secular scholarship. And that's just simply a straw man against our position. That's not our position.
Monique Duson:That's one of the straw man.
Krista Bontrager:You know, I worked in science apologetics for 23 years. I am highly conversant in scientific literature, the nature of general revelation, and the importance of a well thought out well constructed argument in academia. The critical social series, the reason we oppose them is not because there's connections to Neo Marxism, although we see that as being deeply problematic, the reason we oppose them is because we truly believe that they are in opposition at the foundational level, to the Christian worldview, and secondarily that the Christian worldview has a better answer.
Scott:Yeah, no question. And I so appreciate that focus. And I think the other side of it is that what the Christian worldview offers is so much better. We have something that—why in the world would we give up this priceless treasure that we have, in terms of the belief system that comes through the Bible, for something that is so destructive? It just it's just wrong. But I think a lot of times, we don't realize what we have just how powerful it is how it has the ability to create healthy, flourishing societies. Just societies. You guys, I think one of the reasons that it's gained such traction in the evangelical church is because of uses, as you guys have alluded to, it uses, very deceptively, it uses very positive sounding words and language to label itself. And it's not open and honest, about what its real agenda is. Right? If you say, "Oh, this is Marxist," people will say, "No, it's not. It has nothing to do with Marx." And so they'll deny a clear connection there. But they'll use words like equity and inclusion and anti racism. And of course, we all—justice, right? [unintelligible] Social and emotional learning, man, that sounds great! Right? So it's very deceptive. But I think you can help our listeners, just to clarify, because this is still a problem. This is my observation. It's still a problem in the church that people are being fooled by the use of great words that have been redefined in a deceptive way. Can you guys help us a little bit with some of that? What are some of the key phrases and words that are being used to describe the woke movement generally, whether it's a gender or race, and what did they mean by these words, that's different than maybe what we have in our heads? And I know, that's a big question. But maybe you could pick a couple of examples.
Monique Duson:I think for me—because I actually did uphold critical social justice, critical race theory, things like that—for me, I tend to say that I was just born justice oriented. Like, I've always wanted to do social service. I've always wanted to help orphans. I always wanted to help the poor. But these conversations when I came into the church weren't happening in church. When they did happen in church, they happened more among the minorities in the church. And there was a certain way in which they happen, it sounded much like the conversations I would have on the streets or at home and things like that. There was no real biblical lens or slant to it, aside from God says that you should help the poor.
Krista Bontrager:Or do justice.
Monique Duson:Or do justice. And so these Bible verses were like, well, you need to do justice. You need to help the poor—which are great. And I would not say that those are not biblical, they are biblical principles. But we also have to understand the description of what those things mean. How does it describe it in Scripture? How does it describe the way that we should do those things? So for me, when I would read a passage like Micah six that says, you need to act justly or do justice and love mercy and walk humbly with your God? Well, I would focus on justice. And I would then apply a very cultural definition to the word justice, instead of looking just above or below that verse and reading the verse in context to understand what it actually means to do justice and how to do it. Yes. And so you can go to like Leviticus or Deuteronomy, where it says to love your neighbor. Well, I want to love my neighbor, so of course, we should all vote for more Medi-Cal (or Medicare in the rest of the nation). More social programs. More feeding programs, and things like that more welfare programs. But how does it tell us to love our neighbor? Well, loving our neighbor is a direct action that I apply for myself. It's not a social gospel, it's words or God's direction from me to my neighbor. We can look at the the situation of gleaning, which was God's way of providing food for the poor. How does gleaning laws directly impact us today? Well, one of the trans cultural principles I can extrapolate from that is that I can take responsibility, because I understand God's moral law in providing or maybe allowing for the reserve or extra to go toward someone who may be in need, my poor neighbor, my neighbor who is in need of food. It's not about creating more social programs, but it is about believers who have hearts that are impacted by God's moral law, who stepped into communities or into the lives of their neighbors to be able to help provide those things. I think, for me, as a social justice warrior, or somebody who was impacted by the critical social theories, I would have said, taking a Bible verse like love your neighbor or do justice, I would have said, see, this is the proof that we need to do cultural justice. The problem with cultural justice is that you get very entwined in the culture and their definitions of justice. So now I'm going to advocate for Reproductive Justice, which is another word for abortion, or I'm going to advocate for the justice or"just acts" of marriage equality, which would bring in things like the marriage of homosexuals and things like that. I would advocate for the culture's definitions of justice, not the biblical definitions of justice.
Krista Bontrager:I think some of the other terms that people might hear in their everyday life might be diversity, equity, and inclusion. People are having to go to these trainings in their workplaces, or they might hear in an educational context, if they're working in education, phrases like cultural competency, social emotional learning, allyship. There's a new emerging thing I've seen more and more that I think is the future is "belonging." I think they're going to start having "belonging" trainings that will be added on to diversity, equity, and inclusion. Anti racism is, in my opinion, that I think anti racism is the core moral structure around which our public education system is being reorganized. So that's another word that people might hear.
Scott:And when people talk in the culture—let's say Ibram X. Kendi, he's a big advocate for anti racism—what do they mean by that? What does an anti racism actually mean? Because I don't think it's still what a lot of people think it means. Could you describe it?
Krista Bontrager:I'll let Monique, she has a really good answer to that. So I'll let her jump in with that.
Monique Duson:So being an anti racist, according to Kendi, in his book, "How to Be an Antiracist," is that you are not simply just not being a racist, That's not enough. It's that you are actively advocating for policies, laws that support the equitable results of people of color. It is not just that you are now advocating for people of color, it is also that you are advocating for the rights of LGBTQ+ communities and individuals. That you are advocating for the sexual minority. For fat people or obese people, people who struggle with that, because they are also seen as a minority group or an oppressed group. And so he lists out an entire myriad of oppressed category. So to be anti racist, the bait and switch here or the Trojan horse here is, you bring in this shiny horse that says, hey, I want to be an anti racist. Because look, I don't want to be racist. Being a racist in our culture today is horrible. So I don't want to do that. When you bring it into your home though, they open up the side of this Trojan horse, and now you're advocating for abortion. You're advocating for the rights of the queer. You're advocating for all of these things that culture is telling you, you must advocate for. Because according to Kendi, you cannot be anti racist and yet be against the rights of the homosexual.
Krista Bontrager:Or, "Smash the patriarchy." Or ableist studies, fat studies, all of these things are all hooked together. And I think that's one of the most common misunderstandings that we see among pastors is that they think they're doing a noble thing by telling their people to be anti racist. And what they don't understand is that the critical race theory or anti racism, which is Kendi's version of it, is one car in a whole train of cars. So think of the engine is the critical social theories. And then behind that might be feminist studies, where we're going to promote for radical egalitarianism and smashing all patriarchal structures; critical race theory; queer theory; ablest studies; fat studies. These are all the different cars. Critical child studies, which is something we should talk about. They don't understand that this isn't actually a conversation about race. Pastors mean well, but they need to stop thinking that this is a discussion about race. It is not.
Scott:Yeah, I think you're hitting on something so important, if I could just kind of cut in there Krista. Because I think for evangelicals, the woke ideology, you're right. It's rooted in all of these critical studies and all of these different oppressed groups that you've mentioned. And it spans everything from the LGBTQ movement, to race and many other things. But I think for evangelicals, the race issue has been the biggest kind of pill or whatever you want to say, the biggest doorway that they've kind of gotten into this through because they so much don't want to be considered racist. And so it's been very easy for them to kind of adopt this ideology on the issue of race. So that's just my own sense. I don't know if you guys agree with that. But I think that's.
Krista Bontrager:I think that's very true. And I think we're always careful to let people know you can be against racism and against the critical social theories. You don't need critical theories.
Scott:Not only that, but I would say Kendi—anti racism is racist, actually. I mean, if you look at it carefully, it's actively promoting discrimination against a group of people based on their skin color. He's pretty open about that. Well, in my old reading of the Bible, that's called racism. So anyways, it's so deceptive. So anti racism is racism. And I think your point is so good guys, we can't just use Biblical words and assume that everyone knows what we mean by that or even though we know what we mean by those words, because they've been redefined in the culture, actively redefined by the proponents of this ideology. And if we're not aware of that, we're going to be going along with those redefinitions. These hijack definitions. We have to say, wait a second, what does that word mean biblically? What does equality mean biblically? And how is it different than it's being used by somebody who's promoting equity? Right? So we just have to be so careful with that. I'm sorry, I'm preaching to the choir here. But...
Monique Duson:No, I completely agree. Two other words that I would say—because I feel like we're talking about words that are very cultural. Social emotional learning. Critical race theory. Diversity, equity, and inclusion, like those are very cultural. And when we're thinking about Biblical words that are being redefined, justice is one of them. Love is another one and so it's kindness. If you walk into any Target, every tshirt says, Be kind. I want to rip them all down. Because the kind that is being defined is a cultural kindness. It means don't call me out on my sin. If you think that I'm wrong, keep it to yourself. Don't contradict me, don't question me, accept me.
Scott:Actively affirm me regardless of what I'm believing, right, exactly.
Monique Duson:It's an invitation to biblical rebellion. That is what kindness really is, according to the culture's definition. So all of these people walking around when I go to Target or when I go to Disneyland, or any kind of amusement. "Be kind" is on a plane, like, I'm so tired of you and your kindness. You don't actually know what you are promoting. You're promoting an open rebellion. Now if you want to have a little blurb under here that says, "Be Kind according to the definition of Scripture." I can get on board with that. I would much rather prefer a shirt that says be righteous or be holy. Because when you are not kind, you might be unkind because you are telling someone the biblical truth. That is not kind. No one wants your kindness when you're confronting them with the truth of Scripture. It's also not loving to confront someone with the truth of Scripture and I'm not saying you have to be as blunt or bold as me. Being truthful with someone is not loving and will get you kicked out of your church if you are not careful.
Scott:We've had a lot of discussions in the office about this recently, haven't we? I'm thinking to Tim and Luke about this whole niceness, and how that again is so attractive evangelicals. We want to be seen as nice, right? And we can use it as an excuse for Christian apologetics and evangelism. Right? You know, we've got to be seen by the culture as being nice. And so, but what they mean by nice is exactly what you just described. It's affirming, regardless of whether what I'm doing is evil, wrong, destructive, or not. So...
Krista Bontrager:Well, I think that many evangelicals, especially—I'm going to make a stereotype—so this is not true of each and every but a lot of white evangelicals—we have a shared cultural value of what it means to be nice. And that if niceness doesn't show up a certain kind of a way, then it's looked upon as being not very righteous. But I more and more want to challenge that. I think one of the things that I've learned from Monique that, often, Roy's asked about that a little, "Monique, what did you learn from Krista," I wanted to hear the conversation of like, all the things I've learned from her, one of those things has been, how to be stronger. How to be more courageous. How to be more direct. In the conversation about social justice, actually, I've never made meaningful progress with people in a conversation about it, where all I did was engage in niceness. That actually as a strategy doesn't work. You have to kind of learn how to match the other person's energy. So if they're quick with the clap back and shutting you down, it's okay to stand up and push back. I want to see more white evangelicals push back.
Monique Duson:Instead of saying, "Oh, I can't say that, because I'm white."
Krista Bontrager:Yeah, or things like, Oh, I must not have been nice enough. There's something wrong with my approach. And then we self flagellate, because we haven't been nice, and that's why we didn't win the person over. I have come to appreciate, Monique's posture of helping me be strong, more conviction, more courage, and pushing back.
Scott:I just think that's really called for in the hour right now. I think there is a shift going on between kind of this dominant value of niceness, to now recognizing that even if we're as nice as we can be, what we're advocating as evangelicals is still going to get us—it is not going to be appreciated. It's not going to be affirmed in the culture. So, do we give up on that? No, we just have to accept that we're not going to be viewed as nice, no matter how nice we are. And let's just speak truthfully, in a loving way. But let's speak truthfully. And let's do it courageously. Because people need to hear. These are life giving truths, right?
Krista Bontrager:We can be firm, we can be respectful, and try to be persuasive, but understanding that our biggest problem in that conversation might not be that we're not nice. That might not be the biggest issue.
Scott:Right. Tim and Luke, I feel like I'm definitely dominating this conversation. And I knew I would, because I...[laughs]
Tim Williams:I got a few questions. And you can take them, leave them, pick a few of them to answer or not. But I'm just gonna kind of be the guy in the podcast who like, doesn't know that much and is asking questions and trying to understand a little bit more about the topic. So there's some of this conversation that I'm very familiar with, when you talk about diversity, equity and inclusion. I've been on college campuses, where this has been required training and I have been on college campuses where I have seen the student body just drink it in and go forth and this is what they care about now. It now defines their life. I went into what I thought was like a reconciliation unity conversation at my college at one point and there was a very humble oriented, young white man asking for like input from the African American students who were in our class, and there was a an African American man yelling back at him. And this was a Christian ministry environment. And I walked into the conversation, I didn't know any of this stuff. And I was like, Whoa, what's going on? We just, we want love, we want some understanding. What's happening. Anyway. So that's just a little bit of my background. So I'm familiar with some of this. But some of the language that I hear you guys using, and I hear creeping up with other people that are in education, and I don't understand it, they probably don't understand it, maybe some of our listeners don't understand it. "Social emotional learning." "Ableist studies," you mentioned, and I think you said "child studies" and everything that comes back to the child. Anytime I hear the word child, I'm concerned. I just feel like we're in this social experiment right now. And we're testing out these theories on our children who are suffering needlessly. And so I can repeat any of those things. But those are my questions.
Krista Bontrager:Let me take a stab at it and then you can just jump in with some follow up questions, if you want. I've done quite a bit of research on social emotional learning. Not saying I'm an expert or a PhD, so please don't write to our good friends here about that. But I have done a fair amount of research on it. I have a podcast about it if people want to go check it out. My theology Mom podcast, hopefully it's okay, if I plug that.
Scott:Definitely okay Krista, if you didn't, I would. Let me just underscore it right here. Krista is a phenomenal theologian and she's got a great website called Theology Mom. And I encourage you all, theologymom.com, make sure you go and check that out and pay attention.
Krista Bontrager:Well, thank you. Yeah, I did a podcast a couple of months ago on social emotional learning, I'm continuing to research it. But people want kind of a crash course about it. I've got a lot of details there. But basically, this is what is coming into our public schools. And so if you go to your public school, and maybe you don't see on the district website—in fact, I encourage all parents to go on their school district website and look for the equity statement for the school, you can just do it in their search bar. If you can't find it, just call the district office and ask for it. Most districts, unless you're in a very rural area, they will have an equity statement, equity policy, might be several pages long. But this will give you insight into the guiding principles in your school district, of how they handle things when a child comes to school, and says things like I want use different pronouns. I want to go by a different name. And the sort of thing this will explain to you how teachers are going to interact with your children. Social Emotional Learning started out about 15-20 years ago as like a program to help students engage in problem solving. Sometimes they came under like anti bullying campaigns, or how to resolve disputes between peers. So what started out as a noble, (I think, could be argued as a noble purpose) to help students engage in problem solving and better communication has evolved into the ideological implementation arm of implementing queer theory and critical child studies. So I should probably explain a little bit about critical child studies because that might be new for people. So if you think about the oppressed/oppressor category in critical race theory. For example, in the oppressor class, we have white people in the oppressed class, we have all minorities. In the critical child studies framework, the oppressor is the parent, the oppressed is the child. And so now we're recategorizing children as being an oppressed class. And so we think about social emotional learning, I call the intersection between where we see queer theory meet up and intersect with critical child studies. So now if parents are the oppressors, this is why we can go on Tik Tok and Twitter and see teachers now becoming social justice advocates and putting up signs in their classroom that say things like, if your parents don't accept your sexual identity, I'll be your mom now. And so the idea here becomes, and I document this in my podcast, but what they're trying to do is reengineer the public school to become the primary provider, an advocate for the child. To drive a wedge between the child and the parent. So yeah, go ahead.
Monique Duson:I just wanted to add that educators roles are shifting from education and that being their primary role to being that of a groomer or pseudo psychology. So this idea in—gosh, there's a actual philosopher, a recent philosopher, who kind of coined this term, I'm forgetting his name. I was looking for my social justice book back here, but it's not here—the idea of grooming a child and grooming them through their education so that you can actually present an 18 year old or a 22 year old when they get out of college that is ready for a new cultural moment. This is like—
Krista Bontrager:Critical pedagogy? Is it that guy?
Monique Duson:No, it's not a but... Gosh, it's very much about education or educators as groomers, and how our educator"allies," standing with a child but standing with them in such a way that they can groom or guide them through the next phases of their life. And then that explicitly drives a wedge between the Christian parent, the parent who was trying to raise their kid on a particular framework and ideology, and the school system. And if it comes down to your child needing to choose, well, here, you can choose us because I'll become your mom, I'm your safe space. There are classrooms that say, this is a safe space.
Krista Bontrager:And that's what they mean by that. So like, let's say, for example, Tim, you have a kid who goes to a public And so somebody like me, as a child, who was a tomboy, a school, and you don't know it, but your child also—lets just say they're somebody like me growing up, I was always called teacher might have approached me and said, Hey, you should join this club. And then let's say, I'm your kid, I'm your daughter, and so I start going to this club, and you don't even know it. You as a parent, you weren't even aware that I'm going to this club, and they start telling me, Well, you're really a tomboy, and tomboys are being erased now. Because they're a boy, you should pick a different name that more suits you. So I start going by a different name. I picked the name Drew. And I started going by the name Drew at school. But at home, I'm still my birth name that you gave me. The equity policy of the school district informs that teacher being told, there's no such thing as being a tomboy, what whether or not they informed the parents that this child is now going by a different name at school. Using a different bathroom. Some schools now have what are called Transition closets, where the student comes to school in the parent approved you really were meant to be a boy. And so let's engage in a clothes, and they have other clothes at the school that the child can change into so they will feel more of their chosen gender. And then they can change back. So it's very elaborate deceptions that some schools go through for the parents. So now we're starting to hear, here and there, stories of conversation about transitioning you. So there's in California, children being taken away from their parents, I think this is the next frontier. This is where this is going. So if the parent is not affirming, I think we're going to start seeing more removal of children from parental custody. And there's at the state level teacher convention, there were actual been a few stories now that have come out where children have committed suicide, because the disruption in their identity is so different between home and school that they don't know how to function. And if the parent has no idea that they've been workshops to teach teachers how to target and identify certain going by this other personality or other persona at the school. And so we're getting into some really choppy water here with where SEL is going. I want to say a minute to all our public school teacher friends who might be listening to this. This is not a condemnation of you. I think of Christians who work in public students that they might approach to encourage them to school as missionaries. Pastors. I want to encourage you to pray for those missionaries that are in the public schools. But I also want to encourage anyone who's working in public school get connected with us at the Center for Biblical Unity. We have a support group for you. We want to equip you and train you join the LGBT club. to stand up in your environment and really become an intentional missionary where you are.
Monique Duson:And there are also consequences that are I also find it interesting—I have no proof of that this is attached to this. So in Fairfax County School District in why they're doing it—but I find it interesting that in Virginia, they just passed a policy of consequence. So if a teacher misgenders a student, so now I born female, but the association with all of this, there has been, in this specific school district, a measure to limit and/or remove students access to their cell phones in school. Many kids are recording pronouns and the gender that I am going to associate with is what's happening in their schools on their devices. And now that, in this particular school district, who just had, hey, we're gonna offer consequences to these things. And you're not going to be able to have your cell phones he/him they/their, whatever it is—if you call me she/her and anymore. So I think that we should be aware of what's happening. And this is why we're the Center for Biblical Unity, because how are we unifying and coming to a common understanding biblically, of who is the parent and how should children be taught and refer to me by my birth pronouns, you can be punished. raised? This isn't just about racial unity. It started there, but like Krista said earlier, race is just one car, it's the probably the forefront car, on the train. Critical theory being the engine, probably critical legal studies and critical race There can be consequences, not just for teachers, but also for students. theory. But then you get the whole other train. No one's ready for the train. Everyone wants to not be racist, you have to understand that in your commitment to be anti racist, or to uphold critical race theory, you are also upholding all of these other ideologies and what that impact means on your child.
Scott:Just yesterday, in fact, I passed around the office, an article that I had just read, that was really a heartbreaking article, but it ties together the racial aspect of the woke ideology with the gender ideology, specifically talking about public school kids in New York, I think it was. Specifically young, high school aged girls. Honestly, was so heartbreaking, but it was based on a bunch of interviews with young girls who had transitioned, become first lesbian, came out as lesbian and then went on and became transgender. And what came out of that interview was that, what was driving it was—this something I'd suspected, but it was interesting to read it—it was race. In other words, they were white and they were straight. And the teachers and the culture was essentially saying to them, you're the font of all evil in the world. Right? All that's wrong. Yes. All the oppression in the world is coming from people like you. And for young people that don't know about this ideology, they're just being taught this, let's this huge burden of guilt and shame that they that it's resting on their shoulders. And so how are they dealing with it? Well, one of the ways they're dealing with it is they come out as lesbian or trans. They moved from being the problem with the world to a hero overnight. They went on and they said, what was driving the change had nothing to do with sexuality or desire. They didn't have any same sex attraction. It was really the race issue that was driving the gender issue.
Monique Duson:We try to fight over, who's gonna go first?
Scott:I suspected that because you just see this downward spiral of toxicity and brokenness in this ideology and—Christians that are listening to this podcast again, we're not trying to just bash culture, but we've got to educate our children in biblical truth. We just can't leave these these terrible ideas out there on unchallenged in the lives of our kids, right? And in the lives of the kids of our culture, not just our own kids, but in our culture. Go ahead guys. Yeah.
Monique Duson:We don't want to bash culture but we don't want to be ignorant of culture either. And there are words that Paul has that are very strong about culture—that he has no jurisdiction over culture. He's going to speak into the church where he has jurisdiction over. But the thing is that when we speak, and we have jurisdiction over the church and into the church, then we should be calling people to the words of Scripture. So many people and pastors want to run out to the culture. The culture is damned. Like, they don't have any realization or relationship of a holy God, or with a holy God. I will say this, in regards to young white girls committing suicide at higher rates and things like that. The coolest thing in culture right now is to be a victim. That it's about the victim. Candace Owens, and I'm not the biggest fan of Candace Owens, this isn't a plug for her or anything like that, but she says "It is the victim Olympics." And right now, what you're seeing is that the coolest thing and culture is to be a victim. Is to be an oppressed category. Because who wants to be the oppressor? Who wants to be the damned the person in society? The one who cannot do anything right? I think as far as adults go, that is your white Christian, straight, male, educated middle class or above. That's the person that nobody wants to be when you're an adult. When you're reaching that middle school age and all of that, you don't want to be the person who is guilty of the sins of our culture.
Krista Bontrager:I think no, that is a great point. And just to add to that—I think it was my daughter. She's 23. And she knows quite a lot, she has a little hobby of studying gender studies, and she's considering a PhD in that. I think she was the one who pointed it out to me, she said, a white girl can immediately transition themselves, from the oppressor category to the oppressed, simply by changing their pronoun on Twitter.
Scott:Can't change your skin color, but the other thing is pretty quick.
Krista Bontrager:All I'd have to do is change my pronoun in my Twitter bio to they. And I would immediately go from being the oppressor to the oppressed, and then I could cash in on all of those benefits. And I thought that was very insightful, as to how that is working, because the culture is definitely sending a message to—we get the letters from moms, saying, that their sons get told at school, "oh, you're a horrible POS, because you're a white boy and all of this..." The messages that we're sending to our boys is just terrible. And wherever we go, when we're dealing with white communities in ministry and we ask them, what's happening in your community. The three things that come up over and over again, are meth problems, drug opiate problems. Number one is usually what people bring up, suicide among their men and their young people. And then struggling with unemployment and poverty issues. Those are the three things that just come up over and over in the white communities when we go minister there, and we just kind of take the temperature of where they are now at. The obvious exceptions being in like West Chicago, when we did outreach there, the median income there is like about 125,000 a year, but they have the problems of drug abuse and suicide. So, people are struggling. And I—this is a theory, this is not a fact—but I think that there could be a connection between the cultural messaging about white people, toward white people, as to why suicides are on the rise in white communities, but nobody wants to have that conversation.
Monique Duson:And then, Tim, to answer your other question about ableist. Ableism is like the critical race theory or the critical queer theory, it would be looking at who are oppressed or marginalized based on their ability status. So you get the able bodied versus the disabled.
Scott:Guys, you were talking about education and it seems to me that, again, going back a couple of years were very few people were talking about critical theories or critical race theories. There was this battle, I guess you would say, over preserving biblical marriage, as we were getting ready to go to the Supreme Court on Obergefell. But but in two years now, I would say there has been a big awakening really, since George Floyd on this whole subject of the woke ideology, critical theories. And the biggest pushback, and this is an awakening in the culture, right? It's Christian and non Christian alike, isn't it? But it seems the biggest front right now, the biggest pushback is in the schools. And that's really taken on real prominent status in this. As I think a lot of parents are looking at what's being taught and going, no. Again, it's not just Christians, it's non Christians as well. It's not just Republicans, it's Democrats. I think as people recognize the woke ideology, largely they are just rejecting it. They're saying, this is horrible, I don't want this taught to my kids, whether it's gender or race.
Krista Bontrager:People are also getting less afraid of being called a racist, because they know what it means now. And so they're like, okay, you can call me racist, okay, whatever. But I still don't want this for my kid. And I think that people are getting braver. That's something that I see that's improved a lot in the last two years.
Scott:Yeah. Where do you think things are heading? Or do you feel optimistic in terms of where we're at right now? What's your sense of where we're at and where we're heading in the culture? And maybe in the church here on this?
Monique Duson:I think in the culture, things are gonna ramp up. I don't think that... I'm not hopeful—I'll say that—that the push for queer theory or transgender ideology is going to slow down. I think that...
Krista Bontrager:You don't think so.
Monique Duson:I don't.
Krista Bontrager:Because the swimming people just made a big step.
Monique Duson:I saw that.
Krista Bontrager:I thought, well, that's kind of
Monique Duson:Because they lost money. I think it's a money interesting. conversation. But you brought up education. And here's the thing—schools are like bootcamps. School is where I indoctrinate you. School is where I get you ready for 12 years, to be prepared to go to war against the ideologies that don't align with what you've been taught. And unfortunately, that's going to be a very conservative Christian ideology. I think that for even progressive Christians, there's much that the the education system will agree with and affirm. And so for some, what we're seeing is this removal of kids from public education, but I think we have to have a very serious conversation of who should be educating your kids. And what does that mean? And then we need to get creative about education. So if you don't want your kid in a public school, and you might be a single mom or a single dad, what does it look like to join a cohort? What does it look like to get creative as a church. To say, hey, 87% of our K to 12th grade students are in public schools and look at what public schools are turning out? How do we step in and have a conversation with our parents about how they they are educating their kids. The role of education and educating the child is not for the government? The goal is for the parents.
Scott:Amen! You're trying to do homeschool dad. Two of them actually.
Monique Duson:There you go. It doesn't mean that you necessarily have to educate your child and have to sit down and you know, 2x minus three y equal—No, but how do you get creative about making sure that your child is educated properly, and in ways that are aligned with Scripture? I think when we begin to have bigger conversations along those lines, we might start to see change. But until then, I think people need to be clear that the public education sphere is meant to indoctrinate your child into a certain ideology.
Scott:I think that people more and more see that. They see that in a way they didn't even a year ago. And I think we're headed for, this is just my sense, we're headed for some really big changes in that area. And I think I'm feeling kind of hopeful about it, frankly. Because I think Christians have been way too passive on this area of education of children and they need to get active again. And I think one of the great things that's happening to me, I'd love your reaction to this guys, but as we see just how dangerous and toxic these ideas are, how divisive they are, how they're really harming the psyches of our children, how we're losing our kids, even suicides. I mean, this is real. People step back and they go, well, I don't like these ideas. I like these older ideas. And they're finding that a lot of those older ideas come from the Bible and from the church, but they totally took them for granted. They didn't even know where they came from. So there's kind of a rediscovery of biblical truth in some ways. And I'm seeing this even amongst non Christians, I think, you guys like Jordan Peterson, you see this as a good example of this. He's like, I don't like the woke ideology. Huh. Look at the Bible. It's actually says things like all people are made by God with dignity and worth. And you know, it says things like, there's a rule of law that's higher than earthly kings, and all of these powerful biblical ideas we just simply took for granted in the West, because they've been around for so long. But now because they're under threat, we're kind of... I don't know. I feel somewhat hopeful. But we have a lot of work to do as the church right, don't we? So go ahead. I'd love to hear your response.
Krista Bontrager:I think it has to be a two front war. The way I see it is, for Christian parents, we have to get very serious about our responsibility to take the lead in discipling and educating our children. When we're out and about, I think that's the number one thing that grieves my heart, is how many Christian parents are out there that really just haven't even given that issue a lot of thought. God has appointed you to take the lead in your child's discipleship and education. We do a lot with encouraging parents to disciple their kids. Read the Bible. Last year we did a whole conference, we cosponsored a whole conference called "Discipleship Begins at Home." I mean, that's how invested we are in seeing that as part of the solution to all of this. We do a lot with increasing biblical literacy and discipleship. So I think that has to be part of it. And if that means taking my kids out of public school, I guess my biggest advice to Christian parents is don't wait for your school to change. Your kid doesn't have that long. Don't wait for it to change. You do what's right today, for your kid today. And, well, my kid got into a difficult situation at her school. I went down there and withdrew her real quick. And now that I'm old, and I'm an empty nester, and she's gone on to be an adult, let me tell you, I don't regret that decision. And that was... do what's right today for your kid today. Don't wait for your school to change. Because your kids only going to be a kid once. The second front of the war, though, is that I think it's very consistent where a parent can remove their kid and start homeschooling them or get them into a good quality Christian school, while at the same time advocating for better public education for everybody. Run for school board. I would love to see more Christians running for school board. I would love to see more Christians involved in local politics. I think that too often we only have the conversation about national politics. But I think local politics is an area where Christians could really make wonderful contributions to their communities. So I think it really has to be a two front war. And in that, in that sense, is, if we're going to push back against this, we have to have clarity in on both of those
Scott:I think those are great encouragement and insights
Luke:Yeah, I recognize we're getting a little low on time. issues. Krista. I completely agree with that. Guys, we've been talking now for, I think it's just been a little bit over an hour, But if we could, I would just love to go back to the probably need to begin wrapping up. Luke, I'd love to hear any thoughts that you have or reactions you have to the conversation. Do you want to chime in? conversation we were having on kindness and niceness about 30 minutes ago. And for me, being a young evangelical, I see a lot of my peers—I saw myself almost sliding into this in university—getting caught up in becoming social justice warriors out of this desire for kindness and niceness. And you just see that across the board and I totally agree with them. That's a great cause. Yes, those words, kindness, love, those are Biblical words, and we should be chasing after those. But unfortunately, with these friends of mine, what you often see is the desire is one of two ways. One is, like you guys were saying, they're taking those words and using cultures definitions, and running after those like cultures definition of kindness and love, which really is just at the end of the day, a new form of tolerance and not stepping on anyone's toes. Or they're championing those words out of a desire just not to get in the fight. And a lot of my friends, white Christian males, were the "evil people," and they just want to be as safe as possible so they're just going to jump on the bandwagon. What would you guys say to someone like that?
Krista Bontrager:Yeah, I think for me—and that was actually And also trying to draw people's attention to this is very just in this conversation with somebody this morning about this cultural issue. This is very much a—again, this is a very issue. And I think the first thing that I would ask is like, well, what are the boundaries of that being kind or being nice approach, especially if they're a Christian? At what point would you start pushing back? Is it ever kind and loving to push back? I would just start asking a lot of questions. At what point would you see it as necessary to push back? stereotype—so very much a white value. It's a white way of interacting with each other. What I've noticed with Monique's friends and how they speak to each other, they can be very direct, very loud, very insistent. And that's not seen as being unkind. It this is a very cultural issue. And I don't think we fully appreciate that. You know, when I interact with Egyptians who are Christians, they interact with each other very differently than we do as white people. And it's not seen as being unkind, just because they're very, very direct. Now, that's difficult for me, but I have to understand that's not an issue of kindness. That's an issue of cultural distance. And so there's that aspect of it. I think, we buy into that, and we make that the norm, we make that the standard. So that then when we do push back, it's seen as being mean, and I've come to be sort of skeptical about that. So I don't mind asking people questions, "Well, how did you arrive at that? And is that a standard that you put on everybody? And what would you say to a Christian from another culture who engages people in this other kind of a way?" I think that we sometimes unknowingly attach our kind of white evangelical way that we talk to each other and we make that the standard. And I question that.
Scott:it's a really good insight, Krista. There's there is a cultural element. I think there's a white cultural element in the United States because of our history of race. I've had people outside the United States, like in England, who've recognized that. We struggle with this, in a way, because of some of the history.
Krista Bontrager:It's what Monique and I call white shaming. Yeah, we know immediately when we're talking to a white person who is speaking from a place of white guilt and white shame. It's like a cloak on them. And so there's work that we have to do with that person to say like, Please stop saying, phrases like, I'm just a white man or I can't speak into this because I'm a white man. That denigrates your status as a child of God.
Scott:It limits who you are to your skin color.
Krista Bontrager:Right. So when people are engaging in those conversations, if I dig a little deeper, I often find that it's really more about white guilt and white shame, that they're speaking from that place. And they think that anything other than kind of running this racket of niceness, anything other than that is kind of unholy and unsanctified. And I just don't buy that anymore, but I'm up for the conversation to help them explore like, where's that coming from?
Monique Duson:Luke, I would quickly say, to me, it's a conversation of boldness. Like, at what point are you—or not you specifically, but is anyone—so kind that they now feel like they can't proclaim the truth of Scripture. At what point are we so nice that I'm just gonna allow you to be nice in your sin, because calling you out on you're a sinner, telling you that this is actually sin, would be seen as unkind. We have to get confident one, in what the Word of God says so that I know when I should say, hey, look this is a sin. I don't want your soul to linger in hell. So I'm going to tell you the truth. But when we adopt the cultural definitions, and then adopt the cultural norms that say, "Well, you cannot speak into this," we have to get clear on what the Scriptures say. And when the Scriptures tell us to speak, yes, I can speak truth. Yes, I need to be kind. Yes, I should be loving. And we can also look at Jude that says to snatch people from the fire. And so snatch—that's more of my love language—but if we stop at kindness, and then it put the culture's definition of kindness in that place, what do I do with Jude who says snatch, and those two things now contradict each other? Well, Scripture doesn't contradict itself. So both of those things can work together. But what we're seeing is this adaption of a cultural mindset that says I would never snatch, I would never confront, I would never tell you the truth about your sin, because that according to the culture is unkind.
Krista Bontrager:And then Black community, they have a saying,"I said what I said." And when Monique first said that I was like, What in the world is that? And she's just like, "We're not going to talk about this anymore. I said what I said," and I'm like, "Well, that's not very nice." And she says, "I don't care." And she just moved on. I said what I said. So there's another saying that in the black community of, "Living in your unbotheredness."
Monique Duson:I don't know, maybe it's not like just the black community, but I have never heard anybody else say that. Yeah.
Krista Bontrager:Living in your unbotheredness. And I think there's some value that I've had to learn from that. It is like, I'm not going to please everybody. Sometimes it is a matter of I said what I said, sort yourselves accordingly. I said what I said. And sometimes it's a matter of, well, they're all upset, and they want to have another conversation, I'm just unbothered. And I'm, like, y'all, this is the position. This is it. This is where we stand. We're all going to move on.
Monique Duson:Tim, what were you gonna say?
Tim Williams:You know, I was trying to think of who I know, who has really taken on these anti racist ideas and been influenced by them. In my community, I live in North Carolina, and have friends and interact with schools in eastern and central North Carolina. And it tends to be people who are influenced in the college reality. And so I have African American friends who are educated at all ages. And then I have young white friends who are influenced by this. And so I was thinking especially about about those young white friends. They have drank this from the fountain. They're living their lives and define themselves in these ways of being an anti racist. And if you had a piece of advice for them, if you had one conversation with them, or if you had a resource and they would actually look at it, what would you say to them if you had one conversation? If you had one resource, and they would look at it, what would it be?
Krista Bontrager:To white people? To white progressives?
Tim Williams:Yes. But I mean, I'll take it for anybody? I think the sad reality and this is probably a whole separate conversation, but a lot of these people started from a Christian faith and along this journey, I think, no longer see...
Scott:Yeah. Christian deconstruction phenomenon, right?
Monique Duson:When you have a framework that starts—and we don't need to go down this trail but—it starts with people who hated religion, were completely antithetical to Christianity, and now we're just 100 years down the road from the the start of that and probably a little bit more for some of that framework. Why do we think that people wouldn't fall away? There was nothing about God, or there was nothing about the framework originally that was meant to retain any aspect of Christianity.
Krista Bontrager:I'll say this, Tim, I would much rather talk to a black person in general, about these issues than a white person. Why I feel like we make meaningful progress with minorities. We can have very productive conversations by and large with minorities. I feel if a person comes up to us after a talk or whatever, and they're a minority, and they're like a fairly reasonable person, even if they're not totally persuaded of our position, but those conversations tend to go by and large, pretty well. White, progressive sympathetic, social justice sympathetic people, in our experience, are much more difficult to talk to than minorities. We don't make meaningful, much meaningful progress with white progressives. They generally are not very reasonable. They don't listen well. They won't consider your arguments.
Monique Duson:This is the stereotype. It isn't everyone.
Scott:Just if I could add on to that Krista.
Krista Bontrager:The ones that we interacted with.
Scott:In my experience from publishing the book was very much that way. You know, that took me by surprise a little bit. I got a lot of affirmation in the book, and a lot of it was from minority communities. A lot of black people were very positive about the book, a lot of black Christians. The strongest reaction I got against what I was saying was white.
Krista Bontrager:Most minorities, when they come up to us after a talk, they'll hear us out. Even if they don't agree with us all the way to the end, we made meaningful progress with them. They'll say, we'll follow the ministry, let's stay engaged. They're usually very reasonable. And even if they disagree with us, there'll be very reasonable. But white social justice sympathetic people—my favorite moment was the woman who came up to Monique, the white woman who came up to Monique and told her she was a racist after a talk, and she thought she was doing great things to inform and correct Monique about her positions on race.
Scott:Telling Monique she's not really black.
Krista Bontrager:It is very typical. Now, again, I'm not saying all white people everywhere, I'm just saying the people that we have interacted with the progressive oriented people, we have not made meaningful progress. Now, if it's a minority, maybe I might recommend our podcast "Off Code," which Monique and Kevin Briggins cohost that and they're talking about a lot of issues in the black community, and giving perspectives on that. It's a wonderful podcast, for people who are kind of searching and trying to figure things out.
Monique Duson:I would say for the white progressive, I would recommend Dr. George Yancy's book "Beyond Racial Division." It's his newest book, he talks a lot about anti racism in there. I don't agree with everything that he says. But I do think that he does a good treatment on anti racism and why it's never going to get us there.
Scott:Thanks. That's helpful, guys. You have been so generous with your time, I just really want to thank you for that. We could just continue to talk for another hour easily. It's just been thrilling for me and just exciting to touch base with you again like this and just hear what you've been learning, where you see us at, and where we need to be going. And so we'll probably come circle back around at some point and have a very similar conversation if that's okay. And it seems like God's really at work in the church. And it's not easy, but I think the church is coming to grips with just, this is not biblical. Let's get back to the Bible. And let's have the courage to speak truth and love again, just like you're doing. I want to just encourage our listeners to check out the Center for Biblical Unity. It's a wonderful organization with incredible resources. And especially, I just want to again, mention the new resource that's coming up, "Reconciled" and just really advocate that you as a church, or as a small group, check this out and consider using this. This is a really, really important resource for the church right now in the culture. So guys, thank you for that resource and for all the other things that you're providing an offering. Anything that you'd like to share in terms of what you've got coming up or ways that people can reach you.
Krista Bontrager:I think another resource, just to let people know is that we're doing a lot in the realm of training and development. So if people, if they want to get some training for their church staff, their elder team, thinking about issues related to race and justice, or at your Christian school or ministry, and you're wanting to explore alternatives to diversity, equity, and inclusion, but still have conversations about racial issues and justice issues. We do a lot with trainings and we'd love to help out other ministries and schools to preserve biblical fidelity as part of their legacy for the next generation.
Scott:Wonderful. Wonderful. I'm so glad you guys are offering yourself in service in that way, because I know a lot of churches are struggling with this. A lot of universities, a lot of schools. So yeah, if you're one of those, if that you're in the midst of that struggle right now, where you find yourself, here's a resource for you. A really powerful, very biblical resource for you from people who really understand this. I mean, Monique, especially I think you and your experience, you've been on both sides of this in your life. So these are people that really deeply understand this on both sides of the issues. So, guys, thank you. Thank you for all that you're doing. And it's just an honor to know you and thanks for taking time to be on our podcast today. Great to have you. Thanks.
Luke:Thank you for listening to this episode of Ideas Have Consequences brought to you by the Disciple Nations Alliance. As I mentioned last week, make sure to take a minute to check out our landing page for this episode that I've linked in the description below. Again, that page has everything you need to know to continue to study each episode in further detail, including episode overviews, chapter summaries, the transcript, key quotes, and links to additional resources on the topic. If you enjoyed this episode, make sure to click on that link below.