1 00:00:00,120 --> 00:00:03,120 I mean. And the interesting thing is, you know, I wrote the 2 00:00:03,120 --> 00:00:06,960 book. It got published in September twenty twenty three, but even since publication, 3 00:00:07,040 --> 00:00:10,640 there's been fascinating new examples of this. So I an hersty Aali who 4 00:00:10,640 --> 00:00:14,519 I'm sure you're aware of the story of who basically wrote that viral article for 5 00:00:14,599 --> 00:00:18,679 Unheard as a former new atheist herself, who had come from a very you 6 00:00:18,719 --> 00:00:22,679 know, come out of a very fundamentalist Muslim background in the past, just 7 00:00:22,719 --> 00:00:28,960 saying it turns out atheism cannot sustain a meaningful life, and I've decided to 8 00:00:29,000 --> 00:00:33,399 embrace Christianity. And that's just such an interesting example of I think the thesis 9 00:00:33,399 --> 00:00:37,119 of the book kind of happening in real time because it feels like something's changing, 10 00:00:37,159 --> 00:00:42,479 you know, secular, intelligent thinkers are giving Christianity another look, and 11 00:00:42,719 --> 00:00:59,280 I find that quite exciting. This is Jonathan Pjel Welcome to the Symbolic World. 12 00:01:08,640 --> 00:01:12,359 So hello everyone. I am very happy to be here with Justin Brierly. 13 00:01:14,319 --> 00:01:15,959 Mostly you will know his work, you know, for many years he 14 00:01:17,040 --> 00:01:21,400 was the host of Unbelievable, and he is now working on new podcasts coming 15 00:01:21,439 --> 00:01:23,879 out of a book called The Surprising Rebirth of the belief in God, and 16 00:01:23,920 --> 00:01:26,840 it is completely in line with all the things that we've been doing. He's 17 00:01:26,879 --> 00:01:30,599 talking to everybody that is around this resurgence of the belief in God, the 18 00:01:30,680 --> 00:01:36,959 end of the new Atheist, the surprising characters that are converting to Christianity, 19 00:01:36,959 --> 00:01:42,079 who are coming close to Christianity, and so justin it's really great to have 20 00:01:42,120 --> 00:01:45,000 you with me. Oh, thank you. It's an absolute pleasure to be 21 00:01:45,159 --> 00:01:49,000 on the show, Jonathan as a regular listener myself, So thanks for having 22 00:01:49,040 --> 00:01:53,280 me. So tell me a bit about this new project. I mean, 23 00:01:53,319 --> 00:01:56,439 it's not that new. It's been going on now for more than a year, 24 00:01:56,519 --> 00:02:00,640 I think. Yeah, Well, the book itself was published by September, 25 00:02:00,680 --> 00:02:04,519 so it is fairly new. And the most recent thing, though, 26 00:02:04,560 --> 00:02:07,520 is a new podcast documentary series that is really based on the book, and 27 00:02:07,919 --> 00:02:12,719 that's been going for just a few months. And that's really a much deeper 28 00:02:12,719 --> 00:02:15,159 dive in a way, because I get to talk to all kinds of people, 29 00:02:15,280 --> 00:02:17,960 feature all kinds of voices, weave it all together with some narration and 30 00:02:19,039 --> 00:02:23,039 music, and really tell the story really of what I'm calling the surprising rebirth 31 00:02:23,120 --> 00:02:28,000 of belief in God. And the subtitle of the book and the podcast is 32 00:02:28,599 --> 00:02:32,360 why new atheism grew old and secular thinkers are considering Christianity again. And in 33 00:02:32,400 --> 00:02:37,759 many ways it does come out though of those you know, many years, 34 00:02:37,960 --> 00:02:40,639 you know, over a decade and a half hosting conversations between Christians and atheists 35 00:02:40,680 --> 00:02:45,800 and Unbelievable and the way that I saw those conversations changing in the last several 36 00:02:45,879 --> 00:02:49,479 years, and that was really what prompted the genesis of the book and then 37 00:02:49,479 --> 00:02:53,520 the podcast. So tell me a bit about that, because I mean it's 38 00:02:53,560 --> 00:02:57,479 true that in some ways you would be the perfect person to notice the transformation. 39 00:02:57,639 --> 00:03:00,759 So maybe help us see what it is that you start to notice, 40 00:03:00,800 --> 00:03:04,199 and maybe about when you started to see it and what was different in the 41 00:03:04,240 --> 00:03:07,080 way that the atheists and the Christians were engaging with you. Yeah. Well, 42 00:03:07,199 --> 00:03:12,800 I started hosting these conversations on this this Unbelievable show around two thousand and 43 00:03:12,800 --> 00:03:15,960 five. This was before we started podcasting. It was just a radio show 44 00:03:15,000 --> 00:03:20,400 to begin with. But once we started podcasting, we started to you know, 45 00:03:20,599 --> 00:03:23,560 pick up a lot of listeners, not just Christians, but also non 46 00:03:23,680 --> 00:03:27,719 Christians atheists who were tuning in for these discussions between atheists and Christians. That 47 00:03:27,759 --> 00:03:30,599 I was hosting, and and really it was around the time that new atheism 48 00:03:30,680 --> 00:03:34,960 was building up ahead of Steam. So it was just around the time Richard 49 00:03:35,000 --> 00:03:38,520 Dawkins was publishing The God Delusion. You had a real growth of that kind 50 00:03:38,560 --> 00:03:42,680 of online atheist scene in the UK. Not long after we had the Atheist 51 00:03:42,759 --> 00:03:46,240 Bus campaign, where we had buses rolling around London saying there's probably no God, 52 00:03:46,360 --> 00:03:49,960 now stop worrying and enjoy your life. So there was there was a 53 00:03:50,000 --> 00:03:53,719 real kind of dynamic sense in which you know, this very specific, quite 54 00:03:53,800 --> 00:04:00,840 dogmatic form of non belief was presenting itself and that was reflected in the conversations 55 00:04:00,840 --> 00:04:03,280 we had, you know. So it was often these new atheist type characters 56 00:04:03,280 --> 00:04:08,919 who would be coming on opposite Christian apologists to debate the existence of God and 57 00:04:08,960 --> 00:04:13,479 whether Christianity was evil and can we trust the Bible? And so that was 58 00:04:13,520 --> 00:04:15,720 great, really interesting. I really, you know, cut my teeth in 59 00:04:16,000 --> 00:04:20,040 Christian apologetics in those early years and was able to sort of, you know, 60 00:04:20,360 --> 00:04:25,560 kind of put together my own sense of how to understand Christianity at an 61 00:04:25,600 --> 00:04:30,720 intellectual level at least. But I did notice especially kind of from the sort 62 00:04:30,720 --> 00:04:33,839 of I guess from about twenty fifteen onwards, there just was a kind of 63 00:04:33,879 --> 00:04:40,040 noticeable shift in well, firstly the number of non Christians atheists coming on who 64 00:04:40,040 --> 00:04:45,319 were actually disassociating themselves from New atheism, saying I'm not a Richard Dawkins kind 65 00:04:45,360 --> 00:04:47,920 of age, because I think there was almost a sense that it had become 66 00:04:47,959 --> 00:04:54,439 a bit shrill and dogmatic and almost quasi religious in itself. And also just 67 00:04:55,439 --> 00:04:59,680 many more secular folk that I was featuring on the show who were actually a 68 00:04:59,680 --> 00:05:03,199 lot more open to the value of Christianity, weren't dismissing it as readily as 69 00:05:03,199 --> 00:05:08,399 the new atheists were. And I started to bump into people like Douglas Murray, 70 00:05:08,439 --> 00:05:11,600 for instance, who you know, arguably was very much part of the 71 00:05:11,639 --> 00:05:14,879 new atheist set when he sort of lost his faith in his early twenties. 72 00:05:14,920 --> 00:05:16,879 He was, you know, going for lunch regularly with Christopher Hitchens and that 73 00:05:16,920 --> 00:05:21,480 sort of thing. But actually, in latter years, I think basically realized 74 00:05:23,120 --> 00:05:29,160 I'm basically bred of Christian stock, I don't believe in God necessarily, I'm 75 00:05:29,199 --> 00:05:32,560 not a Christian, but he calls himself a Christian atheist, And I just 76 00:05:32,600 --> 00:05:38,279 started to see more and more people like that coming through who were just recognizing 77 00:05:38,279 --> 00:05:44,600 that fundamentally atheism cannot provide all the answers for life, and that actually we 78 00:05:44,639 --> 00:05:49,600 still owe an enormous debt to the cultural and spiritual and moral value that Christianity 79 00:05:49,639 --> 00:05:59,519 is granted the West. Essentially. Wow, and so in twenty fifteen sounds 80 00:05:59,560 --> 00:06:01,360 about right to me. And so it's like, you know, it's something 81 00:06:01,360 --> 00:06:06,800 that seems to be happening to the culture. And have you seen also the 82 00:06:06,800 --> 00:06:11,040 new atheists also go into certain directors because one of the things I've noticed is 83 00:06:11,079 --> 00:06:15,560 how the new atheists, because in some ways there was a weird secret desire 84 00:06:15,639 --> 00:06:21,279 for something more that they ended up becoming more and more ideological in their approach, 85 00:06:21,319 --> 00:06:25,759 like even more politically motivated, you know, being influenced by by a 86 00:06:25,800 --> 00:06:29,959 certain ideology. I don't know if it's something that you notice happening at some 87 00:06:30,040 --> 00:06:33,839 point when the atheists were no longer just attacking Christianity, when they actually had 88 00:06:33,879 --> 00:06:39,680 to now propose a social world, like they had to propose something that we 89 00:06:39,720 --> 00:06:43,279 can we can start to see something else here. And I know I totally 90 00:06:43,319 --> 00:06:46,439 did. I mean I was kind of an interested bystander for a lot of 91 00:06:46,439 --> 00:06:49,519 this, but because of my world did intersect with New Atheism quite quite frequently. 92 00:06:49,959 --> 00:06:54,160 I was often sort of seeing some of these dramas unfold in the New 93 00:06:54,199 --> 00:06:58,399 atheist community. So in the book and the podcast I do go into some 94 00:06:58,439 --> 00:07:02,000 detail about the way that innerly there was a lot of argument, debate, 95 00:07:02,160 --> 00:07:06,399 and a kind of unraveling really of the movement because of it. So it 96 00:07:06,439 --> 00:07:11,399 was around I think twenty eleven really that I think there was this particular moment 97 00:07:11,519 --> 00:07:15,240 called that came to be called Elevator Gate, which really set the tone for 98 00:07:15,399 --> 00:07:19,079 the way in which New Atheism would start to unravel. And this was an 99 00:07:19,120 --> 00:07:25,360 atheist conference happening in Dublin in Ireland, and one of the speakers, Rebecca 100 00:07:25,399 --> 00:07:30,720 Watson, who was a sort of online atheist commentator under the name Skeptic, 101 00:07:30,959 --> 00:07:35,240 was talking at this conference about the problem that the atheist movement had with women, 102 00:07:35,600 --> 00:07:40,920 that it was misogynistic, patriarchal, there was a lot of sexism in 103 00:07:41,199 --> 00:07:46,319 this kind of very male, white dominated movement. And well, she then 104 00:07:46,800 --> 00:07:48,680 had sort of late night drinks with some of the other speakers, which included 105 00:07:48,759 --> 00:07:54,439 Richard Dawkins, and on her way to her hotel room, you know, 106 00:07:54,759 --> 00:07:58,639 early ours of the morning, she basically got propositioned by one of the attendees 107 00:07:58,680 --> 00:08:01,759 of the conference in the elevation. So she wrote about this later on her 108 00:08:01,759 --> 00:08:05,639 blog and said, this is the problem with you know, the atheist movement, 109 00:08:05,680 --> 00:08:09,519 exactly what I was already describing and getting propositioned and so on. Well, 110 00:08:09,560 --> 00:08:13,879 that might have been the end of it, except that Richard Dawkins himself 111 00:08:13,959 --> 00:08:20,199 weighed in on this sort of by posting a very highly sarcastic kind of response 112 00:08:20,240 --> 00:08:24,319 blog to Rebecca Watson called dim Muslima in which he, you know, very 113 00:08:24,319 --> 00:08:28,879 sarcastically compared her troubles to a Muslim woman, you know, who's getting her 114 00:08:28,920 --> 00:08:31,759 hands cut off, you know, for disobeying her husband or something like that, 115 00:08:31,120 --> 00:08:33,759 and just said, you know, but pity your poor American sisters who 116 00:08:33,799 --> 00:08:37,720 have to put up with people asking them for coffee in an elevator. Well, 117 00:08:37,720 --> 00:08:41,639 this just poured gasoline on the whole thing, and suddenly I do honestly 118 00:08:41,639 --> 00:08:48,120 see elevigator Gate as the point at which the movement kind of split basically between 119 00:08:48,159 --> 00:08:52,879 those on the kind of Rebecca Watson's side who were very interested in atheism not 120 00:08:52,960 --> 00:08:56,600 just being about a denial of God but about being for something. So it 121 00:08:56,639 --> 00:09:00,759 was at this point that people started saying, we need an eth and plus 122 00:09:00,799 --> 00:09:05,320 we need a movement that is also about social justice and feminism and LGBT rights 123 00:09:05,360 --> 00:09:09,600 and so on. And then you had the Richard Dawkins kind of crowd, 124 00:09:09,679 --> 00:09:13,879 who you know, went very you know, we're not into that at all 125 00:09:13,919 --> 00:09:18,080 and said we just want science and reason and common sense and you know, 126 00:09:18,159 --> 00:09:22,519 an oasis of freethinking. And so the movement really split, and I would 127 00:09:22,519 --> 00:09:24,799 say it was almost like the culture Wars kind of came early in that sense 128 00:09:24,799 --> 00:09:30,639 for New atheism. That was the thing that broke the movement apart. And 129 00:09:30,679 --> 00:09:35,039 the kind of arguments that these atheist figures started having within the movement like completely 130 00:09:35,120 --> 00:09:39,159 dwarfed any arguments they were having with their Christian counterparts, because it ended up 131 00:09:39,200 --> 00:09:43,679 with a not you know, atheist conferences being canceled because people weren't prepared to 132 00:09:43,720 --> 00:09:46,720 share a stage any longer. So I watched all this from the sidelines, 133 00:09:46,759 --> 00:09:52,080 and it was just an interesting reminder that, yeah, movements kind of come 134 00:09:52,080 --> 00:09:56,679 and go, and this one very much founded as soon as it tried to 135 00:09:56,720 --> 00:10:01,559 do something more than just be this denial of God, tried to build anything 136 00:10:01,600 --> 00:10:03,960 more than that, Suddenly the whole thing just just fell apart very quickly. 137 00:10:05,840 --> 00:10:07,519 Yeah, and you see it. It's still it still exists in the online 138 00:10:07,559 --> 00:10:11,279 word. What you have these people that have made a career as atheists, 139 00:10:11,279 --> 00:10:16,639 but you know, it's like they just make video after video after video about 140 00:10:16,679 --> 00:10:20,519 how religion is stupid, and you think, okay, like this is interesting. 141 00:10:20,559 --> 00:10:22,600 I mean, it's interesting that that's it. Like that's your that's your 142 00:10:22,639 --> 00:10:26,799 thing, that's your stick, and that's fine. But uh, there's a 143 00:10:26,840 --> 00:10:30,279 manner in which, like you said, is soon as you try to propose 144 00:10:30,320 --> 00:10:33,360 a mode of unity, then all of a sudden you're in trouble. And 145 00:10:33,399 --> 00:10:37,440 if you and if you're not careful, then you're surprised, you know, 146 00:10:37,480 --> 00:10:41,919 with like what is it Matt Dillahunty talking about women with penises and you're like, 147 00:10:41,960 --> 00:10:46,759 what happened? How did we get from like Richard Dawkins biologists, scientists 148 00:10:46,840 --> 00:10:50,600 who basically, you know, all categories are now exploded and we're in a 149 00:10:50,639 --> 00:10:54,559 we're in a weird postmodern and reality. I think the interesting thing about it 150 00:10:54,600 --> 00:10:58,600 is for me, it's it's kind of meant that the cultural ground does all 151 00:10:58,639 --> 00:11:05,039 shift in the process because people who were formally happy bedfellows like Dilla Hunt and 152 00:11:05,080 --> 00:11:09,039 Dawkins now are not on speaking terms any longer. You know, Dawkins got 153 00:11:09,399 --> 00:11:13,720 you know, his Humanist of the Year award rescinded by the American Humanist Association 154 00:11:13,799 --> 00:11:18,039 because he's been quite you know, outspoken on transgender and so on. You 155 00:11:18,039 --> 00:11:22,960 know. And so you find then this weird sort of changing where actually suddenly 156 00:11:24,840 --> 00:11:30,000 secular atheist kind of more conservative minded folk kind of then seem to sort of 157 00:11:30,159 --> 00:11:33,200 form alliances with Christians who maybe are kind of sympathetic to those issues. And 158 00:11:33,200 --> 00:11:37,759 you find that the secular atheists who are kind of more on the woke side 159 00:11:37,840 --> 00:11:41,399 kind of suddenly they're kind of more in keeping with their kind of other woke 160 00:11:41,480 --> 00:11:46,360 brethren. So it's a kind of you know, it felt like the game 161 00:11:46,480 --> 00:11:48,320 changed quite a bit once the Culture Wars came and just kind of messed up 162 00:11:48,320 --> 00:11:52,679 everyone's categories and they realized we were not sure we actually agree with each other 163 00:11:52,720 --> 00:11:56,639 on anything after all, And so we're to you is the most like when 164 00:11:56,679 --> 00:12:03,519 you hear these characters talk about their their return to Christianity or they're coming close 165 00:12:03,559 --> 00:12:07,320 to Christianity, you know, what is what is the thing that's most salient 166 00:12:07,360 --> 00:12:11,799 you that that pops out as you know, this is what's going on in 167 00:12:11,120 --> 00:12:15,000 these transformationsuse they're happening all at the same time, so it's like it's not 168 00:12:15,080 --> 00:12:18,320 just an individual thing, it's a there's something happening in the culture. Yeah, 169 00:12:18,600 --> 00:12:20,919 that's right. I think I think there's there's a few different things going 170 00:12:20,960 --> 00:12:24,480 on. I think one kind of in a sense small part of it, 171 00:12:24,679 --> 00:12:28,679 and I think it was just symptomatic in some ways the new atheist movement kind 172 00:12:28,679 --> 00:12:31,919 of coming and rising and falling. Is that generally there is this you know, 173 00:12:33,159 --> 00:12:35,519 meaning crisis in our culture, which which you and many others have pointed 174 00:12:35,559 --> 00:12:39,919 out, and and it's it's on the basis of the fact that people have 175 00:12:39,000 --> 00:12:43,879 lost a story essentially to live in, and the story that materialist secularism offered 176 00:12:45,120 --> 00:12:50,200 just ended has just not proved capable of building a flourishing, meaningful life for 177 00:12:50,279 --> 00:12:56,279 people. And so what I see is a lot of these secular thinkers now 178 00:12:56,480 --> 00:12:58,840 sort of realizing that the atheist project is kind of dead on its feet, 179 00:13:00,440 --> 00:13:03,360 and so they're basically just saying, well, look, let's let's look around 180 00:13:03,360 --> 00:13:05,720 and see what's here, and oh, hey, it turns out the Christian 181 00:13:05,759 --> 00:13:11,639 story has actually provided people that sense of meaning, purpose and identity for millennia, 182 00:13:13,120 --> 00:13:15,759 and they're just willing to give it a second look in all honesty, 183 00:13:16,279 --> 00:13:18,799 and it's almost like they had It's almost like they had to go through some 184 00:13:18,879 --> 00:13:22,879 of these folks, I think, a kind of teenage atheist phase almost before 185 00:13:22,919 --> 00:13:26,360 they kind of came out on the other side realizing, ah, there are 186 00:13:26,360 --> 00:13:31,759 other ways to understand the world than just this kind of very one dimensional flat 187 00:13:31,279 --> 00:13:37,039 science explains everything kind of mode of thinking. And so yeah, I do 188 00:13:37,159 --> 00:13:39,720 draw out the stories of a number of those people, some of whom have 189 00:13:39,799 --> 00:13:43,080 kind of crossed the line to Christian faith, Others who seem to be teaching 190 00:13:43,159 --> 00:13:46,159 on the brink of it, others who seem to be just kind of acknowledging 191 00:13:46,200 --> 00:13:50,600 its value. But maybe I don't know what it's going to take ultimately for 192 00:13:50,639 --> 00:13:54,000 them to kind of cross the line themselves. I mean. And the interesting 193 00:13:54,039 --> 00:13:58,159 thing is, you know, I wrote the book. It got published in 194 00:13:58,240 --> 00:14:01,399 September twenty twenty three, but even sit publication, there's been fascinating new examples 195 00:14:01,399 --> 00:14:05,279 of this. So I an HERSTI Ali who I'm sure you're aware of the 196 00:14:05,320 --> 00:14:09,840 story of who you know, basically wrote that viral article for Unheard as a 197 00:14:09,840 --> 00:14:13,480 former new atheist herself who had come from a very you know, come out 198 00:14:13,519 --> 00:14:18,080 of a very fundamentalist Muslim background in the past, just saying it turns out 199 00:14:18,080 --> 00:14:24,840 atheism cannot sustain a meaningful life, and I've decided to embrace Christianity. And 200 00:14:24,840 --> 00:14:28,320 that's just such an interesting example of I think the thesis of the book kind 201 00:14:28,360 --> 00:14:31,639 of happening in real time because it feels like something's changing, you know, 202 00:14:31,960 --> 00:14:37,679 secular, intelligent thinkers are giving Christianity another look, and I find that quite 203 00:14:37,720 --> 00:14:41,720 exciting. Yeah. One of the things that I've noticed is, you know, 204 00:14:43,279 --> 00:14:46,799 this is basically experience in my own world, which is the Orthodox Church, 205 00:14:46,120 --> 00:14:50,639 you know, in North America. But we are seeing waves of converts, 206 00:14:50,639 --> 00:14:52,320 I mean, you know, perishes, some are doubling, tripling, 207 00:14:52,440 --> 00:14:58,120 like just massive amount of conversions. But the conversions they have a certain characteristic, 208 00:14:58,159 --> 00:15:03,440 which is their intellectual conversions, you know, and it's not it's not 209 00:15:03,559 --> 00:15:09,639 as much the kind of usual I'm not usual, but the story of someone 210 00:15:09,759 --> 00:15:13,360 who maybe hit rock bottom, who's been having all these problems and turned to 211 00:15:13,399 --> 00:15:16,759 God, you know, and found God in their struggle and in their their 212 00:15:16,759 --> 00:15:24,399 suffering. But it's really people that are you know, university graduated, you 213 00:15:24,440 --> 00:15:26,559 know, that are professionals that are that are thinking, that are reading, 214 00:15:26,639 --> 00:15:31,200 that are extremely that are quite intelligent, who are actually dealing with the meaning 215 00:15:31,240 --> 00:15:39,200 crisis, and that are looking to find meaning. And so that's to me 216 00:15:39,320 --> 00:15:41,799 is very interesting. I don't know if that's something that you've noticed as well 217 00:15:41,840 --> 00:15:46,240 in these in this movement, that they're that it doesn't look like early Christianity 218 00:15:46,320 --> 00:15:50,919 with slaves and poor people and women and people that had no recourse basically finding 219 00:15:52,039 --> 00:15:54,679 the God of love. And you know, in this in this possibility of 220 00:15:54,679 --> 00:15:58,360 of of Christ and now right now it seems like it's actually an elite that's 221 00:15:58,399 --> 00:16:02,440 converting. Yes, yeah, I think I think there is something in that. 222 00:16:03,480 --> 00:16:07,919 I mean, and another aspect of this is arguably that it's quite a 223 00:16:07,919 --> 00:16:15,480 male dominated sort of sort of demographic. Now again, I think I think 224 00:16:15,480 --> 00:16:18,000 that kind of ties into the fact that you know, when you look out 225 00:16:18,039 --> 00:16:22,159 at the average audience for the people turning up for say a Jordan Peterson lecture, 226 00:16:22,320 --> 00:16:26,360 it is highly male and it probably is the same demographic you've just described. 227 00:16:26,399 --> 00:16:30,919 Who are you find a converting to Eastern Orthodoxy, and there's I think 228 00:16:30,000 --> 00:16:36,559 it's something to do with the idea that people have just comeing to the end 229 00:16:36,559 --> 00:16:40,480 of their resources. I think Christianity has always appealed in a sense to those 230 00:16:40,480 --> 00:16:45,080 who who obviously find themselves in that place destitute, you know, dried out 231 00:16:45,120 --> 00:16:49,519 and everything else. And in a sense that's always been where Christianity has found 232 00:16:49,519 --> 00:16:52,480 its first fruits, if you like. Of people are who are just desperate 233 00:16:52,559 --> 00:16:56,960 for something and they find it in christ. But I think that the more 234 00:16:56,960 --> 00:17:00,279 intellectual sort of ones who sort of for a good while being able to live 235 00:17:00,279 --> 00:17:04,640 on their own resources and kind of assume that they had life figured out at 236 00:17:04,720 --> 00:17:07,119 some level, or at least, you know, if they watched enough, 237 00:17:07,519 --> 00:17:11,200 read enough God delusion books, they could kind of convince themselves that life had 238 00:17:11,240 --> 00:17:18,079 basically been explained. I just think sometimes it takes something like us collapsing into 239 00:17:18,640 --> 00:17:23,759 the tribal cultural wars that we're currently facing, or the threat of Putin invading 240 00:17:25,440 --> 00:17:30,759 a democratic country, or the rise of Ai and everything suddenly like these kind 241 00:17:30,799 --> 00:17:34,359 of tipping point events suddenly I think kind of remind people a of their mortality 242 00:17:36,039 --> 00:17:38,400 and b that we haven't got it all figured out, and there's just a 243 00:17:38,440 --> 00:17:42,319 sense in which I see a lot of the chickens are coming home to roost, 244 00:17:42,359 --> 00:17:47,720 if you like, in the postmodern West and all that Enlightenment stuff that's 245 00:17:47,720 --> 00:17:51,519 happened, and it just feels like this is the moment when now it's, 246 00:17:51,839 --> 00:17:55,720 as you say, those elites who are suddenly realizing I don't have this figured 247 00:17:55,720 --> 00:18:00,039 out. I am, you know, basically depressed, even though I've got 248 00:18:00,559 --> 00:18:06,640 more technology than I could ever have dreamed of and more material prosperity than any 249 00:18:06,680 --> 00:18:10,160 of my forbear has ever had, and yet I'm more unhappy than any of 250 00:18:10,160 --> 00:18:15,400 them. There's just something about this moment, and again the male thing. 251 00:18:15,680 --> 00:18:18,720 I don't know what your thoughts are on that, Jonathan, but I'm just 252 00:18:18,799 --> 00:18:22,640 wondering whether that's something to do with the fact that as we've lost that story, 253 00:18:23,599 --> 00:18:27,480 particularly, it's hit men in a way where they've lost something of their 254 00:18:27,720 --> 00:18:36,559 identity, that there's an identity crisis thing going on here, and for whatever 255 00:18:36,640 --> 00:18:42,720 reason, suddenly, when it's presented well, the Christian story suddenly gives people 256 00:18:44,000 --> 00:18:48,359 a sense of identity that they were probably looking for all along. I think 257 00:18:48,359 --> 00:18:52,680 that's right. I think that you know this is annoying to This is annoying 258 00:18:52,720 --> 00:18:57,319 to the secular listener. But there is a way in which the man, 259 00:18:59,319 --> 00:19:02,799 especially in our cultures, is the vector of identity. Right, There's a 260 00:19:02,839 --> 00:19:04,680 reason why women would take the name of their husbands there, you know, 261 00:19:04,720 --> 00:19:08,640 there's there's a reason in which the idea of the Saint Paul presents the idea 262 00:19:08,640 --> 00:19:11,440 of the head and the body, these types of images that is representing the 263 00:19:11,519 --> 00:19:17,119 Christian tradition. And so when there's an attack on identity in general, uh, 264 00:19:17,200 --> 00:19:22,440 and on vectors of of of identity, then men will definitely suffer. 265 00:19:22,599 --> 00:19:26,720 And we can see that. And there has been a kind of organized attack 266 00:19:26,799 --> 00:19:30,880 on maculinity, you know for the past several decades, you know, the 267 00:19:30,920 --> 00:19:33,960 Homer Simpson, Idiot Father and et cetera, et cetera, like this constant 268 00:19:34,000 --> 00:19:40,119 attack on on on masculinity. And so it seems also that in some ways 269 00:19:40,279 --> 00:19:45,200 men are the most difficult position in that regard, in the regard the question 270 00:19:45,279 --> 00:19:48,240 of story and identity and purpose and stuff. And so I think you're right 271 00:19:48,279 --> 00:19:52,480 that in some ways Christianity and you can see a lot of people convert. 272 00:19:53,240 --> 00:19:56,400 There isn't just Christianity that's that's coming towards us. Right, there's a lot 273 00:19:56,400 --> 00:20:02,079 of neopaganism, there's a lot of Jim bro you know, yeah, I 274 00:20:02,119 --> 00:20:06,680 mean there's there's the Andrew Taits school of masculinity that that's kind of in competition 275 00:20:06,799 --> 00:20:10,720 with the kind of the biblical kind of form of that. So it's yeah, 276 00:20:10,759 --> 00:20:14,240 absolutely, there's there's other possible routes that this could go, and that 277 00:20:14,240 --> 00:20:17,079 that that is the great danger. And one of one of the sort of 278 00:20:17,680 --> 00:20:19,599 one of the metaphors I use in the book is, you know, you 279 00:20:19,640 --> 00:20:25,319 know when GK. Chesterton said, when people, you know, stop believing 280 00:20:25,319 --> 00:20:27,079 in God, they don't there after believe in nothing. They have the capacity 281 00:20:27,079 --> 00:20:30,559 to believe in anything. And I think, and I think, if there 282 00:20:30,640 --> 00:20:33,640 is something coming back on the tide, you know, if if if you 283 00:20:33,640 --> 00:20:38,160 know Matthew Arnold's famous Dover Beach tide has gone out of faith, if it 284 00:20:38,279 --> 00:20:41,119 is coming back in again. Some people have said, well, how do 285 00:20:41,160 --> 00:20:44,680 you know it's going to be Christianity that comes back in again? There could 286 00:20:44,680 --> 00:20:48,680 be all kinds of other things. And we're obviously seeing that because the religious 287 00:20:48,680 --> 00:20:52,599 inclinations never go away, that search for meaning and purpose has to get filled 288 00:20:52,599 --> 00:20:57,440 by something. So I guess I'm I'm sort of I'm optimistic that it's gonna 289 00:20:57,799 --> 00:21:03,720 ultimately even Andrew Taite school of you know, religion will ultimately fail because it 290 00:21:04,039 --> 00:21:10,599 isn't It's always going to be a weak heresy or parody of the Christian thing. 291 00:21:10,720 --> 00:21:12,799 But that's that's in a sense, that's me saying that as a Christian. 292 00:21:12,839 --> 00:21:17,079 You know, that's something I kind of take on faith because I do 293 00:21:17,200 --> 00:21:21,160 believe there's there's something bigger than us. That's that's ultimately you know, going 294 00:21:21,200 --> 00:21:26,079 on here. Yeah, But I think also that Christ has revealed something about 295 00:21:26,160 --> 00:21:32,079 reality that once it's been revealed, cannot be taken back. So once you 296 00:21:32,160 --> 00:21:37,680 once you see that the notion that self sacrificial love is the is the source 297 00:21:37,759 --> 00:21:41,000 of our relationship, that it's the source of healthy relationships, the source of 298 00:21:41,680 --> 00:21:45,359 of of even hierarchies in the world, that that's actually how proper hierarchies function 299 00:21:45,559 --> 00:21:49,640 is through self sacrificial love. You can't really take that back, and you 300 00:21:49,680 --> 00:21:52,119 can try, but it ends up being, like you said, it kind 301 00:21:52,160 --> 00:21:56,640 of caricature. There's something antichrist about the reaction to it. There's no way, 302 00:21:56,960 --> 00:22:02,039 there's no way to really fully gate now from that story. You know. 303 00:22:02,119 --> 00:22:04,359 That's one of the reasons why I try to help people understand. I 304 00:22:04,400 --> 00:22:07,839 try to help people understand that it's like you're in the Christian story, folks. 305 00:22:07,839 --> 00:22:11,160 You can't you can't avoid it anymore. If you try to get out 306 00:22:11,200 --> 00:22:14,480 of it, you only the only thing you can do is become Antichrist. 307 00:22:14,960 --> 00:22:17,839 Uh. And And it's not like a moral thing that I'm not trying to 308 00:22:18,000 --> 00:22:21,480 guilt you into anything. I'm just saying it's just how It's just how it 309 00:22:21,599 --> 00:22:23,960 is once you there are some things that once you know, you can't know 310 00:22:25,079 --> 00:22:27,720 anymore. It's like the genie is out of the bottle. You can't exactly. 311 00:22:27,880 --> 00:22:32,039 Yeah, yeah, yeah, and that's that. I think that's true 312 00:22:32,039 --> 00:22:37,720 about about about Christianity. And so what do you see coming down the line? 313 00:22:37,720 --> 00:22:38,839 Like what do you see? I mean, I don't want you to 314 00:22:40,359 --> 00:22:41,920 I don't want if you don't feel comfortable saying it, but you know, 315 00:22:42,000 --> 00:22:45,319 because now there's this thing going on, like this this movement that's happening, 316 00:22:45,400 --> 00:22:48,880 how do you see it develop it? Yeah, it's really interesting. I'm 317 00:22:48,880 --> 00:22:52,519 not a good profit of these things, and all I'm really pointing out is 318 00:22:52,559 --> 00:22:56,440 what I see happening, right, now, which is this kind of yeah, 319 00:22:56,599 --> 00:23:02,160 just just this really interesting conversation that started again with people taking Christianity seriously 320 00:23:02,200 --> 00:23:04,720 and kind of the door being opened for you know, a quite significant number 321 00:23:04,720 --> 00:23:08,519 of people, by the likes of Jordan person and even you know Tom Holland, 322 00:23:08,519 --> 00:23:14,440 who you know, I think is one of the best unsung evangelists the 323 00:23:14,519 --> 00:23:18,000 UK has. Right now, Most of the people I meet at the moment 324 00:23:18,039 --> 00:23:22,519 who are seriously taking Christianity seriously again, they've they've basically been reading Tom Holland's 325 00:23:22,519 --> 00:23:26,359 Dominion, you know, and understanding that they are basically products of the Christian 326 00:23:26,400 --> 00:23:30,039 story at a fundamental level. So I find that all very exciting. Now, 327 00:23:30,079 --> 00:23:34,319 where is it going? I mean, my hope and prayer is that 328 00:23:34,359 --> 00:23:38,680 we might be seeing, you know, the next great Revival. I mean 329 00:23:40,119 --> 00:23:45,319 that doesn't mean that it's going to be a revival that looks like previous revivals, 330 00:23:45,839 --> 00:23:48,720 but it's going to be whatever needs to happen in our moment. I 331 00:23:48,759 --> 00:23:52,160 think, having said that, it could get worse before it gets better, 332 00:23:53,359 --> 00:23:59,200 because you know, we all know where certainly the statistics on church attendance and 333 00:23:59,240 --> 00:24:03,400 religiosity and so on are in the West. So I'm not saying that suddenly 334 00:24:03,440 --> 00:24:06,839 we're going to be seeing you know, the pusel filled and churches bursting at 335 00:24:06,839 --> 00:24:10,720 the seams. But I do feel like there's a there's a kind of winnowing 336 00:24:10,839 --> 00:24:14,559 happening of the church itself at the moment. There's kind of a lot of 337 00:24:14,640 --> 00:24:19,599 models that were kind of superficial or not fit for purpose are sort of having 338 00:24:19,640 --> 00:24:22,440 to be broken down. And I think that all is part of the process 339 00:24:22,519 --> 00:24:26,519 is there's there's almost like there's always been, I think this kind of birth 340 00:24:26,559 --> 00:24:33,000 and redeath, sorry, death and rebirth of the church in various generations, 341 00:24:33,000 --> 00:24:36,319 and I just wonder whether we're going through that now. And you've seen obviously 342 00:24:36,359 --> 00:24:38,559 in some of the scandals in parts of the Catholic Church, but equally in 343 00:24:38,599 --> 00:24:42,319 the you know, in my area, this sort of more evangelical sort of 344 00:24:42,400 --> 00:24:48,279 church where you've had lots of celebrity pastor scandals and certain ways of doing church 345 00:24:48,319 --> 00:24:53,240 which are obviously toxic, are not kind of actually giving life and doing you 346 00:24:53,279 --> 00:24:56,839 know, bringing people God in the way that they're meant to. And so 347 00:24:56,839 --> 00:25:00,799 so I feel like there's there's that going on one hand, but there's also 348 00:25:00,880 --> 00:25:04,279 this kind of bubbling up of something quite exciting on the other hand, and 349 00:25:04,720 --> 00:25:10,200 that I want to sort of just ask the church to, yeah, absolutely 350 00:25:10,200 --> 00:25:15,319 be realistic about the bad stuff, but also to maybe have some hope and 351 00:25:15,319 --> 00:25:18,119 get excited about the good stuff and ask, well, what can we do 352 00:25:18,200 --> 00:25:21,319 to nurture that and to kind of learn the lessons that we need to learn 353 00:25:21,599 --> 00:25:26,680 to make sure that we shepherd this movement in a way that's helpful. As 354 00:25:26,680 --> 00:25:30,400 I say, it could go off in bad directions. You know, there's 355 00:25:30,440 --> 00:25:34,680 always the danger that it turns into some kind of quasi Christian nationalism or something 356 00:25:34,720 --> 00:25:40,240 like that. You know, there's all kinds of things that will come in 357 00:25:40,319 --> 00:25:44,480 and try to vuy I think for what is actually the true work of the 358 00:25:44,519 --> 00:25:48,079 spirit that I think is going on at some deeper level in the lives of 359 00:25:48,079 --> 00:25:52,200 these people and the people who are seeking meaning. So that's all just to 360 00:25:52,240 --> 00:25:56,799 say, I don't know exactly where it's going, but I just have a 361 00:25:56,880 --> 00:26:02,559 sense that the wind is blowing and it feels like something's changed in the atmosphere 362 00:26:02,880 --> 00:26:07,880 quite significantly, and that actually that if the church, if we're Christians, 363 00:26:07,920 --> 00:26:15,839 can sort of just lean into that and start to answer the questions people are 364 00:26:15,880 --> 00:26:19,839 actually asking right now. That would be a really good start. I spent 365 00:26:21,160 --> 00:26:25,759 you know, most of my career kind of doing that traditional apologetics. You 366 00:26:25,799 --> 00:26:30,160 know, here's five reasons to believe in God and for reasons to be the 367 00:26:30,160 --> 00:26:33,799 Resurrection. I just feel like now is possibly the moment to actually step a 368 00:26:33,839 --> 00:26:37,160 little back from that, not saying that's not important sometimes, but to just 369 00:26:37,200 --> 00:26:38,960 help people understand why they would want this to be true in the first place, 370 00:26:40,599 --> 00:26:42,400 and that that's kind of where we're at. I think in our culture, 371 00:26:42,440 --> 00:26:49,160 people suddenly realizing I want something to be true, and kind of helping 372 00:26:49,160 --> 00:26:52,880 them to realize and then maybe you know, later on you can show them 373 00:26:52,920 --> 00:26:56,480 that in fact it is true, you know, with with some of that 374 00:26:56,519 --> 00:26:59,920 traditional apologetics. But it's like at the moment, it feels like people are 375 00:27:00,880 --> 00:27:03,680 are just at that point of realizing that they want there to be a bigger 376 00:27:03,720 --> 00:27:08,200 world than the one they've actually been presented with. And so do you see 377 00:27:08,440 --> 00:27:12,880 yourself like your approach apologetics, do you see that it has changed in the 378 00:27:12,920 --> 00:27:15,759 past few years, like the way that you're talking to people. I think 379 00:27:15,759 --> 00:27:19,480 it has in all honesty, because, as I say, you know, 380 00:27:21,200 --> 00:27:25,240 the first half of my career sort of hosting these shows was really kind of 381 00:27:25,279 --> 00:27:29,160 in that bread and butter sort of science versus faith, you know, can 382 00:27:29,200 --> 00:27:33,279 we you know, five arguments for God kind of stuff, And as say, 383 00:27:33,319 --> 00:27:37,440 it was all good, kind of intellectually kind of rigorous stuff that helped 384 00:27:37,440 --> 00:27:41,160 me to kind of get a handle on that. But I quickly realized that 385 00:27:41,680 --> 00:27:45,000 there's relatively few people ultimately who actually step into something on the basis of that. 386 00:27:45,200 --> 00:27:49,599 It might be an important part of the process, but there's always at 387 00:27:49,680 --> 00:27:55,559 the end of the day, there's an imaginative element to this where people have 388 00:27:55,640 --> 00:27:59,200 to kind of I don't know, their mind has to be renewed in some 389 00:27:59,279 --> 00:28:03,759 way where their imagination kind of gets baptized as much as their their intellect kind 390 00:28:03,759 --> 00:28:10,440 of gets convinced. And I've never met someone in all n ste if I 391 00:28:10,480 --> 00:28:12,799 just look at it in the cold light of day who just had some intellectual 392 00:28:12,799 --> 00:28:18,559 conversion. There's always a sort of spiritual imaginative component going on. And I 393 00:28:18,599 --> 00:28:21,640 know it's kind of too cliched almost to say, but C. S. 394 00:28:21,720 --> 00:28:26,839 Lewis was obviously a brilliant exponent of doing this because he did that traditional apologetics 395 00:28:26,839 --> 00:28:29,960 so near Christianity and the problem of pain and that kind of thing. But 396 00:28:30,440 --> 00:28:33,000 I think where he was at his most fruitful, where he resonated the most 397 00:28:33,079 --> 00:28:37,119 with people, is when he wrote the Narnia stories and things like that, 398 00:28:37,160 --> 00:28:42,839 where he created a world that people wanted to be true, and then he 399 00:28:42,880 --> 00:28:45,799 said to them, well, what if this world does in fact exist? 400 00:28:45,880 --> 00:28:51,480 What if you're actually living in this world? And for me, that's a 401 00:28:51,599 --> 00:28:56,400 very powerful, you know, way into the Christian faith, and I think 402 00:28:56,440 --> 00:28:59,599 that we need to sort of recapture some of that in the way we approached 403 00:29:00,200 --> 00:29:06,880 people today. Hm hmm. Yeah, obviously I totally agree with you in 404 00:29:06,920 --> 00:29:10,799 some ways. You know. That's why I've been focusing my attention on storytelling 405 00:29:10,920 --> 00:29:15,400 quite a bit recently, you know, to to help people as much as 406 00:29:15,400 --> 00:29:18,599 possible. See that, and so have you seen I'm curious what you see 407 00:29:18,640 --> 00:29:22,839 the role of artists being in in this, because you know, it's the 408 00:29:23,559 --> 00:29:26,319 world of apologetics is usually a world, like you said, of scientists of 409 00:29:26,400 --> 00:29:32,920 kind of theologian, often very systematic thinkers, and so how do you see 410 00:29:33,000 --> 00:29:40,839 artists playing a role in what you're describing. I think that what I would 411 00:29:40,839 --> 00:29:45,279 love to see is is artists And I'm again not the first place to say 412 00:29:45,319 --> 00:29:51,799 this, but but artists stop. Who are Christians stopping doing quote unquote Christian 413 00:29:51,880 --> 00:29:56,000 art that is basically just a knockoff of secular art but with Jesus in the 414 00:29:56,200 --> 00:30:00,480 in the frame kind of thing. I just think we need to do great 415 00:30:00,599 --> 00:30:07,039 art because at anytime you do great art, true art, you are representing 416 00:30:07,119 --> 00:30:12,720 Christ at some level. And to that extent, yeah, I just want 417 00:30:14,559 --> 00:30:18,519 folk who do find themselves, who do call themselves Christian, to just do 418 00:30:18,559 --> 00:30:23,039 their art as well as they can and to sort of, yeah, just 419 00:30:23,319 --> 00:30:26,799 to put it out in the public sphere and to I mean one of the 420 00:30:26,839 --> 00:30:33,079 things I you know, what's been fascinating is doing this new documentary podcast series, 421 00:30:33,119 --> 00:30:37,319 The Surprising Rebirth of Belief in God. I ended up for various reasons 422 00:30:37,400 --> 00:30:42,480 moving on from hosting The Unbelievable Show about a year ago, and it was 423 00:30:42,559 --> 00:30:49,000 kind of to some extent it was It wasn't a move I'd completely planned out, 424 00:30:49,079 --> 00:30:52,480 but it did give me suddenly an opportunity to do something very different. 425 00:30:52,519 --> 00:30:56,400 And I thought, I've got this book coming out, and I just this 426 00:30:56,480 --> 00:31:00,720 thought dropped into my soul. You know what, Now that I've got some 427 00:31:00,799 --> 00:31:07,920 time and space, I would love to do a really good documentary podcast series 428 00:31:07,079 --> 00:31:10,279 based on the book. I just felt like there was a story to be 429 00:31:10,359 --> 00:31:15,400 told here and and so, you know, in God's providence, I sort 430 00:31:15,440 --> 00:31:18,799 of had this time and space to kind of work on something that I would 431 00:31:18,839 --> 00:31:21,480 never have been able to work on, you know, in my previous role. 432 00:31:22,279 --> 00:31:26,720 And I've poured a lot of time and effort into sort of trying to 433 00:31:26,720 --> 00:31:30,759 create something that's not just information but is actually a bit more of an experience. 434 00:31:30,920 --> 00:31:36,720 It's that it's it brings something across, not just through the people and 435 00:31:36,759 --> 00:31:40,640 the voices, but through the music and the kind of the way it's woven 436 00:31:40,680 --> 00:31:42,599 together in something that is a little bit more artistic. Now I'm not saying 437 00:31:42,599 --> 00:31:48,359 it's some Oscar worthy, you know, production, but it's what I've what 438 00:31:48,440 --> 00:31:53,359 I've noticed releasing that is that the response has been really quite different to the 439 00:31:53,440 --> 00:31:59,319 kind of these more sort of just kind of brains on legs debates that you 440 00:31:59,359 --> 00:32:01,759 know, that I hosted for many years. It's it's kind of like people 441 00:32:02,759 --> 00:32:07,640 suddenly feel able to engage with it at a different level because they feel like 442 00:32:07,839 --> 00:32:10,880 they're entering into a story. So so many of the people who've got back 443 00:32:10,920 --> 00:32:14,680 to me, whether they're Christian or non Christian have said, Yeah, I 444 00:32:14,720 --> 00:32:17,519 feel like this, this resonates with me. I feel like this is telling 445 00:32:17,720 --> 00:32:21,960 my story. I kind of, you know, had all those memories of 446 00:32:21,960 --> 00:32:23,640 the new atheist phase and I've kind of you know, moved on in my 447 00:32:23,720 --> 00:32:30,920 thinking and and it's just like it. It just reminded me that that there's 448 00:32:30,920 --> 00:32:34,839 something about doing something in a storytelling mode, in an artistic mode, in 449 00:32:34,880 --> 00:32:38,920 an imaginative mode that just does connect with people on a different level. And 450 00:32:38,960 --> 00:32:43,039 I'm kind of really enjoying that, if I'm honest, and I feel like 451 00:32:43,079 --> 00:32:51,079 that's where Christians need to try and almost like sometimes we need to put down 452 00:32:51,079 --> 00:32:53,839 the kind of the manual on you know, five ways to convert someone in 453 00:32:53,880 --> 00:33:01,119 five minutes and just sort of start again, say let's just create something people 454 00:33:01,400 --> 00:33:07,359 will enjoy, people will appreciate, people will love, and then see what 455 00:33:07,400 --> 00:33:09,960 God does with that, because I think that's what art is. Ultimately, 456 00:33:10,160 --> 00:33:15,119 if it's used in a really didactic, top down, sort of overanalyzed way, 457 00:33:15,839 --> 00:33:20,519 it stops being art and people kind of know that they're being preached to 458 00:33:20,599 --> 00:33:24,319 and know that they're being sort of sold something. And that for me, 459 00:33:24,400 --> 00:33:30,240 is where Christians who want to be artists should start to focus themselves, stop 460 00:33:30,359 --> 00:33:34,400 trying to kind of do the thing, you know, do the thing, 461 00:33:34,559 --> 00:33:37,799 you know, anticipate what this art is going to do to someone, and 462 00:33:37,920 --> 00:33:40,240 just do the art, you know, and it will speak for itself in 463 00:33:40,279 --> 00:33:45,480 that way. Yeah, it's an interesting moment right now because for many years 464 00:33:45,599 --> 00:33:51,680 Christians were caught in that world where they basically made propaganda, you know, 465 00:33:51,759 --> 00:33:57,400 especially in the highly produced world of music or of movies and television. You 466 00:33:57,400 --> 00:34:00,680 know, they just basically made Christian propaganda. But now we're at an interesting 467 00:34:00,759 --> 00:34:07,480 time when Hollywood itself has become propaganda. And so it's actually opening a very 468 00:34:07,519 --> 00:34:15,880 interesting space for Christians and religious people to do like C. S. Lewis 469 00:34:15,880 --> 00:34:21,119 and Tokien did, which is basically tell stories that have the right worldview, 470 00:34:21,159 --> 00:34:23,119 that have the right perspective, that is a complete perspective, right, that 471 00:34:23,239 --> 00:34:28,280 isn't just me kind of And I'm seeing that, like you interviewed Marnshaw and 472 00:34:28,360 --> 00:34:31,119 Paul kings North and a few artist types, and I can see that they 473 00:34:31,159 --> 00:34:37,519 get that right away, right, the possibility of using the poetry of Christ 474 00:34:38,239 --> 00:34:43,760 as a means to affect the world, not through argument and through kind of 475 00:34:43,760 --> 00:34:47,119 convincing, but just like you said, following in entering into a story. 476 00:34:47,920 --> 00:34:52,079 And I think it's why, in a funny way, you know, these 477 00:34:52,119 --> 00:34:55,920 profits from outside the church like Peterson and Holland and others have actually been so 478 00:34:57,000 --> 00:35:01,480 effective actually drawing people towards Christianity. It's because they're not going at it as 479 00:35:01,800 --> 00:35:07,039 kind of you know, three point evangelists. They're they're just opening it up 480 00:35:07,440 --> 00:35:12,920 and saying, here's a story, and isn't it interesting? And what would 481 00:35:12,920 --> 00:35:15,719 happen if you know, you you started to step into it. They're not 482 00:35:15,760 --> 00:35:20,559 you know, they don't have a plan, I think, to convert people. 483 00:35:20,679 --> 00:35:24,519 But people are being converted. And it's because it's it's this much more 484 00:35:24,559 --> 00:35:31,320 sort of natural, holistic way of doing things where where where people. I 485 00:35:31,360 --> 00:35:35,599 mean, the thing about especially you know, Jordan Peterson that I find with 486 00:35:35,719 --> 00:35:39,119 him is the reason I think he connects with people is because they genuinely feel 487 00:35:39,159 --> 00:35:46,960 like he cares about them, like he cares about their soul basically. And 488 00:35:46,960 --> 00:35:51,920 and when he you know, you know, breaks down in tears on stage, 489 00:35:52,000 --> 00:35:54,320 it's it's not manufactured. It's a kind of it's a kind of real, 490 00:35:54,440 --> 00:35:58,719 a real reality that kind of breaks through the intellectual firewall that I think 491 00:35:58,760 --> 00:36:01,719 you get actually with a lot of the public thinkers and things, and and 492 00:36:01,760 --> 00:36:07,840 I just think there's something about that. There's there's something about the that's very 493 00:36:07,920 --> 00:36:12,639 attractive to people, I think, And and you can't manufacture it, you 494 00:36:12,639 --> 00:36:15,320 know, you can't then say, you know, to the evangelist, well 495 00:36:15,480 --> 00:36:19,199 you need to do the Jordan Peterson thing and start crying on stage, because 496 00:36:19,239 --> 00:36:22,239 that's the way to get them in. It's it's just got to be real, 497 00:36:22,519 --> 00:36:24,920 you know. And that's and so whether it's art, whether it's you 498 00:36:24,920 --> 00:36:30,480 know, Jordan Peterson on the stage, people connect with with real stuff, 499 00:36:30,559 --> 00:36:34,760 and that's where I think we have to go in that sense. Yeah, 500 00:36:34,800 --> 00:36:37,000 that I think that that's right. I mean, since we're talking about Jordan, 501 00:36:37,079 --> 00:36:40,519 I am curious to because you kind of were there at the outset. 502 00:36:40,599 --> 00:36:46,800 I remember you interviewed Jordan quite early in his you know, Skyrocket to to 503 00:36:46,800 --> 00:36:52,480 to fame, and I'm wondering how you see Jordan's role in this transformation, 504 00:36:52,599 --> 00:36:57,559 especially the new ative transformation, if you see if you feel like he's played 505 00:36:57,559 --> 00:37:01,199 some role in changing the way people proceed religious I mean, you could probably 506 00:37:01,199 --> 00:37:05,079 answer this question far better than I could in all honestly, Jonathan, but 507 00:37:05,519 --> 00:37:09,320 the I mean, the reality is Yeah. I remember in twenty seventeen, 508 00:37:09,440 --> 00:37:13,920 that was when I first started to hear the name Jordan Peterson being banded around 509 00:37:13,960 --> 00:37:15,199 and people saying, hey, you should get this guy, really interesting, 510 00:37:15,519 --> 00:37:21,760 you know, Canadian psychologist on your show justin He's having these amazing sellout lectures 511 00:37:21,760 --> 00:37:23,440 on the Bible. And I was thought, oh, that sounds interesting, 512 00:37:23,639 --> 00:37:27,079 you know. And I heard he you know, was making some waves as 513 00:37:27,119 --> 00:37:30,800 well around the C sixteen villain all that. But I finally kind of got 514 00:37:30,800 --> 00:37:36,400 my opportunity. Actually, in early twenty eighteen, I was starting a series 515 00:37:36,440 --> 00:37:40,920 of shows from Unbelievable called The Big Conversation, and I Peterson was just about 516 00:37:40,960 --> 00:37:44,880 to release twelve Rules for Life, and he happened to come over to the 517 00:37:44,920 --> 00:37:49,199 UK for a kind of almost pre released sort of mini tour, and I 518 00:37:49,239 --> 00:37:52,239 remember sort of getting in touch with the publicist at the time saying, I'd 519 00:37:52,280 --> 00:37:54,920 love to book, you know, Dr Peterson onto my show. I'm going 520 00:37:54,960 --> 00:37:59,559 to hopefully bringing on with a sort of atheist psychologist, a debate meaning and 521 00:37:59,599 --> 00:38:01,239 God kind of thing, and she said, yeah, that should be fine. 522 00:38:01,280 --> 00:38:04,639 Yeah, we got room in to schedule, So that was fine, 523 00:38:04,760 --> 00:38:07,400 and I just remember a series of emails from her as the time drew near, 524 00:38:07,480 --> 00:38:10,280 where she said, all this, this man's far more popular than I 525 00:38:10,320 --> 00:38:13,880 was expecting him to be, and could we just whittle down your time a 526 00:38:13,880 --> 00:38:16,880 bit because I need to take him over to the BBC afterwards. And it 527 00:38:16,920 --> 00:38:22,440 was It was interesting because I even then I could see something was going on, 528 00:38:22,000 --> 00:38:25,239 and they had sort of, you know, around the time he came 529 00:38:25,280 --> 00:38:30,480 over, they booked kind of hastily booked sort of a thousand seater auditorium and 530 00:38:30,480 --> 00:38:34,519 it sold out, you know, in hours, and so they booked a 531 00:38:34,519 --> 00:38:37,760 second one and that sold out. And this was before the book was even 532 00:38:37,960 --> 00:38:42,800 properly released. And then the book came out, and funnily enough, just 533 00:38:43,280 --> 00:38:47,119 a day or two after I recorded my show with Peterson, he had that 534 00:38:47,159 --> 00:38:51,800 he recorded that viral interview with Kathy Newman you may remember, where you know, 535 00:38:51,920 --> 00:38:53,440 they kind of debate the gender pay gap and that kind of thing. 536 00:38:53,840 --> 00:38:59,000 So then it just exploded and everyone was suddenly, it seemed, talking about 537 00:38:59,079 --> 00:39:01,320 Jordan Peterson. So I was kind of sitting on this show that I just 538 00:39:01,360 --> 00:39:05,199 recorded as well, but I wasn't going to be releasing mine for a few 539 00:39:05,239 --> 00:39:07,440 months, you know, because we weren't going to start this series yet. 540 00:39:07,480 --> 00:39:10,480 But when when we did, obviously it caught fire and you know, brought 541 00:39:10,760 --> 00:39:15,239 you know, I can thank honestly Jordan for the fact that our YouTube channel 542 00:39:15,320 --> 00:39:20,239 kind of got going at that point because of that video. But it's I 543 00:39:20,239 --> 00:39:23,679 guess what I noticed, you know, a more fundamental level was that, 544 00:39:24,760 --> 00:39:30,440 Yeah, this was a classic example of a completely different conversation because I brought 545 00:39:30,519 --> 00:39:35,239 him on with this atheist psychologist, Susan Blackmore, to debate the question of 546 00:39:35,840 --> 00:39:40,039 whether we can make sense of life without God. And you know, I 547 00:39:40,079 --> 00:39:45,519 didn't, in that sense, bring Jordan on as a Christian guest, so 548 00:39:45,559 --> 00:39:46,559 it was kind of an unusual show in that way. I'd normally have a 549 00:39:46,639 --> 00:39:51,119 Christian opposite, you know, an atheist or something like that, but he 550 00:39:51,960 --> 00:39:54,559 could have if you had just been casually listening, you could easily thought he 551 00:39:54,719 --> 00:39:59,800 was a Christian sort of guest because he was defending the idea of, you 552 00:39:59,840 --> 00:40:04,760 know, the fact that the only way we can talk of value as humans 553 00:40:04,800 --> 00:40:07,239 is that we're made in the image of God, and you know, and 554 00:40:07,719 --> 00:40:12,400 it was just the most fascinating thing. And I as soon as that show 555 00:40:12,440 --> 00:40:15,199 went out, suddenly I had a huge influx of new listeners, people getting 556 00:40:15,199 --> 00:40:20,760 in touch. A very good friend now actually called called Dean in Australia who 557 00:40:20,960 --> 00:40:24,159 you know, stumbled across the unbelievable show because of having Peterson on, and 558 00:40:24,800 --> 00:40:31,000 just people who are basically agnostics but really interested and just looking for something. 559 00:40:31,559 --> 00:40:37,840 And I just realized there's this whole sort of outside these kind of quite nerdy 560 00:40:37,239 --> 00:40:45,320 Christian atheist apologetics debates, there's actually this whole demographic who are just basically looking 561 00:40:45,320 --> 00:40:50,119 for something and they've kind of looked into the Sam Harris and the Dawkins way 562 00:40:50,159 --> 00:40:53,480 of it and it just hasn't quite worked. And suddenly Jordan Peterson comes along, 563 00:40:53,480 --> 00:40:57,159 and I don't know, it just opens a door for them. It's 564 00:40:57,159 --> 00:41:00,440 like, for whatever reason, he speaks language that they can understan, they 565 00:41:00,440 --> 00:41:02,480 can kind of get their heads around faith and religion in a new way. 566 00:41:02,880 --> 00:41:07,719 And suddenly it's like a door opens for them. And and as like a 567 00:41:07,719 --> 00:41:12,480 good number of them I think are walking through that door. Mhmm. Yeah, 568 00:41:12,519 --> 00:41:19,519 that's the when I I remember watching that interview and also thinking he's bringing 569 00:41:19,559 --> 00:41:22,960 people on a in a place that they're not used to. He's saying things 570 00:41:22,960 --> 00:41:25,079 that people are not used to hearing and kind of crashing some of the argument, 571 00:41:25,079 --> 00:41:30,320 the normal arguments that people have. Remember even argued with her about the 572 00:41:30,719 --> 00:41:36,760 idea that memes then affect genes, right, trying to say that it's like, 573 00:41:36,840 --> 00:41:39,800 if there's this idea that memes, that memes are just a a you 574 00:41:39,840 --> 00:41:44,400 know, an emergent property. But he was he said, then the meme 575 00:41:44,679 --> 00:41:47,320 affects the development of the gene through the way that humans act. And and 576 00:41:47,639 --> 00:41:52,199 it's like I could see her like she had never thought about that in her 577 00:41:52,360 --> 00:41:53,960 entire life, and I thought, ah, and it's weird because it's an 578 00:41:54,000 --> 00:41:58,280 argument that Jordan us that he hasn't even touched. After that, and I 579 00:41:58,320 --> 00:42:01,679 thought, that's the type of argument. They can help people understand the idea 580 00:42:01,760 --> 00:42:07,000 that at least understand that top down meaning is real, that constraint from above, 581 00:42:07,079 --> 00:42:12,000 it's something that you can't avoid even in your even in your biological kind 582 00:42:12,039 --> 00:42:15,920 of evolutionary way, and that that way of arguing is a way to help 583 00:42:15,920 --> 00:42:21,320 secudar people understand that that that when we talk about, you know, idea 584 00:42:22,079 --> 00:42:24,239 meaning coming down from heaven or names coming down from heaven, that it happens 585 00:42:24,280 --> 00:42:29,159 even in the biological sphere. So anyway that I remember that interview, I 586 00:42:29,679 --> 00:42:31,920 remember loving that there's some I mean, it was only a short interview in 587 00:42:31,960 --> 00:42:36,480 all honesty, you know, we we had about fifty minutes, and but 588 00:42:36,559 --> 00:42:38,920 we packed an awful lot in and and I just, yeah, there was 589 00:42:38,960 --> 00:42:43,079 some absolutely stunning moments in that one. I mean, the one, the 590 00:42:43,119 --> 00:42:46,239 one that I particularly remember is is Jordan Beatson essentially saying to Susan Blackmore, 591 00:42:46,280 --> 00:42:51,039 well, I don't really think you're an atheist. And she kind of got 592 00:42:51,079 --> 00:42:52,760 somewhat offended by this, you know, what do you mean I don't believe 593 00:42:52,760 --> 00:42:54,960 in God? And he basically did his thing and saying, well, no, 594 00:42:55,039 --> 00:42:59,239 you do have something that He's got to you. It's that you know. 595 00:42:59,440 --> 00:43:01,679 And and and obviously she kind of, you know, went back and 596 00:43:01,719 --> 00:43:06,239 forth on him on that. But it was interesting because it did introduce me, 597 00:43:06,280 --> 00:43:09,079 i think, to the first time, to this quite nuanced kind of 598 00:43:09,079 --> 00:43:14,400 way in which Peterson and yourself to some extent, kind of talk about God. 599 00:43:14,440 --> 00:43:17,039 Because again, as he has been on many interviews, he wasn't too 600 00:43:17,079 --> 00:43:21,800 willing to be drawn on exactly what he means by God. But he was 601 00:43:21,840 --> 00:43:24,639 willing to say, we will have something that functions as God in our life, 602 00:43:25,239 --> 00:43:30,320 and again I saw. I just think that whole conversation has been quite 603 00:43:30,360 --> 00:43:36,559 interesting. I think it's sometimes confusing for people because they are it's like, 604 00:43:36,880 --> 00:43:39,119 uh, you know, I wish I could just get a straight answer on 605 00:43:39,159 --> 00:43:43,519 this. But I think what I've I'm I guess even I am beginning to 606 00:43:43,559 --> 00:43:49,400 learn, is that so many, so often that conversation is already being held 607 00:43:49,599 --> 00:43:53,960 in sort of rationalistic, naturalistic terms, you know, when you say, 608 00:43:54,440 --> 00:43:59,000 just define God for me and then then we'll we'll decide whether he exists or 609 00:43:59,000 --> 00:44:01,760 not kind of thing. Actually, and I just think Jordan is just one 610 00:44:01,760 --> 00:44:05,119 of these people. He says, I'm not going to play the game that 611 00:44:05,159 --> 00:44:07,599 way. Okay, that's because I'm immediately going to fall into your trap basically, 612 00:44:08,159 --> 00:44:12,599 And I just found that quite refreshing that he was kind of I don't 613 00:44:12,599 --> 00:44:15,639 think he was being evasive in that sense, he was just not willing to 614 00:44:15,840 --> 00:44:22,079 sort of fall into that specific debate, which you know how that's going to 615 00:44:22,119 --> 00:44:24,199 go kind of thing. So yeah, yeah, a lot of people make 616 00:44:24,199 --> 00:44:28,440 fun of Jordan because of that that these moments where he says, well, 617 00:44:28,440 --> 00:44:30,639 what do you mean by God? What do you mean by believe? What 618 00:44:30,639 --> 00:44:34,559 do you mean? And and I think that I understand why they make fun 619 00:44:34,559 --> 00:44:37,599 of him, but I think that they're He's basically trying to say, when 620 00:44:37,599 --> 00:44:42,239 you're talking about the source of reality, when you're talking, when you're when 621 00:44:42,280 --> 00:44:45,760 you're that's the conversation you're having, You're saying, what is the source of 622 00:44:45,800 --> 00:44:47,880 meaning? What is the source of reality? What is the source of all 623 00:44:47,920 --> 00:44:54,159 things? Then if you try to use a language that reduces that to propositions, 624 00:44:54,159 --> 00:44:59,519 then you're already in the wrong sphere. And so you have the problem 625 00:44:59,679 --> 00:45:04,039 of you have you have the problem of again that we're falling into a trap, 626 00:45:04,079 --> 00:45:06,440 which is, like you said, if I if I try to define 627 00:45:06,440 --> 00:45:08,599 God like I try to define the species of a dog, then then the 628 00:45:08,679 --> 00:45:14,599 Christian is lost at the outset. And there the truth is that in our 629 00:45:14,599 --> 00:45:19,599 own Christian tradition, there is an apophatic idea. There is an idea that 630 00:45:19,639 --> 00:45:24,480 God is not totally definable, that God cannot be completely captured by meaning. 631 00:45:24,519 --> 00:45:28,440 And it's not a way of evading, it's a way of saying, the 632 00:45:28,480 --> 00:45:32,559 source of all things cannot be captured by things like that's just how it's actually 633 00:45:32,639 --> 00:45:37,599 just a kind of normal argument for the same reason that how can I say 634 00:45:37,599 --> 00:45:40,039 this, like, you'll never get to the Big Bang even in your science, 635 00:45:40,039 --> 00:45:44,559 because you can't get to the origin in the system. The origin the 636 00:45:44,599 --> 00:45:49,039 origin is behind the system of something, And that's a difficult argument for people 637 00:45:49,079 --> 00:45:53,519 understand. But I think that there's something about JORDANU intuitively yeah once and I 638 00:45:53,559 --> 00:45:58,480 think and I think, you know, there's always that danger in my world 639 00:45:58,480 --> 00:46:01,719 that we want everything kind of buttoned down and kind of explained and neatly, 640 00:46:01,880 --> 00:46:07,599 sort of systematically kind of done. And I think in that sense, Peterson 641 00:46:07,719 --> 00:46:13,440 sort of has sort of frustrated both Christians and atheists at that level because he's 642 00:46:13,480 --> 00:46:15,719 not willing to be put in those boxes in that way. But I found 643 00:46:15,719 --> 00:46:21,000 that but in an interesting way, that's part of his appeal I think for 644 00:46:21,119 --> 00:46:28,079 many people is that he's sort of not kind of using the typical language of 645 00:46:28,480 --> 00:46:31,559 either side, and so he's he's kind of That's why I think it opens 646 00:46:31,559 --> 00:46:36,480 it up for people in a strange way, because it's it's a bit more 647 00:46:36,519 --> 00:46:39,880 expansive and they feel like this isn't the kind of the thing I heard in 648 00:46:39,920 --> 00:46:44,920 Sunday School. But it's not that it's not kind of you know, the 649 00:46:45,159 --> 00:46:49,199 Dawkins lecture either that I was at. So, yeah, I just think 650 00:46:49,199 --> 00:46:52,239 there's something going on there that means that it's yeah, sometimes hard to pin 651 00:46:52,360 --> 00:46:54,599 down in the way because people like to have things very black and white, 652 00:46:54,599 --> 00:46:59,920 But at the same time, it's kind of opening up the possibilities for people 653 00:47:00,159 --> 00:47:04,280 in other ways, you know. And so in your new in this new 654 00:47:04,320 --> 00:47:10,320 project, in this new documentary series, what are the things that have surprised 655 00:47:10,400 --> 00:47:15,280 you because you kind of had a perception and the right perception, that something's 656 00:47:15,280 --> 00:47:19,199 happening in culture, and so we need to investigate this and understand it. 657 00:47:19,239 --> 00:47:22,559 But what are some of the things that that you didn't expect to see? 658 00:47:22,599 --> 00:47:27,880 Maybe I think some of it is is the people you know that I encounter 659 00:47:27,960 --> 00:47:32,360 who have become Christians, and some of them are really surprising stories. You 660 00:47:32,400 --> 00:47:37,079 know. You know Paul kings North quite well, and again he's someone who 661 00:47:37,559 --> 00:47:43,960 was himself completely shocked, surprised by the fact that he became a Christian because 662 00:47:44,000 --> 00:47:46,039 it was that was not the thing that he was expecting would provide the answers. 663 00:47:46,079 --> 00:47:49,239 You know, he thought he knew what Christianity was. You know, 664 00:47:49,280 --> 00:47:52,320 there's that sense in which I think you can almost become inoculated to Christianity if 665 00:47:52,320 --> 00:47:55,159 you've kind of received a small shot of it, you know, at some 666 00:47:55,239 --> 00:48:00,320 point thinking that you've had the real thing, and then you discover later that 667 00:48:00,480 --> 00:48:04,400 are no. It turns out the real thing was something altogether different and bigger, 668 00:48:04,880 --> 00:48:07,320 and and he you know, went through, you know, sort of 669 00:48:07,320 --> 00:48:10,400 teenage atheist phase. He kind of then spent a long time in sort of 670 00:48:10,440 --> 00:48:14,920 in Buddhism, felt like he still needed to worship something though. There was 671 00:48:14,960 --> 00:48:19,840 that kind of deep sense that the world was enchanted and nature that she loved 672 00:48:19,880 --> 00:48:22,480 so much, and so he tried wicker you know for a while, and 673 00:48:22,119 --> 00:48:25,519 you know, was out in the woods kind of doing nature religion and worship. 674 00:48:27,480 --> 00:48:31,400 But again in a very sort of really interesting series of events in his 675 00:48:31,480 --> 00:48:36,079 own life where at one point his wife, out of the blue, again 676 00:48:36,119 --> 00:48:38,119 not a Christian, told him he was going to become a Christian. And 677 00:48:38,159 --> 00:48:44,760 then he was having dreams about Jesus and he was suddenly having all these correspondences 678 00:48:44,800 --> 00:48:47,599 from people he hadn't realized were Christians in his life, and it just there 679 00:48:47,639 --> 00:48:51,320 was just like he says, it was almost like he got dragged out of 680 00:48:51,320 --> 00:48:55,800 wicker and into It's orthodoxy in fact in the end. So it's I just 681 00:48:55,800 --> 00:49:00,119 find that really interesting because again you've got someone who's highly intelli, you know, 682 00:49:00,280 --> 00:49:06,840 person twenty first century modern person, but who who suddenly finds that the 683 00:49:07,119 --> 00:49:12,280 story they've been looking for a kind of a story to make sense of life, 684 00:49:12,320 --> 00:49:15,920 and suddenly that the last story they expected to do it was the one 685 00:49:15,960 --> 00:49:20,840 that did it. And I just am finding kind of increasing examples of that 686 00:49:20,840 --> 00:49:24,440 that again in a funny way, that that sort of story of Ian hersty 687 00:49:24,440 --> 00:49:28,159 Aali And I'm only mentioning kind of the big, well known once here. 688 00:49:28,079 --> 00:49:30,760 There's lots and lots of other smaller, less well known stories that I could 689 00:49:30,760 --> 00:49:37,760 mention. But again, I just find it so interesting that suddenly, you 690 00:49:37,800 --> 00:49:42,239 know, in this moment, she comes out and says, actually, I'm 691 00:49:42,280 --> 00:49:47,280 not an atheist anymore. I And she doesn't kind of give a you know, 692 00:49:47,840 --> 00:49:52,920 credle statement of belief exactly in Christianity, but what she does say is 693 00:49:52,960 --> 00:50:00,000 atheism isn't enough, and I need what whatever it is that this person Jesus 694 00:50:00,320 --> 00:50:05,920 represents. That's what I'm looking for in my life. And again I just 695 00:50:06,320 --> 00:50:09,760 find I would that you could have knocked me over with a feather when when 696 00:50:09,800 --> 00:50:14,639 she dropped that article, because I was like, what this is? This 697 00:50:14,679 --> 00:50:16,159 is a bit like St. Paul on the Road to Damascus. Here this 698 00:50:16,320 --> 00:50:20,480 was a proper new atheist one that you know, she shared the stages with 699 00:50:20,639 --> 00:50:22,719 Harris and Dawkins, so if it could happen to her, it could happen 700 00:50:22,760 --> 00:50:27,880 to anyone, you know. And so so these I do find these genuine 701 00:50:27,960 --> 00:50:31,199 surprising. I feel like something's changed in the atmosphere that it's possible for those 702 00:50:31,239 --> 00:50:36,599 kinds of stories to suddenly be happening. So that's probably the bit I find 703 00:50:36,639 --> 00:50:40,440 most exciting, most surprising. I think in a way, there's lots of 704 00:50:40,440 --> 00:50:43,719 other surprising elements to it, you know, as I said, the way 705 00:50:43,760 --> 00:50:49,159 that the ground has shifted so completely, so that I see kind of unusual 706 00:50:49,159 --> 00:50:54,000 bedfellows now with some of the atheist interlocators who are now sharing stages with Christians, 707 00:50:54,039 --> 00:50:58,960 who are you know, buddying up and kind of collaborating in various ways. 708 00:50:59,199 --> 00:51:01,880 So many interesting commonversations that you're having with with people that you might not 709 00:51:01,960 --> 00:51:06,199 have ever thought to you would be having, you know, ten years ago, 710 00:51:06,679 --> 00:51:09,440 because I think there's been a kind of convergence of lots of things and 711 00:51:09,440 --> 00:51:13,639 and so I I don't know how that's all going to shake out, and 712 00:51:13,679 --> 00:51:15,519 it's not all necessarily going to be positive, and people are going to go 713 00:51:15,559 --> 00:51:19,880 off in different directions with this, but I do just find that that the 714 00:51:19,920 --> 00:51:23,239 whole thing is sort of getting shaken up, stirred around. And I feel 715 00:51:23,280 --> 00:51:28,639 like, you know, again this is my me speaking as a Christian, 716 00:51:28,639 --> 00:51:31,559 that God's doing something, you know, in the process of all that, 717 00:51:31,719 --> 00:51:38,039 and and I just yeah, quite excited about it. Well, everybody, 718 00:51:39,039 --> 00:51:44,599 you check out Justin's book, The Surprising Rebirth of the Belief in God and 719 00:51:45,000 --> 00:51:49,719 his the documentary series re Enchanting. Like I said at the outset, it's 720 00:51:49,760 --> 00:51:52,719 really interesting. He's talking to all the people that similar people that we're talking 721 00:51:52,719 --> 00:51:58,519 to there is you know, he's in the he's perceived some of the similar 722 00:51:58,559 --> 00:52:01,199 things that everybody's watching this as see that there's something happening. There's a deep 723 00:52:01,239 --> 00:52:07,079 shift in culture, and definitely there is a return of the sacred and the 724 00:52:07,159 --> 00:52:10,800 possibility of seeing Christ freshly again. And so Justin, thanks so much for 725 00:52:10,840 --> 00:52:14,039 all the work you do. Oh yes, You're so welcome, Jonathan. 726 00:52:14,039 --> 00:52:19,559 It's been absolute privileged to be on. Just one slight sort of correction there, 727 00:52:19,639 --> 00:52:22,320 which is the re Enchanting podcast is a slightly different thing to the Surprising 728 00:52:22,360 --> 00:52:25,800 Rebirth of Belief in God podcast, but we're using quite a lot of material 729 00:52:25,880 --> 00:52:30,800 from that in the documentary series, so they're very much connected in many ways. 730 00:52:30,800 --> 00:52:34,199 Where's the best place people can find you're working. Yeah, justin Briley 731 00:52:34,280 --> 00:52:37,679 dot com is my website, so you can sign up to the newsletter, 732 00:52:37,719 --> 00:52:39,639 do all the usual things there, but you'll get links to the podcast, 733 00:52:39,679 --> 00:52:43,960 to the book and to re Enchanting as well if you want to follow some 734 00:52:44,000 --> 00:52:46,079 of the conversations we have on that other podcast. But yeah, justin Briley 735 00:52:46,199 --> 00:52:50,480 dot com. All right, thanks Justin, Thank you so much.