Relatable with Allie Beth Stuckey - Ep 364 ｜ Christians vs. Cancel Culture ｜ Guest： Dr. Christina Crenshaw

00:00:00.000 Hey guys, welcome to Relatable. Happy Thursday. So excited for you to listen to this conversation

00:00:14.680 that I'm about to have with Dr. Christina Crenshaw of Baylor University, who is the

00:00:19.560 latest target of a small but loud mob of cancelers who are trying to take her down and get her fired 0.99

00:00:28.080 simply because she tweeted skepticism about Biden's executive order to expand Title IX

00:00:34.180 so that boys will have access to girls' restrooms and locker rooms and sports teams. And she simply 0.99

00:00:41.260 questioned the implications of that. And also, if the feelings and if the opposition of the majority

00:00:49.600 of Americans even matters when it comes to policies like this and when it comes to this kind of

00:00:55.200 activism, she's got a lot of insight for us, a lot of encouragement. As you can tell,

00:00:59.560 it's a longer conversation because so much is packed in. But I know that you are going to

00:01:04.320 leave this dialogue feeling edified and feeling challenged and feeling built up. So

00:01:09.600 I'm really excited to end the week with this conversation. Without further ado, here is Dr.

00:01:15.060 Crenshaw. Dr. Crenshaw, thank you so much for joining me. Could you tell everyone who you are

00:01:23.920 and what you do? So thank you so much for having me. So I teach as a professor, technical lecturer

00:01:30.420 at Baylor University. I have been in education for 20 years, taught as a high school English teacher

00:01:36.060 and then moved into the higher ed side. And I have taught as a professor out in California.

00:01:43.040 And then we moved back to Waco, teacher Baylor. I have taught everything from educational leadership

00:01:49.240 to social issues and education, most currently teaching a faith and writing class in the English

00:01:55.620 department. And then I also teach an anti-human trafficking class through the Honors College.

00:02:01.740 Okay, gotcha. And you are here not just because you sound like an awesome professor, which I'm sure

00:02:06.740 you could teach us a lot of things, considering everything that you have studied and taught over

00:02:10.840 the years. But you're also here because you've gotten kind of unfortunately and unintentionally

00:02:17.900 in the middle of some drama and maybe in some hot water with some students at Baylor because

00:02:22.780 of something that you said on Twitter about the expansion of Title IX. So can you just give us a

00:02:28.020 recap of what happened? Sure. You know, it was just a week ago, so still kind of reeling from it. But

00:02:34.060 I would say it was a small group of students with a very loud voice. And that is often the case. But

00:02:41.240 because I want to accurately represent the student body, I have felt overwhelmingly supported by

00:02:45.800 colleagues and students. Yes. So about two weeks ago, I would call him a like-minded colleague. Dan

00:02:53.000 Darling posted his own tweet that said, you know, we need to be concerned as people of faith about the

00:02:59.740 Mexico City cancellation with the executive orders by Biden and this Title IX expansion that we should

00:03:07.460 be concerned about this. And so then I replied and said, you know, what about the rest of us? Do we

00:03:12.920 have a voice on this? You know, essentially saying we are catering, we are appeasing the 1% really at 0.84

00:03:20.040 the expense of the 99, the rest. And that isn't to, you know, imply that everybody shouldn't be

00:03:26.720 protected. But my concerns, what I was really raising with just 140 characters is the idea that are we

00:03:32.860 penalizing biological females at the, you know, in order to cater to, again, to kind of acquiesce or 0.72

00:03:42.380 appease, you know, the small percentage who really want to occupy these spaces. And if you, you know, kind of

00:03:49.140 look at the language of the tweet, I use it in terms of children. Because when I was tweeting, I was not

00:03:54.720 thinking at all of my identity as a professor. You know, I certainly have, you know, a constitutional

00:03:59.720 right as a professor to solve this opinion. But I'm looking at it through a lens of being a female,

00:04:05.040 of being a mother, and anti-trafficking work that I do. I think that those are all places,

00:04:10.440 this is a place of real concern. If we start allowing biological men, whatever their sexual 0.97

00:04:16.240 identity, that is sort of like a nuanced and tangential, you know, conversation. If we allow

00:04:22.960 biological men to have access to spaces historically reserved for biological women, we are going to 0.94

00:04:31.100 have, that's, it could be problematic. I think that there's enough data and enough reason to be

00:04:36.620 concerned about, about that. Yeah. And so you raise concerns about that. And just, I think everyone

00:04:42.800 listening probably knows exactly what you mean by the Mexico City policy and the expansion of Title IX.

00:04:47.540 But just to clarify for people who may not know, the Mexico City policy, Biden reversed. And what

00:04:54.280 that actually does is it sends our tax dollars to fund abortions worldwide. This has kind of gone

00:05:00.220 back and forth between Republican and Democratic presidents. Republican presidents have said,

00:05:04.460 yes, the Mexico City policy stands. Our tax dollars are not going to fund abortions worldwide.

00:05:09.640 Democratic presidents, including Bill Clinton, Obama, and now Biden, have said, yeah,

00:05:14.000 your tax dollars are going to fund abortion worldwide. Christian should obviously care about 1.00

00:05:18.260 that. Those of us who are pro-life and then the expansion of Title IX is talking about allowing boys

00:05:24.720 who identify as girls into girls' exclusive spaces. So locker rooms, bathrooms, sports teams. And your 0.99

00:05:32.240 tweet raised a concern about that, which I think is a totally legitimate question. What about those of us

00:05:38.860 who don't want our daughters to share a bathroom with a boy? Like, do we matter? Do our concerns 0.89

00:05:45.700 care? Does our offense matter if we're offended by this? If we're worried about the safety of our

00:05:52.460 kids or just the fairness for competition for our girls? Why don't our voices have a say? And I think

00:05:58.620 the fact that you got so much backlash for raising that concern shows that the opinion of some people,

00:06:04.740 even if it's a minority of loud people, is that your voice and your opinion and your concerns,

00:06:09.620 they don't matter at all. And not only that, but they're bigoted. Would you say that's an accurate

00:06:15.000 assessment of the reaction that you've gotten from some? Absolutely. Again, I would say, you know,

00:06:20.020 here's what I think is also really fascinating about this is I didn't realize how organized

00:06:25.040 the backlash would be. So, you know, a good week goes by and nobody really, you know, people like the

00:06:32.300 tweet or whatever, but there was not an immediate reaction to it. Mostly because within my then

00:06:38.600 small, it's tripled in size and since small Twitter community, it is full of like-minded people. So I

00:06:44.440 think it's, you know, similar conversations that I have been having. But there is a group on campus

00:06:50.480 who is working to become an organized official sanctioned group on campus that would support LGBTQ

00:06:58.480 right. So they would be part of the university campus recognized groups. And they've been on

00:07:05.380 this mission for a while. You know, I was doctoral student there and I remember, you know, they were

00:07:09.880 fighting for to be part of the university even then. And I'm not really privy to all of their

00:07:15.500 conversations. I have not really been paying attention. I just know it's been at least, if not

00:07:19.120 longer, a 10-year battle. And apparently there has been a very organized effort as of late to make

00:07:27.280 this happen. So the Baylor Lariat, which is the student paper, ran an article recently, but, you

00:07:33.340 know, before my tweet, you know, really advocating for this group to become an officially recognized

00:07:38.680 group. And this was just fodder for, I think, their agenda. Because then from here, they ran an

00:07:45.900 entire student, I mean, it's student paper. It's not Baylor official, but, you know, it's on campus.

00:07:50.400 A story about, and the title of it was, Dr. Crenshaw, you know, our Baylor lecturer tweets

00:07:57.280 homophobic rhetoric. And so, you know, it's even that language that was homophobic. You know, I'm

00:08:02.540 looking at our children and what this means for women. And suddenly this has this label on it that

00:08:10.480 looks to shut down conversation, that looks to really label somebody, to pigeonhole them. It shuts

00:08:17.740 down. It makes the conversation polarizing. And it's no longer a conversation. It's a label. And

00:08:22.980 it's hate speech, which is part of, you know, what they had called it. So a petition gets started to

00:08:28.760 get me fired. You know, there's a whole change.org petition to get me fired. Finally, the university

00:08:34.560 weighs in, and they do it in a very diplomatic way, which is to be expected. And they say, hey,

00:08:39.700 this is the right to free speech. This wasn't hate speech. It's within the constitutional right.

00:08:44.020 We need civil discourse. That then enrages the students, the small group on campus even more.

00:08:50.720 Yeah, how many signatures were there at the time that Baylor responded?

00:08:54.220 I have to be honest. Allie, I can't bring myself to look. So friends will, like,

00:08:58.520 screen check colleagues are coming to my defense. They're like, or did you see this comment?

00:09:03.080 And I always thought it was odd when, you know, people of notability, celebrities or,

00:09:08.380 you know, politicians would say, I don't read the news on me. And I'm like, yeah, you do.

00:09:12.400 Yeah, you do. But I think your soul can only take so much.

00:09:18.340 Totally. So I would estimate that between, you know, social media and my emails, and this is a

00:09:24.480 fascinating case study. Social media is where all of the hate speech is coming. Nobody will write that

00:09:31.260 in an email. Like it's either overwhelmingly supportive or they'll say, hey, I support you.

00:09:35.920 But maybe if you're going to raise this question, just needs to be a little more sensitive. I'm like,

00:09:39.740 fair. That's fair. But on social media, between the two, I've probably gotten 300 responses.

00:09:45.360 If I had to quantify it, 75% is probably supportive. And then 25%, you know, there were some who

00:09:52.020 wished ill will to my children. And I, you know, there was a day last week where every time a car

00:09:58.540 would drive by the house, I'm like, wait, I get nervous, which I've never, ever had a reason or,

00:10:03.780 you know, to struggle. But the amount of just hateful words, just venom that I think people

00:10:09.700 would say. And I understand they believe they're fighting for justice with these words is what I

00:10:15.240 think it is. You know, they're young, they're in college. This is their activism. And I don't think

00:10:22.620 that they realize that I have been doing this two decades longer. And, you know, that I have actual

00:10:28.460 things that you can point to, to say, this is what activism looks like. Even if you want to,

00:10:33.480 you know, I approach life through a Christian worldview lens. Everything I do is very gospel

00:10:38.780 centered. But I think even as an agnostic or an atheist or in a pluralistic society, you could look

00:10:43.740 at that and say, she's doing really great work. And just because you disagree with this one tweet

00:10:49.640 doesn't mean you have the liberty to paint her as transphobic. So I think that that has been the 0.93

00:10:55.480 majority of the rebuttal to the situation. Yeah, I would probably intensified it is I don't know

00:11:02.820 if you've noticed, but almost every Christian network picked it up.

00:11:16.380 Because I think it's because not that there's, you know, this entire thousands and thousands of

00:11:22.820 people mob that's coming after you, it might just be and it typically is a small minority of loud

00:11:29.760 voices that are speaking up, but it's happening at a Christian university, you echoed a concern

00:11:36.940 that a lot of very rational people have people who believe as you and I do that we are called to

00:11:44.160 love our neighbors, and that we are called to treat people equally. We also believe that, you know,

00:11:50.020 we live in a pluralistic society where we have to balance rights and religious liberty and all

00:11:54.040 that. So rational people, right, you and I from my perspective, anyway. But we have some concerns,

00:12:02.620 right? We have some concerns with the expansion of Title IX, we have some concerns for our, for our

00:12:08.000 girls, for kids, for what this means for safety and trafficking and all of that. And I think that's

00:12:13.540 probably why it's caught on because you said something in a very simple way that you probably,

00:12:19.220 I mean, not that you did it thoughtlessly, but you probably didn't think that much about it before

00:12:22.840 you said it. I had no idea the firestorm it would cause. It was just a simple reply to a friend,

00:12:28.480 like we were having a conversation. Absolutely. Yeah. So I think that's, yeah, that's why it's kind of

00:12:33.820 picked up and it's become something, especially when there are students, even if there are just a few

00:12:40.100 hundred or a few thousand students trying to get you fired. I mean, we say that we live in a society

00:12:47.560 that has free speech and technically that is true because we have a first amendment, but I've talked

00:12:53.580 a lot before that, yeah, you can have a first amendment, but if the institutions and the people

00:12:59.460 around you will not allow you to safely state your very rational opinions, then do you really have

00:13:07.580 free speech? What do you think? Yeah. You know, so it's interesting. I didn't have a reason to really

00:13:11.940 dig into my first amendment right to tweet before, you know, and mostly I have, I'm a pretty, you know,

00:13:19.200 safe centered person online. But also I just, you know, I think we all assumed we lived under these

00:13:26.400 rational, reasonable protections. But it turns out that there are actually, you know, some criteria

00:13:33.220 under this and that I was within my first amendment right. But you are protected to free speech if

00:13:39.580 your speech is contributing to a concern in the public square. So essentially if it's something

00:13:44.880 on policy, if it's something socially, and if it's something within the local community. So if you are

00:13:49.500 expressing concern, which I was, that's protected speech. You are also protected if your speech is not,

00:13:57.420 if you are not representing any official organization. So I could not say, you know,

00:14:03.460 on behalf of Baylor University, on behalf of my organization. But you're not talking about

00:14:07.120 what the first amendment allows you to say. You're talking about. Under the first amendment,

00:14:11.660 there are these employer rights. Employer. Okay. So you're talking about under the umbrella of

00:14:16.960 employer. You're not talking about in general as an individual, because obviously the right to free

00:14:21.620 speech expands much farther than just genuine concern and things like that. Correct. Correct. But under,

00:14:26.320 if you are an employee and your employer wants to look into investigate, you know, potentially have

00:14:32.720 some sort of, you know, retribution for your actions, then the questions that they would look

00:14:37.900 at, and there's been some cases who have gone, you know, to the appellate courts on this, they look

00:14:41.660 at, okay, is this person contributing to a conversation at large in the public square? Yes. Is this person

00:14:47.880 representing the organization for which they work? No. I mean, perhaps, you know, like indirectly,

00:14:54.380 but as I am not claiming to stand for the right. So this was in completely within my constitutional

00:15:00.300 right to free speech on all levels. Right. So I think that that's where, you know, Baylor had to

00:15:06.120 land on that. But it does raise concerns. You know, I have gotten some requests to be parts of groups

00:15:12.000 behind paywalls. And these are groups that I would never think did not feel comfortable speaking in

00:15:18.060 public because they have very large public platforms. But I think this was really eye opening

00:15:22.900 experience to realize that people don't necessarily feel comfortable speaking freely,

00:15:28.820 even if they can root their stance in data. I think a Cato study came out recently saying that

00:15:36.720 two thirds of Americans don't feel like they could share their opinion in public without some sort of

00:15:41.580 backlash or persecution. And now I don't know if it looked, I imagine the demographics were broad

00:15:46.820 across the spectrum. I would like to think on the study, I haven't looked into it, but I do remember

00:15:50.760 reading that and thinking so that's that's, you know, people from both ends of the spectrum are

00:15:54.740 feeling if I lend my voice to any conversation in the public square, I could potentially be risking my

00:16:02.600 livelihood, if not worse. And when I would hear studies like that prior, I would think, well, that's a

00:16:09.820 little bit of an of a rash reaction that surely we still live in an America where we can say things

00:16:16.620 like, I disagree with Biden's 30 executive orders that he assigned within the last 10 days without

00:16:23.740 having to have a university that has historical Baptist tradition roots, disagree and slander. And so I think 0.98

00:16:33.300 that's what's been alarming for people to say, wait, if this Christian professor at a Christian university

00:16:39.840 cannot even express Christian Orthodox traditional views without any sort of persecution or backlash,

00:16:47.960 what does that mean for the rest of us? And I think that that was really what was raised in all of these

00:16:53.560 articles that have been written. Right. And Baylor, though, they have, they've done a pretty good job of

00:17:00.220 making you feel supported. Is that true? I would say that that is true, largely. I will go on record saying I

00:17:06.680 have not personally heard from administration. I think that there may be just hoping it dissipates.

00:17:13.080 But the provost, who is the second in command right under the president, did write a really great

00:17:18.220 response about free speech. Civil discourse brought up this example and said, these are not, this does

00:17:24.420 not constitute hate speech. It is not grounds for reporting somebody to Title IX to question Title IX.

00:17:30.500 And we're not going to fire her over this. And so it was, it was a stance. Yeah.

00:17:35.860 Again, that just enraged the small group further, because then they took their, you know, backlash

00:17:43.280 out on me. So, yes. And I, in my experience, it does typically dissipate. You're, you'll get probably

00:17:49.260 a trickle every now and then of people who will message you and, and things like that. But it is

00:17:56.780 probably more encouraging than you realize for people to see someone like you raise a concern and,

00:18:04.740 you know, state something that so many people feel. And, you know, we talked about a couple weeks

00:18:10.080 ago, there was this baby sleep trainer. Her name is Kara Dumoplin. And she, it was found out that she 0.97

00:18:15.160 voted to, or she donated to the Trump campaign. And, you know, they tried to cancel her, put all of

00:18:20.440 her paid for content for free online and all this terrible stuff. And, you know, how she reacted to it

00:18:27.000 was very kind, very gracious, and she didn't apologize. And that's the thing that I think

00:18:31.340 people need to see, is that if you say something that you really meant, and then the mob, even if

00:18:36.740 it's a small mob, they come after you, they try to take you down. Unless you really regret what you

00:18:41.840 said, don't apologize. And I appreciate that you have it. Yes, maybe you've taken some, what you feel

00:18:48.400 like it's constructive criticism or whatever, but not apologizing, not then adding caveats,

00:18:53.660 not then backing down. That actually gives people a lot of courage, don't you think?

00:18:59.140 Yeah, you know, I have found that to be true. Well, one of the things I said to someone who

00:19:02.540 reached out there, you know, a really big Christian organization, and they had written about me. And he

00:19:09.000 said, you know, thank you for your bravery. And I said, you know, just very honestly, I was like,

00:19:13.000 well, bravery is hard. I mean, bravery, it's really difficult. It's not easy to be on this

00:19:18.460 side. I can see why people would cater or what people would cave and retract a statement. I could

00:19:24.080 understand that now. I haven't. And I stand by what I said, you know, I will say it again,

00:19:28.700 biological males do not need to be in biological women's spaces, that that really is not the best 0.99

00:19:35.640 for the majority. Yeah, you know, I'm putting it in very simple terms, because it's hard to believe

00:19:40.800 that is a polarizing statement in this day and age. I know, right. The you know, I would say my

00:19:46.100 husband asked me the other day, I was like, if you could do it again, would you? And I'm like,

00:19:49.160 gosh, it's always such a hard answer. I know a hard thing to answer. But I would say yes,

00:19:54.140 I would maybe take off the cool at the end. I think that made it a little snarkier than I had

00:19:58.920 intended, you know, in the moment, again, just between, you know, colleagues or small little

00:20:03.480 Twitter circle. But I think, you know, otherwise, no, I feel comfortable with what I said,

00:20:07.820 I stand by what I said, I don't apologize for what I said. And,

00:20:10.800 and I'm sorry, if it hurts a few people's feelings, I'm not looking to be cruel, I'm not

00:20:17.260 looking to hate anybody, I am simply looking to protect the interest of everybody. But in this

00:20:23.480 case, the majority, you know, like we have not stopped to consider how sometimes policies we make

00:20:29.780 actually hurt more people than they help. And I'm just asking, can we ask the question about whether

00:20:35.540 this is really a good idea, whether it is with funding overseas for abortion, and or whether it

00:20:41.020 is allowing biological men to compete in sports or to participate in girls clubs that have been

00:20:47.380 exclusively for girls, you know, we have to remember that Title IX 1972 was really created to protect

00:20:53.680 women, to create space for them to compete in education, for them to compete in sports for them 1.00

00:20:58.460 to have equal opportunity and equal access. And so this is the first time, you know, really Obama

00:21:04.380 administration that we see he was the first one to include, you know, rights of people who were not

00:21:10.260 biologically of their gender that we've always defined it by. But I think when we look at what

00:21:15.480 defines sex, like that's also a conversation I've had people who are not necessarily faith based,

00:21:21.840 but our scientists, who are, you know, biologists who who work with anatomy, and they're like, this,

00:21:27.620 this is really ridiculous for the sciences, the hard sciences are having a hard time with this as well.

00:21:32.560 Definitely. And we've had some of those people on this podcast, there are a lot of people. It's

00:21:37.600 interesting how this whole not just cancel culture, but I would say how far leftism has moved to the

00:21:43.420 left, how it has created strange bedfellows, it has united people in common cause, you know, I have

00:21:50.740 conversations on this show with atheists about the dangers of critical race theory, agnostics about 0.97

00:21:56.600 the dangers of, you know, erasing, erasing women, radical feminists, they would call themselves who 1.00

00:22:04.680 disagree with the expansion of Title IX and Biden's executive order and the Bostock case, that

00:22:10.420 apparently Biden's executive order was based upon. And so there's a lot of people, I would say the vast

00:22:18.860 majority of people, when they really think about the issue, not just, well, do you believe transgender

00:22:23.920 people have rights? Well, yeah, of course, I believe everyone has rights. But when you dig past it, well,

00:22:30.060 do you think that men should be able to enter girl spaces, in prisons, in women's shelters, in locker 0.74

00:22:37.060 rooms, in bathrooms, in girl sports? Most people say, well, no, that's, that's not fair. But I think when

00:22:45.300 we've allowed kind of postmodernism in this post-truth world in which we live to infiltrate

00:22:50.100 every area of our lives, then what is science? What is biology? What is gender? What is sex?

00:22:56.820 It all becomes very relative.

00:22:57.720 It all becomes very arbitrary.

00:22:59.320 Yeah.

00:22:59.860 But the ironic thing in all of that is that in the midst of all of that relativism, our people,

00:23:07.220 the people who carry that relativism are so dogmatic about being right.

00:23:10.800 Yes.

00:23:11.460 And you have just been on the, on the bad end of that. Would you agree?

00:23:15.040 Right. And I think what I'm finding too, is you really cannot enter any kind of a civil discourse

00:23:22.440 or conversation with people who are dogmatic and hostile and refuse to have a conversation about it.

00:23:29.600 You know, if they're, if they're not willing to be reasonable about it, if they're not willing

00:23:32.540 to bring in any kind of facts or data, if it is completely what we call, you know, within writing

00:23:38.420 pathos, you know, logos, pathos, ethos, if it's basically just a feelings-based emotional argument,

00:23:45.740 then you can only take that conversation so far.

00:23:49.280 Yeah.

00:23:49.800 Because really this is a conversation that requires that we look at the logos, the facts involved in

00:23:56.480 this, the data, you know, do we really think this is in the best interest of everybody?

00:24:01.900 And that isn't to say that we don't look to protect everybody and to extend rights, but

00:24:06.880 perhaps that looks like single stall bathrooms, or can I at least have a nuanced conversation

00:24:11.960 about what this will mean when biological men want to compete in track and sports?

00:24:16.740 Because we already have some examples, some case studies of when biological men have competed

00:24:22.580 in women's sports as they identify as transgender, then they obliterate the field. 1.00

00:24:28.620 You know, they, they end up winning all of these competitions and, and you have these

00:24:32.040 women athletes who are saying, wait a second, this is not fair.

00:24:35.020 This is not right.

00:24:35.620 We have worked too hard to get here.

00:24:38.460 You know, first and second wave feminists worked to establish equal space. 1.00

00:24:42.680 And then we have these third and fourth waves coming in saying, well, anybody who wants to

00:24:46.520 identify as a woman, as a woman is welcome to join the table in the conversation.

00:24:50.220 So I think there are a lot of us left still, you know, saying, can I raise my hand and ask

00:24:55.320 a few questions about this because it feels, it all feels a very anti-woman to be quite

00:24:59.880 honest.

00:25:09.140 Yes, it definitely does.

00:25:10.240 I was just posting about, um, on, on Instagram, I listened to, you know, I'm pregnant.

00:25:15.780 So I listened to some pregnancy podcasts, some birthing podcasts and things like that.

00:25:20.920 And the insistence upon saying people, birthing people instead of women or pregnant women or

00:25:26.940 moms, it really grinds, it really grinds my gears. 1.00

00:25:31.040 And it's, it's offensive to me.

00:25:33.320 Or when I hear the term chest feeding or something like that, I'm like this amazing miracle that

00:25:38.520 I so uniquely get to experience.

00:25:40.820 What a privilege it is that God gave women this amazing ability to be able to, to birth

00:25:48.400 life and then sustain life.

00:25:50.240 You're saying that that has nothing to, that's not unique.

00:25:53.480 Like that's, that's not a, a special characteristic that God gave me that I can't relish in the

00:25:59.480 beauty and the uniqueness of being a woman through birth that I have to say, no, this just applies

00:26:04.700 to all people.

00:26:06.060 I'm offended by that.

00:26:07.160 And kind of going back to your original tweet that got some people mad.

00:26:11.580 Does my offense not matter?

00:26:13.280 Right.

00:26:13.740 Right.

00:26:13.940 Like, can I be offended that you're offended or does it not work that way?

00:26:17.560 Yeah.

00:26:18.380 So I can't be offended.

00:26:20.000 So the, the vast majority of, of people who give birth, I mean, they're all women, but

00:26:26.400 the vast majority of us identify as women and you calling that into question, it offends

00:26:34.720 me.

00:26:35.020 It bothers me.

00:26:35.600 It feels like I'm being, it feels like women are being erased.

00:26:38.900 Right.

00:26:39.300 And so we've gotten so far, like you said, in women's rights.

00:26:43.620 And I definitely, I don't consider myself a feminist.

00:26:46.340 I don't agree with a lot of the so-called logic of feminism. 1.00

00:26:49.600 I think it helped get us here, but we have gotten so far in so many ways for women's rights

00:26:54.620 only for me to not be able to say like that women have unique capabilities. 1.00

00:27:02.140 It all just seems so counterproductive.

00:27:04.240 Well, and it all seems very, it's all very circular.

00:27:07.000 And I think to your question earlier, I mean, if your listeners want to do a deep dive into

00:27:12.400 critical theory, because that is where critical race theory stems.

00:27:15.360 A lot on our podcast.

00:27:16.920 Well, and I did a podcast through, actually our church, we did one, it has a podcast and

00:27:21.840 we did one on critical theory and the dangers of it.

00:27:24.220 And really this idea of deconstructing, you know, like specifically with theology, deconstructing

00:27:30.320 2000 years of church history in order to fit into your postmodern secular humanist narrative.

00:27:37.400 Like that just seems ridiculous.

00:27:40.400 Like there's a lot of hubris involved in that, right?

00:27:43.180 The amount of, the amount of like hermeneutical gymnastics you have to go through in order

00:27:48.560 to make something fit your postmodern narrative is, it's exhausting and it's embarrassing.

00:27:54.260 And I don't think that they see the circular thinking within it, you know, like, well, I'm

00:27:58.200 offended, but I'm offended, but you don't get to be offended.

00:28:00.300 Okay, got it.

00:28:01.140 You know, and I think also the irony.

00:28:03.600 So for example, within the article that the slanderous article that the Baylor student paper

00:28:08.300 wrote, this, a student of mine, a former student of mine said, essentially like, I really liked

00:28:13.100 Dr.

00:28:13.340 Crenshaw.

00:28:13.560 She was on our safe list for the LGBTQ community.

00:28:18.740 So I was on her safe list on Monday, but then they had to like take me off on Tuesday

00:28:21.780 and I'm like, nothing about me has changed.

00:28:25.180 Unsafe.

00:28:25.660 Right.

00:28:25.920 You know, so whatever it was about the way that I taught or, you know, like my life is

00:28:30.020 a pretty open book.

00:28:30.820 You can go to my website.

00:28:31.820 You can see I'm, you know, overtly faith-based.

00:28:34.360 You know, I have associated with a lot of faith-based things.

00:28:36.740 If that made you feel safe on Monday, but then I tweet something on Tuesday and suddenly

00:28:43.120 it negates the whole of everything else that I stand for, that is on you, not on me.

00:28:49.380 Right.

00:28:49.580 You know, so I think that that has been really interesting too, is, is to see all the logical

00:28:53.860 fallacies within this progressive thinking that says you have to wholesale accept our

00:29:00.060 narrative or you were, you were either with us or against us, you know, and, and, um, it's

00:29:05.020 disheartening, but I think before it felt more like theory and to actually live through it

00:29:09.600 and you're like, no, really, I do think that we need to be concerned about free speech.

00:29:14.180 Even if you run in, you know, Christian circles, I think that you need to be concerned about, 1.00

00:29:21.360 you know, your right to express orthodox traditional views because there are going to be people who

00:29:25.960 question that.

00:29:26.680 I think that we also need to be concerned about how much of a voice we give to youth.

00:29:33.500 You know, I, I have said often before on social media, yes, all voices matter, but not all

00:29:39.300 voices carry the same weight.

00:29:41.380 Yeah, definitely.

00:29:41.940 You know, look to the experts.

00:29:43.040 It kind of goes back to the ethos, pathos, logos, you have to have, I mean, obviously appeal

00:29:48.860 to authority is a, it can be a logical fallacy, but knowing where something is coming from and

00:29:53.820 if that person has any significance.

00:29:57.940 Totally.

00:29:58.600 Matters.

00:29:59.120 I would go to Dr. Fauci to get my epidemiology, but I go to a lot of people listening to this

00:30:04.760 podcast would disagree with that.

00:30:06.340 Okay.

00:30:07.060 Compared to, for my theology, I would go to Dr. Timothy Keller, right?

00:30:11.200 Like I don't, you know, you go to the expert in the field.

00:30:14.680 I'm not necessarily saying that I agree with everything Fauci says, but I'm saying you don't

00:30:18.000 take advice exclusively from the internet.

00:30:20.400 There's going to be people who also don't agree with Timothy Keller on everything.

00:30:24.660 So just, you know, people have, you can disagree on all that.

00:30:29.160 That's perfectly fine.

00:30:30.660 But yes, they are experts and that you wouldn't go to Dr. Fauci for theology.

00:30:36.080 Exactly.

00:30:36.740 Or Keller for epidemiology, right?

00:30:39.020 Like you, you go to the people who have done the hard work in this field.

00:30:42.660 And that is, you know, really my point there.

00:30:44.780 So wherever you land, if you, you know, gospel coalition or whatever, you know, is where you

00:30:49.340 go for your source, but the point is go to people who do this for a living.

00:30:53.740 Don't just take advice from groups on the internet, you know, like you, you have to go

00:30:58.500 to people who have the clout and credibility is really, is where I'm coming from in that.

00:31:02.620 And so I think that that has been interesting because we live now in this, in this world,

00:31:06.940 the last 10, no more than 15 years where everybody has a voice and everybody has a seat

00:31:11.480 at the table and we want to, you know, hear every voice and every voice counts.

00:31:15.180 And I think that we're starting to realize there's a danger in that, that that is

00:31:19.120 not the, the, the most reasonable and the, and then the best interest of everybody to

00:31:24.660 allow so many voices to be present at the table.

00:31:27.260 Yeah.

00:31:27.700 So, yeah.

00:31:28.520 And you have to look at actually how many voices are there.

00:31:31.700 There was someone who I've had on this podcast, Abigail Schreier, who she wrote the book Irreversible

00:31:36.760 Damage.

00:31:37.520 And she talks about, yeah, well, she talks about this subject, about how there's actually

00:31:41.480 a social contagion involved, but these teenage girls suddenly saying that they identify as

00:31:46.260 the other gender, some of them go through surgery or procedures and they regret it.

00:31:50.260 So she's written a book about that.

00:31:51.540 She's really been a champion, um, uh, of that issue of advocating for these young girls who

00:31:58.280 are kind of being tossed aside by the medical community and just given hormones and forgotten

00:32:03.320 about, but someone, one person, random person on Twitter complained about target selling her

00:32:09.740 book.

00:32:10.040 One person random again, like, I don't know how many followers they had, but it wasn't

00:32:15.360 some journalist or activist or anything target immediately responded, took her book out of

00:32:22.400 distribution.

00:32:22.860 Now, thankfully she noticed this and the rest of us it's, I mean, this is what it always

00:32:28.760 is.

00:32:29.020 The rest of conservative Twitter got loud, started writing stories about it, interviews on it and

00:32:35.900 they put it back on distribution, but it seems like just one tiny voice of opposition when

00:32:42.160 it comes from the left is enough to make major corporations and sometimes universities, universities

00:32:48.580 cower in fear and kowtow for no reason.

00:32:51.980 I just think it would make such a statement if more people did what you, what you said and

00:32:56.260 said, okay, do I need to respond to this?

00:32:59.660 Where is this?

00:33:00.500 Where is this coming from?

00:33:01.400 Is this just one random troll that is angry?

00:33:04.020 Okay, that's not worth responding to.

00:33:06.500 It's when the universities respond or when the corporations respond and when they kowtow

00:33:10.960 to these demands that it becomes this whole big thing.

00:33:13.560 Just say no to petulant children. 1.00

00:33:16.140 Yeah, and you know, and I think there are very, there's only a few examples that I can

00:33:19.820 point to where I have seen corporations stand up to an angry mob.

00:33:25.480 I remember this summer hearing a story about there was a group, some probably changed petition

00:33:29.560 online to get Trader Joe's to cancel, you know, some of their, their items.

00:33:34.580 And Trader Joe's was like, you know, we don't listen just to the views of a few.

00:33:38.740 Like we make corporate decisions within corporate and we feel fine with these names.

00:33:43.560 We are not going to change them because you woke up today and chose to be offended by this.

00:33:48.560 That is not how it works.

00:33:50.020 And you know, and that's really interesting too, because when a student reached out and

00:33:52.320 was like, we're reporting you to Title IX.

00:33:53.860 I got to tell you, Allie, my first thought was actually not fear because I went to that

00:33:58.200 place in my mind.

00:33:58.760 I was like, okay, probably Baylor's going to get this and think this is ridiculous.

00:34:02.700 You know, she is, you know, a graduate of our school.

00:34:05.600 She's won awards.

00:34:06.560 She has a great teaching record.

00:34:08.360 She really, at the end of the day, makes us look good.

00:34:10.940 Like this is what we want to be able to say our professors are doing great research, great

00:34:15.640 work, and from a place of Christian mission, you know, check, check, check.

00:34:19.680 But I thought to myself, okay, so Baylor gets this, you know, what if they do decide

00:34:23.740 to do an investigation?

00:34:24.500 Because that's what they were trying to trigger.

00:34:25.960 They were trying to initiate these students, some sort of an investigation into this Twitter

00:34:30.740 post.

00:34:31.740 And I thought, okay, let's say I lose my job.

00:34:35.200 Let's say I can never teach there again.

00:34:37.460 I can't ever go to, you know, A&M or UT or any other school.

00:34:41.400 You know, I'm blacklisted.

00:34:43.520 I guess I just pivot and I do something else.

00:34:46.020 I had to go there in my mind, which is really sad and disheartening.

00:34:49.360 But I say that to give people courage, because I think these are places we have to think

00:34:54.440 through, particularly as Christians, particularly as believers.

00:34:58.640 We have to say, I'm going to count it all loss.

00:35:02.060 What does that look like to count it as a loss?

00:35:04.920 It is disheartening that I had to count faith as a loss within a faith-based circle.

00:35:10.640 I mean, it really brings tears to my eyes to even think about that, that I, you know,

00:35:13.900 didn't feel completely protected and within tradition and orthodox and biblical perspective

00:35:19.800 amongst this group of students.

00:35:21.900 That loving my neighbor looks like loving my transgender neighbor, but it also looks like

00:35:27.260 loving all of the women and all of the daughters and all of the people that I would be concerned

00:35:32.480 with, you know, when this Title IX policy is implemented or implemented back from the Biden

00:35:38.640 administration.

00:35:39.320 Because Trump had rolled it back, and then Biden just reinstated it, is essentially what

00:35:43.580 happened.

00:35:44.600 So I think that on this side, I would say coming out of this, that we have to count the cost.

00:35:51.620 You have to be able to say, worst case scenario, what would my plan B be?

00:35:57.100 Because I don't want to allow the world to negate what I know to be true, true about science,

00:36:05.400 true about scripture, true about morality, all the things that we have historically said,

00:36:10.960 this is a truism, and we have upheld it through the test of time.

00:36:15.040 We can't just allow a postmodern narrative to obliterate that.

00:36:19.740 There has to be space for a conversation and not just a cancellation.

00:36:25.920 Yeah, absolutely.

00:36:35.400 I like what you said about the importance of loving everyone, loving your transgender neighbor,

00:36:42.440 loving all kinds of neighbors.

00:36:44.940 But we cannot, not but to you, but to this idea of love that is projected on us or is

00:36:55.100 dictated to us by the world.

00:36:57.200 We don't get our definition of love from the world.

00:37:00.700 So loving your transgender neighbor, your gay neighbor, whatever it looks like, doesn't 1.00

00:37:06.720 mean to the Christian saying, yes, we agree with you on everything.

00:37:12.100 We agree with how you live your life.

00:37:14.360 That's just, that's not what God calls us to.

00:37:17.020 We see a perfect depiction of love and truth in Jesus that he never compromised in what is

00:37:24.160 true, that he always relied on the truth of God's word and his mission from the father,

00:37:29.140 even while loving so radically and intentionally throughout his life.

00:37:33.080 And that's what, that's what Christians are called to do too.

00:37:36.800 I mean, Martin Luther said, truth at all costs, peace if possible.

00:37:40.340 Right.

00:37:40.480 And we're not to make peace with the world.

00:37:42.720 James tells us that, you know, enmity with the world is peace with God and vice versa.

00:37:48.700 Friendship with the world is enmity with God.

00:37:51.620 And so I think that Christians also need to not lay down and be okay with it, but get used 1.00

00:37:57.900 to the cancellation that's coming because Jesus says that we're going to be canceled

00:38:02.940 for saying things that to us are so obvious that, hey, boys and girls are different.

00:38:07.000 And in some places they don't need to be sharing spaces.

00:38:10.400 And hey, like, this is what we believe about life inside the womb.

00:38:15.160 People want to make you feel like that's radical.

00:38:17.260 People want to make you feel like that's fireable, like that's cancelable.

00:38:20.540 Well, in Matthew 10, Jesus says, well, don't fear the people that can hurt your body.

00:38:26.080 Fear the God that can destroy both your body and your soul in hell.

00:38:30.180 That's our response to cancel culture.

00:38:32.640 Yeah.

00:38:32.980 Is that there's nothing you can do to me that is worse or bigger than what God can do.

00:38:39.000 So, right.

00:38:39.960 And that's, and I think that that would be, you know, yeah, sort of my overall synopsis

00:38:43.960 that, you know, my key takeaway lesson learned from this for everybody else is that you really

00:38:50.220 do have to go into a situation where you are speaking up for truth.

00:38:55.780 Again, you know, biblical truth, scientific truth, just things that we know to be little

00:38:59.640 T truths and big T truths and to say, okay, but I have to count the cost of standing up

00:39:05.900 for this because if I don't, then what is the legacy I am leaving for the generation

00:39:10.160 behind me?

00:39:10.660 I am constantly thinking that if I acquiesce to a postmodern, secular, really relative

00:39:17.180 narrative here, what damage am I doing to the gospel?

00:39:20.980 What damage am I doing to my children who are coming up behind me to my, to my Christian 1.00

00:39:25.640 witness and to the precedence I am standing for them?

00:39:28.700 And so I think that that is, it's definitely true.

00:39:31.020 It's a little disheartening because I think we all, we're all working as believers towards

00:39:36.740 a place where we can engage our faith in the public square.

00:39:40.940 And I have been a fierce advocate, whether I am doing that through anti-trafficking work

00:39:44.660 because I see redemption and restoration in that, whether I am joining, you know, Christian

00:39:48.440 women's leadership boards, I am doing that because I believe that the gospel is the answer

00:39:53.900 to brokenness.

00:39:55.200 And it sometimes looks like overtly Christian work and sometimes it looks like common good

00:39:59.380 work, right?

00:39:59.960 But I am nervous for the first time after this experience saying, wait, it is getting

00:40:05.380 harder and hostile.

00:40:06.900 When people have been warning me about this, I see it, I've experienced it.

00:40:11.600 And this isn't coming from a state school.

00:40:14.700 You know, this is coming from in a school that associates and their rhetoric says that,

00:40:19.840 you know, they're unapologetically Christian, right? 0.98

00:40:22.260 And so to the one side who is saying, well, being Christian looks like accepting everyone.

00:40:26.860 Being Christian looks like loving everyone.

00:40:28.960 Being Christian does not necessarily mean look like acquiescing to everyone when you are

00:40:34.160 having to acquiesce what God says to be true.

00:40:37.440 And I think that we are entering into this new era where we are going to have to navigate

00:40:43.220 those nuanced conversations as believers with such care and caution.

00:40:48.440 You know, I mean, it doesn't mean that we shirk back, that we aren't bold about it.

00:40:51.200 But I think that this is where culture may not be as much on our side as it has been historically.

00:40:58.400 Yeah.

00:40:58.660 And I'm seeing that.

00:41:00.560 Absolutely.

00:41:01.300 And I, you know, that's scary for a lot of people.

00:41:04.440 But we, you know, we did an episode on cancel culture the other day and said so much of what

00:41:08.680 you're saying now is one of the pieces of advice that I give to myself, that I give to everyone

00:41:14.020 that's looking at this wave of hostility that they know and feel is coming, whether or not

00:41:18.860 they've experienced the way that you have.

00:41:22.840 Two, number one, count the cost.

00:41:25.020 It's time for us to count the cost ahead of time.

00:41:27.320 Don't wait until you've been canceled to count the cost.

00:41:31.100 Decide now, is it worth living for Christ?

00:41:35.360 And I'm not trying to say that means we have to agree on all things politically, but there

00:41:39.420 are some basic things that to the Christian are not political.

00:41:42.200 Gender is not political to the Christian.

00:41:44.420 Abortion is not political to the Christian.

00:41:46.540 These are theological issues primarily.

00:41:50.400 And so it's time to count the cost.

00:41:52.980 And then another thing that I think that I encourage people to do is that when they see

00:41:56.580 someone like you or someone that they know, we're just standing up for what is true, getting

00:42:02.220 the brunt of this mob to stand up with them, to be willing to share the arrows, be willing

00:42:08.340 to share the heat.

00:42:09.300 I think that's part of loving people as you, you know, treating people as you want to be

00:42:13.460 treated.

00:42:14.400 I would want someone to stand up in my defense and say, hey, this person's character is not

00:42:19.640 what you're saying it is.

00:42:21.100 This person is not a hateful person just because you disagree with them.

00:42:24.420 And you know what?

00:42:25.420 I agree with them.

00:42:26.580 I think if we had more people willing to publicly say, I know I'm going to get canceled.

00:42:30.780 I've counted the cost and it's worth it.

00:42:32.460 And when I see someone being unfairly maligned for something that I know is true and I agree

00:42:36.940 with, I'm going to raise my hand.

00:42:38.920 Even I could stay hidden for a really long time, but I'm going to raise my hand and say,

00:42:43.240 you know what?

00:42:44.460 I agree.

00:42:45.400 Yeah.

00:42:45.760 That's really powerful.

00:42:48.060 Maybe we won't change culture.

00:42:49.460 Maybe we won't change politics, but we'll at least be united under a banner of truth while

00:42:56.220 all of this is happening.

00:42:57.760 Right.

00:42:58.200 And I think too, you know, it's interesting because it actually, you know, it brings tears

00:43:02.160 to my eyes.

00:43:02.660 I got teary eyed when a student reached out and said, I just want you to know we have a

00:43:06.320 group chat with 188 students in it and we're praying for you.

00:43:10.080 I didn't even know you could put that many on.

00:43:11.920 You know, but I just got really teary.

00:43:14.680 It was a male student that I actually have never even taught.

00:43:17.500 And I think this has been a red letter moment for this micro example I would love to believe

00:43:24.420 is going to be true at the macro level.

00:43:26.140 That when we face opposition, that like-minded people with similar values will rally around

00:43:32.700 us and say, this is not okay.

00:43:35.020 You don't get to cancel somebody because they have a dissenting opinion.

00:43:38.920 And that is true of the right and the left, but I think that most of us would agree with

00:43:43.440 the statement that we see it more strongly on the left.

00:43:46.040 There was a study that came out of Harvard recently.

00:43:48.280 I don't know if you've read this.

00:43:49.420 Not long ago, but within the last two years that looked at cancel culture and it found

00:43:54.340 that both sides do it, but it indicated that the left does it more and that the consequences

00:44:00.460 are more dire.

00:44:02.280 And I, you know, and so I read that and I remember thinking, well, I can, I can see that.

00:44:05.700 But I think here, like, I really see that it's a very rare that I see conservatives trying

00:44:11.420 to ruin someone's livelihood.

00:44:13.680 It happens.

00:44:15.100 The incidences are much more rare.

00:44:17.860 And yeah, typically I see it with something like, hey, I'm going to boycott Netflix because

00:44:21.960 they had cuties. 0.88

00:44:23.120 Exactly.

00:44:23.700 You know, we talked about that too.

00:44:25.100 The distinction between saying, hey, I'm going to take my business elsewhere, which everyone

00:44:28.840 is totally, you know, free to do on the left or the right.

00:44:31.800 Fine.

00:44:32.160 Vote with your dollar.

00:44:32.820 Um, that's very different than saying, hey, this small business owner, this one person

00:44:37.740 who said something I don't like, or this florist who won't service a gay wedding because of

00:44:43.260 her belief in, you know, biblical traditional marriage, I'm going to ruin her life and I'm 1.00

00:44:47.100 going to go after her in court.

00:44:48.920 Those two things are, they have very different repercussions.

00:44:52.040 Right.

00:44:52.580 Right.

00:44:53.080 Very different motives.

00:44:54.680 Yeah.

00:44:54.960 And very different, uh, repercussions.

00:44:57.520 Yes.

00:44:57.740 And so I do think, so again, I, you know, I see this happen on the right or the left.

00:45:02.460 I see it happen more on the left and I, and I do see that the consequences are more dire

00:45:06.160 and there is actually a study that's, that supports that.

00:45:09.140 So I, you know, we, we can point to some data there, but I think, yeah, that is the thing

00:45:14.420 that, um, I think as believers, we're going to say, you know, we're, this is a red letter

00:45:17.820 moment for all of us.

00:45:19.300 Micro example on what we need to do at the macro level.

00:45:21.560 When we experience cancel culture, when, you know, somebody is trying to negate our right

00:45:27.040 to free speech, to ask valid questions in the public square, to say that we disagree,

00:45:32.480 then we have to be able to rally like-minded believers to say, she's not alone.

00:45:36.220 He's not alone.

00:45:37.240 We are concerned too.

00:45:38.600 And that's not okay.

00:45:40.340 Um, and I, I think that in a way that we have not historically had to, because we shared

00:45:45.480 the majority belief, I don't know in this culture.

00:45:49.100 I, I don't know that we have the loudest voice and that is the thing.

00:45:52.880 I think that we have the shared majority values, um, across the, you know, the, the spectrum

00:45:57.860 of Christendom and people who, you know, believe in Christianity, but I don't know that we have

00:46:03.140 the majority voice anymore.

00:46:04.280 And so it is going to take a rallying of people who say, Hey, that's not okay.

00:46:09.680 Yeah.

00:46:09.880 You cannot just bully somebody into submission.

00:46:12.320 Yeah.

00:46:12.920 Yeah.

00:46:13.200 And I think the refusal to be bullied into submission also is, I mean, both of those

00:46:19.760 things play together.

00:46:20.660 Other people encouraging you and saying, Hey, don't be bullied.

00:46:24.440 Hey, everyone else don't bully her.

00:46:25.800 And also that person, Hey, I'm not, I'm not going to be bullied.

00:46:29.940 And I actually think there's a lot of encouragement.

00:46:32.320 I remember a pastor, um, a few years ago saying something that's just always stuck with me and

00:46:38.200 has just become more and more significant as the years go on.

00:46:42.420 And as I hear about different situations like this is that the church actually thrives on

00:46:47.080 the margins.

00:46:47.540 So we are, the church is in America being pushed out of the mainstream into the margins.

00:46:52.020 And the way that that's happening right now is it's being really just evangelicalism in

00:46:56.960 general as being conflated with things that it is not white nationalism, white supremacy,

00:47:01.560 hatred, bigotry, um, being told that it's dangerous, that it's inciting violence and domestic

00:47:06.600 terrorism, that it's a threat to national security.

00:47:09.300 And so of course, any kind of speech that is even similar to any kind of traditional

00:47:13.940 conservative Christianity, whether or not that person's a Republican, whatever, is going

00:47:18.640 to be pushed to the margins.

00:47:19.760 And that's scary for a lot of people because we have had this exceptional respite from religious 1.00

00:47:25.860 persecution as Christians in the West and in particular as America, as Americans.

00:47:30.000 Christians, but the, it's the, it's the rule, not the exception that the church has been

00:47:36.920 persecuted.

00:47:38.160 And Jesus promises us that the gates of hell are not going to prevail against the church.

00:47:43.640 That includes true believers in America.

00:47:46.020 So yes, there's going to be pruning to the vine.

00:47:48.720 Yes, there's going to be people that we thought were believers that at the slightest bit of pressure

00:47:53.120 fall away.

00:47:54.260 Yes, there's going to be compromisers who then come, come back and repent.

00:47:58.020 And we might be pushed to the margins to where we don't have the cultural megaphones anymore,

00:48:02.740 to where we are called, everyone's called a bigot and a racist for believing that the

00:48:05.940 Bible is the word of God, whatever it is.

00:48:08.220 But the church doesn't die on the margins.

00:48:11.020 The church thrives on the margins.

00:48:12.540 The church is not destroyed by fire.

00:48:14.260 It's refined by fire.

00:48:16.200 Yeah.

00:48:16.600 And in all of these instances that you might feel, maybe you feel like this is so small

00:48:21.500 that you just said a tweet that wasn't even necessarily theological.

00:48:24.760 Yeah.

00:48:24.980 And, you know, it's not going to make, it might not go to Fox News.

00:48:28.080 It might not go to, certainly not going to go to CNN.

00:48:31.120 You know, it might not be this viral story.

00:48:33.380 This small instance actually does matter.

00:48:37.080 It actually does matter.

00:48:39.100 And people listening to this conversation, it actually does matter.

00:48:42.620 It is just another fortification of people's spirit to say, you know what?

00:48:47.840 I am going to count the cost and it is worth saying this thing that people think is controversial.

00:48:53.480 Do you have any just last words of wisdom or encouragement for people who are facing,

00:48:58.780 you know, the same kind of anxiety that a lot of people are feeling right now with our views?

00:49:02.940 Yeah.

00:49:03.120 I would say take heart in knowing that even if you feel that the church is being pushed

00:49:08.040 to the margins and not really welcomed, you know, in public spaces, that there are still,

00:49:14.260 you know, people who are willing to stand for truth and you're not alone.

00:49:18.340 I would say to take comfort knowing that the global church is growing.

00:49:22.300 You know, the global church, I think more than ever, the last few years have made me look

00:49:26.580 to what is God doing globally?

00:49:28.620 Sometimes I can become a little, you know, ethnocentric, just what's going on in the American

00:49:33.500 church.

00:49:34.120 And I forget, I have brothers and sisters in Christ all over the world.

00:49:38.900 And we're facing far greater persecution than Americans ever have.

00:49:42.600 Right.

00:49:42.920 I might, you know, I could have lost my job as a professor or been canceled at universities.

00:49:48.720 I wasn't, thankfully.

00:49:50.160 But there are people being persecuted in prisons for their faith.

00:49:54.620 The underground church in China, I mean, there are places, you know, where people do not

00:49:58.040 feel like in the Middle East that they can profess to be a Christian.

00:50:00.220 And so I think you're not alone in your persecution, but you're not alone in your hope either.

00:50:06.280 You know, that, yeah, for 2,000 years, the church has been growing and it has withstood

00:50:10.840 the test of time and it will.

00:50:12.680 And so I think that's where my hope is.

00:50:14.280 You know, I know that the Lord is never ending, you know, that His promises are true

00:50:19.560 and that I can rest in that.

00:50:22.160 I can trust in that.

00:50:23.000 I can trust that, you know, those promises are going to come to fruition.

00:50:26.420 Even if I don't see it in the moment, those are going to come to fruition.

00:50:30.200 And I would say the last thing, a litmus test for me, you know, because sometimes people

00:50:34.700 don't know, well, what voice do I trust?

00:50:37.080 What, you know, who do I listen to?

00:50:38.300 These are my quick litmus test for people.

00:50:41.180 I would say, I ask myself, would I trust this person to raise my children?

00:50:46.740 Would I trust this narrative to raise my children?

00:50:49.340 As I'm listening to, you know, particularly I am trying to find voices for racial reconciliation

00:50:53.840 within the church, because I want to find people who love Jesus and who are pointing

00:50:59.520 me to truth and to say, you know, I trust the fruit in your life, you know, the love,

00:51:04.020 joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control.

00:51:06.880 I see that in you and I would trust you to raise my kids.

00:51:10.340 And then I see these other hostile, cancel cultural narratives and I think, I wouldn't trust

00:51:14.700 you to babysit my kids.

00:51:16.180 I don't want that anywhere near.

00:51:17.520 So if you wouldn't let your kids touch it, you probably shouldn't touch it either.

00:51:22.540 And then another thing I say is, okay, creation, fall, redemption, restoration.

00:51:27.060 Do I see this idea that the biblical narrative creation, we're created in God's image, we've

00:51:32.360 all experienced a fall.

00:51:33.700 We all have a fallen sinful nature, whatever that vice is, you know, it needs to be redeemed

00:51:38.020 and restored.

00:51:38.900 And do I see redemption and restoration in this story, in this narrative, in this person?

00:51:45.000 And if you cannot point to that, you probably ought to run from it.

00:51:50.880 Yes and amen.

00:51:51.900 And make sure that we are defining sin and wrong and right and good and bad and true and

00:52:02.120 redemption and restoration and reconciliation in biblical terms, not in worldly terms.

00:52:08.880 And thankfully, the Bible does give us the answer for so much.

00:52:12.560 And if anyone is wondering, okay, wait, how is there a connection between talking about

00:52:17.700 gender and, you know, your faith and persecution and all of that?

00:52:21.080 That's something we've talked a lot about on this podcast before.

00:52:23.840 Biblical Telos of Gender is an episode that we did a few weeks ago that makes that connection

00:52:29.680 in case, you know, anyone's new to the podcast and hasn't heard it.

00:52:32.580 But I just want to thank you so much for all the encouragement that you've given us, for

00:52:36.460 the insight that you've given us today.

00:52:39.000 Is there any way for people to support you?

00:52:40.900 Just pray for you?

00:52:41.880 Can they reach out to you or what?

00:52:43.760 Yeah.

00:52:44.120 So I've finally made my social media accounts public again.

00:52:47.820 I had to go private in order to just protect myself from the onslaught.

00:52:51.300 But you can follow me on Instagram.

00:52:54.100 You can follow me on Twitter.

00:52:55.640 However, I, you know, not all that active, maybe I will be now.

00:53:00.600 But yeah, so you can finally on social media, have a web page, would love to connect with

00:53:05.460 anybody who is like minded, and, you know, wants to establish a friendship in that.

00:53:10.940 Okay, awesome.

00:53:12.040 Well, thank you so much for taking the time to talk to us.

00:53:14.360 Okay, thank you.

00:53:15.200 Thank you, Allie.

00:53:15.940 Thank you.

00:53:16.000 Thank you, Allie.

00:53:25.640 Thank you.

Relatable with Allie Beth Stuckey - February 04, 2021

Ep 364 ｜ Christians vs. Cancel Culture ｜ Guest： Dr. Christina Crenshaw

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