Relatable with Allie Beth Stuckey - REPLAY ｜ Churches： Beware of the 'After Party' Trojan Horse ｜ Guest： Megan Basham

00:00:00.000 A new curriculum called After Party is being pushed onto churches, promising to bring Christians of different political backgrounds together and back to the fundamentals that Jesus taught.

00:00:16.960 Unfortunately, this curriculum does not deliver on this promise and actually is funded by secular progressives.

00:00:25.480 here today to uncover all of this and more is Megan Basham. She is a reporter for the Daily

00:00:31.140 Wire. Fascinating conversation. You are going to learn a lot from this. I know I did. This episode

00:00:36.660 is brought to you by our friends at Good Ranchers. Go to goodranchers.com. Use code Allie and check

00:00:40.020 out this goodranchers.com code Allie. Megan, thank you so much for joining us again. I really

00:00:54.640 appreciate it thank you it's always good to be here yes okay uh tell me about this this is right

00:01:01.720 up our this is right up our alley i know my audience is going to be really interested in

00:01:06.160 learning about this let's start with okay what is the after party what is it i bet most people

00:01:11.460 listening to this have no idea what that is right and they might find out soon what it is so the

00:01:16.920 After Party, it's a Bible study curriculum that was developed by Curtis Chang, who is a former

00:01:25.160 pastor and a Duke Divinity consulting professor. I believe he's done some work in Silicon Valley,

00:01:31.240 but he really became known for the website Christians and the Vaccine. So he was working 0.64

00:01:38.060 in partnership with the federal government to sort of spread the message that Christians needed to

00:01:43.900 not be afraid of the covid vaccine needed to get vaccinated and he had a fairly viral uh video that

00:01:50.060 went out that said um if you were concerned about it being derived from aborted cells at one point

00:01:57.840 you know way back in its history you should look at it as the um as like an image of jesus's

00:02:03.740 redemption of of sinners so the vaccine was a redemption of that sin it was very bizarre but

00:02:10.000 it kind of went viral. And so he, in partnership with David French and Russell Moore, developed

00:02:16.160 this Bible study called The After Party that is supposed to address political divisiveness

00:02:22.140 and partisanship. So at the outset, an interesting choice of three people, because I don't think

00:02:30.000 when we think of David French, for instance, we necessarily think of someone who is carrying

00:02:34.380 the message of turning down the tone of political divisiveness among Christians.

00:02:39.100 But leaving that aside for the moment, when the Bible study came out, it also came out

00:02:45.520 right about the same time as an Atlantic writer, Tim Alberta's book, Warning About Christian

00:02:51.440 Nationalism, came out.

00:02:53.300 And in that book, he mentioned interviewing Curtis Chang.

00:02:58.300 And he said they were developing this Bible study curriculum to go into churches, but

00:03:02.760 they could not get any evangelical backers they couldn't get any christians who wanted to fund it

00:03:07.420 so they had to turn to mostly progressive unbelievers and it didn't offer any more

00:03:12.460 information than that um and you know chang moore and french were very much sort of the hero of this

00:03:18.580 little vignette in the book well you know naturally your reporterly spidey senses go

00:03:24.720 off and go well wait a minute who are these secular backers who are funding a bible study

00:03:29.140 about politics that's going to be going into evangelical churches so i did some digging um

00:03:35.960 and the first thing that i found was that um they were part of a big grant funding round from

00:03:43.060 rockefeller philanthropy advisors which if you're not familiar is a very secular left foundation

00:03:49.780 they have given yeah big big dollars a hundred million dollars to um an initiative to help uh

00:03:59.140 transgender youth lgbtq queer youth as they put it get gender affirming care um they are funders 0.79

00:04:08.280 of abortion initiatives and things of this nature so this way back like the rockefellers i know that 0.86

00:04:14.460 the rockefeller name is sometimes the center of a lot of conspiracy theories but the truth the

00:04:19.680 verifiable truth is that this family has been a funder of progressive causes like planned

00:04:25.540 parenthood, like abortion initiatives, like you said, for a very, very long time. So the fact

00:04:32.180 that they're funding, helping to fund a Bible study should raise all the red flags.

00:04:38.600 Right. And, you know, just to flesh that out even a little bit more, you know, even in this grant

00:04:45.100 funding round, there were other initiatives that were for things like promoting LGBTQ rural

00:04:53.640 leadership, supporting a group who's looking to keep to keep fossil fuel resources in the ground

00:05:02.200 on behalf of climate justice. So even in just this one grant funding round, it had a lot of

00:05:08.800 other secular left projects that it was funding in the same round as the after party. And when I

00:05:14.800 reached out to the after party and asked them about this, you know, they said, well, we're

00:05:18.820 going to update our website to be more transparent about our funding. And they also happened to

00:05:22.760 reveal at that point that another of their big backers is the Hewlett Foundation, which is,

00:05:27.760 of course, the second largest funder of Planned Parenthood. So these are not great partners to

00:05:34.280 have. Yeah. And, you know, so then from there, I go to the website. I look at, OK, who are their

00:05:41.280 this is who their financial backers are, but who are they partnering with to sort of get the word

00:05:45.720 out about this, um, curriculum to help support it, maybe just through, um, using social media,

00:05:53.260 uh, spheres of influence. And one of their, you know, what they say is one of our partners is a

00:05:58.860 group called one America movement, which is itself. Um, it builds itself as an ecumenical

00:06:04.800 group, meaning people of different religious faiths coming together to address political

00:06:08.680 divisiveness, but you go on their board and you see that one of their board members is a woman

00:06:14.400 at an LGBTQ affirming synagogue.

00:06:17.540 Another one is a man who founded Black Lives Matter

00:06:21.720 in New York, and he has defended rioting as a self-defense.

00:06:27.500 And he has called Jesus a black radical revolutionary. 0.88

00:06:31.980 So yeah, so these are the partners

00:06:35.000 that After Party is working with.

00:06:38.340 And when I saw that, I went, 1.00

00:06:40.480 this should be a major red flag for Christian churches that are bringing this in. There was 1.00

00:06:47.280 a major pastors conference, very mainstream evangelical pastors conference at a big church

00:06:52.640 in Mesa. And they were hosting Curtis Chang and Russell Moore to speak on this topic of political

00:06:59.940 divisiveness in the church. And I heard from a president of a small Christian college who is a

00:07:06.760 member of the CCCU, which is the I always stumble on their acronym, but the Council for Christian

00:07:14.280 Colleges and Universities. And he said they also sent out an email saying this curriculum is

00:07:20.180 coming. We encourage you to bring it onto your campuses and your student life ministries or in

00:07:25.900 your pastoral classes. So that is a really concerning issue that, you know, they're pushing

00:07:31.700 this everywhere. And these are the people who want to make sure that it's getting into your

00:07:36.760 churches and your Christian colleges. Wow. Okay. So what do you think? I know that we can't read

00:07:43.680 hearts and minds. And so if you don't want to answer this question, that's fine. But just based

00:07:48.240 on what you know, you've probably watched more closely than anyone, the evolution of people like

00:07:52.560 David French and Russell Moore, like what would be the motivations of people like this who profess

00:07:58.220 to be conservative christians and i'm not you know i'm not doubting their salvation um but why

00:08:04.320 would they want to partner with not just okay we're not just talking about secular forces or

00:08:08.440 secular entities but we are talking about entities that are and have been for a very long time

00:08:13.780 diametrically diametrically opposed to christ diametrically opposed to christian values

00:08:19.480 who are funding things like abortion, like practices and organizations that conservative

00:08:29.860 Christians have been fighting against for years. I don't really understand why do Russell Moore

00:08:36.540 and David French want to partner with people like this who have set themselves as enemies

00:08:42.320 against the cross of Christ for so long? And like you said, I can't read their hearts,

00:08:48.780 but I can see sort of what the trajectory has been. And if you look at someone like David French,

00:08:53.500 for example, most people outside of a very niche conservative Christian audience wouldn't really

00:08:59.300 have known who he was a few months ago, or excuse me, a few years ago. But since he became a very

00:09:05.300 prominent Trump critic, there has been, I will say, a lot of rewards within the secular media.

00:09:11.000 He is now a columnist at the New York Times, which is, you know, about the pinnacle of secular

00:09:16.160 media career. That's about as high as you can get. So, and you look at that and they're also

00:09:21.560 being given very prestigious fellowships. They're working with Trinity Forum now. And, you know,

00:09:27.820 that was another element of this that I didn't get into, but one of their other partners is

00:09:31.480 Trinity Forum. And for this curriculum that is supposed to be about how to move beyond

00:09:36.520 partisan politics, well, Trinity Forum is participating with never Trump political

00:09:42.580 action committees. So these are things that are very political. And I think that that is probably

00:09:47.820 part of it, too. I mean, there's a certain irony in saying we are going to promote this

00:09:52.780 curriculum about how to not be political when I think you can say that David French and Russell

00:10:00.380 Moore and Curtis Chang, though he's a little less known, are some of the most political voices in

00:10:05.960 evangelicalism. If you look at David or excuse me, Russell Moore in particular, he was very out

00:10:11.800 front in pushing, um, amnesty immigration bills and bills that a lot of conservatives did not

00:10:18.000 like. Uh, so I think that that can be part of it is I think you can say there's probably some

00:10:23.360 political motivation there in that they don't particularly like the candidate who has come

00:10:28.240 to dominate Republican politics. And I can understand that, but they've been very outspoken

00:10:33.140 in saying that there was, um, a compromise of principle among Christians that they did vote

00:10:39.560 for this candidate, that they did back this candidate. So I think there may be a certain

00:10:43.540 element of saying we have to be right here. And to be right, all of those other people have to

00:10:48.680 be wrong, even though that choice that they made did result in the Dobbs decision. And so I think

00:10:57.200 you can see people just over a trajectory, they just sort of start to dig in because I am not

00:11:02.020 going to admit that maybe I did not have full perspective on what was motivating some other

00:11:07.420 people to make their political choices. So let me try to, in the best way that I can, articulate

00:11:14.720 what I think they would say they are doing and what they would say after party is about. And

00:11:21.560 the reason why I think it's important to do this is because when this curriculum is presented at

00:11:27.080 your church, you are going to hear it in the most unifying and innocuous terms possible. So I think

00:11:33.920 it's important for us to recognize what that message will be and then what is actually lying

00:11:38.540 behind it, which is what you articulated. What they are probably saying is that God is neither

00:11:45.480 Republican nor Democrat, and the church does not need to be endlessly divided by the issues of

00:11:52.420 race, the issues of immigration, the issues of abortion, the issues of the vaccine. We need to

00:11:56.900 go back to remembering what is fundamental, what holds us together, and we don't need to be

00:12:01.940 idolizing politicians or any kind of political partisan position but we need to go back to

00:12:08.820 just following biblical principles we need to keep the first thing the first thing and we need to

00:12:15.100 unite races we need to unite ethnicities and nationalities and people of all different

00:12:20.180 backgrounds to ensure that we are advancing God's kingdom first and foremost and unfortunately

00:12:26.680 there has been this scary idolatry of Donald Trump they might not even say Donald Trump they

00:12:31.760 would probably just say, you know, a politician or whatever, among white evangelicals. And there

00:12:37.860 has been a scary rise of nationalism and a scary rise of isolationism that we really need to guard

00:12:45.060 ourselves against because, you know, our citizenship is in heaven. That's what we'll hear.

00:12:49.840 Our citizenship is in heaven. It's not America first. America first is an unbiblical position,

00:12:55.340 whether you're looking at immigration or foreign conflict or whatever. That's kind of how they 0.62

00:12:59.560 And you could see how someone who's maybe not very politically savvy or someone who has kind of imbibed this holistically pro-life, and I use scare quotes there, mentality of, okay, to really be pro-life, you have to be like for, you know, all welfare and open borders and against the death penalty and all these things.

00:13:21.880 you could see how that is appealing, how someone who is tired of partisan politics would hear that

00:13:28.080 message and say, oh, that sounds like a relief. That sounds great. I don't want to be involved

00:13:33.560 in partisan politics. I'm sick of the news cycle. So that's how it's being presented. Right. Right.

00:13:39.400 But tell us, like, what's what's really going on? Like, what is actually the curriculum?

00:13:45.600 OK, yeah. So I watched through all of this curriculum. And, you know, as I told my husband

00:13:51.380 About 80 percent of it is what you just described, just this sort of pablum of let's not be divisive.

00:13:57.120 This is exhausting. Our kingdom, our citizenship is in the kingdom of heaven.

00:14:01.740 Yes, those things are true. But we also, by God's grace, have been allowed to be citizens of a representative republic.

00:14:09.880 And that comes with certain responsibilities to see to the health of the republic.

00:14:13.940 That is part of our job as citizens to to vote, to use our speech in responsible ways that benefit our republic and benefit our states and our communities to freely associate in those same ways for issues that we think are really important, like protecting the lives of innocent people like the unborn.

00:14:34.380 So, you know, it was really interesting as you watch through the curriculum, it was very,

00:14:38.540 very shallow.

00:14:39.300 It did not deal with any of that.

00:14:40.640 It did not deal with verses like render unto Caesar.

00:14:45.540 What is Caesar's?

00:14:46.380 Well, I would argue that, you know, our political responsibilities, you might say, are Caesar's.

00:14:51.300 And that is something that we as Christians steward for the good of our neighbor and our

00:14:56.420 children and our country.

00:14:57.740 And it didn't get into that at all.

00:14:59.180 It also didn't get into those verses about, you know, working for the good of the place

00:15:02.360 that you live.

00:15:03.920 And so really, there was so little Bible.

00:15:07.180 And that was really shocking to me that I went there for a Bible study.

00:15:10.200 There is just no Bible here.

00:15:11.840 There's just kind of this sloganeering.

00:15:14.260 And one of the most interesting points of the series that came up to me was when they

00:15:19.920 kept emphasizing David French in this one segment in particular said, you have to have

00:15:25.040 humility when you approach complex issues.

00:15:28.480 If anyone tells you that they know how to solve an issue, you need to be on your guard.

00:15:34.480 And as he was saying that, there was someone holding up a pro-life sign in the background.

00:15:39.640 So it seemed like a very clear message that if you think you have a clear response to a complex issue like abortion, then you need to be on your guard against that person.

00:15:50.380 Well, some issues are complex, and Christians can have different views, but not on abortion.

00:15:55.420 I mean, thou shalt not murder is not really that complex.

00:15:59.300 It's not nuanced.

00:16:00.300 Yeah.

00:16:00.960 Right.

00:16:01.360 That is not nuanced.

00:16:02.400 And I think that that is a strategy to say, gosh, everything's complex and you can't be

00:16:08.200 sure you have to show humility.

00:16:10.160 Well, to show humility about something that God is very clear on, we're not to be humble

00:16:17.120 on God's behalf.

00:16:18.700 I mean, we may need to be humble on our approach and how we talk to our neighbors.

00:16:22.740 But when it comes to the truth, we don't have to be humble about knowing what the truth is.

00:16:28.340 And we certainly know that that's a life.

00:16:30.360 And we certainly know that we should act in defense of that life.

00:16:34.060 So that is one of the clear things to me was that, you know, I was really troubled by how much they continually return to that look.

00:16:40.580 Be humble.

00:16:41.220 You don't know.

00:16:42.300 You could be wrong.

00:16:44.340 And then on the flip side, you know, they.

00:16:46.840 Did God really say, Megan?

00:16:49.020 Yes.

00:16:49.220 God really say? Why don't you have some humility, Eve? Why don't you have some humility? If you're

00:16:54.840 telling me that you really know what God said, Eve, why don't you have some humility? Right. And

00:17:01.080 let me tell you what God really meant because really God's commands, Megan, they were just so

00:17:06.920 nuanced. Yeah. He might have very hard to decipher. I mean, literally this is a satanic message. You

00:17:14.700 think, you know, what God said about murder. You think, you know, what God said about life inside

00:17:18.980 the world. Did God really say? Wow. Well, and what's odd to me is it's coming from people who

00:17:25.420 have been so very certain on things that truly were issues of conscience where Christians might

00:17:30.900 differ, like the vaccine, like, you know, COVID mandates and lockdowns. I mean, I kind of want to 0.51

00:17:36.300 remind people that David French said Christians who were not willing to get vaccinated for a lot 0.98

00:17:42.420 of really good reasons. Maybe you were a woman of childbearing age. Maybe you were trying to get 0.97

00:17:46.840 pregnant. Maybe you just wanted to sit back and see like, gosh, you know, this is something new. 0.97

00:17:50.720 I just don't feel comfortable in my spirit about this. They accused you of not caring for your

00:17:56.840 neighbors, not loving your neighbors, being willing to see your neighbor die if you didn't

00:18:01.320 want to get this vaccine or you didn't want to not go to church. So, you know, that was an

00:18:06.960 interesting element of this to see confusion on something that is extremely clear, where they

00:18:11.820 have taken very hard line positions on things that should have been matters of conscience.

00:18:17.440 And that goes for Curtis Chang as well, who, again, had this website that was dedicated to 0.71

00:18:22.860 Christians on the vaccine, telling you to get that. And, you know, there have been other

00:18:26.900 elements with Curtis Chang, who I think it should be known that is a Democrat. He has done things

00:18:32.860 like, you know, encouraged Christians who lived in California, don't vote to recall Governor Gavin

00:18:38.480 newsom when that recall vote was up i mean that that was a public post that he was saying you

00:18:43.340 know here's reasons you shouldn't do that um and you know and and smearing the church i will say

00:18:49.960 publicly saying that we own we the church own what happened on january 6th oh yes something i

00:18:56.260 categorically reject that you've talked about that he blames the american church for january 6th

00:19:02.140 what in the world right and that is the kind of thing and i would say that you saw that same

00:19:07.840 language from, um, more and French, this idea that because there are some fringe people who

00:19:15.840 claim the name of Christian doing fringy things, this is somehow an indictment of the entire,

00:19:21.580 um, evangelical Christian church in America. And, you know, I categorically reject that,

00:19:26.860 that you are always going to have fringe groups doing some fringe things. And the church is

00:19:30.940 not to blame for that. Um, now we may want to minister to those people. We may want to speak

00:19:36.500 out on it, but the church doesn't own that. And, you know, maybe the church is never to blame.

00:19:42.280 The church is only to blame when people on the right do something bad. The church is never to

00:19:47.120 blame when people on the left do something bad. Of course, he's not going to call out the quote

00:19:50.560 unquote black church for BLM riots. He's just going to call out the white church as it were 0.93

00:19:58.120 because of, you know, for for January 6th. So it's it's just a shrouded way to try to condemn

00:20:06.080 people on the right. It's just what it is. And that's personally what I think that this

00:20:10.260 curriculum is. Now, I haven't gone through it and I'm not saying and I don't hear you say

00:20:14.220 that. I have. So, yes, yes. So I don't think that you're saying that everything they say

00:20:20.280 is objectively wrong or everything that they say is untrue. Maybe there are some things in there

00:20:24.840 that are helpful to me what i've read and what i'm hearing you say is that it is a shrouded

00:20:30.760 attempt to basically say christians do not stand up for what you believe in if um by doing so you

00:20:38.900 are representing what is considered a politically conservative position if you stand on the side of

00:20:44.700 life if you stand for strong borders or whatever you need to have humility which means you need

00:20:50.760 to be so confused about your position that you're not actually confident enough to say I see that

00:20:55.120 all the time among Christian women by the way it's not just the empathy shaming that we receive

00:21:00.160 it's also the humility shaming and if you would just be humble what they really mean is if you

00:21:06.240 just be humble you would agree with me if you would just be humble you would be pro-choice if

00:21:10.080 you would just be humble you would see that razor wire is not okay on the border if you would just

00:21:15.420 be humble, you would see that you shouldn't vote Republican. Well, what about their pride? What

00:21:21.320 about their pride in assuming that if we had humility, we would just agree with them? I don't

00:21:26.840 know. It just doesn't seem to go both ways. Yeah, absolutely. And it was interesting because there

00:21:31.820 is a moment in the curriculum where you brought up the Black church, and it was taken for granted

00:21:36.680 that one of the issues that Christians have to be working on, and this was stated as fact,

00:21:41.820 is the um systemically unjust system that represses black people in the united states now it's it's in

00:21:48.700 the second either the last or the second to last episode of this series and i went okay so there

00:21:54.380 are some issues that you think are clear and that's one of them uh which again i would say look

00:21:59.840 we could all look at the facts and the data of you know what has happened in police departments

00:22:05.120 across the country and look at differing reasons why you know differing demographics might have

00:22:10.240 different levels of success in different areas and there is that is complex it's incredibly

00:22:15.100 complex when you look at um the history of you know federal programs that right um disincentivize

00:22:21.700 marriage in certain communities and things like that so um that was really just interesting to

00:22:27.100 me that that was a point at which they went this thing however is clear and you know ultimately i

00:22:31.900 go there was very little bible in this i mean maybe a couple of mentions of a few verses but

00:22:37.460 i mean this was not a bible study at all um and then the other thing being that the people leading

00:22:43.620 it you have three guys if you were really trying to go let's look at the arc of divisiveness and

00:22:48.980 evangelicalism why don't you bring in say um a david french but also uh dr albert moeller

00:22:56.500 people who really represent a range of views to wrestle with these issues and that was very much

00:23:01.780 much not what they did. They brought in three like-minded people to tell you why you should

00:23:07.320 be more humble about the issues they think you should be humble about.

00:23:11.600 Yeah. And it's just so telling to me who funds it that, I mean, I think really the biggest

00:23:16.940 impediment to America being fully progressive is the evangelical Christian. It just is. We just are 0.99

00:23:24.720 the most conservative on most issues. And so if you can convince that group, which is really kind

00:23:31.440 of like the last obstacle there that sure you can believe the things that you believe as long as you

00:23:38.820 don't say it as long as you don't act on it as long as you don't vote on it meanwhile you're

00:23:43.860 telling everyone else that all the progressives that in order to be a good person or even in

00:23:50.320 order to be a good christian you do have to act upon your progressive worldview you do have to

00:23:55.480 be a left-wing activist you do have to take it as fact that america is systemically racist

00:23:59.960 one of the verses that I guess they mentioned, so classic, Micah 6, 8, seek justice, love mercy,

00:24:07.260 which is one of the most misused verses because they say that, but then they define justice as

00:24:13.520 the world defines justice, which is social justice, which is not biblical justice at all.

00:24:17.640 And so I'm guessing that they take no time to actually define those things as God defines them.

00:24:23.880 Actually, that was an interesting point. And I jotted it down as soon as I heard it was,

00:24:27.660 Curtis Chang said that we work for justice, as Micah tells us, and working for justice is to

00:24:35.040 make sure that everybody gets what is fair and what they need. And I went, that is not justice.

00:24:40.840 That is not the definition of justice. The definition of justice accords with God's law.

00:24:47.160 The Lord tells us in scripture what justice looks like in his law. It is not making sure that

00:24:52.760 everyone is getting what they need, which is a very amorphous definition that could mean

00:24:57.480 anything to any person we know where justice is and where we find the definition of justice and

00:25:02.600 i did find it pretty fascinating that um even though this this bible study curriculum is not

00:25:07.760 supposed to be about partisanship it's not supposed to tell you um how uh how to vote what

00:25:15.060 to vote for but how you should approach it they when rockefeller noted the funding they said

00:25:20.340 it's going to be unrolling in the battleground and they use that word battleground of ohio

00:25:25.740 and none of these people, Curtis Chang, David French, or Russell Moore live in Ohio. So that

00:25:32.300 was interesting. And then, you know, the big issue, when you look at it, you go in part of

00:25:36.540 the Bible study, they say really what Jesus wants for you when you approach politics is, yes, you

00:25:43.740 think about personal relationships, but the relational approach and how you approach it

00:25:49.540 relationally is what you should prioritize not policies and I went that's what politics is

00:25:56.820 policy politics is setting policy by definition so I don't know what that would mean to say I'm

00:26:03.460 going to approach politics relationally and not with an eye toward policy what yeah I couldn't

00:26:11.240 make sense of that no no if you follow me on Twitter I posted a screenshot of it and I went

00:26:16.100 I am trying to make sense of what this means, because that's what politics is, setting policy.

00:26:21.300 And what we often say, politics matter because policy matters, because people matter,

00:26:26.060 because politics affects policy, policy affects people, and people matter. That is,

00:26:30.040 as you mentioned earlier, politics is not the number one way to love our neighbor,

00:26:34.000 but it's a way to love our neighbor. And we should be advocating for the policies

00:26:38.760 that align most with our biblical worldview, because we believe that God's ways are better.

00:26:45.000 That's not the same thing as scary Christian nationalism, depending on how you define it,

00:26:49.280 or scary theocratic fascism.

00:26:51.100 It's not forcing people to believe what we believe, but we do believe that Christians

00:26:54.580 are called to do what everyone in a representative democracy is doing, which is vote in accordance

00:26:59.860 with your worldview.

00:27:00.980 But this curriculum, like so many other of these Christian, nuanced, nonpartisan organizations,

00:27:08.840 they are encouraging Christian conservatives to be the only ones to check our worldview

00:27:14.180 at the door.

00:27:15.000 We are the only ones that have to compartmentalize our faith, compartmentalize our beliefs before we vote.

00:27:21.000 We have some Christian obligation, apparently, to vote in a way that opposes what we believe.

00:27:26.300 While everyone else is allowed to influence curriculum, corporate policy, legislation based on their moral worldview, Christian conservatives can't.

00:27:37.600 I think that's what this curriculum is.

00:27:39.640 it's convincing Christian conservatives that you have to vote in a way that actually opposes your

00:27:44.460 moral worldview. But everyone else doesn't have to do that. Yeah, I mean, that was essentially

00:27:51.160 what I took away from that was that you should be somewhat quiet. And I don't know if they would

00:27:57.140 have used the word ashamed, but that was how I came away from, you know, from it going, gosh,

00:28:01.920 you should, you know, just be very gentle in how you present your your opinions and your worldview.

00:28:07.840 you. And, you know, to a certain degree you go, well, yeah, you don't, you don't want to be a

00:28:11.020 jerk. You don't want to be aggressive, but I think you can be confident because confidence is 0.98

00:28:14.820 persuasive. Um, confidence often gets you a hearing in a world that seems very confused and doesn't

00:28:21.320 know where they're going, what they're doing, what the answers to life are. So, um, I think this

00:28:26.200 constant counseling to not be confident is designed to do exactly what you're saying, 0.66

00:28:32.120 which is mute and suppress the Christian influence on our culture. And I think we need to know that 0.95

00:28:38.260 our influence, whether they know it or not, for our unbelieving neighbor is good for them as well.

00:28:45.800 That it brings prosperity, it brings well-being to communities, to nations. And when you look at 0.66

00:28:54.900 that, you go, that is a really important thing to think about, is that you are doing good by

00:28:59.480 ensuring the good policies are enacted. And, um, you know, when I look at this, I, I, I try to wrap

00:29:05.200 my head around what they're thinking here. And I really do have trouble with it because, um,

00:29:11.140 if they had not given sucker to something like black lives matter, how many say communities of 0.87

00:29:18.580 color were burned and destroyed. That wasn't good for our neighbor. That wasn't good for, um, 0.94

00:29:24.180 other communities. And it would have been better if we had not been so humble about

00:29:28.360 not speaking out against that when it started yeah ironically this what i believe to be a lie

00:29:34.740 that america is systemically racist and that all disparities are the evidence of discrimination

00:29:41.040 that is a very divisive lie that divides the church to this day unfortunately um and so again

00:29:49.880 it's like okay you're not supposed to be political unless you agree with our politics you can't

00:29:56.020 advocate for a justice outside of social justice you can't advocate for policies that are outside

00:30:02.400 of what these people think are acceptable which is you can kind of be i think the most that they

00:30:08.320 would accept is christ-like is like center right but beyond that is scary and uh divisive whatever

00:30:17.140 the and campaign do they are they involved in this yeah so it was funny afterwards you know

00:30:23.160 the and campaign came out and Justin Giboney did an interview where he said, I don't know if

00:30:28.720 they're directly involved, but he certainly took me to task and said, and I thought this was an

00:30:33.860 interesting admission. Hey, this isn't okay to tag them just because they're being funded by these

00:30:39.900 hard left secular organizations because so are we what I went. Okay. Yeah. So he just gave an

00:30:47.800 interview where he said, yes, we are also funded by Rockefeller. So I did not know that. And I

00:30:52.880 Megan I did not know this okay sorry it just came out I need you to speak slowly and I need you to

00:31:00.780 say all of this again and how you know this the am campaign is funded by the Rockefellers

00:31:06.840 yes so um so Justin Giboney yes I've had him on his yes on his podcast episode he was taking me

00:31:16.020 to task for this piece where I revealed the funding of the after party curriculum. And he

00:31:23.060 said, you know, we also are funded by Rockefeller and groups like this. And, you know, that's okay

00:31:29.720 because they want to see a, you know, a simmering down of divisive politics in the U S so that's

00:31:38.160 part of why they also fund us. So I thought that was a really surprising admission. Um, and, uh,

00:31:46.000 Which now that you're and it's funny because when I heard it, I went, oh, that makes sense.

00:31:49.440 I guess after I had been marinating in and campaign stuff, you know, knowing that Justin is, you know, a Democrat operative.

00:31:58.260 He is. That's his background. And that that wasn't really that surprising to me, having, you know, just come out of doing so much research into the and campaign.

00:32:08.120 So, yeah, I and I haven't looked into it anymore other than that.

00:32:11.780 So that's really all I can tell you is that, you know, people started sending me, hey,

00:32:15.480 Justin Gibbon, he talked about your first things piece and here's what he had to say

00:32:19.440 about it.

00:32:20.120 So I went and listened to it.

00:32:21.640 And that's really all the information I can give you is that he said, us too, we are also

00:32:26.560 funded by these groups.

00:32:28.620 Oh, my goodness gracious.

00:32:31.000 Well, that is very interesting.

00:32:33.060 Now, I've had my, you know, I've had my issues with the A&P campaign basically for the same

00:32:37.480 reason.

00:32:38.620 I'm not saying that I disagree with everything that's said, and I can't impugn any motives,

00:32:43.480 but I mean, Justin's been open about the fact that he's a Democrat, and all of the organizers

00:32:47.540 of the A.N. campaign are Democrats. I don't know if they've ever voted Republican, but

00:32:52.440 they are Democrats. And the feeling that I get, whether they intend to do this or not,

00:32:57.380 is that thoughtful Christians, real thoughtful Christians, won't vote Republican. Now,

00:33:04.600 maybe if you're moderate, maybe if you're kind of a centrist, but that it is wrong to be like a

00:33:12.160 staunch conservative, that that is divisive, that that's idolatry. And maybe he would disagree with

00:33:19.700 that characterization. I think the purpose, either explicitly or implicitly, is to convince

00:33:26.000 Christian conservatives that you and you alone should not vote your conscience and to make you

00:33:30.800 feel better about voting Democrat. After all, it's nuanced. And what you get is kind of like

00:33:36.400 this morally relative argument that, well, yeah, Republicans might kind of get it right on abortion.

00:33:42.720 They might kind of get it right on some things. But then, well, Democrats get it more right on

00:33:48.340 immigration or Democrats get it more right on racial justice or Democrats get it more right

00:33:52.820 on welfare. And so it's really just like six in one hand and half dozen in the other,

00:33:57.680 which i completely disagree with that i don't believe that democrats get it right on any of

00:34:02.120 those things by the way right um and yeah it's okay to say well abortion is a bigger deal

00:34:07.800 like taking kids from their parents homes because they're gender confused is a bigger deal to me

00:34:14.580 than this stuff over here it's like okay to say that we don't have to pretend to be moral 0.72

00:34:19.360 relativists yeah that was going to be my point is that they want to make a moral equivalency

00:34:25.380 between these issues that are not morally equivalent.

00:34:28.400 And part of what was really interesting to me

00:34:30.440 as I was going through this curriculum

00:34:31.820 was that they never got into what I would say

00:34:35.720 are very biblical explanations

00:34:38.000 for why people sometimes back certain policies

00:34:41.140 that are wicked, like abortion,

00:34:43.480 like wanting to trans children 0.99

00:34:45.220 or wanting to back gay marriage.

00:34:47.860 The reason that the Bible tells us,

00:34:50.440 for example, in Romans 1,

00:34:52.320 that people want to pursue policies like that

00:34:55.020 is because they want to indulge sexual immorality

00:34:58.180 and their minds are being deceived.

00:35:00.540 And so there is a sinful motivation

00:35:02.860 to want to see policies like that enacted.

00:35:06.000 For abortion, I mean, you know,

00:35:07.880 child sacrifice is something that we see

00:35:09.800 all throughout scripture

00:35:10.760 and it is never something that is soft peddled.

00:35:13.300 And today our God is convenience or career

00:35:15.980 or, you know, self-actualization

00:35:18.520 or however you want to phrase that,

00:35:21.120 it is the God of self.

00:35:22.480 It is sacrificing to your selfishness.

00:35:25.020 And so at no point in this curriculum did they consider the sinful heart that might lead people to back sinful, wicked policies.

00:35:34.420 And I thought, if you are not going to confront that, then I don't think you have any sort of Bible study curriculum that is really grounded in God's word that understands the depravity of man and how that depravity leads us to pursue things that are really harmful to our neighbors and harmful to us.

00:35:51.000 Yeah, yeah, I agree.

00:35:52.740 And, you know, some people would accuse us of saying, well, you have to vote Republican in order to be a Christian.

00:36:00.820 And I'm not saying that God is checking your voting records before you get into heaven.

00:36:06.460 I'm not saying that.

00:36:08.480 I'm not saying that.

00:36:09.560 I am saying that we should vote in accordance with our conscience.

00:36:13.240 And I don't believe that the policies that the Democrat Party hoists up are policies that Christians can, in good faith, vote for.

00:36:23.280 I'm not saying that there's not debate on any of those things.

00:36:26.100 I'm not saying that there's not discussion.

00:36:27.780 But I think it is wrong to tell conservative Christians, you have to be neutered in order for us to thrive as a country.

00:36:35.780 you have to check your worldview at the door before you, you know, before you can engage

00:36:41.560 and before you can try to influence how society works. I just I think that's wrong. I think it's

00:36:47.220 wicked. Yeah, yeah. And you know, it's funny, because I agree with you that I go, I am not

00:36:53.320 judging anyone's heart on their voting record. But at the same time, I think if you as a Christian

00:36:58.100 are backing, let's say a set of policies, because when you choose a candidate, you are choosing a

00:37:03.400 set of policies. And if the set of policies you are choosing is a platform that says we are full

00:37:09.800 bore for sexual immorality and gender confusion and murdering babies to sacrifice to the God of

00:37:17.260 convenience, I do think that, you know, certainly your discernment is off and I question your 0.99

00:37:22.760 spiritual maturity. You know, people want to get into the Trump issue a lot. And when you read

00:37:28.400 through Tim Alberta's book, which kicked this whole thing off. He is this sort of reason d'etre

00:37:34.940 for everything. I mean, he is the ultimate for how we're deciding whether or not people are

00:37:38.980 Christians. And I go, if you're looking at that as a set of policies, which is how I tend to view 0.52

00:37:43.520 politics, you know, with at each stage of the political process, I am choosing what I think

00:37:48.220 is the best set of policies. So if you are looking at that, and you are saying, and they really have

00:37:54.400 that there is something sick and diseased in the hearts of Christian Trump supporters,

00:37:59.820 I would go, where then, what sort of disease do you think is in your heart as a Christian 0.60

00:38:06.820 or what lack of discernment, what blind spots, if you are choosing a set of policies that

00:38:13.880 is diametrically opposed to God's law, which is not to say that, you know, Republicans

00:38:19.100 are great, because to me, they are very deficient in many ways also.

00:38:24.400 totally um and i go but it's not because they're too conservative efficient right and so i go i

00:38:31.560 have to choose the less deficient option so i choose that option but if it were up to me i mean

00:38:36.600 it is it is very frustrating to me to be in a party that seems to be willing now to say well

00:38:41.700 we lost on a burger fell everybody move forward because i don't want to move forward on that

00:38:46.100 issue i would love a party that would say no that is damaging for children um it is opposed to god's

00:38:52.440 law. It is, you know, it is a sign that our nation is under judgment when we are enshrining things

00:38:58.360 like this into law. So, you know, I would love to be a party that would recognize that. But we don't

00:39:04.000 have that. So I choose the best thing that I can. So it's certainly not to say, you know, the GOP

00:39:08.280 and the church are the same thing. They are certainly not. But, you know, but looking at a

00:39:16.560 sinful world and a really disappointing set of options, I will say sometimes I try to pick the

00:39:22.640 very best one that I can. Yeah, yeah. And I think that's what we all have to do. Let me give people

00:39:27.020 like an example of kind of what this looks like in real life. You were a part actually of this

00:39:32.180 dialogue. My researcher included it in my notes. I wouldn't have even remembered that this happened.

00:39:36.920 But here's kind of what we're talking about in Christian conservatives kind of getting

00:39:40.920 lambasted by these so-called like non-partisan people for saying something very strongly about

00:39:46.780 abortion. So Barack Obama tweeted, it's been a year since the Supreme Court overturned Roe v.

00:39:51.420 Wade. Since then, 14 states have banned most abortions, leaving millions of women and girls

00:39:55.720 with nowhere to turn for the care they need. And yet there are reasons to hope. So and then 0.55

00:40:02.760 he goes on to say that after Roe was overturned, there were other states that helped enshrine

00:40:07.960 abortion rights in their constitution. So if we look past the euphemisms here, we know what he

00:40:12.900 is saying when he says care they need and things like that, right to choose. He is talking about

00:40:18.700 the slaughter of image bearers. Wow. We're talking about child sacrifice. We're talking about the

00:40:23.440 most, I mean, all murder is grotesque, but when you think about what abortion is, the killing of

00:40:29.280 helpless babies, oh my goodness, like that should break all of our hearts. We should never get so

00:40:34.200 cynical in politics that we forget what abortion is and what is being talked about. So I responded

00:40:39.740 to Barack Obama and I said something that I think all Christians should see as non-controversial

00:40:45.440 and non-political, by the way. It's not even political for the Christian. I said, evil man,

00:40:50.280 evil ideology, evil party. Christians have no excuse to ever support these people. There is 1.00

00:40:54.180 no both sides argument. I mean, that is where I stand. Even if you are a single issue voter,

00:41:00.900 which I think it's fine to be, like abortion is that grotesque. So Justin Gibney of the

00:41:06.820 ANN campaign, he responds, in other words, he is saying what I say, which I think that everyone

00:41:12.200 should just like mute that phrase, in other words, because you know that what is about to follow that

00:41:16.740 is someone who just completely. Is not my words. Yeah, misrepresents what you say. But he says,

00:41:21.760 in other words, we get abortion partially right. So you must agree with us on everything when our

00:41:25.780 leaders show a lack of concern. He's talking about Republican leaders show a lack of concern

00:41:29.060 for the lives of immigrants black men killed by authorities pregnant black women the uninsured

00:41:34.380 poor and create laws to make it harder to vote oh my goodness like the number of logical fallacies 0.94

00:41:38.900 in one tweet alone is just insane i don't agree with that representation of republicans at all

00:41:43.620 or the issues at hand right he goes to say thou shall not vote republican is not in the bible i

00:41:49.740 voted for both parties okay so he has voted for both parties he has plenty of criticisms of

00:41:54.060 democrats he says but this narrative is wrong it's extremely disrespectful to millions of faithful

00:41:58.660 black christians interesting and then ben watson ben watson says oh this is i'm remembering now

00:42:07.060 yes ben watson says this is not the first time he and i have gotten into it on twitter

00:42:11.060 he says the type of christianity she espouses includes voting records for membership

00:42:16.520 never said anything close to that in her world my world she creates the standards for how

00:42:22.680 christians are to behave what yeah i think abortion is evil so do you by the way ben

00:42:28.340 Watson. That's a dangerous role to assume. She is creating addendums to orthodoxy and tampering

00:42:34.300 with idolatry. Like, let us remember that I said the ideology and the party that advocates for the

00:42:40.360 slaughter of human beings is evil. And that is idolatrous. It's idolatrous when a Christian

00:42:45.400 conservative talks strongly about things. And you come to my defense and you say that is evil. 0.93

00:42:51.600 So this is kind of what I'm talking about here. I had a big contribution there.

00:42:55.520 yes no you did so i appreciate that so anyway i don't know if you have any commentary on that

00:43:00.360 but that's just an example of kind of like how the dialogue goes when it comes to conservative

00:43:04.780 christians saying things strongly about that which we would call evil yeah i mean largely

00:43:10.940 what i would see is that again you're making an equivalence between something that is a debatable

00:43:16.660 issue um are we a systemically racist society i would argue very much no um our our immigration

00:43:25.060 policies that you know secure our borders are these opposed to biblical christianity i would

00:43:31.840 say no those are debatable issues is it wrong to kill children yes you know that is not a debatable

00:43:39.600 issue so it's this this sort of little trick of saying well but what about this and it's saying

00:43:45.900 that racism yes we all agree that racism is wrong um we all agree that we don't want racism

00:43:51.960 enshrined in our public policy. Do I believe that we've done that? That's the issue. And so it's

00:43:57.860 sort of skipping over that part of it, you know, begging the question, assuming that racism is

00:44:03.500 enshrined and then saying, well, why don't you condemn it? And I'm like, well, I haven't already

00:44:06.960 agreed that it is enshrined in our policy and that our system is rife with racism. So I have

00:44:13.540 to agree on that before we can agree that I don't think it's important. And I don't think it's

00:44:18.600 important to vote for policies that address it because i already right don't see it the way you

00:44:24.020 see it whereas with abortion i don't see that level of complexity and it's sort of the same

00:44:28.980 thing with gun control and you'll see them roll gun control into this pro-life argument saying

00:44:33.460 well but you care about the lives of children what about gun control and i go look i believe

00:44:39.640 christians of good conscience can have different viewpoints on red flag laws on all sorts of

00:44:45.960 background check questions and that sort of thing. But we are not talking about bills designed to say

00:44:52.540 it is okay to go into a school under certain circumstances and shoot children. Nobody is

00:44:58.940 backing that policy. And so they're making that the equivalent of the abortion question, which

00:45:06.480 is a policy to say it is okay to kill this very young baby, this child. So that is the issue. It's

00:45:14.600 the same thing with the transgender question that, you know, as we look at these laws that

00:45:18.520 are banning, um, transgender surgery, puberty blockers, cross-sex hormones for children,

00:45:24.240 that is what the policy does. The gun control policy does not say, um, if we don't do this,

00:45:32.040 then we're backing shooting children. So, you know, it's this very sort of slippery thing where

00:45:36.300 you have to look at what is the intention of the policy? And that's what we're arguing about.

00:45:40.820 Yep. And I mean, just to clarify, as I've said many times, I am open to arguments from Christians who don't vote Republican. I'm not open to arguments that Christians can vote Democrat. Not the current state of the Democratic Party. It's not anything about the name Democrat. It's not like red versus blue. I'm just looking at the party platform. And no, I don't think that any Christian can support that.

00:46:08.940 Now, there are some arguments out there about, I'm not saying I agree with these arguments, but there are arguments out there about not voting at all, voting third party, writing in your candidate. Now, I think that's really difficult to do in a two-party system, but I'm open to those. I'm certainly not questioning people's salvation. 0.94

00:46:25.520 but do i think that it is that it is possible to in good faith to faithfully align with the

00:46:35.080 current democrat party my position is currently is currently no um so but that is not a questioning

00:46:41.420 of salvation or idolatry or anything silly like that um but that's the conversation i think that

00:46:46.920 we get goaded into and you said it's begging the question it is absolutely that's that's what

00:46:50.760 begging the question is that is begging the question the rhetorical kind of devices that

00:46:54.800 were used there. So what should Christians be on the lookout for when it comes to this? A lot of

00:47:00.140 churches, maybe in an effort to try to bring their churches together sincerely, they look at this

00:47:06.840 kind of curriculum and they hope that it's going to be healthy for their churches in building

00:47:10.380 bridges. And it's not, though. I don't think. I think it's a Trojan horse. And so how should

00:47:18.940 Christians and congregations be approaching this if something like this is presented in their

00:47:25.280 churches? Well, you know, the biggest thing is I would ask questions, and I'm so glad you asked

00:47:32.080 this because I thought, you know, one thing I want to end with, because Allie has such a huge

00:47:38.460 audience of faithful church-going Christians, is if your church, if your pastor is saying,

00:47:45.180 hey, we're going to bring this in, we're having this pastor's conference, and we're going to have

00:47:48.300 Russell Moore and Curtis Chang speak to this issue. One, I would ask them why they're doing

00:47:52.780 that. Um, because you know, my belief is let's, you know, very deeply and deliberately and

00:48:00.220 diligently study scripture, study the word. And I tend to think that that is going to form our

00:48:06.580 hearts, our thoughts, our minds, and that is going to inform our politics. So I don't know that you

00:48:11.860 need to have a specifically um political bible study so i have some objections to that in the

00:48:18.420 first place i think that's really weird um to be honest with you especially and then when you get

00:48:23.540 into it something that's so surface level that i go if you're going to do a study like that what i

00:48:28.860 would hope to see is um some deep exploration of scripture on what our responsibilities are as

00:48:35.580 citizens um what the lord expects of us with regard to issues on life and sexuality maybe just

00:48:44.220 you know a few of those unquestionable issues um where scripture is extremely clear so that would

00:48:49.780 be one um so i would ask and i look if it were up to me they wouldn't bring it in at all and i would

00:48:56.140 probably raise a stink and say i don't understand why we're doing this this is who these people are

00:49:00.300 these are the things that curtis chang and some of these other people have been involved in and

00:49:04.100 this is who wants to see it in our church. Rockefeller, Hewlett, second largest funder

00:49:09.500 of Planned Parenthood in the country. There goes my dog. Wants to see this in our churches.

00:49:17.040 And so for that reason, Pastor, I would really prefer, you know, not to give them this access

00:49:22.340 to our church. And the same goes for students at Christian colleges, since I do know that that

00:49:27.140 email went out saying, please, you know, bring this from the Council for Christian Colleges

00:49:32.520 and universities, bring this to your school and your student life and your pastoral ministry

00:49:37.880 classes. So I have a big issue with that to start with. But if your pastor is going to persist in

00:49:44.640 this, I would say if we are going to do this, if you're going to go forward in this, then you

00:49:50.300 actually do need to have voices because Russell Moore, Curtis Chang and David French are all of

00:49:56.820 one mind. They have all sort of been the same sort of never Trump voices. So if you're going

00:50:02.020 to do that, then let's get some other voices, an Albert Mueller, a Wayne Grudem, some other people

00:50:08.720 who will come in and offer some other perspective on what the Lord requires of Christians in a

00:50:15.820 political moment. So, you know, those are the two big things that I would hope people would walk

00:50:19.360 away with. Yeah. And I'm, you know, I'm interested in those debates. It's not that I think that we

00:50:24.280 have a monopoly on the answer to, as you said, you know, those complex issues, but let's not

00:50:31.080 pretend to be nonpartisan when you really aren't when you're not open to other views and i just i

00:50:37.120 just want to end on one thing because i think one of the most interesting things that you highlighted

00:50:41.780 and people can do their own homework on this is the funding of the rockefellers and this is and i

00:50:47.700 want you to talk about your book but i also have a book coming out this fall and one thing i talk

00:50:52.080 about is how the rockefellers have funded abortion for uh for so long for decades and john rockefeller

00:50:59.920 The third was a big fan of Margaret Sanger and was an early funder of Planned Parenthood, her birth control and from its own website, quote unquote, special projects in African-American communities, which is devastating when you think about what the history of Planned Parenthood's relationship has been with African-American communities.

00:51:18.280 And so I think that it is. And by the way, this is on their own website. This is not some conspiratorial website. This is work that they're proud of. This is history that they're proud of. This is history that they're carrying on today.

00:51:28.940 they are still funding the slaughter of human beings and they are funding these projects that 0.94

00:51:34.620 are going into churches and saying oh let's have some humility if you're a conservative Christian

00:51:39.320 who is pro-life or whatever it is it's much more nuanced so I just don't think that that's a

00:51:44.540 coincidence and I think that you are right for uncovering it thank you so much Megan thank you

00:51:50.360 for the work that you do and for bringing us your insight here today I really appreciate it

00:51:54.540 thanks so much thanks for having me

00:51:57.300 .

Relatable with Allie Beth Stuckey - June 06, 2026

REPLAY ｜ Churches： Beware of the 'After Party' Trojan Horse ｜ Guest： Megan Basham

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