Conversing with Mark Labberton

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Conversing with Mark Labberton invites listeners into transformative encounters with leaders and creators shaping our world at the intersection of Christian faith, culture, and public life.

  1. 6 days ago

    Attention, Agency, and Power, with David French

    In a country splitting apart over so much, three words point toward a better way to live: attention, agency, and power. David French returns to Conversing to take up all three. A New York Times opinion writer since January 2023, French writes from a conservative theological background about law, culture, religion, and armed conflict, and has found himself writing directly into the middle of divided hostilities. French comments on how attention, agency, and power took shape in him, and how each gets distorted by partisan fundamentalisms (on both the right and left) built to shut conversation down rather than open it up. He and Mark discuss the courage required to seek out the strongest version of an opposing view, the ways we extend ourselves grace we deny to everyone else,  the spiritual danger of believing you must hold power before you can do any good, and the Civil Rights Movement's commitment to "reconciliation over victory" as a promising model for Christian public life today. Episode Highlights "One of the things that was so damaging … was that humility was often seen as inconsistent with conviction." "A lot of life is … embracing agency and … becoming more and more aware of the tidal forces that brought us to a particular point." "Curiosity and openness requires courage because you're told what to think about everybody, and if you … question that, you can be thrown out of your tribe. You can lose your community." "We must pursue justice, but when we think we have to have power to pursue justice, then we're on the road to perdition." About David French David French is an opinion columnist for The New York Times writing on law, faith, and politics. A graduate of Harvard Law School, he spent much of his career as a constitutional litigator and once led the Foundation for Individual Rights in Education. He grew up in the Churches of Christ in Kentucky, studied at Lipscomb University—where he now teaches—and served in Iraq as a US Army judge advocate, earning a Bronze Star. With Russell Moore and Curtis Chang, he created The After Party, a curriculum for Christian political engagement. His most recent book is Divided We Fall. Helpful Links and Resources David French's New York Times column, where he writes on law, faith, and politics: https://www.nytimes.com/by/david-french David French on X: https://x.com/DavidAFrench The After Party, the Redeeming Babel curriculum for Christian political engagement French made with Russell Moore and Curtis Chang: https://redeemingbabel.org/the-after-party/free-course Divided We Fall: America's Secession Threat and How to Restore Our Nation, French's book on American polarization: https://us.macmillan.com/books/9781250836731/dividedwefall Habits of the Heart by Robert Bellah, a study of American individualism: https://www.ucpress.edu/book/9780520254190/habits-of-the-heart-with-a-new-preface Show Notes Three words to guide public life: attention, agency, power A born contrarian shaped by a fundamentalism: "collectively contrarian" yet "individually very conformist" Harvard Law exposed how "contingent and place-based my own beliefs are"; experiencing a pull toward "the story behind the story" Attention as discipline—seeking "the best expression of opposing views," never the other side's worst Partisans slander rather than engage: "language designed to shut off conversation, not to invite it" Reading the Bible cover to cover in sixth grade, arriving at the lesson that "we're way too dogmatic about stuff" How to embody a faith that can hold conviction and humility side by side Agency according to Gandalf: "It's not up to us to determine the times in which we live," only how we respond Curiosity requires courage, since dissent threatens loss of community Power's real peril—"the spiritually corrupting power of power" and fooling yourself into virtue The undermining of justice by seeking to hold and maintain power; examples in Rosa Parks and Jim Crow segregation / Jesus and the Roman Empire Christian nationalism as "for the nation to be good, Christians must rule" Restoring the Civil Rights Movement's commitment to the way of Jesus: reconciliation, not victory #DavidFrench #Conversing #FaithAndPolitics #ChristianNationalism #Attention #Agency #Power #Curiosity #CivilRights

    Attention, Agency, and Power, with David French

  2. 15 Sept

    Reclaiming Civic Agency, with Michael Wear

    Underneath all the political polarization, rage-baiting, punditry, and aggression, there is a crisis of civic agency. American citizens feel politically disempowered and undermined. And the effect, over time, will be that we lose our ability to self-govern. What is needed is a path between belligerence and withdrawal. In this episode, Michael Wear (Center for Christianity and Public Life, author of The Spirit of Our Politics) joins Mark Labberton to discuss provocation and political effectiveness; the value of gentleness in public life; concrete signs of hope in local political action; the open horizon of the 2028 primaries; and what it would take to reset America's political "agency quotient." Episode Highlights "Checks and balances is just a longer way of saying agency." "I think gentleness is profoundly underappreciated. I think that people are on guard for being taken advantage of, for being imposed upon, for being manipulated, for being used." "In parenting and in politics … we could really, especially in the moment, delude ourselves into thinking that to get a reaction and to be effective are synonymous." "Christians have an alternative imagination that our politics desperately needs, and we're actually robbing the public of that." "We continue down this crisis of … both a real and perceived lack of agency, in such a way that the project of self governance is made incoherent." About Michael Wear Michael Wear is the founder, president, and CEO of the Center for Christianity and Public Life, a nonpartisan Washington nonprofit that contends for the credibility of Christian resources in public life, for the public good. He directed faith outreach for President Obama's 2012 re-election campaign and served in the White House Office of Faith-Based and Neighborhood Partnerships, among the youngest White House staffers in modern history. He is the author of The Spirit of Our Politics and Reclaiming Hope, and co-author of Compassion and Conviction. Helpful Links and Resources Michael Wear's website, with his writing, speaking, and social channels: https://www.michaelwear.com/ The Spirit of Our Politics, Wear's most recent book: https://www.michaelwear.com/spirit-of-our-politics Reclaiming Hope, Wear's first book: https://www.michaelwear.com/reclaiming-hope The Center for Christianity and Public Life: https://www.ccpubliclife.org/ "Politics should not just happen to you": https://theheartofthepublic.substack.com/p/politics-should-not-just-happen-to For the Good of the Public Summit, October 5–7, 2026, Washington, DC: https://www.ccpubliclife.org/summit Settled, the Minnesota nonprofit building church-based Sacred Settlements: https://www.settled.org/ Civic Trust, Matt Harder's participatory budgeting organization: https://www.civictrust.us/ Michael Wear on X: https://twitter.com/MichaelRWear Show Notes Contending for the credibility of Christian resources in public life CCPL turns four this October; the For the Good of the Public summit, Oct 5–7 in DC Why pairing a think tank with intensive leadership formation is personally sustaining, not just strategic Gentleness as an underrated public virtue; bodies relaxing once people sense they won't be imposed upon Parker Palmer on a politics made of brokenhearted people Getting a reaction versus being effective; the diminishing returns of provocation, until the mission's telos shifts unnamed Jesus writing in the sand as an interruption at a moment primed for violence Dallas Willard on formation: not the practices but who you are, on the spot Pope Leo fielding American-frame questions and answering in ways that break the frame's logic The pastor who mistook refreshing RealClearPolitics five times a day for civic involvement A caution against a posture toward the church more dour than reality calls for Settled's church-hosted Sacred Settlements in Minnesota, built on bipartisan zoning reform: https://www.settled.org/ Leaving the Obama White House more hopeful than arriving A decade that stripped ordinary agency: contested elections, COVID isolation, AGI moguls, social media reversals San Francisco AI planning, where "top-down imposition" meant opposite things to technologists and theologians Congress's dereliction—Yuval Levin's institutionalism, plus the Chevron and unitary-executive critiques Abdication that disempowers not just 435 House members but the voters who sent them East-West contrast: California's robber-baron drive and agency reserved for the wealthiest Resetting the agency quotient; participatory budgeting via Civic Trust: https://www.civictrust.us/ Open 2028 primaries in both parties as a possible reopening of the horizon Christian agency surrendered through alignment versus exercised through accountable loyalty Checks and balances as another name for agency #CivicAgency #SpiritOfOurPolitics #FaithAndPolitics #Gentleness #ParticipatoryBudgeting #CivicRenewal #ChristianityAndPublicLife #MichaelWear Production Credits Conversing is produced and distributed in partnership with Comment magazine and Fuller Seminary.

    Reclaiming Civic Agency, with Michael Wear

  3. 8 Sept

    Loud Justice, with Sharon Cohn Wu

    "It is not just that God has a heart for justice," says Sharon Cohn Wu (International Justice Mission), "it is that it is inextricably his character and cannot be otherwise, and that it is so perfectly married with mercy and grace that we somehow survive." Sharon Cohn Wu has served for more than twenty years with IJM, where she is now regional president of North America. A lawyer (JD, Harvard Law), she has spent her career calling for "loud justice"—that is, visible, swift, community-wide accountability—using the criminal justice system and political will to help IJM achieve its mission to increase freedom and safety for the most vulnerable. She's a key voice in pursuing IJM's stated goal: protection for 300 million people across 46 jurisdictions by 2030, and freedom for more than a million. With Mark Labberton, she reflects on her calling as a lawyer to stand between vulnerable people and those who would crush them; why we need systems to seek and secure justice for the most vulnerable to violence; the economics of vulnerability and the predators who exploit it; how public accountability changes expectations and what society will tolerate; and what decades of looking at the worst of human behavior have done to Cohn Wu's emotional, moral, and spiritual life. Episode Highlights "Hope is as contagious as despair." "In the early days, let's say I might have accidentally over-indexed on rage from time to time." "It is not just that God has a heart for justice, it is that it is inextricably his character and cannot be otherwise, and that it is so perfectly married with mercy and grace that we somehow survive." "There's nothing inevitable about this type of violence." "We need consistent and loud justice. 'Loud' meaning the whole community knows that someone was held accountable for this crime against this small child." About Sharon Cohn Wu Sharon Cohn Wu is regional president of North America for International Justice Mission, where she has served for over two decades. She began in casework, went on to lead all of IJM's field programs, and pioneered its Justice System Strengthening projects. She built anti-trafficking operations across South and Southeast Asia, including IJM's first USAID police training grant in Cambodia, and most recently advised the organization on violence against women and children. She studied at the University of Virginia and Harvard Law School and practiced at Arnold & Porter. Helpful Links and Resources International Justice Mission: https://www.ijm.org Ending violence against women and children: https://www.ijm.org/our-work/violence-women-children IJM's research library and external program evaluations: https://www.ijm.org/studies Good News About Injustice, by Gary Haugen: https://www.ivpress.com/good-news-about-injustice The Locust Effect, by Gary Haugen and Victor Boutros: https://global.oup.com/academic/product/the-locust-effect-9780190229269 The Prophets, by Abraham Joshua Heschel: https://harpercollins.com.au/products/9780063335363 Become an IJM prayer partner: https://www.ijm.org/get-involved/pray Show Notes Sharon Cohn Wu's vocational background: law as a family trade among lawyers, judges, rabbis, and teachers Experience: DOJ Criminal Division; corporate law Gary Haugen's Good News About Injustice Early years at IJM: gratitude for every single person freed from slavery, prostitution, and dire circumstances Shifting from case volume to public justice system performance: police, prosecutors, courts, social services "Hope is as contagious as despair," sustained by survivors, staff, and externally audited reductions in violence Violence against women and children as a distinct crime: economic exposure, family dissolution, and a justice system survivors avoid Justice made loud and public, with visible, swift accountability as social and moral deterrent, leading to cultural change IJM's 2030 goal of 300 million protected across 46 jurisdictions and over a million freed—with half a billion as the horizon Reality over strategy: a night walk to a Guatemalan police station, Ghanaian survivors warning families about Lake Volta recruitment Rage mitigated by conviction that God cares more, praying for the fear of the Lord, and Heschel's The Prophets on injustice as offense against God #InternationalJusticeMission #IJM #HumanTrafficking #ModernSlavery #JusticeSystems #ViolenceAgainstWomen #FaithAndJustice #Conversing #CommentMagazine #FullerSeminary Production Credits Conversing is produced and distributed in partnership with Comment magazine and Fuller Seminary.

    Loud Justice, with Sharon Cohn Wu

  4. 1 Sept

    Win or Lose, Run for Something, with Jeanelle Austin

    In February 2026, Jeanelle Austin filed for Minnesota Senate District 62. She started canvassing her district during a polar vortex, and persisted through triple-digit summer heat. And in August she lost in the Democratic Primary. In this episode, she sits down with Mark Labberton to reflect on what this experience has taught her about power, democracy, and what citizenship and neighbor-love means in the South Minneapolis neighborhood where she grew up. The executive director of Rise & Remember—the nonprofit that preserves the memorial at George Floyd Square—Austin followed a conviction, that if running for office meant she could save just one person's life, she would do it. She reflects on what it means to "run for something rather than against someone," the win-win campaign she designed by first answering what she would do with power if she lost, and the democratic machinery most voters never see: caucuses, delegates, conventions, endorsements, and party mailers that carry only the endorsed name. She reveals the shadow side of running against an incumbent in her own party: friends who could not endorse her, the party regular who said challengers to progressive incumbents should be punished, the front-porch conversations, the youth-built platform she carried to a rural Republican youth group, and the value a campaign loss is still worth when first-time voters turn out. Episode Highlights "I remember telling myself I would run for office if it meant that I could save somebody's life." "My dearest friends advised me to not run against someone, but to run for something … this was the first moment where I felt like I would be running for something, and something that really mattered." "I also understood that my power did not come from this seat. My power came from my community, my family, my cultural identity." "This is my home. This is where I grew up. This is my neighborhood. These are my people." "Is it not our responsibility to lift up our best leaders and choose from among them? We are oftentimes choosing between the lesser of two evils." "What are you willing to give up if you say that you love us as your neighbor?" "We have the power as people to make this democracy what we need it to be. But we first have to believe in ourselves." About Jeanelle Austin Jeanelle Austin is executive director and co-founder of Rise & Remember, the Minneapolis nonprofit that preserves thousands of offerings left at George Floyd Square, where she also serves as lead memorial caretaker. She founded Racial Agency Initiative, a racial justice leadership coaching practice, in 2019. She holds a BA in Christian ministries from Messiah College and an MDiv in ethics and an MA in intercultural studies from Fuller Theological Seminary. In 2026 she ran in the DFL primary for Minnesota Senate District 62. The fourth of seven children, she grew up in Minneapolis's Bryant neighborhood, just blocks from the site of George Floyd's killing at 38th and Chicago Avenue. Helpful Links and Resources Jeanelle For The People, Austin's 2026 campaign site: https://jeanelleforthepeople.com/ Rise & Remember, the nonprofit Austin directs: https://riseandremember.org/about/ A timeline of Operation Metro Surge, Minnesota Reformer: https://minnesotareformer.com/2026/02/20/a-chronology-of-operation-metro-surge/ Show Notes Jeanelle's pilgrimage in Palestine with a Black religious scholars delegation; meeting a father in the West Bank whose fifteen-year-old son was imprisoned for throwing rocks "Run for something, not against someone." What it means to a run a "win-win campaign," designed after being advised to decide what she would do with power if she lost How power is located in community, family, and cultural identity rather than in a state senate seat What it was like to challenge a beloved incumbent inside your own party Caucusing for the first time, room to room, learning the process in real time Jeanelle's campaign backdrop: Operation Metro Surge, polar vortex, No Kings protests Her journey from caucus to delegate to convention to endorsement to party resources Pre-recruited delegates and the structural advantage of incumbency; party mailers that carry only the endorsed candidate's name Section 8 notice periods and the gap that produces homelessness Youth-built priorities carried an hour west to a Republican youth group Gun safety, neighbor-love, rural versus urban gun culture Food shelves versus food stamps, and the question of dignity Primary night at the People's Way, turn out for first-time local voters Giving power back by teaching neighbors how to run for political office #JeanelleAustin #GeorgeFloydSquare #Minneapolis #RunForOffice #Democracy #CivicEngagement #FaithAndPolitics #Conversing Production Credits Conversing is produced and distributed in partnership with Comment Magazine and Fuller Seminary.

    Win or Lose, Run for Something, with Jeanelle Austin

  5. 25 Aug

    Women, Misogyny, and the Bible, with Beth Moore

    Growing up, Beth Moore was taught that 1 Timothy 2 and 1 Corinthians 14 were the whole of what scripture had to say about women: submissive and silent. The founder of Living Proof Ministries and one of the most widely read Bible teachers in America, Moore objects to a hermeneutic limited to those passages. In this episode, Mark Labberton revisits his 2018 conversation with Beth Moore, recorded in the months following her viral open letter, "A Letter to My Brothers." Almost 10 years later, debates over women in leadership and whether women are free to use their full gifts in the full service of the church still roil American Christianity. This episode is an invitation to hear Moore's unique journey—discovering what it means to receive women as teachers and instructors of scripture for the building up of the church—and about the faithfulness of God to one woman's story, as she tries simply to be heard. They discuss the cost of speaking up in 2018 and the backlash that came hardest from women, her decision to repent of her own complicity, the way gender gets used abusively in every part of the church, and what it looks like to keep going with Jesus when the way ahead is cloudy. Episode Highlights "I very much am a big believer in the harbor of the church, that when it functions well … it's such a safe place for me. It was safer than my home, Mark." "Where I have been part of this and complicit in this, I will repent. So here is what I'm fighting for. I am fighting for us, and I don't just mean women. I mean women and men, brothers and sisters." "There is absolutely no world in which I would not have spoken up. … It would've been like expecting a dog not to bark at a burglar." "Where our Christianity … departs Christ-likeness, don't call it Christianity. … So if it is not like Him, it is not of Him." "I may not get it right, but I can no longer lay down to what I know is wrong." About Beth Moore Beth Moore is an evangelist, author, and Bible teacher who founded Living Proof Ministries in Houston in 1994 to teach women the scriptures. Her books and studies, including Breaking Free and So Long, Insecurity, have been translated into more than twenty languages. Her 2018 open letter "A Letter to My Brothers" named the misogyny she had absorbed in conservative evangelical life. She left the Southern Baptist Convention in 2021 and now worships as an Anglican. Her memoir, All My Knotted-Up Life, won the 2024 ECPA Book of the Year. She teaches now on the podcast Living Proof with Beth Moore. Helpful Links and Resources Living Proof Ministries, the organization Beth Moore founded in 1994: https://www.lproof.org "A Letter to My Brothers," May 2018 open letter: https://www.lproof.org/blog/a-letter-to-my-brothers All My Knotted-Up Life, Beth Moore's 2023 memoir: https://www.tyndale.com/p/all-my-knotted-up-life/9781496472670 Show Notes Moore's three-generation household; instability at home; the church as a harbor Receiving her calling at eighteen, off a pre-law political science track The surprise of discovering that theologically orthodox, scripture-loving people read women's ministry differently than her Passion drawn from pain; early trauma and a pattern she couldn't break Hypocrisy, pretense, and dreaming of fulfilled desires Strongholds and sexual sin: what her early context named but never taught people how to fight First Baptist Church Houston as a place safe enough to be corrected and still loved Pastor John Bisagno (1934–2018) asking her to speak on a Sunday night, and her own objection that she was a woman Palpable disesteem for a woman in ministry without academic credentials Playing by rules that others were not keeping Scripture as reason versus scripture as excuse Repenting of her own complicity Luke 8, the women at the resurrection, Paul's fellow workers at the end of Romans Backlash to Moore came hardest from women, including readers who abandoned her studies Asking questions on behalf of women without a microphone Affirming women formally while gender bias persists structurally The Samaritan woman at the well, and a Savior who gives dignity Obedience over clarity when the way ahead is cloudy #BethMoore #WomenInMinistry #Conversing #MarkLabberton #WomenInLeadership #Evangelicalism #BibleTeaching #ChurchToo #Complementarianism Production Credits Conversing is produced and distributed in partnership with Comment Magazine and Fuller Seminary.

    Women, Misogyny, and the Bible, with Beth Moore

  6. 18 Aug

    The Human Heart, with David Anderson

    Our hearts are restless, says Saint Augustine, until they find their rest in God. The biological science and the spiritual metaphor are in agreement here. Over the course of billions of beats, our hearts never stop to rest.  Your magnificent heart exchanges or pumps your entire blood volume, just over a gallon, every single minute. (Athlete hearts can pump up to 10 gallons per minute!) In this episode, Mark Labberton discusses matters of the heart with his close friend Dr. David Anderson, a cardiologist of four decades who trained at Johns Hopkins and helped launch one of the first interventional cardiology programs in San Francisco. Anderson reflects on the medical science of cardiology, the profound life-saving medical advances over the past forty years, heart disease versus coronary artery disease, how the brain and the heart communicate, and what happens during a heart attack. In the second half of their conversation, they move from physiology to spirituality of the heart: Pharaoh's hardened heart, "out of the heart the mouth speaks," and the human need to find somewhere to locate the self. Anderson closes with what a cardiologist would tell anyone worried about their own heart, and with a case for medicine as a noble profession. Episode Highlights "When I first began in cardiology, if your heart was damaged, imagining that the heart could actually improve its function was like imagining someone could grow back a new arm." "One of the distinctive things about the heart is unlike other muscles, it doesn't have a time to rest. When it gets insufficient blood supply, it can't just say, 'Whoa, I'm gonna stop here.' It asks you to slow down because it starts hurting." "I think that's part of the intrigue of the heart, that it is inside us … but in some ways it's apart from us. It's responding to environmental things that we're not really even aware of. … I think it's this sense of detachment of the heart from us—but yet its centrality—that has led people to posit the soul or the will or the passions or almost anything that you would think was the real you. "Atherosclerosis … I would describe as it's like having a pimple inside your artery." "First of all, know yourself. That is, it's not a time to be fatalistic because your father had a heart attack in his fifties or your brother just had a heart attack. It's a time to be proactive." About David Anderson David Anderson is a cardiologist who practiced for more than four decades before retiring. He studied at Stanford as an undergraduate and earned his medical degree at Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine. He stayed at Hopkins for residency, then trained in San Francisco at the dawn of interventional cardiology, helping to build an angioplasty program in the early 1980s. Helpful Links and Resources Alta Bates Summit Medical Center, Sutter Health, the Oakland hospital Anderson thanks by name: https://www.sutterhealth.org/about-us/our-hospitals/alta-bates-summit-medical-center DeWood et al., "Prevalence of Total Coronary Occlusion during the Early Hours of Transmural Myocardial Infarction," the 1980 study that identified clot as the cause of heart attack: https://www.nejm.org/doi/full/10.1056/NEJM198010163031601 Waagstein et al., "Effect of chronic beta-adrenergic receptor blockade in congestive cardiomyopathy," the Swedish beta-blocker work behind the recovery he describes: https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/1191416/ What Is Atherosclerosis, National Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute: https://www.nhlbi.nih.gov/health/atherosclerosis Warning Signs of a Heart Attack, American Heart Association: https://www.heart.org/en/health-topics/heart-attack/warning-signs-of-a-heart-attack Angina (Chest Pain), American Heart Association, on the exertional pain he describes at the close: https://www.heart.org/en/health-topics/heart-attack/angina-chest-pain Show Notes The impact of family gene pool, lifelong heart awareness How David Anderson got into medicine, and cardiology in particular A Hopkins autopsy elective, a teenager dead in a parking lot, a mentor who followed From internists interested in the heart to interventionists inside it Catheters, pressures, and the arrival of echocardiography Seeing a beating heart inside a living body for the first time, as a senior resident A colleague's heart attack in 1979 The 1980 angiography study that identified clot as the trigger Spring 1983: an artery occludes, the cath lab opens it, pain gone in fifteen minutes Bypass surgery before that: elective, scheduled, never mid-attack Prevention running under the technology: blood pressure, smoking, the lipid theory Fixing one artery and never having to fix another Coronary artery disease versus disease of the muscle itself Plasticity, not regeneration Adrenaline as an emergency system built for days, not decades Moving from technological advances to molecular-based understanding of heart problems Understanding of the pathophysiology of atherosclerosis and its prevention Beta blockers, ejection fraction, and hearts that came back The heart as a muscle with no rest The heart's own electrical center, and the backup pacemakers below it Your heart doesn't rely on you or your consciousness to beat Why the ancients may have located the self in the heart organ Jeremiah's pounding heart, Pharaoh's hardened one Pascal, the soul, and needing somewhere to put "the real you" Maintaining an appropriate degree of separation from the patient and their family in order to care properly and effectively The difficulty of delivering bad news to patients and their familes Digging for a shared history to call on in a crisis "Medicine is a noble profession." Heart care advice from a cardiologist: First, know yourself. Heart health checklist: cholesterol, blood pressure, weight, knowing your own history The pain that warrants a phone call #Conversing #MarkLabberton #Cardiology #Heart #MedicalScience #HeartHealth #Biology #ChristianHumanism Production Credits Conversing is produced and distributed in partnership with Comment magazine and Fuller Seminary.

    The Human Heart, with David Anderson

  7. 11 Aug

    The God of the Unfinished, with Walter Brueggemann

    The Old Testament, Walter Brueggemann said, is an old text that simply refuses to stay old. "It reads like it was written yesterday." For him, God offers no artificial closure, but is active in the meantime, and at peace with the "unfinished." Walter Brueggemann died on June 5, 2025, at the age of ninety-two, and his own influence is unfinished. This episode is from the Conversing archives: a conversation Mark Labberton hosted with Brueggemann at Fuller Seminary for the 2015 Fuller Forum "Justice, Grace, and Law in the Mission of God." Brueggemann was an Old Testament scholar for the sake of the church, the author of over one hundred books including The Prophetic Imagination, and came to the Bible as a text-wrestler, "comfortable with collisions," taking the Hebrew text and his own life as an artist with equal and total seriousness. He describes his method of exegesis written longhand, "at the end of his pen," catching himself speaking the words as he writes them. Together they discuss the artistry of biblical language and why art is inherently subversive; Abraham Joshua Heschel on the suffering of God in Jeremiah; the pastor as scribe rather than prophet; the violence of God in the Old Testament and what it means to call it recovery; and justice as the "willingness to be inconvenienced." Brueggemann closes with Psalm 73: " Whom have I in heaven, and who do I desire on Earth but you?" Walter Brueggemann was the McPheeters Professor Emeritus of Old Testament at Columbia Theological Seminary. Episode Highlights A Scholar for the Church: "It took me a while to figure out that I wanted to be a scholar for the church and not for the academy … you wanna maintain your credibility in the academy, but it's not where you live." On the Old Testament: "It's so Jewish, and Jewishness means that it's conflicted and multi-vocal and multilayered and complex, and that's the nature of the text, and I think that's the nature of the God who indwells the text." The Everlasting Text: "It is an old text, but I always said to my students, it reads like it was written yesterday … it is an old text that refuses to stay old." On Subversiveness: "Art is inherently subversive because it wants to show us reality in a way that we have never before seen it … what we always wanna do with art or with the Bible is that we wanna cram it into the categories of the familiar." On Unfinishedness: "This is a God who stays faithful in the unfinishedness … in some ways, God isn't finished becoming God yet. So there is more light to break forth yet in our midst." On Fixing Everything: "Our society is about to forget what it means to be human in a technological, capitalist environment … The dominant value system of our society believes that everything can be fixed." Justice as Inconvenience: "I don't mind dying for Christ, but I don't wanna be inconvenienced … so much of justice work is just being inconvenienced." About Walter Brueggemann Walter Brueggemann (1933–2025) was among the most widely read Old Testament scholars of the past century, author of more than one hundred books, including The Prophetic Imagination and Theology of the Old Testament. Born in Tilden, Nebraska, to a German Evangelical pastor, he studied at Elmhurst College, Eden Theological Seminary, Union Theological Seminary, and Saint Louis University. He taught at Eden from 1961 to 1986 and at Columbia Theological Seminary from 1986 until his retirement in 2003, holding the William Marcellus McPheeters chair in Old Testament. His final book, God of All Promises, was published posthumously in 2026. Helpful Links and Resources Walter Brueggemann's official website: https://www.walterbrueggemann.com/ In memoriam and Celebration of Life service webpage: https://www.walterbrueggemann.com/2025/06/05/in-memory/ Brueggemann on X: https://twitter.com/waltbrueggemann The Prophetic Imagination, 40th Anniversary Edition, Fortress Press: https://www.fortresspress.com/store/product/9781506449302/The-Prophetic-Imagination Show Notes In memoriam: Walter Brueggemann, 1933–2025; died June 5, 2025 at 92 Recorded at the 2015 Fuller Forum: "Justice, Grace, and Law in the Mission of God" A rural pastor father, plain in the pulpit and unmistakable in his passion Doctoral study at Union under James Muilenburg, a close friend of Abraham Joshua Heschel Choosing the church over the academy, and what that vocational choice cost Historical criticism as necessary but never sufficient Multivocal Scripture The Old Testament's Jewishness as conflict, layering, complexity An ancient text that reads like it was written yesterday Biblical exegesis in longhand Micah 4: beating swords into plowshares Ecumenism that doesn't coerce Particularity over universal generalization; the scandal of incarnation Heschel on the pathos of God Jeremiah 8 and 9:  "Oh, that I had bigger tear ducts because I must cry more than my eyes will permit me." Why aiming at a doctrinal or moral outcome turns interpretation coercive Wendell Berry, and the discovery that combinations of words do things Art as a refusal of the familiar Unfinishedness Congregations that want closure, and the anxiety of leaving things open Biblical literacy The violence of God read as recovery rather than projection Justice as planned inconvenience: meetings, showing up, critical mass Psalm 73, and coming to oneself in a world of commodity Why the pastoral task feels urgent in a society sure everything can be fixed #WalterBrueggemann #PropheticImagination #OldTestament #Conversing #MarkLabberton #Preaching #Theology Production Credits Conversing is produced and distributed in partnership with Comment magazine and Fuller Seminary.

    The God of the Unfinished, with Walter Brueggemann

  8. 4 Aug

    An Unnecessary War, with Daniel Zoughbie

    Why are we still "kicking the hornet's nest"? The last time Mark Labberton interviewed Daniel Zoughbie (UC Berkeley/UCSF) for his expertise on international diplomacy in the Middle East, there was not yet an Iran war. Regardless of your geographical distance, this war is imminently important as it escalates and impacts not just Iran but the entire Middle East and the entire world economy. "War is really supposed to be a last resort." Taking seriously both the significance and validity of Israel as a nation and the need for appropriate and just treatment of all Jews, Christians, and Muslims during a time of rising anti-Semitism and Islamophobia, this conversation comes at a volatile moment, pregnant with violence and chaos in American foreign policy. Starting the timeline at the 2018 US exit from the "Iran nuclear deal" (the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action) Zoughbie discusses a variety of interconnected issues, including the role of Middle Eastern geography such as the Strait of Hormuz and the Bab el-Mandab ("Gate of Tears"), the proliferation cascade a Saudi Arabian nuclear program could set off, and the difference between tactical brilliance and strategic vision. Together, they also consider hopes for improvement, looking at Gerald Ford's unpopular but effective ultimatum that forced Egypt and Israel to talk; the Olmert-Abbas negotiations that almost reached a two-state solution; the role of Christianity in politics; the danger of national pride; wisdom from antiquity in Herodotus, Croesus, and Cyrus the Great; and a definition of greatness that has nothing to do with force. Episode Highlights Regarding the term "an unnecessary war": "I think the word 'unnecessary' is absolutely the appropriate term, and I might just add another term: unjust. War is really supposed to be a last resort." "Iran has discovered not only that they have this nuclear program, which is incredibly powerful, but they've discovered that they have this power to shut off world's economy [through The Strait of Hormuz]." "Exiting [the JCPOA—Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action] was a really, really big blunder because we did not have anything else to fall back on. The Iranians pointed to this and said, 'Look, we can't trust your word.'" "I feel like the current atmosphere in Washington is really about 'me, mine, and more.' And for us to really have a change in our foreign policy ... we really need to think beyond ourselves as a country." "We'll always try to turn every problem into a nail, right? And we'll use our hammer to deal with that problem. And that's exactly why we're in this mess in the first place." "Greatness is not about testosterone shots. It's about being able to show mercy. It's about being able to see the humanity in others, even your enemy, and ultimately what I would call Herodotus's paradox, which is that the mightiest of the mighty turns an enemy into a friend." About Daniel Zoughbie Daniel E. Zoughbie is a complex-systems scientist, diplomatic historian, and expert on presidential decision-making. He is associate project scientist at the UCSF/UCB Center for Global Health Delivery, Diplomacy, and Economics; principal investigator of Berkeley's Middle East and North Africa Diplomacy, Development, and Defense Initiative; and a nonresident senior fellow at the Atlantic Council's MENA Futures Lab. He wrote Kicking the Hornet's Nest: U.S. Foreign Policy in the Middle East from Truman to Trump and Indecision Points. He founded Microclinic International, whose model has reached refugee and low-income communities across four continents, and studied at Oxford as a Marshall and Weidenfeld Scholar. Helpful Links and Resources Kicking the Hornet's Nest, Zoughbie's 2025 book on twelve presidents and the Middle East https://www.simonandschuster.com/books/Kicking-the-Hornets-Nest/Daniel-E-Zoughbie/9781668085226 "Toxic Foreign Policy and Citizen Diplomacy," Zoughbie's first Conversing conversation: https://comment.org/podcasts/toxic-foreign-policy-and-citizen-diplomacy/ "The Lesson Trump Can Take From Herodotus' Paradox" https://www.theamericanconservative.com/the-lesson-trump-can-take-from-herodotus-paradox/ UN Security Council Resolution 2231, which endorsed the JCPOA https://main.un.org/securitycouncil/en/content/2231/background "World Oil Transit Chokepoints," the US Energy Information Administration on Hormuz and the Bab el-Mandab https://www.eia.gov/international/content/analysis/special_topics/World_Oil_Transit_Chokepoints/ Gerald R. Ford's 1977 Gordon-Conwell Theological Seminary commencement address, quoted at length in this episode https://www.christianitytoday.com/2006/12/gerald-r-ford-lessons-from-presidency/ Herodotus, The Histories, Book 1, where Croesus consults the Oracle and Cyrus spares him https://www.perseus.tufts.edu/hopper/text?doc=Perseus:text:1999.01.0126:book%3D1 American University of Beirut, Zoughbie's standing example of citizen diplomacy https://aub.edu.lb/ Show Notes The 2018 exit from the Iran Nuclear Deal (the JCPOA, or Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action) as the origin point of the current war P5+1: US, UK, Russia, China, France, plus Germany What the deal never covered: missiles, proxies, regional behavior Nuclear non-proliferation In the wake of the US bombing of Iran: enrichment stockpiles, IAEA detections, inspectors no longer on the ground An unnecessary and unjust war How to work backward from the real goals of American national security Proliferation cascade risk: Saudi Arabia, Turkey, Egypt Leverage the US still holds through China, Russia, India, and Pakistan The Saudi nuclear offer, walked back a day later over Israeli recognition Strait of Hormuz geography: 21 miles wide, shipping lanes two miles each The Red Sea, the Houthis, and the Bab el-Mandab ("The Gate of Tears") Israel's tactical brilliance and strategic blindness Mossad's mottos, drawn from Proverbs, and the danger of self-deception 1967 revisited: not a short war but a nuclear near-miss Gerald Ford as counterexample: the ultimatum that opened Egypt-Israel talks Gerald Ford's 1977 Gordon-Conwell address and his oath on the book of Proverbs Hubris: ancient and current Testosterone shots, lethality, and the inverse of humility Pastors and power in the Oval Office Reinhold Niebuhr, Karl Barth, and Christian nationalism Herodotus, Croesus, and Cyrus: mercy as the measure of greatness The path to Tehran runs through Jerusalem The Olmert-Abbas negotiations as a known formula Citizen diplomacy and the American University of Beirut What listeners can do, including welcoming Middle Eastern neighbors #Conversing #MarkLabberton #DanielZoughbie #IranWar #ForeignPolicy #StraitOfHormuz #NuclearProliferation #MiddleEast #Diplomacy #FaithAndPolitics Production Credits Conversing is produced and distributed in partnership with Comment magazine and Fuller Seminary.

    An Unnecessary War, with Daniel Zoughbie
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