The Theology Pugcast

Gentlemen, you have some great things to say, but I find your constant use of “you know” to be very distracting. Is it possible for that to be edited out before it’s posted online? Thank you for the great work you are doing.

There are a lot of podcasts that help me to love God with all my mind, but if one exists that does that better than this show, I have not found it.

When you are sitting in on a conversation with Chris, Tom, and Glen, you are exposed to not only their experiences and knowledge but the good, bad, and the ugly from historical minds. These podcasts are deep reservoirs of wisdom.

I just listened to your 4/29/24 podcast about the 4B movement in Korea, where women are expressing their dissatisfaction with the roles they have been handed by opting out of relationships with men, marriage and children. Not once, in talking about this issue, did these three old white men mention women’s DOUBLE WORKLOAD (since few families can get by with just one wage earner), or how MEN COULD MAYBE HELP WOMEN MORE with that, or how THE GOVERNMENT COULD HELP WOMEN WITH THE WORK OF HAVING AND RAISING CHILDREN, as the governments so wisely do in every country of Europe. Incredibly, although these guys actually brought up “The Handmaid’s Tale”, they showed zero self-awareness of being part of a system like the one in the book, nor of defending patriarchal religious systems like that. They want to double down on entrenching themselves and their communities in a dead, poorly-written out-of-date 2000-year old book that justifies and codifies powerless roles for women. You know It’s not safe to raise children when you don’t have a job and a way out of a bad relationship. Domestic abuse and child abuse by autocratic men have shown us that - when a woman has small children and no way to leave, bad men can do what they want. So work is not just a way to make ends meet for women, it’s a way to ensure good treatment by your spouse. Equality in all job and family roles ensures that children and women will not be mistreated. Absolute power corrupts. We know this!! If you want happy families, fight for equality and justice for women. Make men help more. Make it easier for women to raise children. Pay women better. Make the work week shorter for everyone, as they did in France. Give women free in-home help and longer maternity leave, as they do all over Europe. Encourage men to be very involved fathers (which is not only honorable, but fun and meaningful). I didn’t hear you say anything about good ideas like that. Sounds like you just want to preach more hellfire and damnation, to scare people into the old Christian roles. A society that is unjust holds the seeds of its own destruction. Patriarchy is a stupid system that makes raising children harder. It’s bound to fail, if it doesn’t adapt and change to become more egalitarian. No wonder the women of Japan and Korea, where men help less and women’s roles in the family are much harder, are saying they just don’t want to do it any more. No wonder Christianity is on the way out, in the US. Try really hard, you three old obsolete guys, to put yourself in the shoes of a young Korean woman who knows that if she has children, she’ll have to have a full-time job plus work like a dog at home, or be considered “a bad wife.” Meanwhile men there have much more freedom and much less work at home, and are encouraged to work ridiculously long days at work and also socialize with their male workmates, while neglecting their wife & kids. Maybe you too would step aside from taking on the parenting job, as a woman in Korea. Especially because climate change is a scary reality for our children. Many women don’t want to bring children into a world that may end up in a collapse. And of course we caused that collapse by chasing the dollar and neglecting nature, in the same way men are neglecting women’s needs. There are none so blind as they who will not see.