Jason Arday, Cambridge, DEI & the Crisis of Criticism
Cameron (00:00)
Hello and welcome to Thinking Out Loud. I'm your co host, Cameron McAllister.
Nathan (00:04)
And I'm your co-host, Nathan Rittenhouse.
Cameron (00:06)
We did say we wouldn't talk too much about Jason R. Day, but things are different. Yeah.
Nathan (00:08)
But yeah.
Cameron (00:10)
They are. Very sad turn of events. Very sad turn of events. So if you hadn't been following the Jason R. Day story, he took his own life recently, and it would be
Nathan (00:23)
Go go farther back, just in case somebody really hasn't been paying attention. Who who is this guy and why is he in the news?
Cameron (00:25)
It would yeah, it really hasn't. Who is this guy?
Yeah, so let's so Jason Arday was a man who was catapult catapulted to academic superstardom, had critics right from the start. So it's important to to talk about I'm not playing identity politics. It's important to single out some of the factors, the cultural factors about him. So Jason Arde was a black man. I believe
Now you need to correct me if I'm wrong in any of these details. Also, look, we reserve the right to be wrong. It's a current event show, and occasionally we get facts wrong. So I'm operating with what I believe is current information. I believe Jason Arde was a gay man. He was claimed to be, so we're gonna have to speak carefully here as well. He claimed to be autistic. So the story was here is this man.
Nathan (01:15)
Tough childhood
and upbringing.
Cameron (01:17)
Tough, yes, right. So many, many, many, you know, cards stacked against him in many ways in terms of his his upbringing and his environment and all of that. So not only does he eventually overcome all of these obstacles, this is this is the standard narrative originally, but he rises up the ranks and eventually completes a PhD and ends up as a professor at Cambridge, one of the premier universities, and especially Cambridge is especially known, of course, as a bastion of the sciences as well.
And again, to make matters interesting and political, his area of expertise is DEI. So so many hot butt button issues are all com
Nathan (01:58)
and all the athletic
accomplishments of how many million dollars he raised running so many marathons. There's the whole athletic side to who he was as well.
Cameron (02:07)
Right. So all of this makes for a very difficult situation. Difficult in the sense that it is almost impossible not to see this human being, this man, in symbolic terms. Because just of all of these different categories that he's representing. But from the very start there were crit critics. He had his critics. And there were several and I'm here's maybe you can add some yeah.
Nathan (02:32)
But but well so but this is part
of the story too, Cameron, is that the critics were threatened with lawsuits for harassment. So
Cameron (02:40)
Yes.
Nathan (02:41)
they so the journalists who are trying to look into saying, hey, there's plagiarism involved here, there's downright falsehoods, that there's everybody who's pushing back was the people who were trying to tell the truth, the system was stacked against them being able to actually say what they thought was going on.
Cameron (02:57)
So he and he and yes, it's true to say that Jason R. Day was enjoying a type of diplomatic immunity with regard to a lot of these allegations. And I think finally it was the Telegraph in Britain that was the major y newspaper that was launching the investigation. And and now they've they eventually were able to to to push forward with it. There was an academic. Again, these are facts that you can look up. So I don't feel too bad if I don't have if I'm missing names. There was a fellow academic who had brought forward
plagiarism accurate acusations, and then was provided hard evidence. So all of this has proven to be true. C conclusively. Yes.
Nathan (03:35)
So pointed out Cambridge doubled down on it at first,
then the c critics persisted to some degree, and then he
Cameron (03:42)
Mm-hmm.
Nathan (03:43)
s and then he resigned. He was never fired by Cambridge.
Cameron (03:46)
He was never fired by Cambridge. He resigned. It would be unimaginable or difficult to imagine the headspace that he was in, as all you know, all of this pressure and this scrutiny mounted mounted. But the fact of the matter is the plagiarism accusations were were vindicated. He wa not only was he guilty of plagiarism, it wasn't just plagiarism though, it was the quality of his work, which was was very bad indeed.
Nathan (04:16)
Subpar, let's say.
Cameron (04:17)
Ver yeah, very much so. So why are we why are we bringing all so in in the wake of all of this, Jason R. Day took his own life. So terribly sad.
Nathan (04:27)
Yeah, because
so let's pause here just a second to say when up to the point of his resignation, you and I looked at this story and we thought of it more in terms of another round of a DEI conversation gone a foul. But after he took his own life, and then the response has been basically that he was hunted down and actively persecuted and killed by the critics, this narrative is a little bit there's there's more of a story here now. So it's
It it's it's tricky, Cameron, because as you said at the beginning, he almost functions symbolically in a category. And so we can't the challenge here is to to to grieve the loss of a human life as an individual. But then we're ca because then we're almost going to start talking about this more symbolically in an academic cultural analysis or because he did symbolize an entire set of ideas and a movement and an entire system within Cambridge and maybe we could say British and the intelligentsia in general.
That we'll have to talk about. So this is not us trying to be insensitive to the fact that somebody took their own life, but this was a man who lived as a symbol o of a movement and of a time, and we have to deal with that.
Cameron (05:40)
We do. And I think when you look at the many of the articles that are appearing now, and they and they have very catchy headlines to the effect of Jason R. Day was killed by and then, you know, a name will be given, usually of the some of one of the academics who accused him of plagiarism or something like that.
Nathan (06:01)
Well, I I so but the thing of it is is is I think we have enough information that is beyond accusing of plagiarism. I I think we're saying like th there's a person who says, Hey, that guy lied and everybody's like, yeah, he did
Cameron (06:15)
Mm-hmm.
Nathan (06:15)
and then we're saying that the person who pointed out the falsehood is the one who's responsible.
Cameron (06:20)
Yes. So we have the difficulty of seeing somebody as a human being when it is very the the default is to see them in symbolic terms. And those symbolic terms are going to be dict dictated by whatever side of the political aisle you find yourself on. So there there is that challenge.
Nathan (06:42)
Well
and and I think that's what really is emerging here is the I mean, there's a massive, you know, protest demonstration, memorial visual for him in the UK. And so people are going to take their category of race, of sexuality, of disability, of academic prejudice, of e everybody's just coming at him at this entire topic from their category of like
pre existing. Told you DEI was bad all the way to he's being persecuted because he's black and this is a you know, an execution of a black man. That's that's the c that's the world we live in.
Cameron (07:18)
So these that's
the world we l yeah. So these conversations that we're having get us nowhere, which is why we I think it's fruitful to discuss this. So there's the challenge is humanizing a person who whom we're tempted to see in symbolic terms. That's one challenge. A second challenge, and it's a very big one for us today. The second challenge is separating ideas from a person. We tend to No, no, I'm not hold on, hold on.
Nathan (07:45)
but the b but so okay,
g yeah, right.
Cameron (07:48)
Hold on.
Yeah. So separating ideas from a person, separating the work from the person, we tend to s assume that we just tend to blithely assume these days, without really realizing that we're doing it, that to criticize anything a person does is necessarily to criticize their character. And that is not the case at all. Academic work and free inquiry wouldn't work well if we made that make that assumption. So that's the second one.
The third one I think is, and you can add more challenges here, Nathan, if you want. The third one I think is the most daunting. It's the hardest. And that that is while we want to separate ideas from a person. We actually are dealing with character issues here, though, as well. Because we're not just talking about we're not just talking about shoddy work. There is that. We are talking about dishonesty as well on the part of Jason R. Day. So we have to come to a place where we can say simultaneously.
Many of the setbacks and the persecutions that black people have faced are totally real. Many of the setbacks and the persecutions that people who are sexually marginalized have faced are real. And simultaneously, what Jason R. Day did was not only inaccurate, but wrong. And it is still a horrible thing that he took his life. All of these are true. All of
Nathan (09:11)
Yeah.
Cameron (09:12)
this. We have to say this all with full conviction. In in a normal in a n in
A normal world, it wouldn't be difficult to affirm all of these truths simultaneously. In our moment, it is for a lot of people. So yes, let's work our way through
Nathan (09:24)
Well, let me
Cameron (09:25)
that.
Nathan (09:25)
well so let me just say some I here's the the the additional level is that there was a way in which he was used by the system. I mean so if you go back and you watch some of the interviews with the the Cambridge academic apparatus around him, he was continually put forward as a symbol. A as a as a look how
Cameron (09:48)
So yeah, you you're right.
Nathan (09:49)
virtuous we are as a university. This is how far we have progressed.
Cameron (09:53)
So
let's let's add a f let's
Nathan (09:53)
We now include a
Cameron (09:55)
add another category then, Nathan, with what you're saying. He he did function as the we can use the word symbol, that's charitable. Another a less charitable way of putting it, which I think would be accurate though, would be he was the token marginalized person. Right.
Nathan (10:08)
Everything. Yeah.
Cameron (10:09)
Token everything almost. Yes. Token black man, token gay person, token yeah, autistic person, you name it. Yep.
Nathan (10:20)
So so that that's the challenge I think of the Christian looking at this of trying to humanize somebody whose life was used merely as a symbol.
Cameron (10:30)
And so let's be clear, Nathan, in that category, what you just said, he is a victim there. That he he is. Doesn't
Nathan (10:37)
But
Cameron (10:39)
ups but it also doesn't absolve him of responsibility. But I do think that that is a factor that needs to be weighed in in the balances. Not that we have perfect balances here, but if if you have a human being and they're being used by people who are more powerful than they are, but
They are being kept it they kept kept it. Kept in a kind of gilded cage.
I think we need to be honest about the fact that yes, that's a problem for them. They are they are suffering at the hands of others in that. Does it take them completely off of does it absolve them of all responsibility? No. But it is a factor that we should that we absolutely so I'm so glad you brought that in here.
Nathan (11:26)
So
so so let me let me say two things. One is one and maybe a concluding thought on the Jason R. Day, then, and then one I want to go in the direction of criticism in general and share a story that I think will get us there. One of the things that I thought about looking at this is that Jason R. Day functioned within a system, but he did not function within a system that allowed for forgiveness. Like there there wasn't a why why was his response to criticism to kill himself?
That's not that's not the sign of a healthy you on one hand you could say individual, but not the sign of a healthy context and culture and way of seeing the world and your place in it, where somebody's like, hey, it looks like you lied here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here, and here, and you weren't qualified for this and this and this. And your only response to that is, well, here we go.
And looking maybe at like what do we learn from this, it's worth asking the question of do you live? So I'm I'm saying to you, the listener, to Cameron, to me, do we live and move and have our being within networks and frameworks of community and a vision of reality in which it is okay for you to be wrong and still feel that you have value and are loved and accepted by the people around you. And I think, Cameron, that's just becoming an increasingly tinier space in our world.
We've talked about this as as far as politicians go. You know, if a video shows up of a politician doing something dumb, which actually is increasingly frequent, you know, there's a a sense in which we don't forgive and just move on. and so the only thing you can do is just tell a bigger story about how you're actually innocent. So the inability to give and receive forgiveness actually leads to a decrease in truth because the person who's in the wrong can't afford.
to tell the truth in any given situation because of the loss that it would cost them. and so there is a weird and and tragic
Cameron (13:29)
Mm-hmm.
Nathan (13:31)
core or shell on this thing depending on how you want to look at it.
Cameron (13:36)
Yes, I think I mean, people have pointed out it's a bit of a sort of new shame and honor dynamic that you're finding in our in our moment. But the fact that somebody would come to yeah, so they're found out. I mean, a lot of people, this is their worst nightmare, right? You're you're you're found you're found out. But then the thought is utter despair. Now all hope is lost.
Clearly that says something very significant and sad about our our our cultural moment. But it's also it's we have to remember, I mean, it's all of this is so so in the spotlight. And dealing if if you're if you're dealing with this in real time and your phone is blowing up, it's just this nonstop scrutiny. Yeah.
I just think I it it's hard to it's hard for me to imagine what that would do what what that would do to a mind.
Nathan (14:39)
And but there's a there's a sense here in which you you know probably heard the phrase as a kid, the bigger they are, the harder they fall. I mean, this guy did make it to the top. And and I'm sure there was a lot of resentment among other academics who worked much harder, more years, more research, more citations, who said, How in the world did this guy get to this spot? And so I bet there was a certain amount of Schadenfreude, so to speak, at at his undoing there in the academic world. But the question I'm saying is is who how did he get this far?
And let's let's talk a little bit about criticism and I want to bring up probably one of the the deepest, most longstanding differences that Cameron and I have. The one of the core arguments between us, see at what point Cameron can guess where I'm going with this, is there is a YouTube video. You can look this up t sometime called this is this is in the this is in the top ten of of Cameron's playlist called The World's Worst Church Singer.
Is that what the title is?
Cameron (15:38)
Worst worst church singer ever.
Nathan (15:41)
Worst church singer ever. I don't know. This is like a it's gotta be 10 years ago Cameron first showed this to me.
Cameron (15:47)
I think so, yeah.
Nathan (15:49)
and we were we were speaking somewhere, I think in Michigan, and we were rooming together and you kept
Cameron (15:52)
A camp in Michigan.
Nathan (15:53)
playing this horrible because what happens in the video, and and the reason that it's in between hilarious and just so cringe is you have a guy who clearly is not a talented singer who doesn't know that he's not a talented singer, and he's
S singing the song, Looking for a City, which Cameron likes to put the phrase looking for a city and talks when I'm in the audience just because anyway. So he's singing this song, not a great singer, and the piano player is mess and the piano player
Cameron (16:20)
That's an understatement, by the way.
Nathan (16:23)
I I think is just messing with him because the pianist keeps taking it up a key or changing octaves and pushing him higher and higher. And it just gets worse and
Cameron (16:32)
And faster. Yeah.
Nathan (16:33)
fat yeah, faster and higher. And it's it's the whole thing. And I
It's it's like fingernails on a chalkboard for me of of cringe of like the there's a public mocking execution of this guy that he's oblivious to. yeah. Anyway, that's the transition that I'm using out of this into saying, like, how do we how do we give that's that's basically that's basically yeah, so you can
Cameron (16:55)
Cameron's a horrible person because he's taking delight in this poor man's downfall. Yeah.
Nathan (17:00)
go watch the video and decide whether or not you're on Team Cameron or team team Nathan on this one and let us know in the comment section. but
The fact of the matter is, is that at some point somebody should have intervened here and said, Hey, I'm sure you have wonderful gifts and talents, and there are wonderful ways in which you can serve the Lord. and this isn't one of them. you know, and and some communal discernment here of of helping somebody see reality that they can't see would have been a tremendous gift to this guy. And I don't know anything about the the the man at all or the outworkings of all of this.
But you can see the parallel that I'm making here to not just, I mean, to Jason R. Day, but to our lives in general, of saying, where where is the the new need for actual constructive criticism? We have plenty of mocking and destructive criticism, but where is where is the role, Cameron, for a a community of wisdom to give critical feedback in a meaningful way? Where are we at just as you're kind of looking out across, you know, twenty twenty six?
Where are we at culturally in that category?
Cameron (18:10)
Well, we're philosophically predisposed to resist that kind of critici healthy criticism that you talked about, Nathan, because for so long we have, you know, you could use Charles Taylor's language, you know, basically authenticity or, you know, the politics of authenticity. But basically we have inherited from the romantics a kind of sloppy little dream.
I say sloppy because the romantics were actually more thoughtful about this and more careful and wouldn't have said what we do today. But we have poor man's romanticism. So we don't sound like Wordsworth and Coleridge. We sound like Disney movies these days. And that means, you know, it goes like this follow your heart and follow your dreams. Now, let me just be clear here. I I in certain circles you hear people talk about this cynically, and you almost get the impression that.
desire itself is stupid and that dreams are stupid. That's not at all what I'm saying. But I'm saying we also have to work within the limits of not only reality, but within the limits of our own our own personality and our own capabilities. And that's not very popular right now. So it sounds very Yeah.
Nathan (19:20)
but wait a second. But
but in but but in in good criticism, Cameron, oftentimes good critics are critiquing people who actually do have the capability, but they need to be pushed and and fine tuned and refined to be better at that. So when somebody
Cameron (19:37)
Sometimes.
Nathan (19:37)
writes a book, you can have a great author that still has an editor help with that process because they just need a an ex yeah, okay.
Cameron (19:43)
Sometimes. But sometimes they Right. But so well,
I'll get to the critics in a second because but but sometimes they don't though. So there so when I was younger, I I'll if I tell a story at my own expense, this makes I sound like less of a jerk. I caught the vision of being a skateboarder and being a skate
skater.
Nathan (20:03)
I didn't know this.
Cameron (20:05)
I I did. I did. Well, I was into some of the music of the scene at the time.
In the nineties, sc skateboarding was really big and it was it was very much merged with the punk rock scene as well. So I kind of was and it was it was I mean, basically just kind of this very rebellious subculture. I can't imagine what would attract a teenage boy to that. But what very and I, you know, my dad being generous got me a very nice skateboard, but what what quickly became apparent was that I could not skate to save my life. I was horrible. I'm uncoordinated.
I didn't have the athletic prowess needed. And also I didn't have the willingness to break all my limbs to get good. So I liked to carry it around, but then there came you know, the city and act like I was a skater and act all cool cool. But then there came that fateful day where I was carrying my skateboard. And an older person at my school who was very athletically inclined just gazed at me and very solemnly and seriously just said, poser.
And that little verdict completely destroyed but part of the reason it destroyed me was because it was true. I was, I was opposer. But the loving thing for for me in those circumstances would have been for somebody, another friend to say, Cameron, you suck at skateboarding. This is just not you. It's never gonna be you. And you may have now, I did I have an intense desire at the time for it? I did, but that desire didn't match any capabilities. And so
The generous, the kind thing to do. Actually, that guy saying that to me was actually kind of a it was a it was it was a little mean, but it was also a little it was more than a little helpful. It was kind of what broke the spell. So that's not very popular, but we we have a we're in a moment where people we like to it's very easy to tell people, follow your dreams. It's harder to say you really can't sing, or it's harder to say, You're you're not a very good writer. Now, there are instances where we could say you you could improve here.
This is let me bring in critic critics now. Critics are really unpopular right now. And part of that is part of that has to do with the nature of of the market right now, Nathan. You essentially have an online world because most of our stuff that we consume, most of the articles or pieces of whatever criticism we might come across, they're gonna be in online spaces, right? So what's happened to the online spaces? Now I think there are some good trends where this is maybe.
being reversed a little bit, but it's it's been taken over by influencers.
Nathan (22:39)
Mm-hmm.
Cameron (22:39)
Influencers
generally are just being paid to sing the praises of whatever product they're hawking. And they're also they're paid by, I mean, it's it's very known. They're paid by Hollywood, they're paid by movie studios to, you know, fawn and gush about movies. But what's also happened in in in there is I've noticed, Nathan, that when somebody writes a genuine genuinely negative review, they pan a movie. Let's say, you know, some some new
Oscar contending film comes out and this person just eviscerates it. Oftentimes people go after the critic. I see this in the music criticism world a lot. Somebody, you know, let's say, I don't know, Ariana Grande's new album comes out, or Olivia Rodrigo, or whomever, and just destroys it. Then what tends to happen is people tend to go after the critic and character assassinate them and say, you know, you're oftentimes the musician will do it.
Because the musician often is on social media and they'll go after the critic.
But we need good criticism. So just talking about the arts for a second, if you care about music, or if you care about good writing, there's a great line in Ratatouille. Ratatouille would be my my vote for the best Pixar movie. There's
Nathan (24:00)
Hey.
Cameron (24:01)
a food critic in Ratatouille who's kind of the villain, but he's kind of not really. By the end, you can I so he he's my favorite character, would that you know you make of that what you will. But there's one part where he's talking about
Basically, they're saying you just hate everything, you criticize everything. And he says, he says, you you it seems like you don't like any food. He says, I don't like food. I love it. And when I don't love it, I spit it out. Well, in a word, that's a really good summary of the vocation of a critic. A critic is is somebody, ideally speaking, who guides us in our com contemplation of a of a given field or subject, but who loves it.
And because they love it, they hold it to very high standards. And this is where also
Nathan (24:45)
Okay.
Cameron (24:45)
the critic can help the artist, Nathan, like you said. But yeah, I'll pause there.
Nathan (24:49)
But so let's bring this back to Jason Harday in Cambridge then. Because you could have somebody who says, I have a a Western vision of an academic institution, an historic academy like Cambridge University, and we have such a desire and love for the pursuit of truth. We have a vision of right and wrong, of precision, we have academic standards, we have
And we love what this is about and what it produces. And therefore, I mean, I worked in college admissions for two years. The same thing was true is you could interview a student and they might be as nice as could be, and you might look at their academic history and be like, I don't think the kind thing to do is to put you into the into this situation. And so you weren't stamping people reject because like ha ha ha, but a a you had a bigger vision.
of what needed to happen, both for the sake of the institution and for the sake of the individual. And but without those guiding principles, then I think you're very open to if if the guiding principle becomes what is the maximum amount of diversity we can have rather than what is the best way to pursue truth, those are two very different agendas and they and they work themselves out and with very real consequences. So same thing whether it's music, food or academic rigor,
It's it's not just being down on something, it's being of loving an ideal that is bigger and better that we're hoping that others aspire to.
Cameron (26:22)
Yes, I mean, so Jason Arday should not have gone as far as he did. He should have also been honest, but he should not been n should not have been pushed ahead as far as he was. Part of what makes this look like a a real tragedy is that you have basically the academic equivalent of the worst church singer in the world catapulted to the very top with a big
fat spotlight on them. And then everybody got to see what the church singer sounds like, or how Jason Arday worked in this particular capacity for which he wasn't qualified and for which he wasn't suited. And it just turns into the spectacle that we're we're seeing now. The the the other that mean the real tragic part of this, Nathan, to me is that we don't know all of the circumstances, but I would have hoped
Dearly hoped that Jason Arde, the person, had a community that could hold him and say, Look, you got found out. The person people thought you were isn't really who you are. But you know what? We still love you. You're still a person. It just, I don't know what the headspace was there, but just would would hope for people who find themselves in that kind of position.
Maybe not in such a global position, but a lot of us face I mean, we all face failure in our lives. We all face moments where we feel that we've been found out that we would have at least a foundation of unconditional love in our life of people who would say, Yeah, man, you really screwed up here. You this is bad, but we love you.
Nathan (28:05)
Yeah, th this so that
that is the ideal, but that also is part of the story here is that what we don't have is a lot of people with that response in this situation. You do have people doubling down and protesting and saying that he was killed by the people who are pointing out what seems to be obviously true. And so the so that seems to be a cultural shift of the time we're
Cameron (28:25)
Well, that's also just state. Yeah.
Nathan (28:29)
living in, of which yeah, that so
So there there's the individual sadness and sorrow, the loss of a human life, but this does mean that the responses that people have had to it are indicative of a bigger shift beyond, hey, the academy is a place where we pursue truth to the academy is a place where we who knows even more what the what the highest good is and what the ultimate goals are here.
Cameron (28:54)
Yes. I mean
my g we yeah. I mean we've moved so far away from the ideals that originally animated college and and higher education. We've talked about that before. We've moved away from we you now it's principally kind of private institutions or small classical
you know, Christian colleges that are sort of outposts of a bygone era that try to carry on the vision that college is a place where you go to learn the good life or how to be a well-rounded human being. We've we've we lost sight of that a long time ago, but we're seeing that it actually does have practical outworkings. Character does matter in practical terms as well. Because I think all of us could also look at this and say Cambridge University has not handled this well. It's been an
Absolute farce from start to finish. And had it been handled differently and better by the university, Jason R. Day, as as bad as this all was, may have fared better.
But
Nathan (30:03)
yeah.
Cameron (30:04)
and that's a separate conversation, perhaps. But yeah, that's the the reason there's so much public distrust of higher education is largely because of spectacles like this, which are indicative.
of something that's wrong on a very deep deep level in our institutions of higher learning. This this should not have happened the way it did. It I'm hoping it will inspire not just good conversations, but good calls to action in in our in these institutions, particularly Cambridge. I mean, it'll be fascinating to see okay, what what transpires at Cambridge now in the wake of this. I mean, this is they wanted to avoid, it seemed at first a
Nathan (30:42)
Mm. So there's there's an there's a
Cameron (30:44)
very public scandal and they
They got it in droves here.
Nathan (30:49)
So there yes, there's a shift in the academy, there's a shift shift in the culture. And I wonder, Cameron, as we bring this to a close, if we could just for a split second here say, All right, if this is if let's let's say we embrace the fact that this is the world in which we live, and then we want to think a little bit about living as a Christian in the midst of that culture of I mean, Jesus praised Peter and then turned around and said, Get behind me, Satan. There there there's a
There's a odd New Testament. I mean, the more that I think about, it's amazing the percentage of the New Testament that's about watch out for false teachers, test
Cameron (31:27)
Mm-hmm.
Nathan (31:27)
the prophets, test the spirits, watch out. and and naming them, right,
Cameron (31:31)
And naming them. Calling out. Yeah.
Nathan (31:33)
calling them right. So that but but that's out of a love for the truth. It's out of a love for the truth that the boundaries are drawn, not out of a hatred for individuals and or or a set of of popular ideas.
And I think that's going to be really a challenge for the church. And I say that big church, you know, global church. And it's a challenge for us individually too. That I think what we want to do is to say, is to live lives of, and then that's why you have, you know, don't cast your pearls before a swine, don't let the things you consider to be holy be despised. A a sense in which such a deep love for the truth that we can correct out of that.
rather than attack the individual. And it's it's a story that I've told before on the podcast, but years and years ago there was a gathering of older preachers in the county and the and the one guy got up and was jokingly talking about my grandpa and he said, Well he said I was preaching a lot of hellfire and brimstone messages and he's like and everybody was leaving my church to go over to Dave's church. So and he's like, but I knew that
Dave believed the scriptures and believed in hell and talk about these things. So he said, I went over to Dave and I said, Dave, why is it that I'm teaching about hell and obedience and you know, the justice of God and people get mad and leave my church and they come to your church to talk about the justice of God and obedience in hell. And he's like, Dave looked at me and he said, Well, probably if you weren't preaching it in a tone that it made the people feel that you wished they were going to hell, that would make a difference. and so they had a big laugh about, you know, something that happened thirty years ago.
But there is a little bit of wisdom in that, right? Of the the tone in which we pursue the truth and the tone in which we give the criticism. Is it really for the love of the truth and the love of the person? Or is it for some kind of punching down our own hidden agenda or we're just a cranky person? And I think the posture with which we bring this really reveals a lot about our heart. And one of them is the is the right way to do it and brings about real positive change that we can grow to forward together and community.
And the other divides us and and separates. And so I want us to pick up on the ratatouille food critic idea here as Christians and say, let's make sure that the things that we might on the surface level seem like we're against are byproducts of the fact of what we're really, really for and what we really love and what we really know to be true and our actual deep heart and concern for everybody all around us. And I think in doing so, the world needs that example.
Christ modeled it for us beautifully, and by the power of his spirit, we can live into that too. And so this isn't a theoretical call. This is a a missional mandate to critically think about how we're critical in the world because there is a wrong way to be right. It's a conversation we have with our kids and ourselves frequently in our household. There is a wrong way to be right, and the right way to be right is to do so out of love with a bigger vision of the beauty of truth. And so let's lean into that.
Cameron (34:42)
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