John Stonestreet: If We Know What is Right, Can We Do It? - Do The Right Thing

Summary

In this engaging presentation by John Stonestreet at Biola University, the intricate interplay between knowing what is right and actually doing it is explored through various anecdotes and historical references. The speech delves into the moral failures and redemptive journeys of notable figures like Chuck Colson and Dietrich Bonhoeffer, while also critiquing modern societal approaches such as education, incentives, and rules in instilling virtue. Drawing on philosophical and theological insights, Stonestreet emphasizes the importance of cultivating virtue as a "long obedience in the same direction," and highlights the role of family and community in fostering moral development.

Highlights

• John Stonestreet questions whether knowing right inherently leads to doing right.🤔
• Chuck Colson's Watergate scandal is discussed as a lesson in moral failure and redemption.🕵️‍♂️
• Incentives and rules are critiqued as inadequate answers to moral development.⚖️
• The importance of 'long obedience in the same direction' for cultivating virtue is emphasized.📈
• Stories of redemption, such as those of Dietrich Bonhoeffer, are highlighted for their moral lessons.🌟

Key Takeaways

• Knowing what is right doesn't always translate to doing it; discipline and will are essential.💪
• Human beings have an infinite capacity for self-rationalization, leading to moral corruption.🤔
• Modern society's reliance on rules, education, and incentives often fails to instill genuine virtue.📚
• Cultivating virtue is a long-term journey requiring commitment and community support.⏳
• Family and foundational institutions play a crucial role in moral education and development.🏠

Overview

John Stonestreet begins by posing a fundamental question: Even if we know what is right, can we actually do it? He reflects on the personal stories of individuals like Chuck Colson, who faced moral dilemmas and consequences. Stonestreet argues that while society attempts to guide behavior through rules and incentives, genuine virtue requires deeper cultivation.

The presentation dives into historical and philosophical insights, exploring the transformative journeys of figures like Dietrich Bonhoeffer. Stonestreet discusses how modern methods, such as education and incentives, often fall short in developing true moral character, which encompasses more than just following rules or achieving self-actualization.

Stonestreet underscores the significance of community and family as foundational to moral education. He stresses that virtuous living is a long-term commitment, akin to what philosopher Friedrich Nietzsche called 'a long obedience in the same direction.' By integrating these values into our lives, we can aim to bridge the gap between knowing what is right and doing it.

Chapters

• 00:00 - 01:00: Introduction and Chuck Colson's Experience This chapter delves into the exploration of truth and morality, posing the question of whether truth and righteousness are knowable and if individuals possess the willpower to act accordingly. It uses the experiences of Chuck Colson as a key example, highlighting his role in the Watergate scandal, his subsequent imprisonment, and the life-changing questions he faced regarding truth and ethics.
• 01:00 - 02:00: The Experience of Human Corruption The chapter titled 'The Experience of Human Corruption' explores a personal account involving a high-stakes situation with the president and a group of individuals who were in his office. The president was furious about information that had leaked to the Brookings Institution. In a rash moment, the president suggested sending a team to retrieve the documents, which was an illegal action. The narrator reflects on the failure to speak up against the president's suggestion and how this lack of action led to their imprisonment, contemplating on the nature of self-righteousness and moral failures.
• 02:00 - 03:00: Transformation and Faith The chapter 'Transformation and Faith' explores the theme of self-awareness and human tendency for self-rationalization. It delves into the idea that individuals often become oblivious to their own insensitivities due to their confidence that they cannot be compromised. The narrative highlights a tension between high self-esteem and the reality that even the best and brightest tend to make mistakes, eventually failing to do what they know is right.
• 03:00 - 04:00: Significance of a Common Worldview The chapter discusses the concept of human corruption and how engaging in actions that 'break the code' or moral standards leads to a diminishing sense of guilt over time. Initially, one might feel bad when doing something perceived as wrong, but this feeling tends to decrease with repetition, illustrating a progressive desensitization to moral breaches. The author questions the effectiveness of removing moral restraints by pointing out the observable consequences: increased pain, brokenness, and harm to individuals affected. This discussion is tied to the broader theme of the need for a common worldview and the consequences of its absence.
• 04:00 - 05:00: Personal Testimonies of Change The chapter titled 'Personal Testimonies of Change' explores the profound impact of societal transformations, particularly focusing on the challenging task of altering human will. It emphasizes the significance of a shared foundation and common worldview in achieving meaningful change. The text underscores the severe destructiveness of societal changes, even more so than any other events within the narrator's lifetime. The narrative captures the difficulty of knowing and doing what's good amidst these transformations.
• 05:00 - 06:00: The Role of Faith and Reason The chapter introduces several individuals, each serving time for serious crimes ranging from second-degree unintentional murder to assault. Despite their past, the narrative seems to explore themes of moral awareness and the potential for rehabilitation, hinting at accomplishments within an organizational setting, possibly suggesting redemption or personal growth.
• 06:00 - 07:00: Importance of Moral and Ethical Standards This chapter explores the importance of moral and ethical standards, reflecting a personal transformation from previous wrongdoing, such as secondary possession of methamphetamines, to finding newfound value in life through spiritual belief. The protagonist has experienced a change prompted by the realization of a forgiving and loving deity, leading to a more profound understanding of love and a rejection of a corrupt belief system that only causes pain.
• 07:00 - 08:00: Teaching Children Right and Wrong The chapter emphasizes the importance of teaching children moral values anchored in faith, specifically through the lens of Christianity. It focuses on using God-given talents to positively impact others rather than manipulate them. This involves fostering a sense of community and partial personal responsibility in ethical development.
• 08:00 - 09:00: Challenges of Knowing and Doing Right This chapter explores the dynamics between faith, reason, and passion, emphasizing the importance of balancing these elements. When reason successfully governs our passions, it can channel our passionate nature towards achieving great and heroic deeds. The discussion highlights how the harmonious operation of faith and reason can lead individuals to accomplish significant and noble actions.
• 09:00 - 10:00: Overview of Rules, Incentives, and Education The chapter titled 'Overview of Rules, Incentives, and Education' begins with an expression of gratitude for the opportunity to participate in an important event, highlighting the honor of sharing the stage with notable individuals such as Scott, Ray, Sean, Chuck Colson, and Frank. The discussion emphasizes that the current challenges society faces are rooted in ethical issues. To overcome these challenges, it is essential that there is a consensus on the common definition of ethics. The chapter implies that understanding rules, incentives, and education within this ethical framework plays a crucial role in societal restoration.
• 10:00 - 11:00: Limitation of Education as a Moral Force This chapter delves into the concept of morality being a knowable truth and explores whether it is feasible for individuals to live in accordance with such moral truths. The discussion highlights the challenges of actualizing these moral principles in daily life, illustrating the difficulty with personal anecdotes, such as parenting.
• 11:00 - 12:00: Self-Actualization and Inner Truth The narrator humorously mentions that their entire house is pink and that they lost the battle over it. They recently got a dog, which is a boy, much to the delight of their three-year-old daughter, who expressed her happiness about having a brother. The narrator discusses the challenges and efforts in teaching their daughters the concept of right and wrong, highlighting the family dynamics and values.
• 12:00 - 13:00: Critique of Modern Culture The chapter opens with an exploration of the disparity between understanding moral concepts and the ability to execute them in real life. The author shares a personal anecdote about a 'daddy date' with his three-year-old daughter. These dates usually include a pleasant visit to Starbucks for treats, but on this occasion, they make an additional stop at a dry-cleaning shop. While there, the author tips the employee, who in turn gives the dollar to his daughter, Anna, as a kind gesture. This small act of kindness delights Anna, illustrating themes of generosity and happiness in simple acts.
• 13:00 - 14:00: Examples of Virtuous Lives The chapter titled 'Examples of Virtuous Lives' shares a personal story illustrating the concept of envy and jealousy. The speaker recounts an incident involving their five-year-old child who experienced envy after witnessing a neighbor's child receiving a dollar. The narrator reflects on the misconception that children are innocent of such feelings, suggesting instead that even young children can feel and express envy. The narrative serves as a segue to broader discussions about human emotions and virtues in daily contexts, providing a relatable and insightful example of how virtues are tested and observed in life.
• 14:00 - 15:00: Virtue and Long-term Ethics The chapter explores the concept of virtue and long-term ethics, focusing on the challenge of acting upon what is known to be right. It starts with a personal anecdote about a daughter's struggle to be happy for her sister, despite understanding that this is the virtuous choice. This raises the question of whether knowing the right thing equates to being able to do it, leading to a broader discussion on the connection between understanding and practicing virtue.
• 15:00 - 16:00: Cultural Influence on Morality This chapter explores the impact of cultural influence on morality, highlighting the tendencies to enforce virtue through societal means. It discusses how society often attempts to instill virtue by adding rules, using the example of the 2008 financial crisis to illustrate how new regulations were imposed in response to ethical breakdowns. The emphasis is on the tension between naturally developing virtue through moral understanding and the imposition of external rules to enforce ethical behavior.
• 16:00 - 17:00: Rebuilding Moral Society The chapter discusses the limitations of rules in fostering virtue and morality. It argues that while rules are necessary for protection, they do not inherently make individuals virtuous. The discussion highlights the human tendency for self-rationalization, suggesting that as rules increase, so do the creative ways individuals find to circumvent them. The chapter touches on traditions from religious upbringing, particularly Christianity, noting that it is often seen more as a rule-following religion rather than one that inherently builds virtue.
• 17:00 - 18:00: Ted Haggard's Moral Failure The chapter titled 'Ted Haggard's Moral Failure' discusses the challenges of growing up in a highly rule-oriented religious environment. It highlights how the addition of numerous rules beyond those in the Bible led to some individuals becoming adept at deceit rather than more virtuous. The narrative suggests that incentiving behavior, such as potty training with rewards like Skittles, can be particularly tempting for children and may have parallels to the ways rules and incentives function within religious settings.
• 18:00 - 19:00: Role of Grace and Redemption The chapter 'Role of Grace and Redemption' discusses the concept of morality in society, particularly focusing on the role of incentives. It critiques the practice of adding incentives as a means to encourage people to do the right thing, suggesting that such a system might only foster conditional morality. The chapter poses a significant question raised by Professor George, which is whether individuals can make the right decision even when there are powerful incentives to do the wrong thing. This question underlines the struggle between external incentives and internal moral compass, and leads to a broader discussion on grace and redemption in relation to personal and societal ethics.
• 19:00 - 20:00: Promotion of Virtue in Society The chapter discusses the challenges of promoting virtue in a society where cultural incentives often encourage wrongful behavior. It highlights the inadequacies of relying solely on education to instill morality, especially when contemporary educational systems are not aligned with moral teachings. The argument is made that simply educating individuals is not sufficient to foster a moral society.
• 20:00 - 21:00: Upcoming Speaker Introduction: Scott Ray The chapter introduces the upcoming speaker, Scott Ray, and discusses the importance of definitions in the conflict of ideas. It highlights that discussions about morals, truth, and culture often intersect at the point where definitions cause conflicts. The chapter critiques the current educational focus on technical skills for economic gain, using a quote from D.L. Moody to emphasize that education without moral grounding only increases one's capacity to commit unethical acts.

John Stonestreet: If We Know What is Right, Can We Do It? - Do The Right Thing Transcription

• 00:00 - 00:30 if truth is knowable and by extension therefore right is knowable then the next question is whether we have the discipline in the will to do what is right Chuck Colson our host was a key figure in the great Watergate scandal he was special counsel to President Nixon he went to prison he faced this question with some dramatic consequences a
• 00:30 - 01:00 remembered one the president four or five of us in the office and the president was exploding over something that had gotten out it was in the hands of the Brookings Institution then he turned to Bob hold and he said Bob we got a team in place that can go in and get those documents back then I later realized that was a time and I should have stopped and said wailing mr. president think about the consequences but I did not I ended up going to prison why I think you can be so self-righteous
• 01:00 - 01:30 that you don't see what's really going on you become oblivious to your own insensitivities because you're sure nobody can compromise you human beings have the infinite capacity of self rationalization that's exactly what I did so I see a fascinating tension because everyone in this room they're the nation's best and brightest all out saying you could do it high self-esteem and good good grades and yet there's a common theme throughout these panel is that sooner or later we drop the ball we do that which we know we ought not to do
• 01:30 - 02:00 it once you begin to break the code you'll feel badly about it the first time little less badly about it the second time a little less badly about it the third time and that's the experience of human corruption my first response to this idea of removing restraints is how's that working for you because the fact of the matter is observational II it's resulting in more pain more brokenness more harm to the individuals involved to
• 02:00 - 02:30 the society in general then pretty much anything else that I can think of that's happened in society in my lifetime it is unutterably destructive that raises an intriguing question what about the transformation of the stubborn human will how do you you know what's good and then how do you do it when you have a common foundation and everyone operates with a worldview that is similar in the
• 02:30 - 03:00 sense that there's right and there's wrong it's amazing what you can accomplish as an organization my name is sterling Knox I'm serving a hundred and twenty months for second-degree unintentional murder my name is Charlie seven two hundred four months for second degree intentional murder my name is Steve Janicek I'm serving a hundred months or a cruel calmly senseless act of assault there's bill
• 03:00 - 03:30 from give months for a secondary possession methamphetamines I care no I do care now and the prompted ed change a newfound value on life knowing that there's a god Mary that has forgiven me and that shows me love every day knowing what it is to to love one another no longer following a corrupt belief system that is nothing but causing pain and
• 03:30 - 04:00 harm to other people I have renewed faith in Christ and it's it helps me to refocus on what's important and I've spent enough time taking away from other people God gave me a lot of gifts and it's time for me to start giving them to put them for better use of them to manipulate people to resolve certain issues it's always accomplished in community and it's always accomplished in part as well
• 04:00 - 04:30 by teaching them to control how they think when faith and reason are operating well together when reason is in control of the passions then the passionate aspect of man can lead us to do great things to do really great things heroic things because we're passionate for them
• 04:30 - 05:00 thank you thanks for the opportunity thanks for coming out to this important event it's such an honor to share the stage with guys like Scott ray and and Sean and of course a chuck Colson and Frank and and this is I think one of the richest sections in this curriculum we've what we've talked about so far is that the mess that we're in is a mess of ethics and then secondly if we're going to restore it we have to actually agree that there is a common definition of
• 05:00 - 05:30 truth and that truth is actually knowable in that morality is actually knowable the session now that I want to jump into is is I think the richest in this because it's the most important one and that is if morality actually is knowable is it possible for us to actually live that way now I will say this this is an easy session to give in a much harder session to actually fulfill do you know what I mean I am the dad of three little girls that means a number of things number one it
• 05:30 - 06:00 means my entire house is pink I tried to fight that I lost we did just get a dog though who's a boy and my three-year-old at breakfast the other day said daddy I'm so glad we got a boy finally we have a brother but you know one of the things that we're trying to help our daughters understand is this concept of right and wrong but at the same time there's a
• 06:00 - 06:30 difference between knowing what's right and what's wrong and actually being able to do it I took my three-year-old with me on a daddy date I'd like doing daddy dates with my girls usually we go to Starbucks they get a doughnut I get a coffee everybody wins this time I actually had some dry cleaning it wasn't a very glamorous daddy date but the lady I tipped the lady and she took the dollar that I gave her one of the dollars I gave her and turn around and gave it to my three-year-old daughter Anna it was a very nice gesture and she was beside herself so she came back into
• 06:30 - 07:00 the house and she said mommy I've got a ticket said no it's a dollar that's a whole other discussion my five-year-old saw love that my five-year-old saw it and said do I have and it broke her heart and you know what crept in the Green Monster right envy jealousy you know my back Nord neighbor says kids are you know that she says kids aren't senators I'm like just come hang out watch and we talked to Abigail
• 07:00 - 07:30 about it I said you have to be happy for your sister she was with me and you weren't and that's the way life goes and here's what she said to me she said daddy I want to be happy for my sister I know it's the right thing to do but I just can't you ever felt like that has that ever happened to you so if we know what is right can we actually do it in other words is a return to virtuous
• 07:30 - 08:00 living possible and as we wrestle with this with our daughters I'm finding it's very tempting to try to put virtue on them by adding certain things and it's interesting as I've wrestled with this talk and read through the history of how people understand virtue it's exactly what society often tries to do to bring us back to virtue we add things like for example we add rules in other words and you've heard this from this last you know financial crisis of 2008 everything went wrong so now we have to have more rules because rules
• 08:00 - 08:30 will protect us rules may protect us and we need certain rules to protect us but rules do not make you a virtuous person we add more rules and as Chuck mentioned the infinite capacity of humans for self rationalization all that means is as we become more creative in breaking those rules some of us were raised in that tradition I was raised in that tradition where being a Christian was following a
• 08:30 - 09:00 set of rules and so we knew what all the rules in the Bible were and then we added a couple hundred just to be safe and you know what happened was is that some of us growing up in this background became phenomenal at getting away with stuff it did not make us more virtuous it made us better deceived another way that other thing that we add is incentives now this is really tempting for kids especially when it come to potty training we found out that the secret to potty training with Skittles
• 09:00 - 09:30 but you know the government then also or our society we want to add incentives in other words if you do the right thing then this will come the problem with that is is that it the attempt there is to by us and you add incentives and now we become people who are only moral if we have incentives one of the most powerful lines and the curriculum is by a professor George when he says do we have the capacity to make the right decision in spite of powerful incentives to do the wrong thing now this is the
• 09:30 - 10:00 double whammy of our culture is that we live in a culture in which the incentives are to do wrong we're to do right actually it's the firefly in the face of the incentives incentives don't make us moral either the great secularists answer to this problem is education we're amoral we need education we'll improve people but education will not make you moral especially when education is defined the way it is today now listen one of the things we need to understand
• 10:00 - 10:30 and whenever we talk about morals or never talk about truth and ever we talk about culture and the intersection of all these things is this the conflict of ideas is always over the definition of words the conflict of ideas is always over the definitions and our culture education is simply technical it is to get money is to get a job the ol moody once said if you take someone who steals railroad ties and you give him an education all you've done is teaching to steal the entire railroad in fact one of
• 10:30 - 11:00 the great lines on this is quoted in Steven Garber's terrific book the fabric of faithfulness and he quotes a Duke University student on his education here's what he says he says we've got no philosophy of what it is that we want by the time somebody graduates this so-called curriculum is a set of Hoops that somebody says students ought to jump through before graduation no one seems to have asked how do people become good people and that is the question that's missing in education because education is very much a an acquisition of job skills that's all it is one of my
• 11:00 - 11:30 favorite examples of this is from a guy who actually came through one of our summit programs Noah Reiner Norah was a the freshman class president Dartmouth University and as such as freshman year he was asked to give the commencement address to his fellow students and faculty and so what he said he got up in front of his students and fellow students and he said by all accounts we are the most gifted the most diverse the most promising a generation the most promising class that Dartmouth University has ever had but education won't make us moral and here's how I
• 11:30 - 12:00 know this he said and then he went off to read three or four names of Dartmouth University graduates both at the undergraduate and graduate level who were now convicted felons that was an awkward speech another strategy is that we just want to add self-actualization in other words to find ourselves just go deeper this often by the way takes the form of bailouts we make bad decisions somebody bails us
• 12:00 - 12:30 out just continue to look inside just to continue to look inside as the video said what if you're a jerk I once had a conversation like this with a lady on an airplane it was on the way back from New Zealand and and I was sitting next to her and and I asked her three questions and you know this is the dangerous thing you know Frank like you said you can ask somebody three questions and find yourself in the deepest conversation about life and faith and truth and everything else I said where are you going she said I'm going to Orlando I
• 12:30 - 13:00 said great what's in Orlando she said an avatar conference I said what's an avatar conference and we were off she said in Avatar conference it's a conference will they teach you to look inside and find the truth that's inside of you because we all have all of these messages all these holy books and Bibles and things trying to tell us what to believe and all we need to know is what's inside of us now the first thing of course I thought was lady why are you
• 13:00 - 13:30 flying halfway around the world to have someone tell you that the truth is inside you if they sent you an email you could save a couple thousand dollars but I didn't say that and I started to play the devil's advocate with her I said well what if I look inside and I don't find truths you said no and I knew where she was coming I didn't know she'd actually say it but finally she did she finally she looked at me she said John you don't understand you have all the truth inside you and so do i because we're god i'm god you're a god everyone's gone and so i said ok let's
• 13:30 - 14:00 imagine that you're right and i look deep inside myself and I determined that what's true and right for me is to torture children for fun the people in the seat in front of us turned around it was awkward and her answer was why do you have to talk in extremes I said well why is that in Xtreme I pick up the newspaper everyday and I read about people who think their own pleasure is the highest good listen Peter Kreeft put it well if you're at the edge of a moral abyss the
• 14:00 - 14:30 most progressive way forward is actually backwards it's not to go deeper into yourself I heard Eric Metaxas was here yesterday and as we look at these solutions of adding things it's very clear that it's not enough to get the job done to add more rules to our lives or to add incentives or education or to Pradas to go further and when we see that when we look at examples of men who made great differences men and women who made great differences in history and
• 14:30 - 15:00 Eric Metaxas I understand was here celebrating yesterday the birthday of Bonhoeffer but taxes has written a fantastic biography of Bonhoeffer if you haven't read it two thumbs up he's also written a fantastic biography of way more befores and each of these books in a way that Eric does so well he caps he just basically and captures their life in a sit-ins and he doesn't end Bonhoeffer in the preface and here's how he describes this he's talking about the day when paula and carl Bonhoeffer Dietrich's parents learned about their
• 15:00 - 15:30 son and learned that their son was actually dead and actually came in the scenario of his funeral which was broadcast throughout Britain the challenge there was that Winston Churchill had taught the British people that all Germans were evil and he had to do that they were evil Nazis and he had to do that because in order to keep the morale up and so this this funeral was actually broadcast throughout Britain and throughout Germany and here's how metaxas describes it he says as the couple took in the hard news that the good man who was their son was now dead
• 15:30 - 16:00 so too many English took in the hard news that the dead man who was a German was good thus did the world again begin to reconcile itself to itself in death Bonhoeffer speaks he describes Robo forest in a similar way in fact in Wilberforce sent in the book Amazing Grace near the end he describes a little
• 16:00 - 16:30 vignette and Wilberforce life where he finds himself playing on the floor with a six year old little girl who was a little middle known to over force she was destined to become the Queen of England her name was Victoria do you remember when warble force jumped in and to his causes he said he had two great aims the abolition of the slave trade and the reformation of what manners and what he's talking about the Reformation of virtue he's not talking about being nice he's actually talking about being good
• 16:30 - 17:00 and of course Victoria her name is resonating with the next age of British history which is a almost stands in stark contrast with the one before it because of the reformation of virtue and metaxas describes it this way and so here on the miniature plane of the carpet and a prophetically fitting tableau of domestic happiness the child who would lend the future era her name met the man who would lend it his character my question is where do lives
• 17:00 - 17:30 like these come from the reason that these things of Education and rules cannot make us virtuous is because virtue is not something that's added to our life and the words of Tom right virtue is a way of being human in the world virtue is a trajectory of life it's a direction not a line that we do
• 17:30 - 18:00 or do not cross it's let me say it again because it's a loaded statement and I think in particular in the case of Bonhoeffer Metaxas makes this great argument of where this trajectory started and where it ended up in his plot to deal with the Nazis virtuous living is a way of being human in the world it is a way of being human in the world Frederick Nietzsche put it this way that the great thing in life is a long
• 18:00 - 18:30 obedience in the same direction now Nicci's direction was wrong Eugene Peterson picked it up and he reframed it along obedience in the right direction life is a trajectory if you remember in Charles Dickens play a Christmas Carol Jacob Marley shows up to Ebenezer Scrooge and he's covered in remember
• 18:30 - 19:00 he's covered in what chains he said where's the chains come from and another work of Dickens he actually talks about this it's Great Expectations he begins by saying this pause you who read this and think for a moment of the long chain of iron or of gold of thorns or flowers that would never have bound you but for the formation of the first link on one memorable day life is that long obedient
• 19:00 - 19:30 in the same direction listen it is a difficult thing for us to grasp in our culture and students in particular I think it's tough for us see I think my generation was the last generation that actually read books and what I mean by that isn't that you don't never read a book you're in you're in college but what I mean by that is is that we grew up on books we didn't have Google you know so when we wanted to know something we picked up a book and we started on page one and we headed in a direction does that make sense we actually would now I only got the page five but I was
• 19:30 - 20:00 at least going in the right direction our culture is fragmented our culture is disconnected no one starts on page one they start on page Google and from there you can go every different direction you want this is a striking feature of our society which makes it extremely difficult to be virtuous people is that we live profoundly disconnected and fragmented lives we're the Seinfeld generation now I grew up on Seinfeld and I watched it and I laughed my head off
• 20:00 - 20:30 at the Soup Nazi and the close talker and you guys know what I'm talking about you bunch of sinners but you know my mistake was as I thought my life was like Seinfeld you remember what Seinfeld was the show about what nothing and you know I you know earlier I remember The Cosby Show and every episode of The Cosby Show was the same there was a problem you know Theo cheated on a test Rudy was hiding in the cupboard something like that there was
• 20:30 - 21:00 conflict and 30 minutes later there was what resolution just like in your house everything's fixed in 30 minutes but it wasn't each episode that was like that it was the whole series you know we watched those kids grow up we much watch them make progress Seinfeld this Cosby show the most popular show of the 80s is very different than Seinfeld the most popular show of the 90s first of all who grew up in Seinfeld no one they grew down there wasn't progress that was regressed but what was different was
• 21:00 - 21:30 this his Seinfeld was a life of juxtaposed episodes that had nothing to do with each other I could do something in this part of my life and it wouldn't impact this part of my life I could make a decision here and it wouldn't impact how I made a decision here and my mistake was as I watched it I laughed at it and I thought it was true I thought that how I treated a woman when I was dating her in college would not impact how I treated my wife thirty years all right not thirty years not that old ten years later and I was wrong I
• 21:30 - 22:00 thought how I fudged around the rules in a basketball game wouldn't change how I fudged around the rules when it came to the IRS and I was wrong see our culture is fragmented and so even to see our lives as a long obedience in the same direction as a trajectory as a way of being human in the world is profoundly difficult in the 21st century and it's very profoundly difficult if that's even a word in for the Millennials who
• 22:00 - 22:30 experience their friendships online not with having without having to do the actual hard work of loving and forgiving each other Dickens calls it this long chain we can see the results of this in a very actually even to be back up we saw the results of this in a very real way of what a long obedience in the wrong direction can do with the horrific story
• 22:30 - 23:00 that came out of Philadelphia in the last few weeks Kermit Gosnell as an abortion doctor and he ran what authorities have called a house of horrors I wouldn't even want to describe to you the horrors of it I'm assuming most of you have heard about this but this was more than an abortion clinic this was an infanticide clinic where babies were actually born alive squirming around and he actually made a joke about how one was big enough he
• 23:00 - 23:30 could walk him to the bus stop and he made that joke right after he put scissors in the back of his head and cut his spinal cord list last week he was arraigned on eight counts of murder he questioned the judge on seven of them he looked actually confused because seven of those counts had to do with killing infants alive for 30 years he'd run this clinic made millions and millions of dollars no one had come and inspected
• 23:30 - 24:00 this clinic in the last couple decades despite all kinds of complaints Joseph's bottom in this week's Weekly Standard wrote a terrific article called to live and die in Philadelphia about Gosnell's reaction to his arrangement arraignment and I've quoted it at length here and I hope you can hang with this long quote here's what he said dr. Gosnell was a little bit funneled at his arraignment on January 20 indited for eight murders the Philadelphia abortionist told the court that he
• 24:00 - 24:30 understood the first count a charge of third-degree murder for the death of a woman on whom he had operated he didn't understand the other the seven other counts the first-degree charges for the deaths of seven babies delivered alive and then killed in his clinic who could wonder why Kermit Gosnell was confused at his arraignment no one had stopped him before no one in more than 30 years had questioned him no one had ever given him a signal that he might be prosecuted for performing abortions by inducing excuse me inducing
• 24:30 - 25:00 overmedicated third trimester labor and then chopping through the spinal cord of the living result no one had ever dared call his abortion business murder no one in fact had ever told him he wasn't the absolute ruler of his own little third-world country he has a point and isn't this kind of where we reached in 2008 on the financial sector this long obedience in the wrong direction and then suddenly we wake up and we're like wow how did this happen
• 25:00 - 25:30 interestingly enough one of the critics of this or one of the commentators in this whole event said it was a whole culture of death and the whole culture pro-life culture that made the pro-choice culture that made this possible Aristotle talked about this long ago he said so it is a matter of no little importance what sort of habits we form from the earliest age it makes a vast difference or rather all the difference in the world in Alice in Wonderland there's this great scene where Alice is talking to the Cheshire Cat and and she says
• 25:30 - 26:00 Cheshire Cat could you tell me please which way I ought to go from here and the cat says well that depends a good deal on where you want to get to and Alice said well I don't care and the cat said well then it doesn't matter which way you go that's really profound isn't it you know if you don't care where you go then take any road you please all moral truth claims are equal there just subjective opinion but realize if you want to take that approach all roads lead us somewhere this is the great idea
• 26:00 - 26:30 that ideas have consequences as Aristotle called this habits CS Lewis also talked about that in the article that are in the in the chapter that Chuck talked about earlier in abolition of man called them in without chest and I'm going to quote it here as well and what Lewis says in men without chest in a first chapter of abolition a man he says it still remains true that no justification or talk or defensive virtue will actually enable a man to be virtuous without the aid of trained
• 26:30 - 27:00 emotions the intellect is powerless against the animal organism the head rules the belly through the chest and may even be said that it is by this middle element that man is man for by his intellect he is mere spirit and by his appetite mere animal and the things that make us human is how we train the chest and I would argue the chest as a muscle it's got to be worked out oh if you've ever read CS Lewis's works and then going back to the Chronicles of Narnia you see the
• 27:00 - 27:30 character studies and I think the character study of what Lewis is talking about here of a man without a chest and of course it's a critique on education if you read it is a character that shows up at the very beginning of the voyage of the Dawn Treader there was a boy whose name was Eustace Clarence scrubs and he almost deserved it that is a fantastic beginning to a book you got to admit there was a boy whose name was used as Clarence Grubbs and he almost
• 27:30 - 28:00 deserved it and the next several paragraphs Lewis goes in and talks about what the boy likes and you know what he likes he likes dinosaurs he likes to break things down and scientifically technically break things down but he doesn't like to imagine where dinosaurs came from and he doesn't like to imagine living in a world of dinosaurs in other words he has a head but he has no chest he has no imagination he has no moral virtue to help him live in the world that he wants to study this
• 28:00 - 28:30 is the post scientific enterprise that we study the world and study the world and study the world and that's what an education is it's never what it means to actually live life in the world and so we have a bunch of men without chests so Aristotle calls this cultivation of virtue the cultivation of habits Lewis calls it the chest the thing that can help the reason overrule the passions Dallas Willard calls it the well-ordered
• 28:30 - 29:00 heart that's interesting and proverbs 4:23 above all guards you're what hard you know it's tough for us to understand that word heart in our culture because in our word in our culture that word heart means it really means emotions doesn't it right so we send silly Valentine's cards to each other that say I heart you and what that means is I have strong what feelings to you because that's how love has been neutered in our culture to me nothing but strong emotions in the
• 29:00 - 29:30 Hebrew culture though the analogy for emotions wasn't harp the analogy for emotions was bowels not a hallmark didn't pick up on that it just didn't quite work I love you with all my bath I know there's some guy in here going Valentine's Day is next week that's phenomenal
• 29:30 - 30:00 and another single guy okay well and the hebrew culture the heart wasn't emotions the heart was that thing that connected the reason with the emotions it was the center and this is why the the he the this solomon says above all don't let that go if you've got a choice between letting your mind go and letting your passions go or letting your heart go give up the other two but keep the
• 30:00 - 30:30 will keep the will this is why so many in history have said that the greatest virtue is courage the ability to just stand up and do what's right and this is something that has to be trained Willard says those with a well-ordered heart or a worked out heart a trained heart are people who are prepared for and capable of responding to the situation's of life in ways that are good and right you may say I want to be open to think of anything imagine anything have all
• 30:30 - 31:00 feelings see everything what do you think freedom of thought is all about well then you must take the consequences you can't choose conditions and reject consequences if you choose to step off the roof you can't choose not to hit the ground the mind has walls just as rigorous as gravity if God's eyes are too pure to behold evil it is wise for us and if I can paraphrase him to have the heart the courage to turn away as much as possible as well well here's the question then how do we cultivate virtue let me go through a number of things
• 31:00 - 31:30 here just quickly to cultivate virtue and a generation that's lost it the first thing is this it's knowledge we must know what is virtuous and one of the problems and all the ethics programs that we see in so many secular colleges and universities I remember when I first started to teach a little bit on biotechnology to our students I went to an online clearinghouse of definitions that link to all of these colleges and universities about these different complicated biotechnology terms and I typed in xenotransplantation and and transgenics and all these polysyllabic
• 31:30 - 32:00 words and get it okay and and I on this side this Clearinghouse of biotechnology is about 10 years ago I typed in the word bioethics no hits no hits and so now ethics actually has become so often a response to a particular situation in other words it's just a reaction that's very different than a life lived in in the right direction some of us maybe grew up on this I remember you know you know kind of
• 32:00 - 32:30 growing up and hearing don't have sex before you're married because of all the bad things that'll happen to you you might get a disease you might get pregnant I'm thankful for Lauren winters book real sex the naked truth about chastity where she teaches us that chastity is not a negative virtue it's a positive one the reason that I ought not have sex outside of the context of marriage is not because sex is bad it's because sex is good it was designed for something and I am to live my life in
• 32:30 - 33:00 accordance to the way God actually designed the world and so we must know what is virtuous Kreeft talks about the challenge of this in his book back to virtue he says this is new Christians like other sinners have always been susceptible device but today we no longer seem to know what vice and virtue are help is desperately needed exactly now for exactly at the time when the fatal knowledge of how to destroy the entire human race has fallen forever into our hands the knowledge of morality has fallen out exactly when our toys
• 33:00 - 33:30 have grown up with us from bows and arrows to thermonuclear bombs we have become moral infants there must be moral training from the ground up secondly we must practice repentance we must know what is virtuous it's interesting Scripture and second Timothy all Scripture is god-breathed and its profitable for four things to teach us what is right and then to correct us and then a couple other things there too we must practice repentance as it's as I
• 33:30 - 34:00 said in the video there we fail I work with a lot of students on a annual basis and I get to hear a lot of students and talk with them across a dinner table or a lunch table about how they struggle with their doubts about their faith and nine times out of 10 when they ask me to promote the problem of evil or they ask me about Noah and whether a truth can be known and that sort of thing when we get past the intellectual smokescreen I'm not saying it's motoring because it's irrelevant it's very
• 34:00 - 34:30 relevant but when we get after that the source of their question has to do with the way that they have been failed by an adult especially their dads and they will write about it and as I taught in the college level they write about it you know this is what happened this is what happened I just don't get this Christianity thing every once in a while however I'll run into a student and I'll ask them about their story and as they tell me they'll tell me about an individual or an adult in their life who
• 34:30 - 35:00 has failed them and how they have repented and experienced the grace of Christ and had restoration do you think that students faith is weakened or strengthened all we strengthened all we strengthened we must practice repentance one of the great images of repentance and literature and actually I think it was done pretty well in the movie too is in lay miss and you know the story of Jean Valjean that that that thief and that crook who is taken in by the priest
• 35:00 - 35:30 and then he steals the priests silver and tries to run in the middle of the night and the cops catch him and take him back to the priest and said is this yours and the priest said no it's his I gave it to him and if you've seen the book never seen the book now if you seen the book you know if you've read the book the very next scene is he leaves and his mind is blown and he goes and he steals a coin from a little boy and that was the last thing he ever did the last big moral act and immoral act that he
• 35:30 - 36:00 ever did and here's how Victor Hugo describes it of Jean Valjean he had done a thing of which he was no longer capable this is the power of grace and redemption this is the power of being willing to say I did the wrong thing I did the wrong thing and in third we must rebuild catechizing social structures now that's three big words in a row let me flush it out here we are
• 36:00 - 36:30 catechized by society we get into habits we get into life the fundamental institution of all civilization as the family we will not have a moral renovation in our society until we do something to heal the family the family is where we get our habits it's where we get our definitions it's where we understand fundamentally what's right and wrong
• 36:30 - 37:00 God did not start civilization with the church and he didn't start civilization with a government I'm really sure he didn't start it with the UN God started civilization with a wedding and if the church wants to be a renovating force in society we have to care about the institution's and reshape the institutions and it starts with the home but it doesn't start with it doesn't stop there it starts there and it doesn't stop there it's to raise a next
• 37:00 - 37:30 generation who can then infiltrate other institutions and bring the life-giving work you know and in Deuteronomy Moses sets out before the children of Israel he's like this in there's two ways there's a way of life and there's a way of death now notice he didn't say you have a decision you can either do the right thing or the wrong thing he said listen the wrong things lead you to what death listen culture is either a life-giving or a life robbing thing it is no accident it is no accident that as we
• 37:30 - 38:00 have lost our virtue we have become a profoundly dehumanizing Society and we must rebuild these societies by rebuilding the institutions and it's got to start with the family and it's also got to go to the church I live in the town where a great moral failure happened was the failure of Ted Haggard Colorado Springs you may have heard of Ted Haggard he was the president of the National Association of Evangelicals pastored a large 14,000 member Church in
• 38:00 - 38:30 a town that's really not that big and had a had a big failure and what capsule eights this knowing what it is to be virtue practicing repentance and rebuilding as the as the apology letter that he gave to his church now the rest of the story I'll leave that up to everyone else but I just want to look at the apology letter he said I'm a deceiver and a liar there's a part of my life that is so repulsive and dark that been warring against it all my adult life for extended periods of time
• 38:30 - 39:00 I would enjoy victory and rejoice in freedom there's the knowledge then from time to time the dirt that I thought was gone would resurface and I would find myself thinking thoughts and experience and desires that were contrary to everything I believe in teach through the years I've sought assistance in a variety of ways with none of them proving to be effective than because of pride I began to sieving those I love the most because I didn't want to hurt or disappoint them here's what he says the public person I was wasn't a lie it was incomplete
• 39:00 - 39:30 when I stopped communicating about my problems the darkness increased and finally dominated me when there is no place like the home or the church to communicate about our moral failings the development of virtue is actually impossible the rebuilding of these social institutions are very important thank you buddy I wasn't ready for you to stop
• 39:30 - 40:00 that was so goes like okay next go to break you know becoming the virtuous people that God is calling us to be obviously as John just said requires us to admit our failures and the falseness that we often project our inability to see our own errors causes the world to scorn us we don't become the people that we claim we want to be in order to win the culture my context and hearing I mean all these guys it's still this is
• 40:00 - 40:30 not the posture to go tell the world I know how you now should live this must first speak to our own hearts and change your own life it begins here and then in my marriage and then with my kids and then the people I bump into if we don't get it right here if we live in such a way that we don't have a chest then how do we impact them part of the goal of learning virtue now by the way is to
• 40:30 - 41:00 have an perspective where we're going to be spending eternity as Christians this is not our eternal life please don't confuse that with everlasting life every single human being that has ever lived will have life without end the question much like Orange County real estate this location location location and so once you understand you are an eternal being an everlasting being having a human experience as the Chardin
• 41:00 - 41:30 said then you you understand okay wait a minute I'm in preparation now for eternal life in the presence of God with brothers and sisters who share the same worldview and the training begins on this side now please don't reduce Christianity as I see I must show all the time down to merely fire insurance in hopes that someday when you're dead you'll start to get better Jesus wasn't selling fire insurance he was selling the quality of life now enter into my kingdom where the victory of good over
• 41:30 - 42:00 evil is manifested the kingdom of the heavens is now present and lives among us as manifested by the miracles and we're invited to participate in that how we redeem the world and love the world is by being those virtuous people that the text calls us to be this is how we do it again please don't understand or please don't misunderstand Jesus didn't die for the church he died for the world and whoever so should believe in him
• 42:00 - 42:30 meaning a lot of us don't love the world we can't order wait to escape from it but folks look when you understand and Sean said we're on the winning side it should fill us with the compassion they are so lost our hearts break when we hear about a third world civilization that's urinating and defecating in the water and then cooking with it and wonder why they get sick do we have the same compassion at a moral culture or a culture that is so lost they don't know
• 42:30 - 43:00 the answer they are riddled with deadly diseases of their soul and only we have the inoculation to set them free and it's not us we are not the light of the world one of the bulbs we get that wrong we have no energy inside of us we're the bug the God works through us and how he gets to the world is by this it's by living virtuously it's loving others in such a way that the world wants will be God it's by having the better marriages the better families
• 43:00 - 43:30 and so that is the the mm behind the hole do the right thing conference for me it's once you get the meta picture the divine conspiracy good triumphs over evil or participate with that now it's okay how do we do it we become the virtuous people that were called to be coming up next is one of my profs Scott ray back in the early 90s he was one of my professors here and he sits on the board of several hospitals as an ethicist he's an expert in both business
• 43:30 - 44:00 ethics he teaches over the Business School as well as medical ethics he is my go-to guy on my show when it comes to issues of bioethics and the nuances just this past week we talked a lot about surrogacy and some of the crises and bioethics eggs ploy tation we talked about for about half an hour this phenomena of women being convinced that they the wise thing the virtuous thing would be to sell your eggs for 10 or 20 grand earlier was mentioned about eugenics you know the idea we need to
• 44:00 - 44:30 purify the racist kind of thing that start with Margaret Sanger the founder of Planned Parenthood that's back if you're 510 and blond and playing the volleyball team and scored a 1400 SAT you can sell your eggs for 50 grand if you're a minority and that's oh well good luck and it's here and so let's watch a clip and then hear from one of my favorite profs professor Scott ray the chairman of the philosophy religion ethics department here at Talbot as we
• 44:30 - 45:00 learn more about the scary reality that living wrongly has profound impact and profound results