With All Due Respect (The WADR Project)

This episode is brought to you by Anglican Aid. Your gift will strengthen churches and help transform communities. You can donate to With All Due Respect's featured causes here.

In 2016, following trends in many Western countries, a majority of Australians identified as Christian 52.1%. Five years later, that was down to 43.9%. Christianity is still the most common religion in the country, but for the first time no longer in the majority. 

Moreover, 38.9% of people now identify themselves as having no religion - a jump of almost 10%. 

Megan Powell du Toit and Michael Jensen ask what this really means. And, more particularly, what should Christians do about it? 

The WADR team talk to Prof Ruth Powell of National Church Life Survey Research, which has been doing research into Australians and faith. 

Then Megan and Michael discuss what this seismic shift in faith means for the gospel, before finishing up with a look at Brides of Christ, an Australian TV mini-series which looks at another time of change for faith in the 1960s.

This episode is brought to you by Anglican Aid. Your gift will strengthen churches and help transform communities. You can donate to With All Due Respect's featured causes here.

In their return episode for the fourth season of With All Due Respect, Megan Powell du Toit and Michael Jensen tackle the thorny topic of calling. 

Historically, Christians have been very strong on the idea of 'calling' - God having a specific purpose for people generally called into His kingdom. But recent decades of thought have challenged this idea.

Michael and Megan take a side each and summarise the positions, talk about Hamilton and our desire to believe in a call, and then reveal how they interpreted their own passage into ministry.

This episode is brought to you by Anglican Aid. Your gift will strengthen churches and help transform communities. You can donate to With All Due Respect's featured causes here.

Welcome to another season of With All Due Respect!

Megan Powell du Toit and Michael Jensen embark on another series of podcasts tackling some potentially divisive elements of culture with nuance, grace, and - of course- respect!

This week, our hosts look at the phenomena of fandom and ask - is it possible for fandom to go far? Can a Christian engage in fandom in good faith?

Both our hosts share what they're fans of (this episode is a judgment-free zone!) before casting their eye over Tabitha Carvan's book This Is Not A Book About Benedict Cumberbatch, a work which explores how an ordinary person can become obsessed by a certain middle-aged British actor. 

This episode is brought to you by Anglican Aid. Your gift will strengthen churches and help transform communities. You can donate to With All Due Respect's featured causes here.

With All Due Respect returns for its ninth season with an episode especially brought to you by Living Hope Funerals.

Grief is a universal experience. We all face it at some point in our lives. So, what's a Christian framework for walking through grief? How can we grieve well? Dr Kit Barker joins our hosts to tackle these questions.

Our hosts then turn their attention to the Apple TV comedy-drama Shrinking - a program that explores the variety of experiences people have when it comes to grief.

This episode is brought to you by Anglican Aid. Your gift will strengthen churches and help transform communities. You can donate to With All Due Respect's featured causes here.

In this episode of With All Due Respect, Megan Powell du Toit and Michael Jensen cover the impact of COVID-19 on humanity's most precious relationships.

The WADR team kick off with a consideration of the statistics that reveal relational fault-lines developing in households across the world.

Then it's on to Baptist pastor Tony Calman and his personal experience with divorce, followed by a look at the film Marriage Story which starts after most romance films end – with a married couple thinking about divorce.

With All Due Respect is part of the Eternity Podcast Network. For more and a chance to join in the discussion, click on over to the With All Due Respect web site.

This episode is brought to you by Anglican Aid. Your gift will strengthen churches and help transform communities. You can donate to With All Due Respect's featured causes here.

Megan Powell du Toit and Michael Jensen take a long, hard look at masculinity in 21st-century society and ask if there is any way to stem its rising toxicity. 

First in the show is a serious consideration of the thorny topic of sexual consent, followed by an examination of the health of masculine culture in general.

Then it's off to Brooklyn 99 to see what healthy masculine relationships might actually look like. 

This episode is brought to you by Anglican Aid. Your gift will strengthen churches and help transform communities. You can donate to With All Due Respect's featured causes here.

We revisit episode 7 of With All Due Respect:

In For Argument's Sake, Megan and Michael tackle some holiday-themed sticky questions: Is Easter better than Christmas? Should we really be giving Christmas presents?

Megan points to an essay by G.K. Chesterton on the theology of Christmas presents. Find out why the duo think material gifts can be quite an important tradition, with a theological basis.

Michael suggests that Christmas is a display of God's abundance. It's also an ideal that can often be a terrible judge on those who don't match that ideal. And so, says Megan, "our abundance must not be a selfish abundance ... it should flow out onto the lowly, the unloved ... the lonely."

In a new Q&A segment, Megan and Michael answer a listener question: As two leaders in conservative denominations, how does the Holy Spirit move in your own lives? How open are you both to the prophetic and to signs and wonders? -- asked by Kirsty Farrugia (who also has her own podcast!)

Megan and Michael unpack what 'conservative' might mean in that question, running through their own denominations (Megan: Baptist, Michael: Anglican) and the variety of 'types' you can find in those denominations. Then they get straight into speaking in tongues, dreams and visions. Have either of them experienced such things? And do they think it matters if they haven't? Tune in to find out.

Check out some of the other suggested questions, here.

Then, in Marg and Dave, Megan and Michael review Christmas carols! What is the theology and background of the carols we sing every year.

Hint: they're not sure about Away in a manger ... of course Jesus cried as a baby!

They've created a Spotify carols playlist, for your listening pleasure. Check it out here. And here a few helpful resources to get deeper into the background of some of the most popular carols:

• Hark! the herald angels sing
• Mary, Did you know? (an example of the kind of discussion around this carol)
• O Come All Ye Faithful and the Jacobites
• Silent Night and war

This episode is brought to you by Anglican Aid. Your gift will strengthen churches and help transform communities. You can donate to With All Due Respect's featured causes here.

In light of the Barbie movie phenomenon, our hosts take stock of Greta Gerwig's divisive blockbuster, ponder its themes on humanity, and whether it will become an essential existential text.

Old Testament expert Dr George Athas then joins the show to discuss the film, its relationship to the book of Ecclesiastes, and how death plays a role in our understanding of being human.

This episode is brought to you by Anglican Aid. Your gift will strengthen churches and help transform communities. You can donate to With All Due Respect's featured causes here.

In For Argument's Sake, Michael and Megan talk about the "real blow up" that is the religious freedom debate circling around whether Christian schools should be able to discriminate in the hiring of staff and selection of students. Triggered by a bill from the Greens, there has been heated debate about a letter from 34 Anglican schools in Sydney, organised by the Anglican Archbishop Glenn Davies which supported the schools' right to uphold the Christian ethos of their school in their choice of teachers. Read more about the backlash, which included protests and apologies, here. Also, here is the letter from Anglican Principals, a letter in response from school alumni and the apology from the Archbishop. Phew. What a mess (and check out this Media Watch about the whole saga as it was reported in the media)  "It really went feral, didn't it?" Michael says.

In the discussion, Michael and Megan try to get to the bottom of what it is that Christians are actually arguing for in this latest iteration of the religious freedom debate? And ... is it a fair thing to be seeking to protect?

Then, Michael and Megan get into The Secret Life of Us, a new segment in which they try to figure out what makes the other tick. The topic? How their school experiences have shaped their worldview.

Just FYI: Michael went to North Newtown Public then Trinity Grammar (an Anglican boys school). Megan went to Loftus Public, Ferncourt Public, Campbelltown North Public, Kent Rd Public and Peter Board High. So, let the arguments begin about private vs public schooling.

Moving on to Marg and Dave, Megan chose the much-hyped Boy Swallows Universe by Trent Dalton and called it "one of the great Australian novels". While the novel takes a good look at the "underbelly of Brisbane society", Megan said she found it "quite a joyful novel". Does Michael agree? Listen in to find out.

The book, says Megan, asks questions like, What is it to be a good person? How can I redeem myself? What motivates someone to be good? Listen to Trent Dalton talk about the book's connection to his life on ABC's Conversations podcast.

This episode is brought to you by Anglican Aid. Your gift will strengthen churches and help transform communities. You can donate to With All Due Respect's featured causes here.

Some of the most beautiful poetry has Christian faith embedded within it, and yet some of the worst poetry we have experienced has been within the Christian community. 

A couple of episodes ago the WADR team looked at poet Christian Wiman and brought up his thought that faithful literature should be an ice axe for the frozen sea within you. 

As two people of faith and lovers of poetry, Megan Powell du Toit and Michael Jensen have started thinking more about faithful poetry - and the light it might give to the faithful life. 

They talk to one such potential lamp bearer - poet Dr. Lachlan Brown. They then try to tease out what faithful poetry might be and finish with a powerful poem that recently captured the public's imagination.

This episode is brought to you by Anglican Aid. Your gift will strengthen churches and help transform communities. You can donate to With All Due Respect's featured causes here.

In the final episode for this season, Michael Jensen and Megan Powell du Toit are talking comedy. Their big question: does God have a sense of humour?

When humans laugh, are we doing so as people made in the image of God? Or is this only a human response to the world? Or could laughter be a link to life in the next world?

The WADR team tackle each of these questions together, then review a comedy whose central character Megan has often been compared with - can you guess which one?

Finally, they finish up season 6 with a chat with a comedian who also happens to be an Anglican minister. It's a whole new take on second vocations that's a merry mile from St. Paul's tent-making.

LINKS

Find out more about comedian minister Howard Langmead on his website.

If you'd like to help Michael and Megan continue to deliver With All Due Respect each fortnight, why not make a donation?

With All Due Respect is the podcast for The WADR Project.

This episode is brought to you by Anglican Aid. Your gift will strengthen churches and help transform communities. You can donate to With All Due Respect's featured causes here.

*Content warning: In the Marge & Dave section of this episode, the Netflix series discussed contains sexual assault.

For argument's sake: where we take a debate, cut out the party politics and try to talk it out

Evangelicalism: is it on the nose?

"To own the name evangelical is a difficult thing to do in public these days ... It perhaps means what fundamentalist meant 15-20 years ago," says Michael.

Megan clarifies: It's often equated with being a Trump voter.

So what does the term evangelical actually mean and how does it apply to Australian Christians today?

Mentioned in this segment:

• What is an Evangelical?, National Association of Evangelicals (using evangelical distinctives of historian David Bebbington)
• NAE, LifeWay Research Publish Evangelical Beliefs Research Definition
• Lifeway Research Many Who Call Themselves Evangelical Don’t Actually Hold Evangelical Beliefs
• Joel Osteen – American pastor, televangelist and author
• Hymn And Can it Be That I Should Gain

Further reading:

• 12 ways to be a true evangelical
• Australian College of Theology's June 2019 Nexus magazine (edited by Megan Powell du Toit)
• Evangelicals: Who They Have Been, Are Now, and Could Be, Mark Noll (Ed), David Bebbington (Ed), George Marsden (Ed) – coming soon

Be our guest: opening up the conversation to others

Stuart Piggin and Australian evangelical history

Winner of the 2019 Australian Christian Book of the Year award, Stuart Piggin, knows more about the true history of evangelical Christianity in Australia than most. He has been at the forefront of religious history study in Australia for more than three decades as Director of the Centre for the History of Christian Thought and Experience at Macquarie University (2005-16) and Head of the Department of Christian Thought of the Australian College of Theology.

On accepting this year's award for his book The Fountain of Public Prosperity: Evangelical Christians in Australian History 1740-1914 – written with Robert (Bob) Linder – Piggin said that we’ve “got our Australian history terribly wrong ... Jesus has been everywhere in Australia: in every community there are stories of him everywhere.”

On the release of his second book in the series, Attending to the National Soul: Evangelical Christians in Australian History, 1914-2014, Megan and Michael chat with Stuart about the massive impact of evangelicals on our nation.

Mentioned in this segment:

• Stuart Piggin's books (written with Robert D. Linder): the award-winning The Fountain of Public Prosperity: Evangelical Christians in Australian History 1740-1914 and the newly released Attending to the National Soul: Evangelical Christians in Australian History, 1914-2014

Further reading:

• A history of evangelical Christianity wins Australia's top Christian book

Glossary – Michael has been using big words again:

• Hegelian synthesis: the philosophy of 19th-century German philosopher G.W.F. Hegel which says there is a higher stage of truth that combines the truth of a thesis and an antithesis.
• Egalitarianism: the doctrine that all people are equal and deserve equal rights and opportunities.

Marg and Dave: reviews from two people obsessed by stories, but not always the same ones

Unbelievable

*Content warning: the Netflix series discussed contains sexual assault.

Michael leads us into the murky depths of the Netflix true crime series Unbelievable, starring Toni Collette. A dramatisation of the 2008-2011 Washington and Colorado serial rape cases, Unbelievable follows "Marie, a teenager who was charged with lying about having been raped, and the two detectives who followed a twisting path to arrive at the truth." The miniseries is based on the 2015 news article "An Unbelievable Story of Rape", written by T. Christian Miller and Ken Armstrong.

So what does this series say about the role not only of faith but of evangelicalism in society? Listen in to this episode to find out.

Also mentioned in this segment:

• Isaiah 6:8
• Song In Christ Alone

Further reading:

• This American Life podcast Anatomy of Doubt
• Article Unbelievable: Netflix Shows Christian Faith at Work

Join in the discussion online

www.facebook.com/groups/WADRbyEternityNews/

This episode is brought to you by Anglican Aid. Your gift will strengthen churches and help transform communities. You can donate to With All Due Respect's featured causes here.

For arguments sake: where we take a debate, cut out the party politics and try to talk it out 

Do you need to 'experience' God in order to have real faith? Michael says he suggested this question because in his pastoral experience there are often questions about whether people should have had a spiritual or religious experience and whether you're a Christian if you haven't had one. 

What if you don't ever have that feeling some describe as an "immediate, powerful, palpable experience of the spirit" that can be of great encouragement to those who receive them? 

Megan offers the flipside to this, in that she believes that some in a more intellectually-based faith tradition are often questioned about their spiritual experiences in a way that makes them feel like they're in some way "dodgy". 

The way different faith communities deal with spiritual or religious experience can make this subject fraught. 

Michael says his views have changed and he hopes 'matured'. He believes God can give us religious experiences from time to time: they are individual and meant to encourage us. But because they are experiences we must be very careful, he says. We shouldn't normalise those experiences to the extent that those with different ones don't feel like they're Christians or don't feel like they have the Holy Spirit. 

Megan has a different perspective, coming from her observations of those who don't 'experience God'. "Without experience, faith is ailing," she says. "The experience of God must be present ... but whether we're noticing it is another thing." The way we talk about those experiences and how we teach people to understand them is sub-par in the church today, Megan says. 

How can we help people to be attentive to God in their lives. Megan believes a pastor must first be attentive to God in their own lives. "There needs to be more room for the contemplation part of the pastoral role," she argues. If you're also immersed in Scripture, you come to understand better how God speaks and acts. Michael says it's also about teaching people to pray. Bible study should also be a place for spiritual direction. It doesn't have to be just about reading the word and understanding the word, but about how to take that understanding into our lives to see the hand of God at work. 

Listening to others' experiences of God might also make us more attune to the work of God in our own lives, says Megan. It doesn't always have to be listening to God at the top of a mountain or in a cave - it's seeing God in your every day experience, how he meets needs. There is an attentiveness required. 

A lot of the time the people who say they haven't had an experience of God just need help with the vocabulary to use. 

Michael warns against the dangers of making experience so much in the foreground that we forget to parse it through Scripture. "We don't have a fresh revelation that overturns scripture." 

Also mentioned in this segment:

• The Varieties of Religious Experience by William James

The secret life of us: in which we try to figure out what makes the other one tick

Megan and Michael discuss their own religious experiences and how they've affected their faith. They look back at how such experiences were spoken about in their families of origin. 

Michael says he grew up in a Christian household often trying to deal with the tension of being treated as a Christian for as long as he could remember but also waiting for that moment of 'conversion'. He says he certainly had an intellectualised sense of the faith especially in later teens and university. 

Megan, on the other hand, says her mother is a person who has had many supernatural experiences and so she grew up talking a lot about those experiences and having some of her own. 

The duo also open up about when they've felt spiritually dry and how they've managed to come back to God. 

Also mentioned in this segment:

• CS Lewis’ Surprised by Joy: “For those who are still disposed to proceed I will only underline the quality common to the three experiences; it is that of an unsatisfied desire which is itself more desirable than any other satisfaction. I call it Joy, which is here a technical term and must be sharply distinguished both from Happiness and from Pleasure. Joy (in my sense) has indeed one characteristic, and one only, in common with them; the fact that anyone who has experienced it will want it again.” 

Marg and Dave: reviews from two people obsessed by stories, but not always the same ones. 

Les Murray (17 October 1938 – 29 April 2019) was a prize winning Australian poet, anthologist, and critic. His career spanned over 40 years and he published nearly 30 volumes of poetry as well as two verse novels and collections of his prose writings. He was rated in 1997 by the National Trust of Australia as one of the 100 Australian Living Treasures.

Murray's poetry is full of his religious experience. He said it was because that was his experience. 

"The true god gives his flesh and blood. Idols demand yours off you." That quote, says Michael, which is from Murray's poem Church, should be on church signs everywhere. "It points to the significance of Christ in this consumer economy that sucks us dry," says Michael. 

Poems mentioned in this segment: 

• Poetry and Religion
• An Absolutely Ordinary Rainbow
• The Broad Bean Sermon
• The Last Hellos
• The Church

Further reading: 

• Greg Clarke reflects on Les Murray after his death: Not absolutely ordinary at all
• Les Murray's conversion experience, as written by Catholic Weekly
• Thomas Keneally on Murray's death

This episode is brought to you by Anglican Aid. Your gift will strengthen churches and help transform communities. You can donate to With All Due Respect's featured causes here.

Rev Dr Michael Jensen, rector at St Mark’s Anglican Darling Point, author, public commentator. 

Rev Megan Powell du Toit, ordained Baptist minister, Publishing Manager of the Australian College of Theology, editor of the journal Colloquium.

Episode 1:

• The Drum, ABC, 30 August 2018 (Michael on)
• Global Neighbour Index, Baptist World Aid Australia
• No Room Domestic Violence Report, Baptist Care Australia
• Tonightly Scott Morrison song
• The Wife Drought, Annabel Crabb 

The Handmaid’s Tale TV series, The Handmaid’s Tale book, Margaret Atwood

Megan’s articles on The Handmaid’s Tale: Ethos Season 1, Ethos Season 2, FHE Season 2

This episode is brought to you by Anglican Aid. Your gift will strengthen churches and help transform communities. You can donate to With All Due Respect's featured causes here.

Michael and Megan disagree about the role emotion plays in theology (Michael edited a book on emotion, which you can find here). They argue about whether emotions are a source of theology, why (and if) evangelicals place so much emphasis on reason over emotion and Megan asks if it might be to do with the traditional view that men are more rational and women are more emotional.

If you weren't already uncomfortable, in the Discomfort Zone, Michael challenges Megan to read a section of John Calvin's Institutes on prayer which he says "transformed" his prayer life ... but Megan isn't too fussed with what she read. Instead, she offers a few books of her own on prayer that had a similar transformational effect (Prayer: finding the heart’s true home, Richard Foster and The Transforming Friendship: a guide to prayer, James Houston. She's also currently reading A Praying Life, Paul Miller)

Then in Marg and Dave, Megan suggests they watch Nanette, Australian comedienne Hannah Gadsby's stand-up performance for Netflix which has been heralded around the world.

This episode is brought to you by Anglican Aid. Your gift will strengthen churches and help transform communities. You can donate to With All Due Respect's featured causes here.

Home - it’s an evocative word and one that has instant access to our emotions, whether that’s when Dorothy knocks together her shiny red heels and says there’s no place like home or when angelic children’s choirs sing I still call Australia home on a Qantas ad. 

The Bible culminates with an image of God at home with humanity. Home speaks to us of familiarity, safety, welcome, love. Yet home doesn’t just have positive associations. Some are home less while many have found their homes to be anything but safe. 

This episode Megan Powell du Toit and Michael Jensen begin by discussing whether human beings are actually any good at making home for themselves or others. 

Then the WADR team speak to former NSW Liberal Minister and newly appointed chair of the Faith Housing Alliance, Rob Stokes about the current housing crisis. 

And to finish, continuing 'the whole vibe' of the episode, they hang out with the Kerrigans in The Castle.

This episode is brought to you by Anglican Aid. Your gift will strengthen churches and help transform communities. You can donate to With All Due Respect's featured causes here.

Black Sabbath - old-school heavy metal band or day in the Christian calendar? The Saturday just before Easter Sunday has been called various names but that hasn't kept it top of mind in religious circles.

It tends to be ignored by many Protestants, stuck awkwardly between the mourning of Good Friday and the joy of Easter Sunday.

So Michael Jensen and Megan Powell du Toit ask what was going on in that gap? And what spiritual significance does it have to people of faith today?

Then the WADR team reviews the TV series The Chosen, which tells the stories of the gospels, as well as filling in some other gaps.

If you'd like to help Michael and Megan continue to deliver With All Due Respect each fortnight then why not make a donation?

With All Due Respect is the podcast for The WADR Project, and a proud member of the Undeceptions Network.

This episode is brought to you by Anglican Aid. Your gift will strengthen churches and help transform communities. You can donate to With All Due Respect's featured causes here.

This week, Michael and Megan are joined by Stephen Judd, the former CEO of HammondCare, to discuss how - if at all - an organisation can be "Christian".

Our hosts then discuss whether the broader church is an organisation, and if ministers can gain anything from the world of corporate wisdom.

Finally, they turn their attention to the hit drama Propser, a new show that follows a family as they build a super-powerful, super-wealthy megachurch.

This episode is brought to you by Anglican Aid. Your gift will strengthen churches and help transform communities. You can donate to With All Due Respect's featured causes here.

Welcome to the final episode of Season 8 of With All Due Respect!

This week, Minister Jeri Jones Sparks and former Sydney Archbishop (and Michael's Dad!) Peter Jensen joins the show for a panel discussion on different church generations. The team look at the highs and lows of recent Australian church history, as well as what different generations of Christians today can learn from one other.

Our hosts then discuss the TV series Pachinko, a critically acclaimed show that follows the stories of four generations of a Korean Family, between 1915 and 1989.

This episode is brought to you by Anglican Aid. Your gift will strengthen churches and help transform communities. You can donate to With All Due Respect's featured causes here.

The realities of podcasting mean that we can't always bring you everything that was said on a particular topic ... until now.

In this bonus edition of With All Due Respect, we deliver the full discussion on sex that featured in this season's final episode between Megan Powell du Toit, Michael Jensen and therapist Monica Cook.

All of your questions, answered in full. Get comfy and prepare yourself for an enthralling discussion.

This episode is brought to you by Anglican Aid. Your gift will strengthen churches and help transform communities. You can donate to With All Due Respect's featured causes here.

Notes from Episode 11: If you're happy and you know it ... 

For arguments sake: where we take a debate, cut out the party politics and try to talk it out

Are we as Christians expected to be happy all the time and, if not, do we have a lack of faith? Michael posits that we measure things by 'happiness' but, says Megan, there are still different social narratives on how we think happiness is achieved and what kind of happiness is valuable. They discuss Paul Dolan's book Happy Ever After, which they both read for this episode.

So what exactly is happiness? And what about the recent claims that religious people are happier people? Megan and Michael take a look at happiness vs joy, dig in to what the Bible says on happiness and wonder over its temporal and eternal nature.

Mentioned in this segment:

• Happy Ever After by Paul Dolan 
• The Other Side of Happiness by Brock Bastian
• Is happiness in the Bible? Kirsten Birkett writes for Eternity News 
• Revealed: Religion does make you happier, Eternity News
• Pew Research Center study: Religion's Relationship to Happiness, Civil Engagement and Health around the World

The secret life of us: in which we try to figure out what makes the other one tick

Are we shiny happy people? Megan and Michael share their experiences of happiness and what they have meant in their lives. Megan shares candidly about her experiences of joy and depression. Is life worth living when we're not happy? How do we retain faith without happiness? And, if not to offer happiness, what is the point of faith?

Mentioned in this segment:

• Joy unerasable by Megan Powell du Toit for Fixing Her Eyes
• David Malouf: The Happy Life in Quarterly Essay

Marg and Dave: Reviews from two people obsessed by stories. But not always the same ones

SPOILERS AHEAD! Megan and Michael are talking Netflix and Russian Doll. If you haven't got to episode three of that show yet, you are now warned. 

Here's the premise: In Russian Doll, Nadia keeps dying and reliving her 36th birthday party. She's trapped in a surreal time loop - and staring down the barrel of her own mortality. 

Tune in to here what Megan and Michael think of the show that's been dubbed "the best show all year"  (and it's only February!)

Mentioned in this segment: 

• Netflix's Russian Doll is surprisingly, deeply Jewish - alma. 

This episode is brought to you by Anglican Aid. Your gift will strengthen churches and help transform communities. You can donate to With All Due Respect's featured causes here.

In this episode of With All Due Respect, Megan Powell du Toit and Michael Jensen investigate the unifying anxiety that has risen to the surface of the world's collective consciousness in this time of pandemic: the fear of death.

To begin with Megan and Michael flip through the pages of the novel Lament, which reveals how closely love and agony sit together. 

Then it's time to welcome Dr. Megan Best, an expert in palliative care, who reveals the common attitudes that shape our behaviour as we approach the grave. 

And finally the WADR team ask the ultimate question of each other: what does it mean to die well?

This episode is brought to you by Anglican Aid. Your gift will strengthen churches and help transform communities. You can donate to With All Due Respect's featured causes here.

This episode, the With All Due Respect team test our sense of the 'greater good' to its limits.

The creation of a COVID19 vaccine from research that resulted from a decades old abortion has Christians asking whether or not they can benefit from a loss of life.

Megan Powell du Toit and Michael Jensen ask Denise Cooper-Clarke, a graduate of medicine and theology with a Ph.D in medical ethics, how ethically sound it is for Christians to take the new vaccine.

Then our WADR hosts deepen the debate in For Arguments Sake and consider whether or not people should be compelled to take this life-saving treatment.

Finally, episode 49 finishes up with a review of The Queen's Gambit, showing how a mini-series about chess also has something to add to this thorny debate.

This episode is brought to you by Anglican Aid. Your gift will strengthen churches and help transform communities. You can donate to With All Due Respect's featured causes here.

This episode the With All Due Respect team tackle the issue at the very heart of their podcast: friendship.

Michael Jensen and Megan Powell du Toit start the ball rolling by asking whether the COVID crisis has led us to neglect our friends? Then it's on to a revealing segment in which Michael and Megan discuss how they became friends, and what it is they've taken from each other.

Then author and social commentator Aimee Byrd returns to talk about her book on distinctly Christian friendship, and the WADR duo wrap up the show with a consideration of the book Dorothy and Jack, which chronicles the extraordinary comradeship between Dorothy Sayers and C.S. Lewis.

This episode is brought to you by Anglican Aid. Your gift will strengthen churches and help transform communities. You can donate to With All Due Respect's featured causes here.

In this easter episode…

With the deaths of the Abdullah children, Hannah Clarke and her kids still fresh in the minds of Australians, hosts Megan Powell du Toit and Michael Jensen ask, 'Just how comfortable are we with the idea of forgiveness?'

Michael and Megan then talk to Esther Scott, whose missionary father Graham Staines and brothers were murdered in India.

And we discuss the obscenity of forgiveness as we contemplate the enduring popularity of the song Amazing Grace.

This episode is brought to you by Anglican Aid. Your gift will strengthen churches and help transform communities. You can donate to With All Due Respect's featured causes here.

For argument's sake: where we take a debate, cut out the party politics and try to talk it out

Will the Religious Discrimination Bill be a good thing?

Freedom for Faith's executive director Michael Kellahan is in the hot seat, as Megan and Michael throw some contentious questions at him about the Religious Discrimination Bill:

• Don't we already have religious freedom in Australia?
• Can the bill actually create discrimination?
• Is a bill of rights – which also covers other freedoms – a better approach?

Mentioned in this segment:

• Draft Religious Freedom Bills – including the Religious Discrimination Bill
• Sydney Anglican Archbishop's apology over letter about religious freedom
• Hobart Catholic Archbishop case of religious freedom

Further listening/reading:

• With All Due Respect episode 5 – Public vs private schools, religious freedom and *that* letter on gay teachers
• A simple guide to the religious discrimination bill
• The Government’s Plans for Freedom of Religion Legislation

Discomfort zone: ever thought someone might think differently if they step outside their comfort zone? This is where we make the other do just that. 

The Madness of Crowds - Gender, Race and Identity by Douglas Murray

Michael chose this book knowing that Megan wouldn't like it. Guess what? She didn't. Written by a journalist for the UK's Spectator, the book tackles the epic issues of sexuality, gender, technology and race, as well as forgiveness and justice.

Mentioned in this segment:

• The Madness of Crowds by Douglas Murray
• The Guardian's review – The Madness of Crowds by Douglas Murray review – a rightwing diatribe
• Black Lives Matter movement

Glossary:

• Cultural Marxism: an ambiguous term and many believe that what it refers to doesn't really exist. The term is often used to flag behaviour that applies Marxist class theory to broader categories – such as race, gender and sexuality.
• Raison d'etre: A French phrase meaning 'reason for being'

Marg and Dave: reviews from two people obsessed by stories, but not always the same ones

The Post 

Megan introduces us to Steven Spielberg's gripping film on the true story of Washington Post journalists who attempted to publish classified documents about the US government's involvement in the Vietnam War. The film ring bells about the recent Australian police raids on the ABC. It also leads to the question: is freedom of the press worth defending, particularly in this era of fake news?

Mentioned in this segment:

• The Post

Further reading:

• AFP raid on ABC reveals investigative journalism being put in same category as criminality
• Katharine Graham's memoir Personal History
• Comparing 'The Post' to Katharine Graham’s memoir 

Join in the discussion online

www.facebook.com/groups/WADRbyEternityNews/

This episode is brought to you by Anglican Aid. Your gift will strengthen churches and help transform communities. You can donate to With All Due Respect's featured causes here.

Last season the With All Due Respect team brought you an interview with a Christian Liberal and former Prime Minister, Malcolm Turnbull. So Michael Jensen and Megan Powell du Toit thought it would be good to speak to a Christian Labor politician, Senator Deborah O'Neill. 

Senator O’Neil is a Labor senator for new south wales who has been a politician since 2010, first as an MP in the Australian parliament and then as a senator.  She is currently Vice President of the New South Wales Labor Party, a position she has held since 2011. She is also a committed Catholic

The WADR team then discusses the question of whether Christians have to be conservative, before reviewing a recent film based on the memoir of Christian social justice activist Bryan Stevenson.

This episode is brought to you by Anglican Aid. Your gift will strengthen churches and help transform communities. You can donate to With All Due Respect's featured causes here.

It's family week on WADR. Michael and Megan chat through different perspectives on family, and in particular, adoption. They work through the good and the bad, how it can heal - but also compound - trauma, and what the Bible has to say about it.   

UK-based broadcaster, author, social entrepreneur, and adoptive father Dr Krish Kandiah then joins the podcast for a challenging discussion on fostering and adoption.

Finally, on 'Through The Wardrobe', our hosts share their thoughts on the 2021 documentary Found, the moving story of three Chinese girls, adopted by American parents, who discover they are blood-related, and then return to their country of birth to uncover their origins.

WADR is hosted by Megan Powell du Toit and Michael Jensen. It is part of the Undeceptions podcast network.

This episode is brought to you by Anglican Aid. Your gift will strengthen churches and help transform communities. You can donate to With All Due Respect's featured causes here.

Humans are learning creatures. We spend our whole lives picking up new skills, improving them, and finding new areas of knowledge to explore.

This week Michael and Megan think through the Biblical implications of this, and along the way are joined by Zeeshan LaalDin. Zeeshan is a Project Officer with Anglican Aid. He will be delivering a keynote address at the upcoming Common Knowledge Conference, which looks at the role of education in eradicating global poverty.

Finally, our hosts watch the 2005 TV adaptation of Thomas Hughes' classic 1857 novel Tom Brown's School Days.

• (01:52) - For Arguments Sake
• (19:14) - Be Our Guest
• (43:15) - Through the Wardrobe

This episode is brought to you by Anglican Aid. Your gift will strengthen churches and help transform communities. You can donate to With All Due Respect's featured causes here.

For arguments sake: where we take a debate, cut out the party politics and try to talk it out 

While beauty can be an abstract subject, it's also something that cuts into our everyday lives. Megan and Michael wanted to talk about this subject because they both feel the evangelical world can feel a bit confining when talking about beauty. Megan says her experience of baptists in particular is that they have a strained relationship with beauty.

"There's a suspicion of the beautiful, which goes back to the church fathers," says Michael. Something also happens during the Reformation, when Protestants want to get away from the visual, smash the statues and go back to the verbal. Luther even said that the ears are the organ of the Christian, not the eyes.

Evangelicalism is quite a pragmatic faith. "We're not cathedral builders," says Michael. "We want to things to make a difference," says Megan, so the feeling is that there's no time for "frippery".

Michael and Megan explore what beauty is - is it just 'high art' or is it broader than that? What can nature teach us about beauty? And is there a commonality of the experience of beauty that might be objective truth?

Megan has been reading Culture Care by Makoto Fujimura - an artist, academic and Christian -which issues a call to feed our culture's soul with beauty, creativity and generosity. As many Christians become more embattled in culture wars, Fujimura is asking how Christians can be people who draw others into beauty.

Also mentioned in this segment:

• The deepening crisis is evangelical Christianity in The Atlantic: "Evangelical Christians need another model for cultural and political engagement, and one of the best I am aware of has been articulated by the artist Makoto Fujimura, who speaks about “culture care” instead of “culture war."

Where credit's due: the influences that form and move us

It's Megan's turn to pick a book that was meaningful to her: Surprised by Joy by CS Lewis - the story of Lewis being converted to belief in God and then eventually to belief in Christianity.

Lewis' experience of beauty - which he calls experiences of joy - resonated with Megan, particularly when Lewis talks of creating imaginative worlds with his brothers as a child.

Michael says he picked up on the sense of longing through Lewis' work -  deep in the heart of humans there is something that longs for the eternal.

Beauty, says Megan, shows us that things are significant, special. As the poet Gerard Manley Hopkins writes, "The world is charged with the grandeur of God."

Further reading:

• Michael has written on beauty for Eternity – Are Christians scared of beauty? and Why is there beauty in the world?

Marg and Dave: reviews from two people obsessed by stories, but not always the same ones. 

We're talking transcendent music and faith. And Michael wants to talk about Bach: "The Christian who has done more to advance the cause of beauty than anyone is Johann Sebastian Bach," he says.

Megan, on the other hand, says the music that makes her think of beauty is African American spirituals: "there's a beauty in the sadness, but yet the hope ... there's a beauty that comes out of a the experience of humanity." One song in particular featured in season 3 of The Handmaid's Tale during a scene of infant baptism, 'Down to the river to pray'.

Also mentioned in this segment:

• Well-Tempered Clavier, Bach
• Mass in B Minor, Bach
• O Sacred Head Sore Wounded (From St Matthew's Passion, Bach)
• Down to the River to Pray, Alison Krauss version as seen on The Handmaid's Tale

This episode is brought to you by Anglican Aid. Your gift will strengthen churches and help transform communities. You can donate to With All Due Respect's featured causes here.

In this episode, Megan Powell du Toit and Michael Jensen are talking about Christian Nationalism. Nationalism promotes the distinctiveness of the people of a nation. Christian nationalism goes one step further, defining a nation by its faith, and maintaining it should be protected by the state, enshrined in its laws, and actively maintained.

But is this so? Is Christian Nationalism even compatible with the Christian faith? In a western society that is often spoken of as Post-Christian, the relationship between Christianity and the State has become an increasingly vexed issue.

Michael and Megan start their investigation by reviewing a documentary that seeks to look at how this is playing out in US evangelicalism. Moving on, they discuss whether Christian Nationalism is a problem in an Australian context. Then it's your chance to shape the show - a question and answer session on Australian evangelicalism and what the WADR team think about where it is going.

LINKS

After the highly successful “In the footsteps of the Reformers” tour through the Czech Republic, Germany, Switzerland and the UK. Faith Journeys is launching its latest tour “In the footsteps of Saint Paul”, travelling across Turkey, Greece & Italy from 25th April – 9th May 2023. The tour starts in Istanbul and makes its way through to Greece before ending in Rome. Daily devotions, a pilgrimage handbook and study guide assist with exploring the works, teachings and journeys of St Paul while travelling with like-minded individuals. You also have a Tour Manager throughout who looks after all travel logistics with exclusive local tour guides who all work alongside Michael Jensen to create an immersive touring experience. If you're interested in joining Michael on his instructive tour of early church locations, then you can find out everything you need to know at www.faithjourneys.com.au or by emailing info@faithjourneys.com.au.

If you'd like to help Michael and Megan continue to deliver With All Due Respect each fortnight, why not make a donation?

With All Due Respect is the podcast for The WADR Project.

This episode is brought to you by Anglican Aid. Your gift will strengthen churches and help transform communities. You can donate to With All Due Respect's featured causes here.

With All Due Respect hosts Michael Jensen and Megan Powell du Toit take a long, hard look at cancel culture. Is there a place for it in the Christian community?

Beginning with a discussion about the nature of cancel culture and how they have experienced it in their own lives, the WADR team move on to an in-depth interview with American author, speaker, blogger and former podcaster Aimee Byrd who has experienced the worst this approach to disagreement has to offer.

Then it's off to the movies for a cancel culture take on the 2005 film Goodnight and Good Luck, which considers the walls of silence erected during the McCarthy era.

This episode is brought to you by Anglican Aid. Your gift will strengthen churches and help transform communities. You can donate to With All Due Respect's featured causes here.

In a world in which Christianity is losing its cultural dominance, and under fire for various reasons, should Christians strongly defend the church, or should they be apologetic about its wrongdoing?

There seems to be a wide spectrum between those who want to claim western society will regret abandoning its Christian foundations, and those who are quick to call it out from the inside. Whichever way you look at it, Church history is at the forefront of the public conversation.

Michael and Megan take a look at this phenomenon and then interview John Dickson about where his book, Bullies and Saints fits into this spectrum.

Then the WADR duo finishes with the critically acclaimed 2020 film Minari, which tells a slice of 1980s church history.

This episode is brought to you by Anglican Aid. Your gift will strengthen churches and help transform communities. You can donate to With All Due Respect's featured causes here.

Welcome to season 8 of With All Due Respect!

As Australians prepare to vote in a referendum on an Aboriginal Voice in parliament, Michael Jensen and (newly Reverend Dr) Megan Powell du Toit speak with constitutional law expert Dr Joel Harrison about what it might mean, legally speaking.

They then discuss whether or not the church should be involved with politics at all  - a thorny issue that Michael has had some recent experience with.

Finally on 'Through the Wardrobe', our hosts cast their eye over the controversy surrounding ABC journalist Annabel Crabb's Kitchen Cabinet program, and her decision to have some rather divisive guests on recent episodes.

WADR is hosted by Megan Powell du Toit and Michael Jensen. It is part of the Undeceptions podcast network. 

This episode is brought to you by Anglican Aid. Your gift will strengthen churches and help transform communities. You can donate to With All Due Respect's featured causes here.

This is not click-bait. This is actually an episode about sex that is both incredibly thoughtful and intensely practical.

With All Due Respect champions Megan Powell du Toit and Michael Jensen round out season three with an all-points-considered approach to sex.

They begin the show by asking the question, "Does Christianity's knowledge of the origins of sex translate to good sex?"

Then there's a knock at the door and in walks Christian sex therapist Monica Cook to answer all the questions Christians want answered about this perplexing topic.

Finally, Michael and Megan look at the series Fleabag for everything that can go wrong with sex.

This episode is brought to you by Anglican Aid. Your gift will strengthen churches and help transform communities. You can donate to With All Due Respect's featured causes here.

In our season finale, our hosts answer questions from the audience and give their hot takes on some thorny issues.

• (01:36) - - Q&A Part 1
• (22:47) - - Q&A Part 2
• (39:32) - - Through The Wardrobe

This episode is brought to you by Anglican Aid. Your gift will strengthen churches and help transform communities. You can donate to With All Due Respect's featured causes here.

For Argument's Sake

Michael wrote a response to an article by Stephen McAlpine, an evangelical pastor and blogger in Western Australia, on apologetics, which argued that the era of nice apologetics is over.

What is apologetics? It's nothing to do with saying sorry but it's giving a defence of the Christian message in the public square. Michael and Megan discuss Stephen's contention that artful persuasion doesn't work because it's perceived as a mask for power.

The Discomfort Zone

Michael persuaded Megan to read God is Good For You by The Australian's Greg Sheridan (Read Greg's profile here).
Megan wouldn't have kept going after the first chapter's polemic on the dire state of Christianity if she didn't have to, but in the middle of the book she found some riches she really enjoyed. Michael likes Greg's defence of Christianity as intellectually respectable but both feel that Greg glosses over the real problems that have afflicted the church.

Marg & Dave 

For The Love of God, a documentary by the Centre For Public Christianity, by contrast, is very honest about the stuff that the church has done badly historically. Megan says it answers a lot of the things she had problems with in Greg Sheridan's book but she has a quibble about the film's coverage of women ...

This episode is brought to you by Anglican Aid. Your gift will strengthen churches and help transform communities. You can donate to With All Due Respect's featured causes here.

For arguments sake: where we take a debate, cut out the party politics and try to talk it out 

Can we (Christians, that is!) do politics without being partisan? There's been a storm since Australians discovered the outcome of the Federal election, particularly within the Aussie Christian community. Some Christians seem unable to believe that there are others of their faith who would have voted the opposite of them. And because the outcome of the election was so unexpected, there was a lot of "unvarnished" gut reactions on social media.

Megan and Michael discuss whether it's possible to remain a 'Christian community' when we are so tribalised. And what part should prayer play when it comes to praying for our leaders, especially for those with whom we strongly disagree?

Both Megan and Michael agree that Christians don't need to be apolitical. We are told to have a drive for justice. But how can we do it better? Megan suggests acknowledging real emotions on either side is a good place to start. The pair candidly share how they personally voted, discussing the reasons for their choice and try to model how to respectfully disagree on political priorities while holding to core truths of the gospel.

Also mentioned in this segment:

• Donald Trump turning up unannounced at a Virginian church in the middle of a service for prayer.
• Unapologetic by Francis Spufford

Discomfort Zone: ever think someone might think differently if they step outside their comfort zone? This is where we make the other do just that.

Michael gets to choose the book this episode and it is ... The Second Mountain: The quest for the moral life by David Brooks. Brooks is a Canadian-born American centre-right political and cultural commentator who writes for The New York Times.

Everybody tells you to live for a cause larger than yourself, but how exactly do you do it? Brooks explores what it takes to lead a meaningful life in a self-centred world.

Megan says she certainly wouldn't have read the book had Michael not suggested it. But she really liked it. "It's like the book that I would have written if I was a conservative dude," she says jokingly. But Brooks' emphasis on joy and community also captured her attention.

Michael says he sees this book as one that he can use in pastoring people, especially those in their 40s who are looking to disentangle from their individualism and look to something greater.

In his book, Brooks argues that such individualism makes people so disconnected that they flock to their "tribe", and contributes to the 'us' and 'them' issues we have in politics.

Read more on Christian discussion of David Brook's book:

• On The Gospel Coalition website: David Brooks on his journey as a wandering Jew and a confused Christian  
• From Christianity Today: How David Brooks meandered toward God 

Marg and Dave: reviews from two people obsessed by stories, but not always the same ones. 

We're looking at Derry Girls this week. You can watch the first season on Netflix.

Derry Girls is a comedy set in Derry, Northern Ireland. It’s about the lives of ordinary people living under the spectre of the Troubles in the early nineties, all seen through the eyes of 16 year old Erin and her friends. Writer Lisa McGee bases the story on her own experiences of growing up in Northern Ireland as a normal sixteen year old girl amidst civil conflict.

How does a community with those deep divisions go about living in it?

This episode is brought to you by Anglican Aid. Your gift will strengthen churches and help transform communities. You can donate to With All Due Respect's featured causes here.

In For Argument’s Sake, Megan and Michael tackle the upcoming visit to Australia by evangelist Franklin Graham (son of legendary preacher Billy). They focus upon the controversy surrounding Franklin Graham's visit and how he doesn't have the same ability to unite Christians as his father. With Franklin Graham's vocal support for President Trump stirring widespread debate, Megan explains she has other concerns about his relationship with the politics of power and sexuality. Both Michael and Megan ask: should you attend a gospel event led by a person you disagree with?

In Discomfort Zone, Megan asked Michael to do something outside his usual sphere - read Rebecca Traister's book Good and Mad: The Revolutionary Power of Women's Anger (particularly one lengthy section about President Trump). Michael has questions for Megan about solidarity between women around the world before our duo dive into the biblical concept of vengeance. Oh, and whether anger is only associated with men. And how can anger be responded to.

Then, in Marg and Dave, Megan and Michael dare to enter Netflix series Black Mirror, a near-future commentary about humanity's misuse of technology. Megan and Michael watched the episode Nosedive - about one woman (Bryce Dallas Howard) experiencing a harsh rating system - and marvel at its clear parallels with our world. But what does judging each other have to do with Christianity? Oh, wait ...

This episode is brought to you by Anglican Aid. Your gift will strengthen churches and help transform communities. You can donate to With All Due Respect's featured causes here.

It's the 100th episode of With All Due Respect!

To mark their century our guests chat with Mike Bird, Academic Dean of Melbourne's Ridley College, discussing the question "Is the Bible clear in what it tells us?"

They also discuss the differences in church tradition when it comes to interpreting scripture.

Later, our hosts discuss Sarah Polley's confronting film Women Talking, which explores the consequences of misunderstanding - and abusing - The Bible.  

This episode is brought to you by Anglican Aid. Your gift will strengthen churches and help transform communities. You can donate to With All Due Respect's featured causes here.

In the aftermath of the 2024 Lausanne Congress - at which Megan was a delegate - our hosts take stock of what went on, review the Seoul Statement (and other alliterative faith declarations of past conferences), and mull over the insights of other attendees.

They also discuss a documentary on the first Lausanne Congress, held way back in 1974.

• (01:50) - - Through The Wardrobe
• (15:55) - - What's Going On?
• (33:58) - - Be Our Guest

This episode is brought to you by Anglican Aid. Your gift will strengthen churches and help transform communities. You can donate to With All Due Respect's featured causes here.

This week, our hosts discuss the touchy topic of class. Does Christianity have an issue with class in Australia? What class do our hosts think they belong in?

For 'Through the Wardrobe', Michael and Megan share their thoughts on the hit HBO drama The Gilded Age, a show dedicated to the world of the upstairs and downstairs world of 19th century America.

• (01:36) - - For Arguments Sake
• (19:30) - - The Secret Life of Us
• (33:58) - - Through the Wardrobe

This episode is brought to you by Anglican Aid. Your gift will strengthen churches and help transform communities. You can donate to With All Due Respect's featured causes here.

Can you both love the church and think it sucks at the same time? Well, it's probably what Jesus thinks, says Michael. So we think yes, it's possible!

This topic, says Megan, is inspired by the With All Due Respect Facebook group and members (if you'd like to join, click here). In a thread where members introduce themselves, Michael and Megan realised there were a lot of people who've been really hurt by the church.

Michael suggests reading Paul's letters to the Corinthians in the New Testament, where Paul calls the Corinthians 'saints' and yet is pretty scathing of some of their behaviour. In the Bible, there is never a perfect church. It's about the people of God living out their relationship with God as sinners. That doesn't mean we're happy with that, but it does tell us there's a normality about it - tragic as that is.

Megan points to a movement called "Ex-vangelicals", a reaction against the church mainly in the United States, after evangelicals got tied up in support of Donald Trump. There are also plenty of memoirs about those exploring their faith and 'coming out' of conservatism. See Rachel Held Evans and Sarah Bessey, as examples.

Megan and Michael discuss the cultural stereotype that has arisen around the word 'evangelicals' and whether a similar movement of ex-vangelicals might be seen in Australia. As an evangelical himself, Michael is not so sure.

The duo also discuss how to respond to those people who have had a bad experience of church in a local community setting versus those who take broader issue with the church as an institution. Michael encourages people to keep up their search for a good church, and not to give up on meeting with other Christians because churches can fail very badly. There can also be great healing in the local church with fellow believers, he says.

And how should we deal with critiques of the church? Megan suggests that members of the church, and leaders in particular, need to be critiquing themselves as well as listening carefully to others. More on that in the Marg and Dave segment this week.

Also mentioned in this segment:

• Lego Masters Eternity article

Where credit's due: talking the influences that form and move us

This is a new segment, where Megan and Michael get to share things that they really like!

Michael get to choose this week: Life Together by Dietrich Bonhoeffer. 

Bonhoeffer was writing this book in the 1930s while he was in charge of a small underground seminary that had broken away from the German Christian mainstream movement because of its allegiance to Hitler. The seminary was set up on a farm and he was training pastors there, while trying to find new footing for the church.

"It's a very intense book. But I think it's amazing," says Michael.

Megan's impression was that Bonhoeffer is writing from a place of disappointment in the church, which makes it quite appropriate for this episode.

There's plenty in this discussion about what good community as church really means. But also, says Michael, he appreciated what Bonhoeffer says about solitude. While we do need our alone time with God, that's part of being in community.

Our relationship with God is something we share with each other, says Megan.

What is some advice on returning to church for someone who hasn't been to church for a while? 

Megan suggests asking whether there is someone in their lives who they think, 'Wow, I'd love to have that person in a Christian community.' That might be a good place to start. Connect with them first.

Marg and Dave: reviews from two people obsessed by stories, but not always the same ones. 

It's cartoon time! Megan and Michael take a look at The Naked Pastor cartoons. Michael is less familiar with them than Megan, who says there is a lot of take up of these cartoons by people who are feeling dissatisfied with church.

The artist was a pastor who has moved out of pastoring and it's not clear where he stands on Christianity.

"I help people lose their faith without losing their minds," the artist says.

The cartoons themselves is pretty much all critique, which Megan finds amusing often but Michael isn't sold.

Here are some of the cartoons talked about in this segment:

https://nakedpastor.com/warning-questions-will-lead-you-astray/

https://nakedpastor.com/becoming-my-most-popular-women-and-the-resurrection/

This episode is brought to you by Anglican Aid. Your gift will strengthen churches and help transform communities. You can donate to With All Due Respect's featured causes here.

Notes on episode 15

War: what is it good for? We're talking about the God of the Anzacs + Australian war songs. 

For arguments sake: where we take a debate, cut out the party politics and try to talk it out

War is a controversial topic among Christians. We have been divided in the past over whether war is something Christians should endorse. And there have been historical instances where religion was responsible for "whipping up" war, as Michael says, recalling the Pope and the Crusades. In this contemporary world we live in we still see a connection with religion and violence. So what do we do with this aspect of our faith? 

Megan and Michael discuss whether there is ever justification for Christians to not be pacifists? Might there be a case, thinking through the 'Just War' theory, where it is absolutely necessary to go to war? 

And then there's the Anzac tradition and the dangers of romanticising war. Michael says that while he believes it is important to honour those who went to war on our behalf, we should question whether we are glorifying bloodshed rather than bemoaning it. Megan wonders whether the Anzac tradition has changed now to be more like myth or legend.

Did you know? Much of the Anzac Day commemoration events were started by a Christian minister, Canon David John Garland? Megan and Michael say they have observed that much of the Christian 'commemorative' aspects of Anzac Day services have been stripped away, to become more about Australia and our national character which has been formed through bloody sacrifice. Megan also questions the male emphasis of Anzac, saying in her research Australian nurses were originally very involved in Anzac commemorations, but seem to have been sidelined now. "It's an exclusionary myth, and not just for women," she says. 

Also mentioned in this segment:

• Stanley Haerwaus - "the pacifist you want on your side in a bar room brawl" - has put a strong case for Christians not being involved in war. 
• Augustine and 'Just war'. Read more here or here. 
• Miroslav Volf's Exclusion and Embrace
• Canon David Garland and Anzac commemoration services (see also this ABC article on Canon Garland)
• The Great War nurses story
• Anzac Day: is it just for the boys? from the University of Melbourne. 
• David Malouf's The Great World
• A Peculiar Obsession, SMH: Professor Tom Frame (ex navy, bishop to defence, now academic) says it is important we remember that ''commemoration'' is different from ''celebration'' and from ''contrition''. The centenary is a commemoration, but if we are going to err it should be towards contrition.
• SMH article on Yasmin Abdel-Magied's infamous Anzac Day tweet

Be our guest: opening up the conversation

For this episode, Megan and Michael invite Daniel Reynaud, Associate Professor of History at Avondale College of Higher Education. David wrote Anzac Spirituality: The first AIF soldiers speak. Reynaud is also working on a follow-up book, tracing individual Anzac stories and their journeys of faith through the war. 

Daniel told Megan and Michael that God is big part of the Anzac story: "an unrecognised part". Daniel says that in his research for the book he was "shocked" at how often Anzac soldiers spoke about their faith in letters and diaries. 

Mentioned in this segment: 

• Anzac Spirituality: The first AIF soldiers speak by Daniel Reynaud
• Captains of the Soul: A history of Australian army chaplains by Michael Gladwin
• Gallipoli, 2015 mini-series

Marg and Dave: reviews from two people obsessed by stories but not always the same one 

Megan and Michael dissect four war 'conflicted' songs: 

• The Band Played Waltzing Matilda – Eric Bogle (1972) WW1
• Khe Sanh – Cold Chisel (1978) Vietnam
• I was only 19 – Redgum (1983) Vietnam
• Bodies – Wafia (2017) – modern Syria

Look forward to new episodes every second Thursday.

This episode is brought to you by Anglican Aid. Your gift will strengthen churches and help transform communities. You can donate to With All Due Respect's featured causes here.

In For Argument's Sake, Megan and Michael delve into the depths of confusion about what happens after death. They note that most Christians - well, most people actually - are pretty fuzzy on this topic. It was politicians answering Greg Sheridan's questions on what happens when we die, for his book God is Good For You, that prompted Megan and Michael to explore this more.

Both agree that our culture continues to have a "cartoon-like" understanding of heaven and hell, and they try to uncover what we do know from the Bible about the afterlife, and what remains a mystery.

Then, in the Secret Life of Us, Megan and Michael escape from the theoretical and delve into their personal experiences with death and grief. "This is where the rubber hits the road in living the Christian life, with these experiences of grief," says Michael.

In this segment, Megan shares about her miscarriage on Good Friday and experiences of suffering through depression. Megan and Michael grapple with the "sadness" and "badness" of death, and examine what a good response to death and suffering might look like.

Continuing the afterlife theme, on Marg and Dave, our dynamic duo check out the super popular Netflix series The Good Place. Warning: spoilers!

This episode is brought to you by Anglican Aid. Your gift will strengthen churches and help transform communities. You can donate to With All Due Respect's featured causes here.

This week, Megan and Michael delve into the mystery of 'time', and ask the question ... is time cursed? And how are eternity and time-related?

On 'Through the Wardrobe', the pair cast their critical eye over the now cancelled Amazon series Paper Girls, a time travelling adventure drama that looks at how we might feel if we met our future selves.

Plus, our hosts take some time to answer audience questions. Does pineapple belong on pizza? Do Michael and Megan actually disagree on anything? And what should we do with the work of now-disgraced theologians? Tune in to find out!

WADR is hosted by Megan Powell du Toit and Michael Jensen. It is part of the Undeceptions podcast network.

This episode is brought to you by Anglican Aid. Your gift will strengthen churches and help transform communities. You can donate to With All Due Respect's featured causes here.

Hospitality is a word that conjures up images of wine glasses and silver cutlery. It's the word for the hotel trade or the type of entertaining that looks good on Instagram: themed dinner parties and pretty hand soaps for the guest toilet.

Yet hospitality is also a word that occurs in the Bible. Famously, Hebrews 13:2 urges, "Do not forget to show hospitality to strangers, for by so doing some people have shown hospitality to angels without knowing it."

But exactly what are we being called to do? Is it an occasional drinks with the next-door neighbours or something more?

Megan Powell du Toit and Michael Jensen talk about who exactly are our neighbours when it comes to hospitality and what it might require of us.

To help the WADR team out, Michael and Megan also talk to Jon Owen who has lived a remarkably hospitable life. And then they sing along with Come From Away, the musical about 7,000 unexpected guests.

This episode is brought to you by Anglican Aid. Your gift will strengthen churches and help transform communities. You can donate to With All Due Respect's featured causes here.

In For Argument's Sake, Megan and Michael argue over the validity of a new statement delivered from the US called The Statement on Social Justice and the Gospel, which suggests social justice movements are leading people away from Jesus. It's a topic Megan is particularly passionate about: she's doing her doctoral research on it, in fact.

The pair discuss the huge controversy over the statement, including amongst people you'd think would have agreed. So ... is social justice the gospel? And if it's not, how do you distinguish the two? Tune in to hear the arguments.

Here are a few other commentators that Megan and Michael refer to in this discussion:

Al Mohler. Ryan Burton King. Russell Moore. Tim Keller. John Stott.

In the Discomfort Zone, Megan suggests reading Lisa Sharon Harper's book, The Very Good Gospel, which Megan says gives a very 'social justice flavour' to the gospel. 

Then, in Marg and Dave, Michael and Megan listen to Hozier, and talk about the lyrics that can get under your skin, the visceral anger the artist has against the Catholic church and what Hozier, and the Bible, have to say about sex.

This episode is brought to you by Anglican Aid. Your gift will strengthen churches and help transform communities. You can donate to With All Due Respect's featured causes here.

Now that the Prime Minister has called for an election, Christians will be bombarded by people wanting to win or influence their vote.

Some of that campaigning will be based on what people THINK influences a Christian vote. But despite the rhetoric, the Christian vote is more diverse than is often realised. What issues are on Christian minds and hearts this election?

Megan Powell du Toit and Michael Jensen put that question out there and receive significant responses from Christian leaders as well as WADR listeners. Then the WADR team then discusses how you might sort through all this as you cast your vote.

And to finish off, our resident 'Marg and Dave' review of a series that will make for good election viewing.

LINKS

If you'd like to help Michael and Megan continue to deliver With All Due Respect each fortnight, why not make a donation?

With All Due Respect is the podcast for The WADR Project.

This episode is brought to you by Anglican Aid. Your gift will strengthen churches and help transform communities. You can donate to With All Due Respect's featured causes here.

Theology. It's a term often associated with old professors and dusty books. But theology is actually crucial for the church. So, why don't more Christians take an interest in it? Why has it become so .... stale? These are the questions our hosts (and resident theologians) grapple with.

Speaking of childlike - Michael and Megan are joined this week by author Kaitlyn Scheiss, host of the Curiously Kaitlyn podcast where she fields questions about theology from children!

Finally, our hosts cast an eye over the coming-of-age film adaptation of Are You There God? It's Me, Margaret

This episode is brought to you by Anglican Aid. Your gift will strengthen churches and help transform communities. You can donate to With All Due Respect's featured causes here.

In For Arguments Sake, Megan and Michael do us all a favour and explain what exactly is the culture war. With that out of the way, they try to put party politics aside and discuss examples of such warfare - and whether Christians should be trying to win these battles. Shockingly, Michael and Megan had starkly different reactions to that Gillette ad when they first saw it but they push through to explore the hot button topic of toxic masculinity. From here, it's head-long into the vexing issue of how to respond to the war "out there".

Michael puts Megan into the Discomfort Zone by asking her to read the enormously titled 'The Coddling of the American Mind: How Good Intentions and Bad Ideas Are Setting Up a Generation for Failure' by Greg Lukianoff and Jonathan Haidt. Perplexed by the choice of title and how it fuels the culture war, Megan also has some issues with the solutions offered to the problems raised by Lukianoff and Haidt. But what 'Coddling' opens up is a meaty discussion about resilience, morality and always placing your feelings or experience above everything else.

Finally, in Marg and Dave, Michael finally convinced Megan to see controversial musical The Book of Mormon (finishing in Sydney but about to go to Brisbane). With both stressing that it's a shocking show - "the most profane production I've ever seen," reports Megan - Michael upholds the other surprise factors on offer. Turns out you can get lessons on belief, suffering and Western stereotypes from the potty-mouthed creators of South Park.

• Michael’s SMH review 
• Michael’s Eternity article
  
  
  

This episode is brought to you by Anglican Aid. Your gift will strengthen churches and help transform communities. You can donate to With All Due Respect's featured causes here.

Happy Valentine's Day, listeners! 

"Give your loved one a book this Valentine's Day," suggests Michael Jensen in this episode dedicated to the love of books: The Good Book, other books and a book on good reading.

For arguments sake: where we take a debate, cut out the party politics and try to talk it out

How should we read the Bible today?  Megan and Michael ponder how the Bible is different to any other book. What in the world does a "plain reading of the text" mean when we're talking about the Bible? What part does church play in how we read it? Can you be a better Bible reader than someone else? And what about the Holy Spirit's role in showing us the truth? (Pssst ... heads up ... they also touch on the role of women in the church and the varying biblical interpretations. Deep breath.)

Mentioned in this segment:

Graeme Goldsworthy's Gospel and Kingdom

The Suffering Servant, Isaiah 53

QandA: you ask us questions, and we answer without the spin.  

Megan and Michael try and answer a listener question from Rachel: “Should children be allowed to read fiction that is non-Christian in some way, specifically thinking about things like ‘Harry Potter’? And if not, why is it different to other fantasies like ‘Narnia Chronicles’ or ‘The Lord of the Ring’ trilogy?

Both agree that stories of all kinds can be enriching and helpful to our understanding of the gospel. The duo also outline how they attempted to direct their own respective children towards some stories over others. 

And, sigh of relief, they both declare Harry Potter as having some pretty big implicit Christian themes. Tune in to find out more, particularly about the Sorting Hat and to hear their discussion on  whether Harry Potter is a celebration of witchcraft and the occult (and whether that should be problematic for Christians). 

Mentioned in this segment: 

·       C.S. Lewis, Narnia

·       Tolkien, Lord of the Rings

·       J.K. Rowling, Harry Potter series

·       Phillip Pullmann, His Dark Materials series

Marg and Dave: Reviews from two people obsessed by stories. But not always the same ones

This episode, Megan and Michael review Karen Swallow Prior's On Reading Well: Finding a good life through great books and discuss the politicisation of books, what that means for how we read and why it matters for how we talk to each other. 

Mentioned in this segment: 

·       Karen Swallow Prior, On reading well

·       Aristotle, Nichomachean Ethics

·       Background on Prior

This episode is brought to you by Anglican Aid. Your gift will strengthen churches and help transform communities. You can donate to With All Due Respect's featured causes here.

Megan Powell du Toit and Michael Jensen debate the positives and negatives of being cooped up in one country.

The With All Due Respect team then interview Stephen Liggins, author of Travelling the World As Citizens of Heaven.

And don't miss their take on a travelling film that brings out the spiritual advantages of being somewhere else.

This episode is brought to you by Anglican Aid. Your gift will strengthen churches and help transform communities. You can donate to With All Due Respect's featured causes here.

We kick off by diving into a satire of the Church of England – the oldie but goodie BBC series The Barchester Chronicles. According to Megan: "The drama, humour and delight of the series is the church politics. For anyone who's been in a church, it's very familiar."

Can you have a voice of influence without playing party politics? As a "reluctant participant" in church politics, Megan gives her reasons for being involved in the Baptist Assembly, while Michael gives a personal perspective on the Sydney Anglican Synod. Yes, the discussion does turn to women's ordination.

And, as the Sydney Anglican Diocese prepares to elect a new Archbishop in August 2020, our hosts address the new realm of church politics where "the gloves are off".

Links related to this episode: 

• Episode 1 of Barchester Chronicles, especially the conversation at 44:55 - 45:05:
  Dr Grantly: "My father in law can be a very difficult person."
  Bishop Grantly: "He has persistent bouts of Christianity."

• Episode 3 of Barchester Chronicles, especially the conversation at 7:31-7:34:
  Mrs Grantly: "We could pray."
  Dr Grantly: "There are times when I’m ashamed of my prayers."

• Article by Michael Jensen on Eternity: The art of godly church politics

• Book by Michael Jensen: Sydney Anglicanism: An Apology

About Barchester Chronicles
The Chronicles of Barsetshire is a series of six novels by Anthony Trollope, set in the fictitious English county of Barsetshire and its cathedral town of Barchester. The second in the series, Barchester Towers, is the most famous. The first two novels were adapted as a TV miniseries  – The Barchester Chronicles – by the BBC in 1982, in which Alan Rickman is the "odious evangelical" Obadiah Slope, Nigel Hawthorne plays Archdeacon Grantly and Donald Pleasence as the "naive but lovely" hero, Reverend Harding.

Join in the discussion online
www.facebook.com/groups/WADRbyEternityNews/

This episode is brought to you by Anglican Aid. Your gift will strengthen churches and help transform communities. You can donate to With All Due Respect's featured causes here.

In this episode, Megan Powell du Toit and Michael Jensen ask about the cost of conscience. 

Conscience has been at the forefront in public discussions, as a new phase of the pandemic requires measures that have created an urgent set of ethical dilemmas. This has come at the same time as our politicians are debating bills about freedom of religion.

The WADR team tease out the Biblical approach to freedom of conscience before taking a more personal look at it with Alison Preston, a Christian living with the consequences of a decision of consequence. 

Then Michael and Megan finish up with a well-known movie about conscience, Les Misérables.

This episode is brought to you by Anglican Aid. Your gift will strengthen churches and help transform communities. You can donate to With All Due Respect's featured causes here.

Megan Powell du Toit and Michael Jensen firmly believe the question, 'What is truth?' is no longer something for lecturers in post-modernism to amuse themselves with.

In this episode, the With All Due Respect team tackle the post-truth world we find ourselves in. 

Starting with our favourite, 'You did what now??' segment, Michael explains why he just had to be publicly offended by President Donald Trump in the Sydney Morning Herald. Then Megan and Michael discuss the issue and ethics of truth online. And for a big finish, it's time to chime in on the new HBO documentary After Truth: Disinformation and the Cost of Fake News, which has a perfect score of 100% on Rotten Tomatoes.

With All Due Respect is part of the Eternity Podcast Network. For more and a chance to join in the discussion, click on over to the With All Due Respect web site.

This episode is brought to you by Anglican Aid. Your gift will strengthen churches and help transform communities. You can donate to With All Due Respect's featured causes here.

Michael and Megan are kicking off 2024 by checking in on the state of Evangelicalism.

Karen Swallow Prior returns to the show to discuss her new book The Evangelical Imagination, which provocatively claims to take stock of a "culture in crisis".

Our hosts then hash out the question: does Evangelicalism need another Reformation?

Finally, the pair discuss the 17th-century classic The Pilgrim's Progress and take stock of its influence and legacy.

This episode is brought to you by Anglican Aid. Your gift will strengthen churches and help transform communities. You can donate to With All Due Respect's featured causes here.

This week, our hosts are grappling with the topic of sin. They discuss what sin is, and then ponder the relationship of desire to sin. In particular, is all sinful desire ... sinful? Michael and Megan don't entirely see eye to eye on this one!

Writer and podcaster Elizabeth Oldfield, well-known as the host of The Sacred podcast, then joins the show for a wide-ranging discussion, including on her new book Fully Alive: Tending to the Soul in Turbulent Times.

Finally, our hosts discuss the confronting - and beautiful - film Manchester By The Sea (2016).

• (01:32) - - For Arguments Sake
• (23:18) - - Be Our Guest
• (50:56) - - Through The Wardrobe

This episode is brought to you by Anglican Aid. Your gift will strengthen churches and help transform communities. You can donate to With All Due Respect's featured causes here.

The slow winding back of COVID-19 restrictions means that small groups of Christians are able to gather for worship once again. Yet for the majority of the world, church services will continue to a remote affair for several months to come.

Megan Powell du Toit and Michael Jensen consider what worship looks like behind closed doors, and in particular what role singing plays.

Is making music to God an essential part of relating to Him? Or a cultural add-on that's nice but not necessary? Musician and worship lecturer Tanya Riches joins Michael and Meagan to puzzle out the truth, with all due respect.  

This episode is brought to you by Anglican Aid. Your gift will strengthen churches and help transform communities. You can donate to With All Due Respect's featured causes here.

With All Due Respect hosts Megan Powell du Toit and Michael Jensen take a long hard look at the last year.

The first stop is ask demographer Mark McCrindle to tell us what the statistics have to say about our behaviour in 2020. Then Michael and Megan consider what those tendencies tell us from a Christian point of view.

Finishing up, Michael and Megan tell us their favourite books, television series and films so we can happily read and watch our way through to the new year.

This episode is brought to you by Anglican Aid. Your gift will strengthen churches and help transform communities. You can donate to With All Due Respect's featured causes here.

In the run-up to this weekend's federal election, Megan Powell du Toit and Michael Jensen get all economical.

Jesus famously said, "You cannot serve both God and money," or wealth, depending on the translation. While Christian scandals often involve abuse of sex or power, love of money seems to be the sin we often tolerate. Is that because Christians in the west have been living under capitalism for some time now?

Capitalism gets quite a bad rap these days, so the WADR team asks, Is it the root of all evil? How should Christians relate to issues of money and ownership?

Megan and Michael then talk to capitalism expert Professor Gordon Menzies from the University of Technology, Sydney, about how economics and faith might interrelate. And we finish the show with the television series that has been called a satire of late capitalism - Apple TV’s Severance.

LINKS

Here's where you can get a copy of Gordon Menzies book, Western Fundamentalism: Democracy, Sex and the Liberation of Mankind

If you'd like to help Michael and Megan continue to deliver With All Due Respect each fortnight, why not make a donation?

With All Due Respect is the podcast for The WADR Project.

This episode is brought to you by Anglican Aid. Your gift will strengthen churches and help transform communities. You can donate to With All Due Respect's featured causes here.

With All Due Respect's Megan Powell du Toit and Michael Jensen are joined by The Centre for Public Christianity's Justine Toh to usher out the old year. 

Like 2020, 2021 has had its social highs and COVID lows but, on balance, what did WADR think of the year that was? First up, the team give each other what they think was the theme of the year. 

Then it's time for Megan, Michael, and Justine to share their favourite watch, read, and listens for 2021 in a bumper edition of Marg and Dave - or should it be called Marg, Dave, and Bill? A reference to the king of movie reviews that young Justine just doesn't get... 

This episode is brought to you by Anglican Aid. Your gift will strengthen churches and help transform communities. You can donate to With All Due Respect's featured causes here.

Secular and religious societies are fond of using prayer as an easy means of addressing a crisis - so much so that hosts Michael Jensen and Megan Powell du Toit discuss how 'thoughts and prayers' has become a phrase that has gained much antipathy in the public sphere.

Examining this language of the inner life, Megan and Michael talk about what sort of prayers they use when addressing God, and in what contexts.

Then to finish the show, a special edition of 'Marg and Dave' as the WADR team review their favourite prayers on offer.

This episode is brought to you by Anglican Aid. Your gift will strengthen churches and help transform communities. You can donate to With All Due Respect's featured causes here.

This week, Megan and Michael hash out one of the most controversial issues currently ruling the discourse; the conflict in the Israel and Gaza region.

Our hosts think through how the Bible can guide Christians’ response to the conflict.

A Palestinian Christian and peacemaker joins the show to discuss the challenges facing faith groups in the conflict zone.

Finally, our hosts discuss the film Women in Sink, which documents conversations with women of different faiths in the region.

This episode is brought to you by Anglican Aid. Your gift will strengthen churches and help transform communities. You can donate to With All Due Respect's featured causes here.

While we have been dealing with a pandemic over the last couple of years, we have also been experiencing what some are calling a loneliness epidemic.

Megan Powell du Toit and Michael Jensen discuss how this new struggle has been reported across many countries, particularly in their home country. The Ending Loneliness Together report says that one in four Australians are experiencing problematic levels of loneliness, with one in two Australians feeling lonelier due to the pandemic in 2020.

Why is this so? Does it happen to Christians as much as anyone else, and how can we respond?

Michael and Megan talk first about how loneliness might interact with faith, and then they invite Susan Mettes, behavioural scientist and author of The Loneliness Epidemic, on to the show to discuss how we can begin to deal with this challenge.

Finally, the WADR team take a look at a comedy of loneliness, This Way Up.

LINKS

After the highly successful “In the footsteps of the Reformers” tour through the Czech Republic, Germany, Switzerland and the UK. Faith Journeys is launching its latest tour “In the footsteps of Saint Paul”, travelling across Turkey, Greece & Italy from 25th April – 9th May 2023. The tour starts in Istanbul and makes its way through to Greece before ending in Rome. Daily devotions, a pilgrimage handbook and study guide assist with exploring the works, teachings and journeys of St Paul while travelling with like-minded individuals. You also have a Tour Manager throughout who looks after all travel logistics with exclusive local tour guides who all work alongside Michael Jensen to create an immersive touring experience. If you're interested in joining Michael on his instructive tour of early church locations, then you can find out everything you need to know at www.faithjourneys.com.au or by emailing info@faithjourneys.com.au.

This is where you can find Susan Mettes' book, The Loneliness Epidemic: Why So Many of Us Feel Alone - and How Leaders Can Respond.

If you'd like to help Michael and Megan continue to deliver With All Due Respect each fortnight, why not make a donation?

With All Due Respect is the podcast for The WADR Project.

This episode is brought to you by Anglican Aid. Your gift will strengthen churches and help transform communities. You can donate to With All Due Respect's featured causes here.

Notes from Episode 12: Is it a sin to talk about sin? 

For arguments sake: where we take a debate, cut out the party politics and try to talk it out

Megan and Michael dig into the giant topic that is: SIN. What is it? And what effect does it have on human beings? 

Christians have plenty of hang ups about using the word 'sin'. Megan says in some Christian tribes, it's not a popular word at all. 

Yet despite the wariness around the word, Megan says she likes it. "I find the word 'sin' is one where my evangelicalism and my feminism intersects." Tune in to find out how these "strange bedfellows" (as Michael puts it) come together. 

Meanwhile, the duo discuss the differences between individual and social/systemic sin and the traps in talking about one more than the other, looking specifically at #MeToo as an example.

When the discussion inevitably gets to 'Agency' and 'Liberty', Megan and Michael address one of their key differences. Michael is a Calvinist, Megan calls herself "a particular kind of Arminian" (don't worry - they give a quick crash course on those terms!) And so ... bring on the arguments about free will.

Mentioned in this segment:

• Not The Way It's Supposed to Be by Cornelius Platinga (Jr)
• Valerie Saiving “The Human Situation: A Feminine View.”

Q&A: You ask us questions, and we answer without the spin. 

Megan and Michael pick two questions to tackle:

• Are some sins worse than others?
• Does intent make a difference?

Marg and Dave: Reviews from two people obsessed by stories. But not always the same ones.

Michael and Megan take a look at Kendrick Lamar's Pulitzer-winning album, Damn, though both say it's not what they would have chosen to listen to personally. 

However, Lamar is open about his own faith and the album has many references to sin, pride, lust and also humility and love. 

Looking specifically at the song Fear, Megan and Michael discuss what a 'fear of God' means and why Lamar chose to emphasise the fear over the love of God. 

This episode is brought to you by Anglican Aid. Your gift will strengthen churches and help transform communities. You can donate to With All Due Respect's featured causes here.

This week our hosts ponder the role of animals in creation. What is the standing of animals in comparison to humans in the created order? Is it ever ok to eat animals? Do they go to heaven?

Ethicist and Professor of Animal Theology Clair Linzey then joins the show to ponder these questions further, before Michael and Megan turn their attention to the 2017 film The Zookeeper's Wife, which tells the true story of two brave zookeepers in Warsaw who resisted the invading Nazi forces. 

• (01:44) - For Arguments Sake
• (23:02) - Be Our Guest
• (44:33) - Through The Wardrobe

This episode is brought to you by Anglican Aid. Your gift will strengthen churches and help transform communities. You can donate to With All Due Respect's featured causes here.

Megan and Michael have both experienced and observed bullying in the Christian church, in a variety of cross-denominational contexts.

They begin by discussing why it is that the church can become a 'safe place' for this harmful behaviour, and whether or not theology or gender make a difference.

Then they welcome Stephen McAlpine to the program to share his personal experience. Stephen was the victim of a bullying scandal  involving the former CEO of Acts 29, Steve Timmis, during his involvement with The Crowded House church network in the UK.

Finally, with all due respect, Megan and Michael offer a range of approaches to ensure bullying doesn't find a home in your Christian community.

This episode is brought to you by Anglican Aid. Your gift will strengthen churches and help transform communities. You can donate to With All Due Respect's featured causes here.

This week, our hosts hold up a mirror to themselves and discuss the role of the pastor. They ponder a range of questions, including the Biblical job description of a pastor and whether the modern church is equipping its pastors well enough for the job.

Principal of Morling College Tim MacBride then joins the show to discuss the challenges facing the pastoral profession.

Finally, Michael and Megan riff on the 2001 film Wit (starring Emma Thompson), a cinematic adaptation of the play of the same name, which chiefly focuses on ... death.

This episode is brought to you by Anglican Aid. Your gift will strengthen churches and help transform communities. You can donate to With All Due Respect's featured causes here.

Notes on episode 16

Are we a persecuted people?

For arguments sake: where we take a debate, cut out the party politics and try to talk it out

Do Christians have a persecution complex? And are we being persecuted here in Australia?

Discussion around persecution has heated up since the Christchurch shootings where 50 Muslims were killed by a gunman who entered two mosques in March.

The conversation has ramped even further since Rugby player Israel Folau posted a message on Instagram with a list of people - including homosexuals - who would be going to hell if they didn't repent, and has been found in high-level breach of the Rugby Australia code of conduct, which means he could lose his job (and $4 million contract). 

Megan and Michael delve into the complexity of persecution, looking at the news reporting of Christian and Muslim persecution in different parts of the world and asking questions about whether there's more to persecution than just other people not liking Christians.

And they set about answering the question: how can we show solidarity with the persecuted church while at the same time not playing the victim-hood game?

Mentioned in this segment:

• Open Doors World Watch List 2019: an annual report which lists the countries experiencing the worst persecution of Christians.
• Al Jezeera article looking at Muslim persecution, December 2018

You did WHAT now? Looking at what the other M has been up to 

This episode, it's Megan's turn to read a few articles written by Michael.

The first is an article from 2013 on martyrdom (a subject on which Michael did his PhD) for ABC titled Christian martyrdom and modern identity: Against Candida Moss and Salman Rushdie.

The second, written for the Sydney Morning Herald was about the missionary John Chau, titled Like Jesus, US missionary accepted death as the price of reaching out. John Allen Chau who a young missionary who was killed by the North Sentinelese people on the isolated North Sentinel Island, seven hundred miles off the coast of mainland India in 2018.

Unfortunately, martyrdom has become tied up with suicide bombings, but Michael says Christian martyrdom isn't just about dying for your group. It's also about dying for your enemies. Christians died with words like 'we honour and emperor and pray for him'.

Megan questions our use of the word 'martyr' and how we decide who is a martyr. Some in the media have called Israel Folau a martyr, for example, though not as much in Christian circles, observes Megan. 

"Sometimes we use the idea of martyrdom' in order to justify actions which may not be necessary, or may be unwise, or just wrong," says Megan. 

Michael reflects that what sometimes happened in the ancient church was people would look for ways to become a martyr. But that's not right, says Michael. Martyrdom is not something we bring down on ourselves, it's something that is in God's sovereignty. 

So what about John Allen Chau? Was he a martyr or did he just do something silly? Tune in to find out what Megan and Michael think. 

Mentioned in this segment: 

• Arthur Davis writing for Eternity: John Chau's death raises serious questions
• The Exiled Preacher blog on martyrdom and the Christian life 
• The Female Martyrs’ #MeToo Message, Lynn Cohick for Christianity Today

Marg and Dave: reviews from two people obsessed by stories but not always the same one 

Megan and Michael watch Silence, a Scorsese film (you can stream it on SBS On Demand). Martyrdom and persecution is at the heart of this story. 

Silence is a 2016 historical period drama film directed by Martin Scorsese with a screenplay by Jay Cocks and Scorsese, based on the 1966 novel of the same name by Shūsaku Endō. Silence is the third of Scorsese's films about religious figures struggling with challenges of faith, following The Last Temptation of Christ and Kundun. The film follows the story of two Catholic missionaries (Andrew Garfield and Adam Driver) who travel to Japan in search of their missing mentor (Liam Neeson) - at a time when Catholicism was outlawed.

Michael has reviewed the film for the IFES Journal.  

This episode is brought to you by Anglican Aid. Your gift will strengthen churches and help transform communities. You can donate to With All Due Respect's featured causes here.

In this episode of With All Due Respect, Megan Powell du Toit and Michael Jensen investigate what it means to lose one's religion in the 21st century.

Step one is a review of the iconic REM song, our hosts investigate what lead singer Michael Stipe was actually getting at, and then apply those findings to a loss of faith.

Step two is an interview with journalist Michael Collett who describes his own walk away from Christianity and the factors that keep him from coming back.

Step three, Michael and Megan discuss the factors that have kept them from losing their religion in tumultuous times.

This episode is brought to you by Anglican Aid. Your gift will strengthen churches and help transform communities. You can donate to With All Due Respect's featured causes here.

* Warning: you may hear Megan and Michael munching on "Tumnus cake" throughout this episode. Head to the "Marge and Dave" section below for the recipe.

For argument's sake: where we take a debate, cut out the party politics and try to talk it out

It’s Christmas – but should Christians be feasting or fasting?

It's hard to avoid excessive amounts of food at this time of year. But should Christians be taking a counter-cultural approach, just as in Orthodox traditions where people have fasted during Advent for centuries?

Megan and Michael explore the theology of food and offer a biblical understanding of Christmas feasting.

Mentioned in this segment:

• Bible passages:
  "Physical training is of some value ..." – 1 Timothy 4:8
  "Nothing outside a person can defile them by going into them ..." – Mark 7:15
  Jesus invites the disciples to a BBQ breakfast on the beach – John 21
  Jesus feeds the five thousand – Matthew 14:13-21
  Paul advises Timothy to drink "a little wine" – 1 Timothy 5:23
  Paul corrects abuse of the Lord’s Supper (communion) – 1 Corinthians 11: 17-34
  "Do not forget to show hospitality to strangers ..." – Hebrews 13:2
  "Do not even eat with such people" – 1 Corinthians 5:11

• Dietrich Bonhoeffer, German theologian – quote about isolation and community

Further reading:

• Aleteia article: Christmas is coming — time to start fasting?

What’s going on? Going deeper into what’s happening in the church

Dinner Church Movement

In this brand new segment, Megan and Michael explore the relatively new Dinner Church Movement (which is actually based on ancient principles) and key thinker in this area, Kendall Vanderslice.

Mentioned in this segment:

• The Dinner Church Movement Facebook page
• Dinner Church Collective website
• Kendall Vanderslice website and book We Will Feast: Rethinking Dinner, Worship, and the Community of God
• Bible passages:
  Jesus is the "bread of life" – John 6:35
  "One does not live by bread alone ..." – Matthew 4:4
  The walk to Emmaus – Luke 24:13-35

Further reading:

• Religion News Service article: Dinner Church Movement sets the table for food, faith and friendships
• Christianity Today article: Power in the plate
• Faith and Leadership article: Kendall Vanderslice: Feasting brings people together in community

Marg and Dave: reviews from two people obsessed by stories, but not always the same ones

Food in The Chronicles of Narnia series by CS Lewis

Mentioned in this segment:

• Narnia recipes: Try your hand at making "Mr Tumnus’s Sugar-Topped Cake" (which Megan and Michael are munching on in this episode) or "Mrs Beaver's marmalade roll"
• Mark Sayers' This Cultural Moment podcast

Further reading:

• Notable food moments in The Chronicles of Narnia Wiki on Fandom website
• Intersect Project article: Nourishment, delight, and fellowship: The purpose of food in The Chronicles of Narnia

Join in the discussion online

www.facebook.com/groups/WADRbyEternityNews/

This episode is brought to you by Anglican Aid. Your gift will strengthen churches and help transform communities. You can donate to With All Due Respect's featured causes here.

Like any good Christian response, Megan Powell du Toit and Michael Jensen begin with the theology underpinning so many COVID-19 actions.

Step two, is to ask the question, 'How should Christians live in a time like this?' What are Michael and Megan doing, both in ministry and their personal life? And what might they advise others to consider?

Finally, it's off to the virtual movies to provide listeners with a title worth watching in trying times like these: A Beautiful Day In The Neighbourhood.

LINKS

• An example of the 'God will look after you' response
• The article that inspired A Beautiful Day In The Neighbourhood, Can you say Hero? from Esquire Magazine

This episode is brought to you by Anglican Aid. Your gift will strengthen churches and help transform communities. You can donate to With All Due Respect's featured causes here.

Australia is gearing up to reach its 80% 16 plus vaccination rate, with some states ahead of others. The news has been dominated by both federal and state plans for what reopening will look like with COVID present in Australia. 

Within that, Christians have had particular concerns. What will be the rules around face-to-face church gatherings, and how should we as Christians respond to the risks and freedoms of reopening? 

Michael Jensen and Megan Powell du Toit ask epidemiologist, Prof Greg Fox to answer questions from a public health perspective, and then the WADR team talk about a theologically informed response for churches. 

We finish with a novel that explores what one church did during a plague: Year of Wonders by Geraldine Brooks.

This episode is brought to you by Anglican Aid. Your gift will strengthen churches and help transform communities. You can donate to With All Due Respect's featured causes here.

Leisa Aitken joins Megan and Michael to discuss her dissertation on the psychology of Hope, and why the clinical definition of the word is missing the mark.

On 'For Arguments Sake', our hosts discuss whether there may be a lack of hope within the church. Have Christians in the global west lost their eschatological hope?

Finally, our hosts cast their eye over Christopher Noaln's blockbuster Oppenheimer. In true WADR style, they don't necessarily see eye-to-eye on its message.

This episode is brought to you by Anglican Aid. Your gift will strengthen churches and help transform communities. You can donate to With All Due Respect's featured causes here.

For argument's sake: where we take a debate, cut out the party politics and try to talk it out

Does the Trinity matter?

Warning: we're venturing into spiritually dangerous territory.

The Trinity has been in the news of late because of outspoken religious footballer Israel Folau. Folau and his church subscribe to a form of "oneness Pentecostalism", which doesn't hold to the doctrine of the Trinity – that God is three distinct persons in one.

So does the Trinity really matter or, as Michael asks, "is it just an arcane piece of theological knowledge designed to keep ministers busy?"

Mentioned in this segment:

• Eternity article by "Parent X" – Parent X: Why I told the SMH about Folau
• John Dickson's Facebook post about the Trinity
• Michael's (very old) article about the Trinity (written when he was five years old, reportedly) – The very practical doctrine of the Trinity

Further reading:

• Eternity article by Tom Richards – Israel Folau's problem with the Trinity
• Eternity article discussing the role of the Trinity, “Eternal Subordination” and gender – What the Bible teaches on women, according to a conservative subversive
• The Anglican Church's Sydney Diocese view on Trinity and gender – The doctrine of the Trinity and its bearing on the relationship between men and women

Clarification:

Just to prove the Trinity is a bit tricky, Megan and Michael confused each other at one point in this segment by talking about different things. So, when they are talking about the will of God, Megan was talking about the unity of the will of the Godhead while Michael was talking about the two wills of Jesus (divine and human).

Where credit's due

How our view of the Trinity is formed: creeds and confessions

Here's where we draw a line between the faith practices of our two favourite hosts: Megan is a Baptist, who are generally "non-credal" (ie. they believe the Bible is enough), whereas Michael is an Anglican, a denomination that has long used creeds.

So do we need formal statements of our beliefs? And which came first anyway: the creeds and confessions, or communal beliefs about the God we believe in, like the Trinity?

Mentioned in this segment:

• Baptist Church (NSW and ACT) statement of beliefs
• Anglican Church's Nicene Creed, Apostles' Creed and 39 articles
• Hillsong's song to the words of the Apostles' Creed – This I Believe – and John Dickson's role in the song's creation
• New Eternity podcast featuring John Dickson (thanks for the plug, Michael) – Undeceptions

Further listening:

• Hymn about the Trinity reimagined for modern audiences by Audrey Assad – Holy, Holy, Holy

Glossary - there's some heavy-duty words in this topic, so here's some definitions:

• creed: a formal statement of Christian beliefs
• Calvanistic: relating to the teachings of theologian John Calvin
• heremeneutical: a method of interpreting the Bible
• liturgy: a communal script used during church worship
• doxology: words of praise (often sung) during Christian worship services

Marg and Dave: reviews from two people obsessed by stories, but not always the same ones

John Donne: the poetry of the Trinity

Saucy, erotic and holy: three words you can use to describe the poetry of English writer and Anglican cleric John Donne. Megan and Michael venture into Donne's intimate exploration of the Trinity in a way that only poetry can.

Mentioned in this segment:

• “Batter my heart, three-person’d God”
•  “Wilt thou love God as He thee?”, along with Romans 8 and Psalm 8
• “Father, part of His double interest”
• Miroslav Wolf ("sexy theologian")

Further reading:

• Further poems by John Donne
• Eternity article on John Donne – Bringing Sexy Back 
• Article by the Gospel Coalition on the holy sonnets of John Donne – Battered by Donne: A Personal Appreciation of the Religious Poetry of John Donne

Glossary of tricky terms in this segment:

• lothario: a man who seduces a lot of women

Join in the discussion online

www.facebook.com/groups/WADRbyEternityNews/

This episode is brought to you by Anglican Aid. Your gift will strengthen churches and help transform communities. You can donate to With All Due Respect's featured causes here.

In the wake of Refugee Week, Michael Jensen and Megan Powell du Toit talk to Regent College's Mark Glanville about the book he has co-written with his brother, Refuge Reimagined: Biblical Kinship in Global Politics.

Mark Glanville brings the biblical scholarship of a respected theologian, while his brother Luke adds the insight of an associate professor in the Department of International Relations at Australian National University.

Then the WADR team examines Australia's attitude to refugees and how it mirrors an international approach that is increasingly overshadowed by concerns about personal and national security, economics, and culture.

Finally, it's time to examine the new television series Stateless, and how Australian actor Cate Blanchett interprets life in an immigration detention center.

This episode is brought to you by Anglican Aid. Your gift will strengthen churches and help transform communities. You can donate to With All Due Respect's featured causes here.

Creative acts - and creative people - have sometimes been given short shrift within evangelicalism. Creative work can be seen as less significant than the work of a pastor or evangelist.

But on the other hand, the Bible begins with an act of creation - the first and greatest of all creative acts. So Megan Powell du Toit and Michael Jensen ask, 'Is creativity a waste of Christian time, or is it an essential vocation of the Christian?'

In pursuit of an answer, the WADR team talk to the artist and cultural thinker Makoto Fujimura, who has written extensively about the intersection between the creative and theology.

Then they finish with a look at a beautifully creative piece about a creative person - Oscar best picture winner CODA.

LINKS

Makoto Fujimura's new book, Art and Faith: A Theology of Making.

If you'd like to help Michael and Megan continue to deliver With All Due Respect each fortnight, why not make a donation?

With All Due Respect is the podcast for The WADR Project.

This episode is brought to you by Anglican Aid. Your gift will strengthen churches and help transform communities. You can donate to With All Due Respect's featured causes here.

Mark Twain once famously said, "There are three kinds of lies: lies, damn lies, and statistics".

Our hosts this week are chatting about this third lie - statistics. With the age of social media now dictating how people access statistical data, are we literate enough to understand what we are reading when it comes to statistics? How does this affect trust in official information more broadly? And in a fallen world, where sin distorts everything, how much can we truly trust human knowledge?

Statistician Alan Brnabic joins Michael and Megan to discuss these questions, and why we need statistics more broadly.

Finally, our hosts cast their eye over Moneyball, a sports film that, against the odds, Megan quite enjoyed.

This episode is brought to you by Anglican Aid. Your gift will strengthen churches and help transform communities. You can donate to With All Due Respect's featured causes here.

This episode the With All Due Respect team address the burgeoning crisis talk that has filled audio and video streams, as well as countless social media and blog posts.

Michael and Megan suggest COVID-19 has brought out the truth in the saying, "A crisis on your part does not necessitate a panic on mine."

Together they debate the role 'crisis' has in the Christian life. Then, they provoke each other to voice an opinion on Ross Douthat's book, The Decadent Society: How We Became the Victims of Our Own Success. And they round out the show with a consideration of everyone's current dystopian read, Station 11.

This episode is brought to you by Anglican Aid. Your gift will strengthen churches and help transform communities. You can donate to With All Due Respect's featured causes here.

As the ancient saying goes, you can't go to bed if someone is wrong on the internet. 

Social media can involve a lot of different communication types but it certainly does seem to have a lot of scope for arguing. In fact, it seems that one of social media's key contributions is polarisation and pitched debate. 

Megan Powell du Toit and Michael Jensen discuss how this has ramped up over COVID - the virus situation is ever-changing and the stakes as we respond to it are high. It seems like it would be a good time to know how to argue well and persuasively.

The WADR team looks at the 'how to' of arguing. Then they move that into the deeper question over whether argument can ever be holy. And finally, a review of a new series set in one of today’s battlegrounds - academia.

This episode is brought to you by Anglican Aid. Your gift will strengthen churches and help transform communities. You can donate to With All Due Respect's featured causes here.

Michael Jensen and Megan Powell du Toit begin by asking why it is that we distinguish differently between who is and isn't my neighbour, and how that affected us during the lockdown phase of COVID-19.

They then invite Larissa Minniecon to discuss Australia's poor record for behaving like a neighbour to indigenous peoples. Larissa is a Kabi Kabi woman and a Torres Strait Islander. She helps us understand what indigenous Australians might contribute to our idea of neighbourliness.

And finally, Michael and Megan head to the movies to watch The Farewell, and discover what having a different culture has to say about the 'good' we offer our neighbours.

This episode is brought to you by Anglican Aid. Your gift will strengthen churches and help transform communities. You can donate to With All Due Respect's featured causes here.

As the voting time for the referendum approaches, Michael and Megan are joined by Bundjalung woman Karen Mundine, CEO of Reconciliation Australia, and Peter Morris, General Manager of the Reconciliation Action Plan program of Reconciliation Australia.

They talk through what a 'yes' vote might mean for Australian society, its citizens, and the church.

This episode is brought to you by Anglican Aid. Your gift will strengthen churches and help transform communities. You can donate to With All Due Respect's featured causes here.

For the return of season 6, Megan Powell du Toit and Michael Jensen plunge listeners into the heart of a two-thousand-year-old tradition in their efforts to understand what it might have to contribute to spiritual growth today.

Lent is a period of prayer and fasting in preparation for Easter that has been practiced since apostolic times.

Until recently it wasn't that popular among Evangelicals, but more believers are beginning to observe this 40 days of reflection - including guest Dr. Ros Clarke who has just released a devotional for Lent.

Forty Women : Unseen women of the Bible from Eden to Easter considers the historical truth that the first witnesses to the resurrection were not men, but women - and without women, the Easter story would not have happened at all.

The WADR duo then discusses whether Bible-believing Christians should be doing something that doesn’t appear in The Bible, and finish with a five-star film often watched at this time.

If you'd like to help Michael and Megan continue to deliver With All Due Respect each fortnight then why not make a donation?

With All Due Respect is the podcast for The WADR Project, and a proud member of the Undeceptions Network.

This episode is brought to you by Anglican Aid. Your gift will strengthen churches and help transform communities. You can donate to With All Due Respect's featured causes here.

This episode is a Q and Q episode - no answers, just more questions. Michael Jensen and Megan Powell du Toit open by discussing whether questions are bad for your faith.  

They then get personal and vulnerable by talking about the questions of faith they have that remain unresolved and why. Despite coming from different Christian traditions, do they share any?

And finally, it's a Marg and Dave segment on the poetry of a questioning man of faith - Christian Wiman.

This episode is brought to you by Anglican Aid. Your gift will strengthen churches and help transform communities. You can donate to With All Due Respect's featured causes here.

Neurodiversity is a topic that has seen an upswing of awareness in recent years.

With more visibility than ever before, our hosts discuss whether neurodivergence is a good, or "fallen" condition.

Writer and scholar Kate Morris then joins the show to discuss her own experiences raising a neurodivergent child, as well as her substack aimed at helping Christians love their neurodivergent friends and family.

Finally, Michael and Megan cast an eye over the hit ABC show Austin, featuring Love on the Spectrum star Michael Teo. 

This episode is brought to you by Anglican Aid. Your gift will strengthen churches and help transform communities. You can donate to With All Due Respect's featured causes here.

For argument's sake: where we take a debate, cut out the party politics and try to talk it out 

As the NSW Parliament considers whether or not abortion should be legalised, Megan and Michael discuss the broader issues raised by the abortion debate:

• What does it mean to be pro-life or pro-choice? Can you be both at the same time?
• How do you balance the rights of the unborn child with women's agency over their own bodies?
• When does human life start anyway?
• Does legalising abortion automatically equate to an increase in the number of abortions?
• How should Christians respond to this increasingly politicised issue?

And what about the hot-button topics of gender selection and disability. Who determines whether or not a life is valuable?

Megan and Michael draw on the wisdom of a parent of a child with a disability, With All Due Respect listener Alison Preston, in debating this life-and-death issue.

One thing is clear: the law alone is inadequate in addressing a topic that requires a whole community response.

Mentioned in this segment:

• The NSW Reproductive Healthcare Reform Bill
• Alison Preston writes for Eternity about her decision to go through with her pregnancy and the joy her child has brought – The joy of having a baby with Down syndrome

Further reading:

• Eternity article on the Reproductive Health Care Reform Bill 2019 – Christians suggest changes to abortion bill 
• Eternity opinion article by Paul O’Rourke, CEO of pro-life media and advocacy organisation, Emily’s Voice – What the Bible says about abortion

You did WHAT now? Looking at what the other M has been up to

Michael, always prepared to put himself on the line, has been stepping into the charged abortion debate on social media and in the press in an attempt to change the tone of the conversation.

A descendant of "backyard abortionists", Michael is aware of the "real human cost of an unregulated abortion industry", as well as the moral complexity of the abortion issue.

He makes this vital point for everyone in the church: In a society where one-quarter of women will experience an abortion, "If you don't think you have women in your congregation who have had an abortion, think again."

So how can Christians respond graciously instead of aggressively to this polarising issue? Listen up to how Michael and Megan are doing it.

Mentioned in this segment:

• Michael's Facebook post and subsequent article in The Daily Telegraph – Pro-life or choice, abortion nothing to celebrate
• Michael's appearance on the ABC's The Drum program – Episode 154, September 5, 2019
• Eternity article on the first 'Stand for Life' protest – Thousands gather in Sydney in last ditch effort to stop abortion bill

Further reading:

• Eternity article on the second 'Stand for Life' protest – Abortion rally told ‘Choose Life!’
• Eternity opinion article by church minister Mike Paget – Yes, there's abortion in your church

Marg and Dave: reviews from two people obsessed by stories, but not always the same ones

Now we're squarely in Megan's domain: discussing Season 3 of the dystopian TV series The Handmaid’s Tale – in particular episodes 8, 9 and 13 (the final).

Why has this show become so connected to the abortion debate (so that just wearing a red cloak signals a pro-choice stance)?

Megan guides Michael, and listeners, through the undercurrents of death-happy Gilead, exploring the nuances of values, conflict, faith and society.

Here's a taste of just one of the profound revelations Megan uncovers: "Looking after children is more than just getting them born; it is about giving them good lives."

Further reading:

• Independent article on the show's connection to real life – The Handmaid's Tale compared to Alabama abortion law vote: 'This is happening in our country in 2019'
• Margaret Atwood speaks to Her about her book that sparked the TV series – The author of The Handmaid's Tale has plenty to say about anti-abortion laws
• Eternity articles on The Handmaid's Tale – Has The Handmaid's Tale become ho-hum and The Handmaid’s Tale: religion gone wrong

This episode is brought to you by Anglican Aid. Your gift will strengthen churches and help transform communities. You can donate to With All Due Respect's featured causes here.

Is there a masculinity crisis? Or have we fundamentally misunderstood what being a man in the 21st century means?

Our hosts spend some time discussing their understanding of masculinity, how they’ve seen it shift around them, and what a Christian vision of masculinity really looks like.

Executive Director of the Centre for Public Christianity Simon Smart joins the show to discuss this tricky topic. 

 Finally, Michael and Megan turn their attention to the comedy-drama series Barry. 

This episode is brought to you by Anglican Aid. Your gift will strengthen churches and help transform communities. You can donate to With All Due Respect's featured causes here.

The US election, a showdown between the Republican President Donald Trump and the Democrat candidate Joe Biden, has captivated Australian audiences.

This episode Megan Powell du Toit and Michael Jensen consider the take-home points from the close association between American evangelicals and the trounced Donald Trump.

To help them, they interview American author and Christian commentator Karen Swallow Prior. They then follow this up with a discussion on life in a partisan environment. And for dessert, it's time to dig back into the vaults of Hollywood's greats and consider lessons to be learned from Mr Smith Goes To Washington.

This episode is brought to you by Anglican Aid. Your gift will strengthen churches and help transform communities. You can donate to With All Due Respect's featured causes here.

Megan and Michael welcome "ecotheologian" Mick Pope into the studio to talk about climate change. Recorded before Australia's bushfire crisis worsened, this episode tackles big questions such as "is climate science watertight?" and "what's more important – climate action or evangelism?"

Our hosts discuss the theology behind climate action and whether or not the church should get involved in this "political" issue.

Also in this ep, an exploration of 2040 – an Aussie hybrid feature documentary by award-winning director Damon Gameau (That Sugar Film). The film explores what the future could look like by the year 2040 if we put our minds to it now.

Links related to this episode: 

• Mick Pope's books: A climate of justice: Loving your neighbour in a warming world; A climate of hope: Church and mission in a warming world (written with Claire Dawson); and All things new: God's plan to renew our world
• New York Times article by Richard A. Muller: The conversion of a climate-change skeptic 
• Pope Francis' letter on the environment and human ecology: Laudato Si
• Eternity article by Mick Pope: A letter to my fellow evangelicals about the environment
• Eternity article by John Sandeman: Climate change versus the Bible
• Example of recent media treatment of ScoMo's Pentecostal faith relating to climate change: Scott Morrison's religion and the bushfire crisis (Independent Australia)
• ABC News interactive article: See how global warming has changed the world since your childhood
• Christian Today article by Third Space's David Robertson: What is the truth about the Australian bushfires?
• Religion Unplugged article on what US evangelicals believe about climate change: Why many evangelicals believe climate change is a hoax
• The Gospel Coalition article on how evangelism leads to care for the environment: Review: ‘Is God Green?’ by Lionel Windsor
• 2040 film

Get to know our guest

Dr Mick Pope – self-described "ecotheologian" – has a PhD in Meteorology from Monash University, and lectures in meteorology and climate. He is currently studying a master's degree in theology and is Professor of Environmental Mission at Missional University. He is co-author of A climate of hope: Church and mission in a warming world, and author of A climate of justice: Loving your neighbour in a warming world and All things new: God's plan to renew our world.

Join in the discussion online

www.facebook.com/groups/WADRbyEternityNews/

This episode is brought to you by Anglican Aid. Your gift will strengthen churches and help transform communities. You can donate to With All Due Respect's featured causes here.

With All Due Respect's Michael Jensen and Megan Powell du Toit examine masculine Christianity in the United States and question what effect it might be having down under.

The episode kicks off with an interview with Kristen Kobes Du Mez, author of Jesus and John Wayne, a publication that discovers the worship of Alpha Male role models in the American church.

Megan and Michael then examine the presence of Alpha Males in the Australian context, specifically the iconic Man From Snowy River.

And finally, our WADR hosts entertain us with a 'For Argument's Sake' about the effects such considerations have on the Australian Christian context.

This episode is brought to you by Anglican Aid. Your gift will strengthen churches and help transform communities. You can donate to With All Due Respect's featured causes here.

Welcome back! Season two of With All Due Respect starts with a bang ...

For argument's sake: where we take a debate, cut out the party politics and try to talk it out 

It's game on as Megan and Michael address the elephant in the room: the issue of gender in the church.

This topic marks one of the deepest divides among evangelical Christians, and the church in general. It's also one of the biggest disagreements between Megan and Michael personally (and the discussion that Michael's been avoiding because of the painful responses it can provoke).

So what should women do in the church and why does it matter anyway?

It's time for Megan and Michael to tie their colours to the mast: exactly what do they think about the "c word" (complementarianism) and the "e word" (egalitarianism), what's the biblical basis for these positions and how do they play out in the life of Christians and the church today.

While on opposite sides of the debate, both Megan and Michael agree that this is not just a "women's issue".

Further reading:

• Michael has written on feminism for Eternity – Perhaps feminism is not the enemy
• Megan has written on sex and power in the church for Eternity – Christians need to reform their ideas about sex and power

Also mentioned in this segment:

• Created Or Constructed? Great Gender Debate by Elaine Storkey
• Michael gives a shout-out to Matt Anslow, a member of the With All Due Respect Facebook group, who asked the following question (abbreviated): “My assumption is that God, being wholly good, gives us commands that are for our good ... Complementarians, at least as far as I’m aware, are unable to point to any objective good secured by prohibiting women from exercising these certain ministry roles. Usually the reason given for upholding these teachings is simply that God has commanded it in Scripture, and exegetical arguments ensue.
  Keeping in mind that such commands are seen by many Christians as only being intended for and applicable to their original contexts, what objective goods do complementarians think are being secured by upholding their teaching on ministry roles?”

Q&A: you ask us questions, and we answer without the spin

You can’t ask that! Oh but you did, and Megan and Michael asked you to. The pair field a handful of some 600 questions about gender identity and the church thrown at them by members of With All Due Respect Facebook group – a community of Christians committed to respectful public conversation.

Megan goes into bat for the "feminist egalitarian" team and Michael the "moderate complementarian" team.

Here's just a taste of some of the curly questions they address: Isn't egalitarianism just about women seeking power? Does complementarianism always lead to abuse?

Mentioned in this segment:

• Both Megan and Michael have chapters in the book The Gender Conversation: Evangelical Perspectives on Gender, Scripture and the Christian Life.
  Megan’s chapter is about gender construction, culture and Scripture, calling for both men and women to image Christ.
  Michael's chapter is about responding to domestic and family violence by understanding the new call to mutuality and transformed masculinity.

The secret life of us: what makes the other one tick

Time to get personal.

Michael asks Megan, "Am I a misogynist?"

Megan asks Michael, "Do you think I'm called by God?"

After this epic first ep for season two, our co-hosts may not have solved the issues around gender roles in the church but hopefully we've reached a starting point for mutual respect, understanding and further conversation. 

This episode is brought to you by Anglican Aid. Your gift will strengthen churches and help transform communities. You can donate to With All Due Respect's featured causes here.

Just because the word 'heresy' has fallen out of fashion, doesn't mean it has ceased to exist.

Megan Powell du Toit and Michael Jensen kick off season three of With All Due Respect, turning their attention to this thorny topic.

Their examination begins with a look at the Netflix movie The Two Popes and how it presents a recent clash of theologies in the Catholic church.

Then in For Arguments Sake, Megan and Michael discuss how heresy is currently defined, where it's likely to turn up in the church and what 'heresies' the media has found interesting - including the Christian angst over Israel Folau - as well as how we should go about dealing with heresies when we find them.

Finally, what heresies do Megan and Michael find personally attractive? Well, tune in to find out...

Links for this episode

• The Two Popes, on Netflix and the trailer on YouTube
• Our Favorite Heresies of 2018: Experts Weigh In, from Christianity Today
• The Salt podcast on The Eternity Podcast Network

Join in the discussion online
www.facebook.com/groups/WADRbyEternityNews/

This episode is brought to you by Anglican Aid. Your gift will strengthen churches and help transform communities. You can donate to With All Due Respect's featured causes here.

In some circles preaching is the one thing you can't skip at church. For others, it is an outdated practice. It can have a bad rap. We say to people, "Don't opreach at me!" Yet when Christian podcasts first started, the sermon was the first genre, and during covid, we have found ourselves listening and watching an endless supply online.

But what makes for good preaching?

Preaching is something both Megan and Michael have been doing for decades, so listen in as the WADR crew turns a critical eye on not only other preachers but their personal styles as well.

Then it's off to Gilead to examine the preaching style of one of Marilynne Robinson's key characters.

This episode is brought to you by Anglican Aid. Your gift will strengthen churches and help transform communities. You can donate to With All Due Respect's featured causes here.

As Australians have striven to get vaccination rates up and covid spread under control, one carrot held out to the long-suffering population has been the promise of a normal Christmas.

Michael Jensen and Megan Powell du Toit think we often associate Christmas with homecoming and family. For a start, it's a classic trope of Christmas movies - Christmas Homecoming, I'll Be Home For Christmas, Home For The Holidays, even Home Alone. But the very first Christmas, Mary and Joseph leave their home on a journey. So, is Christmas a story of home or away?

The WADR team talk it all out, look at a Christmas movie about a family - Little Women - and then bring back a segment everyone has been asking for as an excuse to exchange gifts. 

This episode is brought to you by Anglican Aid. Your gift will strengthen churches and help transform communities. You can donate to With All Due Respect's featured causes here.

In this episode, Megan Powell du Toit and Michael Jensen delve into the world of public theology - engaging in society's debates in a way that makes Christ shine. 

The WADR team begins with Canadian scholar and journalist John Stackhouse and an in-depth interview on the nature of public theology.

Then it's time to consider what the challenges are for both the presenter and the message in For Argument's Sake.

Finishing up, Michael and Megan consider whether comedian and talk show host Stephen Colbert is a public theologian, and what we might learn from his approach.

This episode is brought to you by Anglican Aid. Your gift will strengthen churches and help transform communities. You can donate to With All Due Respect's featured causes here.

In this episode, Megan Powell du Toit and Michael Jensen look at the vexed question of racism and the church.

First up, they talk to African American pastor Thabiti Anaybwile about how he understands the way American evangelicalism has interacted with the question of racism. He has been a significant voice on this topic within conservative evangelicalism in the US.

Then the WADR team come back to their Australian context to speak with pastor Grace Lung and her experience as an Australian-born Chinese woman within Australian churches and society.

Finally, Michael and Megan finish with a review of a film that examines the experience of Indigenous students in an elite Anglican school environment.

LINKS

You can find out more about Grace Lung's ministry and track down resources for understanding and dealing with racism on her website.

If you'd like to help Michael and Megan continue to deliver With All Due Respect each fortnight, why not make a donation?

With All Due Respect is the podcast for The WADR Project.

This episode is brought to you by Anglican Aid. Your gift will strengthen churches and help transform communities. You can donate to With All Due Respect's featured causes here.

Hey guys! We're doing a live podcast in April in Sydney. You should definitely come along. More details here.

For arguments sake: where we take a debate, cut out the party politics and try to talk it out

Megan and Michael get straight into discussing child sexual abuse within the church in the wake of Cardinal George Pell's conviction and sentencing earlier this month on several counts of child sexual abuse while he was Archbishop of Melbourne in the 1990s. They consider whether there is something particular about churches that "makes us more prone to this kind of problem?" Megan suggests clericalism is one of the big problems, not just in the Catholic church but all denominations - putting pastors on a pedestal and expecting more of them. Megan and Michael talk about their own experiences as pastors, and what has started to change in the training and formation of ministers to avoid the abuse of power.

Megan also suggests that the fact that most pastors are male also contributes to the problem of abuse in the church. And while Michael says he doesn't necessarily disagree, he has had trouble getting an answer on what specifically would be solved by having more women in the priesthood, and in positions of leadership in churches. Tune in to hear the discussion.

If this episode has brought up any issues for you, Lifeline provides all Australians experiencing a personal crisis with access to online, phone and face-to-face crisis support and suicide prevention services.  You can call 13 11 14 any time – it’s open 24 hours.

Mentioned in this segment:

• Royal Commission in institutional responses to child sexual abuse
• Michael writing for Sydney Morning Herald, March 5 – 'Only hope for institutional Christianity lies in the truth'
• Michael on ABC's The Drum, talking about the conviction of Cardinal George Pell
• Josie McSkimming's letter to Sydney Morning Herald, March 6: "I appreciate Reverend Michael Jensen’s sincerity in responding to the pain of victims of abuse and the distress of church members (‘‘Only hope for institutional Christianity lies in truth’’, March 5). As one who has spent many hours with depressed and traumatised victims not only of church abuse, but also the more subtle and strangling experiences of the tendrils of church power, I suggest that the church could respond in a more constructive manner by examining how its institutional practices perpetuate the problems so decried. While you have only men in leadership positions claiming this is the created order for relationships between men and women, you have the potential for abuses of power to increase exponentially." - Josie McSkimming, Coogee(Josie McSkimming is a former Sydney evangelical and has spent many years counselling Christians about their personal experience of Christian fundamentalism and its effects on their sense of identity. She has written about this in chapters and articles)
• ABC's Q&A and Megan’s question on female leadership
• Megan writing for Eternity – 'Questioning power after Peterson, Graham and Pell'

Look - a new segment!
You did WHAT now? A peek at what the other 'M' has been up to. 

Megan wrote an opinion piece for Eternity seeking to bring together some similar issues that have arisen from the support by many Christians and Christian leaders of the Australian visits of Canadian psychologist Jordan Peterson and evangelist Franklin Graham and then the response of some within the church to the conviction of Cardinal Pell. The piece attracted a lot of comments on social media, from Christians on both sides. Michael notes that in writing the piece Megan was applauded by some and accused of being a heretic by others.

Megan says she was trying to get across the problem of adulating particular people to the point where it is difficult to question them, and how important it is to not shut down questioners. Michael gives his own verdict on Megan's piece and the issues she was addressing.

This is a good example, says Megan, of the lack of respectful conversation among Christians (particularly online) when people disagree with a dominant view.

Mentioned in this segment:

• Megan writing for Eternity – 'Questioning power after Peterson, Graham and Pell'

Marg and Dave: Reviews from two people obsessed by stories. But not always the same ones.

Michael and Megan watch Spotlight, the 2015 award-winning movie following the Boston Globe's investigation of child sexual abuse within the Catholic church in Boston. It is based on a series of stories by the "Spotlight" team that earned The Globe the 2003 Pulitzer Prize for Public Service.

Mentioned in this segment:

• Spotlight (watch trailer here), now on Netflix

We're going LIVE this April

With All Due Respect will be recording a live podcast special as part of Paddington Anglican's PEACEtalk series, on Thursday 11th April from 7pm. It will be a federal election special: a political and personal conversation minus the polarisation.

Join us at PEACEtalks with Megan Powell du Toit and Michael Jensen as we explore some Christians perspectives as we approach the Federal election. Potential segments will include:
– For arguments sake: Should our politicians dream dreams and see visions?
– The secret life of us: How does who we are determine how we vote?
– And a live Q&A with the audience
This is surely to be a lively conversation in which we get to engage!

The event will commence at 7pm with a light dinner followed by the Live Podcast commencing promptly at 7:30pm. Supper will be served after the event. Parking can be tricky, so consider public transport or arriving early.

This episode is brought to you by Anglican Aid. Your gift will strengthen churches and help transform communities. You can donate to With All Due Respect's featured causes here.

** With All Due Respect is taking a short break over August and will be back in the first week of September. First episode back with be about ... GENDER. **

For arguments sake: where we take a debate, cut out the party politics and try to talk it out 

It's been almost a year since the the first episode of With All Due Respect, and we're coming back to the question that started it all: Can we agree to disagree?

Megan says this has become even more crucial since the WADR project began.

But it's confession time and Michael jumps straight in:

There's one topic that Megan and Michael (and Michael in particular) have been avoiding so far: Gender and the church. It's a topic that marks a deep divide among evangelical Christians, and Christians more generally. It's one of the biggest disagreements Megan and Michael have personally, too. And Michael says he's been avoiding the issue on the podcast because of the painfulness and difficulty that discussing it can often invoke.

So how do we tear down those barriers with other Christians who feel so strongly and differently to us? We may never get to common agreement, but trying to find common ground and to understand where each other is coming from should be the aim.

Megan says one of the ways she tries to interact with people is remember that that person has just as rich an internal world as she does - with all their life experiences, hurts and joys. So labelling someone (Megan is often labelled as a "progressive feminist") flattens them. And she says assuming someone else's intentions is just as bad in this.

Cue: virtue signalling

Megan says one way you can assume someone else's intentions - especially online - is by saying they're "virtue signalling". That is, when you are expressing values in a way that people say you're doing it so that you can be seen to be a good person. In Megan's experience, it's often something the right accuses of people on the left.

"It's a destructive thing to say to another person and deeply cynical," she says.

"The place for dialogue is not where we draw out the worst in people, but where we address the best in people."

But telling someone that they're virtue-signalling is essentially shutting down the conversation and refusing to see that there might be other reasons for what they're saying.

Michael wonders if the same can be said when someone dismisses his opinion by saying, "You would say that, you're a white male."

Both Megan and Michael refer to the With All Due Respect Facebook group, where they are trying to moderate the discussion in a way that reframes conversations and doesn't shut down discussion by the terms and phrases we use.

The duo take a look at other Christian podcasts out there who have attempted to frame their conversations in different ways and wonder if often our fences are too high. Is there a place for fences that discourage those who disagree with us?

The secret life of us: what makes the other one tick

Megan and Michael talk about how they've experienced the With All Due Respect journey and what's come up personally for them.

The WADR Facebook Group has been an interesting experiment to see how things in the podcast play out in real (or atleast social) life.

And Michael and Megan reminisce about how they first met and their first responses to each other.

Marg and Dave: reviews from two people obsessed by stories, but not always the same ones. 

This episode, it's Megan's choice: Won’t you be my neighbor? (2018) documentary on Mister Rogers.

Fred Rogers (March 20, 1928 – February 27, 2003) was an American television personality, musician, puppeteer, writer, producer, and Presbyterian minister. He was known as the creator, composer, producer, head writer, showrunner and host of the preschool television series Mister Rogers' Neighborhood (1968–2001). Rogers would end each program by telling his viewers, "You've made this day a special day, by just your being you. There's no person in the whole world like you; and I like you just the way you are."

Megan thinks there are real connections in what they're trying to do with With All Due Respect.