Shame, honour & the gospel: Recovering what we’ve missed
May 7, 2025
This discussion tackles the often-overlooked aspect of shame in the gospel, comparing guilt-forgiveness and honor-shame cultures. It dives into how these cultural frameworks shape identity and behavior, especially in today's social media landscape where public shaming thrives. Listeners are encouraged to reflect on biblical stories of unconditional love, such as the prodigal son, emphasizing acceptance over shame within church communities. The conversation highlights the transformative power of acceptance and the boldness it can inspire in faith.
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Understanding Shame vs Guilt Cultures
Shame cultures focus on community perception rather than individual guilt.
Identity and honor depend largely on social context and others' views.
question_answer ANECDOTE
WWII Japanese Shame Culture
Japanese WWII soldiers often chose death over surrender to avoid shame.
Ritual suicide restored honor after defeat in their shame-based culture.
insights INSIGHT
Social Media Creates New Shame Culture
Social media fosters a new form of public shaming akin to honour culture.
Cancel culture enforces strict social norms with severe social consequences.
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In 'So You've Been Publicly Shamed', Jon Ronson delves into the phenomenon of online shaming and its historical antecedents. The book features interviews with individuals who have been subjected to intense public shaming, including Jonah Lehrer, a journalist who plagiarized quotes, and a woman who was shamed for a tweet at an airport. Ronson also speaks with practitioners of modern public humiliation and examines the immediate and long-term consequences of such shaming. The book raises questions about righteousness, reputation, and conformity in the context of social media and its impact on individuals and society[2][3][4].
Is there an element of the gospel which we’ve forgotten about? That Jesus came not to just to deal with the guilt of our sin and forgive that, but to deal with the shame of being sinners and to cover that too. In this episode we dig into the differences between shame-honour cultures and guilt-forgiveness cultures. So-called honour killings, when family members murder their own kin to end their supposed shaming of the family, baffle and repulse us in the West, and yet Jesus came to a context in first century Judaea which was profoundly honour-based. How can we re-examine the gospel message he brought in this light to see what our profoundly individualistic culture in the West might have missed? And, are things starting to shift in both secular society and the church in recent times, as we drift towards a new form of shame-honour culture driven by cancellation and public shaming via social media?
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• If you want to go deeper into some of the topics we discuss, visit John's website: http://www.johnwyatt.com
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Matters of Life and Death 