Another Life with Joy Marie Clarkson

Can nature teach us how to live, or is the universe random and meaningless? In the first episode of The PloughCast’s new 6-part series about nature and creatures, Susannah quizzes Peter about his dog Hektor, who plays a starring role in Peter’s Plough editorial “The Book of Creatures.” They discuss the evolution of dogs, especially the way dogs’ faces have evolved to hack into human emotions of tenderness – and ask whether this should make us more cynical about nature, or more open to the possibility that it is freighted with meaning and purpose.The imprisoned Czech dissident Vaclav Havel, not a religious believer, nevertheless had a mystical experience of nature that changed his life. The Boston writer Ian Marcus Corbin tells Havel’s story in an ambitious Plough essay “The Abyss of Beauty,” which the hosts discuss, prompting Susannah to describe her own, distinctly urban, version Havel’s conversion experience.The New York Times columnist Ross Douthat then joins The PloughCast for a wide-ranging discussion of nature-related topics. First up is a debate whether there is such a thing as natural law, and if there is, why it fails to move public opinion on controversial questions such as bioethics. Ross then recounts his personal story of the dark side of nature: a harrowing experience of long-term Lyme disease which led him to write his forthcoming book The Deep Places: A Memoir of Illness and Discovery (October 2021).On a lighter note, Ross agrees to talk about the paranormal: UFOs (now also known as UAPs or “Unidentified Aerial Phenomena), space aliens, and alien abductions. What are we to make of the US military’s recent official confirmation of UFO sightings? Are aliens part of the natural world, or are they supernatural – perhaps the same beings formerly called fairies and elves? Finally, an important warning: Don’t anger the Good People.

Leah Libresco Sargeant offers a feminist critique of how modern society pushes women to change their bodies, in an essay that also covers anorexia, surrogacy, gender bias in medicine, and gender dysmorphia.

Springs Toledo on his defeat to and friendship with the boxer Stonewall Strickland.

Eighteen years among Somali Muslims in the Horn of Africa have taught an American Christian that Islam’s five pillars apply to Christianity as well. In this excerpt from a new Plough book, Pillars, she describes what she has learned about one of these five pillars, prayer.

Can it ever be a Christian’s duty to kill? For Plough’s founding editor Eberhard Arnold, this question goes to the core of the meaning of Christianity, and of human life. His seven theses on the Biblical basis of pacifism were written in Germany, during dangerous years.

“The love of the peacemaker is a love that has force, that will not accept the injustices of the status quo.” Anthony Barr on love and justice through the lens of James Baldwin and Ta-Nehisi Coates.

Gracy Olmstead on welcoming the baby she did not want.

Patrick Tomassi discusses the definition of violence with Portland’s Antifa movement, the local Proud Boys, and some of the people caught in between.

This episode included an Anabaptist and an Anglican in conversation as they attempted to address listener questions include the following:I'm convinced that Christians should not use lethal violence. Does scripture outline what those who don't follow Jesus, acting on behalf of the state, should or shouldn't do with regard to levels of violence to restrain evil?How do we read the violence in the Old Testament?What about Just War Theory? Does the state have a moral obligation to use violence, to prevent or reduce the possibility of greater violence? Was the Second World War justified?Plus: Striped bass fishing, the Lambs Club, creative minorities, beer-making, and why Susannah can’t be shunned.

Felix Manz was the first martyr of the Radical Reformation, drowned by his fellow Christians for performing adult baptisms. His story is a story of a world on fire with commitment to Christ, with friends who became enemies wrestling over nonviolence, justice for the poor, and the meaning of the gospel. Pete and Susannah discuss what his time has to say to ours.Then, they catch up with Rachel Pieh Jones, whose eighteen years living among Somali Muslims has taught her more than she could have imagined about her own Christian faith. Her book, Pillars, released recently with Plough Books, describes this journey of friendship and discovery.Pete and Susannah also talk about Bruderhof Easter Gardens, and almost-post-vaccination life in New York City.