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Transcribed highlights of the show can be found in our episode summaries.Last week, a Houston Chronicle reporter tweeted an image from Jerry Falwell Jr.’s instagram. The image showed the Liberty University president posing with his arm around a woman at a party with their zippers down and midsections exposed. By Friday, Falwell Jr. agreed to take an immediate and indefinite leave of absence from Liberty University, which he has led since 2007 as president and chancellor.As CT’s reporting noted:During his tenure—succeeding his father and the school’s founder, Jerry Falwell Sr.—the younger Falwell has expanded Liberty into one of the biggest Christian colleges in the world, now reporting an enrollment of over 120,000 students. But his leadership has also drawn controversy, including around his politics—such as his friendship with President Donald Trump—and personal life—like photos of him and his family at a Miami nightclub.In June, Falwell apologized for a tweet that included an image of the yearbook photo from Virginia Gov. Ralph Northam’s blackface scandal. Dozens of black alumni said he should “withdraw the racist tweet” and resign to focus on politics.This week on Quick to Listen, we wanted to discuss how Liberty University and its president fit in the larger landscape of Christian higher ed.Bill Ringenberg is faculty emeritus at Taylor University, where he was a longtime history professor and Associate Dean of Academic Affairs, and the author of The Christian College: A History of Protestant Higher Education in America and The Christian College and Academic Freedom. He joined global media manager Morgan Lee and editorial director Ted Olsen to discuss where Liberty is positioned the Christian higher ed world, how athletics make a difference in how the school sees itself, and why it took a photo on Instagram for Liberty’s board to react to Jerry Falwell Jr.Take Quick to Listen’s survey!What is Quick to Listen? Read moreRate Quick to Listen on Apple PodcastsFollow the podcast on TwitterFollow our hosts on Twitter: Morgan Lee and Ted OlsenMusic by SweepsQuick to Listen is produced by Morgan Lee and Matt LinderThe transcript is edited by Bunmi Ishola Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Transcribed highlights of the show can be found in our episode summaries.2020 has been a year unlike any other for Christian summer camps. Here’s how CT captured the situation in a recent report:Like most businesses and ministries across the country, Christian camps felt the economic halt right away. Church retreats and events were called off in March, April, and May due to bans on mass gatherings across the states. Before long, camps were forced to grapple with the unimaginable: no summer camp.By May’s end, more than 100 Christian camps had announced cancellations. Most of the rest made dramatic changes to summer programming. Summer camp can represent half of a camp’s annual revenue or more, so skipping it for a year comes as a massive financial blow.Many Christian camps did cancel their summers. Some canceled and then reversed course. Some held programming all summer. This has been a very difficult summer. We've got camps that have been open continuously, even through WWI and WWII, closed down for the first time this summer,” said Jacob Sorenson, the director of Sacred Playgrounds, a ministry offering research and training to camps and congregations. “It's been a very difficult time for the industry as a whole, including secular camps.”One added challenge for Christian summer camps has been politics. “Christian camps are again caught in this political environment where the ones that have a constituency that tends to be conservative have been under a lot of pressure to open up,” said Sorenson, who researches camping ministry and who contributed to the previously mentioned CT article. “While the ones that have a constituency that tends to be more progressive or Democratic-leaning have been under pressure to close down. And it’s made it very difficult for camp directors to make a good decision for the health of their camp communities.”Sorenson joined global media manager Morgan Lee and editorial director Ted Olsen to discuss the financial footprint of summer camp, what to know about how long a “camp high” really lasts, how many camps are using technology in ways never seen before, and who summer camps serve well and who they leave out. Take Quick to Listen’s survey!What is Quick to Listen? Read moreRate Quick to Listen on Apple PodcastsFollow the podcast on TwitterFollow our hosts on Twitter: Morgan Lee and Ted OlsenMusic by SweepsQuick to Listen is produced by Morgan Lee and Matt LinderThe transcript is edited by Bunmi Ishola Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Transcribed highlights of the show can be found in our episode summaries.Last week, John MacArthur announced that his megachurch would hold in-person, indoor services, despite California’s recent COVID-19 restrictions banning in-person meetings. In a statement explaining the rationale for the church’s actions in the midst of a pandemic, the pastor wrote: Christ is Lord of all. He is the one true head of the church He is also King of kings—sovereign over every earthly authority. Grace Community Church has always stood immovably on those biblical principles. As His people, we are subject to His will and commands as revealed in Scripture. Therefore we cannot and will not acquiesce to a government-imposed moratorium on our weekly congregational worship or other regular corporate gatherings. Compliance would be disobedience to our Lord’s clear commands.What exactly should Christians make of MacArthur’s decision? One way to evaluate it is understanding whether it constitutes conscientious objection, civil disobedience, or something else, says Daniel K. Williams, professor of history at the University of West Georgia.From a historical perspective, “true civil disobedience, at least in its classic form, has been public. It's been an active protest. It has been accompanied by the willingness to accept the consequences,” said Williams. “And that last part is one that I'm not sure if that's always consistently followed.”Williams joined global media manager Morgan Lee and editorial director Ted Olsen to discuss what separates civil disobedience from merely breaking the law, how evangelicals have changed their mind on the issue in the past 50 years, and the role of empathy in shifting people’s attitudes and beliefs.Take Quick to Listen’s survey!What is Quick to Listen? Read moreRate Quick to Listen on Apple PodcastsFollow the podcast on TwitterFollow our hosts on Twitter: Morgan Lee and Ted OlsenMusic by SweepsQuick to Listen is produced by Morgan Lee and Matt LinderThe transcript is edited by Bunmi IsholaThis podcast mentions Quick to Listen episodes 219, 216, and 215. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Transcribed highlights of the show can be found in our episode summaries.Despite the fact that the widely esteemed theologian J. I. Packer never lived in the United States, the theologian greatly influenced American evangelicals. One key way this transpired occurred through Packer’s longstanding relationship with Christianity Today.Packer’s first piece—a lengthy article on the opportunity and challenges for evangelicalism—was published in 1958. After the publication of his best-known work, Knowing God, he became contributing editor at Christianity Today in 1983 and then senior editor in 1985. He continued to serve the magazine in similar roles for the next three decades. In 1992, he wrote about how he envisaged his relationship with the publication:One role of CT, which is a features-news-and-thought journal anchored in the historic faith, is to keep you posted, one way and another, on the theological front. I suppose I should see myself as a kind of point man for this purpose.But most of all, I want to be a plumber and sewage man, as I said when I started, and most of all, I want CT always to be showing how head and heart should be joining in mature discipleship today. Head-without-heart journals and heart-without-head journals make for misshapen and underdeveloped Christians. It is important that we should find and follow the better way.Timothy George, distinguished professor of divinity at Beeson Divinity School, was a contemporary of Packer’s at CT. “I would say his role at CT was a mentor to the whole enterprise, especially to all the editors,” said George. “For me and others that worked with him constantly in those days, we respected him and looked to him as someone who was a pioneer in the very thing that we were giving our lives to.”George joined global media manager Morgan Lee and editorial director Ted Olsen to discuss Packer’s CT legacy, the controversy he sparked over his convictions of the Bible’s inerrancy, and who is following in his footsteps today. Take Quick to Listen’s survey!Read our JI Packer coverageWhat is Quick to Listen? Read more Rate Quick to Listen on Apple Podcasts Follow the podcast on Twitter Follow our hosts on Twitter: Morgan Lee and Ted Olsen Music by Sweeps Quick to Listen is produced by Morgan Lee and Matt Linder The transcript is edited by Bunmi Ishola Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Transcribed highlights of the show can be found in our episode summaries.As Quick to Listen listeners are probably well aware, Christians rarely agree on everything.Take an issue like communion. On the one hand, it would be hard to find a Christian who doesn’t believe participating in Communion is a key part of what it means to practice one’s faith. But for some Christians, this is the focal point of weekly gatherings. Others can go months without partaking. For some, using whatever food and drink is around the house counts as the body and blood of Christ. Others need their priests to have blessed the physical products. And of course, COVID-19’s interruption of church services has introduced other questions about digital v. physical options. So how can Christians better connect with each other and work each other across real theological diversity? One recent look at how the church might do this better is outlined in Gavin Ortlund’s new book Finding the Right Hills to Die On: The Case for Theological Triage which asks when doctrine should divide and when unity should prevail.Ortlund joined digital media producer Morgan Lee and editorial director Ted Olsen to discuss whether evangelicals care too much or too little about theology, how debates about culture have changed how Christians relate to each other and how Christians can both stay true to their convictions and better serve the entirety of the body of Christ overall. What is Quick to Listen? Read moreRate Quick to Listen on Apple PodcastsFollow the podcast on TwitterFollow our hosts on Twitter: Morgan Lee and Ted OlsenFollow our guest on Twitter: Gavin OrtlundMusic by SweepsQuick to Listen is produced by Morgan Lee and Matt Linder Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Each Wednesday, Christianity Today's Quick to Listen drops a new episode that adds context and complexity to some of the hottest current events in the Christian world. Subscribe wherever you get your podcasts. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Transcribed highlights of the show can be found in our episode summaries.Take Quick to Listen’s survey!The protests that followed the killing of George Floyd in May started with a focus on police brutality. But six weeks later, a dominant theme is the removal of monuments, and memorials. Protesters have torn down or vandalized dozens of statues connected to the Confederacy and to other controversial historical figures like Christopher Columbus.But this isn’t the first time that statues have been torn down en mass amid widespread protests. After Constantine allowed Christianity in the Roman Empire, Christians tore down so many statues that in Athens they reportedly became known as “the people who move that which should not be moved.” Early church battled each other over religious iconography. Reformation Christians inspired another round of eager statue smashing and removal.“What's funny is when I was first getting acclimated to art as a Protestant, and learning that art history mattered, we were embarrassed about our iconoclastic heritage,” said Matthew Milliner, associate professor of art history at Wheaton College. “But what an honor to be known as ‘the people who moved that which should not be moved.’”Milliner joined global media manager Morgan Lee and editorial director Ted Olsen to discuss how much earlier Christian battles over statues echo today’s fights, what Christians have learned that might help us better understand the call to remove statues today, and whether we should even be creating memorials and monuments in the first place.  Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Transcribed highlights of the show can be found in our episode summaries.Take Quick to Listen’s survey!In 2014, Louisiana enacted a law requiring doctors performing abortions to have admitting privileges at nearby hospitals. Earlier this week, the Supreme Court struck down the law. Legislators said the requirement would improve the level of care that clinics provide for women. Abortion regulations in Louisiana and other conservative states have resulted in clinic closures and corresponded with falling abortion rates nationwide.Beyond the Supreme Court’s power, the federal government plays a key role in terms of shaping public opinion around abortion, says Alexandra DeSanctis, a staff writer for National Review and the host of the For Life podcast.“But I think in terms of what comes before courts, and what actually goes into effect, what actually matters for the everyday American in terms of how they think about abortion, is policy at the state level,” said DeSanctis. “And I think that even among pro-lifers, there are plenty of people who think you couldn't even really pass a ban on abortion through the U.S. Congress. ...So I do think if this is going to be a successful fight for pro-lifers, we have to think first and foremost of the micro-level, local and state policy first.”DeSanctis joined digital media producer Morgan Lee and editorial director Ted Olsen to discuss what was surprising and unsurprising about the SCOTUS decision, what makes John Roberts tick, and if trying to get cases to the highest court in the land should be the goal for pro-lifers. What is Quick to Listen? Read more Rate Quick to Listen on Apple Podcasts Follow the podcast on Twitter Follow our hosts on Twitter: Morgan Lee and Ted Olsen Follow our guest on Twitter: Alexandra DesanctisMusic by Sweeps Quick to Listen is produced by Morgan Lee and Matt Linder The transcript is edited by Bunmi Ishola Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Take Quick to Listen’s listener survey!Transcribed highlights of the show can be found in our episode summaries.The Navajo Nation continues to be hit hard by COVID-19. The community has reported nearly 7,000 cases and more than 330 deaths. Leaders have ordered businesses closed on weekends in a community that is spread across Arizona, New Mexico, and Utah. The Navajo Nation’s preexisting conditions like poverty, limited running water, and close living situations make it extra vulnerable to coronavirus.The lockdowns have made it challenging for people to access the resources they need, says Donnie Begay, who along with his wife, Renee, directs the Nations Movement, a campus ministry that’s part of Cru.“On the Navajo Nation, there are only about a dozen food grocery stories that cover 27,000 square miles that is the Navajo reservation,” said Begay, who lives in Albuquerque. Many on the reservation live at least an hour away from the border of the reservations and these lockdowns cut them off from the businesses on the other side.“These lockdowns can be very cumbersome to people who need to drive an hour or more just to buy groceries or necessities and food during the pandemic,” said Begay.Begay joined digital media producer Morgan Lee and editorial director Ted Olsen to discuss the community’s complex relationship with Christianity, why they’re uniquely vulnerable to COVID-19, and how Navajo millennials are making their faith their own.What is Quick to Listen? Read moreRate Quick to Listen on Apple PodcastsFollow the podcast on TwitterFollow our hosts on Twitter: Morgan Lee and Ted OlsenFollow our guest on Twitter: Donnie BegayMusic by SweepsQuick to Listen is produced by Morgan Lee and Matt LinderThe transcript is edited by Bunmi Ishola Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Transcribed highlights of the show can be found in our episode summaries.Last month, the Chinese government approved a plan that would give Mainland China the ability to crush any acts in Hong Kong that it deems a national security risk. Despite international outcry, the legislation will go into effect in September.In one of many responses by Hong Kongers, hundreds of theologians, pastors, and church leaders signed a statement accusing the draft decision of “further depriving Hong Kong of freedom and human rights.”The Christian leaders accused the Chinese government of destroying its promises and undercutting the city as an international financial center.At a time where, quote, “darkness covers the earth and thick darkness is over the peoples, we fearlessly and solemnly declare the following confession and promise to our society, including our full embrace of the Gospel of the Kingdom, our sincere repentance towards the Church’s shortcomings, our absolute refusal to authoritarian government, and our determination to walk together with Hong Kong society.” the statement said.As Hong Kong heads to the fall, the church could use prayers “for guidance and clarity for church leaders and Christians in Hong Kong and how we're going to walk this path. Because I honestly have no idea what's going to happen next,” said Ann Gillian Chu, who is completing her doctor of divinity at the University of St. Andrews in the Center for the Study of Religion and Politics and who has written widely on the theology of Hong Kong’s protest movements.“And I think there is also a general sense of weariness and dread on what’s going to happen,” she said. “And obviously, this is entirely out of our control. And so there's nothing else we can rely on, except for God.”Chu joined digital media producer Morgan Lee and editorial director Ted Olsen to discuss the state of Christianity in Hong Kong, if the protests will unify or split the church, and if any prominent Hong Kong Christians desire a closer relationship between Hong Kong and China.What is Quick to Listen? Read moreRate Quick to Listen on Apple PodcastsFollow the podcast on TwitterFollow our hosts on Twitter: Morgan Lee and Ted OlsenFollow our guest on Twitter: Gillian ChuMusic by SweepsQuick to Listen is produced by Morgan Lee and Matt LinderThe transcript is edited by Bunmi Ishola Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices