The Two Cities

In this episode we carry on our broader discussion on cultural identity with Dr. Robert Stegmann, who is Research Fellow at Stellenbosch University in South Africa, and the author of Contested Masculinities: Polysemy and Gender in 1 Thessalonians (Lexington). Over the course of our conversation, Dr. Stegmann explains his work on gender in Paul, in which he contends for multiple possibilities of masculinity in the text rather than a static conception of gender. As he does so from a postcolonial and gender-critical perspective, he is very aware of his own cultural situatedness as a white male New Testament scholar based in South Africa. In drawing attention to his background explicitly and consistently, he provides a great model for what we are trying to stress in this series—self-reflection on our own particularities as we approach the biblical text. Team members on the episode from The Two Cities include: Dr. John Anthony Dunne, Dr. Grace Emmett, and Dr. Logan Williams. Get bonus content on Patreon Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

On this episode in the Cultural Identity series we are joined by Dr. Janette Hur Ok, who is associate professor of New Testament at Fuller Theological Seminary and the author of the forthcoming monograph Constructing Ethnic Identity in 1 Peter: Who You Are No Longer in the Library of New Testament Studies series. Dr. Ok addresses a number of key issues related to contextualized readings of the New Testament, noting first of all that western biblical scholarship is also contextualized. In other words, there’s no such thing as an a-contextualized reading of Scripture. As such, Dr. Ok tells us a bit about how she developed her own Asian American approach to biblical studies, and we talk about her forthcoming monograph on 1 Peter in particular, which provides an interesting approach to the issue of ethnicity in the letter. As the conversation continues we discuss a range of important topics that help to round out our series, such as various issues of intersectionality, like Asian American feminist scholarship. Team members on the episode from The Two Cities include: Dr. John Anthony Dunne, Jennifer Guo, Grace Sangalang Ng, and Dr. Kris Song. Get bonus content on Patreon Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Continuing our series on Cultural Identity, we are joined by Norlan Hernandez, who is the Director of the Jesse Miranda Center for Hispanic Leadership at Vanguard University and a PhD Candidate in Intercultural Studies at the Cook School of Intercultural Studies at Biola University. Norlan joins us on the podcast for a second episode on Latin American Theology, following on from last week’s more historically-focused episode with Dr. Octavio Esqueda (Episode #71 – “Journeying Through Latin American Theology”). In this episode we discuss more about how cultural identity is crucial to the task of theology. In our conversation we note the importance and inevitability of contextualization, the communal dynamics of Hispanic culture relative to the institutional nature of the church, epistemologies of the South, and the holistic nature of Hispanic theology and spirituality. Team members on the episode from The Two Cities includes Dr. John Anthony Dunne and Rev. Daniel Parham. Get bonus content on Patreon Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Continuing our series on Cultural Identity we are joined by Dr. Octavio Esqueda for a discussion on Latin American Theology. Dr. Esqueda is Professor of Christian Higher Education and the Director of the EdD and PhD programs at Biola University. As an expert in higher education and the Spanish Reformation, Dr. Esqueda provides a helpful overview of the history of Latin American Theology as well as some of the key tenets of Hispanic Evangelical Theology, which includes the importance of communal theology, a holistic sense of mission, an inclination towards hope, and an intentional positioning as a theology from the margins. As part of this discussion, Dr. Esqueda helpfully explains that justice is always social, and that Spanish Bible readers are more inclined to recognize this than English readers of the Bible because the key Greek and Hebrew terms translated sometimes as “justice” and sometimes as “righteousness” in English are all translated with cognates related to justice in Spanish. Along the way Dr. Esqueda provides a nice mix of the anecdotal to go along with the historical, incorporating stories about his own personal faith journey growing up in Mexico and also some of the insights he gained while doing his doctoral work on theological education in Cuba. Team members on the episode from The Two Cities include: Dr. John Anthony Dunne and Grace Sangalang Ng. Get bonus content on Patreon Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

In our third episode on Cultural Identity, we are joined by Dr. Walter Augustine, who is the Director of Intercultural Education and Research in the Division of Diversity and Inclusion at BIOLA University, to discuss the topic of race one year after the dehumanizing murder of George Floyd. To start Dr. Augustine shares some encouraging developments since last year, but also some of his frustrations. And we discuss whether the guilty verdict given to Derek Chauvin was an instance of justice or accountability, noting an important difference between retributive and restorative justice. This then led us to a discussion on reparations in which Dr. Augustine provides a helpful theological framework in terms of repentance. In appealing to a biblical paradigm, Dr. Augustine looks at Zaccaeus as a great example of restorative justice, and even a kind of reparation. But Dr. Augustine also notes that reparations should not be thought about strictly in financial terms. As the conversation continues we discuss both the fear and fascination of the white gaze upon black bodies, reducing the black experience to “a single story” of physicality; we note examples of this from history, sports, and even American reception of the biblical character Samson. In the end, Dr. Augustine provides some hopeful words for the road ahead, drawing upon Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.’s words about the need for reciprocal mutuality to foster true human flourishing. Team members on the episode from The Two Cities include Dr. John Anthony Dunne, Grace Sangalang Ng, and Rev. Daniel Parham. Get bonus content on Patreon Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Continuing our series on Cultural Identity, we turn to discuss Critical Race Theory and its potential for intersection with the gospel. In previous episodes on Critical Theory (CT) and Critical Race Theory (CRT), we have primarily focused on the common characterizations and misunderstandings of the movement, the theories, etc. In this episode we are joined by scholars who make use of CRT in an intentionally Christian way. Our guests include, Dr. Nathan Cartagena, who is Assistant Professor of Philosophy at Wheaton College, Dr. Jeff Liou, who is the Director of Theological Formative at Intervarsity Christian Fellowship and the co-founder of the Asian American Christian Collaborative, and Dr. Robert Chao Romero, who is Associate Professor of Chicano/Chicana Studies and Asian American Studies at UCLA. Over the course of the conversation, Dr. Cartagena, Dr. Liou, and Dr. Romero explain how CRT relates to the goof news of Jesus Christ and how CRT helps the spread of the gospel through evangelism in racially minoritized communities. This episode contains many powerful challenges for the church to boldly engage in the work of antiracism for the sake of the gospel. Team members on the episode from The Two Cities include: Amber Bowen, Dr. Josh Carroll, Dr. John Anthony Dunne, Grace Sangalang Ng, Rev. Daniel Parham, Dr. Chris Porter, and Dr. Logan Williams. Get bonus content on Patreon Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Kicking of our series on Cultural Identity, we are joined by Dr. Matthew Kim and Dr. Daniel Wong, the authors of Finding our Voice: A Vision Asian North American Preaching (Lexham Press). Dr. Kim is George F. Bennett Chair of Preaching and Practical Theology at Gordon Conwell Theological Seminary, and Dr. Wong recently retired from his position as Associate Professor of Christian Ministries at Tyndale University (Canada). In our conversation Dr. Kim and Dr. Wong talk to us about various issues pertaining to hermeneutics and homiletics from the bi-cultural perspective of being Asian and North American. We talk about what a distinctly bi-cultural hermeneutic might look like, how the incarnation is a helpful model for thinking about bi-cultural identity, how we become aware of our own cultural influences, the role of honor and shame in Asian North American contexts, and what the broader church can learn from an Asian North American perspective. Team members on the episode from The Two Cities include Dr. John Anthony Dunne and Grace Sangalang Ng. Get bonus content on Patreon Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

In this episode we talk about the recent scandals committed by major leaders in the church, most notably Ravi Zacharias. For this conversation we are joined by Aimee Byrd, the author of Recovering from Biblical Manhood and Womanhood (published by Zondervan), and Dr. Michael Bird, who is Academic Dean and Lecturer in Theology at Ridley College, Melbourne. We wanted to have Aimee and Mike on with us because they have been having robust and lively conversations together on YouTube called "Birds of a Feather," and we wanted to be a part of one of their interesting conversations on The Two Cities. Over the course of our discussion we talk about various reactions to the Ravi Zacharias scandal in particular, and more generally we reflect on the cultural factors in the evangelical world that might lead to abuse and how to have systems set in place within the church and within denominations to properly handle situations of abuse. Team members on the episode from The Two Cities include: Amber Bowen, Dr. Josh Carroll, Dr. John Anthony Dunne, Jennifer Guo, Grace Sangalang Ng, and Dr. Chris Porter. Get bonus content on Patreon Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

(CW: Adult Themes). On this episode we discuss sexual addiction with Dr. Samuel Perry, Associate Professor of Sociology at the University of Oklahoma and the author of Addicted to Lust: Pornography in the Lives of Conservative Protestants (published by Oxford University Press). Our discussion begins by addressing the original claim made by the Atlanta shooter, who said that he was motivated to violence by a "sexual addiction." Dr. Perry, who is an expert on sexual addiction from a sociological perspective, directly addresses that claim, but also looks more widely at how we talk about sexual addiction and lust in the church. In particular, we discuss the way pornography and masturbation are often regarded as the worst kinds of problems in the church, which Dr. Perry calls a “sexual exceptionalism.” Dr. Perry further highlights how gendered this conversation typically is in the church as well, leaving women without any resources or recourse to address these issues in their own lives. The conversation as a whole helpfully contextualizes sexual addiction in many ways. Team members on the episode from The Two Cities include: Amber Bowen, Dr. John Anthony Dunne, Grace Emmett, Dr. Chris Porter, and Dr. Logan Williams. Get bonus content on Patreon Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Concluding our Art & Culture series with our fifth and final episode, we turn to discuss the artistic nature of film with Dr. Kutter Callaway, who is Associate Professor of Theology and the co-director of Reel Spirituality at Fuller Seminary. With the 93rd Annual Academy Awards ceremony (“the Oscars”) just around the corner, we discuss in particular the artistry of the Best Picture Nominees from the past year (spoilers throughout). After discussing why Christians should care about film, and after lamenting our various experiences with Christian approaches to film exemplified by organizations like Plugged In, we turn to chat about key themes across the Best Picture Nominees, and how these films are suited to our current moment. In the end, Dr. Callaway stresses the importance of empathy that films uniquely foster in us. As he says, “Art traffics in empathy,” and thus an “ethic of viewership” requires empathy from us or else the art is “stillborn.” Team members from The Two Cities on the episode include Dr. John Anthony Dunne, Brandon Hurlbert, and Kris Song. Get bonus content on Patreon Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.