The Bulletin

AI priests, a polarized church, and women and alcohol. This week on The Bulletin, hosts Mike Cosper and editor in chief Russell Moore talk with David Zahl of Mockingbird about artificial intelligence -- ChatGPT -4.o and AI priests -- and the need for embodied presence and wisdom. Next, they tackle the latest challenge in church polarization, this time in the Presbyterian Church in America. Last, special guest Ericka Andersen joins the show to shed some light on the hidden struggles of women who are alcohol-dependent. Today’s Guests: David Zahl is the director of Mockingbird Ministries and editor-in-chief of the Mockingbird website. Born in New York City and brought up elsewhere, David graduated from Georgetown University in 2001, and then worked for several years as a youth minister in New England. In 2007 he founded Mockingbird in NYC. Today David and his wife Cate reside in Charlottesville, VA with their three boys, where David also serves on the staff of Christ Episcopal Church. He is the author of A Mess of Help: From the Crucified Soul of Rock N’ Roll and co-author of Law and Gospel: A Theology for Sinners (and Saints). His most recent book, Seculosity: How Career, Parenting, Technlogy, Food, Politics, and Romance Became Our New Religion and What To Do About It, appeared in 2019 from Fortress Press. Ericka Andersen is a freelance writer, podcast host and owner of Pitch and Publish Writing Company. She is the author of "Reason to Return: Why Women Need the Church & the Church Needs Women" and "Leaving Cloud 9: The True Story of a Life Resurrected From the Ashes of Poverty, Trauma and Mental Illness." She has been published multiple times in the New York Times, the Wall Street Journal, USA Today, the Washington Post and more. Ericka is a weekly columnist at WORLD Magazine and a freelance reporter for Christianity Today. Prior to freelancing, Ericka worked for National Review Magazine, the Heritage Foundation and in communications for the U.S. Congress on Capitol Hill. Resources Referenced: SobrietyCurious.com “The Bulletin” is a production of Christianity Today Executive Producer: Erik Petrik Producer: Clarissa Moll and Matt Stevens Associate Producer: McKenzie Hill and Raed Gilliam Editing and Mix: TJ Hester Music: Dan Phelps Show Design: Bryan Todd Graphic Design: Amy Jones Social Media: Kate Lucky Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Peru permits euthanasia, Florida frets about national security, and Kristi Noem is in the doghouse. This week on The Bulletin, Mike Cosper and producer Clarissa Moll discuss Florida’s new laws restricting Chinese citizens from real estate transactions and employment at state universities. Conversation turns next to Peru’s first exemption for medically assisted suicide and the growth of the global right to die movement. Finally, we talk about dogs -- our own and Governor Kristi Noem’s, to be exact. Can the vice presidential hopeful remain a viable candidate after the release of her new book No Going Back? Special guests Skot Welch and Karen Swallow Prior join the discussion. Today’s Guests: Skot Welch is the principal/founder of Global Bridgebuilders, a firm focusing on organizational development, cultural transformation and inclusion. Prior to the launch of Global Bridgebuilders, Skot served as Vice President of Business Development and Benchmarking Services for DiversityInc magazine in New Jersey, where he worked with many of the Fortune 500’s biggest global brands across a broad range of industries. Skot’s most recent book is Unfractured: A Christ-Centered Action Plan for Cultural Change. Karen Swallow Prior, Ph.D., is the author of The Evangelical Imagination: How Stories, Images, and Metaphors Created a Culture in Crisis and On Reading Well: Finding the Good Life through Great Books, among other titles. Her writing has appeared at Christianity Today, the New York Times, The Atlantic, the Washington Post, First Things, and various other places. In addition, Dr. Prior is a columnist for Religion News Service, a contributing editor for Comment, a founding member of The Pelican Project, and a senior fellow at the Trinity Forum. Resources Referenced: When Buying a Home Is Treated as a National Security Threat - The New York Times The Art of Dying: Living Fully into the Life to Come Who Will Comfort Me? The Total Care of Cicely Saunders | Acton Institute “The Bulletin” is a production of Christianity Today Executive Producer: Erik Petrik Producer: Clarissa Moll and Matt Stevens Associate Producer: McKenzie Hill and Raed Gilliam Editing and Mix: TJ Hester Music: Dan Phelps Show Design: Bryan Todd Graphic Design: Amy Jones Social Media: Kate Lucky Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

College students protest and the United Methodist Church splits We’re recording live this week from CT’s quarterly staff meeting with special guests CT president and CEO Tim Dalrymple and news editor Daniel Silliman. Host Mike Cosper and producer Clarissa Moll discuss the escalating student protests on U.S. college campuses -- why students are gathering and how free speech rights shape university discourse. Then, the United Methodist Church met this week to remove all LGBTQ limitations from its books. Should conservative churches within the denomination stay, or should they go? Today’s Guests: Timothy Dalrymple is a former national champion gymnast who turned to academia following an accident in college where he broke his neck. He studied at Stanford University, Princeton Theological Seminary, and Harvard’s Graduate School of Arts and Sciences, where he made suffering a key theme of his research and teaching in modern Western religious thought. Dalrymple was a key player in the launch of patheos.com, an online marketing place of religious ideas, and he pioneered many of the techniques that led Patheos to become the world’s largest platform for multi-religious conversations. In 2013, he founded Polymath, a creative agency that services businesses and nonprofits serving the world. Dalrymple currently serves as Christianity Today’s President and CEO, the flagship evangelical media ministry founded in 1956 by Billy Graham. Daniel Silliman is a journalist and a historian. He is the news editor for Christianity Today, the author of a history of bestselling evangelical fiction, and teaches humanities at Milligan University. Daniel spent several years as a crime reporter outside Atlanta before pursuing higher education in Germany, earning a MA from Tübingen University and a doctoral degree from Heidelberg University. He has reported and edited news coverage for CT since 2019. “The Bulletin” is a production of Christianity Today Executive Producer: Erik Petrik Producer: Clarissa Moll and Matt Stevens Associate Producer: McKenzie Hill and Raed Gilliam Editing and Mix: TJ Hester Music: Dan Phelps Show Design: Bryan Todd Graphic Design: Amy Jones Social Media: Kate Lucky Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

This week on The Bulletin, host Mike Cosper sits down for a special one on one conversation with author and political columnist Tim Carney about his new book Family Unfriendly: How Our Culture Made Raising Kids Much Harder Than It Needs to Be. Grounded in fascinating sociological research and filled with engaging stories, this discussion highlights the many ways that culture shapes our expectations and behaviors -- even when we don’t realize it. Whether or not you’re a parent, you’ll find this episode enlightening and beneficial. As Tim says, we all gain from a culture that values children. Today’s Guests: Tim Carney is a senior fellow at the American Enterprise Institute, the senior columnist for the Washington Examiner, and the author of four books, most recently Alienated America and the forthcoming Family Unfriendly. He has written in the New York Times, Washington Post, Wall Street Journal, Atlantic, National Review, and many other newspapers and magazines. Tim has appeared on CNN, FOX News, MSNBC, CNBC, and PBS Newshour. Tim and his wife Katie raise six children in the Washington, D.C., area. “The Bulletin” is a production of Christianity Today Executive Producer: Erik Petrik Producer: Clarissa Moll and Matt Stevens Associate Producer: McKenzie Hill and Raed Gilliam Editing and Mix: TJ Hester Music: Dan Phelps Show Design: Bryan Todd Graphic Design: Amy Jones Social Media: Kate Lucky Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

This week on The Bulletin, our hosts explore why third party candidates appeal to voters, how the pro-life movement became so hypocritical, and what amazes us about Beyonce’s new chart-topping album. Hosts Mike Cosper and editor in chief Russell Moore talk with CT’s political correspondent Harvest Prude, New York Times columnist David French, CT’s chief impact officer Nicole Martin, and Nashville songwriter and producer Charlie Peacock as they dive deep beneath the headlines to the stories that are shaping our world. Resources Referenced: Some Evangelicals Want a Third-Party Option, Even Without a Chance at Winning | News & Reporting | Christianity Today The Gospel of Life: Evangelium Vitae: John Paul II Today’s Guests: Harvest Prude is a CT’s national political correspondent and a congressional reporter based in Washington, D.C. She is a former reporter for The Dispatch and WORLD, having served there as political reporter for their Washington bureau. David French is a columnist for the New York Times. He’s a former senior editor of The Dispatch. He’s the author most recently of Divided We Fall: America's Secession Threat and How to Restore Our Nation. Charlie Peacock, born Charles William Ashworth in Yuba City, California is a Nashville-based, 4x Grammy® Award-winning, multi-format jazz and pop recording artist, composer and record producer. Peacock’s production credits range from Chris Cornell and Ladysmith Black Mambazo to AAA and Americana successes such as The Lone Bellow, Holly Williams, The Civil Wars, Ben Rector and Brett Dennen. Nicole Martin serves Christianity Today as chief impact officer after serving on its board of directors. Nicole oversees three major strategic initiatives that are shaping the future of CT including The Global Initiative, the Big Tent Initiative, and the Next Gen Initiative. “The Bulletin” is a production of Christianity Today Executive Producer: Erik Petrik Producer: Clarissa Moll and Matt Stevens Associate Producer: McKenzie Hill and Raed Gilliam Editing and Mix: TJ Hester Music: Dan Phelps Show Design: Bryan Todd Graphic Design: Amy Jones Social Media: Kate Lucky Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Iran’s intentions, the implications for other global conflicts, and the necessity of a strategic and supportive American response. In this special episode of The Bulletin, hosts Mike Cosper and editor in chief Russell Moore talk with former Congressman Adam Kinzinger about Iran’s missile attack on Israel over the past weekend. Today’s Guest: Adam Kinzinger served in the U.S. House of Representatives from 2011 to 2023. A member of the Republican Party, Kinzinger originally represented Illinois's 11th congressional district and later Illinois's 16th congressional district. After President Donald Trump was defeated in the 2020 presidential election, Kinzinger became known for his vocal opposition to Trump's claims of voter fraud and attempts to overturn the results. Kinzinger served in the U.S. Air Force, flying missions in Iraq, Afghanistan, South America, and Guam. He has served in the Air Force Special Operations Command, Air Combat Command, Air Mobility Command, and Wisconsin Air National Guard. He is presently a lieutenant colonel in the Air National Guard and founder of CountryFirst. “The Bulletin” is a production of Christianity Today Executive Producer: Erik Petrik Producer: Clarissa Moll and Matt Stevens Associate Producer: McKenzie Hill and Raed Gilliam Editing and Mix: TJ Hester Music: Dan Phelps Show Design: Bryan Todd Graphic Design: Amy Jones Social Media: Kate Lucky Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

What's making rural America so angry? And why do Christians seem to hold their tongues when it comes to sports gambling? Mike, Nicole, and guest host Bob Smietana converse about the new bestselling book White Rural Rage with guest Mike Waddey, former pastor of a town of just 88 people. Mike Cosper shares his own story about the temptations of sports betting, and producer Clarissa Moll joins Cosper and Dr. Kris Bauman, former Trump administration Israel adviser for the National Security Council, to talk about the current slowdown in the Israel-Gaza war and Israel’s complicated path forward. This week’s guests: Bob Smietana is an award-winning religion reporter and editor who has spent two decades producing breaking news, data journalism, investigative reporting, profiles, and features for magazines, newspapers, trade publications, and websites. Most notably, he has served as a senior writer for Facts & Trends, senior editor of Christianity Today, religion writer at The Tennessean, correspondent for Religion News Service, and contributor to OnFaith, USA TODAY, and The Washington Post. He is best known for his coverage of evangelical Christianity, end-time cat worshipers, and the human side of religion. Mike Waddey has pastored in two small, rural communities over the past 20 years. He is the former mayor of Cottage Grove, the smallest incorporated town in the state of Tennessee (88 people), a position he held while also serving there as pastor. Mike holds a DMin from the Robert Webber Institute for Worship Studies and is a proud husband and father of six children and grandfather of two. Kris A. Bauman, Ph.D., Colonel (ret.) USAF is the Brent Scowcroft Professor of National Security Studies at the United States Air Force Academy where he teaches American Foreign and National Security Policy, and Middle Eastern Politics. Col. Bauman previously served at the White House on the National Security Council as Director for Israeli, Palestinian, Jordanian and Egyptian Affairs. “The Bulletin” is a production of Christianity Today Executive Producer: Erik Petrik Producer: Clarissa Moll and Matt Stevens Associate Producer: McKenzie Hill and Raed Gilliam Editing and Mix: TJ Hester Music: Dan Phelps Show Design: Bryan Todd Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

This week on The Bulletin, a law professor takes us to school to learn about Christian civility, Mike and Russell discuss the contentious U.S. Congress, and Bernie Sanders proposes a 4-day work week. Hosts Mike Cosper and editor in chief Russell Moore are joined by Washington University professor John Inazu, CT chief impact officer Nicole Martin, and chief investment officer David Bahnsen of The Bahnsen Group for lively conversation about this week’s headlines and current events. Fans of FX’s The Bear will appreciate this week’s Ritchie reference! This week’s guests: John Inazu is the Sally D. Danforth Distinguished Professor of Law and Religion at Washington University in St. Louis.His latest book is Learning to Disagree: The Surprising Path to Navigating Differences with Empathy and Respect (Zondervan, 2024). Nicole Martin serves Christianity Today as chief impact officer after serving on its board of directors. Nicole oversees three major strategic initiatives that are shaping the future of CT including The Global Initiative, the Big Tent Initiative, and the Next Gen Initiative. David L. Bahnsen is the founder, Managing Partner, and Chief Investment Officer of The Bahnsen Group, a bi-coastal private wealth management group with offices in Newport Beach, CA and New York City, managing over $5.3 billion in client assets. David is a frequent guest on CNBC, Bloomberg, and Fox Business and is a regular contributor to National Review and Forbes. He is the author of Full-Time: Work and the Meaning of Life. “The Bulletin” is a production of Christianity Today Executive Producer: Erik Petrik Producer: Clarissa Moll and Matt Stevens Associate Producer: McKenzie Hill and Raed Gilliam Editing and Mix: TJ Hester Music: Dan Phelps Show Design: Bryan Todd Graphic Design: Amy Jones Social Media: Kate Lucky Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

This week on The Bulletin, hosts Russell Moore and Mike Cosper talk with Tom Nichols of The Atlantic about theatrics on the world stage -- Donald Trump’s promise to pardon rioters from the January 6 attacks on the Capitol and Vladimir Putin’s response to the recent terrorist attack in Moscow. With his characteristic wit, Nichols helps listeners navigate the confusing messages politicians send and, with the hosts, clarifies the call of Christian witness. Producer Clarissa Moll talks to Mike and Russell about the bridge collapse in Baltimore and how Christians can resist indifference to the news. Finally, Mike and Russell remember the 10th anniversary of Mars Hill Church’s closure and reflect on the dangers of nostalgia. This week’s guests: Tom Nichols is a staff writer at The Atlantic and an author of the Atlantic Daily newsletter. He is a professor emeritus of national-security affairs at the U.S. Naval War College, where he taught for 25 years, and an instructor at the Harvard Extension School. He has served as a legislative aide in the Massachusetts House and the U.S. Senate. He writes about international security, nuclear weapons, Russia, and the challenges to democracy in the United States and around the world—along with occasional contrarian views on popular culture. His books include The Death of Expertise and Our Own Worst Enemy: The Assault From Within on Modern Democracy. He is also a five-time undefeated Jeopardy champion. “The Bulletin” is a production of Christianity Today Executive Producer: Erik Petrik Producer: Clarissa Moll and Matt Stevens Associate Producer: McKenzie Hill and Raed Gilliam Editing and Mix: TJ Hester Music: Dan Phelps Show Design: Bryan Todd Graphic Design: Amy Jones Social Media: Kate Lucky Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

This week on The Bulletin, hosts Russell Moore and Nicole Martin are joined by New York Times columnist David French to talk about the growing crisis in Gaza and Russia’s recent re-election of Vladimir Putiin. With so much suffering and conflict in the world, how do we determine who is truly responsible and how do we create a way forward? Theologian David Taylor stops by to talk about the book of Psalms in seasons of conflict, how lament offers us language for the suffering we see around us and how regular engagement with the psalms can shape us into people who persevere with hope, regardless of what the headlines are. Take our listener survey and let us know what you think of the show. Visit MoreCT.com/Bulletin. This week’s guests: David French is a columnist for the New York Times. He’s a former senior editor of The Dispatch. He’s the author most recently of Divided We Fall: America's Secession Threat and How to Restore Our Nation. David Taylor is a theologian, author, speaker, priest, and director of initiatives in art and faith. A professor at Fuller Theological Seminary, he has lectured widely on the arts, from Thailand to South Africa. He has written for The Washington Post, Image Journal, Theology Today, Worship, Religion News Service, Christianity Today, and Books & Culture, among others. He is the author of Open and Unafraid: The Psalms as a Guide to Life. lives in Austin with his wife Phaedra, a visual artist and gardener, and his daughter Blythe and son Sebastian. “The Bulletin” is a production of Christianity Today Executive Producer: Erik Petrik Producer: Clarissa Moll and Matt Stevens Associate Producer: McKenzie Hill Editing and Mix: TJ Hester Music: Dan Phelps Show Design: Bryan Todd Graphic Design: Amy Jones Social Media: Kate Lucky Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices