Episode 103: Ethics, Morality, and America with Ojo Taylor

In April of 2017 I had a long conversation about my journey out of Christianity with Steve Hackman that ended up in two installments of his fantastic podcast series, Beyond the Pale. We recently had a follow-up conversation that went beyond those basics – pretty far beyond.

Steve brought up some pretty heavy topics at the intersection of faith, politics and morals. It’d be tempting to frame this conversation in terms of current American events, but from the U.S. to the protests in Hong Kong where Steve and his wife Tammy live, to Brexit in the U.K. and elections in other parts of the world, It’s clearly a much broader, global set of dynamics. We only just barely scratch the surface of course, but Steve is a thoughtful and insightful guy and approaches everything in terms of the real impact on others and how his faith informs that end.

Steve identifies as a Christian, but as he says in this episode he often feels more at home with non-dogmatic, compassionate pilgrims of other belief systems including unbelievers. He’s had other guests on his program who have also left the faith, including his brother Andrew who has also been a guest contributor on my blog.

And for the love of all that is good, please don’t miss the first 20 minutes where Steve and Tammy talk about how they think about living their beliefs (although Tammy is currently deconstructing too) and talk about a recent example where Tammy was only hours from being an organ donor to an anonymous little girl, a segment worthy of its own show. (Listen below or on Steve’s site, or download it all on iTunes or Stitcher.)

Episode Index:
1:13- “(Intro) Steve & Tammy discuss how to love people radically even when its hard
 21:47- Talk with Ojo Taylor begins
 22:22- When your country goes off the rails
 32:28- How Ojo’s friends have reacted to his “de-conversion”
 37:06- Evolving beyond the “Volcano god”
 40:01- Should we fear or embrace “secularisation?”
 53: 30- Ethics & Sin
 1:07:19- Some hope for America
 1:16:32- When Christian musicians lose their prophetic voice

As always, thank you for listening!