From the Book of Numbers to the storming of the Capitol, Andrew L. Whitehead joins us today to discuss Christian Nationalism and its impact on American religion. His new book, with co-author Samuel Perry, offers a seminal sociological study for understanding this new movement, including the various ways Christian Nationalists think, vote, and manifest their desires for a renewed Christian America.  

To learn more about the work that Andrew is doing, check out his bio, his new book, and follow him on Twitter at @ndrewwhitehead.

 

Finally . . . join us this October in San Antonio for the CLS National Conference. This year's event will feature Lee Strobel, Ruth Okediji, James K.A. Smith, and Laudir Lugo. Register today.

 

[This episode has been produced by Josh Deng. Music comes from Vexento.]

Volume 4 of "Small Brains on Big Books" features Drew Nelson and Mike Schutt discussing Beowulf. You'll love this discussion, even if you didn't love Beowulf in High School. 

Andrew Nelson is preacher at Southside Church of Christ in Mount Pleasant Texas, and Mike Schutt is the host of Cross and Gavel audio, Executive Director of Worldview Academy, and Clinical Associate Professor at Trinity Law School.

Join host Mike Schutt, Law Student Ministries Communications Coordinator Joan McElveen, Pepperdine 3L Reed Bartley, and law student leaders from other law schools across the country, as they share and discuss virtual meetings that work. 

Listen in on excerpts from our first-ever national Law Student Leaders' Summit, featuring an introduction to Law Student Ministries, an overview of Christian Legal Society's four ministries, an exhortation on the calling of the leader, and some questions and sharing by campus leaders from all over the country. 

On Wednesday, September 9, the Department of Education announced a new rule that will protect religious groups meeting on public university campuses. Kim Colby, the director of the Center for Law and Religious Freedom at Christian Legal Society, lays out why the regulation was necessary, and what it will mean for students. 

The Department's announcement is here. 

Join Drew Nelson and Mike Schutt as they discuss the insights and admonitions of Rod Dreher‘s 2017 The Benedict Option. The book has been widely discussed, and rightly so, in Christian circles since its publication, and, as Drew and Mike discuss, Dreher’s challenge to the Church to be the Church is a welcome one, regardless of the relative dangers of secular culture. Yet the book’s insights on that score are helpful, too, and Drew and Mike highlight Dreher's key insights on politics, education, and technology as they relate to his main thesis.

Andrew Nelson is preacher at Southside Church of Christ in Mount Pleasant Texas, and Mike Schutt is the host of Cross and gavel audio, the director of Christian Legal Society’s Law Student Ministries, and Clinical Associate Professor at Trinity Law School.

Kim Colby and Reed Smith of the Center for Law and Religious Freedom unpack the troubling Supreme Court decision in Bostock v. Clayton County, Georgia, handed down June 15. Justice Gorsuch seems to abandon his vaunted "textualism" in favor of a convoluted "literalism" with disastrous results. This is part three of three episodes discussing the important Supreme Court decisions of the last three weeks. 

Between June 15 and June 30, 2020, the US Supreme Court handed down three significant decisions of critical interest to religious conservatives. Colby and Smith join host Mike Schutt to discuss each case. Their conversation is divided into three episodes, one for each case. 

Episode 92 features Kim Colby on Espinoza v. Montana Dept of Revenue, episode 93 focuses on June Medical Services v. Russo with Reed Smith, and episode 94 unpacks Bostock v. Clayton County, GA, a particularly troubling case on the meaning of the word "sex" in Title VII. 

Kim Colby is Director of the Christian Legal Society'sCenter for Law and Religious Freedom, and Reed Smith is the Center's Director of Litigation.

Between June 15 and June 30, 2020, the US Supreme Court handed down three significant decisions of critical interest to religious conservatives. Kim Colby and Reed Smith, attorneys at the Center for Law & Religious Freedom, join host Mike Schutt to discuss each case. Their conversation is divided into three episodes, one for each case. 

Episode 92 features Kim Colby on Espinoza v. Montana Dept of Revenue, episode 93 focuses on June Medical Services v. Russo with Reed Smith, and episode 94 unpacks Bostock v. Clayton County, GA. 

Kim Colby is Director of the Christian Legal Society'sCenter for Law and Religious Freedom, and Reed Smith is the Center's Director of Litigation. 

Between June 15 and June 30, 2020, the US Supreme Court handed down three significant decisions of critical interest to religious conservatives. Kim Colby and Reed Smith, attorneys at the Center for Law & Religious Freedom, join host Mike Schutt to discuss each case. Their conversation is divided into three episodes, one for each case. 

Episode 92 features Kim Colby on Espinoza v. Montana Dept of Revenue, episode 93 focuses on June Medical Services v. Russo with Reed Smith, and episode 94 unpacks Bostock v. Clayton County, GA. 

Kim Colby is Director of the Christian Legal Society's Center for Law and Religious Freedom, and Reed Smith is the Center's Director of Litigation. 

Dr. Drew Trotter, executive director of the Consortium of Christian Study Centers, is a film critic who understands the role that movies play in shaping us as a society. His lecture, The Movies and America: What the Nominees for Best Picture Tell Us About Ourselves, is an annual favorite around the country. 

In this episode, Dr. Trotter sits down with host Mike Schutt to discuss the nominees for best picture. They discuss how we love our neighbors through watching movies, how to better understand what we watch, and the issue of difficult or graphic content in today's movies. They also consider what these nominees might tell us about ourselves. 

Drew Trotter is the Executive Director of the Consortium of Christian Study Centers. He was for twenty-two years the Executive Director and President of the Center for Christian Study in Charlottesville, VA. Drew has written on film and popular culture for over thirty years in such publications as Books & Culture, Christianity Today and Critique, and in the field of Biblical studies. For over twenty years, he has presented a seminar entitled Show and Tell: How to View a Movie Responsibly, helping laypeople and students in churches, Christian college and secular university environments understand this powerful medium and how to think about its influence both on the individual and the society. He has taught seminars on popular culture, university education in America today, a Biblical model of discipleship and how to interpret the Scriptures. Drew has three sons, two daughters-in-law and six grandchildren and lives with his wife of forty-five years, Marie, in Charlottesville, VA. 

Mike Schutt is host of the Cross & Gavel Podcast. He is Clinical Associate Professor at Trinity Law School, Director of the Institute for Christian Legal Studies, and director of Law Student Ministries at Christian Legal Society. He is the editor in chief of the Journal of Christian Legal Thought and director of the CLS Law School Fellows program. 

Pastor Mark Bertrand has turned to the Psalms for his sermon texts during the global pandemic, and he joins Mike Schutt to discuss insights and encouragement from this rich source. You'll be encouraged as Mark explores how the "Songbook of the Church" speaks to us about lessons in crisis, sources of hope in trial, and the joys inherent in the life of faith.

J. Mark Bertrand is the pastor of Grace Presbyterian Church in Sioux Falls, South Dakota. He is also a novelist and author, and he teaches on the Worldview Academy faculty. His crime noir works are Back on Murder, Pattern of Wounds,and Nothing to Hide. His book [Re]Thinking Worldview: Learning to Think, Live, and Speak in this World (Crossway 2007) is a great primer on Christian thought and action. He blogs at the world-renowned Bible Design Blog, sharing thoughts and photos on a multitude of design issues.

His real claim to fame is that he was interviewed by Ken Myers on Mars Hill Audio Journal, volume 90, which also features Mike Schutt discussing Redeeming Law. 

Mark was also a guest on Episode 46 of Cross & Gavel, one of the most popular episodes in the podcast's history. More recently, he joined Mike to discuss the "New Moralism" in Episode 70 and law and government on Episode 73. 

Cross and Gavel is a project of Trinity Law School and Christian Legal Society.

Host Mike Schutt again welcomes East Texas preacher Drew Nelson to the podcast to discuss The Odyssey, Homer's ancient epic poem about . . . well, wait. What is it about? 

Mike and Drew explore that question and more-- including why good Christians should read good pagan literature and why you might like The Odyssey-- as they highlight its major themes and give some background to the poem. Their hope is that a couple of regular guys reading big books might encourage other regular folks to do the same.   

Drew Nelson is preacher at Southside Church of Christ in Mount Pleasant, TX, and Mike Schutt is host of the Cross & Gavel podcast, director of Christian Legal Society's Law Student Ministries, and Clinical Associate Professor at Trinity Law School.

Cross & Gavel is a project of Trinity Law and CLS.

Greg Rummel, President and CEO of Rummel Agency in Frankenmuth, Michigan, has a word of encouragement for us in this global pandemic: God's got this, too.

Listen in as Greg shares with host Mike Schutt how battling cancer helped hm to think well about living in difficult times-- and to focus on what is really important. You'll be encouraged!

Cross & Gavel podcast is a project of Christian Legal Society and Trinity Law School. 

   

"The efficiency brought by new forms of technology has just made us demand more of one another," says Myron Steeves, dean of Trinity Law School. "Our important innovations sometimes give us the opposite of what we desire."

In this episode, Dean Steeves and Mike Schutt explore the topic of technology and the tyranny of time. If advances in technology and greater efficiency in our lives don't make us better people all by themselves, why do we keep chasing them as ends in and of themselves? Is too much of a good thing still good? Join the conversation as they ask these questions and others! 

Cross & Gavel is a project of Trinity Law School and Christian Legal Society. 

Carl Caton is the founder and president of the San Antonio Marriage Initiative, a ministry focused on bringing help and hope to the city of San Antonio. Carl and his team, in partnership with volunteers around Texas, seek to network, equip, and mobilize the local church community to strengthen marriages in the city.

One of the organization's key strategies is to "identify best practices and resources" and to "collaborate with like-minded individuals who will deploy that knowledge throughout the local faith community." This, amazingly, includes the family law community. 

Listen in as Carl describes a vision for the family that includes reliance on the expertise of lawyers, judges, and others invested in the family law system. Carl also sees the need to minister to and encourage those attorneys and judges in the system, who see, day after day, the toll taken divorce and custody battles. His compassion for the legal professionals runs deep in his own history, and listeners will be inspired by his wisdom for those seeking to do redemptive work in this field. Carl Caton's message is a message of hope and redemption in a troubled world and profession. 

For more information on the San Antonio Marriage Initiative, visit their website. 

Mike Schutt is host of Cross & Gavel and is Clinical Associate Professor at Trinity Law School and director of Law Student Ministries for Christian Legal Society. 

Join host Mike Schutt as he welcomes local preacher Drew Nelson to the podcast to talk about the classic "On the Incarnation," by Saint Athanasius, 4th Century Bishop of Alexandria. 

As a young man, Athanasius attended the Council of Nicea and spent the rest of his life standing firm against the Arian heresy that remained popular, despite its condemnation by Nicea. 

On the Incarnation is a wide-ranging apologetic regarding the eternal Son of God taking on flesh to reveal the Father and save humanity. 

Drew and Mike read the book with their Wednesday morning men's group, and they report on their impressions. 

Drew Nelson in preacher at Southside Church of Christ in Mount Pleasant, TX, and Mike Schutt is host of the Cross & Gavel podcast, director of Christian Legal Society's Law Student Ministries, and Clinical Associate Professor at Trinity Law School.

Cross & Gavel is a project of Trinity Law and CLS.  

The CLS Law School Fellows program is designed to build a community of scholars around the topics of professional formation, vocational stewardship, and Christian jurisprudence. Each year, CLS gathers a group of students in Washington, DC for an intense week of lectures, mentoring, discussion, and fellowship. CLS pays the expenses of accepted candidates. 

In this episode of Cross & Gavel, Fellows Founding Director Mike Schutt discusses the program with CLS CEO David Nammo, Trinity Law School Dean and Fellows faculty member Myron Steeves, and two 2018 Fellows, Ronia Dubbaneh and Paulina Belovarski, who are both attorneys. 

For more information on the Fellows program, visit the website. Rising 1Ls and 2Ls should apply before midnight on March 1!

Cross & Gavel Audio is a cooperative project of Christian Legal Society and Trinity Law School. 

The Department of Education has proposed new regulations that are open for comment by the general public. Two sections of the new regulations are designed to protect religious student groups from being singled out and denied benefits because of their religious identity. 

Kim Colby, Director of the Center for Law and Religious Freedom at Christian Legal Society, summarizes the proposed regs and why they are needed. She also suggests that those who are in support of these regs should take action to comment in support of their final adoption.

Here are the regulations Kim addresses on the podcast:

Proposed regulation 34 CFR § 75.500(d) (§ 76.500(d) is essentially verbatim):

“A public institution shall not deny to a religious student organization at the public institution any right, benefit, or privilege that is otherwise afforded to other student organizations at the public institution (including full access to the facilities of the public institution and official recognition of the organization by the public institution) because of the beliefs, practices, policies, speech, membership standards, or leadership standards of the religious student organization.” 

The Center for Law and Religious Freedom has a guide to the regs and tips on how to comment at CLSReligiousFreedom.org/CampusComments. Here are the basic steps on how to submit a comment on or before February 18:

1. Go to https://www.regulations.gov/document?D=ED-2019-OPE-0080-0001  (You are at the right place if the title is “Uniform Administrative Requirements, Cost Principles, and Audit Requirements for Federal Awards, Direct Grant Programs, State-Administered Formula Grant   Programs, Developing Hispanic-Serving Institutions Program, and Strengthening Institutions Program” and the ID No. is ED-2019-OPE-0080-0001.)
2. In the upper right hand of the page, press “Comment Now.”
3. Write your comment in the large blank space in the middle of the page (up to 5000 characters).
4. At the top of your comment, type ID: ED-2019-OPE-0080-0001.
5. If your comment is a document longer than 5000 characters or you want to include an attachment, type in the blank space, “I support the Department’s proposed regulations 34 CFR § 75.500(d) and § 76.500(d) for the reasons given in the attached comment” and upload the longer document or other attachment below the large blank space.
6. Fill in your first and last name (or initial). Note that your name will appear on the public website.
7. Hit “continue” to go to the next page.
8. Check the small box indicating that you “have read and understand the statement.
9. Hit “submit comment.”

Cross & Gavel Audio is a cooperative ministry of Christian Legal Society and Trinity Law School. Mike Schutt is director of CLS Law Student Ministries and the Institute for Christian Legal Studies. He is a Clinical Associate Professor at Trinity Law. 

Law professor Jeff Brauch argues that our beliefs about human nature will drive our politics, our policy, and our culture. In his recent book, Flawed Perfection: What It Means to Be Human and Why It Matters for Culture, Politics, and Law (2017), he lays out a compelling case for the importance of an accurate understanding of human nature.

He begins with the idea that our fundamental presuppositions about the nature of human beings will drive how we approach almost anything in the public sphere. From there, he provides examples from the fields of human rights, criminal justice, and bioethics, to name a few. 

Join Professor Brauch, Executive Director of Regent Law School's Center for Global Justice, Human Rights, and the Rule of Law, as he and host Mike Schutt discuss this important topic. 

Professor Brauch joined the Regent Law faculty in 1994 and served as dean from 1999-2015. He has taught Christian Foundations of Law, International Human Rights, Civil Liberties and National Security, Torts, Negotiations, International Criminal Law and other courses.

Prior to teaching, Brauch served as a law clerk for Justice William Callow of the Wisconsin Supreme Court and then worked five years as an associate with Milwaukee law firm Quarles & Brady, where he specialized in commercial litigation.

Cross and Gavel is a project of the Institute for Christian Legal Studies, a cooperative ministry of Regent University School or Law and Christian Legal Society, founded eighteen years ago through the collaboration of Dean Brauch and CLS in the work of Cross & Gavel host Mike Schutt. 

Pick up a copy of Flawed Perfection from our friends Byron and Beth Borger at Hearts & Minds Bookstore. 

On the 80th episode of Cross & Gavel, August Huckabee, economics professor at Worldview at the Abbey in Colorado, returns ("Feel the Bern," Ep. 52) to discuss cultural trends and countermeasures in these strange times.

August teaches students at the Abbey, directs TeenPact programs around the country, and lectures at Worldview Academy. Host Mike Schutt asks him about trends he is seeing in this generation and what educators and parents might do to cultivate both courage and grace in the face of the challenges facing people of faith as they both engage and create culture.

Join the conversation and pass it on to friends! You'll be encouraged and edified by the conversation. 

If you'd like to learn more about Worldview Academy or Worldview at the Abbey, follow the links. 

Here are some of the books Huck and Mike discuss on this episode. Visit our friends at Hearts & Minds Books to order:

• F.A. Hayek, The Road to Serfdom
• Burton W. Folsom, The Myth of the Robber Barons
• Milton Friedman, Capitalism and Freedom

Cross & Gavel is a project of Regent University School of Law and Christian Legal Society. 

This week, the Supreme Court of the United States decided Masterpiece Cakeshop v. Colorado Civil Rights Commission, holding that the Commission's "clear and impermissible hostility toward" religious beliefs violated the First Amendment of the US Constitution. Already, commentators dispute the breadth and lasting import of the Court's 7-2 holding on narrow legal grounds. 

In this episode, Mike Schutt talks with Kim Colby about these questions. Kim is Director of Christian Legal Society's Center for Law & Religious Freedom, an expert in First Amendment law and a long-time friend of religious freedom. 

Listen in as the discuss what the case held, why, and what the holding may mean for future cases. Also learn what Constitutional lawyers mean by GVR. 

Kim Colby is the director of Christian Legal Society’s Center for Law and Religious Freedom , where she has worked since graduating from Harvard Law School in 1981. She has represented religious groups in several appellate cases, including two cases heard by the United
States Supreme Court. She has filed numerous amicus briefs in federal and state courts. Ms. Colby has prepared several CLS publications addressing issues about religious expression in public schools, including released time programs, implementation of the Equal Access 

 

Act, and teachers’ religious expression.

Visit the Center's website for resources on its first amendment work. 

Cross & Gavel is a production of Regent University School of Law and Christian Legal Society. 

Episode 78 is Part 2 of our conversation about three Academy Award-nominated films, and it focuses on Call Me By Your Name, a romanticization of predatory sexual relationship. It's visual beauty hides the reality behind the relationship at the heart of the story and the deadly message that sexual experience is the defining element of our lives. 

Dr. Trotter and Mike Schutt discuss this film and its themes, and they wander into topics of movie-going, thoughtful criticism, and Christian worldview on the way. While the conversation is rated PG-16, you'll be edified by their approach to this movie and films in general. 

Drew Trotter is the Executive Director of the Consortium of ChristianStudy Centers. He was for twenty-two years the Executive Director and President of the Center for Christian Study in Charlottesville, VA. Drew has written on film and popular culture for over thirty years in such publications as Books & Culture, Christianity Today and Critique, and in the field of Biblical studies. For over twenty years, he has presented a seminar entitled Show and Tell: How to View a Movie Responsibly, helping laypeople and students in churches, Christian college and secular university environments understand this powerful medium and how to think about its influence both on the individual and the society. He has taught seminars on popular culture, university education in America today, a Biblical model of discipleship and how to interpret the Scriptures. Drew has three sons, two daughters-in-law and six grandchildren and lives with his wife of forty-four years, Marie, in Charlottesville, VA. 

Mike Schutt is host of the Cross & Gavel Podcast. He is Associate Professor at Regent University School of Law, Director of the Institute for Christian Legal Studies, and director of Law Student Ministries at Christian Legal Society. He is the editor in chief of the Journal of Christian Legal Thought and director of the CLS Law School Fellows program. 

Dr. Drew Trotter, executive director of the Consortium of Christian Study Centers, is a film critic who understands the role that movies play in shaping us as a society. His lecture, The Movies and America: What the Nominees for Best Picture Tell Us About Ourselves, is an annual favorite around the country. 

In this episode, Dr. Trotter sits down with host Mike Schutt to discuss three of the nominees, including the winner for best picture. In Part one, they discuss Guillermo del Toro's The Shape of Water and Greta Gerwig's Ladybird. 

Drew Trotter is the Executive Director of the Consortium of ChristianStudy Centers. He was for twenty-two years the Executive Director and President of the Center for Christian Study in Charlottesville, VA. Drew has written on film and popular culture for over thirty years in such publications as Books & Culture, Christianity Today and Critique, and in the field of Biblical studies. For over twenty years, he has presented a seminar entitled Show and Tell: How to View a Movie Responsibly, helping laypeople and students in churches, Christian college and secular university environments understand this powerful medium and how to think about its influence both on the individual and the society. He has taught seminars on popular culture, university education in America today, a Biblical model of discipleship and how to interpret the Scriptures. Drew has three sons, two daughters-in-law and six grandchildren and lives with his wife of forty-four years, Marie, in Charlottesville, VA. 

Mike Schutt is host of the Cross & Gavel Podcast. He is Associate Professor at Regent University School of Law, Director of the Institute for Christian Legal Studies, and director of Law Student Ministries at Christian Legal Society. He is the editor in chief of the Journal of Christian Legal Thought and director of the CLS Law School Fellows program. 

 

In August 2016, the American Bar Association, seeking to impose a "cultural shift" on the legal profession and change how lawyers think about gender and marriage, amended Model Rule of Professional Responsibility 8.4. The rule has no legal force-- it simply suggests a "model" from the ABA for states to follow in their ethics codes-- until a particular state adopts it. Yet the Model Rules are influential, followed by many states as a matter of course. 

The current rule-- the rule that ABA Model Rule 8.4(g) would amend-- combats invidious discrimination and disciplines lawyers who corrupt the legal process through bias and prejudice in the course of representing a client.

The proposed rule would expand the conduct for which lawyers could be disciplined to any "conduct related to the practice of law," which is defined to include "interacting with witnesses, coworkers, court personnel, lawyers and others while engaged in the practice of law; operating or managing a law firm or practice; and participating in bar association, business or social activities in connection with the practice of law." 

In addition to this expansive reach into employment law and social activities, the rule does away with the requirement that the words or conduct that could be censured are "prejudicial to the administration of justice." Under the proposed rule, a mere "offense" given by words or conduct could subject a lawyer to a grievance, even though it has nothing to do with protecting clients, the court, or justice. 

It's a bad idea. And it is a threat to religious liberty and lawyers' autonomy. 

Host Mike Schutt, who taught Professional Responsibility as a Regent Law professor is joined by Kim Colby to discuss the rule and its implications. 

Kim Colby is the director of Christian Legal Society’s Center for Law and Religious Freedom , where she has worked since graduating from Harvard Law School in 1981. She has represented religious groups in several appellate cases, including two cases heard by the United States Supreme Court. She has filed numerous amicus briefs in federal and state courts. Ms. Colby has prepared several CLS publications addressing issues about religious expression in public schools, including released time programs, implementation of the Equal Access Act, and teachers’ religious expression.

For more resources on this rule-- including videos explaining the issues and critical scholarship-- visit the Christian Legal Society 8.4 Resources page. 

Cross & Gavel is a production of Regent University School of Law and the Christian Legal Society.