Life & Faith

In a world obsessed with success, plenty of us feel a compulsive need to achieve.

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We tell ourselves - and our kids - to try hard and never give up, for this is the secret to success. But by the time young people finish school, many students find it hard not to link their efforts and abilities with their identity and their self-worth with their achievements. 

CPXer Justine Toh’s book Achievement Addiction calls out our fraught relationship with success. In this episode, we talk about tiger parenting and its fixation on academic accomplishment and how meritocratic ideas associating success with effort imply that our wins and failures are always deserved. We also discuss other social cues showing the value we place on achievement - like the way former Australian Federal Treasurer Joe Hockey once described Australia as a nation of “lifters, not leaners” which distinguishes between those who contribute to the public purse and those who take from it. 

We also talk to Julia, a Sydney-based cardiologist, who wouldn’t describe herself as an achievement addict but who found herself striving for significance. She lets us in on what might be found on the other side of achievement. 

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Explore:

Justine Toh’s Achievement Addiction and other titles in the Re:CONSIDERING series.

Amy Chua’s Battle Hymn of the Tiger Mother

Michael J. Sandel’s The Tyranny of Merit: What’s Become of the Common Good

Journalist Greg Sheridan makes a compelling case for reading the Bible book by book and finding within those pages a Jesus as intriguing as he is attractive and compelling.   

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When journalist Greg Sheridan outed himself as Christian with his book “God is Good for You”, a friend challenged him to follow it up with something that would illuminate the living Jesus of the gospels. That was enough for Greg to commit to a couple of years soaking in the New Testament in search of a way to explain the Christian story to a people largely estranged from it. 

The result is Christians: The Urgent Case for Jesus in Our world.

Sheridan says of his reading of the Bible, “ ... it's so gripping. It's so immediate, it's so visceral … there's also a tremendous power to it”. Here is his attempt to convey something of that power, and he does so with a disarming honesty and wide-eyed enthusiasm. His aim is to point people to the life-giving words of Jesus and his early followers and the way that message continues to enthrall, challenge and inspire today.   

In this episode of Life & Faith Simon Smart speaks with Greg about the book, why he wrote it and the people who come to life within it.

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Christians: The Urgent Case for Jesus in our world by Greg Sheridan

Life & Faith marks a milestone, and gets a bit nostalgic. 

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This week is the 400th episode of Life & Faith! 

In this episode, Simon Smart, Justine Toh, and Natasha Moore get together (remotely) to swap stories of their favourite episodes, tech fails, meeting their heroes, and memorable surprises over the years of making the podcast. They also manage to cajole producer Allan Dowthwaite, the man who makes everything at CPX work, out from his preferred spot behind the scenes to answer a few questions in front of the microphone.

Join the team on a trip down memory lane with the ghost of episodes past, and enjoy Tim Winton making a joke at his own expense, Justine reflecting on spiritual seekers, Simon and Al recalling the least amount of prep time they ever had for an interview, Natasha admitting the most intimidating person she’s ever interviewed, and the novelist Christos Tsiolkas offering a powerful distillation of what Christianity (a faith he does not share) is all about.

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Episodes referenced in this episode: 

Hope Is Violent

Misadventures in Wellness

Murder Most Popular 

An Empty Plate

An Evangelical Election

Out of the Fishbowl 

He Had a Dream

Fear Is a Useless Thing

Wrestling Paul

80 years on, Life & Faith charts the ripple effects of a much-loved book.

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“I got out a yellow pad, cause I’m a lawyer, and I would have two columns – there is a God, there isn’t a God; Jesus Christ is God, he isn’t God – I went down that, and I went through the whole rational process and I thought to myself wow … I’ve never gone into a courtroom and argued against a mind like this.”

On Wednesday 6 August 1941, a relatively unknown Oxford don fronted up to a microphone at the BBC in London to give the first of a series of talks that would evolve into what is probably one of the most influential books of the 20th century - one which continues to have ripple effects well into the 21st.

C. S. Lewis spoke to his fellow citizens, during a time of crisis and hardship, about the nature of reality, morality, human nature, God, and the meaning of life. Later he referred to his account of what he believed as “mere” Christianity - the faith that has been common to Christians everywhere and at all times, explained in ways that stirred people’s imaginations and satisfied their intellectual curiosity.

Mere Christianity has only grown in popularity, decade after decade, and in this episode of Life & Faith Simon and Natasha hear from a number of people who have loved this book and would even say that it changed their lives. 

John Lennox - like Lewis, an Oxford don and Northern Irishman - describes what it was like to hear Lewis speak in the flesh. Nixon’s “hatchet man”, Chuck Colson, who famously became a Christian just before going to prison over his role in Watergate and devoted his life to prison reform and ministry until his death in 2012, tells his story of transformation. And three young Aussies describe their own encounters with this still compelling book, 80 years on from its first incarnation.

“‘A young man who wishes to remain a sound atheist cannot be too careful of his reading.’ So yeah, I wasn’t very careful. And let this happen … thank God.” 

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Explore: 

The surviving recording of C. S. Lewis’ original broadcast talks 

Chuck Colson, “How God Turned Around Nixon’s Hatchet Man” 

George Marsden, C. S. Lewis’s Mere Christianity: A Biography 

You’re 30 and feeling meh about life. Bridie Jabour, The Guardian’s opinion editor, knows your pain.

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On New Year’s Day, 2020, Bridie Jabour, The Guardian’s opinion editor, published a column about millennial malaise: being in your 30s and somewhat dissatisfied with your situation in life. 

She’d attended a few dinners where women around her age were facing varied challenges: relationship breakdown, fertility issues, being a parent, starting a new job. Though everyone’s situation was unique, “they all seemed to be kind of melancholy and questioning it all,” Bridie said.

Bridie’s column sampled some of the experiences of her generation. It went viral overnight, racking up 600,000 views in a normally sleepy summer period. She received interview requests from New York, India, South America, as well as country Queensland. 

She seemed to have touched a nerve for millennials facing a unique set of economic and social circumstances: precarious work, delay in having children, soaring house prices putting home ownership out of reach for many.

But even aside from the challenges facing this particular generation of young people, Bridie recognises that what she’s describing is a “good old-fashioned existential crisis”. 

This interview covers Bridie’s take on work and the endless pressure to be productive, the spiritual lives of millennials, the question of whether or not to have children, why being wry is a millennial thing, and longing for meaning in a world where meaning, like everything else in life, is complicated.

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Explore:

Bridie Jabour’s book Trivial Grievances: On the Contradictions, Myths, and Misery of Your 30s

The wrestle with busyness, productivity, balance, and tech easily becomes the story of our lives.

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“I don't like work-life balance. I think that it implies that work is a different thing from life. And I think that if we're doing work right, it's a part of life.”

Dr Jenny George cares deeply about people’s well-being at work. She is CEO of Converge International, which provides Employee Assistance Programs among other things. 

And Daniel Sih, as a productivity coach, pastor, and former physiotherapist, is all about helping busy people make space in their lives. He’s the author of Spacemaker: How to Unplug, Unwind and Think Clearly in the Digital Age.

Work/life balance, digital Sabbath, tech addiction, time management, working from home, inbox zero … these things have a profound impact on how we experience our lives day-to-day. Join Simon Smart and Natasha Moore for a conversation about what mental and spiritual health looks like in our high-pressure, hyperconnected moment.

“Actually we'll never get everything done, we'll never read everything we can do, we'll never be the perfect mum or perfect dad, or get through every episode of Netflix that we want to watch. It'll never happen in the digital age, and so that pausing allows us to say, ‘I'm enough, and it's enough, and mess is ok. Let's enjoy today.’”

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Check out Daniel Sih’s Spacemaker: How to Unplug, Unwind and Think Clearly in the Digital Age

Find out more about Converge International

Michael Wear talks about faith, politics and having Barack Obama as a boss. 

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Michael Wear worked in the Obama White House for 3 ½ years in the office of Faith Based and Neighbourhood Partnerships before heading out and leading religious outreach on President Obama’s re-election campaign in 2012 and then directed religious affairs for the president’s second inaugural.

He is an expert on the place of faith in public life, and maintains a hopefulness that Christianity still has a deep well of resources to bring to bear on the pressing challenges of contemporary life--even being a unifying force. Michael is an optimist and believes the resources of Christian faith can be, not just a private belief system, but in fact a significant contributor to the common good.

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Michael’s book about this period of his life is Reclaiming Hope: Lessons Learned in the Obama White House about the Future of Faith in America.

The plight of the Tamil family from Biloela makes us ask: could we do refugee politics differently?

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The story of the medical evacuation of four-year-old Tharnicaa Murugappan to a Perth hospital from detention on Christmas Island has struck a nerve in the Australian community. Tharnicaa, her sister Kopika, and their parents Priya and Nades are facing deportation to Sri Lanka after Priya and Nades were found not to be genuine refugees. 

The family’s plight has shone a spotlight on Australia’s deliberately harsh policies of detaining asylum seekers. But their former community in Biloela, central Queensland, is campaigning that the family be allowed to stay in Australia. Politicians and personalities from across the political spectrum have also joined the cause. It seems that this Tamil family are helping Australians reimagine the kind of welcome the nation might offer to vulnerable people. 

This Refugee Week, we bring you an interview with Mark and Luke Glanville, two brothers who’ve written a book called Refuge Reimagined: Biblical Kinship in Global Politics. 

Mark is an Associate Professor of Pastoral Theology at Regent College in Vancouver, and pastored a church in East Vancouver that welcomed refugees to be part of a community called Kinbrace. Luke is an Associate Professor in the Department of International Relations at Australian National University.

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Explore:

Refuge Reimagined: Biblical Kinship and Global Politics

The community of Kinbrace

The plight of the Tamil family from Biloela makes us ask: could we do refugee politics differently?

------

The story of the medical evacuation of four-year-old Tharnicaa Murugappan to a Perth hospital from detention on Christmas Island has struck a nerve in the Australian community. Tharnicaa, her sister Kopika, and their parents Priya and Nades are facing deportation to Sri Lanka after Priya and Nades were found not to be genuine refugees. 

The family’s plight has shone a spotlight on Australia’s deliberately harsh policies of detaining asylum seekers. But their former community in Biloela, central Queensland, is campaigning that the family be allowed to stay in Australia. Politicians and personalities from across the political spectrum have also joined the cause. It seems that this Tamil family are helping Australians reimagine the kind of welcome the nation might offer to vulnerable people. 

This Refugee Week, we bring you an interview with Mark and Luke Glanville, two brothers who’ve written a book called Refuge Reimagined: Biblical Kinship in Global Politics. 

Mark is an Associate Professor of Pastoral Theology at Regent College in Vancouver, and pastored a church in East Vancouver that welcomed refugees to be part of a community called Kinbrace. Luke is an Associate Professor in the Department of International Relations at Australian National University.

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Explore:

Refuge Reimagined: Biblical Kinship and Global Politics

The community of Kinbrace

How do you raise kids who see the world’s problems, and believe they can do something about it?

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“I guess I'm concerned that kids are becoming depressed and overwhelmed by the big problems that they see in the world. And I think if we just leave it at that, they will grow up with a worldview that says, ‘The world's a wreck. There's nothing I can do in it. I might as well just watch Netflix.’ Whereas I think if we give kids an opportunity to respond to the problems in the world when they're young, they will develop a worldview that says, ‘Oh, there's a problem in the world. There's something I can do about that.’”

Susy Lee has a background in psychology, theology, aid and development, peace and conflict, children’s and family ministry, and … computer science. Across her various jobs and studies, she’s been preoccupied with the question: how do you make the world better? 

She’s convinced that how we parent has an awful lot to do with it. In her new book, Raising Kids Who Care: Practical conversations for exploring stuff that matters, together, Susy has built a handbook for family discussions on everything from consumerism to how to listen well, conflict resolution to porn, world poverty and climate change to finding your purpose in life. 

In this episode of Life & Faith, she explains how her own family background and experience has shaped her, and offers a model for parents and others to help kids encounter the tricky realities of life in ways that are hopeful, and might just change the world.

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Buy a copy of Raising Kids Who Care: Practical conversations for exploring stuff that matters, together https://www.amazon.com.au/Raising-Kids-Who-Care-conversations-ebook/dp/B0971FTPXR/