Trinity Forum Conversations

By The Trinity ForumSociety & Culture Religion & Spirituality Christianity

Favorites
90
Followers
Typical duration
49 min
per episode

Based on Podcast App listening data

Trinity Forum Conversations episodes

October 17, 2023 Healing a Divided Culture with Arthur Brooks
Healing a Divided Culture with Arthur Brooks
In his book, Love Your Enemies best-selling author, thought leader, and professor Arthur Brooks blends cutting-edge behavioral research and ancient wisdom to offer a better way to bridge divides and mend relationships.

In March of 2022, The Trinity Forum hosted an Evening Conversation with Brooks to help us explore just how to love those we disagree with and be agents of redemption and reconciliation amidst a divisive time. Arthur unpacked several of the strategies necessary to overcome such cleavages and restore harmony, and the moral courage required:
“We often hear today, in our culture of activism and anger, that real courage is standing up to the people with whom you disagree, sticking it to the people with whom you disagree publicly. That's moral courage.
That's wrong. That is maybe a perfectly fine thing to do. You should stand up and say the things that you believe. But that's not moral courage.
You know what moral courage is? My father taught me this as a kid. Moral courage is standing up for the people with whom you disagree. Standing up to the people with whom you agree on behalf of those with whom you disagree. That's moral courage”.- Arthur Brooks
We hope this conversation kindles in you a deeper affection for your neighbors, and a greater desire to see the divisions in our communities and our nation be healed.

This podcast is an edited version of an evening conversation recorded in 2022. Watch the full video of the conversation here. Learn more about Arthur Brooks.

Authors and books mentioned in the conversation:
Love your Enemies, by Arthur Brooks
Strength to Strength: Finding Success, Happiness, and Deep Purpose in the Second Half of Life, by Arthur Brooks
Arthur Schopenhauer
John and Julie Gottman
Dalai Lama

Related Trinity Forum Readings:
City of God by St. Augustine of Hippo
Children of Light and Children of Darkness by Reinhold Niebuhr

Related Conversations:
Rebuilding our Common Life with Yuval Levin
The Challenge of Christian Nationalism with Mark Noll and Vincent Bacote
The Decadent Society with Ross Douthat
Science, Faith, Trust and Truth with Francis Collins
Beyond Ideology with Peter Kreeft and Eugene Rivers
Justice, Mercy, and Overcoming Racial Division with Claude Alexander and Mac Pier
Healing a Divided Culture with Arthur Brooks
After Babel with Andy Crouch and Johnathan Haidt
Trust, Truth, and The Knowledge Crisis with Bonnie Kristian
Hope in an Age of Anxiety with Curtis Chang & Curt Thompson

To listen to this or any of our episodes in full, visit ttf.org/podcast and to join the Trinity Forum Society and help make content like this possible, join the Trinity Forum Society

Special thanks to Ned Bustard for our podcast artwork.
51 min
October 03, 2023 Justice, Mercy, and Overcoming Racial Division
Justice, Mercy, and Overcoming Racial Division with Claude Alexander and Mac Pier

A recent Gallup poll found that over 70% of Americans are both worried about and deeply dissatisfied with the racial tensions and divisions in the country. And yet when those numbers are broken down, you’ll find that around a third of white Americans consider a race to be a significant problem in the country, compared to around three quarters of African Americans and nearly 60% of Latinos.

Given these differences both in perception as well as the many differences of opinion that are embedded in it, how do we understand and live out the biblical mandate to love our neighbor? How do we learn to know and love our neighbor across difference?

Dr. Mac Pier and Bishop Claude Alexander join our podcast to help us think deeply about our various spheres and stations and how through intention and vulnerability, we can begin to heal divides, overcome injustice, and create new places of mercy and flourishing:

“It's really important for those of us that have had opportunities to really think about what is our role in making things right…and in God's commitment to that. And just as God met our need for justice on the cross, he invites us to meet the need for justice in community with one another.” - Mac Pier

We hope this conversation inspires you to deepen your commitment to being an agent of reconciliation right where you are. Because as Dr. Pier shares, it’s a “radically powerful thing when we become enveloped relationally and affectionately by people that are different from ourselves.”

This podcast is an edited version of an online conversation recorded in November of 2021. Get a full transcript and watch a video of the conversation here. Learn more about Bishop Alexander and Dr. Pier.

Authors and books mentioned in the conversation:
Required: God’s Call to Justice, Mercy, and Humility to Overcome Racial Division, by Bishop Claude Alexander and Dr. Mac Pier
Necessary Christianity: What Jesus Shows We Must Be and Do, by Claude Alexander
A Disruptive Gospel: Stories and Strategies for Transforming Your City, by Mac Pier
A Disruptive Generosity: Stories of Transforming Cities through Strategic Giving, by Mac Pier
A Disruptive God: Encounter Psalm 23 and Discover God's Purpose For You, by Mac Pier

Related Trinity Forum Readings:
A Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass
City of God by St. Augustine of Hippo
Children of Light and Children of Darkness by Reinhold Niebuhr
Letter from a Birmingham Jail by Rev. Martin Luther King Jr.
Long Walk to Freedom by Nelson Mandela

Related Conversations:
Rebuilding our Common Life with Yuval Levin
The Challenge of Christian Nationalism with Mark Noll and Vincent Bacote
The Decadent Society with Ross Douthat
Science, Faith, Trust and Truth with Francis Collins
Beyond Ideology with Peter Kreeft and Eugene Rivers
Justice, Mercy, and Overcoming Racial Division with Claude Alexander and Mac Pier
Healing a Divided Culture with Arthur Brooks
After Babel with Andy Crouch and Johnathan Haidt
Trust, Truth, and The Knowledge Crisis with Bonnie Kristian
Hope in an Age of Anxiety with Curtis Chang & Curt Thompson

To listen to this or any of our episodes in full, visit ttf.org/podcast and to join the Trinity Forum Society and help make content like this possible, join the Trinity Forum Society
Special thanks to Ned Bustard for our podcast artwork.
32 min
September 19, 2023 Beyond Ideology with Peter Kreeft and Eugene Rivers
What is ideology? What are the consequences of an era when seemingly every human issue is viewed through an ideological lens?

In October of 2021, the Trinity Forum and Comment magazine partnered for an evening conversation to explore precisely these questions. Cherie Harder and Anne Snyder moderated a conversation with philosopher Peter Kreeft and Rev. Eugene Rivers to unpack the nature and implications of ideology’s reign in our present culture — both what it’s doing to our intellectual vitality as a society, but perhaps more urgently, what it’s doing to our civic and organizational life across sectors and geography:

“So from a Christian point of view, what's the most important and first thing we must do in order to save Western culture or Western civilization?...Well, I think the first answer is stop idolizing it. Stop making the salvation of Western civilization your summum bonum, your final end, and religion a means to it. Religion is not a means to politics.” - Peter Kreeft

This wide ranging conversation takes on the spiritual dimensions of our ideological age, and centers our hope not in politics, but squarely in the love of God in Christ. Dr. Kreeft and Rev. Rivers call us back to the first things, asking us to look afresh at our political commitments, and to see the image of God in the face of our neighbor.

This podcast is an edited version of an evening conversation recorded in 2021. Get a full transcript and watch a video of the conversation here. Learn more about Dr. Peter Kreeft and Rev. Eugene Rivers.

Authors and books mentioned in the conversation:
Christianity for Modern Pagans, by Peter Kreeft
Three Philosophies of Life, by Peter Kreeft
Suma of the Suma, by Peter Kreeft
If Einstein Had Been a Surfer, by Peter Kreeft
The Philosophy of Jesus, by Peter Kreeft
Doors in the Walls of the World, by Peter Kreeft
Socrates
Elizabeth Anscombe
The Screwtape Letters, by C.S. Lewis
Donald Williams
The Dust of Death, by OS Guinness
Frantz Fanon
Martin Luther King, Jr.
Abraham Heschel
The End of Ideology, by Daniel Bell
Exodus and Revolution, by Michael Walzer
Francis Schaeffer
Carl F. Henry
James Boyce
John J. DiIulio
Achieving our Country, by Richard Rorty
St. Augustine
Billy Graham
Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn

Related Trinity Forum Readings:
A Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass
City of God by St. Augustine of Hippo
Children of Light and Children of Darkness by Reinhold Niebuhr
Letter from a Birmingham Jail by Rev. Martin Luther King Jr.
Brave New World, by Alduous Huxley

Related Conversations:
Rebuilding our Common Life with Yuval Levin
The Challenge of Christian Nationalism with Mark Noll and Vincent Bacote
The Decadent Society with Ross Douthat
Science, Faith, Trust and Truth with Francis Collins
Beyond Ideology with Peter Kreeft and Eugene Rivers
Justice, Mercy, and Overcoming Racial Division with Claude Alexander and Mac Pier
Healing a Divided Culture with Arthur Brooks
After Babel with Andy Crouch and Johnathan Haidt
Trust, Truth, and The Knowledge Crisis with Bonnie Kristian
Hope in an Age of Anxiety with Curtis Chang & Curt Thompson

To listen to this or any of our episodes in full, visit ttf.org/podcast and to join the Trinity Forum Society and help make content like this possible, join the Trinity Forum Society

Special thanks to Ned Bustard for our podcast artwork.
48 min
September 05, 2023 The Decadent Society with Ross Douthat
Decadence isn’t a word most of us use on a daily basis, and yet author and columnist Ross Douthat believes that it perfectly captures the state of a largely stagnant and sclerotic American culture.
In his book, The Decadent Society, Douthat explores both the meaning of decadence and the trajectory that led us there. But in addition to diagnosing our state of cultural stagnation, he points with great hope toward societal renewal:

“I think the escape from decadence is probably a dynamic thing where technology, politics, and religion are all sort of operating together, but it's hard to imagine it happening without a really strong religious element within it.” - Ross Douthat

This conversation is being released for the first time as part of our podcast series on the Challenges of Modernity, and we hope you’ll both enjoy it and that it provokes you to consider those paths toward societal renewal that give Douthat hope.

This podcast is an edited version of a conversation recorded in 2020. Learn more about Ross Douthat.

Authors and books mentioned in the conversation:
The Decadent Society: How we Became Victims of our Own Success, by Ross Douthat
From Dawn to Decadence: 1500 to the Present: 500 Years of Western Cultural Life, by Jacques Barzun
Hatchet, by Gary Paulsen
Steven Pinker
Brave New World, by Alduous Huxley
Robert Gordon
Karl Marx
Rod Dreher
Rob Bell
James Pike
Pope Francis
Peter Thiel
Martin Luther
Ignatius of Loyola
Watership Down by Richard Adams
The Great Gatsby, F. Scott Fitzgerald

Related Trinity Forum Readings:
A Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass
City of God by St. Augustine of Hippo
Children of Light and Children of Darkness by Reinhold Niebuhr
Letter from a Birmingham Jail by Rev. Martin Luther King Jr.
Brave New World, by Alduous Huxley

Related Conversations:
Rebuilding our Common Life with Yuval Levin
The Challenge of Christian Nationalism with Mark Noll and Vincent Bacote
The Decadent Society with Ross Douthat
Science, Faith, Trust and Truth with Francis Collins
Beyond Ideology with Peter Kreeft and Eugene Rivers
Justice, Mercy, and Overcoming Racial Division with Claude Alexander and Mac Pier
Healing a Divided Culture with Arthur Brooks
After Babel with Andy Crouch and Johnathan Haidt
Trust, Truth, and The Knowledge Crisis with Bonnie Kristian
Hope in an Age of Anxiety with Curtis Chang & Curt Thompson

To listen to this or any of our episodes in full, visit ttf.org/podcast and to join the Trinity Forum Society and help make content like this possible, join the Trinity Forum Society

Special thanks to Ned Bustard for our podcast artwork.
48 min
August 22, 2023 The Challenge of Christian Nationalism with Mark Noll and Vincent Bacote
The Challenge of Christian Nationalism with Mark Noll and Vincent Bacote

As the lines between faith, politics, and patriotism have become, in some quarters, increasingly blurred, it is increasingly important to understand the origin, ideas, and consequences of Christian Nationalism — what it means, why it matters, and how best to respond.
“Responsible Christian patriots try to show how Christianity can be a service to the nation; extreme nationalists make Christianity a servant of the nation.” - Mark Noll
“If you think about the cross: patriotism, rightly construed from a Christian point of view, will put the flag at the foot of the cross. Christian nationalism wants to drape the [flag] over them. So is God serving your country, the sponsor of your country, or are you, as a Christian, operating wherever you are and having loyalty, but not your primary loyalty to your country over God?” - Vincent Bacote
We hope you find this conversation insightful and helpful as you consider the state of our culture and shared political life, and your role in reviving responsible Christian patriotism.
This podcast is an edited version of an Online Conversation recorded in June of 2021. You can access the full conversation with transcript here. Learn more about Mark Noll and Vincent Bacote.

Authors and books mentioned in the conversation:
The Scandal of the Evangelical Mind by Mark Noll
God and Race in American Politics: A Short History, by Mark Noll
The Civil War as Theological Crisis, by Mark Noll
In the Beginning Was the Word: The Bible in American Public Life, by Mark Noll
The Political Disciple, A Theology of Public Life, by Vincent Bacote
Reckoning with Race and Performing the Good News, by Vincent Bacote
The Spirit in Public Theology: Appropriating the legacy of Abraham Kuyper, by Vincent Bacote

Related Trinity Forum Readings:
A Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass
City of God by St. Augustine of Hippo
Children of Light and Children of Darkness by Reinhold Niebuhr
Letter from a Birmingham Jail by Rev. Martin Luther King Jr.

Related Conversations:
Rebuilding our Common Life with Yuval Levin
The Challenge of Christian Nationalism with Mark Noll and Vincent Bacote
The Decadent Society with Ross Douthat
Science, Faith, Trust and Truth with Francis Collins
Beyond Ideology with Peter Kreeft and Eugene Rivers
Justice, Mercy, and Overcoming Racial Division with Claude Alexander and Mac Pier
Healing a Divided Culture with Arthur Brooks
After Babel with Andy Crouch and Johnathan Haidt
Trust, Truth, and The Knowledge Crisis with Bonnie Kristian
Hope in an Age of Anxiety with Curtis Chang & Curt Thompson

To listen to this or any of our episodes in full, visit ttf.org/podcast and to join the Trinity Forum Society and help make content like this possible, join the Trinity Forum Society

Special thanks to Ned Bustard for our podcast artwork.
42 min
August 08, 2023 Rebuilding our Common Life with Yuval Levin
Rebuilding our Common life with Yuval Levin
One of the greatest problems in our civic life is that our institutions are weak. And they're weak not merely because they are distrusted by outsiders, but because their leaders fail to take their institution-building responsibilities seriously. Rather than submitting to the responsibilities and constraints that any functioning institution imposes, those leaders have come to use the institution as a personal platform to gain attention and express themselves.

On our podcast, Yuval Levin explains how institutions have historically served to connect, mediate, and structure much of our social interaction, but as they’ve been hollowed out from within, they’ve lost their sense of authority and are no longer able to serve a morally formative purpose:
“A lot of people are using institutions as platforms to express themselves in the culture war, rather than as molds that might form us into better men and women. And that contributes enormously to that loss of confidence and also to the broader social crisis that we're all living with.” - Yuval Levin
We hope this conversation inspires you to look afresh at the institutions you lead or of which you are a part, and ask, “what is my responsibility here?” Please share it with a friend and other institution builders you know.
This podcast is an edited version of an Online Conversation with Yuval recorded in November of 2020. You can access the full conversation with transcript here. Learn more about Yuval Levin.

Authors and books mentioned in the conversation:
A Time to Build: From Family and Community to Congress and the Campus, How Recommitting to Our Institutions Can Revive the American Dream, by Yuval Levin
Rabbi Johnathan Sacks

Related Conversations:
Rebuilding our Common Life with Yuval Levin
The Challenge of Christian Nationalism with Mark Noll and Vincent Bacote
The Decadent Society with Ross Douthat
Science, Faith, Trust and Truth with Francis Collins
Beyond Ideology with Peter Kreeft and Eugene Rivers
Justice, Mercy, and Overcoming Racial Division with Claude Alexander and Mac Pier
Healing a Divided Culture with Arthur Brooks
After Babel with Andy Crouch and Johnathan Haidt
Trust, Truth, and The Knowledge Crisis with Bonnie Kristian
Hope in an Age of Anxiety with Curtis Chang & Curt Thompson

To listen to this or any of our episodes in full, visit ttf.org/podcast and to join the Trinity Forum Society and help make content like this possible, join the Trinity Forum Society

Special thanks to Ned Bustard for our podcast artwork.
32 min
July 25, 2023 All the Lonely People with Ryan Streeter and Francie Broghammer
All the Lonely People with Ryan Streeter and Francie Broghammer
Why is it, in the midst of relative peace and prosperity, we are increasingly alienated, lonely, and depressed? Even before we lived through a global pandemic, we were (and are) living through a deadly loneliness epidemic.

In this conversation Ryan Streeter and Francie Broghammer join us to wrestle with tough questions such as how to think about reinvigorating relational and community ties that encourage the flourishing of both the individual and the body politic.

We discuss the antidotes to isolation in a time of pandemic and strive to find hope for connecting lonely people in a divided and polarized nation:
Loneliness is the subjective feeling of being alone. You can feel alone in a crowded room. And so this is important that we highlight because what happens when you start feeling that way is that not far from there is this inability to find meaning in your life and daily actions. - Francie Broghammer
We hope this conversation on America’s epidemic of loneliness and the path towards meaningful connection inspires you to consider how you can further cultivate enduring friendships and engage with your community.

Our podcast is an edited version of an Online Conversation with Ryan and Francie from April, 2021. You can access the full conversation with transcript here.
Learn more about Ryan Streeter and Francie Broghammer.

Authors and books mentioned in the conversation:
Transforming Charity, by Ryan Streeter
Religion and the Public Sphere in the 21st Century, by Ryan Streeter
The Soul of Civil Society, by Ryan Streeter
The Pursuit of Loneliness, by Philip Slater
The Lonely Crowd, by David Riesman
Bowling Alone, by Robert Putnam
Arthur Brooks
George Orwell
Yuval Levin
Alexis de Tocqueville

Related Trinity Forum Readings:
On Happiness, by Thomas Aquinas
On Friendship, by Cicero
Man’s Search for Meaning, by Viktor Frankl
Augustine’s Confessions
The Long Loneliness, by Dorothy Day
Wrestling with God, by Simone Weil

Related Conversations:
Strength in the Second Half with Arthur Brooks
Cultivating a Life of Learning with Zena Hitz
Being, Living, and Dying Well with Lydia Dugdale
Hope, Heartbreak, and Meaning with Kate Bowler
The Burden of Living and the and the Goodness of God with Alan Noble
All the Lonely People with Ryan Streeter and Francie Broghammer

To listen to this or any of our episodes in full, visit ttf.org/podcast and to join the Trinity Forum Society and help make content like this possible, join the Trinity Forum Society

Special thanks to Ned Bustard for our podcast artwork.
39 min
July 11, 2023 The Burden of Living and the Goodness of God with Alan Noble
The Burden of Living and the Goodness of God with Alan Noble
We don’t often talk about the courage required to face ordinary life. Such common human challenges as sorrow, despair, anxiety, and mental illness may cause us to experience life more as a burden than a gift. For many, this struggle is a constant one.

In his new book, On Getting Out of Bed: The Burden & Gift of Living, author and professor Alan Noble considers the challenges that face each one of us every morning. He concludes that the simple decision to engage with the world each day constitutes a declaration of the goodness of God.
“One of the things I want to remind people of is that actually just by choosing to go through the basic motions of life, you are affirming to other people that this life is good.
“And just putting your feet on the ground and getting up despite the suffering you might be experiencing, communicates to other people that this life is worth living even when you are suffering. And that's a powerful witness.”

Bearing witness and Carrying Each Other
As Alan so eloquently makes the case, our call to faithfulness is not a solo journey. When we persevere despite our suffering, we communicate that God’s creation is good, and it’s an encouragement to others. It's by carrying and being carried by others that the pilgrim can make it home.
“Now, there may come times when you are required by your suffering to radically depend upon others to carry you out of bed. My advice is to embrace those moments, knowing that you'll carry your neighbor in return when the time comes.”
We hope you’ll enjoy this conversation and share it with your community.
This podcast is an edited version of an Online Conversation with Alan recorded in April of 2023. You can access the full conversation with transcript here. Learn more about Alan Noble.

Authors and books mentioned in the conversation:
On Getting Out of Bed: The Burden & Gift of Living, by Alan Noble
Disruptive Witness: Speaking Truth in a Distracted Age, by Alan Noble
You Are Not Your Own: Belonging to God in an Inhuman World, by Alan Noble
Jacques Ellul
The Soul of Shame: Retelling the Stories We Believe About Ourselves, by Curt Thompson
Related Trinity Forum Readings:
On Happiness, by Thomas Aquinas
On Friendship, by Cicero
Man’s Search for Meaning, by Viktor Frankl
Augustine’s Confessions
The Long Loneliness, by Dorothy Day
Wrestling with God, by Simone Weil
Tale of Two Cities, by Charles Dickens
Related Conversations:
Strength in the Second Half with Arthur Brooks
Cultivating a Life of Learning with Zena Hitz
Being, Living, and Dying Well with Lydia Dugdale
Blessings for Imperfect Days with Kate Bowler
The Burden of Living and the and the Goodness of God with Alan Noble
All the Lonely People with Ryan Streeter and Francie Broghammer
To listen to this or any of our episodes in full, visit ttf.org/podcast and to join the Trinity Forum Society and help make content like this possible, join the Trinity Forum Society

Special thanks to Ned Bustard for our podcast artwork.
32 min
June 27, 2023 Blessings for Imperfect Days with Kate Bowler
The Blessing of Imperfect Days with Kate Bowler
It’s easy to be caught in the trap of perfectionism, especially when those around us seem to have it all together. But we can find ourselves alone and discouraged when things don’t go as we’ve planned, and the lives we actually have fail to resemble those we’d hoped to lead.

In her recently released book The Lives We Actually Lead, New York Times best-selling author and Duke University professor Kate Bowler (along with co-author Jessica Richie) offer a collection of blessings that center gratitude and hope while acknowledging the reality of our often messy and frantic everyday lives. They show how embracing our limitations and vulnerabilities, as well as those of others, can open new possibilities for healing, hope, and community.
Finitude, Gratitude, and Being of Help
In this conversation, Kate shares about her work detailing the Prosperity Gospel movement from an academic standpoint, and how her own setbacks and health catastrophe in a cancer diagnosis both deepened her sense of being loved by God and softened her toward those desperate for a miracle.
Kate and Cherie's conversation goes through deep waters, but does so with much humor and heart. We hope you'll listen and share it with your friends and loved ones.
This podcast is an edited version of an Evening Conversation with Kate recorded in February of 2023. You can access the full conversation with transcript here. Learn more about Kate Bowler.

Authors and books mentioned in the conversation:
Blessed: A History of the American Prosperity Gospel, by Kate Bowler
The Preacher's Wife: The Precarious Power of Evangelical Women Celebrities, by Kate Bowler
Everything Happens For a Reason: And Other Lies I've Loved, by Kate Bowler
No Cure for Being Human: (And Other Truths I Need to Hear), by Kate Bowler
The Lives We Actually Have: A Hundred Blessings for Imperfect Days, by Kate Bowler and Jessica Richie
Seneca
Joel Osteen
Oprah
Joanna Gaines
Rev. Dr. Stephen B. Chapman
Wendell Berry

Related Trinity Forum Readings:
On Happiness, by Thomas Aquinas
On Friendship, by Cicero
Man’s Search for Meaning, by Viktor Frankl
Augustine’s Confessions
The Long Loneliness, by Dorothy Day
Wrestling with God, by Simone Weil
Tale of Two Cities, by Charles Dickens

Related Conversations:
Strength in the Second Half with Arthur Brooks
Cultivating a Life of Learning with Zena Hitz
Being, Living, and Dying Well with Lydia Dugdale
Hope, Heartbreak, and Meaning with Kate Bowler
The Burden of Living and the and the Goodness of God with Alan Noble
All the Lonely People with Ryan Streeter and Francie Broghammer

To listen to this or any of our episodes in full, visit ttf.org/podcast and to join the Trinity Forum Society and help make content like this possible, join the Trinity Forum Society

Special thanks to Ned Bustard for our podcast artwork.

49 min
June 13, 2023 Being, Living, and Dying Well with Lydia Dugdale
Being, Living, and Dying Well with Lydia Dugdale
In the wake of the Black Plague of the middle ages, people cried out for help to die well. What developed over the ensuing centuries was a work called the Ars Moriendi, a book designed to help Christians die well. In the midst of the global COVID-19 pandemic in 2021 we were joined by professor and physician Lydia Dugdale to discuss her book The Lost Art of Dying Well which explores the wisdom of the Ars Moriendi:
“The Christian theology about death is one of paradox in many ways. Death is overcome. That is what Christians celebrate on Easter Sunday. But death still has a sting. It still is bitter. It hurts, it rips, a hole in the fabric of our lives. And so we hold in tension this idea that death has this sting, but also is ultimately overcome. So we don't need to accept death, but we need to start by acknowledging finitude.”
Acknowledging our Finitude and Call for Community
Over the course of our conversation, Lydia explains how acknowledging our finitude and investing in our community are the two crucial first steps in preparing to die well. And these steps in preparation for a good death ultimately help us to live well too.

We trust you’ll find much to think about and wrestle with in this conversation, and we hope it inspires you to live wisely and well today.

This podcast is an edited version of an Online Conversation with Lydia recorded on Good Friday in April of 2021. You can access the full conversation with transcript here.
Learn more about Lydia Dugdale.

Authors and books mentioned in the conversation:
The Lost Art of Dying: Reviving Forgotten Wisdom, by Lydia Dugdale
This Republic of Suffering: Death and the American Civil War, by Drew Gilpin Faust
Philippe Ariès
A Tale of Two Cities, by Charles Dickens
The Christian Art of Dying: Learning from Jesus, by Allen Verhey
Related Trinity Forum Readings:
On Happiness, by Thomas Aquinas
On Friendship, by Cicero
Man’s Search for Meaning, by Viktor Frankl
Augustine’s Confessions
The Long Loneliness, by Dorothy Day
Wrestling with God, by Simone Weil
Tale of Two Cities, by Charles Dickens
Related Conversations:
Strength in the Second Half with Arthur Brooks
Cultivating a Life of Learning with Zena Hitz
Being, Living, and Dying Well with Lydia Dugdale
Hope, Heartbreak, and Meaning with Kate Bowler
The Burden of Living and the and the Goodness of God with Alan Noble
All the Lonely People with Ryan Streeter and Francie Broghammer
To listen to this or any of our episodes in full, visit ttf.org/podcast and to join the Trinity Forum Society and help make content like this possible, join the Trinity Forum Society

Special thanks to Ned Bustard for our podcast artwork.
29 min

About Trinity Forum Conversations

From the publisher's feed

Trinity Forum Conversations is a podcast exploring the big questions in life by looking to the best of the Christian intellectual tradition and elevating the voices, both ancient and modern, who…