I spent the weekend of Nov. 3-4 at The Lifetime of Ministry Conference at Covenant Theological Seminary in St Louis, Mo.
The conference was structured around Carl Trueman’s 2020 book The Rise and Triumph of the Modern Self[1]. Trueman and CTS Systematic Theology Professor Robbie Griggs were the keynote speakers. Griggs added insights into how technology affects our understanding of the self.
I read Trueman’s book, slowly, in 2020-2021, appreciating its timeliness in explaining the rise of LGBT ideology, with a particular emphasis on transgenderism.[2] As Trueman says, his goal is not to lament or even primarily to offer solutions to this noticeable difference in worldview from a previous generation. His goal is explaining why we are where we are, and then to briefly, humbly suggest how we as Christians might respond.
For the remainder of this article, I want to offer 20 thought-provoking quotes from the conference, some from Trueman (CT), some from Griggs (RG), with a few disclaimers:
- I wrote my notes on my iPad with a bit less precision than I did during my journalism days when I would check my written notes against a recording.
- I assume my notes and context are accurate, but if anyone stumbles across this who attended the conference and thinks I have a quote or its context wrong, I would welcome feedback in the comments section or private correspondence.
With, 20 Quotes from The Lifetime of Ministry Conference about how to minister to the Modern Self:
1. What does it say about culture if that comment (“I am a woman trapped in a man’s body.”) is widely accepted? It says biology and body have lost authority, and feelings have gained authority. – CT
2. It’s important to realize there is not one cause to this problem. And therefore there’s no one solution. … The circumstances of today are a long time in the making. Bruce Jenner didn’t transform anything. He was a culmination.[3] – CT
3. This isn’t a result of arguments. (Mentions Charles Taylor and his phrase ‘social imaginary’ – widely-accepted arguments in culture.) … Intuition forms morality more than we think. Intuition forms worldview, too. Many people who hold views on gay marriage do so because of the TV show Will and Grace. – CT
4. The greatest American theologian (Jonathan Edwards) was actually British. – CT
a. MG: This was Trueman, a Brit who’s resided in the USA for a long time, just having some fun. Our largely American audience laughed. After all, Edwards died in 1758, before the Declaration of Independence.
5. (Explaining Expressive Individualism) The real me is my inner feelings, and authenticity is acting out on those inner feelings. … I was trained (as a British man) to be inauthentic, reserved, part of the team. That’s very inexpressive. – CT
6. Freud made his arguments in scientific idioms at a time when scientific idiom carried a lot of weight. By making every stage of human existence about sexual desire, he made sexual desire the essence of what it is to be human. Sex is what we are, not what we do. – CT[4]
7. Technologies aren’t neutral. They carry ideology. – RG
8. Computers tell us that learning is about information capture, not meaning making. The digital default is to consume info quickly, but it makes us feel adrift, because information can’t replace relationships. – RG
9. Relationships are inefficient. If you don’t want your congregation to view your ministry as merely information, then our digital means of ministry needs to be secondary to all the other ministry that we do. – RG[5]
10. Real relationships are slow, messy, inefficient, and they are irreplaceable. – RG
11. We’re sense-making creatures. We ask, ‘Why?’ – RG
12. We need to help others limit the information they take in, and we need to first love our neighbors locally, not globally. – RG
13. We need to recover what it means to be human. – CT
14. What we need to do (in response to the sexual revolution) goes beyond arguments. – CT
15. The rise in the psychological self[6] has led to a downgrade in the importance of the body. … The gospel (as expressed in the Apostles’ Creed) ends with the resurrection of the body, not just forgiveness of sins. – CT
16. The body is embodied. Sex is important. The sexed body is important. – CT
17. Transhumanism is the belief that technology will allow us to transcend the human form. Transgenderism is a subset of Transhumanism. – CT[7]
18. In a mobile society, we should cover the big bases of theology in 12 months, like the Heidelberg Catechism does. … We should preach regularly on the body, anthropology, the image of God, and embodied issues. – CT
19. Digital environments extend personal presence, but they don’t replace personal presence. – RG
20. It’s a common experience to feel out of place in your body as a young person, to feel out of place with your peers. Digital mediation doesn’t help this. – RG
Do those quotes (that small bit of information) accurately convey the fullness of the conference? Of course they don’t. See quote 8 for a short explanation of why. But I hope that at least whets your appetite and maybe encourages you to read one of the books mentioned already. I’d recommend starting with Strange New World, and if I come across a book from this topic by Dr. Griggs, I’ll pass that on, too. I purchased, but haven’t read yet, a copy of The Tech-Wise Family by Andy Crouch in light of several things that Dr. Griggs said.
In all this, I hope it helps us minister to modern selves, the selves around us and our-self, as well.
-Pastor Matt, 11-22-23
[1] Full subtitle: Cultural Amensia, Expressive Individualism, and the Road to the Sexual Revolution. It’s not an easy read (400+ pages and lots of primary-source footnotes), but it’s a good, rewarding read.
[2] My wife and I recently read his shorter version (approximately 180 pages) of the same book - Strange New World: How Thinkers and Activists Redefined Identity and Sparked the Sexual Revolution.
[3] Olympic gold medalist Bruce Jenner now identifies as Caetlyn Jenner. I think Trueman called him “Bruce,” and while that usage might be controversial, controversy is not my goal, and I don’t think it was Trueman’s, either.
[4] This may be obvious, but I’ll repeat it to avoid confusion – Trueman is not stating agreement with Freud. He’s merely explaining his logic and its effects and how contemporary people (even those who reject most of what Freud taught) agree and live accordingly.
[5] This is definitely a paraphrase, and I hope I’ve represented it well.
[6] What’s the psychological self? See quotes 1 and 5 above for a better idea, but the short version might be that the psychological self is one that defines itself less by biology, observable realities, and external authorities and more by inner feelings.
[7] This is part of a larger discussion in Trueman’s books that intersects with thoughts like the following: How technology has enabled advances in personhood that dehumanize us, how Transgender ideology is actually unraveling the LGBTQ political alliance from within.