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"Loving Disagreement" with Kathy Khang & Matt Mikalatos · The Weight

• 0:00
  Eddie Rester: I'm Eddie Rester.
• 0:01
  Chris McAlilly: I'm Chris McAlilly. Welcome to The Weight.
• 0:04
  Eddie Rester: Today we have two guests with us who have written a book that's entitled, "Loving Disagreement: Fighting for Community through the Fruit of the Spirit." And the authors are Kathy Khang and Matt Mikalatos.
• 0:15
  Eddie Rester: I think I said that correctly that time.
• 0:20
  Chris McAlilly: I think you got it right. This is a great conversation. There is in the cultural environment that we're in, in the American context, and a lot of times for...
• 0:31
  Eddie Rester: In the church context.
• 0:32
  Eddie Rester: Well, I think a lot of things. We talk about the
• 0:32
  Chris McAlilly: In the church context. There's just disagreement. There are divisions, polarities. And it does feel like we're in a moment where people are kind of moving away from one another, that they've stopped listening to one another, or even that they've stopped wanting to be in gospel, but where they talk about so often the church relationship with one another.
• 0:50
  Chris McAlilly: And this is a conversation with two folks who I think have a desire to model and to encourage folks to stay in relationship slightly longer, and even across pursues conformity, not community. That for me is the disagreement. And they try to model in the book how to do that well. What was your takeaway, Eddie?
• 1:08
  Chris McAlilly: takeaway. The base thing that that Paul shows us, that Jesus shows us, is the power of a loving, Christ-centered community. And too often, we're willing to give that up for the pursuit of a cause or a theological truth, and we abandon one another in that moment. So. I thought it was an incredible conversation.
• 1:44
  Chris McAlilly: Yeah.
• 1:44
  Eddie Rester: It's one that we need right now.
• 1:46
  Chris McAlilly: Yeah, for sure.
• 1:46
  Chris McAlilly: No doubt. One of the things that I heard that I'll take away is that we're not called as Christians to civility. They said civility is not a Christian virtue.
• 1:55
  Eddie Rester: Correct.
• 1:56
  Chris McAlilly: Jesus doesn't call us to politeness. We're called to the fruit of the Spirit: love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, generosity, faithfulness, self control. I think I got them all right from Sunday School.
• 2:06
  Eddie Rester: Pretty much.
• 2:06
  Eddie Rester: [INTRO] Life can be heavy. So heavy, in fact that the way we carry can sometimes cause us to lose hope.
• 2:27
  Eddie Rester: But we've all come across those people in life who seem to be experiencing the same world we live in, except they maintain a great depth of joy and hope.
• 2:36
  Chris McAlilly: A former generation called this gravitas.
• 2:38
  Chris McAlilly: It was their description of a soul that had gained enough weightiness to be attractive, like all things with a gravitational pull.
• 2:47
  Eddie Rester: Those are the people we want to talk to. On this podcast, we talk to pastors, entrepreneurs, artists, mental health experts, and many others.
• 2:57
  Chris McAlilly: We'll create space for heavy topics. But we'll be listening for quality of soul that could be called gravitas.
• 3:04
  Eddie Rester: Welcome to The Weight. [END INTRO] Eddie, man.
• 3:06
  Eddie Rester: We're here today with Kathy Khang and Matt Mikalato... Mikala...
• 3:13
  Matt Mikalatos: You can say it how ever you like, man.
• 3:14
  Chris McAlilly: Dude, we talked to him. Guys, everybody that's listening out there, you just have to know Edie asked the question of Matt. He didn't want to mess it up. He knew that he would. He said, "Matt, how do you pronounce your last name?" And then even having had that conversation before we press record, he screwed it up.
• 3:31
  Matt Mikalatos: Eddie, it's normal. It's a four syllable name. People struggle with it.
• 3:33
  Matt Mikalatos: It's normal. But it's Mikalatos.
• 3:38
  Chris McAlilly: Matt, Matt.
• 3:38
  Chris McAlilly: We're just getting to know one another here. But you can't let Eddie off the hook. You just have to...
• 3:43
  Matt Mikalatos: Oh, no, I can.
• 3:44
  Chris McAlilly: Okay, well, fair enough.
• 3:47
  Matt Mikalatos: I'm the only one that can.
• 3:49
  Kathy Khang: That's because Matt is the nicest one on our podcast. It has been established. He is the nicest one.
• 3:58
  Matt Mikalatos: Yes, I've been crowned via voting and common, yeah, common opinion.
• 4:04
  Eddie Rester: It's good. It's good to have one nice person on the podcast. I'm not really sure who it is on ours. But thank y'all for joining us today.
• 4:10
  Eddie Rester: You've written the book together. I want to get to that in just a minute or two. But give us a little thumbnail sketch, each of you, about who you are, what you do. Both of you have some roots in campus ministry. So just share a little bit about who you are before we get to your book.
• 4:32
  Kathy Khang: So I guess I am the highest pitched voice that y'all will be hearing, and I used to be in campus ministry for about 20 plus years, but currently I am a yoga teacher and a writer and a bit of a wandering soul still trying to find a place to call a church home.
• 4:59
  Eddie Rester: One of your books, a couple of years ago, was"Raise Your Voice." I think a very specific place in life just in understanding. Share just a little bit about that book and what brought you to the place of writing that book.
• 5:14
  Kathy Khang: Sure. That book was really birthed out of probably the 20 plus years of leadership in ministry, and watching, quite frankly, a lot of white leaders, leading in different ways. And finding myself, maybe even gaslighting myself, into believing that my leadership, my voice, my influence, did not necessarily have equal space and equal importance, not just in the culture around us, but broadly, I would say in the kingdom of God. And in those 20 plus years of ministry finally coming to a place, I think at that point, I was in my 40s, saying, "You know what? I have learned a few things. And I still have a lot of questions." And so that is how that book came about, more or less a bit of what I had learned and then offering up questions and opportunities for readers.
• 6:22
  Chris McAlilly: Matt, tell us a little bit about you.
• 6:25
  Matt Mikalatos: Yeah, so much like Kathy, I was in full time Christian ministry, working with college students for about 20 years. And two years ago, actually, two years ago this last month, I made the transition to being a full time writer in Hollywood. So writing on TV, TV and movies, which has been incredibly fun. Just a really great experience. Except for the fact that we're on strike. The Writers Guild is on strike now. Two years ago, I made it as a professional writer. And now it's been four months that we've been, you know, trying to get the studios to talk to us. So that's been interesting. But having been a missionary for 20 years, I was like, four months without money?
• 7:07
  Matt Mikalatos: We can do that. So yeah, yeah.
• 7:11
  Matt Mikalatos: We're still good, our family.
• 7:14
  Chris McAlilly: And how did you guys meet? Because one of the things that you mentioned is that you only recently, you started working together before you met in person. So how did you guys strike up a friendship and then kind of a project together?
• 7:32
  Kathy Khang: Well, we actually met in person in real life for the first time last month to record the audio book. So that was the first time we met in person. We have been talking with each other for how many years?
• 7:50
  Matt Mikalatos: Four years, maybe?
• 7:52
  Matt Mikalatos: Four years.
• 7:52
  Kathy Khang: Four years, question mark?
• 7:53
  Kathy Khang: So Matt and I have been podcasting together at the Fascinating podcast. I was pulled into an existing podcast where Matt and two of his friends were podcasting. And you can talk a little bit about that, Matt.
• 8:12
  Matt Mikalatos: Sure. So it's kind of funny. I got tricked into this podcast, into joining it, by these two guys I had met JR and Clay. And one of them, Clay said, "What if we did a podcast?" I was like, "Guys, I don't have time for this." I had literally just met them. I was preaching at one of their churches. And they said, "We'll do everything. You just be available when we call once a week." And I was like, eh, okay, let's see how it goes. And so we started talking every week. We became pretty good friends, really good friends, actually.
• 8:41
  Matt Mikalatos: And then we were saying we need to... Our viewpoints are a little stagnant, to be honest, the three of us. We have a really similar take on a lot of things. It would be great to get a woman on this podcast, especially a woman of color, especially a woman of color who's deeply spiritual that we respect. And we made a very short list. And we reached out to Kathy, and had a few conversations. I think, Kathy, you were a little nervous that you're going to be the...
• 9:08
  Kathy Khang: Token.
• 9:09
  Matt Mikalatos: That we just wanted you because you were a woman and a person of color, not because you were Kathy Khang.
• 9:15
  Kathy Khang: Right. Right. And so I think that actually is part of the friendship. And I think part of why Matt and I felt comfortable writing together and writing on this topic was that when Matt, Clay and JR reached out and the four of us had a conversation, I remember point blank saying, "So why do three white guys want a woman of color to join them? And how do we make sure I am not the token. Because I will look like the token. And I don't want to be the token." I've been the token. You don't pay enough for me to be the token.
• 9:54
  Matt Mikalatos: Hah. We pay nothing.
• 9:57
  Kathy Khang: So I think that is how our relationship, working together and then our friendship, started off with having those hard conversations around race and diversity within the context of podcasting and faith.
• 10:14
  Chris McAlilly: So when we look at, so the project is called Loving Disagreement, but it responds to a particular moment in American culture and in kind of the Christian spaces and and contexts that you guys had been involved in. Maybe talk a little bit more about kind of what motivated this particular
• 10:37
  Matt Mikalatos: Yes, so I've done a number of books with project.
• 10:41
  Matt Mikalatos: NavPress, and one of the editors there, a woman named Caitlyn Carlson, reached out to me and said, "Would you like to do a book about civility for Christians? We're clearly wrestling with it." And I went back and forth about it. And then Caitlyn said, "It'd be amazing if you'd get someone who also had a different viewpoint than you, so you could model this in the book. And what about Kathy Khang?" and I was like, "I love Kathy Khang." So then I was more interested. But I also thought Kathy wouldn't be. And so I was debating not even mentioning it to Kathy, which she can tell you about that in a minute.
• 11:22
  Matt Mikalatos: But when we did start working on it, so spoilers, we did, obviously. One thing we recognized almost immediately was that civility is not a Christian virtue. It's not something we're called to. And it often gets in the way of us treating each other the way we're meant to as believers particularly, and that it's a very, very low bar for Christians. The fact that we're not hitting civility means we're not hitting a whole bunch of other things were meant to be.
• 11:50
  Matt Mikalatos: And because civility is about politeness, and Jesus doesn't call us to politeness. And sometimes politeness gets in the way of things like peace and justice, goodness. So that was kind of where we started. But Kathy, tell the guys about how I neglected to include you in decisions that involve you.
• 12:13
  Kathy Khang: So my understanding is that Matt had a conversation briefly with JR, one of our co-hosts, who's also a dear friend about this, and Matt had said, "Yeah, but Kathy, she won't want to do this." And JR had said, "Why are you answering for Kathy?" And so Matt recognized that moment of, I don't know, overstepping, assuming, and got me on a call.
• 12:44
  Kathy Khang: And much to his surprise, I had said yes.
• 12:50
  Matt Mikalatos: Surprise and delight.
• 12:51
  Kathy Khang: Well, in all fairness to Matt, I had said a number of times on our podcast, in private conversations, that I was really, really tired of the Christian space. Having been in ministry, campus ministry for so many years, seeing what was happening publicly, in the public sphere, how Christians were behaving, and not really necessarily needing to jump into the fray on that. But this particular invitation spoke to me in a little bit like, a little bit of hope still alive in my heart, that there are people who still think that the gospel is important and can change people's lives. And if we can't do that, then I'll be done.
• 13:49
  Matt Mikalatos: Yeah.
• 13:50
  Chris McAlilly: I wonder, I like to ask, sorry to interrupt, Matt.
• 13:53
  Matt Mikalatos: No, no, please.
• 13:53
  Chris McAlilly: I like to ask folks, there are these moments on the podcast--we're in a lot of conversations with people who either grew up in the church, had left the church, or, you know, actively leading in churches, or theologians or biblical scholars. And there are these moments where I hear somebody or I see someone say,"but that's not what the gospel is. And this is what the gospel is." And there's a really deep conviction that's related to that. And I would be very interested if you wouldn't, you know, kind of... I can tell that you have some thoughts about it.
• 14:26
  Chris McAlilly: I would love to hear what those are, Kathy. Kind of how do you articulate the gospel? What does that mean?
• 14:34
  Kathy Khang: It's meant to be good news.
• 14:36
  Matt Mikalatos: That's right.
• 14:37
  Kathy Khang: It's supposed to be good news. And that is good news, not for the individual, but for the whole. And if the good news cannot transform a community, cannot transform a family, can't transform a neighborhood, a church building it's in, then it is not good news. It is not the gospel. And, you know, we don't focus in this book necessarily on The Gospel.
• 15:12
  Kathy Khang: So I think that is where... I love how we have approached this is that the idea of the fruit of the Spirit comes out of our actions living out the good news. So it is not just about proclamation, isn't about, "Do I go to heaven when I die?" Or does your neighbor go to heaven when she dies? But it is what does our daily life look like, and should it not reflect the good news?
• 15:47
  Eddie Rester: Wow.
• 15:48
  Chris McAlilly: Thank you for sharing, Kathy.
• 15:50
  Eddie Rester: Matt, anything that you would add to that? As you...
• 15:54
  Matt Mikalatos: Yeah, I mean, unfortunately, in religious community, the word "gospel" has started to be used as an authoritarian control tactic.
• 16:02
  Matt Mikalatos: Because what people are saying sometimes when they say, "Well, that's not the gospel," or"that's a false gospel," about things that have nothing to do with God or the character of God, which is what the good news is about, right, the good news of Jesus. But then they're saying, "You disagree with me on a moral reading of this part of scripture." What they're saying is, they're threatening us with heresy, with removal from community, or each other, right?
• 16:33
  Matt Mikalatos: People on all sides tend to do this. And Kathy is exactly right. If it's the good news of Jesus, it should be recognizable as good news.
• 16:43
  Matt Mikalatos: So for instance, when I was in college, and some random guy knocked on my door, and this actually happened, and said,"You need to stop smoking pot, stop sleeping with your girlfriend and come to Jesus." He didn't even know my name. I didn't smoke pot. My girlfriend lived eight hours away. I didn't immediately recognize that as the good news of Jesus. Do you know what I mean? And if someone had told me, that guy just presented the good news to you, I would have been baffled. I was like, the good news is "Don't smoke pot and don't have sex?" Like, what? Doesn't make any sense. And I think you can say things that lead us there. But if it's not about the good news of Jesus, who is loving and compassionate and kind and desires to be in relationship with you, and wants to make your life better, and like all these things, are we actually talking about the gospel at that point?
• 17:29
  Chris McAlilly: Yeah, that's great. That reminds me of one of my favorite translations of Galatians five, so the fruit of the Spirit passage that's kind of at the heart of y'all's engagement comes from this book in the New Testament, Galatians chapter five, and Eugene Peterson, who was a famed spiritual writer and a translator of the New Testament, his translation of those passages are so great. He just, he basically said... He doesn't say, "Don't fornicate." He says if you live your life your own way, you're going to end up with cheap and repetitive, loveless sex. You're going to end up in paranoid loneliness and cutthroat competition and all kinds of negative things. But if you live your life God's way, there all these amazing things.
• 18:23
  Chris McAlilly: It's just his description of the things that God can bring into your life like fruit in an orchard. It just paints a more beautiful picture. And it doesn't lead with, "You're not good enough for this," you know?
• 18:40
  Matt Mikalatos: Right.
• 18:41
  Chris McAlilly: Or there's something that... "You're living your life out of step, clearly, and let me judge you for that." And that's not good news. I mean, most people don't experience that as good news.
• 18:52
  Chris McAlilly: And so there's maybe a more beautiful way in. I'm glad that you guys, even if you don't... I mean, I think we can all say that the church doesn't often live up to the Gospel, or the way that ordinary Christians live don't connect with good news, or perhaps it's not recognizable. I guess, I know, Eddie, you've got some questions as well to jump in. But my question for you guys is, at what point did you see that? Or have you seen that in your past?
• 19:26
  Chris McAlilly: Maybe when you were growing up?
• 19:26
  Chris McAlilly: Maybe in your family of origin, maybe friends. Was a seed that maybe you want to try to germinate, cultivate, and extend. But where have you seen the gospel lived out in a way that has given you a seed of either memory or hope in the past?
• 19:45
  Kathy Khang: I mean I grew up in the Korean immigrant church, and it is not perfect. There's a lot of things I can critique. But for me and my family, the landing place has always been the church. It was always a place where, and one of the few places growing up and even in adulthood, where I find welcome as a Korean American. And as far as churches go, it's the only place where I have found my family as a whole is welcomed in both the English and the Korean, in the coffee hour and the barley tea, right, that there is something about my experience, for all of the teenage angst that I experienced, that it crosses culture crosses generations, that that was the place where I most felt myself and known. And that was good news that I didn't need to be embarrassed of my family and my parents and how we operated, that was different, even though we opened the same Bible and the same hymnals. It was just in a different language.
• 21:18
  Chris McAlilly: Yeah. What about you, Matt?
• 21:23
  Matt Mikalatos: So I grew up in I would... I think it's fair to say fundamentalist evangelical circles. And still many, many people I love, who would would probably embrace that description of themselves. And I think I got mixed messages when I was a kid, particularly about how God was good. But also do your devotionals every day, or he will legitimately smite you.
• 21:53
  Matt Mikalatos: Things that as I got older, just wrestling with, like, how does the good God do all these things that just make me feel uncomfortable morally? And how is it the my moral sense is so different than his but it seems like he's the one that is being unreasonable here?
• 22:10
  Matt Mikalatos: And I think it was a long process, and I'm probably still in it. But I think where I landed is what if God actually is good? What if they were right when they said that? You know, and I started looking at the places where I've connected with God best and the people through whom I've connected with God best, and realizing this--people like Kathy, my parents, people who showed kindness that was beyond what I expected, not less than what I expected, that withheld judgment in difficult moments, sometimes. Things like that. And I started to go, like, if these people are the most godly people I can think of, then why am I so worried about God being worse than them? And that was, yeah. That was a big part of it for me were these relationships, family and friends that were deeply committed to Christ, and showed generosity and kindness and love to me.
• 23:06
  Chris McAlilly: Thank you for sharing.
• 23:07
  Eddie Rester: Thank y'all for sharing. I want to talk about the book. The title itself,"Loving Disagreement," I hear that two different ways. And maybe you intend that.
• 23:18
  Matt Mikalatos: Yeah.
• 23:18
  Eddie Rester: I hear disagreement that is loving.
• 23:23
  Eddie Rester: Then I also hear love disagreement. And so...
• 23:28
  Chris McAlilly: I only hear one thing, and it says love disagreement. I don't love disagreement and so...
• 23:33
  Eddie Rester: I'm a born and raised Southerner. I can tell you my story, and you'll see why I run from disagreement. So what is it? You said that civility is not what we're called to. But this loving disagreement, I think, is a part of what we're called. So help me understand the title of the book and then we'll get into some other stuff.
• 23:55
  Eddie Rester: So.
• 23:57
  Matt Mikalatos: Yeah, Kathy and I are both fighters on some level. We're very different style of fighters, I would say.
• 24:03
  Matt Mikalatos: You think that's accurate, Kathy?
• 24:04
  Kathy Khang: Yeah, definitely.
• 24:06
  Matt Mikalatos: We're not afraid of disagreement, we often enjoy it, even when we think someone is just incredibly, incredibly wrong. There's something about those conversations that are invigorating. And I think, as you're suggesting, part of the life of the church should be disagreement. We are called to different things within the church. It would be surprising if we didn't sometimes have different takes on things, just depending on what our role and purpose is within the body. So yeah, I think where we've gotten to a place where things like,"oh, this is what the gospel really says," we've been moving people toward conformity instead of community, right. And that conformity removes disagreement because you're not allowed to disagree, which means I think our community is weakened.
• 25:02
  Matt Mikalatos: And we're seeing this all over, right? We don't talk much in the book about LGBT issues. But if you look at the church right now, the United Methodist, the Nazarenes, nonprofit organizations like InterVarsity, Campus Crusade for Christ, they're all wrestling with, "Can we even be in community with you if you're wrong about sex?" And to me, that's a shocking question that we're even asking this. And it is creating an enormous division and very, very little actual communication and community. So, I don't know.
• 25:35
  Matt Mikalatos: Kathy, what do you think?
• 25:38
  Kathy Khang: Yeah, so I mean, Eddie, you're right, it's a title that is a little bit of a Rorschach test. A little bit of one of those, you know, I forget what it was, but you look at this picture, and it was just a bunch of dots, and you're supposed to like focus in on something and you see the image.
• 25:57
  Kathy Khang: It's kind of like that, like, what do you see and what does that tell you about you? And so it is about being in disagreement in a loving way.
• 26:05
  Kathy Khang: And can we do that? Because that's not always modeled. We don't necessarily think of disagreement as something that we can approach with love. And so I think with that, we tend to run from disagreement. It's just easier not to talk about those things. And so like Matt said, when you enter in and find a community that doesn't do that at all or doesn't do it, well, it's a weak community. It's only held by what is similar. And that can only go so far and so long before people start to really show who they are, which is very... We are God's creation. We should be very, very different from one another.
• 26:56
  Kathy Khang: And so we want that title to be a little provocative and interesting, on purpose.
• 27:03
  Eddie Rester: When you think about the early church, and this is the thing I come back to, Chris has heard me say this before, when you think about the church that emerged in Jerusalem on Pentecost, or the church in Corinth that was drawn together from people across every sector of life, the early church was bound, a group of people who were very, very different. If you read the New Testament, struggled with "What do we do?" That "I was raised to not just be different but think different about myself and you?" And really, Paul struggles with this, almost in every letter, even in Romans when you get lighter in Romans, and he's talking about things so. But you've really centered in on one of Paul's writings to the church at Galatia. Why does the fruit of the Spirit, maybe that letter, provide such a window for y'all to talk about this, understanding how we disagree?
• 28:09
  Matt Mikalatos: Yeah, I think what's great about this particular passage, so we talked about the fruit of the Spirit, is what Paul says is you guys are fighting and tearing each other to pieces, and if you're not careful, you're gonna eat each other up. Right? And then he says, here's how you can tell if you're doing it right when you're in a fight. Here's what it should look like. And that's when he starts talking about the fruit of the Spirit. And when you look at those things, right, what he talks about is joy and peace and patience and kindness, goodness, all these things. And then you go on Twitter, or X if you prefer, and you just do a search for people with the word"pastor" in their bios, and see how they're interacting. And you have to go like, "Oh, maybe they have not yet received the New Testament, right? They haven't read this part." And I see it in myself too. And I gotta say, honestly, Kathy, I don't know if you've experienced this. But with this book coming out, there have been a couple of times I'm typing something and I'm like, I cannot be the author of "Loving Disagreement" and also say this publicly on social media. That would not be acceptable.
• 29:20
  Kathy Khang: I just embrace the fact that I am human, and I'm gonna get it wrong.
• 29:24
  Matt Mikalatos: Right.
• 29:25
  Kathy Khang: I'm just gonna...
• 29:25
  Matt Mikalatos: Sure.
• 29:26
  Kathy Khang: Just gonna let it out.
• 29:28
  Chris McAlilly: But I think social media is a piece of this.
• 29:31
  Matt Mikalatos: For sure.
• 29:32
  Eddie Rester: It's the place...
• 29:32
  Eddie Rester: And I finally left Twitter before it became X, back in July. I think I was like, I just my soul can't do this, and I'd been in there forever. But what is it about that kind of space that allows us not to live out of kind of our identity, this fruit of the spirit that we talk about? Why is that?
• 29:59
  Chris McAlilly: I could venture something. You guys will venture something better. But you know, one of the things that in Galatians... I went back and was doing some reading, I'm actually preparing a sermon on the fruits of the Spirit for this week. And so, I went back and looked at Galatians 1, and I mean, it begins like, "Grace and peace to you from God, our Father in the Lord Jesus Christ, who gave Himself for our sins to set us free from the present evil age." And there's just this sense that they're the spirits at work in the world: spirits of competitiveness, spirits of power, spirits of greed, jealousy. All the spirits of the age, you know, are present, piled on top of one another in these social media spaces. And I don't know, I that's one of the things that I see.
• 30:51
  Chris McAlilly: I mean, it could be an intense thing to say the age that we're living in is evil. You know, that's an intense thing to say.
• 30:58
  Chris McAlilly: And, you know, I think having some nuance and care throwing around the word "evil" is important. And yet, I also think that there are just so many other spirits than the Spirit of God at work in those spaces. You know, I have various kinds of friends across the theological spectrum, and people will talk about them, you know, but just spirits of power, and the powers and principalities that kind of find their way into a lot of conversations. That's one of the things that I observe. I don't know. What do you guys see?
• 31:35
  Kathy Khang: Well, I think social media is an interesting space. Because you can operate out of a profile and have a level of power, but also a level of anonymity. And so there's not a whole lot that can keep you accountable to your actions on a daily, in person, in the flesh kind of way. So you can be a jerk online with "pastor" in your profile and not worry too much about what the ramifications of your behavior will be. It would require somebody on your elder board to follow your account. Right? And then to read the entire thing, and to bring that up to your board. But even for me, I'm not a pastor, it would require somebody I know to read what I post and hold me accountable.
• 32:40
  Kathy Khang: But I have those people, so I think that's part of it, right, is how you approach the way you engage online. For some, it is very consistent with their in-person, in-the-flesh realities. But I think when you get to a place where you have a huge following or no following and you feel like you owe no one anything, there is the ability to just lash out. And we all know that there have been studies. There are ways in which our engagement online can affect our moods, for better and worse, and addictive to certain highs and lows. And so I do think that there is that a sense of being drawn to that kind of power, to hold a conversation, to hold courts online, and it's not a good thing.
• 33:50
  Matt Mikalatos: Yeah, I think, too, obviously, you're rewarded for bad behavior on a lot of social media, because engagement is what drives and conflict creates engagement, either people fighting with you, or people like you agreeing.
• 34:04
  Eddie Rester: Yeah.
• 34:05
  Matt Mikalatos: I think honestly, Protestants are hardwired with some problematic things that make us more susceptible also, spiritually.
• 34:13
  Matt Mikalatos: If you just go back to the roots of the movement, like Martin Luther wasn't a guy that you look at and say, "Here's a guy who was full of the Spirit whenever he was in conflict," right? Like, I think of the story, was it Servetus, Michael Servetus? That they're having a fight over, I can't remember if it was communion or baptism, I think it was communion. It's like, "Is God actually present in the elements or symbolically present?" And there just fighting, fighting, fighting, fighting. And at the end, Servetus says, "Look, we disagree, but we're both followers of Jesus. Can we shake hands?" And Martin Luther is like, "No." That's one of our heroes, right?
• 34:53
  Matt Mikalatos: Or John Calvin, or people like this, because what ends up happening--and I don't want to downplay the importance of truth. Jesus is truth, right?
• 35:00
  Matt Mikalatos: But what we end up putting at the center of our arguments is truth and winning the truth. And that is not how Paul discusses a Spirit-filled conversation. You will notice that truth is not part of the fruit of the Spirit, which is actually kind of baffling. Because, I think because Paul and Jesus both would say that the truth is what it is. The truth will be discovered. Like we see Paul sometimes in disagreements saying things like, "I trust that the Holy Spirit will make this clear to you." Right? It's like, you haven't discovered the truth yet. I'm not gonna browbeat you anymore. And that's a kindness. Right? He pushes peace instead of pushing truth, but we're like, "I don't care if I have to be cruel. I don't have to. I don't care if I call you names, as long as the truth is paramount." And I think that's a weakness, or it's a place that can draw us away from Spirit-filled disagreement.
• 36:02
  Chris McAlilly: I think leaving room for the Spirit, you know?
• 36:05
  Matt Mikalatos: Yeah.
• 36:06
  Chris McAlilly: As you said this idea that in a conversation, it's not a zero sum game between me and you, and I either win the truth or you win the truth. And then if you win the truth, I lose at the truth. But that, you know, there's a sense that the Spirit's at work in the midst of the conversation. I think that's really important. And I guess I've found that to be an important thing to remind myself if I'm in conversation with someone, that I don't have to control the argument to the point of its ultimate resolution. You know, there's a leaving room for the Spirit. And just part of it is just acknowledging that there is a Spirit, you know?
• 36:50
  Matt Mikalatos: Yeah.
• 36:51
  Chris McAlilly: That in a conversation, you know, I think part of it is we've spent some time on the podcast, talking with... I'm reminded of a conversation we had with Greg Jones, Eddie, where he was talking about Charles Taylor's work, that we live in a secular age, and that most of our conversations happen within an imminent frame. So we're just all like just bumping up against one another and warring at one another. But we don't leave room for the Spirit. We don't leave room for the action of God in the conversation to kind of move us into a different place. And I don't know. I think... I don't know, there's something about what you said that kind of gave rise to those memories, and just some conversations that I'm in where it's like, it's important to remember that there are not just two actors in this conversation, that God can actually lead us, if we allow it, into maybe a different place or a different plane or a different kind of peace. I broke in on you, Eddie. Sorry.
• 37:50
  Eddie Rester: I think one of the things I want to hear a little bit more from y'all about is, Kathy, something that you brought up is that the people around us are important. And I think at the heart of your book is community. So how do you define and how do you understand Christian community? Because a lot of people will fight for issues, but they won't fight for their Christian community. In fact, they'll break their community to win an issue. So what is it? What is Christian community? What do we fight for?
• 38:22
  Kathy Khang: Well, it's definitely more than the four walls of the church building.
• 38:24
  Kathy Khang: And I think I can say this as somebody who is still looking for a church home, that my faith community, my Christian community, is the fellowship of believers. And that is the whole. That's not just here in the North suburbs. It's not just in the Midwest. It's not just here in the US. I am a part of the whole body. And so that can be super broad and unhelpful for people who want something tangible and, you know, a group you can meet with every week.
• 39:09
  Kathy Khang: And so when I think kind of in that sense, my Christian community is mostly focused in the US, but people across time zones, with whom I have disagreements with, don't see as often as I would love to, but I also know if they see bad behavior on my part, they will call it out. Because we have not truth and not rules, but we have relationship. And so we have walked through failure in showing the fruit of the Spirit to one another and also success in showing that fruit of the Spirit to one another.
• 39:59
  Chris McAlilly: So I hear a couple of things. One is not tied to particular local gathering, a fellowship of believers, and then I also hear the importance of accountability in relationship with one another, both working through failure and hard things. And also acknowledging, naming, celebrating, giving thanks for the good things.
• 40:17
  Kathy Khang: Right. All of those things. And I would say all of those things are exactly what the church, local church and capital C Church ought to be doing, but don't necessarily do well or think that that is the whole of their mission. Right?
• 40:34
  Kathy Khang: That, oh, well, we have to put on a great VBS. And we have to have this ministry and that ministry. And those can all foster Christian community, but I don't know if that's where people necessarily start when they think of The Church and think, "Oh, we are a Christian community. We are a part of something bigger and broader." I hope that's what they're thinking. I hope that's what we're thinking. But I don't know if that's always the case anymore.
• 41:07
  Matt Mikalatos: Yeah, I think it's interesting, too, when you look at the fruit of the Spirit, that several of the virtues mentioned are things that presume continuing relationship.
• 41:20
  Matt Mikalatos: Right? Love, faithfulness, patience, like, all three of those are saying these are long term relationships, not just that we're going to disagree for a few minutes, and then we're done. Patience in particular is about loving the person who's in front of you, not the person you want them to be, or that they used to be. And that means when I disagree with someone, and I think they're wrong, understanding that it might take time. It might take a year. It might take 10 years for them to come to recognizing the right thing there. Or I might be the one who's transformed as I move closer to Jesus. I might agree with them in five years. That's certainly happened before. And yeah, I think we're so quick. I was part of a denomination that split because they had a disagreement about whether you have to stand to read the Scripture. And it seems so minor. But I think the fact is, most of the things, not all, but many of the things that cause church splits are minor things like that.
• 42:19
  Eddie Rester: You talked about patience, and it reminds me of story of a guy. When I was a young pastor, there was a guy who disagreed with me vehemently about something. It was huge, to the point then men from the church sat with him and said,"Why don't you come sit with Eddie, talk this out." He said,"No, I'm not going to talk it out with him." But he wouldn't leave the church either. When I would preach, he would sit in his pew and look down. And for years, this went on, and just it was frustrating. But finally, one day in the parking lot, he walked up to me, and just had this extremely... I had written him off. But he had had the patience with me to wait with me until we can have that moment.
• 43:00
  Eddie Rester: And I don't think we give each other the gift that he gave me, in those moments, of patience. I think that's powerful in a time when church, and when I say"church," is a disposable asset.
• 43:16
  Eddie Rester: "If we set this one aside, well, we'll go get another one."
• 43:24
  Matt Mikalatos: Right. Right.
• 43:24
  Matt Mikalatos: That's why I think Kathy's definition is so helpful, because you should have these relationships that continue regardless of where you worship, right? Like, so Kathy, and I, for instance, had never met until recently. But when I was going through grief after the loss of a loved one, Kathy was a really important person in my life during that time. Like, sent me cards and like checked in with me every week, and you know, things like that. And other friends as well, that we weren't sitting in pews next to each other, but we were checking in, you know, praying for each other, that kind of thing.
• 44:01
  Chris McAlilly: One of the fruit of the Spirit is faithfulness.
• 44:04
  Chris McAlilly: And, you know, I think one of the dimensions that I hear, all the fruit... I mean, I have friends that are gardeners or friends that are farmers, and they'll tell you that it's easier to grow a tomato in Mississippi than it is in Arizona, or whatever. And so the environment and the culture that you are in impacts what the fruit look like and how they taste and all the rest. And this is kind of basic to the metaphor. But I do think you're right, Eddie, and I think you point to something really important that particularly the American context, and maybe our know, the North Atlantic West, global capitalism, I don't know.
• 44:46
  Chris McAlilly: Name the context kind of as you will. There is a kind of impermanence to it, like the sense that we don't need...
• 44:55
  Chris McAlilly: There's a disposability to it.
• 45:02
  Chris McAlilly: There's a kind of throwaway dimension to the culture.
• 45:04
  Chris McAlilly: Pope Francis names this in his encyclical, writing about climate change. And it really is like the disposability of the poor and the vulnerable people and places that we just kind of throw away. But I think it's beyond that. I just think we just tend to... People, places, and things, we tend to stay with them as long as they're useful to us, giving us pleasure, making our lives better. But as soon as that's over, we tend to throw them away, throw places away, throw things away. And I don't know, it can be extremely difficult, I think, in this context, to cultivate these particular virtues. And to do that for individuals or for communities. Because there's so many. I mean, I think this comes back to the spirit of the age that we live in is so bent against some of these things. I don't know. What do you guys think?
• 46:06
  Kathy Khang: Well, I think it was you, Chris, at the start of the conversation had mentioned, you know, the sense that this book is written addressing kind of a moment that we are experiencing. And yes, it is.
• 46:16
  Kathy Khang: But I would also say, folks, people of color, folks in the margins, have named this for a long time. And it is becoming more mainstream of a conversation because it is impacting the white majority here in the United States. And so I would say even that idea of the disposability of the church, or this sense that well, you know, "I don't have to stay at this one. I could go to that one." Which is really the case, right? Where I live, is of both-and. That the churches also--churches, as in little C buildings--also look at their communities and can see, who do we really want in here? And when do we want them in our spaces and why?
• 47:20
  Kathy Khang: So I think about all of the heat waves that we've recently experienced all over. But here in the Midwest, particularly in the last couple of weeks, we've had some bursts of heat. And I always think to myself, Oh, look at all those churches running their air conditioning, and the doors are locked. And you have to buzz in. Those are not the places that are the cooling spaces for the public to just walk in freely. And that's just any time of the year, right, that so many of the buildings, the physical spaces, have chosen certain values as more important than the other. And it goes back to, I think, fruit of the Spirit and our values, and how will we engage in those conversations.
• 48:15
  Kathy Khang: And when we don't engage in those conversations, what results in is buildings that remain locked and unused, and resources directed in certain ways for certain people.
• 48:33
  Chris McAlilly: What that reminds me of, Kathy, I think it's incredibly well said, and one of the things that reminds me of is the parable of the mustard seed that Jesus preaches. And the seed, it's just a small seed that gets planted. It grows, and it doesn't become a massive tree, it just becomes a little shrub.
• 48:47
  Chris McAlilly: But the shrub is for the shelter of the birds, whoever would come. I mean, there's this sense... There's a deep hospitality to the image, that what gets produced is a place of hospitality. And the birds come and take shelter in the shade of the tree.
• 49:09
  Chris McAlilly: And I think that's perhaps a great way to kind of begin to wrap up the conversation is to allow the conversation really to provoke hard questions about kind of the communities that you're in. What is the composition of them? Who are the people that you're willing to actually fight with, in loving disagreement? What are the communities that you've left and for what reasons? Why is it that, what are the things that you're willing to, or think that... What are the values that you hold so strongly that you'd be willing to break community?
• 49:47
  Chris McAlilly: And then also, ultimately, kind of what would it look like to cultivate loving disagreements towards a greater set of communal virtues that would actually be something that look like good news, right, to other folks? And so I'm going to be thinking about this conversation for a while, after we get off.
• 50:09
  Chris McAlilly: I'm so grateful to you guys for your work and for the opportunity to kind of dwell on these ideas.
• 50:17
  Eddie Rester: Actually, real quickly, the book comes out in October of 2023. What do you hope people? What do you hope it does, in people after they've read it?
• 50:28
  Matt Mikalatos: Well, you know how Jesus said, "They'll know you are my followers by your doctrinal purity at the expense of human relationship." If people could really take that to heart.
• 50:42
  Kathy Khang: [LAUGHTER]
• 50:42
  Eddie Rester: That's what I've heard from you this whole time.
• 50:43
  Matt Mikalatos: I hope what people will come away with, and this is what it has been doing for me just living in this passage with Kathy over this last year, is that in the moments when I'm disagreeing, and I'm angry-- me, personally, I often get angry in disagreement. In the midst of that anger, to stop and say to myself, am I disagreeing with the Holy Spirit involved here?
• 51:09
  Matt Mikalatos: Are these different? Is joy, is is faithfulness and gentleness, are these welling up from the Spirit inside of me, or is something else happening? And if something else happens, then I have to acknowledge that I am not filled with the Spirit in the moment of this argument.
• 51:30
  Matt Mikalatos: And it's really interesting.
• 51:30
  Matt Mikalatos: Look at the things that Paul goes on to say, you know, this is the work of the flesh afterwards, and they are the hallmarks of our disagreements in the church. It's all about hatred, dissension. Anger, yes, yes. Anger, me, preach. So what has been helpful for me is that it just keeps bringing me back to this to say to myself, "Okay, am I filled with the Spirit? Or is this just my flesh in this argument?" And I think if all of us could get to that place, that even if we're just aware of it, just asking the question, I think would radically alter the way we're interacting with each other, when we disagree about really important things that we need to have conversations about.
• 52:14
  Eddie Rester: Kathy?
• 52:15
  Kathy Khang: I hope that readers walk away with a sense of hope.
• 52:21
  Kathy Khang: And that is what I am hoping for. We are entering into even more fraught times, and that this will remind us that we are not a people of hopelessness, but a people of faith. And what does that look like? It means that we are not perfect, and that's okay, but that we have hope for something better. And that something better does not need to wait until heaven.
• 52:58
  Eddie Rester: Amen. Thank y'all for being with us today.
• 53:00
  Chris McAlilly: Thanks so much.
• 53:01
  Matt Mikalatos: Pleasure.
• 53:01
  Matt Mikalatos: Really, really enjoyed it.
• 53:03
  Kathy Khang: Thank you.
• 53:03
  Matt Mikalatos: Thanks.
• 53:04
  Eddie Rester: [OUTRO] Thanks for listening. If you've enjoyed the podcast, the best way to help us is to like, subscribe, or leave a review.
• 53:12
  Chris McAlilly: If you would like to support this work financially or if you have an idea for a future guest, you can go to theweightpodcast.com. [END OUTRO]