Latest / The Speak Life Podcast / What Can We Learn From 2020? || SLP337

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What Can We Learn From 2020? || SLP337 · The Speak Life Podcast

• 0:07
  SPEAKER_03: Today on the live cast, with the help of Russell Brand, we discuss what is 2020 teaching us.
• 0:13
  SPEAKER_03: Well, hello, and welcome to the live cast.
• 0:14
  SPEAKER_03: My name is Paul Feasy, and as always, I'm joined by Glenn Scrivener.
• 0:17
  SPEAKER_03: Hello, Paul Feasy.
• 0:18
  SPEAKER_02: Here we are together.
• 0:19
  SPEAKER_03: Yes.
• 0:19
  SPEAKER_03: In person.
• 0:20
  SPEAKER_03: In the flesh once again.
• 0:21
  SPEAKER_02: In the studio.
• 0:22
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah, yeah, we've got back now.
• 0:24
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah, yeah.
• 0:25
  SPEAKER_02: Now we're we've got our Christmas on.
• 0:27
  SPEAKER_02: I don't know if you'd noticed.
• 0:28
  SPEAKER_02: It's quite subtle.
• 0:30
  SPEAKER_02: What was the giveaway?
• 0:31
  SPEAKER_02: Yes.
• 0:32
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah, yeah.
• 0:32
  SPEAKER_02: So uh we've gone for a quite traditional Christmas, although some people don't like the fact we've got a tree in the background.
• 0:38
  SPEAKER_02: It's very upsetting for some people.
• 0:40
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
• 0:40
  SPEAKER_02: I don't know.
• 0:42
  SPEAKER_02: I'm not sure we can please them.
• 0:43
  SPEAKER_02: But um there it is, there it is.
• 0:45
  SPEAKER_02: I I like getting my Krimbo on.
• 0:46
  SPEAKER_02: You obviously love getting your Krimbo on.
• 0:48
  SPEAKER_03: I've gone for the old Christmas jumper.
• 0:49
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah.
• 0:50
  SPEAKER_03: I think I think once December kicks off, you're allowed.
• 0:52
  SPEAKER_03: You're allowed to start.
• 0:53
  SPEAKER_03: So no sooner.
• 0:56
  SPEAKER_03: You're a Grinch until December 1st.
• 0:58
  SPEAKER_03: Absolutely, absolutely.
• 0:59
  SPEAKER_03: And even some people would say that's too early.
• 1:01
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah.
• 1:01
  SPEAKER_02: You know, you shouldn't wait till.
• 1:02
  SPEAKER_02: I've noticed that we've both got our hands in our pockets.
• 1:04
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah, that's because it's about minus eight in here.
• 1:08
  SPEAKER_02: The studio.
• 1:09
  SPEAKER_02: We need some heating in the studio.
• 1:10
  SPEAKER_02: So uh do uh do support us on Patreon and send logs.
• 1:16
  SPEAKER_02: Otherwise we'll catch our death of cold.
• 1:18
  SPEAKER_02: Speaking of our death of cold.
• 1:20
  SPEAKER_02: A nice link.
• 1:22
  SPEAKER_02: 2020.
• 1:23
  SPEAKER_02: Um yeah, we thought we'd talk about what uh 2020 is teaching us.
• 1:28
  SPEAKER_02: And uh the inspiration for it is uh a little video by uh Russell Brand, uh which we found both insightful and hilarious.
• 1:37
  SPEAKER_03: Yes.
• 1:37
  SPEAKER_02: And we thought we could uh have a look at it because I think he puts his finger on some stuff that we can learn from the pandemic.
• 1:43
  SPEAKER_02: So uh if you haven't seen it, or even if you have, you can watch along with us and uh we'll react.
• 1:49
  SPEAKER_02: Watch along with Glenn and Paul.
• 1:52
  SPEAKER_02: Got your React face on.
• 1:53
  SPEAKER_02: Let's get our reaction game on.
• 1:54
  SPEAKER_02: Here we go.
• 1:56
  SPEAKER_04: Black Friday, that annual festival of consuming.
• 2:00
  SPEAKER_04: But during a global pandemic, when all of us are asking questions about society and the way that we relate to one another, ought we be trying to sustain these kind of crazy ideas?
• 2:10
  SPEAKER_04: The answer is yes.
• 2:11
  SPEAKER_01: I think people should shop and shop uh with confidence.
• 2:15
  SPEAKER_04: It's interesting, isn't it, that a leader of a sovereign nation is compelled to go on the TV and tell people to shop with confidence.
• 2:22
  SPEAKER_04: And haven't you sensed from the start of the global pandemic that there are two agendum?
• 2:30
  SPEAKER_04: One is, you know, safety and stopping the spread of the disease, and two is continuing to prop up systems that have collapsed again and again and again, notably in 2008.
• 2:40
  SPEAKER_04: No wonder conspiracy theories are abound at a point when it seems clear that certain information is not being transparently relayed.
• 2:50
  SPEAKER_04: That the discourse between us and the powerful is broken, veiled, and contingent upon keeping us contained within our roles, primarily as consumers.
• 3:00
  SPEAKER_00: Christmas is right around the corner, and even as coronavirus cases surge, thousands of shoppers are expected to hit the stores with Black Friday next week.
• 3:08
  SPEAKER_04: I've always thought of Black Friday as a kind of monstrous parody of the decline of humankind anyway, when you see footage of people rushing into stores, elbowing people aside.
• 3:19
  SPEAKER_04: But now, when Mother Nature herself is clearly letting us know, you might want to consider making some changes, is a global pandemic, go into your houses, reflect.
• 3:29
  SPEAKER_04: Still, Black Friday is happening.
• 3:31
  SPEAKER_04: Still, it's a news item.
• 3:33
  SPEAKER_02: I do love that.
• 3:34
  SPEAKER_02: Um, for a number of reasons.
• 3:36
  SPEAKER_02: I mean, Black Friday here in the UK, like we've we've imported Black Friday from America.
• 3:41
  SPEAKER_02: We have not imported like Thanksgiving.
• 3:43
  SPEAKER_03: No.
• 3:45
  SPEAKER_02: Which is meant to be the prelude to having given thanks to God for all that we've had, now we go and punch somebody for a flat screen TV.
• 3:53
  SPEAKER_02: We've taken that on board.
• 3:55
  SPEAKER_02: Not the not the Thanksgiving.
• 3:57
  SPEAKER_02: But then notice the Mother Nature.
• 3:59
  SPEAKER_02: Mother Nature.
• 4:00
  SPEAKER_02: What is Mother Nature's been teaching us?
• 4:01
  SPEAKER_02: Something.
• 4:02
  SPEAKER_02: Which I think is a profound insight.
• 4:04
  SPEAKER_02: That that um Russell is not seeing the pandemic as a random event of some kind of barren nature or chaotic nature.
• 4:12
  SPEAKER_02: It's personal.
• 4:14
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
• 4:14
  SPEAKER_02: And it's a teacher, and we're meant to learn from it.
• 4:18
  SPEAKER_02: And I think that's that's that's pretty that's pretty profound.
• 4:21
  SPEAKER_02: Because I think w one of the dangers in 2020 is that we see COVID-19 as a random event from chaotic nature, and then we just cast ourselves as the heroes who must vanquish this sort of random intruder into our world, and if we're clever enough, we'll be able to sidestep this random event and march on into progress land where everything is wonderful all the time, right?
• 4:48
  SPEAKER_02: Whereas I think it's a very different view, isn't it?
• 4:50
  SPEAKER_02: That Russell Brand is like, no, there is a teacher, there is a lesson to be learned.
• 4:56
  SPEAKER_02: It's a corrective, sees it as a corrective thing.
• 4:59
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah.
• 4:59
  SPEAKER_03: Rather than whereas we feel we'll we'll overcome and continue in the same vein.
• 5:04
  SPEAKER_03: Yes.
• 5:05
  SPEAKER_03: Can't wait to get back to.
• 5:07
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah.
• 5:07
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah, we want to get back to life as it was.
• 5:09
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah.
• 5:09
  SPEAKER_03: There won't be any modification of the way we've been living.
• 5:12
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
• 5:12
  SPEAKER_02: And the only thing that we'll learn is how to get cleverer at vaccines.
• 5:16
  SPEAKER_02: And then so that we can continue in a life that we'd always already known.
• 5:21
  SPEAKER_02: Whereas whereas I think Russell and many other voices during 2020 have been saying, actually, maybe maybe Mother Nature or who knows, maybe the universe is trying to tell us something.
• 5:33
  SPEAKER_02: And uh and that's why, you know, like speaking as as Christians, that there've been a number of different responses to coronavirus that have tried to answer the question, how could God allow suffering in 2020?
• 5:46
  SPEAKER_02: I don't think very many people are asking that that exact question.
• 5:51
  SPEAKER_03: Right.
• 5:51
  SPEAKER_02: I think I think certain certainly people are noticing that 2020 is a bit rubbish.
• 5:57
  SPEAKER_02: Um but it's not so much as shaking the fist at the heavens.
• 6:00
  SPEAKER_02: I don't I don't get that feeling.
• 6:02
  SPEAKER_02: I I do get the feeling that lots more people are saying what what is Russell's what Russell is saying, which is there's something we're being corrected.
• 6:09
  SPEAKER_02: There's a lesson, there's something to there's something to learn from this whole thing.
• 6:12
  SPEAKER_02: And I think that's a much much healthier way to to go about things.
• 6:15
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah, definitely.
• 6:17
  SPEAKER_02: Let's keep going.
• 6:18
  SPEAKER_14: It's the most wonderful time of the year for bargain hunters.
• 6:23
  SPEAKER_04: I'm a bargain hunter.
• 6:25
  SPEAKER_04: Yes, it is a wonderful time of the year for bargain hunters, but we're also surely on the precipice of some global reckoning where we've been invited to look at what is your purpose as an individual, as a society, as a planet.
• 6:37
  SPEAKER_04: Could I hunt for some bargains?
• 6:39
  SPEAKER_07: Is Black Friday 2020 cancelled?
• 6:42
  SPEAKER_07: No, but it will be different.
• 6:44
  SPEAKER_04: Certainly will.
• 6:45
  SPEAKER_04: It'll be taking place under the dark shadow of the apocalypse.
• 6:54
  SPEAKER_04: The first thing that's important is that you spend.
• 6:57
  SPEAKER_04: Then the little way down here is that you're safe while you spend.
• 7:01
  SPEAKER_12: This is really going to sort of accelerate that Christmas shopping that we've all been looking forward to.
• 7:05
  SPEAKER_12: It's almost on par now with Boxing Day.
• 7:07
  SPEAKER_04: I mean, I'm English and I'm still not certain what Boxing Day is or what we're supposed to be doing on Boxing Day.
• 7:12
  SPEAKER_04: And of course, these uh festivals of retail take place neatly in alignment with other more nationally or internationally sanctioned holidays to of course harness that feeling of goodwill.
• 7:23
  SPEAKER_04: On a personal level, sometimes if I'm happy, like even with something really innocent, like my children, I think, oh god, they're so beautiful, I love them.
• 7:29
  SPEAKER_04: Let me go and buy a buzz light yeah.
• 7:31
  SPEAKER_04: But that actually did happen.
• 7:33
  SPEAKER_04: Like I felt I love you so much.
• 7:34
  SPEAKER_04: I don't know, what should I do?
• 7:36
  SPEAKER_04: Write a poem, go for a walk at sunrise with you, have a buzz light year.
• 7:40
  SPEAKER_12: But when you think about it, we're not travelling, we're certainly not travelling internationally.
• 7:44
  SPEAKER_12: Even domestic travel is difficult.
• 7:45
  SPEAKER_12: There's a reason for that, Professor.
• 7:47
  SPEAKER_12: It's because the whole planet's falling apart.
• 7:49
  SPEAKER_12: Oh, which means we're we're saving that money, and obviously we're now starting to spend that money as we get closer to Christmas.
• 7:54
  SPEAKER_04: Hmm.
• 7:54
  SPEAKER_04: All this money I've saved from being imprisoned in my home due to the global pandemic, and of course, not to forget the accompanying political fissures that are defining this time of social unrest, the alienation, the sense of meaninglessness.
• 8:10
  SPEAKER_04: I have saved a few pennies, and I do have an eye on this pair of shoes.
• 8:14
  SPEAKER_14: 3000 brand new smart TVs are up for grabs online, prices starting at just a dollar.
• 8:20
  SPEAKER_04: I suppose what makes me most upset when I see them cellophane wrapped TVs, and God knows I love a TV and I love watching TV and I love consumerism and I love entertainment.
• 8:28
  SPEAKER_04: How could I not have a product of my time?
• 8:30
  SPEAKER_04: I feel look at humanity's resources, look at our capacity, our capability.
• 8:35
  SPEAKER_04: It's not resources we lack, it's a vision we lack.
• 8:38
  SPEAKER_04: On an individual level, we know these systems aren't working, but what is it?
• 8:42
  SPEAKER_04: What happens whenever anyone mentions any kind of change or alternative?
• 8:46
  SPEAKER_05: What do you want?
• 8:47
  SPEAKER_05: Living communist China, living communist Russia?
• 8:49
  SPEAKER_05: Is that what you want?
• 8:50
  SPEAKER_05: Oh, sorry, I was one aware that there are only two options.
• 8:53
  SPEAKER_05: Like if you say, I don't really like classical music, people don't go, boy, what do you want?
• 8:57
  SPEAKER_05: Just to listen to some clanging bin ledge spinning held next to your head, don't they?
• 9:01
  SPEAKER_04: No, I might listen to the array, the vast variety of types and tones of music, the limitless possibilities that could emerge from the mind of humankind.
• 9:12
  SPEAKER_04: Were we to collectively focus not on sustenance but on our thriving, on the protection of the planet and of one another, of bringing power and resources as close to the people that are affected by them as possible.
• 9:23
  SPEAKER_05: Oh, alright, what do you want to do?
• 9:25
  SPEAKER_05: Take a ditch, put your head in it, and soil yourself.
• 9:27
  SPEAKER_05: Uh no.
• 9:31
  SPEAKER_02: So he's putting his finger as well on, you know, I mean, for purpose as well, you know, 2020 is meant to have been a year where we've gone into our room and considered purpose, meaning, what it's all about.
• 9:43
  SPEAKER_02: Um, but I I'm always struck by Blaise Pascal, who said, you know, 400 years ago, he says all of man's problems boil down to this.
• 9:50
  SPEAKER_02: We can't sit in our room quietly with our own thoughts.
• 9:52
  SPEAKER_02: Uh because we need distractions.
• 9:55
  SPEAKER_02: He called them diversions, but uh, yeah, so Pascal was kind of, yeah, i it was it was um predictive really of our modern age.
• 10:05
  SPEAKER_02: We can't sit quietly in our in our room, so we need distractions.
• 10:08
  SPEAKER_02: And isn't Black Friday a totally I notice this is the way it's true, isn't it?
• 10:14
  SPEAKER_03: There's that kind of ah the everything's terrible, like politically everything's falling apart, like there's divisions amongst this group and that group, like racial tensions up, you know, there's all these identity politics issues, people are getting sick and dying, and like you've been inside for months and you've lost your job and your income, um, and you know, people you know have died, and your mental health's taking a real hit, you know.
• 10:40
  SPEAKER_03: Have you thought about having a coffee machine or something like that?
• 10:43
  SPEAKER_03: That would be that'd be the thing that will cheer you up and make life good again.
• 10:46
  SPEAKER_03: Here's a TV for a dollar.
• 10:49
  SPEAKER_03: Oh, it's all better now.
• 10:51
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
• 10:51
  SPEAKER_02: Retail therapy, you know, and and it kind of it kind of is.
• 10:56
  SPEAKER_02: It it it's it's one of those diversions that gives it you that instant hit.
• 11:00
  SPEAKER_02: And but it's like it's like fast food, isn't it?
• 11:02
  SPEAKER_02: You know, it leaves you feeling emptier than ever.
• 11:04
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah at the end.
• 11:06
  SPEAKER_14: At calls they're offering bargain coffee machines, paddle boards, even outdoor furniture.
• 11:12
  SPEAKER_05: Here's a bargain, a paddleboard, a coffee machine, and a chair.
• 11:18
  SPEAKER_04: Oh sh.
• 11:18
  SPEAKER_04: Even without this pandemic, it's obvious that we are facing crises.
• 11:23
  SPEAKER_04: 2008 showed us that.
• 11:25
  SPEAKER_04: The cultural wars around uh 9-11.
• 11:28
  SPEAKER_04: On almost every level, almost every tendril of our being, almost every neural pathway is being fired at me, and you too, surely.
• 11:36
  SPEAKER_04: This is a time for change.
• 11:37
  SPEAKER_04: This is a time for awakening.
• 11:39
  SPEAKER_04: We are in the midst of a great global reckoning.
• 11:41
  SPEAKER_02: Awakening.
• 11:42
  SPEAKER_04: The sort of the propaganda war to maintain these systems, the very systems that not only won't make you feel less alienated, empty, and alone, but are responsible for you feeling it in the first place, are going in an overdrive to sustain their nefarious systems.
• 12:00
  SPEAKER_13: But shoppers are being warned if a deal seems too good to be true, it probably is.
• 12:06
  SPEAKER_04: This deal seems too good to be true.
• 12:08
  SPEAKER_04: The deal I'm being offered is ignore all of the evidence that this is a time where change is necessary and buy this coffee machine for five quid.
• 12:18
  SPEAKER_04: That seems too good to be true.
• 12:20
  SPEAKER_04: It is.
• 12:24
  SPEAKER_02: And again, it is this is a time for learning.
• 12:27
  SPEAKER_02: Like everything he's saying, this is a time for learning.
• 12:30
  SPEAKER_02: Um but I would I would say like consumerism is is one false answer.
• 12:35
  SPEAKER_02: But there are other false answers out there as well.
• 12:38
  SPEAKER_02: There's the there's the there's the panic answer, or there's the um this is this is a time when we stand up first and foremost for our civil liberties, you know, immense government overreach and all that kind of stuff, which I think is a real danger and a real threat.
• 12:54
  SPEAKER_02: But the panic and hysteria, you know, it's kind of it's interesting, you know, on on one side there are people very, very afraid of coronavirus and locking themselves down.
• 13:05
  SPEAKER_02: And then there are on the other side, there are people who are just very afraid of the government who's forcing to forcing us to sort of lock down.
• 13:11
  SPEAKER_02: And then there are people who are very, very afraid of the economic consequences of the lockdown, and and it's it's like, where do you sit?
• 13:18
  SPEAKER_02: And what's interesting is everybody's panicking.
• 13:21
  SPEAKER_02: Like everybody is full of fear at this time, and no one's really doing what Russell is saying, which is like, okay, sit in your room for a bit and try and think about the big picture and where where meaning and purpose kind of fits in.
• 13:35
  SPEAKER_04: One of the giants of global capitalist consumerism is Walmart, and they have made a magnificent piece of propaganda come information film to ensure that we're able to continue with our mindless habits during this time of reflection.
• 13:53
  SPEAKER_10: This year has been unlike anything we've experienced before.
• 13:56
  SPEAKER_04: I mean, as soon as you see someone sort of jauntily, but this year's been unlike, why are you wearing that mask?
• 14:02
  SPEAKER_04: Oh, because uh there's this airborne virus that's killing millions of people and making us re-examine our relationship with nature and each other.
• 14:13
  SPEAKER_04: But uh also though there's some deals.
• 14:15
  SPEAKER_10: And our holiday shopping events are going to be different than what you've seen in the past.
• 14:19
  SPEAKER_04: They certainly are, they're tinged with death.
• 14:22
  SPEAKER_10: Protecting the health and safety of our customers and associates is our number one focus.
• 14:27
  SPEAKER_04: Well, if that's your number one focus, don't have a great big sale then.
• 14:30
  SPEAKER_04: Just cancel the whole thing.
• 14:32
  SPEAKER_04: Because haven't you noticed, like I have, that there's nothing that you can acquire, purchase, put on, style your hair with, play with uh on the end of your hand or on the end of your phone that's going to make any difference to this sense of loss and alienation?
• 14:45
  SPEAKER_04: When, oh when, will you accept that it's a journey within that needs to be undertaken?
• 14:50
  SPEAKER_04: I'm not a Luddite, I'm not anti-progress, technology, medicine, advancement of humankind in any way.
• 14:55
  SPEAKER_04: But surely, surely, purchasing simply for the point of purchase in order to sustain these systems has to end.
• 15:02
  SPEAKER_04: Why is nobody offering us that?
• 15:05
  SPEAKER_04: Why?
• 15:06
  SPEAKER_04: Why?
• 15:06
  SPEAKER_03: We will continue to have our safety measures in place, including I think he does a good job there, doesn't he, of just highlighting that that feeling of I'll just buy something else and now make it good, you know.
• 15:21
  SPEAKER_03: If I have this one more thing, that'll n that'll fill me up or that'll numb the pain or distract me long enough to not have to think about reality.
• 15:29
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah, yeah.
• 15:30
  SPEAKER_02: Because everything is tinged with death.
• 15:32
  SPEAKER_06: Yeah.
• 15:32
  SPEAKER_02: Because what's what's interesting though for me is that that was true in 2019 as well.
• 15:36
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah, that's been true for years.
• 15:38
  SPEAKER_02: Well, quite a number, you know.
• 15:40
  SPEAKER_02: All of history almost.
• 15:43
  SPEAKER_02: But yeah, this this idea that I well I I think, and and speaking like in biblical terms, like plagues are intensifications of life as normal.
• 15:55
  SPEAKER_02: It's not they're they're not bolts from the blue.
• 15:57
  SPEAKER_02: Um and we're tempted to think that that you know most of life is um just business as usual, and and then there's the holy cow bucket over here.
• 16:08
  SPEAKER_02: Like every now and again there's a there's a kind of a holy cow moment.
• 16:11
  SPEAKER_02: Holy cow! Most of life is is business as usual, and then there's holy cow.
• 16:15
  SPEAKER_02: I I get that from uh Ed Katmall, who uh wrote Creativity Inc.
• 16:19
  SPEAKER_02: And he says, you know, it's what businesses always imagine.
• 16:22
  SPEAKER_02: They imagine that most of life is business as usual, and then when a problem comes, they like run around like headless chickens.
• 16:28
  SPEAKER_02: That's that's how we operate.
• 16:29
  SPEAKER_02: You know, we think we think most of life is fine.
• 16:31
  SPEAKER_02: And then death! Who told me about death?
• 16:33
  SPEAKER_02: Why did nobody tell me?
• 16:35
  SPEAKER_02: There was this thing called death.
• 16:37
  SPEAKER_02: And I so I I think all of what Russell's saying is true.
• 16:41
  SPEAKER_02: It's just it's just always been true.
• 16:43
  SPEAKER_02: Um, but sometimes we need an intensification.
• 16:47
  SPEAKER_02: You know, C.S.
• 16:48
  SPEAKER_02: Lewis said that sometimes pain is God's megaphone to rouse a deaf world.
• 16:53
  SPEAKER_02: And he's saying the same kinds of things.
• 16:55
  SPEAKER_02: It's just turning the turning the volume up just a little bit.
• 16:58
  SPEAKER_02: Offering us that.
• 16:59
  SPEAKER_10: Why?
• 17:00
  SPEAKER_10: Why?
• 17:01
  SPEAKER_10: We will continue to have our safety measures in place, including mask requirements for our associates and customers.
• 17:06
  SPEAKER_04: They're really trying to convey that these people are smiling underneath these masks.
• 17:11
  SPEAKER_04: Hey, I couldn't be happier.
• 17:12
  SPEAKER_10: Enhanced cleaning, including sanitizing our carts after customer use.
• 17:16
  SPEAKER_04: Nothing to see here.
• 17:17
  SPEAKER_04: It's just a man hosing down a trolley with bleach.
• 17:20
  SPEAKER_04: Come on into Walmart.
• 17:22
  SPEAKER_10: Plastic barriers at our checkout registers and social distancing decals on our floors.
• 17:27
  SPEAKER_02: Have you seen the Mitchell and Webb sketch with like, do not go outside, and like so many days since the incident, the incident or the event go outside.
• 17:38
  SPEAKER_03: It's basically everything is fine.
• 17:44
  SPEAKER_03: Keep on purchasing.
• 17:46
  SPEAKER_03: Keep on purchasing.
• 17:47
  SPEAKER_04: If the sustenance of a system requires such lunatic infrastructure, it is the system itself that needs to be modified.
• 17:56
  SPEAKER_04: You can see now, can't you, plainly and clearly, that at the apex of this ideology is sustain this system at all costs, at any cost.
• 18:04
  SPEAKER_04: Oh, it's destroying the planet.
• 18:05
  SPEAKER_04: Shut up! We've all got a pandemic.
• 18:08
  SPEAKER_04: Be quiet, I tell you.
• 18:09
  SPEAKER_04: It's not even working anyway.
• 18:11
  SPEAKER_04: I said shut up!
• 18:12
  SPEAKER_10: You will likely remember that last year we hosted a single in-store event.
• 18:16
  SPEAKER_04: I don't actually likely remember because you know what, mate, there's been one or two things happening.
• 18:20
  SPEAKER_10: This year we are spreading those savings.
• 18:22
  SPEAKER_04: Perhaps don't use the word spreading.
• 18:24
  SPEAKER_10: The only thing spreading faster than these savings is the pandemic that's killing your elderly and vulnerable loved ones.
• 18:31
  SPEAKER_10: As you approach the front doors, you may notice that customers are waiting outside in a single straight line.
• 18:36
  SPEAKER_10: We will have health ambassadors to greet our customers.
• 18:39
  SPEAKER_04: Hello, I'm a health ambassador in their high vis.
• 18:42
  SPEAKER_04: Now, I don't mean to be derisory about the people that work at Walmart.
• 18:45
  SPEAKER_04: Far from it.
• 18:45
  SPEAKER_04: They're as much of a victim of this situation as anyone else.
• 18:48
  SPEAKER_04: I'm not even critiquing them, but to use a piece of language like health ambassadors for people that are probably on a living wage, a poverty wage, in order that people can queue up a dis some distance apart to sustain the behemoth of Walmart and like simply using Walmart because they had a funny advert, you could apply it to any comparable company.
• 19:09
  SPEAKER_04: Like that's outrageous, ridiculous.
• 19:12
  SPEAKER_10: And remind them about our mask requirement.
• 19:14
  SPEAKER_04: This is what propaganda looks like, isn't it?
• 19:16
  SPEAKER_04: We uh envisaged it being somehow Orwellian, vividly drab and draconian, but it's this it's this lurid, vivid, jaunty version of tyranny.
• 19:29
  SPEAKER_04: Jaunty tyranny.
• 19:31
  SPEAKER_02: It's Eldus Huxley, it's it's Brave New World rather than 1984.
• 19:35
  SPEAKER_02: I mean a lot a lot of people make make that comparison, you know.
• 19:37
  SPEAKER_02: Eldus Huxley had this dystopian vision for the future alongside George Orwell's 1984.
• 19:42
  SPEAKER_02: In 1984, it's the straconian governments that's going to, you know, like there's some bureaucrat called Ian with a clipboard and a pen, and this gray man who's keeping you down, and you know, big brother and all that.
• 19:56
  SPEAKER_02: Whereas Aldus Huxley paints this p picture of we enslave ourselves through our passions, through our desires, through consumerism, and you know, which which is the more likely um way of slavery these days?
• 20:11
  SPEAKER_02: I think Russell Brand is right.
• 20:12
  SPEAKER_02: I think I think Aldus Huxley is right.
• 20:15
  SPEAKER_02: I I think Blaise Pascal is right.
• 20:17
  SPEAKER_02: Um, we enslave ourselves, our own appetites enslave us far better than any government could could possibly do it.
• 20:25
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
• 20:26
  SPEAKER_10: How you shop the store is different this year.
• 20:28
  SPEAKER_10: Instead of multiple preset cue lines, after entering the store, you will be directed toward the main aisles to shop our deals.
• 20:35
  SPEAKER_04: Okay, that don't look confusing.
• 20:37
  SPEAKER_04: In order to go out and get a cheap television, I've got a beer in Tron.
• 20:41
  SPEAKER_10: This allows us to keep the whole store open rather than closing certain departments.
• 20:45
  SPEAKER_04: And if you look closely, there's Mrs.
• 20:47
  SPEAKER_10: Pac-Man coming down the other aisle to give you a pandemic.
• 20:50
  SPEAKER_10: The most merchandise available during these events are considered grab and go.
• 20:54
  SPEAKER_10: So you can grab one and keep moving.
• 20:56
  SPEAKER_04: They're asking us to regress back to some sort of neanderful state of unborn idiocy.
• 21:03
  SPEAKER_04: Grab and go.
• 21:11
  SPEAKER_03: You just pull it all up on the shelves as you go.
• 21:14
  SPEAKER_03: It's the apocalypse.
• 21:16
  SPEAKER_07: Give me my toilet roll.
• 21:18
  SPEAKER_07: At Dayteland Shopping Mall in Kendall, officers kicked off their annual holiday crime initiative.
• 21:23
  SPEAKER_05: Ah, the annual holiday crime initiative.
• 21:25
  SPEAKER_05: Slay bells ring.
• 21:31
  SPEAKER_07: And detailed what the department is doing to keep shoppers safe.
• 21:34
  SPEAKER_11: During this initiative, uniformed and undercover officers will conduct surveillances and high visibility patrols, focusing in and around major malls and shopping centers.
• 21:45
  SPEAKER_04: Of course, the reason that we're being told that there are high visibility patrols in order that consumerism can carry on unaided is because they recognize that these sales and these retail festivals are taking place during a time of perhaps unprecedented.
• 22:00
  SPEAKER_04: Economic decline.
• 22:01
  SPEAKER_04: But while we're being encouraged to go out and buy stuff under the watchful eye of armed police, in the UK, 750,000 jobs have been lost, outstripping the damage done by the 2008 financial crisis.
• 22:13
  SPEAKER_04: Unemployment is the highest in four years.
• 22:15
  SPEAKER_04: If you're American, the number of job losses soared to more than 40 million since the start of the pandemic, increasing by more than two million each week.
• 22:24
  SPEAKER_04: Of course, the fallout has hit lower income Americans the hardest, with 46% saying they have trouble paying their bills, and 32% saying it's been hard for them to make rent or mortgage payments turning to borrowing money and food banks.
• 22:36
  SPEAKER_04: Of course, we're supported Marcus Rashford and his incredible efforts, and uh specifically the One Can Trust to a local to where I live, and we uh urge all of you to help and indeed use those facilities if you can.
• 22:47
  SPEAKER_04: But what this obviously makes clear is that on one level it is recognised that we've been invited to participate in these festivals of indulgence when it's understood that a vast swathe of the population are no longer able to participate in it.
• 23:03
  SPEAKER_04: This, I think, for me, this Black Friday symbol presents a perfect opportunity to understand why humanity is in this situation in the first place.
• 23:14
  SPEAKER_04: We are ignorant to the fact that our structures and systems are failing us, that we need to make enormous change.
• 23:19
  SPEAKER_04: Don't you remember way back at the beginning of the pandemic, there was a kind of sense of unity and togetherness and mutual reflection and a kind of folksy willingness to re-examine the way that we live?
• 23:30
  SPEAKER_04: Well, that's over.
• 23:31
  SPEAKER_04: The bifurcations that preceded it have re-emerged, whether that's in American or British politics or wherever you happen to live in the world, and what is being enforced globally is the mandated religion of consumerism.
• 23:43
  SPEAKER_04: Let the coronavirus pandemic and the upcoming holiday seasons provide not an opportunity for us to double down on consumerism, but to ask of ourselves and one another: should we be trying to sustain the unsustainable or ought we be looking within and communicating with one another anew to find new ways of living together when the old way is clearly expired?
• 24:08
  SPEAKER_04: I hope you enjoyed that video.
• 24:09
  SPEAKER_02: If you didn't very much, yeah, very much enjoyed it.
• 24:12
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah, definitely, definitely.
• 24:13
  SPEAKER_02: What do you take from uh from Russell's wisdom here?
• 24:16
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah, I mean I think he's right, but what he says at the end that when we first came into this lockdown period, there was this sense of oh, we're in something new and this is a time for us to to change.
• 24:28
  SPEAKER_03: You know, look at that, we're gonna pull together and re-examine life and priorities, and hey, aren't we doing things together as families that we didn't do before?
• 24:36
  SPEAKER_03: Or, you know, all those kind of things.
• 24:38
  SPEAKER_03: But I think he's right that that is that's disappeared, you know.
• 24:41
  SPEAKER_03: And I was preaching recently and I said that I think there's a sense actually people have hardened now more so rather than ask I think we went into it as Christians, saying, like, oh, in a sense, people are gonna start asking the big questions, you know, and our security's been stripped away and all the things we look to.
• 24:59
  SPEAKER_03: Um but I think actually people aren't asking those questions anymore.
• 25:05
  SPEAKER_03: People just seem to be almost like the Black Friday stuff doubling down on the consumeristic side of things, and you know, I mean, I mean I've been to be honest, yeah, even I'm I've been surprised at the number of people who in the midst of all this have been like, oh, we're just gonna swan off to Portugal or something, you know.
• 25:21
  SPEAKER_03: Like I'm like, we're in the middle of a global pandemic, like but it's like we've got to have our holiday.
• 25:26
  SPEAKER_03: You're like, okay, interesting.
• 25:28
  SPEAKER_03: Like yeah, it's it's almost like we we don't want to learn, or if we do, we're we're happy for society to learn as long as we can still have our holiday at a big TV.
• 25:37
  SPEAKER_02: Yes, yeah, yeah.
• 25:39
  SPEAKER_02: And we've all got grumpier, haven't we?
• 25:40
  SPEAKER_02: We've all got tetsues.
• 25:41
  SPEAKER_02: Shut up.
• 25:42
  SPEAKER_02: I haven't.
• 25:44
  SPEAKER_02: You especially.
• 25:47
  SPEAKER_02: And yeah, I think I think Russell's put his finger on like one of our false saviors.
• 25:52
  SPEAKER_02: You know, one of our false saviours is the big flat screen TV or going on the holiday or consumerism or material thing.
• 26:00
  SPEAKER_02: That's one kind of false saviour.
• 26:04
  SPEAKER_02: I mean, you you could identify other false saviors as the government, although you know fewer and fewer people trusting them.
• 26:13
  SPEAKER_02: Um there there is a kind of, I think, safetyism as well that some people can, you know, as as as long as as long as it's you're safe.
• 26:20
  SPEAKER_02: You know, there's there's nothing more important than than than that.
• 26:24
  SPEAKER_02: So actually, one of the things that the pandemic can do is make us prioritize our health and b one particular disease above all others.
• 26:34
  SPEAKER_02: And it has got us focused on our health in one in one smaller aspect.
• 26:39
  SPEAKER_02: But of course, you know, undiaged cancer and undiagnosed strokes and heart attacks and and then the the medical effects of poverty and the mental health effects of of poverty poverty kind of to throw into the mix.
• 26:51
  SPEAKER_02: So there is there is another false savior, I would, I would say, in in terms of the the illusion of safety, the illusion that you can be safe so long as you wash your hands for 20 seconds, so long as you know.
• 27:03
  SPEAKER_02: Sure.
• 27:04
  SPEAKER_02: That's that's another kind of false saviour.
• 27:06
  SPEAKER_03: But uh but I But that's that's always been there though, as well.
• 27:09
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah.
• 27:09
  SPEAKER_03: So even before COVID.
• 27:12
  SPEAKER_03: Right.
• 27:12
  SPEAKER_03: So the idea that we were just safe.
• 27:16
  SPEAKER_02: Yes.
• 27:17
  SPEAKER_02: Yes.
• 27:18
  SPEAKER_02: Well, comparatively we have been.
• 27:19
  SPEAKER_02: Like compared to around the world and down through history.
• 27:22
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah, no, of course.
• 27:23
  SPEAKER_02: You know, in the post-war periods, the fact that we can talk about a post-war period that's been 75 years long, that's a that's astonishing in human civilization.
• 27:32
  SPEAKER_03: But that I think we said it one of the previous weeks that that is the blip in history.
• 27:37
  SPEAKER_03: Yes.
• 27:37
  SPEAKER_03: The kind of 75 years of peace time.
• 27:40
  SPEAKER_02: Pretty much peace.
• 27:41
  SPEAKER_02: Peace and prosper, like unparalleled prosperity.
• 27:43
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah, yeah.
• 27:44
  SPEAKER_02: So, you know, like in the Bible, it talks about the hard times as war, famine, and pestilence.
• 27:49
  SPEAKER_02: So we've been we've been war-free largely in the West.
• 27:54
  SPEAKER_02: Um, we've been famine-free.
• 27:56
  SPEAKER_02: Uh, you know, I mean, the economic hit in 2008 was a kind of a famine.
• 27:59
  SPEAKER_02: It's like the crops failing.
• 28:00
  SPEAKER_02: You know, when the when the big banks fail, it's like the crops fail and and s, you know, the bottom drops out of the housing market and everyone, you know.
• 28:07
  SPEAKER_02: So that's kind of been a a little famine.
• 28:11
  SPEAKER_02: And then pestilence, I mean, pestilence has seemed like such an arcane thing that's, you know, it doesn't happen to us, not these days.
• 28:20
  SPEAKER_02: And I just I just wonder whether, especially the the pestilence we're in, you know, we're we're encountering now and the famine that we're going to go into, you know, the economic downturn, that has begun an unprecedented economic downturn, um, and that is going to continue in 2021, I think that's going to wake us up to normality.
• 28:40
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
• 28:41
  SPEAKER_02: Because what yeah, what we were in, that's the weird thing.
• 28:44
  SPEAKER_02: What we're in now, this is this is real life for most of humanity.
• 28:48
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah.
• 28:48
  SPEAKER_03: And yeah, and as you say, it has been for for most of history.
• 28:52
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah.
• 28:53
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah.
• 28:53
  SPEAKER_03: And I think maybe that's something that people should the Black Friday stuff means you don't have to think about that.
• 29:01
  SPEAKER_03: Like, so I've had one or two moments where not not like I've I've felt like overwhelmed by the whole thing.
• 29:07
  SPEAKER_03: So I wouldn't say I've been overwhelmed by it, but there's always been that thing in I've I've almost been too able to imagine, you know, like oh, everything is out of control, you know.
• 29:20
  SPEAKER_03: And but I don't, you know, for whatever reason it's quite hard to explain because I I I don't get to that point where I'm thinking, like, oh my goodness, it's all what do we do?
• 29:28
  SPEAKER_03: Like, but I can put myself suddenly in that place for a few seconds and like, oh gosh, that would be really quite terrifying.
• 29:34
  SPEAKER_06: Yeah.
• 29:34
  SPEAKER_03: But I imagine there are a lot of people who do feel that way, and there were clearly there are.
• 29:39
  SPEAKER_03: Um, and there are those who are struggling like very clearly with their mental health because the whole thing is too overwhelming for them.
• 29:45
  SPEAKER_03: But then I imagine there's a lot of others who who are doing the Black Friday thing or whatever it is, because in a sense you don't then have to think about how overwhelming it is that the world isn't like the way it has been for the last 75 years, and actually 75 years was a blip.
• 30:03
  SPEAKER_03: So if we're wait waking up to reality, you say, Well, I don't want to wake up to reality, I'll just buy another TV.
• 30:07
  SPEAKER_03: Right.
• 30:08
  SPEAKER_03: You know, and the more I do this, the more I keep trying to do this and go keep going on holidays and keep trying to be normal, um, the less I have to think about it.
• 30:16
  SPEAKER_06: Yeah.
• 30:16
  SPEAKER_02: Um I think that's partly why the government wants to save Christmas for us.
• 30:21
  SPEAKER_02: But the Christmas they want to save for us is the consumerist thing.
• 30:25
  SPEAKER_02: It's it's it's it's at least the very cozy domestic little celebration where you you turn on the lights and the twinkle-y and the tinsel.
• 30:34
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah, chestnuts roasting on open fire and all that stuff.
• 30:37
  SPEAKER_02: And if there's no place to go, let it snow, let it snow, let us know.
• 30:40
  SPEAKER_02: Because the fire is so delightful, you know?
• 30:42
  SPEAKER_02: And and I think little um kind of embodied this.
• 30:46
  SPEAKER_02: Have you you haven't yet seen it?
• 30:47
  SPEAKER_03: I don't think I've seen, I might have seen it, but I'm not sure.
• 30:50
  SPEAKER_02: I wanted to show this to you so we get your we get your reaction.
• 30:53
  SPEAKER_02: We we're gonna catch your capture your reaction on camera.
• 30:56
  SPEAKER_02: This is how Little want to play the true heart and soul of Christmas.
• 31:02
  SPEAKER_02: Take a look.
• 31:03
  SPEAKER_15: The world is hushed and white with snow.
• 31:06
  SPEAKER_15: Lowly hugs me through a window.
• 31:13
  SPEAKER_15: No, it's a Christmas that's a little with great prices instead.
• 31:16
  SPEAKER_15: Rich, bridge, turkey smelling with a logo and oh what a price.
• 31:24
  SPEAKER_03: Emotional crazy emotional crazy.
• 31:30
  SPEAKER_15: We don't want to afford a winning Christmas.
• 31:39
  SPEAKER_15: We don't have a fucking light.
• 31:51
  SPEAKER_02: There you go.
• 31:52
  SPEAKER_02: That's that's the Christmas you can believe in, right?
• 31:55
  SPEAKER_03: No, we don't want we don't want relationship.
• 31:57
  SPEAKER_03: We want more food.
• 32:00
  SPEAKER_03: I am gonna start using the phrase emotional gravy.
• 32:02
  SPEAKER_03: Ooh, that's a bit of emotional gravy there.
• 32:06
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah.
• 32:07
  SPEAKER_03: What's advantageous?
• 32:09
  SPEAKER_03: I want some more emotional gravy bridge.
• 32:11
  SPEAKER_03: Turn that delay pedal on.
• 32:12
  SPEAKER_03: Emotional gravy.
• 32:13
  SPEAKER_02: Emotional gravy.
• 32:16
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
• 32:16
  SPEAKER_02: I mean, they just decided to own the crassness.
• 32:19
  SPEAKER_02: Oh, yeah.
• 32:20
  SPEAKER_02: Gosh.
• 32:20
  SPEAKER_02: Because they're post-ironic.
• 32:22
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
• 32:22
  SPEAKER_02: There's at least four kind of quotation marks around that advertisement.
• 32:27
  SPEAKER_02: But like, what do when you have no more story to tell?
• 32:30
  SPEAKER_02: I mean, like, if you're tuning in from outside the UK, every year Christmas advertisements, especially by the department stores and the supermarkets, are because I think is it the Tesco one where they're just like there's no naughty list?
• 32:41
  SPEAKER_02: Yes, there's no naughty list.
• 32:42
  SPEAKER_03: I've seen that one.
• 32:43
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah.
• 32:43
  SPEAKER_03: And that's just like.
• 32:44
  SPEAKER_03: Again, the the crux of the advert really is just like, yeah, Christmas is rubbish this year, so stuff yourself with food.
• 32:52
  SPEAKER_03: Just indulge.
• 32:53
  SPEAKER_03: Just eat more, you'll be fine, you know.
• 32:55
  SPEAKER_03: Numb the pain.
• 32:57
  SPEAKER_03: Yes.
• 32:57
  SPEAKER_03: Numb the pain with more emotional gravy.
• 33:00
  SPEAKER_03: More emotional gravy.
• 33:06
  SPEAKER_02: This is the problem.
• 33:07
  SPEAKER_02: And you know, we went into the pandemic thinking, oh, you know, this is God's megaphone to rouse a deaf world.
• 33:13
  SPEAKER_02: And we were noticing that people were saying things like, Mother Nature is speaking to us.
• 33:18
  SPEAKER_02: Will we learn?
• 33:20
  SPEAKER_02: But maybe we were too optimistic about humanity's ability to learn.
• 33:26
  SPEAKER_02: Because, like, like to do a brief history of plagues in the Bible, I mean, people might know that Exodus, there are some pretty famous plagues in the Bible, ten plagues, crash on down.
• 33:37
  SPEAKER_02: And, you know, and one thing to say about a biblical framing of a pestilence is that in the Bible, a plague is a it's a judgment from a merciful God who you can learn from, and he provides a way of enduring the plague and coming out the other side.
• 33:57
  SPEAKER_02: So the plagues that that crash down on Egypt because they are holding God's people in slavery, um, the final plague is the plague on the firstborn, and the lamb is slain to redeem God's people, and it's all a picture of how Jesus, the firstborn son, Jesus the lamb, would be slain in our place.
• 34:15
  SPEAKER_02: He would take the great plagues himself.
• 34:18
  SPEAKER_02: And through God's kind of redemption, where he takes on board the plague and comes out the other side, there is uh happily ever after.
• 34:26
  SPEAKER_02: And there's always there's always a way through the plague if you will learn from what God is trying to teach you in the plague.
• 34:32
  SPEAKER_02: Um but like famously, what happens to Pharaoh?
• 34:36
  SPEAKER_02: You know, every time the plagues crash down, he kind of he hardens his heart to the plagues and he hardens his heart and he hardens his heart and he hardens his heart.
• 34:43
  SPEAKER_02: And even at points where he says he's learning from the plague, he says, alright, you can go, you can go, and he changes his mind and he hardens his heart, and he hardens his heart.
• 34:52
  SPEAKER_02: So do we learn from plagues?
• 34:54
  SPEAKER_02: Uh we're meant to.
• 34:56
  SPEAKER_03: And you know, it's hard, I guess, if if if you if your worldview says that everything we've been doing is good progress bending upwards, you know.
• 35:09
  SPEAKER_03: It's very it's gonna be very hard to to take this as a wake-up call to say that isn't a good thing.
• 35:15
  SPEAKER_03: You'll just assume that this is a small bump in the road until we get back on that, rather than think, was this is this the thing that we think we're doing actually the wrong thing or we need to change direction.
• 35:26
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah.
• 35:26
  SPEAKER_03: It's quite difficult, I think, to it's you've got to humble yourself a little bit to do that, haven't you?
• 35:31
  SPEAKER_03: Is it?
• 35:31
  SPEAKER_03: Right.
• 35:32
  SPEAKER_03: You've got to realize maybe the the way we live is is built on the wrong things.
• 35:39
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah, and maybe it's part of the problem.
• 35:40
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
• 35:41
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
• 35:41
  SPEAKER_02: Maybe we're part of the problem, not part of the solution.
• 35:43
  SPEAKER_02: And I think the the big test is, is COVID-19 a judgment from a merciful god who, if we humble ourselves and learn, we can come through.
• 35:55
  SPEAKER_02: Or is COVID-19 a random eruption from a chaotic nature?
• 36:01
  SPEAKER_02: And if we're clever enough, we can sidestep it, right?
• 36:05
  SPEAKER_02: And I think the the our natural impulse is to think, okay, we're clever enough, we can sidestep it.
• 36:10
  SPEAKER_02: But then actually, what one of the one of the effects of that is that the we who considers themselves clever enough to sidestep it, tend to be the rich, the powerful, the developed nations who can afford to lock down.
• 36:22
  SPEAKER_02: Most of the world cannot afford to lock down.
• 36:25
  SPEAKER_02: Most of the world cannot afford this vaccine.
• 36:28
  SPEAKER_02: Most of the world can't afford to do what we think is the normal reaction to COVID-19.
• 36:33
  SPEAKER_02: Um, and so it's it it will lead to ever greater inequality.
• 36:38
  SPEAKER_02: And um that's so that that's one problem.
• 36:41
  SPEAKER_02: But but always when when God brings plagues, we are meant to repent.
• 36:46
  SPEAKER_02: Okay, and this sounds like really archaic language, doesn't it?
• 36:49
  SPEAKER_02: I've talked about pestilence.
• 36:51
  SPEAKER_02: I've talked about the judgment of God, and now I'm saying repent.
• 36:55
  SPEAKER_02: But I don't think I'm saying anything a million miles from what Russell Brand is saying.
• 37:00
  SPEAKER_02: No, no, he's not used that kind of language, but it's it's like the word repent literally means change your mind.
• 37:08
  SPEAKER_02: So it's it's a change of mind that leads to a change of life.
• 37:12
  SPEAKER_02: What is what does Russell Brand want us to do?
• 37:14
  SPEAKER_02: You know that Mother Nature is teaching us, sending us to our room.
• 37:20
  SPEAKER_02: That's a judgment, right?
• 37:21
  SPEAKER_02: Go to your room.
• 37:22
  SPEAKER_02: That's a judgment.
• 37:24
  SPEAKER_02: And we are to rethink, to humble ourselves, as you say.
• 37:28
  SPEAKER_02: And I th I do think we need to recapture that language as archaic as it sounds, you know, like like we've been I don't know what thumbnail we're gonna end up with for this video.
• 37:36
  SPEAKER_02: I don't know what title we're gonna use.
• 37:39
  SPEAKER_02: But you know, could we use you know, COVID-19, the judgment of God.
• 37:44
  SPEAKER_03: Well, could be, isn't it?
• 37:46
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
• 37:46
  SPEAKER_03: Do you I I think so it it's it's something whether as a as a planet, you let's say, um, we maybe we need to humble ourselves um and re-examine it in the sense Ross was talking about.
• 38:00
  SPEAKER_03: I wonder as well whether it's a wake-up call, like for the just the church and the people of God um to humble ourselves as well.
• 38:08
  SPEAKER_03: You know, like the church in the West is pretty, you know, uh a bit of a low ebb comparatively to the rest of the world and compared to other points in history.
• 38:17
  SPEAKER_03: Um and I wonder whether some of that is because we've we've gone so far from the Lord.
• 38:24
  SPEAKER_03: And you know, at the moment people seem desperate.
• 38:26
  SPEAKER_03: I mean, particularly in the early days, people were desperate to get back to normal with church.
• 38:32
  SPEAKER_03: Um and I wonder whether you know that that is the right thing.
• 38:38
  SPEAKER_03: Maybe God is using this time for us as a church as well to re-examine what we're doing and to change our ways.
• 38:47
  SPEAKER_03: Right.
• 38:48
  SPEAKER_03: Um but the danger is that you know we don't humble ourselves and repent.
• 38:53
  SPEAKER_03: We're like, we're just gonna we're gonna tough it out until we can get back in the building and then back to the same old normal.
• 39:01
  SPEAKER_02: Because that's the other thing to say, well, there's a number of things to say about judgment.
• 39:04
  SPEAKER_02: When I say COVID-19 is a judgment from God, I mean I do mean that.
• 39:08
  SPEAKER_02: But let me unpack what I mean.
• 39:10
  SPEAKER_02: Like, um, first of all, 1 Peter chapter 4 in the New Testament says judgment begins with the house of God, that is God's people, you know, the ch the church.
• 39:19
  SPEAKER_02: Um and yeah, absolutely, the first poop the first people who should be rethinking, who should be repenting, who should be humbling themselves, are God's own people.
• 39:27
  SPEAKER_02: And historically that's kind of been the case.
• 39:28
  SPEAKER_02: You you read sort of Luther and his um responses to pandemic in in Wittenberg, or you um read about John Wycliffe kind of leading living through the Black Death.
• 39:39
  SPEAKER_02: Um they they were saying, okay, this is God's judgment because of the clergy, right?
• 39:43
  SPEAKER_02: This is God's judgment because of um those church leaders.
• 39:48
  SPEAKER_02: So that's that's the first thing to say is that um the judgment of God is not something that zaps all the nasty pagans out there and leaves God's people untouched.
• 39:59
  SPEAKER_02: Um another thing to say about judgment is that actually Jesus goes through it at the head.
• 40:06
  SPEAKER_02: So all the plagues in Egypt lead up to the Passover.
• 40:09
  SPEAKER_02: And people might know that Jesus died at Passover because he is the true Lamb.
• 40:13
  SPEAKER_02: He he took on himself the true judgment, he took on himself the great pestilence of death for us.
• 40:20
  SPEAKER_02: Um so that when we bow our heads to judgment, we do it in him and with him.
• 40:24
  SPEAKER_02: And um, and and so, in a sense, it's it's a judgment from a merciful God who wants to meet you in that judgment.
• 40:31
  SPEAKER_02: He doesn't just hurl it from on high and say, say, how do you like that?
• 40:35
  SPEAKER_02: you know.
• 40:36
  SPEAKER_02: Um that actually Christ comes and joins us in in our you know spiritual stupidity.
• 40:43
  SPEAKER_02: Um and so as we bow our head to the to the judgments, we do it with Christ.
• 40:48
  SPEAKER_02: Another thing to say is that the judgment of God doesn't look like how we think it looks.
• 40:52
  SPEAKER_02: The judgment of God is actually him handing us over to what we want.
• 40:57
  SPEAKER_02: You know, so there's a there's a great verse in Romans chapter one that's that says um God's judgment is he handed them over to their desires.
• 41:04
  SPEAKER_02: He says that a number of times.
• 41:06
  SPEAKER_02: God hands people over to their desires.
• 41:08
  SPEAKER_02: And it's very much like that that um Simpsons clip.
• 41:11
  SPEAKER_02: I forget what's what's the context where Homer is fed it a bunch of donuts?
• 41:16
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah, um he's in isn't he in hell like for a few days until he's doesn't he is he gonna have a trial or something?
• 41:22
  SPEAKER_03: Oh yes.
• 41:23
  SPEAKER_02: It's like it's mythological.
• 41:24
  SPEAKER_02: It's like one of their Halloween specials or something, isn't it?
• 41:27
  SPEAKER_02: And he's punished with and there's this demon so has a machine donuts, eh?
• 41:32
  SPEAKER_02: Uh-huh.
• 41:33
  SPEAKER_02: Well have all the donuts in the world.
• 41:38
  SPEAKER_02: And then and then Homer says, more.
• 41:41
  SPEAKER_02: I don't get it.
• 41:44
  SPEAKER_02: I think that's totally like 2020.
• 41:46
  SPEAKER_02: It's it's kind of like God's like, um, oh, so you you like retreating from the world and being part man, part sofa, watching Netflix, do you?
• 41:55
  SPEAKER_02: Well, here all the Netflix in the world.
• 41:59
  SPEAKER_02: And stupidly, most of us go, more, yeah, just keep gorging.
• 42:06
  SPEAKER_02: But it is a sense, like like God, God is giving us our desires and saying, Do you want that?
• 42:11
  SPEAKER_02: There's a there's a great line in the Narnia books and it sums up kind of C.S.
• 42:16
  SPEAKER_02: Lewis's kind of picture of what God's judgment looks like.
• 42:20
  SPEAKER_02: Um and one of the characters says says, I think it is it is it Aslan?
• 42:23
  SPEAKER_02: I think Aslan says, um all get what they want.
• 42:28
  SPEAKER_02: They do not always like it.
• 42:31
  SPEAKER_02: And and I wonder whether as a society, you know, we kind of we we get what we want, but that's our base desires.
• 42:37
  SPEAKER_02: We don't we don't always like it.
• 42:39
  SPEAKER_02: And and in some ways, like we've wanted insularity, and we've wanted indulgence, and we've wanted to just we've wanted our little retail therapies, and we've wanted just me, me, me, me, me.
• 42:52
  SPEAKER_02: But we don't always like it.
• 42:54
  SPEAKER_03: No.
• 42:55
  SPEAKER_03: No, not at all.
• 42:56
  SPEAKER_02: And that's what I mean by the the judgment of God.
• 42:58
  SPEAKER_02: Um not Zeus hurling a thunderbolt, um, but that's it's an intensification.
• 43:05
  SPEAKER_02: We're already mortal.
• 43:07
  SPEAKER_02: And so, I mean, mercifully, God has given us a plague in which the average age of death is actually above the national life expectancy of those in the UK.
• 43:17
  SPEAKER_03: I mean, you you think well this I mean the the thing that makes this uh plague, I guess, I'm assuming different to plagues in history is the how widespread it is because of global air travel and stuff like that.
• 43:31
  SPEAKER_03: But I mean you imagine what it would have been like if the Black Death had occurred in a time of global air travel.
• 43:37
  SPEAKER_03: You know, didn't it kill about fifty million people or someone would think like half of Europe just e even in those days?
• 43:44
  SPEAKER_02: I think in some cities, at some points like a ha a half, but yeah, more like a third in in urban areas and just indiscriminate.
• 43:52
  SPEAKER_02: And if you got it, you you've stuffed.
• 43:54
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah, yeah.
• 43:55
  SPEAKER_02: You know.
• 43:55
  SPEAKER_02: There was no ride.
• 44:00
  SPEAKER_02: Of coronavirus and um so like what do we see COVID-19 is?
• 44:04
  SPEAKER_02: Is it is it a judgment from a merciful God who is trying to teach us and make us you know repent, rethink, humble ourselves, return to the Lord?
• 44:16
  SPEAKER_02: Or is it the eruption of chaotic forces that have caught us off guard because we expect tranquility in life?
• 44:24
  SPEAKER_02: But if we're clever enough and if we're rich enough, we can sidestep it.
• 44:28
  SPEAKER_02: I just I just pray we don't take that option.
• 44:30
  SPEAKER_02: Because actually, you know, the way that the story of plagues unfolds in the Bible is that again and again, when plagues fall, some people take the hint and some of the Egyptians join the Israelites and come out, right?
• 44:42
  SPEAKER_02: So that's great.
• 44:43
  SPEAKER_02: And in Amos there are plagues and and the Lord keeps on saying, but you still haven't returned to me.
• 44:49
  SPEAKER_02: And in Revelation, it keeps on talking about these bowls of plagues, but the people still didn't repent.
• 44:54
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah.
• 44:55
  SPEAKER_02: So it's not like it's a it's not like a s it's a slam dunk that in 2020, okay, oh, there's a megaphone coming down from heaven saying, Hey guys, you need to learn some stuff.
• 45:05
  SPEAKER_02: Uh and it's it's not like most people will go, oh yeah, what do we need to learn?
• 45:09
  SPEAKER_02: Um we go to our little pet comforts, like our black Black F Friday sales, you know.
• 45:16
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah, and I think like it is a s it is a chance for you know, that as Russell Brand's saying, it's for s for society to try and deal with some of these things.
• 45:25
  SPEAKER_03: But you know, I think there is that element of the church.
• 45:28
  SPEAKER_03: It's a wake-up call for the church as well.
• 45:31
  SPEAKER_03: Um, you know, if we pray and humble ourselves, you'll come and heal our land.
• 45:34
  SPEAKER_03: That's the the verse, isn't it?
• 45:36
  SPEAKER_03: Um but the question is, have we have we prayed and humbled ourselves?
• 45:41
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah.
• 45:41
  SPEAKER_03: Um and so I mean, well, I was just looking on my phone for um a quote from Bonhoeffer, and he was he was writing in so so uh maybe this is more Church of England specific here.
• 45:52
  SPEAKER_03: But he was writing in, you know, 1937, I know a Nancy government, and and he said this, like the price we're having to pay today in the shape of the collapse of the organized church is only the inevitable consequence of our policy of making grace available at all too low a cost.
• 46:07
  SPEAKER_03: We gave it away the word and sacraments wholesale.
• 46:09
  SPEAKER_03: We baptized, confirmed, and absolved a whole nation unarked and without condition.
• 46:14
  SPEAKER_03: Our humanitarian sentiment made us give that which was holy to the scornful and unbelieving.
• 46:18
  SPEAKER_03: We poured forth unending streams of grace, but the call to follow Jesus in the narrow way was hardly ever heard.
• 46:24
  SPEAKER_03: With us it has been abundantly proved that the sins of the fathers are visited upon the children unto the third and fourth generations.
• 46:30
  SPEAKER_03: Cheap grace has turned out to be utterly merciless to our evangelical church.
• 46:35
  SPEAKER_03: And I just kind of, you know, he's got this thing about cheap grace, this idea that basically we we uh we can be orthodox on grace in terms of doctrine, but it's cheap grace in that we just say to everybody, Oh, it's fine, you know, don't you don't need to follow Jesus, don't need to turn and change your ways at all.
• 46:54
  SPEAKER_03: And like I wonder whether the church in the West, you know, I mean particularly it stands out there when he says about our humanitarian sentiment, you know, that just feels like a very modern thing, you know, to be like, oh the the the humanitarian, the the loving thing to do is just tell everybody it's all good and everything's okay and you're good.
• 47:13
  SPEAKER_06: Right.
• 47:13
  SPEAKER_03: You know, you're not sinful, you don't need to change.
• 47:15
  SPEAKER_06: Right.
• 47:16
  SPEAKER_03: Jesus loves you as you are, you know, and all those things.
• 47:19
  SPEAKER_03: But the call to follow Jesus in the narrow way to come and die, that's what I mean.
• 47:24
  SPEAKER_03: We've been talking about that kind of stuff with John Bear, haven't we, and some of the other stuff?
• 47:27
  SPEAKER_11: Yes.
• 47:27
  SPEAKER_03: Has kind of faded a little bit.
• 47:30
  SPEAKER_11: Yes.
• 47:32
  SPEAKER_03: And is this the reason the church is in such dire straits now in the West?
• 47:36
  SPEAKER_03: And could this season be a season where it wakes us up to say, actually, we need to do something else here?
• 47:43
  SPEAKER_03: We need to go back to calling people to Jesus.
• 47:46
  SPEAKER_03: Because you know, the uh Tom Holland says, doesn't he, that i in the wake of COVID, our bishops basically he said I could get the same thing from any local Lib Dem MP.
• 47:56
  SPEAKER_03: And if the church, if that's all the church has got, then quite there's no no uh no one's got any reason to listen to us.
• 48:03
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah, yeah.
• 48:04
  SPEAKER_03: But do we have a distinctive message, particularly here in the midst of COVID?
• 48:08
  SPEAKER_06: Yeah.
• 48:08
  SPEAKER_03: Um where we can call people to something, you know, as people maybe do question things, can we say, look, no, there this is a wake-up call.
• 48:17
  SPEAKER_03: Yes.
• 48:18
  SPEAKER_03: Um it's it's not just it's a wake-up call for us as a church, but it's a wake-up call to society, and maybe we need to as a church need to be ones who say something more about that.
• 48:31
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah, yeah.
• 48:31
  SPEAKER_02: Because life is serious.
• 48:33
  SPEAKER_02: It's very serious.
• 48:35
  SPEAKER_02: And yeah, and it's all very well saying, oh, okay, aren't the people queuing up for Black Friday sales, aren't they frivolous, etc.
• 48:42
  SPEAKER_02: etc.
• 48:43
  SPEAKER_02: But yeah, isn't aren't the people of God frivolous if we just play at church and don't have a serious message for serious times?
• 48:52
  SPEAKER_02: And do we have a serious message for serious times?
• 48:55
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah, I mean, at the end of the I mean, uh like that it seems to be that that so much of the church's response has been, wash your hands.
• 49:04
  SPEAKER_02: Like And not wash your hands, ye sinners.
• 49:09
  SPEAKER_02: Not even in the spiritual sense.
• 49:11
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah, yeah.
• 49:11
  SPEAKER_03: You know, and that's not to deny that there are there have been plenty of churches out there on an individual level who have been serving their communities and caring for their flocks in in in great ways.
• 49:23
  SPEAKER_03: So that's not at all to deny that.
• 49:26
  SPEAKER_03: But you know, particularly in our country where we have an established church who uh who in a sense it's it is our job, the church's job, to pontificate on some of these things, you know, you just kind of feel like it'd be great if you came out and had a good message that gave people something to really think about rather than stay indoors and go outside.
• 49:50
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah.
• 49:50
  SPEAKER_02: You know.
• 49:51
  SPEAKER_02: Have you seen this?
• 49:52
  SPEAKER_02: Have you seen Reverend Ian Paul's message on Sky News?
• 49:55
  SPEAKER_02: Uh yeah, yeah, actually, that was really good.
• 49:57
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah, yeah, and he's got some really good stuff on it.
• 49:59
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah.
• 49:59
  SPEAKER_03: Should we have a look at that?
• 50:00
  SPEAKER_08: Churches are open at the moment.
• 50:03
  SPEAKER_08: They may have to close their doors again.
• 50:05
  SPEAKER_08: What would you say to the Prime Minister this morning?
• 50:09
  SPEAKER_01: Well, I'd say three things, I think, and it's what we've expressed in the letter that I signed.
• 50:13
  SPEAKER_01: Uh, number one is that we can't simply think about this virus in isolation and consider its risks on its own.
• 50:20
  SPEAKER_01: Uh, the lockdown is having a huge effect on all sorts of things.
• 50:23
  SPEAKER_01: I mean, weddings are one example, but we see with the example of the lockdown of students in Scotland, another one.
• 50:28
  SPEAKER_01: Um, you know, we are really conscious, church leaders are really conscious from our pastoral experience that the lockdown has a huge effect on all sorts of people.
• 50:36
  SPEAKER_01: It creates fear, it creates isolation.
• 50:38
  SPEAKER_01: Uh, those living on their own, those who are poorer and don't have the luxury of, you know, large places to live in and gardens to visit, they disproportionately suffer.
• 50:46
  SPEAKER_01: So the first thing I'd want to say is look, we must consider all the implications of this and all the responses and take the risks around the virus in the round and look at the other implications of lockdown too.
• 50:57
  SPEAKER_01: So that's the first thing.
• 50:59
  SPEAKER_01: I think the second thing as well is that uh we've had all this language about beating the virus, as if illnesses and disease are something that we can just sort of, you know, uh muscle array and push away from us.
• 51:10
  SPEAKER_01: And that's not the case as as one of the experts in this debate has said, that we have an ecological relation with the virus.
• 51:17
  SPEAKER_01: I think, you know, we would say, church leaders would say from a Christian perspective, one of the things that the virus has done is confronted us with our mortality.
• 51:26
  SPEAKER_01: Uh people die of diseases.
• 51:28
  SPEAKER_01: And we need to put the risks of COVID in the context of the fact that, for instance, today in Britain, typically 1,698 people will die, tragically.
• 51:38
  SPEAKER_01: And we need to look at the wider picture of what this is telling us.
• 51:42
  SPEAKER_01: But the third thing, I think, for us as well is we we really want to say to the government that the spiritual dimension of life is really important.
• 51:50
  SPEAKER_01: And the Christian church has a message of hope to offer the world.
• 51:54
  SPEAKER_01: Um, I was just reading in morning prayer this morning, just before coming on, uh, reading one of the psalms that was set in the Church of England uh uh cycle of prayer.
• 52:01
  SPEAKER_01: And it says two things the Lord is full of compassion and of mercy, and then it goes on to say uh he knows that we are made of dust, he knows that we are like the grass of the field that pass away.
• 52:12
  SPEAKER_01: And and what we want to say to the Prime Minister is look, we've got a really important spiritual message here of hope, and that is significant as well.
• 52:20
  SPEAKER_01: And and please don't inhibit us on sharing.
• 52:23
  SPEAKER_01: This is a time when people have had all sorts of questions raised about life, and we believe you've got something really vital to share, which is going to have a really practical impact on the lives of people in Britain today.
• 52:33
  SPEAKER_09: Yeah, I'm sure leaders of other faiths will feel exactly the same way as you do this morning.
• 52:39
  SPEAKER_03: All religions are the same, they all lead to the same place, so you know I'm sure other people have got things to say.
• 52:43
  SPEAKER_02: Okay, you had to had to get that in.
• 52:45
  SPEAKER_02: But like how how beautiful for Ian Paul to sort of bring out Psalm 103 is the psalm that he was kind of mentioning.
• 52:52
  SPEAKER_02: And uh yeah, the life of mortals is like grass, they flourish like a flower of the field, the wind blows over it and it is gone, and its place remembers it no more.
• 53:00
  SPEAKER_02: But from everlasting to everlasting, the Lord's love is with those who fear him.
• 53:04
  SPEAKER_02: You know, there is an everlasting love to get connected to.
• 53:08
  SPEAKER_02: But by ourselves, we get blown away.
• 53:11
  SPEAKER_02: We're like dust, we're like flowers of the field, we might flourish, but you know, and and the pandemic is meant to wake us up to these things.
• 53:18
  SPEAKER_02: And the church is meant to, alongside this, you know, point point to the pandemic, point to the lessons that are to be learned, and and say, you need to get connected to that everlasting love, because without that, we're in big, big trouble.
• 53:34
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
• 53:34
  SPEAKER_02: So to summarize, uh, COVID-19, I do think we need to recapture the sense that plagues are judgments.
• 53:42
  SPEAKER_02: And I think Russell does a brilliant job of saying plagues are wake-up calls to make us rethink.
• 53:49
  SPEAKER_02: And he, as he puts it, Mother Nature is trying to teach us something, and we need to go into our rooms as though we're on the naughty step, because you know, we are being punished.
• 53:58
  SPEAKER_02: Like this is a punishment, right?
• 54:00
  SPEAKER_03: You come out when you've calmed down.
• 54:01
  SPEAKER_02: Yes.
• 54:02
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
• 54:03
  SPEAKER_02: When you yeah, we when you've got something sensible to say, you know, then you can come and rejoin us.
• 54:08
  SPEAKER_02: And and I think, you know, I think 2020 has been a judgment in this kind of terms.
• 54:13
  SPEAKER_02: And and, you know, partly it's it's the pestilence.
• 54:17
  SPEAKER_02: Also, there's also there's the the issue of the panic uh around the pestilence.
• 54:22
  SPEAKER_02: You know, in in uh Leviticus chapter 26, it it talks about there are those who can get so fearful that even the sound of a windblown leaf will put them to flight.
• 54:32
  SPEAKER_02: You know, and that's that's a kind of judgment that God hands certain people over to as well.
• 54:36
  SPEAKER_02: So it's it's not just um you know, it's not just the pestilence, it's not just the famine, you know, the economic downturn, it's not just the fearfulness that we get you know handed over to and we evermore kind of lock ourselves away.
• 54:52
  SPEAKER_02: Um, all these things are wake-up calls.
• 54:54
  SPEAKER_02: They are intensifications of the ordinary run of life that are meant to teach us, and we're meant to correct and rethink and humble ourselves and connect ourselves to true wisdom.
• 55:05
  SPEAKER_02: And as Ian Paul says, you know, we are we are like dust, we are like a flower of the field, we need to get connected to the eternal love of God.
• 55:12
  SPEAKER_02: And there is a there is a son of God, the firstborn son, who took the great plague called Passover.
• 55:22
  SPEAKER_02: He was that sacrificial lamb, he endured the the great judgment, the great punishment, and came through so that he can be with us in the darkness and he can lead us through out to hope.
• 55:32
  SPEAKER_02: And this is this is what we need in in 2020.
• 55:35
  SPEAKER_02: So please, you know, don't think of 2020 as a bit of a blip, you know.
• 55:42
  SPEAKER_02: There's business as usual, and I guess 2020 was the holy cow kind of kind of yeah.
• 55:49
  SPEAKER_02: No, 2020 is a wake-up call to what life is really like.
• 55:53
  SPEAKER_02: We are dust, we are blown away like like flowers.
• 55:57
  SPEAKER_02: We need to get connected to something far bigger than ourselves, and Christ has done that.
• 56:01
  SPEAKER_02: He's come down into our darkness, he's taken our plagues, come through to hope.
• 56:07
  SPEAKER_02: And let's let's be preaching that message, you know, to a world that that some people, like Russell, are ready to hear a message of correction.
• 56:16
  SPEAKER_03: Yeah.
• 56:17
  SPEAKER_02: And let's be let's be freely giving that message.
• 56:21
  SPEAKER_02: Well, that should do us uh for today.
• 56:23
  SPEAKER_02: Uh guys, if you want to uh follow up on uh stuff at speaklife, you can go to speaklife.org.uk.
• 56:29
  SPEAKER_02: If you put uh slash sign up at the end, you can sign up to our emails.
• 56:32
  SPEAKER_02: Um do subscribe to us down below on YouTube and click the bell so that you'll get our videos in your feed.
• 56:38
  SPEAKER_02: If you're listening on the podcast, do share it around, give us a rating and review on your podcatcher that helps us to get seen.
• 56:43
  SPEAKER_02: But uh that should do us for now, shouldn't it?
• 56:45
  SPEAKER_02: I would think so.
• 56:46
  SPEAKER_02: Alrighty.
• 56:47
  SPEAKER_02: Well, God bless everybody, and uh we'll see you again soon.
• 56:49
  SPEAKER_02: Take care.
• 56:50
  SPEAKER_02: Bye.