Podcast
Paleo Protestant Pudcast
Hosted by Darryl Hart · EN
Protestants outside the orbits of evangelicals and mainliners talking about church stuff.
62episodes
Episodes
Newest firstAll episodes
Boys of Summer
Jul 11, 202200:57:33Tap to summarizeToo much for any single podcast to cover, but the regulars, co-hosts, Korey Maas (Lutheran), Miles Smith (Anglican), and D. G. Hart (Presbyterian) give it their best college try. The topic that was supposed to drive this conversation was the annual meeting of synods and general assemblies. But because Presbyterians are much better organized (some call it anal) than Anglicans and Lutherans, the confessional Protestants only had the Christian Reformed Church Synod, and the General Assemblies of the Orthodox Presbyterian Church and the Presbyterian Church in America to discuss, though Dr. Smith did bring up a convention of his ACNA Synod. What kicked off the episode was the LCMS President's statement on abortion, which might have seemed surprising to those who assume two-kingdom theology means silence about public affairs. The co-hosts also had a few brief words about Anglicanism, Lutheranism, and Presbyterianism in Canada and the challenges of communions ministering across national borders. A new feature with this episode was recommendations for reflection about confessional Protestantism. Miles Smith wrote a piece on theonomy that is especially relevant for American Presbyterians but that also applies to any Protestant communion where Christendom still has some appeal. Korey Maas also recommended a piece by Jake Meador about Christendom in relation to the current predicament of religion and American politics after Roe v. Wade. And D. G. Hart recommended the fraternal address from the United Reformed Churches to the OPC by Pastor Brian Lee, about to be published in the July issue of the Nicotine Theological Journal. Somewhat outside the box, but of relevance for thinking about membership and belonging to the church (whichever one that's relevant), was a discussion between Glenn Loury and Nikita Petrov about national and racial identity and the degree to which members of groups and nations benefit from but also bear responsibility for the larger body of rulers, bad actors, and members. This recording may be best consumed while waiting for the coals in the grill to turn orange.
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Why Do You Need to Learn to Pray?
May 24, 202200:49:01Tap to summarizeAnother potentially controversial subject -- especially given Presbyterians' tradition of kvetching (and more) about prayer books -- but once more co-hosts, Korey Maas (Lutheran), Miles Smith (Anglican), and D. G. Hart (Presbyterian) avoid conflict. It's a shame. This recording's subject is the degree to which confessional Protestants rely upon read or formal prayers, how that affects occasions (like men's Bible study) when spontaneous prayer may be in order, and the effects on devotion in the home. Why did Jesus teach his followers to pray and what does that instruction imply for distinguishing better from worse ways of addressing God? Through it all in the subtext is the question of the sort of piety and even temperament that gravitates to either formal or extemporaneous prayers. Listeners can be grateful that all the interlocutors favor congregational singing that relies on written verse instead of spontaneous (even if holy) utterance.
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Easter Afterglow
Apr 28, 202200:50:20Tap to summarizeChristians on social media got a lot of mileage out of typing "He is risen!" on a specific Sunday in April. Some Presbyterians wondered about all the hub bub since during the week leading up to Easter Sunday, Jesus was was risen on each and every day. This episode brings co-hosts, Korey Maas (Lutheran), Miles Smith (Anglican), and D. G. Hart (Presbyterian), together to talk about Easter, the liturgical calendar, and what it means or doesn't mean to them. The hope was for interlocutors to take off the gloves and show their sectarian sides. But all remained calm and collected. Too bad, since the question of following the church calendar in relation to being a confessional Protestant may be significant in understanding shades of Protestantism. This episode's sponsor -- too little too late -- was Armbrust USA-Made Surgical Masks, which come in six different shades.
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How to Start a Protestant Magazine
Apr 5, 202200:55:34Tap to summarizeThe short answer is: go back to the early days of First Things and convince its founding editor, Richard John Neuhaus, not to convert to Roman Catholicism. Short of that, co-hosts, Korey Maas (Lutheran), Miles Smith (Anglican), and D. G. Hart (Presbyterian) consider why Roman Catholics have so many magazines and Protestants are limited to Christian Century, Christianity Today, and World Magazine (which is in a long winded way the successor to J. Gresham Machen's Presbyterian Guardian). The reason for asking is the recent founding of yet another Roman Catholic publication, Compact. It now joins the ranks of Crisis, National Review, American Affairs, Public Discourse, and The Lamp (among others). All of these are outlets for American conservatism as well as forums for frustrations with the liberal aspects of such conservatism. For anyone curious about the Roman Catholic presence in, if not creation of American conservatism, have we got a book for you. By the way, Roman Catholics also have America (a Jesuit magazine) and Commonweal (run by the laity) which produce thoughtful articles and reviews on church and society and more. So why can't Protestants match Roman Catholics? Sometimes confessional Protestants have produced publications, such as the Reformed Journal and Cresset. Evangelicals even tried a book review, Books & Culture. But in general, Roman Catholics seem to outperform Protestants in serious publications. (Sometimes, all confessional Presbyterians can muster is the Nicotine Theological Journal, a glorified newsletter.) Listeners beware: the reasons available in this episode are messy and not always satisfying. This episode's sponsor is New Balance's The 574.
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Why Not a Paleo-Protestant Story Hour Instead of a Drag Queen Story Hour?
Mar 21, 202200:50:54Tap to summarizeThis conversation took place before Spring Break. Listeners will decide how well it aged. The question before the co-hosts, Korey Maas (Lutheran), Miles Smith (Anglican), and D. G. Hart (Presbyterian), was whether Confessional Protestants have any stake in either a David-French-like defense of Drag Queen Story Hour or a Sohrab Ahmari denunciation of such public events as the inevitable result of political liberalism. In other words, what alternatives do Protestants have other than integralism (Ahmari) or evangelical niceness (French)? Spoiler alert: Protestants do have alternatives but identifying what they are precisely may require a semester rather than a pudcast. Listeners may follow some of the co-hosts on Twitter @IVMiles and @oldlife. This recording was sponsored by the Library of America, volume 19, Edgar Allan Poe: Poetry and Tales. (Thanks again to friends in the podcasting world for assistance with production.)
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Which Confessional Protestants are Hot?
Feb 24, 202200:51:41Tap to summarizeIn this recording Korey Maas (Lutheran), Miles Smith (Anglican), and D. G. Hart (Presbyterian) take the temperature of confessional Protestants. The notion of a "hot" Protestant has less to do with sexual appeal than with intense piety. Michael Winship's book on the Puritans uses "hot" to describe those English Protestants who were eager to carry out the reformation in the Church of England as well as in the lives, families, and vocations of believers. A similar tendency was evident in the most zealous of Scottish Protestants who wanted Presbyterian rather than episcopal government in the Church of Scotland. That historical record suggests that Presbyterians are more prone to run a fever, which is ironic since for much of the twentieth century Presbyterians had the reputation of being "God's frozen chosen." Hotness is not peculiar to Presbyterianism, though. Lutherans have had their challenges with Pietists, another set of Protestants who challenged the official and seemingly cold versions of Lutheranism. Meanwhile, Anglicans have always had to decide whether the metric of high church or low church is inversely proportional to the heat of Anglican piety. Low church Anglicans have often favored hotter forms of devotion and in the twentieth century that preference veered into charismatic expressions of piety. Lots of discussion in this episode. Listeners will have to judge the degree of heat or light.
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If the Options are either Liberalism or Constantinianism
Jan 19, 202200:53:13Tap to summarizeThe regular interlocuters, Korey Maas (Lutheran), Miles Smith (Anglican), and D. G. Hart (Presbyterian), finally get to politics -- church life can only hold your attention for so long. The reason for the shift in discussion is the larger critique that Roman Catholics and Protestants are making against political liberalism (short hand for representative government, constitutionalism, separation of powers, civil and religious liberty). (For an evangelical -- largely squishy -- take on the matter, see this.) These criticisms raise a larger question about the confessional Protestant churches that emerged with the Reformation. Since they depended on the civil magistrate -- we call it the "magisterial" Reformation, after all -- are confessional Protestants ill served by a liberal political order? Listeners will hear about the different approaches among the three confessional churches in conversation and may even be tempted to ponder the effects of the American political and cultural environment on confessional Protestant churches. Trigger warning: find something to bite to preserve your nails.
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The Point of Christmas is Not that It Was Cold
Dec 20, 202100:48:09Tap to summarizeIt is likely obvious by now that Korey Maas (Lutheran), Miles Smith (Anglican), and D. G. Hart (Presbyterian) together are not as funny as Lutheran Satire (Dr. Maas on his own may manifest the Lutheran spiritual gift). That is a backhanded way of saying that this episode's discussion of Christmas, Advent, and December congregational singing is not nearly as pointed or as amusing as Martin Luther Yelling about Inferior Anglican Christmas Hymns. (This episode's title comes from Luther's yelling on that video.) But the interlocutors do lay out some of the differences among Presbyterians, Lutherans, and Anglicans over the liturgical calendar and the songs that accompany them. We do even bring up whether German hymnody receives less attention thanks to the demands of English as the native tongue for confessional Protestants in North America. Bonus content: Dr. Maas and Dr. Smith preached on the same Sunday in Advent from similar texts in the Lectionary. They compare notes. Dr. Hart is shocked. Bonus bonus content: bumper music.
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Come to Jesus (How Someone becomes Paleo-Protestant)
Nov 23, 202100:53:51Tap to summarizeKorey Maas (Lutheran), Miles Smith (Anglican), and D. G. Hart (Presbyterian) do their impersonations of evangelicals and give their testimonies in this episode. That's a way of saying they describe the biographical route by which they came to Lutheran, Anglican, and Presbyterian churches, respectively. Spoiler alert: theology is important (even for Anglicans). Related: education and catechesis are also important. What may be surprising is the influence that Francis Schaeffer had on three American Protestants, in different communions, who became adults in different decades, while living and pursuing academic degrees in different regions of the United States. A question unanswered is the degree to which these stories are characteristic of cis-gender men or whether they might also apply to women.
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Putting the Confession in Confessional Protestant
Oct 21, 202100:52:44Tap to summarizeKorey Maas (Lutheran), Miles Smith (Anglican), and D. G. Hart (Presbyterian) return to talk about the way that our different communions use and rely on our confessions (Book of Concord, Thirty-Nine Articles, and the Westminster Standards). We even go into the weeds of subscription, a topic that Presbyterians may have thought they owned but is also relevant to Lutherans. These men even talked about revisions to confessions and whether that undermines the status of the original confessions. Don't be surprised by the relative reticence of our Anglican interlocutor since the Church of England and its subsidiaries has shown greater attention to adhering to the Book of Common Prayer than to the (highly Calvinistic) Thirty-Nine Articles.
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