ASM104 On the Road Again

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okay it's one of these weird episodes of ask science mike where there's no theme song and there's no editing because greg's not going to get to touch this file before i put it on the web server for your apps to download uh i'm back to traveling really heavy again in the 2017 leg of the finding god in the ways book tour as i record this tonight i'm in chapel hill and you'll hear that live episode next week i had told greg there wouldn't be a show this week but a couple of things came up and i wanted to talk to you when i travel a lot sometimes it's hard to do ask science mike especially when like this week the questions were so good they required a lot of research and i haven't been home long enough to get any work done and i haven't stayed in one place very long so it's been kind of like a city a day right now and uh i would usually just stick with that but a couple things i want to talk to you about first of all upcoming events march 20th i'll be at in athens georgia for iris 2017 which is the interdisciplinary research and ideas symposium which is like a bunch of you know artists and scientists and one idiot podcaster march 24th i'll be at the blue conference in fairfax virginia with a pretty cool lineup of folks and march 29th i'll be in houston texas for the christ and creation conference with logos and then just hit the calendar later in the year october 21st i'll be at the rubicon conference in dublin ireland and tickets for that are on sale now and if you're in the uk and you've been thinking gosh you'd like to see a science mic event now's your chance uh while i'm over there i'm going to put together a united kingdom book tour to support finding on the ways which is out in the uk and so if you're a a church or you have a venue of some kind and would be interested in hosting a tour stop in the uk in like the middle of october uh just go to ask sciencemike.com and click on the speaking of little link up top or in the menu depending on if you're on your phone or your computer and then send a form and say i'd we'd really like to host science mike on his uk tour and we'll be in touch with you on how to do that uh be a lot of fun i think uh so but that's cool like i'm really excited about going dublin for a conference and really grateful to the folks at rubicon for hosting me on that so if you're in that area uh i'd love to see you or if you've been thinking well i'd really like to take a uk vacation well it seems like october 21st might be a good day to include in your travel planning now what i wanted to talk to you about no questions this week kind of messed up but i'm on tour and when i'm on tour in the receiving line after the event when people come up and tell me about you know their life story or what's been going on with them or how my work has impacted them a lot of people offer me suggestions about things that i should do where the liturgist should do in the world different ideas for how to build groups together or apps we should make or types of liturgies or art we should produce and that happens a dozen times at every event at least a dozen times people tell me their ideas for what we should be doing and that made me think how often we sit and we think you know somebody should blank somebody should organize our church to be more active in social good somebody should create a way for people to gather and talk about doubt and faith more openly in my city somebody should fill in the blank do this thing and i i would love to be a part of it if they did and i have become convinced that anytime you think somebody should do something it it means you should do it you had an idea you had a vision you see a need and you should be the one that makes that happen um so for example michael and i created the space in the liturgists about having a scientifically informed philosophically literate mystical approach to christianity and hosting that for people and and letting everyone know that there's room at the table for anyone who's hungry that there's no boundaries around being a part of the church and we just did it now we're not qualified to do that neither michael and i or i are seminary graduates or um ordained ministers right we just we just did it and then i thought that the church needed to have better conversations about science and how it affects our faith so i just started ask science mike i'm not a scientist i'm not a pastor there's a million reasons a million excuses a million valid reasons why i was not the person to host this program you know i can think of a handful of scientists off the top of my head who i think would do a better better job at my program than i do but they didn't and if i would have just emailed you know a scientist at a seminary or a a working scientist as a believer and asked them to make this podcast they wouldn't have because they're busy doing the thing that they feel called and compelled to do so for all of you who said we wish the liturgists would create a church or we wish the liturgists would create a weekly gathering in our city that means you should now how do you get started that's always the tough thing [Music] you know rob bell talks about that a lot he does that a lot how to be here and in his two day events he talks about the next right thing you know there's a thousand steps don't think about number 777 think about what you do this afternoon and tomorrow that moves you towards this vision and this goal and if you reframe the way you think about getting things done from you know if you can't achieve this grand vision tomorrow it's not worth doing to you can make some progress today and tomorrow and this week you'll be shocked how much you can do especially over time frames measured in months you know in this kind of approach like somebody should really also applies to justice work inequality and creating social quality i've noticed lately that in our kind of post-trump uh perpetual outrage fight america um that there's this deep critique of behaviors on the left and the right so one thing i've noticed is is a lot of my friends who are sympathetic with causes for justice get upset about tone that people on the left use or what they call censorship because people will shame certain ideas and and so they'll devote significant energy to trying to reframe the way other people talk about justice and i think in the someone should model if you're uncomfortable with language or tone that just as just as advocates use but you agree with their goal whatever that may be the movement for black lives you know you know police brutality and and and and the way we do uh convictions and sentencing for black people especially black men versus white americans so i you agree with the outcome but you don't agree with the approach that means you're the person that should lead a conversation with the tone you think is appropriate for people in your city that means if you think you know if someone swears it undermines their entire credibility in a discussion about a justice issue then go ahead and start talking about that issue without swearing because your sensibility your awareness of who that shuts the conversation down for means you're the best person to talk to whoever that may be you're the best person to talk to the people in your life that you understand about these issues so if you understand that profanity will shut the conversation out with people at your church then talk about justice without using profanity don't outsource that work to other people that don't have the influence in your community that you have so what's the underlying thread here i've noticed people feel disempowered and helpless they feel like their efforts won't pay off like they can't change the world but i heard steve jobs talking once and he said one of the greatest insights of his life was realizing that everything around him was just something somebody made up right why do we drive on one side of the street why do we stop at stop signs why do we flip a switch to turn on the lights those are all decisions that people made and that means human decisions create the world that we live in and your decisions are just as good as anyone else's you have the same capacity to shape culture and language and norms as anyone else especially if you practice so if you listen to ask science mike you care a lot about better conversations about science and faith so host them you don't need me to create a safe space for questions my answers aren't any better than yours that's the big secret of this program i don't it's not about creating answers it's about creating space and you can create that space if you like the kind of conversations we have on the liturgist podcast you can gather intelligent thoughtful and evocative voices in your community and host those conversations and that is what will change the church and that is what will change the world not me doing more or michael doing more or richard rohr writing another book all all you know that work is meant to inspire you to do what we are doing and more and more someone dozens of someone's listening to this podcast have ideas and insights i'll never have in my life you have a vision for something i could never do and that means only you can do it thanks for listening everybody and i'll talk to you next week