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Religion on the Mind

What is a ‘Theology of Culture’? (#360)

Religion on the Mind

Religion on the Mind

Religion, Spirituality, Religion & Spirituality

4.7542 Ratings

🗓️ 13 November 2025

⏱️ 39 minutes

🧾️ Download transcript

Summary

Matthew Burdette—Episcopal priest, theologian, and editor—joins me for a wide-ranging conversation about theology and culture. We cover a little bit of everything in this one! Matthew begins by telling me about his theology of culture, and how his approach allows God to remain distinct from culture while still being relevant to everything. We look at how both liberal and conservative Christianity can fail when they focus too much on either human goodness or human sinfulness.  Matthew also challenges common assumptions about power and privilege, arguing that gestures like land acknowledgments or other virtue signals can often mask—rather than address—real authority, and we wrestle with thorny questions about immigration, marriage, and what it means to bear the "cross" of Christian ethics in a world of undeniable trade-offs.  In the Patron-only second half, we discuss how paternalism—from COVID policies to climate change messaging to my own admitted tendency to peoples tendency to manage others anxiety for them—undermining both personal relationships and democratic governance. Matt's Substack | Matthewburdette.substack.com ___________________________________________ Follow Dan on IG: www.instagram.com/dancoke/ Or Twitter: twitter.com/DanKoch Faith deconstruction resources: www.soyouredeconstructing.com/ Join the Patreon for exclusive episodes (and more) every month: patreon.com/dankoch Email about the "sliding scale" for the Patreon: youhavepermissionpodcast@gmail.com YHP Patron-only FB group: tinyurl.com/ycvbbf98 Website: www.dankochwords.com/yhp.html Join Dan's email list: www.dankochwords.com/ Artwork by sprungle.co/ Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Transcript

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0:00.0

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Surface repaired to smoothness, nourishment with a regimen use versus non-conditioning shampoo. Welcome back, everybody, to Religion on the Mind, the show that focuses on the overlap of

0:43.5

psychology and religion and spirituality. I am your host, Dr. Dan Koch, licensed therapist,

0:49.3

and researcher in the psychology of religion. And my guest today is Matthew Burdette. He's an editor

0:56.3

at Penguin Random House, a writer, a theologian, and an Episcopal priest whose substack

1:02.4

theology of culture explores how Christian faith intersects with modern life. And I believe,

1:09.9

Matthew, that your initial theological work was focused on Black Liberation

1:14.5

theology, but it seems to me that your scope has widened out considerably while retaining

1:20.4

some of that influence. Is that fair to say? That is fair to say, yeah. Half my dissertation work

1:26.1

for my doctoral work was on Black Liberation

1:28.5

Theology. Okay. A solid half dissertation level of interest in this topic. That's like should be a unit. Half of a

1:37.1

dissertation. But I also want to say this just as people are kind of orienting themselves. If all you

1:42.7

hear is liberation theology and

1:44.3

Episcopal priest, you might think that Matthew is like far left. But I actually think in some

1:51.2

ways you are probably to my right and in some ways not. And that just makes me kind of more

1:56.5

intrigued and curious to see where we fall as we discuss some of these topics. So I'm looking

2:02.6

forward to that. And I just want to say give credit where it's due. I discovered your substack

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