The Brass Spittoon

The former editor in chief of Christianity Today stops by to talk about his love of Port William and the AI infused world to come. Highlights 1:00 Biloxi boy and Berry man 5:30 Unlikely CT choice? 11:00 Wendell at his most metaphysical 16:30 Crowning Kingsnorth (or not yet) 26:00 Carl Henry and the future of Evangelicalism 32:00 Praying away 35:00 Ezekiel and the fog machine 40:00 Kids seeking Orthodoxy and old folks? 44:15 A global and Martian focus 48:00 Keller on moving institutions 51:00 Berry patch pickings Resources Russell's bio and Berry's cover Marce Catlett at the FPR Bookshop Scott Moore and Berry at Georgetown College Rise and Fall podcast Wendell Kimbrough helps us find our way home

The author, activist, and grandfather who once warned of The End of Nature has a brighter disposition these days. Highlights 1:15 Dirt roads and tricorne hats 3:15 Protesting with the life-changing Wendell Berry 6:45 Paneling over real problems 16:30 Evacuate the building! 19:15 Looking back, looking forward 23:30 Deregulation to the rescue? 31:00 Lone Star State of mind 34:30 Corny truths and consequences 40:00 Cultists and conservative Sunday school teachers 53:30 A new day for the sun Resources Bill's bio and buy the book (and the other book) Solar SunDay and nitro Sunday, Sunday, Sunday Van Morrison’s Brand New Day If Bill’s statement about 9 million deaths raised an eyebrow, here’s more on that. Wendell Kimbrough helps us find our way home

The longtime editor-in-chief of World magazine discusses the Zenger Prize, his new gig at Christianity Today, the temptations of conservative politics (compassionate or otherwise), and his memoir Pivot Points. Highlights 1:00 Aspiring galactic editor and globe trotter 5:45 Street level reporting v. suite level pontification 15:15 BREAKING: Flatwater Free Press on the Zenger Prize long list 18:00 Welcome to the jungle . . . and Phoenix 25:00 Adventure is out there! 30:00 A young communist hears Jesus in Russian 34:00 Leaving World for purple pastures 41:00 Character counts, on the diamond and in the Oval 49:00 Covering Marvin’s seat at W’s table 59:45 Hitchhiking as a way of life Resources Marvin's bio and buy the book (and the other book) Announcing the Zenger Prize winners at FPR Read the winning articles Nominate the next winner Marvin’s work at Current (R.I.P) Wendell Kimbrough helps us find our way home

After a life of physical and spiritual adventure, an innovative homesteading teacher and pastor turns green with gratitude. Highlights 1:00 California to Idaho (before everybody was doing it) 12:00 The plane, the plane! 19:00 Picture pages, picture pages 26:00 Raising the dead with his students (and Robert Redford) 37:00 Finding Jesus in the mountains 45:15 Turning green in the pulpit 57:00 Timber Butte homecoming 61:00 Looking for the real thing 66:00 Thanks and love Resources Tri's homestead website and buy the book Full Cowboy & Preacher film “Check your local listings.” (It’s 10 a.m. 12/28/24 in Idaho on PBS World) On PBS with Bill Moyers two decades ago “Liver-Eating” Johnson’s grave Wendell Kimbrough helps us find our way home

The editor-in-chief of the FPR website discusses the recent conference in Grand Rapids and his latest book, Words for Conviviality. Highlights 1:00 Pacific Northwesterner in western PA 8:00 Prospects for localism and trad wives now 11:00 Bilbro’s obsessive bibliography 17:00 Printing press 2.0 and Postman problems 25:30 Frederick Douglass, cancer patient 30:00 Margaret Fuller, proto-podcaster 35:00 Melville’s pilgrimage and Jeff’s truck stop oats 40:00 A convivial reading Resources Jeff's bio and buy the book (and some more books) FPR’s excerpt (suitable for nailing on church doors) Exploring Ivan Illich on the podcast John reviews Jeff’s early works here and here Wendell Kimbrough helps us find our way home

The AEI scholar and author of American Covenant joins John to talk about a document that he believes could unify we the people, again. Highlights 1:30 Second home 8:15 The national “we” 13:45 A dignified basis for unity 21:00 Changing culture by changing institutions 25:00 Make Congress boring again 29:00 What women want 32:00 Cheese pizza and Tip O’Neill 37:00 Think Tank U 41:00 A hunger for scallops and solidarity 47:00 Plausible deniability? 50:00 A hopeful Constitution Day Resources Yuval's bio and buy the book FPR’s review Yascha Mounk, Yuval, and the back of John’s head at AEI Wendell Kimbrough helps us find our way home

Longtime ghostwriter Nancy French tells her own tale in the Ghosted: An American Life. French was raised in rural Tennessee and would later provide the words behind famous talking heads but found her own enchanting voice amid political and personal tumult. Highlights 1:15 Mud pies for Parisians 6:00 Hillbillies on the run 9:30 Romney/Palin ‘08 11:00 Prison break with the Kardashians 13:30 Pulling political punches 20:00 Google University School of Journalism 27:30 French Holy Ghost revival 31:30 Befriending a critic 38:00 Laker girl 39:30 Trusting God with cancer 42:00 Back on the case Resources Nancy’s website and buy the book John’s review Wendell Kimbrough helps us find our way home

Timothy Carney, an AEI senior fellow and the author of Family Unfriendly: How Our Culture Made Raising Kids Much Harder Than It Needs to Be, talks about the village it takes to raise a child and the metaphorical (and sometimes literal) rise of “No Children Allowed” signs. Highlights 2:30 A lively home and coffee shop 4:00 Trumpy Christians? 7:15 Find a secular van fam, win a free book! 16:30 Was Hillary right? 22:15 Trickling down to Fishtown? 29:30 House plans, town plans 36:30 Work from home 43:45 Childless for the planet or better by the trillion 54:00 Ponzi scheme or Korean contagion 57:00 The sporting life Resources Tim’s bio and buy the book FPR at 15 Churchy Trump resistance column Nancy Pearcey’s “Common Good Men” Korean “Child Free”Zones Wendell Kimbrough helps us find our way home

Ashley Colby, founder of the Rizoma Field School, digs up inspiring true stories of resistance and restoration (with references to donkeys, elephants, and our 49th state). Bill Kauffman, author and regular conference closer, weaves Wisconsin professors of the past and the robo-umps of tomorrow into a seamless and side-splitting localist garment. Rory Groves introduces the duo and ponders a porch free of PhDs. Highlights 1:30 Rory Groves, unlikely agrarian Ashley Colby: “Doomer Optimism: Life Adjacent to the Machine” 5:30 Adjacent, whether we like it or not 7:45 Donkey driving, mastodon ranching, hospitality boot camp 12:00 Alaskan laundries and cider-sipping city dwellers Bill Kauffman: “Off the Empire, On Wisconsin” 17:15 A thieving historian 22:00 Rural drama 26:00 Little things mean a lot 33:00 You’re out! 38:30 A midnight tale Resources Speaker bios and conference videos FPR Books and bookshop Conference co-sponsor Plough Thanks to Wendell Kimbrough for our theme music

Brian Miller visits the porch to talk about his new book chronicling life on a Tennessee farm. Highlights 1:30 Bayou Bengal Volunteer farmer 5:45 A monastic text 11:15 Man of letters 14:00 Pesto chango 15:30 Remote control 18:00 Growing pains 23:00 Lamb on the lam 27:15 The rest of the story Resources Buy the book An excerpt at FPR Brian’s farm and blog Paul Harvey’s “So God Made a Farmer”

Adam Smith, a philosopher at the University of Dubuque, counterattacks the disenchanted War on Suffering. FPR President Mark Mitchell goes biblical to bring down a heightened politics of insanity. Brass Spittoon podcaster John Murdock looks at a key architect of religious politics and wonders what might happen if his blueprints were followed. Gerald Ford groupie and FPR perfect attendance award winner Jeff Polet opens by reflecting on political goats. Highlights Jeff Polet: Introduction 1:30 Statistical sirens 3:00 Humane oxymorons 5:15 Dirty politics 6:15 Animal farm 9:45 Oh yeah, the intros! Adam Smith: “The Politics of Reenchantment” 10:15 A reading from St. Aldo’s almanac 11:45 Frontlines in the War on Suffering 20:00 Enchanting politics with fairies and green fire 24:00 Institutionalizing flatness 31:00 Supernaturally small Mark Mitchell: “Politics in Babel” 33:00 Towers trump? 38:00 Name callers 42:00 Crashing symbols 46:00 Abraham skips the bricks 47:15 Hope in failure John Murdock: “Back to the Future of the Religious Right” 51:45 “The Poll” and holy holes 57:00 Franciscan biography 62:00 White and wrongs 66:00 The limits of integrity 69:00 Polyface politics and ravines made for walking Resources Speaker bios and conference videos FPR Books and bookshop Conference co-sponsor Plough Thanks to Wendell Kimbrough for our theme music

Jeff Bilbro, FPR’s super-beaver EIC and Grove City College professor, looks to ancient mythology to assess modern technology and fiction of the future. Cassandra Nelson of the University of Virginia’s Institute for Advanced Studies in Culture is stuck in the middle, a bit like AI itself. Author, teacher, and mother Tessa Carman looks for life in abundance in Minnesota and Maryland. Writer and Berry Center board member Kate Dalton Boyer introduces the speakers. Highlights 1:00 Kate kicks things off Jeff Bilbro: “Where Now Are Wayland’s Bones?” 3:30 Kingsnorth and Norse smith explained 12:30 Tempted by ease and justice 15:00 AI amigos for the autonomous 19:00 Computerized convocations 22:00 Wise touch Cassandra Nelson: “Median Humans and the Life That Really is Life” 26:00 Harboring a secret subtitle 29:15 A hallucinating average machine 34:30 M.A.D. results 41:00 Fancy tooters over computers 45:00 Against photocopies Tessa Carman: “The Joy of Tech Resistance” 46:30 FPR Match Game 48:00 Manifestos and better tools 51:00 You don’t have to! 55:00 Postman knocks, people dance 63:00 Better names and best practices Resources Speaker bios and conference videos Interview with Jeanne Schindler on Postman Pledge FPR Books and bookshop Conference co-sponsor Plough Thanks to Wendell Kimbrough for our theme music

Eric Miller, biographer of Christopher Lasch and a professor at Geneva College, plus longtime porcher Jason Peters of Hillsdale College address the role of imagination in shaping our shared reality. Matt Stewart, an associate editor of the FPR website, introduces this duo that has impacted his life in important ways. Highlights 1:00 Matt Stewart, teacher’s pet/pest and herb connoisseur Eric Miller: “The Instructed Imagination” 6:00 Hannah Coulter v. Mark Heard 13:30 Collegiate conscience and imagination 16:00 Augustine’s commonweal 20:00 O’Connor’s name calling 23:00 Walker and Wendell looking for hope Jason Peters: “Imagination: Not Whimsical but Fatal” 27:45 Last year’s speech and this year’s joke 29:30 The propositions begin 35:00 Stoves and stand-up 38:00 Rainbows on the run 43:00 Unified Kauffman and computerized thinking 50:00 Fatalities and old farts Resources Speaker bios and conference videos FPR Books and bookshop Conference co-sponsor Plough Thanks to Wendell Kimbrough for our theme music

Paul Kingsnorth delivered the keynote address at the 2023 FPR conference in Madison, Wisconsin. With help from a diverse band of fellow travelers including Jewish-Canadian songwriter Leonard Cohen, Anglo-Catholic social critic Malcolm Muggeridge, and the prophetic French-Egyptian Sufi Rene Guenon, the unexpectedly Irish Orthodox Kingsnorth takes listeners on a tour of techno-mirages, holy wells, and green deserts in a search for culture-seeding saints. Highlights 2:00 Jeff introduces Paul 3:30 Paul introduces his thrift shop shirt 7:30 The disquiet of machine things 12:30 Surface debates and the depths beneath 19:00 Mumford and some on the suicide of the West 25:00 Anti-culture and real culture-making 29:00 Who is on the throne? (Or Paul as a sociological Bill Bright) 35:00 Transhumanist candor 38:00 Signs of light and darkness with Guenon and Spengler 47:00 A reluctant convert 50:00 Leaving the broken center for the margins 60:00 Short on saints Resources Paul’s Substack and an interview at FPR On "AI Demonic" at Touchstone “The Cross and the Machine” at First Things Conference videos Conference co-sponsor Plough Wendell Kimbrough helps us find our way home

Paul Kingsnorth, the keynote speaker at the 2023 FPR conference in Madison, Wisconsin, begins things with a bonus talk on the power of prayer in a desecrated western world. Highlights 1:15 Mark Mitchell’s welcome 4:00 Paul flies in 5:30 A long list of labels 7:30 Roots and power 8:15 My neighbor Vinny (and his dying cousins) 12:30 Centering work 14:00 Citizen culture 19:00 Two trinities 23:00 Our like will not be here again 24:30 Candles to blow 37:30 The still point in the turning world 30:00 An Orthodox Texan’s sermon 32:45 Closing hymn Resources Paul’s Substack and an interview at FPR “The Cross and the Machine” Conference videos Wendell Kimbrough helps us find our way home

Bill Kauffman, author of multiple books including Poetry Night at the Ballpark and long the closing speaker at FPR conferences, talks about the origins of Front Porch Republic and his unique life of letters. Host: John Murdock Guest: Bill Kauffman Highlights 1:30 Defending the homeland 2:30 The Closer 7:45 Muckdog memories 12:15 Perfectly sized 15:00 First Man and Senate staffer 18:00 Morning drinks and Mormon journeys 22:15 Life on the fringe 24:00 Not a murderer 26:15 Jimmie Foxx found dead 29:30 Paying the bills 31:30 A Barber in the House 34:30 Bucket listless 36:00 See you in Madison, but I digress Resources Bill’s work at FPR, TAC, and The Spectator Poetry Night at the Ballpark The Congressional Journal of Barber B. Conable Liberty Fund Wendell Kimbrough helps us find our way home

The After Virtual conference podcast series closes with a focus on civics and cemeteries. Mark Mitchell, author of Plutocratic Socialism, talks on, well, plutocrats and socialism (plus the importance of property ownership to maintaining the republic). Rachel Ferguson, author of Black Liberation Through the Marketplace, highlights the historic role of roads in undermining minority communities and current efforts at neighborhood stabilization. Regular conference closer Bill Kauffman regales the crowd with tales from the crypts of Batavia. Speakers: Mark Mitchell, Rachel Ferguson, and Bill Kauffman Highlights 2:30 Mark Mitchell — Why Property Matters 3:15 FPR, born in apocalypse 9:00 Plutocrats and socialists, a love story 19:30 What would the Founders do? 22:15 Rachel Ferguson — What’s Wrong with the Roads? 23:30 Housing many things in the Black Church 26:30 Eugenics, red lines, and roads 30:00 Cars explained, Ike appalled 38:00 Neighborhood Stabilization (and its All-Stars) 46:30 “Paid to talk to me” v. the Jesus people 50:00 Bill Kauffman —The View from the Cemetery 51:00 Grave matters with Walt Whitman 54:00 Masons and monuments 58:30 Wings are overrated 1:00 Barry Goldwater and friends 1:04 Ontologically speaking 1:07 Baseball R.I.P. Resources Speaker bios Conference videos Save the (new!) date: 2023 Conference in Madison, Wisconsin (October 21, 2023) Thanks to Wendell Kimbrough for his musical talents

The penultimate session from the FPR conference After Virtual: The Art of Recovering Lost Goods addresses health. Philosopher Adam Smith from the University of Dubuque and medical doctor Brian Volck, author of Attending Others: A Doctor’s Education in Bodies and Words, take on the medical/industrial complex (with assists from Alasdair MacIntyre and Wendell Berry). Speakers: Adam Smith and Brian Volck Highlights 2:15 Adam Smith—Medicine After Virtue 3:15 Medicine in the New Dark Ages 5:00 Out of practice 11:30 The medicalization of everything 16:00 Infected with emotivism 20:00 Curing the disease of freedom in 1851 26:00 De-medicalizing birth, death, and more 29:00 Brian Volck — Hospitality, Responsibility, and Presence: Practicing Medicine as if Bodies Actually Mattered 31:00 Bad metaphors and good definitions 33:00 The trouble with trolleys and telemedicine 41:00 Patients in the flesh 45:00 Paleo-Benedictine hospitality 48:15 Stewarding stethoscopes 51:30 Q & A Resources Speaker bios Conference videos Save the date: 2023 Conference in Madison, Wisconsin (October 7, 2023) Thanks to Wendell Kimbrough for his musical talents

Chris Arnade, the keynote speaker at the After Virtual conference, has traded global finance for skid row photography. Chris discusses his journey from Wall Street board rooms to a booth at McDonald’s and the associated rejection of careerism and self-definition. Speaker: Chris Arnade—An Address in the Universe of Meaning Highlights 3:00 Prayer time around the world 6:45 The liberal emancipation project (of destruction) 10:30 Transcendent values first seen in a traffic jam 16:00 “Everything we believed was wrong” 27:00 Place and the giant sucking sound of NAFTA 30:00 Family ties 32:00 The “meaning” address and its replacement Resources Speaker bios Conference videos Save the date: 2023 Conference in Madison, Wisconsin (October 21, 2023) Dignity: Seeking Respect in Back Row America The Substack home of a traveling man An NPR story on Chris Arnade Arnade’s work at The Guardian and The Atlantic Thanks to Wendell Kimbrough for his musical talents

The second episode from the FPR conference After Virtual: The Art of Recovering Lost Goods looks at education. Jeff Polet discusses walking away from Hope. Angel Adams Parham talks about the elementary power of a rapping Homer. Jason Peters goes back to the future of the educational machine. Speakers: Jeff Polet, Angel Adams Parham, and Jason Peters Highlights 1:15 Jeff Polet—Why I Left the Academy 2:00 The news from Nineveh 5:30 Signs of declines 8:30 Searching for a pony 16:30 Jargon, gymnasts, adjudications, and generals 23:15 Gerald Ford comes calling 25:00 Angel Adams Parham—Education for Flourishing: K-16 and Beyond 26:30 Cultural canons and tug-of-war 28:15 Classics and community 32:30 Taking creative license with the gods 34:00 Disturbing images of beauty 40:00 Rapping Homer, Reading Frederick Douglas, and Rediscovering Sundiata 45:00 Resources for Learning 47:00 Jason Peters—The Sin Against the Body: For This They Wept Not 48:30 March madness and the managerial class 51:45 Phone sex prophecy 55:00 Would not a storm by any other name smell just the same 58:00 Even better than the real thing? 64:00 1909 all over again 70:00 Truth buoys up Resources Speaker bios Conference videos Save the date: 2023 Conference in Madison, Wisconsin (October 7, 2023) Thanks to Wendell Kimbrough for his musical talents