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More to the Story with Dr. Andy Miller III is a new podcast exploring theology in the orthodox Wesleyan tradition. Hear engaging interviews and musings from Dr. Miller each week.
Transcript:
Welcome to the more to story podcast I am so glad you've come along and look. I'm bringing back one of my favorite guests from the very first season, and I and I, I called this the the straight fire podcast that I had with her. So you're gonna catch it in just a minute. And I hope you'll be willing. Let them with ears. Listen.
Andy Miller III: But this podcast is brought to you by Wesley Biblical Seminary, where we are developing trusted leaders for faithful churches we hold to the full inerrancy of Scripture the reality and promise of the sanctified life we've just now like, had an influx of more than 300 students because of the emergence of the global Methodist church. There's all kinds of things happen here at Wesley Biblical Seminary. We'd love for you to check it out.
Andy Miller III: and you can find that out. Find out more about us at Wbs Edu, a full range of degrees, from bachelors to doctoral degrees, and on top of lay initiatives that you can find out about our website. And if you're listening to this podcast if you're coming, just because Katie's gone, you might be interested to see that Robert Gagnon, who's.
Katy Faust: New fact.
Andy Miller III: Member with us will be teaching a class on Biblical, on on the Bible and sexuality. Now, some people might want to take that for credit, or you could audit it for $300. So we're we're thrilled to have him coming on. I saw the I know you interact with him? Some there, Katie, online. So
Katy Faust: Oh, he's a king! He's a theological king. He's one of the few, like real
Katy Faust: Biblical scholars who are speaking with precision into what is happening in the culture related to sex and marriage. And I, you know, I've watched a few of his
Katy Faust: debates. I've seen a few of his rebuttals, and I'm like good luck.
Katy Faust: Good luck against Professor. I don't know. Danielle, I think, is how the French.
Andy Miller III: Gagnon Gagnon. I'm sure he appreciates the French pronunciation, though.
Katy Faust: One time he told me like, that's how you say it in French, but you know who who even does that anymore. But I mean if there was a theological version of Ben Shapiro destroys Liberal, you know. Students like that's Professor Gagnon, you know. He will
Katy Faust: take your silly little argument, you know, Kevin Young just put something online on Twitter a couple of days ago, like, actually, Jesus did affirm same sex love because the centurion that came to have his servant healed. That was actually a young boy lover of his. And I mean, like, Yeah, you mean, you bring that kind of stuff to somebody like Professor Gagnon, and he will be like I will shred you
Katy Faust: with so much Biblical truth. You won't be able to stand when when it's over. So good for you guys, for scooping him up, and very happy to hear about the expansion of Wesley Wesley Theological Seminary. What is it.
Andy Miller III: Oh, so so you have to make a distinction. We are Wesley Biblical Seminary. You will not find Robert Gagnon at Wesley Theological Seminary. That's the truth. Sadly, because basically you I saw you shake your head as I was talking about the Methodist situation. They would certainly be on the side of staying with the United Methodist Church, whereas the United Methodist Church, because of our stance on inerrancy. Well, okay, probably we don't know it's political.
Andy Miller III: never approved Wesley Biblical Seminary. So we are. We are in the conservative stream. And so for many years we were not accepted in the kind of mainstream Methodism. But now.
Andy Miller III: like now, things are becoming very clear, and our hiring are working with a Rob Robert Gagnon, who will be a visiting professor in and so he's not a full member of the faculty in the same way. But that's giving him an opportunity. Just teach 2 classes a year. And then, right we just want. We believe he has something to say to the world and culture at this time, and you know it's interesting, Katie you mentioned like he will. He will shred people.
Andy Miller III: They people won't debate him. They will.
Katy Faust: Right. That's right. He will out fact. You he will out exeet you. He will out like concordance. You, I mean, please, please, and and I'm you know it's nice that you guys have an alternative. Wesleyan branded institution here because there has to be. I mean, honestly, the Wesley brothers have got to be like, come on, people do something that actually represents us for one. So it sounds like, that's what you guys are all about.
Andy Miller III: That's right, you know. And as a global Methodist church has has come around with more 4,000 churches, as 7,500 churches have left there there. And people don't know about this. And people can go back in my podcast to see. I've talked, there's many small Wesleyan denominations. Now, global Methodist is gonna be the biggest but
Andy Miller III: there's a the Association, Independent Methodist, Congregational methods, Evangelical Methodist, Protestant, Methodist, and then free Methodist, Nazarene Savage army, these type of groups who have generally been in the conservative stream. That would affirm the authority and errancy of Scripture and the like. So they're there, but it's it's sad that there are some. There's been this trajectory in Liberal Methodism, so.
Katy Faust: Oh, it's it's sad. And you know I saw last week, right, that they just decided to
Katy Faust: repeal their prohibition on gay clergy and decide to officially do what they've been doing in practice for a long time, which is
Katy Faust: completely destroy the institution of marriage in the name of, you know LGBT acceptance, which is ridiculous, and honestly my responses. May their demise be very swift! Take them out, Lord, take them out! May they die from the inside faster than
Katy Faust: then. They already have been crumbling because they have refused to shape the culture, and instead have allowed the culture to shape them. So die. I don't want you. I don't want you with the name of Christian. I don't want you masquerading as a church. You have nothing but death to offer. The culture. Be gone.
Andy Miller III: Well, Katie, would you just tell me what you think.
Katy Faust: Yeah.
Andy Miller III: And la la.
Katy Faust: Opinions and communicating those opinions are really challenging for me. But you know my my frustration. Is.
Andy Miller III: Yeah.
Katy Faust: There's a lot of churches that are
Katy Faust: being
Katy Faust: seduced
Katy Faust: by this idea that we can be loved
Katy Faust: by the culture and loved by the world. But it's not we. Can't you get to? You have to choose? Do you want God's approval? Or do you want the world's approval? And here's the biggest problem. You know the churches that are choosing to compromise on God's design for marriage. What they are I will tell you the exchange they are making. They are saying.
Katy Faust: we want social acceptance
Katy Faust: at the cost of child rights and well, being, that is the straight swap. Okay, you redefine marriage. What you're doing is, you are redefining parenthood once you say mothers, and once you say husbands and wives are optional in the institution of marriage, you are saying, mothers and fathers are optional in the institution of parented. What you're saying is, I would rather have the woke. Progressive
Katy Faust: people in my social circle like me, then say that children actually have concrete rights and interests that we, as Christians.
Katy Faust: need to respect and defend. And I wrote an article at World Magazine earlier this year, and I can't remember the title of it, but it really is about how Christianity began
Katy Faust: with child protection. It was one of the first expressions of our true and undefiled religion before God. Right was, yes, to care for orphans in their distress, but also to recognize children as image bearers who required protection and dignity. And what does that look like for first century Christian? Well, we didn't abort our kids like the culture did. And then we rescued the children that were being exposed, because they were deemed to be the wrong sex or not, as fit or
Katy Faust: pre preterm. You know, in the first century you did have children that were being
Katy Faust: surgically
Katy Faust: mutilated and castrated so that they could become household servants. You did have widespread, rampant sexual abuse, and the sexualization of children, and everywhere that Christianity went, those practices came to an end. This is actually part and parcel of the original mandate, for Christian is child protection, and
Katy Faust: I will tell you what God's plan a is for child protection.
Katy Faust: It's all of his rules about sex and marriage.
Katy Faust: everything about God's rules for sex and marriage. Ultimately you can directly connect to child protection. So when you, for sake.
Katy Faust: God's design for sex and marriage, you are forsaking children, you are saying we would rather have social accolades than children who are thriving than children who are protected, than children who are
Katy Faust: free from exploitation and abuse. So
Katy Faust: get behind me, Satan. I want you to die. If you're gonna compromise on what God says about sex and marriage, because what you're saying is.
Katy Faust: children can be sacrificed so I can live a more comfortable life, and that is incompatible with true Christian.
Andy Miller III: Amen. I mean I am with you, Katie, and this is I so thankful for a chance to talk to you about these type of things and in the in the context of methods zoom. And those who are regularly podcasts know I may. I didn't even get through my intro, and that does not matter at all. I will go right for it here with you.
Katy Faust: I'll wait patiently. You do your intro.
Andy Miller III: No, no.
Katy Faust: I will just drink my coffee, and I will enjoy.
Andy Miller III: I like it. I I was so like, and all my audience will be so glad they'll be like. Finally, Andy, stop saying the same thing. I know that he's gonna say every time. So we we with that just to highlight that sorry for the commercial. But go back and you could listen to it, too, Katie. But people could go back and listen to my conversations with Tom Lambrick and Rob Renfro, 2 leaders of the there's a group Katie called Good News for United Methodist. They've been working for 50 years trying to. They've held the line for so long. And now, after
Andy Miller III: the most recent decision. They were just there, just to
Andy Miller III: almost to see it in. And so when I was on this conversation, they were there because the Africans had come, and they were trying to find a way out for the Africans.
Katy Faust: Well, and why didn't they center the black voices, Andy? I wanna know why they didn't center the black voices because there were black voices there, and you know what the black voices said. They said, you are forsaking our God and our teaching. But they didn't center those black voices because they don't actually like the black voices they worship their Wok God, and if those black voices reflect their well God, then of course, we center their voices. But if not all those backwards bigoted Africans, I mean, who wants to listen to them anyway?
Andy Miller III: Well, hopefully, they'll come on eventually and just be enlightened eventually. And the one who went most viral was my friend Bishop Jerry Coula, KULA. H.
Andy Miller III: S. Students from his school now like Do graduate work with us. So he stood up and stood strong. So they were there. But I I when I had them on, I said, Oh, isn't this kind of like a a sad moment like here's a Bishop Francis Asbury's denomination and John Wesley's denomination. This is what's happened.
Andy Miller III: and I I mean there was a bill of sorrow for me, but they said exactly what you said.
Andy Miller III: even though they didn't say die, but I mean but they they made me the same thing like, Go ahead, it is clear now it's clear what needs ahead.
Katy Faust: Site.
Andy Miller III: Where we think things are alright. You already know where.
Katy Faust: And let me just say, Okay, okay. So die. Dye is.
Katy Faust: Katie. Speak, but I would say the Biblical speak is, sift them, sift them like wheat. Lord, I mean like, crush them, roll over the top of them with your judgment, and then
Katy Faust: sift them by throwing them into the wins of the spirit blow away the chaff, and then let the pure kernels of those of us who are serious about sowing the seeds of the word be planted across this country, and I mean, if you are not standing firm for God's truth, then I do want God to crush you, and maybe among that crushing. There will be a few people who emerge that say, no, I'm going to be all about the planting.
Andy Miller III: Yeah, we wanna do that. As Chris, as Jude said with mercy, I mean there, there's hope. I mean, I I believe there's hope in. In this one the great things has happened. And Eric Huffman on my podcast. Who was from that very tradition and and came out of it. And I I just hope that others will have that same experience. And that's what I want for for everybody, and that's in in this tradition, like nobody is too far gone like we. So anyways, this.
Andy Miller III: if you can't haven't figured it out, you're pretty slow. But I have on the podcast. Again with me. Katie Faust, who is the president and founder
Andy Miller III: of them before us ministries. And so, Katie, you've already kind of highlighted a little bit. I've had John before, but I think I have enough new listeners. I want them to make sure to get your message, and you started to highlight it.
Andy Miller III: that it's not that you don't believe or affirm the Biblical stance on marriage or on abortion, which, by the way, United Methodist Church last week embraced abortion, and stands now against all the States like Mississippi. That have laws against it. So I mean there it is you you come at that. You're a pastor's wife. You have all this sort of stuff. But you, you have a different perspective
Andy Miller III: that I love because you're trying to develop you, not just trying. You have developed a different argument, and it's all
Andy Miller III: and can seen in your title. Then, before us help us know. What is it that you all are doing.
Katy Faust: Yes, when it comes to anything related to marriage and family we say, put them before us, put the children before adults center their needs, their rights, their longings their well being in all of these different conversations. So if it has to do with marriage and family, we're gonna say, first, consider the child.
Katy Faust: So if you look at children's natural rights right again, you know I'm a pastor's wife. I am like the I am like the biggest Bible thumper you're ever gonna meet. But the nonprofit is not a religious nonprofit. It is based on natural law and social science. We tell the stories of children who have grown up in modern families, so you yourself can see how they are victimized when we don't protect their rights.
Katy Faust: So we are nonprofit that is
Katy Faust: established to defend children's rights to their mother and father.
Katy Faust: Children have a right to life. Most of us who are in the Christian conservative world understand that right? And I believe that we have made incredible progress towards
Katy Faust: abolishing abortion because we have stood firmly on children's natural rights.
Katy Faust: Thank God, there are hundreds of organizations that are doing that.
Katy Faust: We are the only nonprofit solely devoted to defending children's natural right in the family to their mother and father. And when you do that, what you get is absolute clarity
Katy Faust: on everything that has to do with marriage and family. So you understand that if children have a right to their mother and father
Katy Faust: that marriage is actually a matter of justice for children, because it's the only relationship that unites the 2 people to whom children have a natural right, and that means that you have to view most divorce with derision, because they separate a child from one or both of their parents at least 50% of the time, and the vast majority of divorce cases are not because of abuse or addiction, or adultery or abandonment which used to historically be the justification for ending a marriage.
Katy Faust: These days most divorces are ending low conflict marriages right? Just because the adults fall out of love. But divorce
Katy Faust: wreaks havoc on the life of the child and diminishes their physical, mental, emotional, academic, and relational health. If
Katy Faust: children have a right to their mother and father. That means that we reject all forms of modern family which really is just code for child loss. The child has to lose something to be in that family. If we believe children have a right to their mother and father, and a right to life. By the way, that means we will reject big fertility. We will say No to Ivf. In almost all cases it means, we will say, there is never a situation where you should
Katy Faust: cut children off from one or both of their biological parents at conception through a commercial process. It means, we will say, no to all forms of surrogacy which always sacrifices children's maternal bond, so adults can have something that they want, and it means that any question about adoption is always going to be centered around the wellbeing of the child, not the desires of the intent intended parents, and not even
Katy Faust: what the birth parents want. Ultimately it will always come back to. What about the kid what's the best best interest of the child? So at them before us we are hardcore
Katy Faust: child protectionists. Right? We just think that
Katy Faust: beyond abortion
Katy Faust: children have rights that need to be respected and protected by the only people in society powerful enough to do that, and that is adults. So
Katy Faust: that gives you an idea of sort of the scope of what we're after. We have even more projects, you know, that are broadening out that mission across the globe, but that's it, and you know.
Katy Faust: if you have not dialed into this already, like, give me enough time, and I will trigger you as well, because everything that I'm talking about is in some way going to infringe on or encroach on what an adult wants, what you want, what I want, something that is going to burden us in some way, but the only alternative is for children to be burdened on behalf of adults, and that is a world of injustice.
Andy Miller III: Wow. So I hear a little different emphasis. And it's maybe maybe it's just that I'm hearing it. Finally, myself. It was 2 and a half years ago that I interviewed you last time. But is it new language? I know it's not a new idea necessarily for you to say to the parents like that seems like, and I'm here. So what do you mean by that? Like the the children's rights to the parents as opposed to to society.
Katy Faust: Oh, very good. So
Katy Faust: we are a children's rights movement. Okay, we are here to defend children's rights, and children primarily have a right to life, and thankfully that is being covered by a lot of great nonprofits organizations.
Katy Faust: We are defending children's right to both biological parents, to their mother and father, and we spend quite a bit of time in our first book done before us. Why we need a global children's rights movement in Chapter one talking about what are children's rights? What do children have a right to? And they do have a right to their own mother and father whenever possible. This is a fundamental natural right, and by natural right I mean
Katy Faust: a right that can be discovered through the philosophy of natural law, right, natural law, which is the basis of most of our
Katy Faust: are laws related to justice. Yeah, common law, right? This is the grounds on which Martin Luther King, Jr. Argued that his black brothers and sisters have a right to equal treatment, even though it wasn't recognized in civil law at the time. This is a system of universal morality that can be discovered through looking at the natural world. So that is the natural right. We are defending children's right to their mother and father.
Katy Faust: Now this term children's rights can throw especially Conservatives into a bit of a tailspin, because the term children's rights has been co-opted and corrupted by the left
Katy Faust: to not only advance non rights, but to smuggle in some of the most destructive ideologies in the name of children's rights. So we are using it correctly, and we are using it properly, and the work that we do around marriage and family is primarily aligned with this children's right to be known and loved by both their mother and father.
Andy Miller III: So when we think about this, that the best situation for children is to have the right to their own, they have, they have this right to their own mother and father to biologically different
Andy Miller III: people.
Andy Miller III: Now, that's obviously chat in in in that way.
Andy Miller III: Then before us, because of that foundation.
Andy Miller III: stands against same-sex marriage? Right? It'd be it because it's taking this away. Well, some some would say, Well, is there really difference? I mean, we could. We could just bring it. If it's 2 women, we could just bring a man in and play baseball with the kids, or what.
Katy Faust: That's right.
Andy Miller III: To whatever. So what's the big deal like? Why can't we just provide? Are you saying that? The single mom isn't able to provide for their kids. Wayne. Wh. Why is this so important that that people have a right to their that children have a right to both a male and female. The Male female Parents.
Katy Faust: Yeah, and not just a male and female parent. There.
Andy Miller III: First, yeah.
Katy Faust: Male and female parent, and so let me lay out the
Katy Faust: the rule here, and then we can address some exceptions. So the rule is. And I'm just talking. From a biological standpoint. We have actually been studying family structure for decades. And what we see is biological parents, advantaged children in ways that unrelated adults, don't they? Just don't. We spend all of Chapter 2 of that first book done before us? Why we need a global children's rights movement going through the Social Science data on why, mother, why their own biological parents distinctly advantaged children. So the summary is
Katy Faust: a child's own mother and father are statistically the most connected to the child. They're statistically the most invested in the child in terms of giving time and money and resources. They're statistically the most protective of the child. The child who grows up in the home of their married biological parents suffers the least amount of accidental injury and death, and they suffer the lowest risk of abuse and neglect. Conversely.
Katy Faust: the inclusion of an unrelated adult, specifically an unrelated man is the factor that rates forces
Katy Faust: rates of abuse and neglect to Skyrocket. Sociologist, Brad Wilcox said, the most dangerous place a child can find themselves in the country today is in the home of an unrelated man left to care for the child himself. So mother's boyfriend or a stepfather. So this is actually so widely acknowledged in the social science literature that evolutionary biologists have a name for it, and it's called the Cinderella effect
Katy Faust: that a child who is living with a step parent, the mother, or the father.
Katy Faust: It's so common for them to be treated differently, to be treated more poorly, to be treated as a child that is invested and protected less than the biological offspring of that parent that it's it's widely acknowledged. So
Katy Faust: I'm not. You know, this is not a new concept. This is actually
Katy Faust: well established in the social science literature, and it's also common sense, I mean, from an evolutionary perspective, you can say, well, and this is the evolutionary biologist explanation for this
Katy Faust: disparate treatment among biologically related child or stepchildren or
Katy Faust: cohabiting children in the home, is why on earth there's no
Katy Faust: evolutionary advantage to investing in something that's not going to carry on your own genetic
Katy Faust: code. Right? So obviously, you have been wired to only invest in your genetic offspring
Katy Faust: those of us that are Christians and adhere to the Biblical worldview. We're like, well, that's sin, nature. You're a sinner. That's why you're doing it. But God has established biological systems. That do make it easier for us to invest in our own children. And we actually see this in adoption. You know that adopted children grow up in homes that are statistically
Katy Faust: by parents who are wealthier, that are educated with more stable marriages and adoptive parents, who even spend more time and money on their kids than the average biological parent. And yet
Katy Faust: adopted kids fare worse.
Katy Faust: They have more externalizing disorders. They struggle more in school. They have identity issues. And so, even when parents are really purposefully trying to invest in these kids, there is still a disconnect when it's not your own biological children. And I say this
Katy Faust: as an adoptive mom, as a woman who used to be the assistant director at the largest Chinese adoption agency in the world, who understands that adoption is an institution, adjust society's response to children who have lost their parents and can be incredibly redemptive.
Andy Miller III: Yes, yes.
Katy Faust: But to pretend like there's no difference between an unrelated adult who's just dropping in for a weekend, or even a lifetime.
Katy Faust: that it's absolutely false. If you actually want to look at the research and what we know about parent child connection.
Andy Miller III: Wow! So when this happens, when could could you just even
Andy Miller III: maybe give it an illustration of that? you, you hit it. Hint at a little bit when you're talking about the Cinderella effect. But where? Where is it that this goes wrong like? Give us a story of like how that happens.
Katy Faust: Well, this is why I said, I'm gonna trigger you because I'll get on a podcast. Like this. And i'll say, well, let's talk about the disadvantages of having 2 moms or 2 dads. The child's gonna suffer from
Katy Faust: father hunger. If they have 2 moms like they are, they crave the love of a dad, even if they're well loved by 2 wonderful, lovely women, they're going to be disadvantaged when it comes to their development, because mothers and fathers offer distinct and complimentary benefits to children. What moms do for kids is not what's do for kids. Right? You don't need 2 parents, 2 mothers who are saying, Be nice, be safe.
Katy Faust: Go to bed on time. You also need the parent that's saying, Go bigger, go stronger. Let's stay up late, and let's just, you know, have a movie night, and we're gonna watch the entire Star Wars trilogy tonight. Oh, and you know, by the way, you absolutely should crush your siblings and monopoly, because I just think that you should just take them for everything that they're worth. Right like you actually do need that male and female compliment in the home. And so I'll get on a podcast. Like this. And people be like yeah, of course, moms and dads matter. This makes so much sense.
Katy Faust: But then I'll say.
Katy Faust: children that are raised by their mother and her new husband.
Katy Faust: they're about as well as children raised by a single mother, which is to say, not as well.
Katy Faust: Okay, yeah. There are heroic step parents out there who are seeking to fill the gap of a negligent biological parent. But if you are talking about household structures.
Katy Faust: you cannot simply swap in a new husband or a new wife, and think that your child is going to be unaffected. In fact, if a child is splitting homes
Katy Faust: after a divorce, for example.
Katy Faust: 50% of those kids develop split personalities, 2 different personalities because they have to become 2 different people at their 2 different households, because Mom is a conservative Christian and Dad decided to explore Buddhism. And Mom is a conservative, and Dad is a wild Liberal that's taking them to all different kinds of like, you know, women's marches. And mom is the one that's saying, no, that we need to go to church every week, and Dad is saying, you know, who cares about that backwards? Religion, I mean. Children actually have to become a different person
Katy Faust: depending on that drive from Dad's house to Mom's house. So, unfortunately.
Katy Faust: no matter who we are.
Katy Faust: single, married, gay, straight, fertile, or infertile, in a thriving marriage in a struggling marriage? The answer is, adults need to do hard things on behalf of children, because
Katy Faust: if you are going to splice the child's family and separate them from their mother or father.
Katy Faust: You're really just saying, Hey, kid, I'm gonna level you with additional challenges because I don't want to do hard things on my own.
Andy Miller III: Right? So so this is part of why no fault. Divorce is a problem, right? That it makes it easy for people to get out now I'm sure you've had people say, oh, I believe you on all the stats, Katie, like I I yeah, I see that. But it won't be the case with
Andy Miller III: see? And they might can. Maybe a woman comes up to you, says, Well, my husband's not like your husband, your husband's a pastor. Everything. Everything must be perfect in the foust house, for sure, right and.
Katy Faust: Turn!
Andy Miller III: You know, like I I see you. You're doing these various things like
Andy Miller III: well, and they say, but it's just so hard. My, I just need to get. I just don't love him anymore. There's this or that I mean all kinds of excuses. Come up. How do you respond. In those moments I'm sure they've happened, Katie.
Katy Faust: So the reality is, it is hard. And you're right.
Katy Faust: You're right. Dealing with his porn addiction. It's awful
Katy Faust: and dealing with her. You know, Stonewalling, because she hasn't dealt with her childhood trauma. And you're just trying to like have an honest conversation with her, and and she simply doesn't want anything to do with you, or the fact that you guys are in debt again because she can't control her spending habits. Or you guys are wildly disagreeing about parenting styles because you grew up in an authoritarian home, and he grew up in a permissive home. I mean, like the kinds of struggles that you deal with in marriage. I'm never gonna diminish them.
Katy Faust: never gonna diminish them like one of the things that we did in our, you know, 20 years of ministry together is we've done a lot of premarriage counseling, mid marriage, counseling crisis, marriage, counseling, divorce prevention.
Katy Faust: and the kinds of challenges that you're gonna face in a marriage all of us will face in a marriage
Katy Faust: are not minimal.
Katy Faust: And they do have the potential to
Katy Faust: plummet you into into deep sorrow. So the solution is not to pretend, like those challenges don't exist.
Katy Faust: The solution is to recognize that if you do not confront them as the husband as the wife.
Katy Faust: What you're really saying is.
Katy Faust: Katie, this cross is too heavy for us.
Andy Miller III: M-hmm.
Katy Faust: Here, kids.
Katy Faust: kids, you take it instead. Wow!
Katy Faust: It's not that the burden is going to go away. It's that the burden is going to transfer from your strong adult shoulders, where you have resources like pastors and counselors and therapy and
Katy Faust: volition, and the ability to change your own habits. You're going to transfer that burden from your capable shoulders onto your children's very weak and vulnerable shoulders. So you're going to have to choose. Someone's gonna do the hard work. We just think it should be the adult.
Andy Miller III: Wow! I'll Katie, this is so strong and so so much truth. I thank you for saying it. And let's imagine this scenario that there is somebody listening, and they've just separated from their spouse and separated from their family. Maybe they've even. They even had a divorce, and they hear this, and they're convicted. What do you say to them?
Katy Faust: We spent Chapter 5 of our book
Katy Faust: talking about divorce and the situations where divorce may be permissible, or might even be advisable.
Andy Miller III: Those cases.
Katy Faust: Exist. Okay? So there are situations of abuse where you do need to separate at minimum for your safety, and especially for the children's safety.
Katy Faust: That's just not the majority of divorces. Today. The majority of divorces take place because one or both of the adults are not doing hard things, and that is actually the problem with no fault. Divorce it. It's not really no fault, it's not going. Let's just wash it and let it go. Usually, what divorce is these days is unilateral divorce.
Katy Faust: one person being divorced against their will. Usually there's one spouse that is trying to keep it together and trying to do the work and trying to improve the marriage and trying to live up to their wedding vows, and one parent, who, because of no fault divorce can get out of Scott, free, upend, and destroy everybody's life with virtually no legal consequences. So
Katy Faust: a lot of people look at this and say I was divorced against my will. This is awful. And now I'm not with my kids at least 50% of the time. Some men especially, are like I am paying through the nose, child, support that is actually keeping me in in a status of poverty. And I never get to see my kids. So if you're on the other side of divorce. There's a very good chance that an injustice was done against you as well.
Andy Miller III: Yeah.
Katy Faust: But if you're on the other side of a divorce and you're going.
Andy Miller III: I should work harder.
Katy Faust: I should work harder.
Andy Miller III: Yeah, yeah.
Katy Faust: Do the hard work right now, and you need to disallow. Disabuse yourself of disillusion
Katy Faust: that it's not. Gonna be hard on your kids. It is, it will. And actually, we have more data than ever about how divorce harms kids for life and don't don't fall into the illusion of thinking, well, I'm gonna get remarried, and that's gonna fix everything cause. Now they're going to have, you know, a new dad in their life, or they're going to have. You know they're gonna see that I'm happy. And once I'm happy they're going to be happy. You know the studies that we have say that if you get divorce.
Katy Faust: your children are 45% more likely to get divorced themselves. So you, failing to keep your marriage together or reconcile just passes that intergenerational burden on to them. They'll figure they will either have to figure out how to do it themselves. Or they just will never try.
Katy Faust: Then what we see is if a child's parents divorce, yeah, their own likelihood of divorce goes up 45.
Katy Faust: If you remarry.
Katy Faust: their likelihood of divorce goes up by 90%.
Andy Miller III: Wow!
Katy Faust: So your new marriage will not redeem marriage for them. It is simply going to say, this actually is more disposable than I thought it was, to begin with. So what happens if you're on the other side of divorce, and you could do something about it.
Katy Faust: You reconcile.
Andy Miller III: Yes.
Katy Faust: You do the hard work in your own life.
Katy Faust: You plead with the child at the parent to do the hard work in their life.
Katy Faust: You embed yourself in a community of healthy marriages. Okay? Because you are. You probably got into this divorce because you've got a few divorced friends and divorce. We actually have seen that divorce functions as a contagion. If you have even one friend who has divorced that is a close friend of yours, your likelihood of divorce drastically increases. So surround yourself with people who have
Katy Faust: healthy, thriving marriages that you can, patting yourself after? Who can hold you accountable? Who can actually tell you.
Katy Faust: Hey? I see this, you wife, I see your
Katy Faust: you're penchant for being critical
Katy Faust: to your husband.
Katy Faust: I can help you with that. I have also overcome that. Let's really put some strategies in place, so you can build him up rather than breaking him down. Or, guys, you're embedded with
Katy Faust: a bunch of other godly men who say, Dude, what the hell are you doing? You have got to quit the porn. Now you're destroying your wife.
Katy Faust: I will help you. I have been through that I can get along. I can come alongside you and make sure that you are living only for her. Okay, so you can't do it alone, but you do need to do it, because the only alternative is you are going to saddle your children with lifelong relational loss, that they very well may not be able to overcome themselves.
Andy Miller III: Wow, Katie, this is so helpful on. I just know people are listening right now and feeling conviction, but I hope you hear it as a motivation that you step up like you're gonna do something. You're gonna start to act and you're gonna reject the passive approach.
Andy Miller III: Rk, I want to pivot a little bit, because I really want to get your opinion on it. A couple of things. We only have a few more minutes, but obviously we're in an election year, and.
Andy Miller III: Sadly. People seem to be trying to take politically expedient positions on both the Presidential on the Presidential election on both sides, and Donald trump has come out in support of Ivf. Help us know how them before us. This philosophy, then, even speaks in that situation and and how we can. Yeah. Let me just start. There.
Katy Faust: Yeah, great. So I'm glad you brought up the election. I just submitted the manuscript for my third book, and it's called Pro Child politics.
Katy Faust: Why, every cultural.
Katy Faust: economic and national issue is a matter of justice for children. So really, you can look at all of the evergreen political issues that we debate during every election, whether it's energy, whether it is the environment, whether it's education or race, or Esg or the economy. Anything that we end up.
Katy Faust: Yeah, immigration border security, foreign policy. Actually, all of those issues
Katy Faust: are questions about, are you going to prioritize children?
Katy Faust: Or are you going to do what is politically expedient or comfortable for adults in the moment, and then just force children to shoulder the load later on. It's really the them before us. Philosophy applied to every major political issue.
Katy Faust: I did not write all of these chapters because I am not an expert on energy, but I did tap
Katy Faust: some of the greatest thinkers and authors on all of these different topics to write these chapters for me. So I have moms for liberty, founder, Tiffany justice, who wrote my education chapter, and I have Chris Elston, also known as billboard Chris, who wrote my transgender chapter right. I have the cofounder of Strive, the big Rama Swami's
Katy Faust: investment firm writing my Esg chapter. You know, I've got somebody that used to has been in immigration and naturalization services, and that works at the Heritage Foundation, writing my border security chapter. And so it's all through the lens of prioritize kids then before us. So first of all, I would say, get go to them before us.com subscribe to our newsletter, because that book will be available for Presale in the next month.
Katy Faust: and we really need to start thinking about, not just elections.
Katy Faust: but as an electorate. We need to be thinking about child protection in every major area of politics.
Katy Faust: Now.
Katy Faust: I have a chapter on life.
Katy Faust: And Abby Johnson wrote that chapter for me. Right? So when you're talking about protecting children's right to life, there are 2 fronts of that battle.
Katy Faust: the first one we are very familiar with.
Katy Faust: We need to fight the baby. Taking industry. We need to fight the industry that is
Katy Faust: solely devoted to destroying little lives through abortion.
Katy Faust: But we also need to fight the baby making industry. We need to fight Ivf. Because Ivf by the numbers
Katy Faust: Ivf destroys more embryonic children every year than abortion does.
Katy Faust: People don't realize that when you create a baby in a laboratory that baby is incredibly vulnerable, that baby
Katy Faust: by the numbers. Only
Katy Faust: 2 to 7% of babies created in a laboratory will be born alive.
Katy Faust: The vast majority are going to be discarded because they didn't make the grade. They didn't look fit enough, or they were the wrong sex, or they had the wrong hair color, or they had the wrong eye color.
Katy Faust: They'll be discarded. They'll be donated to research and experimented on until 14 days, or maybe longer. They will be frozen for future use, and the vast majority of those kids that go into a freezer never come out.
Katy Faust: Then they will either not survive the thaw, or they won't survive the transfer, or, if they are implanted successfully, many of them will be subjected to selective reduction. That is, abortion which functions as quality control and quantity control. When you have a big fertility related pregnancy. So the truth is that
Katy Faust: those of us who oppose Ivf. We do it because we actually care about children and their rights and their dignity. And we think that the 92 to 97% of the ones that are not born alive
Katy Faust: also deserve a chance at life.
Katy Faust: And Ivf as an industry is actually one of the greatest threats to unborn children that we're seeing in the world today. So it's very important that we get clarity about this. And it's very important that our principles drive us not what the politician says, and not even our own self interest.
Katy Faust: If you're a Christian, it is child protection that should drive you and child protection begins at conception.
Andy Miller III: Gotcha. So so now we have even, you know, move to by Donald trump just to say, well, of course, moving things to the States this, this State's perspective, but this then, moves beyond. If we, if we just keep your argument in mind, we are protecting children like this. This is the point. It's not about our choice
Andy Miller III: are the expediency that's involved with us being elected or getting it our way in certain other areas. This is about the lives of children, them if we're going to really put them before us, what's wrong with the State's rights? Approach.
Katy Faust: Well, I am conservative to the core, and I love Federalism because it's a fantastic design. But are you comfortable with child? Sex slavery being a state level decision.
Andy Miller III: Right, good.
Katy Faust: Are you? Yeah? Are you comfortable with making child unix being a state level decision.
Katy Faust: No, no, you're not Madras of child.
Andy Miller III: Is that a real thing, child? Unix? What were you talking? I don't know what you I mean. I don't know what a unix is.
Katy Faust: Yeah. A Unic, you know, was much more common in the first century, but actually, the
Katy Faust: the Dsm, the Diagnostic and Statistical manual has now recognized Unic as a category.
Andy Miller III: Okay.
Katy Faust: Of a sexual identity. And so what that means is surgically amputating children's genitals for the sake of their sexual identity. I mean, so we are bringing back all the pagan practices in the name of progressivism. And you know, sexual identity. That's really what we're doing. And a lot of the arguments against
Katy Faust: child transitions, and you know, medical assistance for transgender children. What we're really saying is, you should not be able to amputate children's healthy organs, either because they are transgender, or because they're a unique or whatever it is like. Don't touch the kids.
Katy Faust: Children actually have a right to bodily integrity, to not have their body surgically or chemically mutilated in the name of a progressive ideology using experimental off label hormones and treatments. So
Katy Faust: matters of child protection should not be left up to the State.
Katy Faust: It actually is a fundamental right. It's it's actually part of the Bill of rights, I mean, the founders couldn't say, Hey, I don't think that you should be able to
Katy Faust: design and discard children using sperm and egg donor catalogs and eugenic practices of
Katy Faust: genetic screening at the moment of conception, and then decide whether or not you want the child who's got brown eyes or the higher intelligence, and implant those I mean. The the founders didn't say that. They said
Katy Faust: that your right to life needs to be protected. Okay, and children's right to life need to be protected. Unfortunately, we're now at the place where we should say children's rights to their own mother and father needs to be protected, and children's right to not have
Katy Faust: experimental, hormonal and chemical and surgical treatments
Katy Faust: at the age of 15 should be protected, and children have a right to innocence. They should not have
Katy Faust: sexually explicit materials or drag Queen story hours parading around in front of them, desensitizing them to future child predators protected, I mean, unfortunately, we're at the place where child protection has got to be something that every person, especially Christians, are making a full throated defense. For this is not a State's rights issue.
Katy Faust: This is a matter of protecting the fundamental rights of the most vulnerable citizens in our country, the citizens that cannot vote and cannot lobby and cannot hire lawyers and cannot log and cannot submit amicus briefs. We have to represent them. Okay, it's not a State's rights issue is a fundamental human rights issue, and we Christians are the ones that are charged to advance those rights.
Andy Miller III: Yes, Amen.
Andy Miller III: Well, Katie, I could go on for a long time, but you have to go, and I'm so appreciative of your time, and it means a lot to me that you're out there fighting this fight. I encourage you all to look up them before us. Check! I'm so excited. Who's publishing this book that's coming out on
Andy Miller III: this third. But yeah.
Katy Faust: My my publisher is standing by me. So it's Post Hill Press again, and I'm very grateful for their very fast work on this, because it's gonna be 6 months from contract to publishing date, and that is like a whirlwind in the publishing world these days.
Andy Miller III: Yeah, when we'll be out.
Katy Faust: September.
Andy Miller III: Awesome great just in time for the lecture. Well, it's great.
Andy Miller III: Katie, thank you. Thank you for fighting this fight. It's it's I enjoy our conversations and opportunity to be able to share with you. Looking forward to seeing what you're doing, going forward.
Katy Faust: Good. Well, we love Methodists who love the Word of God, and who are standing strong. So let me just pray. I prayed that your platform, and your voice increases because I want more of this from the Methodists.
Andy Miller III: Amen. Well, we're coming. We're coming a strong and.
Katy Faust: Good thanks. We like it.
Andy Miller III: Thanks for giving us some of these arguments. Alright! God bless you, Katie.
Katy Faust: Take care!