Disregarding The Body – Podcast
The Crisis of our Time
Courtesy of the National Gallery of Art
Companion Posts
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Starting Again
I was born in the sixties. But I am not a child of the 60’s. My family was lower-middle class, and by the standards of the time, traditional in most every way. Dad was a minister. If he or mom had lived into their 90’s they would not have imagined the social changes we have witnessed in the last 20 years. It would be too easy to say the sexual revolution of the 60’s caused all this change, as some conservatives maintain. But the roots of this change go back much further than the swinging 60’s.
So I’m embarking with some misgivings on a survey of cultural history. There are deep intellectual and cultural traditions that have shaped our everyday lives. We’ve come to a point in the Western world where the statement “I’m a woman trapped in a man’s body” is comprehensible to many public leaders, at least in public. That phrase would be completely incomprehensible to my parent’s generation, in public or private, not to mention every preceding generation. It is still incomprehensible to many, if not most people today. But if you express your bewilderment in public, say at many workplaces in the Western world, increasingly the odds are you will be regarded as stupid, immoral or worse. You may be reprimanded for your irrational “phobia.” You might even have your career derailed. If you broadcast your view on a public forum, say Twitter, expect the Twitterati to pounce with the ferocity of a caged unfed Tiger. In certain parts of the world you may even be charged with a hate-crime for your expressed incredulity at the latest massive cultural shift. (See the following posts, here & here.)
As a 60’s poet might say, “The times they are a changin.”
The tectonic cultural shift in the last 20 years is quite breathtaking. Regardless of what you think about gay marriage, we have gone from year 2000 where the majority of Americans were opposed to gay marriage to today where normalization of Transgenderism is fast approaching.
A long and winding road brought us to this point. I want to offer a thoughtful and hopefully generous exposition, from a Classic Christian point of view, of how we got here. As I go, I’ll be documenting some disturbing current events. (Read my next post). I hope that even those who disagree with Classic Christianity will find here a fair and readable assessment of our state of affairs. (post continues page 2)
When Bodies Don’t Matter: The Gnostic Temptation of Our Age
In recent years, I started to notice a common thread running through several major cultural flashpoints: homosexuality, transgenderism, AI, and Covid. At first glance, these topics seem disconnected. But the more I examined them, the more I saw a hidden connection—a way of thinking that undergirds them all. That underlying theme is an ancient Christian heresy: Gnosticism.
What Is Gnosticism?
Gnosticism teaches that salvation comes through secret knowledge (gnosis) and that the physical world is flawed or even evil. In this view, the true self is immaterial, and our bodies are little more than prisons. Early Christians rejected this heresy forcefully. The Apostle John, for instance, insisted that anyone who denies Jesus came in the flesh is not of God (2 John 7).
Today, Gnosticism hasn’t disappeared. It’s just morphed into new forms.
Gnosticism and the Sexual Revolution
Take homosexuality and transgenderism. The underlying belief here is that our bodies don’t matter—or at least, they shouldn’t have the final say in who we are. If someone’s desires conflict with their biology, then biology must yield. In transgenderism especially, the body is treated not just as irrelevant but as an obstacle to overcome. It’s a mindset that says, “What I feel on the inside is who I truly am—my body just hasn’t caught up yet.”
This isn’t a scientific outlook. Ironically, it clashes with Darwinian evolution, which says our physical traits exist for a reason. Our anatomy speaks to our purpose. Even noted biologist-atheist Richard Dawkins has made similar observations, emphasizing that male and female bodies evolved for reproduction, and that denying the biological basis of sex is anti-scientific. He certainly doesn’t frame this as a critique of Gnosticism—but the resonance is striking.
Gnostic thinking rejects the biological basis entirely. It tells us that truth is found in the internal self, not the external form.
Virtual Reality, AI, and the Disembodied Future
This disembodied way of thinking also shows up in technology. Virtual reality is now marketed not just as entertainment but as an alternative to real life. Marc Andreessen, one of Silicon Valley’s top voices, once argued that those who value the physical world are simply enjoying their “reality privilege.” For most people, he claims, the digital world offers more meaning, more justice, and more joy. In a widely shared 2021 interview, Andreessen framed virtuality as a more equitable frontier than physical reality, arguing that investing in digital life is not only desirable but ethically necessary for those lacking “reality privilege.”
Mary Harrington, a feminist critic of transhumanism, connects this to the rise in trans identities. Kids who grow up immersed in virtual spaces—from Minecraft to Instagram—come to believe that the body is endlessly editable. If you can modify your online avatar, why not your real one?
She labels this phenomenon “Meat Lego Gnosticism”, vividly depicting a mindset where our bodies are deconstructed and reassembled, like LEGO blocks, at our own discretion rather than respected as integral, given wholes.
Artificial intelligence takes this logic even further. Some experts now openly ask whether unplugging an AI that claims to be conscious would be morally equivalent to killing a human. Why? Because if humans are just biological computers, then a silicon-based computer might be a person, too. Once again, embodiment is dismissed as unnecessary—or even oppressive.
Christianity Is Embodied
The problem is that this is profoundly anti-Christian. From Genesis to Revelation, the Bible insists on the goodness of the body. Creation was called “very good.” Adam and Eve were given bodies with sexual differentiation and purpose. The Law regulated food, clothing, and ritual purity—bodily matters. Circumcision, anointing, sacrifices, baptisms—these are not incidental to the faith. They are expressions of it.
And then came the Incarnation. After creating bodies, and calling them good, God took on a body. He didn’t just give us ideas or a philosophy—He lived, suffered, bled, and died. He rose again with a body, and He gave us bodily sacraments: bread and wine, water and oil.
Christianity is not a disembodied information exchange. It is a flesh-and-blood, incarnational way of life. When we start treating livestreams as a sufficient replacement for church, or when we reduce Christian teaching to mere data transfer, we’re slipping into a Gnostic mindset.
Many in the tech world find the very idea that our nature has been given to us—rather than designed by us—to be a kind of offense. Yuval Harari, for example, boldly declares, “Organisms are algorithms,” and envisions a future where human life is no longer shaped by divine design but by human reengineering: “Science is replacing evolution by natural selection with evolution by intelligent design—not the intelligent design of some God above the clouds, but our intelligent design.”
For the modern mind, it’s galling to be told that our identity, limits, and even our flesh have been handed to us. The Christian worldview says we are fearfully and wonderfully made; the new Gnosticism says we are merely constructed—and ought to be reconstructed at will.
Why It Matters Now
Covid accelerated this shift. We were suddenly told that human bodies were dangerous. The ideal became disembodied—stay home, go virtual, avoid touch. What shocked me most was how quickly many Christians accepted this. The body, once central to Christian worship and community, became an afterthought.
But this wasn’t a new temptation. Gnosticism has always haunted the Church. What’s new is how persuasive it’s become in the age of digital technology and identity politics.
When Christians start believing that the body is incidental to the faith—or to being human—we’re not just making a theological mistake. We’re surrendering to the spirit of the age. We’re forgetting that Jesus rose with a body, that the Church is a Body, and that salvation is not just for our souls but for our whole selves.
Embodied Discipleship
What does it mean, then, to resist the Gnostic pull? It means leaning into our createdness. It means honoring our bodies as gifts. It means worshipping in person when we can, serving one another physically, and refusing to reduce faith to a collection of doctrines floating in the cloud.
To be Christian is to be human in the fullest sense—mind, soul, and body. Our world doesn’t need more clever ideas. It needs the witness of embodied lives: people who live out truth in their flesh and bones, who love with their hands and feet, and who follow a Savior who did the same.
Gnosticism says salvation is found in escaping the body. The Gospel says it’s found in the Word made flesh.
And that makes all the difference.
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Beyond Roe: The Real Revolution We Need
In his recent Public Discourse essay, Ryan T. Anderson argues that the deep crisis behind America’s abortion debate is not merely legal but cultural—rooted in a sexual ethic that separates pleasure from commitment, responsibility, and family. He contends that true pro-life work must go beyond legislation to challenge the assumptions of the sexual revolution, calling for a renewal of virtue, chastity, and the enduring ties of marriage and parenthood.
Consent plus condoms does not make people happy (or safe). No one on his deathbed looks back on his life and thinks of all his various and sundry orgasms. He does think of the love built up in a decades-long relationship with his spouse and in relationships with his children and grandchildren—something the sexual revolution simply can’t compete with.
Our primary task is not to persuade people of the humanity of the unborn—but to change how people conduct their sexual lives.
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Be Revolutionary
A Court Ruling and a Cultural Moment: Upholding God’s Design in a Time of Confusion
The recent Supreme Court ruling in United States v. Skrmetti marks a significant, if limited, moment of clarity in a cultural fog. With a 6–3 decision, the Court upheld Tennessee’s law that prohibits puberty blockers, cross-sex hormones, and surgeries for minors. The ruling doesn’t directly speak to the truth or falsehood of “gender identity”—it simply recognizes the state’s right to regulate medical interventions for children. But for those of us committed to a biblical worldview, this legal decision echoes a much older and deeper truth: we are not self-created.
As First Things rightly notes, this is a partial victory for common sense. But more than that—it is a moment to pause, give thanks, and speak clearly about what’s at stake.
Created Male and Female
From the opening pages of Scripture, we learn that our bodies are not accidents or raw material to be re-engineered at will. “So God created man in his own image… male and female he created them” (Genesis 1:27). This isn’t incidental to our faith—it’s foundational. God’s creation of two sexes is not a cultural artifact to be deconstructed; it is a good gift woven into the fabric of what it means to be human.
Modern ideologies that promote the notion of a disembodied self—where one’s identity can be detached from the body and reconstructed according to internal feelings—run counter to this truth. While compassion demands that we listen to those who suffer and struggle, it does not require us to affirm ideas that defy God’s design.
Loving Truth, Not Reinforcing Confusion
The great tragedy of today’s gender ideology is not just that it’s scientifically unsound or psychologically risky—it’s that it’s spiritually disorienting. It teaches children that their bodies are meaningless and malleable, that their identities are for them to create from scratch, and that truth bends to desire.
This is not love.
True love is never content to reinforce confusion. It does not affirm lies or encourage irreparable harm. As Christians, we are called to speak the truth in love (Ephesians 4:15)—and that means calling a halt to medical experiments on children in the name of “gender affirmation.” The state of Tennessee, by passing this law, rightly chose to protect minors from irreversible decisions they are not mature enough to make. The Court, in turn, rightly deferred to the state’s authority.
But this isn’t a comprehensive victory. The ruling leaves unresolved the larger cultural question: what is a man? what is a woman?
The Role of Parents, Churches, and the State
Biblically, the family—not the state, not the medical establishment—bears primary responsibility for the formation of children (Deuteronomy 6:6–7; Ephesians 6:4). The Court’s decision, though narrowly reasoned, affirms the state’s right to reinforce that boundary, protecting children from misguided ideologies being enforced through medical coercion.
Still, the real work lies ahead. The Church must disciple parents, prepare young people for life in a confused world, and extend both truth and grace to those ensnared by deceptive ideologies. Laws can restrict harm; only the gospel can restore wholeness.
Hope Beyond the Culture War
We are not merely fighting for “traditional values” or a return to some idyllic past. We are bearing witness to a kingdom not of this world, but for this world. In Christ, we proclaim a vision of humanity that is far more than fluid identity. We are not cosmic accidents. We are creatures—embodied souls, male and female image bearers of God, called into a story of redemption, not reinvention.
The decision in Skrmetti gives us a window. It is a pause in the cultural storm, an opportunity for the Church to speak clearly and act faithfully. Let us use this time well—not to gloat, not to retreat, but to proclaim with confidence and compassion:
“You formed my inward parts; you knitted me together in my mother’s womb. I praise you, for I am fearfully and wonderfully made.” (Psalm 139:13–14)
Embrace, Don’t Affirm