In this episode of the Denison Forum Podcast, host Mark Turman kicks off 2025 by introducing listeners to the new Culture Brief podcast. Joined by Conner Jones and Micah Tomasella, the discussion covers the objectives and format of Culture Brief, highlighting its focus on news, sports, entertainment, and technology from a biblical perspective. The trio dives into current topics like the fall of the Assad regime in Syria, the tragic murder of a healthcare CEO, and the excitement surrounding NFL and college football playoffs. They examine these events’ cultural and spiritual implications, offering listeners a taste of what’s to come with Culture Brief.
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Topics
- (00:28): Introducing the New Podcast: Culture Brief
- (01:24): Meet the Hosts: Connor and Micah
- (03:07): What to Expect from Culture Brief
- (05:13): The Format and Audience of Culture Brief
- (12:16): Diving into the First Stories
- (18:07): The Tragic Story of Brian Thompson
- (28:10): Mental Health and Spiritual Influences
- (29:33): Syria’s Political Upheaval
- (31:30): Impact on the Middle East
- (35:46): Prayers and Humanitarian Efforts
- (41:12): Football Season Highlights
- (50:54): Faith in Sports
- (53:57): Conclusion and Call to Action
Resources
- Culture Brief Podcast
- Luigi Mangione charged with murder in death of insurance CEO
- The Health Care System Is Flawed. Let’s Fix It.
- Boise State’s faith-driven journey to the College Football Playoffs
- What Travis Hunter’s Heisman win says about our culture
- Civil war in Syria escalates as rebels take Hama
- What does the Syrian conflict mean for the world?
About Micah Tomasella
Micah Tomasella is the Advancement Officer at Denison Ministries and co-hosts Denison Forum’s “Culture Brief” podcast. A graduate of Dallas Baptist University, Micah is married to Emily, and together they are the proud parents of two daughters. With an extensive background in nonprofit work, finance, and real estate, Micah also brings experience from his years in pastoral church ministry.
About Conner Jones
Conner is the Director of Performance Marketing at Denison Ministries and Co-Hosts Denison Forum’s “Culture Brief” podcast. He graduated from Dallas Baptist University in 2019 with a degree in Business Management. Conner passionately follows politics, sports, pop-culture, entertainment, and current events. He enjoys fishing, movie-going, and traveling the world with his wife and son.
About Dr. Mark Turman
Dr. Mark Turman is the Executive Director of Denison Forum and Vice President of Denison Ministries. Among his many duties, Turman is most notably the host of The Denison Forum Podcast. He is also the chief strategist for DF Pastors, which equips pastors and church leaders to understand and transform today’s culture.
About Denison Forum
Denison Forum exists to thoughtfully engage the issues of the day from a biblical perspective through The Daily Article email newsletter and podcast, The Denison Forum Podcast, as well as many books and additional resources.
EPISODE TRANSCRIPT
NOTE: This transcript was AI-generated and has not been fully edited.
[00:00:00] Dr. Mark Turman: Let me first of all say Happy New Year as we begin 2025. I’m Mark, the host of the Denison Forum Podcast. We’re glad to have you back with us as we begin our fourth year in our podcast, trying to help you understand the world that you live in, bring clarity and equipping so that you can think biblically and serve eagerly wherever God gives you influence.
Today, I’m excited to let you know that Denison Forum is launching a brand new podcast, which will be actually our third. Now, some of you may know or not know that Denison Forum hosts a brief podcast every morning called the daily article that is based on the writing of Dr. Jim Denison, our founder. And if you don’t want to read that in the form of an email or a website article, you can actually get it as about a seven minute podcast.
And you can just look up the daily article and receive that in your podcast platform. You also know about our podcast, obviously the Denison Forum podcast that we’re celebrating in this new year. And today I have two of my friends at Denison Forum and Denison Ministries who are going to help us to learn about a brand new resource, a podcast that we are calling Culture Brief.
So let me introduce you to the host. You’ve heard them before on our podcast. Connor Jones works in our marketing and helps us with what’s called performance marketing, helping to get our message out in various social media platforms and other areas. Connor’s been on our podcast before, as well as Micah Tomasella.
Micah works in our development and advancement area. And these two guys have known each other as deep friends for a good while. We’ll let them describe that to you. And they will be the host of this brand new podcast launching this week called culture brief. So guys, welcome back to the Denison forum podcast, which I just have to say and declare right now, this is the flagship podcast.
Of Denison forum, right? You’re going to agree with that and it’s in the name. Say hi to the say hi this morning,
[00:02:11] Micah Tomasella: guys. As of right now, it is. Yes. Hello, everyone. It’s good to be here. And I’m so glad to get to spend even more time with both of you this morning.
Dr. Mark Turman: So polite.
[00:02:22] Conner Jones: So respectful. Don’t you think?
Dr. Mark Turman: Don’t you feel honored, Connor?
I do. You know, every time I see Micah, I’m just honored. Yeah. I’m so grateful to be here. Thanks, Mark, for that intro. And I think Micah and I can both say, we are so excited for this podcast to launch this week. And so we’re going to be diving into all the good stuff every week.
And What a what a great opportunity here to just kind of explore what the new show is going to look like. So thanks for having us on.
[00:02:47] Dr. Mark Turman: You bet. So we’re going to get our our friend, our producer, Katharine, to put the culture brief trailer that we put together. We’re going to get her to attach that at the end of this conversation.
Since we don’t have it here at the beginning, I don’t one of you just kind of briefly describe what culture brief is going to be about.
[00:03:09] Conner Jones: Yeah you know, it’s kind of been a conversation for a while of how do we approach one, a way of talking about news on a podcast that’s not interview style, that’s not daily, but still keeps up with all the stories.
And so that’s what we’re hoping to do with culture brief. We’re going to be posting every day. Thursday, a new episode where Mike and I kind of break down all the big stories out in our culture. So not just politics, not just news. We’re going to be talking about sports. We’re gonna be talking about entertainment.
So if it’s movies, TV show or Hollywood stuff we’ll be discussing that. We’ll be talking about technology, anything that’s kind of just driving the conversation in our culture. We want to be hitting on and bringing biblical perspectives to we’re going to bring laughs to that. Mike and I have known each other for a very long time.
And so we’re so excited to co host this. I don’t know, Micah, what has it been like nine, 10 years since we’ve met? I mean, we went to college together and now we’re coworkers and we’ve done a lot of life together. And so we’ve got a way of just, you know, bantering and joking with each other and making sure that each other knows we can have fun.
That’s the idea of culture brief is. Bring about biblical perspectives on whatever is driving the conversations on social media or at the water cooler every single week.
[00:04:23] Micah Tomasella: Mm hmm. Yeah, absolutely. You know, and something that Connor doesn’t always mention. He says that we go to college together, but I was his RA.
I was his resident assistant. So when he came in as a freshman and just so you know, he got in trouble a lot.
[00:04:38] Dr. Mark Turman: Which might even actually be good fuel for conversation as culture brief unfolds, right? We can talk about various aspects and stories around things that Connor got in trouble for and how Micah enforced accountability.
Absolutely. That’s what they
[00:04:53] Micah Tomasella: called me, the enforcer. I was a sophomore at that point, you know. 19 years old. Yeah.
[00:05:00] Dr. Mark Turman: Right. Right off. So one of the things we wanted to try to do is we introduced this new resource. And then this podcast, we wanted to try to help our folks understand the differences between these different podcasts.
We’ll now have with you guys doing culture brief. We’ll now have three podcasts in Denison forum world. And we want to try to help them understand the difference. Connor, you already mentioned just a second ago, some of the things that you guys are going to try to talk about, which in some ways I think widens the coverage area of topics.
Denison Forum kind of goes into various areas, but everybody has kind of their niche. And so we don’t in the Denison Forum podcast or in the daily article so much, we don’t usually touch a lot on sports or movies or music. We do occasionally, I would say, and we’re not not opposed to that at all.
We, we did a podcast with a couple of really fun guys that were promoting a faith based movie called Summer Camp and was really a wonderful conversation. And so we do those things. But you guys are gonna try to widen our perspective a little bit into some other news areas, some cultural areas that maybe don’t get written about or talked about as much in the daily article or in the Denison Forum podcast.
Let’s unpack that a little bit more. I know you love these areas as so many of us do. But when we come at it from the standpoint of Denison Forum and news discerned differently how do you guys think we can connect those dots for folks of bringing biblical perspective into things like movies, movies, music.
Sports that kind of thing. How do you guys think you’ll do that?
[00:06:45] Micah Tomasella: So the daily article podcast right is a great way To stay up to date daily and get a direct reading of the morning newsletter the daily article, right? So that’s the daily article podcast leans more into interview format with subject matter experts.
It offers great deep dives and longer conversations around Specific topics and specific things that are at times driving culture, of course, right? but then culture brief hopes to to breathe a breath of fresh air into what feels so bogged down and busy, right? Our lives, right? So we want to be a space that believers can come and they can hear top stories and our culture that week, get biblical insights, but also have fun.
You know, as Connor said, we’re going to crack jokes, we’re going to have banter, we’re going to play occasional games even. Each week when we’re releasing these episodes, we’re. We’re definitely going to be on top of what’s driving the conversation each and every week. And so that’s the fun part.
We’re really kind of widening the goalposts here, not moving the goalposts, but widening it. And that gives us an ability to cover every single topic because us as believers and us being in a different generation than example, you Mark each every time. We’re engaging with a story. Sometimes we want to think out loud and sometimes we want to understand why is this happening or really when this is happening, what can I do about it?
How can I worry about it? How can I process through it? And so Connor and I are just going to bring conversations that we normally have with us and from our friends from college as well that we stay in touch with and are close with, we’re really going to kind of Bring that conversation into this podcast format and hopefully it equips and it encourages everyone who takes a listen.
[00:08:23] Dr. Mark Turman: Okay. Yeah, that’s really, really helpful. And we’re going to just let everybody know kind of in a few minutes after we give you a general introduction to what culture brief is all about. We’re going to kind of walk through this with two or three stories that we think are be relevant but we’ll also kind of give you a sense of.
Okay. This is how Culture Brief will, will work with that story and with, with what its importance is to our walk with Christ. And then I’ll try to contrast that. If we were talking about this on Denison Forum, we would probably go at it this way and see if we can bring some clarity. So you’ll know the difference when you want to engage with any of our podcasts.
You’ll know what to expect and what you’re likely to get. Guys, y’all have kind of pointed out that. You want to try to cover two, three, maybe sometimes four different areas on every one of your podcasts. Give us a sense of, you know, how long do you think your show is going to be? And how would you cover two or three stories or segments in a particular show?
Kind of give us a feel of what the, The run of your podcast on any given episode might be like,
[00:09:31] Conner Jones: yeah, for sure. So I think the idea will be to be around 30 minutes an episode. We’re going to aim for that half hour mark. It could go a little longer. It could be a little shorter, might just depend on the news of the week.
If it’s a slow news week, Hey, it might be a few minutes shorter. We’ve got a lot to cover, maybe a little longer, but with each topic that we’re covering, our idea is to give you just a basic breakdown. Here’s what you need to know. Here’s what’s happening. And then offer some sort of encouragement or biblical insight to these stories that we can really say, Hey, here’s how you can take this and engage culture with it.
Or here’s how we should interpret it as Christians. If it’s something that seems really out there for Christians, but is big in the news and you know, it’s hard for Christians to, to talk through or cover or whatnot. We want to talk about it and engage that and then say, Hey, this is what the Bible says.
About this specific thing and then going from there, you know, we’ll go into some segments about trivia potentially just to have some fun. We’ll, we’ll have some games that Mike and I will play. We may try to engage our audience with that. We’re going to have a mailbag so that our audience can send in questions to us and we’ll cover we can do research for that.
And just talk it through on the next week’s episode. So we will have an email address set up to go for people to send us questions or remarks and we want to hear from everybody. So if you’re going to listen to the show, please reach out to us. We want to talk through what you’re thinking as well.
We want to involve you in the show. And then we’re also going to just Have some just time to say, Hey, here’s what’s coming down the road. Here’s what you should look out for in the next week. If it’s a big event, if it’s a big football game, if it’s a movie, if it’s a big political event we’re going to say, Hey, this is, this is happening in the next week.
You may not have known about it, but we’re making you aware. Be on the watch out. And then we’ll talk about it again next week on the new episode. We’re just trying to equip people who don’t have time really to engage with all this. Mike and I, we are passionate about pop culture in news and sports, and we already engage with it.
And so we want to help you. A lot of people just. Don’t have the desire or time to go through everything and I don’t blame them. So that’s what we’re here for. We’re going to dive into all of that for you and help you break it down. And hopefully in about a half hour, you get a good understanding of what’s happened in the last week and maybe coming up in the next week.
Yeah.
[00:11:42] Dr. Mark Turman: Okay. Helps. That’s yeah. Really helpful for that. Connor, Micah tell us a little bit about the backstory about how and why you and Connor decided you wanted to get into this world. And. I know when I started podcasting about three years ago I thought it’s not really about me, people wanting to hear me so much as, as it is about me wanting to try to bring some exposure to some of these topics and how faith and biblical understanding could shape people’s perspective on how they could talk or deal with them in their lives and in their circles of influence.
Tell us a little bit of the backstory and what motivates you guys to, to want to engage in this podcast and. To try to help people. Where did all that come from?
[00:12:27] Micah Tomasella: Yeah, Mark, that’s a great question. I mean, so Connor and I’s friendship plays like a huge part in this. Yes, we’re coworkers, but we’re also best friends and we’ve been close for a really long time.
And so this is, this whole thing has felt really natural. It’s not like we’ve had to get to know each other through the process or even some podcasts and some hosts that get to know each other by hosting several shows together. I mean, Connor and I we’re married, we’re We have kids, we’ve been there for the biggest moments of each other’s lives for the last 10 years.
And so it’s cool to be able to do this together. So it felt really natural. And also, Cotter and I are kind of naturally into different things. And we feel like that kind of completes kind of what it is that we’re going to be talking about. So he’s going to take the things that he’s passionate about. I’m going to take the things that I’m passionate about.
But I think the best way to kind of answer your question is really talk about Who are we trying to reach and why is that important? So culture brief is trying to reach more of a millennial Gen Z audience, but even past that, we really think that we’re going to have something for everybody, no matter what phase or stage that you might find yourself in.
If you listen to our episode every single week, we’re going to have something for you. And so we are informed in what’s going on. Connor and I consume a lot of news. We do that for fun, but we’re also doing even more of that to be prepared to study, to show ourselves a proof of what it is that we’re going to be talking about.
We, we also. We’re not going to speak on issues and claim as if we have all the answers. We stand on God’s truth, on God’s word. We believe that viewing, viewing everything through a Christian perspective, of course, but there are certain topics and things that we don’t have all the answers to. So we’re not going to approach it that way.
And I think that that’s going to allow us to have more real, more honest, even at times more fun conversations is that we’re going to approach it that way, but we’re going to take every story seriously and we’re going to have fun with the stories that are affecting us each and every week. And Alex, our coworker, she mentioned this as she’s listened to certain episodes that we have recorded so far, you know, she said, I really feel like these episodes are preparing me for the future.
water cooler talk at work, you know, so I’d like to think that our episode if you listen to it every single week It’s we’re not going to have time to cover every single top headline But we’re going to cover the main ones for the most part And we really we want to prepare you for that water cooler talk at work or when you’re gathering together With your family for holidays or get togethers You can actually know what’s happening and what’s going on and we’re going to be able to give it to you from a fun but biblical perspective, but then ultimately Right.
We’re a part of a mission and a vision that goes beyond ourselves, you know, and that’s as Christians. But even with Denison Forum, we desire to equip the saints for the work of the ministry. We want to equip our listeners to live biblically and act. Act 12, and so we hope our podcast and our episode kind of fills that void.
You can’t do everything as a ministry, as a digital content ministry, but we felt like this was kind of a void and we’re really excited to step into that and we’re humbled and grateful for the opportunity. I hope that helps.
[00:15:25] Dr. Mark Turman: Yeah, no, that’s great. Ditto to all of that. Yeah, and a couple of clarifications.
You don’t have to be a millennial or a Gen Z to follow the Culture Brief podcast. No, absolutely not. Yeah, it’s for everybody. It’s for anybody and everybody, and I think anybody that listens to this is going to not only be equipped, but they’re going to enjoy this. It’s going to be fun, not to say that I’m not fun and enjoyable or our Daily Article podcast with Chris Elkins.
Sharing Dr. Denison’s daily article. We’re all fun and enjoyable, but this will be fun and enjoyable in a different way. Let’s give a few samples by diving into two or three stories and seeing if we can kind of give people a taste of what they will find. Because as soon as they listen to this podcast, they’re going to immediately go search and find Culture Brief.
And they’re going to experience the very first inaugural episode of culture brief as it comes out basically the same week that this podcast will come out. And when, and when you
[00:16:21] Micah Tomasella: hit it, when you hit culture brief, you hit the follow button, there you go. You’ll always be alerted every single time an episode is released on wherever you consume your podcasts.
Yeah,
[00:16:31] Dr. Mark Turman: and as most podcasts grow, they’re going to grow by people sharing what they find and what they experience. And so we hope you will find and follow Culture Brief on your favorite podcast platform. We obviously want you to share that with others. That you know regardless of their age and just say hey give this a try This might be something that would really encourage and equip you in your faith and in your walk with christ and in those water cooler conversations We want you we’re asking you very explicitly this morning As denison forum podcast listeners to do that with us and for us And you’ve done that with denison forum podcast.
We want you to do that with culture brief as well But let’s jump in and talk about a few stories And see how we might understand them a little bit, but also contrast them in ways from the other podcasts that we do at Denison forum. Recently in the last few weeks, we’ve seen this really tragic story of anger, violence, and even murder carried out against the CEO, Brian Thompson of United healthcare.
And the, the perpetrator, Luigi Mangione which is, as we talked about offline a little bit, just a phenomenal name and apparently an incredibly bright and capable young man who murdered the CEO of United Health Care right on the streets of New York City, right in a place that I mean, I’ve walked in front of that hotel myself and probably many of our listeners have as well in Manhattan.
But let’s just talk about that. That that story is now almost a month old and continues to unfold and is really reverberating not only in the health care industry. But really across the wide spectrum of major business and major business owners, a lot of conversations have been generated in a fresh way about protecting high profile CEOs and leaders of organizations and businesses.
How would you guys approach this in a, in a typical issue within culture brief? How would you talk about this story?
[00:18:43] Micah Tomasella: Connor, do you want to lay out kind of the facts of the story real quick and then we’ll talk about it?
[00:18:47] Conner Jones: Yeah, for sure. Yeah, I think to answer your question mark, normally we would kind of just give you a brief rundown.
Here’s what’s happening. Here’s what where we go with that. So yeah, I’ll do that brief rundown real fast. So you’re right. Brian Thompson was murdered December 4th in Midtown Manhattan, right in the heart of New York City, which is just kind of crazy. And then it was all caught on camera and honestly, it looked like a very much so targeted hit.
Once that video released later in the day, everybody was able to recognize this was not just a random act. This was targeted. And then we found out that the bullets. The bullet casings had a message on them. Each bullet had a word. Those words were denied, defend, depose. And in the following days, those three words have been a rallying call for a lot of Americans who are seeing that as like a message to send to big business and to CEOs and say, we you know, we support this guy who murdered an innocent man which has been very interesting.
And that’s the other part of the story. You know, we, we later found out that the assassin was Luigi, as you said, and he was caught December 9th. So it took five days to get him, but they did get him at a McDonald’s in Altoona, Pennsylvania. And then we found out more and more about him in the days that followed about his background as an Ivy league graduate as a, a son of a wealthy family in Maryland and all that led to questions about why did he do this?
And we find out he had a back surgery that might have sent him down a spiral. He disappeared for six months. In fact, I just saw this morning that the San Francisco police. Had a missing persons report on him and reached out to New York city police department to say, hey, we think this could be your guy So it was known that he was missing Nobody knew what he was up to and then all of a sudden he shows up and does this a terrible act all that to say it has brought about interesting conversations like you mentioned mark for ceos and security and None of them should have to fear for their life And you definitely should be able to walk down the street even in new york city without having to be scared of being shot and killed is certainly That’s a terrible, terrible thing, but it’s also brought about conversations around the healthcare industry.
And even the CEO of United Healthcare’s parent organization, the United Health Group wrote an opinion article for the New York times. Just in response to this murder saying, Hey and I would suggest going to read it. The article is titled. The health care system is flawed. Let’s fix it. And he talks about how, yeah, there are issues here and it’s a patchwork system that’s been built over decades.
Nobody would start the health care industry in this way. The health care insurance industry in this way. It’s just ended up here. And he’s saying it’s not perfect. But every corner is filled with people who try to do their best for those who serve. And Brian Thompson was one of those people, he says who came from Iowa.
And he said he never forgot where he came from because it was the needs of the people who live in places like Jewel, Iowa, that he considered first finding ways to improve. So when you look at the CEO and you’re thinking, okay, maybe he was the leader of a company that is The fraud and people are taking away their money or whatnot.
You also need to understand the full story. And so that’s something that in culture brief, we might dive into a little bit more and say, here’s who this man was that was murdered. Here’s who’s this man that did the murder and just offer the facts. And then we’ll offer a way of looking at the story from a biblical perspective.
And I would say, you know, just from my own seat right here, I’d say as Christians, we got to stand firm in condemning such horrible actions as Murder, even if it’s for, you know, what some people would say is a great cause you can’t just. go out there and commit such a horrible act. But we can also recognize that God can redeem all that he allows different conversations can come about here.
And that’s just the main facts, a little bit of a biblical encouragement. And I’ll leave it, Micah, if you want to add anything there.
[00:22:32] Micah Tomasella: Yeah. I mean, I would just say, and Connor, that’s, that’s great. You’re definitely right about how we as believers should be reacting, but I, I also think this story really encapsulates kind of where we are as a culture right now.
Mm hmm. I, you know, I’ve seen videos of, of, you know, all these people at these concerts like EDM concerts or like techno concerts, like whatever it might be. And they’re, these DJs are like doing their sets and behind them are pictures of Luigi Mangione and the crowd is cheering. There have been GoFundMes, there have been various platforms for raising money and all of these are popping up and they are raising hundreds and thousands of dollars to pay for Luigi’s legal fees.
I mean, he is viewed as this, you know, this figurehead that has ignited this movement that we’re seeing right now in our culture, this anger towards big corporations, but even just this anger towards things that hit close to home. I mean, I think even personally, we’ve all dealt with frustrations with our insurance companies and we’ve known people who struggle to keep insurance or whatever it might be.
And so we shouldn’t look at this situation and just say, Hey, the murder was wrong. And then culture’s crazy. Let’s just move on. What I would say is Let’s look at the way that culture is reacting. How do we as believers react to it? Of course, but what is this saying? Like, what is the bigger picture? What is, you know, how are people truly feeling about this?
And I think what we’re seeing is there’s a lot of built up and pent up anger specifically towards insurance companies, because I think in one way or another, I would. Either personally or somebody that they know, you know, a claim has been denied. People haven’t been able to get the surgeries that they need to get.
The claims process itself is something that’s kind of come under the microscope of why is it so difficult for me to refute this or claim this? You know, what is my recourse? So I think the silver lining, God redeeming all that he allows everything happening, you know, for a purpose and reason in God’s kingdom would be hopefully this does bring some sort of reform and prayerfully, this doesn’t lead to.
The murder of other individuals who work in the industry.
[00:24:34] Dr. Mark Turman: Yeah, really, really good thoughts and overview of the story and yeah, look forward to you guys unpacking stories like that and in this way and just to contrast that a little bit some of our readers and, and followers were already know that Dr Denison wrote about this at least once in the daily article and we’ll attach that article to the show notes of this episode.
And we’ll do that with Culture Brief as well. The guys will sometimes pick up on something that Dr. Denison saw in the culture and wrote about and they’ll take that and unpack it a little bit further from the standpoint of their perspectives in Culture Brief. You’ll see that happen in this podcast probably pretty consistently.
But Dr. Denison wrote about this and particularly this angle about How many in the culture are now seeing Mangione as an icon and a hero and that he did a good thing by murdering this ceo And what does that say about all of us? What does that say about our culture? And to try to turn somebody who was just brutal and evil in their action into a hero and how could that be a concern for the wider part of the culture?
I heard a a podcast on this topic as well where one person said, you know what? We shouldn’t even mention his name because that’s exactly what he wanted. He wanted attention for this and he wanted to try to provoke change in the healthcare industry by doing this terrible, violent thing. And her perspective was, you know, we shouldn’t even draw attention to him at all.
We shouldn’t, we shouldn’t give him what he was after, which was the sparking of a conversation based on his violent action. And that’s not a good reason. The health care industry. Yes, it does need attention. It does need good people working on really big problems. And we all can identify and relate to being frustrated.
With the way our healthcare system works. That’s something we all tap into, but trying to motivate Change by violence is evil on the face of it And yeah, we need to recognize that if we were talking about this in denison forum podcast world we would probably go get one, maybe two subject matter experts that deal with both mental illness because there’s quite a bit of attention coming out that Mangione probably was suffering from some kind of a psychotic break.
When he decided to do this, as y’all mentioned a minute ago, he went off the grid for a number of weeks before stepping out to do this. And people were concerned filing mission missing persons reports. So we probably, we might have somebody come on Denison forum podcast and say, let’s talk about the influence of mental illness.
As well as spiritual you know, distance as two factors that could have really influenced somebody to do something like this. We might talk about just the problem, the spiritual reality of anger. And what does the Bible tell us? How does it address the issue of anger and what we can do to manage our anger in a faith driven kind of way, because a lot of anger is driven, or a lot of violence is driven by anger and anger is the face.
Or the expression of a spiritual open or spiritual lacking that needs to be addressed in some way. And so we might go down those areas theologically, pastorally in areas of mental health and the need for spiritual depth and connection that would be ways of hopefully preventing these kinds of actions.
So anyway, that’s the kind of thing that people might experience if they are listening to Culture Brief. Let’s also talk a few minutes about the ongoing story of the disruption and upheaval that’s going on in Syria. How would you guys kind of bring us up to speed about what’s going on with the fall of the Assad regime and the changes that are happening in Syria?
How would y’all go about that topic?
[00:28:35] Conner Jones: I think we would again just present the facts, but then not just the Syrian aspect. We want to present the big picture and how this impacts even American culture and believers across the world. So I, you know, I would say we would say the Syrian regime of Bashar al Assad It’s dismantled, which is actually a good thing.
Now there’s a further conversation of who’s taking over now? Are they good people or not? And there’s more to look into there. How do we think that Christians are going to be safe in the hands of these rebels who took over Syria? We need to do some deep research. And so we would present some more facts on that as well.
But the overall picture of saying, Hey, Syria is in new hands. Assad was a terrible, terrible dictator, an evil man who had to flee his country and he’s now believed to be in Russia and his military all fled the country. A lot of them going in to Iraq, going across the border to escape essentially the rebels who are taking over and have taken over.
And it seems at the forefront right now that this is going to bring about new freedoms for the Syrian people who have been in a civil war for over a decade. I mean, that country is just. Devastated and those poor people are looking forward to new freedoms into a new way of life. And I saw yesterday that it’s expected.
I think in 2025 over a million Syrians who have fled the country over the last 10 years are expected to go back home, assuming that it all goes smoothly with this new regime. I mean, they’re going to have to put in place a government and everything. So that’s going to be very interesting to watch stuff.
We’ll probably be covering, but I think Mark, the interesting thing here is the big picture. And what this means for the Middle East because Syria fell, but that was just the third fall in a string of domino effects that impacts the entire Middle East because Iran had a proxy system with Syria. And with Hezbollah and with Hamas.
And in the last year, all three of those regimes have essentially been dismantled. They still are around to an extent. They’re hanging on by a thread. Hamas is still being engaged with, with the Israeli military and the Gaza Strip. Hezbollah still has some resources, but Israel has done an incredible job with their intelligence and with their military of taking out these Proxies that Iran had set up essentially on their borders.
And so when we look at the big picture here, we’re seeing a weakened Iran which is good for the prospects of Israel and its future. It’s also probably good for the prospects of the U S and our future because Iran was seen as a very big military juggernaut and they still are, I mean, they’re still working on nuclear weapons, but they had two failed missile attack launches on Israel.
They have now lost their proxy on the Gaza Strip. They’ve lost their proxy on the northern border in Lebanon with Hezbollah. And Israel has shown their savviness when they blow up pagers and walkie talkies and do an assassination in the heart of Tehran on a top Hezbollah member. And they are making it very clear that this is not going to, this is not going to last this conflict with Iran.
Israel is making sure that they are establishing themselves as the military power in the Middle East. And then the U S has a lot to play there with Saudi Arabia and oil and everything. There’s a lot more at play. But this is a bigger story than just Syria falling. It’s just a piece of the puzzle of a new a new Middle East forming.
No,
[00:31:58] Dr. Mark Turman: Mike, I just wanted to get your, your input here on just What would you be perspective, your perspective beyond just how your view of Iran has changed even in the last 6 to 8 weeks? How would you look at that? Given what what Connor just laid out about Syria and these other proxy partners.
Yeah. How, how’s your view of just that one country of Iran changed?
[00:32:23] Micah Tomasella: I mean, it’s definitely changed a lot. And Connor, thank you for the clarification, Mark. I’ll get back to that in just a second. Because when, when everything was happening in Syria, when it first started happening, I was like, all right, who am I rooting for here?
Am I rooting for the rebels or am I rooting for Bashar? You know, it’s like, What who’s who’s in the right and time will tell because this rebel group who’s instilling you know Installing their government and saying everything they’re saying Hey They’re gonna grant these rights to women and they’re gonna allow people to worship freely to a certain extent of the things that they’re saying So we’ll see what happens.
But mark what’s really changed is, you know, we went into 2024. There was a lot of fear swirling around Iran and their ability to develop nuclear weapons. But then even just kind of this fear of this alliance, whether if they want to put it on paper or not, this clear alliance between these three pretty powerful countries in China, Russia and Iran.
And so what’s happening in Iran is really kind of yeah. It has a bigger geopolitical impact because it definitely seems to be dealing a blow to those countries that if you’re an American and you want to protect American interests, whether if you disagree with some of the American interests or not for the safety of our nation, right?
are pretty happy with how things have kind of unfolded, not with the you know, the, the people who’ve been caught in the, in the middle and the difficulties of all of these wars and what’s happened and all the clear humanitarian crisis. And God loves us all equally, but from a political perspective and from the way that it affects our world, it definitely is a good thing for American interests, how things have unfolded.
And Iran is definitely seeming to be a little bit weaker than people thought. They seem to be a bit more all bark. No bite.
[00:34:05] Conner Jones: Yeah. And just to mention, a lot of that changed when their president died in the helicopter crash this summer, and then it started to go down even further. But you’re right, Micah, we gotta, we gotta keep in mind all those who are just caught on the crossfire, the innocent civilians in Palestine, Israel, Lebanon, Syria, even Iran, praying for the people there that that’s our calling as Christians is to say, Hey, God, you can redeem all that you allow.
Please be with these people, bring peace to their land and
[00:34:31] Micah Tomasella: to their hearts. I mean, it’s just so easy to get overwhelmed by these situations and say, you know, what, God, what on earth can I do about this? I mean, scroll on social media, look at news articles, all of the, the moms that just want to feed their kids.
And the dads that just want to provide for their families. I mean, it is just so sad. People who have nothing to do with these conflicts that just a very few amount of people who are rich and powerful on the top, it affects millions of people and they get caught in the middle. But what I get stuck with and what I get convicted of is I forget sometimes that when I pray that matters, the prayers of a righteous person are working and they’re powerful and they’re effective.
We forget that when we pray, we’re praying to the God of the universe. The one that set all of this into motion is in control and sovereign overall. So don’t think for one second believer who’s listening to this, that your prayers don’t matter, that they don’t count, that they don’t have an effect. They do.
And if all we can do is pray. For what’s happening in the Middle East, if that’s all that we can actually do, that does matter and that does make a difference and I truly believe that.
[00:35:35] Dr. Mark Turman: Yeah. Exactly. Such a good word. And and as the Denison Forum podcast audience knows as well as those that follow Dr.
Denison through the daily article, and again, we’ll attach these things, but Dr. Denison, when the Assad regime fell, Dr. Denison wrote an excellent response to that or an examination of that. About understanding how Syria got to where it is today. And then what could be coming next? As you guys have already alluded to you know, some of these people that are now in charge have been known to be terrorists themselves.
And so the world is kind of waiting and watching to see what is going to happen next. And then you know, we’ve had the opportunity, we’ll have the opportunity again to interview some people like Dr. Hamus Shariat, who is from Iran is a very dynamic and beautiful. powerful believer. Some have called him the Billy Graham of Iran.
He helped us in times past to kind of understand the workings of what goes on in Iran beyond those power brokers. And how many people have turned away from those leaders. Eso we have conversations like that, and we have other people in the region. We have friends, many friends in Israel who are able to give us insight and understanding from their perspective, not only from Israel, but also from a regional perspective and how these things work together.
It’s a very different world there now since October 7th almost a year, year and a half ago when Hamas invaded and terrorized Israel in the way that they have. And so a lot of these dynamics are changing in a big way and will continue to change. In other things that influence that changes in leadership is we have a new president that takes office in just a few weeks that will have an influence on Syria and the surrounding region.
All of these things kind of intertwined together, but we want to be those people who are a part of what God is doing to redeem the situation. We’ve had conversations before with. Ministries and christian groups that are on the ground trying to help refugees trying to help people that as you guys said, hey, I’m just trying to feed my Children.
I’m trying to get to the next day. I’m trying to find a safe place to shelter even for a few nights. And we know some people that are on the ground helping in those ways. And we want to try to vet some of those opportunities so that if people feel led to give they would know that they’re giving to a credible ministry organization that is really making a difference in those regions.
We don’t want to just understand something from an intellectual or biblical framework. We actually want people to take action and we want to help them take action by pointing them to trusted partners that can be a part of that. So these are the kinds of things. Go ahead, Micah.
[00:38:25] Micah Tomasella: Let me just say briefly, Mark, that really illustrates a great point.
What you just said, good news is out there. You just have to look for it because the good news isn’t what’s selling. That’s not on the top of the web page or the newspaper. If you still read a physical newspaper, I like to do that sometimes it’s kind of fun, but you have to dig a little bit deeper. But if you want to find good news.
You’ll find it and you’ll find that there are a ton of Christian organizations that are making a difference in some of the most dire circumstances beyond what we can even recognize. Good news is out there and God is redeeming this situation even as we speak. So if you want good news, I just think that you’re bringing up some positive points, Mark, in the midst of kind of a difficult topic.
If you want some good news, it’s out there. Sometimes we just have to look for it.
[00:39:13] Dr. Mark Turman: Yeah, you know, we don’t want people to just shrug and say, you know what? It’s just a mess. Nobody can ever help over there and just move on. That’s that kind of dismissiveness is something we don’t want any of Christ followers to take on.
Let’s, let’s go one more topic. Let’s go here about something that. Most of us love not everybody. My wife reminds me. She cares very little About the world of football. She tolerates me when I watch, college or pro football But she doesn’t really have much of an interest even though she works in an environment where she helps high school football games to happen, which is kind of ironic but she’s not a big fan, but many, many people are, and you know, a lot of us are very interested this time of year as we move into playoff season, both for college and pro football.
How would you guys bring this up? Why would you bring this up? All right, let’s, let’s talk a little white ball and why we bring up football. Why not?
[00:40:16] Micah Tomasella: Exactly. Great. Again, great question on time. You know what? Let me just make a side note since we’re talking about sports now, since we’ve transitioned to sports now Connor, Mark, and I are a part of a fantasy football league together.
And I believe I’m the only person on this podcast. That’s in the playoffs. I think, and it’s only, let me,
[00:40:34] Dr. Mark Turman: let me clarify just so everybody knows this is a bragging rights only league. There’s no sense on the table other than bragging rights.
[00:40:42] Micah Tomasella: So then therefore I can brag. He isn’t even one. He’s already bragging.
[00:40:46] Dr. Mark Turman: And now, Conor, would you help us understand what the Bible says about bragging?
[00:40:52] Micah Tomasella: Yeah, Conor, why don’t you ask chat GPT real quick, right? For that. Okay. So let’s, let’s jump in. So let’s talk about. College football playoffs and then the NFL playoffs. I just want to talk to you a little bit about the format and kind of what’s at stake.
We’ll kind of keep it general. So the 2025 Super Bowl is going to be played on Sunday, February 9th at the Caesars Superdome in New Orleans. Fun fact, New Orleans, the Caesars Superdome, it’s changed its name a few times, has hosted the Super Bowl 10 times. Wow. Okay. That’s crazy. More than any other venue.
But then also the Chiefs are going for a three peat. They’ve won the last two Super Bowls. So they’re going for a three peat. You’d believe. In a league that has been competing since 1966, specifically for the Super Bowl, there probably has been a team that’s won three times in a row, especially with the several dynasties that we’ve seen.
Nope. Interestingly enough, the Packers, who played in the first one, they won two in a row, and there have been eight times that a team has won it twice in a row, but none have been able to do it for a third time. And the Chiefs, led by Patrick Mahomes, are in a good spot to potentially. Do it for the very first time.
So we would be witnessing history in that regard. But what I want to spend a little bit more time talking about is I want to talk about the college football playoff because we are experiencing a different format than we ever have before. For the first time, we will experience a 12 team playoff. The college football playoff era began in 2014.
For the first decade, four teams were selected by a committee, a committee of many, many voting members who would decide who are the four. Best teams, you’d have two semifinal games, they would play and then the winners of those games would then go and play in a championship game. Okay. But what’s interesting is that now with this new format, 12 teams are selected to be a part of the playoff field.
The four highest ranked conference champions will be seated one to four, and then each will receive a first round by and then five through 12 play each other on the home fields of seats five through 12. Eight. The quarterfinals and semifinals rotate amongst six bowls. The Cotton Bowl, Fiesta Bowl, Orange Bowl, Peach Bowl, Rose Bowl, and Sugar Bowl.
Both semifinals will be played around the New Year’s holiday and the national title game will be held on Monday night, January 20th. So the 12 best teams, you know, you see teams like SMU that made it this year, right? Teams that you wouldn’t typically see get a chance. To actually win a national championship.
The playing field is level. If you win four games and sometimes three games, if you have a first round buy, you can be a national champion. You can actually win it all. So we’ve seen it go from, it was two teams for a long time. Then it was four teams. Now it’s 12 teams and I think everybody’s excited to see how this plays out and it really levels the playing field and gives a lot of different teams and colleges an opportunity to actually win a national championship.
[00:43:40] Conner Jones: Yeah, man, it’s going to be so exciting. There’s just going to be so much football to watch over the next few weeks and the new competition, this new bracket for college football playoffs. It doesn’t get better than that. I’m, I’m secretly just rooting for Boise state. I don’t know why. I just love the fact that they’re in there.
And our Ashton gente went to the high school right down the street from where I live. And he’s, he’s a great believer at Boise state. It’s got great believers. We have an article on that out there as well on Denison forms website. It’s going to be so much fun. NFL playoffs should be fun. It seems like a little bit of a different year there.
The chiefs, you know, they You’re right. They are primed to go back to the Super Bowl, but they also don’t look as good as they have the last few years. We’ll see if they can pull that together. They’re winning by like
[00:44:20] Micah Tomasella: one to three points every week. And the refs are sometimes playing for them as well.
You know what I mean? Yeah, they have a 12th teammate on the field usually.
[00:44:27] Conner Jones: And they, they could win. I actually, if I’m given a Super Bowl prediction, I think we’ll see the Chiefs versus the Lions. And I think the Lions have the best shot at winning this whole thing, but I would love to hear what you guys
[00:44:38] Dr. Mark Turman: think.
Oh I, you know, I would love to see a Chiefs versus Lions Super Bowl mainly cause I just you know, I’ve lived almost my whole life watching the Lions not be good and it’s so fun to see them be good. It is right now. Yeah. And and just for, just for their fans, just for their city, you know, we’ve people have always kind of derided Detroit as a a city for so long, part of the rust belt supposedly.
And I would just like to see what that would do for their community. Yeah. Even though I basically have dubbed myself a Chiefs fan after being so long frustrated with the Cowboys and my extended family, which is quite large, we basically have all become Chiefs fans. And we, many of, some of my family were chiefs fans before they were cowboy fans because the chiefs predate the cowboys.
We go back that far in my family. But I’m also sitting here going, you know what, if I was, if I was going to send an email to you guys at culture brief, I would, I would write, I w I would wonder if my wife might write you an email and say how can you help my husband not spend so much time watching football instead of spending time with me?
There might be a pastoral issue here relative to, you know, being one person in a marriage, being eager to focus on something, being entertained by something and their partner, their spouse, not being interested at all. There’s, There’s at least a biblical issue in there somewhere. I think,
[00:46:09] Micah Tomasella: You know what marriage is a partnership and you know, for example, what works in my marriage is yes, my wife might sit around and be there while I’m watching a football game.
But when she says, honey. Do you want to go to Target? Yes, I would love to go to Target, right? It is give and take. It is give and take in marriage. It’s a partnership. You’re one together, but I would love to hear everybody’s Super Bowl prediction and then who they think is going to win the college football playoff side note real quick.
I’m going to say the bills. Because I would love to see Josh Allen awarded for having an awesome season and then it’s kind of a similar concept, Mark, I would like to see the city of Buffalo rejuvenated and they’ve been to the Super Bowl what five times and they’ve never won. I mean, ju I mean I think it was five years and they’d never won.
I mean, that is historically crazy. And I would say the bills. And then, you know what I’m gonna, I’m gonna pick my Texas Longhorns to win it all with the national title.
[00:47:12] Dr. Mark Turman: Yeah, I would and I would go with you. Yeah. I’m going with you on the Texas prediction as well, and Okay. I remember several of those Super Bowls where the bills lost to the Cowboys and at the hands of Troy Aikman and others.
So I. I, you know, I could be, I could be pretty good with the bills, but I’d rather see the lions if it’s, if it’s not going to be the chiefs. I’d rather it be the Lions. Connor, what do
[00:47:34] Conner Jones: you
[00:47:34] Dr. Mark Turman: think?
[00:47:34] Conner Jones: The Lions haven’t even been to the Super Bowl, so the Bills have had to show up. They missed it multiple times. I will say, the Bills being in the playoffs is always fun.
There’s usually some good snow games in there up in Buffalo in the month of January. I, I gotta clarify, Mark. That Mike and I are both massive, massive Dallas Cowboys fans. Yeah. And it has been a lifetime for the two of us of absolute failure. We were both born in 1996 later in 96. And the last time the Dallas Cowboys were in the Super Bowl was February of 1996.
They won that year. But since then, there’s been no NFC Championship appearances. And so our whole life has just been drowning in the sorrows of Cowboys fans. Maybe we’re bad luck.
[00:48:14] Dr. Mark Turman: If you guys want to invite me onto your podcast to talk about the good old days of the Cowboys back when they were a dynasty, I’d be happy to come on and tell you great stories all the way back to my childhood.
You know, and, and there’s kind of a story here. When I was about 10 years old, the Cowboys were becoming good for the first time in the early seventies in the days of Roger Staubach and Tom Landry. And one of the things that went along with this and kind of a little bit related to what I said a moment ago, my family shifted at that point from being a faith focused family to being a football and sports focused family.
So I’ve actually lived that reality. Which, you know, if we were dealing with this in Denison Forum or maybe writing an article or two about this we might talk about the aspect where for some people, their sports engagement really starts to kind of look and sound and feel like their religion and kind of looks like their faith.
And we might go down that road. We might go down the road and there will be these stories during this playoff season as there always is. There will be some great stories about how both college and pro athletes some of them walk very deeply with Christ and they use their platform of athletics and football as a way of expressing their faith.
And I was actually talking to somebody a week or so ago who said, you know what, you’re seeing a greater boldness in some of these athletes. about their faith, and they’re trying to do it with a great deal of humility and trying to do it in very appropriate, non offensive ways. But they’re trying to be unapologetic about, you know what?
I love playing this game. I love the camaraderie. I love all that this is about, but my life is really identified and centered in Christ. And that’s where my identity is because there’s going to come a day not too long from now where I’m not playing football or one of the other sports because sports essentially is a young man’s game, at least at these highest levels, right?
And so there’s all kinds of things to talk about and think about from a biblical perspective Around those kinds of ideas as well, even though we love sports in so many different ways And but yeah, if you guys want to talk about roger stahlbach and and troy eichmann and the good old days I’m, happy to go with you
[00:50:34] Micah Tomasella: have your have your people get with our people and we’ll see how we will insulin you in
[00:50:38] Dr. Mark Turman: We’ll do that.
Her name is katherine
[00:50:41] Micah Tomasella: I think she’s she’s the one for for all of us mark. You make a great point You I think, I mean, ultimately, it’s all about where your priorities lie, what you’re spending time on. For example, I think a good way is if there’s a noon game, are you going to church that day? Right? Like, are you still putting.
Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. The first thing first, what, how are your actions lining up with actually how your heart is? Because ultimately your actions and your mouth will tell you where your heart actually is, no matter how long you might try to fool yourself. And, you know, I’ve been noticing a ton of people this year, Mark, it’s a really great point.
A ton of NFL players are really just professional players interview after interview, not just saying, I thank God, I think Jesus, the one who saved me, the one who died for me, just getting so specific about who God is to them. and who they believe the one true God to be. It has been very encouraging to see moments like that.
And you’re right. I I’m seeing a lot of boldness, but I’m seeing it spoken with truth and in love more consistently than I have before. And that’s been very encouraging for me to see.
[00:51:47] Dr. Mark Turman: Yeah, that’s a good, yeah. It’s such a great thing. Cause you know, in the Denison forum world, we want to equip people, but we want to equip them to be cultural missionaries, As Dr Dennison says over and over again to ask God, God, what areas of influence do you want me to be in and how can I live faithfully for you in that environment?
How can I be a faithful president presence? As James Davidson Hunter writes about, how can we be faithful presence for the kingdom of God and for Jesus? In any of these environments, whether we’re, you know, super athletes or not. What are the places where we can be that salt and light that Jesus Creates us to be wants us to be invites us to be as representatives of him guys Thank you for this and thank you for what you’re going to do in culture brief we hope this has been a really helpful introduction To our folks and that they will go and not only find but as you said earlier, Micah that they will follow culture brief And that they will share it also with friends and family so that others can be a part of these conversations you can go find it now on your podcast platform You’ll also get to hear our minute and a half trailer as soon as we sign off here and we just again want to thank you as Followers of denison forum and followers of this podcast Thank you for being a part of these conversations with us.
Let us know how you think that we can serve you better so that we can equip each other To be salt and light to be cultural ambassadors for christ in our context And we look forward to sharing with you through the daily article podcast the culture brief podcast and also the denison forum podcast Check us out on the web.
Check us out at denisonforum. org And we look forward to sharing with you in the days to come. God bless you. We’ll see you next time
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