# The case for holy war Page: https://stenobird.com/podcast/today-explained-663276/the-case-for-holy-war Text version: https://stenobird.com/podcast/today-explained-663276/the-case-for-holy-war.md Podcast: [Today, Explained](https://stenobird.com/podcast/today-explained-663276) Published: 2026-04-20T18:00:00+00:00 Episode link: https://www.podtrac.com/pts/redirect.mp3/pdst.fm/e/pscrb.fm/rss/p/mgln.ai/e/257/traffic.megaphone.fm/VMP9948797108.mp3?updated=1776866313 Audio file: https://www.podtrac.com/pts/redirect.mp3/pdst.fm/e/pscrb.fm/rss/p/mgln.ai/e/257/traffic.megaphone.fm/VMP9948797108.mp3?updated=1776866313 Processing state: not_requested JSON: https://stenobird.com/v1/public/podcasts/today-explained-663276/episodes/the-case-for-holy-war Duration seconds: 1565 ## Resource The Secretary of Defense suggests the Iran war is blessed by God. The head of his church, Pastor Doug Wilson, agrees. Some call Wilson an extremist. He prefers Christian nationalist. Either way, he's no longer a fringe figure. This episode was produced by Hady Mawajdeh, edited by Jolie Myers, fact-checked by Gabriel Dunatov, engineered by David Tatasciore, and hosted by Noel King. Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth at the Pentagon. Photo by Alex Wong/Getty Images. Listen to Today, Explained ad-free by becoming a Vox Member: vox.com/members. New Vox members get $20 off their membership right now. Transcript at ⁠vox.com/today-explained-podcast.⁠ Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices ## Actions - request_transcript: `POST https://stenobird.com/v1/public/podcasts/today-explained-663276/episodes/the-case-for-holy-war/transcription-requests` — Idempotently request low-priority transcript generation for this episode. - read_markdown: `GET https://stenobird.com/podcast/today-explained-663276/the-case-for-holy-war.md` — Read the agent-friendly Markdown representation of this episode resource. A page view does not enqueue transcription. Agents should invoke `request_transcript` explicitly when they need this episode processed. ## Transcript Full transcripts are not published on public pages unless there is a clear rights basis.