{"podcast":{"title":"The Moral Imagination","slug":"the-moral-imagination-1176352","podcast_index_feed_id":1176352,"rss_url":"https://moralimagination.libsyn.com/rss","website_url":"https://www.themoralimagination.com/podcast","image_url":"https://substackcdn.com/feed/podcast/2345140/f237656e46c06d769905a4459a214bd1.jpg","author":"Michael Matheson Miller","episode_count":63,"summary":"Michael Matheson Milller","last_synced_at":"2026-07-02T22:17:51.928287+00:00","page_url":"https://stenobird.com/podcast/the-moral-imagination-1176352"},"episode":{"title":"Ep.50 On Benedict XVI -Reason, Freedom, Beauty, and the Intellectual Sources of Secularism and the New Evangelization","slug":"ep-50-on-benedict-xvi-reason-freedom-beauty-and-the-intellectual-sources-of-secularism-and-the-new-evangelization","published_at":"2023-01-06T19:36:00+00:00","page_url":"https://stenobird.com/podcast/the-moral-imagination-1176352/ep-50-on-benedict-xvi-reason-freedom-beauty-and-the-intellectual-sources-of-secularism-and-the-new-evangelization","show_page_url":"https://stenobird.com/podcast/the-moral-imagination-1176352","url":"https://www.themoralimagination.com/p/ep50-on-benedict-xvi-reason-freedom-ae0","audio_url":"https://api.substack.com/feed/podcast/142169485/3b9f50fb5fdb0c508a6c4074021244dc.mp3","summary":"Pope Benedict XVI / Joseph Ratzinger passed away on December 31 at the age of 95 years old. His writing and teaching have been a major influence on my thinking. So in honor of his memory and gratitude for his example, this episode is a talk I gave on Pope Benedict XVI on Five Crises of Culture and the Intellectual sources of Secularism and the New Evangelization. I go through five intellectual themes/crises that Benedict identifies in the West “where the roots of Christianity are deep but who have experienced a serious crisis of faith due to secularization.\" Truth and the Dictatorship of Relativism Reason Progress Freedom Beauty I examine how he describes and explains the challenges of our age; how he addresses each of them on their own terms, and the proposes a Gospel response. One element of the crisis of faith is grounded in intellectual sources. We think, and too often live, like secularists and adopt often without thinking a secular framework. But secularism is not neutral. As Benedict argues, “We must develop and adult faith.” An \"adult\" faith is not a faith that follows the trends of fashion and the latest novelty; a mature adult faith is deeply rooted in friendship with Christ. It is this friendship that opens us up to all that is good and gives us a criterion by which to distinguish the true from the false, and deceit from truth. We must develop this adult faith; we must guide the flock of Christ to this faith. And it is this faith - only faith - that creates unity and is fulfilled in love.” In this talk I provide a lot of quotes and references. You can find show notes, links, and outline of the talk at www.themoralimagination.com Resources See the outline / handout of the talk below. Also see Amazon links to books I refer to in the talk below. I also provide…","meta_description":"Pope Benedict XVI / Joseph Ratzinger passed away on December 31 at the age of 95 years old. His writing and teaching have been a major influence on my thi…","key_points":[],"chapters":[],"topics":[],"duration_seconds":3405,"processing_state":"not_requested","actions":[{"name":"request_transcript","method":"POST","url":"https://stenobird.com/v1/public/podcasts/the-moral-imagination-1176352/episodes/ep-50-on-benedict-xvi-reason-freedom-beauty-and-the-intellectual-sources-of-secularism-and-the-new-evangelization/transcription-requests","description":"Idempotently request low-priority transcript generation for this episode."},{"name":"read_markdown","method":"GET","url":"https://stenobird.com/podcast/the-moral-imagination-1176352/ep-50-on-benedict-xvi-reason-freedom-beauty-and-the-intellectual-sources-of-secularism-and-the-new-evangelization.md","description":"Read the agent-friendly Markdown representation of this episode resource."}]}}