0:00 apparently an offer has been made to
0:01 Merill Streep to portray Alan as in the
0:04 Christ figure in the Narnia stories in
0:07 an upcoming Chronicles of Narnia movie
0:08 and really movies eight movies uh and
0:11 there are reports that aan will be a
0:13 female character so we'll see how this
0:16 unfolds nothing is said in stone as of
0:18 my recording of this but this is not
0:20 looking good and I think thinking about
0:22 this can help us think about our culture
0:24 right now so let's do two things in this
0:25 video real quick laying out the facts
0:28 what do we know at this point and and
0:30 second of all why is why would this be a
0:33 disastrous idea and why should we care
0:35 about this I actually think this is not
0:37 a small matter something like this it
0:38 reflects something of the times so this
0:41 is worth thinking about so what do we
0:42 know uh Netflix has acquired the rights
0:44 to produce a new Narnia series uh I
0:46 think the first movie will come out
0:48 around late 2026 sometime in the
0:51 Thanksgiving I think Thanksgiving
0:52 weekend in the theaters it's kind of an
0:54 interesting release because it'll be a
0:55 kind of a streaming theatrical hybrid
0:58 I'm not aware that there's been a movie
1:00 quite like this where you have four
1:01 weeks in the theaters only in IMAX and
1:03 then it'll come to Netflix uh sometime
1:06 in December um it's a reboot it's not a
1:09 sequel to the previous Disney films if
1:11 you remember those from 2005 to 2010
1:14 first three and they're planning on
1:16 doing eight of them the first two of
1:17 which will be directed by Greta Gerwig
1:19 she's the same person who directed the
1:21 Barbie movie uh apparently they're going
1:23 to start with the Magician's Nephew
1:25 first this is another whole thing you
1:26 know do you go with the chronology or
1:28 the publication order I'm very partial I
1:30 love the Narnia books you'll you'll get
1:33 the sense of that uh watching this video
1:35 I think they're great stories and I
1:37 think it's best to go in the order of
1:38 publication starting with the line the
1:40 Witch and the Wardrobe but that's kind
1:41 of a separate issue that's not as
1:42 serious as what we're talking about here
1:44 there's also talk of Daniel Craig
1:46 playing Uncle Andrew if you remember
1:48 that character from the book The
1:49 Magician's Nephew this has really got my
1:51 wires crossed because when I think of
1:53 Daniel Craig I think of him playing
1:54 James Bond so these are Uncle Andrew and
1:57 James Bond are about as different as you
1:58 can imagine uh here's a picture of Uncle
2:00 Andrew in one of the books but you know
2:03 that's just a challenge for Daniel Craig
2:05 I think uh you can go from a young James
2:07 Bond type person to an older eccentric
2:09 character if you're a good enough actor
2:11 so that's not the issue the issue with
2:12 this that I am having is the female
2:15 asant and I actually think that that's
2:17 not a small matter and it invites some
2:19 reflection about what is going on in our
2:21 culture where this kind of thing can
2:22 happen and let me just start by saying
2:24 in terms of the concern here it's not
2:26 because I'm a snob about books you know
2:29 there are some people where you're a fan
2:31 of the books and granted I love the
2:32 Narnia books but you're a fan of the
2:34 books to the point where nothing would
2:36 satisfy you no matter any kind of movie
2:38 would make you upset that's not really
2:40 where I'm coming from to give some
2:42 comparison I loved the 2005 movie I
2:44 thought it was pretty good that they had
2:46 Liam niss do the voice of Alan in that
2:48 movie I thought that that was a great
2:50 choice and while it's always hard to
2:52 make a book into a movie and and to
2:54 capture the spirit of it and you can
2:56 criticize various things I never got the
2:58 impression in that movie that there was
3:00 an agenda being forced into the story I
3:03 felt the same way about the Peter
3:05 Jackson Lord of the Rings trilogy I
3:07 thought they did a great job you can
3:09 critique various aspects of it you know
3:11 you can say they took too much creative
3:13 license here and there and that kind of
3:14 thing I'm not saying it's perfect but I
3:16 didn't get the sense from those movies
3:18 that they were there was a kind of
3:20 subversive agenda being forced into the
3:23 narrative in fact Peter Jackson talked
3:25 about this in interviews and he said we
3:27 made a promise to ourselves at the
3:28 beginning of the process that we weren't
3:30 going to put out any of our own politics
3:33 our own messages or our own themes into
3:35 these movies in a way we were trying to
3:38 make these films for him that's tolken
3:40 not for ourselves I think that's the
3:42 honorable way to treat any sort of C
3:45 cultural artifact like uh the Narnia
3:48 books or the Lord of the Rings books or
3:50 or anything if you have the
3:53 responsibility of taking A Book Like The
3:57 Chronicles of Narnia books or Lord of
3:59 the Rings and putting them into any kind
4:01 of production whether it's through film
4:03 or anything else that is a sacred
4:04 privilege it's kind of a form of
4:06 inherited wealth in a way you know
4:07 you're getting to benefit from the
4:09 incredible genius that went into the
4:11 original production and it's very easy
4:13 to misuse the power that you've been in
4:15 trusted with you know if you're
4:17 borrowing your neighbor
4:19 Lamborghini um you have a responsibility
4:22 to not go out joy riding recklessly
4:25 because it's a Lamborghini right well
4:28 when we have the sacred privilege of
4:29 taking something like the Narnia stories
4:31 and turning them into a movie we need to
4:33 take that very seriously and a female
4:35 Alan is uh a kind of subversive way to
4:39 deal with it just think how CS Lewis
4:41 would feel about this let's explain a
4:43 little bit why and let me say the
4:44 concern here is not with Merill stre
4:46 herself she's a great actress okay did
4:48 you know Merl stre holds the record for
4:50 the most nominations for winning an
4:53 Oscar she has 21 nominations incredible
4:57 acting career she's an amazing actress
4:59 so God L her it's not with her that the
5:01 concern here it's the concern with
5:02 changing the biological sex of aan which
5:05 if I understand it from reading a bunch
5:06 of websites today that's the plan again
5:08 we're very early on we'll see how it
5:10 unfolds from here I'm recording this
5:11 April 2nd 2025 but it sounds like
5:13 they're going to make aan female now one
5:16 of the simplest ways to State the
5:17 concern is just to say look aan is a
5:20 allegorical representation of Jesus
5:23 Christ Jesus Christ was a man so don't
5:26 make the allegorical representation of a
5:28 man female and because the masculinity
5:31 of Christ is a very serious matter those
5:34 of us who are followers of Jesus believe
5:36 that the Eternal Son of God chose to be
5:38 incarnate in that particular way and we
5:41 don't want to mess with that but there's
5:43 maybe even a deeper way to put this is
5:45 this feeling of the misuse of a
5:48 particular cultural item in this case
5:50 The Chronicles of Narnia to push an
5:53 agenda uh unlike what you what I
5:55 mentioned with the earlier Narnia story
5:58 at least the original movie and the Lord
5:59 of the Rings movies and let me say that
6:01 my motive in talking about this is not
6:03 just to stir people up into anger and
6:05 reactionism um because we get enough of
6:08 that but it's just to encourage
6:09 reflection about our culture right now
6:11 because for those of us who are
6:13 followers of Jesus we're often quick to
6:15 criticize the surrounding culture but we
6:17 have to actually be Discerning to see it
6:19 it actually takes a lot of wisdom to
6:21 look around and see what is happening
6:22 and how eccentric the modern West is
6:24 remember that culture is not the
6:27 landscape that we see it's the glasses
6:29 we see through we often don't notice how
6:32 much the culture has gotten into US it
6:35 has to do with how we see things less
6:37 what we see and what we're consciously
6:38 aware of and the fact is that modern
6:41 Western culture has become different in
6:44 various ways from every other culture in
6:47 human history and that those differences
6:50 are actually growing and expanding with
6:53 time and we need to be aware of this
6:55 there are certain things that were sort
6:56 of taken for granted everywhere whether
6:58 you're in South America or Asia whether
7:00 you're in 1000 BC or 1000 ad certain
7:04 things that are relatively static and
7:06 then the modern West is deviating from
7:09 one of them is
7:10 secularization there's some materialist
7:13 people in the ancient world there's some
7:14 people who don't believe in the gods but
7:17 societies as a whole were always
7:19 religious another difference is the
7:21 tendency to reduce morality to harm
7:25 Jonathan height talks about this in his
7:26 book The Righteous Mind which is an
7:27 amazing and helpful book everybody
7:29 should read it and he's saying most
7:31 cultures have had a bigger set of
7:34 intuitions that inform our sense of
7:36 morality we've really reduced it down
7:39 it's very thin in the modern West and
7:42 another is our more fluid and libertine
7:46 views about sexuality and gender I'll
7:49 just say you know at a basic street
7:50 level when I'm trying to disciple young
7:52 people just the way this plays out in
7:54 pastoral Ministry one of the basic
7:55 issues that comes up again and again is
7:57 just I I to try to put it at its at its
7:59 nerve center we've lost our sense of
8:02 sexuality as a sacred and holy gift from
8:06 the Creator God that's the simplest way
8:08 I can put it so if we were to say as
8:10 followers of Jesus we believe in such a
8:11 thing called sin so what is sin well one
8:14 way to get at the essence of sin is
8:17 reversing the categories of Creator and
8:19 creat and creature so uh a Christian
8:23 world viw says basically there's a
8:24 Creator and so he calls the shots you
8:26 know he he made us and so he determines
8:29 how ought to live and happiness and
8:31 flourishing comes when you follow the
8:33 way he set things up to go and sin is
8:35 saying no we know better than the
8:36 Creator now if there is any way where
8:39 you see like that just playing out in
8:41 such a tangible destructive way uh any
8:46 area where you see that playing out it
8:47 would be I think in in this area and I
8:50 think the tendency to say no we want to
8:54 determine what sexuality is rather than
8:58 submit to to how the Creator designed it
9:01 I think it's actually a huge cause of
9:02 some of the issues we have with
9:04 depression and anxiety in our culture
9:06 and I think if we those of you who pray
9:08 with me for the rech christianization of
9:10 the West we have to recognize this is an
9:12 area where we're going to have to do a
9:13 lot of cultural rebuilding just like the
9:16 early church did in the in the Roman
9:18 Empire sexuality had been cheapened
9:20 pornography was everywhere there was
9:22 horrific
9:24 exploitation uh and Christianity changed
9:26 a lot of that for the good even though
9:28 it wasn't perfect we can learn a lot
9:29 from the early church because we've got
9:31 some rebuilding to do in our society in
9:33 this area as well so that's kind of the
9:35 broader cultural backdrop but on the
9:36 specific issue of making Alan female why
9:39 is this so problematic the concern here
9:41 is that masculinity and femininity have
9:44 a robust and particular and definite
9:47 meaning and you can't just swap them in
9:50 and out for for each other most cultures
9:52 throughout all of human history have had
9:54 more of a sense of that uh and it's
9:56 being increasingly forgotten in the
9:58 modern West and this isn't a all matter
10:00 so one simple way to point this out and
10:02 this will be a short video right on the
10:03 nose just to draw attention to this is
10:05 to just look at CS Lewis himself you
10:08 know let's honor like like Peter Jackson
10:09 said they wanted to honor tolken with
10:11 their creation I wish we would do that
10:14 with with Narnia movies by the standards
10:16 of today Lewis would be viewed as an
10:18 arch traditionalist on questions of
10:21 sexuality and gender and marriage even
10:23 of course as some people would view him
10:25 as a liberal for other things he
10:26 believed in uh I've talked about that
10:28 elsewhere but nonetheless you can read
10:31 his article priestesses in the church to
10:33 see some of his views on the meaning of
10:35 masculinity and femininity but I think
10:38 one clear way to put it and I want to
10:40 read you this amazing quote and it comes
10:42 from the ransom Trilogy and this is in
10:44 particular from paralandra the middle
10:46 book this is this Trilogy of adult
10:48 fiction that he wrote uh very different
10:50 from Narnia but one of the themes in
10:52 them is gender especially in the third
10:55 book That Hideous Strength I have an
10:57 article written about this where I talk
10:58 all about this it's online you can read
10:59 it if you want but I want to talk about
11:01 paralandra here here's this here's the
11:03 quote this is uh just hang with me and
11:05 read this quote for the last bit of this
11:06 video this it's the quote itself you
11:09 know that's the one thing that's hard
11:10 about quoting CS Lewis is there's almost
11:11 nothing to say because he's so clear
11:13 himself this is happening where the main
11:16 character named Ransom sees two uh
11:19 Angels basically one of them is the
11:21 angel of Mars the other is the angel of
11:23 Venus and he notices that one is
11:25 masculine and one is feminine now right
11:27 there the thought of a masculine Ang or
11:29 a feminine angel that already gets you
11:31 thinking that already makes you wonder
11:33 well what does that mean exactly you
11:35 know here's what he writes what Ransom
11:37 saw at that moment was the real meaning
11:39 of gender everyone must sometimes have
11:42 wondered why in nearly all tongues
11:44 certain inanimate objects are masculine
11:46 and others feminine what is masculine
11:49 about a mountain or feminine about
11:51 certain trees Ransom has cured me of
11:54 believing that this is a purely
11:56 morphological phenomenon depending on
11:58 the form of the word still less is
12:00 gender an imaginative extension of sex
12:03 our ancestors did not make mountains
12:05 masculine because they projected male
12:07 characteristics into them the real
12:10 process is the reverse gender is a
12:12 reality a more fundamental reality than
12:15 sex sex is in fact merely the organic
12:19 adaptation to organic life of a
12:22 fundamental polarity which divides all
12:25 created things female sex is simply one
12:28 of the things that have feminine gender
12:30 there are many others and masculine and
12:32 feminine meet us on planes of reality
12:35 where male and female would be simply
12:36 meaningless masculine is not attenuated
12:39 male nor feminine attenuated female on
12:42 the contrary the male and female of
12:43 organic creatures are rather faint and
12:46 blurred reflections of masculine and
12:49 feminine their reproductive functions
12:51 their differences in strength and size
12:53 partly exhibit but partly also confuse
12:57 and misrepresent the real polarity this
13:01 this is something that without
13:02 commenting on at Great length I would
13:03 just love to encourage people to think
13:05 about this is one of those things you
13:07 know reading the past even going back
13:09 now 75 years it's been 75 years since
13:11 the first Narnia book was published if
13:13 you can believe that 75 years but even
13:15 just going back you know to a couple
13:17 Generations ago to CS Lewis it it gives
13:19 us perspective on the current moment uh
13:22 so that we can understand a little bit
13:24 of just how eccentric some things are
13:26 going and Lewis's basic Point here is
13:29 that masculine and feminine are greater
13:33 categories that lie at the heart of
13:35 reality itself and their reflection in
13:37 biology is just one instantiation of
13:40 that deeper reality now for a fuller
13:42 picture of that read That Hideous
13:43 Strength where that's actually a motif
13:45 of the whole book people often accuse
13:47 Lewis of being a sexist for his views on
13:49 these things here's a funny anecdote
13:52 about that to finish off one of the
13:53 early reviewers of his book till we have
13:56 faces another one of my favorites of his
13:58 it's the red book right over there right
14:00 there if you can see that red book um
14:03 the reviewer didn't yet know who the
14:04 author was now this reviewer had
14:06 previously criticized CS Lewis of male
14:10 chauvinism and yet he didn't know that
14:13 Lewis wrote this book this book is
14:14 written from the point of view of a
14:15 woman and so the reviewer insisted the
14:18 author of this book must be a woman
14:20 because no male author could ever have
14:22 possibly understood the world from a
14:24 woman's point of view so well it's kind
14:27 of funny to think that uh if only he had
14:29 know and that was actually CS Lewis we
14:31 should have some humility in seeing what
14:34 we can learn from someone like CS Lewis
14:35 on these matters and pre-modern voices
14:38 as well we've got a lot of cultural
14:40 rebuilding to do uh one of the things
14:42 that we need is cultural humility the
14:44 insights of the modern West that can
14:46 feel so natural to us we have to have
14:49 some mechanism of getting perspective on
14:51 them and reading church history reading
14:53 other broader history even reading
14:55 people from 100 years ago even reading
14:58 people like C Le us from a few
14:59 Generations ago can give a lot of
15:01 perspective as we're doing the work of
15:03 cultural rebuilding I would say there
15:04 are two things we can say the first is
15:06 we need to tell people how much Jesus
15:07 loves them that he will forgive them
15:10 what for everything they've ever done
15:11 they need to feel the love of Christ
15:12 from us but secondly and with that we
15:14 need to teach them what it means to be a
15:16 human being and then if people come to
15:19 know Jesus what it means to be a
15:20 Christian and that means teaching in
15:22 this area about gender and sexuality and
15:25 we're going to have to have courage to
15:26 stand against the pressures um even as
15:29 we do so without anger and ranker but
15:31 nonetheless steadfastly stand against
15:32 the pressures and hold out a Christian
15:34 Vision which is what leads to
15:36 flourishing and joy forever more uh if
15:39 you're interested in a good study study
15:41 point a good starting point to study I
15:44 would say just start with Ephesians 5
15:46 and just give some consideration read
15:48 some church history voices on that text
15:51 and and give some consideration to why
15:55 it is that marriage portrays the gospel
15:57 the relationship between marriage
15:59 between one man and one woman and the
16:01 gospel the love of Jesus for his bride
16:04 study that that's a great starting point
16:06 all right one final thing this is kind
16:07 of selfish to mention but I have built
16:10 speaking of Narnia things and trying to
16:11 Steward it well I have built a card game
16:14 based upon the Narnia Universe I know
16:17 you thought I was a nerd
16:18 already now you see just how much of a
16:22 nerd I am uh it's a customizable card
16:24 game uh so they have these for like Star
16:26 Wars and Lord of the Rings and other
16:28 universes like like this I built one for
16:29 Narnia but I I've been sitting on it for
16:31 like 12 years I have no idea what to do
16:33 with it I does anybody out there know a
16:35 gaming company or what would be the next
16:38 point of contact for if I wanted to try
16:40 to share this with others I have no idea
16:42 what to do with it I built it and I
16:43 don't know what to do so I thought I
16:44 mentioned that leave me a a comment if
16:46 you have any suggestions on that and in
16:48 all these other things uh let's be
16:49 mindful of the world around us and not
16:52 angry not reactionary but nonetheless
16:54 Discerning and then we want to bring
16:56 Jesus and hope to people in the midst of
16:58 it thanks for watching everybody
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