Can You Be a Bible-Believing Christian and a Socialist?

Dan McClellan Hey, everybody. I'm Dan McClellan. And

Dan Beecher I'm Dan Beecher.

Dan McClellan And this is Data Over Dogma, where we increase public access to the academic study of the Bible and religion, and we combat the spread of misinformation about the same. How are things, Dan?

Dan Beecher Oh, I'm, I'm, I'm itching for a fight.

Dan McClellan Good.

Dan Beecher We're about to, we're about to dive into, uh, to a, a bit of a mess here.

Dan McClellan Yes.

Dan Beecher And I'm, I'm kinda looking forward to it. Uh, the, in, in, in, uh, in this corner is us, and in the, uh, the opposing corner is gonna be one Pastor Mark Driscoll, who, uh, who's gonna hit us with some twisted scripture. So I'm looking forward to that. Why don't we just dive into it? Here's twisted scripture. All right. Uh, Mark Driscoll. He's a, he's a pastor, he's a, he, uh, formerly disgraced pastor- ... but apparently they let him back in.

Dan McClellan Well, I think he's still disgraceful, but, um-

Dan Beecher Disgraceful, yes ...

Dan McClellan in, in a lot of ways, yes. But, uh... No, he start, he started his own-

Dan Beecher Yeah, he started his own thing ...

Dan McClellan different church. Yeah.

Dan Beecher So.

Dan McClellan 'Cause he was, uh... Yeah, he talks about humility despite, uh- ... being, being booted for, uh, his domineering and, and non-humble- Yeah ... um, approach-

Dan Beecher Well, and some other problematic- ... to pastoring ... behaviors, as I understand it. But I, but we won't- Yes ... we don't need to get into any of that.

Dan McClellan No.

Dan Beecher 'Cause all we care about is the claims that he's making, which are, uh, which are cute. He's, he's gotten some cute claims. Yeah. And the claims today that we're gonna be talking about, uh, are, and he... I'll just read from the post that he wrote- Mm-hmm ... which says, uh, that he wrote. He didn't write this, but- ... uh, but the post that is on his, uh, on his page. It says, "You can't be a Bible-believing Christian and a socialist. You can't separate Christian, Christianity from economics. If God owns everything, then the government doesn't. The Bible teaches that God delegates stewardship to individuals and families, protects private property with you shall not steal, and commands parents to leave an inheritance for their children. Those aren't modern political ideas. They're biblical principles." There's a lot-

Dan McClellan Good grief ...

Dan Beecher packed into that.

Dan McClellan Yeah.

Dan Beecher And, and he did a whole video. Uh, I actually watched the extended 20-minute version of it. I don't recommend it.

Dan McClellan My condolences, yeah.

Dan Beecher Uh-

Dan McClellan That was, I...

Dan Beecher I was trying to bone up. I don't know, you know? Uh, but yes, he made... The main thing that he does, and, you know, we, he has a, a, a shorter clip, too. And the first thing he says is that basically capitalism equals the correct Christian economic ideology, question mark. Like, he basically says that because God took his little finger and wrote in the stones on to Moses, "Thou shalt not steal," that proves that capitalism, uh, that proves that ownership is a thing, that we're, the, the... 'Cause you, nobody could steal anything if nobody owns anything. And because ownership is a thing, therefore, dot, dot, dot, capitalism, not socialism. Uh-

Dan McClellan So when, when he says socialism, he means a specific brand of communism.

Dan Beecher He, he, he means Marxist communism, yeah.

Dan McClellan Yes, but-

Dan Beecher He's not, he's not talking about socialism literally at all. Right.

Dan McClellan But socialism is what the leftists are advocating for, so he needs to use that as the proxy for- Right ... uh, for his argument. Ugh, good grief.

Dan Beecher It's a lot. 'Cause he- It's a, it's a-

Dan McClellan Yes, yes ...

Dan Beecher it's a, because it, he literally is wrong a- about ma- Like, he just keeps taking wrong things and adding them to his... Like, his premises are all, like, wrong, wrong, wrong, wrong.

Dan McClellan Yeah, yeah.

Dan Beecher Therefore, conclusion.

Dan McClellan Because, like, socialism and, and capitalism are kind of, there's kind of a hydraulic relationship between the two, and, and they're also, they occupy, each occupies its own little spectrum, 'cause it has to do more with the degree to which the means of production are controlled by the public versus, um, private entities'- Right ... 'interests.

Dan Beecher Right.

Dan McClellan And you can have both capitalist and socialist systems within the same country.

Dan Beecher Right.

Dan McClellan Like-

Dan Beecher Many countries do.

Dan McClellan Yes. And, like, uh, and there's, there's the great meme, where it's like, "We should have, uh, socialism like the Nordic countries," and the person responds, "No, that's not socialism. It's capitalism with this, that, and the other sprinkled in to it." " Okay. Let's have that." "No, that's socialism."

Dan Beecher Right.

Dan McClellan Like, it's, you, you can't win when, when everybody wants to reduce everything to these binary zero-sum games.

Dan Beecher Right.

Dan McClellan Um, 'cause, like, there are a lot of ways that America is, is socialist. Um-

Dan Beecher Yeah.

Dan McClellan And-

Dan Beecher Do you like having a fire department? 'Cause- Yeah ... that's a socialist program. That's, that, you're not paying for the fire department to come out to your house if, uh, you know, if, if you need them, so.

Dan McClellan And, and we've got, we've got a lot of things that are, um, are providing social safety nets to people. I th- I think- Right ... when, when people think of, of socialism, what, what they mean is, is social safety nets.

Dan Beecher Sure.

Dan McClellan Um, and so-

Dan Beecher So things- ...

Dan McClellan but, but these are, these- ...

Dan Beecher things, things like, like Medicare and Medicaid, things like- Yeah,

Dan McClellan Social Security, uh, things like that. Um-

Dan Beecher Yeah.

Dan McClellan And when we think about these as, as distinct- uh, economic approaches, or at least, um, occupying different ends of a spectrum of economic approaches, like that doesn't go back to the biblical period.

Dan Beecher Right.

Dan McClellan Like, there are a lot of ways that, that, that... You can't get there from here. That's... They didn't organize their economies that way anciently.

Dan Beecher Yeah.

Dan McClellan So the Bible's not addressing socialism v. capitalism. Um, and but the Bible does make a lot of moral assertions that I would say are going to resonate more with a socialist approach than, than a quote-unquote capitalist approach today. Um, 'cause-

Dan Beecher Yeah, I don't think Driscoll likes those ones very much.

Dan McClellan Oh, well, he certainly doesn't understand them, whether or not he, he likes them.

Dan Beecher Yeah.

Dan McClellan He-

Dan Beecher It is really interesting. Like, one of the big claims that he makes is that God commands us or, or, or wants us to accumulate generational wealth.

Dan McClellan Mm.

Dan Beecher Uh, he's, you know, he says, he, "And pass it on to our descendants," which, you know, first of all, not easy for everyone to do. Not a thing that everyone is capable of doing.

Dan McClellan Yeah.

Dan Beecher Uh, especially when you're talking about, you know, a country like ours where wealth is being consolidated sort of purposefully with a single class of people, and they're making... They are intentionally making it difficult for other classes of people to even possibly accumulate wealth.

Dan McClellan Yeah. Uh, you, you can go read The Rule of, uh... or no, The Color of Law for a wonderful discussion of how our government was structured to explicitly and programmatically, systematically privilege the access of white folks to, uh, protections and to, uh, generational wealth over and against, uh, Black folks who are explicitly marginalized in that. Redlining is still a thing.

Dan Beecher Yeah.

Dan McClellan In, in-

Dan Beecher Yeah, there are still systematic-

Dan McClellan You know, it's morphed. It's changed. Yeah. There... Yeah. There, there are a lot of, uh, systematic, or systemic, excuse me, power asymmetries-

Dan Beecher Right

Dan McClellan ... that give folks who look like you and me easier access to generational wealth. Um, you know, there's... The, and, and there's, you know, that's its own conversation, but Driscoll have no interest in overturning those systems-

Dan Beecher No, no

Dan McClellan ... of power.

Dan Beecher He looks like us. He's doing great.

Dan McClellan Yeah. Yeah, he's doing great, and so he wants to endorse those systems even though they are, uh, quite intentionally and doing a good job of preventing people who don't look like us from accessing that. So when he, when he's talking about, uh, he wants, God wants us to accumulate general- generational wealth and, and pass it on, when he supports a system that prevents certain groups of people from doing that, that's... Like, fundamentally, that's white supremacist.

Dan Beecher Right.

Dan McClellan Uh, and, and I'm sure that he doesn't agree with that. I'm sure he doesn't understand that.

Dan Beecher Yeah.

Dan McClellan I'm sure his brain will not allow him to understand that, because that would indict him.

Dan Beecher Right.

Dan McClellan And he's not going to allow himself to be indicted by anything.

Dan Beecher Well-

Dan McClellan So-

Dan Beecher I mean, it feels to me like the thing that most indicts him is his own book- ... which is the Bible constantly talking about sell what you own and give it to the poor.

Dan McClellan Yeah. Oh, yeah.

Dan Beecher Like, wealth is, especially the New Testament, it is constantly talking about how wealth is bad, being a rich man is bad, give it to the poor. Like, the best thing you can do, in Mark 10, the best thing you can do if you want to, uh, y- be in the kingdom of heaven is to sell your wealth, sell your possessions, and give it away.

Dan McClellan Yeah. And, and that's actually, that's distinct from where I think, uh, Driscoll will go when looking for his proof text, because-

Dan Beecher Right

Dan McClellan ... and there are, and there are reasons for this, because you can go in the Hebrew Bible and you can see, um, you know, wealth is, is not treated as the enemy, is not treated as a villain in places like Proverbs, in Samuel and Kings, and, and things like that. But you also have, in the prophets, for instance, condemnations of people who are, um, consol- doing land consolidation, who are engaged in a kind of something that you could call, um, uh, what... Oh, I, shoot, I forget the word. But it's, um, it's like predatory capitalism.

Dan Beecher Right.

Dan McClellan Like, I'm, I'm lending money because I'm counting on them defaulting-

Dan Beecher Right

Dan McClellan ... so I can then take their stuff, their collateral. Like, that is something that was a problem in the eighth century BCE, and you had prophets coming out here and saying, "You are doing this, t- uh, consuming the houses of the poor, and that's incredibly bad. That's, that's immoral."

Dan Beecher Yeah.

Dan McClellan "That is grinding the faces of the poor, and God hates you for it."

Dan Beecher Well-

Dan McClellan Taking advantage of the economic system, taking advantage of the legal system in order to protect your own stuff over and against the interests of the poor and the needy is explicitly called out as immoral. So, so what Mark's defending is, is, like, you can find defenses of, of being wealthy in the Hebrew Bible, but you also find excoriations of the kinds of things that Mark's talking about. And then we get to the New Testament, and this is being written by folks who are not in government. These are not people with, with systemic power.

Dan Beecher Right.

Dan McClellan They're, they're-

Dan Beecher Yeah, very much the opposite.

Dan McClellan Yeah. And so, and there are reasons that they say give everything to the poor, and they don't seem to care about, uh- ... intergenerational anything, they actually say, "Be celibate." And the reason is they thought Jesus was coming back right away.

Dan Beecher Right.

Dan McClellan So it didn't matter. None of it mattered. And so you can't draw from the collection of texts from people who are like, "The world's ending before I could ever have a kid anyway, so none of that matters." You can't draw principles to apply to 21st century America from those kinds of ideological texts. But if you were going to try, they would ba- they would say, "Give all your money to the poor. Don't worry about having kids. None of that matters."

Dan Beecher Right.

Dan McClellan Um, so the-

Dan Beecher Yeah, j- that, that does speak a little bit against generational wealth if it's like-

Dan McClellan Yeah

Dan Beecher ... "Don't even have generations. What are you doing?"

Dan McClellan Yeah, yeah. We, we- this is all coming to an end. The, the whole scene is gonna be wrapped up and tied off with a, a neat little bow before you even have a chance for a baby to be born, so. Yeah. Yeah, it's, it's laughably uncritical and, and not thoughtful. But, uh, he, he focuses in on the Ten Commandments, doesn't he?

Dan Beecher Uh- Uh, yeah.

Dan McClellan Yeah.

Dan Beecher He- He, I... Go ahead.

Dan McClellan Which is problematic. He focuses on the shall not steal.

Dan Beecher Yeah.

Dan McClellan The idea seems to be that if you have personal property, that's capitalism and cannot be socialism, which again, is, is drawing the line, uh, well outside of, of where it belongs when it comes to the relationship of socialism to capitalism.

Dan Beecher Yeah.

Dan McClellan Um, but the Ten Commandments also twice, if I ref- recall correctly- ... um, refer favorably to slaves that you own as well.

Dan Beecher Yeah.

Dan McClellan Uh, so are we-

Dan Beecher They don't, they don't usually print that part.

Dan McClellan No.

Dan Beecher Like, when you, when you see, when you see a Ten Commandments in a, in a schoolho- in a schoolroom-

Dan McClellan Yeah

Dan Beecher ... in Texas, it's not gonna say that part.

Dan McClellan Yeah, you've got dot, dot, dot. Well, what was there? Slaves were there.

Dan Beecher Yeah.

Dan McClellan That's what the ellipses are occluding, is-

Dan Beecher Yeah

Dan McClellan ... the fact that the Ten Commandments presuppose that you own slaves. Um, and so where's that in this economy that, that Driscoll is, is constructing from the Ten Commandments? Well, it's not there because we decided that was bad.

Dan Beecher Yeah.

Dan McClellan We overruled that. And most of the, the Ten Commandments that have anything to do with economics are about not necessarily protecting your private property, but protecting the weak and the poor from the wealthy and the strong. Uh, the, you know, the, the, the notion that you shouldn't be coveting.

Dan Beecher Right.

Dan McClellan Why do you think that is? It's because they don't want people going out there and doing what the prophets are excoriating in the, the Hebrew Bible. They don't want people going out there and, uh, engaging in land consolidation and predatory loans and stuff like that, 'cause they, you ... In the, in the ninth century and then in the beginning of the eighth century, you, uh, uh, it was basically a subsistence economy.

Dan Beecher Right.

Dan McClellan You had your farm. You grew what you needed to survive on the farm. Maybe you had a little left over to take to the farmer's market on Saturday, and maybe you made some, a little extra walking around something, uh, from a couple extra handfuls of whatever you were growing. But basically, you grew what you needed to survive. The, we had, in Israel and Judah in the eighth century, kings that reigned for, like, 40 years each, exceptionally long reigns. And these were very prosperous times. A lot of people made a lot of money because we were beginning international trade.

Dan Beecher Hm.

Dan McClellan Primarily things like olive oil and wine and, and things like that was, was going into, uh, Phoenicia and, and elsewhere. And so a lot of people are getting very wealthy, and the economy shifts into what is called a command economy, where you didn't grow whatever you needed to survive. You grew what your creditor demanded you grow-

Dan Beecher Hm

Dan McClellan ... because you were now making money for, uh, whoever owned the, the property. And, you know, you would get loans, and the loans would come due when it was harvest time, when money was worth, uh, you know, your goods were worth the least amount.

Dan Beecher Mm-hmm.

Dan McClellan Uh, and because you were growing what they told you to grow, you couldn't diversify as a pro- protectionist strategy. Because if a, a specific crop fails, if you've got a bunch of crops, great, you can make up that, that gap. But if you're being told, "Only grow this," and that crop fails, you're up a creek.

Dan Beecher Right.

Dan McClellan And so there's gonna be a m- a lot more defaulting on loans. There's gonna be a lot more ... Basically, it becomes serfdom, where the wealthy people in the city now own your property, and they're like, "Hey, you can stay on the property. You continue to work it, but I get all of the income from it. I get all the goods from it."

Dan Beecher Yeah, that was

Dan McClellan y-

Dan Beecher And that was- Sorry. Sorry. I, I, I was just thinking that, that, that ... Is that what led to the, the whole jubilee thing of, like, re- releasing people from these debts and, and that sort... All, all, there was a whole, whole bunch of stuff.

Dan McClellan Yeah. In, in response to this, the fact that suddenly this command economy was leading to a lot more income inequality and wealth being, um, concentrated in cities, uh, you had other folks coming out, and you had the prophets who were saying, "All of this is incredibly wicked, and God hates you." And then you had, uh, people who were responsible for particularly the Book of Deuteronomy, which is coming in the late seventh, it's probably starting up in the late seventh century BCE, so about a century after all this is getting really, really bad. You, it trickles down to the scribal class, and they're like, "Okay, well, we're gonna write laws that ease this." ... that make up for what's going on here, and that's why you have, "Oh, you gotta leave the gleanings for the poor. Oh, you've got to, uh, in the seventh year they go free. The debts are going to be, uh, all released in the, the jubilee or, or whatever," which we have no evidence that any such thing ever happened, but, but it's a nice thing to write down-

Dan Beecher Yeah

Dan McClellan ... and to, and to post in front of your courthouse even if-

Dan Beecher And, and-

Dan McClellan ... those laws have no authority within the courthouse itself.

Dan Beecher Well, and it's a decidedly anti-capitalist idea, uh, that is, that is, like you say, it doesn't matter if it's, if it actually happened or not, it's in Mark Driscoll's book.

Dan McClellan Yeah.

Dan Beecher You know what I mean? Like he-

Dan McClellan Yeah

Dan Beecher ... it is the thing that he is decidedly ignoring.

Dan McClellan Yeah, and e- it, it even says in that book, uh, in Deuteronomy that, uh, you're not even allowed to, like, when you give, you have to give to the poor. You're not allowed to do it reluctantly.

Dan Beecher Right.

Dan McClellan It literally says you must do it with a, with a happy heart.

Dan Beecher Yeah.

Dan McClellan Um, and it-

Dan Beecher And, and that's, and, and it's, it's interesting because Driscoll in his video says redistribution... It's a very, uh, it's a very... He gets very libertarian about-

Dan McClellan Mm-hmm

Dan Beecher ... everything, but he's, he starts to say redistribution, even taxation, is theft. Uh, and, and that, that is, A, really funny coming from someone who isn't paying taxes because he's- ... because he's a pastor, and so shut up about that. Why, why are you even commenting on it? But the idea that redid- the redistribution of wealth is somehow theft, uh, is, feels really counter-biblical to me. It feels real- Like, like, you know, the, like you said, landowners must... I, I think in Leviticus, uh, when I was looking it up, it's, I saw something about landowners having to leave the edges of their fields-

Dan McClellan Yeah, that's the-

Dan Beecher ... for the poor

Dan McClellan ... the gleanings. Yeah, so.

Dan Beecher And yeah, so it's like, uh, honestly if it, it... Like, redistribution is about as biblical as you can get.

Dan McClellan Particularly when you've got Jesus, who is supposed to be God for-

Dan Beecher Yeah

Dan McClellan ... for Driscoll, saying-

Dan Beecher Driscoll's supposed to like that guy a lot.

Dan McClellan Yeah, and supposed to listen to him. Saying multiple times, "Sell everything you have. Give it to the poor."

Dan Beecher Right.

Dan McClellan Um, but also you've got, like, Acts 4 and 5, which is a, which is explicitly communalism, where nobody... Everybody gave everything that they had, and then it was distributed as people had need. And you-

Dan Beecher Right

Dan McClellan ... you, you need-

Dan Beecher And, and what's-his-name and what's-her-name were, were punished for not-

Dan McClellan Yeah

Dan Beecher ... doing it.

Dan McClellan Well, not just punished, they died.

Dan Beecher That's punishment.

Dan McClellan They were killed by God.

Dan Beecher That counts as punishment.

Dan McClellan Yeah. But, um, and, and people say, "Oh, well, it's 'cause they lied to the Spirit." About what?

Dan Beecher Yeah.

Dan McClellan About whether or not they gave them all their money.

Dan Beecher Right.

Dan McClellan And, uh, yeah, if you, you, you can't read that and, and be like, "Oh, well, that doesn't count." That's... And, and some people will say, "Oh, well, it's, it's not about the government. It's about how individuals are supposed to act." And I think the way you represented Driscoll, he was trying to make a big deal about, uh, uh-

Dan Beecher He-

Dan McClellan ... individualism.

Dan Beecher Yes. Uh, he did. He very much said that, that, yes, you should volunteer your tithes. Uh, your charity should be voluntary and on an individual level-

Dan McClellan Yeah

Dan Beecher ... not, not done at a governmental level.

Dan McClellan Which i- which is something that is never said in the Bible, in the New Testament.

Dan Beecher Right.

Dan McClellan This is kind of an is-ought fallacy that is overlooking the fact that it, i- the is part is a product of the fact that nobody writing the New Testament had any role in government or ever thought they would have any influence whatsoever in government.

Dan Beecher Right.

Dan McClellan They were... The government was in a far-off place and didn't care what they thought, and so they were just telling the other people around them, "Here's what we're going to do."

Dan Beecher Right.

Dan McClellan So the is-ought fallacy ignores the circumstances that lead to the fact that the authors of the New Testament never say, "Hey, by the way, if you're in government leadership," because they never contemplated any such circumstance. But the notion that they would have said, "Hey, if you're any- ever in any kind of government leadership," it, the priority is not- ... ensuring the poor have what they need. The priority is protecting the agency of the people who have money.

Dan Beecher Yeah.

Dan McClellan So whether or not the poor eat is secondary.

Dan Beecher Yeah.

Dan McClellan Our primary concern is that we not force somebody who has money to do anything that they don't wanna do. I think we see from the example in Acts 4 and 5, if you wanted to participate in the community, you kinda had to give them all your money. So it is reading into the text things that are, one, not in the text at all, but two, only inappropriately imposed upon the text based on the notion that we do find counsel for people in government in the New Testament. We don't.

Dan Beecher Right.

Dan McClellan Nobody ever anticipated that their messaging was going to influence people in positions of power within governments. So it's silent on that, so you can't really draw those kinds of conclusions. This is, this is more, um, just rationalizing right-wing authoritarianism and social dominance orientation into, uh, your interpretation of the biblical text and ignoring most of the data.

Dan Beecher Well, and, you know, if you're gonna be claiming that taxation is theft, what does the "Render under Ceas- unto Caesar that which is Caesar's" text mean? What is he referring to-

Dan McClellan Yeah

Dan Beecher ... in that moment when he says when he says that? Like, that-

Dan McClellan Yeah

Dan Beecher ... other than taxation, it seems like it's kind of the thing. Like-

Dan McClellan Which, which-

Dan Beecher ... you're supposed to pay your taxes

Dan McClellan ... which undermines the whole everything belongs to God-

Dan Beecher Right.

Dan McClellan ... when, when Jesus says, "Whose face and inscription is on it?" "Oh, Caesar's." "Okay." ... give that to Caesar.

Dan Beecher Yeah.

Dan McClellan Render unto God what is God's. And Mark's saying, "Oh, well, turns out everything is God's, even Caesar's stuff." And yeah, you can, y- you can find that in other parts of the text, but only by just entirely overruling and silencing the rhetorical intent of that particular story, which is that, hey, you should be paying taxes. That, you know, that coin, whether your money jingles or folds, the money was created by the government.

Dan Beecher Right.

Dan McClellan That's, that's who created that. That's who is using it, so that is theirs to do with as they please.

Dan Beecher Well, and also, like, okay, your theology is that God owns everything. Well, in the meantime- ... until God decides to show up and collect and just say, "You know what? I'm taking over," um, we're dealing with what we- with our economies currently.

Dan McClellan Yeah

Dan Beecher So th- th- that's not a useful framing of anything-

Dan McClellan And it's-

Dan Beecher ... to say that

Dan McClellan ... it's evasion, pure and simple, because, uh, Mark will say, "The churches need to be taking care of the poor." Okay, you haven't.

Dan Beecher Yeah.

Dan McClellan Nobody has stopped you. And, and yes, there are a lot of organizations out there that are Christian that commit a lot of money-

Dan Beecher Mm-hmm

Dan McClellan ... to taking care of the poor, and the sick, and the disabled, and, and a lot of different groups of people. And it's not enough, and it will never be enough, and you are not trying to make it enough.

Dan Beecher Right.

Dan McClellan It takes the government to be able to make it enough. So once again, you're saying, "My priority is not ensuring that poor people have food. My priority is protecting my money."

Dan Beecher Right.

Dan McClellan And that is definitely not-

Dan Beecher It is-

Dan McClellan ... a Christian or a, uh, at least not a New Testament outlook.

Dan Beecher Yeah.

Dan McClellan That is definitely the outlook of one who loves money, which-

Dan Beecher Of a rich guy.

Dan McClellan Yeah, yeah, which-

Dan Beecher Which he definitely... Yeah. I mean, this is-

Dan McClellan Yeah

Dan Beecher ... this, what he's doing is, is trying to leverage his Christianity so that none of his parishioners notice that he's being gross about his wealth.

Dan McClellan Yeah.

Dan Beecher Like, he's, like, he's amassing as much wealth as he can and doesn't wanna give it away.

Dan McClellan Yeah.

Dan Beecher Uh, his, his whole position is about being, uh, you know, being protected by the law but not bound by the law, but he wants others to be bound by the law and not protected by the law.

Dan McClellan Right.

Dan Beecher And that just seems, uh-

Dan McClellan The-

Dan Beecher ... it seems as backwards as it could possibly be.

Dan McClellan Yeah. It is, it is insincere. It is hypocritical. It is fundamentally selfish. Uh, and, and, you know, the love of money is the root of all evil, as, uh, as-

Dan Beecher Wait, where does it say that? Does it say that in- Oh, God, in some... I

Dan McClellan don't know. I-

Dan Beecher I feel like that was... It was, was that, I think it was A.A. Milne that said that.

Dan McClellan I think that was a, it was a headline. I read a headline one time- ... that said, said something like that. Yeah. And, and, you know, if, if there's, if there's anybody who loves money, it's Mark Driscoll.

Dan Beecher Yeah.

Dan McClellan Um, so.

Dan Beecher No, look, hey, I, I'm not opposed to generational wealth. I would love to get some. Uh, but

Dan McClellan I- I think we should make it available to everybody-

Dan Beecher Yeah

Dan McClellan ... uh, without trying to mitigate other people's access to it just because we think that that makes it easier for us to get it.

Dan Beecher Right. And if, and if you actually believe that the poor, the needy, the underserved should be well taken care of, the way it seems like a Christian should, um, yeah, like you point out, Dan, government's the only thing that can do that.

Dan McClellan Yeah.

Dan Beecher It's the o- it's the, it's literally the only way that can happen.

Dan McClellan Yeah.

Dan Beecher Alas. All right. Well, friends, uh, you know, that's it for today. Thank you so much for joining us. If you would like to become a part of making this show go and sticking a stick in the eye of people like Mark Driscoll- ... we'd love for you to join us on-

Dan McClellan Rhetorically, rhetorically

Dan Beecher ... rhetorically speaking.

Dan McClellan Yes.

Dan Beecher Uh, we, we definitely do not want to attack him physically.

Dan McClellan No.

Dan Beecher Uh, much. Um, go, go be a patron over on patreon.com/dataoverdogma. It's the best way to help our, help us do what it is that we do, and you can get early and ad-free access to the episodes. You can get our bonus content, which we do every week, and, uh, and you can get our eternal gratitude, and that's what's really worth the most, isn't it? Wouldn't you say?

Dan McClellan Plenty.

Dan Beecher Um, so thanks so much to Roger Gowdy for editing. Thanks to Sam for being our right-hand man, and thanks to all y'all for tuning in. We'll talk to you again next time.

Dan McClellan Bye, everybody.