The Substantial Life

In our last episode of the year, we discuss the value of beauty in our day to day lives.

We will be back in January 2022. We also would like to thank all our listeners for their support and engagements in the last few months.

This episode is hosted by Job Vorster and Pierre le Roux.

Find us on -

Podcast: https://anchor.fm/substantiallife

Facebook: @substantiallifepodcast

Instagram: the_substantial_life

The Substantial Life blog: https://meditations47239726.wordpress.com/

How should we respond to difficulties in life? When we walk through the valley of the shadow of death, what should we do? In this episode, we discuss suffering, especially as it pertains to our own character and to the nature of God. In the first half of the episode, we have an interesting discussion about how we should approach difficulty and suffering in our day to day life. In the second half of the episode, we discuss the problem of gratuitous evil, an argument against God's existence based on our subjective experience of pain and suffering. We hope you find endurance and hope from this episode. 

Find us on -

Podcast: https://anchor.fm/substantiallife

Facebook: @substantiallifepodcast

Instagram: the_substantial_life

The Substantial Life blog: https://meditations47239726.wordpress.com/

Why does an all loving, all good, all knowing God allow evil in this world? In this episode we discuss this time old question. We go down some interesting paths, finding that hope is on the other side.

This episode is presented by Job Vorster, Pierre le Roux and Karnu van Heerden.

Find us on -

Podcast: https://anchor.fm/substantiallife

Twitter: @Substantial_pc

Facebook: @substantiallifepodcast

Instagram: the_substantial_life

The Substantial Life blog: https://meditations47239726.wordpress.com/

The First and Second World Wars were some of the most brutal wars in history. Existentialism is a philosophical movement that tried to find meaning after the devastations of the world wars. Peaking in the 20th century, it still has an influence on modern culture, especially arts and the theatre. We continue our worldview series with an interview with Dr Louise Mabille about existentialism. 

Find us on -

Podcast: https://anchor.fm/substantiallife

Twitter: @Substantial_pc

Facebook: @substantiallifepodcast

Instagram: the_substantial_life

The Substantial Life blog: https://meditations47239726.wordpress.com/

Questions and answers on our worldview series. In this episode, we discuss questions received by our listeners: How God grounds morality, how we should interpret atrocities committed by Christians in history, the difference between Platonism as referred to in Theology and atheistic moral platonism. We also discuss the evolutionary view of religion, specifically in the Bible and how we should go about to know which worldview is true.

Special thanks to Steffen Schwarz for these well-considered and thought-provoking questions.

This episode was presented by Job Vorster and Pierre le Roux.

Find us on -

Podcast: https://anchor.fm/substantiallife

Twitter: @Substantial_pc

Facebook: @substantiallifepodcast

Instagram: the_substantial_life

The Substantial Life blog: https://meditations47239726.wordpress.com/

We live in a world where many doubt God's existence or even deny his existence altogether. Naturalism is the belief that the physical world is all there is. This worldview has been a fundamental player in the politics, art, philosophy and science of the 20th and 21st centuries. In this episode we take a dive into naturalism. Why do people believe that the physical world is all there is? We also give our personal thoughts on this way of looking at the world. 

This episode is hosted by Job Vorster, Cabrin Redlinghuys and Clinton Stevens.

Find us on -

Podcast: https://anchor.fm/substantiallife

Twitter: @Substantial_pc

Facebook: @substantiallifepodcast

Instagram: the_substantial_life

The Substantial Life blog: https://meditations47239726.wordpress.com/

What is the relationship between the Christian church and the society at large? First we ask the question: "What is society? How do we all relate to it?" Then we discuss our relationship as individuals to society at large. Finally, we talk about the relationship between Christians and society.

This episode is hosted by Job Vorster, Pierre le Roux and Cabrin Redlinghuys.

Find us on -

Podcast: https://anchor.fm/substantiallife

Twitter: @Substantial_pc

Facebook: @substantiallifepodcast

Instagram: the_substantial_life

The Substantial Life blog: https://meditations47239726.wordpress.com/

Does it matter whether or not God exists? Does it matter what He/She/It is like? In this episode, we dive into religious beliefs, the foundations for meaning value and purpose in everyone's lives. The fact of the matter is, whether or not you adhere to any particular religion, you have beliefs about the meaning of life, its value and the existence/non-existence of purpose. 

We look at various dominant worldviews: Animism: The world is full of spirits. Polytheism: There are many gods and goddesses. Atheism: There are no gods, only atoms and void, we have to figure it out for ourselves. 

This is the first episode of our God series, in which we investigate religious beliefs and worldviews, with their relation to a substantial life. 

Find us on -

Podcast: https://anchor.fm/substantiallife

Facebook: @substantiallifepodcast

Instagram: the_substantial_life

In this episode, we discuss technology and the idea that we can save ourselves from suffering through technology. What is technology? In the second section of the episode we discuss transhumanism, the belief that we can somehow become "more than human" through technology. Would this lead to heaven (or hell) on earth? If you are interested, join us for this episode!

Find us on -

Podcast: https://anchor.fm/substantiallife

Twitter: @Substantial_pc

Facebook: @substantiallifepodcast

Instagram: the_substantial_life

The Substantial Life blog: https://meditations47239726.wordpress.com/

Wealth and romantic love are two pursuits that fill our minds for most of our time. How should we relate to money? Can we have too much? What attitude should we have regarding wealth? How does a healthy romantic relationship look? How should you act if you are single? Engaged or married? 

We will look at the biblical perspective on wealth and romance in this episode. We will see what the writer of Ecclesiastes has to say about wealth and romance. 

Find us on -

Podcast: https://anchor.fm/substantiallife

Twitter: @Substantial_pc

Facebook: @substantiallifepodcast

Instagram: the_substantial_life

The Substantial Life blog: https://meditations47239726.wordpress.com/

In the second episode of our practical ethics series, we discuss the roles of work and friendship in our lives. How should we rightly relate to work? What are the values and virtues of friendship? These two topics are so fundamental to our lives, and we thought it would be good to discuss them.

Find us on -

Podcast: https://anchor.fm/substantiallife

Twitter: @Substantial_pc

Facebook: @substantiallifepodcast

Instagram: the_substantial_life

The Substantial Life blog: https://meditations47239726.wordpress.com/

We start our series on practical ethics, where we use Ecclesiastes as a framework for discussing the role of things such as money, wisdom, pleasure, relationships and meaning in our lives. This episode, we discuss wisdom, knowledge and pleasure. How do they fit into our lives? These are both things that people either look down on or make the sole reason for living. We will go deep into that in this episode. 

Find us on -

Podcast: https://anchor.fm/substantiallife

Twitter: @Substantial_pc

Facebook: @substantiallifepodcast

Instagram: the_substantial_life

The Substantial Life blog: https://meditations47239726.wordpress.com/

Our first interview of the podcast! Koos Vorster is a professor of Christian ethics at the Faculty of Theology at the North-West University. He recently published a book on human flourishing. We had an interview with him discussing the purpose of human life, dignity, important human relationships and practical ethical topics such as abortion, euthanasia and capital punishment. 

Find us on -

Podcast: https://anchor.fm/substantiallife

Twitter: @Substantial_pc

Facebook: @substantiallifepodcast

Instagram: the_substantial_life

The Substantial Life blog: https://meditations47239726.wordpress.com/

What is freedom? How does it relate to human flourishing? In this episode, we introduce freedom, its role in the flourishing life, the role of the state in protecting freedom and the problem of evil. We really enjoyed recording this episode, we hope you enjoy it as much as we did.

Find us on -

Podcast: https://anchor.fm/substantiallife

Twitter: @Substantial_pc

Facebook: @substantiallifepodcast

Instagram: the_substantial_life

The Substantial Life blog: https://meditations47239726.wordpress.com/

Sam Harris, a famous "New Atheist" has been in public discourse for some time now. Together with Richard Dawkins and others, he has been a vocal advocate against religion. He has authored many books, including Letter to a Christian Nation, The Moral Landscape and others. In this episode, we discuss Sam Harris' moral theory and his ideas on human flourishing. We also give some of our own thoughts on his ideas based on the ideas developed in previous podcasts.

Morality Wars - https://www.amazon.com/Morality-Wars-Ongoing-Debate-Goodness/dp/1978710860

Find us on -

Podcast: https://anchor.fm/substantiallife

Twitter: @Substantial_pc

Facebook: @substantiallifepodcast

Instagram: the_substantial_life

The Substantial Life blog: https://meditations47239726.wordpress.com/

We as humans want to do more than just survive, we want to thrive. How does human flourishing look like? What type of decisions must an individual make to flourish? What type of decisions must societies and organizations make to help human flourishing? In this episode, we will start our discussion on human flourishing. 

Find us on -

Podcast: https://anchor.fm/substantiallife

Twitter: @Substantial_pc

Facebook: @substantiallifepodcast

Instagram: the_substantial_life

The Substantial Life blog: https://meditations47239726.wordpress.com/

What do we mean when we speak about goodness? In this episode, we will be discussing a helpful principle for figuring out the good of something. This is surprisingly useful in various ethical dilemmas. We also discuss how to order your life according to what is good. We also answer two excellent questions posed by listeners:

1. What is ethical for a soldier? Is everything justified?

2. Does morality exist objectively? Do we not learn our idea of morality from the environment we grow up in?

Find us on -

Podcast: https://anchor.fm/substantiallife

Twitter: @Substantial_pc

Facebook: @substantiallifepodcast

Instagram: the_substantial_life

The Substantial Life blog: https://meditations47239726.wordpress.com/

The first episode of the Substantial Life podcast. In this episode, Pierre and Job introduce themselves and the podcast. They discuss some popular views on how we should make our decisions.  This followed by a discussion on the difference between descriptive and prescriptive morality. They then end the podcast by discussing the ultimate aim of ethics.

Find us on - 

Twitter: @Substantial_pc

Facebook: @substantiallifepodcast

Instagram: the_substantial_life

The Substantial Life blog: https://meditations47239726.wordpress.com/