Gen Z turns to Jesus, trade war with China, Harvard conflict & Rory McIlroy | Ep. 15

In this episode of Culture Brief, Conner Jones and Micah Tomasella explore why more members of Gen Z are turning to Jesus, even as traditional religious affiliation continues to decline. They also talk through Rory McIlroy’s long-awaited victory at the Masters, the status of U.S.-Iran nuclear negotiations, and what’s behind the ongoing trade tensions with China. Plus, they examine new developments in the Trump administration’s response to antisemitism on Ivy League campuses and what we’re learning from the latest JFK files release. All that and more—filtered through a biblical lens and designed to help you think clearly in a complex world.

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Topics

• (00:50): Gen Z’s growing commitment to Jesus
• (05:32): Mental health and faith among Gen Z
• (08:30): Resurgence in church attendance
• (14:36): Trump’s tariff policies and trade war with China
• (25:42): Trump’s battle with Ivy League universities
• (31:18) The broader implications of government-university conflicts
• (36:16): Listener mailbag: JFK files
• (39:29): Masters tournament recap
• (43:14): Trump administration’s deportation controversy
• (44:59): US-Iran nuclear negotiations update
• (45:49): Movie box office highlights
• (46:54) Easter weekend reflections

Resources

• Mailbag: [email protected]
• DenisonForum.org/subscribe
• Culture Brief on Instagram
• New Research: Belief in Jesus Rises, Fueled by Younger Adults | Barna Group
• Commitment to Jesus Reaches Decade-High Levels | Barna Group
• Number of Americans who don’t identify as Christian but claim ‘personal commitment to Jesus’ nears record high: survey
• Is Gen Z a lost cause for the church?
• Why are teens sadder, lonelier, and more depressed than ever before?
• Why teens are growing up more anxious and depressed
• ‘The Quiet Revival’: huge increase in young people attending church – Religion Media Centre
• China suspends rare earth exports, kneecapping US industry reliant on Beijing’s ‘monopoly’
• China Exports to United States – 2025 Data 2026 Forecast 1992-2023 Historical
• US-China Trade Data: Import-Export Bilateral Trade Statistics – USImportData
• Trump threatens Harvard’s tax-exempt status after freezing $2bn funding
• Trump Administration Will Freeze $2 Billion After Harvard Refuses Demands – The New York Times
• The Promise of American Higher Education – Harvard University President
• Barack Obama on X
• Rory McIlroy’s Masters win and a transforming life principle
• Rory McIlroy, Tom Cruise, and the power of persistence
• Exclusive: ICE decides who’s linked to gangs, border czar says
• Is “The King of Kings” worth seeing?
• The God Who Feels Your Pain | Denison Ministries

About Micah Tomasella

Micah Tomasella is the Advancement Officer at Denison Ministries and co-hosts Denison Forum’s “Culture Brief” podcast. A graduate of Dallas Baptist University, Micah is married to Emily, and together they are the proud parents of two daughters. With an extensive background in nonprofit work, finance, and real estate, Micah also brings experience from his years in pastoral church ministry.

About Conner Jones

Conner Jones is the Director of Performance Marketing at Denison Ministries and Co-Hosts Denison Forum’s “Culture Brief” podcast. He graduated from Dallas Baptist University in 2019 with a degree in Business Management. Conner passionately follows politics, sports, pop-culture, entertainment, and current events. He enjoys fishing, movie-going, and traveling the world with his wife and son.

About Denison Forum

Denison Forum exists to thoughtfully engage the issues of the day from a biblical perspective through The Daily Article email newsletter and podcast, The Denison Forum Podcast, as well as many books and additional resources.

EPISODE TRANSCRIPT

NOTE: This transcript was AI-generated and has not been fully edited. 

Conner Jones: [00:00:00] Hi, I’m Connor Jones. I’m Micah Tomasella, and this is Culture Brief, a Denison Forum podcast, where we navigate the constant stream of top stories and news, politics, sports, pop culture, and technology. And we’re doing it all from a Christian perspective. And Micah, we just gotta start off the top right now and just say congratulations to Roy McElroy for winning the greatest masters comeback of all time.

One of the best Sundays final rounds of golf. Anybody has ever seen, and even if you’re not a golf fan, you probably saw the images of Rory collapsing on the ground as he finally won this big tournament that he has longed for for so many years. Got the Career Grand Slam. We just love a day of golf like that.

Man, it was perfect. 

Micah Tomasella: Yeah, it was great. It was wonderful. We’ll be diving into that. A little bit later in the show. Guys, thanks for joining us today for another episode of Culture Brief. Here’s a few things that we’re gonna go over. So we’re gonna talk about Gen Z’s commitment to Jesus reaches decade level high.

Yes, I said that some good news on that front. I’m excited to talk about. We’re gonna talk about [00:01:00] Trump policy fights, the JFK files, some updates as well. And then USI ran talks, some updates on that and so much more. So Connor, let’s jump into the brief. The brief. Alright. So let’s talk about Gen Z’s commitment to Jesus.

And really it’s, it can be framed up in curiosity, in openness. There’s a lot to dive into here, so let’s get into it. So recent studies present a complex picture, and when I say complex, I mean it a complex picture of generation Z’s relationship with faith. While traditional religious affiliation and church attendance have declined.

There’s a notable and exciting trend of openness to spirituality and a yearning for authentic community. And so these numbers that I’m gonna dive into is it’s not spirituality in the sense of, you know, anything or everything, spiritual and mother earth, and this religion and that religion. There is a specific openness to Jesus in these times, and it’s really [00:02:00] interesting.

So let’s talk about it. So first of all, let’s talk about spiritual. Curiosity amid declining affiliation. Let’s talk about that kind of juxtaposition. So Barna ISS Research Barn is a wonderful research group, does a lot of Christian research specifically around the world here in the us and their numbers are typically spot on.

You know, sometimes you see those, those polls or what Barna puts out, and I feel like the last several years I almost kind of get discouraged when I read what they put out. Of just how this is declining. This is declining. This is declining, but this is a big study that they did and it was exciting, and so I’m excited to talk about it.

Barney’s research indicates that 77% of US teens are at least somewhat motivated to learn more about Jesus, specifically with 52% of them being very motivated to learn about Jesus. However, only 32% are categorized as. Committed Christians and 33% are categorized as nominal Christians. This suggests a gap between interest in Jesus and [00:03:00] a personal commitment to Jesus among Gen Z.

So there’s that. There’s that foundation being built. There’s that curiosity. There’s that ground swell, that momentum that’s starting. Maybe the pendulum that’s starting to swing hasn’t swung totally yet as those numbers indicate. But despite this interest, this is kind of the juxtaposition. Church attendance remains low.

Only 28% of Gen Z Americans attend religious services at least once a month, and a mere 13% attend weekly. This decline is attributed to factors such as minimal exposure to church during their upbringing and the impact of COVID-19 pandemic, and obviously as teens, parents have a tremendous impact. On their kids and their faith.

What happens more at home? You know, what happens at home is more important than what happens within the church walls. But Connor, before we kind of dive even more into this initially, what are your thoughts on this when you hear this? 

Conner Jones: Yeah, I, I, I think it’s awesome. You know, we need a resurgence of the Bible of truth of church attendance in this nation, but also in the [00:04:00] world.

We’ve seen that decline in the last 20 years. Millennials declined big time and then. After that Gen Z declined, I’m really encouraged by this Mike. Back in 2023, I actually wrote an article for GenOn form about Gen Z, and the title was literally, is Gen ZA Lost Cause for the church? Because at that time, the studies were showing that Gen Z was really checking out.

They were not about church, they were not about anything with Christianity. They were like you said, all about spiritual. Discovery. They wanted to find something deeper. They wanted to find some sort of meaning. And so a lot of them turned to any, any religion, but also astrology and mysticism type stuff.

And manifesting is a big one. That is a very dangerous concept. The idea of just being able to manifest whatever you want. But what’s cool is seeing that a lot of them are now starting to turn. In this way towards Christ. I think it’s a big cultural shift. I, I’ve seen over the last year and a half, maybe two years, a lot of.

Kinda I don’t wanna say church is becoming trendy. Again, that’s not [00:05:00] the way I’m trying to, to say this, but there is something about it that like, people are like, Hey, we should check this out. There’s actually not that bad of a situation at the church. It’s not just you know, whatever your preconceived notions are.

And you’ve got artists like Forest Frank that are big and bringing a whole different style of music and ex excitement to the Christian movement for a younger generation. I don’t know. I, I’m really, really encouraged by these numbers. 

Micah Tomasella: Yeah. Yep. So let’s kind of jump into the reasons, or kind of the, the context behind why might this be happening and why the numbers from 2023 look different than in 2025.

Mental health challenges and the role of faith in it are a big part of this. So Gen Z faces unprecedented levels of anxiety and depression. The CDC reports that persistent feelings of sadness or hopelessness among teens nearly doubled from 26% in oh nine to 44% in 2021. Contributing factors include, and I think this is a big part of it, man, excessive social media use, which leads to reduced in-person social interactions, [00:06:00] and then overprotective parents play a part in this as well.

The more time you spend on your phone, you get stuck in those algorithms of social media. And whatever that algorithm is, is pushing you to that one side, telling you the other side is the enemy, that everybody’s this and that, everybody’s that. And I mean, everybody kind of falls into it. Whatever generation you’re in of, the more time that you spend in front of a screen and just not outside with your neighbors, it’s not a good thing.

And you start to develop a. A fear for other people or other opinions. And it’s reckless. I mean, it’s, it just, it causes a lot of issues. So engagement with scripture appears to mitigate some of these challenges, though according to these studies. So the American Bible Society found that Gen Z individuals who regularly read and apply the Bible experience half the anxiety levels of their peers.

This underscores the potential of faith practices in promoting mental wellbeing. So this is real concrete data that when God’s word is actually applied to these young [00:07:00] people’s lives their anxiety levels, their mental health levels are at a much better level than those who are not applying God’s truth, which makes sense to us, right?

It does. It’s always, it’s always good to hear numbers back up what we know to be true. 

Conner Jones: We know that Gen Z is being noted as this generation that has so many mental health. Problems. They’re, like you said, they’re depressed, they’re anxious, they’re all, all these different things, and they just don’t know where to turn to for that, how you get help.

Yeah. And, and as this data is showing, yeah, the Bible is, is. Just massive peace in finding help and finding healing in mental health. And so seeing this and hopefully that, that is just something that continues to spread that information, people are like, Hey, I was healed by talking to God and going to his truth.

Micah Tomasella: Yep. You know, we’ve, we’ve talked about this concept a lot of, when you have the world at your fingertips. All of the world’s issues just mm-hmm. By scrolling, [00:08:00] I mean, that is tough for anybody to bear, but especially in such a developmental time as you’re coming into your own, going through puberty trying to figure out what you wanna do with your life.

Just the pressures, the social pressures on, on top of they have the world at their fingertips. I mean, we, you and I have the world at our fingertips. But hopefully we’re more mature and equipped to kind of handle it and shut it off and shut it down and compartmentalize and bring it to God. But when you’re growing up, that’s difficult, right?

That is, that’s a difficult place to be. So let’s talk about to a certain extent a resurgence in church attendance. Maybe not here in the us. In Europe. So let’s talk about that. So contrary to the narrative of decline, there’s evidence of a quiet revival among young people in certain regions in England and in Wales.

Church attendance among 18 to 24 year olds has increased from 4% in 2018 to get this four times as much, 16% in 2024. Wow. This resurgence is attributed to a desire for a community [00:09:00] and the influence of family members such as, you know, grandparents or, those who are helping younger people with their faith formation.

Young adults are not only attending church, but also engaging in prayer, Bible reading, and faith-based. Faith-based social activism, as you would call it. This trend suggests a shift towards a more holistic and more of a community-oriented expression of faith. So that’s, so we’re starting to see church attendance uptick in places like Europe, like England and Wales, where maybe we’re not seeing that church attendance uptick quite as much here in the US yet.

But I’m trying to kind of give more of a a worldwide view of this. And then, you know, let’s talk about community and the role of community, authentic community in. The groundswell that we’re seeing. Barna did a study called Making Space for Community. It was a report and they highlight that 57% of Gen Z and millennials prioritize building strong relationships at church over hearing thought provoking sermons.

So they’re [00:10:00] over half or prioritizing that over. Going on Sunday and hearing the thought provoking sermon, which is a great thing. It’s just here’s what they’re focused on. This preference indicates a desire for authentic community, like I talked about authentic connections, supportive community, churches that offer relational discipleship.

I. Health, you know, mental health support. Not just ignoring that, but actually diving deep into that. And flexible engagement opportunities are more likely to resonate with Gen Z. So utilizing platforms like Instagram and YouTube for their interactive content, churches that are doing that also are able to facilitate some meaningful connections there.

And here’s kind of my conclusion of these numbers as I kind of wrap this up. Gen Z definitely brings some challenges to the table. They’re grown up with a lot, like we said. Lots of struggles, but there’s also real opportunity here. If the church is willing to rethink this, if they’re willing to build genuine community, supporting those who are struggling with anxiety and depression, and they’re focusing on [00:11:00] authentic relational discipleship, that’s gonna make a big difference.

This generation is clearly hurting, but they’re open and they’re hungry. Their curiosity and hunger for meaning shows that now’s the time to step up. Fellow Christian. Church, there’s potential for growth and even revival if we meet them where they are. This is pretty exciting, gen Z may seem distant with trends and technologies that feel out of reach for some people maybe who are in older generations.

Connor, you and I are on the tail end of the millennial generation, so these things don’t seem so distant to us, but for our listeners who are in older generations, but faithfulness in your current spheres, whether family worker, community. It still matters. God has placed you where you are for a reason in the church, you are in the neighborhood, you are in the home.

You are your presence, integrity and authenticity can have a profound impact. You don’t need to be on every social media platform to have an impact or to influence this generation. You just need to show up and you need to be [00:12:00] real, be present. And another suggestion I would have is, is just don’t be in such a hurry that you miss people who are hurting in your life.

So scheduled. That you miss an opportunity that God might have right in front of you to touch someone’s lives, to just be an encouragement to them and to point them to Jesus. Your life can be a testimony to God’s faithfulness, fellow believer. You just have to be willing and you have to be ready. So if you are a follower, a committed follower of Jesus Christ, you can play a crucial role in mentoring and discipling Gen Z by offering guidance, by offering wisdom, by offering.

Support, be faithful where you are and let God use your presence to plant seeds for this revival that the foundation of is swelling up these numbers. Back that up. There’s something happening here. The pendulum is swinging in a different direction. So let’s be ready for that. And I just wanna leave us, Connor, with the words of Jesus, either way, no matter what the trends say, good or bad, right?

We need to look at what Jesus says here, and remember to be faithful exactly where God’s planted us. No matter [00:13:00] what the numbers say, lemme bring you back to the first and second greatest commandments. Matthew 22 verses 34 through 39. But when the Pharisees heard that he had silenced the Sadducees, they gathered together and one of them, a lawyer, asked him a question to test him, teacher, which is the great commandment in the law, and he said to them, you shall love the Lord your God, with all of your heart, with all of your soul, and with all of your mind.

This is the first and the greatest commandment. And a second is like it. You shall love your neighbor. As yourself. 

Conner Jones: That’s good. Yeah. Gen Z. If you’re listening to this and you’re in Gen Z just be encouraged by this. Your peers are seeking something out and you have the chance to, you know, disciple them in a way.

If you feel you are strong enough in your faith to do that you can plant seeds, you can talk to them, and if you’re older. This is a great just reminder, man. They, they need some guidance. Share your wisdom, share your faith, share your testimony. Love that. Thank you for this encouraging story, Micah.

That was, [00:14:00] that was just really, I mean, I’m, I’m, I’m coming away. I’m just like, I’m blown away by these numbers, especially when you look at England, which is so known as an unchurched nation in the hemisphere. And they’re not in the Western hemisphere, but they’re in the west. And so seeing those numbers that they have grown significantly.

In Gen Z, quadrupled in percentage of attendance at church. I’m just blown away by that. It’s crazy. It’s crazy. Big things. No matter old. 

Micah Tomasella: No matter what generation you’re in, you can play a part in this. Absolutely. There’s a part, there’s a role that God has for you. You just gotta step out in faith. 

Conner Jones: Michael, let’s dive into some Trump stuff.

Tariff stuff, policy stuff. You know, the, the stuff that just makes the news every day and keeps people thinking what in the world is going on? And honestly, it keeps us on our toes because even last week we spent a good chunk of our podcast talking about all the tariff stuff that was happening last week.

All the confusion. Who’s getting tariff this, who’s getting tariff? That, and by the end of our recording we were [00:15:00] like, man, we’ll just see what happens in an hour after we recorded Trump removed all the tariffs that we had just talked about. So it is just a constant change. 90 day pause. 

Micah Tomasella: Yeah. 

Conner Jones: I mean it, yeah.

He, he gave a 90 day pause on the tariffs to most of the countries in the world, and kept a 10% baseline on all of those countries, but removed the, the big tariffs, which helped stabilize the stock market. Which is good, but he did continue to tariff China. In fact, he upped the tariff. I think when we ended the podcast last week, it was at 104%.

It’s now 145% tariff on any goods coming from China. Boom. Actually not any goods. Yeah. You know, we’re just continuing to raise the tariff. Not 

Micah Tomasella: right. There’s exceptions. There’s exceptions, 

Conner Jones: so we’ll hit on that real fast. So yeah, it, it that, that tariff increased from 84% to 125% to now 145%. And then I saw this morning the Trump administration is considering a 245% tariff on Chinese goods.

So I don’t know, man. We’ll just see, [00:16:00] that’s a big tariff. You know, China’s not so happy about that. So how have they responded? Here’s what they’re doing. China increased their own tariffs on US goods from 84% to 125%. And then they also announced all orders of Boeing aircraft, which are all made in America, are gonna be suspended for two years at least.

That affects 129 aircraft orders. That may not seem like a big deal, but that is billions of dollars worth. It’s a lot money of American manufacturing and Boeing’s obviously already in their own situation with a lot of headaches and financial headaches. Yeah. But that’s gonna impact a lot of jobs and suppliers and all of that.

And just, yeah, that’s a big setback. They’ve also halted exports of some rare earth minerals and magnets that are crucial to the US production of cell phones and electric vehicles, fighter jets, a bunch of technological advancements there. So they’re, they’re, they’re firing back. I think Micah, this indicates that we truly are in an all out trade war.

Yeah. With China. Totally. So Great. I don’t even know what to feel about [00:17:00] this. It’s just, it’s just always something. So what does this mean for the economy? What does this matter more for China? Does this matter more for the us? Here’s what I can say. The total goods exported from the US to China equals about $147 billion.

That’s typically made up of oil seeds and grains, mineral fuels other types of oils, nuclear reactors, machinery and services such as like education travel services, intellectual property, all of that. So $147 billion is what the US exports to China. That’s what could be tariffed. On the reverse, China exports $501 billion worth of exports to the us, which is the trade 

Micah Tomasella: deficit that we hear about a lot.

I mean, that’s the trade deficit on. Display more than a th you know, more than three times right? Between, between two. So yeah, that trade 

Conner Jones: deficit technically equals $353 billion. Yeah. So this probably impacts China significantly more. Yes, it’s going to impact the us, it’s gonna impact our [00:18:00] farmers and our manufacturing, and it’s gonna cause problems long term.

But yeah, China, China may have more to lose here, but they’re, they’re also standing pretty strong. Yeah, because China, they export a bunch of electronics, machinery, furniture. Building supplies, toys, sporting goods, all of that. And so the way that they’re gonna try to get around this, one thing that they’re exploring over in China is what’s called a gray channel, which is a way to circumvent the US tariffs by rerouting goods through other countries with lower tariff rates.

So let’s say they wanna reroute through like Indonesia. Yeah. Then you know their companies. Ship it to in Indonesia where they’re not gonna have nearly that type of tariff, and then Indonesia ships it on their behalf. Which is why 

Micah Tomasella: Q is, that’s a big part of why Qi is like visiting those southeastern Asian countries right now.

Yeah. He’s on a little 

Conner Jones: tour trying to build up a, 

Micah Tomasella: a little, 

Conner Jones: A little alliance trade channel. Yeah, yeah. Alliance with Thailand and Vietnam and Laos and stuff. I don’t know. We’ll just, we’ll see what he does there and what China fully does. But they’ve, they’ve got [00:19:00] other options they can get around this, I think.

Yeah, they’re, they’re trying to, to strengthen those relationships. And here’s the thing. Here’s what Trump says is the leverage. It’s what we already mentioned. Yeah. That there’s a $353 billion deficit. The Chinese import way more to the US than we do to China. You know, Trump’s dialed back some of these tariffs.

The Trump administration announced that they’re going to have exclusions that include smartphones. Laptops, hard drives, computer processors, servers, memory chips, semiconductor manufacturing equipment, and a bunch of other electronics. 

Micah Tomasella: Yep. 

Conner Jones: Those are not gonna get that 145% tariff anymore is that makes up 40% main 

Micah Tomasella: stuff.

Conner Jones: Yeah. Yeah. They’re still gonna be tariffed 145%. Those things are gonna be tariffed at 20%, so we’ll just, you know, see how much that impacts pricing here in America, how that impacts pricing across. Apple and Dell and any other big products that are made in manufactured in China. Lots of back and forth.

Lots of implementation. Then exemptions and exceptions, [00:20:00] it’s kind of confusing. It’s hard to keep up every day. It’s something new. And what’s interesting is on Sunday, Trump said there was no tariff exception announced on Friday. These products are subject to the existing 20% Fentanyl tariffs, and they’re just moving to a different tariff bucket.

That’s the way he’s trying to classify this big change of having exclusions. I, I like what Axios noted, they said that Trump’s erratic real-time tariff tweaking, has confused investors, deflated the dollar and shaken the stock market. Investors and the nation’s financial system crave stability and predictability the opposite of what Trump’s delivering.

So yeah, the confusion is, is of course affecting the markets. And then, you know, wall Street Journal, they said, so what happened? And what’s the real policy? Who knows, that’s, that’s literally what they said in their article. And political Politico had an article that they titled Tariff Carve Outs Weak US position in the China Trade War.

And that to sum in the White House, the exceptions are indicative. The relatively weak position the [00:21:00] administration is in as it wages, a trade war with China, which has spent years making preparations for an escalation with the US on trade. The carve outs also reveal the conundrum facing the administration.

The US is imposing new tariffs on Chinese goods in an attempt to move manufacturing back to the us. But those tariffs are particularly painful for US manufacturers because they are currently so dependent on Chinese parts. Micah, what are your thoughts? What do you think about all of this? 

Micah Tomasella: It’s tough because if I’m given my own personal opinion it’s, it, it’s very clear that China in many ways has taken advantage of the United States and a lot of countries who were in an alliance with whether funds, it’s, it’s on trade or on inventions or ips or intellectual property.

So it’s clear that there’s a problem. I think, I think with a lot of what’s happening. Is we can get frustrated at the unpredictability. I know I do. I can relate to that. But at the same time, nothing’s been done about [00:22:00] these issues really in a really long time or maybe ever. And so it just depends on what strategy you want to be taken.

Do you want this to be a sledgehammer or do you want this to be very precise? Cuts at the right time with a little bit more strategy? I don’t know what. Is what there, you know, what moves he makes, what the administration makes and what they’ve actually planned out and they’re trying to make it appear a certain way as opposed to just off the cuff decision making.

I do think it’s kind of a, a balance of both. ’cause the Trump administration’s trying to keep China specifically in some of the world on their toes, but, you know, at the same time. Depending on who you read and how you read it, this is a great idea, or this is not such a great idea. You know, for example, the Wall Street Journal specifically Politico, are pretty left-leaning.

And so they’re not, they’re not gonna like this. And but at the same time I think what happened last week, these decisions with [00:23:00] the tariffs, there was a 90 day pause after the bond market went crazy. After the stock market was crashing, not cra kind of crashing for a few days, he crashed. Yeah.

Trump listened to the smart people in his cabinet, like Scott Bessett for example, and said, okay, we’re gonna do a pause. So all the people who were asserting that this whole thing was like 40 chess. That he baited China? I mean, we’ve just gotta see. I don’t think it’s that because Trump listened to just what he says himself.

Hey was planning this. Everybody freaked out, okay, I’m gonna do these 90 day pauses. We’re gonna get these deals in place. You know, I don’t think it’s 40 chess. I think it’s Trump has an agenda, the administration has an agenda. It wasn’t working out the way they’d hoped, so they changed course. That’s not a bad thing to listen to smart people to look at the market and to change course, that’s not a bad thing.

So this is hard to navigate. I mean, even as I’m kind of explaining this, [00:24:00] there’s just, there’s two sides to this and I find myself, I. Visiting both sides pretty frequently. 

Conner Jones: Yeah. It’s just interesting. I, I, I do wonder if there was a better way to roll all this out and it wouldn’t have been so chaotic that think that’s the thing.

Micah Tomasella: I think for sure. I think for sure on that one. 

Conner Jones: Yeah. We’re approaching a hundred days of Trump’s presidency, and in that a hundred days, I mean, I, I’m not sure. Any other president has done anything remotely close to the number of changes in executive orders and all of that as Trump has, and it’s been what people voted at him, what they voted him in for.

Yes. And he’s getting things done, but. When you go so fast, you may, and we talked about this with Doge specifically a few weeks ago. Yeah. They were making cuts almost too rapidly, having to rehire people that they were firing and laying off, and so when you move too fast, it can get sloppy. So maybe they just need to slow down and be a little more precise, like you were saying, as opposed to just taking a sledgehammer and everything.

Micah Tomasella: Yeah. Next week when we talk about this, something totally is gonna be different, you know? Oh yeah, for sure. Maybe the trade war in China. Got way worse, or [00:25:00] maybe we have an agreement in place, like I think both are just as likely. So it’s so true. We’ll talk about it next week. 

Conner Jones: Could Micah? It could happen in the next few hours like it did last week, you know?

No doubt. Everything is just moving so fast. Okay. That’s why 

Micah Tomasella: everybody’s just gotta calm down about this stuff. Like all of these rising prices, look, these tariffs are just now going into effect. We’ve just got to see. What happens and how, how it plays out. This is a lot of what if, this is a lot of fear talking, and I know it’s scary.

I’m not saying that it’s not, but we’ve also gotta trust God and then give it time to actually play out first before stamping it as this or that. Or before saying the world’s ending or this is gonna crash the economy. Let’s just, let’s just give it a 

Conner Jones: second. Totally agree. Something else that Trump’s been in a fight about is the higher education and some of these Ivy League elite universities, he’s been trying to pressure Harvard and Columbia.

And so just real fast on kind of what’s going on there. So the New York Times reported that Trump finished lunch in the private dining [00:26:00] room outside of the Oval Office on April one. I saw this. 

Micah Tomasella: Oh 

Conner Jones: my God. And then he floated the proposal. What if the government simply canceled every dollar of the nearly $9 billion promised to Harvard University?

The administration’s campaign to expunge woke ideology from college campuses has already forced Columbia to strike a deal. And Trump then said, what if we never pay them talking about Harvard? I. And he casually asked, wouldn’t that be cool? So he’s got, he’s got his sights on Harvard now. Yeah. And they are in a, they’re in their own little battle.

So the, the White House did end up sending a letter to Harvard, which is America’s oldest university, also America’s wealthiest university, and demanded that they change their hiring, admissions, and teaching practices which they say will help fight antisemitism on campus. This all stems from last spring when there was a bunch of pro-Palestinian protests and.

Lockouts and taking over buildings on these Ivy League campuses and it just Jewish people not 

Micah Tomasella: feeling safe, truly 

Conner Jones: Jewish students. Yeah. Feeling like they were in danger. C Jewish professors 

Micah Tomasella: were [00:27:00] not given the support they needed. I mean, this, this is it was pretty bad. It’s been very cataloged. Yeah.

And so that’s, that’s how the 

Conner Jones: White House is approaching this as saying, we’re trying to make these campuses safer. You guys did not do that. The presidents of these Ivy League universities went before Congress and did testimonials and testified that. They did what they could or whatnot, and a lot of them had to step down or resign, including the president of Harvard.

She ended up resigning over plagiarism issues. But I mean, really it was because this all happened at the same time, right? Yeah. So yeah, they sent that letter and they said that they needed to change their practices, including reporting students to the federal government who are quote. Hostile to American values.

What does that mean? I think that’s a big question mark. And that they’re ensuring each academic department is viewpoint diverse, not just only having what they would consider liberal or pro-Palestinian views, and then hiring an external government approved party to audit programs and departments that most fuel anti-Semitic harassment.

And of course, because of the whole plagiarism thing with the former president, they also said that they need to [00:28:00] check faculty staff for plagiarism. Okay. Fair enough. So Columbia, they caved, they struck a deal with they caved. Yeah. You know, they struck a deal with the administration. I’m not even saying that’s a bad thing, I’m just saying that they caved.

No, no, 

Micah Tomasella: no, no, no. It’s just, that’s just such a hot word right now. Caved. Yeah. Yeah. 

Conner Jones: And a lot of people would say that big law firms are caving to Trump and Yeah. CEOs of tech companies are caving to Trump. That’s the word that’s being used. So that’s kind of, I probably use that word because I’ve just been reading it all day every day.

I know, I know of different people meeting with Trump and striking deals with him is the way that the White House would say it. So as opposed to Columbia who did make a deal to try to get back their federal funding, Harvard is gonna stand up to the White House and they’re gonna, they’re gonna pick a fight.

And so they, they wrote back a letter. The university president wrote this letter and he posted it the other day and it, it got a lot of views, especially on Twitter. I think it had 56 million tweet views. And they said federal grants have led to groundbreaking innovations across a wide range of medical engineering and scientific fields.

And these innovations have made countless people in [00:29:00] our country and throughout the world, healthier and safer. And he’s saying that because the Trump administration. Froze $2.2 billion of federal funding that was gonna go to Harvard. They give them $9 billion and Trump is threatening to, to freeze that whole thing.

That’s a lot of money. But Harvard is saying, we use that money to better society basically to improve sciences. And research and all of that. So he’s saying, you guys look like the bad guys for not giving us the money to do these research. I imagine the White House would say we can send it to other universities.

Mm-hmm. That would be their rebuttal. And, and the president of Harvard continued to say, it makes clear that the intention is not to work with us to address an antisemitism in cooperative and constructive manners. It’s just demanding that we do things to combat antisemitism with the majority representing direct governmental regulation of the intellectual conditions at Harvard.

And he says, no government, regardless of which party is in power, should dictate what private universities can teach. Whom they can admit and hire in which areas of [00:30:00] study and inquiry, inquiry they can pursue, and that Harvard will not surrender its independence or relinquish its constitutional rights, saying that the government is unlawfully trying to dictate teaching and operations at Harvard.

Yeah, hours after that letter is when Trump paused the $2.2 billion and that has sparked a whole debate, especially on social media. And there you wanna know, Micah, what another president had to say about this, because I found this pretty interesting. Sure. Barack Obama tweeted, Harvard has set an example for other higher ed institutions rejecting unlawful and ham-handed attempt to stifle academic freedom.

While they’re, while taking concrete steps to make sure all students at Harvard can benefit from an environment of intellectual inquiry, rigorous debate, and mutual respect, let’s hope other institutions follow suit. So yeah, you get the left side of, of this argument really standing behind Harvard and saying that they’re doing the right thing.

Standing up [00:31:00] to what they would say is an overreaching government who’s just trying to punish. A university for not having the same ideals as them, whereas the White House is saying, we’re doing this because you guys are not protecting students, particularly Jewish students from dangers on your campus.

So a lot, a lot to take in there. This is not something that impacts tons of people. You know, this is gonna be definitely for No. I 

Micah Tomasella: mean, it sets a precedent though. I think that that’s the thing, right? It’s if it can happen here, it can happen other places. And then you think about. You know, if Trump can do this well then what if somebody else comes into power and takes these steps against institutions that, that president might not agree with?

I mean, it just, it sets a precedent. I what’s, what’s so interesting about a lot of these things is it’s, it is not so simple because clearly there’s an issue at Harvard and a lot of these heavily government subsidized universities where it is producing the type of person that thinks one way. Yeah. And [00:32:00] no other way is welcome.

You know what I mean? Like intellectual debate, mutual respect. I think that people, there’s been a ton of studies, a lot of things that have come out, but like we’ve seen that’s doesn’t really seem to be happening consistently from a place like Harvard or maybe even like Columbia. And then antisemitism has clearly been an issue there.

So you wanna address these things, but how do you address these things? Yeah what, what, what is too far? But then every other attempt in the past hasn’t really worked, how far is too far? What is the right thing to do? This is this is another subject that I’ve just, it is hard to, to just land on this is exactly the right way.

I. 

Conner Jones: It, it definitely is. Yeah. There’s, there’s what’s the middle ground? Who’s in the right? Yeah. Who’s in the wrong? Probably both sides to an extent, right? Yeah. The one thing that I will say that kind of I, I think we should mention here is yesterday we’re recording on Wednesday, yesterday, Tuesday, Trump posted on truth social that he should remove their tax exempt status at Harvard.

That [00:33:00] is a slippery slope if you start to just use tax exempt statuses as a threat. And some way to punish institutions that you don’t agree with. That’s kinda like you just said. It could set a really bad precedent and that could end up turning in the future on, for instance, Christian ministries, other faith-based institutions, any institutions, schools, universities, whatever it is that is a nonprofit and has tax exemptions.

If somebody doesn’t like them. They could take that tax exempt status away and it could cripple them financially. The, the thing with Harvard is they have a $53 billion endowment, so they’re, they’re not in trouble here. They’re totally fine. And that what, that’s what puts them in the position to be able to have this argument with the White House.

So I’m not worried about them. It’s more so about what’s the cultural impact of this one thing, and. Is there gonna be judges that come in and make Yeah, I’m not worried about Harvard. Sorry. I’m not either. I mean, the only people that worry about Harvard that I know of are Lewis. But there are other 

Micah Tomasella: impacts.

There are other Lewis 

Conner Jones: Lit and Harvey, Harvey Specter. They care. That’s right. I do not, of course they care, care tons about Harvard, but it [00:34:00] is interesting. Beautiful campus though. I’ve been there. It’s, it’s awesome. Yeah, so bye. 

Micah Tomasella: Yeah. 

Conner Jones: So Micah, it, it makes me wonder, what would a world without sin look like?

Imagine a world with no sin. Obviously there would be no conflict between nations. In trade wars or any sort of violent conflict, there would be no conflict between institutions like the government in a university. There would be no conflict in our own personal relationships, but we do know that the reality is Genesis six 12 says, and God saw the earth and behold it was corrupt for all flesh had corrupted their way on the earth.

But Micah, there is a peace that awaits us in the kingdom of heaven, thankfully. And as John 1, 1 14 says, and the word became flesh and jwt among us. And we have seen his glory, Gloria, as of the only son from the father full of grace and truth. So we should strive to bring that peace to our lives daily, right?

Stand up for what’s right and [00:35:00] just and true to God’s word. And don’t pick fights that will only cause more pain. Are these fights worth it? Is the fight with China worth it? Is the fight with Harvard worth it? I don’t think that’s for me to say, I think that’s for people to discern and determine on their own.

But you know, on a smaller scale in your own life, what are the fights that are worth it? Is it worth it to, to cause conflict? So while we might not really be waging a trade or constitutional war, I. We do have the ability to choose a more peaceful path in our daily life. Yeah, that’s good. You know, think about this in your own life, is your coworker frustrating you?

Is a parent or a child frustrating you and making you mad? Is a situation that you’re just in this week with someone causing a lot of conflict in your life? What are the better ways to go about conflict resolution than picking a fight? Two Chronicles seven 14 says, if my people who are called by my name humble themselves and pray and seek my face and turn from their wicked ways, then I will hear from heaven and will forgive their sin and heal their land.

So in regards to like trade wars and foundational government [00:36:00] disagreements, we should pray for our, our nation of leaders in terms of finding a better resolution, but we should also do that within our own lives and pray for our hearts as we go about our daily. Life. 

Micah Tomasella: Solid. Solid. Connor, thank you for that.

Thanks for taking us through these stories. Okay, well let’s, let’s jump into the mail back here. We got a really interesting Instagram direct message at DM for sure. But we wanna continue to hear from all of you. Please send your questions, thoughts, or topic ideas to culture [email protected].

Follow us on Instagram at Culture Brief Podcast. Here, Connor, I’ll let you kind of take the answer on this one, but here’s the DM that we got. She says, I’m loving this podcast. You guys are killing it. Can you talk more about the JFK files now? And they’ve been released for a few since they’ve been released for a few weeks.

Thank you for that. Anna. Joy Connor, tell us what we got on that. 

Conner Jones: Yeah, it, it’s interesting. We even talked about this when they, the files are coming out. We were like, oh, this could [00:37:00] be, you know, the big thing. They dropped like 80,000 documents and. You know, since they came out, nothing really seemed to happen.

Like everyone was like, it felt like a dud. That’s how it felt. Yeah. And it pretty much was, which is a bummer. I mean, I think everybody was looking for that smoking gun answer who really killed JFK? And we didn’t get that, but we did learn a few things. So all I hit on those real fast. The CIA.

As we found out downplayed the Congress and the public, what it actually knew about Lee Harvey Oswald before the assassination. They had been tracking him for a while. They were surveilling him more, more than previously known. The chief of counterintelligence, Jamie Engleton, he actually had a stack of 180 pages sitting on his desk all about Lee Harvey Oswald.

Yeah, the week before he assassinated Kennedy. Yeah. Interesting. So if anything we, we probably learned that the CIA was more aware of Oswald and had, they were really trying to track him and they just kind of lost that. Yeah, they were. Totally aware that he was a danger [00:38:00] to society. And I guess maybe they were even aware that he hated Kennedy.

Kennedy. We also learned, had more distrust of the CIA than we previously knew. Everybody knew that he was not in love with the CIA, but these documents did reveal, he was pretty distrustful of them. Mm-hmm. Which kind of fuels the theory that maybe the CCIA A was behind his assassination. And then Jefferson Morley, a Washington Post reporter who runs the JFK Facts blog said, so what this story raises is this question.

Was the CIA incredibly atrociously incompetent when it comes to the Lee Harvey Oswald assassination attempt or not attempt, but reality Or was the CIA actually running an operation involving Oswald? While we don’t have the answer to that question, I. There are still some relevant records to come out.

For example, one file of another CIA officer who was involved in the pre assassination surveillance of Oswald is still kept secret. So maybe there’s some more out there that we need to find. But thanks for the question, Anna. Joy, there’s still lots of questions to be answered. Ultimately, we didn’t learn tone, but we learned that maybe the CIA wasn’t as [00:39:00] competent as we thought.

Micah Tomasella: Yeah, we’ll definitely keep you guys in the loop as we learn more. You know what this reminds me of? It kind of reminds me of the Trump assassination attempt. It just kind of seemed gross negligence, lack of planning, you know, all this stuff about this one guy. So if the CIA isn’t behind it, knew so much about him, but wasn’t aware of where he was and how he, he was able to pull off that shot, you know?

And it just kind of reminds me of the Trump administration and kind of, not the Trump administration, but what happened with Trump. Okay. So let’s, let’s jump into the Masters poll. So Connor, you gave a spicy hot take last week. Where you said if you haven’t been to the Masters, you shouldn’t be able to wear the master’s gear.

So here’s, here’s kind of some of the poll results that we saw. And Connor, you can kind of give more context to this. So the question was, should you wear Masters apparel? If you’ve ever been, we posted this on X, on Instagram, on Spotify, different places. And to clarify, we do know that you can purchase Master’s gear.

Actually, to clarify, Connor knows that you [00:40:00] can purchase Master’s gear secondhand, but it is wildly more expensive than if you purchase it there, and the products are more limited if you don’t purchase it there. So on XA guy Zuno MP 60 guy. He said to Connor’s, take, this is without a doubt the dumbest thing I’ve ever heard.

Conner Jones: Yeah. I got a lot of heat for this one in comments and people reaching out to me. They’re like, what are you talking about? And then a lot of people were like, you do know you can buy it online, right? I’m like, yes, I know you can buy it online. But in the clip that we posted on socials. That part was not included.

It just was me saying, it’s so exclusive. You can only buy it at the Masters, which technically is true. If you want the official stuff and you want it at the right price, they intend for you to buy it there. Yes, of course you can buy anything online. I’m not stupid, but people think I am and that’s fine. I think it was funny to read all these responses, and I will also say that in the polls I feel a little vindicated because on Instagram, 43% of people said that, yeah, you can wear stuff if you’ve not been to the Masters, but [00:41:00] 57% said no, you should not. And so that, that makes me feel good. And then on Spotify it was a 50 50 tie. You know, half the people think that you should wear master stuff if you’ve not been, and half of ’em don’t. I did one comment we got on on Spotify, Josh, he said, I wholeheartedly agree with Connor’s hot take.

Thank you Josh. I’ll take it a step further though. If you wear any band apparel, you better listen to that band or artist. More respect if you’ve seen them alive. I actually fully agree with that. You know, people like to fashionably wear like Rolling Stones or Guns N Roses or Def Leppard shirts, and I’m like, if you’re wearing that, I better be able to ask you.

What your favorite song is by that band. If you don’t know a’s another one 

Micah Tomasella: top five, you should able to list like five songs. I feel like if you’re wearing a shirt, you should 

Conner Jones: be, you should be able to really listen stuff. 

Micah Tomasella: Yeah, gimme some deep tracks, you know what I mean? Not just Paradise City, you know what I mean?

Or something like that okay. Cool. All right so let’s jump into our check-in section real quick. So the masters, Rory McElroy won the 2025 Masters tournament this past weekend. Completing the Grand Slam, joining [00:42:00] legends like Tiger and Jack Nicholas. He secured the victory in a sudden death over Justin Rose.

It’s beautiful to watch. After both finished 11 under par, Rory missed. His putt on the 18th, that would’ve put him 12 under and he would’ve won and avoided the playoffs, right? So everybody was like, oh no, it’s happening to Rory all over again. Again, he’s melting down rumble. He went to the playoff. He won his first, his first Masters win.

It’s his fifth major title ending in 11 year pursuit. Of the green jacket, the final round drew significant attention with an average of 12.7 million viewers, peaking at 19.5 during the playoff. And Dr. Denison in one of his most recent daily articles, I think it was on Monday when it came out, he said this was the most emotional round of golf he’s ever seen.

And that’s kind of what you alluded to Connor at the beginning of him falling on his face, you know, as he went. Just the most genuine response. Kissing his wife, kissing his kid, just Hey, after all of these years of hard work and pursuing my dreams, I did it. Everybody loves stories like that. It was beautiful to watch.

Conner Jones: I loved it, man. I was sweating bullets [00:43:00] for him. I was so nervous for him, and he was so close to blowing it several times, and I was like, Rory. Of course, he made it as hard as possible, but that almost made the wind, pulled it off more Beautiful. I loved it. Hold it off. Just amazing, amazing golf could talk about it all day.

But real fast. I wanna also hit on an update that we need to give, because we talked several weeks ago about the deportations that the Trump administration is doing particularly of gang members. They’re sending them off to El Salvador prisons. I don’t think a lot of people have a problem with that, but where the issue comes in is what if you misidentify someone and mistakenly send them there?

That seems to be what happened with Kilmore Abrigo Garcia. We mentioned him previously on an episode. He was sent. To this prison in El Salvador, even though he was legally living in Maryland, and it’s because he was being accused of being a member of MS. 13 A. A very violent gang. Yeah, but the administration has said that they mistakenly identified that, and he should not probably have been sent but they’re also saying no, he was dangerous.

It, it depends on who you ask. Is it the Justice Department or the White House? Yeah. Anyways, this week, the president of El Salvador Naive, [00:44:00] b Kelly, said in a question. He, he came to the White House to meet with Trump and they talked about all of this, but he was questioned whether he’d return a Burgo Garcia to the US and he said, that’s preposterous.

How can I smuggle a terrorist into the United States? And you know, even though the US is saying that they mistakenly sent this guy to El Salvador, and he’s now in a very, very brutal prison there they’re not working. Super hard to bring him back. And the Supreme Court is in on this and they said that he mu the government must facilitate his return.

But the White House is saying he’s not our problem anymore. He’s in El Salvador. He is El Salvador’s problem and he’s an El Salvadorian citizen. So that yeah. Makes it even more complicated. 

Micah Tomasella: Yeah, it’s tough. It’s a tough one. ’cause he was here legally, but he wasn’t a citizen. And then the Trump administration is saying they’ll provide a plane, but they’re not necessarily going to send the manpower over to get him out and then make sure he comes back. And then the president of El Salvador, I think that guy’s probably just gonna do whatever Trump says, right? So he says, Hey, I’m not gonna send him back. I’m not gonna stress out about doing that.

So we’ll see how this situation plays out. All right, let’s get [00:45:00] into the Iran negotiations update real quick. USI ran talks. A second round of nuclear talks is set for this Saturday in Rome. So this is the second face-to-face meeting. Again, these are the first direct talk. Since 2015, there’s a uranium dispute.

The US wants Iran to move. Its enrich uranium abroad. Iran at this point refuses. There’s military tension. The US sent a second aircraft carrier to the region and continued strikes to Iran. Proxies like the Houthis rebels and stuff like that. I mean, look the US has just kind of showing force here in the background and then.

Diplomatic signals, both sides are coming outta those meetings saying that they’re satisfactory, that they’re working towards something. And then Russia’s role is something interesting to, to take part or to think about in this negotiation. It’s unclear if Russia will accept Iran’s uranium if a deal is made.

So that’s, that’s the update on those talks right now. 

Conner Jones: High stakes talks, so we’ll see what happens there. Mm-hmm. One other thing real fast is I want to hit on a couple movies because we’ve got the biggest movie of the year so far that I would never have predicted. And it’s the Minecraft movie. Yeah, not really up my alley. Probably not up your alley, Micah. But no, it’s been very popular. [00:46:00] And this is another Gen Z thing, right? Like they, they grew up on Minecraft. We did not, but they did. Yeah. And so they, they fled to these movie theaters, but they’re causing chaos in some of them. There’s been a lot of viral trends about going into the movie theaters and just causing absolute chaos during a certain chicken jockey scene.

I’m not sure there, but just gotta mention that it’s made half a billion dollars worldwide and couldn’t that be one of the biggest movies of the year? Jux position to that is a movie called The King of Kings, which is, this is pretty cool. It’s an animated movie about the resurrection of Christ. I mean it’s, it’s the gospel story essentially, and it’s kind of.

Bajillion stars, and I mean, Oscar Isaac is the voice of Jesus. He’s got Pierce Bronson and Kenneth Brano, Uma Thurman, mark Hamill, and Forrest Whitaker. All that to say, it’s made $20 million essentially in the movie theater, $19 million opening weekend. That’s big for a faith-based movie. Love this. If you have kids, go take them to see this movie leading into Easter weekend.

We’ve got a review on Denison Forum. We’ll link that in the show notes as well. 

Micah Tomasella: Okay, so for our tune in section Easter weekend. Friday coming up. [00:47:00] Jesus’ death Sunday is coming. Jesus’ Resurrection on Sunday. Enjoy that time with your family and use this time. Our encouragement is use this time to reflect on Jesus, his life and how he gave it up for us on the cross.

Sinless perfect took on our sin, our shame, and we’re so thankful for that. And so this Holy week. This weekend of Easter is a wonderful time to spend time with family, to spend time at church, recognize and remember Jesus and all that he’s done for us, and the salvation that he offers to us so freely because of what happened on this weekend over 2000 years ago.

Conner Jones: And if you’re looking for a resource to help you, kind of just prep for Easter weekend, Dr. Jim Denison founder of Denison Forum. He wrote a great Easter devotional. It’s going to be out today, Thursday, and you can go to denison ministries.org/easter. If you’re subscribed to our newsletters, it will be sent to you and you can go explore.

That’s called the God Who Feels Your Pain. An Easter meditation on the cross. [00:48:00] It’s really good stuff. Check that out. Hey guys, thanks for joining us on this week’s episode of The Culture Brief, a Denon Forum podcast. All the articles that we mentioned, all the videos that we ever mentioned, they’re always linked in our show notes.

So go check those out if you’re looking to read any of our stuff. And please, please, please subscribe, rate, review the show and share it with a print, and we will see you next Thursday. 

Micah Tomasella: See ya.