What happens when a society teaches people that they have no lasting purpose, then wonders why they feel hopeless?

I am spending time volunteering with Stranraer Reformed Presbyterian Church in Scotland. On Thursday, October 15, the church is hosting a free public talk on depression at 7 p.m. at the Millennium Centre. Depression deserves our attention because its effects reach beyond individuals into families, communities, and the life of nations.

The Christian still wrestles with sin and sorrow. Yet Christ is working in us. Our hope rests on His faithfulness, not on our ability to manufacture a cheerful mood.

I am also a professor at Arizona State University, where I see the importance of this question among students. The 2024-2025 Healthy Minds Study, based on responses from more than 84,000 students at 135 colleges and universities, found that 37% reported moderate to severe depressive symptoms, and 33% reported moderate to severe anxiety. Both measures had improved since 2022, but the burden remains enormous.

In Great Britain, the picture is troubling too. NHS England found a common mental health condition in 22.6% of adults ages 16-64 in 2023-2024, up from 18.9% in 2014. Among 16- to 24-year-olds, the figure was 25.8%. In Scotland, 2023-2024 data show that 10% of adults reported at least two symptoms of depression and 16% at least two symptoms of anxiety.

Some people seek relief through alcohol or drugs, but self-medication can become another prison. The National Institute on Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism notes that alcohol may temporarily relieve anxiety even as heavy drinking and repeated withdrawal worsen it. The damage can spread outward: The United Kingdom recorded 9,809 alcohol-specific deaths in 2024, and victims in England and Wales believed offenders were under alcohol's influence in 39% of violent incidents in 2023-2024.

Clinical depression is not simply unbelief. Faithful Christians suffer it, and medical treatment can help. My concern here is spiritual hopelessness: What account of life can sustain someone when pleasure fades and suffering remains?

The secular state can fund treatment and other necessary services, but it cannot supply redemption. No program can answer the question that comes before policy: Why should I have hope? If human beings are only material organisms, here briefly and then gone, what lasting meaning does suffering possess?

That does not mean every government intervention fails. It means government has limits. A list of recommended behaviors may help people manage a problem, but it cannot give them a reason to live or reconcile them to God. Our trouble reaches deeper than ignorance of the rules.

A culture that reduces human beings to appetite, chemistry, and consumption should not be surprised by a crisis of purpose. Physical pleasure and distraction cannot bear the weight of the human soul. An evening's escape still leaves tomorrow's question waiting.

Owen Anderson

Christianity begins somewhere else. Human beings are made in the image of God, and Christ redeems His people by His blood. Our lives therefore have meaning now, not merely after death.

Sometimes Christianity itself gets reduced to “when you die, you go to heaven and avoid hell,” as though everything before death were unimportant. That misses our present calling. Alienation from God has consequences now. Clinical depression is no verdict on anyone's salvation, but spiritual despair can foreshadow the hopelessness of separation from God. Communion with Christ brings hope into the present.

First, our feelings do not define us. We cannot always explain why darkness settles over us, but we can bring God's Word to bear on it. The psalmist asks his own troubled soul, “Why are you cast down, O my soul?” (Psalm 42:5). Then he directs it: “Hope in God.” His sorrow is real, but it does not have the final word.

Second, Christianity offers grace rather than a ladder we climb to earn acceptance. Rules can identify wrongdoing, but they cannot free sinners from sin's power. Islam's five pillars, for example, prescribe religious duties, but Islam does not offer the Reformed Christian doctrine of justification by grace alone through faith alone. The distinction is not academic: Christian hope rests on what Christ has done, not on whether we can accumulate enough religious merit.

I find no comparable assurance in religions built around reincarnation. A cycle of death and rebirth governed by karma is not the Christian promise of reconciliation with God and resurrection. Christianity offers a destination, not an endless series of attempts to repair ourselves.

Kelsey McNeal/Disney General Entertainment Content/Getty Images

The Christian still wrestles with sin and sorrow. Yet Christ is working in us. Our hope rests on His faithfulness, not on our ability to manufacture a cheerful mood.

That hope also takes practical form in the church. We visit the lonely, listen to the grieving, pray with the discouraged, and help families bear burdens they cannot carry alone. The sufferer needs patient fellowship, not an accusation that sadness proves spiritual failure. The gospel gives us both a message to proclaim and neighbors to love.

Finally, Christian hope reaches beyond the individual. The Great Commission sends the church into the world because the nations belong within the scope of Christ's saving purpose. History need not follow a straight upward line; setbacks do not cancel God's promises. I believe Scripture points toward a day when “the earth shall be full of the knowledge of the Lord” as the waters cover the sea (Isaiah 11:9).

That gives parents, students, and churches reason to labor faithfully even when today's headlines seem to announce defeat.

Christians have hope to offer a hopeless world. We should bring it into the darkness. If you happen to be in the Stranraer area, join us October 15 at 7 p.m. And for a further resource on spiritual depression, listen to Martyn Lloyd-Jones’ series.

What Fulton Sheen understood about fame that today’s Christian influencers don’t

Humility is the necessary virtue.

Let me unpack that a little: Without humility, Saint Peter will not let you pass through the Pearly Gates.

Our culture has moved so far toward autonomy that we can barely imagine obedience as anything other than weakness.

And what is humility?

Like the old adage says, humility is not thinking less of yourself, but thinking of yourself less. If you study the lives of the saints — or, for that matter, almost any historically admirable person — you’ll recognize that humility is an immensely attractive quality.

Celebrity cleric

Blessed Fulton J. Sheen, America’s most famous Catholic bishop of the 20th century, had plenty to be proud of. Now on his way to sainthood, Sheen was a brilliant scholar, a gifted writer, and one of the most compelling communicators of his age. His radio broadcasts reached millions. His television program, “Life Is Worth Living,” drew audiences in the 1950s that rivaled the biggest entertainers in America.

Yet two episodes in Sheen’s life suggest that one of his greatest virtues was not eloquence at all. It was obedience.

The first came before almost anyone knew his name.

After his ordination in 1919, Sheen pursued advanced studies in Europe and distinguished himself at the University of Louvain in Belgium. He became the first American to win the prestigious Cardinal Mercier Prize and earned the university’s coveted agrégé degree. By the time he was 30, Oxford and Columbia reportedly wanted him to teach philosophy.

Then, in 1926, his bishop ordered him home to Peoria, Illinois — not to a university, but to St. Patrick’s, one of the city’s poorest parishes.

Sheen went.

He visited the sick, celebrated Mass, begged for parish funds, and preached. Nine months later, his bishop explained what had happened. People worried that Sheen’s European success had made him “high-hat,” too important to take orders. The parish assignment had been a test.

He passed.

Entertainer in exile

Soon Sheen was sent to teach at Catholic University in Washington, D.C., beginning the public career that would eventually make him famous.

Four decades later, obedience cost him far more.

By then, Sheen was a household name. His television audience reached into the tens of millions. But he had also clashed with New York’s powerful Cardinal Francis Spellman over money Sheen raised for the missions. Sheen appealed the dispute to Rome and prevailed. Spellman, according to accounts of the dispute, did not forget it.

In 1966, Sheen was sent to Rochester, New York. Many biographers have interpreted the transfer as a form of exile: One of the world’s most famous religious communicators suddenly found himself running a relatively modest diocese far from the center of American media.

His years there were difficult. Accustomed to packed auditoriums around the world, Sheen once gave a series of retreat talks in Rochester’s largest auditorium and drew a disappointing crowd.

“The whole world comes to hear Fulton Sheen, except his own diocese,” he reportedly told a fellow priest.

Dick Lewis/New York Daily News/Getty Images

Right or wrong

It’s tempting to make the lesson here that Sheen’s superiors were right. They were not necessarily right at all. Spellman may have acted vindictively. Sheen himself made mistakes in Rochester. Authority can be petty, shortsighted, and simply wrong.

But that’s precisely why obedience — like its close friend, humility — is a virtue.

Obedience means little when the person in authority agrees with you. Its real test comes when you believe you are more talented, more informed, or more capable than the person giving the order — and perhaps you are.

Modern celebrity culture teaches almost the opposite. Discover your gift. Build your brand. Grow your platform. Maximize your reach. If an institution doesn’t recognize your genius, leave it. If a boss frustrates your calling, find another boss. If a church constrains your ministry, start your own.

That instinct is not always wrong. Institutions can become corrupt, and conscience has claims no human authority can erase. Obedience is not servility, nor does it require cooperating with evil.

But our culture has moved so far toward autonomy that we can barely imagine obedience as anything other than weakness.

Serving in silence

There is a particularly American — and, yes, Protestant — dimension to this. The Reformation elevated individual judgment against ecclesial authority, while the American experiment elevated independence and suspicion of hierarchy. Those impulses produced real goods. But untethered, they can also produce a Christianity in which everyone becomes his own pope, pastor, and doctrinal court of final appeal.

Catholicism proposes something harder: Your gifts are not entirely your own. Your vocation does not entitle you to the largest audience. You may be called to serve where no one applauds. You may even be badly deployed by legitimate authority.

Sheen, who had every reason to believe his voice belonged on the biggest stage available, accepted assignments beneath his stature and endured humiliations he did not deserve.

In 1979, near the end of Sheen's life, Pope John Paul II embraced the frail priest in St. Patrick’s Cathedral and offered what may be the perfect summary of his legacy: “You have written and spoken well of the Lord Jesus Christ. You are a loyal son of the Church.”

Not the most famous son. Not the most brilliant.

A loyal one.

In an age obsessed with building our platforms, Fulton Sheen leaves us with a harder question: Can we remain faithful when obedience costs us the audience we think we deserve?

Don’t hide from Halloween. Use it to love your neighbors.

October is here again, so what the advertisers call "spooky season" is upon us. Stores are packed with Halloween candy and costumes, along with spiders and bats and skeletons (and they have been there since school started, but that’s a complaint for another day).

Last week, we talked about how too many Christians are fixating on what they perceive as the evil of Halloween — its emphasis on ghosts, witches, and death — without acknowledging that it sprang from both Christian and pagan roots and has been largely sanitized into a cultural holiday focused on costumes, candy, and neighborhood fun for children.

DON’T hit them over the head with a Bible. But don’t hide your faith either.

This has led to some (wrongly) judgmental attitudes, much of it springing from bad theology.

I ended that article with a promise that there is a better way to reclaim and redeem Halloween, because surely we Christians can do better than being the always-dark, candy-less house on the block.

Trick or tract?

Our highest calling, of course, is to love our neighbor. And Halloween brings those neighbors to our door, literally. What if we prayerfully and thoughtfully considered how we can bless those neighbors on this one day, with an eye to building relationships?

I am not talking about handing out Christian tracts instead of candy. Don't be that person.

I am talking about eagerly seeking an opportunity to connect with at least one if not more families in your neighborhood with whom you can begin to build relationships. This, in fact, is why God has you where you live (see more on this here).

Let me tell you about what one family did for Halloween. They set up a tent in the driveway, hung lights from it, and under the tent placed their BBQ grill, on which they cooked hot dogs. A table held buns and condiments, a bowl of Halloween candy, and Jell-O shots for the adults. They publicized this on the neighborhood webpage a day or two before Halloween.

To be clear, they weren't Christians seeking to love their neighbor. They were seeking to promote the father's business. But how might we promote our Father's business similarly?

Halloween hospitality

If you have access to one, a tent in the driveway with lights strung on it is very welcoming on a dark night!
Grilling hot dogs was a pretty good idea — another might be a big crock-pot filled with chili, with paper cups and spoons for serving.
A hot drink station with cocoa, cider, tea, etc.
Freshly made pumpkin bread or oatmeal cookies in little treat bags as an alternative to commercial candy.
Set out lawn chairs and invite people to sit down and rest for a moment — and if they do, introduce yourselves and get to know their family.
Let your kids dress up and pass out the goodies (if you also allow your kids to trick-or-treat, one of you can hold down the fort while the other takes the kids around the neighborhood).
Let people know a day or two ahead that you welcome them to come by and "sit a spell," as the saying goes.

This will cost you time, effort, and money. But it is a ministry investment in the lives of precious people God has placed in your neighborhood. You can't love them if you don't make an effort to know them, and you can't know them if you never even meet them.

And they will know you after this!

You could also just set out lawn chairs toward the end of the driveway where you will be able to actually see and converse with the adults as you pass out candy. Compliment the kids' costumes. Ask the adults where they live in the neighborhood. They won't linger long without a reason to stop at your house, but at least you'll physically meet some of them. Since most parents don’t accompany their kids all the way up to the door, you at least have to get out where they are!

Walter Leporati/Getty Images

A few do's & don'ts

DO wear a costume. Bible costumes are fun. So are a lot of others. Don't be anything that will scare children. Don't be a witch. Don't be the devil (duh).
DON'T hand out Christian literature that talks about how evil Halloween is. In fact, you don't have to hand out Christian literature at all. But if you do, hand it out with full-size candy bars.
DO ask their name and where they live in the neighborhood. Discreetly record a voice message to yourself or write down names and information — the idea, after all, is to use Halloween to start building a relationship. See #6 below.
DON'T exclude your kids from this opportunity. Recruit them to participate as fully as possible in your family blessing the neighborhood, whatever you end up doing.
DON’T be a Halloween hider. What a sad message you send to your children by turning off all the lights to avoid the neighbors. God put you in your neighborhood. Unless you live somewhere with no trick-or-treaters, get out there and redeem the opportunity.
DO follow up! Sometime in November, reach out to someone you met on Halloween and invite him or her over for coffee or to watch the big game or for a casual dinner. Your goal here is to become an authentic friend. As you get to know each other, don’t be afraid to ask for help on something, either — that’s what friends do.
DON’T hit them over the head with a Bible. But don’t hide your faith, either. Practice transparent honesty and pray for the opportunity to discuss deeper things. Until then, BE the deeper thing.

Halloween is an opportunity for your family to bless others and begin forging relationships to lost people in need of Jesus. I would love to hear about your family’s experience redeeming this annual event by loving your neighbor!

Editor's note: This article has been slightly expanded from Diane Schrader's 2025 article on Halloween.

What to do when your in-laws are working against you

Marriage creates a new family, and sometimes that means setting boundaries with the family you came from.

BlazeTV host Ron Simmons tackles complicated viewer questions of dealing with in-laws who might be causing more strain than the relationship is worth.

One viewer asked Simmons how to “deal with in-laws” who don’t share the viewer's faith “when a child is involved.”

“I think you have to always respect your in-laws, up to the point where you make sure that there’s obviously no abuse or anything like that,” he says. “But I would say respect with boundaries.”

Simmons explains that a job that comes with being a Christian parent is to “expose our children to the love of Christ … so that the Holy Spirit can begin working on them and bring them under his umbrella.”

“And I wouldn’t allow anything, as much as I could, that would get in the way of that,” he says.

Simmons then reads a question from a viewer who explained that her father-in-law asked her husband “to keep his estate and money from the wives.”

“He said it’s not for us to know, but me and my husband tell each other everything. So it feels wrong for him to ask that,” the viewer explained.

“First of all, that’s wrong for … the dad to do that, all right? That automatically puts a strain between his son and daughter-in-law. I mean, that sets up a marriage strain right there,” Simmons explains.

“Now, a lot of people, maybe they're first-generation money, they’re afraid that, you know, the wives are going to not respect that and, you know, go off and spend the money or something like that,” he says. “But as far as you and your husband go, it’s perfectly OK for your husband to talk to you about that, right?”

“You don’t break that bond,” he continues. “That’s why the Bible says that when we grow up and we get married, the husband leaves his mom and dad and clings to his wife, that they become one flesh, and one flesh shares with each other. I promise you, my right hand knows what my left hand is doing, right?

“Is it wrong for him to ask that? Personally, I think it is,” he adds.

Want more from Allie Beth Stuckey?

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Pastor takes a stand after Iowa city council starts official business with 'hail Satan' prayer: 'Reverse that curse'

An apparent fetishization of religious "diversity" had officials in an Iowa city permit a satanic invocation prior to conducting official business on Tuesday. While many at the meeting appeared willing to put up with the infernal appeal, one Christian man stood up and spoke out.

How it started

Ottumwa, a city in Southeast Iowa, adopted a policy on Jan. 20 allowing for invocations to be given at the start of official city council meetings.

'That's not welcome here.'

"This policy is intended to acknowledge and express the City Council's respect for the diversity of both organized and unorganized religious denominations, as well as other faiths, belief systems, or the lack thereof, represented and practiced among the citizens of the City of Ottumwa," the policy states.

Per the policy, invocational speakers are to be "selected without preference to any specific religion, belief, faith, or ideology, from amongst a diverse pool of Ottumwa citizens" and are asked not to proselytize, disparage other beliefs, and to keep their invocation under two minutes in length.

Summoning the devil

Matthew Dalbey, a former Ottumwa city council member, seized upon the opportunity not only to offer a prayer down to the devil but to violate the city's policy by taking a general dig at the beliefs of others.

"Let us pray," started Dalbey. "Dear dark father, let us stand now unbowed and unfettered by arcane doctrines born of fearful minds in darkened times. Let us embrace the Luciferian impulse to eat of the tree of knowledge and dissipate our blissful and comforting delusions of old."

Dalbey is a member of the Iowa chapter of the Satanic Temple. While Dalbey told KTVO-TV that he and other members of the Satanic Temple don't actually believe in Satan or worship him, the anti-Christian group and its members certainly behave as though they do.

After all, in recent years, the Satanic Temple has erected statues of Baphomet on government property around Christmastime; offered expectant mothers telehealth abortion services and promoted an "abortion ritual"; challenged pro-life legislation; distributed satanic literature to children; publicly performed "unbaptisms"; held a demonization ceremony in protest of the canonization of the Catholic Spanish priest Junípero Serra; and promoted euthanasia and pornography.

After imploring the devil to help the Iowans present to turn against ancient beliefs and deriding "arbitrary social norms," Dalbey championed "agnosticism in all things" and called for opposition against any "arbitrary authority that threatens the personal sovereignty of one or all."

The radical concluded his prayer with "hail Satan."

Righteous indignation

New Life Center Pastor Rick Bick refused to let the satanic prayer go unchecked.

Bick — who made an invocation prior to a council meeting earlier this year and is set to do so again in December — declared, "Let's just reverse that curse that was just put on our city."

"That ending with, 'hail Satan' and 'hail dark god'?" continued the pastor. "That's not welcome here."

'I am a Christian man with Christian values so I chose not to participate.'

Bick reiterated that the satanic prayer was a curse on this city and noted, "Most of you know that, and we just need to stop and reverse it."

Ottumwa Mayor Benjamin Foote attempted to defuse the situation by calling for a "moment of silence to reflect on whatever it is we need to reflect on at this time."

Cara Galloway, the council member who cast the lone vote against the invocation policy in January and reportedly warned about the inevitability of a satanic prayer, noted at the end of the meeting on Tuesday that selectively objecting to invocations now may expose taxpayers to legal liability.

The City of Ottumwa issued a statement on Tuesday, noting, "It is very clear that many of you have watched at least the first two minutes of the October 6 City Council meeting."

The city underscored that it "cannot discriminate against a denomination and everyone that is invited to perform the invocation has followed the correct protocol."

Councilman Bill Hoffman told Blaze News, "We as elected officials are not aware of the content before hand. In my opinion, I do not believe this one invocation expresses the beliefs of most of Ottumwa."

"Personally as a councilman, I only speak for myself, I did not stay in the room during the invocation as I do not agree with the content," continued Hoffman. "I am a Christian man with Christian values so I chose not to participate, and I stepped into the hallway and did a personal prayer to God for strength and wisdom for myself and to watch over our city."

Other members of the council and Mayor Foote did not immediately respond to Blaze News' requests for comment.

The satanic invocation has prompted widespread outrage.

"WTF," tweeted BlazeTV host Sara Gonzales.

Former NCAA swimmer Riley Gaines wrote, "Jesus, come back now."

BlazeTV host Steve Deace suggested, however, that it is par for the course in the Hawkeye State: "To be fair, Democrat candidate for congress @SarahforIowa does preside over Satanic weddings."

Sarah Trone Garriott, a leftist Lutheran minister who is presently running against Republican Rep. Zach Nunn, has helped oversee at least one "wedding" for satanists. In 2023, she discussed her efforts to accommodate disciples of the fallen on their big day, going so far as to consider readings about the devil "to make them feel more comfortable."

As of Thursday morning, Blaze News' Poll Watch has Nunn with a 6-point lead.

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Netflix ‘adapts’ Steinbeck’s ‘East of Eden’ — and Satan gets a sympathetic makeover

Any thrill I might have experienced upon learning an “East of Eden” adaptation was in the Netflix pipeline was rapidly extinguished by memories of the latest screen desecrations of beloved classics.

Earlier this year, provocateur Emerald Fennell turned Emily Brontë’s Gothic tragedy “Wuthering Heights” into cheap fodder for the smut-obsessed. This summer, Netflix retconned Laura Ingalls Wilder’s “Little House on the Prairie” — complete with culturally fluent pioneers and a DEI-mandated American frontier.

They are systematically eliminating our clearest portraits of evil because behind them lies the Christian realities that inspired them.

As for Christopher Nolan’s “Odyssey,” I thought it was a cinematic success, but it still made the face that launched a thousand ships a lesson in representation, while casting transgender “Elliot” Page as the Greek warrior Sinon, who’s not even a Homeric character.

I’m already recoiling thinking about the heresy that animates feminist auteur Greta Gerwig’s upcoming “Narnia” reimagining, which intends to emasculate Aslan and turn Lewis’ sacrosanct creation myth into a secular 1950s “rock opera.”

I could go on, but that’s enough to make plain the pattern of Hollywood’s utter disregard for adapting the literary canon faithfully. Always it must infuse its warped catechisms, lest we plebeians forget where it stands.

But being the masochist I am when it comes to these matters, I watched Netflix’s “East of Eden” anyway, and I have to tell you, I was genuinely gutted by what I witnessed. Not annoyed by predictable woke tropes, although those were there too. No — gutted.

My visceral shock, however, was less about the revision of John Steinbeck’s perennial Cain and Abel allegory and more regarding what that deliberate modification reveals about the dismal state of our culture.

Will the real Cathy Ames please stand up?

If you haven’t read Steinbeck’s “East of Eden” (and please do!), I’ll take the liberty of giving you a little teaser: The novel's antagonist, Cathy Ames, is certainly one of the most heinous villains in American literature, if not in the entire Western canon.

The book introduces her with this haunting bit of prose: “I believe there are monsters born in the world to human parents.”

And that’s an apt entrance for Cathy. She is a monster at birth, a mutant at the soul level, a fiend cloaked in human flesh. Modern-day psychologists would diagnose her as an incorrigible sociopath who takes pleasure only in the torture, humiliation, and demise of other people.

Cathy is also what critics call a “static character”: She undergoes virtually no meaningful change over the course of the novel. More unsettlingly, she remains almost impossible to relate to at a human level. Steinbeck gives her no humanizing backstory that draws our sympathies, no redeeming ethical or moral arc, no thing we might point to and say, “See, that’s why she behaves so horribly.”

Static characters are almost humorous in their simplicity, and they serve a variety of purposes in literature. But in Cathy’s case, her function is symbolism. She is an emblem for unadulterated evil, and that’s neither my nor the literary authorities’ verdict. It’s Steinbeck’s. In a letter, he called Cathy Ames “a total representative of Satan.”

It’s a tailor-made description, given she frames two young boys for sexual abuse, drives a man to suicide, and burns her parents alive all by the age of 16 and the end of the chapter that introduces her. In hopes you will read the book for yourself, I won’t spoil the rest of the unspeakable horrors that unfold at Cathy’s polluted hand.

But as sinister as she is, Cathy Ames plays a paramount role in this story. “East of Eden” is a moral epic, meaning it’s not just an entertaining tale about fictional people and events. It actually employs those things for the explicit purpose of drawing our attention to the cosmic war between good and evil, heaven and hell, God and the devil. Cathy, as I’ve already noted, represents the dark side of that epic struggle. Humanize her in any way and you collapse the entire framework.

But surprise, surprise — that’s exactly the sin the makers of Netflix’s “East of Eden” committed.

A moral epic gets the Hollywood makeover

Writer Zoe Kazan told Reuters, "We wanted our audience to be able to identify with every single character, the ones that are good on the surface and the ones that are evil on the surface because if we think about people that are evil or bad as being not human, we don't learn anything about ourselves."

A pleasant sentiment, except no logical reader could conclude that Steinbeck’s Cathy Ames is evil “on the surface.” He makes it unmistakably clear from the outset that she is not just a perpetrator of evil but the embodiment of evil itself. “A malformed soul” are his exact words.

So to correct Ms. Kazan, Cathy is nonhuman in that she lacks the very qualities that make one so — empathy, moral quandaries, regret, emotional baggage, anything that would resonate with a real human being. The Bible gives Lucifer no domesticating backstory, so why should his literary stand-in have one?

Actress Florence Pugh, who plays Cathy in the series, had her own nauseating comments: “She can still make terrible decisions and face awful consequences, but there can also be ... an understanding of her history and her past, which makes her the way that she is.”

Except being a static archetype, there’s literally nothing in Cathy’s history or past to explain her savagery. The fact that she is inherently and incurably evil is the entire point of her character.

But that won’t do for Hollywood. It must tinker and snip at a classic until it creates its desired Frankenstein's monster. Thus Kazan gave the diabolical Cathy Ames a tragic backstory, turning her from a Satan figure into a woman we can pity, even as she destroys. She suffers abuse, acquires trauma, is driven to desperation, and, of course, experiences the cold hand of misogyny. It’s not even worth delving into. Suffice it to say it’s a lie. More important to me is the "why" behind it.

When killers get poignant backstories

The show's egregious misreading of Cathy raises an important question: Are the makers of this blasphemous series just stupid, or are they up to something?

That’s a rhetorical question. You know as well as I do there’s an agenda at play. What might surprise us is how ugly it is.

Obviously, these Hollywood revisionists are well aware Steinbeck’s Cathy Ames is not a sympathetic character in any sense of the term. But they chose to rewrite her as one anyway — and it has nothing to do with the audience wanting to “learn something about themselves,” as Kazan sold it.

"Introspection" is a reasonable sop to satiate the masses, but it’s a ruse. Cathy must be remade, for she represents the very thing the progressive left wants to retroactively undo. As long as objective evil breathes, it stands as a barrier to their dark vision for the world: a dystopia ruled by moral relativism, where one man’s act of slaughter is another man’s tragic mental break.

Or should I say woman’s? After all, the morally intact part of the nation has been watching, mouths agape, for months now as thousands of people (most of them mothers) fought for a woman who admitted to methodically strangling her three young children to death in a basement. “Postpartum psychosis” was an evocative enough backstory to tip the pity scales in Clancy’s favor.

A similar and equally disturbing trajectory of events surrounded the premeditated stalking and murder of United Healthcare CEO Brian Thompson. His admitted killer, Luigi Mangione, was made into a sympathetic vigilante by radicals who cheered his “courage.” His chronic pain, denied claims, and manifesto then made him an ideal mascot for progressives’ agenda to blame “the system” rather than the criminal.

Karmelo Anthony, the “good kid” who stabbed an unarmed student after a verbal confrontation, claimed self-defense, and was cast as a victim of racism, is yet another example.

There is a pattern here, and it reveals a dark truth: There is much power to harness when you give a killer a poignant backstory.

Silver Screen Collection/Kent Nishimura-Pool/Getty Images

Television tells a vision

But backstories, even those belonging to killers, are not off limits. On the contrary, they are the lens that allows us to see the gray, the nuance that tempers dichotomous thinking. Much good results from understanding motive so long as the line of objective morality remains unblurred — because for every degree it fades, Pandora’s box opens a hair more. And then suddenly, the demons are too numerous to count. And they do not go back in the box willingly.

But Steinbeck’s Cathy Ames is designed to make us look at those bloodthirsty demons, not the complexities of real people living in a broken world. To adapt her character, or any similar character, in this way is a calculated attempt to corrupt what C.S. Lewis called the “Law of Human Nature,” the idea that man is born with a moral radar.

No doubt entertainment has been powerful in the dulling of man’s intrinsic moral compass. Under the guise of artistic license, it surreptitiously conditions the masses. True to its name, television tells a vision — in this case, that evil is really just the manifestation of trauma or poverty.

By turning a Satan symbol into a tragic figure, a Netflix series becomes propaganda for the progressive push for absolution. And of course, the communists are cheering. Explaining away evil is their vision too, you know. The only difference is their endgame isn’t equity or decarceration; it’s dominion.

Christianity in the crosshairs

I initially thought it was ironic they chose a famous moral epic — the least fitting vessel — to undermine the idea of pure evil. But then I realized that’s exactly why they chose “East of Eden.” They are systematically eliminating our clearest portraits of evil because behind them lie the Christian realities that inspired them. If your goal is to unmake evil, Christianity is where you must aim the arrow.

Steinbeck’s 600-page epic boils down to a single word. After God rejects Cain’s offering in Genesis 4, he tells the soon-to-be fratricidal murderer: “Sin lieth at the door ... and thou shalt rule over him.” After a long spiritual journey, the character Lee discovers that the Hebrew translation for “shalt” — timshel — is less of a command and more of a gracious offering.

Despite Satan and his wicked pull on the hearts of man, “thou mayest” rule over evil. That is the lesson Cathy’s son Cal — who fears he has inherited his mother's malevolent nature — walks away with.

But when you get rid of objective evil, what is there to rule over? That’s what really guts me. By painting evil as buried trauma, the series offers a secularized, counterfeit timshel. Biblical permission to recognize and deny Satan’s influence turns into a therapy session on handling our misfortunes better than our forebears. It would be a decent message if it didn’t obscure precisely the cosmic war between good and evil that “East of Eden” seeks to illuminate — a darkness our culture exploits for any number of nefarious ends.

The war is real, however, and there's no opting out of it. You can distort works like "East of Eden" to pretend that it isn't, but you remain a combatant nonetheless. Just one who's chosen to fight for the losing side.

When the Pentagon cries ‘UFO,’ Christians should look to the Bible, not the skies

The Pentagon wants you to watch the skies ... again.

Last month, the War Department published a sixth release of declassified and historical files related to UAPs, while the All-Domain Anomaly Resolution Office continues to publish military footage of UAPs. Some cases have explanations. Others remain unresolved because of insufficient data.

Most of the people getting excited about 'aliens' have spent their entire lives being taught that nonhuman spiritual beings don't exist at all.

"Unresolved" does not necessarily mean extraterrestrial. It does mean, however, that Christians should stop laughing at the question.

This wheel's on fire

The Bible never says humanity is alone. From Genesis to Revelation, Scripture speaks of intelligent beings who are not human. Some serve God; others rebel against Him. Today, though some may call them "aliens," changing the label does not change what they are.

Job 38:7 says that at creation, "the morning stars sang together and all the sons of God shouted for joy." These heavenly beings existed before humanity and were not originally from Earth.

Western art often depicts angels as harmless babies or ordinary humans with bird wings, but biblical angels look very different. The original Hebrew mal'akh and Greek angelos mean "messenger" and are used to describe what these beings do, not everything they are.

Daniel described a heavenly being with a face like lightning, eyes like flaming torches, and limbs like burnished bronze. Ezekiel's cherubim came with wheels within wheels covered in eyes. And Isaiah's seraphim, the "burning ones," were adorned with six wings each. If someone who rejected Scripture saw such a spiritual being today, what would they call it? Likely an alien or a god.

As Paul says in Ephesians 6, our struggle is not against flesh and blood, but against spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly places. The idea of the unseen realm is not a modern conspiracy theory. Rather, it has always been part of the biblical worldview.

Deities ... or demons?

Ancient archaeology provides another connection. Mesopotamian traditions from Eridu speak of the apkallu, sages associated with the age before the Flood. They were given the role of bringing knowledge to humanity. Centuries later, Assyrian palaces at Nimrud displayed human and eagle-headed winged figures connected with these sages. At Nimrud and Nineveh, enormous lamassu, which are human-headed winged bulls or lions, guarded royal thresholds. Ancient texts also speak of the Anunnaki, a group of powerful deities.

Now put these figures next to Ezekiel's description. He describes each cherub as having four faces at once: a human, a lion, an ox, and an eagle. The apkallu looked like a human body under an eagle's head and wings. The lamassu combined a human head with the winged body of a bull or lion. These same features keep showing up in Ezekiel's description of a similar being.

This doesn't prove the carvings are exact portraits of cherubim, but the resemblance is too striking to ignore. These cultures may have been deceived by real spiritual beings, represented them in their images, and worshiped the creation rather than the Creator. These artifacts show that early people were already telling stories about nonhuman beings, sacred knowledge, and contact between heaven and earth.

The biblical writers didn't treat these pagan gods as harmless myths. Both Deuteronomy 32:17 and 1 Corinthians 10:20 say the sacrifices pagan societies offered were made to demons. That's a different claim than what most people assume today, where the old gods get filed away as folklore.

But swinging too far the other direction causes its own problems, and Christians shouldn't assume every strange light is a demon. A UAP could be a balloon, a drone, an aircraft, classified technology, a natural event, a hoax, or a simple misperception. Some encounters may still involve spiritual deception too. Christians should test the evidence and test the spirits.

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The coming darkness

This connection between the pre-Flood world, ancient cities, and rebellious spiritual powers is one reason we wrote our biblical fantasy novel "Lightborn: Dawn of Darkness." This world is not separate from what we see happening today. The novel explores where this spiritual rebellion began and imagines the ancient world behind the biblical account.

Archaeology shows that ancient civilizations believed in powerful nonhuman beings and worshipped them as gods. Scripture reveals the darker spiritual reality at play. These fallen spirits did not simply disappear along with the ancient world. They continued to influence people and nations, and that spiritual deception will play an important role in the end times.

Most of the people getting excited about "aliens" have spent their entire lives being taught that nonhuman spiritual beings don't exist at all, and that's the actual danger. Paul warned of this in 2 Thessalonians 2, describing a lawless figure who comes cloaked in false signs, wonders, and deception.

We believe the modern alien narrative could help prepare people to receive dark powers as teachers or saviors. Scripture does not say the Antichrist will arrive in a spacecraft. It does warn that supernatural appearances do not automatically come from God and that people may encounter angels without recognizing them.

If a shining being offers secret knowledge, a new religion, or a savior other than Jesus Christ, the church should not first ask which planet it came from. We should ask who it serves. Good angels refuse worship. Fallen ones seek it. Jesus Christ alone is the way, the truth, and the life. Whatever future disclosure may reveal, that truth will never change.

Nick Freitas says America needs real men again

Who better to write a book called “The Man Book” than BlazeTV host Nick Freitas, a former Green Beret and Virginia legislator, husband, father, and — let’s be honest — an undeniably rugged, manly looking guy?

Freitas has built a huge social-media audience with dry humor and blunt observations about politics, culture, marriage, and family. His Instagram following recently crossed 2 million. More important, he offers young men an alternative to influencers peddling a hollow parody of masculinity built on conquest, self-promotion, and obsessive image management.

National renewal begins when men accept that calling at home and live in a way their wives, sons, and daughters can trust.

I have argued for years that real masculinity is not toxic. The one-dimensional brute whom the left beats like a cheap piñata is a cartoon caricature. Toughness, discipline, and endurance can make a man a better father, husband, and protector.

Freitas’ book makes much the same case. Published this spring, “The Man Book” — subtitled “A Point-by-Point Guide to Sucking It Up and Getting the Job Done” — reached the New York Times bestseller list and peaked at No. 6.

Appearing recently on A.J. Rice’s “Dangerous Laughter” podcast, Freitas said national renewal begins with men who accept responsibility, build strong families, and transmit faith, character, and durable values to the next generation.

“I am 100% absolutely convinced that the way you're going to save the country and the way you're going to save our politics is through godly families that are strong, that are cohesive, and that are transferring their values to future generations,” Freitas said.

His political career grew out of frustration. Freitas served two combat tours in Iraq and later said he became fed up with political leaders imposing rules of engagement that, in his view, constrained warfighters in the field. After leaving the Army, he entered politics and served in the Virginia House of Delegates from 2016 to 2026.

“The real problem,” Freitas told Rice, “was our side had kind of given up making the argument on what we believed and why. And to the extent that we did make the argument, it was always kind of this stuffy, overly academic, esoteric argument, instead of actually just talking to people and maybe — God forbid — adding a little bit of sense of humor and sarcasm to it.”

That direct style eventually migrated from politics to questions about marriage, fatherhood, Christianity, and manhood. The questions Freitas received changed too. Young men wanted to know how to become good husbands and fathers. Young women wanted to know how to recognize one.

AscentXmedia/iStock/Getty Images

The central distinction in “The Man Book” is between masculinity and its counterfeits. A good man is neither passive nor recklessly aggressive. He is strong but disciplined, capable but humble, protective without being domineering, and willing to use force when necessary without making violence an identity.

Freitas argues that progressive politics has alienated many men by treating qualities they naturally want to cultivate — strength, courage, competitiveness, competence — as suspect. Attempts to manufacture a politically acceptable masculinity therefore ring false. Aggression can imitate strength, but violence without self-command, responsibility, and moral purpose is not manhood.

“There’s no pinnacle that you achieve with respect to manhood,” Freitas said. “There’s just things that you go through and experiences that you develop and character that you develop that helps shape you and turn you into the sort of a godly man that other men want to follow and look up to and that your son can follow and look up to.”

That formation requires doing hard things. Freitas encourages fathers to create rites of passage and even to give their sons what he calls a “violent hobby” — learning to shoot or fight, for example — not as an invitation to recklessness but as a way to develop competence, courage, and self-command.

“The problem is that when you get to a critical mass where there’s enough men that don’t know how to do the difficult things,” he said, “you end up in a society where you remember very quickly why you needed men that could do difficult things.”

Theodore Roosevelt made much the same argument more than a century ago: “We need ... the iron qualities that must go with true manhood,” including resolution, courage, indomitable will, and the ability to do “the rough work that must always be done.” Roosevelt immediately added that strength without moral purpose becomes little more than force and cunning.

“You’ll be your son’s hero until you prove to him that you shouldn’t be,” Frietas told Rice. A boy’s natural admiration gives his father an extraordinary advantage — and an obligation to become worthy of imitation.

“Part of being a man is doing hard things that hurt — that may make you tired, that may make you frustrated — and developing the emotional and intellectual maturity and the intestinal fortitude to push through in order to keep your word and take care of the people that you love.”

RyanJLane/iStock/Getty Images

That means bringing sons into real work instead of relegating them to passive entertainment. The invitation tells a boy he belongs and that his contribution has value.

“You will never understand how important it is to your little boy to be included on projects dad is doing,” Freitas said.

A father’s example matters just as much to daughters. His strength, honesty, presence, and affection establish their earliest standard for honorable manhood. “Understand that you are the first vision to your daughters of what a good man looks like,” Freitas said.

That is where the interview moves beyond a book about masculine habits. Its larger claim is that politics reflects culture, and culture is formed most powerfully in families. Strong nations require men who can govern themselves, do difficult things, protect others, and transmit faith and virtue to their children.

National renewal begins when men accept that calling at home and live in a way their wives, sons, and daughters can trust.

Halloween isn't opening a door to demons. Christians need to stop pretending it is.

It’s that time of year again, when certain well-meaning but misinformed Christians sin against their fellow believers by questioning their salvation and accusing them of inviting demonic activity.

One young woman told me she is 'called' to spend her time looking into these things, so she can warn everyone about the evil of Halloween.

The crime in question? Participating, in any way, in anything related to Halloween. Well, except for denouncing it — the well-meaning/misinformed group enthusiastically participates in things like this:

Diane Schrader

I appreciate the zeal of the people who came up with this. They want people to stop being evil and turn to Jesus.

But there are so many things wrong with this approach.

Let’s unpack some of their base philosophies on this — all of them pretty questionable.

Halloween is evil

The first false assumption is that Halloween is inherently evil.

The history of Halloween is a mash-up of Catholic and pagan traditions. All Hallows' Eve (“hallow” means holy) was the night before All Saints' Day, an explicitly Catholic celebration to remember dead saints, which intersected with pagan harvest time traditions related to the belief that the dead could come back as ghosts — thus the “spooky” imagery of the holiday.

Trick-or-treating seems to have emerged from a medieval British practice called “souling,” where the poor would go door-to-door on November 1 or 2, offering prayers for the dead in exchange for food, often “soul cakes.”

Are some pagan roots evident here? Yep, just like a lot of things in our culture. Our names for the days of the week, for instance, reflect the names of pagan gods — like Thursday is named for the god Thor.

The key point here, though, is that nobody will be worshipping Thor this next Thursday, most likely. Because how something started is largely irrelevant. What matters is how it is today.

Halloween traditions brought to the U.S. by immigrants from Britain, Ireland, and Scotland became increasingly mischievous and destructive in the early 20th century, sometimes leading to outright vandalism or violence. To curb this behavior, in the 1930s, various community groups, civic organizations, parents, and churches began promoting organized, door-to-door treat-collecting for younger children.

Trick-or-treating exploded in popularity after World War II and, as it was heavily marketed by the candy companies, grew into a cultural staple representing good clean fun for America’s kids.

That is what changed, and for the vast majority of Americans, that is where we are today.

So no, Halloween is not inherently evil, even in its history, nor is the American tradition of trick-or-treating.

Light should have nothing to do with darkness ...

We can agree on this one; it’s in the Bible, of course — “what fellowship has light with darkness?”

The problem is, as we just clarified above, that children trick-or-treating, which is 99.99% of Halloween for most American families, is not “darkness.”

Ironically, the misled are actually taking this passage out of context, because it certainly is not arguing that we can’t go out and be around “darkness” (unbelievers). On the contrary, how can we love them if we hide away from them?

The real meaning of the passage surfaces when we read the whole thing:

Do not be unequally yoked with unbelievers; for what partnership have righteousness and lawlessness, or what fellowship has light with darkness? —2 Corinthians 6:14

This is prohibiting close attachments with non-Christians that might compromise the Christian's faith — think marriage or perhaps a business partner.

It’s hardly an injunction against going outside on an October evening and chatting with trick-or-treaters.

... but we’re just fascinated with darkness

It is my observation that the misled crowd tends to be more interested in ferreting out sordid aspects of the darkness than they are in bringing light.

Some even boast of having “gone down the rabbit hole” of “research” on Halloween. But it isn’t actual research, or they would at least have some of the basics down (see above, “Halloween is evil” section).

Instead, they grab onto and fearmonger the most horrific (yet undocumented) claims. We’re talking about TikTok videos from highly questionable “pastors,” spurious claims by “ex-witches,” or paragraph after paragraph detailing pagan gods and occult practices — none of this is a good use of time for most Christians.

One young woman told me she is “called” to spend her time looking into these things, so she can warn everyone about the evil of Halloween. She might be called; I’m just not sure who’s doing the calling. Because this is what we’re told to focus on:

Finally, brothers, whatever is true, whatever is dignified, whatever is right, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is commendable, if there is any excellence and if anything worthy of praise, consider these things. —Philippians 4:8

There’s no darkness in that (above) at all!

Anyway, here are a few of the claims repeatedly made “from the dark side.”

CLAIM: You’re worshipping the devil when you trick-or-treat, whether you want to or not! (A lot of credit is given to what satanists have allegedly said about all this.)

FACT-CHECK: You can’t be "tricked" into worshipping the devil.

CLAIM: Halloween is the worst day for human trafficking!

FACT-CHECK: There is zero supporting evidence; there is no “worst day” for human trafficking, according to law enforcement.

CLAIM: Also human sacrifice.

FACT-CHECK: Again, zero supporting evidence for this.

CLAIM: Witches are out casting spells on Halloween; being outside risks having a demon attach to you.

FACT-CHECK: You can’t accidentally pick up a demon; you have to willfully sin to invite that kind of activity.

CLAIM: If your neighbor is a witch or a satanist, the neighbor curses the candy, and that demonic presence comes into your home!

FACT-CHECK: Your neighbors are most likely not witches or satanists. And if they are? “Little children, you are from God and have overcome them, for he who is in you is greater than he who is in the world.” —1 John 4:4

NBC/Getty Images

All demons, all the time

There is a flavor of Christianity that tends to fall into this obsession with darkness, and it reaches its pinnacle in so-called “deliverance ministry.”

Deliverance ministry focuses on casting out demons and tearing down spiritual strongholds and uses language about curses, “soul ties,” and the “legal rights” of demons. Much of this is not biblical. There are people who claim “deliverance” is their gift, and they dig deep into the darkness because of that.

The problem is that there is no such gift in the Bible. Only Jesus and the apostles were able to cast out demons. No instruction about that is given to us, and there is not even the suggestion that we should try to interact with demons in any way. On the contrary, actually, as we’ll see below.

Instead, every believer is given everything we need to win at spiritual warfare, in the fight against the demonic:

We are to put on the full armor of God (Ephesians 6:10-18).
We are to resist the devil (James 4:7).
We are not to give him room in our life at all (Ephesians 4:27).
We are to seek God, who tells us we can overcome the world, by simple faith (1 John 5:4).
We are to be alert and of sober mind (1 Peter 5:8-10). A magnificent passage, and not a word in there about ordering demons around.

The things I have heard some Christians say about “opening a door to demons” are truly troubling. Touching a crystal opens the door. Stretching your body in a way that yoga teaches opens the door. A pumpkin on your porch opens the door — and the person wasn’t even talking about a carved pumpkin — just a pumpkin. Or my very (least) favorite: Using alternative medicine opens the door.

Some of the most outspoken purveyors of this kind of thinking are people who were formerly involved in the occult. I respect their desire to stay far from anything that reminds them of their old lives. But they overstep when they blindly condemn others for a pumpkin, a stretch, or a trip to a functional medicine provider.

Believers, of course, cannot “accidentally dance with the devil.” We are sealed in Christ, who never lets us go, as multiple Scriptures attest. We have nothing to fear from demons while we walk in His light. We can walk outside on Halloween night, and we can even bring home a Hershey bar and not fret that it’s “cursed.”

However, Christians can certainly make choices that open them to satanic influence. Mindfully disobeying God puts you in a dangerous place. But we are bought and paid for by the blood of Christ, and obeying the Scriptures above is our ticket to spiritual safety.

The bad attitude of the demon-obsessed

It shouldn’t be too surprising that people who get caught up in demon obsession are going to respond very negatively to being told they’re on the wrong track.

But they prove they’re wrong with how they interact with the rest of us. Because it is wrong to demonize (pun intended) fellow believers who participate in neighborhood trick-or-treating. The spiritual pride of those who think they have it right leads to them saying some pretty appalling things.

This guy on the right below is a prime example, and Red Pen Logic does an excellent job of explaining how he’s wrong in this brief video.

The 'Halloween Halters'

As for the “Halloween Halt” event advertised in the graphic at the beginning of this article, I think it’s pretty obvious that accosting families with children to tell them that their Halloween celebration is satanic is highly unlikely to win anyone to the cause of Christ, but it will certainly embitter, anger, and antagonize moms and dads just trying to enjoy this cultural tradition with their little ones.

Two truths the Halloween halters and haters are missing:

God put you in your neighborhood for a reason.
One night a year, God literally brings your neighbors to your door.

This is called a gospel opportunity, and next week I’ll share some ideas on how to make it truly a night of light.

This essay previously appeared at the She Speaks Truth Substack.