Agnostic Dad, Gay Son, Catholic PhD: Why This Professor Stopped Arguing | Brad Harper

Send us Fan MailWhat happens when a theology professor realizes the arguments he built his career on don't actually reach the people he loves most?Brad Harper grew up in the Bay Area with a devout Christian mom and an agnostic rocket scientist dad. He chased a PhD partly to prove his family wrong. It didn't work. He spent eight years studying historical theology with Jesuits at St. Louis University, pastored alongside hundreds of ex-Catholics navigating their faith, co-wrote a book with his gay son about staying connected through radical disagreement, and after 24 years teaching at Multnomah landed on something the apologetics books never told him: people don't come to Jesus because you won the argument. They come because you stayed in the room.In this conversation with Tim Osborne, Brad traces the thread from his family dinner table to the church's current entanglement with Christian nationalism, making the case that every time the church has reached for power instead of proximity, it's lost the thing it was trying to protect. He unpacks what healthy eldership actually looks like, why younger generations are drawn to liturgy, and what it meant to hear high school classmates at his 50th reunion say "you're the reason I followed Jesus."For pastors wrestling with faithfulness without combativeness. For parents navigating deep disagreement with their kids. For anyone wondering if the church can still be compelling without winning the culture war.