383 - John Vervaeke and Chris Mastropietro - Awakening from the Meaning Crisis

The Symbolic World

Jonathan Pageau

Religion & Spirituality, Society & Culture, Education

4.8 • 824 Ratings

🗓️ 9 March 2025

⏱️ 75 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

🧾️ Download transcript

Summary

In this conversation with John Vervaeke and Christopher Mastropietro we discuss their collaborative work on the 'Awakening from the Meaning Crisis' project, exploring the dynamics of their partnership, the impact of their ideas on contemporary discourse, and the challenges of making complex concepts accessible. They delve into the importance of narrative in understanding philosophical ideas, the role of dialogical reasoning in writing, and the surprising effects of their video series on academic engagement.

Buy their book: Awakening From the Meaning Crisis: Part One: Origins: https://www.amazon.co.za/Awakening-Meaning-Crisis-Part-Origins/dp/1645011003

John Vervaeke's course on The Symbolic World: https://www.thesymbolicworld.com/courses/the-cognitive-science-of-ritual

Daily Wire Plus: The Gospels seminar: https://www.dailywire.com/show/the-gospels

=====================

NEW COURSE: The Symbolic World Goes to Middle-Earth
Join us for an in-depth study of J.R.R. Tolkien’s Legendarium, where we'll explore his masterful use of medieval literary genres, Christian storytelling traditions, and hidden philology. This course, presented by Richard Rohlin, will guide you through Tolkien's vision for a "Mythology for England," examining his work as a complex tapestry of Universal History. Through this journey, we’ll also examine Tolkien’s use of epic poems, chronicles, and literary devices to craft a truly legendary vision of the past, present, and future. Thereafter, we'll look at how his work has inspired later authors of fantasy, shaped the genre more generally, and continues to aid our recovery of deeper, cosmological storytelling.
- Dates: Live classes are on Mondays at 1 PM Central starting March 3, 2025
- Course length: 5 weeks, 10 hours of lectures
- Cost: $150
- 10% Discount for all patrons at the Involved tier or higher, apply your discount code at checkout
- Participants will be given access to lesson recordings with downloadable audio
- You’ll also have the opportunity to apply these ideas to contemporary authors and your own mythopoeic writing!
- The course is hosted on the Symbolic World Circle Community platform. Sign up as a free member at https://www.thesymbolicworld.com/join-community before making your purchase.
Register today: https://www.thesymbolicworld.com/courses/tolkien-and-universal-history

=====================

Timestamps:
00:00 - Coming up
00:39 - Intro music
01:03 - Introduction
01:42 - Working together
06:23 - Coming to terms with John's vocabulary
11:26 - Getting feedback
14:27 - Telling a story
18:36 - A dialogical process
22:25 - Change in academia
26:48 - John Vervaeke and Jordan Peterson at UofT
29:21 - Cross-disciplinary
36:01 - Cognitive science
40:14 - Making woo acceptable
45:06 - John and John teaching
52:33 - What was the Gospels seminar like for Jonathan
00:15 - John's experience
03:23 - The strangeness of Christianity
08:19 - Hope for the book's reception

💻 Website and blog: http://www.thesymbolicworld.com
🔗 Linktree: https://linktr.ee/jonathanpageau
🗣 Join The Symbolic World Community for discussions about symbolism: https://thesymbolicworld.com/subscribe
🔒 BECOME A PATRON: https://thesymbolicworld.com/subscribe

📱 SOCIAL MEDIA
Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/TheSymbolicWorld
Twitter: http://www.twitter.com/pageaujonathan
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/jonathan.pageau
Our website designers: https://www.resonancehq.io/
My intro was arranged and recorded by Matthew Wilkinson: https://matthewwilkinson.net/

Transcript

Click on a timestamp to play from that location

0:00.0	And I think that's what's happened, right? People who are, maybe, to use your word,
0:03.4	scientifically inclined or, you know, skeptically inclined in the pejorative sense of the term,
0:08.8	who never would have considered any argument for the necessity or elegance or depth of a religious tradition
0:17.3	passed through the gate of a series of scientific terms and found on the far side
0:24.4	of that gate something beautiful they had never thought to consider real.
0:29.4	And it was actually the scientific bridge that made that possible for them.
0:34.4	Rather than the science alienating them, it actually became an invitation.
0:38.6	This is Jonathan Peugeot. Welcome to the symbolic world. Hello, everyone.
1:05.0	Everybody watching this will know who these people are with me today.
1:10.0	Of course, John Roveicki and Christopher Mascoe Piotro.
1:13.6	They have been working together for several years.
1:16.6	I've already written a book together, and now they've taken the awakening from the meaning
1:20.6	crisis content and put it into a book, so we're really excited to see that.
1:24.6	It's been such a huge help for so many people to be able to frame
1:28.2	what's going on and to frame the concepts, to find words, to talk about the things that we all
1:33.6	have insight about. And so, first of all, congratulations to both of you on the publishing of this.
1:39.5	Thank you so much. And so I guess I do have a question about to start off is I would like to know a
1:49.2	little bit about how it is that you work together, you know, because you guys have been working
1:52.7	together for years. You have a great partnership and I like to know a little bit how that comes
1:57.9	together. How do you, how do you work through the ideas and put them on paper as a team?
2:04.2	I guess I'll go first.
2:07.2	So we have two ways, Chris and I, of working.
	...

Transcript will be available on the free plan in -23 days. Upgrade to see the full transcript now.

Previous episode | Next episode

Disclaimer: The podcast and artwork embedded on this page are from Jonathan Pageau, and are the property of its owner and not affiliated with or endorsed by Tapesearch.

Generated transcripts are the property of Jonathan Pageau and are distributed freely under the Fair Use doctrine. Transcripts generated by Tapesearch are not guaranteed to be accurate.