https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BdXRI-5BxMw
Today, I am interviewing Luke Smith. He has a YouTube channel with over 200,000 subscribers and also a website where he talks about pretty much everything, from his experience in academia to philosophy, linguistics, minimalism, living below your means, and being truly free from the system. He discusses living on your own land and, generally, how to have real freedom in the modern age. I started watching his videos when I wasn’t even Orthodox; I was still Catholic. I remember seeing him talk about Orthodoxy, and it just didn’t register in my head what it even was. He has talked about Orthodoxy increasingly over the past few years, and so I’m really glad that we could finally collaborate. I want to learn about your journey coming to Orthodoxy, so thanks for joining me.
Yeah, thanks for having me on. I guess it’s been a long time coming, and in a way, it’s a re-debut for me on the internet because I don’t know, I just— we’ll talk about it— but I haven’t been on here in a while and kind of forget how it works. So, yeah, thanks for having me on. Lots of the people at my parish, actually, I told you this before, but a lot of them are familiar with your channel and all this kind of stuff. A while back, you did a video on me, and everyone was like, “Oh, Luke, you’re on the internet!” and I was like, “Yeah, I guess.” So, yeah, awesome to be here.
So, my first question for you is: what was your upbringing like? Were you raised with any religion? Did you have an atheist phase or anything like that?
Yes to both, I guess. I grew up, I guess I would say, normal American Evangelical. You know, I went to a Southern Baptist Church growing up; my parents both were Southern Baptists. I don’t know, there’s kind of a bird’s-eye view I can give. I don’t know how much detail people need to know, but like a lot of people in my teenage years, or in the run-up to that— well, actually, let me start before that. Okay, let me just say, I know a lot of Orthodox people have this kind of tension between their origins. They kind of look at all the things they grew up with as heterodox, and they think, “I was taught wrong on this or that.” There’s part of that, but I think in general, I did get a good— I mean, my way of looking at it is, you know, whenever you become Orthodox, you have a phase of being a catechumen where you have to learn what it actually is to be a Christian and what that truly means to overcome the passions and have faith and all this kind of stuff. The way I look at it is my young life as an Evangelical was kind of like being a catechumen in the Orthodox faith. Now, my catechumenate was not ideal; there were a lot of things— there were kind of poison pills in a lot of that kind of stuff. But when it comes down to it, as I return to the faith, I don’t necessarily look at that as a betrayal of my young life or my upbringing. If anything, it kind of perfected it. You know, all the good things I still get to keep, and all the things that were kind of iffy, kind of questionable about American Evangelicalism— those, thankfully, I can discard.
Yeah, and you know, even as a child, there are always some things you grow up with that you’re kind of like, “This is weird, but I guess this is how people do it.” So, I don’t look back at kind of— well, I say I don’t look back; I think there’s a temptation to look at your upbringing with a critical lens. That’s kind of being mad at your own sin in a way, right? We’re tempted to do that. Like, I’m very tempted to be like, “Oh, well, this is what I would have thought back then; I’m so foolish for thinking that.” I try not to think like that anymore, or I try not to have that reaction because, either way, in general, I had doubt. I went through a prolonged atheist phase. I feel like maybe in the course of the interview we can go into the details here, but it’s almost like if I just give you my biography, there are too many twists and turns, you know? And it’s not about me, right? Like, that’s not— you know, some people will say, “Oh, that’s something similar to me,” but, you know, I don’t know. Yeah, we’ll talk about that as we go on, I guess. But yeah, I grew up an Evangelical, went through an atheist phase for most of my adult life, in which I had no interest in— you know, I’m the kind of person who doesn’t have a big— some people are very spiritual, let’s say; they have that kind of orientation, and that was less the way I was as a child. Like, I was— you know, it’s a personality thing, I think, as well. But somehow, I found myself in the Orthodox Church, which is, you know, quite a blessing, I guess.
So, when did you start to fall away from the faith? Was it in college? That’s typical for most people.
It was before that; it was definitely a lot before that. I would say like my early teenage years. So, when I was in middle school, I was very pious. You know, I was trying to figure out— like, I was trying to figure out the Bible, and I read a lot on my own. I remember the first day— it was like a Sunday— I read through Revelation. There are some deep red pills in this, right? Of course, that’s a very dangerous thing, but in the Orthodox Church, you know, as most people probably know who are Orthodox, the Book of Revelation is the one book you don’t read in the liturgical cycle. You know, it’s kind of a different book, you know? But you know, in Protestantism, obviously, you grow up there— there’s this kind of very democratic ideal, which is bad, just to be clear— that a lot of Protestant people kind of have, and I had, where I can just open up the Bible and kind of figure things out myself. And, you know, I didn’t have the kind of authority to do that, but as a middle schooler, I was very kind of pious and, you know, like really almost to the point of— and again, I’m not a very spiritual person; I didn’t see spiritual things in every way, but I wanted to do things the right way, you know what I mean? I wanted to live a proper life.
But as I kind of became a teenager, you know, on one hand, there were issues going on kind of in the state— let’s say American Evangelicalism has been unraveling for generations. You know, at this point, this was around the time of the Iraq War and stuff like that, where you have all this kind of— you know, a lot of even demonic stuff that is in the mindset of evangelicals, where they’re, you know, really— which has caused so much harm to the Christians in the Middle East. You know, the— I don’t know— the political Zionism and all this kind of stuff where, you know, Americans back those— if you are a little younger, I don’t know how old you are actually.
I’m 24.
Okay, so you might— this might be before your era. But like after September 11th, like the mindset there was this kind of excitement about being an Evangelical, and we’re going to destroy Babylon; we’re going to invade Iraq and do all these great things, and the world is going to be over in a couple of years. There was like the Left Behind series and all that stuff. I look back at it, and I can’t believe, you know, I was ever a part of this. Not to say that there aren’t like very pious people in it who— I don’t want to say fell for it, but they— you know, that’s just what you think the world is like. One of the first kind of— I don’t know— parts where I realized something was wrong is, ironically enough, like looking at the situation in the Middle East, where, you know, as I grew up, I started looking into like what really is going on in the Iraq War. Like, who is winning there? Who’s losing there? And, of course, the Christian population of Iraq was devastated. In the same way, you know, like the Christians in Palestine or Syria and all these places have gone through so much. That’s when I started to realize like the simplistic worldview I was given— like, is that really accurate? Am I accidentally supporting like evil people doing evil things in the world?
Yeah, and that was one of the first things for me that was like— it’s not like a lack of belief, but at least the poison, as I said, like growing up as an Evangelical, sometimes there are good things about it, but there’s like a poison pill with it. I started to realize like whatever truth is, I’m not getting the full truth, you know?
Wow. So, did that lead to a sort of agnosticism where, “Oh, this simplistic worldview that I was given is more complex,” or did you become like a militant atheist or anything like that?
I would say like I gradually— as an individual, I started learning more about, like, I guess the modern— there’s not a name for it— just the modern secular worldview. You know, I got into evolution and things like this, not just as an explanation of things, but more as an ideology— like as, you know, an explanation of how humans work, how the passions work, all this kind of stuff, which, you know, obviously the idea— not just in evolution, but really what science tries to do is it strips— it makes humans machines in a way. You want humans to be machines; you want to reduce them to that because you can explain them, you can control them, you can, you know, use them for your own purposes. And, you know, I, as a young person, I guess I became very interested in that worldview. So, I— and at the same time, when I said that Evangelicalism was kind of imploding, that was happening even in the churches that I was in. So, like the church that I was in— I mean, it’s a good example of kind of the naivety of that age— where I was in a church that— I don’t know, it was called— well, I’m not going to dox anything too much, but it was a small church that was on a hill with beautiful oak trees. We decided we were going to move down to this other part of the county; it’s one of the fastest-growing ZIP codes in the whole country. We’re going to move down there; we have enough money; we’re going to build a big building, and we’re going to start a church there. And it’s going to be wonderful.
I think this is a period where everything was kind of going wrong. Firstly, a lot of the background of the people in my church, you know, they didn’t really know what they were getting into, and they ended up selling the old church. Some company bulldozed the hill, and they built a Walmart where it used to be. So, actually, when I— that’s where I was baptized as a Baptist; like, it’s now a Walmart. I mention that not just as a funny anecdote, but like that was kind of what happened to this era of Evangelicalism in suburban America. It kind of became— I mean, it really— like I think about the church I used to go to. I said a little bit ago, there’s a way in which being Orthodox has given me everything I used to have, all the good things I used to have as a Protestant, and that like, you know, the things that were true, the things that were noble and right. But like, I can’t really go back to the kind of church that existed in the early ’90s, like a Baptist church; they just don’t exist anymore. They’re totally different. They’re all slideshows and rock concerts and stuff like that. You can probably find some primitive Baptists that are doing different stuff, but that religion is gone. I can’t go back to that if I wanted to, you know what I mean? And that’s how it’s been in that environment for every generation. Like, you know, these people are still Baptists or whatever, but the churches they go to are totally different from the churches their parents went to and the ones that their grandparents went to, even though on an Excel spreadsheet of beliefs, they might believe mostly the same stuff.
So, either way, all that is to say, during that period, that world was unraveling, and my church— once they moved, they started losing people. They had this huge thing they had to pay off, and eventually, they ended up selling it. I mean, years and years later, people just kind of stopped going; they couldn’t make ends meet. They ended up selling it to a megachurch, actually. Both the churches I grew up in were sold to megachurches, and they’re just doing who knows what nowadays. So, either way, when I was in that environment, you kind of see the writing on the wall; you see your faith disappearing, and at the same time, you’re faced by all these passions and temptations from the world, and those have become very appealing. The ideology of, you know, atheism and stuff like that became very appealing to me. Oh, I have friends like this instead of— whereas, you know, my church is kind of passing away. And part of that is rational, and part of it is not me trying to justify my atheism of that period, but that sets people up for a very difficult— it requires a lot of spiritual maturity to overcome the temptations to be worldly. At that point in my life, I was just not fit to do it, so I very much became an atheist entirely. You know, I’m not one of these people who’s like, “Wait, technically, I’m an agnostic,” but, you know, I was an atheist. I had no— I went through a brief period of kind of hostility to religion, but very brief. Very after that, I kind of had— I looked at religion as being just kind of a— I don’t know— an aspect of the world that you could study. Interestingly enough, you know, I’m not going to say that, you know, in all bad things, including my atheism, there was, you know, you do see the grace of God appearing in ways that maybe it wouldn’t happen if I had gone a different path. And, you know, that actually encouraged me during this period. I really got into studying like kind of early church stuff and, wow, like the history of even like the Roman Empire and things like that. And, you know, I didn’t really think of the Orthodox— my way of thinking of it was just like, well, first I realized, okay, the religion I grew up in— no one had that; that didn’t exist. Like, you know, when you hear things like, okay, let’s say St. Constantine, Constantine the Great, you know, famously, he waited to the end of his life to be baptized, right? Now, that’s not an Orthodox practice nowadays, but back in the day, right, a lot of people thought they could kind of— oh, I won’t have to confess later on; I’ll just wait to the end to be baptized. The church doesn’t do that practice, but I bring that up because I’m like, well, as a Baptist, that’s not what we believe about that. And I think in so many cases, you read these early disputes in the church, and it’s not like there’s some pseudo-Protestant sect that they’re always like— that are the heretics, but it’s even worse than that for a Protestant. It’s more like these people are totally talking about something; they’re talking about a religion that’s so different from what I grew up with as a Protestant that I really had this— as you know, as an atheist back then, it was just like, oh, well, I guess it’s just changed, you know? Things are different. But I definitely realized like what I grew up with was very— it’s very ahistorical, you know? It’s not— there are— again, I’m not saying like it’s all bad, and I don’t mean any ill to any Protestants who are saying this, but like you’re not getting— the way my priest says it is like Protestants don’t have the full deck of cards. You know, like they have some of the cards; they understand some things, but when they don’t have the right cards, sometimes they’ll replace it with the things they want or, you know, point or kind of expediencies.
So, yeah, for the longest time, that’s when I was basically like an atheist, and that was my mindset, you know?
Wow. So, as an atheist, what compelled you to read the early church fathers? Were you just interested in understanding all kinds of religions, and you started to see kind of a—
I think, well, I will say this: by itself, it’s not going to make me Orthodox because I was still under that idea that like, well, I guess this doesn’t exist anymore. You know, historical Christianity and Protestants intuitively all believe this; they kind of believe, yeah, there’s the early church that disappeared, right? I actually remember my mother, when I was a really little kid, you know, I was at VBS or some kind of church thing, and afterwards, I asked my mother— I’m kind of curious, like, you know, we have the Bible; we hold it at such high esteem, and I was curious about it. I was like, “Mom, you know, where did the Bible come from?” And, you know, bless her heart, I mean, this is just such a beautiful— it’s an innocent reaction, but she thought for a second, and she’s like, “You know, I think we found it in the ground one day. Like, we uncovered it.” You know, and in her defense, at the time, I think she’s thinking about like the Dead Sea Scrolls or something like that. But that is such a perfect illustration of what you grow up kind of believing if you’re a Protestant. You just have this idea that the church is something we’re creating right now; we’re reading it from a document. It’s not a living, breathing historical society. And that’s also why a lot of Protestants will do things like, you know, let’s say the Shroud of Turin, okay? Which is one of the most— honestly, the scientific evidence behind the Shroud of Turin being the actual burial cloth of Christ is so wildly compelling. Like, when you really look into it— I mean, don’t read Wikipedia because they’re going to be against it, but you know, whatever— if you really look into it, it’s amazing. But Protestants have a tendency to, whenever they see something like that, they almost want to deny it. They want to deny that there are relics; they want to deny that there are kind of historical miracles; they want to deny. And it’s weird because they get in the same boat as atheists, unfortunately. And I think where that comes from is implicitly they do have this idea that the religion is— I mean, there is no historical Christianity that’s still around; we are just discovering it; we’re reading it from this book.
Yeah, and I think that was— I mean, that’s wrong, you know? And one of the best evidences— I mean, we have the Orthodox Church has preserved so much very detailed information in the lives of the saints and all this kind of stuff for our instruction. I mean, we’re not— we’re not like necessarily groping around in the dark. We might be in our own souls when we’re trying to overcome passions and stuff like this, but the church has given us so much. And it’s what I said; my priest says, like, if you don’t have that, you don’t have the full deck of cards. You just don’t. If people attain— and there are some people who are Protestants or any other religion who obtain an admirable level of morality or a kind of saintliness, but it would be so much— you know, it would be so much better if they had, you know, everything they really need.
Yeah, I think both of those groups, atheists and Protestants, kind of have this core belief of like deconstruction. With the Protestants, it’s got to— we got to get rid of all the traditions of men, but they end up deconstructing the entire faith because, you know, Orthodoxy— Christianity is based on tradition. You know, the Bible itself is a part of tradition. You know, you start deconstructing the liturgy, but this is something that has been passed down that isn’t given in the Bible alone. And then the atheists just take that one step further. If you’re going to deconstruct everything about Christianity, why can’t we just deconstruct the Bible? And they end up not actually constructing everything; it’s just trying to make like a lowest common denominator belief, and it’s ultimately— if you look historically or cladistically kind of at the history of the church, like where does like this kind of liberalized religion come from? I mean, it comes from— I mean, there’s a generation of, you know, Protestants, let’s say in Germany, you know, Martin Luther, who already is starting to question— weirdly enough— scripture, right? Yeah, it was Martin Luther who didn’t take books out of the Bible, but he demoted what they now call the Apocrypha, right? For theological reasons and for other reasons, and the next generation of German, you know, scholarship went even further into deconstructing the text of the Bible. German higher criticism is very much— it comes from that Protestant Reformation. It’s just an issue of where are you going to draw the line of when do you cease being a Protestant? When do you just become an atheist?
Yeah, and so like there— I even know of, you know, some Protestants, unfortunately, who will go even further. They’ll say, “Well, look, there’s some manuscripts that don’t have the end of the Gospel of Mark in it, so we shouldn’t have that in our Bible.” It’s like, well, the church has always had it. Like, even— I mean, and that is a good illustration of the difference of how they look at scripture versus how the church looks at it. Let’s say, for example, the Apostle Mark didn’t write the very end portion of the Gospel of Mark; maybe one of his assistants, someone else wrote it a generation later. Either way, the church treats it as the Gospel of Mark. Okay, if someone else wrote that, it’s not— for a Protestant, that’s a big problem because, again, you have this idea that the Bible either came down from the sky or you dug it out of the ground, and it’s just by itself; you just know. But the reality is, like, we can trust the Bible because we know— I mean, it came from this community of the church, which is so uniform, Catholic, you know, in its belief and in its practice. And that’s the thing that is really, honestly, like one of the things that blew my mind when I was looking into Orthodoxy is just— like you, in America, you can go to, you know, again, let’s talk about Baptists because I have that background. You can go to a Baptist church, and then one down the road, and you’re going to see they’re doing entirely different things for their services. I mean, they’re going to have songs and then preaching, but what those songs are, what they’re about, what the preaching is about— you might have different theology, and they’re going to be totally different. But it was wild for me when I was becoming Orthodox to realize, okay, so the church in Russia and, you know, Greece and Georgia and all of Eastern Europe, they are so much on the same page. And even, you know, non-Chalcedonian churches and other churches that are not in community with the wider Orthodox Church, they still have this— there’s more similarity between them than there are any two given Baptist churches. You know, that should tell you there’s something going on here. There is something— even if— I mean, there’s some sense in which people are being united by a tradition, and they’re guided in a way that you can really tell when there’s a significant divergence, you know?
And that was wild to me because, again, your mindset is— it’s very me-centered. You don’t think of it that way, but as a Protestant, you know, you just kind of open the book and say what you think it’s about, you know?
Yeah, and I think it’s important— I’m sorry if I’m rambling a little bit, but I do want something— I don’t want to— I apologize if I’m saying anything too hard against heterodox people, Protestants, whatever. And I do want to clarify the important thing, ultimately, with heterodox Christians is not that they— again, they don’t have like a spreadsheet of beliefs and they’ve checked the wrong answers, you know? I think the issue is really those beliefs that might be wrong; they can cause— they cause sin, you know? It’s not them in themselves. If an innocent person innocently misunderstands something, that’s one thing. But I think the issue is, you know, when you have a theology that’s based on individual people reading the Bible and interpreting it for themselves, and that has no concept of, you know, of apostolic succession and, you know, authority in the church— like there’s no— I am, you know, in many Protestant sects, like it ends up being that everyone is in a spiritual democracy, right? Everyone is equally entitled, and that’s one of the reasons you have this kind of wildness. And worse, like there’s a— you know, you have a temptation to be kind of arrogant. And I think a lot of people who even convert to Orthodoxy still kind of have an issue with, you know, “Oh, look at this person; he’s heterodox; therefore, he’s just bad.” In reality, we have to realize that like these, you know, erroneous beliefs or bad theology or whatever, it’s harmful because it harms people, and it harms the life they live. And it’s a threat, you know? Heresies are damnable not because, again, you check the wrong box, but because it can affect how you process the entire world. And that really is, I think, a lot of the stuff that I had to deal with, you know, growing up.
Anyway, yeah.
No, I totally agree with that, and I’ve struggled with that. And I think people who convert to Orthodoxy struggle with that because it’s such a richness of truth, and it’s just like a fire hose. You want to share it with everyone, and you can— you can go too far in interacting with the heterodox that you maybe don’t do it with love. So, finding that balance of like, you know, giving the truth in love is what we’re all called to do and not letting—
Yeah, yeah. I think most times it’s— I can speak for myself. I think there’s a tendency to look at someone and be like, “Oh, look and see yourself, see your old self in him,” and you want to condemn him for that reason, right? And not only are you condemning someone; that’s wrong, but you’re also holding on to your own kind of sin, you know? And that’s where a lot of that tendency— like, for example, when I see a Muslim— I was never a Muslim; I never interacted with them; I don’t really have strong, you know, reactions against them. But again, when there’s something I grew up with, I’m like, “Oh, how could you possibly do that?”
Yeah.
And that’s just the wrong way to look at it. And I think I’m reminded, actually, my priest— it’s slightly different, but I think it’s analogous. He was talking about— I’m going to not remember the exact things, but he was talking about some monks in a monastery, and one of the monks, who in a moment of pride, you know, he made some comment like, “You know, I haven’t eaten meat in 15 years.” Right? And the abbot says something to him, saying, “You know, listen, you should have been eating meat for all these 15 years because your pride in that instant has totally undone all of your fasting.” You know, it would have been better if you were just not fasting. And I think in the same way, if you are Orthodox— like, it’s one thing to, again, have the right beliefs, but if you don’t have Christlike humility, you’re not Orthodox. Like, for all the right boxes you check, for all the lifestyle changes you go through, if you’re arrogant about it, you’ve lost everything, you know? Like, you’re not like Christ, you know? And he’s not— you know, when he interacts with people, let’s say like the Samaritan woman, who, you know, they were a syncretic sect; they were partially pagans, you know? He’s not— he doesn’t say that she’s not wrong, but at the same time, that’s not how he approaches her. He doesn’t approach her out of arrogance or condemnation. And ultimately, that’s the model for how we need to be.
And a lot of times as well, the first time I ever went to an Orthodox Church, actually— which I’ll give the explanation of that— I was talking about Orthodoxy for a while on my channel. I was like the last person to actually convert. Okay, just to be clear, like there are people— and this is for us to think about— you know, there were people on my channel who I would talk about Orthodoxy in a live stream, and I know that there’s at least one I remember who was emailing me before I ever went to a church. He went to a church, became a catechumen, and was baptized, and he was like, “Hey, thanks, Luke, for telling me about Orthodoxy.” And I just was like, “Man, I’m really slow.” And again, that’s not for— that’s not to— it’s important for people like me and you to remember how easy it is to influence people for good or for ill, you know? It’s dangerous. That’s one of the reasons I haven’t put up videos on my channel recently because, I don’t know if I have— you know, a lot of my videos have been giving people advice, right? And I want to be very careful with that. Not to say I’m not going to do it, but I just want to— I want people to— I feel like I have to put like asterisks about, you know, everything. But either way, I’m sorry; I’ve opened a lot of things. I want to talk about— when I’m still finishing, the first time I went to an Orthodox Church, actually, there’s a guy who was watching one of my live streams in West Virginia, which is not close to where I live, okay? He was in West Virginia; he was at— what is it? Christ the Savior? Yeah, I think it’s Christ the Savior in Wayne, West Virginia, right? Father Jonah is there, and he invited— he asked Father Jonah to invite me over, and I came for Holy Week, and it was an amazing experience. It’s right under Holy Trinity, the— or Holy Cross, the monastery in West Virginia. Wonderful experience; I had a great, great time there.
But, you know, when I first talked to Father Jonah, he said this thing, you know, he was like, “Well, okay, you seem like really— you want to become Orthodox. Hey, just remember, you know, it might happen now; it might— God might not open the path for you to become Orthodox for 10 more years.” You know, and that was something like really— that’s weird because if you grow up as a Protestant, you’re like, “Come down the aisle! Come on, accept Jesus right now!” You know, it’s a very different mindset. And, you know, the faith of that is really surprising, the idea that like you don’t necessarily have to— something if your heart is in the right place. Sometimes you have to rush because God, you know, wants you to rush, but that mindset, it was just very new to me, and I appreciated it a lot.
I constantly find when I interact with priests who have been Orthodox either their whole life or most of their life, you know, for decades, it’s— it really is a— I don’t know; I’ve been exposed to something totally new. A mindset— like, I’m still as red-pilled as I might think I am; there are so many things that I still— I don’t know; I’m not there yet, you know?
Yeah, Orthodoxy is a spiritual gold mine. It really humbles us, just like the depth of everything. But I want to ask a question about, you know, earlier when you were kind of in this atheist/agnostic phase. Did you start to believe in God, or did you start to— like, when you were looking into Christianity, did you even know Orthodoxy was a thing?
In discerning between like Catholicism or— like, what was that like starting to believe in God again?
I think probably my first reflex was actually like— similar to what I said before, you know, there is— you know, there’s belief and there’s also practice. And I think the first thing that came to my head is that, well, maybe religion is wrong in belief, as you know, still being an atheist, but maybe they’re right in practice. You know, maybe I should buy a church; maybe I should be socially connected or something like that.
Yeah.
That was step number one. And although that’s still— that can be dangerous, right? Because you don’t— you know, people who are not— I— that’s not the same thing as going to a church with a clean heart and faith, but it was step number one.
Yeah, and I think as I just— I think that step and with a little bit of prayer, I think it very much opened— you know, if you don’t have faith, pray for faith. You know what I mean? That’s what people say so often. And I think what gradually happened is, in my academic work, weirdly enough, the possibility of God became a possibility. I think I was looking over at the University of Arizona, which is where I was, you know, I was doing a degree in linguistics or PhD in linguistics or whatever. But, you know, they have a bunch of people there who do research on consciousness, which is, you know— there’s no— I will say there’s no scientific explanation of consciousness, but I’ll go further and I’ll say it’s impossible for there to be a scientific explanation of consciousness. It is literally something right in our face at all times that is non-material. And whatever complex material interactions can happen in the universe, you can create a complex computer; you can even create a complex philosophical zombie. But consciousness is just something that is not matter. I want to say I wrote a blog post on it a little bit ago, but that kind of opened me to the possibility.
And obviously, in Orthodoxy, we have this concept of noose, right? Which is really, in a way, it’s consciousness, and it’s something that is very tied in with the concept of God. And, you know, the Trinity actually, you know, has— there’s a full theology which is way actually beyond my level even at this point as a recent convert that goes into the relationship between, you know, all these kind of core aspects of the universe. But either way, I started reading early— I just started reading weird stuff like neoclassical— or not neoclassical— like late post-classical philosophy, a little bit hermetic stuff. A lot of that stuff is like questionable because it’s tied to the occult. I was never in it for that reason, and, you know, no one should be. But it did open me to the possibility of, you know, these people are speaking within a mindset that is similar to the modern mindset, but at the same place, it almost like assumes God. It’s part of their way of looking at the universe.
And I think what I realized is like my entire way of looking at the— like the materialist mindset that all of us automatically get in our society, including sometimes if we’re Orthodox or definitely if you’re Protestant or something like that, it almost presupposes a kind of atheism. It presupposes an atheism, and if you believe in God, you just tack God onto that in some way. And that is so different from how people in history looked at things. And more than that, you know, there is this ultimate sense in which, you know, there’s a sense in which some deistic kind of person or— let’s not say deistic— like atheists, of course, are dealing with a philosophical problem when they’re talking about the creation of the universe and where things came from. And the difference between raw atheism and raw theism is almost like what they think God’s personal pronoun is, right? You refer to God as a he or an it, you know? And that was kind of step number one.
So, I think what happened is there were a bunch of little cracks in the facade; there were a bunch of cracks in the Matrix for me where it’s like, okay, I see my worldview isn’t necessarily sufficient. I mean, it kept me content for a decade, you know, but it wasn’t necessarily sufficient to deal with the edge cases, which are really not edge cases; they’re really something fundamental to how the universe works, right? That I’ve just gotten used to making reasons, “Oh, we’ll explain it someday,” you know? So, that started happening. And at the same time, I think, more importantly, God was putting me in a part in my life where I was being extremely humbled without my will. You know, terrible things were happening to me, partially because of my own arrogance, honestly. But I was in a position when I was around 25 or so; I basically lost everything— everything I built up, you know, everything— my academic career, all this kind of stuff. And it was partially my own arrogance, but also was partially the evil state of the world. It’s almost like me and the evil world were conspiring, but it all worked out for the best because I had to— I basically had the choice of, you know, I got to get out of this place. You know, part of me was realizing I’ll never be happy here; it’s like a very evil system. But at the same time, I was very motivated by my own will.
And after that, you know, when I moved away from the university, I was just— and this is, I guess, around the time I started my YouTube channel. I started like very much re-evaluating things. That’s when I actually started going to church seriously as someone who actually believes or is at least open to belief. And, you know, in the initial period, I very much was gravitated to Catholicism for a very superficial reason because, like, I know Latin really well, and I kind of Greek; I can read the Greek scriptures a little bit, you know? But my Latin is really good, and so I had this opportunity to read a bunch of Scholastic stuff, you know, Roger Bacon and Aquinas and stuff like that. But— and that was kind of a bridge to get into Orthodoxy accidentally, also because it’s kind of like a halfway between the modern mindset and the Orthodox mindset. But, um, so that’s kind of how things happened in my case.
But, um, yeah, you have something to say? Sorry.
Yeah, was there any like transitionary figures besides just reading like theologians in Catholicism? Because, you know, we have some overlap in the church fathers with Catholicism and Orthodoxy. I noticed I heard that you mentioned like Dr. Michael Heiser in one of your streams. So, was there like important figures like that that helped you?
Weirdly enough, no. Like, I don’t know— Michael Heiser is interesting. I mean, obviously, he was never Orthodox; he doesn’t— he just really looked into— and this happens in a lot of cases. You look at Michael Heiser; I think also— there’s N.T. Wright, who actually is, I think, an Anglican bishop. He doesn’t know that much about Orthodoxy, but he’s very close accidentally to being Orthodox. Yeah. Most of his scholarship is basically like why Protestants were wrong in the Reformation, like why were they wrong about— they were actually wrong about Paul; they’ve been reading Paul wrong for 500 years. Here’s this guy who’s a Protestant saying this kind of stuff. I either way, I can’t think of in particular— Heiser I started reading after I would self-describe as Christian, and maybe I was already looking at Orthodoxy. Honestly, I think part of it was just what I said earlier, where I realized like, okay, outside of the West, outside of Protestantism in the Roman Catholic Church, everyone else is kind of on the same page. And that in itself is kind of a testimony. So, in a way, it was by process of elimination. I was like, okay, well, I know what I grew up with; I know there are issues in that. The Roman Catholic Church, I’m seeing a lot of good things in Roman Catholicism, but like there’s something where historically things have gone really weird, you know? And that’s all that I can say. And things have really changed in Catholicism, unfortunately. You know, I still interact with a lot of— I have, you know, Catholic friends and stuff like that, but, you know, I think there is something that’s very lost there, unfortunately.
So, that’s kind of how I ended up. And there’s a long time of me just being kind of— I’m theologically Orthodox, but where I live, there were just no— or at the time, there were just no churches around where I was. So, it almost became a— like I thought I’d have to drive like two hours or so. And I had this interaction— I’ll publish it; I’ll tell you. Do you know R.V.?
Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah. He was a popular convert.
Yeah, R.V., you know, he’s a manosphere guy back in the day who repented of his sins basically and became very Orthodox. You know, he really turned his life around, and, you know, he’s disappeared from the internet. I’ve heard people who know where he is and stuff like that, but, you know, he’s disappeared from the internet. And I think it’s very admirable, honestly.
Yeah.
But there’s one point where I had emailed him about something; I forget exactly. And I said this thing about, “Oh, you know, I’m thinking about, you know, I’m very set on becoming Orthodox; there’s just no church anywhere around me.” And he sent me back an email that wasn’t harsh, but he kind of scolded me. He’s like, “If there’s a church four hours away, you should be driving.” That’s basically what he said. He’s like, “In the last days, even having that is a blessing.” And at the time, I’m like, I know he’s right. Like, I know this man is right.
Yeah.
And eventually, you know, once— again, Father Jonah invited me to his parish, which I drove all the way to West Virginia for that. He let me stay at his house, by the way. He’s— if you know the site, Damine Gallery, that makes icons, that’s actually his business. I’ve been in his workshop; it’s very nice.
Wow.
So, he— and he actually gave me my first icons, which there’s a story with that as well that he doesn’t even know, but I’ll tell him next time I see him.
Either way, what was I going to say? So, at that point, I basically just had to kind of swallow my laziness and, you know, start driving to church. And I think, you know, for a while, I was still— I’d still pop into a Protestant church. But I think there came a point where it’s like I was like, “Listen, every day I don’t go to an Orthodox church, this is an absolute waste.” You know, even if I’m not communing, even if I’m not a catechumen yet. So, I started going to the Greek Church in Tallahassee, which is Holy Mother of God. I went there for a bit, but eventually, there’s the church I go to now. I’ll go ahead and dox the church I go to. Not just that, I had— on the way here, I actually had a phone call with my baptismal sponsor, and we were talking about other things, but he’s like, “Oh, you’re going to talk to Kyle? Give our parish a shout-out.” So, I’m going to give them a shout-out. So, I now go in Greenville, Florida. I go to St. Andrew’s there, which is a very small mission parish. I say very small, but it’s exploding in the number of people we have. That’s usually where I go. I do travel a lot; I go to different places, but, you know, so that’s where I was baptized, and that’s where I’ve been since.
I even— although my baptism, for those people who don’t know, it’s been very recent. I guess it was at the beginning of this year.
Okay.
So, again, I was like the last person to convert. When I went to Europe, the last video on my YouTube channel is about me going to Europe, going to Greece, Montenegro. I went to a lot of great places. I went to St. Nectarios Monastery, but like I wasn’t baptized in— I couldn’t, you know what I mean? I can’t even commune. But it was still a great experience. But anyway, wow.
So, sorry I haven’t been on the internet so long. I think I’m just like putting everything out.
No, it’s good. A lot of people have been waiting for this, like, “What’s going on?” Like, you know, it’s over a year, but I understand that stress because, you know, all your videos were giving advice, and it’s really good advice. And I know people who still watch them. You know, I still watch the old live streams and things like that. But it is a big responsibility, you know, giving other people advice.
And so, has that been just kind of like a struggle? Is like, you know, where do I go from here since you’re like re-evaluating a lot of things?
Yeah, yeah. I think there’s— it’s not necessarily there are things that I re-evaluate, but I think a lot of it is even though— even if it sounds great to me, I’m just not sure because, you know, I’m new to the concept of spiritual authority, right? Again, as a Protestant, you don’t— as a Protestant, you don’t necessarily have that. But here, you always— I mean, you know, I have a friend I have— you people watching may know— Luther, who has Transfigured Life, you know, the YouTube channel. Yeah, me and him have met, you know, and I like that he always does a video pretty much nearly always with a priest, you know? And I assume that you at least get an okay to do kind of stuff like this.
And so, I think it’s very— I just want to be cautious about it. Like, I just don’t know. I don’t want to like necessarily put— I also don’t want it to be— I guess one thing I’m worried about is for some people, I want to make sure that like them converting is not like a fad, you know? I have a friend who goes to a parish, and the priest there— it’s an Antiochian parish, actually— and the priest there says if you have like an MD, if you’re like a theology person, you’re going to have to be a catechumen a whole lot longer because, like, you want to make sure— you got to make sure this guy has left aside all the issues they have and also that they’re not following a fad and that their conversion is genuine.
Yeah.
And, you know, I kind of feel like I just want to be careful, you know? That’s all it is. But, yeah, that’s part of it. But I’m not against like giving it— I mean, when I talk to people in the parish, you know, I’ll happily give my personal advice or whenever it’s needed. But, you know, you just got to watch my— I have to watch my words, you know?
Yeah, definitely because it’s a big thing when you’re converting to not— it’s one thing to like believe the right things, but actually acquiring, you know— we hear Orthodox say that Orthodox worldview, that— or like living like Christ, having that Christlike humility like you were talking about, it just takes time. And it takes going— like going to church and— I mean, even outside of church— really living Orthodoxy out daily, which is the hardest part. It’s easy to like believe the right things, but to, you know, live that daily is really difficult. And people in America are— I mean, it’s great how many people are converting. It’s such a blessing to see people— my parish I go to used to be in a doctor’s office. They’d have to set up every weekend, you know, in a doctor’s office waiting room. But we’ve grown so much, and I love that.
And thank God for that. But at the same time, we need to start thinking about the next generation, you know? Because so many things— like, are we— are Orthodox people ready in America, which is really a very demonic country, you know? Just in terms of the things you get exposed to, and you really have to do the bare minimum. You have to fight against the grain in a way, unfortunately. And all of us— so I think it remains to be seen, and, you know, may God’s grace be with us. But I think it’s going to be another struggle where— when— I mean, I see that you recently got married, and that’s, you know, thanks be to God for that.
Or are you engaged, or did you—
No, I got married a few months ago.
Okay, yeah. Either way, that’s fantastic. So, the next struggle for, you know, everyone in that situation, as great as that is, is like, how am I going to raise— like, how can I raise children that don’t have the baggage that I have? You know, the cultural baggage, all the sins that we’ve been exposed to. You know, how do I protect my children from that? And, you know, I think even there’s something I think about. You know, I remember having this conversation, you know, children— I think if you’re a Protestant, let’s say, or any— it doesn’t matter what religion you are. Let’s not even talk about religions; let’s talk about your own sins. You know, when you’re praying, I mean, let’s say you have a prayer to the Virgin Mary. You know, if you have a Protestant background, you might have some little nag in the back of your head that says, “Oh, well, you’re not supposed to do this.” You know, and that’s an evil thing that you’ve grown up with, you know, that you kind of have to get over with.
And the important thing when it comes to setting the next generation right, we don’t want to raise our children like that. We don’t want them to have little theological arguments in their head. We want them to be able to live and breathe and be, you know, the Christians are supposed to be and not like kind of— you know, and that’s a difficult thing in a country where, you know, we just don’t have that.
And more than that, I think it’s really important— like, and I’ll just go ahead and I’ll puke out what I want to say right now, and that is I think it’s really important, like Americans who are converting, who are becoming, you know, Christian in the truest sense of the word, they have to realize they’re going to be discarding a lot about their lifestyle. The suburban, ninive lifestyle is nearly entirely incompatible, not just with human life in general, but as it happens, the Orthodox faith. Right? You— I mean, imagine living in a traditional Orthodox country where, you know, you work leisurely throughout the day, and at a set time of day, everything closes down, and people have the option to walk to church to go to the ninth hour or something like that. You know, you can just walk, you know, and just hear a prayer, and that’s part of your life. There’s a daily breathing of everything you do in your life that is tied into the church, and that’s something we don’t have now.
And what we need, in a way, to establish is people need to be physically not just close to each other, but they need to be physically next to each other. You know, we need to have a place where we can walk to church and walk to our community members and stuff like this. And that is— that is actually normal life in a way. But to attain that, we do have to— you know, everyone has to make sacrifices, right? I remember I was thinking earlier today, you know, the story of the Rich Young Ruler, right? Where the Rich Young Ruler comes to Christ, and he says, “What do I have to do to be saved?” He said, “Easy, just throw away everything, give it to the poor, follow me.” Right? So, and the Rich Young Ruler, he cries, and he leaves. And I’m actually— I’m much more lucky than the Rich Young Ruler, I think. I mentioned to you because, again, when I was 25 and I quote-unquote lost everything that I was building up in my life, I didn’t have a choice; it just happened. It would be a blessing— what a blessing it would be for the Rich Young Ruler if God had just taken away all of his temptations. You know, that sounds bad, but it sounds great. It really is great.
And that’s the mindset you kind of have to have. Like, I think people should have— I mean, I’ve always been a proponent of like self-sufficiency and independence and all that kind of stuff before I became Orthodox, but now it seems like even more dire because you really only want to have your toes in the world. You know, just one of your toes if you need it. You know, I got to make a little bit of money, but I’m ready to leave that at any moment, you know? That I think is the mindset that is very important, and that applies to me as well because, yeah, I have property, and I live in a place, and if push comes to shove and I have to move and sell everything, I have to be ready to do that.
And so, this is something— and that is like the spiritual struggle that all of us kind of deal with where mostly the world— it doesn’t just have evil in it; it has something even worse. It has distractions. It has like good things that aren’t quite as good. It pulls your noose; it pulls your attention to, you know, stuff on the internet, stuff on, you know— which, by all means, if you’re watching this because you’re, you know, just wasting time or whatever, don’t watch it. You know, turn off. You know, there is that kind of temptation all of us have all the time, you know, with just all of the distractions that are in front of us and the comfort. Like, modern life— our main— the main sin of America is probably just the love of comfort, you know? The love of, you know, “I just don’t want to be bothered with this; I just want to keep doing what I’m doing,” you know?
Yeah.
So, yeah, that’s actually the next question that I wanted to talk about is that when I started to become Christian, I started to get really into like minimalism and living below my means. Like, I don’t need a bunch of stuff to be happy, and consumerism is really destructive to me. I bought a lot of random stuff; like I bought like a lot of manga, and I’m like, “Why did I just buy like 50?”
Yeah.
It’s very cringey, and it’s also like your money is your time. So, why am I wasting it in buying a consumer good when you can buy something like land or something that’s going to actually help you be free? And that’s one thing I appreciated about a lot of your videos is talking— I mean, that’s how I actually first found you. It was like, you know, how to not be a wagey anymore and, like, you know, go live in the— go live in the country. And you talk about like the ThinkPad and the ThinkPad of cards, the Lexus and, you know, credit card churning— like all of these ways where the money that you do have is going to go further. And living below your means because you really don’t need that much to be really happy if you have God, if you have your community. Like, focus your time on living below your means and investing in things that are actually going to make you free.
So, my question is, did you always have that mindset of kind of like living below your means, or did that kind of start when you lost everything?
Well, I think even before that, I kind of had the mindset of— I think it started as a personal disposition when I was younger. I think I wrote in a blog post like Millennials are more or less divided into two categories. You have like the constant spenders who are just blowing money everywhere; they’re getting coffees all the time, blah, blah, blah. And then you have maybe a smaller segment of them who are like, “Let’s see, can I live in a 10 by 20 box for the rest of my life?” And that’s kind of how I was, you know, from the beginning. Like, there’s a point where when I was 18, I’m like, “Okay, I have a car; could I live in this car if I need to? Like, how?” And so that kind of is my mindset. And it can be good or bad; like, there’s a sense in which it can be like a vice, you know? Because it becomes like almost in a way— I feel sometimes, let’s say, you know, you mentioned like credit card churning and stuff like that, which, you know, I’m a proponent of whatever you can to not invest in the world more. But, you don’t— I realized at some point there’s sometimes like a lot of people are greedy for money; it’s almost like I’m greedy for exploiting things or like just— I feel like there’s something vicious about— like it’s a vice, you know?
So, you have to— but I do think the goal, you know, the goal in general is, as I said, like living in a close community of people physically next to each other where the normal ins and outs of life— you just don’t need— like you don’t need to drive 20 minutes to the store to get something for $20 to do something basic anymore. And, you know, you look at— I mean, a great example, you know, there are many good examples of people who live in a traditional lifestyle, you know, in the Orthodox world. So, you know, in America, we have the Amish, right? In the Orthodox world, there are kind of the Old Believers; a lot of them live more or less like Amish people. You know, they wear older clothing, and they live in communities. But, you know, one thing I think just reading about a community like that, let’s say the Amish, like if an Amish person wants a house, what happens? They all get together over a weekend; they build a house. After the weekend is done, the house is built. Okay, there’s no debt; there’s no like, you know, unnecessary spending. All the labor is just done, and everyone knows how to do it because they’ve done it a million times. You get a free house, and you give— you participate in building everyone else’s houses. And that’s not just an Amish quirk. I was actually reading a historical document from the county I live in from the 1800s, and they’re actually talking about these house-raising— I mean, people— everyone used to do this, you know?
Yeah.
Everyone used to do that. This is not just some Amish weird thing. This is just human life, and we’ve lost it. You know, we’ve totally lost it. Or even, you know, more than that, I think it’s really important— like any property you buy should really ideally be in your family for as long as it can be, you know? Like, if you have property, if you have, you know, acres or something like that, expect to build all your kids’ houses there, you know what I mean? That’s I think the mindset we have to have, and it’s very different, but it’s so much better. And it’s so much— like a lot of the pain in the modern world is self-imposed. It is— we choose to live this painful and also sinful life, you know? And ultimately, sin— you know, sin isn’t fun; like, sin isn’t joyful. You know, there might be some fleeting enjoyment, but like, you know, I think that if anything, in most cases, people need to be more true to what they kind of know is the right thing to do or the thing that’s going to— I don’t know— re— like there’s a lot of— it’s like what I said earlier. Growing up as a young Protestant, there were a lot of things, you know, I grew up with where I’m kind of like, “This is kind of weird that we do this. Isn’t this— I don’t know— isn’t this like weird VBS stuff where we’re dancing and like goofing around? There are all these light colors. Is this really the appropriate way to worship God?” You know, you kind of have this like reaction. It’s very natural, you know? And it doesn’t just apply to faith; it applies to everything in life.
Like, if the fact that— I mean, let’s say schooling— I’m a big proponent of what’s called unschooling, which is really just like don’t send your kids to school. You know, let them learn in the natural way. If they have intellectual aspirations, they will naturally run across those. If they don’t, they don’t need a massive formal education, you know? And that’s one thing where schooling is a great example where it’s so unnatural. You take these kids, you put them in a classroom for eight hours a day; they don’t have— and guess what? They don’t behave because it’s evil what you’re doing in essence. And, oh, well, we’ll just give them Ritalin, and we’ll give them drugs if they’re not— you know, it’s so— every— like it’s not just the stimulus is bad, but the response to the stimulus is bad, and like it just gets worse and worse. And so that’s why it’s important, as I said, if you’re going to be in the world, you know, and I struggle with this as well, but if you’re going to be in the world, just dip your toes a little bit if you need something. But the rest, you should be able to leave at any point, you know?
Yeah.
What’s really sad is when someone is 10 years into a career, and they just don’t feel like they can get out of it. That’s sad. I mean, that is slavery. It’s really— it is slavery, and it’s also being a slave to the world, you know, in a bad sense, the world, you know?
Yeah, definitely.
Yeah, I think there’s a huge problem with schooling. It doesn’t actually teach people skills. Like, they learn all the— they learn all these facts that aren’t actually applicable to their life. And I think there’s a huge— there’s a lot of truth in what you said about, you know, people who have aptitude are naturally going to search out these things. Like, I know lots of people who are homeschooled, and they’re, you know, very high achievers because, you know, they don’t need— you don’t need to sit in a classroom for, you know, eight hours a day. And, you know, especially with what they’re teaching nowadays, it’s just completely unproductive, and it’s actually destructive to children. And it’s all meant to just socialize them, not actually make them free, independent people. And I think that’s the whole problem with the system is they want to disconnect people from the basic tasks that humans used to do, like, you know, food collection, building a house. Like, the average person in high school isn’t going to be able to think, “Oh, I can build a house,” because there are all these regulations, and you have to do— you know, you have to use all these tools and stuff like that. But it really— if you’re building something simpler like the Amish or some of these traditional communities, it doesn’t need to be that complicated. We’ve just overcomplicated it so much.
And, you know, houses are so big now; they’re like, you know, they make— you know, the square footage just keeps increasing and increasing. Of course, if you’re making like a huge house, it’s going to take a lot of skilled labor. But I think really getting back to— I think really the core of it is individualism or like toxic individualism versus some form of collectivism is that especially Orthodox Christians in America, we should see ourselves as a collective on the local level because those are the people that are going to be impacting your life the most. And getting really connected with them— keeping wealth within your communities, keeping your toes, you know, as little in the world as possible. Because we really want— we don’t want to be like the world. We don’t want to— I mean, because the world inflames our passions and distracts us, really.
Yeah, yeah.
And I think the thing, again, like the hard thing for me or anyone else is we have to be willing to kind of make sacrifices to get to that point.
Yeah.
And once we’re there, it becomes a lot easier. It becomes easier as you go on, you know? It’s not like— I remember one of my old videos that I don’t know if it was one of my more popular ones, but it was— I think it was one of the more impactful ones in terms of like the responses I got or emails where I’m like, “Will you ever stand up for yourself?” or something like that, where it was talking— it wasn’t really about the— can you say that on— you know, the thing a couple years ago? Is that banned? I don’t know. Can we talk about the vaccines?
By the way, I assume all that’s all been memory-holed, so I can talk about the vaccines, whatever. So, the COVID vaccines or whatever, which I didn’t really talk about those, but what annoyed me why I did that video is like these guys who are like, “I don’t want to get the vaccine, but I’m going to give in because I just have to.” And I think my point in that video is like if you’re going to give in now, that’s just giving them license next time to— for the next thing you’re going to have to give into. That’s going to be another struggle. Whereas if you make the stand now, it’s actually going to be easier, you know? And that’s kind of how I look at it. Like, I’m glad that I actually moved when I did, you know? I’m glad that I lost everything when I was 25 instead of when I was 30. That would have been a lot harder, and actually, property’s a lot more expensive, you know? So, it would have been a mess.
But, yeah, and so, yeah, all these things in the world— like, I remember seeing your videos about modern, you know, TV and movies and how it really feeds into this cycle. And, you know, there’s propaganda on every level from the education system and ads, TV, movies. And I think that’s why we’re seeing such a growth in like alternative entertainment, alternative education. But, yeah, how do you— I don’t even believe in the alternatives, so—
Yeah, so I— what’s an issue to me is when people— people, you know, they don’t like, “Oh, well, I don’t like this TV show or I don’t like the news, so I’m going to make my own news.” And in reality, like all of that kind of stuff is really a spiritual distraction. I think even— I think even being too invested in things like politics or something like that can really be— can really just, I don’t know, cover your spiritual eye, and you read things in a wrong way, and you invest yourself in the wrong things that ultimately you don’t have control over. You know, like that’s kind of the— I guess the thing about democracy that’s really pernicious, that’s really kind of evil, is that it’s based on a lie that we can control power in the world. You know, we can control the principalities and powers. If anything, it’s so wicked because it gets people invested in it because they feel like they can affect things, and that is a spiritual distraction. And that is— you get invested in these things that you can’t control, and you start rooting for a team.
Even if that’s not to say all— everyone’s in politics is equal; I’m not saying that or anything. But I’m just saying it’s not for us to be invested in it. It’s a distraction. Same thing with most of this stuff. Like, there is no alternative for— you know, people would often ask me like, “Hey, Luke, you’re in free software. What’s a good free software alternative for like Twitter or Reddit or something like that?” And it’s like, I mean, there are some, but you shouldn’t be using them. Like, just stop. You just close the screen.
Here, oh, I don’t want to do— probably going to mess something up. But, you know, yeah.
Yeah, because all these things are ultimately meant to sedate us. I really think they’re— they’re bread and circuses. These shouldn’t be the things that define our life, the TV shows and your job and things like that. It should be the people around you, focusing on them, your local church. Because people who like hyper-obsess about like politics and like things in the world— I mean, on the left and right, I noticed that they’re just very doomer and blackpilled, and they’re like sad about something that was never even in their control in the first place because they have that illusion that, you know, if we just win this election, everything’s, you know, going to change. And it’s not. There can be good changes from elections, but it’s just— your ultimate hope should not be in that. It’s like you should be focusing on your own repentance because that’s ultimately what’s going to matter at the final judgment. It’s not going to matter, you know, how much you cared about this certain political issue. It’s going to be really— were you Christlike? Were you humble?
Yeah, yeah.
And that especially— the kind of political— I don’t want to talk too much even indirectly about politics, but I think it— the complexity of the world is so great that individual humans— truly, it’s so difficult to actually understand how things are going to be affected by this policy change or the other. There are some things that are very black and white. Okay, you know, abortion is demonic, okay? Things like that. But even then, when you have the layer of democracy on top, you actually don’t know, okay, well, maybe Trump is more likely to, you know, do something about abortion even though he says he’s not going to. But you also might get worse stuff in Israel because of him. You know, there’s all this kind of stuff going on, and ultimately, I’m just not qualified. I don’t— I’m not a spirit-bearing elder that can see the future and I know exactly how to interact with all this kind of stuff.
So, I think it’s very unwise to be emotionally attached to it most of all. I’m not going to fault someone who like votes in an election. Oh, you know, whatever. I think there’s something weird about— I will say like I become kind of wary about participation in that in general. But like I’m not going to fault someone definitely for voting or something like that. But most important, no matter what you do, is you don’t have spiritual distractions when you’re living your spiritual life, and you’re focused on— you know, you can’t beat all the evil in the world. You’re not under obligation to do that. You have to beat the evil within yourself, and, you know, that’s really the struggle. That’s a struggle. It’s very difficult even to do it for yourself, but like don’t bite off more than you can chew that you have no hope of chewing, you know?
Yeah, exactly.
I think that’s what living in this modern age and like being hyperconnected to everything, it makes you feel like you do have— like you can make a change on these like global things when it’s all ultimately just leading you to despair versus just focusing on— on that. It’s defeat the evil within yourself. That’s the whole approach of Orthodoxy. It’s like if you want to— if you want to save other people, focus on your own
I think that’s what living in this modern age and being hyperconnected to everything makes you feel like—you do have the ability to make a change on these global issues. However, it ultimately just leads you to despair versus focusing on defeating the evil within yourself. That’s the whole approach of Orthodoxy: if you want to save other people, focus on your own repentance. And that’s really difficult—confronting your own sins every single day.
So, my final question for you is: what advice would you give to young men in general? Like, a young man who’s in high school. I’ve got a lot of young Zoomers watching my channel, so is there any overall advice that you would give on how to succeed in life?
I can say a couple of things. I’ll give the precursor of, again, be careful about my advice because I’m no big authority. But I will say there are a couple of things I notice. One of the big things—here’s maybe something you’ve never noticed about my channel: I’ve never done videos relating anything to girls. One of the reasons I do that is because I think modern men are way over-invested in that area, more than they should be. That’s not me saying they should all be monks, but I do think that, in the same way that you don’t want to have too much investment in a very particular plan for your future, you don’t want to be too invested in a passion.
I think a lot of guys have a vicious cycle where a lot of their self-worth comes from women and that kind of stuff. So, I would say a couple of things about that. Firstly, I think it’s important to keep perspective. If you’re a young guy, don’t worry—you have to set a lot of things straight with yourself before you get married or have a successful marriage in the first place.
One thing that I think I may have said on a live stream, but this is a good way of thinking about it: imagine you’re in your apartment or house, and knock knock knock—who’s at the door? You open it up, and it’s the girl of your dreams. Are you even ready for that girl? Are you prepared? Because honestly, most of the guys who are constantly thinking about girls are nowhere close.
If you’re a guy, you have a little more leeway with age, obviously. You can be a little older and still get married; it’s not an issue. So, I would just say I’m very happy whenever I see a young man who’s not constantly thirsty for female attention. That’s a big relief. And guess what? I truly think it is actually kind of a scam that men are told they’re supposed to have all these desires and passions for women.
It’s important to remember that if you look at other cultures, most cultures in the world will have the idea that women are inherently more romantic but also more sensual than males naturally. That’s pretty much a given assumption in almost any culture. But we have this very opposite idea where men are told that they just need females all the time, and it’s just not so.
I would say that I think women can be, again, and I would say that a lot of men, although they have a lot of improvements to make, should not be in a position where they just get female attention and run with foolishness. Another thing I would say that’s related to that—and again, take my advice with a grain of salt; I’m not a big spiritual authority and this is not even advice—this is just something for young men to keep in mind.
A lot of people talk about the conversion of men to the church; you know, a bunch of men coming in. There are a lot of girls coming in now, but there seem to be more men than women in America right now. A lot of people talk about that as if it’s a bad thing. I understand that, because a lot of these guys, like I just said, are kind of thirsty—they want females in their life.
I will just say I think it’s worth considering that some of those guys right now, God might intend for them not to be married. We need monks; we need bishops. I’m not saying that you out there right now are worthy to be something like that, but I think keep that in mind. If you grow up in a Protestant society, you’ve never even had the category of someone who has a full life that is powerful and impactful, and you even have a lot of the joys of marriage in having spiritual children and having a huge impact on the world you’re in.
Even if you’re living a life of prayer, I think there’s so much in that, and you don’t have a concept of that. So, there’s a possibility that a lot of these guys frankly should at least consider the alternative, which is a higher calling. Those who are called for that, that is a higher calling to work as a monastic.
I was talking to a guy who went to one of the churches I go to sometimes, St. Mary of Egypt in Atlanta. What a wonderful parish! I don’t know, everyone should go there if they’re anywhere near. What a blessing to be in the Atlanta area! I don’t think anyone’s ever said that, but to go to that church is truly wonderful.
I remember talking to a guy there who, just as an experiment—as many of them do—stayed at the monastery for a brief period, contemplated becoming a monk, and eventually decided against it. He was tonsured a reader and was helping them with services and stuff like this. But it gives you a taste of a fuller Christian life.
I’ll say as well, if you’re a young man in that position where you’re single or whatever, there’s so much for you to accomplish. There’s so much advancement for you to make in the Orthodox Church. Obviously, you usually have your prayer book that has morning and evening prayers. I would also consider talking to your priest or someone else about praying the hours. I think it’s a wonderful thing for people to do. If you have free time at your house or if you have an extra, a little longer lunch break, you can pray an hour. You can learn how to do that, and it’s a wonderful thing.
I say that because if you’re a single man who has a lot of time and you’re on the internet too much, there is already a full world of prayer that you can participate in. Whether you’re going to be a monastic or whether you’re going to be married, it’s going to prepare you for both. When you get married and you’re going to be praying with your wife or your family, you want to have a good habit established. You want to be used to this kind of stuff.
So, I would say in general, whether you’re going to be married or a monastic, the things you need to do are basically the same. You need to divest from the sensuality of the world. You are over-invested in women. I think people just need that perspective and contemplate the alternative of monasticism. But don’t listen to me and think you’re going to be a monk; listen to someone who is a spiritual authority. Get a spiritual father, go to a monastery, say you’re interested in it.
I’ve met many people. There’s a convert I met at St. Mary of Egypt; he actually was a convert from, I think his parents were liberal Jews or something. But his conversion was he read a wonderful book that I just read, “Brothers Karamazov.” I don’t know if you’ve read that, but it’s so beautiful. It’s a good book to read, not even necessarily for the plot, but it gives you a viewpoint of an elder or the Orthodox mindset if you don’t have it—what it’s like to live in an Orthodox society where people bless each other and all this kind of stuff.
Either way, this convert I met had started reading “Brothers Karamazov,” got halfway through, and just had to throw down the book. He said, “I have to convert; there’s something going on.” He says that he wants to pursue monasticism. Most people out there who are listening to this are probably going to be married; that’s probably what God has in mind for them. But I’m just saying for those of you—those one or two who might be considering it—consult a spiritual authority about it.
One more thing, not necessarily about the same topic, but just as advice to young men: I think it’s important to read the scripture readings of the day and read scripture and stuff like that. But I think the best part of the scriptures are the Gospels. A lot of people read the Bible with the wrong mindset, including myself. I would read the Bible, especially if you’re a convert; you might read it for argumentative reasons or apologetic reasons.
A helpful way to read the Gospels that I’ve recently kind of adopted is to read the Gospels and assume whenever there’s a bad guy, you’re the bad guy. You are the Pharisees; you are the Samaritan woman; you’re the woman caught in adultery. You are all of those things. Approach the Christian faith with humility, and look to authority when it’s there. I think it’s hard to go wrong there because you want to question your own impulses—even the things in you that might be good.
There might be impulses I have that I think are good, like seeking independence. There’s a good aspect of that, but there can be something evil with that as well. So, just be vigilant.
Is there anything else I should say? No, that’s perfect. I mean, men need to focus on themselves and become the best version of themselves, especially on that spiritual level. Even going to a monastery, making pilgrimages—even if it’s just for a weekend—start with something like that. Just see what it’s like at a monastery. You’re not going to regret it. Whatever your path is—if you’re going to be a priest, married, or a monk—that time at the monastery is going to be good. They’ll have you do some work; you’ll get some physical growth and some spiritual growth. It’s just going to be good for you.
I think it’s just important to be physically close to other Orthodox people, even those who are sometimes still figuring things out. It’s important for us to be physically close. You know, we try to do as many little events as possible at our parish, even though we’re small. Sometimes we’ll meet up in the middle of the week at the parish and just have a meal.
I think again, the goal is for us all to be physically next to each other, within walking distance. Now, we might not be able to achieve that in this next generation; it might be a difficulty. But just go forth humbly, without arrogance. I hope I can do that; I give that advice, and I hope I can do it.
It all starts when you actually go to church. That’s why I always promote the Orthodoxy in America Church locator, so you can find a local church and get involved there. The churches all need help; you can be an altar server, you can help in the choir, you can help on the church board. There are so many different things, and even if you just try out for a while, that’s how you get to know people in your local community. Since America is so spread out, going to that church, you’re actually going to meet your neighbors, which is great.
Thank you so much! I really enjoyed this interview. I’m glad that we could do it, and if you’re open, I would love to do a part two. If anyone has any questions or topics they want us to cover, just comment them below, and maybe Luke and I can do that in the future.
Thank you so much!
Sure! Yeah, that sounds like a great idea. I’d love to do something like that sometime soon.
Awesome! God bless!
@redhairedshanks5845 - 2024-12-17 12:43:45
NO WAY DUDE. he finally fixed his thinkpad!+1 tys.
@GeorgeFy - 2024-12-17 12:43:45
Kyle managed to bring back Luke smith, God bless you Kyle+907
@JLG629 - 2024-12-17 12:43:45
Luke looking like a 2nd century monastic monk. I dig it+431
@Johnathan_Porkinstein - 2024-12-17 12:43:45
I legit thought he was shanked in the balkans+576
@klokmami - 2024-12-17 12:43:45
You did it brooooo. Luke smith is back. God bless bro. Luke I hope you're doing well. I still read your old blog posts on your website.+255
@tomatofractal - 2024-12-17 12:43:45
I am amazed. I used to watch Luke's videos about Linux, GNU, and never noticed that he was orthodox christian. God bless you Kyle and Luke. Glory to our Lord Jesus Christ+230
@boomer-d9q - 2024-12-17 12:43:45
I can't express how happy I am to see he's still around.+61
@christosbq - 2024-12-17 12:43:45
God Bless you Kyle, I remember asking you one stream to have Luke on. Glad it finally happened!+68
@SinkingStarship - 2024-12-17 12:43:45
Luke stops by my parish occasionally when he's in town, great guy. Would love to see some new stuff from him.+160
@thomas-hall - 2024-12-17 12:43:45
Luke is the absolute GOAT and so are you for bringing him on. Large reason I'm Orthodox today!+87
@supaF - 2024-12-17 12:43:45
Luke Smith helped me not be bug pilled. thanks for coming back to the internet, Luke, and thanks for bringing him on Kyle+78
@knightrider585 - 2024-12-17 12:43:45
Great to see Luke again. I have been regularly attending divine liturgy for the first time in my life since the start of this year. God willing, I will be baptised in January.+68
@JoaoVitor-pm7rb - 2025-01-17 12:43:45
HE'S ALIVE!!! HE"S NOT DEAD, THE TRULY CHAD!!!+59
@MoggingTowardsBethlehem - 2025-03-17 12:43:45
loved this Fyodor Dostoevsky interview!+13
@JoeyG-o8r - 2025-03-17 12:43:45
yooo he's alive! Luke inspires me to step away from the internet each lent. It starts tomorrow this year, which is why I looked him up today. God bless!+10
@michaelns9887 - 2024-12-17 12:43:45
Now this is real Monk Mode+175
@jerome6193 - 2024-12-17 12:43:45
My wife and I got ahead of ourselves. We started homeschooling on a single income before owning a home/land. It lasted 2 and half years. We are now back to all the children being in school and my wife working. We are sacrificing a year of our ideal lifestyle to get ahead financially. It sucks but we have to push through it. Canada's economy is rough right now.+24
@imissnickplur4964 - 2024-12-17 12:43:45
Great to see LUKE again! what a TREAT!+43
@okinawabongrip - 2024-12-17 12:43:45
You brought Luke Smith back! Thank you!+36
@sunderkeenin - 2025-01-17 12:43:45
I knew that Luke was truly having a better life when he stopped uploading for so long and it's great to see such a confirmation of that. Most things Luke said has implied that the day he stops uploading is the day we should be happier for him, and that does seem to be true.+26
@OrthodoxKyle - 2024-12-17 12:43:45
😂😂+70
@spaceghost0813 - 2024-12-17 12:43:45
He finally got TempleOS up and running+82
@myaccount0000 - 2024-12-17 12:43:45
finally arch install recovered+28
@einc-btw - 2025-01-17 12:43:45
@OrthodoxKyle hey what is that intro song... It sounds familiar but I can't work it out..+1
@x-12plus60 - 2025-03-17 12:43:45
@einc-btw yeaah broo plz come back if you find it out+1
@marro1916 - 2024-12-17 12:43:46
Why would I bless him?+4
@perti888 - 2025-02-17 12:43:46
@marro1916 🤓+9
@enderman_666 - 2025-01-17 12:43:46
monastic monk+26
@chemmius - 2025-03-17 12:43:46
I don't know about that. He looks more like a 19th century Russian mathematician to me...+12
@əöü - 2025-04-17 12:43:46
he is from prison lol+2
@KhawārijGooner - 2025-05-20 12:43:46
monastic monk+3
@Hero_Of_Old - 2024-12-17 12:43:46
Lmao+14
@Ratimir101 - 2024-12-17 12:43:46
You know nothing about Balkans then+22
@lithn669 - 2024-12-17 12:43:46
From the looks of him he got kidnapped to a monastery+56
@kompassorpigo7600 - 2024-12-17 12:43:46
@Ratimir101 aww did the obvious joke hurt your feelings?+22
@Ratimir101 - 2024-12-17 12:43:46
@kompassorpigo7600 that joke is stale as mummy+11
@xeriasual - 2024-12-17 12:43:46
@Ratimir101 jokes have roots in truth and it wasn't the joke that hurt your feelings.+12
@jamesevans2507 - 2025-03-17 12:43:46
@xeriasual what truth is that? How about you tell me the truth about how many shankings happened in the Balkans in the last 5 years compared to Londonistan or the Emirate of France?+5
@flawlessvic - 2025-05-20 12:43:47
He just posted 3 videos over the past week. Finally! ha+1
@Sever3dHead - 2024-12-17 12:43:47
he never was at that time+13
@improvisedchaos8904 - 2024-12-17 12:43:47
He had made a couple mentions of the Orthodox Church. Luke helped tip me to using Gentoo as a daily driver, then put Orthodoxy on my radar as a bonus.+31
@slowboywhiteboardv4 - 2024-12-17 12:43:47
Same! I never knew!+2
@ryanpmcguire - 2024-12-17 12:43:47
Wow, that came out if nowhere+2
@syloui - 2024-12-17 12:43:47
The arch Linux to orthodoxy pipeline is real+18
@P3rformula - 2024-12-17 12:43:47
He said he was going to a Southern Baptist church initially after moving back to Florida. I stopped following him during covid and I guess it was at that time that he changed to Orthodox.+3
@OrthodoxKyle - 2024-12-17 12:43:47
Thank you ☦️🙏+17
@mememan9890 - 2025-01-17 12:43:47
Whats bugpilled?+4
@ZeEduardo95 - 2025-02-17 12:43:47
@mememan9890 check the concept of the bug man or luke dabbing on nerds+6
@OrthodoxKyle - 2024-12-17 12:43:48
Glory to God ☦️🙏+4
@michaelns9887 - 2024-12-17 12:43:48
Герман Стерлигов mode+15
@mountainmanmcbeachfront5296 - 2024-12-17 12:43:48
IM MMMMONKINGGG+8
@microcolonel - 2024-12-17 12:43:48
Luke pointed me to the Orthodox Church years ago, and this year I was finally received after about four years of spotty catechesis. :+ ) ☦︎+13
@nousquest - 2024-12-17 12:43:48
32:44 "I was doing my degree... PHD... or whatever" Classic Luke Smith+143
@BillyCarlyleYoutube - 2024-12-17 12:43:48
It's really good to hear from Luke again, glad he's doing well. He'd always said he wanted to get off of YouTube and the internet more generally, so I figured he'd reached a point where he thought it was time. Good job on the interview, thanks for putting it together.+12
@m0mason690 - 2024-12-17 12:43:48
Luke Smith’s Youtube channel introduced me to Orthodoxy. It’s great to hear from him again and that he is Orthodox now. Thanks for this video Kyle! Glory to God!+28
@Hallowed_Knight - 2024-12-17 12:43:48
THE MOMENT WEVE BEEN WAITING FOR+52
@sonicfan826 - 2024-12-17 12:43:48
The two folks who inspired me to look into Orthodoxy, God bless you! Not yet gone to a church yet but I want to be orthodox, please pray for me guys I'm a 16 year old inquirer+42
@hv-1944 - 2024-12-17 12:43:48
Great interview. I haven’t seen Luke smith in ages. I used to watch his videos on Linux and tiling window managers along with Mental Outlaw, Distrotube etc. He is a treasure to the Linux community. God bless you+13
@neizih2809 - 2025-01-17 12:43:48
Very glad to see Luke Smith again, I'm a young man and since I've seen his video some time ago my perspective on things changed a lot, I'm really thankful for his videos. Glad to see him doing well+5
@lGalaxisl - 2024-12-17 12:43:48
Been watching Luke's videos lately, and learned he is also Orthodox. This new interview makes me happy, thank you Kyle!+6
@knight_gabriel - 2025-01-17 12:43:48
I swear Luke has boosted world economy by 3 trillion $ with his tech and Linux videos. Then boosted spirituality of all those he helped get on their feet. Great man, love him, he doesn't know I exist but he helped me so much I basically owe him my life. One in a million, absolutely brilliant man.+5
@kaiowasdeath - 2025-01-17 12:43:48
Thank you very much for sharing this, Kyle! We finally know that Luke is alive and well and alright! Cheers, dude!😊+3
@CallMeZatiel - 2025-05-17 12:43:48
Luke Smith is my hero <3+2
@minerForAHeartOfGold - 2024-12-17 12:43:48
My name is David. God bless you both. I am very grateful for everything I have learned from Luke and his YouTube channel. He has been a great inspiration. Thanks to Luke I decided to return to the path of the Orthodox faith. Please send him this thanks from me+5
@FrickelbudeCH - 2025-04-17 12:43:48
Glad to see that Luke is alive and well!+2
@itsamemarkus - 2025-05-17 12:43:48
My brain lost 7 vim keybindings watching this+7
@joemulhern - 2024-12-17 12:43:48
Luke has been an inspiration to me for many years and I still love his blog posts. So glad to hear from him again+4
@Hallvard0 - 2025-01-17 12:43:48
Glory to God! Many years Luke, after following you for years and your channel it's so wonderful to see you join us as a brother in Christ. God bless you brother, blessings from an Orthodox in Sweden+5
@voinoiudarie3361 - 2024-12-17 12:43:48
WHEN THE WORLD NEEDED HIM THE MOST HE RETURNED+11
@repentandseekChrist - 2024-12-17 12:43:48
Very glad to see you back Luke! 😊+8
@iavv334 - 2025-01-17 12:43:48
God bless you Kyle and Luke, merry Christmas+3
@folksurvival - 2025-02-17 12:43:49
Cringe.+1
@THE_ADAM_WEST - 2025-01-17 12:43:49
Yep hahaha+4
@OrthodoxKyle - 2024-12-17 12:43:49
🙏🙏☦️+9
@Olav_96 - 2024-12-17 12:43:49
You need to participate in the divine liturgy.+3
@sonicfan826 - 2024-12-17 12:43:49
@Olav_96 I know but I can't+1
@Hallvard0 - 2025-01-17 12:43:49
God bless friend, see if you can contact a priest.+1
@folksurvival - 2025-03-17 12:43:49
WineMomEnjoyer So you want me to lie? Why? Save from what? What was my comment? It has varnished.+1
@mountainmanmcbeachfront5296 - 2024-12-17 12:43:50
Dude I was just showing people some of his vids on Christ the other day+2
@Blenzo480 - 2024-12-17 12:43:50
Luke got me into the Orthodox sphere of YouTube form his Linux videos.+66
@aliencreation8744 - 2025-01-17 12:43:50
good to see luke back, missed him. Please make more videos luke.+4
@hll97fr16 - 2024-12-17 12:43:50
I don't know about theosis, but Luke Smith is definitely going into Stallmanosis+23
@TH1NK3R3R - 2025-04-17 12:43:50
no wayyy he's alive! looking like a sage, I am 3 months late after checking every month before it+3
@Lex-by3xf - 2024-12-17 12:43:50
been waiting for this one!+10
@youtubeenjoyer1743 - 2024-12-17 12:43:50
Minimalism, wowzers! It's just like the blocks in Minecraft!+32
@Netherilt - 2024-12-17 12:43:50
Glad to see this guy is still alive+7
@TheCommentor- - 2024-12-17 12:43:50
Kyle the amount of Linux bros you will introduce Christianity to through this video will be huge+81
@qsam14 - 2024-12-17 12:43:50
OMG. It's Luke Smith! I used to watch his Linux videos and vlogs. Glad to see you have connected with Luke and share on your channel!+6
@ross.the.roofer - 2024-12-17 12:43:50
I found Luke smith from Kyle. Found Luke smiths channel powerfully stimulating. Became sad he left YouTubes, but understand (thanks to his videos) why he had to go. Now he back on Kyle. How sublime.+12
@letusplay2296 - 2025-05-17 12:43:50
Man, I really needed to see this video. I forgot about how beneficial Luke's videos had been on my mindset when I was in University. I just started living in a new country and I'm somewhat isolated from the rest of my religious community (although I do pray with the only other person in my area once a week) and it's been more difficult than ever to keep myself from becoming tempted by the satanic distractions I see around me. Thank you.+1
@dinochicken1178 - 2024-12-17 12:43:50
I went to St Mary’s last week. Beautiful perish, very nice people there too. One guy bought me an icon ☦️+13
@beybladeguru101 - 2024-12-17 12:43:50
It's so great to hear from Luke Smith after so long, especially with all of this great advice that pertains so much to my current experience as an inquirer into the Church for the past year or so. Thank you for bringing him back after so long. It's funny that most of the people here are fans that came here from his Linux videos, but the way that I came across him were through his "political" videos, and later finding out that we both studied economics and linguistics(a strangely common combination, actually). His "Not Related" podcast series was amazing, and I've watched it many times, including his episode about Jesus and the meaning of the "Logos." I was still an "agnostic" at the time, and that video didn't convert me, but I strangely resonated with it be because I had stoicist leanings then. Only when I started going to Church did the pieces come together for that podcast and his other videos to make sense. P.S. I only started using Linux a few days ago+5
@Ortho_Wisdom - 2024-12-17 12:43:50
Glory To Our Lord And God Jesus Christ Forever Amin+34
@ZZFilm - 2025-05-27 12:43:50
For anyone interested in Old Believers, there are three really great films made by Jana Sevcikova that come on a dvd bundle called “Old Believers” and it’s 100% worth tracking down. May be hard to find. I’ll add a trailer after this comment.+3
@biswadeepdey106 - 2025-02-17 12:43:50
Luke's video about standing up for myself has been pivoital in changing my life's course from being a corporate slave to a free man. Good to know that he is alive and well. God bless him.+2
@CaydenJohnson-kz7fj - 2024-12-17 12:43:50
I haven't seen Luke Smith in so long, great to see he's still doing okay+4
@dfc6117 - 2025-01-17 12:43:50
Luke looking like a Dostoyevski novel character. Glad seeing him so good. May God bless you all.+16
@dashi3l - 2025-02-17 12:43:50
cant believe my eyes that luke smith came back+4
@botmanemcassiopeia2865 - 2025-02-17 12:43:50
Luke please bring back the NotRelated podcast+7
@gknight686 - 2024-12-17 12:43:50
Yeah actually me too he was my first exposure to it+5
@KingOfComedyXD - 2024-12-17 12:43:50
TempleOS led me to Orthodoxy (seriously)+8
@Mojo_DK - 2025-01-17 12:43:50
I am so sorry to hear that.+1
@Blenzo480 - 2025-01-17 12:43:50
@Mojo_DK Why? Lol+2
@Mojo_DK - 2025-01-17 12:43:50
@Blenzo480 Believing in some non-personal, non-physical origin to reality might make sense to some people...although it does not convince me. But going from that to any human made religion with weirdly specific rules and traditions makes no sense. Especially if Luke is convinced that god is not a person with feeling or a personality. Everything said is also diametrically opposed to the ideal of being humble. In this video, it is claimed that other people believe something that is not true and that they are sinners. Claiming to know how the world works, where we come from and what everything means is the opposite of being humble. It is also weird to me that there is an authority that can interpret the bible and nobody else can. How is this compatible with everything Luke used to believe. What happened to the smart free thinker that I respected. And how can anybody dare to claim to know what god wants us to do. So I guess I am sorry to hear that in your search of community and happiness you got caught in an institution that is created to give some humans the power over others, believing in things that are not founded in rationality. The fact that Luke does not see that is just baffling. But if it makes you happy, you of course are free to live the life you want.+5
@runeheadah - 2025-01-17 12:43:50
@Mojo_DK That's exactly right. Never, ever let anyone tell you that you are not allowed to find the truth without some "authority" telling you what to do. No man can ever have spiritual authority over you, or anyone else. If they can then do you really have the choice of truth versus lies, or are you just a puppet? I was sorry to hear that Luke chose to be a puppet.+3
@Pabloparsil - 2025-02-17 12:43:50
Nobody expected Linux to be a gateway drug to orthodoxy+4
@simpleprogrammingcodes - 2025-05-27 12:43:51
How is Linux connected to Orthodoxy in your opinion?+1
@Blenzo480 - 2025-06-03 12:43:51
@simpleprogrammingcodes It's not related. I could however, make the argument that Linux users are often in favor of decentralized systems and Orthodox Christianity is a decentralized church. All the bishops have equal authority. Where Catholicism the bishop of Rome is the centralized authority of the church.+2
@michaeldonnelly8068 - 2024-12-17 12:43:51
Linux bro here that used to watch Luke before his thinkpad broke checking in+24
@NitroNilz - 2025-05-27 12:43:51
Fantastic!+1
@Imbenthatsall - 2024-12-17 12:43:51
Amen. God bless+3
@repentandseekChrist - 2024-12-17 12:43:51
Amen ☦️+2
@ZZFilm - 2025-05-27 12:43:52
https://youtu.be/dD3g8bfhZTg?si=S8X2NfCaGEGA1LPI+2
@NoahMReed1 - 2024-12-17 12:43:52
When will Arch be recognized as the official distro of the Orthodox Church?+60
@jimmlmao - 2025-05-17 12:43:52
No more linux videos but he is living life better now. God bless you Kyle and Luke+2
@Leo-t4i8v - 2024-12-17 12:43:52
I am a Linux user due Luke's tips. Thanks Luke Smith. I miss his tech videos.+8
@ChellSneed - 2024-12-17 12:43:52
Ex muslim here, Christ is King. I love you, luke.+93
@CrazyCaliforniaFishing - 2024-12-17 12:43:52
GOOD MORNING ALL!+40
@EnochHinaut - 2024-12-17 12:43:52
Wow he went full orthobro I actually remember when I first saw his video about living without the internet for a week.+18
@unaboomer7297 - 2025-03-17 12:43:52
He stopped going to restaurants in 2023 and now apparently he has stopped going barbers in 2024! Jokes aside, I'm glad to see him again.+5
@bbseal6174 - 2024-12-17 12:43:52
Nice, luke smith. I started watching him at the end of middle school, during my own secular phase. Helped bring me back to Catholicism.+5
@stuckmannen3876 - 2024-12-17 12:43:52
Luke was the first person ive heard talk about Orthodoxy.+11
@CursedKitten1 - 2025-05-27 12:43:52
This made me consider somehow paying or recruiting the Amish to one day build my house. There has to be some kind of deal I can make with them ...+3
@slowboywhiteboardv4 - 2024-12-17 12:43:52
The part where he said his mom told him she thought the Bible had been discovered and dug up out of the ground had me both laughing and crying.+9
@babaku3062 - 2025-01-17 12:43:52
It is good to see Mental Outlaw return to the web.+8
@joshuaduncan235 - 2024-12-17 12:43:52
Good to hear Luke mention his visit to Christ the Savior. Fr. Jonah was very helpful for me along the way to Orthodoxy as well.+4
@JonJon69420 - 2024-12-17 12:43:52
I hope for part 2, Luke is awesome,, as theme for part two anything goes for me+4
@Ahmedsmemoriesbsd - 2025-02-17 12:43:52
I'm watching this from my X260 ThinkPad running Arch Linux with suckless dwm using MPV to play this video.+7
@rotatedbear5924 - 2024-12-17 12:43:52
YAHOO! Luke smith is back.+15
@ToddMagnussonWasHere - 2025-01-17 12:43:52
I really enjoyed the last third of this video, on his comment on things we can control— I think some of his wisdom in his own videos from 2-3 years ago applies to politics or vices, people who get too invested in politics or the gender wars or this or that technology end up this episodic loop where they are willing to do the same thing over and over and over again in the form of that distraction, inevitably both men and women begin to fail at serial progression within physical, mental, and spiritual aspects of their life.+6
@DeliveringTrends - 2024-12-17 12:43:52
WOW! I thought Luke was totally AWOL! Nice you can interview him.+19
@BrettSayles - 2024-12-17 12:43:52
"Go forth humbly, without arrogance" This...+7
@AlexRobin78 - 2024-12-17 12:43:52
What a fresh perspective for young men. I needed to hear that.+2
@johnpaulhumphrey2981 - 2025-01-17 12:43:53
Nah, CRUX will be+3
@danni222 - 2025-01-17 12:43:53
arch is the official distro of the lgbt+ church😂+18
@HiboMan - 2025-02-17 12:43:53
@danni222 Dude what the hell You aren't funny+2
@rafaelf.9246 - 2025-02-17 12:43:53
Didn't age well+3
@NoahMReed1 - 2025-02-17 12:43:53
@ what do you mean?+2
@thames5328 - 2024-12-17 12:43:53
What convinced you to convert?+1
@ChellSneed - 2024-12-17 12:43:53
@thames5328 I am from iraq. I can't explain it that well, but I guess it is like revelation story and you can't point which part made me seek it in the first place, but I saw God hand at work in my life. And I had a feeling that can't even be described. a feeling of belonging and rest. Christ turned me from a wicked loser into a good man.+19
@Kenanalasadi8989 - 2024-12-17 12:43:53
fake..+14
@Om4r37 - 2024-12-17 12:43:53
@ChellSneed that’s strange because muslims also believe in god 😂+4
@pacman_pol_pl_polska - 2024-12-17 12:43:53
@Kenanalasadi8989 mad cuz bad+5
@Dutelus - 2024-12-17 12:43:53
MORNINGGG!!!!!!!!!+2
@WozzyWatkins - 2024-12-17 12:43:53
GOOOODDDD MORNINGGG+2
@yongtenglei7075 - 2025-03-17 12:43:54
God bless…. He is still alive.+2
@grassconsumingfire - 2024-12-17 12:43:54
Should've asked him what the most Orthodox linux distro is. Thanks for bringing him back.+37
@nodis4074 - 2025-01-17 12:43:54
YESSSSSSSS HE'S BACK+3
@Aaron-Ansell - 2024-12-17 12:43:54
Woah, the guy who brought me into the Church is interviewing the first friend I made in the Church+5
@DIOGENEShound - 2024-12-17 12:43:54
First liturgy this Sunday! Wish me luck please.+12
@GospodinStanoje - 2024-12-17 12:43:54
This was a good interview, but I believe it could be structured a little bit better. Luke loves, and we love him for that, to ramble, therefore I believe questions that require shorter answers or non open-ended questions, even as an interruptions sometimes, would be awesome. Maybe a bit more lively, a bit more back-and-forth. It seemed that you, Kyle, were a bit bored or distracted. I don't think that's the case, but it seemed like that when Luke used to speak for 7-10 minutes without interruption or push-back or some kind of sub-question. But again, this was hearing from Luke for the first time in almost two years so it's good enough. Thank you and God Bless. Maybe somebody can explain it to me, but I didn't quite catch what has made Luke into a believer after his atheism phase. He started attending the church because he thought:"Maybe this is not true, but in practice it is good" and then he believed over time? Did I get that right? (These are the kinds of things I wish Kyle could make more clear by asking them directly after or in the middle of his responses. I didn't understand many of the things he said) My questions for Luke part 2 would be: Also, I know this is kind of a Protestant-brain(even though I'm not a Protestant myself), but: 1) How does Luke, or any of you guys deal with "difficult passages"? (I don't know how to ask this question in a more sincere way without looking like a guy who is trying to be seen as sincere and then tries to be a smart-aleck know-it-all re**it atheist guy by having some knee-jerk pre-maid response) The priest in church I've asked told me - "You have to figure that on your own". Some very good people from the church told me:"Just keep coming to Church, that'll do it. You'll get the answers". I am doing that, but I would be lying if I was to say that something changed. I still find them difficult, especially in conversations with other people who are questioning my attendance at Liturgy. So I'd like to hear what Luke thinks about it. 2) How do we, as Orthodox people, square Evolution with the Genesis account? (I've read Luke's blogs over the years, but these are the things I still don't understand) In one Livestream, 2-3 years ago, some guy asked this question and Luke responded:"I don't know, I don't think too much about it." That is, kind of, the answer I get from all the other Orthodox people from the Church I attend. And it's good to see that most of Orthodox people have same or very similar answers, but I don't know what that means. What do I tell someone that asks me this question? Of course I'm going to say that I myself don't know, but what is the "official" Orthodox answer? I don't need or expect to have(or even get) an answer to every possible theological or Biblical question, but these seem to be surface-level questions that I don't have an answer to. 3) About the consciousness - ["The interaction problem"] If consciousness is not merely a product of our brain but something other-worldly, then why is our consciousness affected if we "prod" the brain? (I've read his blog post and analogy about brain being essentially something like a TV receiver. But why would that other-worldly thing be connected to brain and not a shoulder for example?) There are mysteries both ways. Mystery for a materialist is that we have NO idea how the consciousness work even if we, in theory, have all the parts and physical forces figured out. Also "redness" as a property in our mind is impossible to find when you cut open a brain. But I was wondering what he thinks about the interaction problem, or rather - Why does he think that other-worldly thing called "consciousness" is connected to the brain and not a shoulder or ring finger? Thanks.+14
@chronotriggerfan - 2024-12-17 12:43:54
Good to see Luke Smith is not only alive but alive in Christ!+3
@prostagma6055 - 2025-01-17 12:43:54
I was once told at the age of 22-23 by a younger serbian who was 17 that we are bad christians becouse of the plethora of beliefs and supersticions we maintain from the slavic pagan days i told him that if we preserved that that we probably maintained the autenticity of christianity as well and that did make him have an opiffany and he did change his mind+3
@Grizaptimus - 2025-01-17 12:43:54
I am a recent convert to orthodoxy. I used to watch Luke's videos about linux and whatnot, didn't have a clue he was orthodox!+3
@daars8159 - 2024-12-17 12:43:54
Never would've thought Kyle would bring back Luke Smith, legendary I remember watching all of his linux videos back in the day, insane how two great people converged on Orthodoxy.+3
@goyworldorder - 2024-12-17 12:43:54
wow, i didn't expect this at all. God bless Luke and Kyle, this is a more epic crossover than freaking Deadpool and the Avengers!!! :OOO+5
@kukaoot6077 - 2024-12-17 12:43:54
To @LukeSmithxyz and anyone else who liked the brothers Karamazov, consider also reading Dostoevsky's the idiot. The main character's honesty and trust is admirable and it's overall a joy to read.+4
@michaelns9887 - 2024-12-17 12:43:54
Luke had a lot to say and definitely has a lot more to say. I hope he goes back to making videos once in a while.+8
@JohnSmith-yt8di - 2025-01-17 12:43:54
If he had invested in a hair transplant he wouldn't have had to go down this route+16
@ambiguoustv7403 - 2025-01-17 12:43:54
My first instinct was to use ytdlp to download this vid something i learned from Luke Smith funny how much of an impact he's had+5
@allegoricalstatue - 2025-02-17 12:43:54
Holy {REDACTED}! He's actually still alive+4
@BrettSayles - 2024-12-17 12:43:54
Epic vid! Thanks Kyle!+2
@frittatas__ - 2024-12-17 12:43:54
I just want to thank Luke. When I first started watching him, it was only for Linux and tech related topics. I used to be a pretty nasty type of atheist, cursing Jesus for everything wrong in my life and I had no intention what so ever to return to orthodoxy. I was raised into the faith, being Greek and all, but around middle school I completely abandoned it. Unfortunately, it is very common for Greek people who have left Christianity to curse God, and I was no exception. Honestly I was really angry with God, without even knowing why; that lasted for 9 years give or take. The first time I started becoming interested again was after watching Luke's video on the Logos. I was still pretty against Christianity, mainly because of my pride. It is a serious hit to your ego to admit that you were wrong for all those years and return to your faith, so I seriously didn't want to go through that. It took me around half a year and a lot of miserable events in my life, to finally look past my pride and start getting back into my old faith. I doubt Luke is gonna read this, since he has basically left the internet, but thanks a lot man. That one video of yours was the start of a weird and impactful journey that I will be on for the rest of my life. God bless you and Kyle.+31
@OLinuksiePrzyKawie - 2024-12-17 12:43:54
Wow, Luke Smith is so humble here! Great to see him again!+1
@ezmonyi - 2024-12-17 12:43:54
Is this the latest Arch installation guide?+18
@evan7391 - 2024-12-17 12:43:54
Artix duh+9
@Persian_Rug_Merchant - 2024-12-17 12:43:54
Gentoo+3
@mountainmanmcbeachfront5296 - 2024-12-17 12:43:54
Alpine+1
@johnpaulhumphrey2981 - 2025-01-17 12:43:54
Its obviously CRUX+2
@pgmdps13 - 2025-03-17 12:43:54
Has to be debian+3
@NitroNilz - 2025-05-27 12:43:54
None of them. O is for OpenBSD. Minimal. Conservative. Traditional. Orthodox. Put it in your box. And be safe and saved. Amen. ☦ 🐡+2
@srcmge - 2025-05-27 12:43:54
@NitroNilz 🐡+2
@OrthodoxKyle - 2025-03-17 12:43:54
🤣🤣:_wow::_wow:+2
@maximilianmusterhans4659 - 2025-02-17 12:43:55
Lookism is one of the strongest brainrot memes.+2
@gonsonandenschinder - 2025-03-17 12:43:55
Looking good is objectively helpful in life+4
@OrthodoxKyle - 2025-03-17 12:43:55
Glory to God ☦☦+1
@robwyde1684 - 2025-01-17 12:43:55
Great interview. Please keep making videos Luke!+1
@Inevitable-Infarct - 2024-12-17 12:43:55
Dude this is awesome. I used to listen to Luke back when I was an atheist and he was one of the reasons I dug into Christianiy then he disappeared. So glad to him!+7
@TravisHi_YT - 2025-01-17 12:43:55
More Luke content to CONSOOOOOME!!!+5
@ytmorgen - 2024-12-17 12:43:55
If you're taking questions for a part two interview, I would love to hear more about why he chose EO over Catholicism.+6
@anasouardini - 2025-01-17 12:43:55
I remember where once Luke Smith trolled me into using DWM and ST 🤣+8
@Preserved-Faith-33 - 2024-12-17 12:43:55
That is so weird, I literally just watched the video saying “hopefully we collab but he stopped posting” this morning!+9
@manutebol956 - 2025-01-17 12:43:55
no way mental outlaws deepfake is back+9
@SandyCheeks1896 - 2024-12-17 12:43:55
I’m glad he’s alive!+3
@Novanim - 2025-01-17 12:43:55
Makes me happy seeing Luke alive and well.+1
@NuryPPanaligan - 2025-01-17 12:43:55
Thank God Luke is alive.+2
@er63438 - 2025-01-17 12:43:55
He's alive 🙌+3
@GavrielBrown - 2024-12-17 12:43:55
I would love for luke smith to become a writer and write a few books.+5
@kupo871 - 2024-12-17 12:43:55
I've missed him!!!+7
@drewberchtolzthofen886 - 2025-02-17 12:43:55
Yeah, was really glad to hear from Luke.+1
@Hero_Of_Old - 2024-12-17 12:43:55
I was thinking about Luke a few days ago, and here he is!+3
@burnzy3210 - 2025-03-17 12:43:55
Just when you thought luke couldn't get any more cringe and bald, he comes back as a christian of all things+5
@hwangillee1756 - 2024-12-17 12:43:55
Just wanted to let you know that you are the reason why I'm learning latin right now and so many other things. Plurimus Gratias tibi Luce!+3
@tato-chip7612 - 2024-12-17 12:43:55
he still looks like a runescape character+8
@boringnpc230 - 2025-03-17 12:43:55
I feel like he is getting closer and closer to becoming unabomber+4
@0xD90F39DFAE - 2025-01-17 12:43:55
i wish luke smith still posted videos+3
@thesmokecriminal5395 - 2024-12-17 12:43:56
They are the same thing really+2
@Ratselmeister - 2025-04-17 12:43:56
Me too, and i didnt stopped since.😂+3
@petargrabovac - 2024-12-17 12:43:56
bro brought back luke smith+5
@OpenBASED - 2024-12-17 12:43:56
That's interesting and all, but the real question is do he still use Artix?+9
@GhostofTradition - 2024-12-17 12:43:56
Wow made my day seeing this, haven't watched it yet but glad he's not gone 100% uncle Ted and comes out from time to time!+2
@MILLIONDOLLARPOVERTY - 2025-01-17 12:43:56
Linux and Orthodoxy go together like bread and wine+4
@jordanm2984 - 2024-12-17 12:43:56
HE LIVES!+3
@1Iljo1 - 2024-12-17 12:43:56
WE ARE SO BACK!!, Praise the Lord+12
@SandyCheeks1896 - 2024-12-17 12:43:56
It’s crazy how the “atheist phase” is so ubiquitous. I feel like I did it because my faith was based on nothing sound and I subconsciously needed to build it back from scratch. Thank GOD I didn’t give into hopelessness, hedonism and nihilism.+6
@Acampandoconfrikis - 2025-03-17 12:43:56
LMAO that north korean song at the end of the video. Based and Pochonbo pilled+3
@mansonpeter9428 - 2025-05-20 12:43:56
It´s distressing that Evangelicals care so little about Christians in the ME+4
@Imbenthatsall - 2024-12-17 12:43:56
Awesome vid. Thanks+4
@osi9567 - 2024-12-17 12:43:56
Great to see him again+2
@krunkle5136 - 2024-12-17 12:43:56
The town or village life is truly ideal, but unfortunately muddied by Americans easily who think it means dirt roads or the American countryside where you need a car to go five miles to the nearest bit of civilization. Ideally it's narrow streets and lowrise houses, lowrise apartments and offices etc and then maybe a few acres of farm and a church. No huge parking lots, no big box stores etc. This is a realistic and functioning community that keeps some modern amenities in balance and at human scale. This is where communities that close at a certain time of day and congregate at a church can form. There's actually an interesting phenomenon in of a places Japan, where different Shinto and Christian cults have formed that OWN neighborhoods and towns. They own shops etc and are extra crime free because they're tight communities.+7
@m_poeis - 2025-02-17 12:43:56
>becomes orthodox >immediately lets his beard grow as much as he can so it is always like this huh+5
@crbgo9854 - 2024-12-17 12:43:56
Orthodoxy, linguistics, philosophy yeah everything I study that's awesome+3
@random80085 - 2024-12-17 12:43:56
He's alive!!!+4
@Ultrajamz - 2025-01-17 12:43:56
Miss the luke live streams+3
@Seselix - 2024-12-17 12:43:56
The legend himself+4
@ndrechtseiter - 2024-12-17 12:43:56
Храни Господь всех смотрящих сие видео. May God bless all the viewers. Thanks for bringing Luke back for a short time!+13
@James-f4k9m - 2025-05-27 12:43:56
1:05:00 the way he describes being overly invested in politics and control over wide-scale world events reminded me of the hubris of that type of thinking: the limits of what we can understand and do, and not getting spiritually bamboozled by things which, over time, often amount to massive distractions for many people.+3
@kptxxz - 2024-12-17 12:43:56
Luke's out here preaching mgtow orthodoxy. Bro is down bad fr 💀+6
@folksurvival - 2025-02-17 12:43:57
Hopefully the people who got suckered into the atheist meme phase will eventually get out of their current Christian meme phase.+1
@Erosistheonlyreal - 2024-12-17 12:43:57
Sounds wonderful.+1
@triedtofail - 2025-05-17 12:43:57
"Crime free". You have no idea how bad "bad neighbors" can be. It does not even imply crime. Doesn't matter which religion is practiced. Living in society means you have to live with borderline mentally unstable people as well+1
@ArcadiaTurnips - 2025-05-27 12:43:57
🤡🤡+1
@3within1 - 2024-12-17 12:43:57
St. Mary's of Egypt Roswell is an awesome church. It's where we go and are getting baptized. Look forward to the sequel. God Bless☦+3
@zelllers - 2025-01-17 12:43:57
I thought he was gone I actually miss his rants which are mostly all bang on+2
@user-sb5vt8iy5q - 2024-12-17 12:43:58
HOLY SH*T is he back????+3
@nousquest - 2024-12-17 12:43:58
Never clicked a video so quickly+7
@gintokisakata7490 - 2025-01-17 12:43:58
Okay, Luke was busy ditching Windows and installing LARBS on all the notebooks from the orthodox churches monks on the Balkans.+4
@BicMitchum - 2025-01-17 12:43:58
Truly a miracle+2
@guglielmobartelloni - 2025-01-17 12:43:58
Luke Smith is starting to look like the kind of man that knows the secrets of the universe.+3
@scottphris - 2024-12-17 12:43:58
today I am interviewing luke smith he has a youtube channel that he abandoned and also a website that he abandoned and a cooking blog that he abandoned+4
@Theoretically-ko6lr - 2024-12-17 12:43:58
Glory to God ❤+3
@JonasThente-ji5xx - 2025-04-17 12:43:58
Luke has risen from the dead. Thank you Kyle. True Jesus power.+4
@ingenarelitems - 2025-02-17 12:43:58
even tho it feels really weird watching my fav linux youtuber talk about religion and kinda say stuff that i found kinda weird. i'm just glad he's alive.+3
@fms6306 - 2025-01-17 12:43:58
Happy to see Luke. He really got me deep into Linux.+1
@NoahMReed1 - 2024-12-17 12:43:58
Oh my goodness gracious+3
@jonathanhirschbaum6754 - 2025-03-17 12:43:58
TempleOS in Bash without single "if" is coming+3
@improvisedchaos8904 - 2024-12-17 12:43:58
I didn't realize this is what I wanted to see.+4
@user-abc933q11q - 2025-04-17 12:43:58
Great one+1
@einc-btw - 2025-01-17 12:43:58
I still don't understand. So is Luke going to be playing GTA 6 or not ?+6
@Machlerlabs - 2024-12-17 12:43:58
Where has this dude been?+9
@Didibalus - 2024-12-17 12:43:58
So the guy who said that Luke became orthodox monk was right!+4
@reorseX - 2024-12-17 12:43:58
daaamn, luke grew a beard+6
@OthorgonalOctroon - 2025-01-17 12:43:58
*that pretends to know the secrets of the universe+7
@mountainmanmcbeachfront5296 - 2024-12-17 12:43:58
HOW CRAP DUDE IM GONNA ABAONDOOOONNN+2
@conquer8924 - 2024-12-17 12:43:58
NO WAY. speechless rn+4
@edhet - 2025-01-17 12:43:58
The man, the myth, the legend.+2
@cezarcampos9012 - 2025-01-17 12:43:58
Luke is unrecognizable with that beard+3
@BG-ct7ny - 2025-02-17 12:43:58
Wow Luke is back man I missed him+1
@illenemonusquam - 2025-04-17 12:43:58
Powerful Norwood.+2
@DanielBergerHewitt - 2024-12-17 12:43:59
No Fucking Way, I have high respect for you Luke, You are a genius and I wish i have the strength to go monk mode like you. Praise God!+2
@didacusa3293 - 2024-12-17 12:43:59
All the memes about him being dead or having developed a crippling candy crush addiction — even some going so far as to say that he died. It’s insane.+3
@Coolguywithmask - 2025-03-17 12:43:59
God bless.+1
@erik.stoffregen - 2025-01-17 12:43:59
What a relief! I can switch in good conscience from TempleOS to Larbs. 😉+2
@sprinklednights - 2024-12-17 12:43:59
I definitely enjoyed this YouTube video a lot as there've been a lot of personal beliefs fitting in there (although some I don't fully agree with). I've been reconsidering my faith as I've left it alone for 8 years now, and with my current situation in my life, I'm kind of feeling interested in going back to religious beliefs, however, I'm still indecisive about it. Nevertheless, this video inspired me in a certain way. I have a lot of questions; some pointless, some already mentioned, some perhaps out of void for this topic, so I'll just leave this comment here in case someone wants to respond :) It's also great seeing Luke Smith again; not that I'm entitled on constantly watching his content, but rather because it's just nice to hear him talk C:+2
@hlapatsas - 2025-02-17 12:43:59
I hope Luke still using OpenBSD, that's how I discovered him!!! Greetings from Greece!!+2
@IntermediateRepresentation - 2024-12-17 12:43:59
No way he got luke smith here ❤+3
@RightOverWrong - 2024-12-17 12:43:59
I don't think I've clicked on a video faster.+6
@joemulhern - 2024-12-17 12:43:59
One question for a follow up interview: Luke, one of the most impactful quotes I’ve ever heard was from a random video of yours where you said “yes God has a plan… But you are in it!” How have you personally lived that message?+2
@tannersimek1210 - 2024-12-17 12:43:59
Kyle, I hope one day in the future, through the grace of God and the Holy Spirit that I may be able to venerate you as a saint. You are a blessing to the world. May god have mercy on us+1
@lukethekuya - 2024-12-17 12:43:59
I love you Luke Smith 🙏🙏🙏+1
@atl4625 - 2025-04-17 12:43:59
Real life is something to be fascinated by+2
@stonedaurelius6496 - 2024-12-17 12:43:59
Luke pleaseee come back we miss you+2
@donaldturnbull - 2024-12-17 12:43:59
Good to see Luke after his long hiatus 👍+1
@ChristianTheChicken - 2024-12-17 12:43:59
Good to see Luke again.+1
@OrthodoxKyle - 2025-03-17 12:43:59
Awesome! Thanks for the comment (: feel free to join my discord or email if you ever have any questions 👍 you are always welcome to come visit a Church. (Links in description). God bless you on your journey ☦️🙏+2
@NitroNilz - 2025-05-27 12:43:59
I was so happy when he finally tried it! I left Linux about 7 years ago for OpenBSD.. I love it. Kalimera, oBSD gang!+2
@Hero_Of_Old - 2025-04-17 12:43:59
Big if true+3
@LogicalFindings - 2024-12-17 12:44:00
rather i didnt go through comments, anyway amazing dialogue and happy to see luke again after all these years!+1
@occisoft8082 - 2024-12-17 12:44:00
LUKE SMITH!+2
@ohdude6643 - 2024-12-17 12:44:00
What!??? He's back?+5
@rezmed1144 - 2025-02-17 12:44:00
Luke ! you should travel and explore the world to expand your knowledge and gain a broader perspective on other cultures and reflect your beliefs on what you encounter.+2
@alby280280 - 2025-01-17 12:44:00
He found Luke+4
@houjimari - 2024-12-17 12:44:00
luke is back+3
@zalazalaza9093 - 2025-01-17 12:44:00
HES BACK!+1
@impersonator4439 - 2024-12-17 12:44:00
Luke Smith going monk mode+5
@akeccunkaq - 2025-01-17 12:44:00
GOAT !+2
@John-t1d - 2025-01-17 12:44:00
I am not surprised that Luke Smith looks like this lmao+3
@cheemsbread5423 - 2024-12-17 12:44:00
Install Gentoo Kyle+8
@RubenPedro - 2025-05-17 12:44:00
Luke switched Emacs church for Orthodox Church+2
@hunterrules0_o - 2024-12-17 12:44:00
Luke smith is slowly becoming a caveman im convinced hes given up technogly and now lives in a cave ooga booga style in order to be truly free.+5
@АльбертЛесков-б7н - 2024-12-17 12:44:00
Люблю Люка Смита, мой любимый линукс-энтузиаст, желаю Вам преуспеть в своей вере и стремлении познать Бога, и может иногда выпускать новые видео 😅❤+3
@thesolidhead - 2024-12-17 12:44:00
Don't want to sound like an ad-hoc blasphemer, but I can't keep myself from calling this interview: The second coming of Luke :D+4
@CopeAscetic - 2025-02-17 12:44:00
Gonna give monasticism a try, thanx Lewke!+1
@jojen4083 - 2024-12-17 12:44:00
Hahahahha, tell him he needs to drop new content IMEDIATELY, I NEED TO CONSUME.+8
@inxendere - 2024-12-17 12:44:00
HE'S ALIVE+2
@chanting_germ. - 2025-02-17 12:44:00
Literally just glad he's alive lmao+4
@michaelcaballero9718 - 2025-05-17 12:44:00
HE'S ALIVE+1
@-.2.. - 2025-01-17 12:44:00
Nah, he's a monk.+4
@nikunjkhangwal - 2024-12-17 12:44:01
Not something i care about but good to know he's alive+2
@MrSomethingdark - 2024-12-17 12:44:01
the Luke Smith Chetnik arc is complete.+2
@OfficialAnekito - 2025-02-17 12:44:01
He is alive! :0+1
@PauloConstantino167 - 2025-04-17 12:44:01
Linux and open source turned him into a priest+3
@rikhardfsoss - 2025-01-17 12:44:01
uncle neoTed is back :D+3
@soundsnags2001 - 2024-12-17 12:44:01
NO WAY!!+5
@tru2thastyle - 2024-12-17 12:44:01
Oh snap, Luke has reappeared!+1
@aegis_helion - 2025-01-17 12:44:01
Luke Smith: shaving is bloat+6
@Ultrajamz - 2025-01-17 12:44:01
Come back luke!+3
@bananaman9869 - 2024-12-17 12:44:01
He finally grew his hair back+4
@opfax163 - 2024-12-17 12:44:01
Ah he is alive 🎉+2
@AnotherGameDoge - 2025-02-17 12:44:01
I can't believe that Luke said almost the same thing as Zizek's Christian atheism (Although they took completely opposite paths to reach the same destination+2
@danstoian7721 - 2025-04-17 12:44:01
Thought orthodox are like humble people, not... I'm better than everyone else....+4
@0ne87 - 2024-12-17 12:44:01
Glad hes ok+2
@giridharpavan1592 - 2025-03-17 12:44:01
55:00 wow, just heard about omish people building their own houses, the community comes and builds your house.. gotta learn more about them, could take a thing or two into this community.+2
@tirelessslackerfgc - 2024-12-17 12:44:01
He's alive!+1
@Pabloparsil - 2025-02-17 12:44:01
No high pitched voice, 2/10. Glad to see Luke back.+2
@generic_user444 - 2024-12-17 12:44:01
>My Conversation with Luke Sm-ACK!+6
@alabamamotionpictureproduc6626 - 2024-12-17 12:44:01
Bro, do you even Systemd?+8
@matthewsiahaan1312 - 2024-12-17 12:44:01
We need to organize communities and political power similar to the Js.+3
@NitroNilz - 2025-05-27 12:44:01
This made me LOLL+1
@cranberrysaucekrazybloke1.891 - 2024-12-17 12:44:01
FNF like having fun, I hold no interest!+2
@Hero_Of_Old - 2024-12-17 12:44:01
Communities, yes. Will never work in the political game since they control it.+2
@CziffraNum - 2024-12-17 12:44:02
Sad to hear you left the one Holy Apostolic Catholic Church. Understandable but sad to hear. I pray you find your way home again and that Mr Smith does the same.+4
@someguy782 - 2024-12-17 12:44:02
Didn't realize he was an orthobro, but I'm not at all surprised. The most obnoxious meme religion ever.+5
@QuintonDailey - 2024-12-17 12:44:02
Honest question Kyle, I’m inquiring orthodoxy and I’ve been looking at it all and the only thing that has me hung up is icon veneration. I understand the differences in worship and adoration but I’m looking for a really solid defense for it or something if the sort to prove it isn’t idolatry, every other doctrine and dogma I understand and agree with, but icon veneration really has me on the fence still.+5
@n.m4497 - 2024-12-17 12:44:02
The Messiah is back+1
@akshay-kumar-007 - 2024-12-17 12:44:02
My favorite Bald guy is alive!!!+1
@PigeonPost-t9s - 2024-12-17 12:44:02
HE'S ALIVE!+1
@gamma4053 - 2024-12-17 12:44:02
No, I will only take minimalism part.+6
@seraphimwieber3893 - 2024-12-17 12:44:02
1:17:48 I read Brothers Karamazov for the plot. The plot:+3
@sonofasalesman - 2024-12-17 12:44:02
He's back!?+6
@RussTeeTrombone - 2024-12-17 12:44:02
We’re so back+1
@musahakim7150 - 2024-12-17 12:44:02
Just discovered his stuff this week+1
@harsh4kube - 2025-02-17 12:44:02
dude looks like he is enlightened+1
@fall1n1_yt - 2025-03-17 12:44:02
SAINT NEKTARIOS MENTIONED! 🇬🇷❤+2
@manfrombritain6816 - 2024-12-17 12:44:02
Holy shit he's alive 😂+3
@alkeryn1700 - 2024-12-17 12:44:02
he's alive !+1
@realliftafromthesva - 2024-12-17 12:44:02
YEEEEEEEEEEAAAAAAASSSSSSSSSSSSSSSS WE ARe SO BACK+1
@hjf3022 - 2024-12-17 12:44:02
Luke introduced me to Rmarkdown+2
@blitzkrieg2928 - 2024-12-17 12:44:02
He escaped the Balkans+4
@matthewsiahaan1312 - 2024-12-17 12:44:02
Legendary+1
@1d10tcannotmakeusername - 2024-12-17 12:44:02
We're so back+1
@Dane2177 - 2025-03-17 12:44:02
It is sad. Orthodoxy is an easier pill to swallow than something like Sedevacantism, I suppose.+1
@thesmokecriminal5395 - 2024-12-17 12:44:02
Meme religion?+4
@OrthodoxKyle - 2024-12-17 12:44:03
Hello! Here are some good resources on it https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yrVscRrwo34 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nnAr2yIFONs https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=M9lTwlRd1Po https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jdwr7jGUNw0 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MPg-tUwoJM4 You can also join the discord and reach out (link in description) there has always been imagery in the faith, you can even look in exodus where God commands Israelites to create imagery in the temple. You should come visit a church and talk to a priest. Reach out anytime! God bless!+7
@brandonboe8620 - 2024-12-17 12:44:03
Soldiers venerate superiors and the flag all of the time. Jesus, Mary and the Saints deserve much more than the flag or a superior secular officer+4
@freedomgoddess - 2024-12-17 12:44:03
i like minimalism. it's a common tool, in my experience anyway. may you use it wisely.+2
@ytmorgen - 2024-12-17 12:44:03
True minimalist.+6
@n.m4497 - 2024-12-17 12:44:03
No, he was always in our hearts+2
@pesterian41 - 2025-02-17 12:44:04
HE'S BACK FROM THE DEAD+3
@Forbiiden - 2024-12-17 12:44:04
luke im begging for you do come back+2
@steve-rambo - 2025-01-17 12:44:04
YEEEEEEES+1
@joelmillerurena7874 - 2024-12-17 12:44:04
Hey Luke it's Joel+2
@thetravelingmerchant1 - 2025-03-17 12:44:04
Brutal norwood victim spot, pray for his soul that he doesn't become a redpill masculinity coper.+4
@mildass6173 - 2024-12-17 12:44:04
don’t mind me just sending love to luke ❤❤❤❤❤❤❤❤❤❤❤❤❤❤❤❤❤❤❤❤❤❤❤❤❤❤❤❤+1
@heavensplayer - 2024-12-17 12:44:04
god bless+1
@nemfazoltan8364 - 2025-04-17 12:44:04
Hes following the path of Ted Kaczynski. Got this homeless look. Now ignoring the public. Will he be the next LukaBomber?+3
@joelmillerurena7874 - 2024-12-17 12:44:04
Well Luke you're doing a good job that's all I got to say+1
@mexicanguy91 - 2024-12-17 12:44:04
I do not know if its okay if to ask for prayer here but I have lost my connection with God and but my name is Hector if you guys don't mind praying for me+11
@bampoe8670 - 2024-12-17 12:44:04
Hes alive!+1
@79Fbanana - 2025-02-17 12:44:04
welcome back libertarian Vladimir Lenin+4
@vaayuo - 2025-02-17 12:44:04
From a linux head to religion That was quite a jump+2
@HeraldKros - 2024-12-17 12:44:04
Oh man. He went from Linux to the monastery😂+3
@baglespelledwrong8159 - 2024-12-17 12:44:04
I will always remember Luke Smith as the perfect example of what happens when you fall for every single /g/ meme at once, without carefully analyzing them first. He owns four ThinkPads at least. While I see nothing wrong with them in themselves, as they are admittedly pretty good value for the price, four is just mindless consumerism, contradictory to his "philosophy". He started using every single shitty pseudominimalist, ncurses-based program, used a shitty riced out i3 setup of dubious actual productivity (like all tiling wms), then fell for the full Suckless meme and went in even deeper. Then he started making videos shitting on Python and praising C, which is ironic considering he is not even a programmer by his own admission. He effectively spent years trying out, configuring and hopelessly trying to integrate tens of meme programs to build what is, combined, effectively a shittier Emacs, just like most of /g/ was doing in their "productive" desktop threads a year or two ago. Then he read the Unabomber manifesto and blindly accepted it without constructively analyzing it first, same with the anarcho-primitivist ideology that was all the rage about a year and a half ago on 4chan and 8ch. While he stated on his website that he "didn't browse 4chan much anymore" it was obvious this wasn't the case. Then he went and took the memes way too far, and unironically went to live in isolation. While I see nothing wrong in itself, the actual reason he did it is massive cringe. He became Christian because of 4chan, the least christian website. He has the mentality of someone 10 years younger than he is, yet he acts like a literal boomer jokingly criticizing "zoomers" despite he himself being the worst example of a millennial. He attacks "nerds" when it't painfully obvious he's deeply unhappy with himself, as it was obviously self-directed criticism thinly veiled as an edgy dabbing video. He is a perfect example of someone you should avoid becoming at all costs.+14
@marcelplch8725 - 2025-01-17 12:44:04
It's amazing to see Luke again, it feels awful to see him talk of christianity most of the time.+10
@shotakai2559 - 2024-12-17 12:44:04
Это уже не Люк Смит, это уже Лука Кузнецов :0+3
@fikrirahmatnurhidayat4988 - 2025-03-17 12:44:04
HE'S STILL ALIVE?+4
@pichass9337 - 2025-01-17 12:44:04
Ah yes, the Amish who are known for their very small houses that aren't made with a bunch of tools... There are a lot of points of thought in this that aren't very well thought out (what the hell is "alternative entertainment"?), but I love your lip gloss.+4
@TheInvoker - 2024-12-17 12:44:04
I use Arch BTW+3
@OrthodoxKyle - 2024-12-17 12:44:04
Of course it is okay! I will pray for you Hector 🙏🙏+6
@mexicanguy91 - 2024-12-17 12:44:04
@ thank you so much Kyle I am very grateful I hope I become orthodox+2
@communist754 - 2024-12-17 12:44:04
@OrthodoxKyle I have a strong desire to become an Orthodox, but it’s hard to start really believing in God after being an atheist my whole life. I rationally see that Orthodoxy… well, works, there is something to it. But I haven’t felt the presence of Christ in my life. And I have realized that that’s quite sad, it’s like being chronically depressed and never knowing what love feels like. So, how do I get from “okay, there’s something to their practice” to actually feeling God’s presence? Is it even possible to achieve through a conscious effort?+2
@OrthodoxKyle - 2025-03-17 12:44:04
We often hear God when there is silence, pray to God daily, talk to him, ask him for faith, wisdom, guidance etc 🙏☦️ Orthodox prayer books are also helpful because they have beautiful prayers that help us acquire Orthodox mindset ❤️ I highly recommend visiting an Orthodox Church for Divine Liturgy & vespers 👍 “come and see”, we experience God, holiness, reverent & sacred environment. Reach out anytime! And may God bless you on your journey ❤️🙏+4
@mexicanguy91 - 2025-03-17 12:44:04
@OrthodoxKyle Kyle I love your vids and I am a nobody but I am limited on what I can do but still thank you for praying for me+2
@Dovus-V - 2025-02-17 12:44:04
Glory to God ☦+3
@simpleprogrammingcodes - 2025-05-27 12:44:05
In some weird way it's connected, like the tendency for minimalism, understanding, and introspection.+1
@rkdeshdeepak4131 - 2024-12-17 12:44:05
You just copied this from a reddit comment+4
@thechadbuddha - 2024-12-17 12:44:05
nice copypasta+4
@communist754 - 2024-12-17 12:44:05
Who cares about programming crap? Dude ended up in a very decent place spiritually. You can start with wrong assumptions and still get to correct answers.+3
@moussaadem7933 - 2024-12-17 12:44:05
tiling WMs and simple Unix style programs are so comfy, can't go back. you haven't really presented any criticism, you just don't like that way of doing things, which is fine+6
@simpleprogrammingcodes - 2025-05-27 12:44:05
Is it generated by AI?+1
@0xKrem - 2025-01-17 12:44:05
RIP Vim Diesel+10
@urod7149 - 2025-01-17 12:44:05
invite him to a podcast with someone who runs a linux channel, I'm sure you'll get Luke to talk about something else.+2
@gasergaser8629 - 2025-01-17 12:44:05
tak tocno+2
@merami03 - 2025-03-17 12:44:06
no this is ai he is fake+1
@sne3348 - 2025-01-17 12:44:06
Ooooh Luke+1
@linux-dev-labs - 2024-12-17 12:44:06
Wow, I heard Luke Smith was kidnapped in Mexico but I'm glad to see that he's well.+1
@someone01233 - 2025-01-17 12:44:06
He turns into Richard Stallman+3
@Pepelepooo - 2024-12-17 12:44:06
NO WAY+5
@rkdeshdeepak4131 - 2024-12-17 12:44:06
The best linux youtuber of all time+1
@carlosmengs - 2025-01-17 12:44:06
Luke come back to youtube 😢+4
@Jordan-hz1wr - 2025-01-17 12:44:06
Holy shit, Luke didn't succumb to his candy crush addiction!+3
@acrxsls1766 - 2024-12-17 12:44:06
He went to Greece and fuckin' stayed there 😂+3
@samschrank - 2024-12-17 12:44:06
Lets gooooooooo!+1
@reiisthebestgirl - 2024-12-17 12:44:06
So Luke finally manage to escape from soystemd mafia+2
@tony-btw - 2025-02-17 12:44:06
he is alive+1
@scaJoshuaBrown - 2024-12-17 12:44:06
PLEASE TELL ME THAT HE WILL START UPLOADING AGAIN+3
@resentfulsoulofthetoilet589 - 2025-01-17 12:44:06
lmao from boomer in the woods to counterfeit Bolsheviki in record time+3
@_idiot - 2025-01-17 12:44:06
WOOOOOOOOOOOOAAHH!!!!!!+1
@guyug6940 - 2025-04-17 12:44:06
By Fauci he's alive!+2
@tanura5830 - 2025-01-17 12:44:06
32:44-33:35 consciousness+1
@ArktosUrsangon - 2025-02-17 12:44:06
Straight up looks like one of the communist revolutionaries+4
@dsal3389 - 2024-12-17 12:44:06
he is actually alive+1
@RoofusRoof19 - 2024-12-17 12:44:06
2025 already gearing up to be epic+1
@YomdoAdey - 2025-01-17 12:44:06
has Luke become a monk?+3
@simpleprogrammingcodes - 2025-05-27 12:44:06
How so?+1
@folksurvival - 2025-02-17 12:44:07
Is Kris Occhipinti.+1
@gintokisakata7490 - 2025-01-17 12:44:07
Peertube plz!+1
@Moha-bb7xm - 2025-05-17 12:44:07
A legend+3
@fennecbesixdouze1794 - 2024-12-17 12:44:08
@38:30 this is not weird at all. There have been many works toward ecumenism in the recent past. These include joint statements from mainline Lutheran churches and the Catholic Church, joint statements from the Catholic churches and the Orthodox communion, and joint statements from mainline Lutheran churches and churches in the orthodox communion that assert they share, at this point, the same understanding of salvation and justification. And I could say the same of mainline Anglican churches, etc etc other national churches whose parishes were separated from the Holy See during the reformation. Basically: that whole point of theology that was supposedly the whole point of the schism? Oh never mind about that. Really these schisms are political events, the workings of Satan within this fallen world to divide the body of Christ. To think "ah the Eastern Orthodox tradition is the one unbroken tradition" is hubris and vanity, and hilariously historically ignorant. None of us have yet attained to perfection, we strive toward it. We all have the sins and scars of our histories. What to think of these protestant churches? Did whole Christian communities simply vanish in entire countries, simply because the King or the local Prince declared that all the churches were now protestant? No, the churches went right along worshipping and serving the spiritual needs of the Christians in those communities. And yes they were influenced by sinful and mistaken doctrine, just as churches have been in all kinds of other places throughout all history. It is not our job to look back, judge others and excise millions of Christians from history. It is our job now to set about mending the divisions we have created through our sinfulness and pride, that we might all be one just as Christ is one.+2
@AbilityModifier - 2024-12-17 12:44:08
I'm grateful you've shown Luke is, infact, still alive. But fuck do I wish he'd go back to memetier rants about linux and related topic as opposed to his reappearance being an orthodox christpilled situation. But alas, such are the way of things.+5
@terrapin323 - 2025-01-17 12:44:08
kyle you need more sleep, also thanks for talking to luke+2
@toobskuiks116 - 2025-01-17 12:44:08
Question: is it a good idea to invest time into learning to use FOSS, like Arch Linux? I wonder if your view on this has changed in the past 2 years.+2
@Mojo_DK - 2025-01-17 12:44:08
I really thought that Luke was a rational guy. I guess I was wrong. But the way the world is now, I am honestly not surprised .+9
@con_sci - 2024-12-17 12:44:08
woah+3
@TakiGosc427 - 2025-01-17 12:44:08
I have a question: when you mentioned traditional orthodox societies where people life by leisure work and daily prayer what place / country are you referring to? It's a genuine question, since the only current orthodox countries I can recall are the ones I would rather not life compared to where I am currently life. Or are they societies from the past?+3
@3er24t4g1 - 2024-12-17 12:44:08
How did you get him to come out of his shed?+2
@jayantaroratv - 2025-01-17 12:44:08
Luke looks so cool+1
@user-iv1in2bd2w - 2024-12-17 12:44:08
HES ALIVE+1
@Gobadán-s7w - 2024-12-17 12:44:08
The aeropagite is back!+2
@finlaymartins272 - 2024-12-17 12:44:08
Monkmaxxed and orthopilled+6
@bbsara0146 - 2025-01-17 12:44:08
Would you say orthodox is the linux of religions for people who are hardcore maxis, catholocism is like the windows for power users, and protestantism is like the apple for casuals?+2
@Rytheking2 - 2024-12-17 12:44:08
Luke looks like he just took vows on mt athos+5
@mustfaaboassd - 2024-12-17 12:44:08
Bro looks exactly what I want to be+2
@MrSomethingdark - 2024-12-17 12:44:08
Breh imagine being a militant believer!+2
@Perkonic - 2024-12-17 12:44:08
Oh my soy... he looks just like minecraft steve now!! Wowzers!!+2
@barjaktar - 2024-12-17 12:44:08
🔥🔥🔥+1
@gindphace - 2024-12-17 12:44:08
LOOUUUUKKKKEEEEEEEE!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!+1
@sniper_in_bush - 2024-12-17 12:44:08
glad luke accepted allah❤+2
@simpleprogrammingcodes - 2025-05-27 12:44:08
But it's still awesome! Right?+1
@1Lll_llllllLLLLllllll_llL1 - 2025-01-17 12:44:08
if you are asking it then it is not worth your time.+2
@sibylla104 - 2025-01-17 12:44:08
you dont have to spend time learning anything to use linux, luke was building custom desktop environment which make it seem crazy+2
@Atheist-k8h - 2025-01-17 12:44:08
It seems he was always a deeply conservative person.+3
@Dovus-V - 2025-02-17 12:44:08
God is the source of rationality.+4
@Mojo_DK - 2025-02-17 12:44:08
@ That only makes sense if you believe in god in the first place.+1
@Dovus-V - 2025-02-17 12:44:08
@ No. Because rationality itself has its existance in a non-material, eternal way; which can only be justified under divine conceptualism.+2
@Mojo_DK - 2025-02-17 12:44:08
@Dovus-V How do you know that rationality doesn't come from the material world? There are many philosophical theories that are compatible with that notion. And if you assume that god gives us rationality, couldn't he in theory give us wrong rationality/logic? In that case your theory, that is based on logic, undermines logic/rationality itself. It is a self-defeating argument.+2
@Dovus-V - 2025-02-17 12:44:08
@Mojo_DK Logic is inmaterial because it is mind-dependent. It is not written in tablets or derived from how atoms are arranged. It is allocated inside the mind of an agent if you will. If truth is mind-dependent then we need an eternal being to account for it, because if we are the ones that account for it (the main atheist position), then truth stops existing when we perish. Therefore truth needs to have its ontological origin in God. In the case of Christianity, truth is the Logos himself. The eternal Son of God.+2
@roachdawgjrjr - 2025-02-17 12:44:08
@Dovus-V nicely put, friend+3
@Dovus-V - 2025-02-17 12:44:09
He is probably talking about the Byzantine period.+2
@simpleprogrammingcodes - 2025-05-27 12:44:09
There are some more rural areas in some countries (Russia, Greece, and others), but I still have to visit those places in order to be able to tell where exactly they are.+1
@einc-btw - 2025-01-17 12:44:09
No+8
@cherubin7th - 2025-02-17 12:44:09
Catholicism is more like Unix+4
@mountainmanmcbeachfront5296 - 2024-12-17 12:44:10
a middle aged Pizza Hut delivery driver?+5
@rexevan6714 - 2025-04-17 12:44:10
Oh he grows hair+2
@InspirationalMoon-mk7xc - 2025-05-17 12:44:10
What happened? I missed Luke Smith.+2
@ny_hai - 2025-01-17 12:44:10
He is back. 🤣+1
@ludwignagelhus524 - 2024-12-17 12:44:10
When you buy xmr instead of btc+2
@MrRa1nes - 2024-12-17 12:44:10
23:40 not just a little bit of rambling, it's 83 minutes long and keeps growing with that beard.+1
@tuxpizza - 2024-12-17 12:44:10
Luke Smith W+1
@BunnyKhatri-pd8zm - 2024-12-17 12:44:10
Hey i am a hindu and i would like to your thoughts on Hinduism.+3
@humanman642 - 2024-12-17 12:44:10
hes alive+1
@kkndzocker - 2025-01-17 12:44:10
Luke Repost on your Channel+5
@1Lll_llllllLLLLllllll_llL1 - 2025-01-17 12:44:10
hey luke!+1
@TaiyakiCorolla - 2025-01-17 12:44:10
Any chance you can also bring Roosh V on?+2
@TheActualCorrectOpinion - 2024-12-17 12:44:10
Would like to know the song name that cut off at the beginning?+3
@batubulgur - 2024-12-17 12:44:10
Turns out, the true GNU GigaChad was Christ all along...+1
@localareanetworkcl - 2025-01-17 12:44:10
I love his Dugin beard+1
@owlmostdead9492 - 2025-05-17 12:44:10
1:02:30 so you want to turn your back on "gods creation", you're quite literally just anti-progression. Your ideal world is where humans are forever a hunter-gatherer tribe. Understanding more of "gods creation" i.e. science is not a sin, its just a tool that can be used for good and bad.+2
@bob-ti1ps - 2024-12-17 12:44:10
He starts going full moldbug at 1:05:30+2
@PixelBoar - 2025-02-17 12:44:10
Hey Kyle, what is the instrumental in the beginning? It sounded relaxing but only lasted for a two seconds.+2
@Dystopia_is_Now - 2024-12-17 12:44:10
He's alive??+2
@BunnyKhatri-pd8zm - 2024-12-17 12:44:10
Bro what happened? 💀💀💀🙏🙏🙏+5
@winterkatzen - 2024-12-17 12:44:10
Something about him seems different.+2
@one_step_sideways - 2025-05-27 12:44:10
Good news happened+1
@thesmokecriminal5395 - 2024-12-17 12:44:11
Heresy+1
@OrthodoxKyle - 2025-03-17 12:44:11
Check out my video “Eastern Religions Cs Christianity” 👍 Look into Orthodoxy, reach out anytime! God bless ☦️🙏+2
@NitroNilz - 2025-05-27 12:44:11
✅+1
@MedBVLL33 - 2025-02-17 12:44:11
Is Roosh doing ok nowadays?+2
@OrthodoxKyle - 2025-03-17 12:44:11
roi - videoclub instrumental+1
@sprinklednights - 2025-06-09 12:44:12
Hell nah not Dugin 💀 it looks more like Dostoevsky+1
@OrthodoxKyle - 2025-03-17 12:44:12
roi - videoclub instrumental+2
@PixelBoar - 2025-03-17 12:44:12
@OrthodoxKyle Thanks!+1
@0xKrem - 2025-01-17 12:44:12
What happened ? He was captured by the glowies and they brainwashed Luke into an conformist soy+3
@nikhilhalbe - 2025-01-17 12:44:12
my pookie bear is on the interwebs again :)+2
@cassian-b7x - 2025-03-17 12:44:12
omg!!!+1
@ChristianTheChicken - 2024-12-17 12:44:12
What is the outro music? Sounds like Jean Jacque Perrey.+1
@johnthomson2377 - 2024-12-17 12:44:12
Wait, he's not dead?+2
@Idhem19 - 2025-01-17 12:44:12
Did anyone read about Islam? The Prophet Muhammad (peace be upon him) is even mentioned in the Bible, prophesied to come, and that we should follow him.+3
@redbeard1891 - 2024-12-17 12:44:12
Tf he is still alive.+3
@user-3v4lx3z1fn - 2025-01-17 12:44:13
what song plays in the very beginning of the video? please help+2
@maximilianmusterhans4659 - 2025-01-17 12:44:13
Luke is easily in the top 0,01% intellectually. What does he now do with it? Living an impotent life as an orthodox larper in a village. How did he come up with this incredible plan? Did they visit and intimidate him after he posted too much problematic wrong-think content? Same story as with RooshV when he wanted to organize offline meetings with other revolutionairy minded men. What a waste ... In my opinion this is just as sinful as when the average joe wastes his life playing video games.+8
@yepsan95 - 2024-12-17 12:44:13
NO WAY+2
@Sean-te5xj - 2025-01-17 12:44:13
All this talk about dogma, and which sects are more trve, and nothing about what Jesus actually taught, and the fact that the church teaching has very little in common. You can have the sermon on the mount or you can have the creeds, good luck reconciling the two. Like Jesus said in regards to serving two masters.+3
@TreeBee123 - 2024-12-17 12:44:13
Converthodox bros use their private judgement to determine Eastern church is most based, then they tell you private judgement is not valid and you have no authority to exercise it.+4
@moussaadem7933 - 2024-12-17 12:44:13
He is back ??????+1
@idan4794 - 2025-01-17 12:44:13
He literally resurrected+1
@Sor430-z1p - 2025-03-17 12:44:13
what blog did he read about counsciousness?+1
@Dan-pi6dx - 2025-01-17 12:44:13
wow+1
@everyumclust7985 - 2025-02-17 12:44:13
whats the intro song?+2
@alkeryn1700 - 2024-12-17 12:44:13
what's your intro music ?+2
@smit17xp - 2024-12-17 12:44:13
He doesn't talk about linux and stuff anymore. He's dead to me+6
@mountainmanmcbeachfront5296 - 2024-12-17 12:44:13
ITS THE LARBS GUY+1
@JoaoVictor-xi7nh - 2025-02-17 12:44:13
The beard, the asceticism, the christianity - this man became tolstoy+3
@gasergaser8629 - 2025-01-17 12:44:13
yes he is , in a part talking about false prophets+5
@thebristolbruiser - 2025-01-17 12:44:13
"Beware of false prophets, which come to you in sheep's clothing, but inwardly they are ravening wolves. Ye shall know them by their fruits. Do men gather grapes of thorns, or figs of thistles? Even so every good tree bringeth forth good fruit; but a corrupt tree bringeth forth evil fruit. A good tree cannot bring forth evil fruit, neither can a corrupt tree bring forth good fruit. Every tree that bringeth not forth good fruit is hewn down, and cast into the fire. Wherefore by their fruits ye shall know them." Wow, you're right. Muhammad really is mentioned in the Bible.+4
@maniacZesci - 2025-02-17 12:44:13
@thebristolbruiser Not directly, but likes of him yes.+1
@OrthodoxKyle - 2025-03-17 12:44:13
roi - videoclub instrumental+2
@chirhoagape - 2025-02-17 12:44:13
For when you realise your pride is blinding, you will see the light.+4
@OrthodoxKyle - 2025-03-17 12:44:14
roi - videoclub instrumental+1
@OrthodoxKyle - 2025-03-17 12:44:14
roi - videoclub instrumental+1
@sadboinlh1586 - 2024-12-17 12:44:14
Linux brought me here+2
@fren648 - 2024-12-17 12:44:14
HEYS BACK BASED!!!!!!!+1
@michaeldonnelly8068 - 2024-12-17 12:44:14
Wtf, crossover outta nowhere+1
@cultoftranquility9616 - 2025-01-17 12:44:14
The Thinkpad of beards ...+2
@francisjurksaitis - 2025-02-17 12:44:14
He's alive?+1
@starman4840 - 2024-12-17 12:44:14
luke smith if you're reading this please shave your head. it's better full bald+3
@laughingvampire7555 - 2025-01-17 12:44:14
the unaboomer looks more boomer every day+2
@MedBVLL33 - 2025-02-17 12:44:14
He emailed Roosh v? Any idea what happened to Roosh? Is he doing ok?+1
@jellyfin449 - 2025-02-17 12:44:14
hey, everybody's favorite fascist linux guy!+2
@ross-sound-journal - 2024-12-17 12:44:14
Gandalf+1
@PASTRAMIKick - 2024-12-17 12:44:14
I'd like orthodoxy more if it weren't for its Autocephalous structure, I know it's there because of theological reasons, but what's going on with Russia and the Moskva Patriarchate is really problematic, then people and families get divided because they don't know which church they belong to and the real estate of the church itself is owned by one but not the other... It's too messy, one of many reasons why I will remain Catholic forever, even though I have a lot of respect for Orthodoxy, the Pope in Rome is ultimately the Pontifex Maximus.+3
@nessunolinux - 2025-03-17 12:44:14
Linux?+1
@RippedTailor - 2024-12-17 12:44:14
I soyfaced.+3
@jcsd0 - 2024-12-17 12:44:14
IQ so high his head is getting bigger+8
@jeremybullen655 - 2024-12-17 12:44:14
16:28 that's restorationism, not protestantism+1
@cnyegun - 2025-01-17 12:44:14
is this the real one? his voice is different+1
@alphago9397 - 2025-02-17 12:44:14
that beard is bloat.+5
@ln9895 - 2024-12-17 12:44:14
No way!+1
@mastercontrol5000 - 2025-01-17 12:44:14
Luke, merge my PR+1
@rothbardfreedom - 2025-03-17 12:44:14
Let's take Luke to a Batushka concert.+2
@maximilianmusterhans4659 - 2025-02-17 12:44:15
He became "orthodox" and went offline. It's the latest trend of "the people in charge notice you and tell you to shut up".+2
@communist754 - 2024-12-17 12:44:15
What’s problematic about Moscow Patriarchate?+1
@hueylongenjoyer3747 - 2024-12-17 12:44:15
The ecclesiology of the Orthodox Church was how it was for the first millenium. There were multiple breaks of communion like between Antioch and Rome + Antioch and Alexandria.+2
@zeroface8337 - 2024-12-17 12:44:15
I guess now we know why all the icons have such gigantic heads+2
@jmw1500 - 2025-01-17 12:44:16
47:40 well the USA was protestant+1
@alexander5597 - 2024-12-17 12:44:16
имхо Люк просто впал в неофитскую крайность, бороду отрастил, канал забросил и пр+2
@lorkh4nn - 2024-12-17 12:44:16
luke went to greece and came back looking like the patriarch of constantinople lmao+3
@Imbenthatsall - 2024-12-17 12:44:16
I am part of the one true walmart faith. I was baptized in Mountain Dew and chrismated with ketchup.+5
@JOHNSMITH-ve3rq - 2024-12-17 12:44:16
Lmao wow amazing thought he was totes gone+1
@braiinworms - 2025-01-17 12:44:16
LUKE SMITH+1
@Simon-xi8tb - 2025-01-17 12:44:16
How did Luke quit porn ?+1
@epieursvelte13cirertrollferpur - 2024-12-17 12:44:16
Lenin??+1
@alexander5597 - 2024-12-17 12:44:16
чувак одними старыми синкпадами сыт не будешь ты пойми, все равно нужен апгрейд будет. нужно идти в ногу со временем, не впадая в крайности конечно+6
@jdanks - 2025-01-17 12:44:16
hey luke, hyprland video when? lol jk god bless brother+1
@shavebunny - 2024-12-17 12:44:16
WHAT THE HELL+3
@jmw1500 - 2025-01-17 12:44:16
47:05+1
@Komejian - 2025-02-17 12:44:16
i feel bad for his hairline+3
@Twtgod - 2025-01-17 12:44:16
Do not listen to his advice on women, everything he said his good except the women part.+3
@Tanmaydeshpande-nl5jy - 2025-02-17 12:44:16
This That or the Other+1
@danstoian7721 - 2025-04-17 12:44:16
22:03 I find that to be hypocritical. It's Protestants who -- to begin with -- foind out that Matthew's Gospel was not first, it's actually Orthodox who denied it a "heresy". It's also Protestants who found out that Mark's ending is not "genuine", it's Orthodox who protest this precisely because it denies tradition they held to be ancient!+1
@ImmersionEsque - 2025-01-17 12:44:16
Modern day Dostoyevsky+2
@davemoore7808 - 2025-01-17 12:44:16
Abandoned Catholicism? That's a shame.+3
@Oiw08 - 2025-01-17 12:44:16
I don't know, but how did a person like you not convert to Islam until now? You also found the facts different from what they seemed to you before in many aspects of life. Perhaps you will be reasonable and not leave the matter behind you.+1
@mdq8198 - 2025-01-17 12:44:16
horrible monastic mindset+3
@thesmokecriminal5395 - 2024-12-17 12:44:16
Че, он православным стал+2
@0xDEADDEAD - 2025-02-17 12:44:16
@thesmokecriminal5395 страшно это как то+1
@mileineles - 2025-03-17 12:44:16
Feel bad for ur sentience+3
@Hero_Of_Old - 2025-01-17 12:44:17
His advice is true+4
@gasergaser8629 - 2025-01-17 12:44:17
every advice he made is much of nonsense , specially one about women+3
@hermitxIII - 2025-02-17 12:44:17
He's extremely out of touch with what the average person actually struggles with.+2
@folksurvival - 2025-02-17 12:44:17
Without the talent.+2
@Oiw08 - 2025-01-17 12:44:17
jake brancatella . Find this channel+1
@OrthodoxKyle - 2025-01-17 12:44:17
I have playlist showing why I am not a Muslim: https://youtube.com/playlist?list=PL6eyVWFC0v8d9mMiqRt6IDS71W9l1X8q7&si=zefM5pWfte-cPLox Also Jay Dyer debated Jake and won: https://youtu.be/9NKyHcO2kQQ?si=oALk09GqK1CQbi4f Very bad arguments from Jake! Quran says Allah has a foot and shin?? Look into Christianity!+4
@vlad.the.impaler. - 2024-12-17 12:44:18
Wtf no way+2
@wanderer_144k - 2024-12-17 12:44:18
aint no way+1
@keyibreand3840 - 2024-12-17 12:44:18
Check David Bentley Hart & follow the rabbit hole!+1
@jmw1500 - 2025-01-17 12:44:18
11:11+1
@Mojo_DK - 2025-01-17 12:44:18
I am sorry but Luke is the last person that has Christ like humility. With all the random claims being proposed here and with all the other people being judged...do you both really feel like you are humble people. Really question yourself for a second.+4
@gustavojoaquin_arch - 2025-01-17 12:44:18
Average Aryan classic ⚡⚡🗿+3
@ehfoiwehfowjedioheoih4829 - 2025-01-17 12:44:18
Ortholarp+5
@Dane2177 - 2025-03-17 12:44:18
I almost didn't click on this Luke looks so different. I have a book of papal encyclicals he republished some years back. To think he left all that (not to mention YouTube and Linux) for the bearded schismatics is just sad.+3
@milostean8615 - 2024-12-17 12:44:18
WHAT+1
@giabao576 - 2025-01-17 12:44:18
dude+1
@MrFoxPro - 2025-01-17 12:44:18
Is he willing to work on TempleOS?+2
@imhappyanyway - 2025-03-17 12:44:18
чувак поменял одну религию на другую (и спустя время он сделает это снова) надеюсь, кто-то заархивирует видео с его канала, т.к. оч вероятно, что он его удалит+3
@RRHINE13 - 2025-01-17 12:44:18
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=og5WrTAZAu4&list=PLhIASvKdyikYu-mGUd9Rc7Sq5qLjIYRFV&index=170+1
@jshowao - 2025-01-17 12:44:18
HE'S ALIVE!!! It's a shame he is a theist, but I can't deny his Linux prowess.+3
@marro1916 - 2024-12-17 12:44:18
Are you okay dude? I'm genuinely asking. I'm not sure that you are all there. You okay Kyle?+2
@Kenanalasadi8989 - 2024-12-17 12:44:18
may Allah guid you to Islam+4
@devadasn - 2024-12-17 12:44:18
Where in the Bible does it say you can pray to the dead? Name one place that says it not some vague verse. Name one place where it says you can pray to Mary+1
@Yunes948 - 2025-05-17 12:44:18
get initiated into mithraic mysteries Luke+1
@RubenPedro - 2025-05-17 12:44:18
This is AI+1
@Dovus-V - 2025-02-17 12:44:18
Are you Orthodox?+2
@Mojo_DK - 2025-02-17 12:44:18
@ Nope+1
@OrthodoxKyle - 2025-03-17 12:44:18
Neither of us claimed to be humble people? We are both sinners working on our own repentance and trying to be better. The point of Christianity is to recognize your own sin and trust in Christ ☦️+5
@OrthodoxKyle - 2025-03-17 12:44:18
“Bearded schismatics”? Catholic Church considers the Orthodox “the other lung of the Church” (read Vatican II), Catholic canon law says Orthodox can receive the Catholic Eucharist (schism is moral sin). Catholic says Orthodox have valid sacraments & make post - schism Saints. So “bearded schismatics” isn’t even true, according to Catholic Church we have Christ (the Eucharist) and make Saints without the Pope. Also Rome has admitted they started the Schism, based on forgeries in Alexandria document & Christi documents. I myself used to be Catholic, check out my playlist called “if you’re Catholic”. Study these and look into Orthodoxy deeper. God bless ☦️🙏+6
@jackt-z2m - 2025-03-17 12:44:18
Dane, you are based.+2
@Dane2177 - 2025-03-17 12:44:18
@OrthodoxKyle You would be right if Vatican II was truly Roman Catholicism. It wasn't. It consistently undermined that which came before. I don't know what to believe about the forgeries you mention, given that.+1
@Dane2177 - 2025-03-17 12:44:18
@jackt-z2m Thanks!+1
@one_step_sideways - 2025-05-27 12:44:18
@jackt-z2m you forgot the "i" in "biased"+1
@3567-j3n - 2025-03-17 12:44:18
почему+1
@one_step_sideways - 2025-05-27 12:44:18
@imhappyanyway Теперь когда пыль уселась, ты удалишь свой комментарий, и мне заархивировать его?+1
@imhappyanyway - 2025-05-27 12:44:18
@one_step_sideways я ждал этого комментария) посмотри,с какой частотой он публикует новые видео - они записаны заранее но почему? братишка нестабилен ну и если что, то у меня архив моих любимых видео имеется)+1
@OrthodoxKyle - 2025-03-17 12:44:19
He is a joke: https://youtu.be/F8bLxDXMdjA?si=Eu8n80zgAbXyOMnL+1
@hxplxss1835 - 2025-02-17 12:44:19
Theism is based+4
@jshowao - 2025-02-17 12:44:19
@hxplxss1835 Nah, its actually quite dumb.+3
@hxplxss1835 - 2025-02-17 12:44:19
@ L take, expected from a linux user+4
@Dovus-V - 2025-02-17 12:44:19
Why is it a shame brother? What's wrong with believing in the One True God?+4
@jshowao - 2025-02-17 12:44:19
@Dovus-V Because there is no god and no proof of one.+1
@Dovus-V - 2025-02-17 12:44:19
@jshowao Not all things are proven in the same way.+3
@jshowao - 2025-02-17 12:44:19
@Dovus-V Yeah, they pretty much are in the real world.+1
@Dovus-V - 2025-02-17 12:44:19
@ How do you prove the laws of logic are real? Or that 2+2=4? Or that truth exists? Would that also be through the scientific method/empirical verification, or would it require some other approach?+3
@jshowao - 2025-02-17 12:44:19
@Dovus-V You just start with a set of axioms that make sense and go from there. The laws of logic have worked for thousands of years and there are mathematical proofs of 1+1=2. The point is, no supernatural element is required to do this. Just human reasoning. The question you should be asking is what do we need God for at all? I could live my entire life not thinking about God once.+1
@Dovus-V - 2025-02-17 12:44:19
@jshowao I have justified axioms in a coherent system. You have a bunch of particulars with no justification. Everyone at the end of the day has to land on a basis for their beliefs: that's the same for Christians, muslims, atheists, satanists, libertarians, communists... That's why when I bring up justification for non-empirically verifiable categories, I'm asking for a specific metaphysical grounding, not an arbitrary story. You said "thousands of years proved..." "Just human reasoning". That's fine and dandy but it's a description. I'm asking you if you have a justification for that set of beliefs.+3
@Dovus-V - 2025-02-17 12:44:19
@jshowao You have to understand that if you can say "Logic just is" or "Maths just works", I can very well also say "God just is".+3
@jshowao - 2025-02-17 12:44:19
@Dovus-V I have justified axioms in a coherent system as well. It's called society. My question to you is why do you need to invent a fake being to justify yours? And tone down the philosophy terms you don't know anything about to try and sound smart.+1
@jshowao - 2025-02-17 12:44:19
@Dovus-V That is not what I said clearly. You know what a proof is right? That is not a "just is". And no, you can't say "God just is" because god in all religions is supposed to be a defined being that you can supposedly interact with yet nobody can provide any concrete evidence for beyond what would be classified as an imaginary friend. I can show you the representation of what 1 is. I can show you that an apple is not an orange.+1
@Dovus-V - 2025-02-17 12:44:19
@jshowao (Answering to your comment about proofs and "just is" statements): Well, you are right to an extent, but I think you are confusing two different categories. You are talking about empirical statements about the world, which of course you can make all day long, and I have no problem with that. Or the doing of math, etc... The thing is, as I said in my first comment, empirical proof is a thing, but we are not talking about things in the world or mundane statements about things. We are trying to have a meta-level discussion, where we try to get to the PRECONDITIONS of all of those things (as you said, axioms, which are not exactly the same thing as preconditions, but it's fine to call them that in this context). Preconditions need to be justified. If they don't need to be justified, then I can say "God exists", and when you ask me about my theistic worldview, I can just say "It's my precondition". If the conversation ends there, then I'm dumb and arbitrary, yeah. The thing is, we need a justification. A justification is not a story, it is a coherent "thing" that allows you to build knowledge and beliefs in a coherent worldview. My argument is that the only possible way to ground all the preconditions of knowledge is God. By virtue of what I talked about in the other comments.+1
@Dovus-V - 2025-02-17 12:44:19
@jshowao By the way, youtube may be hiding some of my answers so if you're interested in reading them all, make sure to sort by recent in the top page of the comments section. They may or may not be hidden but just to make sure cause youtube acts weird sometimes.+1
@jshowao - 2025-02-17 12:44:19
@Dovus-V Pre-conditions dont need to be justified at all. For example, why do I need to justify what 1 is when I can just take one object, place it on a table, and say that represents one of something. Even the very words you and I type were made up by humans. However, the great thing about humans is we can come to consensus about many things. Nobody (of merit) is trying to change the meaning of the English word "the" for example. This is how axioms form. Then the axioms are used to build more knowledge. God is just a character in a story someone made up and convinced a lot of people to pretend is real. You said it yourself, a justification is not a story yet the Bible is literally a story.+1
@folksurvival - 2025-02-17 12:44:19
@jshowao Gödel’s Incompleteness Theorem.+1
@Dovus-V - 2025-02-17 12:44:19
@jshowao Well, you can say that. But the thing you just mentioned (1 thing in a table is an instantiation of the number 1, therefore 1 is a thing), is actually a hotly debated concept in philosophy that started with Aristotle. For example, you could ask if that 1 thing is counted by division or by identity (is it "one" because of how it relats to other things, or is it "one" because of some inherent metaphysical status?) Or, for example, is 1 a number just like 2 and 3, or is it a totally different thing that works axiomatically and that predates numbers? It doesn't matter what the answer to these questions are, but I'm bringing them up so that you see that this particular numerical issue may not have such a simple answer in reality. I'm not appealing to consensus, just showing how the topic goes into huge depths. Now, regarding consensus. I will just ask you a genuine question: was the consensus that humans had back in the 1200's also a veredict of what's true? Because people in the 1200's were pretty much all religious, and Christian in the case of Europe. So I'm wondering, how does consensus work to discern what's true? You say preconditions don't have to be justified, and I keep telling you: Then I also don't have to justify my preconditions, which are ultimately theistic. So who is right? What if I just presuppose God to explain everything else.+1
@jshowao - 2025-02-17 12:44:19
@Dovus-V Its only "hotly debated" by people that want to make everything into a debate. Aristotle is a 2000+ year old man who didnt have all the understanding we have now. It's not 1 because of metaphysics, it's 1 because humans decided and agreed that is what 1 represents. And 1 is still demonstrable as I've already gave an example. You clearly have to justify the existence of god because god, according to you, is an actual being that operates in the world. Consensus changes clearly, obviously going back in time, consensus changes due to lack of knowledge. God isnt needed to explain everything, so presupposing it is foolish. In what way is god required to understand how anything operates in the world?+1
@chirhoagape - 2025-02-17 12:44:19
@jshowao Who created you?+1
@jshowao - 2025-02-17 12:44:19
@chirhoagape My parents+1
@chirhoagape - 2025-02-17 12:44:19
@ and them?+1
@jshowao - 2025-02-17 12:44:19
@chirhoagape Their parents lol+1
@chirhoagape - 2025-02-17 12:44:19
@ and them?+1
@Dovus-V - 2025-02-17 12:44:19
@jshowao Well, you can reject philosophy as a whole and that's fine, but then you're also kind of surrendering the possibility of debate at all. It's fine, you're not forced to debate, but to dismiss philosophy in that way is akin to dismissing deeper debates that are not strictly empirical. On God "not being able to explain everything" you are right. But the role he plays in my paradigm is that of a "grounding principle", which predates everything else fundamentally, but not as in him being an explainer. If I want to explain why nature is regular and ordered, I may have a million mechanisms that I can appeal to. But if I believe in God, I ultimately have a REASON for all these mechanisms. It's not the mechanism itself, just the foundation that makes the mechanism possible. It was a fruitful discussion though, I appreciate it.+1
@jshowao - 2025-02-17 12:44:19
@chirhoagape This was a nice troll after the second time, but I think you can answer this question now+1
@jshowao - 2025-02-17 12:44:19
@Dovus-V There does not need to be a grounding principle that predates everything. Humans are born with brains and the ability to reason. They come up with their own societal structures and rules that they agree to live by. The problem is with you and you assuming that there has to be some grounding principle to predate everything. You do not have a reason to appeal to god for all these mechanisms because all these mechanisms are explainable without god. You admitted this yourself, yet you can't accept it for some reason. And I never implied ignoring philosophy, I just dont think a man 2000 years ago had as many answers like a man in modern times does.+1
@chirhoagape - 2025-02-17 12:44:19
@ No, I think you know the answer and it has been staring you in the face for a while now.+1
@jshowao - 2025-03-17 12:44:19
WineMomEnjoyer About as much as you presuppose god with no evidence of their existence. Every system has axioms, even religion. its just belief in religion offers and has offered nothing to the advancement of science. I can show you how logic works by demonstrating it. Please, demonstrate god to me.+1
@3567-j3n - 2025-03-17 12:44:19
@jshowao this is just called being arbitrary.+1
@chirhoagape - 2025-02-17 12:44:20
Aisha+1
@Kenanalasadi8989 - 2025-02-17 12:44:20
@ The mother of believers+1
@Kenanalasadi8989 - 2025-02-17 12:44:20
@chirhoagape Also what about the 3 years old rebekah ?+1
@roachdawgjrjr - 2025-02-17 12:44:20
@Kenanalasadi8989 nowhere does it say she's 3 years old+1
@Kenanalasadi8989 - 2025-02-17 12:44:20
@ best case scenario is that she was in her early teenage years, anyway, I can give you ton of examples of prophets and figures you glorify from old ages which have married very young females, it was too common back then, playing smart with nowadays criteria's would be delusional+1
@freedom8383 - 2024-12-17 12:44:20
Name anywhere in the bible with an innerant, inspired table of contents that shows me what books belong in the Bible?+1
@OrthodoxKyle - 2024-12-17 12:44:20
1. The Saints are not "dead" , they are alive in Christ.. They are only "dead" if you are an Atheist 2. We want Holy People to pray for us, intercession is all throughout the Bible. The Saints are holy people 3. The Bible has prayer to Saints in Revelation 4:4;10-11 Revelation 5:8 And when he had taken the book, the four beasts and four and twenty elders fell down before the Lamb, having every one of them harps, and golden vials full of odours, which are the prayers of saints. <--- the prayers of the Saints are offered to God in heavenly worship also in revelation 8:3:4 watch this: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eCYCpVwsEXU 4. The Bible doesn't tell you anywhere to base everything on Bible alone.. It refers to outside tradition, Apostolic Tradition like Liturgy of Saint James (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Liturgy_of_Saint_James) Earliest worship has asking for prayers of Saints.. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5QiWFrkAzfw More proof: https://www.oca.org/reflections/fr.-lawrence-farley/praying-to-the-saints I have provided you many resources, please look into them! God bless!+17