Kathleen Wadkins: eternal perspective amidst controversial news

Whit's End: Real People, Hard Questions

Kathleen Wadkins lives with her husband, 2 kids and their dog in eastern Iowa. In her words, “it actually exists!”

Kathleen is the head of content at The Pour Over, which aims to be a politically neutral, Christ-first news source. When you subscribe to The Pour Over, you’ll get an email newsletter 3x a week with a brief overview of some of the world’s biggest stories.

I found the Pour Over about 6 months ago while walking with a friend. We were talking about how I wanted to do a better job of staying up with current events but didn’t want to get sucked in to an unhealthy extent or consume news in a way that made me fearful, shortsighted, and/or emotionally fatigued. Enter The Pour Over.

This interview touches on how to read controversial news while keeping an eternal perspective, as well as seeking openness to correction and unconditional love. How do we respond when we're offended? How do we speak about people who are not present? Do we use our words to dignify or villify our enemies? Are we allowing the comment section on social media to be a petri dish that cultivates an US vs. THEM mentality?

We pick up this conversation on how Christians are called to be set apart in a world that thrives on division, offense, and controversy.

Show Notes/References:

• thepourover.org

• The Pour Over core values - brevity, levity, dignity, and clarity

• “By this everyone will know you are my disciples, if you have love for one another.” -John 13:35

• IG: @ thepourovernews

• FB: @ The Pour Over

Memorable Quotes:

• “The Pour Over exists to be a trustworthy news resource guiding people toward eternal hope.”

• “This topic, this story, might be really big right now, but our goal at TPO is to keep the big things big and the small things small, and in light of eternity it probably won’t matter in 1,000 years, but your relationship with God will.”

• “One of the biggest opportunities we have as Christians is to reflect God’s light to other people.”

• “If someone was curious about how Christians are approaching the biggest topics of today and they came to our comment section, what would they find there? Would it be love and acceptance? Would it be gentle conviction? Would it be grace and truth? Or would it be keyboard warriors?”

• “We shouldn’t be willing to sacrifice relationships in order to win arguments.”

• “How can over half a million people choosing to have an eternal perspective about an election year impact the world around them?”

• “People are quick to make a judgment that we’re on a different team.”