Resources for Further Study:

• Leaving a Legacy by Johann Kurtz
• Becoming Noble | Johann Kurtz | Substack

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The Questioning Belief podcast explores objections to Christianity through in-depth discussions with experts. Drawing from her background as a former atheist and her experience in apologetics, Dr. Kathleen Noller invites you to explore thoughtful responses to serious questions about faith. Learn more.

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Explore written reflections from Dr. Kathleen Noller and get in touch with her through her Substack, The Reformed Gadfly.

Transcript

Welcome to the Kathleen Noller podcast brought to you by the C.S. Lewis Institute. The objection we're going to discuss in this episode is as follows. At the end of a lifetime of living and working to glorify God, our legacy solely rests in our individual relationship with Christ and how well pleased he is with us. Concerns over building generational wealth or financial wellbeing of our children are ultimately worldly and should not be the focus of the devout Christian. Further transmitting one's wealth to one's children breeds laziness. Warren Buffett himself says, “Quote, leave children enough so they can do anything, but not enough that they can do nothing. So, to address this objection and talk about his latest book, we have our speaker today, Johann Kurtz. He is a legacy advisor and succession strategist, helping individuals and families least to arrange their affairs towards lasting good. He's a Substack bestseller and his blog, Becoming Noble on philosophy, theology, and history is read by tens of thousands each week. He recently published a book titled Leaving a Legacy, Inheritance, Charity, and Thousand-Year Families, which reveals that true charity is a multi-generational project and that virtuous family dynasties are its indispensable guardians. It equips leaders to embrace the sacred duty and forge a legacy they will forever be proud of.

Welcome, Johann. Thank you so much for joining us.

Johann Kurtz: Thank you. Thank you for the comprehensive bio. I appreciate it.

Kathleen Noller: Yeah, of course. So, I don't know if you know this, but my husband and I got your book as soon as it came out and we have been discussing it. We both read it together. We've been talking about it pretty much every single night after dinner since we've read it. So, we've really had time to chew on what you've been talking about. And I think for our listeners, when you read this book, I think it'll be the same for you and your family. So, before we get started, the book is dedicated to your grandfather, Michael, who you say is the hero of your family. I'm sure there are several grandparents, parents listening to who wish for such a dedication relationship with the young younger generation. So, I'm just curious, what did he do to become your hero?

Johann Kurtz: Yeah, well, he was, he was an amazing figure. I mean, he was, he was the generation, sort of greatest generation. He was, he was a highly decorated veteran of, of World War II. And I'm lucky enough. I've got his war diaries here somewhere. they're off camera, but,

Kathleen Noller: Oh, nice.

Johann Kurtz: But he wrote a war diary, and he didn't speak about it a lot in person, but the tales of his heroism are available to us.

Kathleen Noller: Oh

Johann Kurtz: And he was very gravely wounded as the result of the actions, which got him decorated.

Kathleen Noller: wow.

Johann Kurtz: And he saved some of his men's lives. He was an officer in a cavalry regiment called the Royal Hussars. He saved some of his men's lives at an act of incredible daring. He climbed into the burning wreckage of a tank to extract the medical equipment and indeed a man from a sort of raging fire and was terribly burnt as a result. So, his skin was burnt off, his face, his hair was burnt off, his hands were seared shut. And he spent a year and a half in hospital after... the war and he was one of the first recipients of reconstructive plastic surgery. So, you see people from that time whose sort of entire faces were rebuilt in quite an experimental way. Despite this, this sort of radical act of life-changing heroism who is in her early twenties, he went on to lead the, an abridged and incredible life. I mean, he met my grandmother. It was a very beautiful woman after this had taken place. So, you can imagine he was a, he was a striking figure, asked her to marry him within hours of meeting her in the British countryside.

Kathleen Noller: Oh, wow.

Johann Kurtz: And they went on to have children. So, and, and sort of, you know, faithful mass attending not, not without controversy, I should say she, she converted to Catholicism to marry him. So, her Anglican family was, was not,

Kathleen Noller: Oh,

Johann Kurtz: was not the best pleased with that development. But I'll say a serious Christian family for their entire lives.

Kathleen Noller: I bet.

Johann Kurtz: So made his mark in one obvious and dramatic way early on. But I think more than that, just a lifetime of seriousness and family. And he ran a farm in his later years, which I have very beautiful memories of. So, a presence in our lives.

Kathleen Noller: That's wonderful to hear. What an incredible figure and what an excellent candidate as we're discussing leaders and how to forge this legacy that your family is going to be proud of with many generations down the line. So, I want to segue into, so the first section of your book is talking about charity. And so, you also talk about you know generational wealth and how can we incorporate giving into that? But first, my sort of initial question, I think what a lot of Christians are going to think right off the bat is why should they care about something as quote unquote worldly as generational wealth? So, the Bible, as you know, is full of cautions against greed and idolatry of money. First Timothy states that love of money is the root of all kinds of evil. So how can we as Christians focus so deeply on building generational wealth without sucking to the idolatries that the Bible warns us of? And are we just playing with fire or can we really steward it with goodness?

Johann Kurtz: Well, think all the above. I think the criticisms are completely valid. The cautionary tales are relevant. And this isn't going to be a sort of apologetics of being wealthy.

Kathleen Noller: Yes.

Johann Kurtz: think the idolatry of money is perfectly put, which is disordered attachment to the wealth itself, especially in liquid or monetary form. Whereas if you start to recognize that what wealth can be, is a tool for effecting real world change, and that all of us are called to order the world to participate in creation, to participate in that act of dominion, you know, our God given mandate in healthy ways which respect our Christian faith, then you start to see money as one amongst an arsenal of options available to you for making the world a more orderly and beautiful and Christian place. So, the question then is, when you approach that multi-generationally, are there structures or practices which you can leverage to ensure that any wealth you do leaves your children sets them up to continue that practice, that well-ordered relationship with wealth? And obviously you do have charitable obligations, and it is indeed correct that one of those charitable obligations is completely legitimate and necessary expression of that is given to the poor but likewise, the Bible, speaks in many places in defensive terms of inheritance.

Kathleen Noller: Yes.

Johann Kurtz: And I include some of those quotes in the book. We must be a little bit careful with them, of course, because an inheritance here shouldn't just be understood as material, but it's also spiritual and so forth.

Kathleen Noller: yes

Johann Kurtz: But one of the things I explore in the book is ways that you can leave those two things together. That is the way that you order your material estate and the spiritual inheritance you leave to your children interrelated in subtle ways. Are you building them home that is reflective of their faith, of your faith, that contains artworks, perhaps a library, artifacts? Is your local church well patronized? Does it, you know, does it have the funding to continue? Essentially, have you ordered your local environment in a way that reflects that faith? Because it is, of course, true that you should be teaching them and raising them in faith, but we're embodied beings and space. And if we have the capacity to, we should be designing one to reify the other. You know, liturgy isn't just, isn't just thoughts, it's action. It's the expression of faith in the world. And so, the constitution of the world is important. So yeah, I mean, to sort of summarize, think you hit the nail on the head. Availability, a disordered attachment to money itself, can be very dangerous. It's an ever-present temptation. And one of the things I look at in the book is how can you structure your estate to make sure that you're not just accruing liquid wealth in the way that that that many men do, especially since the financial revolution within the last years, and particularly since the Second World War.

Kathleen Noller: Yes.

Johann Kurtz: Now people have a lot of their wealth in very liquid forms, but how can you actually embed it into structures, estates, social organizations, entrust it to your children so that they can get married and start children young, such that they can pursue careers which are meaningful without compromising their ability to build a home for their family and so forth. So all of these things interrelate. The idolatry point is a good one, but I do think there is a productive place for the use of wealth and there are some biblical examples of that.

Kathleen Noller: Yes, that's very well put. I think you know folks that are reading your book will very much discern that you're not arguing for sort of a Matthew serving two masters, serving God and money.  You're putting everything in its proper place and wealth is a very valuable tool as we do live on this earth and things are transactional. It is a very valuable tool in our arsenal, like you said, to be able to give back and to be able to exercise as servant leadership in your community. So, moving into what you discussed in terms of charity. So, your first chapter is titled giving is not charity. So, could you just briefly tell us what is charity or what's the classic Western Christian version of it and how does that relate to noblesse oblige?

Johann Kurtz: Yeah, great question. So, I think that one thing that really catches lot of families, wealthy Christian families, but all, you know, this doesn't exclusively apply ultra-high net worth families or anything, middle class families with some resources to devote charity. One thing that catches them off guard is that something that bears very little relationship to a traditional Christian understanding of moral obligations has now monopolized the term charity. So, you see a lot of quotes unquote charities, which are legal entities, which are devoted to activities, which have nothing to do with Christianity and in many ways are antithetical to a Christian understanding of the world, you know, revolutionary social change and so forth. And Whatever it is, when you donate money to those institutions, it certainly doesn't appear to be anything that our forefathers would have thought of as charity. And one thing I've noticed is when I've engaged families with means is that, you know, posit this question to them, to you, what is the difference between charity and philanthropy? And often these are very important concepts in their lives. They're engaged, you know, as a major part of their self-conception, their justification in the world in these acts of philanthropy. And yet these even basic terms, they get taken aback by and they say, you know, that's interesting haven't thought about the difference.

There is a difference, especially when we're using these words rigorously. Charity. is a theological virtue. It's properly understood. To go right back to its source, it's love for your God and as an expression and extension of your love for your God, a love for his creation for your fellow man. And as such, it's a virtue, it's a habit of the soul, it's a disposition to the world, it's something that perfects you by participating in it regularly, this act of loving everyone who you met, your family, your neighbors, and so forth. And, and what it is not, an entirely theoretical, sort of. Philosophical stance, what developed, I think in the era of mass globalization, is something that has become known as telescopic charity, which is, I think, a dangerous abstraction of charity that becomes impersonal. I talk about the contrast between the actions in the parable of the Good Samaritan, which is this intensely personal encounter that results in moral obligations to a man present at the scene who's actually encountering a destitute person who doesn't just give him money and move on, but who goes to him, puts him on his own donkey, who carries him personally to the innkeeper after dressing his wounds. He returns to the innkeeper after a few days. Money is a component of it. He gives money to the innkeeper to look after the man, but that's not the totality of it. It's an actual live activity. And we will kind of expect that if we examine the terms carefully, specifically neighbor, which is derived from the Greek lesion, which speaks of physical proximity and moral obligations to those present at the scene. And what you started to see in the late century, and this is where we get into this realm of philanthropy, which is distinct from charity, is this realization that, well, now, know, mass media, especially in the edge of the internet, these huge bureaucratic world globe spanning institutions mean that actually I can perform some kind of mathematical calculation, which means that I can devote my attention to someone on the other side of the world who is, according to some model or financial model, the most needy person. I can maximize the number of lives saved by donating.

Kathleen Noller: Yes.

Johann Kurtz: The problem with this is that often While I don't think there's any problem if you care deeply about an issue and you really do care and you focus on it and you take on some responsibility for the resolution of that issue, devoting your financial resources or some part of it to an institution like that, the problem is that As you move towards that model, you stray further from the really essential thing, which is this charity is a virtue and that that concerns your relationship with God, you know, and that is inviolable, that that should never be replaced with some bureaucratic globalist activity. And what philanthropy is, it sort of takes advantage of this process of globalization. One of the works I cite in the book is Andrew Carnegie's gospel of wealth. Andrew Carnegie being the, one of the richest men in the world at the time, industrial magnate who's, who's in the process of losing his faith, sort of sporadic records of him attending church. But what he, what he does is, in combination with some, some, I would, I would say abusive labor practices. Um, he sort of says, well, you know, for the first time I am in, possession of this massive, essentially liquid wealth, the amount of cash available to me is huge. This isn't like a king of old who would have nominal wealth, but largely that is tied up in land and a castle.

Kathleen Noller: yes

Johann Kurtz: you know He can't sell his castle and so forth, and he has obligations. This is a man who has tremendous liquid capital. He's losing his faith, but he has access to the sort of new sciences of psychology, sociology, and purported sciences, I should say. And he says, well, how about i and he says this very explicitly in the Gospel of Wealth, it's quite a striking docent. He says, how about approaching this question of charity scientifically as opposed to theologically? Could I move from this older Christian model of ameliorating of those who are suffering in my life to some kind of radical reorganization of society such that I could actually restructure the constitution of our civilization to avoid any of these problems, poverty or material arising in the first place? very quickly this devolves into essentially just politics and macroeconomic management. And by that point, you've fully moved away from anything that the, you know, scholastics or whoever would understand as charity, certainly the church fathers. And the final thing I want to say is that charity, especially for families who are confronted with this question of charity, just my plea don't do what a lot of people now do, which is wait till the end of your life, write a charity into your will and consider your charitable obligation done because that doesn't come close to fulfilling the totality of what Christianity has always understood as charity and that you would be Charity reduced to a financial transaction from one bank account to another bank account between people you never meet and can't love and can't follow up on and can't take on some of their suffering and can't take on responsibility for this mutual relationship love. That isn't what Christianity is always meant by charity. There is, as I said, there is a way to use your material abundance and give to the poor, which is ordered and Christian. But be selective about which institutions you give to. Think about the totality of their impact on the world. And think about how you can become personally involved. Don't sort of outsource to charity as a service, which is now common.

Kathleen Noller: Yes, it's a very modern temptation. And I like how in your book, as you said, you talk about the definition of neighbor and the Hebrew word in the Old Testament. And I think nowadays it can be so tempting to think of your neighbor who normally would be the person who's in social proximity to you as somebody who you interact with online. Or, you know, somebody in this globalist network who is sort of our modern-day neighbors in a sense, because those are with whom we socialize. But I was going to ask you, so personally, you mentioned sort of sometimes you can give in terms of just giving money if it's a little bit more of a detached cause, but it means a lot to you. So personally, a cause that means a lot to me is helping children in the neonatal ICU. So, my first child spent four months at NICU. She was born in the second trimester. It was a long ordeal. And so, I've long wanted to find a way to serve my local NICU, either the parents or the children or whatever it might be. But to do so, at least where we used to live, I would be acting sort of in redundancy of the work of paid full-time employees from either social work within the hospital or from a global charity organization, so I have heard about this issue repeatedly. And at some point, one feels as if one's either helping more for one's own gratification in these cases rather than out of satisfying a real need, or that you could be greatly helpful if you are allowed. But hospital policy, in my case, state policy, prevents a deeply personal or even religious, especially involvement. So, my question for you is this, how do we, if we live in an affluent society, or if we live in a state that's overrun with government programs and large-scale charities designed to fund every need imaginable. How do we find our neighbors who have a real unmet need?

Johann Kurtz: a good question. And I think one of the defining questions of our time, let me, if it's okay, can I read out a quick quote from the book?

Kathleen Noller: Yeah, absolutely.

Johann Kurtz: this was Richard Cornwell, who's a who's an American political thinker and philanthropist. He's writing in philanthropy magazine here in. He says, guided by this mistaken perception of where the strength of society lay and how best to bring that strength to bear on social problems, there ensued sustained and continuous transfer of responsibility in a single direction. Away from society's most primary institutions, individuals, families, circles of friends, local voluntary organizations, local governments, the tragic legacy of this epoch of rationalization was the systematic, irrational disconnection of ordinary people from the business of society, a radical constriction of the definition of the citizen's role. In the end, the only opportunities for participation left to ordinary Americans were voting and paying taxes on time. They had been prejudged incompetent to do much else. So that sort of Related to what you're saying, which is a society that says, look, don't get involved. The professionals are handling it.

Kathleen Noller: Yes.

Johann Kurtz: Like, if you want to give us money, give us money. But otherwise, you know, let us handle it. And I think, I mean, it's a delicate issue, of course, because the NICU is doing important, irreplaceable work, and you sort of don't want to disrupt that. On the other hand, I think this is ultimately a battle that is worth fighting, which is to say there are, especially when it relates to your community and anyone you know, domains of hung existence that

Kathleen Noller: yes

Johann Kurtz: give up to institutions, especially where there's a sort of mandatory state-backed institution that that can't replace society as such.

Kathleen Noller: yes

Johann Kurtz: So, I don't know. I mean, it's difficult. I won't overly comment on your situation, which I can appreciate as a very complex one. but i think I think, you know, if if there's no way of interacting with that official institution without muscling your way in in a way which would be antagonistic, one would hope that there were social or religious institutions which were sort of running parallel, you know, maybe not doing the technical work of healthcare for premature babies, but doing you know social work, bringing the families in question, meals and providing psychological or social or religious support, these kinds of things. So, I mean, I don't have an answer to your question as such, but I would say that like, I'm glad you're continuing to push on that because I don't think it's, I don't think it's right to say. And, you know, the NICU is an example of good people doing good and important work. But there are which are often doing things which I would regard as morally abhorrent or sort of like slipping a bit of poison with your food.

Kathleen Noller: Yes.

Johann Kurtz: So, you know, you must accept this institution and this institution’s elements of it are completely defensible, but also, it's going to support things that I would, I would regard as morally abhorrent. So yeah, I think, I think it's, we're in a difficult place to be mean, it's funny. I was, I was slightly off topic, but like I was, I'm writing an article now and it's, it's in defense of patrilineal naming. So this is the idea that, you know, when a woman marries a man, they should take their husband's name and pass that on to their children. And there's a variety of reasons for this. Just a throwaway fact I found amazing was in Greece in, they amended their civil code. So, this is legally enforced. It is illegal for a woman to change her name upon marriage to match that of her husband, because they judged that this was domain, which was a sort of like striking.

Kathleen Noller: Oh, wow

Johann Kurtz: Yeah, I mean, it's a very, bold move. I'm just, it struck me. I mean...

Kathleen Noller: That's astonishing. I feel like there's so many examples of that that I can think of, especially related to women's quote unquote rights or gender equality or childcare or things like that, where the laws and sort of society has been forced in a way to produce a particular element of social change, which seems good to those who are forcing it, but ultimately sort of takes away the element of free will my question for you is sort of about elites being sort of seen nowadays often as rightly or wrongly out of touch and selfish. So, if we look at Luigi Mangione's murder of the healthcare care CEO and how much sympathy he garnered for himself doing something evil towards someone perceived as morally corrupt, even the British royal family, out I don't know how what the pulse is ah in Europe where you are, but They engage in charity pursuits. They sort of try to engage with the public. But in America, they're sort of seen as superfluous users of tax money. and of course, distrust of scientific elite post-COVID in the U.S. is at an all-time high, I would say. So, my question for you is, can this old-fashioned picture of the wealthy community leader, servant leader, and steward really work in the modern day? Or have we just garnered too much distrust, rightly or wrongly, for organizations and for elites? for any reparation to be possible.

Johann Kurtz: Yeah, great question. And it's one I come up against lot, because I'll say something like, Well, one of the advantages of having rooted, landed elite in an area is that they have uniquely long-term, well, they have a combination of resources and a long-term vision because they intend for their children, their grandchildren, their great-grandchildren to be living in the same place. And therefore, they're invested in a particular community. And it's to their advantage to beautify that community, to invest in it, to make sure that the populace is healthy and is living orderly and good lives, essentially, that their spiritual and physical health is taken care of. And that's the theory. And then, well, people will say completely reasonably, well, you know, if that's the justification for the elite and the elite in my era aren't doing any of those things, then that's a moot justification. And that's completely right. I mean, the book is absolutely not intended as a blanket apologetics for elites everywhere because elites, to the extent that there ever was in, you know, perhaps in high Christendom, a marriage of however imperfect and uneven it was a marriage of, authority and, chivalry and a bless oblige and, and an authentic Christianity in many places that is, that is certainly gone and, you know, think, What I am laying out in the book is hopefully roadmap for how to deepen the thought of a family and provide examples and philosophical scaffolding for families who want to attempt in their own way to embody some part of the maximalist expression of these ideals that some of the great figures of our history, you know, St. Louis IX and so forth have embodied.

I would say that very few elites now continue to embody this and, and, you know, the Royal family, basically don't get me started on, on the British Royal family you know, it's, it's the, you know, because of course, another member of the moral family features prominently in the book, which is, which is the Ed of the eighth who abdicated the throne, after engaging in some extramarital activity. And that normalization of divorce in the royal family has unfortunately, has occurred. It is normal at this stage and the stigma has been removed, which is problem you are at the head of society and you are supposed to be representing this notion that the highest status, the highest wealth, the greatest power can only be justified by the most virtuous exemplary conduct that you sort of project out as the standard for a nation and you inspire people, you elevate them, you act as a figurehead that they're proud of and so forth. And I think that's gone. As you know, did not want to end on a negative note. One of the things that has happened since I wrote the book is that a lot of a lot of families including prominent American families that you would know have, or at least members of those families have written to me and just detailed small things that they're doing. And it's, you know, they're not the entrenched elite of society to the extent that there is a networked elite class, which I think there is in America and really across the global American empire of which I am a citizen for better or for worse. There is a consensus which is certainly post-Christian, a minor Christian heresy in many ways. And these families are not part of that. They are in small places; they carve out institutions of legitimate care for those around them. They preserve and beautify communities. I had a reader reach out to me who founded a tech company and generated a modest degree of wealth. And one of his hobbies, the application of that wealth is restoring and preserving historic buildings within local communities. And I think it's completely wonderful. I looked at a few of his pieces of work and its sort of small forgotten towns that, you know, very early on in their history, when the rail line first came through, someone with a grand vision of what the town could be built hotel you know, whatever it was. And they really took pride in the construction of that thing. And that thing has been left to atrophy, but it is this wonderful, you know, it roots an entire,

Kathleen Noller: yeah

Johann Kurtz: Person community in their history and pride and aesthetics and beauty and a sense of place, a sense of ownership. And the restoration of that to something that's beautiful and productive in the contemporary economy is, is this thing that has all kinds of subtle psychological and spiritual and physical knock-on effects, which I think is wonderful. And there are many expressions of that. So these families are out there, but, but they're not part of the, capital E elite, the, you know, the sort of, the sort of informal network of, of elite institutions that, that are influential our lives from the healthcare apparatus that you mentioned to, to the entrenched civil service in my country and, and in yours and so forth. So, they're out there and my hope is that for those families and for anyone that wants to, to sort of pull their weight a little bit, they might find something useful in the book.

Kathleen Noller: Yes, absolutely. I love that example of restoring those historic buildings. And for anybody who's listening, and when you get to the end of the book, Johann gives his email. And so, if you're interested in connecting and sort of becoming a part of this Leaving a Legacy project, I would suggest that you email him. But that aside, you've touched on aesthetics and beauty in your book, and we've talked about it a little bit today. In the book, you remarked that palaces are not just luxurious homes, nor are king’s dress, for example, just fancy clothes. They have higher symbolic purposes. And so, from my background, it's interesting reading this because I think we all instinctually have this love of aesthetic beauty. And it points us to something symbolic, something higher. But I come from this iconoclastic Protestant culture where our churches look more like office buildings. And toddler the other day came with me. We were going into a random office building. It was this sort of unremarkable gray and white building. and she entered it and she yelled, “We’re at church. church And I just laughed because to her, they look the same and they sort of do. So, my question for you is how should we balance our use of funds or our leadership within a community to pursue aesthetic beauty with its use towards perhaps more urgent or material needs?  and how can we…

Kathleen Noller: How can we pursue aesthetics without being accused of quote laying ourselves up treasures on earth?

Johann Kurtz: Well, I don't want to present myself as ah as a theologian. So, although I'm about to sort of, you know, touch on some theological themes, you know, grain of salt, et cetera, your mind, and denomination may vary, but I think it's very defensible.

Kathleen Noller: Sure.

Johann Kurtz: There are examples in the Bible. give two off the top of my head. The first is the anointing of Jesus at the home of Simon the leper, wherein woman comes and pours fine ointment or perfume on Jesus' hair. And the disciples react in disbelief and they say, what are you doing? That expensive perfume could have been sold, and the proceeds could have been given to the poor and Jesus stops them and corrects them and in arresting fashion and says, no, she's done a great and beautiful thing and honoring me in this way. In a similar way, Joseph of Arimathea, who is described explicitly as a rich man, is sort of written into the, into biblical history by having bought a fine tomb for himself, he gives it to Jesus for his body to be laid in. And this is felt to, in some sense, to have elevated and reflected the dignity of Christ and the church. And the examples go on. This is very clear in the Old Testament, the specifications of the Ark of the Covenant, the Temple of Solomon and so forth conviction in the metaphysical and how we write that into the physical. I was in... I was at Windsor Palace recently, just as a conventional visitor, not as a personal guest of the King, I should stress.

Kathleen Noller: To clarify.

Johann Kurtz: To clarify, yes. And I went into a chapel there, and it was one of the most astonishing experiences. It's the first time I've been there. Very old chapel, almost a thousand years old. And you go inside, and it's almost like a, it has the feel almost of a natural formation in that it's all made of stone. The pillars, the walls, the ceiling. But it's huge. It seems it registers to the senses as this kind of cavernous entity that must be natural information that hang hands could build. And every surface is covered in carvings, whether they're sort of aesthetic and architectural pieces or whether they're little motifs or Christian symbols or the names of people. And they're surrounded by the tombs of people and their bodies and faces and likenesses are carved on top of the tombs. And you're just struck almost bodily by a felt sense of the strength of the faith of the people who must have built this institution because their faith was so strong that they persisted through the just unthinkable difficulty and expense of carving that level of detail, of physicalizing their faith into rock at that scale i mean, it's arresting.

Johann Kurtz: So, I, for better or for worse, have very Catholic views on this this issue.

Kathleen Noller: yeah

Johann Kurtz: But I do think, you know, if you weren't on board with the sort of Catholic aesthetic, as indeed many Catholics now aren't, I would say that it's important to find some kind of felt way to delineate sacred space, to actually give, you know, I think it's fine if a church doesn't look like a high medieval church.

Kathleen Noller: Yes.

Johann Kurtz: And indeed, you know, the evolution of what a church looks like has evolved over millennia anyway. But it must be felt to be different to the surrounding space. Mercia Eliade, who's sort of, is an orthodox, historian and theorist of religion, who I find very compelling, delineates sacred and profane space. So there's this sense that when you enter specific sites, holy sites, churches, you should have this felt sensation that there is an existential change, that actually when you're in this space, you should be totally devoted to reverence, and that this is a space where the divine and the and the personal meat and that aperture must be respected and broadened to the greatest degree it can you know ideally you want to invoke or in children that actually like you're telling them that although the world feels like uh like an even plane that they're moving from one secular domain to another that actually there are certain

Kathleen Noller: Yes.

Johann Kurtz: There are certain places where the world beyond that becomes more visible, more tangible. And, you know, perhaps that doesn't have to be done with glitter and gold. But I do think it's a problem if an office space and a church feel the same. You know that kind of means that...in terms of your resource allocation, your design choices,

Kathleen Noller: Yes suboptimal certainly i think yes that that reminds me also of in your book you talk about  founding father john Hancock and he dressed in fine clothing and jewelry and i when i was looking up his religious background i thought well you know Perhaps in American Protestantism, we see this as maybe garish and immodest because we have this Puritan influence. but Then I read that his grandfather is a Puritan minister. So, I thought that that was a little piece of interesting history for those listening in who might...  who might confuse sometimes you know ornamental ah dress and  actually being you know it being appropriate to dress according to one station, which he was doing at the time do want to touch on meritocracy now because this is such an interesting part of your book and I’ve really enjoyed your articles on this as well so we talked about king Edward the eighth previously so his biographer you write in your book  says about king Edward the eighth that nothing saps the spirit so surely and so irritably irrevocably as a failure to put one's abilities to work  so nowadays I would say putting one's abilities to work is thought of as a really individualized task and typically it leads children to pursue very elite college education far from home and then follow a series of job offers and promotions across the country, even across the world. So at the end of this long road of higher education and -hour work weeks, they often end up trapped financially at least or maybe even geographically by this very career that they pursued to earn independence and So how do you suggest children of the families that you're talking to balance using their abilities for good with this hyper individualization and this sort of endless treadmill of meritocracy?

Johann Kurtz: Yeah, great question. Well, I think it's sad what a lot of families resort to, which is they say, we need to push our child out of the nest quite aggressively. And it's great if they go to the best college in the country, wherever that is, and then they go and work for the best firm in the country, wherever that is, that's a long way from us, no problem. Because that proves they know how to work hard and apply themselves. And that sort of belies two errors, I think understandable. I mean, you know, who wouldn't be proud if your son or daughter went to a great school and they got a great job?

Kathleen Noller: Absolutely.

Johann Kurtz: Discipline is a virtue. On the other hand, I mean, there's sort of two problems with that. The first is that there are other virtues that this model of going out and throwing yourself into the secular world and succeeding as maximally as possible according to its values fails to capture. And, you know, could devote many episodes to all the ways that that wealth has gone wrong, but I think Declining marriage rates, declining rates in family formation, obviously people moving away from family and the church and so forth. There's no shortage of examples of that. And then the other error is in thinking that there's no way to marry people, work close to or for or with the family and discipline and hard work and excellence and what i try to show in the book. It's a very recent thing. It's a post-war thing that the global individualized mass formal examination meritocracy has come up. And it's come up in many ways to meet the needs, the employment needs of faceless mass technocratic system that is not Christian in any meaningful sense, even if it arguably achieves some positive technical effects. And there's a long historic and contemporary tradition of excellence in family business. You know, people say that meritocracy built the West and it simply isn't true. One of the statistics I quote in the book is that as late as, % of the US population was employed in one form another in agriculture, almost all in family enterprises, either owning family farm or working on the family farm of another family member. And that was the backbone on which America became great. And many corporations, you mentioned the Ford family, many, many, of the successful revolutionary enterprises in non-agricultural domains were likewise family enterprises. And even to this day, I quote John A. Davis, Professor John A. Davis, who's a highly respected figure, who's been a professor both Harvard and MIT and their business school departments, is very clear on the literature that the literature shows that, in fact, family firms outperform in the market because they're willing to plan on ultra-long timeline horizons. They have very clear plans for succession. People have loyalty to the family, not for purely mercenary purposes, where they move on as soon as they can, but are invested in the flourishing of the company for reasons to do with pride and community and so forth. There's lots of another interesting research, less of which I included in the book, but I sort of came across while I was writing it. Like, for example, the employees of family firms without HR programs are happier with their employer than the employees of public firms with HR deployments, even though like, yeah, exactly.

Kathleen Noller: I believe that.

Johann Kurtz: Even though a lot of people would asse that the HR department is there too interest, to represent the interests of the workers and to provide, you know, counseling for them or whatever. So, yeah, the answer is, how do you do that? And I devote quite a long portion of the book to looking at family businesses. story of John Hancock is one of them, but also aristocratic families who have successfully raised virtuous children, Louis IX and so forth. What are family practices? And it turns out that there’s a lot of moving components that go into this. I think they all make sense and they feel intuitive once you've identified them, that you don't need to do what lot of people do now, which is say, okay, you can be whatever you want to be. You can go to college wherever you want to go. should do years for another firm to prove yourself. And then maybe in your s, I'll let you come in when I'm two years away from retirement in the family business and you can start to take over, that that causes such a fracturing of identity and geographic preference and career path and destiny that it becomes laughable. I mean, I know a lot of families who are really going through very tough succession crises now because their children simply don't want to invest in perfectly profitable enterprises because they have no ties to the area in which the enterprise is located. They'd have to leave their social circles, the way that they've built up their conception, their pride, their self-identity has nothing to do with this line of business. They don't know anyone in it. They don't want to look like a fool for the first few years when they step into it late in life, when they already have a track record of excellence in another domain. So, one must be careful, but by no means are excellence and family enterprises distinct. As much as meritocracy sort of implies that nepotism, quote unquote, is a bad thing and is for spoiled and undeserving children, I go into this more in the book, but there are many ways in which that is just patently untrue. And in fact, the West was built on nepotism and not whatever this thing called meritocracy is, which is not what it purports to be.

Kathleen Noller: Yes, yes. And in your book as well, you state that the merit criterion and meritocracy sort of apply to an adult means relative economic productivity. So, as a mother who was raised according to meritocratic principles, I really feel the tension of this. And I was thinking about this a lot while I was reading that. I cannot participate in the meritocracy, nor can I earn the sort of implied moral goodness from successful participation without being a productive economic member of society. And I recently read ah Mary Harrington's book, and she sort of ah touches on this as well for women and how  taking yourself out of the workforce to raise your kids or homeschool your kids means essentially if you follow you know down the line, it sort of implies that you're no longer worthy of of merit in this type of society. So, I was wondering if your proposal offers something different to women and if male and female descendants are to follow the same path or slightly different paths in the family enterprise.

Johann Kurtz: Yeah, great question. There's a lot there. And to be honest, like, I think the question of how women fit into this framework, and they certainly do, might deserve a book of its own, because I realized that the offering there for women is probably incomplete at best. So, here’s how I see the problem. And you might have read the piece, stop me if you have, although I suppose most of your listeners won't have. This informed me a lot about my theory of declines in fertility. the dynamics of status in women's role there. Specifically, if you go back to the medieval period, because declines in fertility start way earlier than most people imagine. They stretch back hundreds of years, particularly in the case of France, the French Revolution, and in England as well. In the high medieval period, a woman's self-conception, her source of social status, which is existentially important to all of us, we all want to be valued and respected and recognized members of our communities. There are kind of three categories of status games. The first of virtue games, so you get recognized in your community for being a good person that makes sacrifices, that upholds the law of the community, that pursues excellence in charity and so forth. So, there's virtue games, there's dominance games.

So, someone has status purely because they are at the top of some meaningful organization or society in the case of a king or an aristocrat, something like that. And they are therefore to be respected because their decisions and opinions matter a lot. Or there's competence games, which is are you respected because you are very good at something important. So, if you were a doctor, you would win a competence game. You're not winning a dominant game. You're probably not winning a virtue game because this is done professionally and you expect to be paid. But you are respected because you have demonstrated excellence in something. And in a society where you live in a rooted community, it is very possible for virtue games and indeed dominant games to wield meaningful influence over our lives. Because if you expect to live in an ultra-long time horizon with the same set of people, even multi-generationally, then your reputation matters, then your contributions to the community, if you've allowed the community perpetuate itself by having children, by carefully raising wonderful children who are good members of the community, by really caring for and nurturing a family, that is recognized as an absolutely essential contribution to the continuation of a place and a people and a culture. Conversely, post-Enlightenment, when you see the world become much more mobile, you see the sort of landed aristocracy give way to an international mercantile elite the confidence games radically take dominance over the game of the day. and it's completely legitimate and understandable for women to want status, to want recognition, especially where those women clearly are and always have been. There have been incredibly intelligent women in society. And they are naturally drawn to the application of their excellences that society is telling them is the most worthy and valuable and deserving of recognition and reward.

Kathleen Noller: yes

Johann Kurtz: So, this question of the constitution of society and its composition, its rootedness, its place, the games it plays, they all become, they structure our lives in very subtle and important ways. Now, my hope is that this model of local investment in community by families with means who don't just wire their money off to whatever country, wherever they've never been because they saw an advert after the Super Bowl or whatever. But actually, this continued multi-generational investment in a local community that is a lived communion and covenant with other families in your domain where by you invest in all of the families around you to make sure that they are well-placed to have, to build healthy families, to, you know, to, to, to live their lives faithfully, to remain in the same place because the local economy is thriving, to not want to leave because the place is beautified and healthy and the environment is cared for and so forth. You can start building the architectural fabric of society rewards a diverse array of contributions towards society than just I'm a partner at McKinsey whatever.

Kathleen Noller: Yes.

Johann Kurtz: Like us, we must move away from that model. and its sort of a travesty whenever you have, you have an intelligent, capable woman, totally deserving of respect, whose only way of accruing recognition is to pursue, one that is in direct competition with the family, with, certainly any kind of rootedness in place and so forth.

Kathleen Noller: yes

Johann Kurtz: So, I think, I think a deeper and treatment is deserved there. I mean, there are all these interesting questions that I didn't touch on in the book. I like to imagine whenever I come across a medieval tradition that is at odds with our current way of understanding the world of morality, I like to treat it seriously and imagine that this was dreamt up and practiced by serious, faithful people. You know, think dowries and other things like that. And I just haven't investigated enough of those institutions to understand where they all fit in, in the case of women.

Kathleen Noller: yes

Johann Kurtz: But I'm sure they will do something somewhere. So, I think there's a lot more to be explored.

Kathleen Noller: Yes, I think that's an excellent answer. And I'll put in my plug for you to write a second book on that.  As they're coming into the end of the hour, I’m just going to whittle down to two questions. And both are sort of just concerning advice and practical advice for those who are listening. So, the first one is, Let's say somebody from the post-war generation is listening in and has either spent most of their money in retirement or doesn't have children that they feel would steward wealth according to Christian values. What should they do? Can they do anything to equip the next generation according to your model?

Johann Kurtz: Well, I'd say, you know, in the case of you've got children are unlikely to live according to Christian values, your highest obligation is to God. And your reflection your love for your children should reflect your love for God. And if you feel that, you know, Christian principles are going to be undermined by giving money to your children don't think there's any obligation to take that path. There's no obligation that overrides your dominion mandate to manage your resources responsibly and in Christian fashion. So, I fully sympathize with how difficult that situation is. And I know people in that situation, it's difficult. To the people who, and frankly, they're like, what I would say is, think about what you do love, that you believe is good, that you know something about, that you understand, that you deeply understand, hopefully maybe a family in your community or your local church or something like that. Try and look at these institutions as recipients of any wealth you have left. the reason being is that a lot of these institutions which hold sway in our minds as the culturally dominant charitable institutions are just engaged in a lot of things that i think you and i would find morally reprehensible and if you're not an expert in them in what they do with their money and so forth if your only relationship to them is I’ve heard they're great you might accidentally be leaving a lot of money that will be used in ways that also isn't good. And, you know, in the UK, Oxfam is the kind of big charity if you want to help Africa. And Oxfam does like a lot of weird sort socialist stuff. I mean, explicitly socialist stuff. This isn't a conspiracy theory. They hold sort of like conferences in that regard. So, you're buying into an entire economy that you don't necessarily understand.

Kathleen Noller: Yes.

Johann Kurtz: Whereas if you have a personal relationship, you feel deeply invested in something, if it's in a domain or a place that you understand well, you might have a bit more confidence that it's being used well. And indeed, the people who you give to will be grateful to you and understand that that was an expression of genuine charity, personal charity, and it will help initiate them into this economy of charity where they in turn hopefully feel some responsibility to continue that relationship to the world. With regards to your other question, if you don't have much to give, think love and care are invaluable. It is true that...I think a fair reading of many of the passages, you know, he who doesn't leave an inheritance to his children's children is worse than an unbeliever. I might be amalgamating two different verses there, but it's in Timothy anyway. It's very reasonable to read these passages as commandments to pass on the faith and to pass on relationship to God. And indeed, some of the studies cite in the chapter on parenting children, show that in fact it's profoundly psychologically healthy for children to spend a lot of time with their grandparents. That in fact children feel they can tell their grandparents things they can't tell their parents because their parents have an explicitly disciplinary relationship over them. Their parents can tell stories and extend the vista of the family and its place in history and time that their parents can't tell them. Their grandparents can often have a much more relaxed relationship with their grandchildren because, I mean, you know what it's like. I don't know if you know like, but as a parent, you've constantly got to be like, you can't spoil them because it'll turn into a habit because you don't.

Kathleen Noller: Oh, yes.

Johann Kurtz: Whereas the grandparents can come along and, you know, slip them bit of chocolate and it's no harm done.

Kathleen Noller: yes

Johann Kurtz: So, it's, you know, there's an incredibly important role for grandparents to play without giving any money that I hope our society doesn't lose.

Kathleen Noller: That's well said. And I think this entire episode in your book is going to be very edifying for listeners. i think there's a lot in here for folks that are either you know younger and looking to implement this with their own family or older and you know perhaps don't have this legacy built, but are finding that they want to leave something behind and they want to do they want to do good in a way that goes just beyond their personal relationship with them and Jesus. So, I think you'll find a lot of information and a lot of encouragement in this book if you read it and hopefully from listening to this episode. So, thank you so much, Johann, for your time. And we really appreciate your wisdom.

Johann Kurtz: No, no, thank you. Thank you very much for the invitation. I hugely appreciate it. And I had a great time.