The World and Everything in It: August 21, 2026

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NICK EICHER, HOST: Good morning!

Violent crime in America has plummeted, but the reasons leave much to be desired.

LINDSAY MAST, HOST: And, is motherhood a threat to a woman’s flourishing—or part of it? John Stonestreet is standing by for Culture Friday.

Also today, a review of a family fantasy film that invites us to rediscover wonder.

MOONFACE: The magic of childhood is always forgot. But this is the story of one who did not.

And, this month’s Quest with George Grant. Today, a conversation with theologian and artist Michael Milton.

EICHER: It’s Friday, August 21st. This is The World and Everything in It from listener-supported WORLD Radio. 

I’m Nick Eicher.

MAST: And I’m Lindsay Mast. Good morning!

EICHER: Up next, Mark Mellinger with today’s news.

MARK MELLINGER, NEWS ANCHOR: Iran verbally shrugs off Trump “Economic D Day” » Iran is verbally shrugging off President Trump’s pledge to hit the country with crushing new economic measures.

Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Aragchi says Trump’s recently announced launch of a pressure campaign, which the president has called Economic D-Day, will stir hostility among Iranians and -quote- “bring more failures.”

But House Majority Leader Steve Scalise says part of the new campaign’s bite is that it won’t only tighten the screws on Iran.

SCALISE: Now we’re going to look at all those people that are doing business and feeding billions into Iran’s economy and say, ‘You’ve got to stop doing it or it’s going to affect your economy, too.’

Scalise talking to Fox and Friends.

As part of this new crackdown, Trump says any country providing economic help to Iran will now face major consequences.

The president’s ratcheting up the pressure in hopes it’ll help draw the war with Iran to a close. Negotiations between the two countries are off for the moment. Trump says the primary aim of the war is to ensure Iran never gets a nuclear weapon.

At least 17 killed in Russian attack on Kyiv » In Ukraine:

SOUND: [Construction equipment]

The sound of earthmovers digging out portions of a bombed-out building in the capital city, Kyiv.

At least 17 people died in a massive Russian attack Thursday. Local leaders say the strikes took out a hospital, a school, a preschool, and several other buildings, including peoples’ homes.

Ukraine is more vulnerable to these sorts of strikes right now because its supply of Patriot interceptor missiles from the U.S. and other allies is running critically low.

NY Capitol bombing plot arrest » The FBI has arrested a 35-year-old woman for allegedly plotting to bomb the New York State Capitol building.

Jessica Bowie is accused of buying what she believed was an explosive device to carry out an ISIS-inspired attack. FBI Special Agent Craig Tremaroli:

TREMAROLI: She said -quote- ‘I want to destroy as much of the building as possible and kill the senators while they are meeting.’

Investigators say Bowie converted to Islam five years ago, was radicalized online, swore her allegiance to ISIS in several audio recordings, and was planning to flee to Syria after she carried out the attack.

Karmelo Anthony seeks retrial as new details emerge » The 19-year-old convicted of fatally stabbing another student at a track meet is seeking a retrial as new information in the case comes to light.

A judge this week is considering whether to order a retrial for Karmelo Anthony. Earlier this year, a jury convicted Anthony of stabbing 17-year-old Austin Metcalf to death during a confrontation last year in suburban Dallas, resulting in a 35-year prison sentence.

The case became a national firestorm as it was amplified in racial terms on social media. Anthony is Black and Metcalf was white, though attorneys on both sides said race wasn’t a factor in the killing.

Texas Governor Greg Abbott says a retrial isn’t necessary.

ABBOTT: The jurors who convicted him, they have far more information than I have about it, and I think they got it right. You know, there are videos showing exactly what happened. There are eyewitnesses who saw exactly what happened.

But Anthony’s lawyer says there were several missteps in the trial back in June. Among them, he claims, was an off-the-record agreement between prosecutors and Anthony’s former defense team to stay away from character evidence.

Some of that evidence came out in Thursday’s hearing, including prosecutors claiming Anthony had an obsession with guns and knives and was angry the morning of the stabbing, and the defense claiming Metcalf had used racial slurs in the past and bullied Black classmates.

Cohen claims forgiveness between him and Trump » Donald Trump rarely talks about the concept of forgiveness publicly. But his former fixer-turned-adversary says that’s exactly what’s taken place between the two men.

Trump and Michael Cohen had been at odds for years. Cohen said covering up Trump’s actions landed him (Cohen) in prison for over a year. Cohen’s testimony then later played a key role in Trump’s criminal conviction in New York.

But this week, Cohen hosted Trump for a friendly interview on his radio program.

COHEN: I want to live for the future. I refuse to be pulled back into yesterday's news and yesterday's headlines… I truly believe that there is forgiveness between Donald Trump and myself, and that to me is what is important right now.

Cohen played a portion of the interview on his WABC radio show Thursday night. The full conversation is slated to air Sunday.

$2 million more invested in Fostering the Future initiative » This weekend’s Indycar race in the nation’s capital is bringing more than just high-speed left turns and roaring engines.

Two collaborators on the event, Fox Corporation and Indycar, have donated $2 million dollars to expand First Lady Melania Trump’s foster scholarship program to two more colleges.

MELANIA TRUMP: The greatest achievement investment America can make is not in technology, infrastructure, or capital markets. It’s our children.

This new donation will clear the way for Indiana and Purdue universities to offer scholarships helping young people transition out of the foster care system and into a pursuit of higher education.

There are now 26 colleges and universities participating in the First Lady’s initiative, which is called “Fostering the Future.”

I’m Mark Mellinger.

Coming up, Collin Garbarino reviews a new series based on decades-old children’s stories. Plus, George Grant and theologian Michael Milton talk books on this month’s Quest.

This is The World and Everything in It.

LINDSAY MAST, HOST: It’s Friday, August 21st

Glad to have you along for today’s edition of The World and Everything in It. Good morning, I’m Lindsay Mast.

NICK EICHER, HOST: And I’m Nick Eicher. It’s Culture Friday. Joining us now is John Stonestreet, president of the Colson Center and host of the Breakpoint podcast. Good Morning John!

JOHN STONESTREET:  Good morning.

EICHER: Well, John, National Review reports that violent crime in 2025 in the U-S has fallen 9.7 percent, year on year. That is the largest annual drop since the FBI began tracking these numbers back in 1936.

No single cause has been established. Some theories point to cameras and changes in drug markets; a darker possibility is that young men are simply more isolated indoors, absorbed by gaming, gambling, and pornography.

A lower crime rate is plainly good news. But if part of the decline reflects isolation and digital vice, it may not mean people and communities are healthier. As Prison Fellowship marks 50 years this year, what do you say is the difference between less crime and genuine restoration?

STONESTREET: Well, I don’t think anyone’s had the track record in terms of actual restoration—what happens when someone actually commits a crime. The original theory—that you can just put semi-violent criminals in a small, confined space with other semi-violent criminals and that everyone will be better at the end of whatever sentence—never made sense to begin with.

Understanding the kind of fallen creatures humans are after Eden—these are essential categories that Chuck Colson tried to work into the work Prison Fellowship was doing in the prisons and also into breaking the cycle of crime, including understanding the essential role of moms and dads in the lives of their children and that they’re irreplaceable.

Even the way the ministry of Angel Tree was conceived and carried out was a way to restore and reconcile, and it’s a way of seeing people in that relational aspect of who they really are.

But when you look at this statistic, this big drop, and what it’s credited to, it reminds me of other good news/bad news that we have received lately: the incredible decline of the teen pregnancy rate. I don’t think anyone assumes that fewer teenagers are getting pregnant in America because of a spike in sexual purity or sexual wholeness.

In fact, they’re not having sex. They’re also not dating. They don’t even know how to talk to each other, and we have an absolutely collapsing birth rate in the long run. We have our own problems, and it reminds me of something G. K. Chesterton said: “There are a lot of ways to fall down. There’s only one way to stand up straight.”

Look, if this drop in the violent crime rate was accompanied by, I think, an increase in an understanding of moral formation and an increase in the home—and we know there is nothing more effective in breaking the cycle of crime and cutting back antisocial behavior than being enculturated as a citizen by moms and dads who love and care for you—then maybe that’s the sort of thing we are seeing from certain angles.

I think often about how the parents of young people entering the NBA and professional sports seem to be way more engaged than a generation ago, when both the NFL and the NBA were plagued by what many people consider to be more thuggish behavior.

I think it’s a mix of all kinds of things. But I don’t think that, across the board, America would suddenly score a lot higher in things like moral absolutes if we gave everyone a worldview test. I think there’s a lot more to this statistic that needs to be evaluated.

MAST: John, I know you’ve been following the Lindsay Clancy trial. Her lawyers do not dispute that she killed her three young children. They argue that bipolar disorder and postpartum psychosis left her unable to appreciate the wrongfulness of her actions; prosecutors say she planned the killings and understood what she was doing.

I don’t want to downplay the seriousness of postpartum psychosis…but it is a rare psychiatric emergency, and most women who experience it do not harm their children.

What I am concerned about here is the conversation around it, and that it may add to the idea I often hear: that children will ruin, rather than add to, a mother’s life and happiness.

So what do you make of the way this exceptional tragedy is being drawn into the broader cultural story that children diminish women’s lives?

STONESTREET: Well, I think that’s really important. That’s a myth that certainly predates this story: that children are bad for us, especially that children are bad for women. It’s hard to quantify. I’m grateful for so many of the female Catholic theologians, who are trying to recapture this idea in Holy Scripture, where God created men and women in His image, looked at what He had made, and said it’s actually very good.

The contraceptive mindset has built into society the idea that women should, at some level, oppose who they are. They should particularly oppose their procreative potential and capacity. There is, I think, something to be corrected in the idea of reducing women just to their ability to bear children. That certainly is dehumanizing, but it’s also dehumanizing to say that a woman’s fertility is a problem to be overcome and avoided, as opposed to the good aspect of how God created her to be.

We’re very, very confused on anthropology, top to bottom, and that has fed into, created, and led to this antinatalist society, where we’d rather have pets than have children.

But I tell you, one thing we can do is point to the flurry of resources and research coming out of places like the Institute for Family Studies. Also, as awkward a relationship as I have with happiness studies in America, it just keeps coming back that the happiest people are religious, middle-aged, married mothers. They just are the happiest. And study after study after study after study just gives a whole new spin on what it means to be a church lady these days, and I think we should respect that and celebrate that. Being a mom is a big part of that, too.

So you’re right. When a story like this reinforces the exception, and you’ve already accepted a narrative that children are bad and that women have to fight their fertility to be truly human, then the temptation is to hold this kind of a story up and undermine what is actually true. I think we have a responsibility to celebrate the good that is children.

MAST: Well, speaking of fertility, Congresswoman Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez—she’s 36—she says she is freezing her eggs to feel more in control of her life and to normalize the conversation for working women. With another major political run potentially ahead, she presents the procedure as a way to preserve her options.

WORLD Opinions writer Ericka Andersen warns that this can sound as though marriage and motherhood may safely be postponed. But planned egg freezing preserves a possibility, not a promise; future use requires IVF, and success depends heavily on age and the number of mature eggs frozen.

So what does AOC’s decision reveal about our culture’s belief that technology can put motherhood on our timetable?

STONESTREET: Well, it’s interesting. I think she’s reflecting culture more than changing it. Certainly, there’ll be a plausibility narrative that’s reinforced here. But this is nothing new. This is nothing unusual for a culture, again, in which fertility is understood as a barrier to true womanhood. Fertility is actually seen as a problem to be solved, as a barrier to be overcome, and as something to be subverted so someone can actually reach their true selves, which, in so many cases, looks like being a man or behaving like a man.

It’s really upside down, and we’ve failed to understand the good of it. Ericka Andersen’s exactly right. The promise of this—“It’ll all be fine”—is very much reflected in the attitude behind these artificial reproductive technologies and all of their forms: We can have kids on our own terms. We can have kids when we want them, how we want them, and where we want them. My desires come first, and the kids come second.

If we really believe that kids’ lives begin at conception, these are very difficult pregnancies, very often, and the hormones and everything else involved in extracting eggs are painful. The viability factor on the backside tends not to be as high. It just doesn’t work out the way this technology has been sold to women, as if it makes this promise. It’s a sad thing.

I was interested in hearing so many conservative women whom I either know or am friends with just say, “This is sad.” It’s sad to see this, even if they disagree with AOC in so many different ways, and to realize, “No, this is actually a real woman, and this is a really sad development.”

EICHER: John, the Meta trial started this week and is expected to run about six weeks. I said the other day that “oral arguments” had begun; I meant “opening statements.” I’ve had my nose in so many Supreme Court stories that my mouth apparently went on autopilot.

Four states allege in federal court that Meta designed Facebook and Instagram to drive compulsive use by children, collected data from children under 13 without parental consent, and misled families about the risks. Meta denies the allegations. The states want large financial penalties, but they also seek court-ordered changes to the products themselves. So this could be both a money case and an accountability case.

If Meta and parents have both failed to govern this technology, is it just inevitable that the courts and the government are going to get involved here?

STONESTREET: Well, I don’t think those two possibilities are mutually exclusive. I very much think the opportunity will not be wasted on the government when it can actually seize that kind of money. But, at the same time, there’s a bit of this that can be understood in light of the framework that Chuck Colson offered: “the conscience or the constable.” I think he was quoting someone else. I just don’t know who.

The idea is that if you can’t govern yourself, you have to be governed from the outside. We’ve talked about this a number of times when it comes to gun violence. I’m a Second Amendment guy. I don’t want the state telling me what I can and can’t do when it comes to owning firearms. But if we’re not a society that can wield firearms responsibly—if there is an excuse for the state to step in—it will.

Social media companies have proven that they are willing to deceive customers, including children. Parents have proven that they are unwilling to violate their children’s so-called autonomy in order to put common-sense rules around not having social media platforms that are—observably, testably, and based on research—bad for kids, especially young girls.

If they don’t act, then that door is open, and the person or the group—the entity that steps through that open door of no conscience—is always the constable. It’s the state. I think at some level there’s an inevitability here: if we can’t rein in our behavior when it comes to some of these things, then the regulations come.

MAST: And that is why we can’t have nice things! hahaha

EICHER: Well, apparently not. That’s John Stonestreet. John is president of the Colson Center. He’s also host of the Breakpoint Podcast. Great to talk with you, John. Have a good week.

STONESTRET: Thank you both.

NICK EICHER, HOST:  Today is Friday, August 21st.

Thank you for turning to WORLD Radio to help start your day.

Good morning. I’m Nick Eicher.

LINDSAY MAST, HOST: And I’m Lindsay Mast.

Coming next on The World and Everything in It: faeries at the movies.

Eighty years ago, British author Enid Blyton wrote a series of children’s books about a group of faeries who live in an enchanted wood and the children who visit them. Now those stories have been adapted for the big screen.

Here’s WORLD’s arts and culture editor Collin Garbarino.

COLLIN GARBARINO: The Magic Faraway Tree is a delightful family movie about a father and mother who decide to buck society’s expectations for their family. And that decision leads to some surprising outcomes.

MOONFACE: The magic of childhood is always forgot. But this is the story of one who did not.

At the beginning of the film, Tim, played by Andrew Garfield, wants to see his kids build meaningful relationships with each other, which necessitates putting away the screens that they all seem addicted to.

TIM: OK. Tonight, I thought we could play some games together after dinner.

JOE: Not real live games?

TIM: Yeah, real live games.

BETH: I’m too old for games.

TIM: Alright how about a little bit of dancing?

BETH: We all hate dancing.

When his wife Polly loses her job, Tim suggests it might be time to make some big changes and pursue the dreams of their younger years. What if they moved to the country and started their own pasta sauce making business? Polly’s all for it. The kids are less enthusiastic.

BETH: The countryside? Have you gone completely insane? What about my friends?

JOE: Will there be WIFI?

TIM: Don’t need it. Look. I brought everyone books.

BETH AND JOE: Books?!

The adjustment to country life turns out to be a difficult one for both parents and kids. Making dreams come true entails a lot of hard work for Tim and Polly. Oldest daughter Beth misses her life in London, and her brother Joe misses his video game time. The only person who seems to be doing OK is the youngest child Fran. She wasn’t thriving in their old life, and she begins to blossom in the country.

It also helps that she befriends a woodland faerie played by Nicola Coughlan.

SILKY: Hello. I’m Silky. So called for my silky golden hair.

Silky introduces Fran to some of the other inhabitants of the magic faraway tree that she lives in. There’s the group’s leader Moonface and his sidekick Saucepan Man, but there’s also Angry Pixie and Dame Washalot. Fran and the faeries go on adventures to a variety of fantastical lands. And Fran convinces Beth and Joe to join them.

Most of these adventures are good fun, but eventually the kids find themselves in the clutches of Dame Snap, played by Rebecca Ferguson. Dame Snap is a tyrannical teacher who hates children and runs her school like a prison.

DAME SNAP: You can stay here to learn. And to learn, I must break you. Like this!

The Magic Faraway Tree explores themes that frequently show up in these kinds of family adventure stories. Kids are growing up too fast and need to rediscover their sense of wonder. Families need to spend more time together. That sort of thing. Its episodic nature and familiar tropes might not break new ground, but its whimsical dreamscapes are fun to watch. The movie’s visuals are over the top with a “Willie Wonka meets the Wizard of Oz” kind of aesthetic.

I will admit: Beth is pretty unlikable for much of the movie, but her bad attitude only slightly detracts from the film’s charms. It’s colorful and playful, and kids will probably have their own imaginations sparked by many of the scenes.

DAME WASHALOT: How was it there?

FRAN: It was amazing.

DAME WASHALOT: Well, you haven’t seen the best of it yet.

At its heart, The Magic Faraway Tree is a movie that encourages its audience to experience the world as vivid and real. That might seem ironic since the movie itself is a fantasy. But sometimes fantasy reminds us that there’s more to reality than materialism and commercialism. Modernity disenchanted the world, explaining away the universe’s mystery and sacred meaning. For decades many Christian philosophers have talked about Western society’s need for reenchantment—the need to return to some of the spiritual beauty we’ve become blind to. As silly as it might seem, faerie stories, like The Magic Faraway Tree, help remind us that the world is founded upon what C.S. Lewis called “deep magic” and that faith in things unseen makes more sense than trusting only in your five senses.

I’m Collin Garbarino.

LINDSAY MAST, HOST: Good morning! This is The World and Everything in It from listener-supported WORLD Radio. I’m Lindsay Mast.

NICK EICHER, HOST: And I’m Nick Eicher. It's time now for our monthly feature Quest: conversations with thoughtful leaders about three books that have shaped their thinking.

Not necessarily their favorite books, but the ones that have most influenced their lives and their calling.

MAST: Quest is built off of a concept that appears each month in WORLD Magazine.

And we’ve invited George Grant… our resident word-lover here at The World and Everything in It… to lead the discussion.

GEORGE GRANT: Today I'm speaking with author, theologian, artist, musician, and my friend Michael Milton.

Mike, you have served in a host of different ministry contexts. Military chaplain, pastor, seminary president, and chancellor. So how has reading shaped your life, your faith, and your worldview?

MICHAEL MILTON: The best I can say is completely and deeply, and I love the way you framed our conversation about books that are not necessarily the favorite, but the most influential. Knowing I had this little conversation coming, I thought about that a whole lot.

GRANT: Well good. Let's get to your list. Let's talk about what's the first book on your list and what was going on in your life when you first encountered it?

MILTON: What was going on in my life as I was barely talking. I was raised by my Aunt Eva, Aunt Ee-verr, in my pronunciation of where I grew up, and so in my southern parlance. And Aunt Eva put me on her lap every day and she read from Arthur Maxwell's The Children's Bible, ten volumes, published nineteen fifty three to fifty seven, these ubiquitous blue covers and dentist office and doctor's waiting rooms were my first encounter with Jesus Christ, with the stories of the Bible, four hundred and nine stories in ten volumes. And Aunt Eva read them every night from the time I was born till I could when I could sit on her lap all the way through elementary school. I particularly love the Old Testament stories, David the Shepherd Boy, so I could relate to those. And they were so influential in my life for a number of reasons. Not only did it present me with a Bible, it shaped the way I understand learning, the concept of story, but also the way I understood myself and I understood God. And I would say that there's not a day that goes by that I'm not influenced by the simplicity of the illustrations and the Bible stories.

GRANT: You know, as knowing you as I do and your storytelling capacity, not just in words, but oftentimes in your art, I can really see that. But let's get to the second book now. What's the second book that influenced you and in what ways did it shape you?

MILTON: I love Gerard Manley Hopkins, I love Dylan Thomas, C. S. Lewis, a lot of others have influenced me in great ways. But nothing has influenced me more than a book which is really a manual called Evangelism Explosion. I didn't realize that it would change my life, that in fact I would come to see the Bible stories of my childhood, now come together in a singular intellectual presentation of the gospel that transformed my life. When I read that, I went from well, there was a Mike Milton before that, and there was a Mike Milton moments after I closed the book.

GRANT: Okay, those are two incredibly foundational books. Now on to your third book. What does this one add to your story?

MILTON: Well, this is the two volume biography of Dr. Martin Lloyd Jones by Ian Murray. It was published in eighty-one. I didn't get around to reading it until about nineteen ninety-three. I was graduated from seminary, and I was on my way to planting a church in Ovaland Park, Kansas, and I finished the book on an airplane. I finished the second volume. I treated the two volumes as one continuous read. I couldn't put it down. And when I read the last page, I had to get up from my seat and go to the restroom because I was crying. And I needed space to deal with what I had just experienced. And what I had experienced was this prodigious young man who apparently gave up everything to go to a small Calvinistic Methodist church in South Wales. But he said something in that book that transformed my ministry. He said, when asked about leaving his position as a young surgeon to become pastor of a church in a mining community in South Wales, he said, I've given up nothing. I have, in fact, gained everything. He said, I received everything. I count it the highest honor that God can confer on any man the call to be a herald of the gospel. When I read that, that began to transform my understanding of the ministry.

GRANT: Ian Murray has given me many of my favorites. I would have a hard time narrowing it down. He's done so many, many wonderful things, but the Lloyd Jones is epic, no doubt about it.

Michael Milton is the president and senior fellow of both Faith for Living and the D. James Kennedy Institute of Reformed Leadership. You can find his blog posts, podcasts, books, music and art and more at MichaelAMilton.com.

Mike, thanks so much.

MILTON: Thank you, George.

NICK EICHER, HOST:  Now it’s time to name the crew who helped with this week’s programs:

Mary Reichard, David Bahnsen, Lauren Canterberry, Abigail Johnson, Will Hoogendyk, Lauren Smyth, Daniel Suhr, Hunter Baker, Mary Muncy, Jenny Rough, Cal Thomas, Caleb Welde, Arsenio Orteza, David Closson, John Stonestreet, Collin Garbarino, and George Grant.

Thanks also to our breaking news team: Kent Covington, Mark Mellinger, Steve Kloosterman, Travis Kircher, Daniel Devine, and Christina Grube.

And thanks to the technical production team: Benj Eicher, Carl Peetz, and Josh Goniea.

Harrison Watters is Washington producer, Kristen Flavin is features editor, Emma Eicher is assistant producer. 

I’m Executive Producer Nick Eicher.

LINDSAY MAST, HOST: And I’m producer Lindsay Mast.

The World and Everything in It comes to you from WORLD Radio. WORLD’s mission is biblically objective journalism that informs, educates, and inspires.

The Bible says, “Let the word of Christ dwell in you richly, teaching and admonishing one another in all wisdom, singing psalms and hymns and spiritual songs, with thankfulness in your hearts to God. And whatever you do, in word or deed, do everything in the name of the Lord Jesus, giving thanks to God the Father through him.” —Colossians 3:16, 17

We hope you have a great weekend, and that you make worshiping the Lord with a Bible-believing church this Sunday central to it. We’ll meet you back here on Monday.

Go now in grace and peace.

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