Welcome to another Classical Essentials, a special Best of Basecamp Live series! Over the years, we’ve had incredible conversations unpacking the foundational ideas of classical Christian education. In this series, we’re bringing back some of the most popular and essential episodes to help parents, educators, and school leaders better understand the core principles that make this movement so impactful.
Why should Christian students read pagan books? Wouldn’t it be safer to stick to Christian authors? Shouldn’t we only fill our children’s minds with explicitly biblical works? These are common concerns among parents and educators, and in this episode, Dr. Louis Markos offers a compelling answer.
Many of history’s greatest books—from Homer to Plato to Virgil—were written by pre-Christian authors. Yet, these works wrestle with profound questions about virtue, truth, and human nature—questions that ultimately point to Christ. Rather than being a threat to faith, these books can deepen a student’s understanding of God’s truth and equip them to engage thoughtfully with today’s secular world.
🎧 Join us as we revisit one of the most downloaded and thought-provoking episodes of BaseCamp Live!
Although a devoted professor who works closely with his students, Dr. Markos is dedicated to the concept of the professor as public educator. He firmly believes that knowledge must not be walled up in the academy, but must be freely and enthusiastically disseminated to all those “who have ears to hear.” As a specifically Christian professor he also adheres to a second goal: to fuse into a single stream the humanist strivings of Athens and the Christian truths of Jerusalem.
Believing that “all truth is God’s truth,” Dr. Markos seeks to measure all human knowledge against the touchstone of orthodox Christian doctrine (the Trinity, the Incarnation, the Atonement, and the Resurrection). Believing further that Christianity is not the only truth but the only COMPLETE truth, he seeks to discover in the cultures, mythologies, religions and philosophies of the ancient (and modern) world intimations and foreshadowings of the greater truths revealed in Christ and the Bible.
In pursuing this goal, his three principle mentors have been Plato, Dante, and C. S. Lewis, his central vision has been that of the Magi (whose pagan wisdom proved a partial guide to encountering the Christ child), and his core biblical passage Paul’s address to the Areopagus at Athens (Acts 17).
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