In this episode, Davies Owens briefly steps into the archives to revisit a valuable conversation with Dr. Louis Markos on how the ancient world understood virtue, education, and human flourishing, and why those insights remain essential today.
Dr. Markos explains how the Greeks and Romans, though lacking Christian revelation, asked the right questions about human nature, moral formation, and the purpose of education. Figures such as Socrates and Plato modeled humility, rational discourse, and civic responsibility, forming a vision of education aimed not merely at usefulness, but at virtue.
Together, Davies and Dr. Markos explore why classical Christian education continues to draw from this ancient inheritance. Far from being outdated, a liberal arts education grounded in timeless truths prepares students to engage a modern, technology-driven world with wisdom, clarity, and courage.
🎧 Tune in to hear:
- Why modern culture undervalues what is old
- How ancient thinkers approached virtue and human purpose
- Why education must aim beyond skills and utility
- How classical learning prepares students for real-world work
- Why civilization must be cultivated in order to endure
Join us as we revisit this conversation and rediscover why the ancients still shape virtuous people today.
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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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