Refining Rhetoric with Robert Bortins

What does it look like to build a family legacy that outlasts you by seven generations? In this episode of the Refining Rhetoric podcast, host Robert Bortins sits down with Bill High — CEO of Legacy Stone and co-author of The Legacy Life with Hobby Lobby founder David Green — to discuss how Christian families can build a multi-generational legacy of faith, generosity, and intentional vision.
Bill and Robert dig into why the nuclear family is in freefall (down from 72% to 37% since 1960), why individualism is the enemy of legacy, and how to move your family from consumers to creators. Bill walks through the practical tools families can use — a family vision statement, mission, values, and generosity habits — to unite around something bigger than themselves.
Whether you're just starting out or trying to reverse decades of drift, this conversation will challenge you to stop thinking about the next 20 years and start thinking about the next 150.
Resources:
https://billhigh.com/
https://legacystone.com/
This episode of Refining Rhetoric is sponsored by CC Graduate Degree in Latin Studies:
Classical Conversations is excited to announce the launch of our new accredited Graduate Program in Latin Studies, an 18-credit hour program designed specifically for homeschooling parents who want to deepen their understanding of classical Christian education in Latin writing and translation. This graduate program provides academic recognition for your dedication to classical learning while offering a pathway to advanced study in Latin through our partnership with Southeastern University.
Register today to secure your spot in this transformative educational experience. Click Here to Begin Your Classical Journey

What happens to your child's faith when they leave home for college? On this episode of Refining Rhetoric, host Robert Bortins sits down with Dr. Finny Kuruvilla — Harvard MD, MIT engineer, homeschool dad of nine, and founder of Sattler College — to discuss the crisis in Christian higher education and why he built a tuition-free, classical Christian college in downtown Boston. From the iron law of discipleship to Greek and Hebrew in the original languages, this conversation is essential listening for any homeschool family thinking about what comes after graduation.
Dr. Finny Kuruvilla grew up in Southern California in the public school system — and what he saw there shaped everything that came after. Two things stayed with him: the exposure to harmful content and ideas during those formative years, and the creeping shift from caring what his parents thought to caring what his peers thought. When he and his wife Laura started having children, they were determined to reverse that dynamic. Today they homeschool nine children in Boston, from college age down to nine months old.
The conversation opens with Dr. Kuruvilla's counter-cultural view of children as assets rather than liabilities — a biblical recovery of the idea that children are a heritage from the Lord, not a threat to the rainforest. His older kids run a snow shoveling and lawn raking business. The family's goal is human flourishing, not the accumulation of experiences that require both parents to work full time.
From there, Robert draws him into the crisis he observed from the inside: seven years as a resident advisor at Harvard, watching bright young Christians have their faith "crash and burn" under the weight of an environment where 99% of faculty would not identify as born-again. The official statistic bears this out — 70% of church-attending students stop attending by the time they finish college. Dr. Kuruvilla calls it the iron law of discipleship: "Everyone, when fully trained, will be like his teacher" (Luke 6). Whether parents intend it or not, the law operates.
Sattler College was built as a direct response to the three Cs. On cost: no tuition, with a room-and-board rate of around $9,000 per year in downtown Boston. On discipleship: the learn-do-teach model from Ezra 7, weekly same-gender journey groups for confession and mutual accountability, monthly mentorship meetings, and a campus culture built around the question "how did I share my faith with an unbeliever this week?" On curriculum: Greek and Hebrew required of every student, taught communicatively so that 80% of class time is spent actually in the target language. The freshman class travels to Greece at the end of the year to use their Koine Greek on location in Athens, Corinth, Thessalonica, and Philippi.
The results are striking. Sattler is currently ranked number one in the country for MCAT scores — above Harvard and Stanford — and biology students are regularly publishing in peer-reviewed journals while working in Harvard Medical School labs.
What You'll Learn
•    Why Dr. Kuruvilla — after graduating from Caltech, MIT, and Harvard — chose to homeschool all nine of his children
•    The three Cs that define what's broken in higher education: core curriculum, Christian discipleship, and cost
•    What the "iron law of discipleship" is and why it should terrify every parent sending a child to a secular university
•    Why 70% of church-attending students stop attending church by the time they graduate college
•    How Sattler College addresses all three of those failures — including charging zero tuition
•    Why Sattler is the only college in America that requires all students to learn Greek and Hebrew
•    How Sattler students ended up outscoring Harvard and Stanford on the MCAT
•    What the "learn, do, teach" model from Ezra 7 looks like in practice — and why spiritual obesity is as real as physical obesity
•    How mission drift destroyed Harvard — and the specific bylaws and "poison pill" structures Sattler uses to prevent the same fate
•    Why Christian investors are unknowingly funding abortion, pornography, and gambling through their 401(k)s
•    What the Tower of Babel story in Genesis reveals about the power of organized Christians
Resources Mentioned
•    Sattler College: https://sattler.edu/
•    Eventide Funds (faith-based investing): https://www.eventideinvestments.com/
•    King Jesus Claims His Church by Dr. Finny Kuruvilla — available wherever books are sold
This episode of Refining Rhetoric is sponsored by:
Classical Conversations' new 2026 Product Line
This April, Classical Conversations is launching an exciting portfolio of new products
designed to strengthen math fluency, develop critical reasoning skills, and equip families
with practical tools for classical, Christian homeschooling. From flashcard resources and
reasoning curriculum to hands-on manipulatives and a foundational parent resource, these
releases deepen the classical learning journey for families at every level.
Visit ClassicalConversations.com/WhatsNew/ to explore the entire April 2026 product
collection and start strengthening your family's classical, Christian education today. Don't
miss the special CC Bookstore sale from April 7 - 28!

What does it actually mean to abolish abortion — not just restrict it? In this episode of Refining Rhetoric, host Robert Bortins sits down with Classical Conversations graduate and Students for Abolition president Pate Anglin to discuss why a biblical abolitionist framework goes further than the mainstream pro-life movement — and how student chapters across 8 states are taking that fight to college campuses, state capitals, and beyond. 
Pate Anglin grew up in a homeschooling household shaped by classical education, faith, and the intentional discipleship of his parents — and he credits that foundation with preparing him for what he encountered at East Tennessee State University. Entering college in 2021 on a full-ride leadership scholarship, Pate quickly found himself navigating pronoun mandates, ideological pressure, and a campus culture hostile to a biblical worldview. Rather than retreating, he leaned in — and what started as a small group of young men praying in a dorm room became Students for Abolition, a rapidly growing network now active on 14 campuses across 7 states and into Canada.
In this conversation, Robert and Pate dig into what truly separates the abolitionist position from mainstream pro-life strategy. Pate argues that much of the pro-life movement — though well-intentioned — has unknowingly adopted a humanistic framework, opposing abortion because it "pollutes the water" or "hurts mothers" rather than because it violates God's law. He walks through the abolitionist acronym GATES (Gospel-centered, Aligned through the church, Engaged biblically, Sought immediately) and explains how rooting the argument in Scripture changes everything — including how the law can function as a tool for tutoring society, restraining evil, and even serving as a gateway to the gospel.
They also tackle some of the most contested questions in the movement: Should mothers be criminalized? What would an equal protection bill actually look like in practice? Why do so many pro-life organizations oppose abolition legislation? And why does Students for Abolition intentionally place men in leadership roles on the front lines of this cultural battle?
Whether you're a CC parent wondering how classical education prepares students for the real world, a student looking to get involved, or a Christian trying to think through the abortion issue with more biblical clarity — this episode will challenge and encourage you.
Resources:
Pate's Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/pateanglin/
Pate's X account: https://x.com/pateanglin
https://studentsforabolition.org/

This episode of Refining Rhetoric is sponsored by:
Classical Conversations' new 2026 Product Line
This April, Classical Conversations is launching an exciting portfolio of new products designed to strengthen math fluency, develop critical reasoning skills, and equip families with practical tools for classical, Christian homeschooling. From flashcard resources and reasoning curriculum to hands-on manipulatives and a foundational parent resource, these releases deepen the classical learning journey for families at every level.
Visit ClassicalConversations.com/WhatsNew/ to explore the entire April 2026 product
collection and start strengthening your family's classical, Christian education today. Don't
miss the special CC Bookstore sale from April 7 - 28!

What if government education isn't just failing — but is fundamentally, morally wrong? On this episode of Refining Rhetoric, host Robert Bortins sits down with Dr. Bradley Thompson, political philosopher at Clemson University and executive director of the Snow Institute for the Study of Capitalism, to make the abolitionist case for education freedom. From the moral foundations of laissez-faire capitalism to the great books Lyceum program producing the next generation of principled Americans, this conversation will challenge everything you thought you knew about school choice, government schools, and what the Declaration of Independence actually says about the role of government.
Dr. Bradley Thompson spent decades studying government education before arriving at a conclusion that surprises most people the first time they hear it: the government school system isn't just failing — it is immoral by definition, and it cannot be reformed. His case isn't built on frustration with test scores (though he has that too). It's built on the same moral arguments the anti-slavery abolitionists used against chattel slavery: coercion is coercion, and education by the government for the government violates the natural rights of individuals.
The conversation opens with a tour of the Lyceum Scholars Program at Clemson — a great books scholarship program Dr. Thompson founded, now offering $15,000 per year ($60,000 total) to incoming freshmen who take eight courses over four years covering ancient moral thought, the political theory of capitalism, the American Revolution, and modern moral philosophy from Shakespeare to Ayn Rand. The program's most distinctive feature is its Socratic Tutor system, where each scholar meets one-on-one with a faculty mentor every other week to translate the ideas they're reading into their own lives — specifically around questions of moral character, courage, integrity, and honor.
From there, Robert and Dr. Thompson dig into the argument that most Americans have never heard made seriously: capitalism is not primarily an economic system. It is a political theory — laissez-faire, meaning the government keeps its hands off — and by that definition, what America has today isn't capitalism at all. It's a regulatory, taxing Leviathan that makes the taxation the colonists revolted against look modest by comparison. The moral case for capitalism has been ceded to its critics for a hundred years, Dr. Thompson argues, and that's why the country has drifted toward serfdom.
What You'll Learn:
•    Why capitalism is not primarily an economic system — it's a political theory of radically limited government
•    Why we don't actually have capitalism in America today — and what we have instead
•    The sordid history of government education in America, where it came from, and who it was designed to serve
•    Why Dr. Thompson compares his position on government schools to the anti-slavery abolitionists of 1830–1860
•    Why government schools cannot be reformed — even with the right people in charge
•    The "Friday night lights problem" keeping conservatives from embracing education freedom
•    Why vouchers are just food stamps for education — and how they corrupt private schools
•    Why the socialization argument against homeschooling is completely bogus
•    What the Lyceum Program at Clemson is doing to educate morally virtuous, liberty-minded young Americans
•    What James Madison's Memorial and Remonstrance has to do with education freedom
•    The one thing about the American founding Dr. Thompson wishes everyone remembered
 
Resources Mentioned:
•    America's Revolutionary Mind by Dr. C. Bradley Thompson — available wherever books are sold
•    The Redneck Intellectual (Substack): theredneckintellectual.com
•    Ed Watch Daily (blog): daily commentary on K-12 and higher education issues
•    Snow Institute for the Study of Capitalism / Lyceum Program: search "Snow Institute Clemson" or go directly to Clemson University's website
•    James Madison's Memorial and Remonstrance — referenced as the document that sparked Dr. Thompson's abolitionist turn
 
This episode of Refining Rhetoric is sponsored by:
Classical Conversations' new 2026 Product Line
This April, Classical Conversations is launching an exciting portfolio of new products
designed to strengthen math fluency, develop critical reasoning skills, and equip families
with practical tools for classical, Christian homeschooling. From flashcard resources and
reasoning curriculum to hands-on manipulatives and a foundational parent resource, these
releases deepen the classical learning journey for families at every level.
Visit ClassicalConversations.com/WhatsNew/ to explore the entire April 2026 product
collection and start strengthening your family's classical, Christian education today. Don't
miss the special CC Bookstore sale from April 7 - 28!

Matt Hangen discovered something revolutionary while working as a missionary well driller in Togo: the traditional charity model was failing Africa's water crisis. After losing 117 pounds to illness and watching communities struggle with donated solutions that broke down, he pioneered a different approach. Water4 uses donations as seed capital to build wholly-owned water businesses that operate sustainably through customer payments—just pennies per day. The result? Nearly 3 million people served, 1,800 jobs created in Africa, 40,000 weekly Bible study groups launched, and villages transformed as women and girls get back three hours of their day previously spent hauling water. Matt shares incredible stories of employees like Muhammad (floor sweeper turned shop manager), grandmothers starting rice businesses with clean water, and how providing tap-quality water to rural African homes costs less than many American municipalities spend just planning their water projects. This conversation challenges everything you thought you knew about sustainable development, dignity through work, and the intersection of entrepreneurship and missions.
Resources:
https://www.water4.org/
 
This episode of Refining Rhetoric is sponsored by Worldview Academy:
Students call Worldview Academy the best week of their lives. Through week-long summer leadership camps for teens, Worldview Academy trains Christians to think and live in accord with a biblical worldview so they can better serve Christ and engage the culture around them. Worldview Academy reinforces what students are learning at home and at church and trains this generation to apply that knowledge to the challenging cultural issues they're facing.
To find a camp near you or learn more about Worldview's weekend conferences and other resources for families, visit www.worldview.org