Axis Conversations

"I have a newly 8 year old male. Honesty has been a major struggle in our home because he hides the truth in order to avoid punishment. I feel that I have created an environment at home that doesn't feel safe enough to express mistakes. How should dad and I proceed to raise 2 sons that have the fruit of The Spirit?" - Marie → Read about the "authoritative" parenting style → Click here for the Barna research for indicating resiliant familes 🎧 Listen / Follow / Connect → Become a monthly donor today, join the Table. → Check out the podcast now on our YouTube Channel! → Get your question on Ask Axis! Send in your questions to ask@axis.org. → For more Axis resources, go to axis.org.

Three Big Conversations: A Pokémon card sells for $16.4 million - 3:15 Barna research sheds light on the three things resilient families prioritize - 19:04 Everyone seems to relate to an abandoned monkey in a Japanese zoo - 33:22 Resource of the Week - Conversation Starter - YouTube Video - 1:42 In Other News.. - 46:06 USA hockey set viewership records at the Milan-Cortina Winter Olympics, with both men's and women's teams winning gold, setting hockey up to hang on to its place as the fourth most-followed sport in the US—at least, until the FIFA World Cup in Los Angeles enters the chat. The so-called "boy blush" trend is gaining traction, with artists like Sangwon and Bad Bunny wearing noticeable blush on major stages, and teen boys increasingly experimenting with makeup as part of their personal style. A TikTok meme called "baby boo" started with people dancing to a clip that repeats "she gon' call me baby boo" and has since morphed into users calling it "baby boo syndrome." Eric Dane, known for his roles in Grey's Anatomy and Euphoria, passed away on February 19, one year after announcing his ALS diagnosis. Since then, TikTok has filled with edits of his most emotional scenes. At the BAFTA film awards, a guest with Tourette's syndrome involuntarily shouted a racial slur while Michael B. Jordan and Delroy Lindo were onstage. The moment sparked conversations about the real harm that racial slurs carry for Black people, alongside questions about the awareness around Tourette's and the responsibility of live broadcasting. → Click here to check out the Pour Over Newsletter 🎧 Listen / Follow / Connect → Become a monthly donor today, join the Table. → Check out the podcast now on our YouTube Channel! → Get your question on Ask Axis! Send in your questions to ask@axis.org. → For more Axis resources, go to axis.org.    

A Pokémon card sells for $16.4 million, Barna research sheds light on the three things resilient families prioritize, and everyone seems to relate to an abandoned monkey in a Japanese zoo.   Resource of the Week - Conversation Starter - YouTube Video   In Other News.. USA hockey set viewership records at the Milan-Cortina Winter Olympics, with both men's and women's teams winning gold, setting hockey up to hang on to its place as the fourth most-followed sport in the US—at least, until the FIFA World Cup in Los Angeles enters the chat. The so-called "boy blush" trend is gaining traction, with artists like Sangwon and Bad Bunny wearing noticeable blush on major stages, and teen boys increasingly experimenting with makeup as part of their personal style. A TikTok meme called "baby boo" started with people dancing to a clip that repeats "she gon' call me baby boo" and has since morphed into users calling it "baby boo syndrome." Eric Dane, known for his roles in Grey's Anatomy and Euphoria, passed away on February 19, one year after announcing his ALS diagnosis. Since then, TikTok has filled with edits of his most emotional scenes. At the BAFTA film awards, a guest with Tourette's syndrome involuntarily shouted a racial slur while Michael B. Jordan and Delroy Lindo were onstage. The moment sparked conversations about the real harm that racial slurs carry for Black people, alongside questions about the awareness around Tourette's and the responsibility of live broadcasting. → Click here to check out the Pour Over Newsletter 🎧 Listen / Follow / Connect → Become a monthly donor today, join the Table. → Check out the podcast now on our YouTube Channel! → Get your question on Ask Axis! Send in your questions to ask@axis.org. → For more Axis resources, go to axis.org.    

"I struggle to find reputable, biblically based resources from a child of divorce POV - specifically navigating through talking about the sanctity of marriage when I'm speaking from a place of separation myself (and keeping parent's "adult issues" out of it so I never want my kids to think our problems have anything to do with them). I know one of the first questions my teen will ask will involve "...but you and Dad didn't stay married," or some version of that. It would be great to hear a podcast speaking about this topic!" - Jacquie Brand New Axis Resource → How To Talk About Divorce With Your Teen 🎧 Listen / Follow / Connect → This podcast is entirely Q&A based! Send in your questions to ask@axis.org. → Become a monthly donor today, join the Table. → Check out the podcast now on our YouTube Channel! → Get your question on Ask Axis! Send in your questions to ask@axis.org. → For more Axis resources, go to axis.org.  

Three Big Conversations: Southeastern University cancels class to pray and worship Jesus. - 07:54 "Smart glasses" with AI take creepiness to a new level. - 17:14 What parents should know about the new Wuthering Heights movie. - 29:10 Slang of the Week: lowkenuinely - 01:11 In Other News: - 42:08 Sony Animation Studios (the team behind Into the Spider-Verse and KPop Demon Hunters) has a new animated film called GOAT, starring Stranger Things' Caleb McLaughlin and NBA star Stephen Curry. A new video game in the "Roguelite" genre called Mewgenics had an incredibly successful release last week, but parents should know the game features a lot of questionable—even sacreligious—content. A new TikTok account called @DanySlicer started with two short videos of a man whose face is obscured in shadow. Inexplicably, both videos got millions of views, and many started referring to this completely silent character as the "internet's new villain." Netflix is diving into mixed martial arts, kicking off with a fight between two pioneering and sometimes controversial fighters, Gina Carano and Ronda Rousey. This month on our podcast we explored romantasy and the question many parents are asking: Why are teens and adults so drawn to fantasy and romance novels? Check it out here, or wherever you listen to podcasts.  🎧 Listen / Follow / Connect → Become a monthly donor today, join the Table. → Check out the podcast now on our YouTube Channel! → Get your question on Ask Axis! Send in your questions to ask@axis.org. → For more Axis resources, go to axis.org.

Southeastern University cancels class to pray and worship Jesus, "smart glasses" with AI take creepiness to a new level, and what parents should know about the new Wuthering Heights movie. Slang of the Week: lowkenuinely In Other News: Sony Animation Studios (the team behind Into the Spider-Verse and KPop Demon Hunters) has a new animated film called GOAT, starring Stranger Things' Caleb McLaughlin and NBA star Stephen Curry. A new video game in the "Roguelite" genre called Mewgenics had an incredibly successful release last week, but parents should know the game features a lot of questionable—even sacreligious—content. A new TikTok account called @DanySlicer started with two short videos of a man whose face is obscured in shadow. Inexplicably, both videos got millions of views, and many started referring to this completely silent character as the "internet's new villain." Netflix is diving into mixed martial arts, kicking off with a fight between two pioneering and sometimes controversial fighters, Gina Carano and Ronda Rousey. This month on our podcast we explored romantasy and the question many parents are asking: Why are teens and adults so drawn to fantasy and romance novels? Check it out here, or wherever you listen to podcasts.  🎧 Listen / Follow / Connect → Become a monthly donor today, join the Table. → Check out the podcast now on our YouTube Channel! → Get your question on Ask Axis! Send in your questions to ask@axis.org. → For more Axis resources, go to axis.org.

The Big Conversation: This month we're focusing on relationships, and we're tackling a question many parents are asking: "Why are teens and adults so drawn to romantasy books?" Axis Resources → A Parent's Guide to Teen Dating → A Conversation Kit on Dating → A Parent's Guide to Kicking Off the Sex Talk   🎧 Listen / Follow / Connect → Become a monthly donor today, join the Table. → Check out the podcast now on our YouTube Channel! → Get your question on Ask Axis! Send in your questions to ask@axis.org. → For more Axis resources, go to axis.org.

Three Big Conversations: The hills are alive with the sound of kids saying "chicken, banana," - 14:38 A new AI tool called OpenClaw has an iron grasp on data - 20:20 Backlash took center stage after Bad Bunny's halftime show. - 49:04 Song of the Week: "The Great Divide" - Noah Kahan - 01:16 Click here to read the lyrics. In Other News.. - 1:04:02 James Van Der Beek passed away this week after battling colorectal cancer. Best known for his role as Dawson Leery on Dawson's Creek, he helped define late 90s teen drama, and his legacy continues through streaming nostalgia and even one of the internet's earliest viral reaction GIFs.  At a congressional hearing last week, self-driving car company Waymo admitted that sometimes its cars are being remote-controlled by workers based in the Philippines. An emerging star of the 2026 Winter Olympics is American figure skater Alysa Liu, who won gold and then promptly broke her medal. Cool guys have bangs now, according to GQ. Fellas are trading the long-popular long-on the-top, short-on-the sides haircut for softer, more lived-in fringe. This weekend, the long-awaited, R-rated adaptation of the gothic romance novel Wuthering Heights will hit 3,600 screens and is projected to hit $50 million on its opening weekend.  Axis Resource → A Parent's Guide to Talking About Hell 🎧 Listen / Follow / Connect → Become a monthly donor today, join the Table. → Check out the podcast now on our YouTube Channel! → Get your question on Ask Axis! Send in your questions to ask@axis.org. → For more Axis resources, go to axis.org.

The hills are alive with the sound of kids saying "chicken, banana," a new AI tool called OpenClaw has an iron grasp on data, and backlash took center stage after Bad Bunny's halftime show. Song of the Week: "The Great Divide" - Noah Kahan Click here to read the lyrics. In Other News.. James Van Der Beek passed away this week after battling colorectal cancer. Best known for his role as Dawson Leery on Dawson's Creek, he helped define late 90s teen drama, and his legacy continues through streaming nostalgia and even one of the internet's earliest viral reaction GIFs.  At a congressional hearing last week, self-driving car company Waymo admitted that sometimes its cars are being remote-controlled by workers based in the Philippines. An emerging star of the 2026 Winter Olympics is American figure skater Alysa Liu, who won gold and then promptly broke her medal. Cool guys have bangs now, according to GQ. Fellas are trading the long-popular long-on the-top, short-on-the sides haircut for softer, more lived-in fringe. This weekend, the long-awaited, R-rated adaptation of the gothic romance novel Wuthering Heights will hit 3,600 screens and is projected to hit $50 million on its opening weekend.  🎧 Listen / Follow / Connect → Become a monthly donor today, join the Table. → Check out the podcast now on our YouTube Channel! → Get your question on Ask Axis! Send in your questions to ask@axis.org. → For more Axis resources, go to axis.org.

"Today's teens, especially those who are too young to drive, enter what they call "talking stages," which seem to be a substitute for dating. It's basically a stream of conciousness texting session with one another. I have a 14 year old son. Girls are coming out of the wood work trying to enter a "talking stage" with him. Right now he is talking to 4 girls. He has decided he really likes one of these girls. So the question is, should he continue talking to the other girls, or let them know that he really likes someone other than them? What he has done is ghost the other girls, he simply doesn't answer their texts; this doesn't feel right. What do you think the right way is to handle the situation? I have no idea where girls are getting his number but every week someone new  is texting him out of the blue. It usually starts with, "I thought you were cute so I asked for your number." To me this is also concerning. I think the type of girls he should be looking for are not the ones chasing boys." - Michelle  Axis Resource → A Parent's Guide to Teen Dating Axis Resource → A Conversation Kit on Dating 🎧 Listen / Follow / Connect → Become a monthly donor today, join the Table. → Check out the podcast now on our YouTube Channel! → Get your question on Ask Axis! Send in your questions to ask@axis.org. → For more Axis resources, go to axis.org.

Three Big Conversations: The Grammys offered a chaotic celebration of modern music. - 8:08 "Etsy witches" are getting kicked off of Etsy. - 21:12 Sports betting looms large over Super Bowl LX this Sunday. - 35:06 Song of the Week: "Aperture" by Harry Styles -1:25 Click here for the lyrics. In Other News: - 53:08 "She's free" is a TikTok trend where friends line up, clap and shine phone flashlights as someone walks a celebratory runway after a breakup.  The 2026 Winter Olympics in the Italian cities of Milano and Cortina begin today. If the 2024 Summer Olympics were any indication, teens will probably be fascinated by the athletes and their respective social media presences. A new platform called Moltbook is designed to be a Reddit-style social media forum for AI bots to publicly chat with each other. The Lunar New Year is coming up soon, which brings a new Chinese zodiac. 2026 is the year of the Fire Horse, and people on TikTok are freaking out about it. Iron Lung, a sci-fi horror film that stars YouTuber Markiplier (who also wrote, directed, and financed it), was a surprise box office success that almost beat Disney's Send Help in its opening weekend. 🎧 Listen / Follow / Connect → Become a monthly donor today, join the Table. → Check out the podcast now on our YouTube Channel! → Get your question on Ask Axis! Send in your questions to ask@axis.org. → For more Axis resources, go to axis.org.

The Grammys offered a chaotic celebration of modern music, "Etsy witches" are getting kicked off of Etsy, and sports betting looms large over Super Bowl LX this Sunday. Song of the Week: "Aperture" by Harry Styles Click here for the lyrics. In Other News: "She's free" is a TikTok trend where friends line up, clap and shine phone flashlights as someone walks a celebratory runway after a breakup.  The 2026 Winter Olympics in the Italian cities of Milano and Cortina begin today. If the 2024 Summer Olympics were any indication, teens will probably be fascinated by the athletes and their respective social media presences. A new platform called Moltbook is designed to be a Reddit-style social media forum for AI bots to publicly chat with each other. The Lunar New Year is coming up soon, which brings a new Chinese zodiac. 2026 is the year of the Fire Horse, and people on TikTok are freaking out about it. Iron Lung, a sci-fi horror film that stars YouTuber Markiplier (who also wrote, directed, and financed it), was a surprise box office success that almost beat Disney's Send Help in its opening weekend. 🎧 Listen / Follow / Connect → Become a monthly donor today, join the Table. → Check out the podcast now on our YouTube Channel! → Get your question on Ask Axis! Send in your questions to ask@axis.org. → For more Axis resources, go to axis.org.

Nick Stumbo is the Executive Director of Pure Desire, an organization that exists to provide hope, freedom, and healing from compulsive sexual behavior and betrayal trauma through Jesus Christ. Their work at Pure Desire is clinically informed and biblically based. As a third-generation pastor, Nick Stumbo started his ministry career at the East Hills Alliance Church in Kelso, Washington, where he observed the fallout of sexual brokenness and devastation in the lives of men and women in the church. Confronted with his own addiction to pornography, Nick and his wife, Michelle, found hope and healing through the counseling and group ministries of Pure Desire, which, again, he is now the Executive Director of.  --> Check out Pure Desire Ministries → Become a monthly donor today, join the Table. 🎧 Listen / Follow / Connect → Check out the podcast now on our YouTube Channel! → Get your question on Ask Axis! Send in your questions to ask@axis.org. → For more Axis resources, go to axis.org.

Three Big Conversations: TikTok has a new US owner, which users worry is muddying the platform's approach to censorship. - 10:16 Data shows that sad and angsty songs are ruling the streaming charts. - 29:28 It's official: our algorithms are making us lonelier. - 40:12 Emoji of the Week: 🙂 - 01:19 Axis Resource--> Check out A Parent's Guide to Emoji In Other News: -  52:04 Last week, Alex Honnold free-soloed Taipei 101 live on Netflix, with roughly 6.2 million people watching him climb a 1,667-foot skyscraper without a rope. The 2026 Oscar nominations dropped last week, with director Ryan Coogler's horror-thriller Sinners receiving a record-breaking 16 nominations. Speaking of awards season, after a long hiatus, Justin Bieber is slated to return to the Grammys stage this Sunday night. Ye, formerly known as Kanye West, took out a full-page ad in the Wall Street Journal on Monday to apologize for his antisemitic comments and psychotic behavior. Athleisure is out for 2026. Some Gen Z creators are leaning into vintage (meaning 90s and early 2000s) sportswear and putting their matching workout sets out to pasture. --> Become a monthly donor today, join the Table. --> Check out the podcast now on our YouTube Channel! --> Get your question on Ask Axis! Send in your questions to ask@axis.org. --> For more Axis resources, go to axis.org.  

TikTok has a new US owner, which users worry is muddying the platform's approach to censorship; data shows that sad and angsty songs are ruling the streaming charts, and it's official: our algorithms are making us lonelier. Emoji of the Week: 🙂 Axis Resource--> Check out A Parent's Guide to Emoji In Other News: Last week, Alex Honnold free-soloed Taipei 101 live on Netflix, with roughly 6.2 million people watching him climb a 1,667-foot skyscraper without a rope. The 2026 Oscar nominations dropped last week, with director Ryan Coogler's horror-thriller Sinners receiving a record-breaking 16 nominations. Speaking of awards season, after a long hiatus, Justin Bieber is slated to return to the Grammys stage this Sunday night. Ye, formerly known as Kanye West, took out a full-page ad in the Wall Street Journal on Monday to apologize for his antisemitic comments and psychotic behavior. Athleisure is out for 2026. Some Gen Z creators are leaning into vintage (meaning 90s and early 2000s) sportswear and putting their matching workout sets out to pasture. --> Become a monthly donor today, join the Table. --> Check out the podcast now on our YouTube Channel! --> Get your question on Ask Axis! Send in your questions to ask@axis.org. --> For more Axis resources, go to axis.org.  

Jenna is a writer and content creator based in Orange County, California. She works at Axis as a content specialist. She is currently working on a Master's in Spiritual Formation and Soul Care at Talbot School of Theology. She also runs a Substack publication called "Jenna's Column" where she writes about faith from a Gen Z perspective. In her free time she loves to read (preferably at the beach) and hang out with her husband Parker and their cat, Dolly. Check out our updated Parent's Guide to Teen Slang Become a monthly donor today, join the Table. Check out the podcast now on our YouTube Channel! Get your question on Ask Axis! Send in your questions to ask@axis.org. For more Axis resources, go to axis.org.

Three Big Conversations: Nostalgia for 2016 hits social media. - 8:54 Some hopeful, if complicated, mental health statistics about college students. - 24:40 Teens would rather send a voice note than make a phone call. - 38:08 Slang of the Week - Ragebait - 1:48 In Other News: - 54:22 The Indiana Hoosiers won an electrifying College Football Playoff National Championship on Monday, punctuated by an iconic, fourth-down touchdown run from Heisman winner Fernando Mendoza. BookTok's beloved People We Meet on Vacation, an Emily Henry book-to-movie adaptation, has debuted at No.1 on the Netflix film chart with 17.2m views. A new trend on TikTok involves impersonating owls. "Bringing random items to school" is a TikTok trend where kids pull increasingly unhinged objects out of their backpacks purely for laughs. The tremendous success of a stationery store in Chicago is being hailed as indicative of the "return to analog" trend, as the popularity of journals, calligraphy, and sending snail mail letters surges. Become a monthly donor today, join the Table. Check out the podcast now on our YouTube Channel! Get your question on Ask Axis! Send in your questions to ask@axis.org. For more Axis resources, go to axis.org.

Nostalgia for 2016 hits social media, some hopeful, if complicated, mental health statistics about college students, and teens would rather send a voice note than make a phone call. Slang of the Week - Ragebait In Other News: The Indiana Hoosiers won an electrifying College Football Playoff National Championship on Monday, punctuated by an iconic, fourth-down touchdown run from Heisman winner Fernando Mendoza. BookTok's beloved People We Meet on Vacation, an Emily Henry book-to-movie adaptation, has debuted at No.1 on the Netflix film chart with 17.2m views. A new trend on TikTok involves impersonating owls. "Bringing random items to school" is a TikTok trend where kids pull increasingly unhinged objects out of their backpacks purely for laughs. The tremendous success of a stationery store in Chicago is being hailed as indicative of the "return to analog" trend, as the popularity of journals, calligraphy, and sending snail mail letters surges. Become a monthly donor today, join the Table. Check out the podcast now on our YouTube Channel! Get your question on Ask Axis! Send in your questions to ask@axis.org. For more Axis resources, go to axis.org.

A question on "camp skits not aging well." Libby asks, "We generally have just substituted current pop culture references into old skits to bring them up to date. But it's so necessary right now to help kids engage with culture instead of vilifying it. A recent skit we were planning made it seem like the student was nailing Jesus to the cross by going to a party, hanging out with friends instead of staying home with Jesus—and we want our kids to socialize with real people more! But we are also finding way more extreme drug and alcohol content at parties for the kids who do socialize IRL. How to navigate?" - Libby This podcast is entirely Q&A based! Send in your questions to ask@axis.org. Check out the podcast now on our YouTube Channel! Become a monthly donor today, join the Table. And for more resources, go to axis.org.  

Three Big Conversations: Gen Z heads to trade school en masse - 05:14 The controversy around Grok's creation of deepfake images - 21:26 Fiber is the new protein - 42:00 Slang of the Week: "Choppelganger" - 20:20 --> Check out the definition in our resource The Parent Guide to Teen Slang In Other News: - 55:06 Harry Styles just dropped a mysterious website called WeBelongTogether.co filled with crowd footage and the words "We belong together," and fans are losing their minds trying to decode what it means. The year in anime is kicking off with a bang, with new episodes of popular on-going shows like Jujutsu Keisen, Freiren: Beyond Journey's End, Fire Force, and premieres of highly anticipated newcomers like Sentenced to Be a Hero. The Golden Globes awards declared KPop Demon Hunters 2025's best animated film, and Gen Z favorite Timothée Chalamet won best actor for his turn in Marty Supreme. Survey data from Talker Research found that 63% of Gen Z now intentionally carves out screen-free windows in their days, a higher percentage than any other generation. Popular comedian and influencer Druski has been bouncing around the internet this week because of his skit poking fun at (or perhaps critiquing) the over-the-top production and performative pastors of some mega-churches. Become a monthly donor today, join the Table. Check out the podcast now on our YouTube Channel! Click to check out The Pour Over Get your question on Ask Axis! Send in your questions to ask@axis.org. For more Axis resources, go to axis.org.