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Well, God just decides to sell a book for you.

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I remember the day that I went into my local Christian bookstore and there was my book.

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You are not God! You are just a man!

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The Total Money Makeover book that you sold almost immediately.

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The number one best-selling book.

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Book, book, book.

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No, because you gotta read the book!

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Or you gotta read the book!

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This is Bad Christian Books.

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Welcome to Bad Christian Books, a podcast about the worst bestsellers Christianity has to offer.

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But today we're not talking about a book.

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We're talking about the story of our lives.

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Why don't you go first, Samuel?

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Since you have told me you've written out...

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I think last time, or when we talked about before, you said you wrote out your testimony and it felt very momentous.

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That's true. Yeah, I kind of took another pass at it since then.

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This is our second recording.

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Yeah, I've written out my testimony.

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Let's imagine that the piano is playing, the lights are dimming.

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I have to say, I do feel weird about the word testimony.

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And I probably shouldn't, but it just has a weird vibe to me.

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But I also was like, what do I call this?

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That's how I feel about a lot of church words.

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I cannot imagine...

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We'll just give people some insight into me.

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It's so baked into my experience that I intellectually am aware that it's got to sound so bizarre if you have no context for what a testimony is.

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But I can only imagine that in the way that I can look at any given person and imagine, oh, you drive by a house and you think, what's it like to live there?

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That's what it's like for me with the word testimony.

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It's a weird polysyllabic word that's both ostentatious and I don't know, now I'm just throwing around big words.

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Well, no, it's so interesting you say that because I just realized that too.

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I was like, huh, yeah, if the only other context you hear the word testimony is in a court case.

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True.

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And that's usually a testimony against something.

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I don't know what that means, if there's any meaning in that observation.

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But yeah, it is interesting how like, I mean, we both grew up in the church.

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We can say that up front.

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So like there may be times that we say words that we may not realize people have no idea what we're saying or what that means.

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If that's the case, you can yell at us on Twitter and we'll try to explain or look it up or something.

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Well, this leads us into another good disclaimer because I remember you wanting to mention this.

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Our opinions, we're fully aware that we are learning.

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This is a learning process.

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I mean, that sounds stupid to say, but it's like we've kind of gone through this interesting evolution with the Internet, right?

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Where we understand that it's written in ink, but opinions aren't written in ink.

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So we are our views on these things are going to be evolving.

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We're making these these episodes.

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We're doing research on these things and we're doing the best research we can.

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But that doesn't mean that doesn't take the place of a discussion.

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So think of every episode as the beginning of a discussion.

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If you think if you listen to it and you're like, okay, I think they only got half the story or they got most of the story.

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But I think they're missing out on some nuance or they got none of the story.

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I mean, if they got none of the story, probably probably that's that's really bad.

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But talk talk to us.

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We have our lines of communication open.

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They're all going to be in the show notes.

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We've got email.

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We've got social media, bad Christian books.

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Please hit us up.

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I think there aren't a lot of spaces within the church or church adjacent communities where people can sit and just kind of in a real way and a critical way engage with like what the church in the big sense is saying,

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what individual churches are saying or individual people and talk about the harms but also talk about like what are the things that are life-giving or have come out of that.

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And I think there is this fear, especially in the American Church of engaging in that kind of discussion.

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I feel like people are afraid they like fear that like God can't handle criticism and that that's not the God I believe in.

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Precisely.

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And I kind of want to zero in on that.

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I don't think there are a lot of outlets of religious criticism.

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I think a lot of people hear criticism and they think that it is an inherently negative thing.

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Like, oh, if you criticize, if you're a movie critic, then you just hate movies.

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People who are movie critics actually love movies.

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I love Christians, even if I don't always love what Christianity is doing.

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I think that's the thing is it's like, let's look at it in terms of family for a moment.

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You love your family.

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There you have so much history with your family.

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So when your family is starting to become misguided, do you leave them to their fate?

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Or do you say because I care about you, I want to have a discussion with you about my feelings,

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which I understand are only part of a bigger picture and where we can go from there.

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Yeah. And I mean, we're going to talk about this.

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I guess we've said it.

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This is the episode we're going to talk about us tell you a little bit about who we are.

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But Samuel and I also like don't align completely on.

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We align on a lot of things, but kind of on the central, like some central things we don't align on.

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We have different perspectives and the goal of that is not to like come to a conclusion and say this is Christianity.

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I guess my goal is that we could engage in some of this rhetoric that I think really is toxic in the church

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and has caused a ton of harm to a lot of people for like the last probably five years.

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I've been like informally surveying friends of mine who have left the church or who are like kind of in the church or people who are in the church.

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And like honestly, the number one thing I hear is like they're like,

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I don't feel like there's a place for me to still believe in God and still believe in Christianity,

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but hold things that I value and like hold my beliefs in a lot of social ways.

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And so that should like that should that should wake us up, I guess, in my opinion,

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because there should be a space for all of us.

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You look at the pandemic where there was this concern in the church of,

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okay, I don't want to mask up, shouldn't I still be welcome? Okay, sure.

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What if I do want to mask up? What if I didn't vote for Trump?

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Why what is it about your feelings on these matters other than the fact that they are yours that make them more valid than mine?

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And there's a defensiveness I see in the right where I think they always feel like they're on the defensive.

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So I understand that they feel the same way and I am using us and them here.

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But like I don't I think the church has become hideously exclusive and it's not because, you know, Trump bad.

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I don't like Trump, but that's not the heart of the reason.

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The heart of the reason is the church is becoming a very small specific thing.

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And it's straight away from this idea of we worship a entity that created the entire universe, which includes liberals.

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Well, it includes plants, you know, and includes animals like.

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Yeah, I mean, and even on the like even within,

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I think there are people within the church who probably listen to what you just said and they're like,

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you know, I lean right politically, but I like I'm somewhere in the middle.

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Like I also maybe don't like Trump or I also, you know, like am open to people doing whatever they,

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you know, like with the masks, I'm open to whatever or like people using them if they want to.

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And I think there is this exclusivity.

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That's like a public perception that is really different than when you get to the heart of like an individual.

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And I mean, maybe like the word testimony for us, like there's so there's so many like words like the church.

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That have taken on such a political, social, often negative outside and then like on the opposite side,

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like secular, non-Christian, like these other words, like within the church, like they're like, you can't believe any of that.

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I don't know. There's just like it doesn't seem like there's a lot of middle ground.

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Not a lot of middle ground. And it's become, I think we've we're missing the forest.

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A huge issue I have with current day Christianity, although I suspect it may have been a problem for a very long time,

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is the church has become an institution only.

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It is not the idea that you can't it's not this idea that all these people come together and that's the church.

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It has become about the buildings. It's become about the administration.

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And when that happens, it becomes political.

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And I do think that the political entity of the church and this is probably this is going to be a place where I'm guessing you and I will differ.

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But I was just about to say, oh, we're about to find a place for Samuel and I differ.

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I think the political entity of the church is inherently evil.

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And I think it's been evil the entire time.

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I mean, yeah, I I don't disagree with you in the sense that the church has done the political institutional kind of like business side of the church.

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A lot of evil has come from that. A lot of harm, I think, for the people within it and the people without.

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Yeah, because that's not to say that everybody who ascribes to it is evil.

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It's to say that collectively it is a negative force.

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Yeah, I mean, and I guess I would what I would disagree with is that I I take a much I think there's the church as an institution.

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And I think there's the church as it was created by God.

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And so for me, that is the people who come together, who are this like living body of God, not to get like too scriptural here,

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but like are this like almost like a communal organism of people who believe in God and are trying to do better for each other and better for the world.

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I just I think it's an issue of signifier and signified.

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I think Christians get very defensive of their signifiers.

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Where you hear I think the church is evil and you think I'm talking about believers or people who want to believe in something larger than themselves.

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That's not what I have the issue with. Those people, you know, it's like Mr. Rogers look for the helpers.

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Most people who identify as Christians, at least in terms of what I am seeing, are not showing up or they're too afraid to or they're too attached to identity politics.

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Which is really a criticism you can make of pretty much any American.

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Yeah. Well, and I think I agree.

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I mean, I think that's probably what I mean, we've already explored with some of the episodes recorded.

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I feel often the differences are like a nuanced difference in the brain, like practically they mean very little.

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But I guess I would say like I still have this belief in the church as like an institution that's like a living body that like exists because it is like created by God.

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Kind of in the same way you think of like a system that's like intangible.

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So for me, I do think there is something there that's like not just believers, but like this thing that when we come together and we like experience the presence of God, really powerful things can happen.

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Most of the Christians that I talk to in me, I really think do want to have these conversations and are open to these conversations.

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I personally feel like because of the identity politics, because of how polarized media is within the church and outside the church, people don't know where to go.

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And that was really an interest that I had in starting this podcast was like creating a space where people could talk about this and disagree or agree and work through those messy things together.

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Yeah, I mean, there's so much that I so many places that my mind goes to as well.

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And I don't know if it's good for the About Us podcast.

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We can do a separate one that's Mary and Samuel debate the legitimacy of the church as a institution.

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That would be a great future episode.

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I might cut this part out, but I do want to say it just to see how it flies.

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I think I take issue with the church having legitimacy because it's created by God, because you can say that of literally all things.

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And I think this is an interesting concept.

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This is an error that Christians make a lot where it's like my God can do all things, but he only created the things that I like.

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All things that you experience if you believe in the supremacy of this being exist because of God.

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Certainly, sin plays a role in that, but the church was created after sin.

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So I think in that same way, any excuses we're making for the church as a God created institution you could make for all of humanity.

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And the church does not make those excuses.

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It regularly is too hard on people.

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And I think inspires a culture in which people don't forgive each other.

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And I understand that there is a hypocrisy in me taking such a hard line on the church when, like Mary is saying, there are many people in the church who are eager to turn over a new leaf.

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I mean, my favorite story in the Bible is the story of Jonah, because I really relate to Jonah, where you kind of want to see God judge the church because they, in my mind, have become so terrible.

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But I don't think that is God's view of things.

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I think there is far more mercy in the infinite than we can even imagine.

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So, yeah, I just I think it's interesting because to me, I hear, oh, the church is created by God.

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So it's good.

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And I hear and it reminds me of people who say the Bible is an errant.

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Therefore, all homosexuals deserve to die.

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You know, it's there is a there's a lot of logical fallacies that come when God is putting a capture the flag on your favorite concept, which is like a really harsh way to say that, because I don't think that's exactly what you even meant.

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No, but I mean, I think it's good to talk about like how people may hear that.

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I mean, I think that and yeah, I do have thoughts, but I,

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I agree. I feel like there's something here we need to do another episode maybe in the future because I do have like a ton of thoughts.

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But I do think it is good to just like acknowledge that,

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which is where this conversation started.

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We are learning and exploring topics that we've like had personal experiences with, but like have not spent like decades exploring maybe more like a month exploring deeply and you know, and like I think we want we want to hear from like everyone.

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Please be gracious to us if you think we get something wrong or if we need corrected about something and we're open to hearing it.

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If you're respectful and not a troll.

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Yeah.

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And we would love to hear it and you know, have those conversations.

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Yeah, with that being said, let's let's get into our testimonies, Mary.

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My gosh, I still can't. But yes, tell me.

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You still got that little like cringe feeling like, oh, I don't know about that.

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I do, but I would love to hear your testimony, Samuel.

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So who am I? I'm originally from Ohio, but I've lived in Los Angeles since 2015. I know.

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I'm a self published author of four novels, including Koi pond horror story based on my experiences in the church. I'm a regular guest on a movie podcast. It's called. It's called I know movies and you don't with my friend Kyle Bruhl.

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My day job is I'm an assistant television editor for unscripted TV.

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I married I'm mixed Filipino. I'm an only child and I fear I'm a massive nerd.

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Ever since leaving Christianity, I don't profess any specific religion, but I do study religion, philosophy and the occult in my free time.

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I'm very obsessed with all things relating to belief.

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I just think belief is a really fascinating thing.

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I have a lot of friends who are more like staunch atheists and I think belief has become and they come from religious backgrounds and I think belief has become a very sore topic for them.

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So it's so weird being the like belief guy in Hollywood and then being like the like liberal post Christian everywhere else.

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I was gonna say devil worshiper, but yeah, I mean, yeah, you know,

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I would never know I would never be a simp for Satan.

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Regardless of my I do have a friend my friend faith one time pointed out that she felt like the devil was one of the most sympathetic characters in fiction and I think she's onto something there for more read my novel the Archangel Chad and maybe you'll feel the same way to.

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Have you have you watched the show Lucifer.

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No, I haven't. It's actually I mean it's like kind of cheesy because it's like a, you know, the police drama with the sidekick and the sidekick of Satan, but I actually think you would find the belief system in it very interesting.

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I mean Satan's got a lot to be bummed out about, and it's very relatable to me.

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That's kind of gives you an idea of the hippie dippy stuff I'm up to, you know, again apologies.

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So far, a flurry of demons have not entered me or if they have they've been extremely tidy with the space so I call that a win.

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I've been I've been a Christian since I was four I like that I said I've left Christianity but then the way I wrote this it's as though I still am which I think shows the sort of weird will they won't they I have with my own faith.

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I've been a Christian since I was four. My grandpa was a pastor in the Nazarene Church, and my parents were on the church board of my church growing up.

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Kind of with that I had an overabundance of insight into the workings of the church from an early age, even though I wasn't a pastor's kid, I was kind of a golden boy of my church and a shining example supposedly for the other kids my age around me.

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Yeah, I was the good kid, I was the godly kid.

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And that really messed me up.

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Yeah, I mean it does. We're gonna, when I, that's like a huge part of what I was thinking about as well.

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Jumping ahead slightly like I was a pastor's kid and then a missionary kid but honestly like being a pastor's kid I'm really glad I didn't do that past 12 because like I similarly was like the good kid who like could not fail.

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And yeah, it messes with you a lot as a child.

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It gives you imposter syndrome to last a lifetime.

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I played, I played violin and church worship band and like was really propped up. Yeah, I was really propped up for it. It was this weird thing where you play violin. And like for me, I would just look at the key signature of whatever piece because they don't have violin stuff

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in their worship music and I would just kind of like play all the notes in the key signature for it and call it a day. And then, the church would end and people would just come up to me and they'd be like, loved your violin playing.

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I was really blessed by your violin playing.

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And I'm like, which is, which is great. It's great. It's great. It's really great people were so sweet.

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I felt very weird about it. I mean, you're talking about the way testimony made you feel the people praising me for my violin playing in worship was not, I did not enjoy that.

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I was kind of like, well, don't worship me.

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But not that they were, but it felt like that.

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At an age when I needed friends and a community, I was expected to set the other teens straight.

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We had this, I was on the youth group.

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I was called like the youth council I think I was part of the board. There was like a board for the youth group, and I was 12 and I was on it.

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I would be talking with people in their 20s and their 40s about how to troubleshoot a troubled youth group. Like, I don't know if the kids in the youth group actually were delinquent because when I was 12, everybody was delinquent because I was the golden boy.

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But that also took its toll on me too. They just, they were looking to me to solve problems. I was not a parent, nary a teen yet.

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So that was always interesting. They're like, oh, Samuel's going to go into the youth group and he's going to really set them straight.

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Around this time, I went to a private Christian high school. It was like non-denominational, but it was basically like Baptist Reformed.

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And I really struggled to fit in. The atmosphere was very oppressive.

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I don't inherently have a problem with wearing uniforms, but I may only feel that way because of Stockholm syndrome. It was a uniform atmosphere and it was very much, it was less about, they sold it as purity where it's like, oh, everybody's dressed modestly or whatever.

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But it was really more about wealth. It's like, this school has a image to uphold. We all buy the same uniform, therefore we all look equally wealthy.

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It was also primarily fed by mega churches in the area. And I came from a very, I didn't mention this in my notes, but my, I think I've mentioned this before.

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Like I had a church of like, when I attended there, it was like 50 people. It was very small.

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I just started to realize that it wasn't much about God at all, but about appearances.

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Finally, I went to a Christian college and that's where Mary and I met. And that's also where I tried to recalibrate my faith. I worked admissions at that college.

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Oh my word. You were the worst admissions counselor that the school that should not be named was, has ever seen.

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And I know because you used to come and talk to me about how you were like going to try to like mess with them the next day.

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I forgot about that. I remember.

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You're like, I'm going to try out this experiment to see what they do.

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That's crazy. I don't remember being that much of a mad lad.

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There was a reason that I was so impish at admissions, besides the fact that I was severely depressed.

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We were instructed to make gay students feel unwelcome. It was a part of, we had to do these mock tours to get approved to be counselors.

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And the person running the mock tour, they would pretend to be a student. This is like, it would be some guy in his late 30s, early 40s.

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And he would pretend to be his idea of what gay was. It was that fine line of you told him he was welcome, but his, and I use huge scare quotes here, lifestyle was not.

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So you're telling him he's not welcome.

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And it just felt really gross. We had to do a lot of stuff like that. We had like Astrochurf reviews of this college because it was getting review bombed for not being an accepting place.

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I don't think I haven't told a lot of people that.

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Yeah, wow. I didn't know all of that part. It doesn't surprise me, but wow.

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Yeah. So the college I went to required us to go to chapel twice a week under a penalty of a fine.

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Like you could miss it three times and then they would start charging you, I think like 40 bucks, right? Or was it 15?

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Oh, no, I was going to say it was 50. I don't remember.

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Okay, this is very much, it's a banana, Michael, what could it cost? But I, yeah.

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I was going to say for people who like were very poor in college, like it was an enormous amount. More than what I made per hour, for sure. Like more than double what I made per hour.

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So it was 40 then. It was 40 or 50 because it was like a nice meal out for two.

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That's definitely when I stopped going to church was going to chapel because I had to go to church, quote unquote, twice a week.

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So by the time Sunday rolls around, it's like, am I going to get up early and go to church again? The one time I'm allowed to miss.

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So I also had been to enough church by that point to grow sick of the same salvation or tithe messages being preached, interspersed with anecdotes about a pastor's golfing trip or whatever outrage he'd read about on the news that day.

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It all felt the same. And I felt that the right church would be a place where I could grow deeper.

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The final nail in the coffin, though, was much simpler than that. My wife and I, after moving to LA, sought out a church to attend and even found one we liked.

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The sermon was good and the service was to our liking. But it wasn't better than sleeping in.

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And so to add to all of that, in 2018, I became aware that one of my high school teachers at this Christian high school, a powerful figure in the local community, both Christian and secular, was soliciting minors for sex.

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He taught at that school. As far as I understand, he didn't. He did it for nearly free to, which is a little interesting.

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And at the time was seen as this very charitable thing, but I think it more had to do with just he wanted to be there.

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Yeah, access to people, kids. Yep.

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And I think that really allowed me to be honest about the fact that I think a lot of Christian culture is creepy because that high school really encouraged us to take one on one time with our teachers.

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I mean, we did like a senior trip and he was our cabin leader. And like, this wasn't him, but I would spend hours. Well, I would I would go over to his house and like do movie nights, but I would spend hours talking to teachers one on one after school.

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And they just really encouraged you to have as little boundaries with these adults as possible, oftentimes in total privacy.

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I think it made me realize that Christian culture doesn't have a higher understanding of the world or a better way to love your neighbor.

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And I think regularly Christian culture gets in the way of healthy living. I do actually believe in the in God the Father and God the Holy Spirit.

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I believe in the full Trinity, but I think the Father and the Holy Spirit connect with me the most.

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And I know that you have issues with the Father, but for me it's less the idea of God being a father and more the idea of, well, there I believe that there's a higher power.

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I believe in Jesus, too, but I struggle to forgive Christianity for how tainted the image of Jesus has become for me.

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I think it's to William Blake quote, the image of Christ that thou dost see is my visions deepest enemy. And that's very much how Jesus feels for me.

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I think it's to Jesus's credit that now the church is becoming so hateful that they are overtly rejecting him where they're saying he's too weak.

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I don't like Jesus more, but ultimately all of my beliefs are personal and I have no intention of spreading the gospel to quote unquote nonbelievers.

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Ultimately, I would rather ease the pain of the people I share space with and create an environment where they feel safe and like they aren't alone.

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My experience is unique. I know a lot of others have had it. If the term deconstruction works for you, that's fine, but I kind of reject it because it still feels like it belongs to the church.

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It's a little bit like the concept of colonialism where the church figured out a term for people who were thinking about leaving to keep them in the church while they were thinking about leaving.

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I understand the arguments against there's too much evil in the world claim, but I would like to remind you that I do in fact believe in God and I believe the church like King Belshazzar has been weighed on the scales and found wanting.

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I look now to shine the light of my faith back into the place that almost snuffed it out.

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It's so it's so interesting to hear that and you know you and I have talked about different pieces of it over the years and I lived a good chunk of it with you.

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We were very close friends in college.

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It's, you know, just hearing you talk about specifically like the view of Jesus and I think I also like connects more strongly to the Father and the Holy Spirit and I struggle to a certain degree with the idea of Jesus I, although I think in my journey,

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which we'll get into like I have been able to kind of separate that from what the American church has done to it and I say that in like a I caveat that because like I think probably living outside of the US for a good portion of my formative years like has helped me see like

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church to me different than what it is here in this country.

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And like, I struggle with a lot of American Christians to, you know, I really do and I think it's so challenging to figure out like what that balance with that, what that space is, I don't know.

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Thank you for sharing that Samuel. Thank you for providing a space for it, and thank you for listening. I would love to hear your story. I mean you're making allusions to a childhood outside of the US.

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I had to you know sum up like what has been my faith journey and like a sentence I really feel like God has put me over and over again in situations where kind of the stuff of religion, like the institution, the culture, the like legalism parts of religion has been

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stripped away over and over again. God has shown me that the gospel the, the how do we have a relationship with God like that piece is very simple, and at the same time, very powerful.

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So I grew up like in a ministry family my dad was a pastor until I was 12. My family were missionaries in Ecuador, from 12 until I was 18.

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But even beyond that, like, everyone in my family, and I have a huge family like I know all of my aunts and uncles and, you know, their cousins and their kids and like second cousins and all my great uncles and aunts like we all know each other and everyone's a Christian.

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So pretty much everyone's like specifically a Simile God or Nazarene so like very much in this like charismatic holiness, Wesleyan for people who know what those words mean.

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Very much in that like bubble. Tell the people in the back what charismatic is I always think that one's fun. So, I mean, and I think charismatic means different things to different people because there's also like a charismatic movement that's gone like off the rails and that's

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specifically what I'm talking about. Oh yeah, totally. But like, there's a there's a there's a concept that can sum it up. Oh, true. Yeah, totally.

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Charismatic in general kind of usually means that like the.

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I don't know. This is hard. Do you have a definition of charismatic? Okay, let me let me put it this way. Are there any charismatic Christians who don't believe in speaking in tongues? Yes, Nazarenes.

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Oh, okay. Okay, true. Okay, there's actually a lot of charismatic Christians who don't believe in speaking in tongues. Well, then here's a good way to sum it up then.

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It's the idea that the Holy Spirit can move you in a way that manifests physically often during worship and it can be something as simple as like dancing around or saying thank you Jesus during worship or a sermon or it can in very extreme cases be speaking in tongues.

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Wow, we're getting into it. Speaking in tongues is like a language that humans do not understand. I have a lot of feelings about speaking in tongues because a lot of my family believe in assembly of God like if you are Christian you speak in tongues.

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And that's a whole nother thing that like I feel about but yeah like in general charismatic people believe that like the Holy Spirit can tell you things like through prayer worship your relationship with God, which would be like very different culturally and like how you do church

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then like a more liturgical side or like you know Presbyterians Lutherans even some Baptists where it's like more subdued, or you're following like a very specific like set of words that have been pre written and you've likely read over and over for many, like for thousands of years.

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And charismatic services someone can just say like I think we should do this because of God, and then like the church may do that in that service. That actually does illustrate a good point though and that is the church, even the American church which is so a product of America

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is not a monolith. In fact, it's very diverse in a way that almost makes it a frustrating moving target. Yeah, and it's like, it's always commenting on itself and I think that actually sometimes holds it back because there's so much in fighting between denominations that I don't even think they realize that there's sometimes common issues they all have.

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I definitely agree. So, so like I said like all of my family are Christians and like very much pretty conservative in a lot of ways.

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All of those denominations believe like women can be pastors and full like humans at least as far as their doctrine grows and practice not always but doctrinally, and my family had a lot of matrix so I grew up with feeling like I was empowered to have like faith in God

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and we also like didn't drink.

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There was a lot of like emphasis on what women were constantly.

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I mean my mom has told me like growing up.

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My grandpa couldn't be on the church board because he wanted to go to movie theaters. And that was like, oh yeah that's a big no no for Nazarenes before the 90s.

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Yeah, so like I mean just like a big. I don't know. It's a complex denomination. But, so that being said, like when I was a pastor's kid.

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I definitely felt what you're talking about like having to be the good kid.

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You know, and that the one aspect of like Nazarene church specifically is like this emphasis of holiness, which is the idea that like once you, they called it like filled with the Holy Spirit, you can choose not to send like you don't ever have to send again

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as someone who is like a type A, Enneagram three, like my biggest fear in life is a fear of failure, like I still struggle with that.

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And it has as a kid I was trying to speed run getting sanctified.

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Yeah. Yeah. I mean yeah like it's it's so yeah sanctification is the word they use for that and like it's and it means other things in other denominations like I was talking actually with my cousin who grew up.

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She was one of the few they grew up Baptist. Oh no.

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But we were talking about that and she's like that is not what sanctification means with us and then she was talking about like certain issues that she has in her life based on like every church I mean like everything made by made by humans is going to like mess you up in some way.

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Anyway, yeah, like I really kind of internalize this thing early on that was like, I have to be perfect. One of my earliest memories is I was four, and my children's church teacher told me that in front of like all the other kids were all like older this, it was a very small church so it was like

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four through 12 I mean it was like all the kids together that like I needed to be perfect because I was the example for everyone else because I was the pastor's kid no pressure.

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Good luck with your life. Yeah.

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Yeah.

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And my, I mean to my parents credit my mom heard about it, and went to made an intention to tell me that like that was not true and told that teacher, who was like a lovely lady who was a very special human but was imperfect and she said like, don't ever say that to her again.

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I still internalized it because of my personality predispositions I think.

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I, this is a, this is an interesting formative thing where so much of I think both of our baggage is formed around the flippant things adults said to us when we were very young.

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Where it's like, they probably don't even remember saying that, and they probably were lovely people, and they just didn't think before they spoke and that's, that's not a Christian problem that I think that's a generational and cultural problem, we're just like, kids remember

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what you say to them. So, take on the burden of thinking about it, because even if you don't, they will. That's just a personal, that's a that's a personal albatross on your boy's neck.

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I appreciate that soapbox. And also, as someone who's been a parent. I think you will mess up your children no matter what but it's like how do you help your kids like go through that when you're imperfect right like how do you set them up to feel safe enough to be like, yeah,

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like my mom was like, that's not cool. That's the thing like, it's almost less of a note to parents and more to non parents which is like, yeah, it's like, parent, yeah parents being parenting is difficult I'm not even touching that I'm saying, somebody

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else's kid.

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Maybe don't make that your business. Yeah, no, I think you're totally right and we've talked about that with some of the other episodes, specifically like one that we haven't recorded yet but like every young woman's battle that that was a book given to me by some like random

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human at my high school that I don't even know who gave it to me. My parents even know I read it. And that book is horrible.

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It is a bad Christian book. I will take no argument on that. And I will say I'm parenting like something that I cherish that like my parents and in general my family does is debate and critical thinking was taught to us as a very young age my dad has

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a PhD in philosophy. He like, teaches logic and critical thinking and ethics and so from like a very young age. I don't even know how young I was I can remember going to my dad I mean like explain to me what the different denominations are and like why I always

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like my dad made me a journalist. My mom made me a writer my dad made me a journalist, because he created kind of that love of, you know, digging deeply into a topic and looking at it from like a critical lens.

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And my mom is a writer and she has almost a master's degree in literature and so from a very young age I was reading like all kinds of like classic literature that like probably I shouldn't have been able to or maybe it was fine I don't know.

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But like if it was classical literature for some reason it was fine to read like pretty explicit stuff I don't know. I always remember that you had a quote. I want to say you had a quote from a nice NIN in your yearbook which like at the at the institution we were at kind of blew my mind I was like Whoa, this girl's punk rock really that's so funny.

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Yeah, I don't remember that I've even looked up a yearbook or at the year, I don't even know where the yearbook is did I get one I don't know I don't know if it was your yearbook but it might have been something so fun fun thing about me and Mary we met in the honors program, and it's very possible

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that for some mixer that they did we had to have some quote that like summed us up. And I remember seeing that be like whoa. What was the quote. Do you remember. I can't remember I just remember that it was a nice NIN.

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We're revealing, we are both nerds. Something I've been thinking a lot about actually in the process of doing this project is like, what did my parents teach me and like what did I get from like the larger culture.

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So it's hard to dissect those things but. So when I was 12. My family moved to Ecuador. My dad taught at the seminary and did like trainings and very rural areas for pastors or people who like wanted to get ministry training.

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And my mom did like communications for the compassionate ministry as arm of the mission that we were in that covered Ecuador, Peru, Colombia and Venezuela.

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And while we were there. I mean that entire life experience, I mean obviously like radically changed me, I was there for all of middle school and high school. And I went to a Christian high school and English American Christian high school that was very racially culturally

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diverse. There were I think 24 countries represented in my graduating class and there was like 50 of us. So I grew up hearing like multiple languages being spoken in the hallways and all of those things but also like a bunch of different Christian beliefs.

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Even though the school in general kind of theologically like lined up with my the churches I had grown up in. I mean I, a lot of the teachers really like tried to teach the full range and be like this is like all of the things that Christians believe on this topic.

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And it's okay if you fall in one of these areas.

338
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You know, here's my personal opinion on why I think X or Y. And that was just like such an incredible experience. I look back at that time, and even though my family was attending an all Ecuadorian Spanish speaking church, I never felt really fully like I could be myself there just because it took so many years for me to get fluent in Spanish and kind of by the time I did I was really too busy to like get ingrained in a church.

339
00:45:35,800 --> 00:45:58,800
But like my classmates were my church and the, I guess I had a better Christian school experience that you did Samuel and that like there are certain teachers or volunteers that really were like the mentors to me and you know I really learned like it really doesn't matter what your denomination is it matters like how you're living your faith out.

340
00:45:58,800 --> 00:46:07,800
Here's the worst thing is that was the lesson that I was really wanting to learn from my time at my high school.

341
00:46:07,800 --> 00:46:15,800
In fact, it was one that I, you know how like you sort of have an experience you want to have and you try to make that experience happen.

342
00:46:15,800 --> 00:46:28,800
That was the experience I was trying to make happen which you know is is flawed but I was 13. Cause side note my high school wasn't just a high school was a junior high as well.

343
00:46:28,800 --> 00:46:41,800
And I was coming out of homeschool as well so there was some faux pas. Oh wow yeah I forgot you glossed over that piece. It seems like people at your school were kind, would you say.

344
00:46:41,800 --> 00:46:53,800
I guess yes. And I would also like add the caveat. They were kind to me. Yeah. I mean even at the time. I had a brother who had, I mean I have a brother still.

345
00:46:53,800 --> 00:47:01,800
He's younger than me. I mean, first of all, can we give a shout out to him for the music. Oh yeah, he's an incredible musician.

346
00:47:01,800 --> 00:47:13,800
He's an incredibly creative person. But he had some mental health. I would just say like neurological differences than what our school was willing to allow.

347
00:47:13,800 --> 00:47:22,800
I'm very aware. I was even aware at that time like that. I fit very well into the system. I was who they were looking for.

348
00:47:22,800 --> 00:47:32,800
And so I was nurtured and given opportunities and I grew and for me that school was a very positive space.

349
00:47:32,800 --> 00:47:42,800
And at the same time I recognize like that school was a tear for my brother in a way that I mean I don't want to speak for him but like it definitely has left.

350
00:47:42,800 --> 00:47:53,800
It's definitely still been challenging in his life. And I've talked to other people who I wasn't as close with in high school who like it was deeply scarring.

351
00:47:53,800 --> 00:47:59,800
I had a conversation recently with someone who was quite a few years older than me. We didn't really overlap for much.

352
00:47:59,800 --> 00:48:17,800
But she's half Latina, half white and also queer. And she was telling me about her experiences and just how horrible it was for her.

353
00:48:17,800 --> 00:48:27,800
And like that's a thing that like I didn't even know at the time. And I think also that probably gave me the insight that like things can be good for one person and not good for another.

354
00:48:27,800 --> 00:48:33,800
And just because it's good for you does not mean the system is okay.

355
00:48:33,800 --> 00:48:36,800
And you know what's funny is I definitely saw this one.

356
00:48:36,800 --> 00:48:50,800
You recommended when we first reconnected to listen to the Mars Hill podcast and I witnessed firsthand them using the inverse of that argument as a weapon, which is, oh, just because it's bad for you doesn't mean it's great for a bunch of other people.

357
00:48:50,800 --> 00:49:02,800
And I think that's that's a thing that I've seen, especially more wealthy churches do a lot, which is just like used diversity of experience to sweep bad experiences under the rug.

358
00:49:02,800 --> 00:49:18,800
Yeah. And so I'm glad that you acknowledge that your good experience does not erase the bad experiences of other people because I remember at my college, even my college, my I had a better time at college than high school, mainly because I knew people like you and college.

359
00:49:18,800 --> 00:49:26,800
But in high school, I would try to share about my experience with other people.

360
00:49:26,800 --> 00:49:38,800
And the response I so often got was what I call the youth pastor grimace where they look like they're in pain, but they don't really know what it's like to have a bad day or it's they just don't.

361
00:49:38,800 --> 00:49:49,800
And this is making a generalization, but there's a youth pastor personality type that I've consistently run into, which is like, God, if they hired you because you're not emotionally intelligent.

362
00:49:49,800 --> 00:50:01,800
Excellent. And they they would make that but they would be people my age and they'd make that grimace and they go, I'm so sorry that it was such a bad experience for you.

363
00:50:01,800 --> 00:50:05,800
Thanks, bro. I really feeling not othered at all here.

364
00:50:05,800 --> 00:50:33,800
Well, and I mean, that's like a key piece of I think what I brought back into the church when I came back to the US was this knowledge that I mean, and to go a little bit deeper into like this, my experience like one of the teachers that poured into me the most and was one of my favorite teachers in that high school terrorized my brother and was, in my opinion, incredibly abusive to him.

365
00:50:33,800 --> 00:50:37,800
What do you do with that when you're 17? It's hard.

366
00:50:37,800 --> 00:50:42,800
And so and it's so hard like I'm like, do I like this person? Do I not?

367
00:50:42,800 --> 00:50:54,800
I think that's the complexity of humanity and in my opinion why we do need God because like, we're a whole bunch of we're a jumble of nonsense, all of us.

368
00:50:54,800 --> 00:51:03,800
There's a weirdly, there's a quote from a series of unfortunate events that I keep keeps flashing back to me.

369
00:51:03,800 --> 00:51:20,800
And it's one of the villains of the story near like in the second to last book he says, and when I read this, I was very much in the throes of Christianity and I was like, oh, this is like a godless person trying to work themes in but the character said people aren't all bad or all good.

370
00:51:20,800 --> 00:51:26,800
This is like a chef salad. And at the time it really offended me but as an adult, I think about it all the time.

371
00:51:26,800 --> 00:51:39,800
I love that one because I think it's true. And number two, because you mentioned series of unfortunate events and that's like up there with GarageBand and nostalgia for me so my my millennial heart is happy.

372
00:51:39,800 --> 00:51:42,800
It's such a good YA memory.

373
00:51:42,800 --> 00:51:51,800
No but moving I guess like out of that, my last few years in in Ecuador and in high school really challenging.

374
00:51:51,800 --> 00:51:55,800
Because of some of the stuff that my brother was going through.

375
00:51:55,800 --> 00:51:59,800
My family decided to move back to the US.

376
00:51:59,800 --> 00:52:09,800
About a month before I graduated high school in part due to that and also my grandmother had been diagnosed with dementia and my mom wanted to be close to her.

377
00:52:09,800 --> 00:52:13,800
You know it's hard if you haven't lived that experience.

378
00:52:13,800 --> 00:52:22,800
It's hard to overstate like how horrific and challenging moving back to the US was for me.

379
00:52:22,800 --> 00:52:26,800
It was obviously something like I had to do.

380
00:52:26,800 --> 00:52:34,800
I ended up at this college that felt and is and was like extremely white.

381
00:52:34,800 --> 00:52:36,800
A lot of people from small towns.

382
00:52:36,800 --> 00:52:44,800
At that time in my life I felt like everything had been stripped away from me except for God.

383
00:52:44,800 --> 00:52:47,800
Like people didn't even know where Ecuador was on the map.

384
00:52:47,800 --> 00:52:55,800
I mean I can remember like someone like who couldn't understand like that I had an American passport but lived overseas.

385
00:52:55,800 --> 00:53:12,800
I mean I remember like within my first year or two was a part of a group trying to basically create support for either international or multicultural students and we were told that like it was healthier for us to assimilate.

386
00:53:12,800 --> 00:53:15,800
I remember you telling me about that.

387
00:53:15,800 --> 00:53:21,800
I'm not making up like we were literally told like assimilation was the word that was used.

388
00:53:21,800 --> 00:53:34,800
We were told that it was healthier for us to assimilate than to have a space to talk about what we were going through as like multicultural people in a white only space.

389
00:53:34,800 --> 00:53:40,800
I mean that makes so much sense to me though because that was the only way to survive at the high school that I went to.

390
00:53:40,800 --> 00:53:51,800
For listeners who listen to this podcast but maybe think why do so many Christian millennials or ex-Christian millennials why do they talk about colonialism so much?

391
00:53:51,800 --> 00:53:59,800
It is because colonialism is this all encompassing term for conformity.

392
00:53:59,800 --> 00:54:05,800
I think that would be the most layman way to put it which is forced conformity.

393
00:54:05,800 --> 00:54:18,800
Ironically very antithetical to scripture you know do not conform any longer to the pattern of this world and yet that is what is asked so often of people in Christian institutions.

394
00:54:18,800 --> 00:54:22,800
You were trying to create a transformative experience and they said no conform.

395
00:54:22,800 --> 00:54:29,800
Yeah. Yeah and I look back on that and I think of all the arguments and ways I would tell them.

396
00:54:29,800 --> 00:54:33,800
Well I would tell them things that we've to say we're not going to stay on this podcast.

397
00:54:33,800 --> 00:54:45,800
Speaking of things you can't say I learned recently from somebody who like they work with a nonprofit that deals with like quick content warning for listeners I mean sexual assault.

398
00:54:45,800 --> 00:54:57,800
They they told me recently that they tried to do a presentation at this college and they were informed they were not allowed to use the word rape.

399
00:54:57,800 --> 00:55:08,800
So how do you protect people how do you give people the tools when you're not even allowed to use the word that like it or not is happening even at Christian colleges.

400
00:55:08,800 --> 00:55:12,800
And I would add especially at Christian colleges.

401
00:55:12,800 --> 00:55:16,800
Okay that may be another episode in the future.

402
00:55:16,800 --> 00:55:18,800
I have so many feelings about that.

403
00:55:18,800 --> 00:55:32,800
But yeah it was really challenging and I mean I I literally went from a school where like I was hearing three four languages every single day.

404
00:55:32,800 --> 00:55:46,800
You know everyone was from a different country to if not multiple countries to many of my initial friends my first year had never left the Midwest, let alone the country.

405
00:55:46,800 --> 00:56:01,800
And that's not anything like negative against those people except that I do think when you're like well we can't hear any other voices or we are not even that like we can't even allow people who are different to have a space where they feel safe.

406
00:56:01,800 --> 00:56:06,800
That's, that's problematic. That's very challenging.

407
00:56:06,800 --> 00:56:16,800
And this is a defensiveness I'll even hear from people with decent intentions which is, well not all of us can have those experiences, and they're absolutely right, not everybody can.

408
00:56:16,800 --> 00:56:33,800
But that doesn't erase that those experiences are their own perspective, it is a unique perspective, and it doesn't erase the validity of lived experience, just as somebody who has stayed in the same town their own life has a unique lived experience

409
00:56:33,800 --> 00:56:41,800
that cannot be erased by somebody who's traveled, or somebody who's moved around. It's vice versa, you know.

410
00:56:41,800 --> 00:56:52,800
Well right exactly no I totally yes I agree and, and I, and like that being said like I think that guy who said that, and his mind had good intentions.

411
00:56:52,800 --> 00:56:56,800
He was citing most people do is the crazy thing.

412
00:56:56,800 --> 00:57:22,800
He said, my first few years in college were very challenging. And at the same time, what I felt like God worked on and me in that period was how to be okay with being what I now call an in between person, someone who doesn't fit into a box, and that's okay,

413
00:57:22,800 --> 00:57:31,800
and can recognize and others that it's okay if they don't fit into a box. I spent a lot of time praying like okay like what am I supposed to do.

414
00:57:31,800 --> 00:57:48,800
Can you share a little bit for listeners what it means when you say that God told you something, because when I hear that a lot of times it's a little bit like testimony where it's kind of a red flag, but you're somebody I trust, and you've given your explanation of it and I think it's very compelling.

415
00:57:48,800 --> 00:58:06,800
Hmm. I reflected on this and I actually think this is something I did get from my very Christian family. It's hard to explain but think about the idea of like there's the verse that talks about like testing the spirits is what the phrase is and it's like, you know you hear something in your brain,

416
00:58:06,800 --> 00:58:29,800
and you're like, is this me is this from God, and you try it out with where you tell someone you trust. And as you live it out you try to like, say like, is this good is this bad is this causing harm and over time I have been able to, like, you know, with very small things when I was a child all the way up to now but

417
00:58:29,800 --> 00:58:52,800
I've been able to develop a way of like understanding like this is God's voice. And at the same time like I still test things you know I think I hear something from God and maybe I share it with someone that I trust, another person that I trust their faith, or I share it with someone who's not a faith and see how they respond.

418
00:58:52,800 --> 00:59:09,800
I like how active it is when you told me about it that's what stuck out to me because I usually if somebody says oh God told me this, that's kind of like a sign of like, oh, maybe don't trust this person because at some point, they're going to say God told me this and that's going to become gospel and then there's no reasoning with them.

419
00:59:09,800 --> 00:59:22,800
Whereas for you, you're there's a humility to it that I'm seeing. I mean I think yeah that's how like I was taught was that you have to be really careful when you say something from God.

420
00:59:22,800 --> 00:59:44,800
Like, there's power with that. There's nothing that I mean I was taught there was nothing from that will come from God that will like cause someone harm like it's always life giving if it's from God, and I guess I have like kind of a theory like whenever I do personality tests, I test like off the charts intuitive.

421
00:59:44,800 --> 01:00:13,800
And so I think for me, I'm kind of one of those people that think like intuition or like knowing things that like we can't really explain with our brain right now is like maybe a part of the brain we don't understand or, you know, I have kind of like my theory around that but there is a there is a piece that like I have developed over my life where I feel like 70% confident this is of God versus not, and then you have to test it.

422
01:00:13,800 --> 01:00:24,800
Yeah. It's kind of interesting to because I was thinking about, you know, when you said careful, you should be careful about what you say comes from God and I was thinking about the sort of.

423
01:00:24,800 --> 01:00:34,800
There was a good word for it like a kind of a conspiracy of thought that exists in all systems we all agreed upon realities, and maybe think of.

424
01:00:34,800 --> 01:00:38,800
Have you ever seen into the woods.

425
01:00:38,800 --> 01:00:41,800
I've read parts of it but I haven't seen it.

426
01:00:41,800 --> 01:00:53,800
I really like the lyrics at the end of the musical it says, careful the wish you make wishes are children, careful the path you take wishes come true, not free.

427
01:00:53,800 --> 01:01:02,800
Careful the spell you cast, not just on children. Sometimes the spell may last past what you can see and turn against you.

428
01:01:02,800 --> 01:01:07,800
Careful the tail you tell that is the spell children will listen.

429
01:01:07,800 --> 01:01:15,800
And I think if that doesn't sum up all religions, not just Christianity, all belief systems not just religions.

430
01:01:15,800 --> 01:01:26,800
And the way our words, you know when you say something comes from God it's almost like you're saying it squared, you know, it's words already have power.

431
01:01:26,800 --> 01:01:39,800
Definitely. And I do feel very grateful that I was taught that until you asked me about it. I didn't really think about that being something specific. I was like, doesn't everyone learn that.

432
01:01:39,800 --> 01:01:44,800
Well, and there are Christians who believe God does not speak to you.

433
01:01:44,800 --> 01:01:59,800
Reformed theology believes that God hasn't spoken since the revelation to John at Patmos, which has its own issues and is very much tied to inerrancy doctrine, which also has its own issues.

434
01:01:59,800 --> 01:02:16,800
So yeah, I mean, I think a lot of that started like, just breaking down my own view of like, legalism, which while I don't think like, I don't think holiness doctrine in itself has to be legalistic, although you may disagree with me.

435
01:02:16,800 --> 01:02:24,800
It was for me and how it was lived out, how I saw people like talk about it around me was so legalistic.

436
01:02:24,800 --> 01:02:39,800
Even the Nazarene Church, I went to was so inundated with Calvinism that my entire experience of legalistic Christianity comes from Calvinism, which is so strange, because they're the folks who believe that you can't not sin.

437
01:02:39,800 --> 01:02:54,800
And yet they, and that's really where I see, I'm going to use the P word, patriarchy coming into play because you started to realize men in power couldn't help but sin.

438
01:02:54,800 --> 01:02:58,800
Everyone beneath them better be on their best behavior.

439
01:02:58,800 --> 01:03:12,800
And so, I think that the Adventist theology was always taught to me as this very personal journey. It was basically the idea of like, you could be extraordinary in a way that's very personal between you and God.

440
01:03:12,800 --> 01:03:22,800
And that's always what I've loved about it. I love the idea of being the best you can be, not to be better than somebody else, but because you only get to live life once.

441
01:03:22,800 --> 01:03:35,800
Depending on what you believe. Well, and yeah, I mean, I think like, all of all of that being said, I've come to a place where I believe there's good and bad in every culture and every belief system.

442
01:03:35,800 --> 01:03:40,800
And so we have to wrestle with that. Like, how do we take the good and leave the bad?

443
01:03:40,800 --> 01:04:02,800
So after college, I worked for a local newspaper. At the time I had this impression probably because of like the circle that I'd grown up in that like, I was entering a very like, secular non Christian space, which actually wasn't true like a lot of the people who worked there went to church.

444
01:04:02,800 --> 01:04:07,800
And or didn't, and it was fine. But

445
01:04:07,800 --> 01:04:25,800
I do remember very distinctly just because you know Nazarenes have are very strong against not drinking, like drinking or even going into a bar is like on the par of like, probably above like certain violent things.

446
01:04:25,800 --> 01:04:29,800
I mean, it's just like crazy to me. Looking back at it now.

447
01:04:29,800 --> 01:04:43,800
I feel like Nazarenes handle drinking the way like, non denominational Christian tick tockers handle porn, where it's like, it's so evil and yet you're almost obsessed with it in its absentee.

448
01:04:43,800 --> 01:05:01,800
Yeah, I have to say like journalism as a field is known for having alcoholics. So when I started working at the newspaper, I would go have a drink with my co workers at this bar across the street and I think I would get like Tito's and soda and I'm sure that it was like 90% soda.

449
01:05:01,800 --> 01:05:21,800
I'm sitting there and whatever. I can remember this moment when a co burger asked me about my experience in college because they knew that like that college didn't allow people to drink and here I am in a bar, and I can just be remember being like, fine, like you can believe in God and have a drink.

450
01:05:21,800 --> 01:05:43,800
And it opened up this entire conversation about, you know, like, God, spirituality, religion and people's experience, and I can, I remember having this thought of like, the church wants us not to be in these spaces because they're afraid, and we're missing opportunities to be in relationship with people who

451
01:05:43,800 --> 01:06:11,800
are similar to you. I'm not someone who's super strong about like forcing what I believe on other people, but at the same time, I think it's really healthy to have spiritual conversations. Oh yeah, anyone you talk about and like, well there's a difference between forcing it and discussing it, and I love discussing it and I think that's, I think I talk about it more because I don't want to force it, it comes up more because

452
01:06:11,800 --> 01:06:28,800
you get to actually hear somebody out, you don't just tell them what to think. But I also kind of have my own theories as to why that why churches sometime, a lot of churches are totally cool with drinking, but most churches are cool with drinking, most are.

453
01:06:28,800 --> 01:06:49,800
There is something kind of insidious about the way churches will often rob you of normal social outlets and I think, I do think some churches fear, I don't even think they know they fear this but I do think the outlying of alcohol sometimes comes from a fear that the bar will be superior to the small group

454
01:06:49,800 --> 01:07:09,800
is a theory that I have. Or you can do what I do, which is combine them. Well, it's the most obvious thing now I will say, I think one reason the Nazarene church did do so well in the early days was it was a place for people who were wishing to be sober, which is very valid.

455
01:07:09,800 --> 01:07:27,800
Yeah, yeah, that's, that's the history of kind of the larger denomination that you and I grew up in is that it started actually as a very radical space there were like women in leadership and they were specifically reaching out to people who had addiction.

456
01:07:27,800 --> 01:07:45,800
And so a lot of the rules that have carried on to today exist because at the time they wanted to, you know, they were like, no drinking, because we have people in recovery in our service and we don't want to put them in those people in a situation where either they feel

457
01:07:45,800 --> 01:07:59,800
like they can partake or it's, you know, temptation that they need to create distance from or whatever which is like an amazing history that like that was never taught to me until I was an adult.

458
01:07:59,800 --> 01:08:16,800
I think this shows that, by the way, politicization makes everything toxic, because having a space where drinking is not permitted therefore it doesn't have to be an issue is actually a great idea.

459
01:08:16,800 --> 01:08:35,800
And I think that comes when you shame other people for doing it. Right, and that's working for them. And I think, yeah, there's not the, and it's this lack of nuance that I think really obfuscates so much of any kind of altruism altruism that churches could otherwise be doing,

460
01:08:35,800 --> 01:08:51,800
because alcoholism is a very real and terrible thing. Yeah, but not everybody has it. Fast forward through, you know, early COVID. I was working at the NPR station in Chicago, WBZ.

461
01:08:51,800 --> 01:09:08,800
I was working insane hours, because I was like a digital producer which means I did social media and that should tell you everything in and of itself. I was working a lot with like DEI things with my current job and I was like, you know, if I'm going to try to hold my workplace

462
01:09:08,800 --> 01:09:23,800
accountable to equity and changing and doing a lot of these hard conversations I need to do that with my church, especially if a church is supposed to be a home in a way, a social home a community.

463
01:09:23,800 --> 01:09:26,800
That's where your base should be.

464
01:09:26,800 --> 01:09:29,800
The standards should be so much higher, in a way.

465
01:09:29,800 --> 01:09:54,800
Yeah. So we came out of that period, feeling like we needed to find a church that fit with our values, which at the time was leadership that was racially and gender and culturally diverse, that affirmed queer people had strong theology and, you know, to use a Christian word, discipleship

466
01:09:54,800 --> 01:10:07,800
which basically like was meaty, had good community, couldn't find it. And so we started a house church for two years, which was just like an incredibly beautiful experience during COVID.

467
01:10:07,800 --> 01:10:22,800
That being said, a lot of the process of this throughout this entire story. You know, I've had a lot of thoughts around the ways that the church isn't perfect. We were doing a basement renovation.

468
01:10:22,800 --> 01:10:33,800
I found, so we pulled all of these boxes from our storage room and I found a copy of Every Young Woman's Battle. And I was like, oh my gosh, I can't believe I still have this book.

469
01:10:33,800 --> 01:10:49,800
It crystallized this idea of, let's read Christian books that were just like given out like candy and talk about some of the issues with them and not just like accept kind of the stuff we've been fed.

470
01:10:49,800 --> 01:10:54,800
And so I had like reached out to Samuel and was like, do you want to do this?

471
01:10:54,800 --> 01:11:04,800
Mary and I hadn't really talked in like almost 10 years. I mean, not because we had like a falling out or anything. It was just like we had graduated. We all went off and did our own thing.

472
01:11:04,800 --> 01:11:09,800
And it was just cool anyways to hear from you because you'd hit me up a little bit earlier that year.

473
01:11:09,800 --> 01:11:15,800
Yeah, it was kind of a relationship where it was like once a year we'd be like, hey, are you still alive? What's happening?

474
01:11:15,800 --> 01:11:31,800
One of those college relationships, but it was really cool when, and I think you were very primed. It definitely is a God thing. I think we can say as two people who believe in God, like I think we both believe that it was like a thing that was created for us to be together and do this project.

475
01:11:31,800 --> 01:11:49,800
I fully agree. Well, I had really been, it's funny because I'm fully inundated in like LA vague magic world now. And I've been, and I'll use the LA term, which is really as BS as testimony or Christianese. But I was putting the intention into the world.

476
01:11:49,800 --> 01:11:56,800
Oh my goodness. Actually, when I was younger, I would always say it was like, oh my word.

477
01:11:56,800 --> 01:11:58,800
Yeah, oh my word is your word.

478
01:11:58,800 --> 01:12:12,800
But also, no, I say that because like I actually have some of our friends who've either come from LA or like did that thing and they all are like, yes, the whole like manifest thing.

479
01:12:12,800 --> 01:12:24,800
I'm not dunking on anyone's belief system and I actually do in some sense believe in like positivity, but that's like a whole nother can of worms that just I roll at.

480
01:12:24,800 --> 01:12:43,800
All this is to say, I was very much doing, I was doing what we could call, if I say manifestation rituals, we're going to lose listeners. I was, I was hardcore hoping for some direction, even just beyond like the novel, like the novel I was writing.

481
01:12:43,800 --> 01:12:56,800
And you hit me, it was so interesting because you texted me, have you listened to If Books Could Kill? And anybody else saying that I would just be like, no, I haven't. What, you know, kind of been like, all right, another podcast.

482
01:12:56,800 --> 01:13:19,800
But when you text me, which you know, look at me now, when you texted me that, I just had this weird feeling in the best way where I thought, here we go. And I was like, let's hop onto a pot, let's hop into a call and lo and behold, you know, we swim in different oceans, but we landed on the exact same shore.

483
01:13:19,800 --> 01:13:42,800
And here we are. You were asking me like, what is it to hear the voice of God, I would say that is like that feeling of this is right, this is true. That's hearing the voice of God. And I think, Samuel, you and I are trying to figure out exactly like the line we want to take of how much kind of the Christian is like you said versus like you mean things more secular.

484
01:13:42,800 --> 01:14:02,800
Well, I know for me, it feels dishonest to go fully Christian, and it feels dishonest to go fully secular, quote unquote. Anymore, I think the concept of secular is so funny because secular only is a Christian construct, like it doesn't exist outside of Christianity. So if I was leaning one direction, it would be secular. But I know where I came from.

485
01:14:02,800 --> 01:14:22,800
Maybe to kind of end our discussion, which has been like wonderful. I was having this thought earlier when you were talking like, and I have I can answer it as well. What is a thing that has kept you believing in God throughout your entire experience of life?

486
01:14:22,800 --> 01:14:48,800
What has kept me believing is honestly this understanding. It's honestly evolved throughout the years. I think in the past, it was very much an emotional thing, which was the, I think that is the easiest way to describe it is, I really wanted to leave Christianity behind as early as high school, but I couldn't escape the fact that I felt like there was some thing I was leaving behind.

487
01:14:48,800 --> 01:15:04,800
That doesn't necessarily mean that it's real, but it meant that I understood myself well enough to know that that wasn't the time yet. I needed to understand better what it was I was leaving behind, who it was, if there is such a thing.

488
01:15:04,800 --> 01:15:20,800
And it's evolved into, as I've left the world of the church and I've realized that the church, unfortunately, is not the root of all the world's problems. It might just be greed and cruelty that the desire to have power over another person.

489
01:15:20,800 --> 01:15:34,800
It's this realization that people, the people you meet along the way, everyone's going to tell you how you should see the world. So why not commit to what you want the world to be.

490
01:15:34,800 --> 01:15:50,800
And my time with Christianity really gave me a vision for what I wanted the world to be. And it's not a world where everybody goes to church every Sunday and sings. It's a world where people don't have to be afraid of each other. A world where people don't have to feel alone.

491
01:15:50,800 --> 01:16:10,800
And a world where anything is possible. I think that ultimately, unity is going to be how we accomplish these goals. We need to build bridges. And ironically, I think that is sort of the central message of Christianity. You know, Jesus says, first to the Jew, then to the Gentile, like he's saying, don't leave anybody out here.

492
01:16:10,800 --> 01:16:21,800
I personally do believe it is going to take God's work within humans to make that happen. And I think that can happen outside of the church and I think it happens inside the church.

493
01:16:21,800 --> 01:16:41,800
I also think this is a time in the American church life that historians are going to look back on and be like, there was a lot of upheaval and I hope we come out better on the other side. I came to a place where I'm not afraid of criticizing an institution because I think the God behind it can handle it.

494
01:16:41,800 --> 01:16:58,800
And if he can't, that's a whole other can of worms. I mean, just look at the Old Testament. All the time, God was like, dude, the religion that you created around me sucks. And like, I'm going to do something because like it is not about me.

495
01:16:58,800 --> 01:17:17,800
It's crazy that they never made that mistake ever again. Yeah, exactly. I mean, like, I think humans have issued like anything created by humans will never be perfect. I have faith that like, we're gonna make it through.

496
01:17:17,800 --> 01:17:39,800
Should we move to a conclusion? I think people have a good idea of who we are now. Maybe too good of an idea. I was gonna say probably more than they wanted. We would love to know like, if you're listening, what your story is. Are there things that led you into the way that you think about God or think about the church or, I mean, wherever you're at.

497
01:17:39,800 --> 01:17:53,800
We'd love to hear that. Our email, I guess I should say like how people can contact us. Our email is badchristianbooks. Our handles on all socials is at badchristianbooks or badchristianpod, P-O-D.

498
01:17:53,800 --> 01:18:07,800
Twitter or X or whatever it is like has a character limit and it's very annoying and it messed up our handles. Please let us know. Like, what is your story? How did you come to hear about this? But also how did you come to believe what you did?

499
01:18:07,800 --> 01:18:15,800
And we'd love to hear if you have recommendations on what books we should cover in the future.

500
01:18:15,800 --> 01:18:26,800
And yes, please do reach out to us. Because one thing is we don't really know who our audience is yet. And that's gonna be evolving too. But we want to get to know you.

501
01:18:26,800 --> 01:18:38,800
But until then, keep an eye out for us as we continue our Christian bookstore dumpster dive. I'm a published author. You can find me on Amazon.com slash author, Sam McAuleato.

502
01:18:38,800 --> 01:18:49,800
And if you're like, man, I really want to hear even more of this guy's voice, I sometimes guest on I Know Movies and You Don't with Kyle Bruhl. Mary, do you have anything you want to plug?

503
01:18:49,800 --> 01:19:09,800
I don't have that much to plug, except I'm a producer editor on an upcoming podcast. Season four is upcoming. It's called Change Agents. It looks at solutions to helping people who are returning from incarceration reintegrate into society and heal.

504
01:19:09,800 --> 01:19:27,800
It's going to be amazing. So that's called Change Agents. And you can follow the work I do at hall underscore Mary E. I don't know, I'm a little bit like freewheel in it right now. I'm not as coordinated as Samuel is about what he's doing.

505
01:19:27,800 --> 01:19:36,800
If you want to see a bunch of memes, you can follow me on Instagram at fake Sammy C. I'm on threads as well.

506
01:19:36,800 --> 01:19:55,800
Are you? Yeah, I'm on threads. It feels like it feels like baby's first Twitter. I was gonna say someone's gonna listen to this in two years and be like, what is threads? Absolutely. There's no way threads makes it into like, let's say there's no way threads makes it into the next election.

507
01:19:55,800 --> 01:20:07,800
Oh man, we're in a weird time. Well, this has been Bad Christian Books. Thank you so much for your time, and we look forward to continuing the discussion on our next episode. We'll see you then.