Episode Transcript
[00:00:05] Speaker A: This is the Return, a podcast about religious reconstruction in a world of deconstruction. I'm Jordan Maddox.
[00:00:13] Speaker B: And I'm Dustin Maddox.
[00:00:14] Speaker A: We are not related.
[00:00:16] Speaker B: Different spell.
[00:00:31] Speaker A: In this episode, we're joined by Nate Yoder, a former Mennonite pastor who takes us from rural Ohio to Canada to California, and through some of the deepest questions a person of faith can face. Nate's journey is one of conviction and transformation. He's someone who's wrestled with church politics, calling loss and the complexity of belief, who's also managed to hold on to a faith rooted in love, honesty and humility. To together, Dustin, Nate and I will explore what it means to deconstruct and reconstruct faith, not as a one time crisis, but as a lifelong process.
We'll talk about grief, brave honesty, community, and how to find God again when the institutions fail you. It's a conversation about faith that's been tested and what remains when everything else falls.
[00:01:30] Speaker B: Nate, how about you just tell us a little bit about yourself and your upbringing and the religious or spiritual background of that you grew up with.
Now that we know it's Mennonite, but tell us more about it.
[00:01:42] Speaker C: Yeah, so I grew up in, in central Ohio. Go Buckeyes.
[00:01:46] Speaker B: The Ohio.
[00:01:47] Speaker C: The Ohio State University. Yeah.
And my dad was a pastor, also taught at a local, kind of like a junior Bible college. And then we had a small little vegetable farm as well. So that was my life growing up. It was church work and any spare minute my brothers and I would be playing some kind of ball, whether it was baseball, basketball or football. Depends on the season out in the yard. Yeah, that's what we did probably at a pretty young. And it was a pretty conservative Mennonite environment in some ways a mix of traditional Anabaptist peace theology and some more evangelical, even fundamentalist at times perspectives.
But grew up, my dad was, I was the oldest of three and in high school decided, I think I want to.
I think I want to teach.
So I went to college, obviously, and then I realized I don't want to teach high schoolers, so I'm going to have to get a more advanced degree to teach college level.
So I went to seminary, Asbury Seminary, thinking I would teach, get a master's degree and teach just like in a college, religion, theology, something like that. Ended up going into the pastorate and I should back up. In my teens, people started saying, oh, you'll be a pastor like your dad, all that kind of stuff.
And my parents never pressured me or pushed me to do that. And they never treated us differently because we were pastors, kids. They just didn't do that, which I'm grateful for. I've had other people I've encountered who had a. Somewhat ring in his mind, who. They're just aghast and shocked, like they can't comprehend it because they felt that pressure so strongly. So I was blessed with parents who genuinely lived what they taught and. And believe they're human. We're all human. But there was. There's an authenticity to that that I was blessed with. Anyway, ended up going into the past also. Looking back, I think I was even subconsciously pushing against this community pressure as I perceived it.
[00:03:57] Speaker B: Yeah.
[00:03:57] Speaker C: To follow Dad's footsteps. Anyway, so then I ended up pastoring in Pennsylvania, a couple different churches.
Ended up being like a regional overseer of about 40 or 50 churches for a couple years. And then that ended.
So I resigned because of just some unhealthy dynamics happening in the denomination. And that was hard. That was hard for a lot of reasons because I really did enjoy that job.
But we ended up going to Canada where I pastored there, and then we came to Fresno where I was working at central committee, and I.
Yeah, that was my journey. I don't know, Dustin. Maybe there are things I left out.
[00:04:37] Speaker A: You want to pro. I want to probe now.
[00:04:39] Speaker C: Okay.
[00:04:39] Speaker A: Did you deconstruct ever?
[00:04:42] Speaker C: Did I deconstruct ever? Yes.
[00:04:44] Speaker A: Because the kind of narrative you just told us felt like it was a pretty. I know it's not linear, but that's what it sounded like.
[00:04:50] Speaker C: No, it's a great question describing it. When I was in seminary, my dad actually was forced out of the church that he had pastored for 15, 16 years and just a small handful that had some things against him and just pushed him out. So that kind of rocked me a bit.
[00:05:09] Speaker A: What did that challenge for you in terms of your. Did that challenge your faith in Christianity? That challenged your spiritual beliefs? What did that. What did that undercut in your vision of the world?
[00:05:20] Speaker C: I distinctly remember thinking, if you can be.
Serve well, be well, loved by the majority of the congregation, have integrity, have been effective.
And then because of a very small handful, it just all disappears. You get. Yeah. Get absolutely kneecapped. Why would I go into this? I distinctly remember that thought process.
[00:05:44] Speaker A: So that didn't affect your personal faith in any way?
[00:05:46] Speaker C: No, because at that time, I think my conclusion was I had too much faith in the institution and in the system.
[00:05:56] Speaker A: Okay.
[00:05:56] Speaker C: And I didn't. I don't recall ever blaming God for it.
[00:05:59] Speaker A: Okay. So it was a people problem versus a Christianity problem.
[00:06:05] Speaker C: So, interestingly, yeah. But then probably it happened again a little bit when I left as bishop because there were some remarkable. Again, every situation is unique, but there were some remarkable similarities between what my dad experienced and what I experienced. He experienced that at a much higher level than what I did, partly because I chose to leave and dad had chose to stay longer, which was interesting because I had vowed to myself I would never allow myself to get in a spot like dad had. And obviously, some things are out of our control. Right. But again, I don't think my faith in God ever really was shook by that.
What did shake me a little bit about that was about five years before I was asked to be bishop.
At that time, we were living in the parsonage, which is right next to the church I was pastoring, and I distinctly remember I was walking home from lunch one day.
[00:07:03] Speaker A: And parsonages are great for boundaries. I lived in one, too, so it's great for boundaries, really.
[00:07:08] Speaker B: Clear line.
[00:07:09] Speaker C: Yeah, exactly. I mean, there's a store, there's the edge of the parking lot. It's a great little boundary.
[00:07:13] Speaker A: Right.
[00:07:13] Speaker B: Yeah.
[00:07:15] Speaker A: Are you going to build a tiny home, Dustin, on the church property and live right there?
[00:07:18] Speaker B: Oh, I just often sleep in my office just to make it easier.
[00:07:21] Speaker C: You build a tiny home and I'll sell it to you.
[00:07:24] Speaker B: Perfect. Yeah. Nate is now a realtor.
[00:07:26] Speaker C: So anyways, I distinctly. I remember walking up the sidewalk, going to just have lunch with my wife and kids. And I distinctly remember. It's like out of the blue, this thought came to my mind.
You'll be bishop someday, and it'll be okay. I remember thinking like, that's the weirdest thing. I was only in that denomination three years. Like, it wasn't even really known that well.
So I'll have to say of the different.
Because in the church world, there's a big sense of calling. And I know we're not here to talk about that today, but it's a big. Especially when you're into ministry and you're called.
[00:07:59] Speaker A: But I think you're bringing up something interesting is when there's calling, but then there's politics.
[00:08:04] Speaker C: Exactly.
[00:08:04] Speaker A: How does that. How do you stay? And we haven't really talked about church politics being a reason for deconstruction, but certainly. But it's certainly a big deal. And I think people that are in leadership probably experience this the most. People that go in with a calling, but then when they get there, it's entirely messy and you get frustrated and you're like, wait a second.
[00:08:25] Speaker C: Yeah. And so in my case of the different I've been at, I was pastored three different churches. And then there was the bishop role. The role that personally I experienced the deepest level of pain was also the one where I had the clear sense of, you're supposed to do this. The others, it was, yeah, it seems like a good fit. It makes sense. We sought counsel, we prayed, blah, blah, blah.
[00:08:47] Speaker A: Yeah.
[00:08:48] Speaker C: And so that kind of messed with me for a while.
And I don't know if I've fully.
I guess how I resolved it is to say, you know what?
As a follower of Jesus, my primary calling is to love God and love others. Jesus boiled down to that, just boils down to that.
And it doesn't matter if I'm pastor at church A, if I'm bishop, if I'm a realtor, whatever I'm doing, that's my primary calling. I am called to do that. The particular job and role and position.
I'm a little bit more, shall we say, agnostic at how it all works in reality. I realize there are biblical examples of God gave specific calls, and other times there's biblical examples where it says a group got together and they said it seemed right to us.
So I just don't get too hung up on the specific calling.
And I've also seen it used as almost a club in a political way. God's calling us. And so it's if you don't support it now, you're against God. But that's a whole other topic.
[00:10:03] Speaker A: Yeah, that's an interesting point to bring up, because I think people get specific visions of what church should look like or church leadership should look like or the structure of church should look like when it doesn't meet those expectations and there's something wrong with it. But it sounds like you have a flexible vision of what calling could be, which allows you to adjust to reality as it presents itself. And now I want to ask another question, which is you came from what I would describe as a conservative environment on the east coast, and Mennonite Central Committee in the west coast is a different vibe.
Would you say that's accurate?
[00:10:37] Speaker C: What's your perception of the vibe of Mennonite Central?
[00:10:39] Speaker A: I've met Mennonites from the East Coast, I've met Mennonites from the west coast, and they're very different.
And I think there's an openness with some Mennonites on the West Coast. Would you say that's accurate?
[00:10:49] Speaker C: Yeah, some of it's the coast thing in mcc it would be more of which denomination you come from.
[00:10:55] Speaker A: Okay, so what was your experience at Mennonite Central Committee? How did that affect your faith journey?
[00:11:00] Speaker C: That's funny, because I came. So at Mennonite Central Committee is technically owned by five denominations in the United States.
[00:11:06] Speaker A: Okay.
[00:11:07] Speaker C: And I came out of.
I grew up in what's called the Conservative Conference, which we. Conservative.
[00:11:14] Speaker A: Okay.
[00:11:15] Speaker C: And then I was in.
[00:11:16] Speaker B: It's in the name. It's in the name.
[00:11:17] Speaker A: That's literally what it's called, the Conservative. That helps you to know where you are.
[00:11:21] Speaker B: It's clear. Clear as kind.
[00:11:22] Speaker C: I think they've changed it now to the Rosedale Network or something, but. And then MBS would be pretty conservative. And then I was in what's called the Brethren of Christ. That's a little more centrist. And then the more progressive or on the left, if you will, would tend to be Mennonite Church us. So in mcc, I came from a background where more. It would have been more common to view MCC as more on the progressive end.
And then of course, a lot of the staff in MCC at the time would have come from that constituency.
[00:11:54] Speaker A: Okay.
[00:11:55] Speaker C: So I was viewed a little bit more. Suspicious is too strong of a word. But I was from more perceived to be from the more conservative tribe. So to be quite honest, I enjoyed not fitting into anyone's box on either side. But how did it shape me? It was profound. There are cultural things in MCC that could be a whole podcast just for Mennonites on its own. We won't go there now, but MCC put me in touch with more situations, more races, ethnicities, and people whose lived experience was more. Was much different from mine. And when you encounter people who. And same. We lived in Canada for three years as well.
And again, so when you. There's a difference between a Canadian and the U.S. perspective.
When you encounter people who on paper have a very similar theology to you, but their life experience is so different that they view a lot of social, societal, even political issues, even as moral issues. But they view it very differently. If you're honest, it makes you step back and go, oh, maybe what I thought was a moral issue really isn't. Maybe it's just my cultural lens that I brought to. I wasn't even aware of.
So MCC broadened my world and probably reduced my refined, my sort of core belief about, you know what?
We go back to Jesus, we're called to love God and love others. I can control to some extent if I'm loving God and if I'm loving.
[00:13:33] Speaker A: Others, can I mirror back what you're saying because I think I hear something that's interesting, which is being in a diverse community helped to focus you on what was actually a non negotiable for you versus something that's an appendage that carries with it connections to a specific environment.
[00:13:53] Speaker C: Yeah.
[00:13:54] Speaker A: Ideology. So it helped you to shed some things. Is that what you're saying?
[00:13:57] Speaker C: Yeah. And boil down about what I really care about. There was a time when I would. I loved theological debates this and that. And I realized they all have their place. And honestly now it's like some of that is that experience. And now it's just who cares at the end of the day? It doesn't change the person in need at the end of the day.
Yeah. And not to get.
I want to get overly personal here, but three children.
And we're coming up on almost four years since we lost our middle one after a battle of brain cancer.
And that does the same thing. Like it had the same effect of. On the one hand, broaden my world, be gracious. You never know what someone's going through.
And at the same time. And I'm gonna be a little crass here. Cause that's how strong I feel.
[00:14:48] Speaker A: Really?
[00:14:48] Speaker C: You're worried about that shit? It just doesn't matter.
Like when you encounter that kind of deep need, some of the stuff that in church we can get so worked up about and even throw verses at to support our position. It just doesn't matter. And I just. I. So my tolerance for that stuff has just almost disappeared because it's just. I don't have time for it.
[00:15:10] Speaker A: And I think too we tend to focus on the stories where. And it's my story in some ways. So I don't know if we focused on my arc a lot, which is intensively church, go out into the world, realize I haven't been taught certain things, having been given context, slowly lose faith and then drop off the map. And then later in life think about what it might look like to pick that back up. But it sounds like your journey is also a form of deconstruction.
But the reconstruction happened concurrently with it. So some beliefs were challenged, but the core remained. And you remove some of the stuff that was unnecessary.
So you were having these micro episodes of deconstruction. So I. Because I'm interested to see this anthropologically to figure out how we as people mature with our beliefs. And some people have to go into like Jesus in the desert. And then some people maybe have to get off at a truck stop periodically to Go to the bathroom, but then they get back on the road. It sounds like you just had to get off the truck stop a few times as you encountered obstacles and challenges and grief and life and everything else. See what I'm saying?
[00:16:22] Speaker B: Totally. Yeah. I think on the anthropological side, some of that is like the hero's journey, right in that. In the capital letters sense. And that's why stories like Star wars or Lord of the Rings are so compelling to us, because they capture something that's like the universal human experience of leaving home, whatever that looks like in terms of your own cultural milieu and what you were raised in, being challenged by evil or a diverse perspective that you thought was evil. And then you have to reintegrate and all of those things. So there. That's like, part of the journey of being human and maturity and developing in general.
But I think in what's similar in both of your stories and also different is I think in a lot of stories that I hear of people going through a decons. A classical deconstruction is oftentimes what they come up against. And like, what you came up against, Jordan specifically, and others similar to you, is being told, like, oh, the. Like being shielded from the world.
And then you, like, go off into the world and you realize, oh, there are good, kind, loving people here. And there are all sorts of things that I was told had no life to them, but there's life here and vibrancy and things of that nature. And so then that becomes this disorienting reality. Can I trust home then? And other times that experience happens even within the church itself, when what you're exposed to or encounter is just a different perspective that realize. That makes you realize, like, how culture, like, specifically culturally conditioned I am. Like, when I hear somebody, an African bishop talk about poverty or a Palestinian Christian talking about finding Christ in the rubble of bombings from Israel, you're like.
Like there's.
I'm, like, stuck eating at the same restaurant in my own neighborhood when there's a whole city's worth of options.
And how do we expand our view really in whatever it is? And there's ways that you can do that can be integrated within your faith. Sometimes it takes walking away from it to have your own sense of integration. But I think part of it is just staying open to and holding things loosely. And like you said, Nate, there are things that you realize over time that maybe you had too tight a grip on that you need to let go of, or that maybe that was somebody else's ax to grind. And is a minor that you don't really want to major in or a hill you don't want to die on?
[00:19:15] Speaker A: Yeah. Nate, do you think that or what do you attribute to your kind of stability? Because it seems like you've encountered a lot of obstacles. And I'm curious because I meet some people that have stability and that's just because their head's in the sand or they have stability because they are still just doing what they were taught to do from an early age. And then I. Some people, it's just kind of personality. What do you think it is for you that's kept you in. In spite of losing a child?
[00:19:42] Speaker B: You're a relatively normal person, Nate. How is that?
[00:19:47] Speaker A: You don't have to do a full self psychoanalysis, but I'm just curious what you think. Why did you never walk away when you encountered these extreme obstacles?
[00:19:55] Speaker B: Or if I can add a. A layer to that. Like you've. I know you more personally and so I know that you've experienced things in your life that have most certainly caused other people to walk away from church and faith and those sorts of things.
So. Like how. Why haven't you.
[00:20:16] Speaker C: Oh, that's a good question. You use the phrase about reconstruction, deconstruction. In some ways I feel like that's still ongoing.
[00:20:22] Speaker B: Y. Yeah.
[00:20:23] Speaker C: Some of it could be personality. I don't know. Some of it could be. I saw my it modeled in my dad.
I distinctly remember a day when.
Long story, but they thought that. That they were going to lose our little 20 acre farm because of crop failure, herbicide, overdrift from a neighbor's farm.
And I still. I can still see my dad. He took his shoes off and he quoted from the book of Job. And he said, said the Lord giveth and the Lord taketh away. Blessed be the name of the Lord.
[00:20:54] Speaker A: Man, your dad sounds like a character from Mary Lynne Robinson Valley.
[00:20:59] Speaker C: He's a good dude. Yeah. And that's all modeled when we were going with stuff with Kyle. I never had the why me? Bad things happen.
Bad things happen in the Bible. Bad things happen to people all throughout history. Like why should. Because something bad happened to me. Why should I suddenly just say that's it Presumptuous to think I'd never encounter something bad. That's just not the human experience.
That's just how my mind processed it. And I'm not saying those who ask, why me? It's the wrong question. I'm just saying for me that was never the question. The church. At times I was disillusioned with the church at times with the whole caught up in the Trumpism that has disillusioned me.
But at the end of the day, I believe in Jesus.
I believe you can't read and take Jesus word seriously and be just a complete solo Christian. So I can't give up on the church.
And I think to put it in theological terms, and we've talked about this before, Dustin, the theological truth of Christianity that resonates deepest with me is the incarnation.
God chooses to come sit with us.
Gospel John, the word became flesh and dwelt among us. It's my favorite verse in all the gospels. When we lost Kyle and those some of the early darkest days, all you want is someone to acknowledge it and sit with you and be willing to be with you in your pain without trying to give some fix it or some stupid reason.
And I guess I just never lost faith that God does that with us in the dark times.
[00:22:43] Speaker A: Yeah.
[00:22:44] Speaker C: So I don't know if that answers your question.
[00:22:45] Speaker B: No, I think it's.
[00:22:46] Speaker A: I think you want to come back to the politics segment.
[00:22:49] Speaker B: Let's get back to old Trumpy.
[00:22:51] Speaker A: We're going to get back to Trump here in a second. But I want to ask you, given what you're describing and your stability in your faith journey with some ups and downs here and there, how do you perceive people that are deciding, constructing, that look at things that you experience and said I have. I see this. And this is part of life for some people that leads them to walk away from faith entirely. Given your vantage point as someone that's weathered a lot of storms and has stayed on a particular path, how do you view people that have walked off that path?
[00:23:24] Speaker C: I view them as perhaps more bravely honest than some people.
[00:23:30] Speaker B: Yeah.
[00:23:30] Speaker C: Who stay in church and.
[00:23:33] Speaker A: Hold on, say more about that. Yeah. I don't want to skip over that.
[00:23:36] Speaker C: No, I'll come back to it. And at the end of the day, it's not my job or calling to use earlier to even try to figure out how to view them. I'm called to treat them with love and respect and compassion as people.
It's not my job to try and convince someone to see it the way I do. It's my job to witness to what God's done in my life. And that's all I'm called to do. The rest is in God's hands. So I don't really get too worried about labeling people. But what did I say? What I say?
[00:24:05] Speaker B: The brave honesty.
[00:24:07] Speaker C: Oh, the brave honesty. I get that as humans we want some level of certainty. And I would argue God gives some of that sense of certainty to us. But I do think a lot of the hypocrisy in churches, sometimes a lot of the people who are leaving deconstructing because they say it doesn't line up. I think it's because too often church is not an environment where you can be honest and you can say, hey, what about this?
And if you do, suddenly you're on the outs or you're looked at differently. And so for people who said, you know what? Because I know for some people who deconstructed, it meant they lost a whole social group. They had to reinvent their whole social life for a job or that job or whatever. And so I think if the church had more of that honesty, it would be a healthier place.
[00:24:57] Speaker B: Yeah.
[00:24:58] Speaker A: We did an episode with Sean Beatty where we talked to a pastor in town about hypocrisy, and we really dug into what that is. Exactly. And I think one of the conclusions we came to was that it's a misunderstanding of what it is to be a human, which is humans by nature are flawed and they're gonna make mistakes. And the perception that people in any kind of position, even in church positions, are going to live a life of, like, complete and perfect integrity is just about impossible. But I guess what my question would be for you is what does a church look like that could facilitate brave honesty? Because.
And I'm not a pastor. Dustin is. I'd be curious his perspective, too, which is if a lot of people are having brave honesty, that can cause a lot of friction and instability in an environment where you're trying to shepherd people together.
And so how does a sinner hold where you have a lot of people that are sharing potentially conflictual ideas about faith and you're trying to propagate that faith in that same environment. So I guess I don't know what that looks like. So I'd be curious both of your perspectives on what that would look like.
[00:26:10] Speaker C: No, that's a good question. And this is the other side of the brave honesty. We also live in a Western culture.
[00:26:17] Speaker B: Yeah.
[00:26:18] Speaker C: Which prioritizes the individual above everything else you mentioned. Or Africa earlier. Some Africans, they're identified by their tribe, their family, and then them.
And I'm not saying one's good or bad, but it's just even so we. So sometimes, my way, y' all have to agree. There are times when all of us have to say, if I'm going to be part of this community, I do have to. There's a tension there between the individual and the community, and I don't think that's often acknowledged on conservative or progressive sides. We live with tensions, and part of the fighting is we never acknowledge that there's tensions that we have to wrestle with.
[00:26:58] Speaker A: It sounds like in your description, you're saying that there's not enough opportunity for the individual to express themselves, because you're saying brave honesty and to be brave in an environment suggests that to do that is risky.
[00:27:12] Speaker C: I think in a lot of church settings, it can be. Absolutely. Absolutely.
[00:27:16] Speaker B: And conversely, I would say that's probably the case in traditional evangelicalism with scare quotes. But on the flip side to your other point, in more mainline progressive spaces, it's the opposite.
Tradition actually becomes the stabilizing force because individualism is the default setting.
And clinging to something that's older than you are can be viewed with suspicion in the same way that a conservative church. And this is. I'm not trying to play both sides ism. I'm just saying that there. There is a capacity that I think churches can lean into more to hold the tension between these two poles. And, yeah, I hear you saying yeah.
[00:28:01] Speaker C: And we're talking about the church, but it can happen even outside the church in different groups.
[00:28:05] Speaker B: Yep.
[00:28:05] Speaker C: I've had conversations with people who grew up in. In conservative evangelical settings who were gay.
And of course, that created all kinds of tension in that world.
[00:28:16] Speaker B: You don't say.
[00:28:17] Speaker C: But then in the gay community, they didn't just bash all of their former friends and in fact, at times defended them. And of course, that put them on the outs in the gay community. Right. And so every group has its sort of boundaries that it can do.
[00:28:30] Speaker A: Talking about sociology, at the end of the day, exactly how does the individual remain.
[00:28:33] Speaker B: Remain in group. Out group. Yeah.
[00:28:35] Speaker A: In a community.
[00:28:36] Speaker C: But your question about the church, I do think, and this is an Anabaptist answer, I get that.
But I do think it more focus on Jesus, the certainty of him.
He did say, you can take this whole book and sum it up with love God and love others. First, John, how do we know if this is from God, if it's love?
God is love.
So, like that theme Paul talked about, the theme runs through again and again. So I think it's not easy, especially when you live in a culture where if you deviate, there's plenty of other voices and podcasts or other groups out there that'll say if you disagree on this documentation or that doctrinational, you're wrong or you're an Error or you're a heretic or whatever. Like, it's creating these hard and fast boundaries creates an illusion of safety and people like that.
But I do think a focus on Jesus and how do we love well and keep the focus there and acknowledge some of these things. We may have differences of opinion and some stuff. Who knows? God may.
We just. We don't have to figure everything out here. We can live with some mystery.
[00:29:51] Speaker B: Yeah.
[00:29:51] Speaker C: But there's no mystery in loving God and loving others.
[00:29:54] Speaker B: Yeah.
[00:29:54] Speaker A: What if that brave odyssey challenges some of the things that are core to your denomination or church? Right. If you're challenging beliefs that are. Maybe they're not that love God and love your neighbor, but maybe they are part of your church mission, your church project, your church's core beliefs in some capacity. Like how do you navigate that? That's my question.
[00:30:14] Speaker C: Again, let's go back to being honest.
[00:30:17] Speaker B: So in the mbs, that's Mennonite brethren.
[00:30:20] Speaker C: Keeping square in the Brethren in Christ where I was a part of, and even other Mennonite groups to different levels, they've allowed or embraced people who've been in the military or people who are police officers. I'm not making a statement, but that is a little bit out of alignment with their statements of faith.
[00:30:39] Speaker A: Yeah.
[00:30:39] Speaker C: I remember I was based upon the peace position.
[00:30:42] Speaker A: I was at a Mennonite church in Pasadena and they had like a sharing time.
[00:30:46] Speaker C: Yeah.
[00:30:47] Speaker A: And people get up and share whatever's going on in their life. It was really cool. This woman gets up and she's just weeping because her child was obsessed with a squirt gun. And it was a gun.
[00:30:59] Speaker C: Yeah.
[00:30:59] Speaker A: And she was crying.
[00:31:01] Speaker B: Yeah.
[00:31:02] Speaker A: And I was like, sounds like a really cool super circus.
[00:31:05] Speaker B: Yeah.
[00:31:06] Speaker C: Could I have it, please?
[00:31:08] Speaker B: I'll adult get it off your hands for you.
[00:31:09] Speaker C: But so those. The more conservative Anabaptist groups have allowed some difference there. But then on the question of sexuality, they'll hold a hard line. And I'm not trying to make a position on any of those. It's just illustrative that if every group is honest, they make some accommodation on certain issues. And so let's just acknowledge that and then go from there.
[00:31:31] Speaker B: Yeah.
[00:31:32] Speaker A: How would you feel or how would you navigate, Dustin, a brave honesty that is challenging to some core beliefs of your church. How would you navigate that?
[00:31:41] Speaker B: I think I always go back to Augustine had or it's attributed to. Augustine has a line that, like, in it, in essentials, unity, in non essentials, charity or grace, and in all things, love.
And I think that Kind of creates this like triage in a way. Like the essentials are, if we really want to get down to it, it's what Jesus says, love God, love people as yourself.
And then you can. And then really what that is, theologically speaking, is the Apostles Creed. Like, we agree on these things and we. And that's where we need unity.
[00:32:25] Speaker A: So is the problem what you guys are both suggesting, that churches take too strong a stance on what's important?
[00:32:31] Speaker B: I would say the opposite, that churches take too strong a stand. What's not important?
That the. We're not debating the historical evidence for Jesus resurrection.
We're debating in a theological key, really a political issue of the day.
[00:32:51] Speaker A: Yeah.
[00:32:52] Speaker C: And.
[00:32:53] Speaker B: And we're trying to cherry pick our biblical justification for whatever side we're on of the issue and say, here's why it is what it is.
And one thing like, and it's really hard to do. Maybe I'm crazy for trying to like try and hold the mirror up to say, or at least the question up to say, is this really what we're doing? Have we put the political cart before the theological horse? And are we allowing that to define or create boundaries or whatever? And I think, because I think more often than not that is the case.
[00:33:28] Speaker A: Yeah. Because I see people deconstructing a leaving faith more oftentimes for the Calvin or whoever, the primary and secondary.
I see people leaving for the secondary issues more than the primary, tertiary, tertiary.
[00:33:41] Speaker B: Or whatever that is.
[00:33:44] Speaker A: Yeah. And that's frustrating, right?
That should be frustrating to all of us that someone would leave faith for those tertiary reasons. But then there's a question about how do denominations exist with specific identities? How do you certain churches believe things strongly and that's part of their faith experience? Like, I don't. So I guess I'm still struggling to understand how we can have brave honesty. But also places have distinct identities.
[00:34:12] Speaker C: First of all, I wouldn't say it's easy.
You made a comment about deconstruction reconstruction earlier and as you were talking, it took me back in my mind. I think one way church is different for me than when I was younger.
I think at a point I wanted to know more and learn and understand positions. And I don't innovate. And I still have as much. I don't know.
But to me, understanding all the positions don't matter as much anymore.
To me it's more about how does faith, how does my reading the Bible, how does going to church, even if it's a Sunday, rise dead? The rhythm is important, like to Me, faith is more about, is it keeping me oriented towards that loving God and loving others.
And I think it's easy for church to be about, do I have all the right beliefs and the right understandings?
And for me, that gets wonky because that creates a checklist. But then life doesn't usually fit that checklist, where, if it's an orientation, I feel like it lets me deal with the realities of life better.
[00:35:25] Speaker A: Yeah, I had that experience.
I've told Dustin these stories.
One of my most formative experiences in seminaries was arguing with this biblical scholar named Joel Green. And we'd go round and round in the seminar I took with him. And one of the things that I learned from him was that one way to look at how Scripture works is.
And I grew up with rule book kind of approach. And he challenged me that, no, its main function is just to change you.
It's just to change you.
Yeah, there's. Sure, there's rules in there. I don't know if they're applicable, but if it changes you, that's probably a good thing. And it's also just a story, too. It's a story that changes you. And that. That was deeply challenging for me.
But I think what he's describing is an extreme minority opinion.
Extreme, at least within the laity, within congregations. I think most people look at it in the stipulation. Here's what to do.
[00:36:17] Speaker B: Yeah, certainly challenging the popular understanding of what. The role of Scripture in Western culture, because usually it is the rule book that's meant to change you. Yeah.
[00:36:30] Speaker A: Change your neighbor.
[00:36:31] Speaker B: That I. Exactly that. It's the penal code that I'm going to enforce as I go around, rather than.
No, this is a narrative of sorts that. That changes me into a person who's capable of loving even to the extent of my enemy.
And that we don't really have a shelf for that.
And so how do we navigate that, especially in a moment like ours? And I'm gonna shift gears here. Maybe there's a bit of whiplash or maybe a word.
[00:37:05] Speaker A: A word from our sponsors destined. So let's turn to Trump.
[00:37:09] Speaker B: Yeah. And all that Trump represents.
I think you have such great perspective on what's happening in our moment. And just the.
Like, the evangelical political idolatry.
And that's obviously a massive cause issue for. Or cause case for people that I talk to. They're like, I grew up and it was religious. Right. This very conservative expression of Christianity that if you weren't that, then, like, you're not actually Christian. And so then people get exposed to different ways of living and being and expressing your faith, and that gets challenged. And so how has.
How. I guess the first question is, how have you seen that change over time in terms of being in the church? And the question of the things you never bring up in company are religion and politics. And obviously that's the first thing we bring up now. And how has that changed and what has changed from your vantage point?
[00:38:18] Speaker C: I think the church too often has mirrored the culture, which has gotten increasingly polarized and increasingly nasty. You asked about deconstruction earlier. Seeing the evangelical church move from gritting their teeth and voting for Trump because of abortion in 2016 to, like, doubling down and continuing to defend him no matter what he does.
Like, it's went beyond. It's not a great choice, but abortion matters to me. I don't agree with that thinking, but. Okay, I'll grant it to you.
[00:38:53] Speaker B: Here's my single issue. I'm going to allow it.
[00:38:55] Speaker C: Yeah. And now. So the church wants to be prophetic about sexuality issues or whatever, but when the president gets up and immediately after a widow says, we should forgive our enemy, says, oh, you're wrong, I want to kill him, and everyone cheers. And then they spend this gathering as a great revival event, it makes me want to swear, to be honest.
[00:39:22] Speaker B: Yeah.
[00:39:22] Speaker C: That wasn't there 20, 10, 15, 20 years ago. And why do you think that's changed? I don't know. Honestly, it's been a. That's. In some ways, that's been the hardest thing for me to deconstruct because you go, I gave 20 years of my vocational life to leading these organizations, to teaching this. Did it. Was it all for nothing?
[00:39:43] Speaker A: Yeah.
[00:39:44] Speaker C: Why is it. I know there's tribal identities. There's. I think a lot of. I honestly don't know.
[00:39:51] Speaker A: Do you think it's more the culture or the certain pulpits that are navigating people that way? You think it's like people are watching on TV or what they're hearing on Sunday?
[00:40:01] Speaker C: I think that's what people are hearing, hearing on Sunday in some churches and tv. And I do think there are, and I know many of them personally. I do know there are a lot of people who personally don't like Trump.
But you know what? His vote percentage keeps going up among evangelicals.
And they have been so long of the mindset that the Democrats are part of the other, the evil, the bad. They just can't bring themselves to vote for a Democrat. And so I do think there is an us versus them mentality. And Ethos and even an evangelical theology that's there more than people realize. And when you've been. When you swim in water, some of the water gets in you.
And no matter how hard you swallow a little bit. And so I think it's just years of that sort of breathing that air.
I told Dustin last week, said the analogy, because I have wrestled and wrestled with. I know people who. They go to church and they hear the teaching. I don't always agree with all the theology.
It shapes their life. It drives them to volunteer at their local food banks. It volunteers them to give generously.
It motivates them to be kind and all that kind of stuff, and to try to view the world as, what are the opportunities God has for me today? And there's a deep, genuine sincerity to that. And it's like, how can that happen? And then you see all this stuff over here where people coming out of that setting, frankly, without their votes, we wouldn't have the most horrific stuff going on that's happened politically in my whole lifetime.
[00:41:44] Speaker B: Yeah.
[00:41:45] Speaker C: How do you swear that?
[00:41:46] Speaker A: Do you think that's true on the progressive side of the aisle as well?
[00:41:50] Speaker C: What do you mean?
[00:41:51] Speaker A: Just that politics has subsumed religion.
[00:41:55] Speaker C: Yeah, but. And I'll come back in just a second.
[00:41:58] Speaker B: Okay.
[00:41:58] Speaker C: The analogy, that, for me was helpful, but to say, you know what? Even a diseased tree produces some fruit. And it can be sweet fruit. It can be a great orange, a great apple, whatever.
And that's how I view much of the evangelical church. The system and disease needs a lot of, frankly, pruning, some fresh stuff grafted in. But there still is some good fruit that's coming even out of the disease tree. On the aggressive side, sure, you can be just as fundamentalist on the left as you can on the right.
[00:42:33] Speaker A: I went to the most fundamentalist progressive church in Southern California when I lived down there. It's called All Saints. It's an Episcopal church right around the corner from my seminary.
And literally, they would have, like, at the door. And I think I've told this story before. They would. At the door, they'd have political petitions for you to sign on your way out of church, which I found fascinating. It was like porn for me. I grew up in a very conservative environment, so I was just like, hell, yeah, I'm gonna sign that shit. And then they. They had imam on staff. They had a Buddhist monk on staff. Like, they had a rabbi on staff. And I was like, finally, something really interesting that's happening in Christianity. But there's challenges, like Every other community. But the more I thought about it, I was like, how would I feel if I was in here and I didn't have those same political beliefs? And then that started to bother me a little bit, understandably. And I. So I. I see it as the politicization of religion more broadly. I think the evangelical church is bigger, way more bigger than the mainline. Yep, they are. They have the guy with the bully pulpit in office advocating for their cause seemingly. It probably doesn't. They're just a tool to him. But yeah, I see it as a both sides side kind of thing.
[00:43:46] Speaker C: I think you're right. It's interesting because historically the largest Protestant denomination, Southern Baptist, they were formed to keep a defense of slavery. So there was a political aspect to their even formation.
[00:44:00] Speaker B: Let's pause to let that sink in for a second.
[00:44:05] Speaker A: I think they're the largest denomination in the United States at the moment.
[00:44:08] Speaker B: Oh, yes, absolutely.
[00:44:09] Speaker A: Yeah.
[00:44:10] Speaker C: So, like this politicization of religion, it's really in our DNA.
But then you have the civil rights of Martin Luther King and the faith bedrock.
That's what drove that. And they did nonviolent training to help with that.
Dustin and I talked about this, but I honestly wonder if the church in a democracy where your voice supposedly helped shape things.
I wonder if the church actually hasn't been politically active enough because the votes shape lives, the votes impact people, but has become too partisan.
So we need more Christians trying to bring biblical understanding to the political arena, but less so from the lens of Democrat or Republican.
[00:44:56] Speaker A: Let's bring this back to deconstruction and reconstruction point of the show. And in our episode about political partisanship, I think one of the conclusions we came to at the end is a lot of people deconstruct because they're in a church with different politics than what they have. So they. Maybe they're gay. They're in a church that doesn't accept them, that was advocating for things they don't believe in. And my recommendation, I don't know if this was Dustin's, was find a place that fits you and just go there. Because I think what we determined is the more important thing is for you to be in a place with a community that's pursuing the same spiritual goals as you. And maybe you just need to fit in with a community that shares your politics.
What do you think about that as a recommendation for people? And you want to add to that?
[00:45:40] Speaker B: Yeah, I'm curious in a. I don't know if I'm. I'm curious and I'm Wondering. Wondering if this is going to problematize it in a way? Like, would you recommend that same posture to somebody who, like, just discovered Charlie Kirk and is. Wait, hold on. Everything I thought about social justice issues is wrong and backwards. And now I need to find a church that agrees with this view.
[00:46:10] Speaker A: I don't know. What do you think, Nate?
[00:46:12] Speaker C: That's a good question. Because in some ways, if you do too much of that, it goes back to reinforcing the little tribes and silos we already have.
[00:46:21] Speaker A: And I thought. I don't think that was my end goal. I think I was just.
[00:46:23] Speaker B: No, I'm wondering out loud as a first step.
[00:46:26] Speaker A: But I guess what I'm picking at is people deconstruct because their churches don't match their politics. What should they do about it?
[00:46:33] Speaker C: What should they do about it?
[00:46:34] Speaker A: Because a lot of them just leave, right? Yeah, a lot of them just leave.
[00:46:37] Speaker B: Yep.
[00:46:37] Speaker C: You can always look at your own politics.
[00:46:39] Speaker A: That's definitely a good thing.
[00:46:40] Speaker C: I mean, is there something that I need to learn from someone else? We all bring a bias. We tend to forget that.
Is there room for difference in that church?
[00:46:47] Speaker A: Yeah.
[00:46:48] Speaker C: I don't know. But at some point, yes, to try. And if the disconnect is too strong and you feel like it's willing to be a part of a church where not everyone agrees with me or, like, that's fine. But if you feel the church is strongly advocating and becoming very political about a certain position, and you're very different, that does create a dissonance, for sure. That's all your energy then goes to managing the dissonance, not actually to engage in your spirit, spiritual growth.
[00:47:19] Speaker A: I was deeply influenced by Richard Rohr's book Falling Upward and his kind of Jungian approach to Christianity and that a lot of people get stuck in that first half of life, identity formation. They don't get to that second half life, which is more generative. And I think that's, for a lot of people, a big issue that they carry through into adulthood because they didn't have a place that accepted them for who they are. And from my point of view, developmentally, I. I think people need to get accepted first, and then they can start to have more nuanced views of the world. And so that's part of why I was recommending that, because I think people just need to be affirmed to begin with. You're okay as you are, and they don't experience that.
[00:47:56] Speaker B: Yeah. What's striking me about in this moment, about that book on this topic, is so he Talks about how in the second half of life we all. When between 50 and 70 or thereabouts, we all arrive at the same place no matter what. And at that point we hit a fork in the road where we have three options and it's something like, you can fact check me on this.
We become either pathetic old fools, angry old fools, or holy old fools. And his point, like, the pathetic old fool is somebody who has like, your stereotypical midlife crisis and where you try and be young again. You try and go back to the first half of life.
[00:48:41] Speaker A: A divorce and a car. Yep.
[00:48:43] Speaker B: And then the. The holy old fool is where you just accept your limitations and become a saint of sorts in your old age. But most people get stuck in the. And become the angry old fool because the reality is that you can't. You don't get old and then become angry. You are angry and then you get old. And all of the things that you have put in place to like, tamp that down just run out of steam and it just explodes up. And I think, I guess what's striking me in this moment is the deeper. Obviously I'm going to ask this question more pastorally, like, what are you angry about in. In your current church environment that would lead you to band aid? That anger by switching political allegiances to another place that ultimately doesn't solve the problem. It might be a temporary relief to say, oh, it's so nice.
[00:49:40] Speaker C: Wow.
[00:49:40] Speaker B: Isn't it nice that they're having.
I'm not picking on you like that. They're. That they have a different sort of political posture here than somewhere else. Oh, that. That's great. Because I didn't think Christians could believe like this, and now they do.
But is. I'm wondering, is that really just masking a deeper issue that Jesus can. Actually, I would say Jesus has something to offer and to think through because he deeply understands and sympathizes with the temptation to.
For political power. Yeah.
[00:50:17] Speaker A: I think you're describing step two, Right? I'm describing step one, which is. Yeah, yeah, no, I think you're right. But I think step one is be accepted.
[00:50:27] Speaker B: Yeah.
[00:50:28] Speaker A: Step two is once you're accepted and get comfortable, then you can start to say, oh, that is not as important as I thought it was. And it's like learning anything, like learning a musical instrument where you have to follow certain patterns and scales and learn to step out of the scales and improvise. And I think a lot of people just never learn the scales. And I meet a lot of people like that, and I Think if they get stuck in that phase of just seeking that Excel acceptance, that is a problem.
And I think it's important not to skip over that phase, because if we skip over that phase, those people do get stuck. You see what I'm saying?
[00:51:05] Speaker C: So to use your scale analogy, you go somewhere else and you're playing. As you're playing a scale, just a different key.
[00:51:12] Speaker B: Yeah.
[00:51:12] Speaker C: But you still can improvise.
[00:51:14] Speaker B: Yeah.
[00:51:14] Speaker C: You're just. All you can do is play the scale. Yeah.
[00:51:16] Speaker B: That's good.
[00:51:16] Speaker A: Yeah, yeah, yeah.
[00:51:17] Speaker B: Like, where can people who are deconstructing have deconstructed find spaces for brave honesty like you've described, or alternative viewpoints that might. They might be able to learn from in, like, in general or in particular based on your experience?
[00:51:44] Speaker C: That's a great question.
For me, what helped really shape it was just interacting with people from different backgrounds. So whether it's when I started interacting with more Latino and African American people, I started to understand racial issues like I never had.
[00:52:01] Speaker B: Yeah.
[00:52:02] Speaker C: And listening honestly, when I lived in Canada for three years, I realized issues that I thought were conservative or liberal down here, no, they were American.
So you're struggling with the whole politicization.
Read some stuff from England or something, you'll suddenly get a whole different perspective. So there are writers who are good out there. There's groups online I'm sure are fine too. Email Dustin. I'm sure people in Fresno can talk to us, but I think if you're honest and if you are seeking, you'll find other people who can create safe spaces. I can't say there was one spot I went.
It was more of a journey for me, and I was fortunate to have people that I could just have those conversations with.
[00:52:49] Speaker B: Yeah.
[00:52:49] Speaker A: Maybe what you're saying is find a safe person first.
[00:52:52] Speaker C: Yeah. Yeah.
[00:52:53] Speaker B: When the student is ready, the teacher will appear. Thanks, Nate.
[00:52:56] Speaker C: Thanks for having me chopping up with.
[00:52:58] Speaker B: Us and sharing your story, and I appreciate you and I'm looking forward to the conversation that this generates.
