"Christian Podcasters": Understanding the Backlash Against LGBTQ Conversations

Episode Transcript
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(00:37):
Second Peter 2, 10b 16 in theChristian Standard Bible says bold,
arrogant people. They are notafraid to slander the glorious ones.
However, angels who aregreater in might and power, do not
bring a slanderous chargeagainst them before the Lord. But
these people, like irrationalanimals, creatures of instinct, born

(00:58):
to be caught and destroyed,slander what they do not understand,
and in their destruction theytoo will be destroyed. They will
be paid back with harm for theharm they have done. They consider
it a pleasure to carouse inbroad daylight. They are spots and
blemishes, delighting in theirdeceptions while they feast with
you. They have eyes full ofadultery that never stop looking

(01:20):
for sin. They seduce unstablepeople and have hearts trained in
greed. Children under a curse.They have gone astray by abandoning
the straight path and havefollowed the path of Balaam, the
son of Bozor, who loved thewages of wickedness, received a rebuke
for his lawlessness. Aspeechless donkey spoke with a human

(01:41):
voice and restrained theprophet's madness. Just before this
brickview of scripture, thewriter was warning about the presence
of false teachers and heresiesin the church that would seek to
take advantage of people andcause others harm. After the author
speaks about the trueprophecies of Jesus, return and ultimately
hope in full. The letter ofSecond Peter seems to be an attempt

(02:02):
to help followers of Jesusknow which words are trustworthy
and which words are harmful.Josh Patterson how do you think people
of faith can best discern aharmful teaching from a reliable
teaching?
Yeah, I mean, I guess I wouldwant to give the kind of standard
Christian answer and say we goto the fruits of the spirit and we
can test things against.Against those, you know, so, so there's

(02:26):
that. But also I think maybeif we even go before the fruits of
the spirit, maybe something alittle bit more important would be
the teachings of Jesus. So ifwe filter something through the lens
of Jesus and it doesn't looklike or resemble Jesus, then it's
probably not great, at leastas Christians. And then finally maybe

(02:47):
one that's a little bit moreobscure, but I think important is
flourishing. There's a reallygreat book called the Sermon on the
Mount and Human Flourishing byJonathan T. Pennington, and he argues
that the Sermon on the Mountis about flourishing. And so I think
those three things, Jesus,fruit to the spirit and flourishing,

(03:08):
could be good tools for discernment.
Yeah, I like that. Heyeverybody, welcome to the Whole Church
podcast. Probably yourfavorite church need podcast, and
if not, it's fine. We don'thold grudges. It's just not what
we do around here. Not veryunity of us. That's the only reason
we don't hold a grudge. Sobeware. But guys, I'm Joshua Noel.

(03:32):
I'm excited to be here todaywith, of course, the reason for the
season, no matter what theseason is T.J. tiberious one Blackwell.
How's it going?
Good.
Yeah. And we're joined by avery special guest. Return guest.
Good friend of both of ours,co conspirator of Theology Beer Camp
and the host of RethinkingFaith. He does a lot of other cool

(03:54):
stuff too. So I don't know,maybe there'll be a Josh Patterson
website out there or therealready is. Yeah. Yeah. But yeah,
cool guy.
And he.
He made a post on. On aFacebook Christian podcasters group
recently, and the responseswere so antithetical to the message

(04:15):
of church unity that we werelike, oh, we'll do a whole episode
on the responses that JoshPatterson got for sharing a podcast.
A Christian podcast on aChristian podcast group.
Weird, right?
So here we are. Yeah.
So if you're listening now,you should probably check out the
other shows that are on the OzOut Podcast Network website. Link
is below to check that out.Also, consider supporting us on Patreon.

(04:40):
You could also support usthrough Captivate. Apple Podcasts.
There's a way to get thatextra content for you no matter where
you listen. Except Spotify.Then go to Patreon.
That's true. Spotify just haswhere you just like, hey, want bonus
content? Click here and itjust takes you to Patreon. It's great.
Yeah.
So convenient. But anotherthing, I won't say nothing convenient

(05:00):
just for the transition sake,but I don't know how convenient it
really is, but it is a holysacrament around here because it's
impossible to have discordwhen you're being as silly as I like
to be. So we start everyepisode with a silly question. Great
form of unity here today is, Iwant to say, a relatively easy one.
Perhaps targeted to ouraudience and not to me. Who would

(05:22):
be better at hockey? Icehockey? Indiana Jones, Zorro, or
Captain Jack Sparrow? I'mgonna make TJ go first because I
don't know enough to answerthis question well until I hear his
answer.
Okay, so I'm gonna assume thisis one piece Zora.
It wasn't, but it can.
Okay, so you spelled it right.Oh, okay, cool.

(05:46):
Yeah, I assume I meant that the.
Black cat, the Horse and theother pirate. No, but I guess Indy's
not. I have some thoughts.
I Just wanted like threedifferent action heroes.
That's what I was okay betweenthese three because it was Zoro.
No question. Between thesethree, I think probably Indy, I think
Indiana Jones has the bestchance at being able to play hockey.

(06:10):
I don't think Zorro or JackSparrow would have a snowballs chance
in hell, honestly.
Well that's good. That makesme feel better because I was also
gonna say Indiana Jones, butthat's just because like I've seen
him with snow and cold stuffbefore. I don't know if I've ever
seen Jack, Captain JackSparrow or Zorro anywhere near snow

(06:34):
or ice. Although Zorro doeshave that like Chuck Norris effect
of like somehow everything hedoes, he's like, oh yeah, no, I've
spent 10 years doing thisbefore, so maybe, who knows. J. Patty,
what's the correct answer?
I don't know. I think Zorrowould be. Would bring like speed
to his game. I feel like thatwould be his strong suit. Indy I

(06:55):
feel like could be a more wellrounded player. Speed, skill, probably
some defensive, you know,prowess. I think Jack Sparrow would
be the most fun to have on myteam. But I'm biased because I love
Jack Sparrow is one of myfavorite anti heroes if we want to
call him that. So. So Iprobably have to agree and go with

(07:17):
Indy. But to be contrarian, Icould also say Jack Sparrow because
he's just my favorite.Although he'd be drunk. So like if
he was playing a beer league.
Beer league?
Yeah, like I do. Then he'd be,he'd be good to go. I'd take him.
Yeah.
I just think Indiana Jones isthe only one we could even get to
ice skate successfully. That'sfair because he's, he at least has

(07:39):
a concept of what hockey is.
Right. See I also though I, Idid think about Captain Jack just
cuz I'm like he does have thatlike random luck factor of like just
picking up skates. If for somereason just like it turns out drunken
walk is the same thing asskating in his universe for some
reason you never.

(08:00):
Luck's a big part of the game.
Luck is a big part of thegame. He's definitely got that down.
Yeah.
So for context of the actualepisode, of course we're not diving
deeper into why Indy's good athockey. We could, we could, but we're
not.
Whole different bike.
Both we and Jay Patty haverecently done interviews with Brandon

(08:21):
Robertson on Rethinking Faith.They titled it Proudly Queer and
Boldly Christian. And thetitle for our episode was Love Over
Fear. We've both now sharedthe episodes in the same Facebook
group, and ours mostly gotoverlooked. No one really cared because
you love.

(08:42):
But jpatti's Christians don'tcare about love.
No, they don't. Jpadi'sreceived a ton of backlash and many,
many responses from thecommunity on the Facebook group Christian
podcasters. So, jpatti, couldyou give us the basic lay of how
your post was received andwhat your experience was dealing
with that pushback?

(09:03):
Yeah. So it wasn't receivedwell. Overall. Overall. Which, I
mean, to be honest, wassomewhat expected. Although I didn't,
you know, I didn't think, tothe extent. I thought maybe there'd
be a few people that werelike, this isn't cool. And then the
people who it was for would belike, oh, this is great, you know,
thank you. I have this thing,but really that wasn't it. There

(09:25):
was. I think there's about 400comments on it, which is a lot. And
most people were not toohappy. Accused me of many, many things.
Yeah, it wasn't great. Solike, as far as impact on myself
though, honestly, it'swhatever. Some of the best social

(09:46):
media advice I've ever beengiven by, I think a friend of this
podcast he's been on before,Dr. Tripp Fuller, is that we don't
feed the trolls. And so I tendnot to let things like that on social
media bother me. Althoughthere are times I. I slip up and
give in to give in to thetrolls and can be rather aggressive,

(10:09):
which is not great. Iacknowledge that.
Yeah. Yeah. I mean, I try notto, not to be aggressive, but I will
feed the troll sometimes justso it'll get more comments and more
people. Yeah. Post.
I mean, that's one thing.That's one thing that a few people
have pointed out that like,you know, engaging with this post
and is going to push thealgorithm so more people in this

(10:30):
group see it. Right. So you'recounterintuitive to what you want.
If you want to bury theepisode, don't interact with it.
If you want to get peopletalking. That algorithm loves. Love
some comments.
Any.
That's why people need tostop. Hate watching things.
Yeah.
Right.
It's counterproductive.
There's some things that arejust great.

(10:50):
That's just a click.
That's just a view.
Yeah. They still get pointsfor that, basically. No, I want to
put for context too, becauseyou mentioned there's like 400 some
comments.
Yeah.
Not just this group, amajority of groups for those who
just don't know the ins andout of podcasting, you post in the
hopes that maybe some peoplewill see it, but, like, realistically,
you'll get maybe one to fivelikes. Doesn't matter how popular

(11:11):
podcaster is for the mostpart. Like, I've seen like, high
name people in some of thesegroups. You get one to five likes,
maybe up to like threecomments. That's pretty much it.
Very rarely does somethingactually stand out like this, and
it's almost never for good reasons.
Yeah, it got people in theirfeels, I guess. Yeah. I don't know.

(11:31):
I mean, it's fine. It'swhatever. I know we're going to talk
more about it, like some ofthe particular responses and those
kind of things, but I guessone thing that I would say, just
for context, is that one thingabout this episode is that this was
not like, if I wanted to tryto convince people who disagreed

(11:52):
with me that LGBTQ inclusionis the correct position to hold,
this is not the episode Iwould give them. That was not the
intent of this episode and norwas it really for people who disagree.
This episode specifically wasfor allies and queer Christians themselves.

(12:13):
That's the target audience. Iintentionally didn't do any of the
arguing about the Bible kindof stuff in this episode because
I. I've done that before.Those episodes exist on my feed.
People can find them. I can dothe Bible arguments, I can do psychological
arguments. I can do, you know,whatever. I get it. But this episode

(12:36):
was not for trying to convincepeople of my position. It was more
so to celebrate those who arealready identify as queer and Christian.
Yeah. Yeah, well, and that'swhat's so for our listeners sake,
just for reference, yourepisode, like you said, is more.
More geared towards that. Whenwe interviewed Brandon Robertson,

(12:57):
we mostly were talking to himabout how to better engage with people
who do disagree. So notactually talking about the debate,
but rather posturing for. Forthe debate. And this episode we're
doing currently right now,what you're listening to isn't really
going to be about the LGBTQcontent stuff at all. It's purely
going to be just on, like, howChristians are choosing to engage

(13:18):
with one another online, whysome of this stuff is problematic
and we want to get at, like,how we can do this better. So we're
not going to be bashing peoplefor saying mean things to Josh. We're
getting more to it. I'm goingto share some of the reactions and
comments on here for us totalk about. I've blocked out people's
pictures and last names. I amkeeping first names because I want
to. To people to see, like,hey, this is like real people are

(13:39):
saying this stuff who claim tobe Christians to another person who's
claiming to be a Christian.Like, it's not even like someone
who's like, I'm a Satanist andI want to show you all why God's
awful and your concept ofJesus should burn in hell, you know,
like, it's nothing like thatat all. And that's just like, I think
that's a context we all needto go into. Later this episode, we
are going to include a segmentfrom our friend Christian Ashley,
who is not a fervent, whoagrees with the other side, who still

(14:02):
is like, hey, this posturingis bad because that's what we want
you guys to know. Like, that'sour focus here. We're not trying
to do more debates on lgbtqwho. We're not trying to make people
feel bad necessarily. We justwant to talk about how we should
engage better. So that's whatthis episode is going to be primarily
focused on, just thereactions. Again, usually for context,
you get like maybe five likes.That's what these posts get. This

(14:26):
we got for your post, that'sliterally just you sharing the episode
you recorded of a Christianpodcast on a group called Christian
podcasters. You get 44 sadfaces. We got 22 likes, 12 laughs,
11 hearts, six angry, fourshocked, two caring emojis. Yeah.
Any comments, like, were yousurprised just by, like, this? Are

(14:48):
you surprised by, like,there's more cries than likes?
I. I don't know that I wassurprised, but like, I'm. What I'm
happy about with this is thelikes, the hearts and the care emoji,
because that means the peoplethat this episode was for found it
and that's. That was myintent. The sad thing is interesting.

(15:11):
I mean, I get it. Like, Ithink that's a more compassionate
response because I canunderstand people who do disagree,
especially if this is asalvation question for them. I can
understand the sad face thingbecause it's like, oh, this person
is actively promoting thingsthat could prevent someone from being
saved. Obviously I don't thinkthat, but I can understand the 44sads.

(15:35):
The dis, the laughs are alwaysdismissive in general. I feel like
that's how that emojifunctions most of the time in social
media is just like, haha,you're dumb. I'm going to hit laugh
so we can reject this. Youknow, move on. Anger makes sense.
And then the shocked faces. Idon't know. That could be either

(15:55):
way.
Yeah.
You know?
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
I do think. I think the angryface is really funny.
Yeah.
Why?
Like, I. I like to imaginethat those six people did not leave
a comment, and they're justlike, I'm just gonna. Angry face.
Just what?
You know, I'm mad about it andmove on.
Yeah.
Yeah.
That is really funny to me.
Yeah, I. I do. I think I agreewith you with the SADs, like, the

(16:17):
44 SADs. I'm going to assumebest intentions, and it was just
people who genuinely believethat this kind of messaging is gearing
people to believe something'sokay that's going to lead them to
hell and burn for eternity,and they're sad about that. And I'm
like, you know, if that'struly what you believe, being sad,
minimal. I'm like, yeah, okay.Laughing emoji is just antagonistic.

(16:41):
That's people, I feel like,who's trying to poke the bear, they're
really just about theconflict. And that's where I'm like,
that's just not Christian. Mm.Yeah, that. That's where I'm at.
Yeah. Yeah.
Okay. Do you want to get tosome of the. The actual comments?
I've tried to do these instages, so we're gonna go from, like,
from what I'm considering,just straight up bigotry. Then we're
gonna get to, like, people whothink you're a heretic.

(17:02):
Okay.
And then it's gonna get to,like, people who are trying to, like,
engage well to differentdegrees of success. And then we have
one positive comment. I. Ifound that I was like, I wanna. I
wanna include some positivityhere. Yeah, there are still good
people in this group too.Also, I want to say Aaron, the founder
of the group, was going to beon this episode, which had a really
hard time with scheduling, andthat's why we also have Christian,

(17:24):
because we still. We want tohave that other perspective. So the
founder of the group, Aaron,left this up. This context, I feel
like is important. Left thepost up. Even though a lot of people
asked her, not said a lot ofbad things and mean things to her.
Even though she doesn't evenagree with Josh on affirming same
sex. She just agrees with,hey, this is a Christian podcast
group and we should let peoplepost Christian podcasts here. Seems

(17:46):
pretty obvious to me, but.Okay. All right, we're going to start
with Denny. TJ and I will taketurns reading these comments. That's
how we'll do this. I'll go first.
Oh, will we?
Yeah.
What is the next one? Six pages.
Maybe you get all the.
Go ahead.
Denny's comment has 6 likes.Here we go. I have a podcast. It
is a Christian faith based formiddle school aged kids with 150

(18:09):
episodes thus far. I've beenconsidering joining this group as
judging by the name, it seemedlike a good fit. I thought I could
learn much and or contributeto a slightly dedicated to a site
dedicated to upholding God andhis Word to whosoever might listen.
I thought that this group,united to the cause of Christ, could
make a huge multifacetedimpact on the world by bringing the

(18:31):
truth it so desperately needs.I want to pause and first say, like,
this is a Christian group.Who. Who do you think you reach other
than other Christians? Butokay, anyway, continue. Until now.
Now I see that Christianpodcasters isn't. It doesn't stand
for truth, but is merelyanother outpost of the woke nonsense
that not only undermines thecause of Christ, but leads others

(18:51):
to think that things that Godcalls abominations are cool with
Jesus. They are not. They leadto deception, play into the enemy's
hands, and lead people to hisdoor. Jesus died a heinous, brutal
death to pay for those sinsyou seem to think he's cool with.
I'm doing air quotes for thoselistening. I don't know how the air
quotes helps. I will not bejoining this group. Thanks for making

(19:14):
the decision easy. And ifanyone reading this actually does
want to be part of a group ofChristian podcasters, please let
me know. But this. This breaksmy heart. All right, Josh, what are
your first thoughts? Readingsomething like this, man. Like, how
do you even start to processthis? Non people throwing at you?
Yeah, yeah. I mean, there's alot here. So like, I don't know,

(19:38):
I can see at first that thisperson has good intentions in that
like they're doing, I guess,ministry for young people, which
is awesome. As a youth pastoror former youth pastor, I can emphasize
with that. And so that's cool.Although working with middle schoolers
is a choice. I preferred highschool and older, but yeah. So then.
Well, once it. Once it goes onthough, I take issue with the word

(20:00):
woke being thrown around as apejorative to me is kind of a. What
is it called? Not virtuesignaling, but like. Yeah, it's a
buzzword. Nothing that isjust. It's overly dismissive and
I don't think it's helpful. Sothere's that. But I think what's
sad about this to me, is thatthis person isn't even willing to

(20:22):
entertain the fact that thereare other Christians who disagree
with them. And instead ofwilling a willingness to have conversation
and seek understanding, theimmediate response is they aren't
real Christians because theydon't believe like I do. I'm going
to leave and if anyone wantsto join me, you know, come and we'll
do our own thing. So there'slike a kind of, in my opinion, an
immaturity in this stancebecause, yeah, it's. It's not even

(20:48):
willing to recognize the factthat there are legitimate Jesus loving,
Bible believing Christiantheologians that think LGBTQ inclusion
is a faithful reading of thetext. And to not even acknowledge
that is sad to me.
Yeah, yeah, it's. To me. Thething that really upsets me the most.

(21:12):
I'm trying to find good wordsbecause again, we don't want to be
bashing people, but like, justhow he siloed himself off where,
like one, he's going to aChristian podcasters group because
he thinks more people need tohear about Jesus and this is a place
to go. Like, people don't joina Christian podcast group who don't
at least know who Jesus is.Right. Like, first off, what. What
do you think you're actuallydoing? And then second, like, oh,

(21:32):
well, now it doesn't agreewith me enough and I'm going to leave
because I don't need to hearfrom other people's perspectives.
It's like, so you. Hey. Solike, simultaneously, he's saying,
I'm reaching the world byposting on this group, but also I
want this group to only beChristian who very narrowly think
the way that I do it. I'mlike, this is just nonsensical at
this point. I just don't.Yeah. Tj, any thoughts before we

(21:56):
go to the next one?
No.
All right.
I do not.
TJ's turn.
Oh, so I get three. Is thatwhat happens here? Yes, I get to
read three.
Yeah.
Yeah. I knew it was something.So we have from Kyle. You can't claim
to follow Christ, but have anantichrist spirit. God and Jesus
aren't Burger King. You can'thave them your way. You cannot claim

(22:19):
to know, accept, and followour savior if you are in an open,
unrepentant rebellion. I am soincredibly disappointed at Aaron
somebody that we didn't standup against this. And then we have
a response from Sandra. We'regoing to pretend it's Sandra oh of
Grey's Anatomy fame.

(22:39):
Sure.
What exactly did Jesus sayabout homosexuality? And Kyle replied,
that would be included insexual immorality and adultery every
single time. Homosexuality isdescribed in the Bible, it is considered
a detectable act. Interestingword choice. Sexually immoral and
an abomination. In fact, allinstances, it resulted in God destroying

(23:01):
the practitioners or callingon others to do so. Trying to magically
convince oneself of somethingdifferent and then trying to bring
others along is deception onthe highest level that will result
in damnation.
Yeah.
Yeah.
So, Josh, any thoughts?
There's a lot going on there.
Yeah. So like the whole youcan't claim to follow Christ but
have an antichrist spirit. Thecheeky thing that I'd want to say

(23:22):
is be like, have you heard ofDonald Trump?
So many people I've beentrying to tell this to. I don't know
why y' all aren't listening more.
That's being cheeky and not inthe spirit of church unity. But neither
is these people's comments.So. Yeah, so, I mean, there's that
aspect. And I do, I think Iappreciate Sandra's question here

(23:44):
because, uh, to my knowledge,Jesus didn't say anything specifically
about homosexuality. And Ithink I do not. I mean, maybe I'm
wrong, but I don't think it'strue that anytime it is brought up
in scripture, God eitherdestroys the practitioners or calls
others to do so. I. I thinkthat is not true. Fact check. Fact

(24:06):
checkers, fact check me,please. But this just seems to be
more so a. I don't know, thisperson seems like they don't like
gay people and are using Godto justify that. Especially when
you call for violence againstpeople. I think that is inherently
antichrist because Jesus wasnon violent to the point of death

(24:28):
on a cross. So.
Yeah, yeah. And it isinteresting. There's like, there's
no sources there.
Yeah, yeah, that's always fun.I. It's also funny that like he talks
about in the Bible, she asked,what did Jesus say? And he's like,
in the Bible as a wholethough. And I'm like, okay, but that's
not the question and it's notwhat you originally said either.
So first off, we're ignoringthe fact that you were just wrong.

(24:49):
Right? Like, can we just startwith, hey, you were wrong then. Hey,
the Bible does say in otherplaces though. But no, of course
we can never start withadmitting when wrong. But yeah, Jesus
never said anything abouthomosexuality. I don't want to call
myself a Bible expert, but Iwill say I have a degree in Bible,
working on other degrees inBible and I do read it more than
once a month. So like, I thinkI know it. Okay. At least. And yeah,

(25:13):
no, what happens that Kyle'sreferring to is like, a lot of times
when you hear stories likeSodom and Gomorrah and different
things in the Bible, peoplehave retroactively decided the meaning
of that has to be abouthomosexuality. When historically
and biblically, when thosestories are interpreted in the Bible,
it's not about that. And forthe first couple hundred years of
the church, those storiesweren't interpreted that way. So

(25:33):
you're just retroactivelyreading church tradition as authoritative
in the Bible and probablysomeone who, based on how you're
writing this, is someone whothinks only the Bible's authoritative,
but you're clearly relying ontradition that you're unaware of
to interpret the Bible, todecide what it means when the Bible
itself says that's not what itmeans. Okay, cool, dude. Cool story.
Yeah, definitely. I'm agreeingwith Josh. I think this guy just

(25:54):
doesn't like gay people andwants a reason. And, yeah, that's
how I think they call that.Eisegesis. Maybe you're reading your
perspective into the text.That kind of seems what I think he's
doing.
Yeah, they do do that. You're right.
Yeah. Yeah. Okay. I'll readthe next one. And this one's going
to be confusing because I'mJoshua, he's Josh, and then the person

(26:15):
who commented here is Joshua,but neither of us. So there you go.
Joshua, not us, says the adminclearly supports this way of thinking.
Disgusting. J, Patty replied,we do know who he is. I can tell
you for a fact that the admindoes not support my views and perspectives
because they have told me sothemselves. You should probably relax

(26:38):
and stop making false claimsabout people. If you want to be angry,
be angry with me. The adminhas nothing to do with it. She's
a fantastic human being. Don'ttalk shit. It's on the screen. We're
explicit today. Don't talkshit about people when you can't
substantiate your claims.Also, funny to say shit and substantiate
in the same sentence. Way togo, Josh. Impressive. If you want
to trash me, go for it. It'smy podcast, not the admins. Come

(27:01):
for me. Leave her alone,Aaron. Who is the admin? No, this
is incorrect. Do not assumethings. Referring to Joshua's first
comment. Joshua, not me.Joshua. And then Joshua, not us responds
to Aaron says, then state as adisclaimer, you don't leave it up
and allow false teaching to betaught. That's exactly what you are

(27:22):
doing. Okay, a lot of stuffthere, Josh. You're part of this
conversation. Even I love thatyou're just straight up, like, hey,
Aaron's a good person andclearly does not agree with you.
And you still. You're like,you got her. You got her back. You're
in her corner.
Yeah, it's not cool to see.That's actually probably, you know,
when earlier we're talkingabout things that most upset me,

(27:42):
that's probably the thing thatupset me the most about this is the
way that the group turned onthe administrators, specifically
Aaron, which was not cool, andshe did not deserve that. Like I
said in my response, it's mypodcast, not Aaron's. I'm the one
that says the things, not her,and she doesn't even agree with me.
So, like, if you're going tobe angry, be angry at the source,

(28:05):
be angry at me. That's fine.We can have a conversation, but don't
go after Aaron. Like, shedidn't do it. Right.
Yeah.
But I think one thing that Ido want to point out about this thread,
though, is that the worddisgusting is used. And disgust,
I find, is a very helpfulcategory for trying to understand
some of the vitriol aroundLGBTQ stuff. You know, discuss psychology.

(28:29):
Richard Beck wrote a wholebook about it called Unclean. Billy
Horde and her brother PaulHorde have a book coming out later
this summer called youContamination. That's all about discussed
psychology and theology thatI'm very much looking forward to.
So this is a very real thing.Like, to some people, the thought
of, like, two men kissing ortwo women kissing is disgusting.

(28:53):
It brings that disgust. Youknow, it activates the disgust centers
in our brains in similar waysthat, like, if someone spit in a
cup and then drank, it would.Or something like that.
Yeah.
So, like, I think that'sinteresting to pay attention to because
that is definitely a way thatthis influences the conversation.

(29:13):
So somebody's disgustmechanism can kick in, and then they
can use, I don't know,Scripture or the Bible or something
to seek to justify theiremotional response so they're not
being as rational as theythink they are. And I don't want
to say too much more becauseI'm not a psychologist and I'm not
an expert on how the humanbrain works. But the disgust thing
is a real part of this kind ofconversation that I think should

(29:35):
be highlighted.
I do think it's interestinghow often, you know, when contentious
subjects come up, the firstcall to action is to remove someone's
ability or, you know. Right.Of free speech.
Yeah, that's where I like mytwo. Two big things with this Is.
Yeah, the free speech bit.Like, yes, different groups, we can

(29:56):
set rules for it, etc. But,like, the whole idea that you should
have systems or places whereyou don't have to hear opinions you
disagree with or thatchallenge you is so problematic just
on its own, even without anyChristian values or anything. It's
like you were saying that weabsolutely should never learn from
others or grow. That's juststupid. Not saying that he's stupid.
That idea is stupid. And thenthe disgust thing, you know, of course,

(30:20):
that's just a call for us togo watch Inside Out 1 and 2. And
I think that's important thatthat was left. No, but, like, in
all seriousness, I do agreewith Josh. I know I have family members
who probably use that word inprivate when talking about this stuff,
who wouldn't say it publicly.So I do think in one sense, it is
kind of like a societal normthat, like, oh, that stuff's icky.
We used to justify stuff. ButI think publicly a lot of times when

(30:41):
that word's used, it'ssupposed to be, like, belittling
and make us think less of theother person in a group that's Christian
Podcasters, you think you havethis whole idea of imago DEI that
you just wouldn't want to callthe people disgusting or an idea
disgusting to belittle anotherperson. That's just so. It's such
a fundamental, you know, ideain Christianity of, like, the image
of God being every singleperson, and then for someone in this

(31:03):
group to use, oh, they'redisgusting. You're disgusting. The
idea is disgusting. I'm like,come on, man, what are we doing?
Yeah, it's dehumanizing. Andwhen you dehumanize someone, you
can dismiss them. So.
Yeah, and I think it'sintentionally dehumanizing, too.
Yes.
What's the most.
I agree there's intent. Yeah.
All right, tj, your turn to read.

(31:24):
Awesome. Mike sayshomosexuality is clearly condemned
in the Bible in betweenbestiality and incest. Either you
condemn all three or youapprove of all three. Gross. Mike.
The same Mike, I assume, saysJosh Patterson once again flaunts
his blatant rebellion againstGod and his truth. Homosexuality

(31:45):
is clearly condemned in theBible as gross perversion of God's
sacred institution.Institution of marriage. Brandon
Robertson is a wolf who hatesGod and hates Jesus. Josh Patterson
presenting him in such ablasphemous way shows he is also
a wolf. Enough of the worldlypretend Christianity that is anti
Bible, anti gospel, andantichrist. May Josh and Brandon

(32:05):
repent and believe the truegospel before they wind up in hell
making out with each other, aswolves are known to do. Kenneth says
this is blasphemous heresy.Sorry, but God calls us an abomination.
Repent all caps and be saved.And Jamie says both of you need to
repent and turn to Christ.

(32:25):
Yeah, the make out in hellthings. Josh, really want to make
sure we got that one.
This is my sounds personally,my favorite. My favorite of the comments
because it's so. It starts offall right, so first off, it's. It
makes an interesting claimthat homosexuality is condemned between
bestiality and incest. So he'sconflating bestiality, incest, and

(32:48):
homosexuality as the samething, which the Bible objectively
does not do. So that's just afalse claim right off the bat. And
it's just deeply bigoted.Like, that's kind of a classic conservative,
homophobic talking point. Oh,if you let the gays get married,
then they're going to alsowant to have sex with animals and,

(33:09):
you know, screw their sisteror whatever. So that's just annoying.
Again, there's the grossthing, you know, disgust coming back
in. This guy Mike really hatesme. He has commented on my stuff
in other platforms, like, notjust in this group, but in other
places, and likes to say thiskind of stuff, that I'm in blatant

(33:30):
rebellion against God and thatI hate Jesus and hate God.
The Bible does say to hatethose who. Who hate me. I think something
like that. Or maybe love. Idon't know. Something. Same thing.
So he's not. He's not a fan.But. And it's just annoying because
it couldn't. It couldn't befurther from the truth, both Brandon
and myself. Like, Brandon's apastor. He works in a church and

(33:52):
preaches, like, the, like,Jesus every Sunday. Like, that's
his job. And I run a Christianpodcast, like, constantly talking
about how Jesus is the thingthat keeps me tethered to my Christian
tradition. He's the thing thatI can't seem to get away from. So
there's that. But this makingout in hell comment is just, I think,

(34:14):
objectively funny. When I readit, I laughed out loud. I read it
to my wife. She laughed outloud. And I texted Brandon and was
like, dude, look at this. Andhis response was, whoa, Hell sounds
way more fun than the hell Ilearned about in church growing up.
It's like, it's just aridiculous notion. And again, it's

(34:36):
just deeply bigoted andhateful. Then, you know, blasphemous.
Heresy. As far as I'mconcerned, or as far as I know, there
were no ecumenical councilsthat denounced homosexuality as heretical.
So technically speaking, it'snot heresy. Abomination language,
obviously is used in theBible. We can discuss how that functions

(34:56):
if we want. But the repentant,be safe stuff, and also this, both
of you need to repent and turnto Christ. One thing that I thought
was interesting that came upkind of implicitly in these comments,
but more explicitly in others,is people were also assuming that
I was gay, which shows thatthey didn't listen to the episode

(35:17):
or take any time to get toknow me. Which is fine. People can
think what they want. I don'tcare if people think I'm gay. I don't
have a problem with that. Butthat I think is an interesting thing
as well, that they justassume, like, oh, because Josh is
supporting LGBTQ people, hehimself must also therefore be within
the LGBTQ community. So, yeah,there's some thoughts.

(35:39):
And how many people respondwho just clearly did not listen to
the episode.
Is why 85 to 90% of thecomments? Maybe. Maybe more. Maybe
I'm being generous.
Yeah, just that. That partalone is crazy. But then, yeah, again,
like, Mike's doing thisdehumanizing thing again, which runs
contrary to Mago Day, runscontrary to everything Jesus and
God is about. Like, this issupposed to be a Christian podcasters

(36:02):
group. I think disagreeing isokay. Dehumanizing and ignoring the
image of God and others. It'snot maybe.
And Mike is a pastor. This isverified information. I have a great
stuff. I don't think they'llcare because this is a public act
that they did. But my buddyKeith, he comes to theology beer
camp. He actually went andwrote a Google review of. He found

(36:25):
the church that Mike teachesat and wrote a Google review expressing
his discontent for the headpastor's behavior online and how
they treat others theydisagree with and dehumanize them.
So shout out to Keith.
Yeah, well, also, like. Like,that could be seen as petty or funny,
but I also feel like that'sjust like, an honest thing to do.

(36:46):
Like, I think we should warnpeople about pastors who behave this
way because, like, they're notbeing very Christlike. Yeah. Although
I keep things just kills me.
It could backfire and serveas, like, oh, now I want to go to
this church, because I agreewith that. So it could also have
that kind of effect. It couldhave gained members to the church.
So Mike should be thankful toKeith as well.

(37:08):
Yeah, he's Also straw manning.
Oh very much so, yeah.
Straw man logic.
Logical fallacies are great.No, but I would say like the Bible
calls us to call to like judgeby fruits and stuff. And I very seldomly
want to say someone is orisn't a Christian because I don't
know their hearts, I don'tknow their beliefs whatsoever. Stuff
like this where they're tryingto dehumanize people attacking someone

(37:30):
else. This is clearly like aChristian would not do this. So like
this is where, this is thekind of thing where I think when
we see someone's heart putout, like this is when you call someone
to repent, not when youdisagree with someone's ideas. Come
on, man. Okay, that's whereI'm at. Next comment. Tj read that
one? I think so I get to readthis. I like how I timed this. Somehow

(37:50):
I got all the short ones.Dylan says, oh, somehow, yeah. I
don't think that heresy shouldbe promoted in this group. And it
got 31 likes and hearts forthat. Gory says proudly insert sin
and boldly Christian arecontradictions. I don't make the
rules. 63 likes and hearts forthat one. So lots of people love
these kind of comments. Why doyou think the crowds crowds love

(38:12):
this one so much?
I think it's just because. Sothe word heresy gets thrown around
a lot and not just byconservatives. Progressives will
throw it around as well. Andit's basically become a catch all
for I disagree with you.That's what that word means nowadays.
It's just, that's an opinion Idisagree with. It's heresy. And I

(38:32):
think we should be reallycareful when we throw the word heresy
around. If we have, you know,spend five minutes on Google learning
about what they did toheretics, it's probably, it's like
a pretty serious accusation tocall someone a heretic. And then
when you know, like, oh, theykilled heretics, burned them at the
stake and these kind ofthings, there's an extra layer there

(38:54):
that I don't think is oftenintended. I don't think people often
mean like and you should beburnt at the stake, but it's implicit
in this word being thrownaround. So I, yeah, I think it's
annoying if nothing else. Andpeople like it because it's short
and plethy and you know,they're like, yeah, stand up against
the heretic.

(39:14):
It sounds stronger than sayingyou're wrong, which is what they
really mean.
Yeah, yeah. It carries somekind of like perceived theological
weight to call someone aheretic and then the with the proudly
insert sin and bully Christianthing. I mean, I know not everyone
agrees, but my perspectivewould be that being gay is not a

(39:35):
sin. And the episode wascalled Proudly Gay, Boldly Christian,
which was playing with histitle, which is just called Queer
and Christian. Oh. So myepisode was Proudly Queer and Boldly
Christian. So even just theword queer, if we look at that for
a second, queer just means tolike transgress boundaries. And so
there are a lot of things thatcan be described as queer. People

(39:57):
are just assuming that wordmeans homosexual. And then even if
we go to that, there areplenty of Christians who don't think
that being gay is inherentlysinful. There are some who disagree
with that. You know, so justsaying proudly gay isn't necessarily.
I don't think that's an issuenow. Feels like you assumed that

(40:19):
being gay was a sin and it waslike proudly gay and actively doing
gay stuff. I don't know.Trying to be appropriate.
Yeah.
Then, like, maybe we couldtalk. But I. I don't know. I don't
agree that homosexuality orbeing gay or queer in general is
a sin. So that's my issue withthis comment. But I know a lot of

(40:40):
people would disagree with me.
I think they were short.Quippy is why people like it.
Yeah. Short and quippy.
Yeah.
That is what I was like this,like this. It sounds good because
you had a good title. That'swhy it got a lot of likes.
Yeah, yeah. But also it's.
But.
Oh, go ahead.
My. My problem starts beforewe even get to the brackets. My issue

(41:00):
is with proudly. I think ifyou do anything with too much pride,
that's a sin.
Sure.
I don't.
I'm not saying pride just hasso many different connotations. Meanings
these days.
Yeah.
I mean, you should be proud ofthe work you've done. Right.
Like, you should just not. ButI, I do think, you know, shout out
J. Cole. I think pride is the devil.
All right. Yeah.
Nice.
The devil is a small group oflions or Lars. No.

(41:24):
Yeah, shout out J.
No, I do mean it.
Yeah, yeah. No, I just. Justcontent wise, this is probably lame
with me, but like, I reallyfeel like making out in hell. And
the Burger King comment thatare like, those are actually kind
of funny. They deserve thelikes more. Well, even if I was on
that side, I'm like, come on,man. Like, I really feel like it's
just because they were short.People don't like to read lots. Why

(41:45):
use lots word when few word dotrick? You know, that's that. I think
that's the concept here.
But it's better. Trolling theBurger King and making out in houzz
just is.
Yeah, Burger King is quality trolling.
Yeah, yeah. High qualitytrolling. This is lazy.
Yeah, yeah. You heard us,Corey. It was lazy.
Corey, do better.
All right, what's next here?Faith, Chris, tj Faith.

(42:08):
Ironic. She says, true heresy.I'll fix it. Asterix proudly, consistently
sinning while leading othersinto false theology. You can be queer
and deny yourself, slashsurrender your identity and follow
Christ. That's re.Parenthetically. Re. Think. I'm not

(42:30):
sure what happened there.
She's trying to be happy.
Yeah.
So I. I think what. What shemeant to say. She's correcting your
title, first of all. And thenshe's going on to say, you can be
queer and deny yourself followChrist. I think she would say that's
re. Rethinking Faith.

(42:51):
Yeah, I think she was playingwith my title. I actually haven't
seen this one, and thatactually makes me laugh. That's pretty
good. Re. Rethink is funny. Sowell done, Faith.
This. That is to be. To beabsolutely clear, this is a slur.
Yeah.
That she has said here. Thisis an abbreviation for a slur.

(43:11):
Oh, see, I didn't catch onthat either. Yeah, okay.
Oh, yeah, yeah, I got you.
That's a lot less clever.That's sad.
Yeah, that is sad that if.That. Yeah, if that's what's going
on. That is. That's not cool.
Yeah, I think so.
Yeah.
I think my. My thing was wayfunnier. Yeah, you should have said

(43:32):
that.
I. So also, I think somethinginteresting about this one, though,
is the. You can be queer anddeny yourself, surrender your identity
and follow Christ. So I thinkI know that there are queer folk
who exist. Side B Christiansis the kind of language that is used

(43:52):
to describe them that arequeer and also choose to be celibate
and not act on that. So Idon't want to diminish that. If that
is an adult choice thatsomebody is making and they're doing
it because they think that'swhat Jesus is asking of them, I can
respect it. They're an adult.I'm not going to tell them that they

(44:15):
have to go act on their urges.Like, come on now. I think it's deeply
unhealthy. Like,psychologically, that's not good
for you. But I do want toacknowledge that that is a thing.
Although I don't think, like,we should be prescribing that to
everybody. If that's a choice.Someone wants to make. I'll respect
it. I disagree, but go for it.I don't think you can force that

(44:37):
on people. I mean, look whathappens with priests when you tell
them not to have sex. Just saying.
Yeah, I. Yeah. And it is, it'sinteresting. So I think there's like
basically four sides. And wetalked some about this with an episode
with Dr. Tom Ord and hisdaughter on our podcast before. I'll
try and link that in thedescription. But, you know, you have
like that side A, Christianswho think the whole identity of being

(45:00):
attracted to other people ofthe same sex is just sinful because
you exist. And then you haveChristians, like I'm assuming faith
here, who think like, you canhave that identity, have that attraction,
the orientation, but acting onit would be sinful. Then you have
people probably like myself,I'm not sure where Josh Patterson
falls. I think he's probablymore Tom Ward, who I'm like, hey,
yeah, I'm a first of all thisthing, but I think sexuality, commitment,

(45:24):
all that stuff needs to gotogether. I still think there's some
kind of commitment, some kindof thing. It's not like anything
goes. Whereas Tom Ord thinksas long as everything's flourishing,
it doesn't necessarily need tobe commitment, one night stands,
that kind of stuff is finetoo. So there's a whole array of
different thoughts. And Idefinitely think side B, like faith
here, probably better thanside A. It's probably less harmful,

(45:45):
but still not a fan.
Yeah, yeah, I, yeah, I, Imean, I think we can have. I'm not
one to promote poor sexualethics in general. I think we can
have good sexual ethics and Ithink it's just demonstrably true
that, you know, we can havehealthy sexual ethics and healthy
sexual relationshipsregardless of the gender of our partner.

(46:08):
I know plenty of friends thatare in very healthy relationships
that enjoy healthy sex livesthat aren't. You know, there's kind
of this stereotype that queerfolk just all do each other all the
time and they're justpromiscuous and similar. I mean,
actually very similar. I'mhesitant to make this comparison

(46:28):
because there's going to besomeone that it upsets. But like,
black women are oftencharacterized in the same way and
dismissed as overly sexual,promiscuous, this kind of thing.
And a similar kind ofdismissal happens of LGBTQ people.
I don't want to say that theplight of those two groups is the
same. However, this is asimilar overlap that I'm seeing.

(46:49):
So I'm be trying to be carefulwith My language. Um, yeah, I think
that's something to. To pointout and. And acknowledge, like, hey,
I can be in a monogamous. Ifthat's what you think is right, I
can be in a monogamous,committed relationship with someone
of this. The same sex. Andthat's, you know.
Yeah, just fine. Yeah. Which Iwill go as far as, like, I think
it doesn't even have to bemonogamous. I just think commitment

(47:10):
is an important part of thisstuff. Anyway, we'll move on.
Enthusiastic consent.
Somehow I got a long one thistime. We're gonna try and run through
the next few a little bitquicker so we can start wrapping
stuff up. But, Marlena, Ithink this is where we get to people
trying to do better todiffering levels of degree. So we're
getting a little away from thebigotry and hateful stuff. I absolutely

(47:32):
love all people. Capital all.And I love them enough to tell them
the truth. Inclusion doctrineis the doctrine of demons. And this
is where I'm looking at. Okay?Repentance from sin and being washed
and made brand new creaturesin Christ is the only way. Praying
for scales to be removed andsome true repentance for those who
think love equals sin.Inclusivity. Webster was right under

(47:54):
her says. I actually listenedto this podcast, my friend. He says,
my friend, a lot of. And thereare quite a few takeaways. You and
your guest noted you enjoypissing people off. Exegesis is not
just about one of the possibletranslations, but about looking at
the context for the correcttranslation. You said, story matters
so much. To me, my friend, theBible is the greatest story ever

(48:16):
told, but what matters is thetruth. You both said you believe
Paul was wrong about manythings, including homosexuality.
You can say that you disagreewith him, but that doesn't make him
wrong. You also both spokeabout the etymology of the word homosexual,
and you said that somethinglike the concept of homosexuality
didn't exist in that time. Butthen you go ahead and twist scripture
to include homosexuality. Youcan't have your cake and eat it too.

(48:38):
I just want to encourage you,if you see this comment, to truly
commit to a church community,not just attending once a month so
that they are cool with you,but commit to a community and commit
to growing closer to God.Finally, nobody can be a Christian
agnostic. God bless you. Yeah,interesting stuff. I think they're
trying to do better. Some oftheir language is still very triggering,
and I'm like, that's not cool.But I don't think they're just straight

(49:01):
up attacking you. Here. So howdo you respond to slightly more nuanced
stuff?
Yeah, yeah, I'll. Not to bedismissive of Marlena's comment,
but I'm going to focus onWebster just because they clearly
listen to the episode andtime. So we. We did say that we enjoy
pissing people off. That'sfair. And so that's a fair critique,

(49:24):
whether or not that's right orwrong. I'll let the listener decide
on that. Exegesis is not justabout using one of the possible translations,
but about looking at thecontext for the correct translation.
I take issue with that just ingeneral, based off how translation
functions. Like alltranslation is interpretation. We
bring so much to the textourselves. It's like unescapable.

(49:49):
So I don't think we can reallyfind the correct translation. We
can find translations that arebetter than others, you know, or,
you know, whatever. So that'sfine. Story does really matter to
me. And I agree that the Bibletells a great story. That's kind
of why I stick around. I likethe Jesus stuff. Yeah, I definitely

(50:09):
did say. I, I believe Paul waswrong. This is something that I kind
of was hesitant to say toBrandon because I didn't want dismiss
the first third of his bookwhere he took the time to go through
all of the passages. And Ikind of acknowledged that from kind
of a place of privilege. Ilike, I've done that. I've done the
exegetical work. I've readthrough the Bible passages and I've

(50:31):
made it. I've come to aconclusion. I don't. I think you
can argue that those, youknow, scholarly. You can make a scholarly
argument saying that these arecondemning homosexuality. You can
also make scholarly argumentssaying it's way more complicated
than that. The. The waters aremuddy. I'm comfortable saying I just

(50:51):
disagree with Paul, which isnot something you can say based off
someone's under interpretationof or sorry, rather doctrine of how
inspiration works. Like, isthe Bible inspired? Is it inerrant?
But I would challenge thatperson and say, okay, well, you don't
agree with Paul's take on.Well, actually maybe they do on the

(51:12):
subjugation of women andpatriarchy. Or like, he thought slaves
were kind of an okay thing. Soanyway, I think we can disagree with
Paul and he is wrong. I don'tthink there's any good reason for
me to have to ascribe to asexual ethic from a culture so different
from mine 2000 years ago. Youknow, the etymology thing, I actually

(51:37):
hate this argument. Like, Iknow the 1946 document was very documentary,
is very popular. I think it'sjust. It's too fundamentalist for
me. It's taking the Bibleliterally and then trying to argue
against it. I think that's aboring argument. I don't care. Of
course, the word homosexualitywasn't in the Bible because that
word linguistically did notyet exist. Like, that's a relatively

(51:59):
new word. That doesn't meanthat the concept can't be pointed
to or talked about. Like, Ithink it's not. Like, once that word
became a thing, gay peoplebegan to exist. Like, the. The way
that we use that word also hascontext, so it means something. I
think that's fair. And maybethe Bible isn't talking about homosexuality

(52:20):
in the sense that you and I,how we mean that today. But I, I
actually, I think thatargument's annoying. I would point
to other things and. Yeah,like, I. I don't know. I get his
point about going to churchmore than once a month. That's fine.
It's just not for me. I didthat. I spent a good portion of my
life in churches. I worked inthem for six years as. And once a

(52:43):
month is all of that I canmuster to maintain health for myself
and also stay connected to acommunity who is just a. Okay with
me coming when I. When I feelcomfortable doing so. So I'm going
to keep doing that.
Yeah. Yeah. A couple things.One is I do a podcast episode with
Christian Ashley on his showLet Nothing Move you, because he

(53:05):
invites people with differingopinions sometimes, and we talk about
some of those laws inLeviticus, and I go over why I think
they're there. So if you wantsome more of that exegetical argument
and perspective, I think youcan make the case without even having
to deny biblical inerrancy. Ihappen to also deny biblical inerrancy.
I think Paul is wrong, but Idon't think you'd have to to get
to an affirming situation. Soif you want to check that out, I'll

(53:27):
try to remember to put that inthe show's description. And, yeah,
like, I always take issue withgoing to church, since church is
in the name of our podcast. Ialways have to bring that up because
I'm like, yo, the way theBible defines church is like, people
talking about scriptures andtheology and God together. And, like,
what we're doing right now ischurch. So maybe. Yeah. Yeah. All

(53:48):
right. T.J. did you read thatone? Did I read that one? I think
I read that one.
If I lied, would, you know?
No.
So we have Michael. And hesays, I guess this group needs to
be renamed FundamentalistPodcasters. Nothing Christ like about
all this LGBTQ bashing. Andthen the little sad emoji. We have

(54:11):
Paulette saying, you can't beboth. You'll love one and hate the
other. I don't know what thatmeans. I don't know what that's in
reference to. What is that inreference to?
She's pulling the quote whereJesus talks about, you can't serve
both God and money becauseyou'll love one and hate the other.
And she's just applying thatto, you can't be gay and Christian.
Either you'll be a Christianand love Jesus or you'll love being

(54:33):
gay. Can't do both.
Ignoring context. That'salways fun.
Right? So then we got Jim. Hesays, I've seen this young man in
several debates anddiscussions, which. Yes, yes, he
probably has. He says hisperspective is constant. My main
concern is that he does notsee it as wrong or as something he
is working on. He believes theBible condones it. That is a fundamental

(54:58):
contrast with Scripture, whichunfortunately make him a false teacher.
He seems like a nice guy andappears to be sincere, but I can't
get there from here. Continueto pray for him.
That's like the kindest way oftelling someone they're wrong. Yeah,
it really seems sincere. Imean, it could be kind of condescending,
but I think he's at leastacknowledging Brandon as a human

(55:19):
being, stating that why hedisagree. Why he disagrees, but is
like, I think Brandon issincere. I don't think he's acting
in bad faith. He seems like anice dude. I just can't get there.
I'm going to pray for him,which that sounds like kind of a
biblical thing to do, right?Jesus. I mean, I don't want to assume
this guy thinks Brandon is hisenemy, but, you know, pray for your
enemies. Pray for those whodisagree with you.

(55:41):
Yeah.
This is like the mostChristian response we've had.
Yeah. I feel like if he'sbeing condescending, he's not trying
to be condescending, like, I think.
Right.
Yeah. I'm going to give thisguy the benefit of the doubt. I like
Jim. I mean, I don't like hisbeliefs, but I like him. Yeah.
Right?
Yeah. All right.
Michael was nice. Michaelbeing quippy. Michael standing up
for the LGBTQ folks.

(56:02):
Yeah.
Nothing Christ like, about allthis LGBTQ bashing. Say it again,
Michael. The people in the back.
Nothing Christ like aboutinsert here bashing you. That just
always works, evenFundamentalist bashing, which I were
trying not to do it, butsometimes, man, y' all make it so
easy. Sorry, that one wasbashing. My bad. I apologize, guys.

(56:22):
Okay, I think this is the verylast one here, if I am correct. Yeah,
okay, last one. And then we'regonna start getting into this. But
Sherry, and this is the one.I'm like, this was, this was how
I think people shoulddisagree. I think I'm saddened that
so many Christians are notopen to honest discourse as shown
by the vast negativity in thecomments. Listen to the podcast or
not. Free will. If you listen,disagree with what is presented,

(56:45):
then respond with areasonable, inviting, grace filled
explanation of what's missingor misinterpreted or whatever. No
one in here can claim to nothave sin. So pointing fingers is
hypocrisy, reminder, the onlytrue qualification to claim Jesus
Christ as Lord and Savior.After that, whatever is going on
in someone's life is betweenthem and Jesus. We are all a work

(57:07):
in progress. If a nonChristian or newer Christian or a
less knowledgeable Christianwere to read these comments, they'd
most likely be quite sickenedand turned off of Christianity. That
needs applause. I think.
I don't.
I'm honestly, I'm assumingshe's probably not affirming, but
like, I am affirming ofeverything she said. I think.

(57:29):
Yeah, I agree. I think this isa very kind and caring and compassionate
response. I think even there'ssomething tiny in here that so many
people miss. Like, listen tothe podcast or not. That's your choice.
Like, you don't. If you don't.If you don't want to listen to it.
Forcing anybody.

(57:49):
Yeah, I, I like this one. I. Ialso love her point too, about no
one here can claim to not havesin. So pointing fingers is hypocrisy.
I know I'm rather progressive,but that doesn't mean my anthropology
is so high that I don't thinkpeople suck. I don't think we're
totally depraved. I want to gothat far. But I know myself and I
know my own inner thoughts anddesires and they're not always the

(58:13):
best, so I assume that ofother people as well.
So yeah, someone, someone outthere is like got their little chart
of what you believe, and onthe Calvinist one, they're just like,
no, total depravity.
Got it. Another reason Josh isa heretic.
Very clear.
Yeah, yeah, yeah, man. Andthat's. I don't know.

(58:37):
And her point at the end isgood. From An Eve. From an evangelism
standpoint, if a non Christianwere to walk into this group or a
newer or less knowledgeableChristian, like she said, and read
these comments, Instant turn off.
Yep.
It's just. That's bad pr, you know?
Yeah, yeah.
I mean, very, very least, mostbasal level. This looks bad.

(59:00):
Yeah, yeah, yeah. Like, if Iwas following Christian podcasters
because I wanted to listen toChristian podcasts and I saw this,
I would never listen to aChristian podcast. Like, I don't
want to hear any of thesepeople talk. They all kind of seem
like they suck, honestly.Yeah. And I mean, this is the problem
with a lot of Christiansonline in general, and maybe not

(59:21):
just online on news, onwhatever. Like, I know there's a
lot of good Christians and yougo to small churches, you see that
when you go to theology beercamp, you see that when you meet
Christian, actually, you'relike, oh, man. Yeah, there are a
lot of really greatChristians. But then a lot of times
you hear these people on thenews or online and you're like, so
these people say they're likethis Jesus guy who said all this
stuff about love and, huh. Youknow, like a lot of times it's like,
just, what? How do we gethere? But yeah, so people like her,

(59:47):
I feel like. Give me a littlebit more hope. Yeah.
All right. That was probablythe longest side segment we've ever
had on this show, ever.
Oh, the one with you andChristian just now?
Yeah.
Hey, guys, before cutting tothis separate, shorter interview
that TJ does with ChristianAshley, I want to read to you all

(01:00:10):
part of text that he sent tous to read to Josh Patterson before
you hear this interview. I didread this to Josh Patterson before
recording, but we didn't readit on the air. So just want to take
the time to read this to youall as well for context. So this
is after I sent over toChristian all of the comments that
we discussed on the podcastjust previously to this. Obviously,

(01:00:31):
I believe the position takenthe episode to be contrary to Scripture.
And I would say so to Josh hisface if we were to speak. Hopefully
done so in a way that wasloving and respectful. But there
are better uses of my time andothers than to complain and whine
about an opinion, even if Ithink that opinion is wrong. If you
don't agree with theassertions made in the episode and
question, then strengthen yourposition by studying Scripture. Then
use that knowledge to loveothers while, well, by speaking the

(01:00:52):
truth to them. If you agreewith the assertions, I respectfully
disagree, as I cannotreconcile such opinions with biblical
truth. But this does not meanthat I hate you for thinking differently
than I. Specifically he talksto Josh. I'm sorry you had to go
through this. I apologize thatsome people on my side of things
can't react wisely or controlthemselves. Well, you didn't deserve

(01:01:13):
the vitriol. I heavilydisagree with your assertions, but
I am grateful to be in acountry where such voices are allowed
to speak openly and freely.Obviously I would prefer it if you
were on my side of things, butI can't control you. Neither would
I want to. The great and worstpart of free will is that we make
our own decisions and we dealwith the repercussions. Lord knows
I dealt with plenty forbelieving and acting as I do. Keep

(01:01:33):
searching and questioning anddon't let anyone tell you that you
simply need to accept an idea.I believe what I believe, not because
I was told to, but because Idid the work to comprehend it and
then apply it. God bless youand be with you in accordance to
his will.
I'm here with the one and onlyMCA Christian Ashley from Let nothing
move you. We had somescheduling issues and we had to do
this separately just to getChristian's thoughts on the issue

(01:01:57):
at large. So Christian Ashley,how are you doing today?
Doing all right, tj, how about you?
Also good. Good. It's nice tonot be working. Oh yeah, in the more
laborious job, you know. Solet's get into it. After hearing
the comments that we sentover, how do you respond as a Christian

(01:02:18):
who isn't queer affirmingseeing what other Christians had
to say to Josh Patterson?
Well, honestly I can't saythat I'm surprised because that'd
be a bald faced lie. I'm usedto people on my side of things having
poor attitudes and to how toactually argue against the ideas
presented in Josh Patterson'sepisode which I have listened to

(01:02:42):
and you know, which was thefirst thing they should have done
instead of having the kneejerk reaction of oh this is wrong.
Hey, I had the knee jerkreaction of oh this is wrong. But
then I listened to what hesaid and said oh this is still wrong.
But now what did I do with mytime after that? I didn't go complaining
about it on the Internet. Ijust spent time going over scripture

(01:03:04):
once again and seeing what Godhas to say on the issue, what the
Bible has to say on the issue.And it says, oh Scripture is not
queer affirming, therefore Iam not queer affirming. Then I moved
on with my life andunfortunately, as was the case in
that group, which I am a partof, and I saw this happen, and I
rolled my eyes the instant Isaw all those comments, people don't

(01:03:27):
know how to argue. Well,sometimes. And this is a conflict
on every side of the equationbecause people, for some reason don't
just know how to argue. We'renot taught well, I guess, but it
was just done so poorly and soviciously that it's like, guys, all
you're doing is helping themby acting in this manner because
now they look like they'reunder attack. Because they're under
attack. Therefore more peopleare going to flock and try and defend

(01:03:50):
and protect when you. If youjust shut up and, you know, kept
the truth to yourself for thismoment, things would have been fine.
Yeah, yeah. And I, like, youknow, sometimes on the Internet it's
fun to hop on a dog pile, butI think that is more suited for things
less serious than this.
It was also immenselydisrespectful because you could tell

(01:04:11):
the vast majority of themhadn't actually listened to the episode
proper. They just came withthe presupposition. And a right presupposition,
in my opinion, that affirmingis incorrect. It is a bad way of
loving people. But then theytake it to the extreme. And before
they actually listen to whatis being said in the episode proper,
they make themselves look outto be fools because they're causing

(01:04:33):
problems for themselves andothers when if they had just taken
the time to slow it thingsdown, think things through, we wouldn't
have had an issue.
Yeah, yeah. So if you were topost a podcast episode about your
theology of sexual ethics in agroup like that, or you know, the
same one because you're in it,how would you want queer affirming

(01:04:54):
Christians to respond to your post?
Wow, man. That would requireme to actually post there and be
productive in that regard. Iwas actually just talking with my
great uncle, is a retiredpastor, he's now interiming, and
we were both talking to eachother because, you know, I'm in a
process right now of sendingout resumes, trying to find a place
to end up at, you know, forwork, you know, in a pastoral role,

(01:05:15):
whether that be head,associate, youth, what have you.
And we're both like, no, weboth suck at self promotion, which
you would think is somethingthat, as a very egotistical person
by nature come naturally.Maybe it just doesn't. But for this,
if I were to actually do this,to answer the question, what I would
hope is that they would listento what I had to say, they would

(01:05:38):
go into the episode proper andsee, here is why he believes what
he does. And in fact, Joshuahas been on an episode with me before
where we went over inLeviticus 18, amongst other chapters
we did that day, where I wentover why Scripture says we're not
supposed to do it, why it is asin. Why are we still, after that
part, still supposed to lovepeople who are in the midst of that

(01:06:00):
sin just as much as I'msupposed to love other people in
the midst of other sins. And Iwould hope that if they gave me the
time of day that they wouldsee where I'm arguing from isn't
a place of hate, isn't a placeof, I don't like those people, therefore
I can just besmirch their goodnames. No, it's because of how deeply
I value Scripture. And as I aman inerrant, you know, Christian,

(01:06:22):
looking at the Bible, at theoriginal text, you know, as much
as we get from translation totranslation of what we have now,
I see it inerrant, infallible.This is God's word. What God says
goes. Ergo, if he says not todo something, I don't do that thing
unless I don't want. Unless Iwant to be on the side that's not
his. And then hopefully theywould take that to mean that if they
were to, you know, meet me inperson, you know, I wouldn't be getting

(01:06:44):
the torches and pitchforksready. I wouldn't, you know, be trying
to burn anyone at the stake.I'd instead have a conversation with
them about why I do believeit's sin, why I want them to have
something better in theirlives, because I see the harm that
it does, and because I've seenthe harm that I've done in other
sins in my life. And I don'twant that for anyone. So that would

(01:07:04):
be my hope, is that they wouldlisten first, you know, have their
own opinion. Sure. But thennot make a big deal out of it.
Yeah. Yeah. So how do youthink we should respond to people
who call themselves Christiansbut talk like those in this comment
section? We don't want to, youknow, pile hate onto hate. But how
do we respond? Well, toChristians who shout hate at the

(01:07:26):
things that they disagreewith. And like you said, without
even listening to the episode,without listening to the subject
matter of the post, how do wedo that?
I mean, with love andpatience. And that's a hard skill
to learn in both regards. Youhave to look at another human being
and say, Aspects about youthat I'm not quite fond of. I'm still
going to love you despite themas I'm working on myself as well.

(01:07:48):
I need to recognize, okay,what's the log in my own eye I need
to take out first. As Jesusteaches us how to judge, not that
we can never judge. Go aheadand look through your Matthew, which
actually I'll be covering it alittle bit on that nothing move you
pretty soon. So get rid ofyour own stuff, then worry about
other people. And then as aresult of that, just like just be
patient with people. Andthat's incredibly hard thing to do

(01:08:10):
because they think thatthey're right, I think that I'm right.
I think I've got the betterbacking of scripture than they do.
But they too can connive waysto make it seem like scripture says
something that it doesn't. Andthey can fully believe it. And that's
what they're all about andthat's where they end up. So I need
to meet them where they're atand just have a dialogue. And look,
sometimes it's going to befruitless. Sometimes you're really

(01:08:32):
going to waste your time. Andit's like learning how not to waste
your time over time is a goodthing to do. If you have the first
conversation and they're notgoing to budge whatsoever, maybe
a follow up isn't what youneed to do now, unless they're like
a member of your church orsomething and there's a conversation
needs to happen, something'sgot to give. Whether someone stays
or leaves, that's somethingthat could be brought up. But what
they need to learn and what Ihope a lot of people on my side would

(01:08:53):
actually learn is that if wewant to be taken seriously for what
we believe, we can't have thatknee jerk reaction to this. That
reaction of this is wrong. Iin the core of my being think that
it is wrong. And I think thatpeople who are engaging in it are
wrong are in desperate need ofhelp. Ergo, if I want to then help

(01:09:14):
them. I don't demonize them.Before I talk to them, I talk to
them and hey, I'm going to beopen and honest with you. I'm going
to say this is wrong, this issin. This is what scripture says
is sin. But I'm not then goingto look at them. You're worthless.
You need to change everythingabout your life. No, I think you
need to change some things.Just when I need to change things
about my life. So, I mean, atthe end of the Day for people who

(01:09:37):
are more vocal on my side ofthings, who just need to learn, A,
to shut up sometimes and B, toargue. Well, you just got to be patient,
and that's hard. Like I said,it's not. Our default is to try and
win an argument, and that'swhat they think that they're doing
by arguing the way that theydo by being as loud as they are.
But the loudest voice doesn'tmake you right. And you need to be
careful about. You constructit, lest other people mistake you

(01:09:58):
for a fool. And just go overthe entire book of proverbs for how
many times you can be called afool and you be righteous for calling
that person a fool. This wouldbe a way to call someone a fool and
be righteous so long as youwere doing it in a loving, respectful
way. So just if you're on myside of things. And your response
to this was, how dare he postthis? This has no place anywhere

(01:10:18):
on this, you know, publicforum, semi public. And the fact
that it's podcast creators.What country do we live in? Number
one, this is free speech. He'sallowed to publish these things,
even if they are theologicallyincorrect. He's allowed to talk about
them because we have thefreedom to do such things. And if
I take that very seriously,which I do, that means he can post

(01:10:39):
it on that forum. That alsomeans he's not free from criticism,
just like I'm not free fromcriticism. So just do it. Well, learn
how to love people.
All right, so is thereanything else you have to say to
these voracious commenters orto Jay Patty?
I mean, I would have thatdiscussion to him face to face and
say, hey, I think you'rewrong. Just as I'm sure he'd say,

(01:11:00):
I think you're wrong,Christian, so we can have that discussion.
Discussion. I'm fine withthat. So I'm open to having that
talk. I'm. I'm grateful thatwe do live in a country where he's
allowed to say that and I'mallowed to say what I want. So just.
I do praise God for that. Ihope and pray that he continues through
his process of figuring outwhere he is in his Christian walk
and that I love him, too.

(01:11:22):
All right, so thank you somuch, Christian, for your time and
cooperating with this, youknow, hectic little piece of episode
history. Make sure to check,Christian out where you get your
podcasts.
All right, guys, thank you foryour time. I hope hearing Christian,
someone who isn't affirmingside of things, was helpful for this.
TJ and I are affirming wesupport LGBTQ rights movements and

(01:11:46):
their inclusion in the church.Christian does not, but we do work
with Christian on severalother projects. I'm going to try
to include some links to thosedown below like Systematic ecology,
as well as some of the otherstuff that Christian does. If you
want to hear more from himspecifically, he does mention an
episode I helped him with onhis podcast, Let Nothing Movie, where
we talk about Leviticus 18,where both of us give different perspectives
of how we read that as someonewho, like myself, is affirming and

(01:12:08):
then him who is not, when theBible does talk about homosexuality
kind of as sin, kind of not.If you want to hear that both of
our takes, I will have thatlink down below for that Leviticus
18 episode of Let nothing moveyou. I think it's very beneficial
as well as we're also going tohave links to Josh Patterson's episode
that we're talking about inthis episode proper. So again, thank
you for listening to thisshorter interview that TJ did with

(01:12:30):
Christian. We're going to getback to the show now with Josh Patterson.
Thank you.
So if someone posted anepisode of their podcast that had
someone supporting somethinglike Christian nationalism into a
group, group of Christianpodcasters who are more like the
ones we hang with at TheologyBeer camp, what kind of response

(01:12:53):
or reaction do you think theywould receive? Would it be similar
to this treatment that you gotin the Christian podcasters group?
Unfortunately, I have to say Ithink it would be like, I think.
Well, I don't know. I think itdepends because. And I'm going to
talk poorly about my ownpeople because I definitely am in

(01:13:14):
the more I am obviously in themore progressive camp, but I think
this is something thatprogressive people also do poorly.
A lot of us have come fromkind of a fundamentalist background,
black and white thinking. Andthen when we, you know, deconstruct
or something like that, all weall most people have done is just
flip to the other side ofthings. They swap out their bad guys,

(01:13:36):
but they haven't learned howto think. They're still fundamentalists.
So it's still black or white,us versus them, Those are the enemies.
And so I think if someone wereto start posting Christian nationalist
stuff, they would could expecta lot of the similar treatment. You're
not a real Christian. You hateGod, you know, heresy, whatever.
And like, I would tend toagree with that. Like, I think Christian

(01:13:58):
nationalism is idolatry. Like,I think it is bad and demonstrably
so. Like Christian Nationalismis how we get Nazis. And as far as
I'm concerned, we shouldn'thave Nazis.
Indiana Jones talks Nazism.
Bad Indiana Jones.
Going back to the silly question.
Right, exactly. Tying it all together.
He'll whoop your ass in hockeyfor that.

(01:14:18):
Yeah. So I think. And this iswhere it gets dicey, though, because
now, from a more progressiveperspective, we're going to see progressive
people are going to see thisas a dire issue. Like Christian nationalism
is actively causing harm inthe same way that a more conservative
person might see, wow,promoting LGBTQ acceptance is causing
violence because you'resending people to hell and damning

(01:14:40):
people and all this kind ofstuff. So I think some of the, you
know, the progressives aren'toff the hook. They're not always
the nicest people in theworld, especially towards other progressives.
Like, you're never progressiveenough is what I've learned.
Right, exactly. There's anideological purity culture that exists
within more progressivespaces. That is very annoying and
frustrating to me, but I wouldhope that we could have meaningful

(01:15:03):
conversations about Christiannationalism in a way that is calm,
collected, that seeks first tounderstand the other person and then
to respond genuinely, but onlyafter we understand and recognize
a person as a person,recognize that their ideas are not
who they are. Their idea, wemight think sucks, but we don't dehumanize

(01:15:25):
people and then kind of gofrom there. But I think, unfortunately,
you know, I mean, we can testyour theory. I'll go post Christian
nationalist stuff in, like, aprogressive space and see what happens.
I think. I think what weshould do. What we should do is create
a fake Christian nationalistpodcaster, put his clips in the Ology

(01:15:46):
Beer Camp Facebook group.
Hey, I can help with this.
Yeah. Yeah.
Right.
Well, okay, so part of theproblem I have here, and I'm just
gonna unbox a little bitbecause I know, I know we got limited
time, but there's multipleways I could see all this happening
and still getting the samereaction. And I think that's what
frustrates me the most. Right,so, like Josh's podcast with the

(01:16:10):
same title, Proudly Queer andsomething. What was the last podcast?
Proudly Queer and BoldlyChristian. Right. You could have
had that same title, and itcould have been a podcast. It's not.
I want to say, it is not. Forthose listening, Josh is fully affirming
and a great guy. It is notthis, but it could have been a podcast
where he was saying, hey,listen, I am proud that I have this

(01:16:33):
sexual orientation, but Irefuse to give in to the sin And
I'm proud of it because I wantyou to know my temptation and I'm
standing up for God. It couldhave been this really conservative
point, but you just read thetitle and responded to that, right?
And then, of course, there'swhat Josh actually posted in the
response. And I think the samething could happen in these progressive
circles where, like, someonecould post something about Christian

(01:16:53):
nationalism. And what they'rereally saying is we should have leaders
who love the immigrants, likeI do, who want to embrace the least
of these in our country. Weshould have leaders that embrace
these values of the Bible. Butinstead, if you had a post that just
had the name in it, even ifyou said all those things that they
probably would agree with,they would just react to the title,
I think. I think the samething would happen. And I think that's
what irritates me. It's a lotof times not even about the content,

(01:17:15):
it's just about the title. Andthen even with Christian nationalists,
you also do have, like,different degrees. So, like, we don't
even ask what people mean.Like, do you mean that what you think
is people in our nation'sgovernment should have Christian
values and believe, like,things are good, like love, peace,
and justice? Or do you thinkthat you're saying that the nation
should be ruled by people withthe same religion as you? That's

(01:17:36):
two different things thatmight use the same words. And instead
of asking questions, we justthrow out heresy and hate and all
these words online. And that'swhy I'm like, wait a minute. Shouldn't
our reaction be based on,like, the actual content and not
the title and our assumptions,maybe? Alan.
No, that takes too long.
True.
We want short, quippy posts.Joshua, see the previous, you know,

(01:17:58):
maybe 20 minutes ago, wetalked about this.
Yeah.
That's what people need to do.Respond to Donald Trump. Sorry, Christianity.
Trump isn't Burger King. Youcan't. Have it your way, man. Oh.
Do you think he eats Burger King?
No, he likes McDonald's. He'slike, no, for real. I'm not kidding.
Like, money. I know. He likesKFC. That's funny. I didn't know

(01:18:20):
McDonald's.
Oh, yeah, he consistently hasMcDonald's cater, White House stuff
like. Oh, that's a quickGoogle search, Will.
Yeah, fantastic, though.
But so ignoring the doctrineand opinions, which are all important,
but we're gonna ignore thatfor just a bit here. Let's assume
there was a post or promotionof some idea or podcast that we all

(01:18:42):
magically. We all agree with.Right. Everyone just agrees with
this, that it is harmful anddangerous, we shall magically agree
what this guy posted. Bad.It's bad for the Christian faith,
bad for everything. And it'sbeing posted in a Christian podcast
group. So how do we respondwhen we have something that we do

(01:19:04):
agree is actually harmfulbeing posted in our Christian podcast
group? Do we ignore theharmful, harmful teaching? Do we
attack the person for theirbeliefs? Like, well, how should we
be responding, Josh?
Yeah, I mean, I think just togo back to a few things that I said,
we should always recognizethat people are not their ideas.
We cannot reduce somebody tothe thoughts that they have in their

(01:19:26):
head. I just think that's nothelpful. And also, like, if I was
reduced to the thoughts thatcome to my head, good Lord, not good.
I don't even know if I likethat version of Josh Patterson. So
that's the first thing. But Ithink again, just to repeat myself,
I think we need to seekunderstanding. And this, this comes

(01:19:49):
from experience, right? I havea very close friend of mine who I
love and respect way a lot.They disag. They are like the polar
opposite of me when it comesto politics. And then that informs
their Christianity andeverything. However, I've noticed
when I can have a conversationwith them because they like to try

(01:20:10):
to send me memes to get mefired up and, you know, own the libs
and all this kind of stuff.But when I sit down and actually
talk with my friend and say,okay, tell me, like, why, why do
you think this? What is thething that you're trying to protect?
What are you afraid of? Andthen you can recognize, like, oh,
you care deeply about creatinga safe world for your children or,

(01:20:32):
you know, et cetera. And sothen what I can do is I can recognize
like, whoa, you and I sharesimilar values. I also want a world
where your kids can grow upand be safe. And I want the same
for my kids when I have kidsone day. So I think trying to take
the time to actuallyunderstand, to get behind the thing,
right, because when we justsay stuff, that's never the thing.

(01:20:53):
There's always somethingbehind the thing. And try to learn
people's motivations, whatthey're afraid of, what they care
about, it takes time, energy,effort. Social media is not good
at any of those things. Itdoes not reward those things. But
I think ultimately maybesocial media is just inherently not

(01:21:13):
the place to do that. Like, Ithose kind of conversations, I don't
have on Instagram, DM orFacebook with my buddy, but it's
when I go over to his House,eat dinner with his family, and then
we sit on his back deck anddrink beers. Like, you know, so maybe
social media just isn't theplace. I don't know.
Yeah, I'll say. The mostmeaningful conversations I've had

(01:21:35):
from social media alone thatdon't involve podcasting, and that's
difficult because so much ofwhat I do is just posting my podcast
because I don't really likesocial media that much would be that
I posted something. And I'vehad times where people have messaged
me, private message, directmessage, whatever, and said, hey,
here's what I heard and whatyou said. Are you saying that about
people who believe like, I do,and then we actually are able to

(01:21:55):
have that conversationcompletely online. But, like, the
idea is, like, they actuallywanted to know what I was trying
to say before they juststarted attacking me for saying it
or being public with ourdisagreement. They were like, hey,
let's actually talk aboutthat. And I think that's way more
useful. Even though both ofthe times that I remember that are
most meaningful that thathappened to me, we didn't agree in
the end. One of the times itcame to literally the other person

(01:22:18):
calling me a bunch of names,and then a week later coming back
with, hey, I. I didn't meanthat. I'm sorry. And I realized this
is kind of like, justdifferent focuses in ministry, but
we both love Jesus, and that'swhat's important. And then the other
time, I remember it beingsomeone who was like, hey, I respect
you. I learned a lot from you.I just can't agree with you on this.
And I'm gonna go this way. AndI'm like, hey, man. Yeah, I love
your parents. I understand whyyou believe the way you do. Go that

(01:22:39):
way. I still love you, dude.And, you know, those conversations,
I just feel, like, mean morethan anything you're gonna do in
the public comments, probably.
Yeah. And I do. I just wantthat first way that you mentioned,
I think is easily the funniestway that can go. Like, hey, I just
want to make sure this is whatyou're saying. Oh, it is. Okay. Well,

(01:23:00):
I'm. Okay. I'm gonna call youa bunch of names now.
Yeah, that actually happened.It was funny because it was someone
who used to be one of mypastors. And I was like. I was distraught
for like, a week. Then he cameback, and he was like, dude, I was
so wrong. And having someonelike that who attack you hurts more
than anything I thinkimaginable. But then having someone
who you respected for so Longapologize to you is so much more

(01:23:23):
healing than anythingimaginable. And I had both of those
at the same interaction. Itwas wild.
Yeah.
Yeah. I think we have atendency. We have a tendency to assume
disagreement is personal.Right. That we can. And we can perceive
it as a personal attackpropaganda. Hip hop artist has a
great song called Cynical, andtowards the end he has this bit where
he says, disagreement doesn'tmean that I hate you. If you're intolerant

(01:23:47):
of my views, then what doesthat make you? Cynical and so, like.
Which is. It's a funny turn ofphrase because the whole song he's
talking about how he himselfis cynical, and then he flips it
on those, you know, whatever.So I. I think that I like that line.
Disagreement doesn't mean thatI hate you.
What's the title of the song again?
Cynical.
Cynical Propaganda. Okay, sorry.

(01:24:09):
I'm just going to wonder. It'sa wonderful song.
And have that pulled up forlater. Yeah, nice.
Okay, so since so many peoplewho reacted or commented on your
episode in this group seem toonly be responding to the title without
actually listening to content,like we said we did want to ask you
about the episode. So what doyou think the more progressive Christians
might find most interestingfrom your interview with Brandon?

(01:24:32):
And what message would youhope more conservative Christians
would take from the episode,even if they don't change their minds?
Yeah, so for the progressives,I hope they. It just gives people
a space where if they are anally, it can help them be a better
ally. Especially, I mean, wedo a lot of talk about queer readings

(01:24:53):
of scripture, which intheology is. Is common. Right. There's
various ways of readingscripture, different hermeneutical
lenses, so to speak. So wehave, like, liberation theology,
black theology, you know,womanist theology, etc, and queer
theology is just another lens.And so. And I think that's just how
theology works. All theologyhas an adjective in front of it.

(01:25:15):
Just in seminaries, when yougo to theology class, you know, Theology
101, what it should say iswhite theology. But anyway, that's
neither here nor there. What Ihope people see is it gives them
a perspective and insight intothe experience of queer folk. When
you can kind of see a queerreading of scripture and make you
better allies for those whoare LGBTQ people. I hope that the

(01:25:38):
episode is affirming and thatit helps you see yourself in the
pages of Scripture. It helpsyou feel like that you do belong
within the church, and ithelps you see, you know, yourself
in the face of Jesus or. Yeah.So so there's that. And actually,
that's what I would hope moreconservative people could get out

(01:25:59):
of the episode as well, isthat, you know, again, the whole
love your enemy thing andlearning to see the other in the
face of Christ, and that LGBTQpeople are created in the image of
God just like everybody else.And I hope conservative people from
listening to this episode canat least acknowledge that. That these.
There are people who genuinelylove. Love Jesus. They don't hate

(01:26:22):
God. They're not trying to beheretics. They have a. An intimate
relationship with the divine,and they're gay. And like, I hope
people can acknowledge that.And even if you disagree, stop dehumanizing
people, allow that space toexist, and also just be, oh, I almost
said a bad word on yourpodcast. We already said just, well,

(01:26:43):
here, check this out. Let'ssee. Just being happy that that's
people. More people want to goto church and read the Bible. Like,
isn't that the whole point ofevangelism? So why not gay people,
too?
Yeah, yeah. I. I do find. Andthis is. This is the last comment
that I don't think is veryunifying, but whatever. I do find

(01:27:07):
that, like, most of thepeople, to me, from my own perspective,
who attacks different.Different ideas so much within Christianity,
to me, it feels like they'rerevealing they don't actually have
that much faith. Right. Like,you think if someone come listen
to Brandon Robertson and hearhim talk about the Bible, they're
not going to hear the Bible.They're going to hear that, you know,
this sinful thing you disagreewith is. Right. I'm like, wait a

(01:27:27):
minute. Didn't the same Bibleyou say near it? Didn't God say that
his word will never come backempty? So, like, shouldn't you just
have faith in the Word? Seemslike you don't. Seems like you only
have faith that peopleagreeing with you. And if they listen
to someone who disagrees withyou, clearly Brandon is way more
powerful than God. So that'sdangerous. Come on, man. That's not
faith. But also, I backtrack alittle bit. If someone ever wants

(01:27:49):
to, you know, accuse me of oneday making out with Brandon in hell,
I'm gonna take it as acompliment that you think someone
like Brandon would, you know,find me attractive. Like, that's
kind of cool. Thanks.
Very nice.
Yeah. Yeah. That being said,yeah, we do like to end every episode,
though, talking. I just don'tthink practical that our listeners
could go do. They'll helpbetter engender Christian unity.
I'll make it Challengingwhat's something they could do on

(01:28:12):
social media, Josh, right nowthat would help better engender Christian
unity rather than drive usfurther apart.
Yeah. Go find somebody thatyou disagree with. Maybe in this
case it's Brandon Robertson,and actually spend time reading.
In this case, if it's Brandon,reading his posts, listening to his

(01:28:35):
videos, from a posture ofseeking understanding. That's it.
You don't have to agree withhim. You don't have to heart everything.
You don't have to comment.Yeah, Amen. Hallelujah. Praise God.
But just go listen. From theposture of seeking understanding
and from the posture of I wantto recognize that Brandon Robertson
is created in the. The imageof God. And so. And then, you know,

(01:28:58):
insert the person you disagreewith. Go try that.
Yeah.
And that goes also for all ofour progressive friends too. Go try
to understand your, I don't.
Know, Christian nationalist neighbor.
Yeah, the crazy Christiannationalist neighbor. Exactly. Something
like that. It's a challengefor us all. Seek understanding.
So if we all approach our. Ourworst enemies, our arch nemeses that.

(01:29:19):
You'Re describing here, Perrythe Platypus. Sorry.
That posture of understanding,what do you think changes?
I think at the very least, ithelps us humanize people and can
give us compassion and alsonot immediately write them off. Like,
one of the things that reallyannoyed me the most about the comments
was that people assumed I wasstupid and, like, didn't read the

(01:29:42):
Bible before, didn't know whattheology was. They didn't take the
time to be like, oh, no. Joshhas been podcasting since 2017. He
served in vocational ministryfor six years. He's a nerd and all
he does is freaking readtheology books because he has a problem.
Yeah, he read more books lastweek than you did in your lifetime.
Like, don't assume thingsabout people. Go seek understanding.

(01:30:03):
And that doesn't mean you haveto agree with them. You can understand
somebody and still think theirviews are deeply harmful and problematic,
but at least you see them as ahuman being. And I think that's the
most important thing is thehumanization aspect, man.
Amen. Hallelujah. OtherPentecostal phrases. Yeah.
Praise the Lord.
So love that.
Before we wrap the show up, welike to do what we call the God moment,

(01:30:26):
which you both know. And ifthis is your first time here, what
is wrong with you? I alwaysmake Josh go first. So, Josh, do
you have a God moment for usthis week?
I always have God momentsevery week. Yeah, man, I knew exactly
what I was gonna say until youasked me. I do this, like, every
week. Right. Like I ought tosay. Then you asked me then, like,

(01:30:48):
what was it? Oh, no. I ampreparing to go to Orcon with Dr.
Tom Ord. I'll see JoshPatterson there. Nerd. And just like
my first time going totheology beer camp, I'm a little
nervous because I'm like, man,I'm probably going to be the most
conservative person in theroom. And for those who don't know,

(01:31:08):
being the most conservative ormost progressive person in the room
to any kind of theologicalconvention, like, this is terrifying.
Always. It's just alwaysscary. And I am confident that they
are going to be loving people,because I know Tom and I know Josh
and I'm like, these are lovingpeople. And yet it's still a little
scary. So I'm just challengedto not be afraid to say what I believe,
but also, you know, trust thatthese people are going to be as loving

(01:31:32):
as I know they're going to beinstead of acting like a fraidy cat.
Yeah, that's my. That's mything. All right.
For me, my God moment thisweek happened today. I was driving
home from work.
Whoa.
I got a phone call from anumber I didn't recognize. You know,
the caller ID popped up asecond later and it sounded like
a made up name. I was like,what is. What is this? And then there

(01:31:56):
was that little part of methat was like, I should probably
answer the phone. And so Idid. And that's how I found out that
I had been listed as someone'spersonal reference for a job they
applied for. Which thank God,because I do know him and he really
does need that job.
He should have told you youwere getting that call.
That probably would havehelped, you know, Maybe so. But God

(01:32:17):
finds a way.
Yeah.
And it's just getting me toanswer that phone anyway.
Yeah.
As much as I, you know, didn'twrite because the name just sounds
made up. It's a law firm.That's one of the ones. It's just
a weird last name.
I feel it.
It's like I looked at it like,this is clearly a scam.
Yeah.
But it wasn't. And I answered.And I was, you know, it would actually

(01:32:39):
be a professional and personalreference, which was cool.
Nice. Yeah.
But I'm glad. I'm thankful.
Yeah.
Both for the opportunity andfor the fact that I actually picked
up the phone. Yeah. So, Josh,do you have. Josh Patterson, do you
have a gun? No, actually, justJosh again. Josh Noel again. No,

(01:33:00):
but Jay, Patty, do you have aGod moment for us? This week?
Yeah, I want to. If it's okay,I'll share two, but I'll be quick.
Sure.
One. So, like, when I was inundergrad, my youth minister professor
really drilled into my headthis idea of the Ministry of presence,
which is just about being withpeople. And I had a friend who was
going through. Going throughit, to say the least. And they were

(01:33:24):
very difficult to convince togo out and do anything. But I finally
was able to convince them,like, hey, come, you know, let's
go sit somewhere, you know,have a beer or two. And so it. They
agreed, and I got to hang outand just kind of be present, not
offer any solutions toproblems. And it just. It was cool
to kind of be in a. You know,to feel trusted by that person enough

(01:33:48):
to, like, go and, you know,have a few glasses of wine and a
couple beers and just kind of,like, enjoy life in the moment for
what it was and let the kindof rest of the things fade away.
So that was helpful for myselfand also hopefully helpful for that
person. So I enjoyed that. Andthen the second thing that's probably
a bit more, I guess, Orthodoxis I gotta have Eucharist with a

(01:34:11):
former student of mine onSunday that I haven't seen since
2019. So they. They drove upwith their fiance and were visiting,
and they were like, hey, Iwant to go to church on Sunday. So
I took them to St. Peter's theEpiscopal Church. It's not like anything
they've experienced, and I gotto have communion with them. And
that was kind of a really coolthing for a variety of reasons. So

(01:34:33):
there you go, all the hatersout there, you know, still hating
on me for this episode. I tookcommunion on Sunday and I didn't
burst into flames.
Get on.
You are what you eat. So he'sJesus now. I'm going to cheat and
do a second one too, becauseit's the one that I meant to do.
Yeah, well, you said Josh itagain. It's your fault. Well, it's

(01:34:55):
because I don't want to do awhole episode of Systematic Ecology.
So I'm just going to mentionfor once in my life, I'm intentionally
playing Kingdom HeartsFragmented Passage on its own. For
those who don't know, thewhole purpose of this game was they
hadn't released anything in awhile and they wanted to stall us
for Kingdom Hearts 3. So itwas just content to stall us. So
it kind of like getsoverlooked as, like, oh, okay, that
was like a little mini game.They were just trying to, like, keep

(01:35:17):
us interested Whatever. Andthis time, like Josh Patchman talks
about how story is important.I was like, I wanted to play this
for the story by itself. And,like, for those who don't know, I'm
just gonna summarize shortly,the story is that I've been throwing
away because all this was justthem trying to satiate us of a person,
a human being stuck in a worldof darkness, completely cut off from

(01:35:37):
all other connection, losingevery memory of her friends. And
the king himself comes to herin darkness and assures her that,
I am coming for you. Eventhough you're lost and feel like
you have lost everything andthat you will never see the light
again, I am coming for you.And the fact that that message is
the one that I was like, meh.And I'm looking at it going, man,
that's actually the wholemessage that I live my life around.

(01:36:00):
And maybe I shouldn't meh.That game. That's all.
That is really funny.
Yeah, it is, isn't it?
That's really cool.
Yeah.
I love it when a Japanese gameis just like, here's the Bible.
Yeah.
It happens a lot, actually. Ithappens a lot.
A weird amount of time.
It's really funny. But if youlisten to this whole episode, congratulations.

(01:36:23):
There should be aconsolidatory prize on its way in
the mail.
Yeah. But just depending onaddress, like, you know, 42 Adventure
Time Way.
Yeah. Well, check your spammailbox. Florida Real Life.
Yeah.
Spam mailbox. You can checkout the merch. It's on the Captivate
store to support the show.It's comfy. It's fun to wear. It's

(01:36:47):
breathable. Super importantfor us Southerners right now.
So true.
So true.
Comfy shirts are the way togo, regardless of what they say,
even if you don't like us. Getit just because it's comfy. That's
what I say.
Yeah. The whole church has air conditioning.
True. Yeah. Also, be sure tocheck out some of the other shows
on the All Podcast network Imentioned, Systematic Ecology. TJ

(01:37:07):
and I are both over there. Wetalked about Crunk's New Groove recently,
so that's cool. And. And Ihave another podcast, Be Living Water.
Check that out. And checkPastor Will Rose out at the homily
if you want to hear some ofhis messages. When I remember to
upload them, that's where theygo. Just when I remember them. So
that's problematic. Yeah.

(01:37:28):
Yeah. If only there was, like,a set thing.
Yeah.
So we hope you enjoyed theshow. Next week, we'll be Talking
with Jonathan MacNay andAnglican authority autism researcher
about his work with faith andthose on the spectrum. After that
we're going to have on Dr.Edward Gravely and Dr. Peter Link
about their book Bible 101.Then it's usually there's more there.

(01:37:49):
Then we'll have anotherroundtable discussion, this time
going over how churches canbest disciple people in a time where
church members spend more timewith news and media than they do
in the church. Then we'regoing to be talking to Brian Wrecker
about his book Hell Bent andhow doctrines about hell may be harmful.
Finally at the end of seasonone, Francis Chan will be on the
show to close us out.

(01:38:09):
Perhaps he doesn't knowprobably forever.
So at this point, yeah, yeah.
I mean if he shows up, that.
Is, if he shows up.
Yeah, you guys gotta invitehim. We're not going to.

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