September 21, 2025 • 66 mins
Amy returns to United States of PTSD to complete her powerful story of surviving clergy sexual abuse and the long, winding path to healing through religious deconstruction.
Following her abuse at age 15, Amy faced institutional gaslighting from the Catholic Church. Officials questioned what she "did to seduce" the priest and sent her parents a deliberately vague letter with double negatives that absolved them of responsibility. When they finally agreed to pay for therapy, they insisted on church-approved therapists—a dangerous conflict of interest that led to confidentiality breaches and further trauma.
The psychological damage of religious trauma compounded Amy's suffering for years. Growing up in purity culture, where virginity determined a woman's worth but consent was never discussed, left her feeling irreparably damaged after the assault. "If you're not a virgin when you get married, you're worthless," she explains. This toxic message, combined with being labeled as "trouble" by church authorities, fueled years of self-destruction and self-hatred.
Amy's deconstruction began slowly with questioning the institution rather than God. Watching "Spotlight," the film about clergy abuse in Boston, proved pivotal when she unexpectedly saw her abuser's name on screen. This public validation helped her redirect internalized shame toward its rightful target—the church that enabled her abuse. Years later, a confrontation with Cardinal Sean O'Malley, who showed no emotion as she sobbed about her trauma, cemented her disillusionment.
For those navigating similar journeys, Amy offers compassionate guidance: connect with others who've deconstructed, recognize the parallels between religious control tactics and cult behaviors, and honor your own timeline. "A big part of it is regaining your autonomy," she emphasizes, "allowing yourself to ask questions but also to take it as slow as you need to."
Have you experienced religious trauma or questioning your faith? We'd love to hear your story. Reach out to share your journey or find resources for healing.
The Keepers Documentary: What Happened in Cathy Cesnik Murder Case? - Netflix Tudum (we do not support Netflix)
BITE Model of Authoritarian Control - Freedom of Mind Resource Center
(188) Cults to Consciousness - YouTube
Home - BishopAccountability.org
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Matt@unitedstatesofPTSD.com
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:15):
This podcast is not intended to serve as therapeutic
advice or to replace anyprofessional treatment.
These opinions belong to us anddo not reflect any company or
agency.
Speaker 2 (00:27):
Hello everybody and welcome back to another episode
of the United States of PTSD.
Today we are privileged to haveAmy back and we are going to do
a part two to Amy's story.
Amy, welcome back.
Speaker 1 (00:37):
Thank you so much for having me.
Speaker 2 (00:39):
Absolutely a pleasure we're going to.
I know you wanted to fill insome gaps on the story before we
get to how you went through thedeconstruction process, so I'm
just going to give you the floorto talk about that part and
then we'll take over after that.
Speaker 1 (00:54):
Yeah, thank you.
I wanted to fill in these gapsbecause I think it would add
context to my deconstructionprocess.
So one thing I didn't reallytalk about in the last episode
was how everything came to anend with the archdiocese and the
district attorney's office,with my perpetrator.
So I did end up talking to theDA and I decided that I wasn't
(01:20):
like emotionally, like in anykind of place to go forward with
pressing charges.
I actually don't think I couldeven do that today at 40.
It just it.
It takes a lot and I have a lotof respect for survivors who do
do that, because I know it'snot easy.
Speaker 2 (01:38):
Would you mind talking about that process a
little bit, cause you had saidyou don't know that you'd be
able to do it now.
And can you?
Because for people who arelistening I know people
understand that it's difficultbut I don't necessarily know
that everybody gets it.
Speaker 1 (01:54):
So maybe if you explain a little bit, if you
don't mind a little bit aboutthat process, yeah, I mean for
me at least it was for for thenI was, I was 15, so I I really
just wanted to be a normalteenager and hang out with my
friends and I didn't want to betalking about this anymore.
For, like for now, at my agethat I am now, I am still
(02:15):
intimidated by the church'sattorneys.
They are notoriously reallyvicious towards victims.
From stories I've heard fromother survivors who have gone
through that process, I'd liketo think that I have a thicker
skin and I could handle it, butI do think that it would
destabilize me and so it's moreme trying to self-protect.
(02:35):
I think it would be difficultto talk in detail about what
happened, to be grilled byattorneys calling me a liar, and
to be grilled by attorneyscalling me a liar, to kind of
like be put back in thatsituation that I was in when I
was 15, when I was being paintedas this troubled girl.
I think it would bring up a lotthat I haven't not that I
haven't fully processed it.
I just don't think I want toput myself in that situation,
(02:59):
and that's also part of metaking my power back.
Speaker 2 (03:03):
Thank you for sharing that, amy, and that makes sense
.
I know when I I don't think it'sisolated to the church either.
When I, before I, became asocial worker, one of the
volunteer jobs I had was workingfor what is now called oh my
God, I can't remember the nameof it now Day One, but it used
to be the Sexual Assault TraumaResource Center in Rhode Island,
and when I went for thetraining it was odd because I
(03:25):
think I was actually the firstmale that ever went through the
training it was all women.
I was a victim advocate, so wewould go out to the hospitals
and talk to people who had beensexually assaulted, and I
remember during the trainingthey had told us the way the
police interviewed victims backthen this was in the early
nineties was to get the victimto admit that they were lying
and intentionally focus ontrying to disprove them.
(03:46):
And the rationale behind it assick as it is was that their
belief was that if they couldwithstand that then they would
not back out of going to court.
I mean, obviously the wholething is absurd, but that's what
happened and I don't know thatit's that much better.
I think maybe we've justshifted the way we do it, but it
certainly is something thathappens outside of the church as
(04:07):
well.
Speaker 1 (04:10):
Yeah, that's horrifying, but I believe it.
I mean, that's something thatwe see, that happens, that we've
heard those stories before.
So, yeah, I actually don'tthink it's changed much and I
know for certain the church'sattorneys haven't changed their
methodology.
So, like I had said in theprevious episode, I'm involved
(04:31):
with SNAP, which is theSurvivors Network of those
abused by priests.
So I've gone to a lot ofsupport groups and I just want
to point out that the averageage that a victim of childhood
sexual abuse usually first tellssomebody is, I think, 52.
That's just them tellingsomeone.
That's not an age where theyfeel like they can go and press
(04:52):
charges.
I've sat in support groups withpeople in their 80s like sobbing
, telling the story about theirabuse when they were a child
with their priest, and some ofthese people are looking to get
justice and they are filingcivil suits against the church.
But it's sad because there havebeen survivors who have died
(05:14):
before they got to have that dayin court that they sought after
.
But again, I think it is adeliberate thing.
Like this, abuse is so shamefuland the predators kind of paint
it this way that it makes it soshameful that victims don't
want to come forward and talkabout it.
It's very deliberate.
It really serves the predatorand certainly doesn't do
(05:36):
anything for the survivors.
Speaker 2 (05:38):
Is there when I think about one of the tropes that we
hear, for when people aretrying to discredit survivors of
a sexual assault, they'll oftenblame them and say things like
you know, oh, it's because ofwhat they were wearing, or it
was because of you know theywere leading me on.
Is there a trope in the church?
Is there something that theysay to the victims about what
happened, like how they blamethem specifically or no?
Speaker 1 (06:01):
It's.
It is, um, the that whole thingwhere I was asked you know,
what did he do to seduce you?
I think that that is a commonquestion that is asked.
It's because priests are viewedas these, like really holy
people that are separate fromthe parishioners, like the
congregation, um, that I thinksome people can't wrap their
(06:22):
heads around the fact that theymight be bad people, they might
be predators, and often theexcuse that I hear is that, oh
well, they were just strugglingwith demons or like that's the
devil working in him and we needto pray for him.
And you know, it's or it's thatthe victim actually seduced
(06:44):
this priest, like they wouldn'thave done it if it weren't for
this victim seducing them.
Speaker 2 (06:50):
Would they then turn that into the narrative that the
victim was somehow possessed ordoing devil's work to try to
seduce the priest?
Is it that insidious, or is it?
Speaker 1 (07:01):
I've never really heard it go that far in that
narrative, but that's not to saythat it hasn't because I could
totally see it going that way.
Speaker 2 (07:07):
That's why I was asking yeah, it's more.
Speaker 1 (07:09):
I feel like it's more in line with that purity
culture that it's women, um,specifically that control, like
men's sexual desire, that likewe're like the gatekeepers to
their sexuality, and so I thinkI got blamed because I'm a girl.
I don't, I don't know that.
I've heard that narrative asmuch from male survivors, and
(07:30):
there are plenty.
The narrative that I often hearthat they say is that it that
they committed a sin.
Still, it's yes, they did that,like that, this happened to
them, but it was actually theirfault that it happened.
Speaker 2 (07:43):
I mean, it's the same thing, same same narrative,
different, different outfit it'sthe same thing, yeah, so thank
you for so.
So then, what happened once youdid go forward?
Speaker 1 (07:56):
So I never.
I I didn't ever like presscharges.
I that wasn't something that Icould deal with.
The, the, the archdiocese.
After they finished their likeinvestigation, if you want to
call it that, they sent myparents a letter saying that
they could not discern that thisevent did not happen, something
(08:17):
along that line.
They had a double negative inthere, so it was very odd.
Um, they said they weren'tgoing to take any further action
against this priest and thatthey would pay for my therapy
for six months.
My parents had attorneys atthat point and they were like
that's not good enough, and youwill pay for both her and her
(08:37):
family's therapy for as long asthey need, and that's.
They settled on that and thatwas kind of where it was.
I went on with my life.
I did go to therapy.
The caveat to that was thatinitially I had to go to a
therapist that was approved bythe diocese, which, if, if you
(08:58):
are a survivor of abuse fromsomeone in the catholic church
or really any church, my liketwo big pieces of advice to you
would be one, if you feel likeyou can, if you want to report
it and you're in a place whereyou feel like you can.
Do not report it to your church.
Go to proper authorities.
And then that other advicewould be if the church offers
(09:19):
you free therapy and they'resaying, hey, we have this
support group for survivors orwe have this therapist we
recommend, do not go see thosepeople Talk about conflict of
interest.
Right.
It's also a way for them tocontrol the narrative, I feel
like it's still them kind ofdoing that mind control and
(09:40):
doing that victim blaming, so ahundred percent, it's it, it's.
Speaker 2 (09:43):
It's insidious too, because you would imagine that
the people that they're hiringare certainly working to push
that agenda and are going tomanipulate their work with
clients, and that's disgustingon so many levels and the
archdiocese because they'repaying for the services they do
(10:04):
ask for, like reports.
Speaker 1 (10:08):
I don't know how much like the.
I'm sure the therapists whowere like recommended by them
provided tons of information.
The therapists I saw later thatwere not affiliated with them,
they were very vague and theirresponse is probably similar to
what you would send to aninsurance company.
But the first therapist I sawlike I feel like as a social
worker you're going to like likethis is horrifying just because
(10:31):
of ethics.
It was a husband and wife teamand my mom saw the husband and I
saw the wife but I didn't knowthey were married.
Like that was never disclosedto me and my mom would somehow
make references to like thingsthat I was saying in therapy and
apparently my therapist wastelling her husband everything I
(10:51):
was saying.
Who was then telling my mom wholike so unethical oh my god.
Speaker 2 (10:59):
Well, not only is it unethical, but it's a breach of
confidentiality which is illegal.
So, so that's, that's.
That's horrifying.
Speaker 1 (11:07):
It is horrifying, yeah, and you know I.
What's funny is I went tosomebody else eventually, but
not because of that, it wasn'tmy choice.
That therapist that I wasseeing was basically like I
don't know how to help you and Iguess credit to her for like
being realizing I'm beyond thescope of her like experience,
but it was.
(11:27):
It was hard to hear that as ateenager you know I have.
Speaker 2 (11:31):
I have to say I have mixed feelings about that.
I agree with you.
I think good for good forsomebody for saying, okay, this
might be a little bit outside ofmy wheelhouse.
However, I also think there'sthe implied message of you're
too sick for me, yeah, and Idon't think that that's a
healthy message at all.
I mean, in terms of our code ofethics, there is a
responsibility to continue toeducate yourself about what's
(11:53):
happening, and I would think adifferent route to that would be
then to either pay forsupervision from somebody who is
going to give you a little bitmore information or to learn
about it, but not to be like,hey, you're too sick, see you
later.
Like I don't know, I'm not, I'mnot sold on that.
Speaker 1 (12:10):
Yeah, yeah, I mean, and it was hurtful, it
definitely I was internalizing alot of stuff that I had been
told, that had been said aboutme that you know I was trouble
Now I'm like too much for mytherapist.
You know I was trouble Now I'mlike too much for my therapist
and I internalized so much ofthat and it really festered into
this like really badself-hatred and you know, I kind
(12:31):
of went down this real, like Isaid in the first episode, this
really self-destructive path andI think in a way it was like I
felt so defeated in that like Iwas never going to be good
enough and I was never going tobe able to be the person that
like I wanted to be that goodCatholic girl that I really
(12:52):
leaned heavily into this labelthat had been put on me and so I
went.
You know, fine, if you thinkI'm trouble, I can be trouble.
Like you think I'm a whore thatseduces priests, I can be a
whore that seduces priest, I canbe a whore, and I just I acted
out like really recklessly, um,like engaged in a lot of
reckless sexual behavior, whichis common for, you know,
(13:14):
survivors, I I think that,specifically if you grow up in
purity culture, where this likehigh emphasis is on your
virginity and like how importantthat is to like your worth as a
person, that they don't talkabout consent though, so they
don't distinguish, like yeah,but if you're raped, like that's
(13:34):
not your fault, don't worryabout it, it's just no, if you
are not a virgin, like when youget married, then you're
worthless, it's, it's that.
And I think a lot of people whogrow up in that culture and do
experience a sexual assault,they do tend to kind of go well,
I guess it doesn't matter, Iguess I should just have at it,
(13:54):
right, just sleep with whoever,because what does it even matter
anymore?
The other piece of that is thisfeeling of taking back control
a little bit of your sexualityand your bodily autonomy, like,
well, okay, if I'm going to dothat, at least like it's going
to be my choice to do that.
I mean, it's not what ends uphappening is you end up putting
(14:16):
yourself in really riskysituations or you end up in
really risky situations.
I don't want to like put like ablaming tone to that end up in
really risky situations.
I don't want to like put like ablaming tone to that, um, where
you do experience andexperiencing more sexual
assaults and um, it's just, it'sa real vicious cycle.
But like what's deep down inthat is like your self worth
(14:37):
that you're just.
You don't feel like you're evenworth protecting.
Speaker 2 (14:44):
There's a lot there that I want to respond to Okay.
Speaker 1 (14:47):
That's why I stopped.
Speaker 2 (14:49):
I was.
You know I try not to interruptpeople when they're talking.
Yeah, first of all, I want tosay that it's really brave of
you to talk about it, andeverything that you went through
was it took a lot of courage,particularly at the time this
was happening, and a lot ofstrength to go through with what
you did, to say like okay, Ineed to talk about this.
(15:10):
There's also a part of it that,even though we have, because
any coping skill can be bothtoxic and healthy right, so if
you are, you have a really toughday at work and you go home and
you have a glass of wine butyou don't have a problem with
alcohol's a coping skill andit's an okay coping skill.
But then if you become, if youhave a alcohol problem, that's
not an okay coping skill.
(15:30):
And when I hear you say therewas a part of you that said,
well, if this is what I'm beinglabeled as, that I'm just going
to own it, there's a part ofthat.
That's also empowerment by justsaying like, okay, then I'm
going to take back control andI'm going to say like, okay,
this belongs to me now and Ithat.
I think that that process ishealthy.
But, like I had said, with thealcoholism, I think it then
turns into something that'sunhealthy, right, but what you
(15:52):
talk about is incredibly normaland I think anybody who is
hearing this, that has all beenthrough something similar, can
understand that there is anormalcy to taking back that
power and saying like, okay, nowI'm going to use it.
The other interesting thing is,as you were talking about the,
the amount of importance we puton virginity.
(16:12):
It made me remember when I was,when I was going through
college, my partner at the timehe was an art and like English
major and I remember he did areport on the etymology, the
historic etymology, of where theword virgin came from and,
interestingly enough, itactually meant unmarried.
Speaker 1 (16:29):
Oh, wow.
Speaker 2 (16:29):
It actually wasn't connected to chastity until much
later.
So that and I, if I remembercorrectly, don't quote me on
this, but I cause this was like30 years ago when he told me
this, but I remember him sayingthat when the, when, the, when,
(16:50):
the time the bible was written,it actually meant unwed, it
didn't mean virginal, and thatthat has changed over the you
know, the centuries.
Speaker 1 (16:54):
So that's an also interesting, just kind of side
note to that yeah, definitelyit's the obsession with like
sexual, like sex in general in alot of religion.
Um, it's, it's wild, like it'sthere's.
Speaker 2 (17:10):
They're so sexually repressed but they're also so
obsessed with sex like they'reso obsessed with it which is why
I'm sure you've heard about howthere's a connection between
the app grinder crashing whenthere's Republican conventions
going on.
Because because of how manyoppressed gay men are within the
(17:30):
Republican party and like,obsessed with, like gay culture
because of that, because they'renot out.
Speaker 1 (17:36):
Absolutely that, and that's kind of where I was going
with that.
Is that to to be that likeobsessive, it's, it's it feels
very much like projection andit's just like go to therapy,
please.
Um, it impacts your, yourrelationships, though.
I mean it definitely makes itdifficult to like like to have a
(17:58):
healthy, just romanticrelationship with somebody I
would imagine, because it's veryloaded, like everything about
it is a loaded conversation.
Speaker 2 (18:08):
How did you so you went through that that?
How did you deprogram themessages that were given to you
about your beliefs once you came?
Once you did talk about it Like, how did you take the next step
?
Speaker 1 (18:21):
Yeah, Um.
So I just want to like explainhow I got from a to z.
Yeah, just in between that,because I don't want to like
just brush it off as if like, ohyeah, I self-destructed for 15
years and then I deconstructedum, because that was a really
horrendous time um, of justreally struggling with life in
(18:46):
general around.
Um.
I think I was 26 and myperpetrator died and I um can I
ask how you found out, was it?
Like newspaper.
Speaker 2 (18:58):
Did somebody contact you?
Speaker 1 (19:00):
It was in the newspaper, my mother had it on
the kitchen table like circled,like his obituary circled, um.
My mother made questionabledecisions in terms of how she
handled like my trauma, um, andlike that's how I found out, and
I kind of was left to deal withthat on my own, like we didn't
(19:21):
have a conversation or anything,but that's that's how I found
out.
Um, I went, I reverted back tolike this little, like eight
year old me that was liketerrified of demon possession in
that time and I was terrifiedthat this person was haunting me
now and like, instead of ademon, it was him that was
(19:45):
possessing me, and not in theway that a devil possesses you,
but in that he had possessionover me and he owned me, which
also made it really difficult tohave any kind of relationship
with really anyone.
So I ended up being verydissociative during those 15
(20:06):
years between when I left thechurch and when I eventually
deconstructed.
And then I really struggledwith drinking and I used
drinking to cope.
And when I got to a point whereI wasn't drinking to escape
anymore and I was drinking tonot be sick because I was very
physically dependent on it, Um,that's when I realized I needed
(20:27):
help and I went into rehab andyou know that's not a one and
done thing I went, you know, inand out a few times and once I
had eventually gotten sober fora good year, um, that's when I
really started processing likewhere is this like self hatred
coming from?
I started processing that withmy therapist more.
(20:49):
Yeah, so I don't think there'slike one point where people like
just deconstruct.
I think it's a lot of likechips away at like this thing
that you've built your faith.
And I definitely had somethings happen in my teens and
that made me question, but likeI had just kind of pushed it out
(21:11):
of my mind.
So but I do think like this wasbuilding when, um, around the
time that I was like workingthrough some of my trauma, I got
a letter from the archdiocesesaying that hey, there's just
letting survivors know thatthere's going to be this movie
coming out, Um, that's going totalk about what happened in the
(21:33):
Archdiocese of Boston and thatit might be triggering and so
maybe like, don't go watch it.
Like really shrewd, and I wishmy reaction to that was like, oh
no, I'm definitely going to seethat.
Speaker 2 (21:47):
That was by design.
Obviously, they don't want youwatching it, because that's
going to make people rememberthings and then maybe go back
after the church.
Speaker 1 (22:08):
That was certainly not to protect you or any other
actually looked that up becauseI was trying to find that out.
I think it ran for like sixmonths like in the theaters, and
this wasn't like a bighollywood movie, it was, you
know do you happen to rememberthe name of that so I can?
I'm sorry.
Yeah, it's spotlight spotlight.
Okay, thank you yeah, becausethat was the name of the team of
(22:28):
events investigativejournalists that like uncovered
like what was happening.
It's a good movie.
I I suggest people to watch it.
It is really well done.
Um, I went to go see it in thetheaters and the theater was
packed, like this had been outfor two months and it was packed
.
And, um, there was a scene inthe film where they were doing
(22:49):
like a montage of like they hadalready gotten all the all the
files and there was like amontage piece where they were
like circling the files andthere was like a montage piece
where they were like circlingthe files and going through it.
You know they do that in movies.
And there was this one framethat had like a piece of paper
with all these like priest namesand my priest, like the priest
that abused me, his name was onthe screen and that was like
(23:12):
like holy shit, like I I wasn'texpecting that wow yeah how did
you react?
you remember how you reacted inthat moment I had a friend with
me, um, and she actually grabbedmy arm when it happened.
She was like, are you okay?
And I'm like, yeah, holy crap,I.
I did like feel like I was kindof gonna have a like a little
(23:34):
bit of an anxiety attack, like Ilike I got short of breath and
yeah, it was.
It was alarming, I wasn'texpecting it, but you know, it
was just his name, that's okay.
Um, when the movie ends, theybasically have a list of all the
priests who had been accusedscrolling, and it's goes on for
(23:56):
a very long time, um, and thenthe credits roll and the entire
theater was silent, like no onewas talking, and everyone just
got up and left, very likesolemnly.
And it was a really powerfulexperience for me because I felt
like I had just watched like mystory even though it wasn't my
(24:18):
story is so many people's story.
But to watch it like on the bigscreen with all these strangers
, and to just see that reaction,like how it affected them, I
felt so validated, you knowthat's a powerful feeling to
have yeah yeah, and I think thatwas like my first starting to
(24:40):
turn that self-hatred back tolike where it belonged, which is
this institution that allowedthis to happen, and I think my
deconstructed it.
It didn't start with I don'tknow if I believe in god anymore
.
It started with like I don'tknow if I believe in God anymore
.
It started with like I don'tbelieve in this institution, I
don't believe in the CatholicChurch anymore.
(25:01):
It was more that.
Speaker 2 (25:06):
It's almost when you were talking about the process
of it.
Do you know, jenga, right?
The game Jenga?
If you think about building themountain, the first mountain,
whatever the tower, the firsttime, that would be the
construction of the beliefsystem to begin with.
So it didn't happen with one.
I mean, it happened over thecourse of like years for it to
(25:27):
get there.
And then when we deconstructstuff, it's like you're pulling
out the little pieces slowly andsometimes the tower falls
immediately, and sometimes youcan pull out the little pieces
slowly and sometimes the towerfalls immediately, and sometimes
you can pull out 50 of thosethings before the tower falls.
And I think it's very differentfor everybody.
Speaker 1 (25:42):
so I'm glad you you had highlighted that point yeah,
that's a really great ummetaphor for that, because that
is exactly what happens andthere might be one, just one
block that you pull out.
That's like that sends thatwhole thing crashing down, and
that moment is verydestabilizing.
Speaker 2 (26:03):
I bet, I bet, and I would imagine it can also be
again.
Having played, I'm sure you'veplayed that game too right.
There's sometimes when you pullout a piece that you think it's
just going to slide out reallyeasy and it's the like, the most
destabilizing piece you canpull out and I would imagine
again really similar, like youcan have an experience and think
, oh, this is no big deal, andthen bam, it's like breast
(26:25):
shattering.
Speaker 1 (26:26):
Yeah, and sometimes you don't notice it right away
either.
It's.
It's like, yeah, like you don'trealize how much of an impact
it had on you, until later, whenyou're reassessing it and
you're like, oh, that was, thatwas impactful.
I didn't like it took me alittle bit to get to that point
where, like everything camecrashing down.
I, after seeing this movie,like I was really just angry.
(26:52):
I had a lot of anger and I hada lot of questions and I had a
lot that I wanted to directtowards the church.
And when Sean O'Malley firstbecame Cardinal, when he took
over for Cardinal Law, he hadextended like an invitation to
all survivors that if theywanted to come and talk with him
they could.
And I this was like many yearslater that I was like, actually,
(27:14):
you know what?
I think I want to take him upon that and I want to talk to
him.
And so I reached out to likekind of my contact person at the
archdiocese who helped me, whopaid all the therapy, like took
care of all that stuff, and Isaid I would like to talk to him
and she gave me a littlepushback Like she, she kind of
(27:36):
tried to like keep me at bay andI was pretty forceful and they
set up a meeting.
My therapist came with me andI'm really glad he did, because
he was a witness to whathappened, so at least, like I
had somebody in my corner thatyou know, that could like back
me up.
So I went and I met with theCardinal and I hadn't prepared,
like what I was going to say tohim.
(27:57):
I thought like I just, Ithought I knew what I wanted to
say and when I got in there Iwould just say it.
And, um, so I get to the, tothe archdiocese, and the woman
who set up the meeting she goesokay, I have two things One,
like I have to sit in there withyou guys because we need a
witness, like he needs somebodyelse there, basically to protect
them, you know.
And she's like and two, youcannot bring up money.
(28:20):
If you bring up money, thisconversation is getting shut
down.
And I was so offended I waslike are you kidding me right
now?
Like that is the last thingthat I'm here for.
And so she was like okay, andwe went and we met with him and
I lost it.
I just started sobbing likecrying more than I had ever
(28:44):
cried before about my trauma.
Like it all just came to thesurface and even my therapist
was like kind of taken abackbecause I don't think he had
seen me cry yet.
Like that's how much I had beenkeeping this inside.
And he started crying.
And I'm looking at CardinalSean and I'm looking at this
(29:04):
woman and they have these likejust not even stoic, but like
emotionless faces, like nothing,no, not even like annoyance,
like just nothing.
And the more they looked at melike that, I just started
screaming at them, like like doyou understand?
(29:24):
Like like you're not listeningto me, and I left that meeting
feeling so like pissed off,that's one thing, but just so
like pissed off, that's onething, but just so like unheard.
And I had brought up money.
But I didn't bring it up to belike, hey, like you guys, I want
(29:46):
money.
I brought it up to basicallytry to like demonstrate to them
that this really ruined my life.
I haven't been able.
I didn't.
I flunked out of college.
I wasn't able to hold down agood job.
I was still living with myparents.
I was like 31.
I was a mess and I had allthese medical bills that were
(30:09):
building up because I had a lotof suicide attempts under my
belt and one of them sent me tothe ICU and I was in the
hospital for three weeks and Ihad these bills and I was just
like, so, like, and now I haveto worry about this.
But I didn't say it with anyexpectation that, like, I wanted
them to pay it.
But when we left, the womancame running out after me and
she said oh, cardinal Sean saidto send us those bills and we'll
(30:31):
take care of it.
And I just looked at her like Idon't care, I don't care, like
you are not hearing me at all,like I don't give a fuck about
the money Excuse my French, Idon't.
And I still sent her the bills,good for you and the.
Speaker 2 (30:51):
the ironic thing is these are the people that are
supposed to be the morally, themoral high ground.
People, right, the people whoare preaching about compassion
and empathy and values.
And here they are, being stoic,unconcerned, cold.
It's the hypocrisy of how wetwist things in our culture, in
(31:12):
our society.
Speaker 1 (31:13):
Religion is a great proponent of this twist things
in our culture, in our society.
Religion's a great proponent ofthis.
Yes, absolutely, it's soinfuriating, um, so that
happened.
That was definitely that justkind of fed into this.
Like it really solidified forme that, oh, these people don't
care, they're all they're afteris protecting, like their
reputation and their assets.
(31:34):
That's it.
And that's when I really gotlike angry and I started
deconstructing what I had beentaught specifically by the
Catholic church, like theirspecific teachings, and that's
how that that started, cause Icould no longer hold them, like
you said, as the moral authority.
(31:54):
I'm like these people arecriminals and I can't, like I
don't believe what they've toldme anymore.
I really they've already lied.
Like what else have they liedabout?
And, um, when you start doingthat it's it's hard because if
you grow up in a really highcontrol, religion it's so much
of your identity.
It's like I am Catholic, it'snot.
(32:23):
Oh, I practice Catholicism, Iam Catholic, and I had to like
literally figure out all likelife's existential questions
that religion tends to answerfor people, and I think that's
why people are maybe drawn to it, because it's why are we here?
How did we get here?
What happens to us when we die,like all of those real
existential questions, I had tostart from scratch and I didn't
(32:46):
know anymore, and that is anincredibly destabilizing place
to be in your head, and it'salso the other piece of that is
well, who am I, you know?
What do I even?
What do I even want in thisworld?
What do I even believe?
What do I understand is rightor wrong?
It's a real process and I thinkwhat happens sometimes is that,
(33:07):
because it's so destabilizing,people can often hop from one
high control religious group andgo right to another one, right
to some other cult.
Speaker 2 (33:18):
Or go into an abusive relationship, because there's
so much parallel between theabuse of a church, the abuse of
an institution, the abuse ofsociety and the abuse of
relationships and I wouldimagine that would be an easy
jump from one to the other.
Speaker 1 (33:33):
Yeah, because in these groups it normalizes that.
It.
I mean, even just if you lookat, you know the Christian
relationship with God and I'mnot I'm being broad here, but I
mean if you look at the 10commandments, even it's like
don't, don't worship anyone butme, don't take my name in vain,
(33:54):
like make sure you get to church.
It all has to do with this,this like kind of feeding God's
ego.
Speaker 2 (34:01):
The ultimate narcissism.
I think we could say that right, it's incredibly narcissistic,
everything about it.
If you don't pay attention tome, I will punish you.
You know I'm the answer toeverything, and if you don't
agree with me, I'll punish you.
You know it's.
It's just, it's, it's insidious, it's the original, it's like
one of the most original abusiverelationships.
Speaker 1 (34:21):
Yes, and I, yeah, I love that.
You said that he is anarcissist and I think what
happens is because it's it's Godlike that's considered holy.
It's not just like, oh, likethis is fine.
We like that's considered holy,it's not just like, oh, like
this is fine.
We're normalizing it, it'swe're idolizing it.
So I think people might bedrawn to other people who
(34:44):
demonstrate narcissisticbehaviors.
Speaker 2 (34:47):
It's like that, wow, that's a person's really godly,
you know and then, to bring thata little bit further, if you
look at the um christianevangelicals and who they vote
for, uh it's just the epitome ofnarcissistic, controlling,
oppressive, you know um,xenophobic, like everything you
could possibly add to it, whichwould then reflect the values of
(35:10):
what they're learning in theirreligious institution.
Speaker 1 (35:13):
Yeah, exactly.
Speaker 2 (35:16):
What would you and thank you again for sharing that
, amy, and how difficult it isto kind of go through that
process what would you tellsomebody that might be in your
shoes, that might be, or backthen somebody who might be
questioning, somebody who mighthave these experiences, but
they're so ingrained in thesystem they can't get out?
Speaker 1 (35:36):
Yeah, if they're so ingrained in the system they
can't get out.
Yeah, if they're alreadyquestioning and maybe there's
some separation at least fromthat community.
Because you have to be careful,because in some of these groups
they control so much of yourlife that you could even you
know not really have access toyour finances, so you might not
even be able to get away.
(35:57):
But I think, once there's beena little bit of a separation and
you're willing to start peelingback the layers and really
looking at your belief system,one thing I found really helpful
was listening to other peoplewho've deconstructed, who've
(36:20):
deconstructed Um, and becausethey've gone through it, they
might be able to articulatefeelings that you have that you
don't understand why you havethem, and like put words to it.
Cause that's one thing thathelped me a lot was listening to
other people and going, oh, my,like, yeah, that makes sense.
That's exactly how I feel andthat's exactly what I
experienced, but I just didn'thave a way of like articulating
it before.
Speaker 2 (36:40):
Normalizing it.
Building community hearing thesame story from other people and
that snap website that youtalked about.
That would be a place wherepeople could go to find that
type of connection.
Speaker 1 (36:53):
That would be a good place to go.
Um, I think if you'veexperienced specifically like
sexual abuse in under theumbrella of like a religious
organization doesn't matter whatreligion to deal with that
aspect of it more.
I there's a really good podcastI listen to called cults to
consciousness, and um it, um.
(37:14):
It's on a pod.
It's also a YouTube channel soyou can check that out too.
But she's a deconstructedMormon and she interviews other
people who either grew up inlike actual cults or who grew up
in more mainstream religionsbut that were high control and,
um, I've listened to so manydifferent stories of people
(37:36):
who've grown up in so manydifferent like sects of
Christianity or um, or like incults that there's such a
parallel that runs through allof it and that is control, like
that's.
That's the biggest piece of it.
Um, stephen Hassan, I think hisname is, he's like a cult expert
(37:58):
and he came up with the BITEmodel, which is like kind of a
way to look at cults and it's anacronym for behavior,
information, thought and emotion, and so it's looking at
breaking up those things andlooking at how the organization
controls your behavior, how itcontrols your information and it
(38:19):
creates like your, it thinksfor you and it has certain rules
around emotion and what'sappropriate feelings and you
know, like I talked aboutdampening out my intuition, like
that kind of stuff, and sothere are all these pieces from
that bite model that you can seein everything from like
(38:40):
mainstream Catholicism, like Igrew up in, to like children of
God, like that cult.
So it's interesting but I thinkit's helpful to hear.
Speaker 2 (38:53):
There's a lot of parallel between what you're
talking about then and what'shappening now in terms of being
told what to think and how tothink and to question your own
sanity and your own reality.
We are at a point in societynow where we can watch something
play out right in front of usand somebody can then convince
(39:15):
people it didn't happen.
I mean, we've seen that playout over and over and over again
, I would say probably for thelast like 10 years, and it's
just getting worse.
With like ai now and the use ofai, people are getting less and
less able to think forthemselves and more dependent on
somebody to tell them what todo, which is the worst possible
(39:36):
thing we could be doing rightnow.
Speaker 1 (39:39):
I know it's terrifying and I think, also
having like this piece ofinformation, that I've been just
kind of, I think, spent thelast like five or six years just
really delving into all thesedifferent types of communities
and ways of thinking and how itdoes parallel to what's
happening today, um, politically, it it's been very scary to
(40:04):
watch it all unfold because thishas been the plan for a very
long time.
This didn't just start withtrump.
He was just the vehicle used toget what they want, but what's
happening right now has been inthe works for decades and a lot
of these the youth programs likeLife Teen that I attended, like
(40:25):
there are definitely other onesthat are a lot more, a lot more
fundamentalist and a lot moreChristian nationalist driven
that they've groomed teenagersto be literal warriors for
Christ, to be Christian martyrs.
That's very scary because it isnot a big jump from convincing
(40:46):
teenagers and getting theseyoung kids to agree that they
are willing to die for theirfaith.
It's not a big jump from thatto suicide bombings and I think
we need to be realistic about it.
Speaker 2 (41:02):
I'm glad you said that.
I mean, let's face it, how manyof the school shooters and what
we would call terrorists inthis country fit the same
demographic image?
And it's not people from themiddle east and it's not drag
queens, right, it is.
It is people who are whitemales, who often identify with
some sort of oppressivereligious group and often are
(41:24):
within like right-leaning sides.
Right, not to say it doesn'thappen on the left, because I,
but it's certainly moreprevalent on the right.
And I'm glad you said that,because Trump is not the problem
.
I agree with you on this.
I mean, he is the symptom andI've been, I've been saying this
for a long time.
I mean this, this has been.
We are all being groomed indifferent ways, which is why
(41:45):
they're trying to really editand get rid of social media so
much because we can actually nowsee for our own eyes the stuff
that they have been telling usis not true.
And I mean I don't know if Imentioned it when on the oh, I
actually should have said thisat the beginning.
I was telling amy that eric andI had actually recorded two
episodes in between the time wespoke to amy then and now.
(42:06):
But we wanted to record.
We wanted to release theepisodes in sequence, so I might
say stuff today that is goingto appear later on.
And then next to, we did talkabout what happened with Charlie
Kirk and we talked about aninterview that Erica had with
somebody in Gaza.
Those will be out in the nextnext two weeks or three weeks or
so.
(42:26):
I forgot where I was going withthat.
Oh, so what I?
What I had said was that I hadsent a friend of mine a message,
a private message, on Tik TOK,and it was flagged A private
message, and the messagebasically said something about
the kids starving in Gaza and itwas flagged.
I had to screenshot the messageto send it through, because it
wouldn't let me send it, and Ithought, okay, we've hit a new
(42:50):
level now that they'remonitoring private messages, and
it wasn't anything that shouldhave been flagged.
And then I reposted a videoabout some kids that were being
starved in Gaza and I got myfirst warning on TikTok and it
was taken down.
So they are certainly crackingdown on people giving out
accurate information.
That does not fit the narrativethat they want and it's very
(43:12):
concerning about where this isheading yeah, it's escalated a
lot, I think, in the last twoweeks.
Speaker 1 (43:20):
I I know it's always kind of been there, but I do
feel I'm feeling that more inthe last two weeks.
And, um, when charlie kirk waskilled, my initial reaction to
that, obviously it's horrible,no one deserves to be killed.
But my initial reaction to thatobviously it's horrible, no one
deserves to be killed.
But my initial reaction to thatwas oh crap, they're going to
(43:41):
make a martyr out of him.
Because I knew exactly what thethought process is and the
belief system is for a lot ofhis supporters and it scared me
and I knew.
I knew that it was not, thiswas not going to be good and it
hasn't been it's.
Speaker 2 (44:00):
it's, of course, not.
I mean, we lowered the flag forhim, but we didn't lower it for
the, the kid that was hung froma tree and lynched in
Mississippi, or the twodemocratic legislators that were
executed, or any of the otherpeople.
It's interesting.
You say that I had a similarreaction, and what I say on the
episode for those of you thatare listening is that people are
(44:22):
angry, that people arecelebrating it and people are
angry about other things.
But the reality is is whateversomebody has a response to, it's
a traumatic response.
It's a reaction, a normalreaction to an abnormal scenario
.
I mean, we're not used toseeing people get assassinated
on live TV.
So whatever reaction somebodyhas in the moment is normal,
whatever it is, because it's anabnormal thing.
(44:42):
We're not used to it.
So stop beating people up forhaving reactions.
If, if that's, if, that's whatyou're doing.
I don't mean you and justsaying in general.
But I also want to point outthat I agree with you and this
was my rant, so I'm going to domy rant now, if you don't mind
it's perfectly in tune with whatwe're talking about is.
I am so pissed off right nowwith all my liberal friends and
(45:04):
I'm going to tell you why andobviously I have a lot of more
friends that are liberal isbecause they're doing the same
thing with jimmy kimmel now,jimmy kimmel getting fired for
expressing his opinion, which,from my understanding, wasn't
even that big of a deal.
What he said is problematicbecause it violates the First
Amendment, since I mean ourfreedom of speech, because the
government is interfering with aprivate citizen's ability to
(45:29):
talk.
That's completelyunconstitutional.
So I get that people are upsetabout it.
But what pisses me off is fortwo freaking years now two years
I have been telling all ofthese people to boycott Disney
and Starbucks and all of thecompanies that are funding
genocide, and all I heard fromevery single one of them
repeatedly was well, you got tolive your life, you know you
(45:50):
can't like boycott that stuff.
Blah, blah, blah, blah, blah.
And now that a white comediangets fired from TV, suddenly all
of these same people who havebeen silent for two years are up
in arms and boycotting Disney,disney, I think it's.
I read today it lost five, Ithink it was $5 billion.
I can't remember what it was,I'll look it up later, but they
(46:12):
lost a significant amount ofmoney from boycotts in two days
Two days.
Could you imagine if all ofthose people put their money
where their mouth was aboutPalestinian people being
executed?
But the reality is they don'tgive a fuck about the
Palestinian people.
So all of the liberal peoplewho are listening to this like
own the fact that you're ahypocrite and that's my rant.
(46:35):
So I was so pissed off aboutthat.
I'm still in pissed off about itand I've every single one of
them.
I've been confronting them onit.
Where the hell were you for thelast two years?
Where were you?
And the responses I've gottenfrom some people is I didn't
know.
That's not an excuse.
It's been all over the place.
People have talked about it.
I've posted a shit ton aboutDisney.
(46:57):
I mean, I used to go to Disneyfour to five times a year.
I added up how much I spent atDisney one time, including, like
plane tickets, staying atproperty, purchasing merchandise
.
I've paid for other people togo to Disney.
I spent almost as much as Ispent on buying my first house.
Speaker 1 (47:14):
Oh my gosh.
Speaker 2 (47:14):
That tells you how much I used to go there and I
don't go.
I have not gone since I don'tbuy anything from Disney.
I will not go back to Disneyand I have boycotted everything
that I possibly can withinreason.
That's on that list.
Now, that's not to say forpeople out there.
If you can only afford to shopat Walmart and that's the only
place you could buy, obviouslyyou can't boycott that if that's
the only place you could buy.
Obviously you can't boycottthat if that's the only place
(47:35):
you can purchase stuff in.
But Disney is not a necessity,it's a luxury.
And if you could not cancelyour Disney channel for the
400,000 people that have beenkilled in Palestine largely
children, you need to checkyourself why one white comedian
(47:55):
was the reason why you boycottedDisney.
Speaker 1 (47:59):
Right, that's such a good and valid point and and I,
I feel like, I, I feel like it'seasy, it's easy to ignore
what's happening not in ourbackyard.
It's like now that they feellike they're being touched by it
, it's a different story, um,but it's.
Speaker 2 (48:21):
it's horrifying it's hard, and actually all of the
people because because Berniehas finally admitted it's a
genocide.
He said it sometime this week,this past week.
Speaker 1 (48:34):
Is that because the UN?
Speaker 2 (48:37):
Oh, probably he's a freaking coward, but he finally
said it and all of hissupporters are now like, yay,
praise Bernie, praise Bernie.
He's like so awesome, he'sgoing to save us.
And they're denying I actuallymade a couple comments on a post
about it.
They're denying that he thatthat's the first time he said it
.
They're like he's been sayingit the whole time and I was like
(48:59):
really prove it, link to me thefirst time he said it.
And, of course, radio silence,because they can't do it.
But they are just as delusional.
So if you're out there rightnow listening to me and you
think that Democrats are anybetter, you are insane, because
they are not.
They are not Two hundred andfifty, two hundred and fifty of
(49:21):
our representatives, of ourlegislator, from every state in
the country, just went to Israel.
Why?
Why did they all go to Israel?
Why did they don't belong inIsrael?
We have our countries fallingapart, but they're over there in
Israel.
Democrats Why'd they all go toIsrael?
Why did they?
They don't belong in Israel.
We have our countries fallingapart, but they're over there in
Israel.
Democrats and Republicans, allof them.
They're all over there kissingNetanyahu's ass.
Speaker 1 (49:40):
I think six Rhode Island.
I think six Rhode Island oneswent.
Speaker 2 (49:45):
Yeah, it's, it's disgusting.
It's disgusting.
These are the people we pay torepresent us and they don't
represent us.
They represent a foreigncountry, which is treason by
definition, and they continue toget away with it and it's, it's
nauseating.
But I want people to stop likedoing this whole virtue
signaling thing and just likeboycotting stuff when it's cool
(50:05):
and saying like, okay, let'sboycott this now and then go
back to doing it in a couple ofweeks.
No, if a company has that lowof a moral compass, we should
never be doing business withthem again.
Speaker 1 (50:14):
Period, full stop, unless they rebrand everything,
fire everybody and restart.
I don't want anything to dowith it.
Speaker 2 (50:24):
Yeah, sorry, amy, you know that that that anger was
not directed at you.
Speaker 1 (50:35):
I know and I love a good rant, so, um, it's, um,
it's, it's amazing, how, like,how like.
Just the fact that you saidthat they lost, however much
money they lost, that clearly wecould do it.
It's just the choice not to,and so it's like.
You said, like where were youtwo years ago?
Speaker 2 (50:49):
it's just it's.
I'm gonna look it up right now.
Hold on.
I should have, probably rightnow, 3.87 billion dollars that
they have lost, which is this isnow again.
Imagine two years ago ifeverybody had done that, this
genocide would probably be over.
So, all of those people, I'msorry, but you're responsible.
(51:11):
You're just as responsible as,as you know yeah, I know that's
harsh, but it's the reality.
And I don't think we canpretend that it's not, because
if we say like, well, I didn'tknow and you know I, it was too
hard for me, I think we'reshrieking our responsibility.
But we have co-signed all theirdeath certificates.
Speaker 1 (51:33):
Yeah, if we have given disney a dime, starbucks a
dime mcdonald's burger king,like any of them it's yeah, I
don't like I I don't have wordsright now because it's been so I
(51:56):
don't know how people canignore genocide Like that's one
thing that I don't comprehend,and so I understand your anger.
Speaker 2 (52:05):
I, if I had I'm not even kidding If I had a dime,
for every single time I've hearda person say I just can't deal
with it, um, I'd probably haveenough money to start Disney.
You know, because I'm not evenkidding, it's that prevalent and
the reality is, and I'm goingto, I'm going to be, if I'm
pissing people off, I'm happyabout it actually, because the
reality is.
The reality.
(52:26):
Is you?
You?
You just don't care aboutPalestinian people, period, full
stop.
You, you just don't care aboutpalestinian people, period, full
stop, like, so, don't pretendto do like, don't like, don't
claim that you're all abouthuman rights and then do the
exact opposite.
It's it's hypocrisy, it'svirtue signaling, it's just,
it's it's garbage it is I.
(52:49):
I hijacked you a little bit onthat, I'm sorry, with what you
were talking about.
It was just it was so relevantto the moment, it was no, it fit
right in.
Speaker 1 (52:57):
That's where we were going.
So it's, you did not hijack meat all and I, I, I appreciate
your passion about this and I,you know, I, I do.
At the same time, I understandthe that like pull to not pay
attention because it's sohorrifying.
So I've kind of made a rule Idon't know if this may be for
(53:20):
other people who are feelingthat way Don't look at the news
before bed, you know, do thatkind of at some point in the day
where you feel like you cantake it in, but don't ignore it.
You know, you have to knowwhat's going on.
Speaker 2 (53:34):
That's an important.
I do want to say that becausenobody should inundate
themselves all day long.
I mean, I am a hundred percentguilty of looking at videos
before I go to bed, cause that'swhen I have my downtime and
then I can't sleep.
So that that is something Idefinitely need to stop doing
and I think it's fine to take abreak.
You know, if I was going onvacation tomorrow, I would turn
(53:54):
my phone off for whatever time Iwas on vacation and not look at
it, and that's fine becauseit's situational.
But I know what's happening andI'm not ignoring it and the
amount of things that are goingto change between that day and
Friday or whatever.
It's probably not going to beanything that didn't happen the
week before, but we have to keeppaying attention to it because
(54:17):
these are, you know.
I think I said in one of theprevious episodes, if you ever
wondered what you do during theholocaust, you're doing it right
now because the scholars haveactually said it is passed over
from being a genocide and it isnow a holocaust.
And we are so again.
If people were like, oh, if Iwas alive during the holocaust,
I would have done this, we'llprove it because you're not
(54:38):
doing that, you know.
But I to go back to somethingyou said, because I do want to
tie this in when you weretalking about how important it
is to nab I'm using the word nabum adolescents into these cults
, because that's when they aredevelopmentally the most
impressionable and when theyhave the invincibility complex
where they think that they can'tdie, which is why the military
(54:59):
gets kids at the age of 18 andpromises them the world, because
none of them think they'regoing to die, and then we
completely exploit them on that.
But that's what's happening atthe idf.
They have taken all of thesekids and given them this
ideology that it's okay to shootbabies in the head with sniper
rifles.
And those kids believe that.
You know they, they are on somelevel victims of being gaslit
(55:27):
and brainwashed themselves andpart of a cult, gas lit and
brainwashed themselves and partof a cult.
Yeah, the fact that.
And then you have, we know thatthey're also committing suicide
and we we had, like Aaron Bush,self emulated, you know,
because of, like all of thestuff that they're seeing and
they can't wrap their brainaround what's happening.
It's, but that's what.
That's the best time to get toget people to believe what you
(55:49):
want to believe.
Speaker 1 (55:51):
Yeah, and it's very, very dangerous when you have a
war that's being driven by somekind of ideology, not just like
I want this piece of land, giveit to me.
It's more, I want this landbecause it's my god-given right
(56:13):
to have it.
So that's very, very dangerouswhen you start fighting for this
, for an ideology or like abelief system.
And I I did want to talk aboutthis because, like I was talking
about in t-mania, how you do,they did really literally groom
these people to be soldiers.
I don't know if this was like amassive, like a mainstream
(56:37):
thing, but when Columbinehappened, there was a story that
circulated.
It definitely circulated inlike Christian circles, but I
don't know if it like made likemainstream, so you'll have to
let me know.
But it was about one of thevictims who who died, who.
The story is that she was askedif she believes in god and she
said yes and she was killed andI think I did, I think I did
(57:01):
hear about that.
Speaker 2 (57:01):
I remember hearing that.
Yeah, I do okay.
Speaker 1 (57:04):
So the like christian circle, they ate this up and
they really exploited this poorlike young girl's murder um to
just justify and push this wholemartyrdom and persecution kink
that they have where.
They're coming for you, they'recoming for us christians.
They want to take away, likeour beliefs and you're not going
(57:25):
to be able to, like, go tochurch anymore.
Just the persecution um complexthat they have.
And they elevated this girl who, like sometimes these stories
they would get extrapolated tobe like that the shooter said,
well, if you say no, I'll letyou live and if you say yes,
I'll kill you, like just toreally hone it in that.
Oh no, he shot her because shesaid she believed in god and
(57:50):
this story would be told to usand I remember hearing it and
being asked as, like a 15, 16year old what would you do in
that situation?
Like, would you have enoughfaith to to die for God?
And like, no, I think of thatand I'm like that is fucked up.
I'm sorry, I keep swearing.
That is messed up.
Speaker 2 (58:07):
That's okay.
I did too.
Okay, all.
Speaker 1 (58:08):
That's okay.
I did too.
Okay, all right, I didn't knowif it was family friendly or not
.
Not anymore.
Speaker 2 (58:13):
I could rate it as an explicit episode, and then
it'll be fine.
Speaker 1 (58:26):
I love that, but it's messed up.
It's to try to convince ateenager and prep them and tell
them that you're beingpersecuted.
That's the other piece of it.
So it's not like this is someforeign thing that isn't going
to happen to you.
It's like, no, they're comingfor you.
Are you going to have enoughfaith to stand up and say like,
yes, I believe in God and laydown your life for the Lord?
Like, can you imagine?
Like, what you have to gothrough mentally to prep
yourself for that?
It's, it's so psychologicallydamaging.
(58:47):
And so I do feel for the, theidf soldiers in a way, in that
way that they are being pushedinto this.
But they are kids, they're kids, they're.
Speaker 2 (58:58):
they're fighting that yahoo's war, like that's what
they're doing and I have a tonof respect for the kids who have
actually refused to go into.
I know you keep saying the wordwar.
I refuse to call it a warbecause it's not a war, it's an
ethnic cleansing.
Palestine doesn't even have anarmy, I mean, so they can't
(59:21):
fight back.
I mean, this is just, they'recarpet bombing people, they're
building mass graves, they'rekilling people, they're
poisoning the food.
One of the things and you'llhear on the interview with the
woman that we had from gaza wasthey allowed food in, finally,
and then, after they allowedfood, and they immediately
evacuated them and then bombedthe building.
The food was in and this isjust.
(59:42):
It's just horrific, it'storture.
It's not a war, right like so I.
I correct everybody when I hearthat, because it never was a
war and it's not going it's.
It's been an ethnic cleansingsince day one.
It's been happening since what?
45, 46.
I mean, it's just not, it's notchanging and I think it's
important for people, Iappreciate you correcting me,
(01:00:05):
actually, because you'reabsolutely right.
I correct everybody on that,because I think we have to.
And the other thing is that allreligions do this.
I mean, this is why I amvehemently against religion.
I mean, religion has been usedas a weapon in every religion.
It's like this I had aconversation with somebody the
(01:00:25):
other day who said to me if thepeople of Gaza would just give
the Israelis back their land,the whole world would be better
and they would be happy.
And I said why would they givethem the land?
It's their land.
And he said yeah, but it'stheir Holy land, says who.
And he's like well, you know,the Bible says it's their Holy
land.
And I was like okay, would youagree that the native Americans
(01:00:46):
that existed in in this countrybefore we got here that that was
their holy land?
And he said yes, and I said sowe should give them their land
back, right, because we are thecolonizers that came in and
murdered them.
So if one of the tribes showedup at your door tomorrow and
said this is my land, get out,you would happily give your
house over.
And he was like well, no, that'sdifferent.
(01:01:07):
Why is that different?
And he's like because, becausethis is the is' holy land.
You just told me that youagreed that the Native
Americans' land was holy here.
I mean, there's Native Americanmonuments all over the place
that they built.
They worshiped the land.
So they lived off the land andhe didn't get it and we had to
keep kind of going in circlesaround this conversation and
(01:01:30):
then finally he was like, okay,it makes sense.
Of course it makes senseBecause it's the Palestinians
land.
It always was.
They don't get to come in andjust say like, oh, it's my land,
put a gun to their head and belike, okay, get out, now, I own
your house.
Like that's not and that's whathappened.
And people are justifying it isokay and looking at it and
saying this is moral.
(01:01:50):
Now, I stopped going to churchwhen I was 12.
I mean, I was raised Catholicbut in my memory of Christianity
, jesus wasn't a warrior andnone of the prophets were
warriors that were going outkilling people and advocating
for genocide.
They were people who wouldprobably be hanged today in our,
(01:02:14):
in our country or mostcountries, as being called
communists or socialists.
So they certainly don't embodythe values that they're
screaming.
They never have.
Speaker 1 (01:02:25):
No, not at all.
I mean, it's definitely been.
It's been co-opted by this likeultra white nationalist,
Christian nationalist agendathat they've twisted it, backing
away from the teachings ofJesus and even saying like, well
, no, I think we're not going topay attention to that.
(01:02:54):
Let's look at the Old Testament, like Deuteronomy and Leviticus
that's kind of where they'recoming from.
Which is this?
Like wrathful, hateful God.
Speaker 2 (01:03:04):
Sounds like a God I would want to go hang out with.
Let me tell you.
Speaker 1 (01:03:09):
I mean.
Speaker 2 (01:03:10):
I don't understand the whole appealing part of that
.
My God, amy, we are running outof time so I didn't know if
there was any final like cause.
I want to just do the uh, thememorial that I do at the end.
Speaker 1 (01:03:22):
If there was any final notes you wanted to make,
no, just thank you so much forgiving me the space to talk
about this and for anyone who isstruggling with um
deconstruction and strugglingwith leaving their faith, to
definitely reach out to otherpeople who've maybe been there.
And you also have to be surethat you're honor your own
(01:03:44):
journey and honor like what yourown wishes are, because a big
part of it is also regainingyour autonomy.
So allowing yourself to askquestions, but also allowing
yourself to take it as slow asyou need to thank you, amy, I
appreciate that, and thank youso much for coming on twice.
Speaker 2 (01:04:03):
I know that your episode had an impact because I
actually got emails about it ohI forgot to tell you that at the
beginning about how much peopleit resonated with people I'm so
glad oh it was.
Thank you so much.
Anybody else that's out therethat wants to come on, feel free
to contact me.
The one thing I hate is I get alot of those ai generated
messages that say this episoderesonated with me and it's like
(01:04:26):
and I just delete them, so donot send me an ai generated
message.
So I just want to dedicate thisepisode to another Palestinian
who was executed by the IDF, andthis article came out in
November 20th of 2024 in AlJazeera, so I will link it in
the show notes.
(01:04:46):
But this is and again Iapologize for butchering any of
these names, but his name is DrAdnan Al-Bursh and he was a
orthopedic who worked atAl-Shifa Hospital and from the
article and the information thatwas given by eyewitness
testimony was that he wasdragged into the prison yard,
(01:05:09):
bleeding, beaten, and theybelieved that he was raped to
death by the IDF.
Again, this is a doctor thatthey are, of course, calling a
terrorist, because anybody whois Palestinian is a terrorist
according to them, and nobodyshould be raped to death, and
the article seems like thetorture went on for a long
(01:05:30):
period of time, and I think it'simportant for us to put names
to these people and rememberwhat happened to them.
So that's where I want to endwith there, and again, I will
link that in the show notes.
So, amy, thank you so much forbeing here, and if I pissed
(01:05:51):
people off, good, go dosomething about it.
Yeah, even if that's you don'tlisten to me anymore, that's
fine, but still go do somethingabout it.
Don't be a hypocrite.
Thank you everybody.
Speaker 1 (01:06:01):
Thanks, Matt.
Speaker 2 (01:06:22):
Hello everybody and thank you again for listening.
This is just a reminder that nopart of this podcast can be
duplicated or copied withoutwritten consent from either
myself or Wendy.
Thank you again.
This podcast is not intended to serve as therapeutic
advice or to replace anyprofessional treatment.
These opinions belong to us anddo not reflect any company or
agency.
Speaker 2 (00:27):
Hello everybody and welcome back to another episode
of the United States of PTSD.
Today we are privileged to haveAmy back and we are going to do
a part two to Amy's story.
Amy, welcome back.
Speaker 1 (00:37):
Thank you so much for having me.
Speaker 2 (00:39):
Absolutely a pleasure we're going to.
I know you wanted to fill insome gaps on the story before we
get to how you went through thedeconstruction process, so I'm
just going to give you the floorto talk about that part and
then we'll take over after that.
Speaker 1 (00:54):
Yeah, thank you.
I wanted to fill in these gapsbecause I think it would add
context to my deconstructionprocess.
So one thing I didn't reallytalk about in the last episode
was how everything came to anend with the archdiocese and the
district attorney's office,with my perpetrator.
So I did end up talking to theDA and I decided that I wasn't
(01:20):
like emotionally, like in anykind of place to go forward with
pressing charges.
I actually don't think I couldeven do that today at 40.
It just it.
It takes a lot and I have a lotof respect for survivors who do
do that, because I know it'snot easy.
Speaker 2 (01:38):
Would you mind talking about that process a
little bit, cause you had saidyou don't know that you'd be
able to do it now.
And can you?
Because for people who arelistening I know people
understand that it's difficultbut I don't necessarily know
that everybody gets it.
Speaker 1 (01:54):
So maybe if you explain a little bit, if you
don't mind a little bit aboutthat process, yeah, I mean for
me at least it was for for thenI was, I was 15, so I I really
just wanted to be a normalteenager and hang out with my
friends and I didn't want to betalking about this anymore.
For, like for now, at my agethat I am now, I am still
(02:15):
intimidated by the church'sattorneys.
They are notoriously reallyvicious towards victims.
From stories I've heard fromother survivors who have gone
through that process, I'd liketo think that I have a thicker
skin and I could handle it, butI do think that it would
destabilize me and so it's moreme trying to self-protect.
(02:35):
I think it would be difficultto talk in detail about what
happened, to be grilled byattorneys calling me a liar, and
to be grilled by attorneyscalling me a liar, to kind of
like be put back in thatsituation that I was in when I
was 15, when I was being paintedas this troubled girl.
I think it would bring up a lotthat I haven't not that I
haven't fully processed it.
I just don't think I want toput myself in that situation,
(02:59):
and that's also part of metaking my power back.
Speaker 2 (03:03):
Thank you for sharing that, amy, and that makes sense
.
I know when I I don't think it'sisolated to the church either.
When I, before I, became asocial worker, one of the
volunteer jobs I had was workingfor what is now called oh my
God, I can't remember the nameof it now Day One, but it used
to be the Sexual Assault TraumaResource Center in Rhode Island,
and when I went for thetraining it was odd because I
(03:25):
think I was actually the firstmale that ever went through the
training it was all women.
I was a victim advocate, so wewould go out to the hospitals
and talk to people who had beensexually assaulted, and I
remember during the trainingthey had told us the way the
police interviewed victims backthen this was in the early
nineties was to get the victimto admit that they were lying
and intentionally focus ontrying to disprove them.
(03:46):
And the rationale behind it assick as it is was that their
belief was that if they couldwithstand that then they would
not back out of going to court.
I mean, obviously the wholething is absurd, but that's what
happened and I don't know thatit's that much better.
I think maybe we've justshifted the way we do it, but it
certainly is something thathappens outside of the church as
(04:07):
well.
Speaker 1 (04:10):
Yeah, that's horrifying, but I believe it.
I mean, that's something thatwe see, that happens, that we've
heard those stories before.
So, yeah, I actually don'tthink it's changed much and I
know for certain the church'sattorneys haven't changed their
methodology.
So, like I had said in theprevious episode, I'm involved
(04:31):
with SNAP, which is theSurvivors Network of those
abused by priests.
So I've gone to a lot ofsupport groups and I just want
to point out that the averageage that a victim of childhood
sexual abuse usually first tellssomebody is, I think, 52.
That's just them tellingsomeone.
That's not an age where theyfeel like they can go and press
(04:52):
charges.
I've sat in support groups withpeople in their 80s like sobbing
, telling the story about theirabuse when they were a child
with their priest, and some ofthese people are looking to get
justice and they are filingcivil suits against the church.
But it's sad because there havebeen survivors who have died
(05:14):
before they got to have that dayin court that they sought after
.
But again, I think it is adeliberate thing.
Like this, abuse is so shamefuland the predators kind of paint
it this way that it makes it soshameful that victims don't
want to come forward and talkabout it.
It's very deliberate.
It really serves the predatorand certainly doesn't do
(05:36):
anything for the survivors.
Speaker 2 (05:38):
Is there when I think about one of the tropes that we
hear, for when people aretrying to discredit survivors of
a sexual assault, they'll oftenblame them and say things like
you know, oh, it's because ofwhat they were wearing, or it
was because of you know theywere leading me on.
Is there a trope in the church?
Is there something that theysay to the victims about what
happened, like how they blamethem specifically or no?
Speaker 1 (06:01):
It's.
It is, um, the that whole thingwhere I was asked you know,
what did he do to seduce you?
I think that that is a commonquestion that is asked.
It's because priests are viewedas these, like really holy
people that are separate fromthe parishioners, like the
congregation, um, that I thinksome people can't wrap their
(06:22):
heads around the fact that theymight be bad people, they might
be predators, and often theexcuse that I hear is that, oh
well, they were just strugglingwith demons or like that's the
devil working in him and we needto pray for him.
And you know, it's or it's thatthe victim actually seduced
(06:44):
this priest, like they wouldn'thave done it if it weren't for
this victim seducing them.
Speaker 2 (06:50):
Would they then turn that into the narrative that the
victim was somehow possessed ordoing devil's work to try to
seduce the priest?
Is it that insidious, or is it?
Speaker 1 (07:01):
I've never really heard it go that far in that
narrative, but that's not to saythat it hasn't because I could
totally see it going that way.
Speaker 2 (07:07):
That's why I was asking yeah, it's more.
Speaker 1 (07:09):
I feel like it's more in line with that purity
culture that it's women, um,specifically that control, like
men's sexual desire, that likewe're like the gatekeepers to
their sexuality, and so I thinkI got blamed because I'm a girl.
I don't, I don't know that.
I've heard that narrative asmuch from male survivors, and
(07:30):
there are plenty.
The narrative that I often hearthat they say is that it that
they committed a sin.
Still, it's yes, they did that,like that, this happened to
them, but it was actually theirfault that it happened.
Speaker 2 (07:43):
I mean, it's the same thing, same same narrative,
different, different outfit it'sthe same thing, yeah, so thank
you for so.
So then, what happened once youdid go forward?
Speaker 1 (07:56):
So I never.
I I didn't ever like presscharges.
I that wasn't something that Icould deal with.
The, the, the archdiocese.
After they finished their likeinvestigation, if you want to
call it that, they sent myparents a letter saying that
they could not discern that thisevent did not happen, something
(08:17):
along that line.
They had a double negative inthere, so it was very odd.
Um, they said they weren'tgoing to take any further action
against this priest and thatthey would pay for my therapy
for six months.
My parents had attorneys atthat point and they were like
that's not good enough, and youwill pay for both her and her
(08:37):
family's therapy for as long asthey need, and that's.
They settled on that and thatwas kind of where it was.
I went on with my life.
I did go to therapy.
The caveat to that was thatinitially I had to go to a
therapist that was approved bythe diocese, which, if, if you
(08:58):
are a survivor of abuse fromsomeone in the catholic church
or really any church, my liketwo big pieces of advice to you
would be one, if you feel likeyou can, if you want to report
it and you're in a place whereyou feel like you can.
Do not report it to your church.
Go to proper authorities.
And then that other advicewould be if the church offers
(09:19):
you free therapy and they'resaying, hey, we have this
support group for survivors orwe have this therapist we
recommend, do not go see thosepeople Talk about conflict of
interest.
Right.
It's also a way for them tocontrol the narrative, I feel
like it's still them kind ofdoing that mind control and
(09:40):
doing that victim blaming, so ahundred percent, it's it, it's.
Speaker 2 (09:43):
It's insidious too, because you would imagine that
the people that they're hiringare certainly working to push
that agenda and are going tomanipulate their work with
clients, and that's disgustingon so many levels and the
archdiocese because they'repaying for the services they do
(10:04):
ask for, like reports.
Speaker 1 (10:08):
I don't know how much like the.
I'm sure the therapists whowere like recommended by them
provided tons of information.
The therapists I saw later thatwere not affiliated with them,
they were very vague and theirresponse is probably similar to
what you would send to aninsurance company.
But the first therapist I sawlike I feel like as a social
worker you're going to like likethis is horrifying just because
(10:31):
of ethics.
It was a husband and wife teamand my mom saw the husband and I
saw the wife but I didn't knowthey were married.
Like that was never disclosedto me and my mom would somehow
make references to like thingsthat I was saying in therapy and
apparently my therapist wastelling her husband everything I
(10:51):
was saying.
Who was then telling my mom wholike so unethical oh my god.
Speaker 2 (10:59):
Well, not only is it unethical, but it's a breach of
confidentiality which is illegal.
So, so that's, that's.
That's horrifying.
Speaker 1 (11:07):
It is horrifying, yeah, and you know I.
What's funny is I went tosomebody else eventually, but
not because of that, it wasn'tmy choice.
That therapist that I wasseeing was basically like I
don't know how to help you and Iguess credit to her for like
being realizing I'm beyond thescope of her like experience,
but it was.
(11:27):
It was hard to hear that as ateenager you know I have.
Speaker 2 (11:31):
I have to say I have mixed feelings about that.
I agree with you.
I think good for good forsomebody for saying, okay, this
might be a little bit outside ofmy wheelhouse.
However, I also think there'sthe implied message of you're
too sick for me, yeah, and Idon't think that that's a
healthy message at all.
I mean, in terms of our code ofethics, there is a
responsibility to continue toeducate yourself about what's
(11:53):
happening, and I would think adifferent route to that would be
then to either pay forsupervision from somebody who is
going to give you a little bitmore information or to learn
about it, but not to be like,hey, you're too sick, see you
later.
Like I don't know, I'm not, I'mnot sold on that.
Speaker 1 (12:10):
Yeah, yeah, I mean, and it was hurtful, it
definitely I was internalizing alot of stuff that I had been
told, that had been said aboutme that you know I was trouble
Now I'm like too much for mytherapist.
You know I was trouble Now I'mlike too much for my therapist
and I internalized so much ofthat and it really festered into
this like really badself-hatred and you know, I kind
(12:31):
of went down this real, like Isaid in the first episode, this
really self-destructive path andI think in a way it was like I
felt so defeated in that like Iwas never going to be good
enough and I was never going tobe able to be the person that
like I wanted to be that goodCatholic girl that I really
(12:52):
leaned heavily into this labelthat had been put on me and so I
went.
You know, fine, if you thinkI'm trouble, I can be trouble.
Like you think I'm a whore thatseduces priests, I can be a
whore that seduces priest, I canbe a whore, and I just I acted
out like really recklessly, um,like engaged in a lot of
reckless sexual behavior, whichis common for, you know,
(13:14):
survivors, I I think that,specifically if you grow up in
purity culture, where this likehigh emphasis is on your
virginity and like how importantthat is to like your worth as a
person, that they don't talkabout consent though, so they
don't distinguish, like yeah,but if you're raped, like that's
(13:34):
not your fault, don't worryabout it, it's just no, if you
are not a virgin, like when youget married, then you're
worthless, it's, it's that.
And I think a lot of people whogrow up in that culture and do
experience a sexual assault,they do tend to kind of go well,
I guess it doesn't matter, Iguess I should just have at it,
(13:54):
right, just sleep with whoever,because what does it even matter
anymore?
The other piece of that is thisfeeling of taking back control
a little bit of your sexualityand your bodily autonomy, like,
well, okay, if I'm going to dothat, at least like it's going
to be my choice to do that.
I mean, it's not what ends uphappening is you end up putting
(14:16):
yourself in really riskysituations or you end up in
really risky situations.
I don't want to like put like ablaming tone to that end up in
really risky situations.
I don't want to like put like ablaming tone to that, um, where
you do experience andexperiencing more sexual
assaults and um, it's just, it'sa real vicious cycle.
But like what's deep down inthat is like your self worth
(14:37):
that you're just.
You don't feel like you're evenworth protecting.
Speaker 2 (14:44):
There's a lot there that I want to respond to Okay.
Speaker 1 (14:47):
That's why I stopped.
Speaker 2 (14:49):
I was.
You know I try not to interruptpeople when they're talking.
Yeah, first of all, I want tosay that it's really brave of
you to talk about it, andeverything that you went through
was it took a lot of courage,particularly at the time this
was happening, and a lot ofstrength to go through with what
you did, to say like okay, Ineed to talk about this.
(15:10):
There's also a part of it that,even though we have, because
any coping skill can be bothtoxic and healthy right, so if
you are, you have a really toughday at work and you go home and
you have a glass of wine butyou don't have a problem with
alcohol's a coping skill andit's an okay coping skill.
But then if you become, if youhave a alcohol problem, that's
not an okay coping skill.
(15:30):
And when I hear you say therewas a part of you that said,
well, if this is what I'm beinglabeled as, that I'm just going
to own it, there's a part ofthat.
That's also empowerment by justsaying like, okay, then I'm
going to take back control andI'm going to say like, okay,
this belongs to me now and Ithat.
I think that that process ishealthy.
But, like I had said, with thealcoholism, I think it then
turns into something that'sunhealthy, right, but what you
(15:52):
talk about is incredibly normaland I think anybody who is
hearing this, that has all beenthrough something similar, can
understand that there is anormalcy to taking back that
power and saying like, okay, nowI'm going to use it.
The other interesting thing is,as you were talking about the,
the amount of importance we puton virginity.
(16:12):
It made me remember when I was,when I was going through
college, my partner at the timehe was an art and like English
major and I remember he did areport on the etymology, the
historic etymology, of where theword virgin came from and,
interestingly enough, itactually meant unmarried.
Speaker 1 (16:29):
Oh, wow.
Speaker 2 (16:29):
It actually wasn't connected to chastity until much
later.
So that and I, if I remembercorrectly, don't quote me on
this, but I cause this was like30 years ago when he told me
this, but I remember him sayingthat when the, when, the, when,
(16:50):
the time the bible was written,it actually meant unwed, it
didn't mean virginal, and thatthat has changed over the you
know, the centuries.
Speaker 1 (16:54):
So that's an also interesting, just kind of side
note to that yeah, definitelyit's the obsession with like
sexual, like sex in general in alot of religion.
Um, it's, it's wild, like it'sthere's.
Speaker 2 (17:10):
They're so sexually repressed but they're also so
obsessed with sex like they'reso obsessed with it which is why
I'm sure you've heard about howthere's a connection between
the app grinder crashing whenthere's Republican conventions
going on.
Because because of how manyoppressed gay men are within the
(17:30):
Republican party and like,obsessed with, like gay culture
because of that, because they'renot out.
Speaker 1 (17:36):
Absolutely that, and that's kind of where I was going
with that.
Is that to to be that likeobsessive, it's, it's it feels
very much like projection andit's just like go to therapy,
please.
Um, it impacts your, yourrelationships, though.
I mean it definitely makes itdifficult to like like to have a
(17:58):
healthy, just romanticrelationship with somebody I
would imagine, because it's veryloaded, like everything about
it is a loaded conversation.
Speaker 2 (18:08):
How did you so you went through that that?
How did you deprogram themessages that were given to you
about your beliefs once you came?
Once you did talk about it Like, how did you take the next step
?
Speaker 1 (18:21):
Yeah, Um.
So I just want to like explainhow I got from a to z.
Yeah, just in between that,because I don't want to like
just brush it off as if like, ohyeah, I self-destructed for 15
years and then I deconstructedum, because that was a really
horrendous time um, of justreally struggling with life in
(18:46):
general around.
Um.
I think I was 26 and myperpetrator died and I um can I
ask how you found out, was it?
Like newspaper.
Speaker 2 (18:58):
Did somebody contact you?
Speaker 1 (19:00):
It was in the newspaper, my mother had it on
the kitchen table like circled,like his obituary circled, um.
My mother made questionabledecisions in terms of how she
handled like my trauma, um, andlike that's how I found out, and
I kind of was left to deal withthat on my own, like we didn't
(19:21):
have a conversation or anything,but that's that's how I found
out.
Um, I went, I reverted back tolike this little, like eight
year old me that was liketerrified of demon possession in
that time and I was terrifiedthat this person was haunting me
now and like, instead of ademon, it was him that was
(19:45):
possessing me, and not in theway that a devil possesses you,
but in that he had possessionover me and he owned me, which
also made it really difficult tohave any kind of relationship
with really anyone.
So I ended up being verydissociative during those 15
(20:06):
years between when I left thechurch and when I eventually
deconstructed.
And then I really struggledwith drinking and I used
drinking to cope.
And when I got to a point whereI wasn't drinking to escape
anymore and I was drinking tonot be sick because I was very
physically dependent on it, Um,that's when I realized I needed
(20:27):
help and I went into rehab andyou know that's not a one and
done thing I went, you know, inand out a few times and once I
had eventually gotten sober fora good year, um, that's when I
really started processing likewhere is this like self hatred
coming from?
I started processing that withmy therapist more.
(20:49):
Yeah, so I don't think there'slike one point where people like
just deconstruct.
I think it's a lot of likechips away at like this thing
that you've built your faith.
And I definitely had somethings happen in my teens and
that made me question, but likeI had just kind of pushed it out
(21:11):
of my mind.
So but I do think like this wasbuilding when, um, around the
time that I was like workingthrough some of my trauma, I got
a letter from the archdiocesesaying that hey, there's just
letting survivors know thatthere's going to be this movie
coming out, Um, that's going totalk about what happened in the
(21:33):
Archdiocese of Boston and thatit might be triggering and so
maybe like, don't go watch it.
Like really shrewd, and I wishmy reaction to that was like, oh
no, I'm definitely going to seethat.
Speaker 2 (21:47):
That was by design.
Obviously, they don't want youwatching it, because that's
going to make people rememberthings and then maybe go back
after the church.
Speaker 1 (22:08):
That was certainly not to protect you or any other
actually looked that up becauseI was trying to find that out.
I think it ran for like sixmonths like in the theaters, and
this wasn't like a bighollywood movie, it was, you
know do you happen to rememberthe name of that so I can?
I'm sorry.
Yeah, it's spotlight spotlight.
Okay, thank you yeah, becausethat was the name of the team of
(22:28):
events investigativejournalists that like uncovered
like what was happening.
It's a good movie.
I I suggest people to watch it.
It is really well done.
Um, I went to go see it in thetheaters and the theater was
packed, like this had been outfor two months and it was packed
.
And, um, there was a scene inthe film where they were doing
(22:49):
like a montage of like they hadalready gotten all the all the
files and there was like amontage piece where they were
like circling the files andthere was like a montage piece
where they were like circlingthe files and going through it.
You know they do that in movies.
And there was this one framethat had like a piece of paper
with all these like priest namesand my priest, like the priest
that abused me, his name was onthe screen and that was like
(23:12):
like holy shit, like I I wasn'texpecting that wow yeah how did
you react?
you remember how you reacted inthat moment I had a friend with
me, um, and she actually grabbedmy arm when it happened.
She was like, are you okay?
And I'm like, yeah, holy crap,I.
I did like feel like I was kindof gonna have a like a little
(23:34):
bit of an anxiety attack, like Ilike I got short of breath and
yeah, it was.
It was alarming, I wasn'texpecting it, but you know, it
was just his name, that's okay.
Um, when the movie ends, theybasically have a list of all the
priests who had been accusedscrolling, and it's goes on for
(23:56):
a very long time, um, and thenthe credits roll and the entire
theater was silent, like no onewas talking, and everyone just
got up and left, very likesolemnly.
And it was a really powerfulexperience for me because I felt
like I had just watched like mystory even though it wasn't my
(24:18):
story is so many people's story.
But to watch it like on the bigscreen with all these strangers
, and to just see that reaction,like how it affected them, I
felt so validated, you knowthat's a powerful feeling to
have yeah yeah, and I think thatwas like my first starting to
(24:40):
turn that self-hatred back tolike where it belonged, which is
this institution that allowedthis to happen, and I think my
deconstructed it.
It didn't start with I don'tknow if I believe in god anymore
.
It started with like I don'tknow if I believe in God anymore
.
It started with like I don'tbelieve in this institution, I
don't believe in the CatholicChurch anymore.
(25:01):
It was more that.
Speaker 2 (25:06):
It's almost when you were talking about the process
of it.
Do you know, jenga, right?
The game Jenga?
If you think about building themountain, the first mountain,
whatever the tower, the firsttime, that would be the
construction of the beliefsystem to begin with.
So it didn't happen with one.
I mean, it happened over thecourse of like years for it to
(25:27):
get there.
And then when we deconstructstuff, it's like you're pulling
out the little pieces slowly andsometimes the tower falls
immediately, and sometimes youcan pull out the little pieces
slowly and sometimes the towerfalls immediately, and sometimes
you can pull out 50 of thosethings before the tower falls.
And I think it's very differentfor everybody.
Speaker 1 (25:42):
so I'm glad you you had highlighted that point yeah,
that's a really great ummetaphor for that, because that
is exactly what happens andthere might be one, just one
block that you pull out.
That's like that sends thatwhole thing crashing down, and
that moment is verydestabilizing.
Speaker 2 (26:03):
I bet, I bet, and I would imagine it can also be
again.
Having played, I'm sure you'veplayed that game too right.
There's sometimes when you pullout a piece that you think it's
just going to slide out reallyeasy and it's the like, the most
destabilizing piece you canpull out and I would imagine
again really similar, like youcan have an experience and think
, oh, this is no big deal, andthen bam, it's like breast
(26:25):
shattering.
Speaker 1 (26:26):
Yeah, and sometimes you don't notice it right away
either.
It's.
It's like, yeah, like you don'trealize how much of an impact
it had on you, until later, whenyou're reassessing it and
you're like, oh, that was, thatwas impactful.
I didn't like it took me alittle bit to get to that point
where, like everything camecrashing down.
I, after seeing this movie,like I was really just angry.
(26:52):
I had a lot of anger and I hada lot of questions and I had a
lot that I wanted to directtowards the church.
And when Sean O'Malley firstbecame Cardinal, when he took
over for Cardinal Law, he hadextended like an invitation to
all survivors that if theywanted to come and talk with him
they could.
And I this was like many yearslater that I was like, actually,
(27:14):
you know what?
I think I want to take him upon that and I want to talk to
him.
And so I reached out to likekind of my contact person at the
archdiocese who helped me, whopaid all the therapy, like took
care of all that stuff, and Isaid I would like to talk to him
and she gave me a littlepushback Like she, she kind of
(27:36):
tried to like keep me at bay andI was pretty forceful and they
set up a meeting.
My therapist came with me andI'm really glad he did, because
he was a witness to whathappened, so at least, like I
had somebody in my corner thatyou know, that could like back
me up.
So I went and I met with theCardinal and I hadn't prepared,
like what I was going to say tohim.
(27:57):
I thought like I just, Ithought I knew what I wanted to
say and when I got in there Iwould just say it.
And, um, so I get to the, tothe archdiocese, and the woman
who set up the meeting she goesokay, I have two things One,
like I have to sit in there withyou guys because we need a
witness, like he needs somebodyelse there, basically to protect
them, you know.
And she's like and two, youcannot bring up money.
(28:20):
If you bring up money, thisconversation is getting shut
down.
And I was so offended I waslike are you kidding me right
now?
Like that is the last thingthat I'm here for.
And so she was like okay, andwe went and we met with him and
I lost it.
I just started sobbing likecrying more than I had ever
(28:44):
cried before about my trauma.
Like it all just came to thesurface and even my therapist
was like kind of taken abackbecause I don't think he had
seen me cry yet.
Like that's how much I had beenkeeping this inside.
And he started crying.
And I'm looking at CardinalSean and I'm looking at this
(29:04):
woman and they have these likejust not even stoic, but like
emotionless faces, like nothing,no, not even like annoyance,
like just nothing.
And the more they looked at melike that, I just started
screaming at them, like like doyou understand?
(29:24):
Like like you're not listeningto me, and I left that meeting
feeling so like pissed off,that's one thing, but just so
like pissed off, that's onething, but just so like unheard.
And I had brought up money.
But I didn't bring it up to belike, hey, like you guys, I want
(29:46):
money.
I brought it up to basicallytry to like demonstrate to them
that this really ruined my life.
I haven't been able.
I didn't.
I flunked out of college.
I wasn't able to hold down agood job.
I was still living with myparents.
I was like 31.
I was a mess and I had allthese medical bills that were
(30:09):
building up because I had a lotof suicide attempts under my
belt and one of them sent me tothe ICU and I was in the
hospital for three weeks and Ihad these bills and I was just
like, so, like, and now I haveto worry about this.
But I didn't say it with anyexpectation that, like, I wanted
them to pay it.
But when we left, the womancame running out after me and
she said oh, cardinal Sean saidto send us those bills and we'll
(30:31):
take care of it.
And I just looked at her like Idon't care, I don't care, like
you are not hearing me at all,like I don't give a fuck about
the money Excuse my French, Idon't.
And I still sent her the bills,good for you and the.
Speaker 2 (30:51):
the ironic thing is these are the people that are
supposed to be the morally, themoral high ground.
People, right, the people whoare preaching about compassion
and empathy and values.
And here they are, being stoic,unconcerned, cold.
It's the hypocrisy of how wetwist things in our culture, in
(31:12):
our society.
Speaker 1 (31:13):
Religion is a great proponent of this twist things
in our culture, in our society.
Religion's a great proponent ofthis.
Yes, absolutely, it's soinfuriating, um, so that
happened.
That was definitely that justkind of fed into this.
Like it really solidified forme that, oh, these people don't
care, they're all they're afteris protecting, like their
reputation and their assets.
(31:34):
That's it.
And that's when I really gotlike angry and I started
deconstructing what I had beentaught specifically by the
Catholic church, like theirspecific teachings, and that's
how that that started, cause Icould no longer hold them, like
you said, as the moral authority.
(31:54):
I'm like these people arecriminals and I can't, like I
don't believe what they've toldme anymore.
I really they've already lied.
Like what else have they liedabout?
And, um, when you start doingthat it's it's hard because if
you grow up in a really highcontrol, religion it's so much
of your identity.
It's like I am Catholic, it'snot.
(32:23):
Oh, I practice Catholicism, Iam Catholic, and I had to like
literally figure out all likelife's existential questions
that religion tends to answerfor people, and I think that's
why people are maybe drawn to it, because it's why are we here?
How did we get here?
What happens to us when we die,like all of those real
existential questions, I had tostart from scratch and I didn't
(32:46):
know anymore, and that is anincredibly destabilizing place
to be in your head, and it'salso the other piece of that is
well, who am I, you know?
What do I even?
What do I even want in thisworld?
What do I even believe?
What do I understand is rightor wrong?
It's a real process and I thinkwhat happens sometimes is that,
(33:07):
because it's so destabilizing,people can often hop from one
high control religious group andgo right to another one, right
to some other cult.
Speaker 2 (33:18):
Or go into an abusive relationship, because there's
so much parallel between theabuse of a church, the abuse of
an institution, the abuse ofsociety and the abuse of
relationships and I wouldimagine that would be an easy
jump from one to the other.
Speaker 1 (33:33):
Yeah, because in these groups it normalizes that.
It.
I mean, even just if you lookat, you know the Christian
relationship with God and I'mnot I'm being broad here, but I
mean if you look at the 10commandments, even it's like
don't, don't worship anyone butme, don't take my name in vain,
(33:54):
like make sure you get to church.
It all has to do with this,this like kind of feeding God's
ego.
Speaker 2 (34:01):
The ultimate narcissism.
I think we could say that right, it's incredibly narcissistic,
everything about it.
If you don't pay attention tome, I will punish you.
You know I'm the answer toeverything, and if you don't
agree with me, I'll punish you.
You know it's.
It's just, it's, it's insidious, it's the original, it's like
one of the most original abusiverelationships.
Speaker 1 (34:21):
Yes, and I, yeah, I love that.
You said that he is anarcissist and I think what
happens is because it's it's Godlike that's considered holy.
It's not just like, oh, likethis is fine.
We like that's considered holy,it's not just like, oh, like
this is fine.
We're normalizing it, it'swe're idolizing it.
So I think people might bedrawn to other people who
(34:44):
demonstrate narcissisticbehaviors.
Speaker 2 (34:47):
It's like that, wow, that's a person's really godly,
you know and then, to bring thata little bit further, if you
look at the um christianevangelicals and who they vote
for, uh it's just the epitome ofnarcissistic, controlling,
oppressive, you know um,xenophobic, like everything you
could possibly add to it, whichwould then reflect the values of
(35:10):
what they're learning in theirreligious institution.
Speaker 1 (35:13):
Yeah, exactly.
Speaker 2 (35:16):
What would you and thank you again for sharing that
, amy, and how difficult it isto kind of go through that
process what would you tellsomebody that might be in your
shoes, that might be, or backthen somebody who might be
questioning, somebody who mighthave these experiences, but
they're so ingrained in thesystem they can't get out?
Speaker 1 (35:36):
Yeah, if they're so ingrained in the system they
can't get out.
Yeah, if they're alreadyquestioning and maybe there's
some separation at least fromthat community.
Because you have to be careful,because in some of these groups
they control so much of yourlife that you could even you
know not really have access toyour finances, so you might not
even be able to get away.
(35:57):
But I think, once there's beena little bit of a separation and
you're willing to start peelingback the layers and really
looking at your belief system,one thing I found really helpful
was listening to other peoplewho've deconstructed, who've
(36:20):
deconstructed Um, and becausethey've gone through it, they
might be able to articulatefeelings that you have that you
don't understand why you havethem, and like put words to it.
Cause that's one thing thathelped me a lot was listening to
other people and going, oh, my,like, yeah, that makes sense.
That's exactly how I feel andthat's exactly what I
experienced, but I just didn'thave a way of like articulating
it before.
Speaker 2 (36:40):
Normalizing it.
Building community hearing thesame story from other people and
that snap website that youtalked about.
That would be a place wherepeople could go to find that
type of connection.
Speaker 1 (36:53):
That would be a good place to go.
Um, I think if you'veexperienced specifically like
sexual abuse in under theumbrella of like a religious
organization doesn't matter whatreligion to deal with that
aspect of it more.
I there's a really good podcastI listen to called cults to
consciousness, and um it, um.
(37:14):
It's on a pod.
It's also a YouTube channel soyou can check that out too.
But she's a deconstructedMormon and she interviews other
people who either grew up inlike actual cults or who grew up
in more mainstream religionsbut that were high control and,
um, I've listened to so manydifferent stories of people
(37:36):
who've grown up in so manydifferent like sects of
Christianity or um, or like incults that there's such a
parallel that runs through allof it and that is control, like
that's.
That's the biggest piece of it.
Um, stephen Hassan, I think hisname is, he's like a cult expert
(37:58):
and he came up with the BITEmodel, which is like kind of a
way to look at cults and it's anacronym for behavior,
information, thought and emotion, and so it's looking at
breaking up those things andlooking at how the organization
controls your behavior, how itcontrols your information and it
(38:19):
creates like your, it thinksfor you and it has certain rules
around emotion and what'sappropriate feelings and you
know, like I talked aboutdampening out my intuition, like
that kind of stuff, and sothere are all these pieces from
that bite model that you can seein everything from like
(38:40):
mainstream Catholicism, like Igrew up in, to like children of
God, like that cult.
So it's interesting but I thinkit's helpful to hear.
Speaker 2 (38:53):
There's a lot of parallel between what you're
talking about then and what'shappening now in terms of being
told what to think and how tothink and to question your own
sanity and your own reality.
We are at a point in societynow where we can watch something
play out right in front of usand somebody can then convince
(39:15):
people it didn't happen.
I mean, we've seen that playout over and over and over again
, I would say probably for thelast like 10 years, and it's
just getting worse.
With like ai now and the use ofai, people are getting less and
less able to think forthemselves and more dependent on
somebody to tell them what todo, which is the worst possible
(39:36):
thing we could be doing rightnow.
Speaker 1 (39:39):
I know it's terrifying and I think, also
having like this piece ofinformation, that I've been just
kind of, I think, spent thelast like five or six years just
really delving into all thesedifferent types of communities
and ways of thinking and how itdoes parallel to what's
happening today, um, politically, it it's been very scary to
(40:04):
watch it all unfold because thishas been the plan for a very
long time.
This didn't just start withtrump.
He was just the vehicle used toget what they want, but what's
happening right now has been inthe works for decades and a lot
of these the youth programs likeLife Teen that I attended, like
(40:25):
there are definitely other onesthat are a lot more, a lot more
fundamentalist and a lot moreChristian nationalist driven
that they've groomed teenagersto be literal warriors for
Christ, to be Christian martyrs.
That's very scary because it isnot a big jump from convincing
(40:46):
teenagers and getting theseyoung kids to agree that they
are willing to die for theirfaith.
It's not a big jump from thatto suicide bombings and I think
we need to be realistic about it.
Speaker 2 (41:02):
I'm glad you said that.
I mean, let's face it, how manyof the school shooters and what
we would call terrorists inthis country fit the same
demographic image?
And it's not people from themiddle east and it's not drag
queens, right, it is.
It is people who are whitemales, who often identify with
some sort of oppressivereligious group and often are
(41:24):
within like right-leaning sides.
Right, not to say it doesn'thappen on the left, because I,
but it's certainly moreprevalent on the right.
And I'm glad you said that,because Trump is not the problem
.
I agree with you on this.
I mean, he is the symptom andI've been, I've been saying this
for a long time.
I mean this, this has been.
We are all being groomed indifferent ways, which is why
(41:45):
they're trying to really editand get rid of social media so
much because we can actually nowsee for our own eyes the stuff
that they have been telling usis not true.
And I mean I don't know if Imentioned it when on the oh, I
actually should have said thisat the beginning.
I was telling amy that eric andI had actually recorded two
episodes in between the time wespoke to amy then and now.
(42:06):
But we wanted to record.
We wanted to release theepisodes in sequence, so I might
say stuff today that is goingto appear later on.
And then next to, we did talkabout what happened with Charlie
Kirk and we talked about aninterview that Erica had with
somebody in Gaza.
Those will be out in the nextnext two weeks or three weeks or
so.
(42:26):
I forgot where I was going withthat.
Oh, so what I?
What I had said was that I hadsent a friend of mine a message,
a private message, on Tik TOK,and it was flagged A private
message, and the messagebasically said something about
the kids starving in Gaza and itwas flagged.
I had to screenshot the messageto send it through, because it
wouldn't let me send it, and Ithought, okay, we've hit a new
(42:50):
level now that they'remonitoring private messages, and
it wasn't anything that shouldhave been flagged.
And then I reposted a videoabout some kids that were being
starved in Gaza and I got myfirst warning on TikTok and it
was taken down.
So they are certainly crackingdown on people giving out
accurate information.
That does not fit the narrativethat they want and it's very
(43:12):
concerning about where this isheading yeah, it's escalated a
lot, I think, in the last twoweeks.
Speaker 1 (43:20):
I I know it's always kind of been there, but I do
feel I'm feeling that more inthe last two weeks.
And, um, when charlie kirk waskilled, my initial reaction to
that, obviously it's horrible,no one deserves to be killed.
But my initial reaction to thatobviously it's horrible, no one
deserves to be killed.
But my initial reaction to thatwas oh crap, they're going to
(43:41):
make a martyr out of him.
Because I knew exactly what thethought process is and the
belief system is for a lot ofhis supporters and it scared me
and I knew.
I knew that it was not, thiswas not going to be good and it
hasn't been it's.
Speaker 2 (44:00):
it's, of course, not.
I mean, we lowered the flag forhim, but we didn't lower it for
the, the kid that was hung froma tree and lynched in
Mississippi, or the twodemocratic legislators that were
executed, or any of the otherpeople.
It's interesting.
You say that I had a similarreaction, and what I say on the
episode for those of you thatare listening is that people are
(44:22):
angry, that people arecelebrating it and people are
angry about other things.
But the reality is is whateversomebody has a response to, it's
a traumatic response.
It's a reaction, a normalreaction to an abnormal scenario
.
I mean, we're not used toseeing people get assassinated
on live TV.
So whatever reaction somebodyhas in the moment is normal,
whatever it is, because it's anabnormal thing.
(44:42):
We're not used to it.
So stop beating people up forhaving reactions.
If, if that's, if, that's whatyou're doing.
I don't mean you and justsaying in general.
But I also want to point outthat I agree with you and this
was my rant, so I'm going to domy rant now, if you don't mind
it's perfectly in tune with whatwe're talking about is.
I am so pissed off right nowwith all my liberal friends and
(45:04):
I'm going to tell you why andobviously I have a lot of more
friends that are liberal isbecause they're doing the same
thing with jimmy kimmel now,jimmy kimmel getting fired for
expressing his opinion, which,from my understanding, wasn't
even that big of a deal.
What he said is problematicbecause it violates the First
Amendment, since I mean ourfreedom of speech, because the
government is interfering with aprivate citizen's ability to
(45:29):
talk.
That's completelyunconstitutional.
So I get that people are upsetabout it.
But what pisses me off is fortwo freaking years now two years
I have been telling all ofthese people to boycott Disney
and Starbucks and all of thecompanies that are funding
genocide, and all I heard fromevery single one of them
repeatedly was well, you got tolive your life, you know you
(45:50):
can't like boycott that stuff.
Blah, blah, blah, blah, blah.
And now that a white comediangets fired from TV, suddenly all
of these same people who havebeen silent for two years are up
in arms and boycotting Disney,disney, I think it's.
I read today it lost five, Ithink it was $5 billion.
I can't remember what it was,I'll look it up later, but they
(46:12):
lost a significant amount ofmoney from boycotts in two days
Two days.
Could you imagine if all ofthose people put their money
where their mouth was aboutPalestinian people being
executed?
But the reality is they don'tgive a fuck about the
Palestinian people.
So all of the liberal peoplewho are listening to this like
own the fact that you're ahypocrite and that's my rant.
(46:35):
So I was so pissed off aboutthat.
I'm still in pissed off about itand I've every single one of
them.
I've been confronting them onit.
Where the hell were you for thelast two years?
Where were you?
And the responses I've gottenfrom some people is I didn't
know.
That's not an excuse.
It's been all over the place.
People have talked about it.
I've posted a shit ton aboutDisney.
(46:57):
I mean, I used to go to Disneyfour to five times a year.
I added up how much I spent atDisney one time, including, like
plane tickets, staying atproperty, purchasing merchandise
.
I've paid for other people togo to Disney.
I spent almost as much as Ispent on buying my first house.
Speaker 1 (47:14):
Oh my gosh.
Speaker 2 (47:14):
That tells you how much I used to go there and I
don't go.
I have not gone since I don'tbuy anything from Disney.
I will not go back to Disneyand I have boycotted everything
that I possibly can withinreason.
That's on that list.
Now, that's not to say forpeople out there.
If you can only afford to shopat Walmart and that's the only
place you could buy, obviouslyyou can't boycott that if that's
the only place you could buy.
Obviously you can't boycottthat if that's the only place
(47:35):
you can purchase stuff in.
But Disney is not a necessity,it's a luxury.
And if you could not cancelyour Disney channel for the
400,000 people that have beenkilled in Palestine largely
children, you need to checkyourself why one white comedian
(47:55):
was the reason why you boycottedDisney.
Speaker 1 (47:59):
Right, that's such a good and valid point and and I,
I feel like, I, I feel like it'seasy, it's easy to ignore
what's happening not in ourbackyard.
It's like now that they feellike they're being touched by it
, it's a different story, um,but it's.
Speaker 2 (48:21):
it's horrifying it's hard, and actually all of the
people because because Berniehas finally admitted it's a
genocide.
He said it sometime this week,this past week.
Speaker 1 (48:34):
Is that because the UN?
Speaker 2 (48:37):
Oh, probably he's a freaking coward, but he finally
said it and all of hissupporters are now like, yay,
praise Bernie, praise Bernie.
He's like so awesome, he'sgoing to save us.
And they're denying I actuallymade a couple comments on a post
about it.
They're denying that he thatthat's the first time he said it
.
They're like he's been sayingit the whole time and I was like
(48:59):
really prove it, link to me thefirst time he said it.
And, of course, radio silence,because they can't do it.
But they are just as delusional.
So if you're out there rightnow listening to me and you
think that Democrats are anybetter, you are insane, because
they are not.
They are not Two hundred andfifty, two hundred and fifty of
(49:21):
our representatives, of ourlegislator, from every state in
the country, just went to Israel.
Why?
Why did they all go to Israel?
Why did they don't belong inIsrael?
We have our countries fallingapart, but they're over there in
Israel.
Democrats Why'd they all go toIsrael?
Why did they?
They don't belong in Israel.
We have our countries fallingapart, but they're over there in
Israel.
Democrats and Republicans, allof them.
They're all over there kissingNetanyahu's ass.
Speaker 1 (49:40):
I think six Rhode Island.
I think six Rhode Island oneswent.
Speaker 2 (49:45):
Yeah, it's, it's disgusting.
It's disgusting.
These are the people we pay torepresent us and they don't
represent us.
They represent a foreigncountry, which is treason by
definition, and they continue toget away with it and it's, it's
nauseating.
But I want people to stop likedoing this whole virtue
signaling thing and just likeboycotting stuff when it's cool
(50:05):
and saying like, okay, let'sboycott this now and then go
back to doing it in a couple ofweeks.
No, if a company has that lowof a moral compass, we should
never be doing business withthem again.
Speaker 1 (50:14):
Period, full stop, unless they rebrand everything,
fire everybody and restart.
I don't want anything to dowith it.
Speaker 2 (50:24):
Yeah, sorry, amy, you know that that that anger was
not directed at you.
Speaker 1 (50:35):
I know and I love a good rant, so, um, it's, um,
it's, it's amazing, how, like,how like.
Just the fact that you saidthat they lost, however much
money they lost, that clearly wecould do it.
It's just the choice not to,and so it's like.
You said, like where were youtwo years ago?
Speaker 2 (50:49):
it's just it's.
I'm gonna look it up right now.
Hold on.
I should have, probably rightnow, 3.87 billion dollars that
they have lost, which is this isnow again.
Imagine two years ago ifeverybody had done that, this
genocide would probably be over.
So, all of those people, I'msorry, but you're responsible.
(51:11):
You're just as responsible as,as you know yeah, I know that's
harsh, but it's the reality.
And I don't think we canpretend that it's not, because
if we say like, well, I didn'tknow and you know I, it was too
hard for me, I think we'reshrieking our responsibility.
But we have co-signed all theirdeath certificates.
Speaker 1 (51:33):
Yeah, if we have given disney a dime, starbucks a
dime mcdonald's burger king,like any of them it's yeah, I
don't like I I don't have wordsright now because it's been so I
(51:56):
don't know how people canignore genocide Like that's one
thing that I don't comprehend,and so I understand your anger.
Speaker 2 (52:05):
I, if I had I'm not even kidding If I had a dime,
for every single time I've hearda person say I just can't deal
with it, um, I'd probably haveenough money to start Disney.
You know, because I'm not evenkidding, it's that prevalent and
the reality is, and I'm goingto, I'm going to be, if I'm
pissing people off, I'm happyabout it actually, because the
reality is.
The reality.
(52:26):
Is you?
You?
You just don't care aboutPalestinian people, period, full
stop.
You, you just don't care aboutpalestinian people, period, full
stop, like, so, don't pretendto do like, don't like, don't
claim that you're all abouthuman rights and then do the
exact opposite.
It's it's hypocrisy, it'svirtue signaling, it's just,
it's it's garbage it is I.
(52:49):
I hijacked you a little bit onthat, I'm sorry, with what you
were talking about.
It was just it was so relevantto the moment, it was no, it fit
right in.
Speaker 1 (52:57):
That's where we were going.
So it's, you did not hijack meat all and I, I, I appreciate
your passion about this and I,you know, I, I do.
At the same time, I understandthe that like pull to not pay
attention because it's sohorrifying.
So I've kind of made a rule Idon't know if this may be for
(53:20):
other people who are feelingthat way Don't look at the news
before bed, you know, do thatkind of at some point in the day
where you feel like you cantake it in, but don't ignore it.
You know, you have to knowwhat's going on.
Speaker 2 (53:34):
That's an important.
I do want to say that becausenobody should inundate
themselves all day long.
I mean, I am a hundred percentguilty of looking at videos
before I go to bed, cause that'swhen I have my downtime and
then I can't sleep.
So that that is something Idefinitely need to stop doing
and I think it's fine to take abreak.
You know, if I was going onvacation tomorrow, I would turn
(53:54):
my phone off for whatever time Iwas on vacation and not look at
it, and that's fine becauseit's situational.
But I know what's happening andI'm not ignoring it and the
amount of things that are goingto change between that day and
Friday or whatever.
It's probably not going to beanything that didn't happen the
week before, but we have to keeppaying attention to it because
(54:17):
these are, you know.
I think I said in one of theprevious episodes, if you ever
wondered what you do during theholocaust, you're doing it right
now because the scholars haveactually said it is passed over
from being a genocide and it isnow a holocaust.
And we are so again.
If people were like, oh, if Iwas alive during the holocaust,
I would have done this, we'llprove it because you're not
(54:38):
doing that, you know.
But I to go back to somethingyou said, because I do want to
tie this in when you weretalking about how important it
is to nab I'm using the word nabum adolescents into these cults
, because that's when they aredevelopmentally the most
impressionable and when theyhave the invincibility complex
where they think that they can'tdie, which is why the military
(54:59):
gets kids at the age of 18 andpromises them the world, because
none of them think they'regoing to die, and then we
completely exploit them on that.
But that's what's happening atthe idf.
They have taken all of thesekids and given them this
ideology that it's okay to shootbabies in the head with sniper
rifles.
And those kids believe that.
You know they, they are on somelevel victims of being gaslit
(55:27):
and brainwashed themselves andpart of a cult, gas lit and
brainwashed themselves and partof a cult.
Yeah, the fact that.
And then you have, we know thatthey're also committing suicide
and we we had, like Aaron Bush,self emulated, you know,
because of, like all of thestuff that they're seeing and
they can't wrap their brainaround what's happening.
It's, but that's what.
That's the best time to get toget people to believe what you
(55:49):
want to believe.
Speaker 1 (55:51):
Yeah, and it's very, very dangerous when you have a
war that's being driven by somekind of ideology, not just like
I want this piece of land, giveit to me.
It's more, I want this landbecause it's my god-given right
(56:13):
to have it.
So that's very, very dangerouswhen you start fighting for this
, for an ideology or like abelief system.
And I I did want to talk aboutthis because, like I was talking
about in t-mania, how you do,they did really literally groom
these people to be soldiers.
I don't know if this was like amassive, like a mainstream
(56:37):
thing, but when Columbinehappened, there was a story that
circulated.
It definitely circulated inlike Christian circles, but I
don't know if it like made likemainstream, so you'll have to
let me know.
But it was about one of thevictims who who died, who.
The story is that she was askedif she believes in god and she
said yes and she was killed andI think I did, I think I did
(57:01):
hear about that.
Speaker 2 (57:01):
I remember hearing that.
Yeah, I do okay.
Speaker 1 (57:04):
So the like christian circle, they ate this up and
they really exploited this poorlike young girl's murder um to
just justify and push this wholemartyrdom and persecution kink
that they have where.
They're coming for you, they'recoming for us christians.
They want to take away, likeour beliefs and you're not going
(57:25):
to be able to, like, go tochurch anymore.
Just the persecution um complexthat they have.
And they elevated this girl who, like sometimes these stories
they would get extrapolated tobe like that the shooter said,
well, if you say no, I'll letyou live and if you say yes,
I'll kill you, like just toreally hone it in that.
Oh no, he shot her because shesaid she believed in god and
(57:50):
this story would be told to usand I remember hearing it and
being asked as, like a 15, 16year old what would you do in
that situation?
Like, would you have enoughfaith to to die for God?
And like, no, I think of thatand I'm like that is fucked up.
I'm sorry, I keep swearing.
That is messed up.
Speaker 2 (58:07):
That's okay.
I did too.
Okay, all.
Speaker 1 (58:08):
That's okay.
I did too.
Okay, all right, I didn't knowif it was family friendly or not
.
Not anymore.
Speaker 2 (58:13):
I could rate it as an explicit episode, and then
it'll be fine.
Speaker 1 (58:26):
I love that, but it's messed up.
It's to try to convince ateenager and prep them and tell
them that you're beingpersecuted.
That's the other piece of it.
So it's not like this is someforeign thing that isn't going
to happen to you.
It's like, no, they're comingfor you.
Are you going to have enoughfaith to stand up and say like,
yes, I believe in God and laydown your life for the Lord?
Like, can you imagine?
Like, what you have to gothrough mentally to prep
yourself for that?
It's, it's so psychologicallydamaging.
(58:47):
And so I do feel for the, theidf soldiers in a way, in that
way that they are being pushedinto this.
But they are kids, they're kids, they're.
Speaker 2 (58:58):
they're fighting that yahoo's war, like that's what
they're doing and I have a tonof respect for the kids who have
actually refused to go into.
I know you keep saying the wordwar.
I refuse to call it a warbecause it's not a war, it's an
ethnic cleansing.
Palestine doesn't even have anarmy, I mean, so they can't
(59:21):
fight back.
I mean, this is just, they'recarpet bombing people, they're
building mass graves, they'rekilling people, they're
poisoning the food.
One of the things and you'llhear on the interview with the
woman that we had from gaza wasthey allowed food in, finally,
and then, after they allowedfood, and they immediately
evacuated them and then bombedthe building.
The food was in and this isjust.
(59:42):
It's just horrific, it'storture.
It's not a war, right like so I.
I correct everybody when I hearthat, because it never was a
war and it's not going it's.
It's been an ethnic cleansingsince day one.
It's been happening since what?
45, 46.
I mean, it's just not, it's notchanging and I think it's
important for people, Iappreciate you correcting me,
(01:00:05):
actually, because you'reabsolutely right.
I correct everybody on that,because I think we have to.
And the other thing is that allreligions do this.
I mean, this is why I amvehemently against religion.
I mean, religion has been usedas a weapon in every religion.
It's like this I had aconversation with somebody the
(01:00:25):
other day who said to me if thepeople of Gaza would just give
the Israelis back their land,the whole world would be better
and they would be happy.
And I said why would they givethem the land?
It's their land.
And he said yeah, but it'stheir Holy land, says who.
And he's like well, you know,the Bible says it's their Holy
land.
And I was like okay, would youagree that the native Americans
(01:00:46):
that existed in in this countrybefore we got here that that was
their holy land?
And he said yes, and I said sowe should give them their land
back, right, because we are thecolonizers that came in and
murdered them.
So if one of the tribes showedup at your door tomorrow and
said this is my land, get out,you would happily give your
house over.
And he was like well, no, that'sdifferent.
(01:01:07):
Why is that different?
And he's like because, becausethis is the is' holy land.
You just told me that youagreed that the Native
Americans' land was holy here.
I mean, there's Native Americanmonuments all over the place
that they built.
They worshiped the land.
So they lived off the land andhe didn't get it and we had to
keep kind of going in circlesaround this conversation and
(01:01:30):
then finally he was like, okay,it makes sense.
Of course it makes senseBecause it's the Palestinians
land.
It always was.
They don't get to come in andjust say like, oh, it's my land,
put a gun to their head and belike, okay, get out, now, I own
your house.
Like that's not and that's whathappened.
And people are justifying it isokay and looking at it and
saying this is moral.
(01:01:50):
Now, I stopped going to churchwhen I was 12.
I mean, I was raised Catholicbut in my memory of Christianity
, jesus wasn't a warrior andnone of the prophets were
warriors that were going outkilling people and advocating
for genocide.
They were people who wouldprobably be hanged today in our,
(01:02:14):
in our country or mostcountries, as being called
communists or socialists.
So they certainly don't embodythe values that they're
screaming.
They never have.
Speaker 1 (01:02:25):
No, not at all.
I mean, it's definitely been.
It's been co-opted by this likeultra white nationalist,
Christian nationalist agendathat they've twisted it, backing
away from the teachings ofJesus and even saying like, well
, no, I think we're not going topay attention to that.
(01:02:54):
Let's look at the Old Testament, like Deuteronomy and Leviticus
that's kind of where they'recoming from.
Which is this?
Like wrathful, hateful God.
Speaker 2 (01:03:04):
Sounds like a God I would want to go hang out with.
Let me tell you.
Speaker 1 (01:03:09):
I mean.
Speaker 2 (01:03:10):
I don't understand the whole appealing part of that
.
My God, amy, we are running outof time so I didn't know if
there was any final like cause.
I want to just do the uh, thememorial that I do at the end.
Speaker 1 (01:03:22):
If there was any final notes you wanted to make,
no, just thank you so much forgiving me the space to talk
about this and for anyone who isstruggling with um
deconstruction and strugglingwith leaving their faith, to
definitely reach out to otherpeople who've maybe been there.
And you also have to be surethat you're honor your own
(01:03:44):
journey and honor like what yourown wishes are, because a big
part of it is also regainingyour autonomy.
So allowing yourself to askquestions, but also allowing
yourself to take it as slow asyou need to thank you, amy, I
appreciate that, and thank youso much for coming on twice.
Speaker 2 (01:04:03):
I know that your episode had an impact because I
actually got emails about it ohI forgot to tell you that at the
beginning about how much peopleit resonated with people I'm so
glad oh it was.
Thank you so much.
Anybody else that's out therethat wants to come on, feel free
to contact me.
The one thing I hate is I get alot of those ai generated
messages that say this episoderesonated with me and it's like
(01:04:26):
and I just delete them, so donot send me an ai generated
message.
So I just want to dedicate thisepisode to another Palestinian
who was executed by the IDF, andthis article came out in
November 20th of 2024 in AlJazeera, so I will link it in
the show notes.
(01:04:46):
But this is and again Iapologize for butchering any of
these names, but his name is DrAdnan Al-Bursh and he was a
orthopedic who worked atAl-Shifa Hospital and from the
article and the information thatwas given by eyewitness
testimony was that he wasdragged into the prison yard,
(01:05:09):
bleeding, beaten, and theybelieved that he was raped to
death by the IDF.
Again, this is a doctor thatthey are, of course, calling a
terrorist, because anybody whois Palestinian is a terrorist
according to them, and nobodyshould be raped to death, and
the article seems like thetorture went on for a long
(01:05:30):
period of time, and I think it'simportant for us to put names
to these people and rememberwhat happened to them.
So that's where I want to endwith there, and again, I will
link that in the show notes.
So, amy, thank you so much forbeing here, and if I pissed
(01:05:51):
people off, good, go dosomething about it.
Yeah, even if that's you don'tlisten to me anymore, that's
fine, but still go do somethingabout it.
Don't be a hypocrite.
Thank you everybody.
Speaker 1 (01:06:01):
Thanks, Matt.
Speaker 2 (01:06:22):
Hello everybody and thank you again for listening.
This is just a reminder that nopart of this podcast can be
duplicated or copied withoutwritten consent from either
myself or Wendy.
Thank you again.
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