Reclaiming the Garden Round-Up #1
Highlights from my podcast, both my all-time faves and the best from this past quarter (three months)
At the end of every three months, I’m going to make a post sharing a bit about some episodes of the podcast I host with my friend Anna Dawahare, Reclaiming the Garden. You can access all the episodes I mention on our Anchor site: https://anchor.fm/reclaimingthegarden. From there, you can go to whichever podcast platform you prefer, or you can listen directly from the website.
Since this is my first Round-Up, I won’t just be covering episodes from July-September but also mentioning my all-time favorite episodes. Let’s start off with interviews and collaborations that I will cherish forever:
The Evangelical Church in Hungary with Amy Kósa: Our very first guest, a Hungarian academic, which we met through the virtual 2021 Q Christian Fellowship Conference. The video chat conversations that Anna and I organized with fellow exvangelicals were what helped birth the podcast, and Amy was part of pretty much all of them. We talked with Amy about her religious background, how she became a progressive Christian, and the research she’s doing on the dynamics of evangelical and progressive Christianity in the United States. We also talk about our shared love for the progressive Christian writer Rachel Held Evans, why the Bible is NOT “clear,” the pressure to proselytize, American individualism, and the similarities and differences between evangelical churches in the US and Hungary.
Heaven, Hell, and Making All Things New with Ravel Podcast: In this episode, we take on a topic so big (heaven, hell, the final destiny of creation), we had to bring in the perspectives of our friends from Ravel Podcast–Emily Rettinghouse, Josh Lieuallen, and Stephen Henning. We break down what we were taught about the afterlife (kind of having amnesia in heaven about your friends and family who were in hell? And heaven being a never-ending church service? Yikes!) in our respective faith backgrounds. We then discuss how our views have changed over time, our questions and doubts about why a loving God would punish people forever and about whether there even is an afterlife. All of us land in different places in what we believe now and how that affects how we live (Emily is clergy and she is very refreshing in how openness that she isn’t sure if heaven or hell exist), but all of us are connected to the idea of new creation, not just in some distant future–Jesus’ teachings about the Kingdom of Heaven invite us into the restoration of ourselves, our communities, and the earth, right here and now (and that unfortunately, some people choose to create hell on earth instead). And for some of us, that hope of new creation goes beyond death and into a vision where one day, all life on this earth will be restored, and instead of an endless worship service, maybe heaven is an adventure where we imagine and create with God and each other.
Healing From Harmful Systems with Alicia Crosby (an absolute delight to record, I love her so much): In this episode, we have a conversation with justice educator, activist, (sometimes reluctant) minister, and writer/speaker Alicia Crosby. Alicia and I start off by bonding over our shared alma mater, Hollins University. After that, we get into Alicia’s faith journey, her “ecumenical promiscuousness” and what she’s learned from different Christian traditions, her coming out journey and pansexual identity, and her work related to religious trauma (particularly racialized, imperialist trauma and LGBTQ+ trauma). We also talk about how whiteness and imperialism shows up in both conservative and progressive spaces, the importance of intersectional justice, personal healing, and decolonization (particularly in deconstruction/reconstruction), purity culture, and about the vast spectrum of people who identify with the Christian faith and how they interpret the Bible, from the white folks who worship a macho capitalist “warrior king Jesus” to people like Alicia, who identify more with the Jesus who was changing the world by sitting at dinner tables.
Now, on to the topic episodes, where Anna and I break down what we were taught about something (books of the Bible, systems of oppression, sexual ethics, even musicals) in the churches we grew up in, and discuss how our ideas and theologies have changed around the topic, whose voices helped us see from the margins and different perspectives, hopefully pointing a new way forward for folks who are also figuring out what they believe and are reclaiming and reconstructing.
Let’s Talk About Purity Culture: Content warning: sexual abuse, evangelical bullshit, religious shame/trauma. Purity culture—the sexual ethic taught by most evangelical and Catholic churches that sex is only good/holy in the context of monogamous marriage between a cisgender man and cisgender woman. It’s a teaching that has led to so much sexual shame, abuse, and loss of people’s agency and embodiment. In this episode, we discuss how we experienced this teaching in church (and the culture at large--in a secular context, we would call it rape culture or slut shaming), how it impacted us, and how we deconstructed and reconstructed our sexual ethics to have a healthier, less rigid view of sex. A healthy sexual ethic should be rooted in the values of consent and care for other people—that is, you’re not harming yourself or others, and you make sure to get enthusiastic consent. We also discuss how purity culture creates an environment where sexual abuse can flourish and survivors are shamed into silence; it’s not a bug of the system, it’s a feature. We also make fun of Matthew West’s stupid song “Modest is Hottest.”
Bible Dyke Deep Dive: Revelation (this is a recurring kind of topic episode where we analyze Scripture, and I would recommend all of them but especially this one): The beasts in the book of Revelation are scary...but what’s even more terrifying are the oppressive, violent, greedy empires they represent (and in which all of us are complicit). In this episode, we get down and dirty and nerdy with scripture as we break down the misconceptions we were taught about this apocalyptic text; most notably, the supposed order of events of the end of the world (sometimes called the End Times Timeline).
We explore John of Patmos’ vision in his historical, cultural, and literary context and see that his monstrous imagery is often taken from the Hebrew Bible prophets (especially Daniel) that were referring to the empires that had taken them captive in their day; John was showing how Rome was just the most recent iteration of that same pattern of conquest. In this book, John is laying out a clear choice, and no, it’s not whether you prayed the Sinner’s Prayer or not. Will we follow the way of the empire, acting in ways that profit off the blood of our neighbor and destroy God’s good world, or will we follow the way of Jesus, the slain Lamb, who does not achieve victory through conquest but through loving and dying for his enemies?
We also discuss how Revelation actually offers a vision of incredible hope, especially in its final two chapters, which God invites us to take part in making a reality in the here and now: a vision of a river of life and tree of life, and a city where all of God’s people thrive, where the whole of creation is renewed (God is making all things new, not an all-new earth) and heaven is finally reunited with earth. Contrary to what many evangelicals say, the final pages of the Bible testify that this earth that we live on right now is our home and God’s home.
Musicals that Spark Our Theological Imagination: In celebration of the Tony’s (which at time of release in June was the past Sunday), Anna and I discuss several musicals that make us think about theology and/or LGBTQ+ identity (and we include the perspectives of a few of our friends, too!). We of course start with musicals that take their stories from the Bible (Jesus Christ Superstar, Godspell and Prince of Egypt which yes, April still needs to watch), then go into shows that have inspired us in our journeys of faith without having outright religious themes–among them are anti-purity culture anthems from Wicked and Heathers, queer joy in The Prom, Fun Home, and Everybody’s Talking About Jamie, and (okay, these actually do have outright religious themes) the redemption stories in A Muppet Christmas Carol and Les Misérables. We hope you enjoy what is the most lighthearted episode we’ve ever recorded!
And now, my top three faves from July-September:
Leaving the Mormon Church with Jordan and McKay: In this episode (which is currently our highest played ever, at 205!), we have a conversation with ex-Mormon (or “exmo”) YouTubers Jordan and McKay! They share their journey of growing up in the Mormon/LDS church and the things that caused them to doubt until their “shelves” of faith broke and they decided to leave (the disturbing history of Joseph Smith marrying women as young as 14, the practices and lack of informed consent in the Temple, among other things). All of us discuss what we were taught about the other’s faith tradition–Anna and April were taught that Mormonism was a cult and that Mormons were going to hell, and *gasp* they believed in a Heavenly Mother as well as Father; and Jordan and McKay were taught that, although Mormons tried to do work in partnership with other denominations, those denominations were a distorted mirror compared to Joseph Smith’s restored church. April talks about how her church’s support of Mitt Romney was the first crack in her evangelical faith (because if he’s going to hell as they taught her all Mormons are, then why are they voting for him?). We also talk about the tension in Mormon culture of being very patriotic but also having a distrust of “big government.”
Wealth, Poverty, and Capitalism: In this episode, we break down what we were taught about money, the economy, and socioeconomic status in the churches we grew up in. Even if we were not explicitly taught the “prosperity gospel” à la televangelists (that if you be the best Christian you can be and donate a lot of money to the church, God will make you rich, and poor people are “just lazy and don’t have God’s favor”), we were still taught that capitalism was Good and socialism was Scary, that the government shouldn’t take the church’s role of caring for the poor. We were still taught an individualistic view that people could have financial abundance if they put in the work, completely ignoring the many systemic barriers that keep marginalized communities from acquiring financial security. We also discussed the consumerist culture present in evangelicalism with its church coffee shops and concert style worship. But God’s vision of economic justice, and justice in general, is the exact opposite of that, and the culture in which the Scriptures were written was collectivist. The Hebrew Bible and the New Testament are FILLED with calls to care for our neighbors, to not hoard things when we already have enough. Jesus says the poor are blessed, because the poor are the closest to God–God is not partial to a political party, but God is on the side of the poor and oppressed, always. And that has implications that we (Anna and I grew up well-off) have to wrestle with and make sure we are truly living out God’s call to justice and wholeness for all.
The God Who Riots with Damon Garcia: In this episode, we have a conversation with author and liberation theologian Damon Garcia, whose book, The God Who Riots: Taking Back the Radical Jesus, releases today, August 23rd; links to purchase available below/on his social media pages! We chat with Damon about his spiritual journey of growing up conservative evangelical and discovering that the Jesus he read about in the Gospels was much different than what his church had taught, and why he had to leave the church where he was leading youth ministry. April and Anna bring up their favorite themes of the book (the way he writes about forgiveness will blow your mind!!! In the collectivist culture of the time it was understood to be a communal act that takes away the shame that society has placed upon them!!), and we discussed practical ways for living out God’s dream of radical justice in community. We deeply enjoyed reading his book (which we got an advanced reader copy of, so cool!!) and we hope you will too!
Seminary life update: So…I met Matthias Roberts last week (host of the Queerology Podcast and author of Beyond Shame, and iconic gay Christian). He’s actually an Assistant Instructor at The Seattle School, and on my way to class I happened to pass by his office, and of course I said hi and was a total dork and uh now we’re friends on Facebook? Wild. I feel very overwhelmed with homework but I know I am not alone in this and will learn to get back into the rhythm of academia while still caring for myself well; this overwhelm is part of the learning process.
Do you have any podcasts to recommend? Give them a shout-out in the comments! And if you happen to listen to any of the episodes listed above, I’d love to hear your thoughts and continue the conversation.