Uncertain

New book on Spiritual Abuse available from the founder of Tears of Eden: A Thousand Tiny Paper Cuts: The Subtle, Insidious Nature of Spiritual Abuse and Life on the Other Side-The Final Episode of Season Five (and the final episode of Uncertain) is a very special episode. The Board of Directors of Tears of Eden interviews Katherine Spearing, reflecting on the journey of creating five seasons and 110 episodes. They'll discuss: What Katherine is most proud of during the past five seasonsHow Katherine has navigated carrying stories of abuse and trauma while also being a survivorWhat it's like working with a team and building community after experiencing abuse within a communityWhat it's like to pioneer bringing pivotal conversations into the public eyeHow being a woman has impacted Katherine's approach and experience calling out abuse And More! Featuring Erin Pickersgill, Nikki G. and Brad Klausman Looking for a trauma-trained mental health professional to work with? www.traumaresolutionandrecovery.com/meet-our-practitionersSign up for Tears of Eden’s newsletter to receive updates on the release of Katherine Spearing’s upcoming book: www.tearsofeden.org/aboutUncertain is a podcast of  Tears of Eden, a community and resource for those in the aftermath of Spiritual Abuse. If you’re enjoying this podcast, please take a moment to like, subscribe, or leave a review on your favorite podcasting listening apparatus. You can support the podcast by going to TearsofEden.org/supportTo get in touch with us please email tearsofeden.org@gmail.comFollow on Instagram @uncertainpodcastTranscript is Unedited for Typos and Misspellings [00:00:00] I'm Katherine Spearing and this is Uncertain. So today's episode is a special one. It's a little bit happy and celebratory, and it's also a little bit sad. This episode is for the foreseeable future the last episode of Uncertain. It is the end of an era, the end of a journey, and also the beginning of one, I hope. Is the fifth season. We're ending the fifth season. There are five seasons of Uncertain. There's also over a hundred episodes. That's a really big deal. I was planning to sort of end the season with the episode from last week with Janai Amon talking about the How to prepare for telling your story publicly in a safe way.I was really excited about that episode. I was prepared to end on that episode. And then I met with the board of directors for tears of Eden. Yes, we have a [00:01:00] board of directors. We are a nonprofit. All non profits have a board of directors, and I was really thrilled that they suggested, hey, why don't we do like a final celebratory episode in which we, the board, interview you, Katherine, about the journey we're on.with Uncertain. And I honestly was so in the zone of like, okay, I need to finish the season. I need to wrap it up. I need to get everything out. I need to do the promo and I need to do the recording and I need to do the editing and just kind of full on just work task mode. And so the fact that the board suggested, hey, let's do an episode to sort of commemorate and celebrate.That was really helpful. I really appreciated it. It meant so much to me and this episode meant a lot to me as well. This whole journey has meant so much to me. I'm going to talk more about it in the episode itself during the interview. Be sure to sign up for our newsletter, the Tears of Eden newsletter, so that you can stay [00:02:00] updated on everything that is continuing to happen with Tears of Eden, including but not limited to a book about spiritual abuse that I am currently writing and will be releasing next year 2025. Thank you all so much for listening. Uh, so before I start crying, I will turn it over to the board of directors of Tears of Eden.Here is the final episode where the board of directors interviews Katherine Spearing Erin: Will you like edit things? Oh, definitely. I'll definitely Katherine: edit it. Yeah. And I'll probably just kind of speak, speak openly, and then decide later if I care.you're gonna edit Erin: yourself. I'm definitely Katherine: going to edit myself. I probably edit myself more than I edit guests, honestly, because they're going to be going to be real about that. I was like, why do I say like so much? I say like so much. Erin: You like it. You like it. I like to say like, [00:03:00] exactly. Katherine: So can we have everybody introduce yourselves? Your name, where you're located, your pronouns, and what how you found Tears of Eden, and then what made you want to be on the board of directors aside from me coercing you into it?Brad: Nicky threatening my life. Erin: That'll do it. Nicole: That's because Catherine threatened my life, so I just was passing down the baton. Hey, Erin: I didn't get threatened. I feel left out. Brad: Well, don't worry. That means you saved on therapy bills. It's okay. And Katherine: we are not a cult. Nicole: No. No. We've had enough of those. Katherine: Nikki, why Nicole: don't you go first?Okay. I am Nikki G, and certified trauma recovery coach, and I specialize in religious trauma, cult recovery, and narc abuse, and I hail from the state of Texas. And [00:04:00] how did I find this safe space that I found that I'm in right now? Well, I met Catherine, maybe about 2021, I think and we connected that way, came on our podcast with myself and another coach.And We just hit it off. We found that we had a lot of commonality and our hearts were both centered on, obviously, recovering ourselves, but also helping those who have gone through horrendous forms of spiritual abuse and religious trauma. And so, you know, Catherine reached out to me, I think the end of 2021, and said, Hey!There's a board seat. You want to get on the board? No, she didn't say it that easy, but she was just saying, I would love to have you. I think, you know we hit it off well, and I think we have the same vision. And so I came on board. I remember her. I'm not going to do that now, but I remember her explaining to me how tears of Eden, the actual name came to being, and I just fell in love with that.[00:05:00] And she didn't have the strong army. And so I said, yes. And I've been on the board since the beginning of 2022. So that's my story and I'm sticking with it Katherine: and Nikki has been with me through many a trial tears of Eden related. Yeah. And it's gotten me through many things. Very, very grateful, and also runs the support groups or has run the past few support groups that we've done.Wonderful, wonderful, wonderful support group, support person, wonderful human being. Erin, you want to go next? Erin: Hi everyone so my name is Erin Pickerskill and I'm the, I'm an Episcopal priest in the Diocese of Missouri. And my pronouns are she, her I've been a priest for a few years and as I was training to be a priest, I was in England and had some of my own experiences of spiritual abuse and religious trauma.And as I was. Trying to find out if this thing was even real. [00:06:00] Found myself stomping around the British countryside, walking my dogs and listening to Catherine's voice on the Tia's of Eden podcast on certain and like just praying and wishing and hoping that I could find a community that would understand me and validate my experiences and ended up moving to St.Louis after that. And so did Catherine. So I asked Catherine if I could take her out for a coffee. And And thank her for all of the validation and comfort she gave me and probably many others. And then I strong armed her into being my friend and that's how I do friendship. And but it was just so great.And so then Catherine asked me to be part of the board like on a temporary basis and I loved it so much. Yeah, I just love being a part of this. community. Did I answer all your questions? Yeah, maybe that was about last year, Catherine, or about a year and a half ago. So Katherine: I don't remember, but also came on in a torrential season [00:07:00] of personal and tears of Eden nature.I remember when we both cried. I was like, I don't know. It was like, we laughed. Yeah. Erin: It was amazing. It was amazing. Yeah. To me, like you were, it was like meeting my hero. And Katherine: for me, it was just like, Whoa, we both moved here at the same time. Like, I did feel, Erin: you know, this story that I felt so, so scared, you were going to think I was so creepy because I messaged you and I was like, you're moving to St.Louis. So am I, let me get you a coffee. Like that is creepy. So I'm so glad that I'm so glad that you you took the chance and let me get coffee for you. Katherine: One day it was very special. And I'm so grateful that you're on the board. You bring so much life and laughter and fun and we need that desperately.And we ran into each other literally yesterday, yesterday. It was two days ago, one of those days at a coffee shop. [00:08:00] We're both at the same coffee shop. Yes. This Erin: is awesome. Katherine: Yes. I promise. I didn't Nicole: know you were gonna be there. Katherine: I didn't know you were gonna be there. You're like, I'm not being creepy. I swear. I was in your car route.So good. So good. Cannot escape Erin. No. She's always there. Erin: Oh, that's creepy. Brad's face is so scared. He's so scared. On that note. Katherine: Yeah, right. Brad, how about you introduce yourselves? Brad: Well, you know, I didn't know all that about Erin or I may have reconsidered. However I'm here. So my name is Brad. I short, brief history.I'm a former pastor of 20 plus years in the Southern Baptist church. I escaped with, with no hair, but I escaped and became a certified light coach about four years ago helping people that are deconstructing from religious beliefs. Ideology, trauma and whatever they may go through. My pronouns are he, him. I found out about [00:09:00] tears because of Nikki. Nikki and I met through Instagram discovered we had connection. And then she very bluntly threatened me to interview for tears. And right that same day that she threatened me, s

New book on Spiritual Abuse available from the founder of Tears of Eden: A Thousand Tiny Paper Cuts: The Subtle, Insidious Nature of Spiritual Abuse and Life on the Other SideThis is one of the most important and practical episodes you will likely ever listen to! As more people speak out publicly, sharing their stories of abuse in the church, more and more churches, denominations, and pastors are growing litigious, further abusing victims in civil court. If you're thinking of going public with your story, LISTEN TO THIS EPISODE! Featuring Jenai Auman, author of the recently released book Othered. We'll Cover: Question to ask yourself before going public with your storyThings to consider before going publicTips to mitigate your riskHOW to prepare IF you get suedWhat to expect from lawyersAnd More* Disclaimer: This is NOT legal Advice! * Read this article, written by Jenai, that inspired Katherine to ask her to talk about this on the podcast. This is seriously one episode Katherine has REALLY wanted to do. Jenai wrote a companion article with examples of corroboration here. Jenai Auman is a Filipina American writer, artist, and author of Othered. She draws from her experience and education to write on healing, hope, and holistic spiritual formation practices.Looking for a trauma-trained mental health professional to work with? www.traumaresolutionandrecovery.com/meet-our-practitionersSign up for Tears of Eden’s newsletter to receive updates on the release of Katherine Spearing’s upcoming book: www.tearsofeden.org/aboutUncertain is a podcast of  Tears of Eden, a community and resource for those in the aftermath of Spiritual Abuse. If you’re enjoying this podcast, please take a moment to like, subscribe, or leave a review on your favorite podcasting listening apparatus. You can support the podcast by going to TearsofEden.org/supportTo get in touch with us please email tearsofeden.org@gmail.comFollow on Instagram @uncertainpodcastTranscript is Unedited for Typos and Misspellings[00:00:00] I'm Katherine Spearing and this is Uncertain.Starting in April of this year, I began partnering with Center for Trauma Resolution and Recovery, working as a practitioner for this organization. This organization's CEO is Dr. Laura Anderson. You may be familiar with her. She's been on the pod a couple of different times. She's also the author of the book, When Religion Hurts You.She's awesome. She's the boss. I work with her and a bunch of other really great practitioners over there. If you are looking for mental health professional, a trained, highly qualified, highly experienced mental health professional that can help you navigate religious trauma, spiritual abuse, and all of the sub categories that fall beneath that.I encourage you to check out Center for Trauma Resolution and Recovery. I am currently accepting a few new clients, and there are several other practitioners that are also accepting clients. I know that's a big thing that comes up a lot in the religious trauma spiritual abuse [00:01:00] world is folks just really struggling to find a mental health professional that understands religious trauma and spiritual abuse and the nuances and complexities of the subculture of evangelicalism and church culture.So if that is something that you are looking for, I encourage you to check them out. The link will be in the show notes. Also in April of this year, I signed a book deal with Lake Dry Books. My book, Surprise Surprise is about spiritual abuse. It will be coming out in sometime in 2025. Date is yet to be determined, so I encourage you to sign up for Tears of Eden's mailing list for updates on the release of that book. The need that this book is going to fill in the world of religious trauma and spiritual abuse recovery, that is something that I see lacking in theIt's the need of making the connection between the theology of evangelicalism that actually leads [00:02:00] to the abuse happening. I'm not seeing that a lot in the literature today. Our guest a couple of weeks ago, Krista Brown, she made that connection in her memoir, Baptist Land. But outside of that, it's not really a common thing that folks are addressing. So I felt like it was a pretty important subject to navigate in my book. It's going to be mostly. Following my journey of recovery, but it's not a memoir and it is also going to be pulling some stuff from the work with Tears of Eden. There are direct quotes from podcasts that you may have listened to So sign up for the mailing list so that you can get updates about that. Today's guest is my friend and colleague Janai Allman, and I am so excited about this episode. This is an episode that I have been wanting to do for a couple years. And a few weeks before Janai had, and I had this episode scheduled to record, she sent out a Substacks article about the very subject [00:03:00] that we're going to be talking about today.We are going to talk about her book that just came out, Othered, and we are going to talk about the book a little bit as well, But Janai graciously agreed to have this conversation with me because we both learned a lot of things about telling our stories publicly and how to stay safe and also make sure we get to say our side of the story and those two things are super important on the other side of abuse.So very excited about this episode. I hope this is one that people will re listen to over and over and over again, and I am so excited to be able to include this as a resource for Tears of Eden and for folks who encounter Tears of Eden. Janai Almon is a Filipina American writer and artist who draws from her years in church leadership as well as her trauma informed training to write on healing, hope, and the way forward.She is passionate about providing language to readers so they can find a faith inspiring that freeze. She received her bachelor's degree in behavioral health science, and is currently pursuing a [00:04:00] master's in spiritual formation at Northeastern Seminary. Janiyah lives in Houston, Texas with her husband, Tyler, and their sons, Quinn and Graham.Here is my interview with Janiyah Allman Katherine: Hello, Janai. Jenai: Hi. How are you? I'm really good. I'm so glad we're doing this. Katherine: Yes, me too. I'm very excited about this episode and the subject that we are going to talk about today because it is one, as you and I have, talked about prior to the episode is something that is a big discussion within the survivor community for folks who are wanting to go public with their stories and discussing how to protect ourselves from the potential for a civil lawsuit.It is not an uncommon thing and it's becoming more common like I'm, I'm seeing it happen a lot. You just went through experience of writing a book before we [00:05:00] jumped on, you talked about going through a legal review when you were writing your book. So everything that we're sharing today is going to just be to help people have some awareness about this experience of going public with your story and protecting yourself because you want to, you want to protect yourself. As we jump in, I definitely want to highlight your book . So give folks a just rundown of what your book is and why you wanted to write this book. Jenai: Yeah, I, so my book is a faith oriented book, so I know that some people who might listen to Uncertain, they might be in varying degrees of faith, or totally deconverted altogether, I make space for the deconverted, and but also, I wrote this space reorienting, or I wrote the book reorienting, like, how I posture myself to Like the stories in the Bible and I weave in personal narrative.So this is what I experienced. How does that, how is that at all in accord with scripture? How, and it isn't [00:06:00] a lot of what I experienced while working on staff at a church, one of those churches that are often in those podcasts where they talk about the main guy who started the affiliation yelling at people.Like, I think people, I was a part of a very high control, very toxic masculinity church planting network. And I was ostracized and kicked out essentially othered in from my church because I wouldn't, I wouldn't shut up and I wouldn't, I wouldn't stop advocating for myself. And so I wrote othered.To tell my story and to essentially provide a road map to this is why I still am a Christian. I kind of detangled my experience of that space from the harm I experienced. And I have found a renewed relationship in God. However, it doesn't land per like I'm not in a church today. I'm not and some people, they are so mad that I'm not in a church today.Which, that's like a whole other thing. And then other people are going to be mad that Katherine: you still identify as a [00:07:00] Christian. Yeah. Jenai: Yeah. Like I'm not in a church. I still identify as a Christian. I'm in seminary. So that makes it like even kookier for people. And, and so I sit in a weird place where even as I tell my story, sometimes I still feel very othered because I haven't landed where other people wanted me to land.But that's kind of the whole point. Like I want people to feel free to land wherever, even my, like, I don't mention my husband very often, but even my husband has landed somewhere different in faith. And that's like much more toward deconversion. And so I hold space for a lot of different people. So anyway, I wrote other, I share, it's not a memoir.So it doesn't tell even people get mad whenever I say, I don't say everything that happened in the book, and I think we're going to talk about all of that and maybe why I didn't do that. A lot of that is just to protect myself. I think a lot of people want that, though, and they don't understand the risk that goes into telling everything like in a memoir style.I just use [00:08:00] pieces of the story. Like, my story is not up for debate. But I just used these instances, instances and moments to say, here's where something in me fractured and I had to find my way back to my

New book on Spiritual Abuse available from the founder of Tears of Eden: A Thousand Tiny Paper Cuts: The Subtle, Insidious Nature of Spiritual Abuse and Life on the Other SideMattie Jo Cowsert was a pastor’s kid and proud purity ring wearer before she moved to New York City and experienced an unexpected worldview and identity implosion thanks to Tinder and her Jewish roommate. When marriage equality passed in 2015, Mattie Jo decided to share how the queer community was one of the catalysts for questioning everything she’d been taught about this Jesus guy in her first publicly released blog post entitled: God and the Gays. This was the start of her popular blog, God, Sex, and Rich People. Before terms like “deconstruction”, “purity culture” or “Exvangelical'' became hashtags viewed by billions, God, Sex, and Rich People exposed the sometimes painful, sometimes hilarious realities of a young female Exvangelical navigating the diversity of the Big Apple, working for the 1%, and trying to have good sex without hating herself in the city that never sleeps (and never stops sleeping around).Her book by the same name releases on September 10th, 2024.   Looking for a trauma-trained mental health professional to work with? www.traumaresolutionandrecovery.com/meet-our-practitionersSign up for Tears of Eden’s newsletter to receive updates on the release of Katherine Spearing’s upcoming book: www.tearsofeden.org/aboutUncertain is a podcast of  Tears of Eden, a community and resource for those in the aftermath of Spiritual Abuse. If you’re enjoying this podcast, please take a moment to like, subscribe, or leave a review on your favorite podcasting listening apparatus. You can support the podcast by going to TearsofEden.org/supportTo get in touch with us please email tearsofeden.org@gmail.comFollow on Instagram @uncertainpodcast Transcript is Unedited for Typos and Misspellings[00:00:00] I'm Katherine Spearing, and this is Uncertain. Uncertain is the affiliate podcast of Tears of Eden, a community and resource for survivors of spiritual abuse from the evangelical community. So I don't think I've had the chance to officially announce, But in April of this year, I partnered with Center for Trauma Resolution and Recovery to work as a practitioner for them. Center for Trauma Resolution and Recovery is a online agency that works with survivors of spiritual abuse, religious trauma, purity culture, folks who are deconstructing, All of the things, and it's 100 percent online, so you can meet with a practitioner online.So many folks are addressing the religious trauma that came from evangelicalism, from working in the church, and they're looking for good mental health professionals that understand this. I know that with most of the clients that I work with, they [00:01:00] have already worked with therapists before in the past.But one of the main things that they struggled with in their therapy relationship was that the therapist didn't understand the nuances and the complexities of the subculture of evangelicalism. So if you are looking for a mental health practitioner to help you navigate the complex and confusing and very painful journey of recovering from religious trauma and the trauma from spiritual abuse, I encourage you to check them out. I'm a practitioner there. I see clients one on one. I currently have a client.Few openings for new clients and there are also several other practitioners that have openings for clients as well. So that is an option available to you. Another thing that I haven't announced yet on the podcast is that In April, also in April of this year, I signed a book contract. I am working with Lake Drive Books as my publisher for this book.[00:02:00] And what do you know? The book is about spiritual abuse. It will contain a A lot of my journey, but my journey also entails working with clients, working with survivors through Tears of Eden, there are some genuine quotes that are taken straight from some of the podcast episodes here. So you'll be in familiar territory.One of the gaps in the current literature around spiritual abuse that my book is going to hopefully fill is addressing the reality that The theology and evangelicalism and in the modern day church actually has a massive impact on the rampant abuse that we are now seeing in the church.I haven't seen a lot of that connection made in the current literature that's out there. Our previous guest from last week, Krista Brown, she made that connection really well. Like this theology actually leads to the abuse. So Other than that, I just really haven't seen that much happening. So that's one [00:03:00] of the things that's going to be showing up in this book as well. That's just a little bit of a sneak peek. We'll probably do some sort of launch event through Tears of Eden when it comes out in 2025. The exact date is still to be decided, but subscribe to Tears of Eden's newsletter so that you can get updates on that book when it's coming out and all of the deets around that. The guest today is Maddie Jo Kausert. Maddie Jo was a pastor's kid and proud purity ring wearer, before she moved to New York City and experienced an unexpected worldview and identity implosion, thanks to Tinder and her Jewish roommate.When marriage equality passed in 2015, Maddie Jo decided to share how the queer community was one of the catalysts for questioning everything she'd been taught about this Jesus guy in her first public release blog post entitled, God and the Gays. This was the start of her popular blog.God, sex, and rich people. Before terms like deconstruction, purity culture, or [00:04:00] evangelical became hashtags viewed by billions, God, sex, and rich people exposed the sometimes painful, sometimes hilarious realities of a young female evangelical navigating the diversity of the Big Apple, working for the one percent, And trying to have good sex without hating herself in a city that never sleeps and never stops sleeping around.Her book by the same name releases on September 10th, 2024.Maddie is hilarious and super fun, so I'm very much looking forward to reading her book when it releases. Here is my interview with Maddie Jo Kausert. Katherine: Well, welcome, Glenda, to have you here. I love the title of your book. Why don't you tell us the title of your book? Mattie: I Katherine: will. Mattie: Yes. God's Sex and Rich People, a Recovering Evangelical Testimony. Katherine: Fantastic. And you are coming from New York, where you work as an actor?Mattie: Mm hmm. Katherine: Actor. Mattie: And now [00:05:00] author. Now author. Actor, writer, shameless overshare is what I say. Or sometimes I say actor, writer, babysitter for billionaires. It kind of depends on my crowd. Katherine: Are you still a babysitter for billionaires? Mattie: I am. I am a babysitter. You know, something of the, of the unexpected twists and turns my life has taken.I did not foresee my being like solely raised to be a mom and a wife to be so lucrative. Incredibly lucrative in New York City. There are lots of, of, and I'm not saying this is true of my family, of the family I work for, but there are lots of families in New York that actually don't want to parent their kids.So I'm great. Katherine: Yeah, absolutely. I'm Mattie: good at it. Katherine: Absolutely. Absolutely. I had a life where I nannied. I enjoyed it. I like, Mm-Hmm, . I really enjoyed it. And there are times where I consider going back to it because . Mattie: Mm-Hmm. . Mm-Hmm. . Let me know. I know someone looking for a nanny in [00:06:00] St. Louis.We can get, we can follow up after. Katherine: All right. Let's do it. But yeah. And I had six younger siblings. Mm-Hmm. . And so like, it was like. Super like, I was like, this doesn't work like this. Mattie: Exactly. This is just like my life. Katherine: This is life for me. Yeah. And now I get paid for it.I like this. Yeah. Okay, cool. So, all right. I'm like trying to like in my head, then boom, boom, boom, boom, boom. Okay. So maybe let's start with your, just like your journey, cause you, you're from Branson, Missouri, and you somehow ended up in New York acting and working with rich people. So tell me How you got from point A to point B.And then if you want to touch on some of the things like the journey, the deconstruction stuff that you you are writing about on your blog and on in your book I would love to hear all of those things and then we can just kind of see where it goes. We're going to have, [00:07:00] we're going to have a great Mattie: time.Great. Yeah. And like I kill, I am a loquacious individual. So if you ever need to stop me and say like, you know, just. Interrupt me whenever. So I was born a preacher's kid which if you were a preacher's kid in the 90s, I mean, there are, there are, You know, different varieties of what that could mean. But my variety was of the, the general Baptist convention, which is not, it is an actual like denomination.It's different from first or second Baptist or Southern Baptist, but like it's, it's generally Baptist, right? I think the only thing that's different, it doesn't matter. There's some theology things, right? And they made their own church from the other Baptists. And. My, I say that, I say this in the book, my roots in evangelicalism are as deep as my roots in America.My great grandfather was a Baptist pastor. My grandfather on that side was a Baptist pastor. On my dad's [00:08:00] side, my grandfather was a Baptist pastor and then my dad became a Baptist pastor. So it's just, it's, this shit's literally in my blood. We were Baptist in terms of, like, the traditionally Baptist, but then we, by junior high, we kind of crossed over into the non denominational world, which was very exciting for people coming from a denomination where there was no dancing Katherine: and Mattie: lustful hip moving. And now we got, like, You know, a full band and cool, like, spinny lights and a sick sound system.It was Katherine: hip Chr

New book on Spiritual Abuse available from the founder of Tears of Eden: A Thousand Tiny Paper Cuts: The Subtle, Insidious Nature of Spiritual Abuse and Life on the Other Side-Described as "the public face" of Baptist clergy sex abuse survivors, Christa Brown was one of the first to go public with substantiated child sex abuse allegations against a Baptist minister and documentation that others knew. Since then, for nearly two decades, she has worked to shine a light on the systemic problem of abuse and cover-ups in Baptistland.Christa has been touted in the London Times as "a whistleblower of historic proportions." Her work was spotlighted on ABC's 20/20, and she has been quoted and featured in numerous news outlets, including New York Times, Washington Post, Associated Press, Houston Chronicle, VICE, Religion News Service, Tennessean, National Public Radio, Baptist News Global, Christianity Today, and Huffington Post.After a 25-year career as an appellate attorney, Christa became a yoga teacher. As a runner, she once placed first in her age-category in a 10-K. "It was a rainy, blustery day, and I gained the edge by simply showing up," she says.Though a native Texan, Christa currently lives with her husband in Colorado where she loves to hike in the Rocky Mountains. She is a proud mom and grandma. Connect with Christa on Twitter @ChristaBrown777.Uncertain is a podcast of  Tears of Eden, a community and resource for those in the aftermath of Spiritual Abuse. If you’re enjoying this podcast, please take a moment to like, subscribe, or leave a review on your favorite podcasting listening apparatus. You can support the podcast by going to TearsofEden.org/supportTo get in touch with us please email tearsofeden.org@gmail.comFollow on Instagram @uncertainpodcastTranscript is unedited for typos and misspellings[00:00:00] the uncertain podcast is the affiliate podcast of tears at Eden, a nonprofit that serves as a community and resource for survivors of spiritual abuse. This podcast and the work of tears are supported by donations from generous listeners. Like you. If you're enjoying this podcast, please consider giving a donation by using the link in the show notes or visiting tears of eaton.org/support. You can also support the podcast by rating and leaving a review and sharing on social media. If you're not already following us, please follow us on Facebook at tears of Eden and Instagram at uncertain podcast. Thanks so much for listening. Today I am with Krista Brown discussing her new memoir, Baptist Land, where she discusses her experiences addressing clergy sexual abuse within the Southern Baptist Convention it's a very powerful book. And it is a very needed book for this day and age when it seems like every day we have another story in the news about another clergy person abusing a congregant, a [00:01:00] child. It's rampant. So, super important book.Really hope that you get a chance to read it. During the interview, we had some internet connection issues. I did my best to remove some of the bumps and clicks and gaps. Hopefully it will not impact your listening experience today. Here is my interview with Krista Brown. Katherine: How are you doing today, Krista? How has it been since the launch of the book? Christa: Well, it's been very busy since the launch of the book, but I'm very, very gratified and grateful for for the positive response that there's been. Katherine: Yeah, absolutely. What are some consistent things that you've been receiving from folks?Christa: Well, I think among survivors church to survivors, There's a lot in it that really resonates with people and, and I'm glad for that because I [00:02:00] think it helps people See some of the patterns of their own lives and realize that they aren't alone. But of course, it's not just for survivors I mean it also I think has been resonating with a lot of people who simply grew up in these very high control kinds of Religious environments And they see their own, they see those patterns too, even if they aren't the patterns of direct sexual abuse, they're also the patterns, just how much they were under the thumb of this religious control.Katherine: I think that's one of the things that I really appreciate about the book is that you're not just saying here is the abuse and the abuse is bad and this is why abuse is bad. You're also exposing the theological foundation that is where the the soil for where that abuse grows. Exactly. And I don't I feel like that is missing in a lot of literature about abuse in the church.There's like this [00:03:00] like qualifying statement of just like, but don't worry, the church is still good. It's just these bad people doing these bad things. And I really appreciate how you expose. Oh, it's a lot more than just a handful of folks being abusive and doing bad things. really appreciate that.Christa: Yes. And all of that soil, as you call it is very, very powerful and the, the control and the authority and the domination that derives from it is very insidious. Katherine: Yeah, Christa: and I think can be enormously harmful. Katherine: Yes, absolutely. And so complex as you, you showed of just all the different dynamics and for you specifically, you had abuse happening in your home.At the same time as it was happening in the church. And so it was just kind of all, all of these layers [00:04:00] of social dynamics and family dynamics and power dynamics all wrapped up and, you know, faith in God and all Christa: normalized. Yes, not only normalized but legitimized by the faith. Katherine: And anytime.Anytime. you expressed any like said no or I'm uncomfortable or I don't like this or fight for yourself then it was like immediate gaslighting and immediate like You are the problem. And of course, it's perpetuated of anyone who like, just like raises their hand and just says like, I'm a, I'm a little, you know, and then for incentive for people to even fight.No, it's happening, but like, to even fight to try and change it. It's you just get squashed so fast. Christa: That is exactly right. And that's. Why it's so very [00:05:00] hard for people, I think, to step outside of these environments because You know, it's like you're put in this little box and you try to occasionally peek outside that box and you get poked in the eye, you know, and you reach a hand outside the box and it gets slapped down and that box is pretty tight.It Katherine: really is. It really is. What are some things that are common for you and for you have seen as common for survivors that are things that are just associated with this type of abuse, the sexual abuse, the spiritual abuse that's happening in these communities that make it difficult for them to interact with faith communities?Christa: Well, I mean, the, the faith community itself and all of the accoutrements of faith are often kind of neurologically networked in with sexual abuse. And that's not a cognitive thing that people [00:06:00] hold in their heads. It's, it's a physiological response. It's not as if we can reason our way out of it and say, Oh, well, fine.I'm going back to my faith group. Because there were these good things over there because it's all kind of intermixed together neurologically in the same way that that language is intermixed with everything we hold and think. And I think it's very hard for people at the same time. And a lot of ways if we were, you know, if we've been raised in these faith groups.from toddler hood. It's almost like we have a chip implanted in our brain because it's very, very hard to get past that that control because we have been indoctrinated and raised To give religious leaders the benefit of the doubt, to be trusting of them to give grace to be good and all that goes along with, with goodness and being good.Oh, it would just not be so [00:07:00] good, right? Katherine: But then for the good people, like it works on the good people. And. majority of folks are and so as you just kind of get like sucked into this vortex of just like constant inundation I call it like alien body snatching. We've just been inhabited by a foreign substance that is controlling us.Oh my gosh. So real. Yeah. Interested in listening to more than 40 archived Uncertain Podcast episodes? All you have to do is sign up to become a monthly supporter of 5 or more. Becoming a monthly supporter will give you access to popular episodes such as Confessions of a Christian Parent and When Bad People Do Good Things.You'll also get access to this episode without any interruptions from yours truly. Become a monthly supporter today by going to tiersofedian. org slash support. Katherine: How did you become [00:08:00] Sort of like a spokesperson advocate for SBC bullshit that is happening in this organization. Christa: Well, you know, this was never something that I foresaw or planned on. But, you know, in my own life when my daughter reached the same age, Approximately the same age I had been at the time of the abuse.It just shifted everything it was as though I suddenly saw everything through new eyes and very different eyes. And at that point in time, I was still pretty naive and I thought, Oh gee whiz, if I just talk to church leaders about this, they will surely want to help me. And there'll be older and wiser.Now they'll want to make sure that this man can't hurt anyone else. Yeah. And, of course, I've never been more wrong about anything in my life. That was not what happened. But as a mother, I just could not accept that. I mean, going to, you know, a [00:09:00] couple dozen Southern Baptist leaders trying to get someone to help with this, and finding absolutely no one.Yeah. Even though my story was, you know, Corroborated and documented. That was just something that I could not accept and still can't. And then when I wrote my first op ed for the Dallas Morning News, and this is as far back as 2006. I thought, okay, I'm just going to say my piece here and get it out there.And then I could

New book on Spiritual Abuse available from the founder of Tears of Eden: A Thousand Tiny Paper Cuts: The Subtle, Insidious Nature of Spiritual Abuse and Life on the Other SideCait West is a writer and editor based in Grand Rapids, Michigan. Her work has been published in The Revealer, Religion Dispatches, Fourth Genre, and Hawai`i Pacific Review, among others. As an advocate and a survivor of the Christian patriarchy movement, she serves on the editorial board for Tears of Eden, a nonprofit providing resources for survivors of spiritual abuse.In Cait’s memoir Rift, she tells a harrowing story of chaos and control hidden beneath the facade of a happy family. Weaving together lyrical meditations on the geology of the places her family lived with her story of spiritual and emotional manipulation as a stay-at-home daughter, Cait creates a stirring portrait of one young woman’s growing awareness that she is experiencing abuse. With the ground shifting beneath her feet, Cait mustered the courage to break free from all she’d ever known and choose a future of her own making. Uncertain is a podcast of  Tears of Eden, a community and resource for those in the aftermath of Spiritual Abuse. If you’re enjoying this podcast, please take a moment to like, subscribe, or leave a review on your favorite podcasting listening apparatus. You can support the podcast by going to TearsofEden.org/supportTranscript is unedited for typos and misspellings:I am so excited about today's guest. Kate West has a very special place in my heart. We met over the internet in the very early days of Tears of Eden, in the early days of the podcast Uncertain. She was the first person that I encountered outside of my family who'd Similar to the way that I had, who was talking about it openly in public, online, we have been friends and colleagues ever since then.Her book is about that experience of growing up in the Christian patriarchy movement in the stay at home daughter movement. We'll talk a little bit about the dynamics of that. podcast before. So I'm going to link to some of those episodes in the show notes. She's also a member of Tears of Eden's editorial board.and is responsible for a lot of the content that is on the Tears of [00:01:00] Yin blog, the website. Super grateful for her. Very grateful for her story. And here is my interview with Kate West. katherine: Well, hello, Kate. Hello. How are you? I'm doing all right it is good to see you. Cait: You too. And I think we both have sunny days. It seems like you have some sunshine in your room. katherine: Yes. It's going to be, it's going to be a relatively warmer weekend. I think like 60s ish. How's weather where you are?Cait: Yeah, I think it might get up to 60 today. And I want to, I want to get outside and start. Scraping around in the dirt and get my garden started, but we'll katherine: see. Speaking of dirt, your book. Cait: What a segue. katherine: Your book is called Rift, and you have a metaphor throughout your book about geology. And the earth, you talk a lot about like the earth [00:02:00] and I'm not even going to try to like get into scientific things.So talk to me about your book, which is the full title is rifts, a memoir of breaking away from Christian patriarchy. You have been on the podcast a couple of times before, so I'm going to link to some of those episodes in the show notes. But talk to me about the, the theme of this book and that metaphor, that geological earth metaphor that you use here.Cait: If you've listened to other interviews, the other interviews, you'll know I grew up similar to you, like, as a stay at home daughter, Christian patriarchy movement, quiverful. And this book is a story of me growing up in that and not understanding the world I was living in until it started going wrong and how I figured out how to leave and my life afterwards.And the idea of rifting comes from [00:03:00] this idea in, Well, there's this interesting thing that happens in geology where the earth splits apart and something like continents can be caused by rifts. You might think of like, there's this big rift in Africa where you can see the rift valley. And where I live in Michigan, rift, a rift started the great lakes.That's, we're surrounded by water in Michigan. And that's, that's partly why I talk about rifting is because I'm surrounded by water and I'm fascinated by this idea of, Breaking away because when I left patriarchy, I, I wanted to start over, start with a clean slate and never have to think about my past again.And so I wanted to break away, right? But, but I couldn't escape who I am and where I came from. No matter what I tried, it, it kept coming back. And I feel like that trauma is stored in your body and you just can't. Move on without healing from that. So the idea of a rift is both sides of it [00:04:00] are the same materials, you know, the same ground, but over time they change.in separate ways. So I've, I've moved on from the Christian patriarchy movement. There's still part of me that is because of what happened to me, but I'm changing now and I'm separated from it in a way that allows me to grow. So that's just like a bigger metaphor I'm using throughout the book. It helps me to think bigger picture instead of focusing in on my own story all the time.It's, it's kind of like a grounding practice. katherine: Oh, for sure. And it's a perfect metaphor too, because the new space or the new geological formation, Comes from the old and it's still the same earth, but it's a, it's completely new thing. And it's perfect. And I've been thinking about that so much lately, because I think we all have this leaning of [00:05:00] like, of wanting to have a before and an after, and like, I went through this, but then I healed and now I'm better.And here I am. And this, the reality is. We are impacted forever. Especially something as traumatic as what you went through as what I went through impacted our very identities impacted our bodies. We're never going to not have lived that story, but this. new formation and this new life that we create on the other side of it is, is also possible.So it's not like it has to control the narrative of at all. That's perfect. I love it. I love it. I love it as a metaphor. Yeah. So just in case folks are not familiar with the Christian patriarchy. Would you mind talking about some of the key factors and, and feel free [00:06:00] to just share like how that showed up in your family as well.Cait: Sure. I try to explain this in the beginning of the book because it's, I feel like, I relate to a lot of cult documentaries and cult vocabulary, but the Christian patriarchy movement isn't one singular church. It's this bigger movement. And there are churches within that, but they're across different denominations.And what's really happening is each family is a cult. I know you've talked about that too, where the fathers are the cult leaders and. The mothers, the wives and the mothers are supposed to obey their husbands and all things and then the children under underneath that so It's this hierarchy But it's based on this literal interpretation of of the Bible at least a cherry picked version of that I would say a katherine: version of the a version Cait: And it's this it's really problematic [00:07:00] Belief system where men are on the top, women are beneath them and women essentially don't have any agency in this system.And so you see it in a lot of churches. Some churches will actually say they're patriarchal and they're proud of it, but then other churches will be more subtle about it. And I consider something like complementarianism to be. a version of patriarchy. It's just more, more subtle, something like soft patriarchy.So the bigger movement, I think we grew up like in the nineties where This was a big part of the homeschooling movement, quiverful ideology, having as many children as you can. So it's all tied together, I think, with that, and it's connected to evangelicalism. So it's very complicated. And people are still living this way, so katherine: Yes, they are.A lot of Cait: churches who are patriarchal. katherine: And I think the connection between the [00:08:00] extreme version of patriarchy that we grew up with and the evangelical version of patriarchy, I think a lot of folks don't want to acknowledge the connection. And, and I just, I mean, I worked in the evangelical church for almost a decade and they were so proud of how well they cared for women.And the same things existed, they were just smiling more and weren't as overt about you're supposed to serve men. But, but that mentality was still embedded into it. And I, I sometimes feel like it can be more damaging when it's that subtle, because You're so confused and you're constantly being gaslit.Yeah. And, and then you can't address it because they're constantly like, you know, but we do , right? We do really, we really care about [00:09:00] women. Yeah. And I think that the argument in the Christian Patriarchy movie is the same thing about caring about women because it's like, this is what's best for you. Like this is God's best.For you, and we're doing this because this is God's best. Talk about how that dynamic showed up for you of, and just the, so it's your father giving you these rules. What is that extra layer that's added when he's doing it in God's name? Cait: Right. There's secular patriarchy, right?And so religious patriarchy takes that idea of men are in charge, men should be the leaders men should benefit from the way society is built, and it adds that level of divine blessing. It's almost like, Back in the day when kings said they were divinely appointed to be kings. So it's your father saying he's divinely appointed to be [00:10:00] the authoritarian leader in your life.And, If for me, that meant if I disobeyed my dad, it was disobeying God, which meant I deserved eternal punishment in hell. So it's very fear based mentality, but when you believe that you take it v

New book on Spiritual Abuse available from the founder of Tears of Eden: A Thousand Tiny Paper Cuts: The Subtle, Insidious Nature of Spiritual Abuse and Life on the Other SideWe’re talking about how one of the characteristics of a cult is that they often present as a really good thing. A lot of times, they are doing really good things on the surface. If this weren’t the case, people wouldn’t be joining them. Additionally, not every cult starts as a cult. Sometimes it starts as on organization with really good intentions to help people. We’ll discuss all of that, in this episode. https://www.ted.com/talks/sarah_edmondson_how_to_spot_a_cultSarah Edmondson is a Canadian actress who has starred in the CBS series Salvation and more than twelve films for the Hallmark Channel and Lifetime. She is also a well-established voice-over artist for popular series such as Transformers: Cybertron and My Little Pony: Friendship Is Magic. In 2005, when NXIVM, a personal and professional development company, promised to provide the tools and insight Sarah needed to reach her potential, she was intrigued. Over her twelve-year tenure, she went from student to coach and eventually operated her own NXIVM center in Vancouver. Questions kept coming up about the organization’s rules and practices, which came to a head in 2017 when she accepted an invitation from her best friend to join DOS, a “secret sisterhood” within NXIVM.In 2019, Sarah published Scarred: The True Story of How I Escaped NXIVM, the Cult that Bound My Life, with Kristine Gasbarre. In this tell-all memoir, she shares her story from the moment she takes her first seminar to her harrowing fight to get out. Her full story as a whistleblower is featured in the CBC podcast Uncover: Escaping NXIVM (downloaded over 25 million times) and The Vow, the critically acclaimed HBO documentary series on NXIVM. Now with the launch of “A Little Bit Culty,” Sarah and her co-host/husband Anthony “Nippy” Ames are keeping the conversation going by discussing the healing process with the help of experts and fellow survivors.Uncertain is a podcast of  Tears of Eden, a community and resource for those in the aftermath of Spiritual Abuse. If you’re enjoying this podcast, please take a moment to like, subscribe, or leave a review on your favorite podcasting listening apparatus. You can support the podcast by going to TearsofEden.org/supportTo get in touch with us please email tearsofeden.org@gmail.comFollow on Instagram @uncertainpodcastTranscript is unedited for typos and misspellings:Katherine: Well, hello, Sarah, Sarah: how are you? I'm great. How are you Katherine: doing? Okay. Do you know? Okay. It has been gloomy and St. Louis and today the first sign of sunshine and I like went outside to like be in the sun, but it was 30 degrees. And so I didn't stay there very long, but. It's beautiful today. Beautiful to see the sun.How are, how's the weather in your area? Sarah: I'm in Atlanta. We're in our very brief winter and it's, it's, it's just a couple of weeks, I think. And it really fluctuates on a day to day basis and I have no idea what's in store and I'm just getting used to that as a concept. Yeah. Katherine: I just kind of ups and downs.Yeah. Yes. I have relatives in the Atlanta area and I hear about the bipolar weather. Of yeah, very [00:02:00] similar to St. Louis fun times. Well, thank you so much for being here and your openness to telling your story here. Really excited to hear from you just about The impact of your experience in NXIVM and then your recovery process.You also have your podcast, a little bit culty that I highly recommend to everyone. It's just entertaining. It's good stuff and you learn a lot, but then it's also super entertaining. And so I hope folks will listen to that as well, but you get to interact with a lot of cult survivors through that. And so I w I'm very interested to hear.Just patterns and things that you have seen as you have been doing your podcast and working with folks in this, this area. But just to just start us, start us off for folks who may not know who you are or have not seen the vow or maybe haven't. About on HBO or the, or have listened to your podcast and you give us a little summary of who you are and why you are here. Sarah: [00:03:00] Sure. So my cliff notes slash, you know, elevator story, which I've had to use a fair bit since moving to Atlanta is that I am, you know, from Canada, born and raised, I. I pursued acting as a teenager and young adult, and I took a little tangent, a little detour when I joined a personal and professional development program, which I was taking to help me with my goals as an actor and my relationship at the time.And that was really wonderful in many ways for a long time at first. And it ended up being 12 years later, after many missed red flags, I didn't understand what I was looking at. A high control group or some, some people know this term as a cult, but I realized there's basically bad things going on behind closed doors and the personal development program that I'd been touting for many years as an advocate and as a recruiter for the company.I say company loosely was really a front [00:04:00] for our pipeline, for the leadership. To coerce and manipulate and ultimately not in all cases and not not for me, but for many people sex traffic as well So that's why it is now known as the sex cult in the in the newsletter And I newsletter sorry in the newspapers The headlines media does love a good sensational story.Sure do. Yes, as they sure do. And my role in that was that I was one of the whistleblowers that showed the physical abuse, which is the physical manifestation of emotional abuse, which had been going on for years in the form of branding. And I showed that on the New York times cover and that led to an investigation and the trial and eventual conviction of the leader.Six week trial led to 120 year conviction of the leader. And that was I left six years ago. The trial was about four years ago and three years ago, two and a half years ago. My sense of time is a [00:05:00] little off. My husband and I were in a docuseries that, that documented this whole journey, how we got in and how we escaped on HBO max called the vow.And that really propelled us into this really interesting space where, where we were now sharing something that a lot of people could relate to is like, Oh, I would've, I would've totally joined that. And that's flipped the script as a lot up until then. So many people we encountered, especially since leaving and shouting from the rooftops, we were in a cult you know, they were watching it going.I could have, I could have fallen for that when that's very different when the past people would say I would never have fallen for that. And that's opened up a whole, you know, set of bizarre doors and opportunities for us as whistleblowers and survivors to speak about our experience. Educate people. And that's been like a phenomenally rewarding thing.And ironically, and I didn't say this at the beginning, I, one of the reasons I joined next team as well was to help people. I was, you know, I really enjoyed that process and [00:06:00] now I get to do it for real on the other side and help educate, shine light, prevent, help people get out. If they're already in something, help people heal.If they've already gotten out. All the different stages along the way and help families. And overall just bring awareness to this topic that is kind of become a lot more mainstream now. Narcissism, cultic abuse, gaslighting. It's much more accessible and people are more aware of it. So it's been an interesting time to be part of the zeitgeist in that way.And and then now we have a podcast that emerged in COVID when we had stopped acting. So it's been a interesting, organic progression to be a podcaster as I wrote a book and also and now doing more speaking events and panels on the topic. So yeah, here we are. There we are. Yeah. Cliff notes.Katherine: Yes. I remember watching the vow. I don't remember. I think it was in during COVID watching it and [00:07:00] had just left an abusive church. And that was cult cults like they're definitely very high control, very lot of, you know, stuff being hidden by religiosity and God speak and Jesus talk. And I, I, a lot of us.who had left were like, have you seen The Vow? Have you guys been watching The Vow? Are you watching The Vow? Because The Vow is like very, very, very similar to what we just went through. And I think that that was the thing that stood out to me as well as how engaging it was. And it just I was like, that sounds like Christianity, like so much of so much of the, the attraction and the way that like the evangelizing that was happening and the way that people were getting brought into this thing that, that was presented as this very good thing.And in some ways it seemed like it actually was a good thing. Yeah. Tell me a little bit about that part of [00:08:00] it of like what attracted you to this. And like, what, what drew you in as a very professional human being? Sarah: Yeah. You know what? There's every single group that we've ever talked to anyone about in our podcast.There is always good stuff on the outside. And that's actually one of the first questions we ask people so that others can. See what some of those red flags are of like, you know, what's the catch with this perfect, shiny, amazing, happy community. Well, what, what drew me in was a number of things. And, and partly it was, you know, the age that I was.Where I was, you know, doing this acting work and it wasn't really filling my soul. It wasn't filling my cup in terms of like, this is not the meaningful work that I want to be doing. And the thought of. Cause really they offered a lot of things. The community was presented almost in a way that would appeal to whatever the person wants.And I later learned to do that for others. Like what, what is it that you're looking for? What I was

New book on Spiritual Abuse available from the founder of Tears of Eden: A Thousand Tiny Paper Cuts: The Subtle, Insidious Nature of Spiritual Abuse and Life on the Other SideOne of our Most Loved episodes from Season Three, exploring common misguided perspectives of anger and how befriending our anger can help us heal.Dr. Laura Anderson is the cofounder of the Religious Trauma Institute, and founder of Center for Trauma Resolution and Recovery she’s a licensed therapist, and professor of psychology. Instagram//Facebook: @drlauraeandersonSupport Groups https://www.tearsofeden.org/support-groupsPodcast Collaboration Form https://www.tearsofeden.org/formListen to Trauma and Pop Culture: https://www.katherinespearing.com/trauma-and-pop-cultureUncertain is a podcast of  Tears of Eden, a community and resource for those in the aftermath of Spiritual Abuse. If you’re enjoying this podcast, please take a moment to like, subscribe, or leave a review on your favorite podcasting listening apparatus. You can support the podcast by going to TearsofEden.org/supportGet more info on Pop Culture and Trauma podcast on Instagram @katherinespearing

New book on Spiritual Abuse available from the founder of Tears of Eden: A Thousand Tiny Paper Cuts: The Subtle, Insidious Nature of Spiritual Abuse and Life on the Other SideThis episode is with Ashley Love Richards and Fallon Morey, cohosts of TSFU the PodcastKatherine and Fallon play a game with Ashley asking her Christian Clichés to see if she knows what they mean. We also discuss the perspectives Catholics and protestants have of one another, the origin of Alcoholics Anonymous (spoiler, it’s Christian), and whether or not AA is a cult. This conversation is comical and fun—and borderline irreverent. Shoot Christians Say YouTube Video is the video we watch in this episode! Katherine was interviewed in The New F Word Episode with TSFU. Uncertain is a podcast of  Tears of Eden, a community and resource for those in the aftermath of Spiritual Abuse. If you’re enjoying this podcast, please take a moment to like, subscribe, or leave a review on your favorite podcasting listening apparatus. You can support the podcast by going to TearsofEden.org/supportTo get in touch with us please email tearsofeden.org@gmail.comFollow on Instagram @uncertainpodcastTranscript is unedited for typos and misspellings Katherine: [00:00:00] I actually, hi, Fallon. Hi. These are my two friends that I just met through. That's a fucked up podcast, and we had a blast hanging out and, and, and interview doing an interview. I had a blast hanging out with them and doing an interview with them.And so we decided to do this episode. Fallon grew up similar to me in evangelicalism and Ashley did not. So we're going to play a game called Stuff Christians Say, where Fallon and I are going to introduce Christian sayings to Ashley and ask her what she thinks they mean. And this is a like Not a pass fail like no, like there's, there are no stakes here other than testing your Christian, your Christian knowledge before I, I'm going to play a video, a little video to, to get us warmed up, but before I do that.Ashley and Fallon. I would love to hear what brings you here today. Ashley, go Ashley: first. What's up, Kathryn? [00:01:00] Hey! Super excited to be here. So yeah, I have a podcast called that's so fucked up and it's about Colts and murder and other generally fucked up stuff.Although I would say I primarily focus on Colts and coercive groups and I can high control groups. Obviously that's more where your podcast and your stories fit into. I saw Jesus camp 17 years ago when it came out in 2006. I saw a bunch of evangelical children being brainwashed at a camp to Take abortion out of the you know, take abortion rights away because a third of their fucking friends could have been there that night and they weren't.And then I saw it 17 years later, like right after our abortion rights got taken away. And I was like, hold on, this is a long game. And then I saw shiny, happy [00:02:00] people and I've been obsessed with high control, coercive Christianity ever since. So I'm very excited to have met you through me and Fallon doing a segment called the new f word.The f word was fundamentalism fundamentalism and Actually, it's really funny or it's actually really fun the episode that Catherine was on was called the new f word the C and F and E words Which sound like they're going to be really bad, but it was Christianity, nationalism, fundamentalism, and evangelicalism.So, you know, really, I had a lot of fun. I thought that was fun. Katherine: That was one of my funnest, my funnest or most fun. I don't know. Funnest, funnest episodes that I've ever, ever interviewed on. I had a great time with y'all. Ashley: I wanted to make sure that we knew what the fuck we were talking about before we started [00:03:00] talking about it, because as you said, I have, I am not religious, I did not grow up with any religion, I have a Patreon segment where I learn about the Bible, it's called Ash Learns the Bible, because I knew about that one story, I think Solomon, where they try to cut the baby in half, and I was like, That is fucked up.Is there other shit like that? Because I want to hear about it. So, basically, I guess what I'm trying to say is that Christianity has taken over my life somehow. Katherine: That's an intellectual exercise. Ashley: Yeah, not in That I'm involved with it, but I'm just fascinated and I'm fascinated Katherine: when I meet people who didn't grow up the way that I did because it's so normal and it's so normalized and then as you mentioned on the episode that we did together that I will link in the show notes about How 80 percent of [00:04:00] the United States identifies as Christian, there's so much that's just like very inundated into the culture and most people have had some kind of like church experience.And so when I can't encounter people who don't have any, any upbringing in that I'm fascinated by that. What was your life like? Yeah, it's like, oh! How did you, how did you do Ashley: that? I'll tell you, I'll tell you one thing that made my life different and a lot better that I definitely know, and Did I grow up with fear and shame as a child?Yes, I grew up in a house with a narcissist. But, I tell you what, I was not afraid that any fuck up that I did was going to get me sent to hell. I didn't even know about hell, you know? Like, you guys were constantly in fear that you were going to go there. I didn't even know that it was a fucking thing. I think I saw all dogs go to heaven and...I knew heaven was like a, probably a cool place for [00:05:00] dogs. Yeah. But that was the extent of my knowledge. Right. I love it. I love it. And it has been up until, up until pretty recently. I Katherine: mean, you're going to know so many things after today, after our game today, the lingo. Yeah. And I, I, I, I'm now I'm like worried.Is God going to judge us for playing this game? Fallon: God is not going to judge us for playing this game. Ashley: They loves it, but welcome Katherine: Fallon. Tell us today. Fallon: mainly to talk to you again, cause it was so fun the last time. But then also, like you said, I, I think I've told you before, but I grew up Catholic. So, you know, Catholics are very like religion at arm's length.There's so many rules. There's very like, you know, you spend a lot of money and you go to mass and the mass has like exercises in it where you stand up and sit down a lot and kneel. And my mom used to, or my uncle used to call them the Pope's aerobics when he would go to [00:06:00] mass. And. Around like high school.I started to hang out with Christian people who are more in the evangelical crowd, and I, I think I just wanted to be accepted by somebody. Katherine: Pause. You said you hang out, you hung out with Christian people. Did you not consider yourself a Christian as a Catholic? Fallon: No, not really. Because I wasn't, I wasn't really yourself.Catholic. Yeah. Just Catholic. Like it was like it was I don't know, like it, like it was a nationality or something. Like I, I didn't have a concept of what it meant to be religious because I wasn't really connected to my religion. Like it like you had to go to the dentist, but you just had to do it more frequently.It wasn't like a big deal to me. And then I, I wanted some, like. I want to say I wouldn't, wasn't like meaning and purpose to my life, but I ended up hanging out with kids that like went to church camps and did God stuff. So they bought me my first Bible, the little. [00:07:00] Like tie dyed teen study Bible everyone had in the mid nineties, you know, and They had like the little stories in it and they taught me all about purity culture.Yay. And like good friends do and and then I sort of went on my own path and discovered You know, religion and church when I was in college and then in when I was in the Navy, I got like rebaptized again and I was like fully into it. I would say only about eight years ago, I stopped believing in going to church.And I would call myself having been like evangelical during those years. And now I would call myself. I don't know. What is it called when you believe in a higher power, but not necessarily like the Christian Katherine: God? Spiritual, but not religious. Yeah, that's Fallon: a good Ashley: way. Like I think that agnostic means that you believe in a higher power.You just don't claim to know what that higher power is. And I don't know if something greater than you. Fallon: Yeah. So I don't know if there's like a higher one power or if it's like the power of the [00:08:00] universe. I think there could be. You know, there's like weird forces out there. I believe in ghosts and maybe reincarnation and all that kind of stuff, but I don't subscribe to like a, a religion.So I don't I don't find I need it anymore. But then I met Ashley like last year and somehow found myself on this crazy windy road to becoming one of her co hosts, which has been amazing. And we did this F word segment together where I got to meet you. So I think that's, I think that's my path.That's my my journey here. Katherine: As you were talking, I thought of two other things to add to the list. It's like, we can't just assume because like, we're too like, like, yes, we're more religious people, assuming that, you know, certain things, but I'm like, we can't assume that Ashley knows these things. Ashley: Yeah, I actually had two quick questions.So if you're re baptized, That means you're a born again Christian, which means you're evangelical, right? I just want to make [00:09:00] sure, do I have that right? It's a symbol, Katherine: but could mean a lot of things. It Fallon: could mean a lot of things. Katherine: Like Presbyterians will baptize babies, and it's like a future hope. Like, we're hoping that they will be a Christian in the future, but it's not saying that the baby is a Christian.Like Baptists will baptize someone as an adult because you have to be old enough to like make the decision yourself. And then that is a symbol that you are a Christian when you

Shannon Payton (https://shannypantsshow.com/), known as Shanny Pants by many, is a content creator and podcaster living in Rocklin, California. Although Shannon has a successful career as a Realtor, she has equally enjoyed her hobby of sharing her humor through Instagram with friends and family. In 2020 her video about making school lunches went viral, it opened a whole new world for her. She now has many viral videos and hundreds of thousands of social media followers.Her podcast, The ShannyPants Show is currently in its second season. In her interview style podcast, Shannon shares her struggles of growing up in a cult, battles through years of infertility that ended in a hysterectomy and finally her journey to parenthood through foster care and adoption.She enjoys sharing the struggles of life in a humorous way as part of her self-prescribed therapy and through this, has connected with her fans. Her podcast topics include a wide range of subjects which in one way or another relate to something she has been through.Shannon has been a guest on The Kelly Clarkson show and has appeared on local TV show GoodDay Sacramento multiple times. Shannon is currently writing a memoir and is looking forward to giving her followers a deeper look into her life. When Shannon is asked where she gets all of her ideas for her humorous videos she sarcastically states, “I’m married and have kids, that’s all the inspiration I need for some crazy content”. IG: @therealshannypants @shannypantsshowpodcastUncertain is a podcast of  Tears of Eden, a community and resource for those in the aftermath of Spiritual Abuse. If you’re enjoying this podcast, please take a moment to like, subscribe, or leave a review on your favorite podcasting listening apparatus. You can support the podcast by going to TearsofEden.org/supportTo get in touch with us please email tearsofeden.org@gmail.comFollow on Instagram @uncertainpodcastTranscript is unedited for typos and misspellings  [00:00:00] I'm Katherine Spearing, and this is Uncertain. Do you ever get to a point where everything is just too much and you just need to take a break? That is kind of how I've been feeling the past few weeks.Around trauma recovery. And abuse dynamics and sometimes it just gets to be a lot and I just need to take a break. So I had to do that over the weekend a little bit. And this episode, I wanted to put this episode out because, uh, the guest today, Shani Payton is just a super funny human being and is comedian her content on social media is.So funny and keeps me laughing all day long and I thought that this episode was going to be like this really funny episode because we recorded it. I think back in like December and I listened to it and I was like, Oh, it's not as funny as I thought it was going to be, but there is some laughter. Fear not. [00:01:00] Shani Payton is a comedian and has hundreds of thousands of followers. So, so, so, so funny, but she has a darker origin story. She grew up in a church cult, and she has been on her own journey of recovery and healing, and humor plays a role in our healing process, and we do get to that at the end, but we also just talked about the dynamics of control and the impact that it has on us, it's just a really great conversation, and I really like Shani a lot. I'm going to link to her website in the show notes so you can follow her on all the things. She also hosts the Shani Pants show, which is a podcast. I was recently on the Shani Pants show, I will link to that episode of my conversation with Shani Payton, also in the show notes.Thanks so much for being here, and if you're having one of those weeks where you just need to take a break, then you know what? [00:02:00] You should. Take a break. Go for a little walk. Have a sip of water. And if you can take a break. for a couple days, sure, just do it. If you can. I highly recommend it. It's good to do that.All of the abuse and trauma it'll still be here when you get back. Pretty sure about that. Alright, so here is my conversation with Shannie Payton of The Shannie Pants Show. Katherine: Hello. Shanny: Oh, it's so good to see you. Good to see you. I'm so Katherine: excited. Me too. Talk about culty things. Talk about abuse things, but then talk about fun things too and ways that giggling and laughter and jokes help us on this amazing healing process. Where do you hail from right now? Shanny: Northern California, right around the Sacramento [00:03:00] area.Katherine: Yeah. I lived in LA for four Shanny: years, so. Oh, did you? Okay. I'm familiar with the stomping grounds. Oh yeah. Just a quick, you know, nine hour little drive for me. Not Katherine: bad at all. No big deal. No big deal. I know. I know every, every time I moved someplace, people would say, Oh, do you know so and so? Because they like live in the state and it's like, This is like a massive state.Other than D. C. where people are like, Oh, my friend blah blah blah lives there. Like, D. C. is so big. No, I have not run into them in the grocery store. No. Well, whenever Shanny: someone says, you know, whenever It seems like when people say, Oh, California. Oh, do you surf? And I'm like, no, no, I do not surf. Like, Katherine: like, because Shanny: it's like how the state is, how long it's like, I live more up in the mountains.And, you know, versus the coast. And, and then even so there's. So many different [00:04:00] coasts as far as, you know, all the way down to the Bay Area. Yeah. So it's funny, but everyone that's like, Oh, do you surf? No, no, you would not want to see that all the time. Katherine: Right? Yeah. Shanny: Quick, quick little weekend trips Katherine: every, every weekend.Shanny: But yes, but I do love where we live. It's beautiful. And I, I. Yeah, I really love it. And I grew up here. I've never moved far from home, so I've always been in the area. Yep. Katherine: Right. All right. Well, I would love to introduce you to folks by hearing your story. The group that you grew up in is very similar to the group that I grew up in with this just very fundamentalist dedication to interpretation of the Bible and I would love to hear what that was like for you growing up and process getting out questioning because you're [00:05:00] not, you're not in it now.Right. Right. Right. Shanny: Otherwise I would not be talking to you because you are Katherine: of the world. I am. We could not communicate. No, no eye contact would be happening. So tell me, tell me a little bit about it. I know a lot of folks in our community are going to really Shanny: yes, I, so I was born into this cult religious cult and up in Northern California. My parents were also born into it. So we had some generational, you know, fun things. We're just dragging around. And, you know, it started out as from as much as I can understand, talking to my grandparents and other older folks it started out as kind of like a, we're going to go not, not even nondenominational.It was just like, we're going to do meetings in our home, basically. So I think it started out as a pretty innocent. Kind of fine thing like just Bible studies and in homes and then it's from what I understand. It sounds like in the [00:06:00] 70s late 70s to 80s The his son is now the current leader, but he took over And we'll call him RG.He, and from that point on is kind of when it became more rule based, fear based and that's when kind of there started to be a lot more things that got put into place and people just kind of, I guess, followed along and went with it. And so in the mid, 80s, there was what we call the split of the 80s, where a large group of people were questioning some of the beliefs and rules and restrictions.And there was a, we call it marking to be avoided, but like an excommunication. So there was a large group that were excommunicated from us in the 80s because they were questioning and you don't do that. And part of my family, Katherine: like in a [00:07:00] group, or was it like, we call you in, into the office Shanny: and it was basically, I mean, I was a kid at the time, but it basically is just public, you know, from the front, you're hearing, and we had a lot of different sex.So we had like ours up here in Northern Cal, there was four in North, in California. And then we had like Texas, Virginia, Oklahoma, Canada. Mexico. I think that's all of them. So this message would go to everyone because we would get together. We call them camps where people from all different, what we call assemblies would like beat together and hang out.And so everyone's getting the same announcement basically that these people are marked you are or not to associate with them. And it truly was like, yeah. Oh yeah. Like announcing their name. Oh yeah. Oh, a hundred percent. Yeah. Oh, yeah. Mark, you Katherine: are Shanny: an announcements today. Katherine: It's very light. We [00:08:00] just Shanny: have, you're not allowed to talk to your family again.Oh my God. Yeah. So that happened back in the eighties and I was I was a young kid then and part of my family was marked my dad's sister and her family which she married my dad's best friend. So that was like really hard on my parents. Yes. And it sounds like they were kind of. You know, on the cusp of do we be a part of the marked group or not.And of course we stayed. But it was really sad because all of a sudden, and you know, as a young child, I'm not allowed to hang out with my cousins anymore. And I was really good friends with the one that was really close to my age, and it was just really confusing and I remember like even as a child, like, Oh, it was awful and you're in like life wasn't confusing enough how we lived.But I just remember like praying like, please help them get right with the Lord because obviously they've left the will of the Lord and, you know, [00:09:00] because that's what we are taught is they're wrong and they're sinning. And they're a part of the world now, so they're no longer a part of us. What did K

Marie Griffith, PhD, John C. Danforth Distinguished Professor in the Humanities at Washington University in St. Louis. She served for 12 years (2011-2023) as the director of the John C. Danforth Center on Religion and Politics and the editor of the Center’s journal, Religion & Politics. Her research focuses on American Christianity, including the changing profile of American evangelicals and ongoing conflicts over gender, sexuality, and marriage. Author of several books, including Moral Combat: How Sex Divided America and Fractured American Politics, the book discussed in this episode. Uncertain is a podcast of  Tears of Eden, a community and resource for those in the aftermath of Spiritual Abuse. If you’re enjoying this podcast, please take a moment to like, subscribe, or leave a review on your favorite podcasting listening apparatus. You can support the podcast by going to TearsofEden.org/supportTo get in touch with us please email tearsofeden.org@gmail.comFollow on Instagram @uncertainpodcastTranscript is unedited for typos or misspellings[00:00:00] I'm Katherine Spearing, and this is Uncertain. Hello. How are you? How are you hanging in there? I hope you're doing okay. I'm doing semi okay. It's been a lot inundation with this very real, very damaging type of abuse. One thing that you may or may not know is folks who have experienced spiritual abuse and folks who have experienced sexual abuse.They're very similar to each other. Spiritual abuse and sexual abuse are very, very similar. The impact is very, very similar because it is so, so vulnerable. You are so vulnerable when this happens and it violates our intimacy and it violates our very souls in a way that maybe other abuse doesn't. So if you are traumatized.By the abuse that you experienced in a church [00:01:00] or a high control environment or religious environments in your family. There's a reason for that. It makes a lot of sense. It's very, very serious trauma. So one of the things that we discussed in this episode is how the folks who. experience sexual abuse when they go to the religious institution where they experience that abuse and say, Hey, help me, this happened, this was awful, please help me.When they get dismissed or falsely accused or sidelined or silenced, that that is sometimes worse than the sexual abuse that they experienced in that institution. This episode is with Marie Griffith. She is the author of Moral Combat, How Sex Divided America and Fractured American Politics. It's an intense book.A lot of research went into this book. She's also a scholar [00:02:00] and a professor of religion at Washington University. And one of the things we will also discuss in this episode is how she literally taught a class on abuse in the church in a secular university. What? Crazy, crazy, crazy. Great conversation, lots of mind blowing moments about the connection between sex and sexual abuse and the rampant abuse that is happening in the evangelical church right now.Enjoy, or don't enjoy, but take it in for sure. And as always, take care of yourself, get some rest, give yourself some time after this episode to go for a walk, take a sip of water, breathe. You're okay, wherever you are, you are okay, take a deep breath, you are safe, you are here, you are now, you are present, you're going to be okay.[00:03:00] Here is my interview with Marie Griffith. Katherine: Hi, Catherine. Oh, how are you? How are you? And I have your big book here. This was a lot of work. She took this.Marie: And that was like I don't even want to tell you how many years. I mean, it was really sort of 15 years. I did other things as I was doing that, Katherine: but yeah. Yeah, just like the amount of research that went into just like one chapter I was like, this was a very large endeavor. But how are you this morning? How are you doing? How is your writing? Is it like a writing sabbatical? Is that kind of what this season is called?Marie: Yeah, I'm on, I'm on research leave. You know, it's just a standard leave that scholars get every few years. So but yeah, it's focused on working on this book about sexual clergy, sexual Katherine: abuse. Oh, my gosh. Did I know that? Did you tell me about that? I don't know if I knew from Marie: that [00:04:00] I had taught that course on the abuse crisis in modern Christianity.And so the reason I taught the course was because I started doing research on clergy sexual abuse in both the U. S. Catholic Church And evangelical groups, particularly the Southern Baptist Convention, although not only Katherine: the Southern. Okay. I don't know if I knew that the book itself was about clergy sexual abuse.So I definitely want to hear so much about that. Really excited to talk to you. I'm just like, as I'm like reading this book, I'm like, okay. We just need to be friends because I like everything that you research and everything that you're, I'm like, it's all like stuff that I'm like thinking about constantly.And then just like even reading your book. And then when Megan told me that she literally had a class on like abuse that is happening in the church, I was like. Wait, who, like, led this? Whose idea was it to have this class? Like, tell me, tell me so much more. And so that's why I was, like, very [00:05:00] interested to talk to you.And so I would just love to hear very just to start how you got into doing what you're doing and how this became important to you. Marie: Sure, sure. Yeah. And thank you so much. I really love your podcast and admire the work that you do too, Catherine. So thank you. Well, I am from Chattanooga, Tennessee originally.I was raised Southern Baptist. I grew up in the 1970s and 1980s. So as you may know, that was a time of just tremendous change in the culture, but also for Southern Baptists in particular, and within evangelical Protestantism more generally. The church I grew up in was a really, I thought of it as just a very kind of, you know, ordinary.Church, it was 1st Baptist Church Chattanooga, you know, the kind of flagship Southern Baptist Church of the city. But the, the kind of tensions in the Southern Baptist Convention. Between, [00:06:00] you know, for shorthand, let's say the fundamentalist and the moderates, because that's, you know, what they called each other, at least at the time was really strong.And my mother was the pastor's secretary over a number of years, and she cared deeply about these issues. My dad was the deacon chair for a number of years. So this was dinner table conversation. What was happening within the denomination and. My parents were both moderates. And so I kind of heard that side of it.And it was really painful. A lot of the pastors that I had that worked at our church felt very betrayed by things that happened, convention politics and all of that. And when I left for college, I thought I left it all behind. I mean, it was really painful enough that I just turned my back on a lot of that.But I found myself studying religion and really sort of wondering how all of that came to be. So in some ways, I mean, I think that has, explains a lot about my career, why I became a [00:07:00] scholar of American religion. I've focused on evangelicals. I focused on women. I focused on debates over women's roles, sexuality, and sex.And now clergy sexual abuse. So it really is. There's a personal story behind that, as I think it is for so many scholars. Katherine: Absolutely. And then have you been able to trace? So you're working on a book right now about clergy sexual abuse. And then your book that I was reading before we interviewed.Moral combat. The subtitle is how sex divided American Christians and fractured American politics. Have you been able to trace? The link from this divide to clergy sexual abuse, is that pretty, a pretty clear link for you? Marie: I think so. And, you know, I, critics may argue with me, and they have every right to argue with me, but what I see from the sources, the [00:08:00] long historical sources that I've looked at over many archives that really begin in the really the late 19th century, but certainly by the 1920s and the birth control movement has been a real power struggle within American Christianity, Catholicism as well as, as, as Protestantism, I should say over leadership, over theology, and maybe more than anything else over the appropriate role of women and, and how to think about gender, how God created men and women.and what their appropriate roles are supposed to be. I think we can see that debate starting with The birth control movement, really going back before that, but my book started with the birth control movement, moving through debates over literary censorship sex education in the public schools, homosexuality, same sex rights, abortion, reproductive rights, sort of all the way through.And so, you know, that's, that's an [00:09:00] oversimplification to some degree, but I do think that those wars over sex. over gender, over, over women and, and women's roles in the public sphere and in the family explain an awful lot of our conflicts culture wars conflicts as they are. And, and I do think that's what's led us to the current moment and the, the real fervor over clergy sexual abuse.Katherine: Yeah, and just all of it packaged together when you, and when you put sex sexual abuse itself, and you, and you realize that sexual abuse itself is really not about sex, it is about power, and you, and you see the power dynamic happening in these debates, and like, it's about who's going to get it. To be in charge, basically and, and then you add that in with this dynamic of sexual abuse happening and like less about just [00:10:00] urges that need to be fulfilled, but more about like who gets to be in charge and who gets to have a say and who gets to decide.It makes so much more sense through that lens than just like. Sex addiction which is what it sometimes gets boiled down to, but it's, but that's, it's way more than that one. It's something this ramp

Brian Lee, from Through Cohort and Broken to Beloved Summit interviews Tears of Eden’s Founder Katherine Spearing about the Church’s harmful teachings on marriage that can result in very real trauma—for single and married people. Uncertain is a podcast of  Tears of Eden, a community and resource for those in the aftermath of Spiritual Abuse. If you’re enjoying this podcast, please take a moment to like, subscribe, or leave a review on your favorite podcasting listening apparatus. You can support the podcast by going to TearsofEden.org/supportTo get in touch with us please email tearsofeden.org@gmail.comFollow on Instagram @uncertainpodcastTranscript (Unedited for Typos and Misspellings)Brian: [00:00:00] Hello everyone, welcome to our session. I'm here with Katherine Spearing. Katherine is the founder of Tears of Eden, a non profit supporting survivors of spiritual abuse, and the host of Tears affiliate podcast Uncertain. She also hosts the podcast Trauma and Pop Culture, and is a certified trauma recovery coach, working primarily with clients who have survived cults, High control environments, spiritual abuse, and sexual abuse.She also provides specialized trauma informed career coaching, as folks with trauma often need extra support for interviewing and networking, which I can attest to. Catherine is the author of a historical romantic comedy, which we talked about last year, Hartford's, a novel that challenges gender roles in a patriarchal society that will appeal to fans of Jane Austen.And she's been a guest on a number of podcasts. including indoctrination, and that's so effed up. She's the author of several non fiction articles and writes regularly at katherinespearing. com and tearsofeden. org. Welcome back, welcome back. [00:01:00] Very excited, Katherine: very excited. Me too. Brian: So we're here to talk today about being single within the context of faith communities, which is a big I don't know anywhere else that I really hear about this talked about, so I'm excited to dive into it.What is it like for a single person within these communities? Katherine: Right, yeah, and I think on the subject of it not being talked about very much, I definitely looked, obviously, that's who I am. So I have looked for books on this particular topic, and they all tend to have this, like, this like, consolation prize flair to it.Like You're a single, but you didn't want this. So here's some tips for being happy despite the situation that you find yourself in as if it's like. So so sad. And so haven't haven't read a lot where I was just like, Oh, like I'm empowered. I'm inspired. I'm [00:02:00] encouraged very, very rarely. And then also just within this topic that I'm very, I'm very passionate about just living a thriving life wherever you are and being very present wherever you are, no matter.Single or not, and I think 1 of the things that I have discovered through just the work that I do with religious trauma and spiritual abuse survivors is that to say, hey, like, it's, you know, really important to live a thriving life here. Here are tools to live a thriving life to then. Ignore the systemic issues that then make it difficult to have a thriving life.It's kind of, it's just half of the story. And so there's a lot of. Messaging towards singles of just like be content and be happy within faith communities without acknowledging the things that then make it difficult to be happy. And one example is [00:03:00] I learned very, very young that it was okay for me to be single, but it was okay for me to be single only.If I was unhappy about being single and only I was actively seeking to change that status and at the same time be happy being single and so rejoice in this lot that God has given you, but then also actively seek to change it and actively. Date and actively ask for prayer for your future husband. So, it's very, very stark cognitive dissonance happening within these communities.I also, my, my vocation was ministry and the perspective that I'm coming from for this conversation is. The even growing up in the evangelical church and being in that evangelical perspective, also choosing a vocation of ministry and and being in that for almost a decade. [00:04:00] And and so I think I experienced some of this a little bit more acutely because.I was in ministry and, and happened to be in denominations that were just much more male friendly. And so having being a woman and then also being a single woman some of the stuff I experienced a little bit more acutely. So that's, that's the example that I'm, the perspective that I'm coming from and, and then we'll occasionally use just some stories and examples from clients and, and friends of mine who've also experienced this as well.And. But, yeah, so 1st of full time vocational ministry experience was on the mission field in Mexico. I'm 28 years old. I am the only single woman on this fairly large missions team. I went down. To help plant a church that was like my specific reason for going and the, there was a [00:05:00] headquarters office that I went to every day as part of my work and and, and pretty much right away things like they would have a team meeting for.The church plant, and I was not invited and I, I, I was actively a part of the missions team and would like, go to the office and work in the mission field. All the other women missionaries were. worked at home and were, you know, took care of their children and took care of their homes. They were not actively coming into the offices.They were invited to this missions team. And so right off the bat, I was like different here. Exactly. Just instantly. And in Mexico, the. The that's hierarchy of, of marriage and marital status is even more extreme, I would say, than [00:06:00] than in the, like the South, which is also pretty extreme and.And yet nobody was like, Hmm, it's weird that you're not there. It was like, there was no, and I decided not to make an issue about it, that particular thing. But I was still expected to show up, you know, to church an hour early and help set up and put the coffee on. So I was still a part of this team and help lead the Bible studies and all that sort of stuff, but not part of the planning, not offered a seat at the table.And, and it wasn't a gender thing. It was. The only thing I can think of. A singleness thing. I'm not married. And I think that that was something that I experienced constantly throughout my faith community experience was like, we not a, there's something wrong with you so much, but as a, but a, we don't know what to do with you.Like, we don't know [00:07:00] what category to put you in. Another example was, I was volunteering. Very actively, this is before I went to Mexico in the youth ministry, and I was very, very actively involved in the youth ministry again, like late 20s, considering youth ministry as a potential avenue for ministry.If I did go into full time ministry, and the church that I attended did not have like, singles groups and young marrieds and it was just kind of all adult classes and they were topical, which I think is great and. There was a parenting class, and I thought I'm gonna work. I'm working with youth. 50 percent of that is working with parents and.And then it was targeting like young marriage. Who are my peers? Like some of them are the same age as me. Mm-Hmm. . Some of them are a little bit older, some of them are a little younger. And so it made perfect sense to me that I would go [00:08:00] to this class, which I did, and a week class, I had friends who were leading this class.A married couple that was leading the class, leading the class. And so I knew them and then there was an older couple in the class who had already raised their children and they were there because they wanted to connect to younger families. And they were the only people that talked to me, nobody else talked to me.And it was so. obvious that as soon as there would be like a break or the class would end they would like huddle like so fast it was like like very very quickly just just like ah we don't don't leave us alone yeah with that one we don't Brian: we don't know what to do with her Katherine: we don't know what to do with her and so i'll always feeling that Experience and, and many years later, I worked in [00:09:00] California, which is a very different culture and and I had a very good experience as a single person in California.And I started to wonder after a few years being there, did I make that up? Was that my imagination? Like, like, maybe it wasn't as bad. Maybe it was my insecurity. Like, maybe, you know, I, I felt weird. And so that's why I thought these people were ignoring me or whatever. And then I was in in LA during the biggest part of COVID.So didn't really interact with many people and thought, Oh, maybe I just made it up. Maybe if I go into the spaces and I'm just like super confident, like, they'll be fine. Maybe it's not as bad as I thought. And, and yet, even now, when I go into certain communities, and I would say probably the biggest one right now is as extended family that is in the South.And it is a much more just like, Nuclear family focused. [00:10:00] Everything is focused on that and you get married and you have kids and then you raise the kids and they go to college and then they get married and they have kids and then they raise their kids and their kids go to college and then they get married and they have kids and that's just a cycle and rinse and repeat and I would go, go to, go to events, go to weddings, go to funerals, be around this, this community of people and It, I was like, it's still here.It's, it's still real. And, and after like three hours of talking about feeding schedules and potty training, I'm sitting there like, okay, I have a pretty cool life. A lot of cities. I started this nonprofit. I have a book out. I have a podcast. Like I'm a pretty interesting person. No questions, zero interest in my life outside of

New book on Spiritual Abuse available from the founder of Tears of Eden: A Thousand Tiny Paper Cuts: The Subtle, Insidious Nature of Spiritual Abuse and Life on the Other SideConnie Baker, LPC author of Traumatized by Religious Abuse and a therapist who works with survivors of religious trauma, joins Uncertain to discuss what thriving might look like after Spiritual Abuse. This is a nuanced subject, intended to provide hope (not pressure!). Thank you for joining us for Spiritual Abuse Awareness Month in 2024! Uncertain is a podcast of  Tears of Eden, a community and resource for those in the aftermath of Spiritual Abuse. If you’re enjoying this podcast, please take a moment to like, subscribe, or leave a review on your favorite podcasting listening apparatus. You can support the podcast by going to TearsofEden.org/supportTranscript is unedited for typos or misspellings [00:00:00] I'm Katherine Spearing, and this is Uncertain. It's Spiritual Abuse Awareness Month, and this is our last episode of January 2024. My guest today is someone who It has become very, very special to me. Her name is Connie Baker. She is a therapist. She has a book for survivors of religious abuse. And Connie was our very first guest speaker at our very first in person event.Back in October, and it was phenomenal. She can speak to the survivor experience in such a meaningful way because she is one. And she's been doing this work long before I even heard of spiritual abuse.She has so much knowledge and I trust her to address this subject of thriving after spiritual abuse with nuance and care because nobody wants to be pressured [00:01:00] into thriving when you're just trying to survive and that's not the point of this episode but this is a glimmer of hope for down the road that maybe someday maybe someday We will be here. Here is my conversation with Connie Baker.Katherine: Hello, Connie. How are you? Connie: Good. So fun to see you, Catherine. I'm so Katherine: excited to see you again. For our listeners, Connie was our guest speaker, keynote speaker at the RetreatCon, which was Terzian's very first in person event in the fall. She was phenomenal. I loved every moment of her. Connie's talks, but then also just getting to hang out with this person.So if you have a chance to buy her book and oh shoot, I'm totally blanking on the name of your book. What Connie: is it? It's right, Traumatized by Religious Abuse. Yes. Say it one more time. Traumatized by Religious Abuse. Katherine: Beautiful.Wonderful. Amazing book. Very, very, very practical. A lot of folks [00:02:00] have named your book is just very practical for survivors. And one of the things that we invited Connie to do at the retreat con was speak about. Yeah. thriving after spiritual abuse, which I think so many of us are surviving. Maybe we're healing.We don't really talk about like that moment when you get a chance to just kind of come out of that survival space and laugh. And have fun and see the sun and, and it seems impossible sometimes that we'll ever get to that place. Yes. But, but Connie, Connie is really great about making that realistic. Not, that's, that's what I think I loved about it.It's not fluffy and silver linings. It's realistic and I learned so much from your talk. So I'm really excited to get to jump into that again. to just get us started and sort of lay a [00:03:00] foundation for discussing what it's like to thrive after spiritual abuse after we've been through this. Could you paint a picture for us of what the impact of spiritual abuse feels like?Like, what does that look like to someone? Oh, Connie: yes, yes, I can. Yes, I can. And before we go there, Catherine, I just want to say, I am so thrilled that that was the first retreat. Like, in other words, others are following. It was so, and I know you probably talked about this in follow up podcasts after the retreat, but it was powerful having all those humans.And I think there was also extra power in it post, well, post late pandemic, whatever we're calling this thing for people to to. Humanly be in the same space and connect. I think, well, Terry, just remembering it, it just was so [00:04:00] powerful. And so I'm just thrilled that you are hosting. Cause we talked about this when I was there.We both have hosted big events before, you know, in our life. And I know what it takes to put something like that on. What was there 25, 30 people somewhere in that range, you know, and, and to have that. And the spaces that you. Provided anyway, I just want everybody to go to second annual. Yes, everybody to thank you so much.Yeah, no, I just I'm just reflecting thinking back just with you even, you know, yes, just being here with you. Remembering just the. Goodness. And all the things that happened there. Katherine: Yeah, I, I've, I felt all of those things too. And just was just so thrilled at, I mean, I just like picture that weekend and it's like surrounded and like sunlight and warmth in my mind.Like that's the image. It was just such a warm. Just, oh, [00:05:00] and then that whole idea of thriving after spiritual abuse, like we got to taste it, this can be real. This isn't fake. This isn't this isn't false positivity. This is genuine, you know, just joy, like an experience of joy.And the fact that like, oh, after all, all of us have been through, you know, And in this room and we're laughing together. Like it was just like, Oh, we Connie: laughed so much. Oh my gosh. And you brought a lot of that. You and your leadership team are just pretty damn funny. And we had a lot of fun with that. And so, yeah, I just wanted to say that when you're talking about that connection, because it really, it really was, I'm just like, no, y'all sign up for number two, second annual Be there.Katherine: So be there for the second one. Absolutely. Connie: Exactly. Exactly. So anyway, the question he asked me, what is it? What is the impact of spiritual [00:06:00] abuse? Oh my goodness. I think, I think a lot. In fact, we talked about this at the retreat. I think a lot in life domains. I think it helps break down sometimes. Like what is What is happening to me?Because it just feels like an avalanche. It feels like you are rolling down the mountain in an avalanche and you can't see what's up down, you know. So I guess I think about, you know, different domains of life spiritually. Oh, let's, let's take Let's take the explosion 1 right off the bat. It can not not have an impact spiritually.And that doesn't mean that you're for sure going to walk away from the faith, although that absolutely could and sometimes should be what a person does. That's it. It's not just permission. It's like, no. You find your path. But there's a big [00:07:00] range of what that means, means, but there is no way there is not huge levels of damage, spiritually.It's like existentially, let's take God out of the mix, even, if you're, it doesn't matter whether you say, Whoa, I'm not about this God thing anymore. You still have to rewrite meaning purpose. Life after death, the, the, the, what is a human being? I mean, you just gotta rewrite all that. It's just huge.So there again, spiritually, it, it can be devastating. And often is. Often, for me I think. What am I in decade? I've done, I'm over three decades past my primary spiritual abuse and there's still times I go, okay, still rewriting a little bit of this. Katherine: It went, it went deep. Connie: Yes, it goes deep. So then I'm thinking the impact on the body.Most people don't get out of it without sickness, or, or [00:08:00] injury, or, we're connected beings, so physically it can just smack ya. In so many ways, I'm not gonna elaborate, but just to help people think through what is the impact, you know? Then you've got the emotional, psychological, which most people go through.first. And it's like, right, that's true. Katherine: Yes. Yeah. I'm probably the one that makes most sense. Yes. But as you said, we're integrated and Connie: it's going to affect our bodies and our spirits and our whatever we want to call it. So, so the trauma, I mean, you and I are therapists and those listeners who've heard, you know, you, you know, your stuff and Trauma affects our neurological system, our, you know, our brain, our body, our thought process, our emotions.And so it's just, it just is so extensive and pervasive. I think is another good word. Then you get into the social realm. Yeah. What does it do to families? [00:09:00] Oh, . What does it do to friendships, to community, to parent child relationships, to marriages, to partnerships? I mean the social impact and community. Oh, how I was just telling client this, I think two days ago.It was yesterday. We were talking about, she's like, I just, I'm trying to sort out how to get community. And I could tell by how she was talking about it, there was kind of this framework, like, I'm the only one. Why, why, why is this so hard for me? I'm sure other people have it together. There was kind of this underlying implication.And I said, you just need to know something. Do you know, I have this conversation almost daily. Wow. With my clients. What? How? You're not the only one. No! Please! Rebuilding, especially if you've been raised in the church, [00:10:00] Rick, the, okay, we all know on this podcast. What the toxic streams that run through organized religion.We're clear on that. But I'm telling you, for better and for worse, they do community like nobody else. Katherine: Yeah, and that's just the reality of like how to find that type of organic community. Oh! Side of the church that that I think that's probably the biggest grief for me. And then for so many people How do I get that that's the part I miss the most Connie: besides trauma recovery I would say community especially if we're talking about thriving when people are finally Starting to put their head up above A little bit and look around to see the devastation.That's one of the first questions

New book on Spiritual Abuse available from the founder of Tears of Eden: A Thousand Tiny Paper Cuts: The Subtle, Insidious Nature of Spiritual Abuse and Life on the Other SideJulia and Jeremiah from the Sexvangelicals podcast (a podcast for providing the sex education the church didn’t want you to have) join Uncertain podcast to discuss how Purity Culture can impact men.Some topics addressed in this episode: Erectile DisfunctionShame around sexSexual Agression Gender Binaries Check out two of the Sexvangelicals' episodes featuring Uncertain’s host Katherine Spearing:Episode #53: Kicking Off the New Year with Spiritual Abuse: How to Leave a Controlling Family Environment, with Katherine SpearingEpisode #54: Kicking Off the New Year with Spiritual Abuse: How Romantic Comedies Can Reinforce the Worst Parts of Evangelical Culture, with Katherine SpearingJulia Postema and Jeremiah Gibson are the co-hosts of the podcast Sexvangelicals: The Sex Education the Church Didn't Want You to Have. They are both Boston-based licensed psychotherapists and certified sex therapists who work with clients in Massachusetts. They currently live in Utrecht, The Netherlands. They specialize in helping couples with negative religious backgrounds discover sexuality that works for their partnership. They enjoy traveling to places that tend to fly under the radar, long-distance hiking, cooking very spicy food, unexpected conversations, and introverted days filled with reading and drinking fancy tea.Socials:Instagram and Threads: @sexvangelicalsWebsite: www.sexvangelicals.comSubstack (Relationship 101): sexvangelicals.substack.com Transcript is unedited for typos or misspellings Katherine: [00:00:00] Hello. How are you? Julia: Good. We're excited. Katherine: Yes. It is morning where I am, or early, early, early afternoon, and then it is evening where you all are. I know. So, thanks for giving up your Saturday night.I know you would. Probably normally be out wildly partying, Jeremiah: right? Wildly. The wildest Julia: of parties. Katherine: You in the Netherlands. Jeremiah: That's right. Hanging out with windmills and eating a bunch of cheese. Julia: Today is Sinterklaas and so I have heard that it is a chaotic time to be out. So this is a good day to be inside.We've got tea. It is raining outside. So this is actually a cozy and a Perfect way to send Saturday night. I love Katherine: it. I am so excited to be able to talk to you. I love, I love y'all's podcast episodes. I have recommended them to, I mostly recommend them to friends of mine who are recently [00:01:00] divorced and first exploring.All of the things that they were not allowed to explore pre evangelical marriage. And and so that's a, that's a recommendation y'all are a recommendation that I pass around to some folks. I love your intro. My favorite part about your, your. Podcast episode for listeners is how you, you kind of interview each other and chat like before your episodes, those, those are always really, Jeremiah: yes, absolutely.And we do talk about divorce a lot on our podcast. So, that is unfortunately a part of our story and, and, and how we've come into how we've come into recognizing the impact of purity culture on relationships, so. Is that a part Katherine: of both of your stories? Julia: It is. Yeah. We are both we are both divorced.Katherine: All right. And then, did you all get into doing what you do as sex and relationship therapy post [00:02:00] evangelicalism? Our post? These experiences or was this something that came up before, were you already working in this? Jeremiah: So I, a little bit of both for me. So, I joke with people, except it's not a joke, that I did my first couples therapy session when I was 12.And listeners, you can... Put some of the pieces together. I, so, so I've known for some time that that I wanted to be a couples therapist. Huh. And in the field of psychotherapy there's a specific license for marriage and family therapy. My license is in marriage and family therapy. And a lot of the marriage and family therapy schools are either at these big kind of research schools. So Ohio state has a big program where Julia went Michigan state has one or they're at Christian schools because the history of couples therapy and marriage family [00:03:00] of the history of couples therapy.The history of marriage therapy is pretty closely linked to the Christian community. In fact, our professional organization split in the seventies from the California organization because religious people, the, the pastors spiritual directors in the seventies said like, no, like what's happening in California is too liberal, is too progressive.Let's, let's talk about marriage and let's talk about marriage from the perspective of heteronormativity. And this is. A little bit before James Dobson starts taking over with, with focus on the family, but, but, but it's all connected to that. So. So my graduate program at Abilene Christian University is a Christian university.But interestingly, that was, I would say, probably the beginning of my deconstruction process too. Yeah. Because marriage and family therapy at its root is systems theory. So this idea that everything is interconnected you know, I can't succeed unless you [00:04:00] succeed. We, we talk about this through, through Desmond Tutu's work.And so, so I actually begin realizing, oh, like the church, a lot of the Christian stuff, like, like, isn't really making sense. It's clashing with systems theory. The system stuff makes a lot more sense to me. It connects. The problem is that in my twenties, I am employed by churches. Yeah. I'm, I'm a music my first career is through music ministry.And when I left Texas moved to Boston and very quickly get hired by a church to do music ministry. And so a lot of my thirties, then my early thirties is trying to figure out how to do a systems work. I later discovered sex therapy through, through my office. How to be a sexual health professional and to be a minister at the same time.And I thought I could pull both of them off. The church that I was in worked at claimed to be really [00:05:00] progressive. At the end of the day, I ended up getting fired. I ended up talking about sex therapy too much, made the wrong people uncomfortable, and I get the axe. Oh no! So I end up getting kicked out of Christianity, more so than leaving and choosing not to return to organized religion.  Yeah, these Katherine: two things are very connected in your story, like you're very much and your vocation and your deconstruction are, are very entwined. Jeremiah: Absolutely. Julia: Yeah. Minor entwined but in a different way. Catherine when we were interviewing you, you had mentioned something that I could relate to which is the socialization for women to be some sort of caretakers within.fundamentalist, and other evangelical circles. Being a therapist is very much a nurturing type of career. The other career options I had considered were [00:06:00] teaching and nursing, also stereotypically nurturing, stereotypically associated with Christianity. So, I don't know if I would have become a therapist.Had I not grown up in the environment that I did. What a question, right? Right! Ultimately, I love it most of the time, but sex therapy was deeply connected to my deconstruction process. I got married young, at the age of 22. I am divorced and when I got married my world crumbled because I had learned that getting married, getting married young was a rite of passage into adulthood, would be the sign of my worth as a human being, and would ultimately be the way that I could access the sexuality that had been denied to me.And when I got married and I hated sex, when I got married and I didn't experience the desire from my husband that I was told would be [00:07:00] present all the time, because all men ever think about is sex, which I'm sure we'll come back to in this episode. My sense of identity shattered. My sense of identity was always in my purity as a woman, in my ability to perform my gender role, and in being a desirable person, particularly sexually.So I became very distressed and my first years married were awful for me, even though I didn't understand exactly what was happening. Yeah. I did, two years after getting married, find a phenomenal sex therapist in Boston. I will always give Nancy McGrath a huge amount of credit for my individual and relational growth.She was an amazing sex therapist, an amazing couples therapist. And my ex husband and I made a lot of progress, even though we did choose to get married. And just to get divorced. Yes. Yes. Even though my ex husband and I choose to got [00:08:00] divorced, choose to get divorced. And as I was continuing to grow, as I was continuing to heal, my therapist said, I was already a practicing therapist.She said, if you decided to become a sex therapist, you would be a great sex therapist. And that was such an affirming and healing moment for me in my sex therapy training. I admitted to myself and my therapist for the first time that I didn't want to be married. And so sex therapy training was really like the last Jenga piece that caused the tower to shatter.I wasn't an active member of a religious community when I participated in sex therapy training, but I still was. Connected to the religious world. And I was still married to my ex husband. And because I was married to a Christian man, I had status in my family system and I had status in all kinds of other systems.And then I lost my status within my family. [00:09:00] I lost my status within my community. My divorce was fodder for gossip at a funeral and becoming a sex therapist and ultimately getting divorced was what broke my connection to that world. Katherine: Woo! Goodness. Goodness. So this is somewhat of a rhetorical question that I know the answer to, but I still want to hear your answer.How interconnected is sex? To personhood and relational dynamics itself. How often

New book on Spiritual Abuse available from the founder of Tears of Eden: A Thousand Tiny Paper Cuts: The Subtle, Insidious Nature of Spiritual Abuse and Life on the Other SideRachel Bernstein LMFT, MSEd from the IndoctriNation podcast discusses what it’s like working with survivors from high-control groups. This episode is for survivors looking for a mental health professional or for mental health professionals looking to work with the demographic of survivors of cults, high-control groups, and spiritual abuse. University of SalfordUncertain is a podcast of  Tears of Eden, a community and resource for those in the aftermath of Spiritual Abuse. If you’re enjoying this podcast, please take a moment to like, subscribe, or leave a review on your favorite podcasting listening apparatus. You can support the podcast by going to TearsofEden.org/supportTo get in touch with us please email tearsofeden.org@gmail.comFollow on Instagram @uncertainpodcastTranscript (Transcript is unedited for typos and misspellings)Katherine: Hello. How are you doing today?Rachel: I am doing really good. How are you doing today? Katherine: I am good. I am a little tired. I went to a midnight book release. On Monday nights, and I don't ever stay up that late, and I'm still sleeping.That was a new thing for me. I was like, this is what teenagers do. These are not what people who are almost 40 do. But it was fun. It was a fun experience. I'm glad. Very excited to talk to you today. I know you have indoctrination podcast, and you do a lot of different work with a lot of different clients, but the particular demographic that I would [00:01:00] love to talk to you about is the demographic of folks who've And cults or high control experiences.And I would love to hear from you, what prompted you to work with this demographic and what was the story that led you to working with this type Rachel: of client? Nice. Okay. So there's so much to this story. I'll try not to make it overly long, but Okay, great. No, go for it. Tell, tell, tell whatever. It's slightly long, longer than it needs to be, not overly.Right. Huh. Right. So, When I was growing up, my, one of my siblings who was eight years older got. Kind of a new friend through a friend, and they started hanging out a lot. Next thing we know, she's not really spending time at home. She has taken the money out of her [00:02:00] account and it's gone.Which she had really worked hard for. In my family, we were supposed to work from when we were young. If we needed cash for anything, even to go to the movies, well, you need to earn it. You know, it was like that. So it, you know, we didn't take spending lots of money all at once lightly. Cause we know how much we had worked to make it and suddenly liquidated gone.And she was speaking differently. She was acting in a very kind of in your face way. And we're like, what is going on? So then she said that she has this friend of a friend who's introduced her to this place. It's called Scientology. Got it. And and it's a church, but we're a Jewish family, but it's not a church church.That would, that became a line in our family forever. It's not a church church. Like what? I'm sorry. It's not a church church, but it's not. So. Because there really wasn't the idea of a word cult that was known at the time, and this was in the 70s. So there [00:03:00] was no one to call. There were no resources that, you know, the books out there at the time before the interwebs, the, the books were written by cult leaders.Like there were L. Ron Hubbard novels out there about Dianetics and his science fiction books, but nothing about what is Scientology and that it is a cult. And the, the cult books that were out there too, were more about like working with POWs who had been indoctrinated and watching the Manchurian candidate and are like, yeah, fit, but not.So the turning point was. And I learned a lot about this. My, my parents responded different ways to stressful events. My mom was more of a kind of in your face, you have to stop this right now, finger pointing. I mean, that, that does sometimes come in handy, right? And my father instead was the, let me link arms with this person, see what they like about it, see what's interesting to them.But also I want to ask my questions about what I'm concerned about. So, They had tension and [00:04:00] she had tension with my parents and she said this group is going to teach me how to get along better with, with all of you. And And my friend said she's gotten along better with her parents since she's gotten involved.And so my father, in a very nice way, said could we call her parents and find out? Like, if this really has helped, then I'll say, okay. And she got the number of this person and their parents and the parents said, in this kind of panic tone, where did you see our daughter? Whoa. Right? That was a whoa.And my dad goes, what do you mean? We haven't, we don't know where she is. She left home six months ago and she said for the last six months she's been getting along better with her parents. She hasn't seen them. So this is the way the group defined getting along better, right? No contact. Katherine: No contact. Rachel: Cut them off.Oh my. That actually startled my sister. She didn't know. She didn't know [00:05:00] that's what that meant. I'm sorry. And she tried to get her money back. That was impossible, but. That you could see the personality change right away, and you could see that being in your face and she was having problems with her friends at school for the first time, too, because she was learning other ways of communicating the Scientology way of communicating, which is very in your face.So that became dinner table conversation. How can this happen that people can just take over someone's mind and convince them that something is true. That's really not true. That's totally the opposite of what is true. And then. Because I then was raised hearing about this and that there are many groups that do their recruiting also on college campuses, and they use front names, I then went to college, and I saw it.I saw these groups with their front names that I had learned, and they're at the student union, you know, passing out their pamphlets having people join, taking them on weekends, the bus picked up in front of my dorm, and I remember, because I was now cult educated, [00:06:00] I said to these people, Where are you going?And they said, Oh, we're going on a church weekend. What church is it? We don't know. Really? You don't know. And where are you going? Well, we're going to the mountains. I go, you know, that's not a place like mountains are these geographical structures and geological entities. That's not a place. Do you know where you're going?Is there going to be a phone there? Like, how are you going to leave? And they just thought I was being a drag. And I remember the leaders coming on the bus and asking me who I was and why I was harassing the people who were going. But I thought some of them are going to be dropping out of school after this and needing to show their devotion to this group and not school because that's what would happen.Suddenly these people were gone. Yeah. And then. So there are just two more parts of this story, and it really is, this is a shorter version. When I then went on to grad school to become, to, to become a therapist, to learn [00:07:00] counseling, there was a, a group therapy course where you learn to do group therapy that turned out to be run like a cult.The leader of it, who was the teacher, used, utilized almost every technique of influence and manipulation. And that was just her personality and I did a social experiment in that class, which was interesting because I noticed. This was the year before my dad passed away the year before I broke up with my boyfriend the year before my favorite dog passed away like I was just on the cusp of going through lots of trauma.Yeah, but until then life had been okay, but we were supposed to share our traumas. And if we didn't have trauma to share like if we hadn't gone through abuse or something, we were withholding, we were being resistant to the process. And then I could see people folding like I could see them making stories up just to be liked.And then they would be hugged by the people in the group. Thank you for [00:08:00] trusting us with your trauma and with your, with your past. So people were just crafting stories to please the teacher. I thought, wow, this is happening in a therapy class. I remember talking to my Dean about that. He was actually a little alarmed and I did one of my, I did my dissertation on what happened in that class for that school.That was controversial. But then I, I thought, you know, I want to do this work because there were so few resources for people and. I, yes, I want to do general counseling. I still do some general counseling, but about 80 percent of the counts counseling I do is former cult stuff. And then I start that they were looking for a clinician at a place called the cult clinic in Los Angeles, which was effectively shut down by Scientology.But that was my first taste of harassment, Scientology harassment, which did scare me. I mean, they had. discredited LAPD officers that they hired to harass people to follow people. They were scary, [00:09:00] scary mofos, if I can say. Leaning on my car when I'd come out of the office following me home sending people into poses clients.And I get this note saying, just to let you know, we're watching and listening and thought, what the hell is this? And so I remember staying home for about a week, my father had passed about a year before this, and suddenly I heard his words, which were, you can't let the bullies win. That was his way of looking at the world like you cannot let the bullies win.And I thought, Okay, but I need a week. I just have a week. I'm like talking to him wherever he is. He's already passed. And I had to get myself together and See

New book on Spiritual Abuse available from the founder of Tears of Eden: A Thousand Tiny Paper Cuts: The Subtle, Insidious Nature of Spiritual Abuse and Life on the Other SideBrian Lee shares his personal story of experiencing spiritual abuse and what led him to start Broken to Beloved, an online summit and support resource for survivors. Brian Lee is a pastor, coach, and speaker. As a survivor of spiritual abuse and religious trauma, he has spent his time since leaving vocational ministry in 2021 working to provide recovery and resources for fellow victims and survivors. In 2023, he created and founded Broken to Beloved, a nonprofit organization that exists to help other victims and survivors through its Annual Summit and seasonal Cohorts, while also providing trauma awareness and safeguarding practices to pastors, leaders and churches.Based in Richmond, VA, Brian loves to go on outdoor adventures with his family, explore their neighborhood, community, and city, find good parks, enjoy good food, and have fun together. As a coffee snob and addict, he could always use another cup.Uncertain is a podcast of  Tears of Eden, a community and resource for those in the aftermath of Spiritual Abuse. If you’re enjoying this podcast, please take a moment to like, subscribe, or leave a review on your favorite podcasting listening apparatus. You can support the podcast by going to TearsofEden.org/supportTo get in touch with us please email tearsofeden.org@gmail.comFollow on Instagram @uncertainpodcast Transcript (Transcript is unedited for typos or misspellings): Katherine: hey, Brian. Brian: Hey, Katherine. How's it going? Going? All right. How about you? Doing, Katherine: doing well, doing, doing okay for doing okay. Or a Tuesday. Brian: It's just for the end of the month slash year slash the world is losing its mind. Katherine: Right. I know like there's been a lot of moments this week where somebody will say something about Christmas and I'm like, Oh, that's, that's on Sunday.Yes. Okay. We are, we are still, there is still Christmas. Yes. Well, thanks for joining me. I am really excited to talk to you about your summit that you are hosting and curating in January for Spiritual Abuse Awareness Month. At the time this episode comes out, it will already be January. So I'm really excited to hear about that.I got to participate in that [00:01:00] last year. We'll be participating again this year. Great time to just connect with other people working in this spiritual abuse, recovery, religious trauma, recovery space, and also. Spiritual Abuse Awareness Month for folks who are not aware is in January. And we were talking before we started recording about when we first heard about Spiritual Abuse Awareness Month.When, when was it for listeners that you first Brian: heard about it? I just learned about it last year because, and I, but to be fair, I've only been doing this work for about a year now. I wish I knew about it sooner. And I think we were both saying it's like, we can't find who originated this thing. But it's been around for at least 20 years, which to me is crazy.Yeah. I learned about it because of Aaron hung, who's an artist who was doing that whole AZ trauma recovery series on her Instagram page. And I was like, spiritually, it'd be some awareness a month. That's a thing. And then the more I dove into it, I was like, Oh my gosh, this is absolutely a thing. And it's been around a long time.Why do we not know more about it? Katherine: Exactly. I was wondering too, when, [00:02:00] when did that book, the oldest probably. Documented writing about spiritual abuse is probably the subtle power of spiritual abuse. I Brian: think that's what I was thinking. Yep. And that was, I think it was written in the 90s. I want to say, okay, I'm going to look for a publication date because I want to be sure.But I remember reading it thinking I was like, did they just write this like a year ago? And it's like, no, it's been around for a very long time. Yeah, Katherine: yeah, yeah. And then even just like the reality that PTSD. Was not an official diagnosis until the 80s. Brian: Yes. Katherine: Yes. We're very new in this trauma world. Yes.We're all very new to this. This is a new, new territory for all of us. Did you, did you find the Brian: date? Amazon says the publication date is 2005, but that seems late to me. I feel like it was before that. It has a very nice Katherine: cover. Brian: It does! Which is why I feel like it is. So now I'm opening my Kindle to look for the actual copyright date on the inside of it.Yeah, Katherine: maybe that was the most [00:03:00] recent Brian: publication. That's what I'm wondering. Library, look for the yellow book right there. The yellow book. Yeah. That's what I call it. The yellow book. Copyright page. 1991. You were right. Boom. Boom. First time. Katherine: First time. Yeah. So I guess that's the first time that that became something Brian: that.People and for reference to me that feels like 10 years ago, but it's 32 years ago.Yes, I know that tells you how old I am feel like that long ago, but because it wasn't it wasn't Katherine: Yeah, I know because i'm like i've lived Yeah, I've lived longer in the 2000s than I lived in the, in the, in the, in the 1900s, 1900s or so. Brian: It's been a while. How dare you? Yes, we are, we are, we're getting, we're getting up there.We're getting up there. Yes, yes we are. [00:04:00] Speaking of Katherine: age, actually I have nothing. Nothing to say about it. I'm just trying to segue talking about broken to beloved, which is your summit that's coming up and to get us started. I would love to hear whatever you feel comfortable sharing about your spiritual abuse story and how can you, you said that you discovered this word, right?Or this phrase, spiritual abuse, this term fairly recently, when did you, maybe just to start out, when did you first hear the term and did you have an aha moment like many of us Brian: do? Gosh, when did I first hear the term? I honestly don't even know, but it was probably from one of the books that I started reading that validated that experience for me.It might have been K. J. Ramsey's book The Lord is My Courage, and I read it more as a, oh, maybe this will help me in a [00:05:00] dark season, and that's one of my favorite psalms anyway, so, and then I didn't realize she was going to go into their whole spiritual abuse story, and then I am a person who reads all the footnotes and then goes and finds all the primary resources and reads those, so Katherine: that's favorite reader.They were like, we put this in here for you. Brian: Yes. Well, and that's, I love footnotes. So, so because of her, I think is, is how I found the subtle power of spiritual abuse. And then from there, I went down the rabbit hole. I mean, something's not right. Redeeming Power, Church Called Tove, Try Softer, Narcissism Comes to Church, you know, all these books.And now in the last two years, I've read over 40. Five books on that topic, which seems overwhelming because it kind of is, but it all came out of my personal experience, right? So I left my last church in July of 2021. I had been there for just about three years, I think. And I walked into that church.[00:06:00] My wife and I have both moved here saying to each other it would be really nice if this works out And if it doesn't because we've already been hurt before I think we're done with ministry for a while Which feels kind of crazy to walk into a church saying that like this is the last stop Yes.Basically. Yeah. Not indefinitely, not forever, but for a while, we're going to just give this a break because we're done. And so, you know, my story goes back over 10 years now, I think I worked at a Christian college as the marketing, as the graphic designer for the marketing department. I had also attended and graduated from that college, which isn't unusual.But it was a completely different experience being a student there than it was being on staff there. And I didn't know what to do with the cognitive dissonance of looking at leaders that I respected and admired Who seemed to preach the gospel and talk about servant leadership and humility and all these things But then I would be sitting in meetings I was like I don't know who this person is who is so [00:07:00] angry and belittling and demeaning and authoritarian and all these pieces And so finally leaving that environment I need to ask you a Katherine: question, just like following up on that, because I feel like that's such a common theme of like the, what you preach and what you teach is not who you are.And I just, I just hear that all the time. And just was talking to someone about the other day about her father, who was a pastor and he. He was a pastor and he would preach these things about like parenting and then he would like not be that type of parent. And I'm just curious from the experience that you had what, what is your take on that of like, why, like, you obviously know what's right.Where, where is this disconnect happening because you can preach it enough to convince people then what's happening here. What's your Brian: [00:08:00] take on that? My take for the last two or three years now has been, it all boils down to the need for power and control. And this message is going to work and this message is going to work.And so the secondary or maybe even tertiary word that comes out of that is optics. It all comes down to optics and the way things look and appear so that I can maintain power and control. And so if I can maintain this image of, then I will continue to have power and control and influence over these people as long as they don't see behind the curtain.And if they do see behind the curtain, it doesn't matter because I control them anyway because I'm their boss, right? Or because I am their spiritual authority or leader or whatever it is. So I, it's wrecking. Man, there's so many ways I can go so the last pastor I had woul

New book on Spiritual Abuse available from the founder of Tears of Eden: A Thousand Tiny Paper Cuts: The Subtle, Insidious Nature of Spiritual Abuse and Life on the Other SideForgiveness has often been used in the church to sideline and silence victims, either by perpetrators intent on controlling their victims or by systems of people who believe they’re doing the right thing. Connie Baker, author of Traumatized by Religious Abuse and a therapist who works with survivors of religious trauma, joins Katherine for this important discussion on a topic that is nuance, personal, and definitely emotionally charged. REGISTER FOR RETREATCONUncertain is a podcast of  Tears of Eden, a community and resource for those in the aftermath of Spiritual Abuse. If you’re enjoying this podcast, please take a moment to like, subscribe, or leave a review on your favorite podcasting listening apparatus. Transcript is unedited for typos and misspellingsKatherine: [00:00:00] So I'm very excited to have this conversation. This is like, I have like a handful of conversations that ever since Uncertain started that I wanted to do, and one on forgiveness is one of them.Connie: Yes. I love that. I'm so glad. Katherine: Forgiveness is a, I will probably talk more in this episode than I normally do because this is a subject that I am very passionate about the way that forgiveness has been misused and then also having a really genuine experience of forgiveness. Yes. That I feel like was real. Yes. And looks nothing like what I was told. Forgiveness is Connie: Right, right. To me, so much of it is dismantling what we think it is. So yeah. I'm excited to talk with you Katherine.I mean, you're as much of an expert in this area as I am. It's like, you know, I do have some very strong feelings, which I think are very compatible. Yes. I, I think, but, and I've, you know, I've done, I've [00:01:00] done 18 years of clinical work to say, Hmm, I got some reasons why I think what I do, but I just want, I mean, yes, to me, let's make this baby a discussion.Katherine: So yes, it's a, it's a convo, it's a conversation and one that we need to have because it's just, it's still so misused and I've had so many people throughout my life come at me to want to make sure a, that I have forgiven or that I want to forgive or that I'm not bitter. Right. But the standard of assessing.Whether or not I'm bitter, have forgiven is whether or not I talk about what happened. Connie: Totally. Shut up. If you're, if you're not bitter, you can't talk. Katherine: Exactly. And so to, to realize that most people think forgiveness and bitterness means don't talk about it. And if you've really forgiven, then you don't think about it.And it's just like in the past. Yeah. Something that never happened. So we're gonna get into this. I [00:02:00] love it. Let's do the, the kinda outline that I was thinking for this episode is as just kind of following the outline of your chapter in your book, the F word, which I love, and it's probably what I'll call the, the episode first talk about.What forgiveness is not, and some examples what forgiveness is. Some examples, and then I would love to end, you have a self-evaluation at the end of the chapter, and I would love to kind of end with us sort of doing that and like how that might work for people. I have it written down so I could read it to you.Connie: I just like, ok. Remind me. What are some words? Forgiveness that I prefer? Oh yeah. Do I need to, I like my, I like my questions. Do I need to forgive? Do I want to forgive? If I've decided to take a short step, what is my next step?Good. I'm happy with that. Let's keep the book. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Let's keep the book available. Katherine: Okay. Alright. Let's start with what forgiveness is not how, what would you say? Forgiveness is not. And [00:03:00] then just like maybe an example of how you would describe that. Connie: Yes. Oh, forgiveness is not, and I love that we're starting here.I love it because Katherine, you and I both know, there's so many things people think it is. I think first of all, when we're talking about religious abuse, forgiveness is not something that can be demanded or required of someone who's hurt us. It's not no period. Forgiveness, I think theologically as well as psychologically is something freely given.Yes. Something that is, that comes from the person's coercion. If I heard a person and tell them, you've gotta forgive me. It just kind of disintegrates the [00:04:00] whole idea of what forgiveness, the, a beautiful forgiveness cannon should be. So there's one thing, and I think you, you and I both know so many examples of how, and maybe this is just a great place to start, how this is leveraged    .By specifically leadership that, but it's also systemic. It's a two level thing where the leaders can say, you've gotta forgive me, which has all kinds of implications for them maintaining control. Yep. Because we'll get into what it's not here in a minute too. It's not necessarily reconnecting or reestablishing a relationship with that person.We'll get there in a minute, but when it's demanded or our peers will say, you have to forgive because they are part of a system. Yeah. That supports that and, and says, you've gotta forgive and you've gotta get back into an intimate, [00:05:00] trusting relationship with that person if you've actually forgiven.And so that demand and requirement for forgiveness, to me is number one. It is, forgiveness is not something that you can demand or require. So that I think is a foundation because those of us who have been around and probably listening to this podcast, know what I mean by leaders demanding that and systems that require it.So, when a peer tells you you've gotta forgive. But they are speaking for the church authority, i e God.   It is still a power play. Yeah. It's still a power play and whether intended or not, doesn't matter. It's still a power play.   So that's the first thing.     Any other thoughts on that?Katherine: Just, the verses that are popping into my head are the 70th times seven verse and you know, [00:06:00] forgive as God has forgiven you and the, as far as the east is from the West, God will remember your sins know more. And those are the verses that are used to support this belief system.And it's so convincing. It's right, so convincing, and I'm so glad you said systemic, because it is systemic, it's embedded into it. When those verses pop up as they did just now for me when the forces pop up, what would you say to someone, how, how, how do they combat these things that have used? Connie: I say that is an, that is probably the question I.And I want, if we can remember, maybe I should take a note. Let's ask that after we've gone through some of these ideas, honestly what it is Yes. What it's not can what it's,   I think both of those, because the problem with those verses is [00:07:00] these people are bringing a definition and assumptions    .Around what forgiveness is. So I wanna circle back to that. Katherine: Does that sound okay? Yeah, no, definitely. Let's circle back in the, the. The way that this is like spiritually abusive is those verses like even that verse, far as the east is from the west, will I remember your sins know more.It sounds like this just like, oh, beautiful, wonderful. You know, wiping the slate clean. And it starts from this place of just like this. Like really, you know? Oh, of course I want someone to do that for me. So of course I'm gonna do that to someone else. And that reality that it's weaponized. And when forgiveness is not what forgiveness is not, it's not a weapon and it's not meant to be used for coercion.Connie: [00:08:00] Yes. And control. Katherine: Yes. Or silencing. So maybe we don't know what it is. Maybe we don't have a definition or anything, but if we feel like someone is coming at us, And, and trying to coerce us into an emotion or an action that doesn't feel aligned with the con with what happened in a situation of abuse.Maybe we can't even name it as abuse, but if we're feeling coerced into that response, then that's just a pause. Just a pause right there and just say, something's not right. Connie: Huge pause. Something is deeply not okay. I think that's, we can say with confidence. The other thing that comes to mind is the way I hear forgiveness talked about in Christian circles. It's a cure-all. Yes. For the damage inflicted. In other words, I always use this example. That [00:09:00] feels a little absurd. And I use it cuz I want it to feel absurd. If you are going through an intersection on a green light and you are slammed into the driver's side with an a, a driver who is drunk and it slams in and crushes your upper arm, your ribcage, your hip cracks, your femur busts, and you've got, and you have some internal bleeding, they rush you to the hospital and they do all these surgeries and they're fixing you up step by step, and somebody comes to visit and they say, oh my gosh, how are you feeling? Well, ooh, okay, but boy am I still in a lot of physical pain. And the person looks at you and says, well, have you forgiven the drunk driver?Katherine: You like it, it's just literally the same thing.Connie: It's emotional pain. Yes. [00:10:00] In other words, there's this bizarre assumption that if someone deeply, deeply wounds you that when you forgive, you're gonna be great. You're not gonna feel pain, you're not gonna have any repercussions, you're not gonna have any trauma.You're not going to have PTSD. Your brain wiring will not be affected because if you just forgive   All will be beautifully taken care of. And you shouldn't be sitting there in the hospital with all those bones broken if you've actually forgiven. And of course, that sounds so absurd and bizarre to us and correct.It's crazy making Yeah. To say that, that forgiveness is just gonna fix it all and I'll feel great enough once I forgive. Now you and I both know, we were talki

New book on Spiritual Abuse available from the founder of Tears of Eden: A Thousand Tiny Paper Cuts: The Subtle, Insidious Nature of Spiritual Abuse and Life on the Other SideThis episode discusses the brutal murder of Elizabeth Mackintosh on the campus of Covenant Theological Seminary in 1990. It also discusses an entire denomination’s apparent erasure of women. Karl Saint Lucy is a songwriter, composer, and vocalist living in The Bronx. Karl's father, Michael Johnson, is the prime suspect in the unsolved 1990 murder of Elizabeth Mackintosh on the campus of Covenant Theological Seminary. Karl is the songwriter, a co-composer (with music producer Marius de Vries), and a co-producer of A24's first movie musical, F**king Identical Twins, directed by Larry Charles, which stars Megan Thee Stallion in her first feature film. Saint Lucy was a featured soloist on John Cameron Mitchell's Anthem: Homunculus musical podcast by Luminary Originals and was an alto finalist for the GRAMMY Award-winning men's choir, Chanticleer, in 2017.Check out the 2023 podcast series TRUE BELIEVER that goes into more details about the case, Covenant Seminary, and the PCA.The ‘Cold Justice’ Team Helps Investigate The ‘Savage’ Murder Of A Seminary StudentUS murder suspect 'will not face charges' after Edinburgh nurse killedRESPONSE TO LETTER TO CHURCHESREGISTER FOR RETREATCONUncertain is a podcast of  Tears of Eden, a community and resource for those in the aftermath of Spiritual Abuse. If you’re enjoying this podcast, please take a moment to like, subscribe, or leave a review on your favorite podcasting listening apparatus. You can support the podcast by going to TearsofEden.org/supportTo get in touch with us please email tearsofeden.org@gmail.comFollow on Instagram @uncertainpodcast

Bridget Eileen Rivera is a sociologist completing her Ph.D. at the City University of New York Graduate Center. Her first book, Heavy Burdens (Brazos Press, fall 2021), is a Foreward INDIES 2022 Finalist for religion. Providing an honest account of seven ways LGBTQ people experience discrimination in the church, Heavy Burdens helps Christians across the theological spectrum to grapple with hard realities and navigate a better approach to LGBTQ issues. You can follow Bridget's work on social media @travelingnunIn this episode we discuss: How does religion impact the suicide rate of LGBTQ people? Is the Bible really clear about LGBTQ issues? How does the gender conversation impact the LGBTQ conversation? What is the political motivation behind the myth of the “gay agenda”? REGISTER FOR RETREATCONUncertain is a podcast of  Tears of Eden, a community and resource for those in the aftermath of Spiritual Abuse. If you’re enjoying this podcast, please take a moment to like, subscribe, or leave a review on your favorite podcasting listening apparatus. You can support the podcast by going to TearsofEden.org/supportTo get in touch with us please email tearsofeden.org@gmail.comFollow on Instagram @uncertainpodcastLinks for Survivors Discuss podcast: Website: https://survivorsdiscuss.com/Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/SurvivorsDiscuss/Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/survivorsdiscuss/Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/3qTwCpqu8PBiXvGtJVS8SF?si=b2b62039df4a4d3dAmazon/Alexa: https://music.amazon.com/podcasts/d0479463-01ca-4580-af9c-e06eea1eed33/survivors-discussAudible: https://www.audible.com/pd/Survivors-Discuss-Podcast/B0C9TL21ZL?action_code=ASSGB149080119000H&share_location=pdp

Armed with data from an all-new survey of more than 7,000 women, the authors of The Great Sex Rescue, Sheila Wray Gregoire, Rebecca Gregoire Lindenbach, and Joanna Sawatsky, reveal how experiences in church as teens affect women's self-esteem and relationships today in their new book She Deserves Better: Raising Girls to Resist Toxic Teachings on Sex, Self, and Speaking Up.They expose common evangelical teachings that can backfire: the purity emphasis that can cause shame rather than good choices, the dating rules that can prime girls for abuse, and the one overarching belief that can keep them from setting healthy boundaries.Sheila Wray Gregoire is the face behind ToLoveHonorandVacuum.com, the largest single-blogger marriage blog. She's also an award-winning author of nine books, including The Good Girl's Guide to Great Sex, and a sought-after speaker. With her humorous, no-nonsense approach, Sheila is passionate about changing the evangelical conversation about sex and marriage to line up with kingdom principles. She lives in Ontario, Canada, with her husband.REGISTER FOR RETREATCONUncertain is a podcast of  Tears of Eden, a community and resource for those in the aftermath of Spiritual Abuse. If you’re enjoying this podcast, please take a moment to like, subscribe, or leave a review on your favorite podcasting listening apparatus. You can support the podcast by going to TearsofEden.org/supportTo get in touch with us please email tearsofeden.org@gmail.comFollow on Instagram @uncertainpodcastLinks for Survivors Discuss podcast: Website: https://survivorsdiscuss.com/Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/SurvivorsDiscuss/Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/survivorsdiscuss/Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/3qTwCpqu8PBiXvGtJVS8SF?si=b2b62039df4a4d3dAmazon/Alexa: https://music.amazon.com/podcasts/d0479463-01ca-4580-af9c-e06eea1eed33/survivors-discussAudible: https://www.audible.com/pd/Survivors-Discuss-Podcast/B0C9TL21ZL?action_code=ASSGB149080119000H&share_location=pdp

Two ex-cult members discuss the healing power of art through the creation of a musical. Teruyo (they/them) is a racialized queer, mentally disabled, non-binary theatre artist, anti-oppression activist and graduate student in theatre. Teruyo's encounter with cults and the aftermath of manipulative mind games has fueled their drive to delve into healing and reclaiming identity through anti-colonial and anti-racist cult recovery. Through their academic research and the creation and production of original plays and musical theatre, they aspire to amplify the marginalized voices of the global majority, foster socio-political change, and cultivate trauma-informed artistry. Lennox (they/them) is a neurodiverse, non-binary, queer theatre artist. They've endured the clutches of multiple cults, ranging from religious and spiritual to white supremacy. Ditching society's expectations and cultural boundaries, they've fully embraced their love for writing musicals, giving toxic masculinity the finger. Their creative outlet? Crafting badass socio-political musical stories that resonate with their true calling. They're rewriting the rules and reclaiming their rightful place behind the instruments.REGISTER FOR RETREATCONUncertain is a podcast of  Tears of Eden, a community and resource for those in the aftermath of Spiritual Abuse. If you’re enjoying this podcast, please take a moment to like, subscribe, or leave a review on your favorite podcasting listening apparatus. You can support the podcast by going to TearsofEden.org/supportTo get in touch with us please email tearsofeden.org@gmail.comFollow on Instagram @uncertainpodcast