Note: Can I Say This at Church is produced for audio listening. If able, I strongly encourage you to listen to the audio, which has inflection, emotion, sarcasm where applicable, and emphasis for points that may not come across well in written word. This transcript is generated using a combination of my ears and software, and may contain errors. Please check the episode for clarity before quoting in print.

Back to the Audio Episode

Sarey Martin Concepción 0:08

We tried to put, in any given category, kind of a range of, you know, more moderate work conservative…

Dan Koch 0:15

(in) almost every topic there is, there is something like a Tim Keller, Tim Mackie-Bible Project…

Sarey Martin Concepción 0:22

NT Wright…

Dan Koch 0:23

…NT Wright…there's something like a sort of centrist view. That language doesn't work as well for theology as it does for politics. But, you know, like a taking the scholarship seriously, but certainly, theologically orthodox. There is at least one or two, of the 15 or so topics, I mean, 12 or 13 of them. And then a Christian gets to more, there's also stuff that is further left. But it is not like only a list of liberal theology or progressive theology, it doesn't only contain that, that's not the point. The point is for people to find where they're at, and see if they are supposed to be shifting a bit one direction or the other. The goal is not, like I say, on the intro of You Have Permission, the goal is not to make liberal converts, this is a resource to find where you're at and if you're here, if you come to this website, you feel some need to be moving, and find yourself and go from there.

Seth Price 1:20

Before we get going, a small break. Bear with me. I'll be right back.

Hey, there, everybody. How are you doing? I hope the answer to that question is that you are doing well. And that February was fantastic. I pray that March is better. Before I got going, I wanted to say thank you to both Craig Webster and Tina Green, Craig and Tina, are two of those beautiful people that have decided to help this show, continue to be a show and grow and do all that it needs to do. And I am so very thankful. And so if you thought about that, if you've been on the fence, consider supporting the show on Patreon. You'll find all those links in the show notes. And I get it if you can't, it's fine. Totally fine. I'm glad you're here. And I'm glad you're listening. What you should do instead, just tell a friend about the show. It helps out more than you think. Now, there is a website on the internet, which I guess that makes the most sense, because really where else would websites be if they weren't on the internet.

But the word deconstruction is a word that gets thrown and bandied around quite a bit. And because of that, it has a lot of meanings for a lot of different people. But I think if you drilled it down, it's just someone that finds themselves in a crisis of faith. And I think that that crisis can be really from any faith. I approach it from a lens of Christianity, but I know that others approach it from a different lens, because I've had conversation with those that do. And so I know that none of us are alone. So that website, though, is literally called soyouredeconstructing it is the brainchild of Sarey Concepción, and Dan Koch. Now Dan's been on the show back a while ago, I think we talked about in times and a bunch of other good things. I loved that episode. And I loved this conversation, because we laughed, matter of fact, I busted out laughing, just editing it. And you won't hear the reason that I laughed out loud. But the patrons will they get an unedited version of the show. And I can promise you, the pre-episode chatter is hilarious. So if you need another reason, jump in over there. So Sarey, Dan and I, kind of break down that website, the reasons the why some of their thought processes and some of the feedback of people that have used it. I have spent some time on the site as well. I really do enjoy it. I found some new information and some helpful information for myself. So I hope that you enjoy this conversation and let’s do it.

Seth Price 4:43

Sarey, I don't know how to say your last name Concepción, is that right?

Sarey Martin Concepción 4:47

Good enough for me.

Seth Price 4:48

It's not right?

Sarey Martin Concepción 4:51

Yeah, Concepción; you did it.

Seth Price 4:53

I'm not gonna do that again. Not even try and Dan Koch, welcome back to the show. I'm glad that y'all both made time. So from what I understand you're in like different states. So we're now internet…international…intercontinental? Yes that is the word.

Dan Koch 5:04

We're committing. If we commit crimes, they're federal crimes because we're crossing state lines.

Seth Price 5:12

(we all laugh)

I guess so. I'm sorry. Let's start with you. Dan's been on the show before. And so for lazy people like myself, I'll just put something in the show notes. You can hear about Dan stuff. And you can kind of abbreviate that Dan for the first time that they've opened the Dan door. But Sarey, people that are new to your voice or new to your…who are you? What are you the things?

Sarey Martin Concepción 5:36

Just a, just a lady living in Portland, Oregon. I'm from Los Angeles and just moved to Portland, Oregon a few months ago with my husband and one year old baby girl. And I had a long like first career in the entertainment business, music industry, and film industry before just deciding to leave it all behind and get a seminary degree. So I actually worked for Rob Zombie for many years for people who know who that is, working on horror films and heavy metal, and then decided to go to seminary. So I have a very contrasting chapters in my life. Went to Fuller Seminary, got a master's in theology, and then ended up working there for a while, and recently started working for a nonprofit doing communications for them.

My nonprofit does grant work at the intersection of faith in science. And my side hustle is this website I do with Dan call soyouredeconstructing.com, which we're going to talk about on the show tonight. I also have another side hustle of being kind of a filmmaker and a writer.

Seth Price 6:45

So what do you actually like to do? Like, if you could pick one of those and you're doing that I all weekend alone?

Sarey Martin Concepción 6:52

I think I entered seminary sort of hoping to be like an edgy CS Lewis where I would do both. Like I'd write about theology and I'd also write like, my sci-fi, you know, genre fiction on the side. So I am doing both those things. I just hold it down with a day job.

So I say I equally love, like, I'm a theology nerd. And I'm also like a sci-fi, horror nerd as well.

Seth Price 7:19

That's fantastic.

Sarey Martin Concepción 7:21

I can't really get around doing both.

Seth Price 7:23

Dan, what is the abridged version for yourself?

Dan Koch 7:27

I just have to say that soyouredeconstructing.com is a pretty bad side hustle, given that all it does is cost us money, and not earn any money. (all laugh)

Sarey Martin Concepción 7:38

That's a good clarification

Dan Koch 7:41

We pay for hosting. And we spend our time promoting it, and it does not earn $1. So I guess it's everyone else's side hustle on their behalf that you're doing it. So the abridged version of my story, Seth, is that I was in a rock and roll band called Sherwood for 10 years. And then finished that went back to school, finished my philosophy undergrad, took some time off composed ad advertising music, basically since then, for the last eight years or so. And started theology podcasting about five years ago, and then started a doctoral degree in psychology about a year and a half ago. And I host the you have permission podcast. And I met Sarey through a very fun two weeks seminar at Fuller Seminary a year and a half ago, called theo. psych, which was about science and religion. And I was there as a media person, she invited me because of the podcast, and we became friends and and eventually started working on the site together.

Seth Price 8:42

Yeah. So I want to get to the site. I spent some time in it, though, I want to be really clear, not a massive amount of time in it, because I don't spend a massive amount of time really anywhere except for at work. And currently, Canvas and Google Classroom as I ensure that my children actually submit their coursework because of COVID. But I am curious, what is a Holy Fawn, and I'm aware that many people listening have no idea what your shirt says, but I can't stop wondering.

Dan Koch 9:07

Oh, it's a band. Kind of like a…

Sarey Martin Concepción 9:10

always a band shoegaze

Dan Koch 9:11

shoegaze(y) and heavy band that I like a lot.

Seth Price 9:16

Okay, all right. Fair enough. Fair enough. Okay, so, so you're deconstructing…why? Like, what is the reason to make a repository of I guess resources is the best way that I would use it? And maybe you have that in the website and maybe I stole those words. I don’t think I did.

Dan Koch 9:33

Yeah, its resources mainly.

Seth Price 9:35

Yeah. So what's the purpose there? Like what made the two of you get together and say, Alright, this needs to exist in the world?

Dan Koch 9:44

Well, I will start just because it started with a tweet of mine. And then Sarey can fill in the meat because she's better at that than I am. Are you familiar, Seth with the movement, it gets better?

Seth Price 9:57

No.

Dan Kock 9:58

Okay. So it's like, I don't know how to describe it. If it's maybe it's technically an organization now, but it, it was kind of like a slogan at one point for like gay teenagers. And it was like, older gay people started this thing called, it gets better. Basically like, Hey, you know, this is a rough time. We know you feel ostracized, it gets better, you're not going to feel this way all through your adulthood.

And I jokingly tweeted one day, it gets better, but for former evangelicals, or deconstructing Christians or something like some joke like that, and then, like, I think later that day, I replied to my own tweet going, Hey, actually, maybe this is kind of a good idea. And then Sarey was like, I think it's a good idea. If you actually want to do that, I would like to do it with you. And I said, I would love to do it with you then I'll actually do it. And that began it. So then Sarey, you can explain better than me.

Sarey Martin Concepción 10:52

Yeah, we just wanted to make a curated group of resources for people who were in that space of newly deconstructing. And having gone through it ourselves, and having a lot of friends who've been through it, it seemed like something that was needed. It seems like a lot of times we start deconstructing, you might hear something that sounds like an answer to a question. And that leads you to another something and another, something and another voice. So we thought it'd be helpful to have like, a lot of that stuff in the same place.

So you know, the meat of our site, a lot of it is on topics page, where we break it down by issues that are usually pretty salient for people who are in that beginning phase of deconstruction. But we have other stuff too. We have resources about you know, figuring out if you should go to therapy, and if you want to go to therapy, how do you go about finding a therapist? And what does it look like to find a community if you're feeling ostracized from your, you know, your old church community or whatever? So, sort of treating it holistically? I think Dan brings a lot of that therapeutic kind of voice. You know, he really championed the therapy section of the website because he's a budding doctoral fella.

Dan Koch 12:11

I'm a doctoral fella! So there’s this thing in academia called being a doctoral fellow or a postdoctoral fellow. I'm not that, I'm not a fellow. But I am a fella.

Seth Price 12:22

I thought fellows were just medical doctors. I thought those were fellowships right?

Dan Koch 12:26

I think in different disciplines fellow means different things. But, it's definitely an academic thing that I'm poking fun at. So I'm just a doctoral fella. But I am training to be a therapist.

It was important for me. And I think that there also, it turned out to be kind of a cool way to answer a question that I get all the time anyway, unrelated to the kind of topics page of like, you know, there's questions about hell, and the Bible, and science and, you know, LGBTQ issues and all that. But sort of separate from that people often ask, like, how do I find a therapist who knows what I'm going through, as like a person for whom faith is part of what I want to talk about, in therapy. Some sort of wounding, some sort of transition, maybe difficulty with family members because of a faith change, or oftentimes, within a marriage an imbalance of faith change. And so that was actually kind of a cool opportunity to think through that. And Sarey was able to ask a couple professors from Fuller, and I was able to ask a couple of people that I trust on sort of, like, how would you best describe like going about that? And turns out, there are some pretty cool ways to do it. And so we have a little, for instance, a little tutorial of how to find someone on psychologytoday.com, which is the biggest directory of therapists in America, who specializes in spirituality. I didn't know that that was the thing until I started looking through this, to try and answer that question.

Seth Price 14:03

I didn't know that that was a thing until you just said back because again, I was honest enough to tell you…I didn’t dive into the site.

Dan Koch 14:10

That's very, you know, the therapy page is a bit more of like a lot of texts for people who are really considering something and, you know, there's I wouldn't have expected you to find that on a cursory look.

Seth Price 14:22

Yeah, side tangent because therapy is a triggering topic for my family lately. So there are, we've tried to find therapists for different reasons that I'm not going to put on this podcast, at least not for right now. And I've never been so infuriated by a system as the lack of qualified, at least therapy, in what we're looking for. And one person actually refused to be in network and had like a cover charge that was so high it was more than my mortgage, just to get care. And I was like you realize you’re price fixing the rich people to get medic to get medical attention here and this is not right. Anyway, soapbox for the day. But you said that and so I am going to go to that resource. But yeah, that's that's been my thing for the last few months, I'm just pissed at the world about that.

Dan Koch 15:16

By the way that one of the cool things about the world of psychology, I'm sure it's true in other like medical fields is there are these ethics boards. And if you think that someone really is price gouging or price fixing, you should report them to, if they're a doctor to the APA, if not like your state, medical licensure, whatever. And because that's it's a violation of the ethical code that we agree too.

Seth Price 15:39

They're probably not breaking any laws. But that's how I felt like I literally, as a banker, which is what I do, I was like, this feels like red line. And I know that's illegal. So, anyway, so Sarey, do you think that deconstructing is a necessary evil of having faith of any sort? Not necessarily a Christian faith, but just period?

Sarey Martin Concepción 15:59

Um, I'm not gonna speak with a great level of expertise to that question. But I think part of becoming an adult is deconstructing whatever you were raised with. So I think that pretty much everyone has to go through that phase of like, owning what they were given. And from my experience, from what we're seeing right now, it seems like, that's happening a lot where people are ending up really far from where they started. And not just like, you know, not just moving the needle, like, Oh, I'm a little more liberal than my parents, you know, it's like completely being like, Nah, baby's got to go with the bathwater. You know, yeah. So and that's part of the the website that I tried to emphasize kind of throughout, especially in the topics area, on the homepage, and the messaging.

It was really huge for me to learn about the breadth of the Christian tradition. And there's not a lot of literacy about that I feel like. The rich history of the Christian tradition, what the history is, like, thought leaders outside of a certain narrow, you know, succession of, you know, Calvin to Edwards to, you know, Gospel Coalition, you know. There's a lot of other branches on the tree. And it's really exciting and refreshing to me, if we can get outside of the in group out group thinking of certain creed, a certain denomination, and just see what the the breadth of the tradition has to offer. I think it's really exciting. And it can reignite your spiritual imagination, which is what I experienced when I kind of cracked it open and was like, oh, man, like, I didn't even know like, that that was an option, you know?

Dan Koch 17:45

I think there are people who don't need to deconstruct like, it kind of depends on what parts we're talking about deconstructing. It's sort of like, if you're raised, hyper fundamentalist, then in order for you to be a healthy person, you have to deconstruct. There are elements of your faith that are going to be so toxic to you, that you can stay in it, and basically be miserable. Or you can deconstruct. But our friend Tripp, for instance, was raised like liberal Baptist. And basically the thing ever he describes

Seth Price 18:18

That’s a thing?

Dan Koch 18:19

Tripp Fuller?

Seth Price 18:20

No. Liberal Baptists. Tripp Fuller is real.

Dan Koch 18:21

Tripp Fuller is an American Baptist. His parents were church planners. And like, when he describes his childhood, it's like, oh, that's exactly the way I want to raise my child like, he ended up doing some deconstruction, because he studied philosophy and he went down his own path. But someone raised in his shoes, I don't think necessarily would need to deconstruct that. Where it starts to get problematic for me is when somebody in your community growing up or whatever, or in college, or at some point, starts to universalize the particular aspects of your faith tradition, and say that that's the real one, and judge everyone else by that measure. Once you do that, then you have to at least contextualize your faith and recognize it as part of a broader tradition, a broader spectrum, on all kinds of different questions. Otherwise, you are basically being a bigot of some kind or another.

So it's kind of like, yeah, there are people who don't need to. But, you know, most of us, it seems, these days, and especially with the, you know, just the massive ascendancy of white evangelical Christianity in over the last fifty years in America, we are just seeing a huge population of people who I think mostly do have to come to terms with that. With a few exceptions, where their particular church and family and whatever, we're just awesome, other than those people, yeah, you got to go through some of it. But it's very variable, what you have to go through and it depends a lot on your personality and the specifics of your upbringing.

Seth Price 20:03

So, and either one of you can go into this, so what went into deciding which topics actually made the flowchart for deconstruction, as as I guess, as it's related to this website, specifically, because I think you could say you could be struck literally deconstruct literally in anything and everything. So what kind of went into choosing these tents?

Dan Koch 20:23

I think we were both in this world right, Sarey? It wasn't like necessarily difficult to figure out what, you know, I've got three podcasts under my belt. I know which episodes get clicked on the most. Sarey has been involved in all these academic conversations around these questions. I mean, let's say, the top 10 at least we're kind of no brainers probably.

Sarey Martin Concepción 20:47

Yeah, they just came right out. You know, like, there was some super obvious ones that are, we're on the top of the list. And it's clear to, because I can look at the back end of our site and see what's getting clicked on, and it's like, yeah, okay, we were right, you know. But we're still adding stuff. That's the thing about the site to this, the site's still being changed and added to and, and, actually, that was one of the reason I listened to your recent conversation with Brad Jersak was because someone emailed me and said, I'm deconstructing from a strongly charismatic background. And me and my sister, we have questions about demons and Satan. And like, we need resources on this. So I'm, like, hold my beer. Just like, started doing a little research. And, you know, that was one that I sent to her.

Dan Koch 21:34

Yeah. So Sarey right now is working on a new topic around sort of demons, Satan, the spiritual realm. And I just worked on one that just went up last week around religious and spiritual abuse, because that's what I'm studying as part of my dissertation. And so we're adding as we go, as people kind of bring things up that we recognize there are holes.

Sarey Martin Concepción 21:54

Yeah, or stuff is like a broad umbrella that we might break up into categories, you know, as things go on.

Seth Price 21:59

What's been the one that you've been like, God, I can't find any, like I'm struggling to find really good resources and I should add these. Has there been one where you're like, God? I would? That's a great question. It should be deconstructed. And I don't know where to point you. Have you come up against that, either one of you?

Dan Koch 22:16

I have a question that I get asked all the time for the podcast and would also put on the site, which is, “how do I navigate my family relationships around conspiracy theories”?

And there's just some people have some ideas. I found a few good articles. And I've been trying to interview, you know, one of those authors, maybe none of that's faith based. It's all just general psychology around talking to conspiratorial folks. That is like the freshest wound right now, I think, in our little subculture of sort of former evangelicals is like, Oh, my gosh, what do I do with like, when my dad likes QAnon, or, you know, like, that's fresh and not so clear to me. Sarey, do you have an idea?

Sarey Martin Concepción 23:10

Ummmmm……

Dan Koch 23:11

Not…sorry! Sarey what is all about your idea of how to solve that (QAnon). What's the answer Sarey? (we all laugh)

Sarey Martin Concepción 23:19

Um, gosh, for me, I guess what just came to mind was certain types of resources that I wish existed, like, you know, sometimes people do have like an intellectual problem they need to solve, and sometimes they just need to hear other people tell their stories, and to feel like not alone. Like, I was raised being taught this and I'm hoping sometimes I wish there was more, you know, personal testimonies, people telling their own stories of deconstruction, so people could hear and feel, you know, feel that kinship, feel less alone. (Thoughts of) Am I the only one who's taught this?

Dan Koch 23:54

Am I hearing the genesis of some original soyouredeconstructing.com content in your voice here Sarey?

Sarey Martin Concepción 24:02

It could be!

Seth Price 24:03

I want to piggyback on that, because I've had a thought for a while, and a lot of it is, so I'm gonna have to preface this a bit. So I get disgusted with myself often when I see my own Facebook memories. Because I've had Facebook long enough that you had to like have a .edu and go to the right University, to have Facebook. And some of the things that I have said, I don't recognize myself anymore.

And so I'm tempted, those are part of my story and they're valid, especially when it deals with like religion, and my politics and how those two are commingled. Like, I'm ashamed of it. And I don't want it on the internet anymore.

Sarey Martin Concepción 24:40

Yeah, do you delete it?

Seth Price 24:42

No, I hide it, but it's still there. Like, there's a button that says, Don't let anybody but me see this, at least on Facebook. But I'm curious, in a world of deconstructing, and especially on social media, where we're also isolated and insular, where you say the one wrong thing from 15 years ago, and I'm not allowed to grow apparently, and neither you Sarey and neither are you, Dan. How does someone safely deconstruct on the internet? I guess, is what I'm asking because and come to grips with the past that they've also put on the internet?

Dan Koch 25:12

That's an interesting question. I mean, it probably only applies to public figures in the kind of strict kind of cancel culture sense. Well, I guess I don't know. And I don't know a lot about that topic. I know, there have been court cases around like, just regular, like a cheerleader or something, and a court case that went all the way to the Supreme Court or whatever, to play on, you know, like a team or something like that. But, you know, I think for the average person, no one is really holding our old Facebook posts against us. I haven't had anybody do that, although I did have a very interesting, we have to spend time on this. But I have like, almost like one of those Berenstein/Berenstain Bears things where I was like, I had a couple people very close to me, say that they thought that I became affirming of homosexuality, like a couple years ago. And my recollection is that it was when I was like, 23, or something like, 14 years ago. And I had to kind of litigate this. And I had like, call the drummer of Sherwood and like, okay, and call my dad and like, like, “am I misremembering this, like, do you remember these conversations we had Dad? You know, like, when I was about this age”. Anyway, I was able to work it out. But like, that was like the only experience I could think of where someone actually brought something like that up and I disagreed, or I you know, it had some import.

So I'm not sure I guess I haven't, I maybe should be more worried about it as a some sort of public figure than I am. I don't know.

Sarey Martin Concepción 26:49

It's hard. I mean, I don't think the internet is a safe space to deconstruct, but nor are most like, IRL social spaces, you know? It's a discernment process, for sure. And, you know, we have a section called communities on our site where we indicate some, like private Facebook groups or, you know, chat groups or slack groups, or whatever, where people are deconstructing together. And I think, Dan, I think you do a pretty good job of your, you know, your patron group on Facebook of keeping it pretty safe, where people seem pretty open to share.

Dan Koch 27:25

People are also willing to participate in that, it's not all on me. But yeah.

Sarey Martin Concepción 27:28

Right. And people are doing a pretty good job in there. But yeah, I mean, I totally sympathize with what you're saying Seth. Because even thinking of things I said, in rooms with groups of 15 people 10 years ago, I think back to stuff I said, and I feel that like, hot shame, chest feeling.

Seth Price 27:46

Well, the reason I ask is, so a few months ago, before the election, from like, six years ago, so this would have been when I think a lot older than that. So when Romney was running, I had said something and I've been told that I have a way to be very cutting with my words. I don't know if that's true, because I don't think I write all that well, but other people sometimes do. And so someone shared something that I tagged them in. And it's my voice, and I disagree with it 180%. And then I was like, I don't know that I can take that down. because how bad does that look? You know what I mean?

But I also was like, everybody can see this. And that is not who I am anymore. And then I had a lot of people asking me questions privately, which was fine, but exhausting. And I was like, oh, this, this is not fun. This is you know what I mean? I don't know. It's a weird question. And not necessarily entirely directly related to the website.

Dan Koch 28:45

But I think there's a way I wanted to share something that Mark Karris, who is a past and upcoming guest on, you have permission, two different episodes. In his book, Religious Refugees, he's also a therapist. So his book comes from research he's done of the available literature, but also just experienced with clients going through faith change. And he calls it an “unholy huddle”. This is his term for like, this is one of the necessary factors for growth through this experience. You need a huddle of a handful of people that are safe to talk about this stuff with. And I bet if you asked him, I didn't ask him this at the time, he would say this should be as offline as possible.

You know, in terms of like definitely thinking through a therapeutic lens of like, who's this safe person or these safe people you know, this is not something you want to be performative. It's not something about your personal brand. This is like a truly “for you and your friendships space”. A safe place to to process all of this. And depending on where you live in the country, who your community is, you know constituted of that can be either quite easy to find a few people who are safe like that, or it can be very difficult to find. And maybe has to be online because there is nobody in your rural Arkansas town that you could talk about this with, you know, especially then there's the COVID thing as well.

But yeah, it just made me think of that. And that seems to me, very wise. A very wise thing to include in this sort of plan toward health.

Seth Price 30:29

Yeah, yeah. I have Mark's book. I haven't read it though I will say his Divine Echos book was formative in the way that I approach prayer. Oh, cool. Yeah. I don't know if you've read that book. either of you.

Dan Koch 30:39

I haven't read. I haven't read either of them. I read enough of I I often peruse books and and highlight stuff that I want to talk about and look at. I read intros and outros and chapter titles and skim the stuff that I'm curious about. I mean, I just, I'm in school. I don't have time. I don't have time to read any book I want to read basically right now,

Seth Price 31:01

But you have time for the Holy Fawn.

Dan Koch 31:04

I have time to listen to music. I got an 11 month old, music is on all day. We're just hanging out. Yeah! The balance to how much literature or nonfiction I consume to how much new music I consume has shifted massively since having a kid. It's like, and school I'm sure as a part of it, too-tons of music. So that's been actually really great.

Seth Price 31:29

The best part though, Dan, is when your kids get older, and you introduce them to like Weezer, and that type of stuff. And they're thrilled by it. And so now like my kids would be like Alexa play Weezer. And I'm like, (looks at everyones Echo and is terrified I woke it up).

Sarey Martin Concepción 31:42

It's only the first two albums though, don’t go deeper.

Seth Price 31:45

Well, they got that song from Frozen the entryway, their entry point there was Frozen II.

Sarey Martin Concepción 31:54

OH MY GOSH!!!!

Seth Price 31:56

Yeah. What's funny is when we watched that in the theaters in the back of my mind, I was like, why does this sound like a Weezer song? And then when that soundtracks came at the end, I'm like, because they freakin wrote the song! because they've got like a voice. But so, Sarey, I want to…

Sarey Martin Concepción 32:08

I’m a purist and that horrifies me. (about Weezer :) )

Seth Price 32:11

It's no Rob Zombie!

Sarey Martin Concepción 32:14

Pinkerton all the way.

Seth Price 32:17

So it's that time, I have to try to pay the bills and be right back after the small break.

Seth Price 32:49

The part of your website that I spent the most time digging into is the spiritual practices, because there's been one practice that I've done for about two years now. Because of a book that I read, be examined. And it's been I do it every day. But I'm curious as y'all put those together. That's my favorite part of the of the whole website. Because I think that those practices and making new disciplines is extremely important for somebody that's deconstructed.

Sarey Martin Concepción 33:25

Yes!

Seth Price 33:26

Because, for me, I was like, “Well, now I don't know what to do. Like, I can't go to church

Sarey Martin Concepción 33:30

Yes!

Seth Price 33:31

I don't know how to freakin pray! And I don't know what to do. Do I hold my hands? So can either of you talk a bit about the practices section, kind of what went into it, what's impactful for you all in it? Because I think that that is arguably as important as dogma.

Sarey Martin Concepción 33:46

This is so good because I was sitting here, sorry to interrupt you, I was sitting here being like, how do we pivot to practices because I really want to talk about this part (we all laugh).

But you did it!

But I think it was a big part of it for both of us, or it's a big deal for both of us. Dan, why don't you talk about?

Dan Koch 34:01

Well, let me let me motivate a little bit from what I understand of the psychology research on why you had that experience, Seth, and why so many of us do, especially for those of us who have had some kind of legitimate trauma that exits us out of a religious community. Be that, you know, oftentimes it's a controlling pastor or some sort of controlling group within a church, and then you know, family rifts in all kinds of stuff. We can then associate that pain with the practices. Or, for instance, even if you don't have any trauma, for me, it's like if someone goes “Father God”, like I immediately know like, I'm transported back to a certain specific time in my evangelical upbringing. And if I associate that church and that “whatever” with bad things, with really not Christ or whatever, then you know, triggered is maybe a strong word for that. But the well can be poisoned quite easily if we've had bad experiences.

And so one thing that's cool about finding spiritual practices, it is cool that they're older in a lot of cases, many of these are hundreds of years old. But even if they weren't, even if they're just different, is like, oh, there's no I don't have any associations with the Examen. I had no associations when I started doing centering prayer. And the book that was the big one for me is is the fourth item on the list on the website Experiencing the Depths of Jesus Christ by Madame Guyon. Who's an 1800’s French nun, and like, just to have no baggage is itself powerful to just especially if you're raised Christian, everything has baggage. Your whole life and family and your friendships and your, your adolescence, and you know, all that stuff is tied up in it.

And so I just think that's interesting to kind of motivate why that stuff can be so powerful. Sarey, but you could be a little more autobiographical, with your own story.

Sarey Martin Concepción 36:10

Yeah, I mean, cracking open spiritual practices, for me started with mindfulness. And around the same time, I started to read about more Eastern Orthodox prayer practices too. So I would do sort of a hybrid thing where I would practice mindfulness and then like, pick, like one verse or, you know, phrase from a verse to meditate on. And it just cracked open a lot of just experiencing God, from what I could tell from when I get experience. And I started to loosen my grip on a lot of things. All these spiritual practices are pretty much lost on like contemporary evangelicalism.

So it was new, it was fresh, and it was moving my anchor of spirituality from just like, getting all the facts, right, to a more lived embodied experience of God. And that ended up being really, I don't know, it's just a real pivot for me, because prior to that, it had been all about getting the facts straight getting doctrine, right. And once you tooled around with that well enough, then you were kind of good with God, it totally reoriented me and, and my faith.

Seth Price 37:21

Tongue in cheek question, and then a legitimate question. So I only thought of this Dan, because of what you said. So when you say Father God in a prayer, like I'm immediately transported to a 13 year old youth group or whatever, but I am curious the correlation of the amount of Father Gods to the prayer coming true. (Dan laughs) How many do you think that is like a percentage of the prayer? What 30%…50%? (he laughs again)

Dan Koch 37:44

I think it's inverse. I think that the more Father Gods you put in, the clearer it is that you're just riffing and don't know what to pray in a public performance setting.

Sarey Martin Concepción 37:55

But like want to sound good and authoritative! Like some folks throw that in like every other word. Like it is bad!

Seth Price 38:07

Yeah, to where you don't even know what the prayer is, anyway, just 1, 2, 3, 5, 26, 32?

Dan Koch 38:14

Actually, can I add a very brief biographical detail on the spiritual practices thing before we move on? Just that, for me, the way it worked out in my story was six, seven, years ago, or so when I started doing centering prayer. People have very different experiences, but my experience was like, immediate of God's overwhelming, joyful and accepting presence. And I wasn't able to admit to myself, that I'm a liberal Christian, I just am! Like, I'm a Christian. I follow Jesus. But my ideas that make sense to me, the theological concepts that make sense to me, are the ones that liberal Christians believe. They're the ones I would find in an Episcopal Church, not the ones I would find in a Calvary Chapel.

And I couldn't actually admit that to myself, probably out of anxiety of being wrong, and being in God's bad graces or something, until I felt that overwhelming assurance of God's love for me. And I say that not everybody experiences that because I've had friends that early on in those days I was like, well, this is the answer. And I would try and get them to experience it. And they would try. And not all of them would have that experience. And some of them did. Sarey and I have talked and we've had quite similar experiences, but I have many friends that didn't have those. And so I don't like to say that…I don't want to push that as like a fundamental part of the journey. But for me, it was completely tied to some of the more abstract stuff that now I'm free to discuss on the podcast and put together this list with Sarey and chat with my liberal theologian friends. You know, all that stuff came after I knew I was loved. And actually after that experience, a lot of the personal relationship, kind of, conversion experience language of my youth as an evangelical, made more sense to me, after I directly experienced God and realized I was a liberal. That's one of the great ironies of my story.

Sarey Martin Concepción 40:11

That's actually what I was gonna say, as you're retelling that story was as a young kid, the Jesus story and that concept of God's love really ignited my sense of like imagination and beauty. And over the years, like it sort of got zapped away. And then, yeah, the spiritual practices made that made sense to me again.

Seth Price 40:32

And, well, everyone's been autobiographical, except for me. So I will say for myself, like, I don't ever get auto…ugh..I don't ever get auto…I can't even say the word on, on my own podcast, which is where

Dan Koch 40:43

You’ve got to! Listeners need to know who it is they're listening to.

Seth Price 40:45

I yeah, I think we've established that the things that I say on the internet are not really worthwhile. But I will say, (Sarey laughs) when I make more time for new spiritual practices, like, I find that I grow a lot in uncomfortability. But like, I have to commit personally for like, at least a year to do something. Because for the first three months, I don't know what the freak I'm doing. And I don't know what to expect. You know what I mean? But that's just me.

Sarey Martin Concepción 41:10

Yeah, it's really hard to foster discipline. Oh, gosh it is really hard.

Dan Koch 41:15

Yeah, yeah. Yeah, I’ve barely prayed in 11 months since my son was born. I mean I pray, like, through being spending time with him, but my, my actual discipline of practice, I mean, it's plummeted like never before.

Sarey Martin Concepción 41:28

In the toilet, maybe.

Seth Price 42:31

Well, and this is a bit tongue in cheek, so I would try with my first child, because Dan, this is your first child, right? And Sarey, this your first child as well?

Dan Koch 41:39

Yes, first child, yeah.

Sarey Martin Concepción 41:39

Me too yeah.

Seth Price 41:40

So on my first child, I tried to do the thing where I would stay awake when my wife would be feeding, you know, my son, when we were you know, at home. And I would often get caught not staying awake. And I would be “praying” every single time. That was my excuse every single time as to why my head was bowed. And my eyes were closed.

(Dan and Sarey laugh at my idiocy)

So I would encourage you to pray in that way. Yeah, I mean, it doesn't really get you off the hook. And everybody knows that you're lying. And even worse about prayer, but whatever. That was my excuse, and I'll still do it today. Because what are you gonna do you through the Jesus card in there? So what is the feedback then? So how long is the website even been up? When did it go? When did it become a thing?

Dan Koch 42:19

October-ish or something? it when it went live right?

Sarey Martin Concepción 42:24

Yeah. But…

Dan Koch 42:26

Sort of a soft launch.

Sarey Martin Concepción 42:27

When did we do Tripp’s podcast? I feel like it really like…

Dan Koch 42:32

A month and a half, two months ago, we actually had a launch party on Homebrewed Christianity. That was kind of when we…

Sarey Martin Concepción 42:40

Prior to that we were just sending it to friends and soliciting feedback from people we trust.

Dan Koch 42:45

Seth you were on that list for early looks.

Seth Price 42:47

Yeah, I remember saying something. I don't remember what I said. I hope it was helpful. Maybe it was maybe it wasn't.

So the reason I ask is when I look at everything there, just at a glance, I can see one of two things happening, people saying thank you for putting this together. And for the effort. Because, again, you don't there's nowhere to click support the thing at least I didn't see it at the time, or you're either going to get thank you for putting all this heresy on the internet for you to corrupt my children.

Sarey Martin Concepción 43:13

Oh, my gosh!

Dan Koch 43:16

I think this is actually the time for Sarey to share our first hate mail and it did not come from where you would think it would have come!

Seth Price 43:23

Really‽

Dan Koch 43:24

We've got our first hate email, only one so far.

Sarey Martin Concepción 43:26

Yeah, most people have been like, “this is so helpful. Thank you so much. This is amazing”.

(But the) first piece of hate mail we got was an email with the subject line. You're part of the problem.

(We all laugh)

Seth Price 43:41

All caps.

Sarey Martin Concepción 43:42

And it was so (laughs yes) I think it was all lowercase, which made it even more scary.

Dan Koch 43:49

Like whispering “you’re part of the problem”

Sarey Martin Concepción 43:51

But it was just people, someone who thought that just Christianity was altogether inherently evil.

Dan Koch 44:00

Yeah, progressive Christianity is not, in this person's opinion is not better. It is just like it's worse because it enables Christianity to survive longer. And Christianity is itself the problem from this guy's perspective.

And I was like, wow! I mean, that is…I don't think in 100 years, I would have guessed that that would be the first piece of hate mail you receive. I mean, right. It would be from, you know, conservative folks or whatever, saying we're leading people astray.

Sarey Martin Concepción 44:30

Which is coming.

Seth Price 44:32

I get that argument, I guess. I can see where somebody would make that argument.

Dan Koch 44:36

If we ever get a write up, you know, on Gospel Coalition or something. I'm sure we'll get plenty of those emails. But that would be well worth it.

Seth Price 44:45

I mean, I can submit it as a request. I'm sure there's a “please write about this”. No, I won't do that.

Dan Koch 44:50

That would be great! I'm lacing up my gloves.

Sarey Martin Concepción 44:52

We tried to put, in any given category, kind of a range of, you know, more moderate work conservative…

Dan Koch 45:05

(in) almost every topic there is, there is something like a Tim Keller, Tim Mackie-Bible Project…

Sarey Martin Concepción 45:13

NT Wright…

Dan Koch 45:14

…NT Wright…there's something like a sort of centrist view. That language doesn't work as well for theology as it does for politics. But, you know, like a taking the scholarship seriously, but certainly, theologically orthodox. There is at least one or two, of the 15 or so topics, I mean, 12 or 13 of them. And then a Christian gets to more, there's also stuff that is further left. But it is not like only a list of liberal theology or progressive theology, it doesn't only contain that, that's not the point. The point is for people to find where they're at, and see if they are supposed to be shifting a bit one direction or the other. The goal is not, like I say, on the intro of You Have Permission, the goal is not to make liberal converts, this is a resource to find where you're at and if you're here, if you come to this website, you feel some need to be moving, and find yourself and go from there.

Seth Price 46:09

So, we're coming closely into the time, I've asked this to everybody, and I'm not going to stop because I really enjoyed it. I don't, it doesn't matter. Here we go.

I've been asking everyone, when you say, here's what God is. Like you give words to that. What is that? And so in no particular order, whoever wants to go, what is that?

Dan Koch 46:32

Thanks for the heads up Seth on a question like that!

Seth Price 4633

I gave people heads up at the beginning…

Sarey Martin Concepción 46:36

The questions is “What is God!”

Seth Price 46:38

Yeah. Who/what. I mean, it doesn't matter. Like there's not really a right or wrong answer, right? I mean, maybe…maybe there's not, I don't know.

Dan Koch 46:47

Well, I'll start Sarey, I'll give you some time. But you have to know that I'm doing this for you.

Sarey Martin Concepción 46:52

What does Brad Jersak say? I’m just kidding!

Dan Koch 46:59

By the way, Sarey, anytime I say your name out loud…my phone just…

Sarey Martin Concepción 47:03

I know it!

Dan Koch 47:07

So, like, I don't spend a lot of time thinking about this. But I would be, for now anyway, a pantheist. Which is the idea that everything in the universe is within God, but God is also more than the universe.

So to say something like God is sustaining the universe would be to put it mildly, from where I'm coming from. Everything is within God, all of us. Not that we are all little “Jesus's” in a kind of a new agey way, but rather that everything is shot through with God's love and intention, and, and lure and directionality in some way. And so God is both everything in the universe, and God is the thing drawing the universe closer to, and us and everything in it, closer to love harmony, closer to the kingdom of heaven. Where the lion and the lamb can lay down to a to a non combative, non coercive existence of some sort or another. Which, if it comes to pass, I have no real language for (it) because I can't imagine it, given the world that I experienced other than through metaphors, like the holy mountain in Isaiah that Jesus quotes. And you know, all that kind of stuff. That's my answer. I don't really like the answer. It feels unsatisfying. Maybe just in the presentation.

Seth Price 48:37

Yeah, well, I will say, so I have personally learned more about the character of God from asking this question to like 60 people than some of the books that I've read. Which is why I don't give people any preface of the question. Because I don't like that planned answer, because I just don't feel like it's as authentic. But maybe that's just just me.

Dan Koch 48:58

I did my best to make it sound like it was planned.

Seth Price 49:02

Yeah. Well, you did great.

Dan Koch 49:04

Okay. Sarey. Your time's up. You have to answer it.

(All laugh)

Sarey Martin Concepción 49:13

Um…

God is a loving spirit, who sees me and knows me and is calling all people and things to God self. And that's the best I can do right now.

Dan Koch 49:30

That's good. That's really good!

Seth Price 49:31

That is perfectly fine.

All right. So point people to the places. What door do they open to get into this so you're deconstructing headspace. And then where do they go with like, if they went one place first when they got there? Where would you direct people to click?

Dan Koch 49:47

Oh, that's good. Well, actually, one of the pages we haven't talked about that would be a good place to start is the testimonies page. And that is pretty straightforward. I just did a call out to all the You Have Permission Facebook group folks, and had them answer this question of like, describe for me what it was like, going through your own deconstruction process. And then I categorized 50 or 60 or so of these things by topic.

And so on the testimonies page, you can click on any of these feelings or experiences like fear, self doubt, loneliness, disorientation, deeper connection to faith, excitement, anger, and read the real life blurbs, basically, from people who have gone through this themselves. I actually think that's a cool place to start on the website. And, and just to kind of feel like I'm not alone. And you'll you'll inevitably recognize some of that language as something that you're going through whether or not you have the words for that yet.

Seth Price 50:58

So the website is, soyouredeconstructing.com? I think you buried that. So I'll say it for you.

Dan Koch 51:04

We've said it a lot of times, there's no Patreon or whatever, it's just a free resource. Some of the communities that we list, or do you cost some money to be in some of them are like patron communities, for instance, like the You Have Permission one, but some of them are not, there are some free digital communities to be a part of even there's some that are run by licensed mental health professionals and stuff like that. So it's really not, there's no really commerce angle here. Yeah, it's just a resource.

Seth Price 51:33

So I have a community for this podcast, although this podcast is not in my community. Like I don't proselytize this podcast there. I very rarely actually post things there. But it's a form of church for me, I really enjoy everything that goes on there. So if people are listening, find a community at least a safe place community there. There's some there's some ones that are not all that safe.

Dan Koch and Sarey Martin Concepción 51:55

Maybe we should add yours?

Seth Price 51:58

You can if you want. That's not an advertisement. But you can if you want, but it is protected. And you'd have to answer some questions. And one of the questions is like, if you produce content, you're not going to post it here. And that also applies to me. So yeah, I play by my own rules there.

Well, thank you both so much for coming on.

Sarey Martin Concepción 52:18

Thank you so much for doing this. Really appreciate it. And we hope it can be helpful.

Seth Price 52:49

Today's music is from one of my favorite artists, Heath McNease. You should check out his stuff; it's brilliant. Now, many of you have questions you fill in easy with people. As you wrestle with the concept of faith, I would really encourage you to take your time to find resources and to use resources like so you're deconstructing, but there are others. And if you're not part of a community, a group that can help you feel welcome, and hold, there is a list and I'm going to link it again in the show notes. And for those that are reading the transcript, I'm going to link it right here. There's a list of just Facebook groups, and patreon groups, and discord groups ,and all kinds of support groups here that are fantastic on this website. And I really would encourage you to dive in. And there are other groups like this, that exists like there. There's the group for this show, there is the what if project group there is your favorite heretics, there are many, many, many groups. And so if you're listening and you feel like you don't have a place that you can be yourself openly, if you're missing that, know that those exists.

I'll talk to you next week, I pray that you're well and that you're blessed.