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Ep. 7 - Backmasking and Other Powerful Outreach Tools w/ @christian_nightmares
109 Plays4 years ago
First things first: if you play this episode backwards, you'll hear a distinctly satanic voice humming "Flood" by Jars of Clay. Spoiler alert - it still slaps!
More importantly, we were very excited to talk to the founder of @christian_nightmares, one of our absolute favorite accounts on Instagram! "Chris," as we call him, uses social media to shed light and levity on the more ridiculous figures and organizations in the evangelical movement, both past and present. From everyone's favorite elf on the shelf, Jerry Falwell Jr, to no one's favorite faith-healing bridge troll, Kenneth Copeland, Chris finds the humor in some of the most embarrassing and brazen aspects of contemporary religion, and it's the absolute best. Do yourself a favor, and follow him!
Thank you so much for the outpouring of support, thus far! If you're enjoying the show, we would really appreciate it if you could leave us a review on the podcast platform of your choice, and subscribe to stay up to date on future episodes. Have a great week, everyone!
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Transcript
Introduction and Welcoming Chris
00:00:00
Speaker
How many people do you think you've saved through Christian Nightmares? Nobody. So you're behind even Sam in the soul winning award.
00:00:29
Speaker
Hello and welcome to Growing Up Christian. I'm Casey. Hey, I'm Sam. And today we're joined by a special guest we're very excited about. We're calling him Chris, but he's the founder, I guess, collaborator of the Instagram page Christian Nightmares. How are you doing, man?
Christian Nightmares and Evangelical Experiences
00:00:48
Speaker
I'm doing all right. How are you guys doing? Man, we're doing good, all things considered. It's been a really eventful week. Yeah, to say the least.
00:00:57
Speaker
I guess if you're a professional meteorologist, there's no shortage of content. That's for sure. I wish there was. Thanks for having me on. I really appreciate having the chance to do it. Yeah, we've been messaging back and forth all week like, I'm so excited. I'm just so excited to see where the angst came from. So Casey and I, for the listeners, are, I mean,
00:01:25
Speaker
I don't know how long you've been following this page, Casey, actually, but a friend of mine referenced me to it. And it's just, I mean, everyone should definitely go check it out. It really has, it encapsulates, I mean, the evangelicals like guys for sure, but there's a lot of throwbacks to the type of fun stuff that we learned and are taught when we were young. So if you want to be maybe triggered or whatever, it might be worth checking out.
00:01:54
Speaker
So you've got a lot of great stuff on there. Do people, do they send you things that you get to the point now where just people tag you every time they see something crazy somewhere? Yeah, people do send me a lot of stuff now or tag me on social media, but a lot of it I still search for myself. I mean, there's just, there's so, like I said before, unfortunately, there's still so much, so much of it out there. Yeah. That sounds like a lot of work, actually, to
Community and Critical Thinking
00:02:20
Speaker
I don't know, rummage through the panels of the internet and find some of this stuff. I mean, I don't know if I'm proud about how much time this has been doing.
00:02:31
Speaker
Um, yeah, it can be really time consuming, but, um, I'm also, I've been doing it for a while and I kind of know where to look and it's, it's kind of still cathartic for me. You know, some, some of it's even fun to poke fun at some of this stuff that's just so absurd. Um, but it's really, for me, it's a venting platform too. Um, and has helped me kind of work through, uh, things from my past.
00:02:55
Speaker
Yeah, that makes a lot of sense. I mean, I feel like Casey and I can definitely resonate with that as we are doing something similar here. It feels good to just make light of it and realize how many other people are in on the joke and that other people are getting something out of it too and having that communication with you. Do you pay attention to a lot of the comments? Do you read through them all and stuff like that?
00:03:21
Speaker
I mean, I don't read through all of them. I do check them out sometimes. People are funny on that, man. People say some funny stuff. There's some really good stuff there for sure. Yeah, I mean, I think like you said about finding other people that can relate to this stuff. For so long, I felt like growing up when in the church, I was constantly kind of looking around, saying, you guys think this is crazy too and not really finding it. So it is kind of a...
00:03:49
Speaker
reassuring or comforting in some ways to find this community of people. Yeah, it feels like there's, I mean, the exodus is, I mean, it's been talked about enough anyway, but maybe particularly if you're still pay attention to evangelical things, it's like a crisis for them, the mass exodus and what it feels to me like a lot of people, and maybe it's just a lot of my experience, but and also because I'm from Massachusetts and New England was pretty heavily Catholic area, I
00:04:19
Speaker
it feels like a lot of people like my age, I'm 32.
Internet's Influence on Faith Discussions
00:04:24
Speaker
So basically millennials, a lot of them have parents that were like, saved when they were in their 20s, quote unquote, and they were like, maybe they were Catholic, and then they joined a Protestant church, or maybe they just didn't really, I don't know, but it seemed like there was a lot of baby boomers that got saved in their 20s. And then just like, these evangelical churches kind of blew up. And then
00:04:44
Speaker
what we're seeing now is, I don't know what it was that stuck with them or how it's even changed in a way that is what it is now that's making so many younger people leave. I think that's really kind of a fascinating thing.
00:04:57
Speaker
Yeah, I think so too. I mean, I think maybe part of it too is the internet and communities that are sprouting up, letting people talk about this stuff. I mean, that's one reason why I do Christian Nightmares too is, I mean, I kind of wish I had it when I was growing up. Is there something like it or just, I mean, I'm a little older than you guys. I'm in my forties. Okay.
Chris's Religious Upbringing
00:05:27
Speaker
Yeah, I think just knowing that there are other people that think this stuff is crazy or that are questioning it and being able to talk about it, I mean, I certainly didn't have that, and I think that would have been really helpful. Yeah, definitely. I mean, that's so much of the model for these types of communities, I think, is just…
00:05:49
Speaker
I mean, it's, it's almost isolationism, you know, that's, that's a lot of how the group that I grew up in stayed the way it was for so long is it was just, you know, you saw the same people every week. I went to school with the same people I went to church with and everybody was pretty bought in and anybody who came along who wasn't. Well, it just was not comfortable there, you know? So there was never like that person that you could elbow and be like, do you, does this seem odd to you? Like it was in everybody's best interest to play along, you know? Yeah, absolutely.
00:06:19
Speaker
So we don't have to get into where as we obviously are keeping some things a bit anonymous, but what type of, were you affiliated with a particular denomination? What was your kind of like church upbringing? Was it your whole childhood? Did your parents end up bringing you there at some point? Let's get into that a little bit.
00:06:42
Speaker
Yeah, sure. We went to a Baptist church all the way through. My mother was...
00:06:52
Speaker
was more into it. I don't know how much I want to get into that, but my father wasn't really on board for a long time, which caused a lot of conflict between them and in the home. But my mother took us to church and my father allowed her to take us to church. And
00:07:15
Speaker
Yeah, it was a Bible. It was a very fundamentalist, extreme Baptist church, like fire and brimstone. You know, so many sermons ended with, you know, if you were to walk out of here today and get hit by a card and spend eternity. I spent a lot of time at church. So it was, you know, Sunday mornings, it was Sunday school, and then it was the service after that. And sometimes after that, there was a little gathering
00:07:45
Speaker
down in the, you know, the fellowship hall in the fellowship hall. Yeah. It's like an opportunity to eat out of a brown crock pot full of beef and somebody's pet hair. And then, and then we'd go home and it kind of, this really sucks too. Like my, you know, my mother was like, this is the day of the Lord. You know, you're not really supposed to do, you know, you're not really supposed to have fun on Sunday.
00:08:14
Speaker
Um, so I'd want to go, go out and ride my bike or play with my friends. And, you know, sometimes she'd let me, but a lot of times it was, you know, you got to stay in and read your Bible. I was, I was familiar with the day of the Lord thing. Like it was, I remember the couple of times that my dad would have to work on Sunday. And it was like, I mean, no one, my parents never made a thing of it. It was like, yeah, dad has to work today. My dad's like a self-employed guy and he has deadlines and he, he's a hard worker. And, but it's like,
00:08:41
Speaker
if stuff had to, I don't know, he might have something might have gotten in the way on Saturday.
00:08:47
Speaker
issue came up at work. So I'm like, but I just remember it being even though they never made a big deal about it, it was so ingrained in me that like, that was like a sin that I would almost be worried. I'm like, is this the end of it all? I mean, it's gonna be collapsing. That's gonna work. It's a full-fledged Sabbath day. I mean, that's, I don't know that I've ever really heard anybody say that before. So that's, that's a new, new take on the on that.
00:09:15
Speaker
Yeah, my mother was pretty extreme with this stuff. I don't know if everybody that went to our church was like that. But that's what Sundays were like. And we'd go back to the evening service on Sunday nights. And then Wednesdays was prayer meeting and youth group. And then Fridays was usually some kind of youth group activity that I have to go to. But so it was hours and hours a week
Rebellion and Questioning Faith
00:09:39
Speaker
in church.
00:09:39
Speaker
Yeah, I did so much. I mean, Casey and I were in such a similar boat. So when your mom started, about how old were you when you started going to church? Was that something you were... I couldn't tell if that's what you were brought up in or if that's something you started going to at a certain age.
00:09:57
Speaker
Well, I got born again when I was five. Oh, yes. Nice. And we had been going to church. Yeah, so really, as long as I've been consciously remember, we were going to church. Were you in church through high school? Did you do youth group all through high school and stuff like that?
00:10:21
Speaker
Yeah, I had to, I mean, I had to go to church until I, I mean, I was starting to fight back at that point in my teenage years. I was, you know, trying to rebel against that and give my mother a hard time about it and try to get out of it every chance I could. But for the most part, I had to go until I left the house. I had to go to church and then, you know, I'd come back from college and I'd go reluctantly. And then at a certain point, I stopped.
00:10:49
Speaker
Yeah, man, I want to get into what that was like a little bit later on, the whole stopping point thing, because that's a weird thing. I've heard a lot of people who just carried it out. So many people just carry it out way longer than Nick. It is reasonable, really, when everyone's an adult in the room and can make their own decisions. But it's like that guilt. I mean, there's so many people I know who will still placate that and just go to church for their family's sake.
00:11:18
Speaker
As, as a general rule, okay. Speaking generally, what was your guys's like, what was your least favorite service of the week? Mine was Sunday night. Least favorite. Um, I think it was the morning service. I was just, I was just always so restless and I couldn't wait to leave. You know, it did get long.
00:11:40
Speaker
It got long. Yeah. And they'd go over, you know, usually an hour or so, but sometimes it'd be an hour and a half and it's, I don't know, you're just fidgeting in the pew and it's, and somebody's, you know, talking to you like you're, like you're a bad person. Right. Yeah. That, uh, that's a very Baptist thing. Yeah. So was it like big altar calls and stuff like that every week at your church? Yeah, pretty much. And it was off, you know, it was, it was a lot of, um, you know,
00:12:12
Speaker
You say you're saved, but are you really living for the Lord? And there's a lot of guilt tripping into...
00:12:20
Speaker
No, you come to church on Sunday, but you're out in the world, you know, you're watching these R-rated movies and you're doing, you know, whatever it was, it was just, it was, it was designed to, to, to kind of, to make you feel like shit. Yeah. Your tree's got no fruit. Yeah, exactly. Exactly. Yeah. What kind of fruit are you producing? Garbage in, garbage
Controversies in Evangelical Circles
00:12:39
Speaker
out, blah, blah, blah. Exactly.
00:12:41
Speaker
Man, that's really the sales tactic, I guess, to get a lot of people to keep coming back. And I don't know, maybe it is, maybe it isn't really that conscious. I'm not sure what level of consciousness there is in that tactic or if the people on the stage are just really that afraid everyone's going to hell. But
00:13:01
Speaker
Given my experience in the way that Christians live their lives and think in the conversations they have, I didn't get involved in a lot of conversations about that, and I certainly wasn't telling a bunch of people who weren't Christians, and neither were my parents. So I find it wildly ironic that you go to church to be told that you're going to hell if you're not saved, but you're preaching to the choir, and then none of those people are telling anybody really
00:13:27
Speaker
the same thing. Like they're not like really propagating that message. It's a very insular group. And my experience outside of maybe going to an old folks home and youth group or raking somebody's lawn or doing some church cleanup, you're not really doing a lot to tell other people about this thing. Right. You have to know other people in order to do that. Yeah.
00:13:53
Speaker
Well, you're supposed to be in the world, but not of this world, right? Yeah, right. And that can be broadly interpreted in a lot of ways.
00:14:01
Speaker
You know what? I had a really funny thought this week, and it jogged my memory when you said that you got saved at five. A lot of stuff in my church, like in my church and my school, there was quite a bit of time spent talking about doctrinal differences between our church and other groups of Christians and stuff. And like Catholics, one of the things that they always railed on them about was infant baptism.
00:14:27
Speaker
Because that baby is not making that decision. That baby is not capable of asking Jesus into their heart. They really don't even know what's going on and stuff. Yet it was common practice for people to get saved at like five years old. Right, but I was really thinking clearly and could develop an intelligent…
00:14:47
Speaker
understanding of what was being told to me. I know. I remember getting saved. I was probably around the same age, man. I was probably about five and it's just, I remember it happening because it's like so, I mean, it's basically
00:15:03
Speaker
What do you want to happen when you die? Do you want to go to heaven or do you want to burn hell for all of eternity? And you're like, I'm five. And they're like, yeah, so you might want to think about that. I'm like, I'll do it right now. Let's do it. And then you just like repeat after me. And I remember doing the repeat after me thing and just, man, it's so strange. I can't imagine doing.
00:15:27
Speaker
that to my kids or even I wonder like what my parents were thinking because I mean they're obviously being sold this thing that that's going to happen. They love their kids and they don't want that to happen to their kids and they're like, we just need to take care of this now just in case something happens on the way to school tomorrow. But I wonder if like my dad was like wondering what he was doing or what he thought about it at that time. I'm not going to ask him. It was just commonplace and I think like
00:15:54
Speaker
That's happening and your, you know, your kid is, is saying that he wants those things and everybody around you is probably going like, that's great. Praise the Lord. Yeah. You know, so I'm sure it's easy just to jump in line and go along with it. But yeah, if I have kids someday, I'm thinking, you know, just to illustrate the gravity of the situation, like, could you, would it be wrong to like burn their fingers so that they at least know?
00:16:21
Speaker
you know, make them touch a hot stove or something and be like, you don't want that, but all over. That would get the point across. Somebody's used that tactic. We're going to regret saying. Yeah, I know. I'm sure you can find some paper, like newspaper clivings about some crazy shit like that.
Youth Group and Early Doubts
00:16:41
Speaker
So when you were in youth group, I mean, most people obviously usually the disillusionment or reconsideration or questioning starts happening in high school. Yeah.
00:16:51
Speaker
It didn't happen. And you said that's kind of when it started for you and you started rebelling and I were.
00:16:58
Speaker
I was a full buy-in kind of guy. People who had the questions are the ones that made me nervous. I was like, oh boy, we can do it again. I guess, when did you start having these questions of like, I don't know about this. Did you ever discuss that or mention that in youth group? Did you become any type of person who
00:17:25
Speaker
Who kind of was quote unquote that guy or did you just kind of? Just do it just to get it over with until you couldn't didn't have to anymore No, I definitely spoke up, but I usually did it more through humor kind of okay, but make wise cracks and But I if I can back up for just a minute. Yeah You know one thing that I realized later on in life is that you know, I I remember
00:17:54
Speaker
you know, saying that prayer, becoming born again with my mother when I was five years old, I remember doing it because I knew she wanted me to do it. And a part of me, you know, didn't, you know, like the way you presented it is like, you know, do you want to burn in hell or do you want to go to heaven?
00:18:11
Speaker
I was afraid of those options or of the potential of going to hell. But I don't know if I ever fully believed. I don't think I did. And I think that that caused more turmoil for me in the sense that
00:18:30
Speaker
I was always questioning my salvation. I was terrified that I think I believe this, but I don't really know if I believe this. And actually, I'm not sure if I believe this. So if they're right, I'm really screwed. Oh, man, that's fascinating. So do you feel like because it was the environment you were in, you had this understanding that it could
00:19:00
Speaker
be true. Like, even though you didn't believe in it, was there like, it sounds like there might have still been that fear of like, I don't believe in this, therefore I'm going to hell. Even if you don't believe in it, and you don't believe in hell, it still feels like that's what's going to happen. Was there any of that, like, back and forth? Yeah, definitely. It's, it's, I was, it's not that it was like, I didn't, I wasn't sure if I believed in it, but I was too afraid not to believe it. Yeah, that makes sense. I mean, I remember when I stopped, when I started to stop believing in hell. And I'm like,
00:19:31
Speaker
I was, even though I didn't really believe it, I'm like, ah, fuck, now that's where I'm going because I don't believe the right stuff anymore, I guess. It's really a weird thing to work through. Yeah, I was really paranoid all the time. It made me kind of OCD too. I was confessing my sins all the time. I used to kind of develop these rituals that I had to do before I went to bed at night.
00:19:56
Speaker
doing things in a certain order and then saying this one prayer every night, I had to say in order to be able to fall asleep. And I think it was just kind of trying to create some kind of semblance of control when I felt like I didn't have any control or somebody else might be in control, but I didn't really believe in this person who was supposed to be in control. And I don't know if any of that makes sense, but it was very confusing and maybe very anxious. I think that resonates with a lot of people, man.
00:20:26
Speaker
I mean, I I know I think a lot of people will hear that and be like, oh my god. I was really in the similar It's almost like You know, it was actively preached like in in my circles that you couldn't lose your salvation Like once you were in you were in nobody can pluck you out of his hand all that but you still had this like nagging feeling in you in the back of your head that like
00:20:50
Speaker
you're not actually in like you didn't actually believe enough. You don't seem to be having the same experiences as these people and those people like there's something fundamentally off about how this relates to you as opposed to how it relates to everybody else. And I definitely I think that's a, that's a good point that the control aspect of it, you just want some way of knowing for sure.
00:21:14
Speaker
that this is right and that you did it the right way and that you're good, you know? No, that's exactly it, I think. Was that experience that you were having as a high schooler, as a teenager? That was pretty early on. I mean, I was pretty young. It kind of grew the older I got. Like I said, even when I was five, I remember kind of
00:21:43
Speaker
doing it not because I really felt compelled to do it, but more because I was trying to make my mother feel better. I don't know how long... I don't know exactly when it started to grow into more kind of serious doubt. But I certainly, for years and years, even now,
00:22:05
Speaker
I still have these kind of rituals that I do. It's more superstitious, even though I don't even believe in that. And I haven't really told many people this, too. I pray sometimes still, even though I don't believe it. But it's more like knocking on wood for me or something, because it's just something that was ingrained in me that, again, it makes me feel better
00:22:31
Speaker
not because I feel like I'm talking to somebody, but there's something about...
00:22:38
Speaker
I don't know, like feeling like I have to do it in a superstitious kind of way. Yeah. I totally get that. I, I think that that makes sense to me a lot. I feel like I was kind of in that same boat, you know, or did you ever get the feeling like, um, you know, you never felt like you prayed enough or did devotionals enough or whatever, you know, you always felt lacking in all those things and that when you needed something or something bad happened or something, you know, you're, you're.
00:23:05
Speaker
your impulse was to pray about it, but then you also had this feeling like, I haven't been praying and stuff like I'm supposed to, like, I wonder, you know, I don't want God to think that I just come to him when I've got a problem or something, you know, because they talked about that at church and Sunday school and stuff. Right. Like that guy who you haven't talked to in a year and calls you up because he's moving, needs a hand.
00:23:28
Speaker
I remember that guy. I remember being that guy. And I also still feel bad that I think the last time I saw a particular friend who I hadn't seen in a long time, I moved to an area where he was and I was like, yeah, I'm moving to this area. I'm looking for people to help move. He's like, yeah, that'll be awesome. And that was the last time I ever saw him. So I'm a piece of shit for that. Sorry, I didn't mean to bring that up.
00:23:56
Speaker
Everybody's done that to somebody. It was like an Aesop rock song where he talks about that. Should take like five seconds.
College Freedom and Family Contrasts
00:24:05
Speaker
So, okay, so high school, you start to maybe verbalize those doubts and stuff a little bit, even if it's really just, you know, you're alluding to it through humor and stuff. Like what happened after high school? Did you go to college or? Yeah, I did. I left home and I went to college.
00:24:24
Speaker
Were you like, is it a, um, if you don't want to get into wear that obviously is totally fine, but was it close to home? Were you able to go back home or were you far enough away or did you just kind of stay at college? Like, what was that like as far as getting going back home from kind of time? Yeah, it was close enough. It wasn't too far from home where I could go back when I wanted to. But you, you were living there in college. I was living. Yeah, I was living there.
00:24:49
Speaker
And it was in a city and I loved it because it was, you know, I grew up in a kind of a small town and in this church community and, you know, all of a sudden I'm in the city and I had all these options for, you know, culture and music and I just had freedom to do what I wanted to do. Yeah. Secular college? It was, yeah.
00:25:12
Speaker
So that's where you went. Was there any, did anyone in your family try to push you into a Christian to serve what you said, Casey? Yeah, they did. But I really pushed back on that. And my brother, I have an older brother. He went to like a Bible college for like a year and then he transferred to a
00:25:35
Speaker
to a secular college. Do you have the disillusionment set in with him in a similar way? Did your brother stick with it? No. We are complete opposites in that way. He really stuck with it. He still does to this day. Do you guys talk about much or do you just leave that conversation to the side?
00:26:03
Speaker
We were able to talk about it. It doesn't get ugly, really. We don't agree. And we've kind of learned that we're only going to get so far with it. But yeah, I think he still is legitimately concerned for my soul. And we'll kind of express that at times.
00:26:28
Speaker
and politically we're not very aligned. So that gets a little uncomfortable. We just kind of, we kind of avoid it until I can't shut up anymore. I can't hold an impact anymore and I'll get my job done. The politics is worse than the religion between families at this point. I heard this poll, like I studied whatever, it was like a polling thing that was done by, I think it was Pew Research, but it was like,
00:26:52
Speaker
It had to do with, would you rather your child marry somebody of a different political affiliation or a different religious affiliation? I think back in the 70s and 80s, it was like, oh, definitely political.
00:27:07
Speaker
That's fully swapped now. Like most Christians are like, I mean, if they don't marry someone that's a Christian, I guess that's fine. As long as they don't marry a Democrat or Republican, whatever you are. And it's like, dude, it is. And so it's just funny that like the soul is what's at stake. But everyone's just like, we'll table that discussion because
00:27:28
Speaker
The politics is the real issue. Right. Thanksgiving's going to get way too uncomfortable with that. Oh my God. I just, yeah. I guess it's great. Yeah, you had fun on Thanksgiving, I think, Casey. I canceled mine, so. Does your family know about your page? No, except for my father, actually.
00:27:56
Speaker
Yeah, I'm not sure how to talk about this, but he didn't grow up going to church with us. But at a certain point, he started coming to church. And I think it was more just to keep the peace. Yeah. Do you remember about how old you were when he started going? I'm going to say I was maybe 13 or 14 or so. Yeah.
00:28:23
Speaker
But he's actually very, you know, and he goes to church and he sees the problems with it. I mean, I think he does it to make my mother happy. But he can extract some things from it that are useful for him. You know, he's down with Jesus, which, you know, values the teachings of Jesus. He realizes that especially the brand of Christianity that
00:28:51
Speaker
the kind of church that they go to is pretty extreme at times. But him and I are able to talk. He's supportive of Christian nightmares. He asks me about it. He checks it out every once in a while, and he likes it. That's awesome. That's really neat. Last time I got into a
00:29:13
Speaker
conversation about certain things with a family member, it turns pretty volatile. That was entirely not my fault. Do you think when you were, because obviously if you're a teenager when your dad decides to start going to church, I imagine that had some influence or a pretty big influence on the requirement or the necessity of a buy-in.
00:29:40
Speaker
as opposed to someone whose both parents are there every time and they seem to have like a buy-in to the fullest extent, like maybe my upbringing, Casey's, but like, I knew a couple kids who had a father that, and the church loves to talk about fathers and their role in that stuff, but they
00:30:02
Speaker
They didn't have a father going to church, or maybe not all the time, or they didn't really care that much about it. And those ones always felt more comfortable just being like, maybe I don't have to then. Obviously, that's what the church is kind of afraid of when they have the dads not going.
00:30:20
Speaker
Yeah, I think there was a little bit of that. I think that it was, you know, my mother was all in and my dad, you know, I guess I was in some ways looking at my father saying, you know, he kind of thinks it's bullshit too, you know, related to that. Although it was funny and I don't know if funny is the right term, but
00:30:39
Speaker
I remember eventually my father ended up going forward during an altar call. I remember it so clearly because I was watching him during the service. He wasn't really paying attention. He was staring out the window.
00:30:54
Speaker
And then the altar call came and he was just kind of emotionless, just kind of buttoned up his sports coat and just walked forward and I was kind of like, what are you doing? And my mother was real emotional and she kind of was able to, everyone was surrounding her and hugging her and he's finally come to the Lord. And I get why my father did that, but I was kind of a little disappointed. Yeah, interesting.
00:31:24
Speaker
I could see that I that would yeah, especially if like if you're struggling with whether or not this is for you and you're kind of getting the feeling like even if in some form this you know, I believe some of this but you know, this group of people is like out of their minds and on some things.
00:31:43
Speaker
Like him being the one person in your life, you're like, well, dad's cool and he's not into this. That has to be kind of a shock to the system, seeing him, you know, do it. Do you think, uh, do you think that was part of that, like keeping the peace sort of thing? I think it was. Yeah. And I don't really hold him against, you know, hold it against him. I, you know, I think he was just trying to.
00:32:05
Speaker
to keep the peace. And my parents would fight about it like crazy. So I mean, I get why he did it. But yeah, I kind of felt like I had an ally and it just felt a little strange that day watching it go down.
00:32:25
Speaker
When did you, so yeah, you go to college and you're not home all the time, you're not home on weekends. Throughout college as you would come home, at what point did you just like decide to stop going to church and did you eventually just explain to your mom that like, yeah, I don't really believe in any of this. I'm interested to know what that was like. Yeah.
00:32:48
Speaker
For a few years, I think through college and even after college a little bit, I'd go home and I would reluctantly go to church. I'd start to push back and my mother was really good at guilt trips. I think I just had a little guilt too. There were times when I thought, have I strayed from God?
00:33:12
Speaker
you know, is this something that maybe I need back in my life or, you know, I don't know. But I remember, I remember I think the final, what made me decide never to go back was it was an Easter Sunday and there was an altar call and there were
00:33:34
Speaker
And it was the same old kind of, do you know where you're going to spend eternity and talk about hell? And there were some little kids that were going up and were like bawling. And there's something about that that just really hit me.
00:33:51
Speaker
I just remember thinking, fuck this. I don't want to be a part of this. Yeah, it felt icky. It felt really gross. It felt like, here's these kids, these little kids. Do they really understand what's going on? Are they just confused? Are they crying? I don't think they're really crying because they're filled with the spirit. I think maybe they're crying because they're super confused and scared.
Manipulative Preaching and Emotional Appeals
00:34:12
Speaker
And I just looked at it and said, this is awful. This is fucked up. This is kind of a form of child abuse, in my opinion. And I don't want to be anywhere near it. So that was the last time I ever went to church. Were you with your parents? You were there? Yeah, I was with my family. Did you express that to them after the service?
00:34:36
Speaker
I don't remember having a conversation about that with them. I think that then the next time I came home, that's when it really kind of came to a head. My mom was like, church tomorrow. And I was like, nope. And we got in a fight about it. And then we fought about it for a long time. Every time I'd come home, we'd get into fights about it. But finally, she just stopped trying to push it. You know, one of the things that I think I was talking to somebody this week that
00:35:03
Speaker
It was a interview and the guy that was talking, you know, he hadn't grown up in a Christian home. So a lot of this stuff was just foreign to him, which is foreign to me. It was like, it's, there's things that you assume about other people when you're talking to them that just, you know, they're not always true. But what I was trying to explain to him on, you know, we were talking about some of these weird things like this, like with kids, you know, where how, how do people square
00:35:33
Speaker
with the idea of scaring kids into doing this or of pushing kids into these big decisions and stuff. And I don't think if you didn't go to one of those churches, it's hard to understand that like from that person's perspective, this is the best possible thing that could happen.
00:35:50
Speaker
And regardless of the means it takes to get to that end, like the end is the most important thing in life period. Like whatever happens here is inconsequential so long as you end up in heaven at the end of it. And that opens the door for some really weird practices and manipulative tactics, you know? Yeah, yeah, definitely.
00:36:14
Speaker
I often wonder if they're, I mean, because psychologically speaking, not that I have any psychological expertise, so people can probably completely ignore me, but it feels like, I mean, especially with these bigger churches where you like you see the emotional appeals going on. I mean, I don't know if you were far enough out of
00:36:37
Speaker
Christianity or at this point, or if you had any understanding or familiar with Mark Driscoll, his fall from grace. I covered him a lot on Christian nightmares. When I was at Liberty University, you shared some fun stuff about that. I would listen to his sermons because I was still into it. I'm trying to figure this stuff out.
00:37:07
Speaker
I don't know, like he had slightly different perspectives for actually for a Liberty student. He was a bit on the edgier side. Theologically speaking to not just because he would say damn sometimes or talk about sex too much and like a fucking perp. He ended like really looking back on some of the things he's like, I mean, he's a pervert. Like there's a weird, weird guy, but he just had this like
00:37:32
Speaker
everything about it like he would talk and you're just like hypnotized almost like I'm in like the the passion that he had and the way that I don't know it just it seemed to always work and and you see that and obviously like those are always the people behind mega churches and it's just always like yeah oh look look at the Lord blessing us and you're like I don't know if you look at the common themes it seems like you're just
00:37:57
Speaker
You're just manipulating people when you're all kind of the same people using the same tactics. And I don't know if they studied those tactics and then knew that that's how you get people or fair. They're just narcissists that learned by their behavior that they can, they could convince people of things by being a certain way, but it does. Yeah. Sorry. No, no, you're good. I I've been talking too long. I just, that's what I think of when I think of like sweeping these people up into it and convincing everyone to rally around these things. And I don't know, that's just.
00:38:26
Speaker
I think that guy was a raging narcissist and super homophobic and misogynistic and many other things. I also think I read too that he might have studied marketing at some point too. That would make sense. I think you're right. I think that people like Mark Driscoll are aware of the effect that they have on people and they exploit that.
Evangelical Leaders and Hypocrisy
00:38:55
Speaker
Yeah. I still, I'm trying to process whether or not it's like dirty because they're doing it. Like I think the outcome is obviously the problem, but I always am curious and there's no way to know and you can't get someone's head, but is it, is there, are they genuine or are they not? Like even you can talk about like Jerry Jr, Jerry Falwell Jr. Like I get the feeling that he was genuinely just a dirt bag, but
00:39:21
Speaker
There's so many other people that I can't tell and that's what's like I think I get really frustrated by being unable to tell if like they just if they're they're responding the way they are and doing what they do because they're getting their egos stroked and they like it more than they actually it even understand Yeah, no, I know you mean it's it's who can say for sure somebody like Mark Driscoll though I mean, I think he did get kind of found out in the end with I
00:39:49
Speaker
Many church members said that he was abusive. There were scandals with his pain to get his book on the New York Times bestseller list and all of that. I think that was pretty ego-driven in my opinion. But can we talk about Jerry Falwell Jr.? I want to hear from you guys a little bit. Yeah, we actually didn't end up, we were getting this whole thing started and trying to figure out
00:40:15
Speaker
where we were going with this, when all of the stuff with him even happened. And then it was just not like, it wasn't culturally relevant. I mean, it's always still relevant, but it wasn't timely. So we just never really revisited it. But yeah, it's funny, man. I mean, my first year at Liberty was when Jerry Jr. became the president of the school.
00:40:40
Speaker
It was pretty obvious to me, despite being an evangelical at the time, that he was not that great, I guess. He was off-putting. There's a lot about him that I wasn't sold on. I don't think other people were. Kind of the way they set it up was like,
00:41:03
Speaker
Jerry Jr. got the school and Jonathan Falwell, his brother, got the church because Jerry Sr. had them both. And he kind of just like divided his responsibilities amongst those kids. But what was wild? Go ahead, Casey. I want you to just say some stuff about it before I just keep rambling.
00:41:25
Speaker
I remember like I didn't have a negative impression of Jerry jr. Right off the bat I remember thinking of Jerry senior as just being like You know, he's a nice old guy. He's just got some bad views about you know, you can give any 75 year old person a microphone and they're probably gonna say some stuff that doesn't really cut the mustard anymore but
00:41:47
Speaker
I think when Jerry Jr. first showed up, he just seemed like this kind of quiet, awkward dude. Serial killer. See, I was really put off by Jonathan, and I don't really remember why. I just remember going to Thomas Road, which is the church. April and I went there when he was preaching, and I just did not like him.
00:42:14
Speaker
I got real greasy like televangelist vibes, but you know that might have been a misinterpretation I don't know anything about Jonathan anymore, but Jerry jr. Just seemed like he was a background player That got thrust into the spotlight, but he was kind of like this quiet Not a real well-spoken guy, but him and Becky seemed nice initially like they seem like they were just Nice people that wanted to do nice things for the school. I think
00:42:44
Speaker
You know, Jerry.
00:42:46
Speaker
As a whole, like Jerry Jr., you talk about like these other prominent evangelical leaders, and I'm kind of like a big cult fanatic. So, you know, you listen to like a whole bunch of stuff about cults. Like cult leaders, it's a very specific archetype that ends up heading up a cult. You know, they're narcissists, but they tend to have like certain abilities and stuff that bolster their positions within those communities. I don't think Jerry Jr. has those.
00:43:15
Speaker
Like I don't think if he wasn't handed this empire, if you want to call it that, there's no way he would have ended up in that seat. Like he's not like a man of ambition. The school did well for itself financially after he took over. But I don't know how much of that was him or maybe he's just a great businessman and he's just a really non-charismatic leader.
00:43:37
Speaker
He started like early on, started like shooting his mouth off and making like ridiculous statements. I forget, what was the first one that he weighed in on that was like really prominent? Was it Trayvon Martin? I don't remember. There was one, he, one of the things that really set people up, he said something about, um,
00:43:56
Speaker
like basically that he assisted something really problematic about Muslims a couple of times when it's just like death ready about. No. Yeah. I remember he was speaking in front of Liberty to the students and.
00:44:11
Speaker
there had just been a shooting and he bragged about carrying a gun on him at the moment. And then he said, if all of us had had one of these, we could have ended those Muslims before they got to us or something like that.
00:44:30
Speaker
So it was funny, man. I mean, while they were there, Jerry Jr. and Jonathan Falwell did not get along. And I think that was mostly Jerry Jr. being a douche. But Jonathan was... I didn't really know him or anything. I just... I occasionally was at Thomas Road too, Casey. And he was...
00:44:47
Speaker
He just had a phony vibe, but I think he just picked up on how to preach by a school that teaches people how to preach. I don't know that there is anything like... I always found him to be a fairly genuine person. I've still seen no dirt on him, so he's doing better than the rest of the Falwells.
00:45:02
Speaker
Jerry's hogging all the dirt I Would love to get him into an interview, you know, like a live interview situation be like hey For the fans at home. Did you ever let Jonathan watch? You've had some funny stuff about About that situation that we've been we you know, we're sending back and forth long before all this, you know
00:45:33
Speaker
Well, yeah, I mean I really resent that guy for
00:45:38
Speaker
Well, there's all the hypocrisy, for one, of liberties, their code of ethics versus what they were doing. And then also just the platform that they gave right-wing evangelicals leading up to the election. And then essentially, his big vote of confidence, his endorsement of Trump was huge.
00:46:03
Speaker
It definitely set, I think it did, I don't know, because Jerry Jr. was weird because people didn't really look to him as like a spiritual authority, but there were plenty of people who were just conservative that ended up getting behind him that used him as a, I don't know, they were like, oh, he said it. And then it definitely encouraged things. I think, I still find one of the things you just said about
00:46:33
Speaker
Casey about him just like inheriting it. Liberty was basically, it's like, the similarities between Jerry Jr. and Trump are really striking. So it makes sense that Jr. would absolutely be infatuated with them. It's like they were both given something when worked for nothing, and actually now have nothing to show for it. I think that Jerry, over the past, you know, 10 years here, I think that he wants to be like that
00:47:03
Speaker
He wants to speak for the Christian community in a political sense. He wants to be like the shock jock of Christianity, but I think he's bought his way into that position. Why are all these right-wing evangelicals and stuff coming to liberty and speaking there? They're courting a lot of money.
00:47:22
Speaker
in that, from that organization. I mean, that's one of the things he's under fire for most recently here is creating like this super PAC that basically didn't do anything except for Facebook advertisements and funnel money to the Trump campaign. Yeah. In other words, he's really smart. Yeah.
00:47:42
Speaker
Well, because he was trained as a lawyer and all the trouble they've gotten into, he has the answers on why he's still not in trouble. All the shit in Florida with the hostel and stuff like that. He knows how to legally not get in trouble while being a complete scumbag.
00:48:02
Speaker
I mean, I don't know. I don't just, he doesn't, and he considered, but that's the other thing that people admire about Trump. You're shrewd businessman. It's like, no, you fucked people over and you did it legally. That just makes you an asshole. And that's, that's capitalism to you. Go fuck yourself. Like that's not a good way to look at the world. Chris, what's your favorite like, uh, like scandal like this to get, I mean, his favorite's a weird word to use, but what's been the one that's been like the most enthralling for you?
00:48:33
Speaker
Oh, man. I don't know. It changes. It's happening so fast now. It's seen over the past four years. I mean, there's always been scandals involved with evangelical Christianity, but especially during these Trump years, it just seems like there's one right after another. I know. Yeah, I don't know what my favorite... I wouldn't be favorite. I mean, it's
00:48:59
Speaker
It's unfortunate that these things happen. I mean, the liberty... Who's your favorite, like, that job to cover? I guess maybe that would be easier. It's not as... I guess it's nothing as big as, like, liberty, but somebody that just really gets under my skin is Franklin Graham. Oh, yeah. Oh, yeah. Just his...
00:49:27
Speaker
just his hypocrisy and his double standards and, you know, things that he said about Obama when he was president versus how he just went was totally aligned with Trump no matter what. Yeah. Just I, you know, I like to keep an eye on him and kind of highlight his his his hypocrisy as often as I can. Yeah, he tweets a good bit of job.
00:49:55
Speaker
all of his tweeting, it's like, he pretty much is writing your material for you in some ways, right? Pretty much. I mean, he's just, and you know, he also, there was this one, I shared it on Christian Nightmares. There's a video of him, I mean, he's said a lot of really shitty things over the years, but one, there was this, there's this one video clip of him talking about the gay and lesbian agenda. And he says, you know,
00:50:22
Speaker
He says, gays and lesbians can't have children. And the reporter said, well, they can adopt. And he said, well, no, they can recruit. And the reporter said, recruit? And he said, yeah, they can recruit children into their cause. And I thought that was one of the most hateful, insensitive, just one of the shittiest things I'd ever heard.
00:50:49
Speaker
And nothing, in my opinion, to do with the teachings of Jesus. And the irony isn't lost that his entire career has been built off of recruiting people into the gods. Right, right. Yeah, he really bothers me. Yeah, I'm not entirely sure how, you know,
00:51:11
Speaker
I think the common theme with a lot of the stuff that you post is, I mean, obviously some of it's just funny and silly and whatever, but I mean, the common theme is that like literally these people who, I mean, a lot of them pastors, public figures in some way or another, but who co-opt at least Christian rhetoric, but it's like,
00:51:39
Speaker
I've always found it somewhat, at least, clear on what it looks like. When someone's looking like Jesus versus when they're not, you're like, that person's doing a lot of good stuff. That person's really great. It's very clear what those people look like.
00:51:59
Speaker
And I'm just like, what? And how he talked and how he dealt with things. But every time these people speak and say these terrible things, you're just like, I don't even know if they know they're being hypocritical. Maybe they think they're really just in a war. And if they don't say these things and everyone's going to believe the other side. But it so clearly doesn't look anything like Jesus that I don't really even understand how they got
00:52:31
Speaker
how people are giving them a pass on it so casually. Yeah, and they still have so many followers and supporters. I wanted to ask you, if you don't mind, just quickly getting back to Liberty. I feel like Jerry Falwell Jr. is going to be back before we know it in some way. Maybe not at Liberty, but as a spokesperson for
00:52:56
Speaker
as an evangelical spokesperson in some way. I really like that. But do you think that liberty will be affected by any of this? Or is it, it just seems to me like these things happen and then there's really no fallout. I mean, there was a media, you know, there was a lot of media coverage, but are kids not going to want to go to Liberty now? I don't think it's having any, I think their numbers grow every year. Yeah. It's happening.
00:53:24
Speaker
I don't, man, it's so interesting though. I mean, it's like, because their numbers keep growing, but what you would get like from people there is they go to the school and they give it their money, but like most of the kids there would be like, yeah, I mean, I don't really like the way he speaks and that doesn't really rep, even though there might be Republicans or conservatives or whatever, they'd say like, oh, but the, you know,
00:53:50
Speaker
I don't really buy into that way of thinking or whatever, but you know, Liberty is still a good Christian school that teaches the Bible that does this and that. The number of items in the excuse corner just so far outweigh the name of Jerry Jr. for these people that they just keep throwing money at it and turning it into an even bigger amusement park.
00:54:12
Speaker
Well, and this is like the most recent thing and obviously the biggest, but there was another scandal that they were involved in right after I left, like a couple of years after I left. And Sam, you may have the details more so than I do, but the president of the seminary at Liberty, when we were going to classes there was this guy named Ergen Canner. Yeah.
00:54:33
Speaker
And his big thing was that he was born in Turkey. He grew up a devout Muslim, a Muslim family, and then converted to Christianity. And he was exiled from his family and disowned and this and that and the other. I don't remember all of the stories. And this guy, he was charismatic. I took one of his classes.
00:54:56
Speaker
Yeah, and he taught a three-hour New Testament class. You know, you had to take one. And it was kind of like you want to get into Ergen Kanner's class because it's not that bad. He was very entertaining. You'd sit there for three hours and listen to him and actually like enjoy it. But it came out, I don't even remember how, that his whole origin story was a lie.
00:55:22
Speaker
He wasn't actually, I don't even know if he was from Turkey, but he wasn't like a converted Muslim. I remember hearing about that. Yeah. I don't think he, and he would talk about under knowing, like understanding Muslim extremism, because that's what he was raised around. And like, he really. Very topical at the time. Yeah. Yeah. Of course. Very topical. And he, man. Yeah.
00:55:43
Speaker
and he had a lot of people like kind of hanging on the edge of their seats trying to like waiting for what he was going to say about them because have a new hot take and then people like that you could excuse and this is I mean we've seen this tactic played out a bunch but you can excuse their xenophobia because
00:56:03
Speaker
because they're like from it. So now you're like, well, but I know a guy who who even grew up in it and says, and you get just get to like, it makes your message that much stronger.
Personal Stories and Church Loyalty
00:56:15
Speaker
You know, I had a friend who I'm trying to do this as like, I want to do this as vague as I can. But I have a friend whose dad had some
00:56:28
Speaker
somewhat of a prominent role in like the, I was gay, but then I got saved and then, you know, I got, and then he ended up being like a monogamous marriage and. Inspirational figure. Yeah. Yeah. And it was like, that was his story. And it was like, people really looked up to him in his area for it. You know, it was a prominent guy in like church and it was like, but his, you know,
00:56:56
Speaker
They ended up getting a divorce at one point, but the son of that guy was someone that I had known.
00:57:07
Speaker
he he's gay uh but he didn't come out until he was like so much older and because like the oppressiveness of that environment of like his dad was like the poster boy in their environment for it you cannot you can choose not to be gay and it fucked him up pretty bad uh as a kid in a lot of ways like just having to like deal with that and
00:57:27
Speaker
and maybe feel like it could be true but then also like you know his dad was considered this shining example and he saw all the problems in the parents marriage and things like that because he's you know his dad was never really made he never wasn't gay like it didn't fix it uh it was just like you you faked it for long enough or that environmental group think allowed him to
00:57:51
Speaker
to make the changes for a temporary moment in time. But it was like so tough on him. And it's like, but I only throw that story out there, I guess, because it feels similar to like,
00:58:04
Speaker
He was the one that evangelicals would use when they would talk to their friends. Well, I know someone like that and they're not anymore. So like people want to build these stories up because you need the anecdotal stories that are powerful because there isn't enough actual evidence of any of this shit working.
00:58:28
Speaker
Yeah, that's a long way of saying that it's not going to have any effect. We're going to keep going. I want to, I don't know, Casey, did you have, you,
00:58:42
Speaker
Christian mentioning, you know, that last service that you went to, I haven't experienced like a service that I had gone to that was like, that was more of like, I'm just not gonna be part of this church anymore kind of experience. But Casey, you're I mean, you've been out for a while. Did you just fizzle out? Or did you have any service where you were like, like, fuck this kind of service?
00:59:04
Speaker
Um, I just kind of had like a buildup of experiences. Yeah. But something that happened that once I left my church, well, once, once I was away from my church, when I was at Liberty, there was a situation that happened there that, uh, it was a big turnoff for me.
00:59:26
Speaker
It was basically they had this this guy that was a friend of mine not a close friend But somebody we had gone to that little school together and stuff he was the youth pastor at my church for a while and He was great
00:59:40
Speaker
He's a great dude, a kind person that was a true believer. And he took this little youth group that was insular and not really doing anything and just like opened the doors to the community. So they were doing all these like really cool things. Like they had like video game nights where they had all these different consoles set up, guitar hero and stuff. I mean, they had a couple of hundred kids there at this church that, you know, had a couple of hundred members normally.
01:00:08
Speaker
And just a bunch of stuff like that, like it was really thriving. And I remember coming back to visit, you know, and April came with me and, uh, I was just like, I, this is, this is amazing. Like I can't believe that he's been able to build this. But, um, there was another guy that was a friend of his and, uh, nobody liked him. None of the, none of the main people in the church liked him. Uh,
01:00:32
Speaker
I think he was, so he was a nice dude. He was like maybe a little effeminate or something like that was I think part of why people didn't like him. And there was a couple of situations that happened where stuff blew up. They made a big deal out of him, but there was nothing wrong with this guy. He was a good dude. And somebody at one point found porn on the church computer.
01:00:57
Speaker
So one of the, one of the office computers in the church, somebody had been using it to look at porn. So they set up like a sting operation to get whoever was doing it. And they all thought that it was this, this guy that they didn't like, right? So it was a big deal. Like they, they, you know, kind of waited around. I don't know if they use the camera or if they waited around certain time of day, whatever it was, it was my buddy, the youth pastor.
01:01:25
Speaker
nice and so they uh he's so repressed he can't even wait until he gets home to right he has to do it at church and you you had to know the dude but like he was one of those guys that was like when he was caught he was like it's true it was me i'm so sorry i have a problem i really just want to you know i need i need help and i'm looking at and
01:01:52
Speaker
I mean, for God's sake, he was looking at some porn. He really wanted to be open about it and confess and ask the church for help. And then he was going to go through the steps of whatever they needed him to do to help him with that problem. So he got in front of the whole church.
01:02:18
Speaker
Basically said like hey this was me. I have a problem with pornography It's become an issue for me, and I don't remember. I don't know all the details, but he did it publicly and They crucified addiction recovery at your church
01:02:46
Speaker
No, they destroyed him so they sent him off to like a weekend retreat with his wife For like pornography problems and then fired him and then fired him Yeah, they ditched him and so much for forgiveness yeah, and it was just one it was one of those places where like you know if if I was older if I would have been there for the service and stuff I would have just probably
01:03:13
Speaker
felt like standing up and saying, all right, guys, let's just, you know, for the sake of honesty, let anyone who has never looked at pornography, stand up, please, so that we can commend you. You know, like just a bunch of hypocrites. But this guy who was like turning the church into something, you know, he was like really investing himself in this place, the first person to do that in a long time. And like the minute something happens that they don't like, they're like, out.
01:03:40
Speaker
So they gave the position to another guy who is a total dud. He ruined all those programs. I mean immediately like shut down all of the things that they were doing and it just shriveled up back into what it was before. Wow. And then that guy got caught at a rest stop. He's the pastor there now. Really worked to play up. That's his lifelong dream.
01:04:05
Speaker
He asked me for a donation the other day because he's starting a family counseling ministry or something like that. It will always work out well. They tell you really fun things that don't hurt wives. Yeah. I guess, Christian, I want to actually get like, usually, I want to hear about like, when you started. How long has Christian nightmares been going on? When did you start that? And like, how did this like, when did it like start turning into something?
The Birth of Christian Nightmares
01:04:31
Speaker
We were like, Oh, Jesus, people are really finding this attractive.
01:04:35
Speaker
I started a while ago now. It started in 2009. Really? Yeah. I had been thinking about doing something like Christian Nightmares for a while, but I talked to people about building a website for me and they were like, oh yeah, for a couple thousand bucks, I can do this. It's kind of crazy. And then Tumblr came along. Before it's a workspace.
01:05:00
Speaker
Yeah, exactly. The Tumblr came along and I was like, oh, wow, I can post on here for free and kind of say whatever I want. So I just started kind of Googling
01:05:15
Speaker
memories from my past like people and sermon topics and you know ridiculous stuff like back masking and and just stuff that I remembered back masking yeah do you know what that is enlightened because it sounds fun it's not putting your mask back on in the middle of a pandemic is it yeah I guess I am a little older than you guys it was playing records backwards
01:05:49
Speaker
I didn't know it had a term. I love that. That was a big thing when I was growing up. I used to have these guys come to the church and play records backwards. They did that at your church? Yeah. What were some of the ones they played backwards? Some of them are pretty well known. Queen, like another one bites the dust, it's fun to smoke marijuana.
01:06:14
Speaker
Oh, no. One song I think Sarah to heaven is here's to my sweet Satan. I think I've heard of that one. Does it really? I've never heard these actually played backwards. Does it when you hear it? Do you only think it's because someone told you it does like a Rorschach test or something? It's it's more of that, I think. I mean, yeah, I mean, this guy would come up and say and he would tell you what he thinks they said. And then he played for you. And of course you hear that.
01:06:43
Speaker
But, yeah, I just started, I just started, yeah, Googling all that stuff and started posting on Christian Nightmares. And then pretty early on, I found this video, you guys may have seen it, it was a while ago, it was about the Christian side hug. Okay, yeah. Like it's mocking side hugs, right? Is it like, or is this being a serious video? It's for real, as far as I could tell. It was just about how, you know,
01:07:11
Speaker
You shouldn't be hugging somebody. Christian shouldn't be hugging the regular way that you're hugging from the side, because it's impure if you're hugging somebody face to face like that. These really terrible rappers did a song about it, and I posted it on Christian Nightmares. And somebody picked it up. I think it was maybe, it was, do you remember the site Gawker? I don't. Yeah. Yeah, it was a website. I see Gawker. Gawker. Yeah, yeah, I do remember that.
01:07:41
Speaker
They picked it up and it kind of went sort of viral. So that kind of put Christian Nightmares on the map. And then I was getting some good feedback. People seemed to be really responding to it. I even got an email from this musician that I really like and respect who was like, oh man, this stuff is great. You've made me fall in love with the internet again. And so I felt really encouraged by that.
01:08:10
Speaker
And really for me it was just, I don't know, I had to, I wanted to look at all of this stuff through adult eyes and see how it affected me because so much of it had such a negative effect on me growing up.
01:08:26
Speaker
And, you know, I don't know if this, I don't know if I would recommend this for anybody, but it was almost like I just watched this stuff over and over again as a way to almost kind of desensitize myself to it. If that makes sense. Yeah. Yeah. I kind of needed to.
01:08:41
Speaker
Again, I wouldn't recommend it, but it almost worked. In some ways, I was able to look at it and say, man, this is ridiculous. How was I ever afraid of this? How was I upset by this? Some of it was really uncomfortable to watch, but over time,
01:09:01
Speaker
It kind of helped me. And then as a community kind of built, you know, started to grow from this, you know, that was, that made me want to do it even more. I've met so many amazing people through Christian Nightmares and I've had so many great conversations and email exchanges. And yeah, so that's, that's what's, what's made me want to keep going with it.
01:09:25
Speaker
That's awesome. Man, you're talking about desensitizing yourself to this stuff, which is probably the only way you can not absolutely go insane while searching for it regularly and posting it, but I feel like I could probably use a little bit of that when it comes to...
01:09:40
Speaker
prophecy end times prophecy videos. I keep seeing those get shared from some time and I'm like every time I hear those I'm just like how as an adult like how do you like how do you think after all these times that people have predicted things that after every democrat who's ever been present or at the end of the world like how do you still buy into this silly story of
01:10:04
Speaker
a predicted end. I just, man, it gets me really riled up. Wait, what's that? So I'm starting to think Obama's got like a long game.
Anonymity and Dual Life
01:10:20
Speaker
Yeah, I think doing Christian Nightmares, it felt good to start doing that and still does just because for so many years, I had to sit in church and keep my mouth shut. I couldn't really respond to what was being said and preached at me the way I wanted to. And so this has given me an opportunity to say exactly how I feel about it.
01:10:42
Speaker
Yeah, no, dealing with... Man, yeah, I imagine that must have felt super cathartic to just post and say it in any way that you're feeling at the time without having to just worry about rephrasing it or editing this or editing that to make it more palatable for people. I bet that felt pretty good.
01:11:03
Speaker
Yeah. I just, I mean, I just, I felt so stifled all those years too. And I also, I think even, you know, being anonymous and wearing a mask, I've thought about that a little bit too. Like I, I think I, I've kind of always felt like I wore a mask in a way, because I was one person in my regular life when I was with my, with my friends and my secular friends. And then I was a totally different person and I kind of had to just kind of smile and nod and go along with it. Um,
01:11:31
Speaker
that church, so it feels really good to not have to be phony anymore, even though I'm wearing a mask. Yeah. What's up? It kind of helps your page stand out. I think there's a... I mean, I don't know if you're familiar with MF Doom. I don't know if that's even... Oh, yeah. But he... I mean, rest in peace, of course. Yeah. That was like a bummer of everything going on.
01:12:00
Speaker
And it's already been a shitty week and then you find out. I mean, I guess he's been, he actually died a good few months back and they didn't even, no one knew, but I mean, he always wore the mask and people always got super annoyed. Like some people would get annoyed about it, especially when he would have like Pete, he would book shows and not play them because somebody else in a mask.
01:12:17
Speaker
It helps keep your page even separate from you. I think there's a plus side to having it be its own thing and not just about you or whoever you are in your individualness. It doesn't really necessarily confuse the two and it allows you to probably have a nice healthy partition in some ways.
01:12:42
Speaker
Yeah, I think so. And that that is part of the thinking behind it too, is, yeah, I don't want it to be about me, you know, I want it to, I like the idea that this character of Christian nightmares could be anybody. Yeah. Yeah, it's about all of us who are on it looking at it and experiencing this stuff. Has there been backlash?
01:13:05
Speaker
Yeah, I mean, that's another reason why I'm anonymous too. I get some pretty aggressive and angry hate mail at times, and especially during the Trump years and everything that's
01:13:18
Speaker
You know, it's, I don't know if I want my name attached to this. It's kind of, you know, there's some pretty scary, unhinged people out there. Yeah. They're not threatening, they're witnessing. Didn't you post a video of some mega-pastor and didn't, wasn't there, I feel like I saw something on your page about getting you cease and desist or something like that.
01:13:41
Speaker
Yeah, I did. Does that happen a lot? Maybe not to that degree, but when you post these videos of pastors and tag them, do you hear from the churches or their offices very much?
01:13:56
Speaker
Sometimes I do, yeah. But what's funny to me is I don't take anything out of context or edit the videos at all. I'm posting exactly what they said, and then they're getting mad. I mean, I understand that I'm putting it in the context of
01:14:13
Speaker
Christian nightmares, but I'm really just sharing what they said. And if the power of the Holy Spirit is really in their words, they should just be thankful that it's getting out there. Exactly. Yes. Who knows what?
Evangelism Efforts and Education Debates
01:14:25
Speaker
How many people do you think you've saved through Christian nightmares? Nobody. So you're behind even Sam in the soul winning award. Yeah.
01:14:41
Speaker
I was like, I bought into the, I tried to save my friends and I was like, I have, I have two friends who, uh,
01:14:56
Speaker
I mean, witness to a pretty, I mean, I brought one of these friends to an Acquire the Fire event. And then another one of my friends I had called, I mean, the Acquire the Fire is like, you do a church sleepover, I mean, and then you all go, it's like, the message was insane. And then,
01:15:15
Speaker
And then we go to, and then after my first semester at Liberty, I called another friend whose mom, he was a kid I was in a band with in high school, but his mom had gone to church, a non-denominational church that I thought was the good kind.
01:15:34
Speaker
I called him and probably talked to him for an hour, just trying to convert him to follow Jesus. And I asked both of them about those experiences recently, since starting this podcast. And they were like, both of them, both said, I don't even remember that. I was like, what? It was so wild. I was like, I've been thinking about that for over 10 years. Wow. Yeah, I used to have to...
01:16:01
Speaker
do door-to-door evangelism and standing on corners, handing out tracks, too. Oh, wow, man. You have some special experiences that are not common even among the crazy side of things. That and the Sunday do nothing thing, that's something else.
01:16:24
Speaker
It was no fun. I mean, that was no TV. I mean, that was like, did you really have Sundays where you would just have to sit and literally do nothing except read your Bible and talk to your family? Pretty much. Yeah, pretty much. What's up? Did you guys ever do the abortion protests? Did you do those, Sam? I didn't.
01:16:53
Speaker
Well, that's something we did that was kind of wild. We stood on the street corner and held signs silently. It was like, I don't remember the name of the day, but it was like an annual thing. They did it at Liberty too. Kids would walk around and hold signs sometimes, I feel like.
01:17:10
Speaker
The only thing we protested was when it comes to issues to be dogmatic about, given all the things that there are that Christians could protest that are serious to them, I find it hilarious that the only thing my family ever protested was because in Massachusetts they were initiating
01:17:31
Speaker
or had passed a lot, whatever the standardized test that you have to take to graduate high school, the MCAS. And I was homeschooled and homeschooled parents were livid about that. They were like, there's absolutely no way we want our children having to pass a standardized test to graduate high school like all the other kids. So there was a mass protest of homeschooling at the State House. And
01:17:53
Speaker
There was a ton of lobbying and a shitload of money spent on it, I presume. And to this day, kids who are homeschooled still do not have to take MCAS.
01:18:02
Speaker
Oh, really? Wow. So, I mean, of course, the homeschool parents are like, they're hiding behind whatever excuse they have. But really, they're all just like, my kid is absolutely not going to be smart enough to pass any standardized tests. There's just so many kids that I knew who were like, they weren't going to college, they were going to
01:18:26
Speaker
I don't know who knows what they're going to do afterwards. But it's like, I mean, a lot of people are just fine because it's not like the test isn't super rigorous or anything like that. So without taking it, I mean, you still have your transcripts and you have to maybe take an entry exam into a college or something like that. But I don't know. They should make the parents take a standardized test. Like, oh, you want to hold? Okay, what's 12 times 12?
01:18:53
Speaker
I know. And my home school education really was fine. So I'm like, I was worried that it wasn't but I remember but I remember being there with all those people thinking like, I don't not
01:19:07
Speaker
I remember thinking that this was like, I was excited about it and hoping it worked because I was just scared of tests like any other kids. So you're like, I'm in on this. I mean, I was probably 10, 11, 12, I don't know. I wasn't old when they were doing that. Opposed to all tests on principle. Were you guys both in school? Just me. I was Christian school. Oh, okay. Yeah, he was the K through 12 Christian school.
01:19:36
Speaker
We had to do standardized testing. We did this, the CAT, I think was ours. I can't imagine what our scores looked like. I always did mine on mine, but I'm sure that there were some pretty rough ones. We didn't even ask you, Christian, you went to, did you go to public school? I did, yeah. I went to public school all the way through. Yeah. See, yet another problematic area. I can really point back at the things that they lost, John.
01:20:08
Speaker
Well, we didn't have a lot of money when I was grown up, so I think that that had something to do with it.
01:20:16
Speaker
Yeah, like not being able to send me to a private school or christian school. I mean, I don't even know we're christian schools You have to pay to go to christian school, right? Yeah Yeah, even though you get you're paying for probably a terrible education. It costs a lot of money for something A lot of times our school was uh, you had to pay to go there But you got a huge discount if you as a parent volunteered as a teacher so There's never more than like six people teaching quote unquote at our school and one of them was a teacher
01:20:48
Speaker
I'm just here for the discount and the free cartons of milk. I didn't graduate from high school myself. Oh, no? No, no, I'm saying to teachers. I was like, we could have gotten to a whole new store. You didn't graduate high school. I got nervous for a second.
01:21:07
Speaker
This has been an awesome conversation. I really appreciate you coming on and just talking to us about your story and the beginning of Christian Nightmares. It's been awesome. Likewise. Yeah, it was really great talking with you guys.
01:21:21
Speaker
All right, everybody. Thanks for listening and we will catch you next. Oh, wait, no. Uh, if you want to know more about, uh, Christian nightmares, it's I know on Instagram, it's at Christian underscore nightmares. And then, uh, do you still is tumbler still kind of like your hub? I'm not really posting there as much. I do occasionally, but, um, I'm on Twitter too. I post there quite a bit, but he's got a link tree in his, uh, in the Instagram profile. So you can find all the other stuff in place to follow on there.
01:21:52
Speaker
Thanks a lot. Yeah. And then, Casey, what do we got? We're on, I don't know, everything now. You can find our podcast everywhere. We're on everything now. Spotify, Apple Podcasts, Google Play, Audible, you name it. We're pretty much everywhere. Great. All right. Have a good one, everybody. See you.