The Conversion Practice Survivor

00:18 - Sam (Host)

I would like to begin by acknowledging the traditional custodians of the land on which I live and work the Gundungurra land and people. I pay my respects to their elders past, present and emerging and extend that respect to all Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people. I also want to acknowledge the traditional custodians of the lands on which you, our listeners, are joining us from today. I recognise the deep connection that First Nations people have to this land, their enduring culture and their commitment to the preservation and care for their country. This land was never ceded and it always was and always will be Aboriginal land.

00:58

Hey there and welcome to Beyond the Surface, the podcast where we explore the stories of people who have survived religious trauma, left high control or cult communities and are deconstructing their faith. I'm your host, sam, and each week I'll talk with individuals who have taken the brave step to start shifting their beliefs that might have once controlled and defined their lives. Join us as we dig into their experiences, the challenges they've faced and the insights they've gained. Whether you're on a similar journey or you're just curious about these powerful stories, you're in the right place. This is Beyond the Surface. Welcome, aaron. Thanks for joining me. Thanks for having me. I'm so excited about this episode. Your Instagram is the funnest thing I've ever seen, by the way.

01:48

Um so yeah so if people have not, please go and follow Aaron, because it's the funnest's. So it's so nice, um, and and I think you know it will be nicer when people probably hear the background and the story, but it's so nice to see people just living their best life, enjoying everything.

02:23 - Aaron (Guest)

What we want for everyone, isn't it absolutely?

02:26 - Sam (Host)

yeah, I mean, who doesn't want that? Yeah, live, laugh love oh gosh, we love a cliche, don't we? Oh gosh, I always will quote cliches in my sessions with clients and I always start it with I hate a, but like it always comes out, I don't know, oh goodness. Okay, so like people might know a little bit of your story because you know you sort of became public in the uh, the New South Wales conversion therapy ban, the New South Wales conversion therapy ban. But where does your story start?

03:06 - Aaron (Guest)

Well, in: 1988

04:03 - Sam (Host)

Yeah, tell us about the bubble. What sort of a bubble did you grow up in?

04:09 - Aaron (Guest)

So I grew up in a really conservative Christian evangelical home. So we were a family of five. I have two sisters they're twins and our whole lives revolved around the church and the Christian community. So I didn't know anyone who wasn't a Christian really. We went to a private Christian school. We went to church every Sunday. My parents and a couple of their friends helped to bring the Alpha course to Australia and so we were this traveling group of families in the in the mid nineties who would travel to different churches of all different denominations, spruiking the Alpha course. We'd get up on the stage, or it was like the Von Trapp families put together and we would get up on stage and you remember that song, the Hill song, all over the world, I guess a calling and living in your oh gosh together and everyone in the church would love it.

05:09

And then, um, they would advertise alpha and try and get those churches to do alpha, and then they would run alpha courses. So we, my sisters and I, would have a rug at the back of a church so we'd have to sit on. We couldn't leave the rug and they'd run alpha. So all of my life was consumed by church. We lived right across the road from the church we attended, so we were constantly in the church and I think because of that, it forced this bubble um of this is this is the only world there is, so everything that's in this world is the only way to go in life. Yeah, and so it caused this bubble that was hard to break out of, I guess.

05:53 - Sam (Host)

Yeah, what were some of the like the messages that you received about yourself and about the world around you?

06:03 - Aaron (Guest)

So Evangeline, like part of my upbringing, is I loved, and I still look back on it with love and cherish my upbringing, which some people I talk to find that really hard to believe. They can't fathom it. They just don't comprehend how a world that told me I shouldn't be who I am and I shouldn't love who I am, yeah, and I look back with fondness so it's this weird PTSD that I experience. Yeah, but it is a very loving community and you are taught that you are loved, even though there's a part of you here that is a big part of you that isn't loved. There's ways around coping with that. I think, um, that I was just forced into um and was really good at distracting myself within that bubble, to to distract myself from the pain or from the confusion and just focus on the good and the bright and the light and the love evangelical church exuded yeah, it's interesting.

07:10 - Sam (Host)

I think you're the first person, first Australian person, who has actually used the term evangelical to describe their church upbringing, because we don't hear it all that often in Australia. It's's largely like an American term.

07:27 - Aaron (Guest)

hink when I first came out in: 2020

08:15 - Sam (Host)

Yeah, it's, I feel like um describing the, the church upbringing um is is hard sometimes, but yeah, I think people who have not been a part of a faith community find it difficult to understand the two sides to the coin and it not being all bad. I think it's really hard for people, when they see the harm that has happened on the other end, to not remember that actually there was. You know, we were there for a reason and most of the time we loved it while we were in it. Um, it's not until we get out that we realize all of the crazy shit that happened yeah, and there's still.

09:02 - Aaron (Guest)

There's still things I say to some of my best friends like I miss this about church. Yeah, I went to a concert at the end of last year of a singer-songwriter who has since left the evangelical church and in one of the songs that he did he got the whole audience singing along and then he said there's this part in my song that was inspired by tongues and I want you all just to start singing whatever just noises come to mind. Everyone started singing what sounded like a Pentecostal church having free worship in tongues and I was like this is just a beautiful it was really like warm and like euphoric.

09:42

But uh, I turned to my friend. I was like I miss this about church, I miss the corporate singing, I miss the, the feelings you get in a in a.

09:51 - Sam (Host)

Everyone's here for one purpose, one, one mind, one body, that that whole shtick yeah, the collective singing, I think I like I was a worship leader, so the music is always, and I think forever will be the thing that I miss the most about church. But I did not grow up in a, I didn't go to a Pentecostal church. So, speaking in tongues, I remember the first time I witnessed that I was like what the fuck is this?

10:23 - Aaron (Guest)

Like.

10:24 - Sam (Host)

I was so confused. I grew up in a very like conservative, like Calvinistic style church that was like that was my home church and I remember going to a Bethel worship night and I was like I turned to my now wife and I was like what on earth is happening right now?

10:47 - Aaron (Guest)

um, it was crazy down um end of the scale, though they are extreme, oh yeah, yeah, absolutely really conservative baptist where tongues wasn't, yeah, into the pentecostal world where tongues was normal and explained, I was like, oh okay, this makes a bit of sense and so I grew into it. Yeah, but yeah, then going to Bethel things, it was like this other extreme. I was like I don't know if I'm comfortable there yeah, it's a whole other world.

11:13 - Sam (Host)

Yeah, a whole other world. Um, what was, what was it like for you to um? I mean, there's a difference between growing up in a church family and, like, when did it become a personal relationship with God for you?

11:30 - Aaron (Guest)

Yeah, good question, I think my whole childhood I was always really invested in church life and my faith. Mum always tells this story. She tells two stories one of the day I was born, um, and she held me in her arms and the first words she said were God, I'm giving him over to you. You, he's, you can do with him. I hope he, I hope he serves you all of his life. That was like this prayer that she prayed over me.

12:04

And then, as a young boy I was about seven or eight Mum was cleaning the house. The girls were a little bit younger so they kept her busy and I just decided I'm going to go across the road and see if Pastor Gary needs any help with anything. I couldn't tell mum, and it was a main road, really busy road Crossed the road went over. I was annoying Pastor Gary. Obviously Mum couldn't find me. She started freaking out. She ran across the road because that's all she knew to do. So, oh, gary's over there. I might ask him if he could help me, because I've got the two girls I've got to look after. She walks in and sees me helping Gary, do something, oh my gosh.

12:42

ng, like, on our little Nokia: 3310

14:29

And people ask me do I resent my mum? Is there hatred for my mum? And it isn't because I, even as an adult later on in my life, believed the same thing she believed about myself and she was just brought up in this world like I was and she believed the things that she was taught to believe were true and right and she loved me more than anything else in the world as her son. And part of that love was I don't want my son to end up in an eternity separated from God, was I don't want my son to end up in an eternity separated from God.

15:06

So her response was this great fear that not only was she losing her son, but God was losing her son and she was wrestling with that. So that night she said look, the only thought she could have was if I punish him, this will steer him in the right direction. So she said if this is the direction you want to to choose, if this is the decision you want to make with your life. You need to find somewhere else to live um. And at that age I was like well, my whole world is Christian yeah everyone believes what you believe.

15:40

If you won't, my own mother won't have me in her house, then no one's gonna have me in their house, and so that was the beginning of a long journey of hiding who I was and constantly battling this, praying that God would take it away, make me straight, like, fix this, because I don't want this. I don't want to be this person that you've created.

16:06 - Sam (Host)

Yeah. What was that hiding like for you internally? What impact did that have?

16:17 - Aaron (Guest)

It's interesting because, as a teenager, I constantly I guess I don't know if hiding is even the right word, cause I think if you look at me and look at the history of my life as a teenager and as a as a 20 something year old, the signs were there.

16:40 - Sam (Host)

I feel like the signs are always there.

16:43 - Aaron (Guest)

Right. So everyone I talked to is like I don't know how people didn't pick up on this and I think they were more ignorant than I was hiding. They were just choosing not to see it or not wanting to see it potentially, so I wasn't really hiding. The only part I was hiding was that I'm attracted to men. But everything else about my life was quite real, and the hiding that I was attracted to men was hard at first, but I very quickly learned to distract myself by keeping myself busy, and that was that was the thing I focused on in life was, if I just keep myself busy, if I dedicate myself to God's work and this will, this is all okay, and I used to.

17:27

I remember going to a prayer ministry session once and talking to them about my sexuality and, um, they, they told me, this is like the thorn in Paul's side, um, that he prayed that God would take it away, that just God never took it away, and so this is something you're going to have to live with, or it's like the cross that Jesus had to carry to his own death, like, like, this is your cross, this is your burden in life, and if you can choose to put God first in, amongst that thorn, that cross, that burden. Then think about how great your faith must be, think about what awaits you in eternity.

18:03

And that was the, the, that was the rhetoric that I fully bought into how did that rhetoric impact your relationship with god like personally so I don't think it really impacted in a negative way until I started to prepare to come out at the end of my closeted life and journey. Before that I was so in love with God and so of course I would do anything to carry that cross and live that burden. Live that burden and honour him at the same time. So it didn't really taint my view of God until I started to read and research this whole idea of sexuality and the church and Christianity and faith that I started to go. This all doesn't add up.

18:59 - Sam (Host)

Yeah.

19:00 - Aaron (Guest)

Then my lens started to shift on a whole lot of stuff.

19:08 - Sam (Host)

Yeah, the whole concept of concept of like suffering is godly.

19:10 - Aaron (Guest)

It's really messed up, like really really messed up and really harmful is, and so often the suffering is godly is preached by people who have very little suffering yeah, yeah, the most privileged of people. Yeah, they're driving around in their nice high-end cars, the the big, pretty pastors. Right, they're telling you that suffering is godly well, they live in their mansion and they're having three meals a day. They don't have to live paycheck to paycheck or worry about health issues.

19:43 - Sam (Host)

Yeah, yeah, absolutely. Now I know you became a pastor, so tell us about that. How did that happen?

19:53 - Aaron (Guest)

So went through high school, never acted on my sexuality. I wasn't really in a position to, I guess, either. I just couldn't.

20:05 - Sam (Host)

there was no opportunity that arose, uh, then if you're knee deep in God's work there is going to be, you're probably not floating in the circles no, not at all, not at all.

20:20 - Aaron (Guest)

um. And then, uh, towards the end of year 12, my youth pastor at the time, uh, asked if I wanted to do an internship at the church the year after. Um, and I was like, of course, that's it. I'd looked at the group of 12. There was always 12 that got chosen. It was like the 12 disciples um, handpicked, um, and looked at that group of 12 and thought I would love my next year like a gap year to look like their year looked Like. They looked like they had a great time, they really bonded, they grew in their faith. So I think this would be a great opportunity.

20:55 - Sam (Host)

Was this fresh out of high school?

20:57 - Aaron (Guest)

Yeah, oh, my gosh. And I didn't turn 18 until the year after high school, so I was still 17. Like I was, oh, didn't turn 18 until the year after high school, so I was still 17, like I was. Um, so did this internship? It wasn't the experience I was expecting it to be. My cohort, uh, was not the same bunch of people. Um, the pastor that invited me, some troubles happened. He was removed from his position just before I started, so everything was up in the air and I just was like well, I, the group of people I'm with, aren't the same caliber of people as last year's internship. That's a good way to describe it. I don't know. That's how I felt at the time, you know, and so I was like I'm just going to. I felt at the time, you know, and so I was like I'm just going to put my head down and dedicate myself to learning and growing. And so they all did this.

21:50

For I decided I was going straight to my degree in theology, and so I went and did my degree with all guy.

21:56

I adored him, he was amazing, and it was one night we'd had a worship night at church. It was a beautiful, beautiful youth worship night, and afterwards ended up kissing him and the next week ran to the senior pastor full of shame and regret and guilt and was, like you need to kick me out of the internship. I did this horrible thing. I kissed a guy. He's like well, slow down, slow down. That's not what we need to do here. That's not the answer to this.

22:43

The fact that you've even come to to talk to me about this is good, um, and they recommended our church recommended that I go and get some prayer ministry at this church out in the eastern suburbs, um, and it was there that I was, uh, told by the person in prayer ministry that her son was also was gay, and their senior pastor had pretty much told him that if you want to be healed of your sexuality and you want to be made straight, god does miracles in a way that he responds to our stepping out in faith. And so she gave all those examples. You know, peter, not fake at all.

23:26

Out of the boat. The woman with the issue of blood had to risk her own life and go into the population, that community that she was about in, to reach out and touch Jesus' hem. And so, in the emotion of prayer ministry, I was like, yeah, that makes sense. And she said there's no use just saying God, make me straight, make me straight if you're not going to do anything about it. And so their senior pastor had told her son if you get married to a woman because God created marriage, it's like the first holy covenant he ever made that's where the miracle will come to you.

24:02

Now I don't know what her son's life is like now, but I can't imagine that it worked. No, and I'm scared for him that he's probably still living in this really fragile space, like I was for years. But yeah, so I came out of that, asked this girl who I was really good friends with at church, if we could start dating, if she liked me, like that. And we dated for only like 10 months, I think. We got engaged for six months, got married.

24:38 - Sam (Host)

Oh, like good Christian young adults too.

24:40 - Aaron (Guest)

Yeah, and then we went straight into being part into pastoral ministry. We got our first pastoral ministry job that we stepped into the week after we got back from our honeymoon yeah, oh, my goodness it was a long way to tell you yes, I was a pastor no, I love the long route.

25:01 - Sam (Host)

That's the fun way. Um, oh, that, just like anytime I talk about paths, I just think of like the the narrow and the wide path story. Um, it just is like flashbacks. Um, what was it like for you internally, knowing that you were attracted to men but standing there on your wedding day marrying a woman, what was that like?

25:30 - Aaron (Guest)

I thought I was doing that for god, so I I was fully invested in it. I I really believed this miracle was going to happen. Um, we'd just heard story after story of miracles in our church community. A group had gone over to Africa and seen a person's leg that was all deformed. They prayed for it and it straightened up. And so I'm like this is a God of miracles that we serve. This is an internal feeling that I have. That's how I would have described it. That was an external, visible healing. So, of course, if I take this step of faith, god's going to heal me. And the signs were also at the wedding day. I mean, our whole wedding ceremony was high school musical themed.

26:21 - Sam (Host)

Oh, oh my gosh, that's fabulous.

26:26 - Aaron (Guest)

All the the guys we walked down the aisle. The boys are back. And then there was a slideshow with start of something new. And then I wrote a song for my wife to walk down the aisle to um. And then the entrance to the reception. Was it? It's going to be a night, oh my gosh. And we did our first dance to. Can I have this Dance, gabby and Troy? Oh, that's so funny. It's yeah wild hey.

26:56 - Sam (Host)

Yeah, did your wife at the time know about your struggles with the sexuality?

27:03 - Aaron (Guest)

No, I remember there was a moment we were going to America together and I had to get a health check done. To go to America, to go and serve on a summer camp as volunteers at Christian's camp, I had to go and get a health check and my mum worked at a doctor's clinic and went to my doctor for the health check and he just did a full bloods for everything.

27:26

I'd never been sexually active before this but mum saw the results come back and saw that I'd been tested for full bloods including HIV, blah, blah. She called my senior pastor to say Aaron has obviously been sexually active. Why has he got an STD check? I got pulled into the senior pastor's office. She was like I bet she did it out of love. Again, it wasn't a malicious pull at all. It's like I don't know what to do. What's happening here? And he's obviously doing this in secret. Where do I go? So she went to the pastor. As all good Christian people do, they go straight to the pastor. As all good christian people do, they go straight to the, the top dog.

28:06

And yeah, he pulled me into his office and I was beside myself. I was like no, that's not the case. I had to get a health check to go overseas. And immediately afterwards I was so emotional we're in the church office because we worked there and walked out and I was crying and my ex-wife saw me and, um, she's like are you okay? And we went into a room and we talked about it and I told her mum thinks this that was the only maybe glimpse that she may have ever had that maybe Aaron's gay, because I just wouldn't have ever talked about the shame attached to admitting that to anyone. It was just unbearable to even think about that. Someone would look at me like that or see me like that.

28:49 - Sam (Host)

Yeah, what were the times like I mean, I'm sort of thinking about other stories that I've heard or my own story what were the times like when you're alone at night with your own thoughts, um, just going like like how, how do I get rid of this? Like how, like, why is this? Just like not going away yeah, that's.

29:16 - Aaron (Guest)

That's a really good question. There were a lot of tears and a lot of like yelling at god, like it was, like I'm I'm angry that this, that the day of my wedding there was no disney moment. There was like there was no beast transformation, like from beauty and the beast. That's what I was hoping, like the yeah, in the air and spin around and drop and I'd be a human or billy porter is the fairy godmother yes, that would also be fabulous.

29:48

And yeah, there were many times driving my car or like I'd be driving and I'd see someone who was attractive and I'd yeah, myself looking at them and then instantly feel that regret and that shame and start being like god why have you done this to me? Why is this the cross? Can't you give me some other cross? Can't you give me some other burden? Like, I don't want this. I want to love my wife, I want to be able to serve you without this distraction, and so it was just a lot of confusion and a lot of anger, but always just believed the rhetoric and the teachings around homosexuality, and so my faith was the most important thing to me, and so, if these teachings were true, I couldn't do anything about it.

30:35

I just knew that this is my temptation. Just like an alcoholic is tempted to drink and a drug addict is tempted to, a drug addict is tempted to take drugs, my temptation is being attracted to men, and I've just got to learn to live with this, and so it was confusing and hard, but at the same time, that's where I learned that coping mechanism of getting distracted by church and ministry and life yeah, what was it like for you to pastor a church um.

31:06

It was great. I love people, I'm an extrovert, so pastoring made sense and we'd done several about 10 years at a church, on staff in different capacities, and Jackie and I both felt like we were ready to step into leading something of our own, because the fruit was always dangled oh, you're the next senior pastor of this church. But the senior pastor was never going to retire and so we're like well, we've sort of reached our ceiling here and there are things we'd love to change, but they don't want to change. We'd love to see church done differently and be a place where all people are welcome and everyone. Our church. We called it Fresh Church and the slogan was everyone deserves a fresh start. And we'd been in a church that was a Pentecostal church, that there were a number of instances where we were like we've got grace for this person, but the church doesn't, and so we would see people constantly get hurt or pushed away. Now we want to see church done differently. Um, and so we had some friends, really good friends of ours, who we talked about it with them and we're like let's plant a church. So we started this church from our lounge room and it grew and it was fun and it was vibrant and it was new and it was great.

32:31

But churches, like anything, always grow, predominantly grow with other Christians. As much as we want to say, it's an evangelistic approach and we're trying to win the lost and save lost souls. We have a lot of growth from people leaving other churches to come to our church and with that comes politics and with that comes people not liking certain decisions, and so very quickly, we became the church where everyone deserved a fresh start, to the church where some people deserved a fresh start, and it was that that triggered. It was that that triggered. It was that transition from everyone to some that triggered me researching sexuality and the church's knowledge and teachings on sexuality, so that we could make our bylaws and our constitution fair for everyone. Bylaws and our constitution fair for everyone, yeah and yeah, that, that sort of that. So that journey of being a pastor was fun.

33:37

Um, starting a church was great. I loved the people, I loved our community, um, but I hated the politics of church, um, and the, the fact that you had to you as, as the pastor, you have to please the masses, because they pay your bill, they keep the lights on, they pay your wage, yeah, and so it just quickly became something that I never wanted it to be um, which was sad.

34:10 - Sam (Host)

Yeah, it's the business side of church, hey.

34:13 - Aaron (Guest)

Yeah.

34:13 - Sam (Host)

Yeah, and so was the prayer ministry in inverted commas that you had to, that you went to. Was that your main experience of conversion practices, or was there more?

34:27 - Aaron (Guest)

No, so I never went to camps or retreats or anything like that. I didn't go through conversion therapy. The New South Wales bill that passed was about conversion practices, and so they used my story to show that it's a lot more insidious and coercive than just a camp that you send someone to. It can be done through prayer ministry. It can even be done through an altar call. I remember going to conferences where they would have someone talk about sexual sin and come forward if you want to be set free from sexual sin, and I would run to the front hoping that this would be the moment that God would heal me. So there's lots of coercive and insidious ways that conversion practices happen. For me it was through prayer ministry, altar calls and prayer moments with people.

35:19 - Sam (Host)

Yeah, and I think I've mentioned that a few times in that I think a lot of people who have not been a part of a church tend to think that conversion practices or conversion therapy is very obvious, very overt, and it's like laying on of hands and exorcisms and like the things that we see in, you know, in documentaries on TV, like the stuff that makes headlines and in reality, and in reality it's home groups and conversations around a dinner table and, you know, like doctrines, and it's so much more subtle and so much more insidious than that that it is a system of belief that causes harm, as opposed to just a program.

36:09 - Aaron (Guest)

They're led by really well-meaning people yeah, good people, and they're, most cases, volunteers. They're not paid staff. Yeah, professionals. Yeah, volunteers, who, like the woman in one of my prayer ministry sessions, had had an experience. Her son had gone through what I went through, so she wanted to help others like that. Yeah, and they're just doing what they've been taught is the right thing to do. But they're not the ones that are the bad people here. It's higher up and it's these theologies and these doctrines that are taught to the body of believers that is warped and manipulated.

36:49

And I mean, I took part of my. My love of of being a pastor was preaching. Yeah, I took preaching really seriously. Um, I wasn't a Pentecostal pastor who would just think, okay, this Sunday I want to talk about being fruitful, and I'll just google how many verses in the Bible talk about fruitful and just pop a verse here and there. I did my homework.

37:11

not written to me in the year: 2024

38:19

It's different to what it should be yeah and so I don't blame the people, the volunteers who do the prayer ministry at all. Yeah, I'm not angry at them, like not even angry at their pastors, because often pastors like I was we get into it because of the love of our faith and and the people in the church, um, and in Pentecostal churches, most of them only have to do a year's worth of Bible college, so it's not like they're equipped to take down theologies that have been around for hundreds of years yeah, and they're also like I find you know, I think, about some of the churches that I was a part of.

38:59 - Sam (Host)

They're all also being trained by the same places, and so it's like they're just cookie cutter versions of of one another. 100, yeah, but also, I mean, how, how dare you preach with context, aaron, like no wonder what pastor preaches with context?

39:19 - Aaron (Guest)

I used to get teased all the time because nearly every sermon I ever preached I would say now this word is actually this word greek, and let me tell you, like the word just, for example, the word praise that we say praise and worship the word praise. In the Bible there's seven Hebrew words for one English word of praise, and they all mean different things and we line them together in one word, and so that's the sort of thing I would talk about. Like context is everything here. People, yeah, and you're not trained to to figure this stuff out as an everyday churchgoer yeah, being told that certain things you're doing in your life are wrong, or and so we just we broke the mold a little bit. We did a series called dumb things christians say at our church, um, and we had a a big poster that was up everywhere of jesus face palming, and I got emails from christ Christians in the community that didn't go to our church. They're like this is sacrilegious.

40:15 - Sam (Host)

Oh my gosh. Yeah, we just have fun, take a chill pill.

40:19 - Aaron (Guest)

That's it. Just calm down, don't take it so seriously. I'm sure Jesus is laughing at this poster.

40:23 - Sam (Host)

I know.

40:25 - Aaron (Guest)

And I'm talking about face palming your email right now.

40:27 - Sam (Host)

Yeah, yeah, I'm. I'm curious though, because if that was the style of pastor, that you were to pull that like the text apart, why do you think it took so long to pull apart the texts, a bit like the clobber passages?

40:46 - Aaron (Guest)

so, there, this is a good question, and I've I've asked myself this a lot. There were two things I never preached on and never touched.

40:54 - Sam (Host)

Yeah.

40:55 - Aaron (Guest)

Revelations, because my grandfather scared the shit out of me as a child with Revelations. So as a pastor, we never once in my what was it? 14 years, 12, 13 years of ministry, I never once preached a passage from Revelations. And I'm not equipped to teach on this. It's so ambiguous, it's so out there I don't want to touch it. Did you ever see the play Heaven's Gates, hell's Flames?

41:26 - Sam (Host)

No, but I know of it.

41:29 - Aaron (Guest)

Anytime it came to to town, we were there. So I was terrified of the end times. Always was yeah, and, and sometimes, when I'm at my lowest of low, even now, I go. What if I am being sinful? What?

41:42

if jesus came back tomorrow. What if I end up in hell like this? Yeah, but so there was that and there was sexuality. I just didn't want to touch it because it's painful. I didn't want to go there because I thought if I talk about this, someone might a lot of pastors that you see have big falls um around the world. They're the thing they focus on, is the thing they struggle with. Yeah, I said I don't want to do so. I'm just not going to go there because then I won't. If I'm not constantly reminding myself of my struggle, maybe I won't step into falling away and doing something wrong. So I never did.

42:20 - Sam (Host)

Yeah, while you were pastoring, did you ever have anybody come to you saying that they were struggling with their sexuality? Did you ever have to deal with that?

42:34 - Aaron (Guest)

Yeah, I've actually reached out.

42:35

So there was a young guy who came to our youth group when I was a youth pastor, before we went to church and he had told his best friend he was gay. His best friend brought him to me. His family didn't go to our church, he just came to our youth group. He was one of those kids who loved youth and came to church with his friends on a sunday. Um, and I prayed with him that he'd be healed, just like I'd been prayed for thinking well, maybe it'll work for him. Um, and so recently I've reached back out to him.

42:59

He's actually now living a very happy, out, proud life yeah, we love that he got onto it a lot sooner than I did and, um, I reached out to him to apologize. I was like I'm so sorry. He's like, no, I don't blame you. We've had some great chats, but yeah, I had a few. We had a.

43:19

I guess what sparked me starting to research this whole topic was that we had some cases of homosexuality in the church, had some cases of homosexuality in the church, so we had a. The first instance was we had a guy start coming to our church who was same-sex attracted, had always been told he grew up in a Christian family, just like mine, very Pentecostal church, great worship leader, great piano player. He'd always been told it was a sin, had had moments where he'd fallen to temptation and ran away for a while, went overseas, came back, started attending our church because he saw the billboard up at the train station that said everyone deserves a fresh start and he thought maybe this is going to be a different church. So we had him start coming to our church. He sadly um, because of all the trauma of his past, um was very addicted to alcohol, um, and, may I add, he played piano the best when he was drunk I mean to be fair.

44:27 - Sam (Host)

If I had gone to church um half tanked, I probably might have, I might have sung better also.

44:32 - Aaron (Guest)

I mean, the holy spirit was flowing through the keys on the days he had he'd had a whiskey before coming in. But yeah, he, he was struggling with alcoholism really and I was so fixed on this. Everyone deserves a fresh start. But I was like, no, he can still play keys. He can still play keys, he can still be on the worship team, I don't care what, what. And so we had people push back or he's drunk, why you let him do this. Maybe that's all he needs for god to set him free. Like, just give him, this guy, a break.

45:02

Um, we ended up sending him to a re or getting working with his family to get him sent to a rehab.

45:08

Um came out and he was doing pretty good, uh, and then he um had a, had a moment where he got really really drunk and drank himself to death, which was really sad and and that was really traumatic for me because I saw, I knew the reason why he was drinking and I was like that that's such a such a hard place to have to have been.

45:33

I can't imagine the trauma he had to face, because I don't think it was the same as the trauma I had to face. I felt like I had it so much easier, um, with my sexuality battles, um, and then, a few months later, we had a lesbian couple walk into our church first time, holding hands, um, and the guest services director, the leader who looked after all the visitors uh, I was backstage with our team going over the the service and this is what's going to happen, and I'm getting ready for the the service, and he comes in. He's like pastor aaron, pastor aaron, there's a lesbian couple here. And I was like okay. He's like what do we do? I was like get him a coffee.

46:20

What do you mean? I'm like? Well, every other person who walks in the door for the first time gets a free coffee. Go and get him a coffee. He said no, but they were holding hands okay yeah, and, and it was.

46:33

I got this like anger. For some reason, there was just this and I took it out on this poor guy who was just. He was just confused. Yeah, I got angry and I very rarely get angry, but in this moment I didn't. In front of the the group of people we were getting ready for this, I was like, mate, you don't know that the man who just walked in holding his wife's hand didn't beat her last night and you've just got him a coffee. Now go and get that couple a coffee. Back to my team and I was like so we'll pray at this.

47:03 - Sam (Host)

Like just back to normal.

47:08 - Aaron (Guest)

And this lesbian couple were just amazing. They were a beautiful, beautiful couple. Um, I can't go into their story too much, but, uh, one of them had never been in church, never grown up in church, grew up in australia jesus was just like a swear word, like when you hit your finger with a hammer. Um, the other one had grown up in a really large church overseas. Her parents were pastors one of the biggest churches in the world.

47:35

She'd written worship albums and knew that her sexuality couldn't coincide with yeah parents ministry and she didn't want to ruin that, so she sort of ran away. Um came to australia, the australian girl, um, was struggling with some mental health and some anxiety stuff and we were about to do a sermon series on anxiety and a friend of hers from uni said come to my church. She went home and told her girlfriend from overseas um, we're gonna go to church this sunday. And her girlfriend's like absolutely not. Do you know what they're gonna do to us? Then yeah, and she said no, no, I think this is a different church. So they ended up coming in. They loved the service. They both felt welcomed, which was great.

48:25

Um, australian girl, put her hand up in my altar, call to get saved, and then they started doing what we called our growth track, which is like our course to become a church member. It's a four-week course and on the last week of that course so they've been there at church for five weeks now the last week I would always pop my head into the class and say hi to everyone and encourage them to join a team and get involved, start volunteering, and they pulled me aside and said could they just said, can we have coffee with you this week? Of course let's do that. We sat down, had coffee and they asked me if I thought that their life was sinful yeah yeah, I, I, I do.

49:12

I just was honest. Yeah, I really do think your life is sinful, but it doesn't take away from the fact that you're here, and one thing I always used to say was that if you're either heading towards Jesus or away from him, there's no other, there's nothing else. Um, I said, the fact that you've come to church means you're heading towards Jesus. You're taking steps in the right direction. So I'm not. But right now, yeah.

49:39

And they asked me would I walk through why I believe what I believed? And I said look, I don't have a lot to go off. And the Australian girl said look, I've listened to every single one of your podcasts in the last few weeks, since I've been at the church on the way to uni and back again. I listened to a podcast on the train, and I know that you always talk about. Putting Jesus first means sometimes giving, like giving up on things that you might desire, but it doesn't align with his goal. And she said so we're willing. If we land at the place that we agree with you that this is a sin, we're willing to break up. Um. And they said but first, can we study it? Can we understand it? Can we get? Just take some time? Like, yeah, you don't need to ask my permission. I wish everyone in church asked can I study this? Like a dream? And so I started studying it.

50:33

Wow, that was the launch pad. They wanted to get involved. One of them wanted to be in the worship team. There was no problem with them being on the welcoming team, but as soon as you put someone up on stage, our constitution that was given to us by our denomination stated that's a leadership position and people who are homosexual cannot be in leadership. It was defined in a sentence, pretty much, yeah, and so we had my church board who were saying you can't have them up on the stage, me saying, well, she's an amazing worship leader and I don't think.

51:13

We don't know what, what sins other people up on that stage are battling and deciding to to engage in. What's the difference with having her lead worship? Um, so I, I rocked the boat, let her start playing guitar, start singing. Our worship director didn't want anything to do with it, it just rocked the boat a lot. So we had this big internal meeting and I was like we need to rewrite what our constitution says and I told them I'm going to spend some time studying this, I'm going to work with our board to redefine.

51:51

And that was about a 10-month process from when I started studying until I got to a point where my personal life started getting affected by the study and everything I thought I'd known started to cave in. I, yeah, my life just became this on the inside, this war zone, and it felt like it was crumbling. But I had to keep this happy face and keep going and keep things moving because the church was going great. So, yeah, there was. Was this really really just this tension that built up over a really short amount of time that I'd never let build up in my life before? Um, yeah, and that's.

52:41 - Sam (Host)

That's probably what my undoing was yeah, I think it's really easy for people on the service to think that once you start studying that and realizing that perhaps, hey, maybe these feelings are okay and like it's not everything that I thought it was and all of this sort of thing that that's wonderful news, except that you have a wife and you have a church and you're pastoring and and that's that's a lot to be grappling with all at the same time. What was it like for you to finally come out? How did that happen?

53:17 - Aaron (Guest)

come out, so it was February: 2020

53:24 - Sam (Host)

e left church en masse during: 2020

53:38 - Aaron (Guest)

Yep.

53:38 - Sam (Host)

Yeah.

53:39 - Aaron (Guest)

even hundreds of years since: 1946

54:37

she's amazing. So, yeah, love, love my wife. I've got a son. Um, we had a foster son, uh, who was now 21, but at the time it was like 17. I just, their world was just, it was going well. I didn't want to destroy their world. I had a family who loved me and mum and dad were coming to my church and loved church. We had a church that was growing, it was thriving, a community of people that we loved. I was travelling the world, speaking, I'd written a book, so there was all this stuff that I knew that if I came out, all of that was destroyed and I'd gone to the worst place in my mind about all of it as well, like Jackie's going to hate me.

55:25 - Sam (Host)

Yeah.

55:26 - Aaron (Guest)

She'll take my son away from me, my parents will disown me, the church, I'll lose my job at the church and all the people will disown me from the community. That's where I went in my mind. And then I thought, well, maybe I don't come out, maybe I just continue Like I love my life now. Maybe I don't come out, but I talk about this theology and the clobber passages and how it's been manipulated, and maybe I do this as a ministry. And then I just remembered all those people who start focusing on something eventually have a fall, and I thought, now that I know this, the temptation for me to act on it is going to be so much more. Before, when I thought it was wrong, I, my faith and my love for God stopped me from ever doing anything yeah now that I don't think it's wrong.

56:18

How, how long can I be faithful to my wife for? Um, so that wasn't a an option. But and all the options I kept presenting myself with just weren't a real. I couldn't see it as a reality. Um, and it's my birthday on 29th of February and um, leap year. That year was a leap year, so we had this big birthday party for me in the city, got to say goodbye to everyone that's that was my plan. Like I'm just going to bow out At this birthday party, went around, said goodbye to everyone.

56:52

Jackie and I had driven separately because she was going to take our son home and I was going to go and do some karaoke with a couple of people. So did that, had a few things to drink to help me go through with it, and then went to go and end my life. Got stopped in the process by this woman who was on her way home from work and caught me and so thankful for her, like yeah, she was incredible and promised her that I wouldn't go through with it. Ended up going home Next day preached the best sermon I've ever preached in my church oh, the irony, isn't it? And and the the amount of people who came up to me afterwards that was the best sermon you've ever preached and I got emotional in the middle of it. None of them knew what was going on, but pretty much the the message was about grace and um and just letting people be and loving people. So it was my, my sort of my final sayonara, um.

57:57

And then we went home and jackie and I sat down and I had the conversation with her about hey, I'm gay, um, I've never wanted to say this out loud, I've never wanted to tell you, but and then I talked her through all the stuff that I'd studied and she'd sort of known anyway, because I kept voicing it in bible studies and now our leadership meetings. I kept bringing it up. She was on the journey with me, um, really, for that, she's like the most amazing woman. She, she sat there. She's like you know what we'll get through it, what do we need to do? And by no means was it easy for her like she was so strong, um, throughout it all for me, um, and for our kids.

58:42

But, uh, she she'd gone through a massive traumatic experience as well, which was so different to mine, and she was a victim in all of it. Really at the end of the day. But yeah, we went from there to the leaders of our denomination together and told them. They pretty much said either we pray, we end this meeting and you don't do anything about this and you get to keep your church and your family and everything goes on okay, or this is the decision you're making you'll be removed from your pastoral credentials, will be removed from you. You're not to engage with your church community from this moment and we imagine that you'll also lose your family because you'll be leaving your wife and your kids.

59:33

A really manipulative conversation when I look back at it. And Jackie just grabbed my hand and she looked at them and she said I think we're done Because she knew what we'd come in to do and she knew I wasn't strong enough in that moment just to even stand up for myself and say no, this is the decision.

59:51

I've made, and so we walked out. I was asked not to contact anyone. There was some communication that went out from the denomination to our church that I had been unfaithful to Jackie, and I remember reading someone messaging me and reading this message that said I just want to let you know that I still love you, given everything that you've done. And I was like done, and they mentioned the communication was that I'd been unfaithful. And I wasn't unfaithful Like hang on, what do you mean?

:: 00:26

And when I questioned that rhetoric, it was that by me making this decision to come out was me being unfaithful to my wedding vows? And I was like, hang on, hang on, hang on. Oh, you know exactly what you were doing by using the word unfaithful. Yeah, and to get people to picture that I'd had an affair, because it makes stepping me down so much easier. And so that's sort of where my discontent. Up until that point, I was dedicated to loving God, loving my family, loving the church still, and I was thinking maybe I'll plant another church that's non-denominational and blah, blah, blah. It was in that moment I thought no, I feel like the organized religion is always going to have this level of control, even with best intentions. Even if I was to start another church, there would come a point where there'd be this coercion and control at some point and I was like I don't want to ever be involved in that again.

:: 01:24

Yeah, I'm just thinking of like what it was like to not say goodbye to your church and to not be given that opportunity yeah, good question it was.

:: 01:37

it was really interesting because we heard that that was the rhetoric going around. So then we wrote a statement that we put onto our social media. So it's on my facebook page and if you go back to March 2020, there's this long Facebook post from Jackie and I that sort of said hey, this is the rumour that's going around, this is what really happened, and that was sort of my goodbye. I thought, given the type of pastor I'd been and the type of church we attempted to plant, I thought that more people would have stayed in touch than did. I thought that more of my community would have got around me, but they were scared.

:: 02:21

Yeah.

:: 02:21

I don't blame them. Our denomination came in, took over the running of the church. They sent another church to look after it and they were pretty much told not to engage with me, though I remember listening, um, my ex-wife continued attending the church for a little while, um, and stayed on staff because she'd done nothing wrong, so kept her on staff. No longer a senior pastor, they made her an admin person, um, which was heartbreaking as well for her and a bit of a tough thing to process.

:: 02:51

Yeah.

:: 02:52

But she would still attend the Zoom meetings because it was COVID, so everything was online and I was still living with her at the time. So I'd go into a different room out of respect, but I'd leave the door open. I'd listen and one of the pastors mentioned something about how he was still catching up with me and supporting me. I'd never heard him say peep, I'd never had a conversation with him since the conversation when I came out, and so there was just this false information being taught to the church, and that one of the things was Aaron and Jackie have asked that you give them space and time and so don't contact them. I've never asked for that.

:: 03:33

So there was this sense of control coming in from the denomination hey, we want to make sure that Aaron is left alone, because what if Aaron says something that convinces them? Right? Yeah, that's the only way I can interpret why they were saying the things, the lies that they were saying. Ultimately, oh my goodness, interpret why they were saying the things, the lies that they were saying um, ultimately, oh my goodness, I mean just like the.

:: 03:55

It's just like blatant gaslighting of yes, of like, on mass like yeah, oh, when did like when did your coming out process turn to one of life as opposed to loss?

:: 04:14

Yeah. So I started to feel really guilty. So, in the few weeks after coming out, jackie was so amazing and it was everything that I didn't expect. See, I expected her to hate me and kick me out, and she was incredible. And so there was so much shame and guilt that I started to experience. I felt I was having panic attacks because, hang on, she's meant to hate me. Why doesn't she hate me, like hate me, yeah, yeah and yeah, and I was having panic attacks, wasn't sleeping, struggling to process everything and feel really guilty that, hang on, I've destroyed our marriage and she's been incredible. So I ended up moving in with a musical theatre friend of mine, one of my best friends, molly, and about a month after coming out and it was just that closure, moving into a space that I could just breathe and had some time where I was just by myself. Covid was incredible.

:: 05:28

Yeah, because an extrovert like me who just felt like I'd been kicked out of my community, didn't run into any of the problems of watching online, as they all continued going about hanging out and having fun together. I had no FOMO, because what was already going to be an isolating period for me was isolating for everyone. Everyone was isolating literally, and so I think that just fast-tracked my healing process. I was getting therapy, seeing a really really good psych and had no FOMO, so I wasn't looking at people going. I hate the fact that they're hanging out and I'm not involved and blah blah. So yeah, that isolation time was really great for me just to be alone, process, discover who I really was and allow myself to just embrace what I'd always really wanted to embrace but felt like I couldn't.

:: 06:31

Yeah, was that liberating? Yeah, was it terrifying also. No, like gosh, you really did miss that bit, didn't you?

:: 06:45

Well, so COVID in Melbourne lockdown went for ages yeah, it did so. There was no like diving in the deep end and being taken to gay bars by friends or any of that. Like I wasn't exposed to anything. Like you couldn't do anything. So the worst I could do was that my housemate and I watched RuPaul's Drag Race together, like she was giving me a gay education, right, yeah, that'll do it.

:: 07:15

I was like this is what I've missed out on, um, so, yeah, that like I think COVID really was the help, the the thing that helped me process my trauma in that, in a way where I had no one interfering, I didn't have to worry about, like keeping up commitments with people, like I could just become a hermit for a bit, because everyone was allowed to be a hermit. So it was amazing. I had a really great community of friends from the musical theatre world that got around me and at one point I was posting a lot of stuff about my faith still, because I was still, at that point, really sure I was going to start a new church and, like, do something with my like go back into ministry of some sort. And I was posting a lot and one of my friends messaged a couple of the others and was like Aaron's talking a lot about Jesus. Doesn't Jesus hate him? Like is he okay? Do we need to help him? Like they were, they were really concerned about my mental health and so they they were like oh, if you want, we can do like we were doing like weekly calls and playing games and stuff. They're like, if you want, we can, uh, you can preach to us or something. If, like, if you need an outlet, these are people who don't didn't ever go to church and, like you can, you can do that thing where you preach. I don't want to do that, but I really love to get your insight on what you actually think about the things the church believes.

:: 08:45

Yeah, never listened to an outsider's perspective.

:: 08:49

I've always had top down, I've had outside in, and so we went through the Alpha course together over Zoom oh, my gosh, ten other non-Christians and they ripped it to shreds and it was so refreshing, like it was the therapy I didn't know I needed. Yeah, and they would say that's just ridiculous and just calling out all these different things, I was like I've never thought of it that way. Oh, and so it really like it was just this breath of fresh air, that it was like okay, I questioned, I described like my faith was just this breath of fresh air. That it was like okay, I questioned, I described like my faith was like this beautiful woven tapestry and my sexuality was this loose thread and I pulled on it and it became this mess on the floor. But I started trying to reweave this new beautiful tapestry and I don't know where I'm at with that, still like I think it's. There's bits and pieces together. It's an unfinished work of art, but I like to think of it as right now yeah, I, um, I.

:: 10:01

it's so funny hearing people who have not been a part of a church when they when they respond. Um, I obviously post a lot about religious trauma and different things on my social media and I had a non-Christian client come in and go. I saw this post that you did and I don't actually even remember what it was about, but they were like that's fucking insane, like why would you have ever believed that? And it was just it's so funny and so refreshing to hear somebody's perspective when they've not been immersed in that world. It's, I mean, it's so humorous. I just find it humorous.

:: 10:43

The concept of Jesus dying.

:: 10:46

Yeah, yeah, they're like that's weird, Like that is weird.

:: 10:51

I remember one of the that, that session on why did jesus die. You know, one of the girls in the group was just like he died for everyone, but I didn't ask him to. Yeah, someone to die for me, that's just yeah I thought about it like that I've just thought everyone would love that idea that there's someone who is willing to sacrifice their life for them. But this person has that idea.

:: 11:15

Yeah, yeah, it's so refreshing and it makes you sort of step back and not be like in the thick of it and just go oh yeah, like we can laugh about parts of this, like it's insane. So I mean, you sort of alluded to it, but where is your sense of spirituality now?

:: 11:34

It's very evolved. Immediately after coming out, I was like I have to do something with my life. Like I've only got my degree in theology and it's not going to get me far. Like what am I going to do?

:: 11:49

so I started studying education, realized I don't want to be in a classroom full of kids gave up quickly, but throughout that I did a subject where I learned about the different creation stories or the different creation and redemption arcs of all different people groups, and they are wildly the same. And as I listened and heard that all these creation stories, they all have an Adam and Eve, they all have a creator, they all are told to look after the earth and populate the earth. They all do populate the earth, and the earth becomes so populated that people are either fighting and not doing right by each other. They're all hurting the earth and so the God that created them has to step in and intervene. Like they've all got the same narrative, I started to think well, is Jesus the only way? Yeah, Is it one way? Jesus? Oh gosh.

:: 12:51

Oh I just had like a visceral reaction to that song. Oh my gosh, I've not heard that for so long. Yeah, oh.

:: 13:02

Remember the claps. Yes, jesus, you're the only one that I can.

:: 13:08

Oh my gosh, I'm going to have to put a trigger warning at the beginning of this episode oh, some two hillsong songs I know yeah yeah, gosh, yeah, no.

:: 13:21

So I said I just started to think, if there is a god, um, playing devil's advocate. If there is a god, what if, said god, didn't just reveal himself to the world through one man, jesus, but decided to reveal himself to the indigenous people of australia through bunjil and to, uh, the hindus through krishna, through all the different people who play that jesus role? What if god revealed himself to them? And and we've always just thought as evangelical christians, there's one way what if that's not really a biblical concept? What if we've just, like clobber passages, manipulated and mistranslated to whitewash and westernize religion? And so I haven't landed anywhere? I'm in this like ambiguous stage where people ask me what are you?

:: 14:15

I'm not an atheist yeah I'm not agnostic because I still still sort of believe there's a high power, and so I've started saying I'm more like a christian universalist. So God revealed himself to me through Jesus, but I believe that he can reveal himself to anyone around the world through, and it might not even be a figure, it might just be love, because at the end of the day, all the religions, when you look for the commonality, they've all got this verse or this passage that describes god is love yeah you flip that around.

:: 14:59

Love is god. I've sort of come to this point where planting our church was a step in this direction. Everyone needs a fresh start. I was all about loving everyone, but I think my sort of mantra of life and my spirituality is just that my god isn't a person. It isn't this man with a beard up in the wharfs around in the breeze up in heaven somewhere. My god is just love. Like everything I do, I just want it to be about loving people, loving the people who I'm interacting with, loving the world that I live in yeah if I lead with love, then what can actually go wrong?

:: 15:39

and not much. Like I feel like I've journeyed through this, what should have been really traumatic and really should have set me up to not be in a good place right now by having this focus of love, like it's really helped me to get through to this point where I'm really happy and like, just in this place, where not much can affect my happiness, joy and and I'm not going to let something rob me of it- yeah, I love, I love that and I mean to to circle back to a very, very queer reference, um, that's.

:: 16:17

Uh, my very first tattoo was a song, like a line out of a song from my favorite musical Rent, and it's measure your life in love and and it goes, you know, it goes back to that concept that if we can, you know, lead with love, um, genuine love, um, yeah, things, things change when I love. You have a much better label than me, because I just tend to go with. I'm just like some lost wandering pigeon, just like trying to feel my way around the world and around concepts.

:: 16:51

I have no idea where I am, but I'm actually okay with that. Yes, I love the lost pigeon. Yeah, not knowing is actually freedom to me because, like you know, there's so much about Christianity and high control religion that is so black and white, so certain, so like by the book and I'm just like actually having no idea is really really nice for once.

:: 17:17

It's freeing, isn't it? Yeah, yeah, because you come from a world where you have to have the answers. Yeah, as a pastor, you're seen as this like wealth of knowledge. Everyone comes to you for, like I studied theology, I didn't go and study a finance degree, I wasn't an accountant. Like wealth of knowledge Everyone comes to you for, like I studied theology, I didn't go and study a finance degree, I wasn't an accountant, I wasn't a psychologist. But people would come to you with every problem. Oh, I'm in debt. What do I do? I don't know. Yeah, debt too. Go to an accountant. I'm really depressed. What do I do? Go to a therapist, go to a therapist. Go to a therapist. Oh, I've got this, I've got this itch, and they're saying that I should do that, take this medicine. What do I want to the doctor? Because I'm not a medical? Yeah, it's wild. Like, as a pastor, they expect you to have all the answers and so, stepping out of that world, it's like yeah I don't have to have the answers and I love it.

:: 18:08

I love knowing, I love in this realm of like this. I have no answers and I'm okay with that.

:: 18:17

Yeah, absolutely. So I have been finishing these episodes with what would you say to someone who is fresh in their deconstruction, or they are fresh out of church, deep in their healing of religious trauma? What would you say to that person?

:: 18:34

I would say get a community, because if you're isolated while doing it, I think that's where I would have had trouble. I think that's where I would have really struggled mentally. So find a community who are going to love you, for you, who aren't going to question that because you're deconstructing, you're a bad person or you're sinful or whatever. Find people who don't care that you're deconstructing and know that if you are still in that place of is it okay for me to be deconstructing? You're still like in that early stage as a Christian. Know that when Christians call you a doubting Thomas, that's a compliment. Yeah, because doubting Thomas gets a bad rap and it's the worst label, because a doubting Thomas makes it sound like a slag, like we're tearing you down. But the thing about Thomas that I admire most is when you look at his story. Every other one of the disciples it says they saw Jesus and believed that he had risen again.

:: 19:40

They saw him and we give Thomas this bad. Well, christians give Thomas this bad rap because he said I won't believe until I see Jesus, and so everyone starts calling him Doubting Thomas. Jesus never throws shade on Thomas for doubting and for wanting to see, because everyone else had to see. The only thing Jesus said is blessed are those who haven't seen and believe. And he wasn't talking about people in the room. He was talking about people thousands of years later, us who never get the chance to see. And so being called doubt is okay, doubt is good. Question everything I wish. I wish if I had my time over with pastor, I could tell people to question everything I said from the pulpit. Yeah, because there's not always one lens that things can be interpreted through, and there's so much we just don't know and don't understand about the world of the Bible, the world of early Christians, and so we can't ever, ever choose to live our life solely around the words of about 2,000 years ago.

:: 20:50

It just doesn't make sense.

:: 20:51

Yeah, yeah, absolutely, questions are good.

:: 20:55

Questions are good.

:: 20:57

Yeah, I love that. Thank you so much for joining me.

:: 21:01

No worries, it's been so much fun.

:: 21:05

No, it's been so fun, I've loved it.

:: 21:08

Good I'm glad I've loved it too. It's been so fun. I've loved it. Good, I'm glad.

:: 21:11

I've loved it too. Thanks for tuning in to this episode of Beyond the Surface. I hope you found today's conversation as insightful and inspiring as I did. If you enjoyed the episode, be sure to subscribe, leave a review and share it with others who might benefit from these stories. Stay connected with us on social media for updates and more content. I love connecting with all of you. Remember, no matter where you are in your journey, you're not alone. Until next time, keep exploring, keep questioning and keep moving forward. Take care.