đź“ť Episode Summary
Drawing from her new book, Defrocked: Good News from a Bad Pastor for a Better Church, Lillian shares her journey through ministry, the unexpected challenges she encountered, and the moments that forced her to rethink long-held assumptions about leadership, faith, and belonging.
This episode is an honest look at what happens when certainty begins to crack—and why that might not be the end of faith, but the beginning of something more real.
đź“š About the Book
Defrocked: Good News from a Bad Pastor for a Better Church
A candid and often humorous reflection on ministry, failure, and the possibility of a more honest and compassionate church. Lillian Daniel offers a rare behind-the-scenes look at pastoral life—challenging assumptions while pointing toward a healthier future.
👤 About the Guest
Lillian Daniel is a United Church of Christ minister, author, and speaker known for her wit, honesty, and thoughtful critique of modern church culture. Her work often explores faith, doubt, leadership, and the evolving role of the church in contemporary life.
đź”— Resources & Links
• Find Lillian’s book wherever books are sold
• Learn more about her work and writing: www.lilliandaniel.com
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00:00 --> 00:08 [SPEAKER_01]: I think we were all taught, well, okay, I was taught the Good Samarant story all wrong, which was the moral of the story is you should be a good Samarant, great.
00:08 --> 00:23 [SPEAKER_01]: I want to be a good Samarant, and of course, who want to be a good Samarant in the story, he's a cool guy, he has money, he has points at the end, he can drop the person off and pay for it, he's culturally sensitive, he knows that their enemies, it's like, yeah,
00:23 --> 00:33 [SPEAKER_01]: I want to do that, and I think in specifically Western culture, we're all like, yeah, let me earn this much money and become a partner to law firm, and then I'll be a really good Samaritan.
00:33 --> 00:35 [SPEAKER_01]: But it's a power position.
00:35 --> 00:46 [SPEAKER_01]: And we always assume that the choices for us are the two power roles, where either the helper, or the person who walks by and is busy going to the meeting, the priests, you know, they other in the story.
00:47 --> 00:51 [SPEAKER_01]: Because we don't want to think about being in the ditch.
00:54 --> 01:01 [SPEAKER_04]: Take a breath, breathe it in A mystery
01:02 --> 01:04 [SPEAKER_02]: Welcome to the deconstructions podcast.
01:04 --> 01:08 [SPEAKER_02]: I'm your host John Williamson and we are back with a brand new episode.
01:08 --> 01:18 [SPEAKER_02]: But with a returning guest that I'm very excited about, we had a great conversation as always, but before I get to that, there are a couple ways to support the podcast if you would like to.
01:18 --> 01:27 [SPEAKER_02]: If you, if you have the means to do so, number one, we have a brand new Patreon that we launched that has new incentives on there.
01:27 --> 01:40 [SPEAKER_02]: And one that I've been having a lot of fun with, so a lot of these topics that we've been doing deep dive episodes on, I do an even deeper dive on the Patreon and along with it, you also get some materials.
01:40 --> 01:57 [SPEAKER_02]: And so I've created some content there that you can use if you have a small group, if you just have a small discussion group with your friends, there's some resources that you can, you can actually touch and hold on to on there as well that I think are very fun.
01:57 --> 01:58 [SPEAKER_02]: Check that out.
01:58 --> 02:07 [SPEAKER_02]: If you don't want to do that, and you'd rather have a, you know, merch, and support in that way, we have a brand new designs up on the website.
02:07 --> 02:13 [SPEAKER_02]: So you can find that link through our website www.ddconstructionist.org.
02:14 --> 02:17 [SPEAKER_02]: How you can find the link through the shown-outs as well.
02:17 --> 02:18 [SPEAKER_02]: In fact, both links will be there.
02:18 --> 02:19 [SPEAKER_02]: All right.
02:20 --> 02:42 [SPEAKER_02]: Let's get into this one because this is a really fun conversation, and so there's a version of church most of us were handed at some point in our lives, a version that promised certainty, as a big one, clarity, maybe even a kind of moral high ground, but what happens when the people leading that version of church start to unravel it themselves, or worse,
02:42 --> 02:43 [SPEAKER_02]: when they become part of the problem.
02:44 --> 02:53 [SPEAKER_02]: Today, we're sitting down with Lillian Daniel, a pastor, a writer, and deeply honest voice in the conversation about what the church is and what it could be.
02:54 --> 03:02 [SPEAKER_02]: Her new book, Defraught, Good News from a Bad Pastor for a Better Church, is part memoir, part confession, and part prophetic critique.
03:02 --> 03:06 [SPEAKER_02]: It's not just about failure and ministry, it's about what we might actually learn from it.
03:07 --> 03:11 [SPEAKER_02]: Because what if the cracks in the system aren't the problem?
03:11 --> 03:12 [SPEAKER_02]: What if they're the invitation?
03:13 --> 03:23 [SPEAKER_02]: So on part one of this conversation we explore Lillian's journey through ministry, the moments that challenged her assumptions and how she began rethinking what it means to lead and belong within the church.
03:24 --> 03:30 [SPEAKER_02]: This is a conversation about honesty, humility, and maybe even hope on the other side of disappointment.
03:31 --> 03:33 [SPEAKER_02]: So pull up a chair and let's get into it.
03:34 --> 03:37 [SPEAKER_02]: Here is Lillian Freakin Daniels.
03:44 --> 03:47 [SPEAKER_02]: All right, very excited to have a returning guest.
03:47 --> 03:48 [SPEAKER_02]: It's been a little while.
03:48 --> 03:49 [SPEAKER_02]: It's been a few years at least.
03:49 --> 03:51 [SPEAKER_02]: Thank you for coming back.
03:51 --> 03:53 [SPEAKER_02]: Lillian Daniel so excited to have you here again.
03:53 --> 03:54 [SPEAKER_01]: Thanks.
03:55 --> 03:56 [SPEAKER_01]: It's great to be back.
03:56 --> 03:57 [SPEAKER_02]: Absolutely.
03:57 --> 03:58 [SPEAKER_02]: So you've got a new book out.
03:59 --> 03:59 [SPEAKER_02]: It was very cool.
04:00 --> 04:10 [SPEAKER_02]: Like I said, I was very excited when I saw your publicist email come into my inbox and say, Hey, Lillian's got a new book coming out as we discussed that you've got some life changes that you talk about in the book.
04:10 --> 04:14 [SPEAKER_02]: Obviously, you've moved to Grand Rapids, which is one of our favorite places.
04:15 --> 04:16 [SPEAKER_01]: Yeah, any of lights.
04:17 --> 04:27 [SPEAKER_02]: Yes, it's a it's a really cool city and I kind of feel like I kind of feel like they're growing because Detroit like for a long time hasn't been and so It's the other logical city, right?
04:27 --> 04:30 [SPEAKER_01]: So like, yeah, it's great these days.
04:30 --> 04:32 [SPEAKER_02]: Is it okay?
04:32 --> 04:35 [SPEAKER_02]: I don't want people to think I'm disparaging Detroit.
04:35 --> 04:37 [SPEAKER_02]: I love Detroit, but for a long time.
04:37 --> 04:43 [SPEAKER_01]: Yeah, I love getting to I, you know, I grow all over the state of Michigan in my work and I've really enjoyed Detroit.
04:44 --> 04:46 [SPEAKER_02]: That's awesome, all right, go to try it.
04:46 --> 04:48 [SPEAKER_02]: Yeah, keep hearing I need to get back.
04:48 --> 04:51 [SPEAKER_02]: Now that they've kind of cleaned up the area a little.
04:51 --> 04:53 [SPEAKER_02]: So one of these days, look it back up there.
04:54 --> 04:56 [SPEAKER_02]: So let's talk about the new book a little bit.
04:56 --> 05:04 [SPEAKER_02]: You opened by saying that this isn't a story told from a place of clarity or victory, but from inside the confusion and embarrassment.
05:04 --> 05:06 [SPEAKER_02]: Why was it important for you to write it?
05:07 --> 05:09 [SPEAKER_02]: That way instead of from hindsight.
05:10 --> 05:14 [SPEAKER_01]: Well, the beginning of the book is written that way.
05:14 --> 05:29 [SPEAKER_01]: I do eventually get to some semblance of reflection in there, but the book is defrapped, good news from a bad pastor for better church, and it tells a story that I've been carrying for over a decade.
05:29 --> 05:35 [SPEAKER_01]: So it's not a fresh thing that I've just gone through and in telling the story,
05:35 --> 05:45 [SPEAKER_01]: At least in the beginning chapters, I wanted to try to take myself and the reader back to my mindset as I was going through the experience at the time.
05:45 --> 05:47 [SPEAKER_02]: Love it.
05:48 --> 05:52 [SPEAKER_02]: So you say this isn't an answer key necessarily.
05:52 --> 05:53 [SPEAKER_02]: You point that out.
05:53 --> 05:55 [SPEAKER_02]: It's a collection of honest questions, which
05:56 --> 06:00 [SPEAKER_02]: You know, for anybody who's been listening to this podcast for a while knows that we are all about honesty and authenticity.
06:02 --> 06:05 [SPEAKER_02]: What were the biggest questions you were wrestling with when you started writing?
06:06 --> 06:12 [SPEAKER_01]: Well, so that, I mean, obviously, it's not a self-help book because the title is defrapped, you know.
06:13 --> 06:26 [SPEAKER_01]: But the incident that happened to me was, it was, as I said, back in 15, I was at a big church in Chicago, it was growing, I was writing books, I was, you know, on the treadmill, uh,
06:26 --> 06:31 [SPEAKER_01]: sort of metaphorically speaking, I'm trying to do all the things all the time.
06:31 --> 06:36 [SPEAKER_01]: And then I went through a divorce, both abandoned me and cut me off.
06:36 --> 06:40 [SPEAKER_01]: Now to be fair, they called it graduation, but it's still hurt.
06:40 --> 06:41 [SPEAKER_01]: Hold getting there.
06:41 --> 06:44 [SPEAKER_01]: But you know, it was just one of those mid-life.
06:44 --> 06:47 [SPEAKER_01]: Everything was hitting at once, along with amped up everything.
06:47 --> 06:50 [SPEAKER_01]: And sadly, I was getting into divorce.
06:50 --> 07:08 [SPEAKER_01]: And so I get through that time as the senior minister of church in the suburbs of Chicago, and it's like almost two years later, and I receive word that I'm under a ministerial fitness review, and it was for something that had happened 18 months earlier.
07:08 --> 07:14 [SPEAKER_01]: And the just of it was, I had an inappropriate relationship with a member of my staff.
07:14 --> 07:15 [SPEAKER_01]: It was wrong.
07:15 --> 07:16 [SPEAKER_01]: I shouldn't have done it.
07:16 --> 07:24 [SPEAKER_01]: I was the head of staff, you know, but, but, but the letter in all that came as a shock because it was sort of in the past.
07:24 --> 07:41 [SPEAKER_01]: And so that led to sort of a year long process where I was plucked out of the church immediately and all of a sudden my whole life I had mostly had been a pastor, you know, and I had this sort of year
07:41 --> 07:47 [SPEAKER_01]: in exile, if you will, from my own calling or vocation.
07:47 --> 07:50 [SPEAKER_01]: And yeah, that's what I'm trying to write about.
07:50 --> 07:56 [SPEAKER_01]: So when the book begins, it's literally the beginning of it is it's Palm Sunday coming up.
07:56 --> 08:05 [SPEAKER_01]: And it's like the Thursday before Palm Sunday, and I get a knock on the door, and it's this registered letter telling me that I'm under a fitness review.
08:05 --> 08:14 [SPEAKER_01]: And I'm told, you know, by the powers that be that I must immediately leave the church, so I'm not going to show up for Holy Week or Palm Sunday.
08:14 --> 08:19 [SPEAKER_01]: And I'm going to go through an investigation and a trial and, you know, all the things.
08:19 --> 08:28 [SPEAKER_01]: And at the time, I thought it would be a few weeks and we'd sort of figure out where we were going, but end up being almost a year that I was out of the ministry.
08:29 --> 08:30 [SPEAKER_01]: And then I came back, right?
08:31 --> 08:34 [SPEAKER_01]: And yet this story is with me.
08:34 --> 08:41 [SPEAKER_01]: And so when I begin in those early chapters, you know, I'm telling it like I was feeling it at the time.
08:43 --> 09:04 [SPEAKER_02]: Yeah, that's, you know, that you're probably felt a bit like you're wandering through the desert, you know, and for a lot of folks who are listening, you know, it's sort of the reverse or sort of the mirror image of a lot of folks experience is just in terms of leaving or getting booted out of, you know, and a lot of cases even jarlical church where that was their sole identity.
09:04 --> 09:07 [SPEAKER_02]: much like it was your sole identity to be the pastor.
09:07 --> 09:19 [SPEAKER_02]: So like in a way there's this weird parallel there where, you know, they felt probably lost for a little while too and wandering through the wilderness and trying to figure out, like who am I without this identity?
09:20 --> 09:32 [SPEAKER_01]: Yes, yes, and I think it's important to say up front that unlike some people who might be listening, who were kicked out of their church because they were queer or denied leadership or those kind of things.
09:33 --> 09:39 [SPEAKER_01]: I mean, in my case, I think of it as like being in the ditch, like the good Samaritan, I was the person in the ditch.
09:39 --> 09:42 [SPEAKER_01]: But in my case, I kind of jumped in the ditch.
09:42 --> 09:53 [SPEAKER_01]: And then I brought a shovel and dug it deeper, you know, so that is a different kind of X when, you know, you feel like, okay, wait, I did do something wrong.
09:53 --> 09:55 [SPEAKER_01]: And yet, right?
09:55 --> 09:58 [SPEAKER_01]: And yet, the process was a very strange one.
09:59 --> 10:14 [SPEAKER_02]: Yeah, and my next question kind of couples with that a little bit in the sense that I think one of the things that people talk about a lot who find themselves either leaving or kicked out of a church environment is this there's this a lot of times off
10:14 --> 10:16 [SPEAKER_02]: a sense of isolation.
10:16 --> 10:25 [SPEAKER_02]: And I'm certain that that was very isolating for you as well because you talk about in the book about how you go from being the pastor who's the person that everybody goes to for everything.
10:25 --> 10:29 [SPEAKER_02]: You know, you know, my dad was a pastor grew up in that environment as well.
10:29 --> 10:32 [SPEAKER_02]: And you know, I remember the phone all the time.
10:32 --> 10:34 [SPEAKER_01]: while then P.K.
10:34 --> 10:36 [SPEAKER_02]: Yeah, yes, yes.
10:36 --> 10:40 [SPEAKER_02]: Yeah, it's good that I didn't end up in a workplace.
10:40 --> 10:41 [SPEAKER_02]: That's a past-trisk kid.
10:42 --> 10:45 [SPEAKER_02]: It was sort of a full circle moment for sure.
10:45 --> 10:48 [SPEAKER_02]: But having seen that lifestyle, you're on call 24-7.
10:49 --> 10:55 [SPEAKER_02]: And then you mentioned going from that person to the person that people don't ought to talk to you anymore.
10:56 --> 11:01 [SPEAKER_01]: And so... Not only that, they weren't allowed to.
11:01 --> 11:15 [SPEAKER_01]: So part of what I don't try to overly analyze the fitness review process that I went through in my denomination, but there are some general themes that I think are worth talking about.
11:15 --> 11:18 [SPEAKER_01]: So my denomination is the United Church of Christ.
11:18 --> 11:24 [SPEAKER_01]: We are a reform Christian denomination, but we tend to be on the progressive side.
11:24 --> 11:29 [SPEAKER_01]: We have a list of first, the first woman or
11:29 --> 11:30 [SPEAKER_01]: Yeti, yeti, yeti.
11:31 --> 11:34 [SPEAKER_01]: But we tend to be pretty progressive, right?
11:34 --> 11:55 [SPEAKER_01]: So in some ways the some people might be surprised that the process was as strict as it was, but you have to remember that in that moment in time the pendulum always swings and we were coming off of the clergy sex abuse scandals of the Catholic Church and the terrible sins
11:55 --> 11:58 [SPEAKER_01]: also in the Protestant Church as we now understand, right?
11:59 --> 12:00 [SPEAKER_01]: This is not a count problem.
12:00 --> 12:07 [SPEAKER_01]: But of taking predatory clergy and just sweeping it under the rock or allowing them to move from one place to another.
12:08 --> 12:12 [SPEAKER_01]: And so in my own denomination and many denominations now,
12:12 --> 12:34 [SPEAKER_01]: the pendulum swing the other way so that the way it went was if there's a complaint about you, they take it and they write it up as a sort of case study where they take out the genders, the age, the place, you know, and they say, if this were true, could this person be a danger to their congregate?
12:34 --> 12:37 [SPEAKER_01]: And that's a pretty low threshold, right?
12:38 --> 12:43 [SPEAKER_01]: So for that reason, I was immediately pulled out of the pulpit, but I thought, well,
12:44 --> 12:48 [SPEAKER_01]: At a certain point, they're going to figure out that while I did something wrong, I'm not a predator.
12:49 --> 12:55 [SPEAKER_01]: And I'll be able to come back and talk to my church, talk to the leaders, maybe I'm done there, right?
12:56 --> 13:02 [SPEAKER_01]: But it could be some sort of confession repentance, kind of a conversation, as well as a goodbye.
13:03 --> 13:08 [SPEAKER_01]: But instead, what happens in many of our denominations now, as you are plucked out,
13:08 --> 13:21 [SPEAKER_01]: And then this very labyrinth in process goes on where it's done by combination of volunteers and there's laypeople and ministers and so it takes a long, long time.
13:21 --> 13:27 [SPEAKER_01]: And so in my case, I was investigated for all this time and I thought, well, surely then they'll figure out
13:27 --> 13:35 [SPEAKER_01]: there's not a long list of people or something like that, but then I went sort of to the what I call the tribunal, but people call it different things.
13:36 --> 13:41 [SPEAKER_01]: And I was suspended, I was later suspended again.
13:41 --> 13:49 [SPEAKER_01]: And a lot of it is that you are judged for how you handle the process of being judged.
13:49 --> 14:10 [SPEAKER_01]: and so the process was long anyway so obviously in the midst of that I lost my job at this church because they can't keep, keep waiting for you you know if you go through this and it was just a surreal experience where I thought you know I knew of guys this happened to or who messed up but I had never heard of
14:10 --> 14:37 [SPEAKER_01]: one that went quite the way mine went, and I was also one of the few women senior pastors of a large church, not only in my denomination, but kind of in main line I was writing books, you know, all those things, and then so not only was I told I was not allowed to speak to anyone in the church, but I was allowed to speak to other clergy, and I wasn't allowed to write or speak publicly.
14:37 --> 14:51 [SPEAKER_01]: And the way it works in the church, you know, there's no labor laws in the church, so I could have walked away and said, you know, forget it, it's a free country like we used to think back then before the last few years.
14:52 --> 15:02 [SPEAKER_01]: But you know, I, I could have said, I'm going to talk to over I want to, but if I had any hope of ever returning to the ministry, I had to do what I was told.
15:04 --> 15:05 [SPEAKER_01]: So it was profoundly isolating.
15:06 --> 15:11 [SPEAKER_01]: I lived four blocks from this church on a 20 people.
15:11 --> 15:17 [SPEAKER_01]: And if you think the church had 1 members, like one in 20 people was gonna be my church member.
15:17 --> 15:21 [SPEAKER_01]: People literally parked outside my house to walk to church.
15:21 --> 15:26 [SPEAKER_01]: And I was kind of under this house arrest because I wasn't allowed to talk to anybody.
15:27 --> 15:28 [SPEAKER_02]: Wow.
15:28 --> 15:29 [SPEAKER_02]: That's interesting.
15:29 --> 15:52 [SPEAKER_02]: I, um, this time last year, almost a year ago, actually now, I really stay limited series podcast effort from, from the deconstruction has called spoiled fruit where I, for the first time attempted to do it like sort of an investigation style podcast into a non-dominational movement that had and still has profound issues, you know, with with
15:52 --> 16:02 [SPEAKER_02]: with a number of things, but ultimately, you know, sort of the thing that you were talking about in the sense that it was predatory and involving minors and things that are very different from your story.
16:02 --> 16:05 [SPEAKER_02]: And so yeah, we do see examples of this happening all over the place.
16:05 --> 16:12 [SPEAKER_02]: And not just that movement, that was just the one that was most familiar to me that I had some connection to at one point.
16:12 --> 16:26 [SPEAKER_02]: And so, yes, so there is an obligation from the overarching organizations that run these denominations or non-denominations, in that case, to do something, but it seems like we're still sort of figuring out exactly what that looks like.
16:27 --> 16:34 [SPEAKER_02]: It feels, you know, it seems like, especially in your case, like it seems like they didn't have the greatest structure, maybe in place.
16:35 --> 16:53 [SPEAKER_01]: Again, that's really not the subject of the book, you know, but it was more what I experienced how I felt, but also how I grew in some ways that I never would have chosen that method of growth or spiritual growth.
16:54 --> 16:57 [SPEAKER_01]: But also, you know, I had to look at myself.
16:57 --> 17:04 [SPEAKER_01]: So the incident in
17:04 --> 17:29 [SPEAKER_01]: stupid and and I knew that right and but then to you know circle back I kept thinking yes I understand and trust the process of the beginning because what if they were a list of people and a lot of times if you've done those investigations you know that one person comes out and then it's you know you have other victims and people who've been
17:29 --> 17:37 [SPEAKER_01]: been taken advantage of and vulnerable people have been harmed, you know, not concerning adults, but there's there's generally a pattern, right?
17:37 --> 17:47 [SPEAKER_01]: But but in my case, I think I was just, you know, having a middle-life crisis and screw it up, and which is not to make light of it.
17:47 --> 17:52 [SPEAKER_01]: But what happened to me is that in that isolation,
17:52 --> 17:57 [SPEAKER_01]: I learned a lot of things about being a minister that I was doing that weren't healthy.
17:57 --> 18:03 [SPEAKER_01]: Like now I look back and I see this was like a train wreck waiting to happen and for myself.
18:04 --> 18:05 [SPEAKER_01]: It was the classic scenario.
18:05 --> 18:07 [SPEAKER_01]: The church was big.
18:07 --> 18:20 [SPEAKER_01]: If I had friends outside the church, they joined the church, you know, my hobby, if you asked me, it was like writing books about Christianity and the spiritual but not religious, which now I think it's like not a great hobby.
18:20 --> 18:22 [SPEAKER_01]: That's really my job, you know?
18:23 --> 18:28 [SPEAKER_01]: And it was the classic scenario of not having a life, but then you go through a divorce.
18:28 --> 18:37 [SPEAKER_01]: And you know, if you've done through that experience, you know, you lose friends and are isolated
18:37 --> 18:51 [SPEAKER_01]: The deeper spiritual lesson I learned is that I think as human beings, we are afraid of tragedy and sadness and failure and we're afraid it's contagious and so we pull away from it.
18:52 --> 18:55 [SPEAKER_01]: So, you know, I was told to sign all these papers.
18:55 --> 19:00 [SPEAKER_01]: which I was allowed to keep or have copies of, but it was like basically don't talk to anybody.
19:00 --> 19:09 [SPEAKER_01]: And the congregation was told, if you speak to Lillian, you will jeopardize her standing as a minister, and she couldn't return.
19:09 --> 19:14 [SPEAKER_01]: And so literally I'm watching people like cross the street to avoid me.
19:14 --> 19:17 [SPEAKER_01]: You know, in this town, I lived in.
19:17 --> 19:18 [SPEAKER_02]: Oh my goodness.
19:18 --> 19:27 [SPEAKER_02]: And it's like, I just, I really want to emphasize the point though that there's a huge difference between these types of investigations.
19:27 --> 19:46 [SPEAKER_02]: Like what you described is really like, you know, like you said it may not have been right, but it's also very human because at the end of the day, you're human being and it was in involved to consensual adults and that is very different from the from the plague of.
19:46 --> 20:11 [SPEAKER_02]: you know of these other scandals that that we see in the church today and and again you know the aspect of the community or the communal side of what it means to be human to remove that or to drive somebody of that is yeah so that had to be difficult and I think one of the things that you talk about that is kind of funny is use humor in a lot of places in the book and I think
20:11 --> 20:20 [SPEAKER_02]: I recognize that a lot because that is the way that I tend to deal with things like, you know, I have to laugh through it, you know, like that's the way I heal.
20:20 --> 20:33 [SPEAKER_02]: And so you talk about the the bad pastures club and so talk about like the role of humor in helping you survive that season because I do think that there's a healing power in laughter and sometimes that's the thing that gets you through.
20:34 --> 20:35 [SPEAKER_01]: Absolutely.
20:35 --> 20:43 [SPEAKER_01]: I mean, I've always used laughter and humor, both as a coping mechanism, but also as a political device.
20:44 --> 20:47 [SPEAKER_01]: You know, I find that a lot of times you can make a poet more strongly using humor.
20:48 --> 20:50 [SPEAKER_01]: And they don't necessarily see you coming.
20:50 --> 20:52 [SPEAKER_01]: And so I've done that in preaching.
20:52 --> 21:00 [SPEAKER_01]: I also would say that if you ask people in the church as I serve, they would say I was a very real person in the pulpit.
21:00 --> 21:02 [SPEAKER_01]: I didn't have like a fakey, fakey, minister voice.
21:02 --> 21:04 [SPEAKER_01]: I didn't say these weird things.
21:04 --> 21:06 [SPEAKER_01]: They teach people in seminary.
21:06 --> 21:13 [SPEAKER_01]: Like, I mean, who teaches these people to talk like weirdos to say things like,
21:13 --> 21:14 [SPEAKER_01]: You know, who talks like that?
21:15 --> 21:15 [SPEAKER_01]: Nobody.
21:15 --> 21:18 [SPEAKER_01]: And I never talks like that, right?
21:18 --> 21:24 [SPEAKER_01]: You know, and our church was like a landing place for kind of, you know, the island of misfit toys.
21:24 --> 21:36 [SPEAKER_01]: And so I also think that the church members said this will be dealt with and taken care of in some way, you know, and then when it resulted in this separation, you have these rules then that
21:36 --> 21:42 [SPEAKER_01]: you're not supposed to meddle in a congregation, you should be a part of, which again, good reasons for that.
21:43 --> 21:49 [SPEAKER_01]: But the humor, you know, I was writing about the experience as I was going through it.
21:49 --> 21:55 [SPEAKER_01]: And almost all of that writing is really not worth anybody else reading.
21:55 --> 22:00 [SPEAKER_01]: Some of it was really funny, and the Presbyterian publishers would let me put it in.
22:00 --> 22:11 [SPEAKER_01]: There is some funny stuff, you know, like, I end up, you know, there's people showing up at my house on Palm Sunday after the announcement, I'm four blocks away, they're parked outside.
22:11 --> 22:20 [SPEAKER_01]: They start showing up and texting me, so I'm throwing stuff in a suitcase, running out the back door, and I drive to Madison, Wisconsin, to get away.
22:20 --> 22:28 [SPEAKER_01]: And I'm, like, drinking bourbons in this bar that's literally called the weary traveler.
22:28 --> 22:35 [SPEAKER_01]: Yeah, and I'm like rewriting my sermon on cocktail napkins, you know, covered in tears, right?
22:35 --> 22:51 [SPEAKER_01]: And, you know, but it's also, because, you know, when you, when you go through something like that, you can be grandiose, and I was doing that, even stuff I did that, like, I look back, and I just think, I can't believe I did that.
22:51 --> 23:12 [SPEAKER_01]: I always hated it on TV shows, cops shows, you know, where the cop like shows up at the church and is banging on the door and wants to talk about the priest about, you know, how can you believe in God when this, this innocent child was murdered and this and that and the priest always like, you know, is there listing in the cops like this is why I don't go to church and I'm always like,
23:12 --> 23:16 [SPEAKER_01]: You know, you narcissistic cop give the priest a break.
23:16 --> 23:34 [SPEAKER_01]: He doesn't need to answer your confirmation class questions about why things have it a bad people and then have you insult the church, you know, and also priest and ministers don't live in the church and they're not sitting there waiting for you to come and give your little speech, you know, but literally
23:34 --> 23:40 [SPEAKER_01]: that Monday, I was driving around in my car trying to find a church for my denomination.
23:40 --> 23:41 [SPEAKER_01]: It was locked.
23:41 --> 23:43 [SPEAKER_01]: There was a Catholic church across the street.
23:43 --> 23:49 [SPEAKER_01]: I thought I heard some people in the courtyard, probably the priest tried to have quiet time.
23:50 --> 23:51 [SPEAKER_01]: And I'm climbing up over the fence.
23:51 --> 23:54 [SPEAKER_00]: Like, hey, is this open?
23:54 --> 23:55 [SPEAKER_00]: Is anyone there?
23:55 --> 23:58 [SPEAKER_00]: Like, I just thought maybe I could come in and talk to somebody.
23:59 --> 24:01 [SPEAKER_00]: That's amazing.
24:02 --> 24:03 [SPEAKER_00]: I was feeling like you
24:04 --> 24:08 [SPEAKER_00]: No, no, they were like, you know, leave us alone.
24:09 --> 24:11 [SPEAKER_02]: That's amazing.
24:12 --> 24:18 [SPEAKER_01]: Yeah, you know, having always looked thought those people ridiculous, I became one of them.
24:18 --> 24:24 [SPEAKER_01]: And that's what happens when your life turns upside down in ways that you didn't predict.
24:25 --> 24:25 [SPEAKER_02]: Absolutely.
24:26 --> 24:31 [SPEAKER_02]: Well, I have to ask because Adam will yell at me if I don't, but what do you remember what bourbon you were drinking at the time?
24:31 --> 24:32 [SPEAKER_01]: I'm sure I'm stricken maker's mark.
24:33 --> 24:34 [SPEAKER_02]: Okay, all right, that's fair.
24:34 --> 24:35 [SPEAKER_02]: That's fair.
24:35 --> 24:37 [SPEAKER_01]: Yeah.
24:38 --> 24:42 [SPEAKER_02]: I totally lost the thought I'd just had, there's someone I wanted to circle back on, but I'll come to it, you made me laugh.
24:43 --> 24:51 [SPEAKER_02]: So, one of the things that, one of the most compelling tensions in the book is that you don't dismiss accountability.
24:51 --> 24:54 [SPEAKER_02]: And I think you've made that clear in your remarks so far.
24:54 --> 25:02 [SPEAKER_02]: You're clear that something went wrong, but you also show how damaging, you know, like you just said, the process can be, how do you hold those two truths together now?
25:02 --> 25:07 [SPEAKER_02]: Like, like, I guess what are your takeaways from that process and now that you've got hindsight?
25:08 --> 25:10 [SPEAKER_01]: Yeah, you know, everybody wants a tidy answer.
25:11 --> 25:28 [SPEAKER_01]: So in our process and in this of many, many different types of churches, you know, if you've done something wrong, they can defrock you forever or they can temporarily defrock you, you know, suspend you or something like that and give you a program of growth.
25:28 --> 25:38 [SPEAKER_01]: And it's like, you know, go see a spiritual director, go get therapy, go walk a lab rinse, go, you know, go into rehab if that's your issue.
25:38 --> 25:40 [SPEAKER_01]: You know, whatever it is, like they give you a program group.
25:41 --> 25:43 [SPEAKER_01]: And so people will often say, well, look at...
25:43 --> 25:48 [SPEAKER_01]: it worked because I did ultimately return to ministry.
25:48 --> 26:05 [SPEAKER_01]: My standing was restored and I went through this program of growth, but in the book I talk about what that was like and I just, I really don't recommend forcing people into spiritual direction in order to keep their, their
26:06 --> 26:06 [SPEAKER_01]: You know?
26:07 --> 26:13 [SPEAKER_01]: And so there were so many things I was asked to do, some of which I really do think were ridiculous.
26:14 --> 26:22 [SPEAKER_01]: Like I was already in therapy, I believe in therapy, I'd been in couples counseling through my divorce, you know, all the things.
26:22 --> 26:27 [SPEAKER_01]: And one of the things they told me was, get a new therapist who is a young man.
26:27 --> 26:31 [SPEAKER_01]: And when I said, on what basis, right?
26:31 --> 26:35 [SPEAKER_01]: And they said, well, obviously your current one isn't working out for you.
26:36 --> 26:36 [SPEAKER_01]: Thanks.
26:37 --> 26:46 [SPEAKER_01]: I mean, that's the beauty of having volunteers on a committee do an important work as that sometimes, you know, so there were things like that.
26:46 --> 26:53 [SPEAKER_01]: I was asked to take courses that didn't exist and weren't be offered, you know, and it was like everybody could add their thing.
26:53 --> 26:57 [SPEAKER_01]: And then there were also people, you know, of course I was required to spiritual direction.
26:57 --> 27:06 [SPEAKER_01]: And, you know, some of those were probably offered in love, from somebody who had benefited from it, and some of them were perhaps not offered in love,
27:06 --> 27:13 [SPEAKER_01]: like let's throw things in front of you, you know, and and yet, right, and yet.
27:13 --> 27:25 [SPEAKER_01]: So I go to this spiritual director and I don't want to go and she's a Catholic laywoman who's in Franciscan lay order and it's this dumpy basement, you know.
27:25 --> 27:29 [SPEAKER_01]: And I'm all defended, I'm mad, I'm about to quit the process.
27:30 --> 27:37 [SPEAKER_01]: And literally this woman walks out and her face and body looked like they were surrounded by light.
27:39 --> 27:48 [SPEAKER_01]: And she's like this, I'm a small person, she's a large person, and she comes toward me, you know, like this, and I thought I was an angel.
27:49 --> 27:49 [SPEAKER_01]: Honestly.
27:49 --> 27:53 [SPEAKER_01]: And all of a sudden, all my anger,
27:53 --> 28:00 [SPEAKER_01]: was gone because I, you know, as soon as you just sense, like this is a godly, kind, humble, good person.
28:01 --> 28:09 [SPEAKER_01]: And she, she just woke me into her office and I was like, okay, you know, so despite the resistance, right?
28:10 --> 28:11 [SPEAKER_01]: The spirit can move.
28:12 --> 28:12 [SPEAKER_03]: Yeah.
28:13 --> 28:20 [SPEAKER_01]: Has she was an extraordinary kind person?
28:22 --> 28:52 [SPEAKER_03]: Because he has a body or even a name But if he does, does he know that I'm alive He's got it Even here But though she kept it I doubt she kept it I feel something to
28:52 --> 29:15 [SPEAKER_04]: When you call me, we'll survive.
29:15 --> 29:16 [SPEAKER_04]: So take a breath, breathe it in.
29:16 --> 29:16 [SPEAKER_04]: The mystery that is this.
29:17 --> 29:17 [SPEAKER_04]: The universe, we don't know you.
29:21 --> 29:46 [SPEAKER_03]: If God has a face, His face must look like you're Did God kill His kin?
29:47 --> 29:52 [SPEAKER_03]: Did he have to have blood before he would forget?
29:53 --> 30:08 [SPEAKER_03]: Maybe we made a God, it looks like us, does God know my name?
30:09 --> 30:20 [SPEAKER_03]: Is the aching my soldiers confined to my brain, even so does I need?
30:20 --> 30:26 [SPEAKER_03]: It's not real.
30:26 --> 30:34 [SPEAKER_04]: So take a breath of breathing, the mystery that is the
30:39 --> 30:57 [SPEAKER_04]: If God has a face, her face must look like you.
31:07 --> 31:29 [SPEAKER_03]: The face like a teen, and I'm at a mild red A rock, sand, and it's husband God send their children Fays like a Kim A TED or Tyrone A Lucy born with an extra chromosome
31:29 --> 31:50 [SPEAKER_03]: Pablo with legs, he can't move by himself A girl born a Daniel, who now is then well A pillaging Eve, and white guy's name died If you have a heartbeat, you are the...
31:58 --> 32:24 [SPEAKER_04]: To take a breath, breathe, a mystery that is there.
32:27 --> 32:56 [SPEAKER_03]: If God has a face, the face must look, if God has a face, his face must look, if God has a face, his face must look, if God has a face, his face must look, if God has a face, his face must look, if God has a face, his face must look, if God has a face must look, if God has a face must look, if God has a face must look, if God has a face must look, if God has a face must look, if God has a face must look, if God has a face must look, if God has a face must look, if God has a face must look, if God has a face must look, if God has a face must look, if God has a face must look, if God has a face must look, if God has a face must look, if God has a face must look, if God has a face must look, if God has a face must look, if God has a face must look, if God has a face must look, if God has a face