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Christianity and Marginalized People: Part 1 · Stuff Mom Never Told You

0:05
Speaker 1: Hey, this is Annie and Samantha and welcome to Stephane.
0:07
Speaker 1: Never told you your production of iHeartRadio. Okay, Annie, before
0:20
Speaker 1: we even start, I'm gonna go ahead and ask a
0:23
Speaker 1: big question because I know we've talked about our religious
0:26
Speaker 1: experiences before, but just kind of a reminder so we
0:30
Speaker 1: can kind of get on the same page before we
0:33
Speaker 1: start these episodes. And I said multiple by the way,
0:36
Speaker 1: were you super religious growing up? I went through I
0:40
Speaker 1: would say a two year phase where I was very
0:45
Speaker 1: very religious, like donated my allowance money to the church.
0:50
Speaker 1: I was thinking about this because we have been planning
0:53
Speaker 1: these episodes for a while and here they are perfect timing,
0:59
Speaker 1: and they are they are a couple of them coming.
1:01
Speaker 1: But I was thinking about, like why why that is?
1:05
Speaker 1: And I think it's because I got kind of called
1:07
Speaker 1: out and embarrassed in front of all my classmates when
1:10
Speaker 1: I was younger because I didn't know what Christianity was. Wow,
1:14
Speaker 1: I like I went to church. I think I just
1:16
Speaker 1: didn't put together. So somebody asked me if I was
1:19
Speaker 1: Christian and I like froze up in front of everybody,
1:22
Speaker 1: and I was like, oh, I don't know. And then
1:25
Speaker 1: that was such a sin in small town Georgia, right, like,
1:29
Speaker 1: oh god, she's not a Christian. So it was around
1:34
Speaker 1: that time I really became very very religious. I volunteered,
1:39
Speaker 1: I gave all my money and went to all the classes.
1:42
Speaker 1: But I think it only lasted two years. I did
1:45
Speaker 1: go until about eighth grade. I went to church, but
1:50
Speaker 1: then in eighth grade I stopped going and never really
1:52
Speaker 1: went back. Okay, we'll talk about that more. Yeah, we will.
1:56
Speaker 1: But your family wasn't religious either, right, not really. They
2:00
Speaker 1: became more religious after I moved out, actually, and as
2:03
Speaker 1: they got older, but as kids, I think we weren't
2:08
Speaker 1: super interested in it and it was just kind of
2:10
Speaker 1: a time suck for them. And I know how this sounds,
2:14
Speaker 1: but I think I honestly, I think they were just
2:15
Speaker 1: kind of tired and we weren't into it. So they're like,
2:17
Speaker 1: you know what, we did the thing, right, let's just
2:21
Speaker 1: stop now. So we stopped going to church regularly when
2:25
Speaker 1: I was in middle school. Okay, did you were you
2:29
Speaker 1: the holiday church types? Oh? Yes, yes, we went. We
2:33
Speaker 1: went in the holidays, and I wasn't a couple of
2:35
Speaker 1: the holiday plays o y, of course. But that was
2:40
Speaker 1: more my excitement about like wearing pajamas and getting to act.
2:46
Speaker 1: That's fair, That is fair. Yeah. I grew up, as
2:49
Speaker 1: we've talked about before, in a very super religious family.
2:52
Speaker 1: They are still very very religious, to the point that
2:56
Speaker 1: from my beginning in the in the United States, in Korea,
3:02
Speaker 1: I did have missionaries visit my orphanage. I remember this distinctly,
3:06
Speaker 1: so Westernized Christianity was a part of my past. So
3:11
Speaker 1: I have memories of that, and I remember these Christian
3:13
Speaker 1: people coming with guitars and singing to us. I remember
3:16
Speaker 1: this very clearly. But they were Asian, they were not
3:19
Speaker 1: from a different country. But of course, you know, that's
3:21
Speaker 1: a whole other thing. But I also remember doing Buddhist
3:23
Speaker 1: practices and ancestral practices because we would definitely do the
3:28
Speaker 1: whole respect of the elders, bowing to the elders, making
3:32
Speaker 1: sure that we were doing all these things. So I
3:33
Speaker 1: remember these things pretty clearly from my time as an adolescent.
3:38
Speaker 1: So I came here when I was sevenish to the US.
3:41
Speaker 1: After that I became a staunch Christian, and I hesitay
3:47
Speaker 1: say the word Christian, because even at that point in time,
3:51
Speaker 1: at the church that I had gone to, they do
3:55
Speaker 1: not think theology and getting education like that it's beneficial,
4:01
Speaker 1: and that they believed that to do this, to learn
4:03
Speaker 1: too much takes away from the faith part. It was
4:07
Speaker 1: not holy Spirit, it was holy ghost. They did communion
4:11
Speaker 1: with wine that they made themselves. They made unleavened bread themselves.
4:16
Speaker 1: There was a foot washing every year, a revival every year.
4:21
Speaker 1: If you were a pastor, it was because you were
4:24
Speaker 1: called to be like you literally had the spirit moved
4:27
Speaker 1: in you and you were told by Jesus that you
4:29
Speaker 1: were to speak the word of God. It was the
4:32
Speaker 1: ultimate gift. It wasn't because you went to get an
4:34
Speaker 1: education for it. That was almost blasphemous according to what
4:37
Speaker 1: I was raised by. They don't like other denominations, and
4:41
Speaker 1: that includes Methodists, that includes this sothern Baptist, definitely, no Catholics.
4:47
Speaker 1: It is a whole different world. I don't even really
4:50
Speaker 1: know what the denomination that I grew up in was.
4:53
Speaker 1: I've heard a primitive Baptist as part of it. I've
4:57
Speaker 1: also heard the term, and this could be just like
4:59
Speaker 1: a a nickname for it, foot washing Baptist. We were
5:04
Speaker 1: not quite Pentecostals. And when I say Pentecostal, I meant
5:08
Speaker 1: I mean the kind that believe in tongues and all that.
5:12
Speaker 1: We did have pianos, so they did believe in instruments
5:15
Speaker 1: and music like that. Because you know, the several churches
5:18
Speaker 1: that I knew in my small town did not have instruments.
5:21
Speaker 1: They thought that was blasphemous as well. Whole different thing.
5:25
Speaker 1: So I'll talk a little more about my experience, but
5:27
Speaker 1: that's what I grew up in. So believing in God,
5:30
Speaker 1: in Jesus was a no brainer. Like I was told,
5:33
Speaker 1: the reason I was in the US, the reason I
5:36
Speaker 1: was alive, point blank, was because I was saved by
5:39
Speaker 1: Jesus and God, and so therefore my life is dedicated
5:43
Speaker 1: to that purpose. So growing up, that's exactly what I believed.
5:47
Speaker 1: I believed that I was supposed to be a missionary.
5:50
Speaker 1: In the freshman year of college, I actually took off
5:52
Speaker 1: for a full year to go work in Oklahoma at
5:55
Speaker 1: a group home who actually specializes with Native and Indigenous people.
5:59
Speaker 1: And I'm sorry to that community. I knew what I
6:02
Speaker 1: knew now, everything I did was with good intent, and
6:05
Speaker 1: I believe that for most people who are Christians and
6:09
Speaker 1: who do believe in this idea of missionary and saving
6:12
Speaker 1: people like that's that's the idea. So I don't I
6:15
Speaker 1: can't get mad at that, but looking back at it now,
6:18
Speaker 1: I was like, oh man, that's really damaging and I
6:20
Speaker 1: really regret that part of my life. So I did
6:25
Speaker 1: all of this, and it wasn't until I left college
6:28
Speaker 1: and kind of worked in the real world and then
6:31
Speaker 1: my own personality did not mesh with what the church,
6:34
Speaker 1: what I was told by the church, and I'm saying
6:36
Speaker 1: capital C church, and that's how we probably gonna be
6:38
Speaker 1: talking about it throughout this episode. That's like until I
6:44
Speaker 1: walked away that I was like, this doesn't this doesn't work,
6:46
Speaker 1: this is not this doesn't make sense. And then of
6:50
Speaker 1: course I think we're going to talk more about the
6:52
Speaker 1: fact that this is more common, even though it feels
6:56
Speaker 1: so isolating when you go through these things. Yeah, I
7:00
Speaker 1: had that moment, and I can tell you almost exactly when,
7:03
Speaker 1: like I can remember what like what was happening and
7:05
Speaker 1: things that were happening and as it was unraveling for
7:08
Speaker 1: me essentially of what that looked like. But I still
7:13
Speaker 1: have small faith in things I don't know. I couldn't
7:15
Speaker 1: call it necessarily Christianity and God and all of that,
7:19
Speaker 1: but there is a bit of me that still believes
7:21
Speaker 1: in not necessarily we're not going to talk about manifest destiny,
7:25
Speaker 1: but along the lines of, like, it's not always just coincidence. Again,
7:30
Speaker 1: I don't know what that looks like to me necessarily,
7:34
Speaker 1: and it's hard to let go of like severn times,
7:36
Speaker 1: like when I get into a situation, I automatically like
7:39
Speaker 1: it doesn't necessarily go into prayer, but it's kind of
7:42
Speaker 1: that level of meditation of like please help me, please
7:46
Speaker 1: help me, don't let me die, type of conversations in
7:48
Speaker 1: my head. Right, But yeah, it's a whole thing. And
7:53
Speaker 1: of course these conversations like this you've had, You and
7:55
Speaker 1: I have had this so many times. I think I
7:57
Speaker 1: have it with all of my friends. We just have
7:59
Speaker 1: a whole breakdown of this conversation. Is why we're talking
8:02
Speaker 1: about this today. There is a point I swear to
8:04
Speaker 1: God and yeah, we're going on this journey on this
8:09
Speaker 1: Good Friday you celebrate It is April seventh, twenty twenty three,
8:15
Speaker 1: Good Friday, twenty twenty three. We're talking about I guess
8:20
Speaker 1: westernized Christianity and the marginalized people. And it is more
8:26
Speaker 1: than one episode because there's a lot to it. Oh,
8:29
Speaker 1: and before we start, I probably should have said, because
8:31
Speaker 1: for some of ye all do my comments, we're probably
8:34
Speaker 1: traumatizing and I'm so sorry. Content warning. We are going
8:40
Speaker 1: to be exploring Western Christianity, and I say Western Christianity obviously,
8:45
Speaker 1: we're focusing more on what is happening in the United
8:47
Speaker 1: States in America and those who have these types of
8:51
Speaker 1: Christian beliefs here which are which are different, obviously, and
8:57
Speaker 1: we want to talk about how this has caused trauma
9:00
Speaker 1: for a lot for women and for the marginalized community
9:03
Speaker 1: as a whole. Yeah, and like I said, like we said,
9:06
Speaker 1: we've been dancing around this topic. But y'all this research,
9:10
Speaker 1: we've been working on this for three months. In our
9:14
Speaker 1: contributor Joey, Thank you so much, Joey. It has done
9:17
Speaker 1: so much research for us, literally found probably what seventy
9:22
Speaker 1: five different references, and then we're on top of that.
9:25
Speaker 1: As we went along trying to pull out as much
9:29
Speaker 1: information as we can. There's articles upon articles, and trying
9:34
Speaker 1: to narrow down the information itself was hard, and of
9:37
Speaker 1: course there's lots of lots of opinions on the matter,
9:41
Speaker 1: and we're trying to not be so opinionated as much
9:43
Speaker 1: as we are looking at the statistics, it's kind of
9:46
Speaker 1: hard because as it is personal for us. I guess
9:48
Speaker 1: that's the other Yeah, learning for it. And again, yes,
9:54
Speaker 1: we're talking about religion trauma as a side note, we
9:58
Speaker 1: want to say right at the beginning, we're not trying
10:01
Speaker 1: to disparage or say that religion and spirituality is wrong
10:04
Speaker 1: in any way. Like I said, I still believe I
10:06
Speaker 1: am spiritual. There are things that I will still it's
10:09
Speaker 1: hard for me to get away from, and faith is
10:12
Speaker 1: powerful and being connected to spirituality can be powerful and
10:16
Speaker 1: can be really life saving. I really think that. I
10:19
Speaker 1: think part of what I went through growing up, if
10:22
Speaker 1: it had not been for the faith, the practices that
10:27
Speaker 1: I went through, I would have been in much more
10:30
Speaker 1: dire situations. I will say that. And what we're talking
10:33
Speaker 1: about specifically, I guess we're building up to and having
10:36
Speaker 1: a conversation of what is happening in the US today,
10:40
Speaker 1: what it looks like when we talk about the movement
10:42
Speaker 1: of deconstruction. We're going to explain what that is a
10:45
Speaker 1: little bit and then talk about it more in another episode,
10:48
Speaker 1: as well as how our country looks like it's going
10:54
Speaker 1: towards a Christian nationalist government, and we want to talk
10:59
Speaker 1: about why this should be a cautionary tale for us
11:02
Speaker 1: and that we need to be aware and educated on
11:05
Speaker 1: that subject. So with all of that, let's begin, yea,
11:10
Speaker 1: So let us do it, and let us start with
11:13
Speaker 1: an overview and history of Western religion, because as you said, yes,
11:18
Speaker 1: we're going to be focusing more so on Westernized Christianity
11:22
Speaker 1: and the evolution of what it is today and how
11:24
Speaker 1: that affects the marginalized communities. So we aren't necessarily doing
11:28
Speaker 1: a Bible lesson, which I did go to less How
11:33
Speaker 1: about that you're gonna one up me throughout this. I
11:37
Speaker 1: feel we are not talking theology, although theology does play
11:43
Speaker 1: a lot into today's societal views on gender and reality roles,
11:48
Speaker 1: which we do talk about throughout these episodes. We have
11:50
Speaker 1: several episodes related to this where we've talked about it
11:53
Speaker 1: as well. But let us start with some facts and statistics. So,
11:58
Speaker 1: religion is a large part of humanity. It shapes beliefs,
12:02
Speaker 1: it shapes values, it shapes behaviors. It plays a crucial
12:05
Speaker 1: role in developing an individual's perspectives towards life, society, and
12:10
Speaker 1: the world around them. However, studies suggest that there are
12:14
Speaker 1: significant gender differences in religious beliefs and practices. So, for example,
12:18
Speaker 1: American women are more likely than men to say that
12:21
Speaker 1: religion is quote very important in their lives. According to
12:25
Speaker 1: a survey conducted by Pew Research Center, sixty percent of
12:29
Speaker 1: women in the US say that religion is very important
12:31
Speaker 1: to them, compared to forty seven percent of men. Right,
12:35
Speaker 1: And the numbers actually higher than that. Again, so some
12:38
Speaker 1: of these research surveys came from twenty sixteen, twenty eighteen,
12:44
Speaker 1: twenty twenty, so we've tried to pick from h one.
12:46
Speaker 1: This is one of the bigger ones that happened, I
12:48
Speaker 1: believe in twenty eighteen, and it was saying that sixty
12:51
Speaker 1: percent is highly very important. There is also I think
12:55
Speaker 1: another twenty percent, So even say eighty percent of women
12:58
Speaker 1: in that point timeframe would say it was moderately important,
13:01
Speaker 1: So it's pretty high. The numbers are high. So on
13:04
Speaker 1: the same lines, American women are more likely to pray
13:07
Speaker 1: daily than American men. In the same survey, it showed
13:11
Speaker 1: that sixty four percent of women in the US pray
13:13
Speaker 1: daily versus the forty seven percent of men. And American
13:17
Speaker 1: women are also more likely to attend religious services, with
13:21
Speaker 1: around forty percent of women in the US attending weekly,
13:25
Speaker 1: while only thirty two percent of men attend. And if
13:30
Speaker 1: we take the numbers down by race, the studies show
13:33
Speaker 1: that the Black community are more likely to pray daily
13:36
Speaker 1: with forty seven percent, followed by the Latino community at
13:39
Speaker 1: thirty nine percent. And the Black and Latino communities are
13:43
Speaker 1: also more likely to attend a religious service on a
13:46
Speaker 1: daily basis, though I had to recheck that number. I
13:49
Speaker 1: was daily wow. Okay, daily wow. But for the weekly basis,
13:54
Speaker 1: the Latino community comes first with seventeen percent likely to attend,
13:58
Speaker 1: while the White community comes at sixteen percent, the Asian
14:00
Speaker 1: community at fourteen percent, and the Black community at thirteen percent.
14:04
Speaker 1: So these number numbers are kind of varied. But it's
14:08
Speaker 1: also noted in the A Gallop Pole from twenty seventeen
14:11
Speaker 1: that the Black community are most likely to identify as religious,
14:15
Speaker 1: with more than a two percent on that pole. Wow. Yeah,
14:31
Speaker 1: And within the queer community, religion is still important. I
14:35
Speaker 1: was thinking about this the other day with our book
14:37
Speaker 1: teamed with Glenn and Doyle. There was that whole passage
14:40
Speaker 1: about that almost half of the queer population that was
14:44
Speaker 1: surveyed for the Gallop Pole showed that religion still is
14:47
Speaker 1: considered a big part of their lives, that many still
14:51
Speaker 1: believe in God, they still attend religious services and pray regularly.
14:55
Speaker 1: The surveys showed at least forty seven percent as moderately
14:58
Speaker 1: or highly religious, while fifty three percent stated that they
15:02
Speaker 1: were not. However, those numbers have changed based on age
15:05
Speaker 1: and generation, with only thirty four percent of the eighteen
15:09
Speaker 1: to twenty four year olds being for it versus fifty
15:13
Speaker 1: six percent for fifty to sixty four year olds, So
15:16
Speaker 1: that's a pretty big difference. And within those statistics, the
15:19
Speaker 1: most religious in the queer community was the Black community,
15:23
Speaker 1: who for over seventy percent of those surveyed said that
15:26
Speaker 1: yes religious. But that is twelve percent less than the
15:29
Speaker 1: general population, and we will get into that a bit
15:32
Speaker 1: more later, but yes, the numbers seem to be going down,
15:36
Speaker 1: and as the current state of affairs have brought about
15:38
Speaker 1: the same significant and dangerous changes within the community, many
15:43
Speaker 1: continue to leave their religious ideology and the bias is
15:48
Speaker 1: shown against the LGBTQ plus community hasn't just insumus the
15:52
Speaker 1: queer community, but those who would consider themselves as allies
15:56
Speaker 1: for sure, and outside of the US there are similar
15:59
Speaker 1: studies to justing the same thing. A study in Europe
16:02
Speaker 1: showed that women were also more likely to pray, attend services,
16:06
Speaker 1: and believe in God as compared to men, and similar
16:09
Speaker 1: studies showed the same thing for women in the Middle
16:12
Speaker 1: East and South Asia too. Right, so the overall history
16:15
Speaker 1: of religion is complicated. We know this. Christianity was often
16:19
Speaker 1: an excuse of colonialization all over the world with an
16:23
Speaker 1: intent to conquer and rule, and the spread of Christianity
16:27
Speaker 1: was quick and widespread. Today, the topic of colonization and
16:31
Speaker 1: religion is a hot controversial issue, often causing defensiveness and disagreements,
16:38
Speaker 1: and it's still an issue when we talk about missionaries
16:41
Speaker 1: and current state of churches sending out people out in
16:45
Speaker 1: the world. But before we go there, we do want
16:47
Speaker 1: to talk about is there a reason why the marginalized community,
16:51
Speaker 1: specifically women, are more likely to be religious? And to
16:54
Speaker 1: be honest, the answer is not really, but there are
16:59
Speaker 1: some possible theories based on some of the research and surveys.
17:03
Speaker 1: In a twenty sixteen Pew Research study titled the Gender
17:07
Speaker 1: Gap in Religion around the World, they write based on
17:10
Speaker 1: these wide ranging and comprehensive data sets, so we just
17:13
Speaker 1: kind of talked about that. The study finds that globally,
17:16
Speaker 1: women are more devout than men by several standard measures
17:20
Speaker 1: of religious commitment, but the study also reveals a more
17:24
Speaker 1: complex relationship between religion and gender than has been commonly assumed.
17:29
Speaker 1: While women generally are more religious, men display higher levels
17:33
Speaker 1: of religious commitment in some countries and religious groups. So
17:36
Speaker 1: just to kind of ask more contexts, we're not talking
17:39
Speaker 1: much about the Muslim community. We're not talking about the
17:43
Speaker 1: Jewish community as much, which we should. We will try
17:47
Speaker 1: to come back to, but we're not necessarily focusing on that.
17:50
Speaker 1: But what we do see in that as well as Buddhism,
17:53
Speaker 1: there is a higher number of men committed to those
17:55
Speaker 1: types of religions. So that's what we're talking about here,
17:58
Speaker 1: and in other contexts. There are few, if any discernable
18:01
Speaker 1: gender differences and religion. So just a reminder, yes, and
18:05
Speaker 1: something to note from the same twenty sixteen Pew research
18:08
Speaker 1: on the gender gap of religiousness, US Christians differ from
18:12
Speaker 1: other countries. So here's a quote from the report. Men
18:16
Speaker 1: and women in the United States differ from each other
18:19
Speaker 1: in their levels of religious commitment to a greater extent
18:22
Speaker 1: than men and women differ in other economically advanced countries
18:26
Speaker 1: for which data are available, including Canada and the United Kingdom.
18:30
Speaker 1: While American men generally display less religious commitment than American women,
18:34
Speaker 1: both genders are more religious than men and women in
18:37
Speaker 1: other economically advanced countries, and with that information, the same
18:42
Speaker 1: report shows the variation around the world. It goes on
18:45
Speaker 1: to say the gender gap among Christians, as well as
18:47
Speaker 1: some gender differences in other faith traditions, vary in size
18:51
Speaker 1: and different regions of the world. This suggests that while
18:54
Speaker 1: gender differences in religious commitment may be driven in part
18:57
Speaker 1: by the teachings of a particular religion, they also may
19:00
Speaker 1: reflect national habits or cultural views intrinsic to a particular
19:04
Speaker 1: part of the world. Right So, in that research, they
19:08
Speaker 1: suggest that socioeconomic status as well as working a job
19:12
Speaker 1: outside the home could play a factor. Here's an interesting
19:15
Speaker 1: quote from that article. Women who participate in the labor
19:19
Speaker 1: force tend to show lower levels of religious commitment than
19:21
Speaker 1: women who do not work outside of the home for pay.
19:24
Speaker 1: As a result, when these two groups of women are
19:27
Speaker 1: compared with men, most of whom are in the labor force,
19:30
Speaker 1: the gender gaps differ. Indeed, Pew Research Centers analysis finds
19:34
Speaker 1: the gap between women who are in the labor force
19:36
Speaker 1: and men tend to be smaller than the gap between
19:39
Speaker 1: women who are not in the labor force and men.
19:41
Speaker 1: This pattern holds even after accounting for other factors. They
19:45
Speaker 1: are also associated with religious commitments such as education level, age,
19:48
Speaker 1: and mental status. Moreover, further analysis show that across predominantly
19:53
Speaker 1: Christian countries, the overall gender gaps and daily prayer and
19:56
Speaker 1: importance of religion are smaller in countries where more are
20:00
Speaker 1: in the labor force, which makes us wonder if perhaps
20:04
Speaker 1: this is a link between the oppressive system that uses religion,
20:08
Speaker 1: specifically a patriarchal ideology to key control the supremacy, you know,
20:14
Speaker 1: by taking away financial independence. But we'll talk a bit
20:18
Speaker 1: more about that later. In another Pew article, they interviewed
20:23
Speaker 1: a demographer and sociologists from the University College London, David Voas.
20:28
Speaker 1: I hope I'm not butchering that on the gender gap,
20:30
Speaker 1: and his opinion is maybe that it's just quote biological basis,
20:35
Speaker 1: and here is a full quote from the interview. Personally,
20:39
Speaker 1: I'm tempted to give the classic academic response that more
20:42
Speaker 1: research is needed, at the risk of seeming wishywashye, I
20:45
Speaker 1: suspect that nature and nurture both play a part. Boys
20:49
Speaker 1: and girls are socialized differently, and men and women are
20:52
Speaker 1: still channeled into different roles when we look at the
20:55
Speaker 1: psychology of individual differences, though particularly in personality, it's not
20:59
Speaker 1: easy to attribute gender gaps in their entirety to social forces.
21:04
Speaker 1: And then he goes on to explain, I'm not an
21:06
Speaker 1: expert in genetics, but there appears to be some fairly
21:09
Speaker 1: compelling evidence, for example, from studies of twins, that genes
21:13
Speaker 1: do affect our disposition to be religious. And if that's
21:16
Speaker 1: the case, it's at least pausible that the gender gap
21:19
Speaker 1: in religiosity is partly a matter of biology. If true,
21:23
Speaker 1: though I doubt that it's because there's a god gene
21:26
Speaker 1: and women are more likely to have it than men.
21:28
Speaker 1: It seems easier to believe that physiological or hormonal differences
21:32
Speaker 1: could influence personality, which may in turn be linked to
21:35
Speaker 1: variations in spirituality or religious thinking. Yes, he had a
21:39
Speaker 1: whole lot of opinions, but again, I mean, we're going
21:43
Speaker 1: to talk about those, but like they don't do. It's
21:46
Speaker 1: harder resource heathining these things. I think, yeah, it's kind
21:49
Speaker 1: of how we talked about other like metaphysical type of
21:52
Speaker 1: type of conversations. It's harder to get those, you know,
21:56
Speaker 1: wise in an article written by doctor Angelo, but tone,
22:00
Speaker 1: I think that's right. I'm so sorry for the Iron Institute,
22:03
Speaker 1: doctor Batone. Rights scholars agree that the religious gender gap
22:06
Speaker 1: is due to a confluence of multiple factors psychology, family environment,
22:11
Speaker 1: social status, workforce participation, etc. But there's no consensus on
22:15
Speaker 1: exactly which factors are more responsible for gender differences. So
22:20
Speaker 1: there's a lot. There's a lot we don't know why.
22:22
Speaker 1: There may be many things. It may be all about
22:24
Speaker 1: faith and maybe a coincidence. Again, like me believing what
22:29
Speaker 1: I believed was partly due to my circumstances and being
22:33
Speaker 1: taught that. So the teachings of a particular creed might
22:37
Speaker 1: make it more appealing to a woman rather than men.
22:39
Speaker 1: But local traditions and habits also play a role. That
22:42
Speaker 1: means that even within the same tradition Christianity, for instance,
22:46
Speaker 1: there are significant differences in different parts of the world, which, yeah,
22:50
Speaker 1: I think that's absolutely true, because yeah, Christianity looks different everywhere.
22:54
Speaker 1: I will say again what I remember in Korea, there
22:57
Speaker 1: was a mixture of Buddhism with Christianity, and that's how
23:01
Speaker 1: I learned, which is something that has been charted as
23:04
Speaker 1: they continue to serve a different countries. Again, there's differences,
23:08
Speaker 1: so we're not going to get a full picture. All
23:10
Speaker 1: of these conversations are continued and will continue and probably
23:14
Speaker 1: will change obviously as we continue in time, and the
23:18
Speaker 1: information is still not conclusive. Honestly. Nope, And like our
23:25
Speaker 1: past Monday many on women in superstition, there does seem
23:29
Speaker 1: to be a more likely correlation of women in spirituality,
23:33
Speaker 1: whether it's a level of intuition or protection. But once again,
23:36
Speaker 1: always worth remembering data is typically sexist, with most of
23:43
Speaker 1: the information coming from a very cis heteronormative, middle class group,
23:47
Speaker 1: and how limited information can be when access is also limited.
23:51
Speaker 1: It's just worth remembering. We'll probably put that in between
23:58
Speaker 1: a lot of the things we say, because yes, especially
24:01
Speaker 1: because as time changes, circumstances change. Yeah. M So, all right,
24:22
Speaker 1: we've talked about statistics, We've talked about some theories of
24:24
Speaker 1: the gender gap in religion, but let's talk specifically about
24:28
Speaker 1: women in the capital c Church. And here we are
24:31
Speaker 1: talking about, yes, that one, the Capital C Church as
24:34
Speaker 1: an institution, and we are looking specifically, as you said,
24:37
Speaker 1: at the United States as it pertains to Christianity. All right,
24:40
Speaker 1: So the spread of Christianity is fairly dark. Unlike the
24:45
Speaker 1: stories I was told growing up. Once again, it's very
24:48
Speaker 1: much framed into worth saving people. And who doesn't want
24:51
Speaker 1: to save people? If as a child, would I want
24:55
Speaker 1: you to go to hell? No, so I want to
24:57
Speaker 1: do my best to get you to heaven because that's
24:59
Speaker 1: what I want for you. But conquering and converting were
25:02
Speaker 1: two goals of the Eurocentric governments, as we talked about
25:06
Speaker 1: in our past book club about the Judashoni nation. The
25:09
Speaker 1: first nations had a more egalitarian system that was created
25:12
Speaker 1: through the matriarchal line, but once a colonization began, the
25:17
Speaker 1: Protestant ideals, which are set up through the patriarch think
25:20
Speaker 1: of the father and the son, quickly took over. As
25:24
Speaker 1: Katherine Brecas explains in her research titled Women and Religion
25:28
Speaker 1: in Colonial North America and the United States, from the
25:31
Speaker 1: seventeenth century until the present, women in these religious traditions
25:36
Speaker 1: have differed in terms of their beliefs and practices. With
25:39
Speaker 1: the exception of Native Americans, who seem to have enjoyed
25:41
Speaker 1: relatively egalitarian gender roles before their European conquest, women have
25:46
Speaker 1: shared similar experiences of subordination because of their gender. Once again, Yeah,
25:52
Speaker 1: if you go back to our book club, we talk
25:53
Speaker 1: about that pretty intrinsically. They talk about the fact that
25:56
Speaker 1: they had never known any kind of equal playing from jump,
26:01
Speaker 1: so seeing that was foreign to them, and that was
26:03
Speaker 1: because of the native First Nations people showing them how
26:06
Speaker 1: it could be anyway. And she references the Hebrew Bible
26:12
Speaker 1: as to the lineage and the traditions. She writes all
26:15
Speaker 1: of the major world religions are based on scriptural texts
26:19
Speaker 1: that reflect the mail centered worldview of the times in
26:22
Speaker 1: which they were written. In the Torah. For example, Genesis too,
26:26
Speaker 1: it depicts Eve being formed out of Adam's rib, which
26:29
Speaker 1: suggests that men were the norm and women secondary in creation.
26:33
Speaker 1: Most of the main characters and the Hebrew Bible are men,
26:36
Speaker 1: and the Biblical story revolves around patriarchs like Abraham, Jacob,
26:40
Speaker 1: and David. According to the Hallaha, or Jewish law, men
26:44
Speaker 1: and women have different religious obligations. Women must obey certain
26:48
Speaker 1: rules of modesty, and she writes of the examples within
26:51
Speaker 1: the New Testament as well. Quote The New Testament also
26:55
Speaker 1: includes texts have emphasized women's subordination to men based on
26:58
Speaker 1: the account in Genesis too. Many Christians have argued that
27:01
Speaker 1: Eve's decision to eat the forbidden fruit in the garden
27:04
Speaker 1: of Eden brought sin and suffering into the world. According
27:08
Speaker 1: to this interpretation, God ordained women to submit to the
27:12
Speaker 1: authority of their fathers and husbands because of Eve's disobedience.
27:17
Speaker 1: Christians have also been influenced by several texts from the
27:19
Speaker 1: Apostle Paul, including First Corinthians Chapter fourteen, verses thirty fourth
27:24
Speaker 1: through thirty five. Let your women keep silence in the churches,
27:28
Speaker 1: for it is not permitted unto them to speak, and
27:30
Speaker 1: First Timothy Chapter two, verse twelve. I suffer not a
27:34
Speaker 1: woman to teach, nor to usurp authority over the man,
27:38
Speaker 1: but to be in silence. Throughout American history, many Christians,
27:42
Speaker 1: both Catholic and Protestant, have used these texts to argue
27:46
Speaker 1: that women cannot be ordained as priest or ministers. Until
27:50
Speaker 1: the passage of the Nineteenth Amendment in nineteen twenty, which
27:53
Speaker 1: extended suffrage to women. Christians also used the Bible to
27:56
Speaker 1: argue that women should not be allowed to vote or
27:59
Speaker 1: to whole position a political authority. And before we get
28:04
Speaker 1: too far into political references, it is understood that there
28:07
Speaker 1: are different beliefs and interpretations of these texts and the
28:10
Speaker 1: Bible as a whole, and many changes have happened through
28:13
Speaker 1: the history of Protestant religions with different sects and denominations.
28:17
Speaker 1: Same for other religions and beliefs as well, and we
28:20
Speaker 1: are going to talk about that too, but for now
28:22
Speaker 1: we are referencing the more traditional understanding of these verses. Now,
28:27
Speaker 1: I'm not going to talk about my controversial view on
28:30
Speaker 1: Paul slash Saul, because I have a lot. I have
28:34
Speaker 1: a lot because I often argue, and I'm so sorry,
28:38
Speaker 1: just too many beliefs that Paul is actually outside of
28:42
Speaker 1: the Hebrew slash Old Testament policy only one who really
28:45
Speaker 1: speaks about homosexuality and women as leaders. Like, honestly, when
28:52
Speaker 1: you look at the other acts, and I don't know
28:54
Speaker 1: if the people would come at me. If you look
28:55
Speaker 1: at the other prophets and or disciples, they talk a
28:58
Speaker 1: lot about the charge as a whole, and they talk
29:01
Speaker 1: about the church being women, so that is the wife,
29:07
Speaker 1: so I find that interesting. Of course, they also say
29:09
Speaker 1: then that's Jesus is the husband, and Jesus is the
29:11
Speaker 1: one that leads the church. So that's a whole different conversation.
29:14
Speaker 1: But women are still involved. So I have a lot
29:17
Speaker 1: of thoughts. I'm not gonna put it here. I all
29:21
Speaker 1: about to be noted, Okay, I have a lot of thoughts. Historically,
29:27
Speaker 1: women have always outnumbered men and religious practices, and actually
29:32
Speaker 1: they've tried to change the role of women within the community,
29:34
Speaker 1: even way back when we talked about it again in
29:38
Speaker 1: our book club with the holding as Joni women because
29:41
Speaker 1: for a few of the leaders of the suffrag Jets,
29:43
Speaker 1: we're fairly anti religious and we're going against the church,
29:48
Speaker 1: and really felt like that was part of the problem
29:50
Speaker 1: in taking away the rights of women. So I found
29:53
Speaker 1: that interesting. I still fascinated by that, and I think
29:57
Speaker 1: that's what we're talking about here when we see a
29:59
Speaker 1: lot of changes. Of of course, we've got those who
30:01
Speaker 1: went to the extreme, and we're gonna talk about that
30:03
Speaker 1: right now. According to Breccas, at one point women were
30:06
Speaker 1: able to have a hand in influencing Christianity by arguing
30:09
Speaker 1: women were quote crucial guardians of religious and political virtue,
30:15
Speaker 1: which still influences women women's roles within the Church and Christianity. Today,
30:21
Speaker 1: we'll be talking a little bit more about the virtuous woman.
30:23
Speaker 1: We've already had an episode about the Purity movement, and
30:28
Speaker 1: we're going to come back and talk about it again
30:29
Speaker 1: a little more in context of trauma. Again. I know
30:33
Speaker 1: we already kind of talked about that, so y'all can
30:35
Speaker 1: go back and hear what we said on that. But
30:37
Speaker 1: this does have a big role that plays in it,
30:40
Speaker 1: but at one point was taken as being more in
30:43
Speaker 1: the front line slash leadership for the church. And then
30:47
Speaker 1: within these movements they helped create a quote cult of domesticity,
30:51
Speaker 1: which was a movement that quote again, this is all
30:54
Speaker 1: of her research enhance their authority within their families and
31:00
Speaker 1: bregast rights. Before the Industrial Revolution and the growth of
31:03
Speaker 1: a consumer economy, women played a central economic role in
31:07
Speaker 1: the household, for example, spinning wool, churning butter, and sewing clothing,
31:12
Speaker 1: but as the factory rather than the home, became the
31:14
Speaker 1: center of production. In the late eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries,
31:18
Speaker 1: women placed a new emphasis on their role as nurturers.
31:21
Speaker 1: Instead of earning wages like men, women would provide a
31:25
Speaker 1: haven from the cold and impersonal world of the factory
31:29
Speaker 1: or the office. Again, we're seeing where these influences are
31:32
Speaker 1: coming from, and this history extends even more with different
31:35
Speaker 1: interpretations and understandings of the Bible and the role of
31:38
Speaker 1: the Church, and different discoveries haven't made about the history
31:43
Speaker 1: and about the role of women as well. Many of
31:46
Speaker 1: those who identify as Christians do not agree with the
31:49
Speaker 1: old traditions of women being completely submissive to their husbands
31:53
Speaker 1: or to men at all, and feel that misinterpretation has
31:56
Speaker 1: allowed for these types of misunderstandings of the Bible. As
32:00
Speaker 1: the author of the Making of Biblical Womanhood, how the
32:04
Speaker 1: subjugation of women became gospel truth, Beth Alison Barr, who
32:08
Speaker 1: was also a historian, a Southern Baptist, and a pastor's wife,
32:12
Speaker 1: actually told an NPR this in her interview while she
32:15
Speaker 1: was publicizing this book. She said, the reason we think
32:18
Speaker 1: women cannot be in authority is simply because we've taken
32:22
Speaker 1: five or six verses from the New Testament, and we've
32:25
Speaker 1: used those verses and read the entire Bible through them
32:29
Speaker 1: through that lens, and they're mostly the Pauline verses women
32:33
Speaker 1: be silent, women submit to your husband's etc. And if
32:36
Speaker 1: we step away from those verses and actually put them
32:39
Speaker 1: in context of what Paul was doing, and then put
32:42
Speaker 1: that in context of the entire Bible, what we see
32:46
Speaker 1: is that while patriarchy exists in the Bible, that God
32:49
Speaker 1: is actually always fighting against patriarchy, that he's always raising
32:53
Speaker 1: women out of it, He's always giving women authority in
32:56
Speaker 1: surprising ways, both in the Old Testament and in the
32:59
Speaker 1: New Testament, and that if we look at the historical
33:02
Speaker 1: context of what Paul is actually doing a New Testament,
33:05
Speaker 1: there are serious problems with reading Paul as telling women
33:08
Speaker 1: that they have to be solid and under the authority
33:10
Speaker 1: of men for all times. I feel like she agrees
33:13
Speaker 1: with me, y'all. I think so. I think she agrees
33:16
Speaker 1: with me again, strong opinions about this. I think we
33:20
Speaker 1: should come back. I think we should talk about it.
33:24
Speaker 1: She continues in that same interview. Conservative evangelicalism has been
33:28
Speaker 1: teaching women for so long that there is only one
33:31
Speaker 1: way to be a woman that makes us godly and
33:33
Speaker 1: that allows us to follow Jesus and that one way
33:36
Speaker 1: is to be focused on home and family and marriage.
33:39
Speaker 1: So be free is me wanting women and men to
33:43
Speaker 1: know that the limitations we have placed on them are
33:46
Speaker 1: not God's limitations. There are limitations that we have placed
33:49
Speaker 1: on them within our own human culture, and we can
33:53
Speaker 1: see how they're constructed by human culture and that they
33:56
Speaker 1: are not of God. So be free means be free
33:59
Speaker 1: to be God has called you to be. Whatever that maybe.
34:03
Speaker 1: And she's not the only one to see these differences
34:07
Speaker 1: in the interpretation of the Bible. But much like anything
34:11
Speaker 1: concerning reality or who has authority and supremacy, these opinions
34:16
Speaker 1: are devices. Yea, yeah, I just kind of wanted to
34:32
Speaker 1: go through some of my own experiences of what I've seen,
34:34
Speaker 1: because this is a prime example of what she is
34:36
Speaker 1: talking about of what we were looking my children itself
34:41
Speaker 1: takes out of context and how people wouldn't argue with
34:46
Speaker 1: me what Paul has done, what Paul has said. They
34:50
Speaker 1: use that as the authority because he wrote the Book
34:53
Speaker 1: of Acts, he wrote all the different disciplines, and instead
34:57
Speaker 1: kind of uses that as the ultimate authority over the
35:00
Speaker 1: words of Jesus in itself, which if you ever read through.
35:04
Speaker 1: And this is when we had this joke of in
35:06
Speaker 1: the New Testament. Typically in the copies that we see
35:08
Speaker 1: in the US, Jesus's words are written read purposefully, so
35:12
Speaker 1: that's how you know he is never, at any point
35:15
Speaker 1: in time ever come after people for sin, except for
35:21
Speaker 1: those who are profiting off of other people. The only
35:25
Speaker 1: time you see this man angry, and I say this
35:27
Speaker 1: in that level, and again, I don't give a good
35:29
Speaker 1: Bible lessons. I'm so sorry. That's the only times you
35:34
Speaker 1: see him anger. He hangs out, like we hear this often.
35:38
Speaker 1: He hangs out with prostitutes, he hangs out with women,
35:40
Speaker 1: he hangs out with children. And I'm saying this in
35:43
Speaker 1: such a relevant way, i feel like I'm teaching God.
35:46
Speaker 1: This is Army back to college. But what we see
35:50
Speaker 1: in these very controversial comments about what we think is
35:53
Speaker 1: sin is literally the words of Paul, who never met
35:58
Speaker 1: Jesus and who had actually when persecuted many of Jesus
36:03
Speaker 1: the followers beforehand, literally killing people, killed many of them,
36:09
Speaker 1: and out of the Old Testament, which is the Hebrew Bible,
36:13
Speaker 1: which was never intended for anyone else, out of the
36:16
Speaker 1: Jewish community, and even many of the people of the
36:19
Speaker 1: Jewish community would say, this is not what you think
36:22
Speaker 1: it is. You are taking this out of context because
36:24
Speaker 1: Sodom and Gomorrah is often referenced as this is because
36:27
Speaker 1: they were all gay. Not true. They were actually raping
36:30
Speaker 1: and beating and you know, blessing people in that community.
36:34
Speaker 1: But hey, we're not looking at that alway, because we
36:36
Speaker 1: don't mind that if we look at what we're laws
36:39
Speaker 1: were being passed. But in that level, my church heavily
36:44
Speaker 1: believed in these same theories. As a woman, you were
36:47
Speaker 1: not allowed to speak in church unless you're testifying. That
36:50
Speaker 1: means the Holy Ghost has taken over you and that's
36:53
Speaker 1: not you speaking. And y'all, I had those moments. I
36:56
Speaker 1: actually had those most feeling like overwhelmed in joy or
36:59
Speaker 1: like in a moment that like, I'm supposed to say
37:01
Speaker 1: this thing out loud. This is going to affect people.
37:03
Speaker 1: I really there's levels of like gospels and there's levels
37:07
Speaker 1: of gifts to me. I thought I had discernment. I
37:10
Speaker 1: think I can read people, but that translated into something
37:13
Speaker 1: else spiritually for me, and I got caught up in that.
37:16
Speaker 1: In a long time, the belief is that you have
37:19
Speaker 1: to pray for your sins and I'm literally sitting at
37:24
Speaker 1: an altar crying until you feel okay and say Jesus
37:29
Speaker 1: saved you. And it is an emotion and a feeling.
37:33
Speaker 1: A lot of places, there's a lot of beliefs believe
37:35
Speaker 1: that you are not saved until you're baptized. The church
37:38
Speaker 1: I grew up in was not like that. The church
37:40
Speaker 1: I grew up in was also the type that said
37:43
Speaker 1: once saved, always saved. So technically I'm good, right, Yeah,
37:49
Speaker 1: sounds like all the people like me that they come
37:54
Speaker 1: back with. She was never really saved. So even though
38:00
Speaker 1: during that time I did these holy acts, and that's
38:03
Speaker 1: why I became a social worker. That's why I took
38:05
Speaker 1: a year off to work with kids. And it wasn't
38:07
Speaker 1: that I went and just taught Bible. I literally lived
38:10
Speaker 1: with them and helped them and mentored them. That was
38:12
Speaker 1: something that was important to me that I did something
38:14
Speaker 1: physically as well as spiritually, so I did that. I
38:19
Speaker 1: traveled all over the South teaching young kids the Bible
38:22
Speaker 1: as well. Again, a lot of guilt there, but the
38:26
Speaker 1: one thing I can say is I did teach love
38:28
Speaker 1: and never taught hate. Because by the time I became
38:33
Speaker 1: a high schooler and kind of was able to make
38:35
Speaker 1: form my own opinions what I saw the church that
38:38
Speaker 1: I was growing up when sewed fear, which is that hell,
38:42
Speaker 1: fire and brimstone which came way long ago. We know
38:46
Speaker 1: about this and that you're all sinners until you're saved,
38:52
Speaker 1: and if you do something wrong, you are sinning against
38:55
Speaker 1: God and us, and we can judge you. If a
38:59
Speaker 1: woman what has an opinion, she has to go through
39:05
Speaker 1: the husband. Most of the meetings, you can't be present,
39:08
Speaker 1: but you cannot speak again, you have to talk through
39:10
Speaker 1: the father or the husband. And I bought into this belief.
39:13
Speaker 1: I remember telling my father at one point in time
39:15
Speaker 1: when I was talking to other people who are in
39:17
Speaker 1: different churches denominations specifically, I was like, you know, being
39:22
Speaker 1: a woman of God meant I trust my father and
39:25
Speaker 1: we have the same opinion and that you will listen
39:27
Speaker 1: to me. Of course, that should be the way it goes.
39:30
Speaker 1: That's kind of the whole idea of democracy, that we
39:32
Speaker 1: trust the people that were voting for to be our voices.
39:35
Speaker 1: That's that ideal, except for the absolutely bands women and
39:40
Speaker 1: if you don't agree or if you're in a bad relationship,
39:42
Speaker 1: and as In fact, up until recently, they condone you
39:46
Speaker 1: staying with your husband even if you are being abused
39:49
Speaker 1: or being hurt or being neglected. The only reason, and
39:54
Speaker 1: it is actually written in the Bible that you can
39:55
Speaker 1: technically leave your husband is if he cheats on you,
40:00
Speaker 1: and even then the woman cannot get married. And if
40:06
Speaker 1: they believe that you are in the wrong, you have
40:09
Speaker 1: a physical membership, and that they will take your membership away,
40:12
Speaker 1: and that they will not allow you to go to
40:14
Speaker 1: any other churches within that denomination. No shorts, no pants
40:17
Speaker 1: for women. I remember one sermon and my parents didn't
40:20
Speaker 1: believe this, thank goodness, but one dude got up talking
40:23
Speaker 1: about how women wearing makeup were sinful because they were
40:27
Speaker 1: trying to tempt men. It was quite and my mother,
40:31
Speaker 1: who is the Southern mother who's like never goes out
40:34
Speaker 1: without makeup, was astounded and she was like, I do
40:37
Speaker 1: not believe that that man is wrong. That's the one
40:41
Speaker 1: time I've seen her disagree. And up until my siblings
40:45
Speaker 1: went through some of the really messy stuff that they
40:48
Speaker 1: went through a divorce was absolutely frowned upon. I will say,
40:53
Speaker 1: me living in sin with my partner. They don't talk
40:56
Speaker 1: about it. They're just really grateful that it is not
41:01
Speaker 1: outside of their comfort zone outside of me living with them.
41:04
Speaker 1: And then essentially, so there's a lot. I am definitely
41:11
Speaker 1: haunted by some of the things that I did in
41:14
Speaker 1: the belief that I was doing something well as godly
41:18
Speaker 1: or that I felt committed. I have a Bible that
41:20
Speaker 1: I still keep that is written with so much stuff.
41:24
Speaker 1: I have about four journals of my adventures on the
41:28
Speaker 1: mission trip, thinking that I all my prayers, all of
41:31
Speaker 1: the things that I believe that God was telling me.
41:33
Speaker 1: There are so many things, and again I am very
41:38
Speaker 1: grateful to those experiences because I really think it kept
41:40
Speaker 1: me alive, But there are so many harmful things that
41:47
Speaker 1: actually mess with me as an adult, and it still does.
41:50
Speaker 1: It still does. It has become a pretty big strain.
41:52
Speaker 1: So if my family members hear this ro but yeah,
42:01
Speaker 1: it's it's that that level of understanding the Bible, And
42:04
Speaker 1: of course for this traditionalist had to be King James.
42:09
Speaker 1: The first time I've ever seen a Bible that was
42:11
Speaker 1: not King James was an awful man, by the way,
42:16
Speaker 1: historically real bad, real bad. Just so you know, it
42:20
Speaker 1: was sinful. They did not believe that it was good
42:23
Speaker 1: but my parents have grown, I will say, even though
42:25
Speaker 1: they are very, very religious, they have stepped outside of
42:28
Speaker 1: those strict I think they've lived enough and seen enough
42:32
Speaker 1: to be like, okay, okay, this is becoming a little
42:34
Speaker 1: more hateful than loving, So they have stepped away from
42:38
Speaker 1: that a little more. Still far from far from what
42:41
Speaker 1: I believe in everything I believe so definitely and very
42:45
Speaker 1: far spectrum of my views on the world and what
42:49
Speaker 1: I think is right. And yeah, that really has put
42:53
Speaker 1: a big strain on our family. To be fair, I've
42:56
Speaker 1: never there's always been a strain because of the trauma
43:00
Speaker 1: and the response religious response that I got instead of
43:05
Speaker 1: therapeutic response I should have gotten. Again, my parents were young.
43:08
Speaker 1: They didn't know, and they actually, you know, we've kind
43:10
Speaker 1: of talked about it, and it both of us admitted
43:13
Speaker 1: the wrongs that we had committed when I was young
43:15
Speaker 1: because they didn't know, they didn't know some of the
43:19
Speaker 1: things that we know today. And then like the more
43:22
Speaker 1: thank God, it's at least a more normalized therapy and
43:26
Speaker 1: all of that, but at one point in time it
43:28
Speaker 1: wasn't and they were heavy duty into prayers should fix it.
43:32
Speaker 1: There's nothing you need but God, which is again, and
43:35
Speaker 1: I'm really glad to see that they had stepped away
43:37
Speaker 1: from that. And we've gone through a lot, but a
43:40
Speaker 1: lot of this really pushed me into walking away from
43:45
Speaker 1: religion altogether. I remember having the conversation with my mother
43:51
Speaker 1: in the parking lot of my work about to go
43:55
Speaker 1: in about the fact that I did not believe in
43:58
Speaker 1: God anymore, and her crying and me crying, and we're
44:01
Speaker 1: just sitting there in misery. I sink my mother has
44:06
Speaker 1: purposely forgotten that conversation because I didn't want to lie
44:09
Speaker 1: to her, especially every time we have you been praying
44:11
Speaker 1: about it? Have you been going to church? Because I
44:14
Speaker 1: was super religious and she was very proud of me
44:17
Speaker 1: and thought that I was going to be a missionary.
44:19
Speaker 1: She didn't love it at first, but she soon grew
44:22
Speaker 1: to love it because like people admired me for that
44:24
Speaker 1: in that community. It was. It was a lot of things,
44:30
Speaker 1: but I will say, like this is one of those
44:31
Speaker 1: moments that I realized, this doesn't make sense. We're not
44:35
Speaker 1: going to get into that portion yet, Andy, You're not
44:38
Speaker 1: gonna go deeper into that in another because we're gonna
44:40
Speaker 1: talk about the whole trauma of it all. Yay, But
44:46
Speaker 1: it was the point in which I walked away, and
44:52
Speaker 1: I've seen more and more people in my generation and
44:55
Speaker 1: then the younger kids walking away too, right, yeah, yeah,
45:02
Speaker 1: And we have some numbers around that. So these kind
45:07
Speaker 1: of rules and laws that you've been talking about have
45:10
Speaker 1: come at a cost for the Christian congregation. And the
45:13
Speaker 1: recent article written by Christianity Today author Ryan pede Berge writes,
45:18
Speaker 1: as recently as last year, the religion gender gap has
45:21
Speaker 1: persisted among older Americans. Survey data from October twenty twenty
45:26
Speaker 1: one found that among those born in nineteen fifty, about
45:28
Speaker 1: a quarter of men identified as atheist, agnostic, or nothing
45:32
Speaker 1: in particular, compared to just twenty percent of women of
45:36
Speaker 1: that age. That same five point gap is evident among
45:40
Speaker 1: those born in nineteen sixty In nineteen seventy as well.
45:42
Speaker 1: For millennials and Generation Z, it's a different story. Among
45:47
Speaker 1: those born in nineteen eighty, the gap begins to narrow
45:49
Speaker 1: to about two percentage points. By nineteen ninety, the gap disappears,
45:53
Speaker 1: and with those born in two thousand or later, women
45:56
Speaker 1: are clearly more likely to be nuns than men, and
46:00
Speaker 1: nuns is defined as religiously unaffiliated people in the United States. Right,
46:05
Speaker 1: So when we're saying nuns, we're saying n O n ees.
46:07
Speaker 1: It's not in uns. Good good good follow up clarification yep.
46:14
Speaker 1: And this type of change has been noticed. Some theorized
46:17
Speaker 1: because the church has been so focused on growing their
46:20
Speaker 1: male attendants, whether by offering more male leadership classes or
46:23
Speaker 1: by challenging men to become quote manlier. Some believe this
46:27
Speaker 1: has only pushed women further away from the church. And
46:30
Speaker 1: that same article, they write, evangelical women have long attended
46:34
Speaker 1: church at higher rates than evangelical men, but today that
46:37
Speaker 1: gap is narrowing, not because more men are coming, because
46:41
Speaker 1: more women are leaving. Such women are increasingly likely to
46:45
Speaker 1: deconstruct their faith or identify as nuns, a rising population
46:51
Speaker 1: of the religiously disaffiliated. As Lyman's Stone wrote two years ago,
46:56
Speaker 1: making your church manlier won't make it bigger. It could
47:00
Speaker 1: be a factor in making it smaller. Right. Yeah. And
47:03
Speaker 1: another theory is that as more women become more educated
47:07
Speaker 1: and more likely to focus on careers, they are less
47:10
Speaker 1: likely to be involved with the church. Here's another quote
47:13
Speaker 1: from that same article. Education maybe another significant factor among
47:18
Speaker 1: college educated adults under twenty five women are slightly less
47:22
Speaker 1: likely to say they have no religious affiliation compared to men,
47:25
Speaker 1: thirty nine percent of women versus forty five percent of men. So,
47:29
Speaker 1: once again, when we talked about earlier that job having
47:33
Speaker 1: a check, maybe financial independence does seem to be correlated.
47:38
Speaker 1: Not exactly sure why. Again, the educational level, and there's
47:41
Speaker 1: that conversation, I will say the biggest fear for my
47:44
Speaker 1: parents and my family is that the kids will go
47:47
Speaker 1: to the city and get learning and educated, and that
47:52
Speaker 1: education is going to ruin and I guess taint this
48:00
Speaker 1: Christian morality ideas. And we've seen that today as we
48:04
Speaker 1: talk about CRT and book banning. There is a reason
48:08
Speaker 1: for that. And again later we'll be talking about deconstruction.
48:12
Speaker 1: We talked about it with our interview with Dara. We
48:14
Speaker 1: just said a little bit about it previously, but I
48:18
Speaker 1: want to go ahead and define it since we did
48:20
Speaker 1: mention it. Deconstruction is quote a Christian phenomenon where people unpack, rethink,
48:26
Speaker 1: and examine their belief systems. This may lead to dropping
48:29
Speaker 1: one's faith altogether, or may result in a stronger faith.
48:34
Speaker 1: And so just to let you know, this is from Wikipedia,
48:38
Speaker 1: and typically we don't use that as an actual source
48:41
Speaker 1: for definitions. This term is contentious right now, so much
48:46
Speaker 1: so that if you try to search it you will
48:47
Speaker 1: be bombarded with anti deconstruction articles about how this is dangerous,
48:52
Speaker 1: literally like deconstruction is ruining. You don't listen to this,
48:55
Speaker 1: it is dangerous, walk away from it. And again, we're
48:59
Speaker 1: not going to talk about it here because like I've said,
49:01
Speaker 1: this is there's a lot, but we will be talking
49:04
Speaker 1: about it in our probably next episode. It's something to
49:09
Speaker 1: remember because it is a movement. I've seen it on
49:11
Speaker 1: social media. We talked about it with Dara. There's conventions.
49:15
Speaker 1: We'll talk about the origins of it and why it's
49:17
Speaker 1: important and what we're looking at. Yeah, yeah, I mean
49:22
Speaker 1: there's a reason we put these off for solon. There's
49:25
Speaker 1: a lot to discuss. There is, there is so we'll
49:29
Speaker 1: have We'll have more more coming your way. This is
49:33
Speaker 1: only a bunch of part one, but yes, we would
49:36
Speaker 1: love to hear from you from you listeners. If you
49:39
Speaker 1: would like to contact us, you can Our email is
49:43
Speaker 1: Stuffmedia mom Stuff at iHeartMedia dot com. You can find
49:46
Speaker 1: us on Twitter at mom Stuff podcast, or on Instagram
49:49
Speaker 1: and TikTok at stuff. We've never told you. You You can
49:51
Speaker 1: also find us on YouTube. We have a book coming out.
49:54
Speaker 1: You can preorder it at stuff You Should Read books
49:57
Speaker 1: dot com. Go do it and thanks to everyone. He's
50:00
Speaker 1: already done it. Yea yay. Thanks as always to our
50:05
Speaker 1: super producer Christina, our executive producer Maya, and our contributor Joey,
50:10
Speaker 1: who's particularly helpful with these episodes. Oh so good. Thank
50:12
Speaker 1: you Joey, Yes, and thanks to you for listening. Stephan
50:16
Speaker 1: never told you. Inspection of iHeartRadio. For more podcast from
50:18
Speaker 1: my Heart Radio, you can check out the iHeart Radio
50:19
Speaker 1: app Apple Podcast wherever you listen to your favorite shows