Latest / Follow the Leighder / Quantum Theology and Rural Faith | Zac Cannon

Transcript

Quantum Theology and Rural Faith | Zac Cannon · Follow the Leighder

• Leigh/@followtheleighder: Well, howdy folks and welcome back to another episode of Follow the Leader. I'm your host, Leigh Larson, and y'all, this is a good episode. Joining me from Virginia is award-winning storyteller, Cannon. Welcome to the studio, Zach. Zac Cannon: Hey, nice to be here. I'm glad to be with you and all of your listeners today. Looking forward to this conversation. Leigh/@followtheleighder: Y'all, this is gonna be a good one. I stumbled upon Zach actually through his work with Quantum Theology, which is a book edited and curated by Keith Giles. Is that how you pronounce it, Giles? Yes. And he wrote From Searching to Seeing, which for those who are watching this on audio, I am holding up a book with very underlined and tabbed up passages. I really came to appreciate your theology in the sort of Zac Cannon: Dial. Leigh/@followtheleighder: quantum mystic space. But when you look at your website, I mean, you're prolific. You've got a lot of books. You've got a lot of awards. You've got a background in ministry, spirituality. Obviously, you're writing about some pretty cool stuff with quantum theology and kind of walk us through what this path has been like for you. Have you always been a writer? Have you always been spiritual? Kind of walk us through how your work has come to be. Zac Cannon: Yeah, I'm trying to figure that out myself right now. You know, it's interesting. I'm actually on the first week of a four week sabbatical. And so I'm wrestling with some of those questions internally as well. But the short answer is yes, storytelling has always been a really big part of who I am and how I've experienced the world, how I've processed emotions. It's just I, any of my work. you'll find me in it somewhere and for good or bad. As far as the spiritual side of things, I grew up in rural Virginia, about three hours south of where I am now. So that kind of handshake of country life and evangelical church, we used to call it Bapto Costal. And so kind of saturated and marinated in that spiritual story. And then over... 20ish years of taking that a lot more seriously and hopefully maturing, adapting and adopting what I would consider better practices and a better story revolving around spiritual language. I very much still find myself rooted in the story and the symbols of Christian spirituality, but I still liberally from other traditions and stories as well. Leigh/@followtheleighder: you yeah. Steel like an artist. Did you have some sort of big moment with your baptism to coastal experience or or what what was the wrestling that forced you to start looking at a different language to describe this? Zac Cannon: Thank you. Yeah, sure. It's a few things really. One of them was kind of growing up being taught, led, shepherded, discipled, whatever language we want to use in a particular kind of thought bubble around what Christianity looks like, what Jesus represents, what the gospel is. And then... bumping up against some very real world things that made me go, can I ask some questions about this? And then being not necessarily greeted with curiosity as much as no, actually, we're gonna put some boundaries around this and you can't. So whether that was I have a special needs child. And so some of my really early anxiety was like, you how do you communicate spiritual reality to a child that may never talk? And that's a part of my personal journey and continues to be a part of my personal journey. But on top of that is like social issues and questions I had about X, Y, or Z when it came to the bigger world around us. And then just meeting, befriending, being curious, and learning to love people who I either did not expect to receive me with the openness that they did. Or that I was told to like, hey, actually, those are the people that you're not supposed to be friends with. Those are the stories you're not supposed to listen to. And so all of those things in my late 20s, early 30s, and then spending the next decade, decade and a half kind of unpacking, rearranging, and finding a better way forward for myself, which has somehow also invited others to find, I hope, a better way forward and doing that in community together. Leigh/@followtheleighder: Wow. Zac Cannon: So it's really been a mixed bag. And then finding all these lovely influences through different unit of theologies, quantum physics, all these things and saying, I like that. I'm going to take that for myself and hold on to it. Leigh/@followtheleighder: And piece this together like a tapestry. I think that's beautiful. I want to circle back to you talking about having a special needs child and communicating about theology with someone who can't speak because disability theology, I wish more people were exposed to disability theology. that's a very like umbrella term, but there is a lot to wrestle spiritually when it comes to these really big questions. Zac Cannon: together like a half a street. Leigh/@followtheleighder: If comfortable, can you can you talk a little bit about what wrestling with that looked like as a parent? Zac Cannon: I can tell, like the early stuff was, I know like a big kind of point of tension was I was in this group and it was very much like a point of honor both in that group to have like a lot of children, which is not something that ended up happening for me or my wife by our own decision, but we have to, we love them. And also catechizing to some degree, or at least like some formal kind of... This is what we want our kids to know. And so sitting with that, with a kid who I was like, you know, I know their life is going to be different. know the curvature of our life as a family is going to be different. So what does that look like? And so beginning to be like, well, maybe it's less about, I think a lot of kind of American cultural Christianity and spirituality in general can be very much like head based not as experiential not as practice based and so if if we are trying to adopt a less head You know knowledge based way of being in the world of explaining what our spiritual practices and rhythms are for people who have different bodies and different minds and different capabilities, I just think so much of the church because that's my native place, but like a lot of spiritual places are catered to specific bodies and specific brains and specific ways. so just sitting with that in spaces and realizing, okay, what does that look like for my child? And then what does that look like for me? And then expanding it out to like, okay, there are a lot of other people. So even how I engage with simple things like, hey, how do Can people get into the space where we meet? Can, you know, all these things in here? But it all started there with that question of like sitting around this group and being like, oh, maybe we need to recognize that not everybody shows up in the space the same way, sees things the same way, talks the same way, processes the same way. So that was the launching point for a lot of bigger questions. Leigh/@followtheleighder: Absolutely. it sounds like it really kind of amplified or sent you in a new direction of the story, right? Like the story we think we're going to have or the story that the community has. And the story that your community had was we're to have all these children and they're going to be taught a certain way. And that's the way of truth. And your story was just not that. And it was a different presentation. And I applaud you for stepping in. to yourself and for your family to figure out, okay, well then where is our story and how do we write this? Can you talk about, I have some of your books here pulled up. I know you've done some fiction. You've done really, again, you talked about growing up three years, or sorry, three hours from Charlottesville. Is that what you said? Okay. And you talk about that. Zac Cannon: Yeah, just south of here, yeah. Leigh/@followtheleighder: blue collar grit. I know from my road trips in from Appalachia, that blue collar grit is real. I know what you're talking about with the the the church. But there's also not a ton of resources, just and and I'm out here in rural Montana, we do not have a lot of resources either. And you do have to have grit. And there's a lot of loneliness. There's also a lot of there's a lot of addiction. There's a lot of pain. that is in here. And again, with all the churches, the churches are a critical part of so much of Appalachia, mean, like the backbone. But the hardship about it is it's also caused a lot of pain for a lot of people. Did you feel that when you started to write more, talk more, that, how was it like to, you talked about that your story was resonating with others? What other stories or what other ways did you find that your Virginia blue collar story was resonating? Zac Cannon: Yeah, well, think I think the part of my story to insert here is that a lot of this happened when we were living in California and like a very different culture and a very different expectation of what life looked like. So we moved from where we were at. We moved out there. We were there for about 11 years. We moved back here nine years ago this summer, actually, actually, maybe yesterday. But it's always been. Leigh/@followtheleighder: Okay. Zac Cannon: a balancing act because I put out my first novel Slantwise which takes place in a fictitious version of the area that I grew up and some people were very cautious with that at first because they people were worried I was going to punch down not respect both the people and the culture and the systems and the systemic issues. And I grew up in a very poor, you know, struggling, you know, the furniture factories had all but dried up by the time I was kind of adulthood, late adolescence. And so I saw that. And so what I noticed is that when people read that text or have gotten to know me better, that it does come from, no, a genuine respect. for people that have to work really hard for everything they have. And also... a cautious challenge to people who might not be aware of the things that are cultural or systemic that are actually contributing to the hardships that they face and having to figure out how to express and to talk about those things without it being derogatory or otherwise shaming people. So that's the needle that, that's the... Leigh/@followtheleighder: Yeah. Zac Cannon: kind of walking that tension. I still do that because I have family that live there and friends and and it again it's it's it's not all it's beautiful. They're beautiful people there are beautiful stories there's there's beautiful life, but then there's also just the deep veins of of hurt and hardship that people get trapped into. I definitely wanted to lean in that with my work and continue to probably continue to explore that. Leigh/@followtheleighder: Yes. Zac Cannon: when it's the right time to do those things. Leigh/@followtheleighder: Yeah. And, and I appreciate what you're saying about the, the tension. I'm currently writing a book and about military chaplaincy and part of it is their recruitment. they, how they recruit the military recruits from very Christian conservative areas for a number of reasons. And why do people want to join the military and what are all the different conditions? And, Zac Cannon: But anyway, I'm done. to get part of it. day. you Leigh/@followtheleighder: and having to paint this picture of sort of paint this picture of trying to be as fair as possible and while still not like agreeing with a lot of it but I'm like here's why and how it's happening and there's a lot of compassion I have for it a lot of compassion but like you said we we we make decisions based on hurt and And sometimes they can also be like decisions that further put us into hurt too. I see that quite a bit, you know? So I just have a lot of respect for you for taking on these stories and doing it with such nuance and respect because it is easy to punch down. Zac Cannon: Yeah, my protagonist in my newest book is actually a chaplain or a former chaplain. And that was involved talking to friends that I know that have served and making sure that although he was going to be a very wounded character at the beginning emotionally, that his wounds did not come from his service in the same ways that sometimes are portrayed. And actually that that was some of the more life-giving aspects of his backstory. But it was hard because same thing, finding truth in something that is so, has a spectrum of both lived experiences and what is true about it is difficult. Leigh/@followtheleighder: Did you find it healing to write these stories? What does it feel like for you as an author or as an observer of all of this? Zac Cannon: Yeah, I was talking to my therapist about this. No, it's, it's a, it, it feels like taking. I tend to write, I'm a very peaceful person, but I tend to write stories that explore darker sides of life. And I think that's just because I can take those things and I can play with them and I can, I can reach my own. cathartic kind of expression through telling the story and process a lot of anger or fear. And then I get left with a story that I'm like, now other people are going to read this. But for me, it very much is like, OK, I have these things I'm either afraid of. A lot of my writing involves just being a dad, I've noticed, the different stages of being a dad. So grief. fear, loss, what do those things play out as in these stories? And then, you know, get all the other fun stuff to put on top of them. But at the end of the day, it really is like, what, what, I remember asking my wife, said, what do you, what do I write about? You know, if you had to kind of sum it up for me she said, I think you just always write about relationship. So I find a relationship and I explore it and I see what happened. And like I said before, there's always something of me in there, but, reaching that catharsis. helps me get to the other side of something. So by the time someone reads something I've written, and then we start having conversations about it, I'm normally like, yeah, I'm kind of, I'm not that person anymore, but it's fun. Leigh/@followtheleighder: Yeah. Well, and it's certainly paying off. mean, you've got these major awards. And that's really cool, by the way, that Slantwise won those three, the Indie Reader Discovery, the National Indie Excellence, the Story Trade Book Award, like big deal. And it shows the care and respect that you have when you're awarded these types of accolades. Do you like... Is fiction... And fictional storytelling, particularly with history, does that feel more healing or feel more fun or feel a different thing than simply like a history book? Or where does the fiction play a role? Zac Cannon: So. I think the fiction provides a layer of disappearance. So I can hide behind a character or a genre or some crazy, you know, whatever it, I dabble in all kinds of genres. So I think for me, it's a type of protection. it's when I'm writing, you know, something like quantum theology, that tends to be more from, yes, fiction is representative of a lot of things about me, but nonfiction is as bare as I can get. If you want to, you know, I think both in this quantum theology and some other stuff I've done require. And so I think for me, it's just a, it's a way to disappear a little bit because you know that you're going to put voluntarily involuntary consciously, subconsciously, you're going to have to put some of your on the page somehow. And so whether that's in protagonist or antagonist. You're putting words and actions into people's mouths. So if you can hide a little bit or disappear a little bit, it's a bit of a safety net there. And then every Sunday I get up and normally have some words to say. so that's when I want to be my most vulnerable and my most honest when I'm in front of people in a real setting, in a community. And so I generally save that for, they don't get the disappearing act on Sunday mornings normally. So that's why fiction is the outlet. Leigh/@followtheleighder: Well, and I appreciate fiction and historical fiction too, because it does allow you to just like, as the reader, you get to just drop in and be this character in a new world. But again, based on history, you're trying to figure, like as a reader, you're trying to figure this out. And I have had some transformative experiences reading historical fiction in which, because it wasn't historical or so heavy on the facts or whatever, Zac Cannon: Bye bye. Leigh/@followtheleighder: and I just got to lean into this person's story, I'd found a lot of healing through things, like particularly women's stories and things like that where I was like, I'm not the first woman to experience this or that's huge. And so what you're doing is really a gift, it's healing. I do like that there is that sort of, like we kind of said, like storytelling is as play, as a sort of like playing with this like, And I'm saying this also as someone who can't write fiction to save her life. they're like, makeup is, I'm terrible at just crumbing up with, I don't do well with lying, poker, like, and I'm saying this out of like respect and honor, because it's super cool that you've dove so deeply into history that you can now take on this character. And that you can imagine like good and bad outcomes. Like you can imagine a different story. You can imagine a lot of different ways that humans themselves experience this historical aspect. And again, we're talking to like, re-circle back. This is all about, you know, sort of small town fictional Appalachia and what goes on there. Is that part of it for you too? I know that you were saying it allows you to disappear. and have a different perspective, but does it also feel like for you, like imagining a good or bad ending, it could be healing for you too, or does some of it be like, I want this good ending, but it's not realistic? Like, what is it like to use imagination? Zac Cannon: Yeah. It's funny that you bring that up because I had two conversations about this this week. When it comes to Slantwise, like my initial inspiration was that was I lost somebody and I wanted to write them a better ending. And so that was one of my goals with that book was it's not going to be a happy ending necessarily. Although I think it's pretty happy that wasn't That wasn't the goal to start with, but a better ending. I lost them to the same types of things that plague so many people, depression and drugs and things like that. So that was kind of the starting point for me to want to write Slantwise. But then I'm getting some feedback from my newest novel that just came out. And how do you talk about this without talking about it? People are like, that was... the ending that it should have been, but one day, one day you'll write a happy ending. And so we got on this conversation about what's better, like a realistic, cathartic ending, or tying a really pretty bow on it. And I'm not a, my wife would say I'm a pessimist, but I don't know. I don't think that we often get genuine happy endings. I think that normally what endings we have to... the endings we receive or the endings we have to live through, we can find beauty and goodness and we can make them as happy as we can make them. But normally there's loss and grief involved in an ending as well. Even like childbirth, right? Like that's a process that ends and then, and so there's, it's more cyclical than that. So when it comes to endings, I'm always looking for like, okay, we've been on this journey. Leigh/@followtheleighder: Mm-hmm. Zac Cannon: What's the best way to end this journey, even if we don't tie it all up together and send everybody off with really good feelings? Hopefully decent enough human resonance. But that's kind of where I stand is I want it to be realistic. I want us to have some catharsis and some release, but that doesn't mean we have to. Leigh/@followtheleighder: Mm-hmm. Zac Cannon: We can't come to the end of every story and expect everything to be fixed because that's not how life works. There's still so many things going on all the time. Leigh/@followtheleighder: And a lot of things left unsaid, a lot of pain, lot of harm between people. I appreciate your point. It's like, yeah, we do want the happy ending, but is that life? There's a lot of closure I've had to get that I didn't feel was just, but that was the door. know, like I didn't like it. Well, I didn't have to come with spikes, you know, like, but that's real. And Zac Cannon: and a lot of things. day. Yeah. Leigh/@followtheleighder: It's, I think there's a groundedness to it. I mean, I'm not here to, I don't write history fiction, historical fiction, so I don't have any advice and we're not talking about my advice either, but it's, there is a lot of power in saying this is the way it actually is. And there's a lot of power in, Zac Cannon: you Leigh/@followtheleighder: Just sort of that that realistic like, yeah, I don't think that this should have the happy ending because it feels dishonest or it feels inauthentic to the pain that you are communicating with your with the story you're trying to tell. Almost like this sort of like I don't want to be a wishful thinker and like just slap a bandaid and say like, it's all and it's like because it's not all good. And that's what I'm trying to tell you guys that it's actually not. all good over here and this truth needs to be known. Zac Cannon: Well, and then so much of processing grief, trauma, all the things that life can throw at you. We get to that point. Hopefully we're more whole than when we started, but then there's another hill to climb. There's there's and so that's kind of the way it is. It's like you're always getting better, but you're always moving forward. So, or hopefully you're getting better. You know, there's setbacks along the way, but in a perfect world, I think that's always maturing, always pursuing wholeness. But life still keeps coming at us one way or the other. And you never know what the next phone call is going to bring or anything. So you just got to kind of be prepared to know that that's coming. And working with people so often, when those things come out of the blue, they're like, why is this happening? And I was like, it's just part of being alive. And so how can we find the beauty in this next leg of the journey, even if it's harder than the one that came before it? And that's part of it. Leigh/@followtheleighder: Can you talk about, know that you have a pastor background. Are you still in ministry? What does that look like? Zac Cannon: I am. So that's part of this sabbatical situation. So we moved back here. got a job at the, people laugh at this every time. I am currently the pastor of the oldest Baptist church in Albemarle County of Virginia. was 252 years old now, I think. And that happened by loss. So last summer in August, my friend and my co-pastor passed away suddenly. And so for the past year, myself and the rest of our staff have been doing the best that we can to both honor his memory, keep the dream that we've discerned at the church together and move forward. With that said, we are a very odd Baptist church. Most in this area maybe wouldn't even consider us Baptist in anything other than name or polity. And I think our people are probably okay with that right now too, but I always just call us the contemplative Baptists on the Hill. So we lean into the mystics and into contemplative practices and away from a lot of the other things, but we still have really super fun business meetings and potlucks too. Leigh/@followtheleighder: Absolutely. And that really translates in your quantum theology writing about searching to seeing. if you're comfortable, can we talk about this? OK. I didn't know if you wanted to keep it to your historical fiction. But kind of talk about, for those who may not be familiar, what is quantum theology? And why did you feel that? Zac Cannon: Yeah. No, no, absolutely. Leigh/@followtheleighder: you wanted to submit something to this book because your chapter is fantastic, but quantum theology is not very well known. So if you could educate my listeners on what this is. Zac Cannon: Thank you. Yeah, so the lay person's definitions, which is definitely where I stand as you know, like anyone who checks out that book, I have the have the every man chapter is essentially a conversation between what we're discovering in quantum physics and spiritual practices and theology. And so essentially what it boils down to is this idea that everything everywhere is connected on on all these different levels. And so quantum theology, if I was going to boil it down, just says the same thing that spiritual practices worldwide have been saying for a long time, which is that separation is an illusion. At that quantum level, you and I are bound to one another, our transference of energy and all these other processes that make life on this planet possible. We're interdependent. There's an interchange all the time. So how does that affect our theology? Essentially is the question the book is asking. Leigh/@followtheleighder: And that's, I mean, that's it, the science of interconnectedness. Zac Cannon: And then I'm fine with it. Yeah, that's how I would, that's perfect. Leigh/@followtheleighder: Well, and it's very cool listeners, quantum theology, just like he said, we just agreed that it is the science of interconnectedness at the quantum physics level. this has been around, I mean, this is not like quote unquote woo woo. This was MIT, Harvard, Oxford. Like these are well reputable institutions that are looking at this and saying, yeah, there's something very real. Zac Cannon: Thank Leigh/@followtheleighder: we can see scientifically that we are connected by something bigger and that we do impact one another in that real butterfly effect way. And it can be a little daunting to go into that because it's cool and it explains so much, but then also there's this responsibility and like, can feel a little overwhelming. And when you talk about here and from searching to seeing, I don't want to, folks, when I say the science of interconnectedness, I don't want to secularize it because that's not what the science is arguing. It's actually going the other way of spiritual. Like there is something very real and spiritual between us. From searching to seeing, and can you talk about that? Like what does that mean? What are people doing that you think should... should be pivoted from a search to a site. Zac Cannon: Yeah, so to take it back to kind of an evangelical baseline, a lot of our theology is about finding something beyond us to bring wholeness and fulfillment into us. We might call that thank God. Versus what quantum theology is saying is everything that we need is actually already a part of us. And so instead of continuing to find fulfillment, outside, whether that's in a, you secular way, whether that's our profession, our family, our whatever, or spiritually through, you know, being the best religious people we can so as to garner some type of divine favor or to stay on the good side of the divine checkbook. What it really comes down to is like, what if you're already held in grace? What if the root of your being is love? What if you don't actually have to contribute anything in order to be completely held and whole and who you are already? And then to see, what is it in my life that actually blinds me from those, from seeing myself that way? And then that becomes the thing that we would typically call like sin. And so, what are the things that are contributing to me separating myself from others or isolating myself? I think a lot of trauma informed theology, lot of, you know, psychology goes into it as well. And it's a more holistic way of exploring the story. But the other side of it is so much of Christian language, especially in America and evangelicalism is about separation. It's about this kind of silo way of being. And so we need to explode that as well. because that contributes to so much separation and harm and... Leigh/@followtheleighder: Is this separation language? Is this when you're talking about being chosen or set aside or like what, when you say like there is a language of separation and evangelicalism, what does that mean? Zac Cannon: Yeah, think that that's part of it is if if all of it is How do we get into the club so that we know we're in then that automatically means there's a lot of people out and I can there's an automatic separation built within that there's saved and there's done say there's a lost as opposed to what I feel is is necessary for communication, which is that whatever was accomplished on the cross was accomplished on a cosmic level, even if it's just metaphorical, even if it's just part of the story that I need to remind myself of is to say every single person is loved by the source of love. So how then can I love myself that way and then seek to find their wellbeing with the same type of grace? As opposed to, well, God loved me and saved me and me and my friends are going to get together. We're going to sing songs about that every single week. then worst case scenario is then we're also going to talk about how bad everyone outside of our club is, even if they also have a cross on their, on their steeple, but they might be a different, different flavor than we are. So there's, there's lots of, internalized in-fighting among, it's just, I don't know. It's, it's not very healthy. I don't think. Leigh/@followtheleighder: That is that is interesting to think about the separation between people saved and unsaved like and you're saying all of it and it makes total sense and you're like, yeah, this this integration, this universal Christ, this sort of cosmic crucifixion that you brought up. Thank you for that, by the way. That was a very cool way to word that. Zac Cannon: So that was a... Leigh/@followtheleighder: Now I just dropped my sentence because I looked at my notes. Sorry. Zac Cannon: you Leigh/@followtheleighder: Because that is what I feel that God is calling us to do is like be in community to find the light of God within one another, to try to find similarities. Each other's, you know, and right now we are just so tribalized and people are running around with narrative. I mean, that's part of it is the story all these different tribes are telling themselves in order to keep themselves safe because so much of life. Zac Cannon: you Leigh/@followtheleighder: is destabilized right now. When you started your journey of integration, what was, or just kind of expansion, what was that like? Was that scary? Was that, you know, relieving as you walked into it? What was quantum theology look like for you to like start? Zac Cannon: No, it... Well, it took a while to get there. First, it was terrifying. It was all the moorings had come undone and the ground wasn't steady. if this thing, you know, I've heard it said a couple different ways people take this metaphor, but the idea of a faith or a spiritual practice built with bricks. And if you take one out, it's like a jingo tower. And so all of a sudden I wasn't looking at a tower anymore. was just a bunch of stuff on the ground. And you're like, well, if this one isn't important or if this one isn't real or what, however we quantify it, then what else matters? And so there was a ton of, know, I, I don't use this language lightly because it took a lot of years to get where it, it was able to hold onto it, but it, it, it almost did take my life. And. there was about a year and a half that was extremely, extremely dark. And so I do not fault anyone who, as they start to experience these tensions with their faith life, they might isolate, they might walk away from the church, they might, because it can be devastating. My story just happens to be that I did it while I still worked in a church. and had to show up on Sunday mornings with a smile on my face most of the time. And luckily, eventually found my people, whether that was online or through books or through real life, and they mended me back together. And this happened, but it was really difficult. It was really painful. And I think a lot of people have gone through that. Leigh/@followtheleighder: Yes. Zac Cannon: And at the same time, I mean, I would hope that no one had to go through it to that level. It's necessary to, you know, if a seed doesn't go into the ground and die, it can't make new life kind of language. You know, I often think, well, what would it have been if I just grit my teeth and just stuck with it and let that script be the one that I just committed my life to and... Leigh/@followtheleighder: Right. Zac Cannon: Yeah, I don't know how things would have turned out. Leigh/@followtheleighder: No, and it's, it is, it's a dark night of the soul, the other side of the moon, when your ideology cannot, your ideological container cannot hold where you're going. It's like, and that's, it's like you said, destabilizing, it's dark. You're having to show up and be a total, that's, that's so exhausting, by the way, to show up and smile in an environment that you're not heart committed to or. Zac Cannon: Yeah. Leigh/@followtheleighder: whatever that phrase is, heart confused, you know, because it sounds like you were still showing up and committed, but like in your heart, it was just tough. And it is really beautiful that you have continued to build this and found your people. But yeah, folks, deconstructing kind of sucks in a real big way. mean. Zac Cannon: you Leigh/@followtheleighder: That is the whole way of looking at the world. It's why people don't like it when their faith is questioned. It's not just, don't question me on my favorite ice cream or my favorite book or TV show. It's like, this is how I function. This is how I navigate the world. And it's... Zac Cannon: Thank Yeah. It's the story that I hold on to and now it's broken all of a sudden. And I don't know a single person that's just been like, yeah, I want to do that. That sounds like a good time. It normally happens to us somehow. Something gets in there. Leigh/@followtheleighder: And it's just a weird, it always comes in weird too. Like it's not, I talked to someone the other day and he was part of a fundamentalist evangelical group, very much rapture, like the whole thing. And when the rapture didn't happen, it broke everything for him. But like that was something that no outsider was gonna be able to get through. Like that it had to be an internal logic breaks down and then the whole thing comes and it's... It can also be hard to go through that pain and then push so far the other way and start denouncing everything about that former ideology. And that's what I appreciated earlier in this call when you're like, really had to take some respect with this because a lot of people don't. I've read so many Christian nationalist or ex evangelical book stories testimonies that are very much still rooted in anger. There's still, and you can feel it, there's a lot of pain from the exclusion. They're not wrong necessarily in their arguments or what they're saying, but just in the way they word things. It's, yeah. Zac Cannon: Yeah. Which is funny that you would bring that up because the novel that I did just release takes a character and allows him to go through that. but hopefully to find, because that's the thing is we swing, you swing hard against it because it does make you mad. You almost feel like you've been lied to. And not only have you been lied to, but all of a sudden you're on the outside and it's hard to not feel that way, but you cannot stay there. You have to reintegrate. You don't have to reintegrate into the faith practice that you had. don't have, but like you, there's, you can't stay in a place of, Leigh/@followtheleighder: Right. Zac Cannon: disintegration. So you have to do the work of figuring out what is it? And so sometimes that comes from, know, a spiritual director once told me like, what do you actually want? Has anyone ever asked you what you want? What you long for? What you desire? And just being like, okay, for today, that is here's what I want. And this is what will and then pulling that thread, remembering who you are, who you probably always have been. And the stories that have either told you to quiet that or to take that away from you. And so there is, I think anger is a real response. I just don't think that's the place that we can stay if we want to move forward. And we live in a very angry world across the spectrum and hyper reactive. And I don't think any of us are going to succeed if we can't break this doom loop of just. not again it reinforces the same separation and it makes me not be able to see my my fellow human as people. Leigh/@followtheleighder: Now I think the anger is critical because there was real real harm in a lot of different ways too and like you said it's the whole life like the whole story and like you question everything you're on the outside I mean it's friendships it's routines it's like the potluck like you mentioned like this is what you do and when you don't have that anymore and you're standing on the outs I mean Zac Cannon: No, think the anger is grateful. Leigh/@followtheleighder: you lose community. It's just so you lose language. You realize that thing like then you've got a piece. Okay, what if it was wrong? What if it was actually right or like good for you know, like it's like that piecing back together. And that anger is easy to sit with because it's self righteous. You don't like you get to be the victim without feeling like one in a sad in the sad way you get to like if there's A lot to be said about anger, action, and what it does for us. But also with anger, it will drive you to make decisions based on anger. Or based on not wanting to be hurt again. And nobody wants to be hurt. But if anger is driving your story, that story's gonna go sideways. And that's something I think a lot of us have to learn on our own. We just have to learn, like. Okay, like this, but, then that deconstruction, sorry, that reconstruction begins to happen again. And there's, there can, there's also, you're doing all this new construction or reconstruction, reintegration, whatever you're calling it, and there's still a voice in your head that's telling you like something about it is wrong because it wasn't the original ideology. I hear that quite a bit. And that's on both sides. I've watched people go from evangelical to more progressive and I've watched the progressive go to the conservative and they're like, am I a bad person? It gets really tough to reintegrate because again, you've got people online that so badly wants you to stay in their camp and don't question, don't steal different things. That's not okay. Like it's just like, people don't like that at all. And I'm like, why not? Zac Cannon: Yeah. Yeah. Leigh/@followtheleighder: And I'm saying this too, as someone who has done humanitarian work with Disciples of Christ Christian faith. I've done this border wall at Mexico. I've done it in Pakistan. I've done it in Philippines. And when you're in a crisis situation or a really intense refugee or just like when things get real, a single ideology cannot hold you. Like it just can't. And I know that the real world is not riddled with Taliban and Filipino cartels and Mexican drug cartels. I know in the United States, it's a different world than we're talking about. you're like, it's a little extremely. And I'm like, but I don't know that it is. There was a situation, listeners, I'll tell you, back in the Philippines a few weeks ago where we had 10 pastors, 10 seminarians, theologians on this trip, myself included. And it spanned the political ideology. had a Gen Z leftist and we had Black church, conservative, like it was like the whole like everybody. And every person on that trip went through something they saw or experienced something that really did something to them. So for the Gen Z leftist, like who she had a lot of really strong things about left economic systems and I'm not an economist, I don't want to go down this route, but then she started to wonder like, is making money for yourself such a bad thing versus is capitalism evil? Right? It was like she started, she had to separate that now that she was walking around a communist camp and like seeing the poverty and being like, is this, I want taxes to help my people. don't think, you know, it's just like, you could see it like changed. Zac Cannon: Mm-hmm. Leigh/@followtheleighder: And then for the black evangelical military guy on the far right, he was really struggling because at the beginning of the trip, he said something about how he was fundamentally for the sanctity of life. And this is all that it, and you know, just this kind of grandstanding. And he's walking around these villages, like looking straight into homes where he can see a woman sleeping. And he's like, if that, he was like, that woman could get raped, And I was like, mm-hmm, yeah. Like someone could just walk in, or he was like, I can see her like sleeping. Like she changes clothes and the whole village can see her house. And it's not just hers. It's like all women. Like it's just open shanties. And this is just the environment of abject poverty. And now it's starting to push him like, what if she gets raped? What if she gets like, and what if like the poverty is so bad? What if she doesn't want to bring a child into this? like, now birth control starts to seem like a regulated mercy instead of playing God. And It's like really like, and then mine was like, I have all other things, but like, it just is a tough place to be to have to expand and also not know what the next step is. And kind of going back to that quantum theology. Zac Cannon: You Yeah. Leigh/@followtheleighder: There's also an element to quantum theology. think it also works with process theology. If you're familiar with that, it's kind of in the same vein. I don't actually know if they're different or if they're just two different words for the same thing. But my point being like this idea that there is a science of interconnectedness, there is a science of action too, that I believe like putting intent into the world, not to get too mystical science, but like I do think that voicing manifests like there's something there. Zac Cannon: Mm-hmm. Yeah. Leigh/@followtheleighder: But that is also part of how we get to co-create and co-write a story with God. It's like, man, if I actually don't have a nice box, what do we do? And that almost feels like the real liberating, now God gets to come in. And the God is, and like you were saying, this tapestry of all these different stolen practices and ways of looking at things. Because God is to me, the God of higher perspective. Zac Cannon: Yeah. Leigh/@followtheleighder: In fact, that's a lot my prayer often is like when I get really stuck, I'm like, God, just give me a new perspective now. Like whatever, just something. I can't look at it this way anymore. And now I'm just babbling. is your, this is your, you're the guest and I'm just over here rambling, but. Zac Cannon: No, I'll just say this. My image that comes to mind is just the same image of that has come has been used for centuries in Christian thought, which is just the table. And if we gather around the table enough to hear each other's stories and each other's fears, each other's wants, each other's desires, and we come to the table as equals, all held by the same thing, and we're willing to listen and be curious about our brothers and sisters. then I think that our whole story begins to expand because we recognize where we share things and where we don't share things and where my perspective actually might, it needs some nuance. And I get trapped in the exact same patterns as well, but I think there's something to, the more we can hear and see and be together outside of these different walls that we erect, the bigger the story gets. I think our world right now is thriving on some very small stories that might feel safe, that might feel powerful, but are ultimately keeping us from being who we can be as a people. And not to say that some of those things aren't beautiful little things in and of themselves, they're just not the complete picture. And I think we keep mistaking these small things for the big picture. Leigh/@followtheleighder: Thank you. And we're like really just kind of getting deep into the meat of this and I want to, we're almost out of time, I want to invite you back to build on this. But for this episode, can you, you have shared some really wonderful things today. Can you let the audience know where they can learn more about you, follow you or purchase your writings? Zac Cannon: Thank Yeah, sure. Zachcannon.com. It's simple as that. Z-A-C-C-A-N-N-O-N.com. I have a little Facebook page, ZachcannonWrites, that I post on. And I'm trying to work out some email type of things as well, but I promise not to pester you, the and me, if you have any other questions. You can also just email me directly on my site. I hear there's a quantum theology volume two in the works. So we'll let the LDAC go. Leigh/@followtheleighder: No, that's cool. I eventually want to get in the Keith Giles world. I'm like, you guys, you have some cool people in these books. I want to be one of them one day. Zac Cannon: Bye. Yeah, were we were just talking about that a couple days ago. I was like, hey, I wrote, I just kept writing until you said I could you publish one of my books. So that's all it was. That our inside joke. Leigh/@followtheleighder: Yeah, that whole world is fantastic. The choir. Choir? I always say choir. Choir. Yeah. All righty. Well, do you have any parting words for our listeners other than, I know you just pitched your book, but what are some things or some thoughts you'd like to leave with us today? Zac Cannon: Mm-hmm. Choir. Just spelled weird. Yeah, I have been trying to tell myself and my kids and my church, just to be curious, like to stop and to ask why, more often, why am I feeling this way? Why am I reacting this way? What is beneath this thing? And so that's, that's been my practice. That's my, one of my things I'm doing on my sabbatical. So that would just be something that I offer to you and your listeners is like, well, what is the why? behind or beneath the thing here. And if it's good, that's great. Let's celebrate it. Let's take some time to name that. And if it's bad, then what does it look like to orient myself in a better direction so that I can show up in the world with a little bit more light than today. Leigh/@followtheleighder: and also to build on that, when you start asking why, there is a story underneath all of it, but in my experience, when I start asking why, you have to answer a lot of little whys, and it's almost like a rabbit hole, and even right now, I'm examining my relationship with money and finances, and I am just like, what is this story here that is blocking me from wanting to do some of these things because of worthiness and finances and where did that come from because it's holding me back. And again, you start asking that why and it just goes down the rabbit hole. But absolutely be curious, ask why, what is the why beneath the thing? Beautiful, beautiful. And then that is how you find the story. And that is what you are, Cannon. Storyteller. Zac Cannon: Yeah. There you go. Leigh/@followtheleighder: Well, Zach, I so appreciate your time today. I really, I really do. folks, I hope that you go and listen to Zach or read his material either through his website or his books. Really good stuff out there. Really good stuff. And we need to be looking at the good stuff right now, the healing stuff, particularly because so much of us are angry and we're wounded. But we're not alone. We're not alone. And that is what folks like Zach are showing us and telling us every day. So thank you, Zach. Folks, we are at the top of the hour, so I'm gonna wrap this up, but please let me know in your comments what you thought of this episode. Don't forget to like, follow, subscribe, share, you know the drill. And until next time, I'm your host, Leigh Larson. This is Follow the Leader. See ya.