My guest this week is Eli Fuhrmler-Wheeler. Eli grew up going to Awanas at an Evangelical Free church. Eventually, he attended an Assemblies of God church and spoke in tongues. His parents forbade him from going to that church and “of course I felt they were keeping me from the gates of heaven and pulling me into hell.”
Eli’s childhood was traumatic in many ways. He experienced sexual abuse, neglect, his mom was very sick her whole life, her boyfriends were abusive, his father had an antisocial personality disorder, and he lived on and off in foster homes.
Eli sought the comfort of drugs and alcohol. He discovered he was a lesbian. He was told he was going to hell by his family.
As an adult he began a relationship with his now wife. At 30 he realized he was a man and began transition. Eli has faced rejection by family and some friends. However, his gracefulness through it all has won some of them over.
[Rather than show grace, why not be angry at those who have not shown you grace?] That wouldn’t teach anybody anything. It wouldn’t teach me anything and it wouldn’t teach them anything.
Eli deconstructed from Christianity through the years. He has explored various world religions including Norse Heathenry and various mystic traditions.
Transition and therapy have given Eli the wholeness he deserves. Eli and his wife show unconditional love for one another. This is the relationship that Eli has experienced grace for himself.
My guest this week is Jason, the son of a pastor. He grew up in the independent Christian Churches, an offshoot of Church of Christ that allows music. He grew up doing “sword drills” and was a devout teenage believer. He participated in Bible memorization contests. He became a musician and participated in worship bands for years.
In Jason’s young adulthood he began to question his own interpretation of the Bible. Why was bad language bad? Why the limited role of women in the church? How could a loving god send people to Hell? Eventually, the disparity between the idea of a loving god and the reality of the world and the suffering of innocent children led to his deconversion.
Anything you do with the bible is interpretation.
Jason’s wife is still a believer though they both deconstructed from Evangelicalism and started participating in an Episcopal church. They are making an “unequally yoked” relationship work based on love, equality and mutual respect.
My guest this week is Geoffrey Wallis, author of A Voice From Inside: Notes on Religious Trauma in a Captive Organization. Geoffrey is Physically In but Mentally Out (PIMO) of the Jehovah’s Witnesses. After recognizing the religious trauma and the cognitive dissonance he was experiencing he found help through therapy. He remains within the Watchtower organization because it is a “captive organization” which enforces shunning by family members and friends.
My guest this week is David. David is the son and grandson of pastors. He does has have good memories of growing up in the church and he credits his parents with restraint. As an adult, he became more fundamentalist. He was a Southern Baptist and went through a very strong Calvinist phase.
It seems like that if an all knowing god was to inspire the writing of the most important book ever in the history of mankind it would have been something that would have been preserved to where we could look at the originals and it would have been something that was consistent. And I don’t see that.
David taught apologetics classes. He delved into apologetics to qualm his own questions. But teaching apologetics on topics like the Trinity led to more doubt not less. It was a re-read through the Bible where he began to recognize the god of the Bible is not a loving one. The full implications of Reformed theology began to have horrifying implications.
We you are deconverting like I did, I was weeping before the lord asking him to give that belief back to me and he didn’t.
Ultimately, David deconverted and now calls himself agnostic. Today David is the co-host of the That’s Questionable podcast.
It’s amazing how much more peace I feel on this side of the decision than on the other side.
My guest this week is Daniel Kelly, the new co-host of When Belief Dies. Daniel began as a Charismatic Christian, moved to an Orthodox Christian church and eventually was at a Bible church that preached through every verse in the bible.
Daniel was a dedicated Christian working in a Christian non-profit helping those with disabilities. His mother had MS when he grew up so he was focused on helping his family through difficult times and did not always get to be a kid.
I believed I had to be perfect and I had to be helpful to everyone in order to be valuable.
Daniel’s feminism and belief in the humanity of the LGBTQ community, led to moral objections to some of the harder Biblical passages that do not uphold the humanity and full autonomy of everyone. His serious investigations into theology and the Bible were some of the early seeds that led to deconversion.
The grief Daniel experienced leaving the faith and the loss were profound. He lost his faith, his community, the health of his relationship and on top of that the pandemic hit. He was isolated and alone. He experienced “Hell Anxiety” and worried he was a “vessel of wrath.” The first year after deconversion was one of the most difficult of his life.
He made it through and today he is the co-host of the When Belief Dies podcast. He is building healthy relationships and restoring family relations. He is experiencing the freedom to love people unconditionally.
“Waves” track written and produced by Makaih Beats
Transcript
NOTE: This transcript is AI produced (otter.ai) and likely has many mistakes. It is provided as rough guide to the audio conversation.
David Ames 0:11
This is the graceful atheist podcast. Welcome welcome. Welcome to the graceful atheist podcast. My name is David and I am trying to be the graceful atheist. Please rate and review the podcast on pod chaser.com or the Apple podcast store and subscribe wherever you are listening. Also, please consider voting and nominating the podcast on the podcast awards.com spirituality and religion category. Special thanks to Mike T for editing today's episode. onto today's show. My guest today is Daniel Kelly. Daniel is the new co host of when belief dies with Sam Davis. Daniel and Sam interviewed me on an episode a few weeks back and Daniel and I interviewed Sam that went on when belief dies a few weeks ago as well. Daniel has recently appeared on the when belief dies podcast as the ongoing co host. I got the opportunity to interview Daniel and hear his story firsthand here. And it is an amazing story. Daniel began as a more of a charismatic Protestant, he went to an orthodox church for a while, he really got serious about theology and studying. And some of those seeds lead to future doubt. Daniel also expresses the incredible grief and loss of the deconversion processes. This occurred for him shortly before the beginning of the pandemic, and the experience of the loss of community was profound and difficult. And it just reminds us to tell you that you don't have to go through this alone. If you need to talk to someone immediately recovering from religion.org has a chat hotline and you can talk to someone right now. Secular therapy.org also has a list of secular therapists that we highly recommend. But now here's my conversation with Daniel Kelly.
Daniel Kelly, welcome to the graceful atheist podcast.
Daniel Kelly 2:30
Thanks very much, David, looking forward to chatting to you again.
David Ames 2:33
Yes, absolutely. So we're gonna acknowledge here that the timing is interesting, you are a host of when belief dies with Sam. And you actually were on when you and I interviewed Sam, and that aired on when belief dies. But you are just now i'll probably as people are listening to this coming on as the CO hosts for that podcast. So the timing is just a little different based on the delay that you guys have had. But I'm really excited to have you here today to hear your story. So as much of your story as we can tell. And then at the kind of near the end there. We'll we'll talk more about your work on the podcasts. So let's begin with what was your faith tradition growing up? What was that? Like? Were you a really serious Christian?
Daniel Kelly 3:19
Yeah, so I grew up in a Christian household. And it was a far more charismatic, you know, gifts of the Spirit kind of church that I grew up in. And, you know, obviously, as a kid, that's all I knew, sort of went along with it. But as I sort of entered into my teenage years, I found this magical thing called theology. And I absolutely loved it. You know, I had a copy of Wayne Grudem, systematic theology, and I'd worked my way through the entirety of it. And, and I found that the church that I grew up in, I became more skeptical of the cultural Christianity. And I, I started to question, well, you know, is this true? Or is this just what people want to be true? And I found in theology like, okay, no, no, I'm actually accessing the truth. That's, that's sort of how I viewed it. And I went around to a bunch of different churches in the end in the local area. And I really struggled. It felt like they all sort of had this culture of Christianity. But you know, having these these theological conversations that I was reading about in all my, my textbooks just wasn't going on. And I really struggled with that. So, curiously, I ended up at an Eastern Orthodox Church.
David Ames 4:52
Oh,
Daniel Kelly 4:54
I can't wait, which, you know, was tiny because it's, it's it's Scotland. This is not a The images that you didn't expect much orthodoxy around, but I fell in love with it. You know, obviously, there was just such a different type of worship. But it felt older, it felt ancient. And alongside that, you know, they introduced me to a lot of the, the early church fathers, people like basil couristan Athanasius, these sort of people and, you know, discovered the work of Augustine as well. Okay, who, as I was engaged with Reformed theology was a key part of so you know, that there's some really great teaching there as well. So I absolutely loved, absolutely loved the place and yeah, but eventually I moved out of Scotland, I went to work for a Christian charity down in England, in Yorkshire. and rent a bit there, I had the same struggle finding a church, you know, I couldn't find an Orthodox Church with the same sort of culture. You know, there were very other few Christians who would had any knowledge, real knowledge of Orthodoxy, nevermind, Orthodox themselves. You know, I wasn't fully orthodox myself, I wasn't fully part of that church. But I kind of, I would have said, I had the heart of an orthodox while the mind of a reformed Christian and okay, you know, this was my Christian project to find what what was the true Christianity at the very core of it, because the Orthodox claim to hold on to the original Christianity, the reformers were trying to bring it back to the original Christianity. So I want you to get at that sort of eternal truth.
David Ames 6:45
Now, and you're telling my story, theology being an important part, I often say that Jesus, the Jesus of the, the Gospels, one my heart, you know, I've come for the sick and not the Well, that was like, I'm there Right? At but it was the ology, and specifically systematic theology and college for me that was like that one my mind. And like, I think I've remained a Christian, for much longer than I would have had not had that theological background, and it kind of gave you the playground the, to work with that to have a kind of an never ending puzzle to work with and engage with the intellect. And in some way, the question that I have for you is, I think it's relatively unique, relatively rare, let's just say, to go from a more Protestant to beginning to look at an Orthodox Church. What were the differences? And was was that striking to you? In some way I am, where I'm getting at is, I think many people remain myopic in their own cultural Christianity to use your term and don't, and then they can be shocked when they go, even to the church down the street. Right. So what was that experience? Like?
Daniel Kelly 8:03
Yeah, I mean, I guess the curiosity too, called First and foremost, and just, I guess, because it was outside of my culture, all I could get out of it was the more things that I could understand and things that I could intellectually engage with. But also, there's the sort of the, like, because the liturgy is that they use an orthodoxy is so old. Yeah. And you're surrounded in that room with all the different icons of these, you know, Heroes of Christian faith. There's, there's almost a timelessness to it. And it's, it's closer to, you know, I can't get along with meditation now, which is weird, because in that Orthodox liturgy, it almost feels like a meditative state. And the, you know, to describe it emotionally, it's sort of like the walls fall away, and you're there with the Church throughout, not just throughout the whole world, but throughout all time. And that sort of connects you into that wider story, which I guess because I was on that intellectual journey, trying to uncover sort of more historical intellectual Christianity, that sort of experience alongside it sort of coincided with that. So yeah, it was kind of foreign and I just asked so many questions, which, obviously, they were more than happy to, like, ya know, why do you kiss icons, and, and all these sort of things. But, you know, at the core of, of, particularly that church, there was sort of a strong core of teaching theology and understanding the truth and holding fast to the truth that has been inherited throughout the generations. And I was more of that side of things that I really enjoyed going along and engaging with time again again.
David Ames 10:17
So one more thing that I relate to, and I'll try to get you back to where where I interrupted you. I talked a lot about when I was at Bible college, you know, we would have our dining commons would be open 24 hours a day, and you'd literally be in there at four in the morning having some deep theological conversation. And when I got out of college, the hardest thing for me the most difficult thing was that people did not want to have four hour conversations at three in the morning. And ironically, coming full circle, a lot of the work I'm doing today is people want to have these deep conversations, right, and and when we find each other, that's really exciting. And so I definitely feel like you're a kindred spirit, if I can use that term. In that in that regard. And then secondly, to get us back to where I interrupted you, you were talking about moving and trying to recapture lightning in a bottle and that I relate to that as well, like when you are forced to go to a different church, even within your own denomination, you don't always find the same feel that you're looking for, you have a sense of what you want to be there. And when it's not there, it's can be disorienting.
Daniel Kelly 11:34
Yeah, absolutely. And, you know, I very quickly sort of came to this recognition that denominations, men, virtually nothing, every single individual church had kind of its own culture. And, and it was very few, that actually really, I felt captured that, right, that desire for truth, over and above what was comfortable. And, you know, part of the culture. And you know, when I was when I was in Bradford, it took a couple of years. And eventually I went along to a church where they taught the entire Bible from, I mean, the entire Bible, like literally, their sermons for this week, we're reading chapters one and two. Next week, we'll read chapters three and four, right? Not a single verse was missed, you know, The Good, the Bad, and the ugly. And this was what I struggled with so much, you know, working at a Christian charity, where you're surrounded by all these different types of Christians. And, you know, the Philo theologian me with, every single time someone says, For I know, the plans I have for you, plans for you to prosper. It's, oh, it made me so angry. I mean, I laugh No, because obviously, my interpretation was just as much of a reading into that passage, you know, saying it's a promise of price does, as there's is no, you know, there is a, a funny arrogance that I know, viewed by for myself with that I had then. But you know, it the way that people used the Bible more like a scrapbook, where you took out your favorite passages, and just held to that, rather than, no, actually, that's, this, this book engages with the hardest and darkest themes of life. And, and we should be engaging in embracing of that. So I eventually found the church and it was, you know, a far more conservative, fundamentalist church, then I was used to, you know, as much as I was quite a strong Christian, I was also quite lefty, in my politics, and I'd grown up with a feminist ideology, you know, as as the standard. And so going along to church were some of the I'm I'm then having to challenge myself as well, you know, when they started to teach about complementarianism. And all of a sudden, I'm like, I'm not comfortable with this. Yeah. But at the same time, the challenge came back. Well, while I was trying to escape cultural Christianity, you know, am I just dismissing what the Bible actually says, in favor of the culture that I grew up in? And so eventually, you know, I tried to convince myself of that, and various other things along the way.
David Ames 14:39
Interesting. In some ways, it's your moral intuition that is getting in the way, right. You have a sense of the equity for women in particular, and when that is getting challenged, you're having this moral reaction to that and having in your words to kind of overcome that.
Daniel Kelly 14:59
Yeah, absolutely. and you divide. I remained part of that church for six years, you know, I learned a lot there, you know, they were really intensive with the teaching of sort of biblical theology and sort of reading the entire book I, you know, I felt like I learned a lot. But yeah, there was always that discomfort. And well, I felt like I could really get along with and except the people in my church, sometimes the, the wider community when we went along to conferences, because the other thing was, obviously I, I always struggled with LGBT issues as well. And, you know, going along to a conference where I'm being told, oh, you should support this legal campaign to against gay marriage, you know, it was always this really uncomfortable like me, because, you know, I didn't have this disgust response to sexuality, about, you know, the vast majority of people have been attracted to be women. There were exceptions. And I just went, but you know, I was, I was a very good Christian boy, and I repressed everything. I was just one more thing on the pile, and, you know, it. But at the same time, this, I could see the disgust response coming out of people. And that's was driving their theology rather than, for me, it was a reluctant. Well, God has said this, and I can't question that. It's, it's clear, right? And we have to submit to God, but it was this very reluctant. So yeah, these these sort of, to moral issues around, you know,
David Ames 16:55
human beings, as human
Daniel Kelly 16:57
beings. It's so much easier though. I don't have to hold this conundrum in my head. Yeah. So So these, these really came out quite strong. So what happened is, I got a job offer down in London, and it was a great opportunity. And obviously, London had many, many churches, most of which were considered good ones, within our circles, and so you know, where you could get good teaching. And so yeah, so mid down there. And I saw obviously, stepping back into a secular workplace, having been in this Christian community where I worked at a Christian workplace, and went to church. And, you know, by this point, 95 to 99% of my social circle was Christian.
David Ames 17:57
Right. Okay.
Daniel Kelly 17:59
You know, it was actually really quite hard to break out of it. A lot of the time. And literally, I'm, I'm in the office the first week, and it will, it would have been actually, three years ago, almost to the day. No, because, of course, very first, you know, one of the first things that happens as I'm meeting some people, and they give me this rainbow iced cupcake
David Ames 18:23
for a price. Okay?
Daniel Kelly 18:26
And I'm just stood there holding this cupcake going, Oh, crap, what do I do? Can I eat the cupcake? If this cupcake, am I betraying my Christian values? Am I betraying their values? Like, and, you know, I kind of had an intellectual answer to this. And obviously, I was not someone who's shouting this from the streets, and I had very clear, gay marriage should be legal, you know, God's law is something separate, and, you know, all this sort of thing. But still the idea that, actually no, I'm, I'm now actually working alongside and engaging with people on a regular basis, who are homosexual, gay, bi, trans, you know, and I want to engage with them. And I want to, you know, I started to really go, how am I going to explain this, if it if it ever needs to come up? And how am I gonna talk about this? And also, because I'd taken a job where I was managing policy, and sort of the development of of debt advice. I, I knew that a lot of my policies really impacted women. And I was reading an amazing book by women called Caroline criado Perez, called Invisible women talking about the biases that are built into sis stones and places by men, because we just assume, well, how we live our lives. It's how people live their lives. And so therefore, women are sort of missed out.
David Ames 20:14
It's, it's built into medicine and technology and in almost every facet of our lives. Yeah.
Daniel Kelly 20:21
Yeah. I, I love this book. And obviously for me, this was a massive challenge. And it was, it was that that that made me go. I'm also uncomfortable when I read passages in the Bible, where I could come up with an apologetic, you know, I could I could use every hermeneutic trick in the book. Well, you know, and, but more and more, I started to read the Bible a bit more with the anthropological lens, you know, and there were some other dates, which we'll get to, but the passages where I was reading, where was it an easier and more sensible position, or made more sense, that actually the passages that related to women, were coming from men with that perspective, versus coming from a god with the omniscient expected perspective, right. And obviously, you know, if there are some truly horrendous passages in the Bible in relation to this, and, you know, there's those passages like numbers five, where I could provide an apologetic for it, I could just about squeeze it out so that I couldn't hold to that passage and try and argue that not only could I answer it, but I could show how it was a good thing. In terms of purity, and the importance of Jesus's genealogy and things like that. But at the same time, why what if I was wrong? If I was wrong, then I was holding on to passages and declaring them as good and perfect when actually, they're saying something that that's deeply problematic.
David Ames 22:22
Could you refresh me? Numbers five, I'm sorry, I don't have an off the top of my head.
Daniel Kelly 22:29
Yeah, no worries. So numbers five is a tricky passage, where, effectively if a woman is suspected of sleeping with a man who is not her husband, then she would be brought in front of a priest who would take some holy water and some dust from the tabernacle, mix it together and force it to her to drink. And if apparently, according to the verse, if she's not set forth, the man should be fine. And she will be, she will go on to give birth. If, however, she has slept with another man, then she will be cursed. And the description of the curse is that her womb will swell, and her thigh will fall away. And when you take that sort of a theological reading of that text, you can sort of say, well, first of all, this is really important, genealogies are absolutely vital to the Israelites, and we're going to rely on those genealogies by the time we get to Jesus. And, you know, it's, uh, they're about to enter into the holy land. And it's not just any water or any dirt, this is holy substances. And so what we see here is God is in complete control. And it's as the purity and the holiness of his presence touches this awful depravity.
David Ames 24:01
And, again, I don't know off the top of my head, probably not a lot of mention of the man who was involved in this scenario. No, no.
Daniel Kelly 24:14
Whereas obviously, if you read it from an anthropological perspective, her womb will swell after she's supposedly just had sex with another man. But if she's innocent, she will go on to give birth, you know, probably doesn't take much to read in between the lines here. And that's problematic on a number of levels because obviously, this is not by her consent, she is brought to the priest by her husband. So the thing is, is you can try and push that apologetic, but the question for me is, but what if I'm wrong, but if I'm wrong, this isn't something people are acting out Obviously, I don't, I don't think any Christians are trying to find the tabernacle to write fulfill this, but it's still part of that moral framework of this. This is what God commands, this is the importance of purity. Even that word now sends a bit of a shiver down my spine, knowing how it's been used, especially in the context, particularly of sex and women. But, yeah, that that question really loomed large and became just more and more problematic.
David Ames 25:43
You know, we'll just acknowledge here, the obvious fact that throughout Christian history, women have borne the brunt of being blamed for men's failures. In other words, they are treated as the Jezebel, they're treated as the temptress when it's ultimately the, the men within that culture that have been the problem. And, and even to today, they're complementarianism of today. The problem is, it's not acknowledging that the men are the problem. And I would, you know, would have included my previous self in this as well, of just, you know, a buying into that culture at any level.
Daniel Kelly 26:21
Yeah, yeah, absolutely. I guess, like, I guess I had, like, these were things that were really niggling away at me. And they were way more problematic, because I felt like, Okay, I actually have to talk to people. And if this ever comes up, how am I going to respond, but at the same time, there was also more, the more boring and technical stuff that just was weighing on top of me, because, you know, I, I kind of always had this really funny relationship with Genesis that I just could not get my head around. And obviously, there's, this is a classic, you know, Christian problem, in terms of what genre is, is Genesis, because, you know, when I read it, you know, there were there were clearly elements of poetry in here. And my main argument was always, this is teaching theological truth like that is its core purpose, rather than, yeah, if you were there with your eyes, this is precisely what you would see. At the same time, there was always this question of, well, how did the New Testament off authors then look back at the Old Testament? And how did they read it? And I kind of got myself into this, a bit of a loop in terms of, you know, I want it to read the Bible for truth. And that meant understanding the author's intent and what, what they meant by it in their time and place. And so now, trying to figure out well, actually, it seems like both Jesus or Paul reference Adam, as a real human, and even some of Paul's theological arguments, are based on Adam being a real man. It seems to really struggle. And obviously, to a certain extent, while you know, the ancient readers of these texts were not scientists, they don't think in the way that we think now, at the same time, when they see this big, long list of people and how long they lived, they believe that that's how long they lived. That was kind of the 10. And it's, to a certain extent, I was struggling to figure out how do I match up this special revelation of God and how he's revealed himself through the Bible, verses? Well, what we observe in the world. And then Paul did something weird in the book, in this letter to the Galatians, where he says, Oh, the promise was made to Abraham. And it said to your offspring, singular, rather than plural, except that doesn't. It just doesn't. I tried to read a number of apologetics on on this and trying to figure out how to understand it. But you know, effectively Paul is taking this promise that was made to Abraham and showing how it relates to Jesus. And to, like, I didn't have a problem with the theological points he was making, but he was, he was stretching this passage and changing it to fit what he wanted it to see. As opposed to the clear reading that the author of Genesis had, you know, you know, even like Abraham is his name was originally Abraham, which meant father, and then Abraham father of many, and his offspring will date number this Stars. So Paul's assertion here that the singular rather than plural actually cuts against the entire narrative that was there, right by the original author. And so it all came to a head when, you know, I was reading one day, First Timothy, chapter two in it, it was another passage about women submitting to their husbands. And it were more around teaching in the church, sorry. And so women were not to teach in the church, because Adam was created first than Eve, which, you know, was this doctrine of created order, and it was quite common use by complementarians, and was kind of the thing that I'd accepted. But then he goes further and says, Oh, and Eve was deceived. But Adam wasn't. And once again, and you know, when I read the original story in Genesis, it's like, it's not really there. Yes, she is deceived, but I don't say with her, and then he eats the fruit. And if if she's deceived, well, then at least she she was just mistaken. Adam was just in pure rebellion, like, surely that's the bigger problem here like, yes, yeah. And then he goes on, oh, well, but she'll be saved through childbirth. What do you mean by that poll? I don't know that you've just thrown that in there with very little clarity, and how am I meant to take this passage? And go, Yes, this is good. This is helpful. Or do I take this passage as well, actually, you know, he's, he's a male, and he's living in a patriarchal society. And this is their interpretation. And even, you know, doing some reading around, you know, well, are women more easily deceived? Or is there any literature to support such a position? And the answer that, that I found, sort of reading through a few studies was quite effectively, a kind of yes, in that women are more likely to be victims of deception. But that's because they're more likely to have people try and deceive them. Because of us this morning, you've easily deceived. It's a vicious circle.
David Ames 32:26
Yeah. So it's a self perpetuating cycle. Yeah, exactly.
Daniel Kelly 32:29
But not because of anything intrinsic to that. It's, it's, it's society actually creating its own message. So. And that was just like the pinch point where both this technical concern of I can't make sense of this, and how it was then being used to create this narrative, which, yeah, despite constantly trying to tell myself, well, I can't judge God. The more and more I was considering it, and also, I, I read this obscure philosopher called zero, you call who was also a theist and a Christian and had sort of thought about different ways of morality. Ultimately, my moral contact I still had responsibility for, and to me that the cost of being a Christian, as a cisgendered, heterosexual, white male, was virtually nothing like it was it, you know, I probably will look back now and say, Actually, there were a few things, I missed out on problems and huge, but in comparison to the cost that it demands of others, it was too great. And, you know, for me, I was worried that one day I would become a father. And, you know, if I had a daughter, what would I teach her? If she came home one day and said, I don't think I'm a girl, or right, I'm attracted to girls, which even tell me these things. How much damage could I do? And I think the best image of I've found for this is like before I could flip a coin and if, if God existed, great, I win. If he didn't find a rot in the ground, no, no harm, no foul. And it looked a lot more like I was just a roulette table, putting it all on one number. And they weren't even my chips that I was playing with.
David Ames 34:50
Wow, that is an amazing analogy. I want to respond to a number of those things. I don't want to take away from any of it but like, you know, I have daughters. In what through my deconversion, kind of prior to them becoming young women, so like, you know, I feel like I was able to get around that and really embrace them for whatever they chose, but definitely had the same concerns of when I was in the faith, you know, like, my daughters were whole, complete autonomous human beings, and I was gonna fight for them. And there was no way I was gonna diminish who or what they could become. So I definitely feel that
the other thing I want to touch on, and I don't know if I've, if I've mentioned this yet on Mike, but I recently have done like a Bible study, my wife and some friends. And it's interesting because it is going through the Old Testament. And it was reminding me of some of my Bible college training. So you have these two ideas, you use the word hermeneutics, which is how we interpret things. But the other word that is really important is exegesis, which has nothing to do with Jesus and said, Gee, and there, it just means interpreting the text, as the original author meant, and as the original readers and hearers would have understood it to mean. And then a third concept that is either very heavily implied or sometimes overt is this idea that you read the Old Testament in light of Jesus. And as I'm sitting here, you know, as an atheist, with my family, it was kind of this epiphany moment, like, wait a minute, you can't do both of those things. You can't do exegesis correctly, and do and read it in light of Jesus. And so what you highlighted earlier, and I want to compliment you, first of all, for being one of the most detailed person, people. That is very specific, Daniel. But what you highlighted was not only our propensity to read into the text, our current culture, but Paul's tendency to read his culture into the Old Testament text. And that is the thing that where we where we get, we break down. And my simple example of this is when I had mer Simka, on who's an Orthodox Jewish person. He pointed out that Isaiah 5553, rather, it has not only nothing to do with Jesus, it has nothing to do with the Messiah, as you know, so that just to give you perspective on the original hearers, didn't hear, Oh, this is talking about the Messiah, that now as an atheist, it's easy. This is a human document. These, as you've said, multiple times, every one who is an author of a biblical text is writing a theological document, they are making theological points, they are making a theological points within the culture that they are living in and on, you know, this side of faith that it's so much easier to just accept it, as it is. I recognize it for all of its flaws and some of the wisdom that's there as well, and, and then not be obligated to accept every word of it as literal truth.
Daniel Kelly 38:12
Yeah, I think obviously, like, just because I'm saying this is not a divine book doesn't mean that you have to strip away its humanity as well. You know, you've read through Ecclesiastes, and you're just thinking, were you friends with John pulsar? I mean, you're just having this existential breakdown. And if you just at the very end, it's gone. Well, you know, life must be absurd, you know, we could have just had the early existential is, but instead, it finishes or therefore sort of gods, but you know, actually,
David Ames 38:48
which many people believe is tacked on?
Daniel Kelly 38:52
Yeah, it's brilliant. I think, you know, you can see some real humanity in it. And I think when you do appreciate it as such, and I think this is sort of, you know, I guess, you know, sort of stuff that was gonna touch on but, you know, obviously, coming out of Christianity, I just wanted to destroy it all. And to a certain extent, I believe this, you know, it's a lot of my learning, since I guess I've, I've actually come to appreciate more of, you know, this is a human story, and it's created by humans. And for that, I can just appreciate that. It's going to have all the characteristics of humanity. In all its brightest and, and darkest points along the way.
David Ames 39:44
Yeah. To drive this point home just a little further, you know, in the last 10 years, just the last 10 years, we have gone through dramatic cultural changes with the acceptance of LGBT marriage. trans people are having a racial reckoning of the systemic racism within Western cultures in particular. And, you know, so that even in my lifetime, you know, I can read something from the 90s and think, oh, man, that's problematic. So, no wonder you're reading a document that's 2000, you know, 3000 years old, it's going to be problematic. And if we don't just accept it, that this is these are human beings who are flawed there in their context and their setting, that is just always going to be a terribly frustrating process. And then if you add on top of that, trying to interpret it as literal and authoritative truth, that's where things go deeply, deeply wrong.
Daniel Kelly 40:45
Yeah. Yeah, absolutely. Absolutely.
David Ames 40:56
You've hinted here that, you know, you have kind of this, this Reckoning and you kind of want to burn it all down, which I think is, first of all, a very natural response. I think that is, I think everyone goes through that for at least a certain amount of time. But what were those first few months, that first year, what was that like for you?
Daniel Kelly 41:18
Yeah, it was, it was scary. It was great. Scary. You know, it was not even. I can't remember exactly when, but not long after that. I was just the in the house. And my wife turned to me, as she quite often would. She was reading first Timothy chapter two. And she was wondering what Paul meant by a when she'll be saved through childbirth. And it was this weird coincidence, but I was just caught in the headlights of it. And I all I said was, I don't know, I moved on, because it was truthful. But I, I didn't know what else to say. And I was scared. I was scared of what would happen if I said much more. And, you know, I was still going to church every Sunday for a good few months, probably about six months, in the end. But when you when I kind of made that shift from a dating Christian to a doting atheist, you see so much more. When you observe from the outside, and you see in, because in my, in my job, I was having to learn a lot of behavioral science things as well. You can see it in the songs, you can see these little nudges towards submit submit. Yeah, Jesus is the only answer. So if you leave, you're gonna be in trouble. Yeah. In in the sermons and, you know, this will satisfy you for a bit, but you'll need to keep coming back. It's yeah, you just see so much more
David Ames 43:12
that you cannot unhear the manipulation. Yeah,
Daniel Kelly 43:15
yeah. And it got harder and harder. And obviously, I was, I was just feeling like a fraud. Because I still had all the knowledge. It's like the skill set hadn't just disappeared to be able to read a passage and bring to light various historical facts, and it's different interpretations away stuff up. So I could still do stuff. And yet at the same time, I was going to believe it. But I don't, you know, this, this had been my entire life. And, you know, I'd only just moved, I had not long moved to London, this is probably a good year, after I'd moved down, this is going on and I'm I don't know what, what exists outside of that community, but I just couldn't do it anymore. And I eventually started to tell people and obviously, you know, I felt a lot of people responded with pity, mostly. Obviously, there were, there was suspicion as well. I got a dozen books just sent to be without any notice no one that wants, like, no one was really willing to have a sit down conversation with me. And, you know, especially because I done quite a lot of reading. I knew that. And, you know, I kind of had my arguments as to why I don't think this is either right or healthy. Right. You know, I was afraid of speaking. And, you know, for me atheists were Richard Dawkins or Christopher Hitchens. They were the smug, snarky Oxford men.
David Ames 45:08
Yes.
Daniel Kelly 45:11
He were just mean. And I didn't want to be that they were still my friends. There were still people I wanted to connect with. But at the same time, you know, and also looking back, I projected a lot of anger. Because, you know, I was angry with who I was, as a Christian, I was angry with the way I dated, I was angry with the fact that I'd laid aside my moral intuitions under this, oh, well, I can't question God's I need to accept the truth I need to, uh, not really, I felt engaged with these things properly. Like, why had they not asked these questions sooner? These weren't passages that I hadn't read before I knew them. But Why hadn't I asked these questions in these ways? And also, you know, if someone had turned to me and said, I'm no longer a Christian, you know, my response, technically, as a Calvinist was, well, actually, that kind of means you probably weren't a Christian in the first. Yes, I know, I'm so sad there is this walking, talking contradiction to my former beliefs, and, you know, or, you know, something else has gone wrong. And so, of course, I am angry at myself. So I'm angry at other Christians. And I also feel that there was some rejection. I mean, I went for a walk with a close friend of mine, somebody was really close with and who I had talked a lot through my Christian journey, you know, they were originally a Christian, but they were this very liberal, free flowing, God is just love, kind of Christian. And I had taken them and turn them into this former evangelical Christian. When I tell them, you know, I'm bombarded with, you know, well, what have you been reading? Who Who have you been speaking to? How? How could you come to believe something so evil and arrogant? Wow. And, you know, when when they said that to me, I wasn't surprised. I wasn't shocked. I, I wasn't angry with them. I was angry at myself, because I heard like, behind those terms, I knew the thinking that was there. And I was hearing back. Things I had to create. I had indoctrinated, and I pray, I hated it. And those words haunted me for for a long time.
David Ames 47:55
Man, Daniel, I can't tell you how well you are expressing this idea. I think that there the guilt that we feel for what our former selves have said and done. And you know, and you have the kind of the literal experience of having a friend kind of mirror that back to you. That's pretty intense. That's a pretty intense experience, I think, I think part of this deconversion process, or post deconversion or however you want to say it is forgiving yourself. You know, like, a few episodes back, I talked about, you know, you did the best you could with the information that you had. That was your understanding at the time. And all of us have said terrible, terrible things that we wish we had back. Right. When we were living within that bubble.
Daniel Kelly 48:48
Yeah, yeah, absolutely. And, yeah, it took me a long time to get through that and also to get through, you know, how I then responded to all this, because, you know, a few months later, I I wasn't connected into the church, you know, unfortunately, my wife and I separated. You know, we, yeah, it just went through an incredibly dark time. I felt so completely isolated. Because most of the social interaction I was getting was at work, which kept me busy, but after a while and going through, yeah, just a really difficult place. I recognized actually, I'm, I'm really struggling here. I need. I need a new community. I need people around me who are going to support me because I didn't. I didn't know who my friends and family I could truly trust because they were all Christian. I felt they were all You're going to judge me. And some of that was true, some of that wasn't. But that's how I really felt in that time. So I had to go out, I had to go out of the house, so I needed to engage with people, I need to breathe the same air as them.
David Ames 50:19
On this foreshadowing
Daniel Kelly 50:21
was March 2020. Wow, yeah. Yeah, perfect timing, of course, as as prime minister, Boris Johnson comes out and says, You will stay at home, you will save lives, protect the NHS COVID is here, don't go anywhere. And, yeah, it the isolation definitely came at the worst possible time. And they got a lot worse. And, you know, it's, it's hard and weird to describe what I went through at that time, because I just really wasn't healthy. And in all this, as much as I have my reasons, you know, I was fairly confident that I had left my faith for, for good reasons. At the same time, I still had my moments of doubt. And, you know, those moments of panic, and I'm fear of being wrong, especially when, you know, as someone who was a Calvinist, it is kind of weird, because you look back, and then if we contextualize everything, you know, either I was mistaken the entire time. Or actually, I'm forsaken. Like, the every, every prayer that I made, every time that I felt like I was relying on God, and you know, he was the one person I could trust. I mean, what was he doing? Was he just laughing at me? Was he was the second by me, like, what, what was that? If I'm wrong, you know, why am I left in this situation? And then, you know, I, if you've ever talked to me about hell, as a Christian, I would have given you a very long talk about how Dante's Inferno is not canon. Be very careful about what we think about this topic. But at the same time, obviously, there is there is a motif, and there are passages like and, you know, especially for me, you know, the second John, it talks about people who would be deceivers, and they would speak against Jesus and, and I didn't want to be one of those people. That even though I did, because I was so angry, and but I didn't know what to do. Because if I open my mouth, I would be guilty. And you've got passages and revelation of a wine press, where you know, that people are, are thrown in, and Jesus tramples them to death until the blood runs for 200 miles. You've got Romans nine, where it talks about vessels of wrath. And this was, this was like the passage that really just was constantly in my mind, because it, it talks about people being prepared for destruction being set up so that and the kicker for that was the vessels of wrath were prepared for destruction, so that God's glory might be known to his first vessels of mercy. And, you know, for me, in those moments of panic in those moments where I'd got things wrong, you know, it would feel like, okay, this is what God created before. God created me so that I would have this moment, I would start to speak out and tear it, my friends and family so that in the final day, he would have this long list of things that goes, see, you're, you're nothing but that's their sort of wrath and I'm going to crush you to the cheers and adoration of your friends and family.
David Ames 54:42
That's dark down. Yeah, yeah.
Daniel Kelly 54:46
And I knew this wasn't rational. And I think that that was the that was the thing that really got to me because I'm usually this calm and collected, rational kind of person like these Yeah, these horrible fears were, were something else. And you know, there were things that I try and tell myself, it's like, well, you're not, you're not scared of Allah, you're not scared of these other gods with other forms of hell, why? This is the indoctrination, and you just need to work past this. But at the same time, obviously, and I was aware of that also, it was no coincidence that a lot of this is happening with the isolation. And with that, cutting off of off people, and this, this disconnect from, you know, the huge social circle that I had. And I couldn't even I felt like I couldn't even turn to my youth work colleagues or or some of the few non Christian friends that I have. Because if I then had to say, Well, I believe this, they've got sorry, you believed what?
David Ames 56:15
Can I just acknowledge the, the incredible amount of loss that you're experienced. So those of us who have believed before we are losing the intimacy of a God, who knows that every hair on our heads, we lose that we lose, as you mentioned, 95% of your social circle was were Christian. So you lose, you lose that that was the end of a marriage. So that's got to be devastating. And then on top of all of that, the pandemic is happening. I mean, I just You're breaking my heart down, you're like, I feel for you how I know what it's like to go through parts of that. And you were having all of that at one time. That is absolutely incredible.
Daniel Kelly 57:02
It was bad timing. Certainly. You know, I, I did. I did find my way through it, though. And I guess I and even through the darkest times, there was always something I was always driving myself for, as I knew there was a way through, and I could kind of find that way. I wish I'd gone for therapy at that time. I really should have. That was, that was a mistake. Because yeah, I was on the edge. And in a really unhealthy and unnatural for me, state coming out of it. But you know, a couple of things that start to help. So, you know, because for me, for some reason, in my head, there was still this idea that people don't lose their faith. Or the people that did didn't act. Like even though I had lost my faith, it still felt like I must be the only person that's true. And then I just thought, I wonder if like, I went onto YouTube. And I think I just typed in former Christian. And I started watching videos, I remember coming across a guy called drew in his channel, genetically modified skeptic, a great atheist activist. And I remember seeing his videos, hearing a bit about his story, seeing him critique other atheists for the same things that I was like, Yeah, that's what I don't like about it. And sort of demonstrating a bit more of a actually as atheists, you can have empathy, as well as intellectual rigor. And I'm like, yes. Okay. Yes, that's, that's, that's it. And a various bunch of other people, including, you know, going on to Facebook one day, and a friend of mine, Sam, put up that he was going to be on unbelievable. And I thought, oh, Sam, that's cool. I wonder what atheists you'll be debating because I've just been watching some of those episodes. Until he put up another post that was recommending Alex O'Connor's video and I was like, hang on a bit, Sam. I did a bit more looking. And I came across his blog and his podcasts, and we had worked at the same Christian charity. And basically, it's gone our separate ways. When I moved down to London. It's it's funny looking back at his texts, then we're just texting back. I'll be praying for you as you move into iron and all these things. That's hysterical. I know all of a sudden, it's like, I know someone who has gone through this like, Yeah, and so I reached out to salmon. Obviously, we started talking again. And, you know, obviously a couple of months later, that's when we then actually said, Hey, do you fancy joining me on when belief dies? When obviously, I've moved past quite a lot of this. So yeah, so that was, that was great. And also, obviously, Sam introduced me to your podcast and hearing other people sort of engaged with the real, the real loss that does come with, you know, I don't mind using the phrase losing your faith, because it is a loss in some way. I would, I would wish atheism on everyone. Yeah. The journey? I mean, yeah. On the one, you know, that's sort of a paradox. But yeah, I find that incredibly helpful. But also, I think, what was what was really important for me was just before lockdown, I think it must be in the weekend, or just two weeks, weekends before my dad has come down to London see me? Because, you know, he just really wanted to talk. And obviously, you know, I was so nervous, coming up to this. And my dad just reassured me that, you know, they still loved me, though, the, this wasn't going to change that. And as much as they'd said that when I first told them, there was still a lot of doubt, that actually that was true. But he said, I've just got one question. Do you think I'm stupid for believing in God? And it's kind of funny, because of all the questions like, it seems weird that it wasn't a question about me, but just sort of insecurity about this. It kind of took all the pressure off of
David Ames 1:02:03
Yeah, like, that's an easy one to answer. Yeah, no.
Daniel Kelly 1:02:07
I don't think I was stupid for 20 years, and then suddenly got intelligent. That's not how I think this works. Right. Exactly. Yeah. But I was able to talk about everything with them, and actually just really recognize No, I was, I was still loved by them. I was not a failure. As a son. Yeah. And yeah, eventually went forward for some therapy, to work some things through. Because obviously, like, I was so aware, that sort of this, this journey I'd been on that was, was more than it should have been. A, I knew it was irrational, there was something that all of this was was really setting off. In me, there's real insecurity. And, you know, even when my dad came down to visit, you know, he had said to me, you know, his, his, his main worry was that him and my mom had been bad parents, and that they hadn't done the right thing. And obviously, you know, my instant response was to reassure them and say, No, you guys were loving parents, I know you did your best. But at the same time, you know, my mom had multiple sclerosis. As I was growing up, my dad used to work Saturdays, and all the other days of the week, basically, because we had to keep a roof over our head, we eventually had to lose our house. That's why I work in debt advice, because I actually know the journey of Song of what it's like to grow up in a house that's actually really burdened with debt and to go through that journey. But he would work Saturdays, so the only day we have together as a family was once a Sunday. And that was the one time we be able to spend together. And also just recognizing that, you know, a lot of the behaviors and patterns that I had about myself had grown during that time when I had to be super independence. And when I needed to that sort of comfort, actually, my faith had provided that to me as a such a young child. You know, I and it reinforced some unhelpful things as well. You know, I believed I had to be perfect and I had to be helpful to everyone in order to be valuable. And of course, you know, my faith men, you know, yeah, you you, you have to suppress the desires of the flesh, you need to serve people. And in the end, you'll you'll hear from God Well done my good and faithful servants, you know,
David Ames 1:04:57
all you have to do is be superhuman, and it's, it's okay. Yeah, absolutely.
Daniel Kelly 1:05:01
And, you know, I think, sort of working through that journey sort of realizing that, you know, and this wasn't overnight, but through a long process, so of recognizing, you know, as a, as a little kid, I, I could not comprehend my mom's multiple sclerosis, I can understand that, I couldn't understand really, why my dad had to work so many hours, or why my brother needed extra support, you know. So when I couldn't get sort of the support that I did need, uh, you know, it was sort of this message of, I had created this narrative for myself, Oh, it must be because I'm ugly and broken. You know, I'm a vessel of wrath. And when I could really connect with the kids that had gone through that and reconcile some of that stuff, all of a sudden, this fear of judgment, this fear of, from Gods sort of, came into context of actually just been taking these destructive narratives that I've lived with my entire life and my faith, it's provided some cover to some things, it depends, some things that sort of provided half answers to, and all of a sudden, it was all just coming up, and I just had to work through it. And I needed to take the time to understand myself a lot more. And thankfully, I had plenty of time for that. Thanks. Thanks to COVID.
David Ames 1:06:45
I think as we wrap up, I think it's really something very deeply important that you just described, and that is, when you are giving out to someone else, and you recognize someone who has been in the place that you've been, and you feel empathy and compassion, and you can then recognize that you are deserving of empathy and compassion and, and attention when you were a kid as well. So So for me, it's drug and alcohol and the family and being the family hero, it sounds like for you, you know, the, you know, a serious illness and the need for your dad to work all the time. But regardless, in the long run, you aren't getting the attention that you needed and deserved. And when you see that in someone else, yeah, that that light bulb goes off. And it's like, oh, you know, they did the best they could. It's not there's not an attack against your parents in any way. But you can also acknowledge that you deserve that you needed that. And it wasn't there.
Daniel Kelly 1:07:49
Yeah, absolutely. And that was the thing like, hearing, hearing that from my dad, I know, sort of their recognition of that. And they wanted better as well. It was it was they were doing the best they could and I'd always wanted to support that message. But recognizing that and recognizing just okay, yeah, I need to change the way I think about myself, because, yeah, I've carried that along the entire time. And the faith was my coping mechanism. So when that was stripped away, you know, looking back, it's like, I can see why I fell apart just so much during that time.
David Ames 1:08:31
Wow, Daniel, I cannot tell you what a powerful story this is, your story is going to really impact some people out there the hell anxiety that, in your words, you know, thinking of oneself as a vessel of destruction, I think is very, very common. And it's an area that can take years for people to overcome as they deconstruct and D convert. So I thank you so much for the vulnerability that you've shown and the depth of your story. I'd love the detail. That's been it has been wonderful having you on
Daniel Kelly 1:09:08
Grant. Thanks very much for having me.
David Ames 1:09:17
Final thoughts on the episode. Daniel has an amazing story to tell. And he tells it so very well. I really appreciate Daniel telling his story here. One of the ironies of deconversion is that it's very often that a person has a moral feeling of the wrongness of what Christianity teaches, and that that is one of the precipitating events that leads to deconversion. And in this case, Daniel having an understanding of feminism and the autonomy and wholeness of women and LGBTQ community members, as he was going all the way through the Bible that that was one of the As triggers for him, The irony being that Christianity tries to claim whole ownership of morality, and suggest that non believers don't have any moral framework. And this is just demonstrably untrue. The other thing I thought was really fascinating is talking about Paul's interpretation of the Old Testament, and the recognition that this is not a new phenomenon. There is no way to approach the Bible without interpreting it. So everyone has an interpretation of the Bible, including Paul himself. And that realization can be really freeing, in that you aren't rejecting some deities, word off the mountain, you're rejecting someone's interpretation of the claim that that comes from some deity. And as I recently said, on another podcast, whether or not there is an objective morality, and that's a whole other conversation, you should be terrified of anyone who tells you that they know what it is, and you should do what they say. Bottom line, that is the most dangerous thing has ever happened in history as any one group or any one person who says, They know what's right, and you need to do what they say. Daniel also expressed this idea of the guilt that we feel about the way we used to talk to people the things we might have said the things we might have done, he recognized when he told his friend that he had he converted. And his friend saw that as arrogance. What was brilliant about Daniel is he recognized that he would have done the same, that's the humility that we need to get to. And that's the secular grace, we need to get to that we would have done the same. So how we handle the conservative believers in our lives, needs to be with grace. And that is really, really hard, and it is unfair, but that is the way it is. And then Daniels experience of so much loss, all at the same time. Going through deconversion, losing the community, he said 95% of his social group were Christians having marital difficulties right then probably because of the process of deconversion. And then all on top of that 2020 hits, and we're all isolated. So I just grieve for Daniel, and I'm so thankful that he has made it through. It is a difficult process. I'm not gonna lie to you, it can be very lonely. Part of the reason we do this podcast is to say that you are not alone. And as I mentioned at the top of the podcast, if you need immediate assistance, recovering from religion.org, has an online chat, I believe you can even get on the phone there. Reach out to them, somebody can talk to you right right now, as well as secular therapy project.org, which has a number of secular therapists who you could talk to you you can talk through this process with someone so you do not have to go through this alone. I want to thank Daniel for being on the podcast for sharing his story with such vulnerability and how articulate he was going into specific verses in numbers add Second Timothy at the specific reasons why he had to reach some intellectual honesty. Thank you, Daniel, for being on the show. Remember, you can catch Daniel on the when belief dies podcast with Sam Davis. He is an excellent co host. You can hear he and I interviewing Sam on the Wimba leaf dies podcast from a few weeks ago. And you can hear Sam and Daniel interviewing me on this podcast a few weeks ago as well. So I will put links into the show notes for all of these things. So you can hear more from Daniel. For the secular Grace Thought of the Week, I want to give a shout out to Tris Ramon, they wrote an article about self grace, after having read some of my work about secular grace. And this ties into what Daniel talked about as well, having felt gullible, how could I have believed these things feeling guilty? How could I have said these things. And it's just really important to recognize that the first person you need to forgive is yourself. I've realized how trite this is this sounds so sacrimoni Sweet, and I appreciate that. But the reality is, that's true. You cannot continue to beat yourself up for previous versions of yourself, the mistakes that you may have made, you can make amends if that's helpful, and you can forgive yourself and you can move on and grow as a human being. So the secular Grace Thought of the Week is to have self grace. I have a bunch of interviews lined up in the very near future. But due to scheduling issues, there is a possibility that we may go to an every other week for a while. I'll see what I can do. We'll see if I get things lined up properly and we'll try to continue that once a week. But one of the things I said to myself when I began this podcast is that I wouldn't beat myself up if I couldn't live up to once a week, which is really challenging, right? That's a lot of work. So we're going to do our best Mike and I and I've got again several interviews scheduled and we will try our best to get those out to you as fast as possible. Until then, my name is David, and I am trying to be the graceful atheist. Join me and be graceful human beings.
Time for the footnotes. The beat is called waves for MCI beats, links will be in the show notes. If you'd like to support the podcast, you can promote it on your social media. You can subscribe to it in your favorite podcast application, and you can rate and review it on pod chaser.com. You can also support the podcast by clicking on the affiliate links for books on brisket atheists.com. If you have podcast production experience and you would like to participate, podcast, please get in touch with me. Have you gone through a faith transition? And do you need to tell your story? Reach out? If you are a creator, or work in the deconstruction deconversion or secular humanism spaces and would like to be on the podcast? Just ask. If you'd like to financially support the podcast there's links in the show notes. To find me you can google graceful atheist. You can google deconversion you can google secular race. You can send me an email graceful atheist@gmail.com or you can check out the website graceful atheists.com My name is David and I am trying to be the graceful atheist join me and be graceful human beings
this has been the graceful atheist podcast
Transcribed by https://otter.ai
One of the most difficult things about deconstruction, deconversion, etc. is feeling alone. It’s terrifying not only to go through a full blown metaphysical and existential crisis, but to do so knowing that the people who are supposed to love you the most can’t or won’t accept you as they once did.
My guest this week is Vanessa. She describes herself as “born into a large family of fire and brimstone preaching, bible beating, in-tongues-speaking Christians in the Pentecostal Church of God faith tradition.” Her father, her grandfather, and her great grandfather all were pastors of her home church.
My full break from faith came in the form of rage when it hit me that I’d never had parents – I’d only had pastors.
She began to doubt at a fairly young age and discovered she no longer believed in god in her college years.
As a non-believer she married her believing husband. Recently being unequally yoked has become a discussion point as they negotiate how to raise their daughter. Vanessa is grateful she can be present for her daughter in a way she did not receive when she was young.
We discuss unequally yoked marriage, secular parenting and post-traumatic church syndrome.
My guest this week is Travis. Travis documented his deconstruction on the blog measureoffaith.blog. There Travis has documented his journey from a questioning but dedicated Christian to a doubting agnostic. He delves into the apologetics that were supposed to give him comfort but which ultimately led to loss of faith.
This is one of the more emotionally raw episodes. Travis opens up about his grief at the loss of his beloved father. His dad was an example of faith well lived and it had a profound impact on Travis. We discuss what secular grief is like after one no longer can be comforted by belief in life after death.
I have been feeling a little conflicted putting this information out there that can potentially help people lose faith because it was so important to someone like my dad. It makes me question whether I really want to be a participant for taking that away from someone.
These days Travis feels like he has said what he needed to say on the blog. His compassion and empathy is evident in that he is more concerned with caring for the people in his life than endlessly debating apologetics and counter-apologetics.
My guest this week is Amy Rath, the host of the NoneLife podcast. NoneLife is dedicated to all those who check “None of the above” for a religious category and who do not feel comfortable being categorized any other way. The podcast is inspiring us all to do good in the world and to live an ethical life.
I’m Amy, and I’m a “none.” A what? Well, it took a lot of searching for me to find this term, but it fits perfectly. A “none” is someone who doesn’t belong to any particular religion. There are likely as many reasons for being a “none” as there are individuals, so we’re a hard group to label. Nones might be atheists, agnostics, former-members-of religions, humanists, etc. etc. etc.
Amy grew up a dedicated Catholic and was “all in.” In her late teens and early twenties she felt better “just not believing in anything.” In 2019 she discovered the term “None” as in “None of the above” and had a sense of “coming home.” “Finally there is a name for what I am.” She had found her people.
Amy is a shameless heathen who tries to remember that it’s rewarding to be nice to others. She’d prefer not to create a cult, but don’t test her.
Amy started the NoneLife podcast so that others could discover this sense of finding themselves sooner. She has become an important and inspiring voice for Nones the world over.
The concept of celebrating an ethical life absent organized religion has been on my mind for years.
My guest this week is Michael, AKA Reverend Bones. Michael is an Australian singer/song writer whose latest album Escape From Heaven is about his faith transition out of Evangelicalism.
Sex, Drugs and Rock and Roll? I only did one.
Michael talks openly and honestly about how purity culture affected him and the religious trauma it produced.
I entered a period of 18 months or so of really profound depression which verged on suicidal ideation. One of the things with Christianity, I call it the Nihilism Nazgul …
Michael is now a climate activist and anti-purity culture activist. Michael uses his TicTok presence to speak out on these topics as well as the need for separation of church and state.
If you are interested in producing music for the Graceful Atheist Podcast, the sound I am looking for has a strong baseline and beat with gospel church organ, potentially with R&B or Gospel vocal samples. Here is a playlist to inspire you to Gospel R&B Beats. Get in touch.
I begin every streaming interview with a question, “hi, can you hear me?” Never has an affirmative answer to such a mundane question been so profound as it was with this week’s guest, Caroline Schwabe. Caroline had progressive hearing loss and eventually could no longer speak on the phone even with hearing aids. Almost by accident, she was referred to a Cochlear implant program in Canada during a routine hearing test. January 28, 2018, was her last deaf day. She has been on a three-year journey of rediscovery after receiving a Cochlear implant.
I’m deaf-not-deaf.
Along with her husband, Andreas, Caroline co-hosts a podcast called My Beautify Cyborg about her Cochlear implant journey. It describes the hopes and fears leading up to surgery and the joy and rediscovery after turning on the implant. Caroline’s gratitude and joy is infectious and comes through in each episode.
Caroline and Andreas had experienced major disappointments and hurts from the Church. At the same time she was going through the implant process, both she and her husband were slowly leaving the Church. If not a full blown deconstruction, they have been asking very hard questions and wrestling with the answers. This episode is unique in that there are two parallel stories: one of regaining hearing and one of questioning one’s faith.
Podcasts have played an out sized role in Caroline’s rediscovery of hearing and language recognition, including this one.
“Waves” track written and produced by Makaih Beats
Transcript
NOTE: This transcript is AI produced (otter.ai) and likely has many mistakes. It is provided as rough guide to the audio conversation.
David Ames 0:11
This is the graceful atheist podcast. Welcome welcome. Welcome to the graceful atheist podcast. My name is David, and I am trying to be the graceful atheist. As always, please consider rating and reviewing the podcast on pod chaser.com or the Apple podcast store, and subscribe to the podcast wherever you are listening. Special thanks to Mike T for editing today's show. On today's show, at the beginning of every streaming interview that I do I say something along the lines of Hi, can you hear me? Never before has the affirmative answer to that mundane question been more profound than in the case of my guest this week. Caroline's Schwabe. Caroline's progressive hearing loss was expected due to family history, but no less devastating. The expense of hearing aids and testing and all of that work was daunting. And she was beginning to lose her ability to be in a conversation. She couldn't speak on a phone anymore. Until that is she became eligible for a cochlear implant, which transformed her life. Along with her husband on dress, Caroline co hosts a podcast called my beautiful cyborg that is about her journey of hearing loss and the cochlear implant and the regaining of her hearing. Caroline is about to tell us that story. But intermixed with that is devastation about her husband wanting to attend seminary and that falling through, and various church failures that affected them deeply. So in the midst of regaining her hearing, Caroline was also in some forms of deconstruction. The thing I want you to listen for, and the emphasis is on the word Listen, is the joy that Caroline expresses. When I'm trying to talk about secular grace, it is about thriving, not just surviving, and Caroline is thriving. And you can hear the joy for life, the joy for regaining her hearing, the joy for the simple things that she had at one point in time lost and has now regained. Here's my conversation with Caroline Schwabe.
Caroline's Schwabe, welcome to the graceful atheist podcast.
Caroline Schwabe 2:48
Thank you, David. Thanks for having me.
David Ames 2:51
I will acknowledge here that we have had previous conversation and we may refer back to that a few times. But Caroline, you have such a very unique story that I'm gonna let you get into in just a second. But what was really kind of tugged at my heart. It was telling me that my podcast and other podcasts that deal with faith deconstruction was such a major part of of your life. So I'm kind of just teasing here. We'll get to why that is. But let's begin with what was your faith tradition.
Caroline Schwabe 3:27
I was born to German immigrants to Canada, and they raised they baptized us kids into the Lutheran tradition. So I grew up going to Sunday school and got involved with the youth there. My parents weren't really involved in the church, weirdly, but I enjoyed it. I actually, the Sunday school thing was kind of the obligation that my parents wanted to fulfill their baptismal promises that they made during my baptism. But as I got a little bit older and got involved with VBS, it was all me I wandered over to the church by myself and I, and in terms of the youth group stuff, I got involved on my own too. And, you know, I, I just liked it. There was a sense of community and I liked the tradition. I liked the ritual, actually, of church, and just the feeling of being there with people that I knew and just I was kind of a spiritual kid, if that makes sense.
David Ames 4:29
It makes complete sense. Yeah.
Caroline Schwabe 4:30
Yeah. I kind of had deep thoughts when I was even just a little girl. And, um, and then just carried on with that through high school and stuff. And when I was 19, I went to like the first national Canadian Lutheran church youth gathering that was in in Thunder Bay. And I had met this guy at the sandwich machine, and I was like, I'm not here to be boys. Yeah, I'm gonna go now and And my friend and I were sitting in the bleachers at Lake had University and we heard this unbelievable beautiful piano music just resonating through the auditorium there. And I was like, Where's that coming from? So we, the two of us ran down to the piano was this guy had just met at the sandwich machine. And he's playing this just gorgeous music. And someone like rang the lunch bell, and everybody disappeared. And it was just me and this guy sitting at the piano. So I, I actually settled up next to him. And I played piano at the time, too, had taken, like the, the more regimented route to playing music. So I read music, and I practiced, and then I would be able to perform a piece but only after several weeks of practicing and learning. And this guy was just playing. He's he says, oh, yeah, it's original. I'm like, What do you mean, it's originally so I wrote it. And he had these beautiful hands, and I couldn't believe he was single. So we fell in love immediately. And Andreas and I got married apart me engaged the very next day. So we were engaged very, very quickly. And, you know, when as, as we have talked about that, it's been really interesting, because the day after we were engaged, so like, the third day of knowing each other. We all just sort of laying it all out and telling each other the things that might be we were trying to be very, very honest. Okay. And, and so he told me some stuff. And I said, Yeah, well, I'm probably going to be deaf one day, too, because my mom's deaf and it's genetic. And it's on her side of the family. And he's like, Oh, by the time that's happening, they will come up with a solution for that. Okay. So he, and and that gives me some comfort, you know, knowing that he was okay with it, and that there would be something for that later.
David Ames 7:04
Right? Can we just acknowledge that that's a pretty big deal. That's a pretty Yeah, after three days of knowing each other, you're engaged, and you drop the bomb that you have genetic propensity towards deafness.
Caroline Schwabe 7:19
You know, I agree with you wholeheartedly. And at that moment, because it was such a big part of my life. I mean, my mom was just deaf. So that was just normal for me. Yeah. It's really hard for me to explain. But to me, it didn't seem like the worst thing in the world or a big deal. It was like, when this does come about, you're going to have to learn to deal with that, like, we're going to figure out how to communicate. And I'm going to read lips just like my mom does. And I'm going to probably have hearing aids and all this stuff that, to me was kind of normal, it was just had always been part of my life. Obviously, from the time I was born, so my mum was a little older. She was 36 when she had me and so by then she was already wearing hearing aids. And I didn't know any other way to go through life, but to have someone in my life with hearing impairment. So yeah, I do absolutely acknowledge it now, but at the time, at the time, I didn't think too, too, too much of it. So anyway, he was pretty brave. Yes, in that regard. And he also told me, and we were both very much on the same page in terms of our faith and our approach to life and our outlook on the future and just the things that are important in a marriage. So he told me, he wanted to go to seminary and be a pastor and I was interested in going to university and working towards becoming like a deacon s or what they call it in the Lutheran church at that time was a parish assistant. Okay. So and that was like the Lutheran Church Missouri Synod was was the the sort of mother organization from which the Lutheran church Canada had been born. So in case anyone's interested, that's the flavor of Lutheran. Yeah,
David Ames 9:20
no, I think that's important, right? Like the the diversity of faith backgrounds is important. And so there's going to be somebody out there who's, you know, Missouri citizens or candidate literally from Canada. They're going oh, that's my story.
Caroline Schwabe 9:35
That's exactly right. And you know, it does make a difference in terms of some of the, the understanding of faith and theology and all that stuff. So when I moved out here, the plan was that we would work for a couple years and then Andres would go to seminary and then we would be a pastor and I would be pastor's wife, you know, usually plays piano and teaches Sunday school and helps out in the church. And so I'd basically be a church worker, whether I liked it or not. And I was I was all up for that. So that's, yeah, that's where we came from. But I don't know if you want to go into how we left the church right away, or Yeah, I
David Ames 10:21
think just because I know a little bit of the story. The plan to do seminary didn't pan out exactly the way you intended. Correct. So you want to tell a little bit about that story?
Caroline Schwabe 10:31
Yeah, yes. And no. Because it was a pretty, it's a pretty terrible strike. So we saved up all our money, and we made all the necessary arrangements to take that step and go to school. So we moved, and Andreas quit his job. And he was ready. And it was, he was supposed to start right away. And he went in to the seminary for something I don't even know what and they said, Oh, you're just on time, the President just waiting to see you. Or, sorry, the one of the deans, okay. And he's like, I don't have a meeting. And they said, Oh, yeah, you do. You went in. And they. Now I just need to preface this with all of the years that everyone we knew, had encouraged Andreas to go into the ministry. These were people from the Concordia University where he had attended, where he was he had graduated from these were parents and family, friends, these were professors at the seminary itself, anyone within our churches, I mean, it just goes on and on. Every single person encouraged him to go into the seminar. And he goes, he goes into this unexpected meeting. And he's told that his application has been declined. And they and they wouldn't tell him the reason. So I think that a lot of listeners might be able to understand just how devastating that news would be. This is the future that we have been dreaming about for at least five years. We were already married five years by this time. This is the only thing we've ever intended to do with our life together. And now we're being told that that's not going to happen. And not only not only is it impossible, but there's no there's no reason that we're going to tell you Ouch. Yeah. Andreas. I mean, I think it's very understandable that he struggled tremendously. And so did I just kind of went through life like a zombie for the next little while, and he suffered all sorts of physical and emotional difficulties from, you know, anxiety and nausea and sleeplessness, and just suicidal thoughts. And I mean, he was quite devastated.
David Ames 13:13
Yeah, justifiably so. Yes.
Caroline Schwabe 13:15
Yeah. And I think for my, I can only really speak to what I was thinking at the time, but I remember, I was angry, but more so I just felt a sense of powerlessness. I was like, you know, there are these powers that be these lead, quote, leaders of the church. And they clearly pull all the strings here. And I'm just a little it's gonna say, peon member, like, I'm just a plebe. And I, you know, I can change things in my household, and I can have an impact on things that happen on my street and in my community. And, you know, maybe even in my congregation, but after that, I just felt a sense of, Wow, I'm just, I'm powerlessness here in this situation. And so I made a decision for myself in order to protect myself that I would no longer get involved in any of the politics of the church. So or, or even really get into any of the committees and leadership. So I did teach Sunday school. I think I sang in the choir a couple times and sort of, I don't want to say a state at the periphery, but I didn't get into the meat, the nitty gritty of church stuff. I kind of I closed my heart a little bit at that point. I was just so injured.
David Ames 14:42
Understood. Understood. Yeah. So you said explicitly that the the people in your lives were, you know, pushing Andrea not pushing. We're encouraging Andrei is to go to seminary. Did you also both of you have a sense that God was guiding you to do that?
Caroline Schwabe 15:00
I certainly did for myself, like I, more than anything to be honest, I wanted to be a mom, and, and raise kids. And that didn't work out either, by the way, but that's another story. So I can't speak for Andreas, I know that his faith was very deep and very strong. And he was very committed to not only his, his faith, and his, you know, personal faith life, but also to the church in quotes that the church the you know, we believe that or sorry, it's hard to change your language when you change your thinking about spiritual things. So when I say we, I mean, the tradition in which I grew up the Lutheran tradition, they, yes, believe that all believers are the church. So Right. And that's the quote, but there's also that concept of the institution, so the Lutheran Church in Canada, and then we have sin, it's within. And you know, that there's, there's always going to be church politics. So that's what I'm talking about. Andreas was very, you know, involved and committed to the organization as well.
David Ames 16:19
Right. I guess the the impetus of my question is, there's an element of feeling rejected, feeling rejected by the organization. But there's this added layer of this is supposed to be something that that God is guiding you to do. And so there might have been, and I'm curious what your experience was a sense of God rejecting you as pastors.
Caroline Schwabe 16:45
I know that he's most certainly felt rejected by the organization. And I think that we always, to be truthful, I think that we've both of us have always kind of separated in our minds. And in our hearts, there is a difference. There's the organization and the earthly. That's the best word organization of these people that believe the same thing. And then there's, there's your personal faith in what you believe, who you believe God to be. So I didn't personally feel rejected by God, I was like, this world, this earth thing, and these people are Turks. And there's something wrong here. And you know, you talk about, in general, it's I was like, yeah, there's still you're still gonna find problems in the church, because it's made up of people and people are sinful. And that's, you know, that's always jammed on you throw it is how sinful we are. Yes, so it wasn't a huge surprise that oh, there's, it's not perfect. So that I always kind of wrote it off to that. I didn't, like I said, I didn't personally feel the sense of rejection from God. And I don't think Andres did, either. But I can't really answer that question for him. I know, he was devastated. And he was very depressed. And he certainly felt he has had lasting repercussions from that. In fact, he has PTSD from that incident, because of that sense of rejection, like, just shame and self hatred, and lots of really ugly stuff that came out of that. And I suppose that must tie in with his sense of who he is, and his value as a person. But again, I think maybe one day you're gonna be chatting with him as well. And
David Ames 18:38
yeah, absolutely. And I'm sorry, to it feels like this was a very leading question. And I didn't mean for it to be that way. So I think I read you loud and clear. That was devastating enough as he is. And so Oh, yeah.
So you mentioned earlier, you were kind of feeling like a zombie for that time period after that. Is this the beginning of the hearing loss as well?
Caroline Schwabe 19:10
Yeah, I'm actually the hearing loss started a little bit before that. So I was only we were only married for a year or so I was 21. By the time I had my first pair of hearing aids, and that hearing loss continued as the years went on. So my hearing just degenerated year after year, I would get tested regularly, and we would spend we spent an awful lot of money on hearing aids which is really important you need to aid your hearing if you if you have a loss. What happens is if you don't aid a hearing loss, your brain kind of forgets to understand to be able to interpret words and so it's a use it or lose it type of situation here. Yeah, and Andres was very encouraging And, in fact, he was most often the one who said, hey, it's time we need to, to upgrade your hearing aids. He convinced me to get my first pair of digital hearing aids all those years ago. And I didn't believe that they would be that different than analog AIDS. But he played a clip online of sound recorded through these new swanky new digital hearing aids. And I said, I said out loud, I call bullshit. And he said, Caroline, let's just, let's just try it. And we're talking about a lot of money we're talking about,
David Ames 20:36
and you're young, and you'd probably don't have the cash on hand for that kind of thing.
Caroline Schwabe 20:39
No, it was always a burden. But we that's what I'm saying. He was very, very supportive and always said, like, nothing's really more important than this, Caroline you, you need to be able to hear to function and to have the kind of life that we enjoy. So a social life, and just, you want to give yourself the best chance. So we did we bought those aids, and, um, you know, just to kind of give you an idea, we're talking about $7,000 for a pair aids back then. It's a lot of money. So it was a big decision. But yeah, it was great. And to be truthful, also, that was the last pair of hearing aids, that made a big difference for me, because my loss just continued over the years. And by the time I was 1448, it was time to get a new pair again, and both of us that, like, we're going to spend a lot of money again, and is it really going to help? Because I've already got the best, most powerful aides available right now. And I'm suffering,
David Ames 21:50
right. And you said, I think specifically 15% speech recognition in ideal conditions, that's kind of where you were at?
Caroline Schwabe 21:59
Yeah, can you imagine that. So just to give you an idea of how this works. When you go for hearing test, you they put you in a sound booth. So ideal, right, like you should be able to hear a pin drop in there. But as a hearing impaired person, you don't. So you're sitting there and they do the series of beeps, and you just click a clicker every time you hear a beep, and those those tests are fine. But then they do a word recognition test. And they start where you can still see them. Okay, so my word recognition, when I could read lips was actually pretty good. It was like in the 90 percentile. So 94 or something like that. But the minute they covered their mouth, and I could not see the words
David Ames 22:47
cheaters
Caroline Schwabe 22:49
it was, I hated it, it was the most frustrating thing is like failing a test, but you've got no chance of passing it in the first place. So yeah, 15%. And in my left ear and 11% in my right ear, for Yeah, so it was really, really crappy and awful. And I will also mention just that, since since we're talking about faith in the church and all that it was no secret in our congregation that that I had hearing loss. And Julius would advocate for me and try to get them to put a new sound system in and because I mean, I wasn't the only one. There were lots of all these in our congregation, mostly all these people. And, you know, hearing loss is invisible. He can't see it, I look fairly normal somewhere. And there's, there's no visible disability there. And a lot of times, those of us who do you struggle with hearing, it gets embarrassing after you ask two or three times, pardon me. So you, you, you, unfortunately, adopt this bad habit of faking it. So you're not and you smile a lot and you laugh on cube and everybody else laughs even though you didn't get what was said. So the problem is that we make it worse for ourselves because we make it look like we're normal. And we can hear when really, that's not what's happening. And we're being left out of social situations and any conversation and I couldn't hear the sermon. I couldn't hear anything that was going on at church. So the one accommodation that was made for me was that a few pastors would print up the sermon, and I could follow along while they preach. So that was like the only accommodation that ever happened for me in church, for my hearing loss. But we did keep going to church even after the seminary thing and we kept going and we kept going because we were faithful and we wanted to do the right thing. Yes, you know, so yes, the hearing loss just continued and it just go Kept deteriorating. In the meantime, we got really involved with cycling and kayaking. And we had this other group of friends. And yeah, it was great. It was actually a good time of life and a weird time life because I was getting different differ, but our group of circle of friends was getting bigger and bigger. And it was really exciting. And we would go on these beautiful kayaking trips to like Vancouver Island, Pacific Rim National Park, I mean, take a gang with us. And, and, and I did these crazy bike races and endurance. It was like, sort of an interesting time really, to be not able to hear but so physically active and socially, actually engaged, right? So our friends were pretty good. They would try to include me and make sure that I knew what was going on. But it's it's really hard, because like I said, people forget it's invisible.
David Ames 26:01
Forgive me, sometimes I like to find an analogy of just my own experience. And I don't mean to minimize in any way. My experience trying to learn another language. When I speaking to a native speaker, it isn't so much that I don't know the words, it's that my brain doesn't pick up the sounds they're making. And I wonder if it's analogous. Is it similar?
Caroline Schwabe 26:25
Well, you mean being deaf? Well,
David Ames 26:28
I mean, yeah. Again, obviously, this is a totally different thing. Make that 100%? Clear. But But yes, the loss of speech recognition specifically, yeah, you're hearing something. But it isn't translating into words for you.
Caroline Schwabe 26:43
Yes, it that is a lot what it's like, and it's also there are so many Monty Python sketches and others. Oh, if you think about Charlie Brown's teacher, wah, wah, wah, like you're just you're hearing some sound. But no, consonance. That was my experience. And in fact, in fact, when I took my hearing aids out towards the end of my deafness, which sounds weird, but we'll get to it. I took I took my hearing aids out, and I remember going
I would make all the constants and I got nothing. Oh, wow. There was just silence. And I thought, Wow, I'm so like, How can I be this? And how can I be this Dev? Without even realizing that I'm here that I got this death now?
David Ames 27:51
Right? It snuck up on you.
Caroline Schwabe 27:54
It sneaks up on everybody. We're sadly, the person experiencing the hearing loss is always the last one. To know it. It's always a family member or colleagues or somebody who says, you know, something's going on, you know, you're not catching what I'm saying. And I know people try to be gentle about it, but the person with the hearing loss is going to deny it. Left, right and center. Yes, there they will, every time. And so I was no longer in denial. I just didn't realize how little I was catching despite, despite the frustration, and the isolation and the difficulty following any instructions, just as an example. There was so much it was so obvious. And yet when I couldn't even hear continents at all, it was still pretty striking. So to answer your question, it is like another language. It's like just hearing someone with marbles in their mouth or someone brushing their teeth and trying to say something to you. You're like, Oh, I know you're speaking but those sounds aren't making words. Right? Okay, that's what it's like. So you there's no information being transmitted. The only information I got was through lip reading, and body language. And I was pretty good at it. I mean, I was working through this whole entire time. I was serving tables in hotel restaurants. That's what I have been doing. For for my work for all my life. And so to think that I manage that is actually kind of remarkable. I just have found a million coping mechanisms. And just so many people asked me, How did you do that? How did you work as a server while you were Dev? And I tell everybody well, first of all, this the the Clients are sitting. So they're fixed. They're in a fixed spot. One of my pet peeves with certain people get up and walk around and then ask me for stuff. I'm like, you have to face me and speak clearly, we don't understand what you need right now. Anyway, they would, they would be in a seat, and I could move myself around to the place that I could see their lips and understand. And usually people, when they put their order in to their server, they'll point to the item on the menu. So I would you always use that as a clue. And just several other things that I made work for me and my colleagues were always really wonderful and helpful and understanding and compassionate. So that was, that was good, too.
David Ames 30:42
What I always hear when I hear someone describe the compensating mechanisms that they have to do for whatever they're overcoming, is what a genius you had to be, like, how many other forms of information you are gathering, in order to make, like you say, information out of that data?
Caroline Schwabe 31:00
Yeah, I received a few compliments from some dear friends before it's like, my one girlfriend in the States. She was in Seattle. And she said, Caroline, I think you're brilliant. I mean, I don't know how you can come up with considering how little information you're getting. You're still able to carry a conversation. I mean, wow. And later on, that wasn't even possible anymore. i One of the things that happened during a hearing test once Andreas came with me, and he sat with the hearing a practitioner who was doing the test at the time. And during the word test. I was you know, bombing Right. And, and this, you're supposed to say, whatever you can hear. So if you only get a portion of a word, say that word. The the practitioner says the word ditch. Okay. And I find your laughing I know what you think. But I heard I just didn't care. I just didn't know what he said. So I hear I said girge. Like, I just was like I heard Gert So ever since that day Andreas and and he just about fell off their chairs laughing at this made up word that I came up with. And so anytime I misheard a word after that, we would say, oh, yeah, Gert, like it was just, you heard something that wasn't actually said. And then sometimes the conversation can go on this tangent. And you start talking about this other subject that you thought you heard, I thought we were talking about this. And so I carry on that conversation, and you're going on in a completely different direction. When really were originally, you're talking about another subject entirely.
David Ames 32:49
I can relate to this from just family members who were older, who the same thing, you're having a conversation with them. And it veers off some direction. You're like, I don't know how we got here, but I'm going with it. I'm going to wing it. Good for
Caroline Schwabe 33:02
you. Good for you. Because that is the correct thing to do. Just go with it. Yeah, it's absolutely embarrassing when you when that happens. I recall several incidents when in a social situation, that's what happened and it and just mortified. And I think I just didn't say anything for the rest of the night. Because, you know, you feel so stupid, even though it has nothing to do with intelligence. You're just absolutely buried in this. Being being mortified that you you've made this horrific social error. I'm gonna give you one example because I think it's funny. This is Long time ago, and I was on a Skype call with my mother in law. And we were discussing the this 25th anniversary that we were going to put on a dinner for Jason's sister, and talking about the dinner menu and blah, blah, blah. And I hear mom saying, oh, yeah, because they have they have chickens. And I can just let it go. And we continue talking about the menu in the day and all of that. And at the very end of the conversation, I said, Well, Mom, what about the chickens? Andreas turns very slowly looks at me. And he's like, I'm completely out of my mind. What are you talking about Caroline, and Andreas had this way over the years of being able to sort of memorize everything. Every conversation we're having every every sound in the room, he would just somehow make like a mental record of that of the the audio. And so he after looking at me like I was insane. Went through the conversation with ah, they have tickets, they have tickets for Friday night for a choral performance or something. And same thing I felt like such an idiot like How did I get chicken out of tickets? But we're talking. So one of the things that, you know, I like to say is, hey, context really is important. And especially when you're talking to somebody who cannot hear, if you just say, we're talking about the date now, okay, so we can't do it Friday, because they have tickets, it got it as a hearing impaired person, you just, you're so lost all the time. So just if somebody just takes that one minute, to catch you up, and give you some context, do you have a hope of going forward? Right and being included?
David Ames 35:43
Okay, I think we've got a bit of a visceral feeling for that hearing loss, obviously, not to the depths that you experienced, but we're starting to get a picture for that. We're going to get to very quickly here how technological solution that has changed your life. But before we get there, a quick question about faith. Obviously, you've had the devastating experience of being rejected by the seminary. But did you associate the loss of hearing as with with your faith in a negative way? Or or was it just not an issue?
Caroline Schwabe 36:20
It was it had nothing to do with that? I am, to be honest, no, I, it was one of those. So I'm kind of a positive person, just generally, I'm, I'm happy. Just in general, I like to embrace the beautiful things in life. And so I always said, you know, I couldn't have picked a better time in history to be deaf. If I have to be deaf. This is a good, this is the time to do it. I don't have to use a big horn. Right, right. Not only not only do we have sophisticated amplifiers that we put into our ears, these hearing aids and they become they're getting better and better all the time. Technology's advancing, but also, we use email, we use texting, every pretty much anything you want to watch is going to be closed captioned, or you can find a way to get it closed caption. So there are all these tools that we can tap into. And I always just said to myself, Oh, there's worse things in life, you know, and frankly, it blows me away that I didn't even realize the devastation. You know, you, you realize that in hindsight, that oh, man, my life was a disaster, like, maybe not a disaster, but
David Ames 37:46
it was suffering.
Caroline Schwabe 37:47
It was suffering. And I do remember at one point, I said, I suggested to Andres, that we go to the Deaf Church, because I was like, I can't. I'm not part of the hearing world anymore. But I'm not really part of the deaf community, either. So I felt really stuck and trapped between two worlds. So at that point, yeah, I felt I felt the devastation, but I would say that I leaned on my faith where I, I, it wasn't a reflection of God or anything. It was just life. It was just the burden I had to bear. And I didn't realize how heavy that burden was until later. Till now. Right?
David Ames 38:43
So obviously, we're, you're able to hear me this conversation
Caroline Schwabe 38:52
I have to take every single time I have a video or a phone call now. It I get a charge out of it. It's thrilling to me that I can do this. You get just you know, to highlight how great that is. I also have to just mention, I couldn't make a phone call to make an appointment. Just like I just need a dentist appointment. Andreas, can you please call the dentist so that I can make an appointment? And it's this rigamarole every single time and then also just a little complaint? In general, there are these webs a lot of places will say Oh, you can book online. So you go you click to book online. And you know what the message that comes back is Oh, thank you. Thank you for your appointment request. Someone will phone you shortly to confirm and abort to set up the appointment. I'm like that is now what's called booking online. I was so pissed off every time that happened, including my hearing aid practitioners face I was like, Are you effing kidding me? Seriously. You deal with Deaf people all the time. You This is bullshit So I actually ended up getting the the personal phone number mobile number of the receptionist, the lead receptionist, and she would just she and I would just email or text back and forth. I was like, this is really stupid. This is not catering to your client. Oh, but anyway, so that's just my little pet peeve there that I had to mention. It's just ridiculous.
David Ames 40:36
So do you want to tell us then about the technological solution and how that changed your life?
Caroline Schwabe 40:41
Yeah, absolutely. It's the most exciting and it's the thing I love to talk about most. So as I mentioned earlier, and I'm 48, and it's time for a new pair aids, oh, man, here we go again. And this time, we just really didn't have the seven to $8,000 to drop. So we decided that we would pop in at Costco, and they do have a really decent Hearing Center and a lot of Costco locations. So we ran in there to see if maybe they had some less costly solutions. And I booked a hearing test with a really lovely girl, who I did not notice had any hearing impairment, but she did. Okay, her name is Melanie and she is Alberta's second pediatric cochlear implant team 30 years ago, and she made my appointment. And she also is the art She is a certified audiologist. And she is the person who did my testing. And at the end of the testing, she asked me if I would mind whether she did a few more tests. And I said not at all, you know, yes, please. Right. And then she asked me one question. She said, Do you still use the phone? And I started just tears rolling down my face. I'm like, Nope, can't do that anymore. And she very gently said, Caroline, I, I'd like your permission to refer you to the cochlear implant program at the Glenrose hospital. It's called the Glenrose rehabilitation hospital. It's like the only hospital in Alberta devoted to rehabilitation. So I was walking out of there thinking, This feels like hope. Well, I I didn't know I was deaf enough to potentially qualify for a cochlear implant, because anything I'd ever learned up until then was that you had to be completely like, like 99% Zero sound. So the way that hearing is measured is by they call it thresholds. So, you probably need a typical hearing person requires 20 dB of sound to to hear to understand any that that information coming in. As you lose hearing, you require higher DBS. So my audiogram indicated that I required 75 to 80 dB of sound just to perceive it. Which which means, I mean, that's really pretty tough.
David Ames 43:19
Something to me, like I know that's relatively loud,
Caroline Schwabe 43:23
at DVS. quite loud. And then if you anyway, so it occurred to us at that moment walking out of Costco, wow, we've arrived at this place where we're that depth. And I say we because Andreas and I have always, he's always shared his hearing with me. You know, he's always been been there to help me as we engage in any social interactions. And he's always just made every effort to help me, as I've continued here, and so that was amazing. That was May 2017. And through the summer, I was invited to the Glenrose. I was, you know, the appointments were just made for me, I just showed up. And there's a series of testing that they do. First, I should say that after my first hearing test at the Glenrose, I was approved to enter the program, meaning now we're going to test you further. It looks like you could benefit from a cochlear implant, but now we're going to find out whether that's true because there's there are several factors that could cause an issue or just problems that might mean that you would not be a good candidate. So they did all that testing through the summer. And by the fall, we received news that I was indeed approved. As a candidate, so now, I'm going to get a cochlear implant. And this news was riveting. I mean, we, we were hopeful, but you, you always kind of hold back that bit of hope. Because you could still be rejected from the program, you could still be, they could find something in the way that your physiology is, or they do. Like they test the way your synapses fire in your brain and says anything, could be something that would mean an implant would not be beneficial for you. So when we got that news that I was actually accepted as a candidate, we were just floored, and I was immediately, profoundly grateful. And I said, we have to do something to express that gratitude. So that night, we started a podcast. And it's just, it's called my beautiful cyborg. And we just started talking about how we were feeling about going into this journey, what the process was, and we were basically doing a play by play about every appointment and every new thing that came up and everything we learned about the journey and, and I was still deaf at the time. So the fact that I got through those podcast discussions is kind of remarkable in itself. I mean, we we recorded, oftentimes, we would record an hour and a half and get maybe 20 minutes out of it maybe. Right, right, because I would just do that thing where you go off on another tangent or I just miss your the question. Yeah, it was, it was challenging, but really exciting to see.
At the same time, that year, all that year, Andreas, had been writing a blog. And it was pretty controversial. And I have to backtrack a little bit to the beginning of 2000. I think it was 17, it might have been 16. So he might have already been writing that blog for some time. But the Lutheran church, Canada, Alberta, British Columbia district, had this church extension fund. And you might be familiar with that type of thing. And some of our listeners might might be familiar with that. So it's where members invest money into this fund, where the churches can access for things like building a new building, or perhaps a church extension, or, you know, those types of projects that banks aren't really happy to lend churches money for. And what happened was this fund in Alberta, British Columbia had been mismanaged. So, so greatly to the point that they had lost $80 million of investors. Wow, yeah. And these are old, faithful Christians who are just giving their money to the church for for God's work. And a lot of people that was, for a lot of investors, this was the retirement fund. This was this was, what they how they were gonna, you know, get to stop working, or whatever. And they had a lot of trust in this thing, in this this organization that was supposedly caring for their cash. And so, Andreas blog was a source of information for the victims of this crisis, this financial crisis, and he was not loved at all, by the leadership in the church. In fact, he received David he received death
David Ames 49:02
threats, oh, man,
Caroline Schwabe 49:04
he was cajoled. He was he they, you know, various people tried to get him to stop this blogging and and then on the other side, the victims were calling them and emailing and trying to get more information and really being supportive of him. And this went on for a long time. And we kept going to church. Despite this thing, and this, this, the the, the church did nothing for the victims, you know, they they didn't reach out to them at all. They weren't even they were halfway honest about like the first letter that they received from the Senate was get this that the investment had a sufficient cash shortage. And what does that even mean? Are they even into bankruptcy? Right? So bankruptcy protection. And so, needless to say, we were upset about this. And, and it was a big deal in our something that we talked about a lot at home. And eventually, right around the time that I was receiving more information about my implant, the Lutheran church Canada had its national convention in Kitchener, Ontario, and my family, I grew up in Toronto, in Mississauga, Ontario. So I went to see my family, while Andreas went to the convention. And when he came back to me, from the convention, he was like despondent, he was just, I couldn't believe I've never seen him like this before. And he said, a motion was made to discuss this financial loss. And it wasn't even seconded. They won't talk about it, they won't talk about it. And I looked at Andreas and I said, I wouldn't be part of any organization that treats people this way. Not a community League, not a social club. Not a work organization. I we have we are leaving the church, we have to leave the church. And this wasn't a brand new novel idea. I mean, we had suffered, we had suffered all kinds of just negative situations in the church, even after the seminary incident. So it's not it's not like this was a novel idea that it was time for us to leave.
David Ames 51:36
But this was kind of the straw that broke the camel's back.
Caroline Schwabe 51:40
Absolutely. And that's exactly what it has it what it was, and we hadn't yet informed our congregation. So but we knew we were on the way out. So mid December, my surgery was booked for December 12. And shortly before that, like a week before, our then pastor came to do a house visit, and just check in with me do a little prayer before surgery, right? And he said, Well, Caroline, you must be You must be feeling some fear, you must be a little bit afraid, because any surgery, you know, has its risks. And I say, You know what? I'm not really scared. This isn't. This is something that I'm choosing to go into. It's not I don't mean surgery, because I have cancer, I need surgery, because I want the best tool, the best, the very best technology to give me a chance of hearing better, and improving my my life in general. And I'm not really I'm not really afraid, well, he's basically trying to convince me that I should be afraid. And I said, You know what, Pastor, if I, the worst thing happens, and I die on the table, well, then I guess that means I get to go to heaven, and I'm gonna here. And if I make it through the surgery, and my implant is activated, I get to hear so either way, it's like a win win. I'm really excited about this, this is the best thing that's ever happened to me. And honestly, he was confused. He just didn't know where to what to do with that. It was it was a short visit. And he took off. And so I had to convince him that there was no no reason to fear here. Which is bizarre to me.
David Ames 53:27
Sounds like just utterly lacking in empathy to, you know, to read what you were trying to express was your experience in that moment, rather than his his idea of what it might be?
Caroline Schwabe 53:40
I agree, and at the same time, I think it would be I think that would be a difficult thing for anyone to hear. I think that, you know, if you're a good friend of mine, or if you're, you know, Andreas said that was hard for him to hear too. Because what I was saying was, If I die, I'm willing to take the risk of death to get my hearing. I mean, that's, that's pretty profound. Yeah. That tells you how bad it was.
David Ames 54:11
I think you're hinting at what a dramatic moment this is for you literally contemplating. Even dying, almost feels worth it to you at that point in time. What was the experience going through the surgery or and even before we turn on, so to speak, the switch? How did that feel?
Caroline Schwabe 54:31
The surgery is kind of a blip. Like anyone who goes through the experience is terrified of the surgery like you're just you just are your, your body reacts to you. And every single recipient recipient that we've talked to, has had the same story. You usually get sick, like four days, three, four days before surgery, because you're so stressed out and you're and the lead up is is exciting, and you're anticipating what it's going to be like I can of course, you can't imagine, and there are no promises when you go in to receive an implant as to what how much you will benefit from the implants, there's a great variety of outcomes, they're getting better and better and better. And so you the chances of it being an improvement were excellent, really, really good. But there's still no guarantee. So the physical aspect of it, I mean, I could go into the, there was a little bit of pain, but discomfort and some tinnitus, and some, you know, you feel isolated, because you you're as deaf as you you've ever been, right? What happens is through the surgery, you'll typically lose any residual hearing you might have. So now you have zero sound coming into the ear that's implanted. And that was the case for me. So it was a very quiet seven weeks and seven weeks is very long between surgery and activation. But because it was December, Christmas was in there. And the schedules were kind of all over the place. So typically, from surgery, to activation, it's around four weeks, three to four weeks, you know, they let the scar the incision heal up a little bit so that you can put the processor onto this. So there's an internal component, and an external processor that is attached magnetically to your head through so there's a magnet in the head and a magnet on the processor opposite magnets, and they just attach easily. Yeah. So that seven weeks goes by what we tried to keep ourselves busy. With like some crafting projects, Andres bought a 3d printer, which he has used extensively and become really proficient. And so but we pretty much hunkered down. We were at home for the majority of that time. And I did work for part of it too, which was a challenge. I know. Crazy. But anyway, you do what you would you need to do, right? And the lead up to activation is just so exciting. And you're just dreaming. I remember thinking it's like, knowing that you're going to pick up your brother who you haven't seen for 25 years, and you're gonna see him at the airport again, he can't wait to see that dear, beloved person again. And as like, I can't wait to meet my hearing again. What's it going to be like? And how much am I going to get? And what's it going to sound like and oh, you're just full of hope and anticipation. And on the 28th of January 2018. Andreas held up a piece of paper in front of his mouth. And he said, boat, car, dog house a couple of words. And it's Marley doing this. We know I'm gonna get zero. I can. I don't know what you're saying. Yes. And you said it's just we just need to do this just because January 28 2018 was my last Deaf Day. Wow, the 29th They turned on my implants. So now I've got sound coming in. And it was unbelievable. First of all, the sound when you're first activated is not like anything that you've ever, ever ever heard before. It's just completely foreign. And I don't know how to describe it to you. It's, it's, it's like an otherworldly sound. But as time goes on, and your your brain makes an adjustment, and mine did it very, very, very quickly. Within a couple of hours, I was eight I was perceiving words. And in fact, I have some accessories that come with my implant and my processor. So I I'm we're having this conversation right now, using a phone clip that transmits the data via Bluetooth to my processor and that's how I'm hearing so I'm not wearing headphones. And I'm I'm just dreaming to my head.
David Ames 59:31
So is so amazing.
Caroline Schwabe 59:34
It really is and and the other thing I have is called a Mini Mic. It's called the mini my to buy cochlear and I can attach it to someone's lapel and they can be quite a distance away and I'm just getting it's a microphone so it's streaming directly to my head also. So Andres took the Mini Mic out into the hallway app activation like at the audiologist at the Glenrose and he In the hallway with the door closed, and I'm hearing him saying random numbers, and I'm getting the numbers. Wow. So he's the day before he's standing right in front of me and I can't get any single word. And after with my implant, I'm hearing random numbers. Without seeing. It's just absolutely incredible. By that evening, I was able to hear every word streamed to my implant that we were, we were watching a YouTube video about sound and hearing and actually concerts for hearing for cochlear implant recipients. And I remember thinking, I'm getting all the words, but I, they're just like, it was just a wash, but they were just kind of, I'm hearing them all, but I'm not getting any meaning. So, so I thought to myself, I'm going to have to just memorize, remember, memorize a sentence so that Andreas believes that I can hear this. So I'm in the kitchen streaming. And I heard the words spectral and temporal resolution. And I run into the living room. I said, Andres, she just said, spectral and temporal resolution. I don't even know what that means. And he just looked at me like, it was just unbelievable. I don't know how else to express that was like a light switch from one day to the next. I was deaf. And then I could hear Yeah. So after that, I had a hard time sleeping. I didn't want to go to bed because I just want to be listened to. Right. Especially having conversations with Andrea's so we would stay up till one in the morning. And I mean, I had to get up at 430 to go to work, you know, the next day. But it didn't faze me. I was I was on adrenaline.
David Ames 1:01:57
I think a really interesting story you told in our first conversation was, you had the first experience of talking to one another in bed at night with a light off.
Caroline Schwabe 1:02:07
It was actually in the living room. But yeah, okay. No, that's okay. Yeah, but same thing. Like, can you imagine there's no such thing as pillow talk, and all of a sudden there is Yeah, yeah. Wow. So yeah, we're in the living room. Because we have long conversations. Now. We just can't. So why wouldn't we? Almost like getting to know your spouse again? For the second time, and it was time. Yeah, it was time for me to like, really, I think it was midnight, and he's just turn the light off as a signal like, time to go to bed. It's it. We've been doing this for hours and hours, and you need some sleep. But I could still hear it. Just stayed. And we just kept talking. I think it was another hour and a half before I finally said, Well, how can you believe we just did that? Yeah, we just had a conversation in the dark. Yeah. I mean, maybe for hearing people that sounds ridiculous, because that's just normal. But it's not normal when you're deaf, and you can't talk between rooms. And now we can just think, or just as an example, I'm preparing some food in the kitchen. And I can now I can have a conversation while I do that, where it that was completely impossible before I would have cut my fingers off, for sure. Guaranteed. So it's anything I was doing, I needed to stop and face the speaker and try to understand what they're trying to tell me. Right. So our life has changed in tremendous, beautiful ways. But the other thing that changed was that I did continue to try to listen to music when I couldn't hear. I just cranked up the volume as loud as it would go, whether I was wearing earbuds or if it was like a speaker in the kitchen. I would just it was blaring all the time. And we listened to familiar songs. So that I would just know I would my brain would fill in a lot of the sounds right? But music with music with my CI was a completely new world. In fact, it was a little bit disappointing at first because I couldn't quite I didn't recognize certain songs that were very familiar to me.
David Ames 1:04:21
Interesting. Yeah.
Caroline Schwabe 1:04:22
Because I was only able to hear a portion of the song and now I was getting all of it. Right. So just to give you an example, it's like seeing a class picture and, and, and you're zoomed in on one face and then all of a sudden you can see the whole the whole class. Yeah. So that does not look the same. And it takes the brain a little bit of time to be able to put everything in place. And then once I got music, I got a handle on music, which took probably three months. I mean, I got music pretty quickly. Yeah, but it just got better. Better and better to the point where it felt like now I'm just listening to music normally like you do, right? Which is also pretty remarkable for CI recipients a lot of times they never get there. But after that, I started listening to podcasts. Yes. And wow, this was a, it just opened up a whole, completely new world for me. I hadn't listened to the radio for years and years and years. Now I get to listen to the things I'm interested in. And, specifically, you know, ideas about life and impressions of the world and just learning I was voraciously consuming podcasts and loving every second of it. And I would wake up in the morning and wonder what I'm gonna get to listen to today. What can I get me ears? Yeah. So. So I felt like there was this, this huge learning curve happening. And my brain was just opening up. And I felt like I was coming back to life. In fact, I caught myself saying at one point, before I was alive, like it just it was a slip of the tongue, though. Wow. And what I meant was before my implant. So that's the kind of difference that it made to me.
David Ames 1:06:28
Can we say here that one of the things that the podcast as a podcast as rather than just music is for that speech recognition. And you had gone through that seven weeks being totally deaf as well. And so you were kind of relearning how to understand speech?
Caroline Schwabe 1:06:45
Yes, I was getting that quite a bit, just from my daily life. Because Andreas and I do talk a lot. And also, I was working. So there was a lot of conversation happening with my guests. And I was so excited, I would talk about my implant to anybody that would listen. But you're absolutely right, that it was excellent practice for a speech comprehension. And in fact, I was struggling with the phone. And listening to podcasts most certainly helped me become more adept with hearing on the phone, through Bluetooth streaming. So after several months of, okay, first of all, after a failed attempt at using the phone, or several failed attempts, I just had a limited understanding. And it was it was very challenging. Then I listened to podcasts for probably three months straight, like every second of the day. And then I tried the Phone Clip again. And it was like almost like magic, almost instantaneous, I was able to make a phone call normally, without any problems. So that was definitely a rehab tool, as well. One of the weird things about CI sound is that often, in the beginning, especially there's no discrimination between male or female voices. So that was something I was working on with podcasts, because often there's two people like to a co hosts talking. And so I was learning how to decipher the informant, the format of the voice, so the character of the voice of the person speaking and yeah, it was, it was a really exciting, beautiful time. Unfortunately, at the beginning, I was looking for Christian podcasts. So I listened to a lot of sermons early on. And, and that was, you know, but it was just all sort of more the same. And as we began to grow in our understanding of the world, and just our take on life. And the further away we got from our active involvement in the church, the more I started feeling liberated, intellectually. So I felt I no longer felt the constraints that the church tends to put on people about what we're permitted to exactly engage in and what we're permitted to learn about. Yeah. So I was like, first of all, the one of the pastors that I was listening to ended up being fired by his congregation. I mean, it was a huge debate. I don't even it was so bad I thought, oh, yeah, just another one of those guys. Wow, why was I listening to his garbage when he's actually just a shitty person? Yeah, he's a shitty person.
David Ames 1:09:44
Yes. file now free to say that. Yes,
Caroline Schwabe 1:09:48
completely. Yeah. So in in that liberty in that freedom. I started exploring and I think Andrea suggested, the mind shift. podcasts and you were a guest on their podcast. So that led me to the graceful atheist podcast. And since then I've been listening to several others as well. But one of the things that struck me very deeply and very profoundly was that I felt comforted by so many things that you had said, specifically, one time, in the the anonymous Jeremy episode, I remember you saying, now if you feel foolish for believing this stuff, don't beat yourself up. Like, you know, if you have these regrets, or something, basically, that was what you were saying. And I was just bawling in the backyard listening to this. Because at that moment, I was I was filled with regret about all these years that I had, I don't want to say wasted, but certainly considering constrained myself by continuing in this organization that we cultured, and I realized then that I felt so liberated to just love without any condition, and not feel the necessity weirdly to be judgmental of people. I could just love them as they are, where they are, how they are exactly who they are. Yeah,
David Ames 1:11:30
I know, I know exactly what you mean. Like, you don't anticipate that that is going to be one of the results of letting go of religious dogma as, Wow, I can just love people, and there's no restraint, there's no guilt, there's no feeling obligated to correct something like, and that is incredibly liberating and freeing.
Caroline Schwabe 1:11:51
It's, it's wonderful. And you're right, you don't anticipate that you. In fact, it's it's a fearful thing. And that's the other thing that I've benefited by, through through various podcasts and specifically yours, that there's no need to feel that guilt anymore. There's no, you're just sorry, I sort of lost track of what I was gonna say. But what I'm, what I'm really getting at is that sense of freedom and liberty. That's what I was gonna say, actually, you're fearful and you're scared, because you're gonna lose this thing that you clung to, for all these years. Yeah, whatever that thing is, whether it's the ritual or the community, or the other the habit, frankly, of just having this faith tradition, or the practice that you do, you're just used to doing that, and you do it. And that's the way that you live. And that's what you that's how people that's their impression of you that your church going person and all this other stuff this. So it's really actually scary to leave, and to take that big step. But you're right, that liberty and the freedom that comes from that, too, is off the charts. So not only is my life completely brand new in terms of this hunger for every single sound. But also, the shackles have been shattered and reduced and just they're off, right? There's no limits. Ah, and so I was listening just this morning to your most recent episode, and you were talking about the concept of meditation. And I have to say that the kind of attention I'm able to pay to certain sounds that I get just in regular life, that type of thing that you probably or most people would probably just walk by, right? Is is very, very striking. So I'm on my way home one day, walking down the street, and it's spring, probably March after activation, and the snow is melting. And I'm walking by a storm drain and I stop in my tracks. I'm like, Ah,
David Ames 1:14:25
this is so beautiful. Yes. Just listen to
Caroline Schwabe 1:14:29
trickling her land to plunk. Yeah. And oh, it was just the most magnificent sound hearing the water running down the storm drain like this ugly thing, this horrible, ugly thing. Or we have these old old doorknobs in our home. They're the crystal doorknobs that we're in old homes, and we just kind of think they're cute, so we kept them. But you know there's a spring in a doorknob. So I get up really early in the morning and I'm I'm just exceeding the bedroom. So I'm trying to not make any sound for Andrea so that he can just keep sleeping. And I'm slowly turning the knob back to close the door. And at the very end, there's this barely audible and yes. Tell somebody that makes it being like it's a beautiful spring sound. So these are the kinds of things that I would almost call that a type of meditation. So I spent all this time just contemplating all the beautiful, magnificent things that that come to us by sound waves. And I want to say, like, it's soul touching. And I know this is an atheist. But But it's interesting, because you guys talked about the soil this morning to on the episode that I listen to this morning. And it was the Depo bit deepest level of experiencing. And I thought to myself, there's something about sound and music. That is, that is soul touching, it is the deepest level of what we can experience in this life. And I can't really emphasize that enough, like, when you don't have it, you don't know you're missing it. But let me tell you, in this situation, when I'm getting back, it's just so striking her moving. Sound is. And I have to think about that more. And, you know, I feel as though I'm at the very early stages of if you want to call it a deconversion there's there's a lot of stuff going on in, in our understanding of who we are as human beings, and part of this beautiful universe. Yeah. And I have a lot more work to do, in terms of, you know, everybody talks about how it takes years and years to get through a D conversion process. And I really believe that wholeheartedly because, yeah, it's already been a couple years. And I feel like we have a long way to go yet.
David Ames 1:17:28
I think you're at an exciting point in that you have all the questions. And and there's nobody telling you, you have to come to these conclusions. You get to go explore it, just like you've explored the new soundscapes that you're experiencing the music, the podcasts, the intellectual pursuits that you are interested in now, there is nothing that stops you from exploring your curiosity to find out and so I absolutely respect. You know, you don't need to come on the podcast and say I'm a hardcore atheists, you know, wherever you're at, you're asking really important, deep, profound questions. And wherever you land is exciting and up to you. That's the exciting part.
Caroline Schwabe 1:18:11
It really is. And just that opportunity, I feel as though not only am I finding myself, again, through my hearing, but also I'm finding myself again, in in the context of faith, faith, or whatever you want to call that. Because I know that it's difficult to choose the right words for that journey.
David Ames 1:18:37
Yes. Well, and the episode you were referring to as Michael Mahvash. And we basically, that's what we were talking about is that like, these words are useful for a reason they express something about the human experience. And even if I personally stripped them of supernatural elements, they still function in some way or another. And so it's hard to express things without them. So
Caroline Schwabe 1:18:59
I agree. And also, you know, we get, we get in those habits of using lots of words that are associated with the church. And so it's tricky sometimes to just shift them or think about them differently. But But you're right, absolutely. They are useful. And I'm grateful for that.
David Ames 1:19:16
Yes, Caroline, this has been an amazing story, I have to tell you absolutely unique. One of the most interesting stories that I've heard, and I appreciate, I can't tell you how grateful the I Am, that this podcast has done anything been any part of your discovery of your hearing of the new areas of intellectual pursuit that you can explore in any comfort that that is giving you I just am incredibly grateful for that. I would be remiss if we didn't give you an opportunity to do a bit of a public service announcement announcement about about hearing loss. What would you tell People that is important for them to do.
Caroline Schwabe 1:20:04
Thank you for that opportunity, I think it's extremely important. So the first thing that I think it's just so important is just get your hearing tested. Even if you don't feel that you experienced any loss at all, it doesn't hurt just to know where you're at, it doesn't physically hurt at all, it doesn't cost a lot of money. And if you find out, you've got great hearing, good for you, go get tested again in a couple years. And just make sure that's still the case, it's really important hearing health affects us in a multitude of ways. It's it's physiological, psychological, social, emotional. Also, as I mentioned, if you don't eat last year, you could run into a lot of trouble, including having a greater propensity to dementia and other cognitive issues in the future. So get your hearing tested, just just be mindful of it. And if you do have any hearing loss, find a way to aid that, find a way to make it happen to get yourself a pair of hearing aids, not only will you appreciate being more connected, but also those around you will appreciate the fact that you can communicate better get your hearing tested. It's an also, if I may two things, I guess when you get your hearing tested, it's very important. But also, if you're ever in a situation, where you think, Oh, that's really loud. Or if your ears are ringing the next day. Please, please don't, don't do that. Again, like learn from that experience. If you're if you're having ringing in your ears, you have put yourself you've traumatized your ears, right. So protect your hearing, make sure that you're going to be wearing earplugs when you're in that kind of environment. If you go to a concert or anything like that. It's more valuable than I can tell you.
David Ames 1:22:05
Right here. Yeah, I hear that literally. If you the listener are interested in hearing more of Caroline's story, and I think the the wonder and the awe of the process that you went through, you can check that out at my beautiful cyborg, the podcast. And I believe that's just available on all podcasting systems. Yes,
Caroline Schwabe 1:22:29
it is. And there's also a blog that is available to read, especially if you do have hearing loss and you struggle with podcasts. That's a good way to go. Or I know oftentimes, it's a family member that hears about the podcast or the blog, and then that person refers the hear the person with a hearing impairment to the blog, and then they can read about it that way, because the whole story is pretty much there, too.
David Ames 1:22:55
That's amazing. And we will of course have links in the show notes for you. So Caroline, thank you so much for sharing your story.
Caroline Schwabe 1:23:02
Thank you David, too. It was a joy to chat with you today. And I really appreciate our conversation. Thanks.
David Ames 1:23:13
Final thoughts on the episode? Wow. Caroline's is an amazing story. And Caroline is an amazing person. I cannot imagine what it would be like to lose one of my senses. And then to regain it. Imagine the gratitude that you would feel Caroline expresses that gratitude and that joy for life, joy for listening to the creak of a door or the drain of a sewage system. That's the kind of joy I want in my life. And I am inspired by Caroline. I greatly appreciate the honesty with which Caroline tells her story. I was lucky enough to have a conversation with both her and Andreas earlier before the recording of this episode. And the devastation of the rejection from the church leadership Andreas trying to go to seminary and their hopes for going into ministry. The devastation of the financial failure of the church that they were a part of came through so deeply they were crushed by these events. No wonder you begin to ask some questions. I do want to make it clear. Even Karolina and I discussed that maybe the word deconstruction is a bit too strong of word. I think Caroline still believes on some level. And that's okay. As I said near the end of the episode, she's getting to ask those questions and go search for the answers and follow wherever that search leads. That's the exciting thing is that nobody is telling her or you where you need to land. I also find it fascinating that the hearing loss wasn't the real beginning of deconstruction. It was in some ways after she regained her hearing with the cochlear implant, and listening to podcasts. And from Caroline's first email to me through our first conversation and the conversation you've just heard, I am incredibly humbled, and incredibly grateful that this podcast played even the tiniest part in helping Caroline through that process of language re acquisition. I love the story of podcasts being a major part of her life, as she learns to hear again, regain proficiency at language acquisition. Caroline, thank you so much for being on the podcast. This was an amazing conversation, and I have been deeply affected by it. Thank you to both you and Andreas for your honesty, and your willingness to tell your stories. The secular Grace Thought of the Week is about gratitude. I love the way that Caroline expresses such great gratitude and joy in these very small things. The creek of adore the click of a knob while it turns the water in a storm drain. These wonderful things surround us all the time, and yet we don't see them or hear them or acknowledge them. I often say that is very difficult sometimes to be grateful for the big things to really feel gratitude for big things like like the privilege that you may have, or the house that you live in or the job that you have. But the little things can have a profound impact on your attitude of gratitude. Being thankful for waking up in a warm bed on a Saturday morning, being thankful for talking to your partner until midnight, being thankful for the rain falling on your face. Being thankful for being out in nature and hearing the wind blow through the trees. These little moments if we can stop and acknowledge them, will greatly impact our attitude of gratitude. I for 1am Grateful for Caroline, I am grateful for you the listener, I am grateful for those of you who write me your stories and who are willing to come on the podcast and tell your stories that I get to be a tiny part in that process for you is incredibly humbling. And I am eternally grateful for that. Thank you. As always, I have some amazing conversations that are coming up. As I've mentioned before, I have Sam and Daniel interviewing me, I've just finished editing that. And I'll be interviewing Sam and just a little bit. And so both of those will be out shortly on our respective podcasts. I've recently interviewed Michael from Reverend bones who has a new album out called Escape from heaven. Michael is an activist focused on the damage that purity culture does to everyone. And that was an amazing conversation. And then I just recently had a conversation with Amy Rath, who runs the nun life podcast, which is a great podcast please check it out. She is amazing and inspiring. And I can't wait to share all of these conversations with you. Until then, my name is David and I am trying to be the graceful atheist. Join me and be graceful human beings. Time for the footnotes. The beat is called waves for MCI beats, links will be in the show notes. If you'd like to support the podcast, you can promote it on your social media. You can subscribe to it in your favorite podcast application. And you can rate and review it on pod chaser.com. You can also support the podcast by clicking on the affiliate links for books on Bristol atheists.com. If you have podcast production experience and you would like to participate podcast, please get in touch with me. Have you gone through a faith transition? And do you need to tell your story? Reach out? If you are a creator, or work in the deconstruction deconversion or secular humanism spaces and would like to be on the podcast? Just ask. If you'd like to financially support the podcast there's links in the show notes. To find me you can google graceful atheist. You can google deconversion you can google secular race. You can send me an email graceful atheist At gmail.com or you can check out the website graceful atheists.com My name is David and I am trying to be the graceful atheist. Join me and be graceful human beings
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