Praise Be To Pod

Elizabeth Holmes promised to revolutionize healthcare with just a few drops of blood. So how did Theranos go from Silicon Valley darling to one of the biggest fraud scandals in tech history? Ashley and Bailee trace the company's rise and fall, from Holmes's ambitious vision and meteoric success to the investigations and revelations that brought it all crashing down. Plus, You Can See Eve...

From Catholic guilt to evangelical youth group, Maggie Crane has experienced more than one flavor of religious baggage. Ashley and Bailee sit down with the Massachusetts-born, NYC-based comedian to talk about growing up Irish Catholic, finding her way into evangelicalism, and the strange cultural differences between two religious worlds that might have more in common than you'd think. Plus, p...

Demons, deliverance, and the belief that every struggle has a spiritual explanation. Ashley and Bailee unpack the origins of deliverance ministry, what it looks like in modern evangelical and charismatic churches, and their own experiences with a practice that can blur the line between spiritual warfare and real-world harm. Together, they explore what happens when everything from anxiety to talkin...

He told a whole congregation how wives should behave while doing the opposite behind closed doors. Ashley and Bailee skip the true crime recap of Netflix's Death of a Pastor's Wife and ask the scarier question: how does a church spend years training people to forgive a pastor before anything even comes out? Plus, a praise report, a sprained foot, and a very serious debate about Nathan Fi...

Ashley and Bailee unpack their thoughts and experiences with evangelical discipleship programs (think YWAM, Bethel School of Supernatural Ministry, Teen Mania’s Honor Academy, etc.). They discuss how these programs offered young, disenchanted evangelical millennials an alternative to college, trade school, or other forms of higher education, as well as the immersive culture, community, and spiritu...

This week, Ashley and Bailee explore what it means to rebuild self-trust after spending years in an evangelical culture that taught them not to trust themselves. From being told that “the heart is deceitful” to learning to be suspicious of their own desires, instincts, and decision-making, they unpack how constantly looking outside ourselves for permission and direction can leave us disconnected f...

Ashley and Bailee sit down with filmmaker Grace Sims to talk about her evangelical childhood, her time with Youth With A Mission, and the purity-culture nicknames that followed her through high school. The conversation moves into Grace's gradual deconstruction and the deeply personal story behind her short film, The Country They Call Life , which follows a young woman navigating the decision...

This week, Ashley and Bailee continue their conversation about 9/11, getting into the attacks themselves and the enormous cultural impact they had on a generation of Americans. They talk about how September 11th changed the way Americans understood safety, terrorism, patriotism, and the world around them, and how the aftermath shaped American and Evangelical culture for years to come. Together, th...

This week, Ashley and Bailee begin a two-part conversation about 9/11 and the American evangelical response to one of the most defining events of their generation. But before getting into what happened after September 11th, they take a step back to look at the political, historical, and social climate that led up to the attacks. Together, they unpack the history of U.S. involvement in the Middle E...

This week, Ashley and Bailee continue their conversation with Mike Maeshiro – delving into what it’s like being LGBTQ+ in an evangelical world where your sexuality is treated as an affliction to overcome. Mike opens up about how being closeted made it nearly impossible to imagine a future for himself, and how pouring himself into ministry served as a distraction from his sexuality and from the pos...

This week Ashley and Bailee kick things off with the politics of expensive desk chairs, the two hours Bailee lost Uncle Marty, and her unexpected new love affair with baseball (much to Ashley's disapproval). Jacob weighs in with his signature distaste for Rotten Tomatoes ratings. In our Part 1 interview with Mike Maeshiro, founder of Numa, we go back to the beginning. Mike opens up about know...

This week Ashley and Bailee break down the Five Love Languages: where they actually came from (hint: it's more churchy than you think), why zero peer-reviewed studies back them up, and how a 1992 Christian Literature release somehow out-lasted Myers-Briggs as our go-to personality rubric.  The author, Gary Chapman, was a Baptist marriage counselor with a Ph. D. in adult education. Somehow his...

This week, join Ashley and Bailee for a full-length “What's on Your Heart?” episode. From our thoughts on Lindsey Graham to Ashley’s trip to Kenya to Minnesota’s abysmal air quality, we're spending the entire episode catching up on everything that's happened over the summer, sharing what's been on our minds (and hearts), and following every tangent that inevitably comes with it...

This week, Ashley and Bailee continue their conversation on heaven by exploring how the beliefs they inherited about the afterlife shaped the way they lived, loved, and understood the world around them. Together, they reflect on how evangelical Christianity informed the way they imagined heaven, discussing how those beliefs influenced everything from fear and purpose to relationships, justice, and...

This week, Ashley and Bailee kick off a two-part conversation exploring the origins of heaven and revisiting one of the foundational beliefs they were taught growing up in evangelical Christianity. Together, they reflect on the version of heaven they inherited from the church, and explore how that picture was shaped by centuries of history, theology, and cultural influence. They discuss the histor...

This week, Ashley and Bailee continue their conversation with their friend Scip as she reflects on growing up in 90s evangelical culture and her journey through deconstruction. Together, they explore Scip’s upbringing in the Assembly of God church, her experience attending an evangelical Bible college, and the ways those environments shaped (and challenged) her faith. They unpack the unique cultur...

This week, Ashley and Bailee are joined by their friend Katherine Scipioni “Scip” to respond to a parishioner question about navigating family relationships when faith and identity collide. Together, they discuss the pain of conditional acceptance, responding to a parishioner’s story about her conservative Christian family members choosing not to fully support her upcoming wedding to her fiancée....

This week, Ashley and Bailee explore the lingering ways evangelical Christianity continues to shape their thinking, even after deconstruction. Together, they reflect on how certain patterns don’t automatically disappear when beliefs change…they often shift form. From over-functioning in relationships to carrying a sense of moral urgency into political spaces, they examine how old frameworks can qu...

This week, Ashley and Bailee unpack one of evangelicalism's most enduring coping mechanisms: spiritual bypassing. Together, they explore the pressure to "choose joy" when life is falling apart, the expectation to stay positive no matter the circumstances, and the ways difficult emotions are often treated as spiritual failures rather than normal parts of being human. Along the way, t...

This week, Ashley and Bailee fail the Bechdel Test for the very first time with an all-new episode on one of humanity's oldest and most infamous subjects: men. Together, they unpack some of the dynamics they've noticed in progressive spaces and relationships, exploring the ways patriarchal patterns can persist even as people deconstruct old beliefs and embrace new values. From emotional...

This week, Bailee and Ashley are joined by a very special guest: Bailee’s childhood best friend, Bekha.  Bekha and Bailee first met as children when Bekha's family began attending the charismatic evangelical church that Bailee's parents planted and pastored in their small rural community.  While Bekha and Bailee share many memories and experiences from their upbringing in the church, Bek...

This week, Ashley and Bailee celebrate one year of Praise Be to Pod , reflecting on the journey that brought them here. After a year of conversations about evangelicalism, spirituality, culture, power, and healing, they take stock of how their deconstruction has evolved—and where it might be leading next. Along the way, they discuss the different stages of deconstruction they've experienced,...

Content Advisory: This episode explores themes of domestic violence, sexual assault, and violence against LGBTQ+ people This week, Ashley and Bailee are joined by Ashley’s husband Danny to discuss the infamous pipeline of powerful men who conveniently find God in the middle of public scandal and accountability. Using Shia LaBeouf, Kanye West, and Russell Brand as case studies, we explore why celeb...

This week, Ashley and Bailee explore the resurgence of tradwife and homesteading aesthetics, “divine feminine” content, and viral online trends centered around softness, submission, and retreat from modern life — asking what cultural conditions are making these ideas feel especially appealing right now. We also look at how these movements don’t exist in a vacuum, but often intersect with broader p...

This week, Ashley and Bailee are joined by Jubilee Dawn for a conversation on “signs and wonders” within charismatic evangelical spaces. Jubilee shares from her experience in Bethel’s School of Supernatural Ministry (often described as “Christian Hogwarts”), reflecting on what it was like being immersed in a culture where prophetic words, miracles, and supernatural “signs” were not just encouraged...