The Dismantling Doctrine Podcast

This week's guest features Paul Kivel, author of Living in the Shadow of the Cross: Understanding and Resisting the Power and Privilege of Christian Hegemony . Since the fateful decision by Emperor Constantine in the 4th Century CE to make Christianity the official state religion of Rome, Christianity has enjoyed unprecedented power, cultural and religious dominance--the very definition of "hegemo...

In this bonus episode, ex-Scientologist and host of the Sensibly Speaking Podcast-- Chris Shelton--drops in for a deep dive into the cult psychology of QAnon.   What is QAnon, and who exactly is "Q," its enigmatic leader? Chris and I not only answer those questions, but further, we unpack the appeal of this growing internet cult movement from a cult psychology point of view.   If you have friends,...

Due to the rapidly-unfolding series of scandals surrounding Jerry Falwell Jr--and his wife Becki--I turned to one of the most qualified people out there who could knowledgeably discuss this story: Kristin Kobes Du Mez, recent guest and author of the recent book Jesus and John Wayne.   Kristin and I try to make sense of the narratives swirling around the many scandals that have not only dogged Falw...

This week's episode features a conversation with Dr Michael McVicar, assistant professor of religion at Florida State University and author of the 2015 book, Christian Reconstruction: RJ Rushdoony and American Religious Conservatism . Dr McVicar's book is incredibly helpful in developing the historical and cultural context that both explains who Rushdoony was, but also why his legacy is so signifi...

My study and research of Christian nationalism has led me both to David Barton, who runs the organization WallBuilders out of Aledo, Texas, and to another figure--Dr Warren Throckmorton of Grove College, a professor of psychology. What do these two people have in common? Barton is a revisionist "historian" who has made a career out of promoting the myth that America not only was founded as a Chris...

This special bonus episode features journalist Sarah Posner, as we discuss her latest book Unholy: Why White Evangelicals Worship at the Altar of Donald Trump . So why exactly do they worship at the Trump altar? Turns out that the answer to that question is more complex than it may seem...because as Sarah lays out in the book, it's not just white evangelicals--it's also the alt-right that forms Tr...

In this special bonus episode, returning guest David Hayward ("The Naked Pastor") drops back in for a discussion of his new book Til Doubt Do Us Part: When Changing Beliefs Changes Your Marriage.   We discuss what happens when married couples experience the reality of one person who is deconstructing his or her religious beliefs. What happens when the other person isn't on the same page? What abou...

This week's show features returning guest: journalist and author Katherine Stewart, who wrote the recent book The Power Worshippers . In this episode, we'll be talking about Katherine's 2012 book, The Good News Club: The Christian Right's Stealth Assault on America's Children . She uncovers  not only the agenda behind the sectarian, fundamentalist organization known as "The Good News Club"--which...

This week's guest is Julie Anne Smith, known primarily for her blogging and activism through the Spiritual Sounding Board blog.  Julie Anne not only works hard to expose church abuses of all kinds--sexual as well as spiritual--she is herself a survivor, having come through the ranks as a former Christian homeschooling mom. She subsequently began to deconstruct and question a lot of the indoctrinat...

This special bonus episode features a conversation with journalist and author Angela Denker, whose recent book Red State Christians: Understanding the Voters who Elected Donald Trump takes a much more personal look at Trump Christian voters in America. Beyond being a journalist and author, Angela is also a Lutheran pastor--and after seeing the disruptive effect of the Trump vote in 2016 on her own...

This week's guest is Rob Boston, senior editor of Church and State and long-time prolific writer for the organization Americans United for the Separation of Church & State . Rob has been with AU for more than 30 years, and in that time he's written extensively on not only church and state, but on exposing--and debunking, in some cases--many of the key leaders of the Christian Right and Christian n...

In this special bonus episode, I'm happy to share my interview of Kristin Kobes Du Mez, author of an outstanding book released on Tuesday, the 23rd of June 2020, and timed to coincide with its release. Titled Jesus and John Wayne: How White Evangelicals Corrupted a Faith and Fractured a Nation , the book explores the legacy of "evangelical masculinity"--and chronicles how, in the last century or s...

This week's episode features an information-packed chat with Dr Milton Gaither, widely considered one of America's foremost leading experts on the subject of Christian homeschooling. Dr Gaither wrote the book on the subject--literally. His 2008 book Homeschool: An American History (revised in 2017) contains a wealth of information not just on the development of homeschooling in general, but specif...

This week we are taking another break from talking about dominion theology and Christian nationalism to focus on a topic I've dealt with a lot in the past--how to reconstruct your life, and rebuild, after leaving one's faith or religious beliefs behind.   My guest this week is David, host of "The Graceful Atheist" podcast. We have a fantastic discussion comparing notes both as ex-pastors who walke...

In this special episode, I'm chatting with author, ex-evangelical and now atheist, John Loftus.   John is the author of the recent book The Case Against Miracles , an anthology that aims to discuss miracles from a scholarly point of view. Along with several other noted academics, John takes aim at this topic, seeking not only to define miracles--but to ask whether or not there is even evidence to...

I apologize in advance for the long title, but when you hear this show, I promise it will be worth the listen! This week's guests are the legendary returning guests, Conway & Siegelman. They wrote the hugely important and influential books Snapping in 1978 and then, just a few years later, came out with Holy Terror .  With their incredible, on-the-ground field research, they were among the first t...

Off the back of a recent Medium article I recently wrote on this subject, I decided to riff on this topic and so turn it into a podcast episode on its own.   In this episode, I describe what life was like for me, growing up as a loyal foot soldier in "The Lord's Army." Thoroughly indoctrinated by my church and Christian school experiences alike, I had never heard the names of influencers like RJ R...

This week's guest is sociologist and author Sam Perry, who co-wrote the book together with Dr Andrew Whitehead Taking America Back for God: Christian Nationalism in the United States. What makes their book on Christian nationalism different? The authors take a sociological approach to the subject, distilling data from nationwide surveys on religion, to uncover the motives and inspiration behind Ch...

In this special bonus edition, I have the pleasure of bringing together three ex-evangelical pastors: myself, Tim Sledge, and David Hayward (better known as "The Naked Pastor.")   A former megachurch pastor from Texas, Tim is the author of the bestselling books Goodbye Jesus and Four Disturbing Questions With One Simple Answer . David is of course best known for his poignant cartoons that, while p...

This week's guest is Katherine Stewart, author of the book The Power Worshippers: Inside the Dangerous Rise of Religious Nationalism .   Katherine has devoted the last ten years of her life to uncovering, and telling the story publicly, of the many and varied ways in which the Religious Right and other Christian nationalist groups have infiltrated American society, from education to the top levels...

This week's guest is Stephanie McCown, author of Razed Evangelical: Losing My Faith But Finding Myself .  Stephanie is an unbelievable survivor--not only has she come out of a very toxic experience within evangelical Christianity, she is a cancer and addiction survivor also. But she had to navigate all of those experiences without God...and in the process, lost her faith--but found herself. Also h...

In this special bonus episode I am joined by therapist and friend from Canada, Janice Selbie, who has been a guest on the show a few times before.   Janice was due to host the CORT2020 conference on religious trauma in just a few days--that is, until the COVID-19 outbreak forced her to cancel the conference. Hopefully it will be rescheduled at some point in the future.   However, along with the un...

This week's guest is psychologist, author and speaker Dr Marlene Winell, who--in many ways, it could be said--almost literally "wrote the book" on the subject of religious trauma syndrome, or RTS. As you'll no doubt hear us discuss, this recording took place prior to the unfortunate cancellation of the CORT2020 conference which was to be held in Vancouver, BC. Dr Winell was meant to be one of the...

Do you identify as an ex-evangelical or as a post-evangelical? What is the difference between the two terms, and why should it matter?   This week's episode features a conversation with Dan Koch, self-identified progressive Christian and host of the You Have Permission podcast. Dan's aim with his show is literally to "give permission" to people within Christianity who might be questioning various...

This week's episode features a discussion with Julie Ingersoll, an expert on the oftentimes strange and bizarre world of Christian Reconstructionism. Julie wrote an extremely helpful book on this subject, entitled Building God's Kingdom: Inside the World of Christian Reconstructionism .   We cover 3 major aspects of this movement: first its origins, second its impact on Christian education (and sp...