An Army of Normal Folks - What Happens When You Finally Listen to Foster Kids (Pt 2)

Episode Date: May 26, 2026

When Brian Mavis and his wife learned there were hundreds of foster kids in Colorado that nobody was stepping up to adopt, they realized the problem wasn’t that people didn’t care — it’s that they’d never truly heard the kids’ stories. In this powerful conversation, the founder of America’s Kids Belong shares how recording video testimonies of foster children transformed his life, helped more than 2,400 kids find families, and revealed an upstream solution to some of America’s largest problems. You’ll walk away with practical ways to help foster kids in your own community — whether that means adopting, fostering, supporting foster families, mentoring a child, or simply becoming the kind of adult who refuses to look away.Support the show: https://www.normalfolks.us/#joinSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Hey, everybody. It's Bill Courtney with an army of normal folks, and we continue with part two of our conversation with Brian Mavis. Right after I put on my new army of normal folks t-shirt, and then we get brief messages from our generous sponsors. Hey, it's us, the Jonas brothers, and guess what? We have some big news. What's the news? Huge news. We created our own podcast called, Hey, Jonas. We invented a podcast? Well, we didn't invent it. We just contributed. The first people to do podcasts. Pretty, yeah, pretty wide range of podcasts throughout there. But this one's extra special.

So how did we actually come up with a name, Hey Jonas, guys? I honestly don't remember. I think it was on a call about what we should call it. Well, we were thinking I'm originally calling it one of the early names of our band. Before Jonas Brothers was... This is how you guys remember it going down? Yes. I have a very different memory of this.

We were talking about a thing, a bit for the podcast. where people could call in and say, hey Jonas, and then I wrote down on my little notepad, Hey Jonas, and offered it up as a potential title for the podcast. But thanks for remembering that, guys. Listen to Hey Jonas on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcast. Just listen. We don't care where you hear it.

Another podcast from some SNL late-night comedy guy, not quite. Unhumor me with Robert Smygel and friends. Me and hilarious guests from Bob Odenkirk to David Letterman help make you funnier. This week, my guest, S&L's Mikey Day and head writer Streeter Seidel help an a cappella band with their between songs banter.

Where does your group perform? We do some retirement homes. Those people are starving for banter. Listen to humor me with Robert Smigel and friends on the Iheart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. Keith Giamanka seemed like a mild-mannered suburban dad, but secretly, he became someone else,

a master of disguise who went on a crime spree. At the time, did it seem like a crazy idea? It seemed very crazy. But I felt so desperate that I felt it was the quickest, easiest way out. Did you allow yourself to think about how it could go wrong on what that might look like? No. I didn't want to manifest that. I was trying to manifest success.

Every family has its secrets. But what happens when you discover that your dad has been. and living a double life. That is not the look of an innocent man. This is going to change my life and my family dynamic forever because everything that had existed prior in my reality is now untrue. Listen to Deep Cover the Family Man

on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. Here's something that should not be as complicated as it is, getting a racist statue removed. And here's something that should be be a whole lot easier than it is. Getting a new one put up in its place. As long as there's a politics of race in America, there's going to be a politics of remembering the Civil War. To get to school, I had to go down Robert Lee Boulevard. Get to the grocery store, I had to go down Jefferson

Davis Parkway. If you're an historian and you leave out half of what the history is, you're not doing your job. I'm Akila Hughes, and Rebel Spirit season two goes deep on both of those things. The fights, the politics, the people who won, and my personal campaign to add something to do. to the Kentucky State House that's actually worth the wall space. We are more than our bodies. We contain essence. We contain spirit. How do you represent that?

They are just fueling a fire that is really catching. You'll see what I mean. Listen to Rebel Spirit Season 2 on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. So when you started in Colorado, you almost got run out of Colorado. And then that turned into kind of. movement. Yeah.

So Colorado, we had some very collaborative people in the government, one woman in particular, and she left, and she was replaced by someone else who was the antithesis, and even was like someone of bad character. She was a liar, really against the church, stuff like that. And we're like, man, it is getting harder and harder, very hard to do what we're wanting to do. So then we had a gentleman out of Chicago. He hired a gal and said, hey, I'm interested in this space. Take a year and just study what's working in the United States.

You know, fly east, west, north, south. So she learned about us. She came out and visited us a couple of times. And then she ended up, see, so how long? ago, almost 11.5 years ago, she said to her boss, meet this couple in Colorado. So we fly out in January 9th and 10th. And he, at the end, I'm like, why are we here? And he goes, oh, we're on your team. I go, what's that mean? He goes, well, just try stuff and go, go beyond Colorado. And if you need or help, give us a call. So we fly home.

home, my wife says, are you going to do this? Because she really felt like at that moment, to go beyond Colorado meant me stepping up into that role more than being a pastor. She goes, are you going to do this? Are you going to help lead this and get, you know, and I said, no. And she goes, why not? And I go, getting kids into families is your thing. It's not my thing. So I slept on the couch that night. It's true story. True story. You can imagine how well that went.

So I was on the couch that night. I wake up in the morning. So even pastors get put on the couch. Oh, God. Man, that makes me feel so much better. So advice to you guys out there, buy a nice couch. Wow. That morning, I wake up to a text on my phone, I pick it up, I read it. It says it's from a gal who's adopted a couple of kids. Oh, I thought you're going to say, I hope you enjoy the gal. Right. It's long term until you get straight.

Move into the basics. Yeah, okay, go ahead. It's from a gal who's adopted a couple of kids that we help. It says, Brian, I had a dream about you last night. I dreamt that you died. And I tried to get into your funeral, but I couldn't get in because it was full of kids who you got families for. I was like, oh, crap again. Yeah, that's an oh, moment. Like, uh-oh, I'm in trouble. So I keep running for God. You're already on the couch. Well, now God's, you're doing it to me too.

Yeah, you're about to be put on the, right? Yeah, the eternal couch. Uh-huh. I am, I'm on God's couch. And so, um, it, uh, it, it, I'm, hard-headed, so it's still a few more months, and a couple more really weird things like that happened. And I'm still resisting God. And then I'm, it's like April now. It's been a few months. And I'm in Starbucks with my friend Dan, and I tell Dan, Dan, I am so frustrated with God because everything says,

I'm supposed to go help get kids into families. But that's not my thing. My thing is to point people to Jesus. Then I said something I hadn't said before. I said, but what if the people I'm supposed to help point to Jesus are kids who need moms and dads? And I just started weeping. And I could see in my friend's eyes like, man, you are slow,

but you get there eventually. And so I called up in this guy in Chicago. I said, all right, we're in. And we started 11 years ago as of May 1st. So we're just a week or two away from this recording to that 11 year anniversary. And we started with our very first meeting was with the chief of staff of Governor Haslam. And we said, like, let's make things better in tennis. In my state.

Yeah. one thing with the Chicago I don't know if you I think I know who it is we talked about it but I don't know if you want to say his name you don't have to but also like had he made a commitment to you like with the first meeting him just saying hey I'm on your team that sounds kind of vague like he said hey I'm going to give you this amount of money or if you do this I'm gonna so it was just like super vague and weird you like what actually just happened to this meeting I have no idea this guy is his name is Joe Ritchie and he he unfortunately passed a few years ago when he was a great mentor to me. And he once said in his retirement that he used to,

you know, during his work, he used to pick undervalued and overlooked companies. Now he picked undervalue and overlooked people. And he called him squishy freaks. And his job description to me literally was, go try things. Wow. That was. Well, that was. A perfect job description for me. I hate getting boxed in and told what to do. And so he was great. And then he, yeah. So then I called him.

I said, we're in. And he did help financially, but also helped with connections and helped with mentoring. And, like, one of his stories. So second time I meet him. So now it's May.

We're in Tennessee. I'm meeting him for the second time in my life. You know, we'd spent two days with him in Chicago. Now it's a few months later. and we're staying in the mama cash house. So Johnny Cash's house has burned down and across the street is where he built a house for his parents. And we're staying in that house.

And there's a few of us there and I'm a bad sleeper. So was Joe. And so we're both up and it's early in the morning, you know, five or something. So he and I are sitting at a table like this and drinking some bad coffee. And he was quiet. and we're still trying to get to know each other. He's very Chicago guy, Chicago mustache, you know. And I like trying to break the ice, and I had done finally some research on him.

I said, hey, Joe, I see that you have the world record for flying across the United States faster about anybody else in a, you know, twin prop. I said, tell me about that. So he's staring at his coffee and he goes, oh, I didn't want to do it. But my buddy, he liked collecting world records and I had the plane for him for it. And Chuck Yeager, he had the record and he wanted to take it from him. Chuck Yeager? Yeah, yeah.

And he goes, when Chuck flew, he took everything out of his plane that didn't need for flying. And he flew alone. And he flew so hard that when he landed, he had to throw away both $500,000 engines. He goes, when I flew, I didn't take anything out of my plane, I had my buddy with me, and when I landed, my engines were cool. That was it. I was like, this guy does not know how to finish a story. He has not looked at me the whole time, by the way.

He's staring at his cup of coffee. And I said, uh, so how'd you do it? He takes a sip of his coffee. puts it down, and now he looks at me, tailwind. He goes, always look for tailwind. And you can create tailwind by choosing who you work with, always bet on character, and you'll get tailwind. And so, and he crashed through, I mean,

they beat the Chuck Yeager by 100 miles an hour. It wasn't like just by a little bit. And so that became one of our mantras, look for tailwind. And so I framed it around the question, what wants to happen? Like, what, what's God doing? What's, you know, look for those conditions. And then, and then join, join that. And so we felt like, okay, let's look for people who care about kids.

And whether it's the governor or, you know, the janitor, we're looking for people of care. character. And that was 11 years ago. 11 years ago. Was there even a name America's kids belong at that time? So we were, my wife and I had founded what was adopted. Because right now it's the Do Stuff Foundation.

Uh-huh. Yeah, yeah, just try stuff. Just try stuff. Yeah. At this point. So we were. By Joe, the coughing three. Yeah, so we, that had been an easier name to remember, try stuff.

Yeah. So we were adopt colored kids. Then we became adopt America's kids, and then that only lasted a couple months. And we're like, oh, we're bigger than just adoption. We are foster care, reunification, that kind of stuff. So that's when we became America's kids belong. Again, I wish we maybe called it all kids belong because America's kids belong is just hard to say. So, and then we started looking like, where does this want to happen?

So Tennessee was one of the places we actually started in Oklahoma and then Tennessee, who now worked in South Dakota, Kansas. Kansas, Georgia, Kentucky, Virginia, Indiana. And so it became a thing that you're filming kids. Filming kids and then. Telling their stories. Yeah. And putting and having a mechanism to get that content in front of potential caring adults.

Yes. But that's not all. So here's the other part of the story. So we had done that. And so when I said yes to yes and yes to. to Joe and all that. We were talking about like, you know, what else do we need? And I said, well, a former intern of mine is a pastor in Richmond, Virginia, and one of his congregants is a gal named Janet Kelly. And she was the youngest secretary of state in the country. And they just did

a campaign at the last year of Governor McDonald's governorship where it was, I think it's called Virginia Adops. And so instead of campaigning for voters, you were a campaign for families. And so they helped do this campaign and get through political connections. And so we had two different approaches. We were very grassroots in the church and in the community. And we called what they did grass tops. And we said, let's go from bottom up and top down.

And so we said, let's do these two campaigns. And so in kind of the academic world, they refer to these two approaches. One is the way we did it was called ABCD, asset-based community development. And it asks a different question. Doesn't look around and say, man, what's missing? We really have some big gaps here. it says, man, look at all the assets this town has. It just needs to be activated.

Like, what if, you know, the laundromat did this? And what if, you know, we just act, you get things going. And Virginia had a model that was more called collective impact. So the way I like to describe it just through an analogy is asset-based community development says, well, let me put it this way. You ever look in the sky and you see these geese flying by in formation? It's just beautiful. But what if you look up in the sky and you see nothing?

Well, you look down and you're like, oh, there's geese everywhere. They're just walking around not flying. Some are just crapping. And what if we could get them up flying? So asset-based community development says, let's activate these geese, and they get them up and flying. Collective impact says, well, they're all flying in different directions. Let's get them flying together. And so usually you get like the governor or head of child welfare and say, here's the goal.

And the goal is, let's have enough families. Let's change your weights. So another way I picture it is there's a picture of a three-ring target. And there's three groups of people. In the middle, bullseye are the heroes. And that's not us. It's the kids. They're the wounded warriors.

They're ones who've been hurt from at home. And then the next group out are the healers. They're the ones who say, I'm going to help this wounded warrior. That's the families who say yes and foster and adopting. Problem is, when you invite trauma into your house, it's no joke. And so those families quit at a rate of 50% a year. So you recruit 100 families today. You'll have a 50 next year, 25, 17, and five years out, you have about five families left.

unless you have the third group, and that's the helpers. Another army of normal folks, people say, if you say yes to the kid, we're going to say yes to you. We're not in a stage of life or call to have kids come in our home, but we're going to have your back. We're going to help with mentoring, mowing the lawn, helping with math homework, carpooling, And then now we say, you know, we have pizza places offering free pizza and we call these foster-friendly communities. So that's the assets in a community that you can mobilize to support the caregivers to take care of the heroes. Yes. And so, and we want to say, look, you are seeing and we appreciate.

We know what you're doing is hard. We know you didn't sign up this. This isn't a job for you. This is your life. These kids live with you. sleep in your beds and they, you know, you feed them and you, you cry with them and you, man, you have hard times. I mean, seeing your documentary, like, there are times when you're like, I don't know if I can do this anymore. And you have people out in the community go,

you don't have to lift this alone. We'll be right back. Hey, it's us, the Jonas brothers. And guess what? We have some big news. What's the news? Huge news. We created our own podcast called, Hey, Jonas. We invented a podcast. podcast? Well, we didn't invent it. We just contributed to it. We're the first people to do podcasts. Pretty, yeah, pretty wide range of podcasts throughout there. But this one's extra special. So how did we actually come up with a name, Hey Jonas, guys? I honestly don't remember. I think it was on a call about what we should call it. Oh, we were thinking, I'm originally calling it one of the early names of our band before Jonas Brothers. This is how you guys remember it going down? Yes. I have a very different memory of this.

We were talking about a thing, a bit for the podcast, people could call in and say, hey, Jonas. And then I wrote down on my little notepad, Hey Jonas, and offered it up as a potential title for the podcast. But thanks for remembering that, guys. Listen to Hey Jonas on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcast. Just listen. We don't care where you hear it.

Another podcast from some SNL late-night comedy guy, not quite. Unhumor me with Robert Smygel and friends. Me and hilarious guests from Bob Odenkirk to David Letter help make you funnier. This week, my guest, S&L's Mikey Day and head writer, Streeter Seidel, help an a cappella band

with their between songs banter. Where does your group perform? We do some retirement homes. Those people are starving for banter. Listen to humor me with Robert Smigel and friends on the I-Heart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. Keith Gianmanca seemed like a mild-mannered suburban dad,

but secretly, he became someone else, a master of disguise who went on a crime spree. At the time, did it seem like a crazy idea? It seemed very crazy. But I felt so desperate that I felt it was the quickest, easiest way out. Did you allow yourself to think about how it could go wrong and what that might look like? No, I didn't want to manifest that.

I was trying to manifest success. Every family has its secrets. But what happens when you discover that your dad has been living a double life? That is not the look of an innocent man. This is going to change my life and my family dynamic forever, because everything that had existed prior in my reality is now untrue. Listen to Deep Cover the Family Man on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.

Here's something that should not be as complicated as it is. getting a racist statue removed. And here's something that should be a whole lot easier than it is, getting a new one put up in its place. As long as there's a politics of race in America, there's going to be a politics of remembering the Civil War. To get to school, I had to go down Robert Ely Boulevard. Get to the grocery store, I had to go down Jefferson Davis Parkway.

If you're an historian and you leave out half of what the history is, you're not doing your job. I'm Akila Hughes, and Rebel Spirit Season 2 goes deep on both of those things. the fights, the politics, the people who won, and my personal campaign to add something to the Kentucky State House that's actually worth the wall space. We are more than our bodies. We contain essence. We contain spirit.

How do you represent that? They are just fueling a fire that is really catching. You'll see what I mean. Listen to Rebel Spirit season two on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. Full circle on Joe. into that point, did you get kicked out of Colorado? Of your own state? Basically.

I mean, we kind of quit Colorado. All because the politics at the top became prohibitive. Yeah. Because of some probably political or preconceived agenda about how children are supposed to be systemized. And, yeah, and kind of an anti-Christian bias. And also what we were doing was working really well. So they ended up kind of taking it back to get kind of credit for it. We did end up, my wife ended up a couple years later.

Some like new boss came in and heard the story and called and to his credit apologized. So we're still there. We're kind of doing that foster friendly thing. But it's there are states who are far more receptive. I remember watching a movie about... Does that not make you angry? Yeah. It's...

Because my home state, it was in... And it has real impact on kids. I mean, kids are being... The kids are saying... Kids are the ones that are being hurt. It's like the system preempts the need of what the system is designed for. Yeah, I mean, it's no secret. You know, people know that foster care is a broken.

system. And it doesn't mean the system means to be chuffed. It just needs to be improved. And I believe it gets improved by inviting people into it who want to help. You get good people in there. They ask for better customer service. Everything. That's the way it works. Tide increase. All the boats rise. All right. So ultimately, you end up in how many states? we're in nine right now okay and maybe one part of it before we move on to is how do you market

the videos to the public yeah I was just about to get to that but I want to ask this question first and then roll to that of the 4,000 foster kids that you filmed which is an incredible number if you think about the time and effort it takes to actually set up and film and get somebody's story

it's not easy yeah we got remarkable team All right. How many of them have matched with an adoptive family against how many would have matched what the metrics say would have matched if you didn't exist? And then to Alex's question, how on the heck do you make the match? Yeah. So what are the numbers of the 4,000 that have matched against the backdrop of what the metrics say would have matched, i.e., what is your success rate with film, against not film. Yeah. And then how do you get, how do you market the film and find your perspective care base?

Yeah. Okay. So we've got over 4,000, but let's just say it's use 4,000, keep the math simple. We've done, we get a 60%. And so 2,400 of those kids have been matched against the backdrop of? The backdrop is, so when we go in. What's the baseline? Yeah. So when you go to a state, we say, give us your longest waiting kids.

So they give us the kids who've gotten zero inquiries for years. So the answer is zero. I mean, it's not like, well, they had a 30% chance and we doubled it. It's almost, it's virtually, I'll give them one percent. Infantestimal. Yeah. Are these like mostly 17-year-olds or 15 to 17-year-olds? We've never said no to a kid. So on the low end, we'll do.

little kids, two or three years old, but they're almost always severe special needs. So, for example, we had a little boy in South Dakota. He was like three. He was born completely deaf and blind. And so he was in foster care, nobody inquiring about him. We videot him again. He can't. So we should show him playing.

We show this is real. This is his reality. And his foster. or parent playing with them. A nurse calls up and says, I have a biological child born deaf and blind,

has the same disease. I know how to do this. Don't come on. And adopts them. So we have young, but most of the kids we do are, I would say, who?

Right? No, it's, I, I, I, they got a playmate. On one side, on one side, on one side, side of what I'm about to say, look, I try to be painfully honest. I could tell from your documentary.

I just did. Right? I mean, let's be candid about what things are what they are, right? No way on God's Green Earth I'd sign up for that personally. Oh. I honestly feel small saying that. But the truth is, I know me. Mm-hmm.

But the flip side of that is, I am in awe of someone whose heart says, I'm going to spend the rest of my life caring for this very physically damaged human being. Because I know how. Yeah. I'm willing to give my life. There are amazing. people out there who do, you're like, there are, you know, it's it. I would have, I would have been filming that kid thinking, this is a no-go-fo show.

This is never, who is going to sign up to enjoy? Yeah, we, I agree with you. And I, there may be people sitting there saying, gosh, Bill, you're sick, you're, you're a mean, stupid bastard. But what I hope they're doing is many are going, yeah, I couldn't do it either. To your credit, though, Bill, you also have to leave your company at 2.30 p.m. to go coach other kids. It doesn't matter if I didn't have the company. I'm telling you, I couldn't move. I'm just telling you. I just, I know me. Again, I mean, there are people.

But I say it out of unbelievable amount of respect for this. Yeah, there's, there are people out there who are remarkable human beings and who have, I think, they just, they, they're brave. They are brave. But they have so selfless. And selfless, yeah. And, and again, so she goes, I know how to do this. So then, so then there's kids who are 12 and, you know,

So there's a lot of people, I mean, from what little I know about you, I think, I mean, you'd be great with teenagers. Like, you don't want to change diapers. I mean, if you were to do this, you would pick a teenager, I'm guessing. Probably. Because you're great with teenagers. There are people who aren't great with teenagers. So you got to know yourself. You got to know, like, here's what, here's how God made us.

We're great with teenagers. And so, particularly boys for you. How do you get to, how do you get to these pairs of that now circling back to Alex's original question? Because it's a really good question because I'm not like signing up saying, hey, show me some videos of some foster kids. Yeah. I'm in.

You're not putting it on prime. Right. Or Netflix. Yeah. No, early on, we learned right away what not to do. one of our early first videos we we put on YouTube and you know it's this 12 year old girl you know just innocent I think I'm the one who actually did the interview I remember her at the very end I asked she was she was looking down the whole time and I asked her what do you want people to know about you

and she looked up at me for really the first time and she said that I'm lovable oh gosh that But the comments when we put it on YouTube were disgusting. I bet there were some sick people. I wanted to kill them. Right. So we're like, no more YouTube. So we work with the state and say, you tell us your rules and we'll abide by them. And so some states, you have to, you know, enter your information and all that.

Other states, not as much restrictions. we share the videos with other agencies whose job is... That makes sense. So we're like free, like use this. I mean... Well, I would imagine the foster social worker person loves this tool. Yes. Because instead of saying, let me tell you about this kid, let me show you this kid.

Oh, and we have, I mean, we, and those things have, I mean, to people who just don't know the child, but a lot of times these videos also been shown to, like, former school, like, teachers, like, oh, I used to teach this child when he was in second grade. Yeah, well, now he's in eighth grade. And they're like, well, here he is right now. And they're like, there are even aunts and uncles who don't know their own nephew or niece. They see the video.

Again, it does the same thing for them. They're like, I just, they're like, I don't know, I don't know. And then they see the kid's video and they're like, oh, gosh. How do we say no now? I mean, they want to say yes. So they're used privately. are used with other agencies. And then also if you go to our website, America's Kids Belong, there is a page dedicated

to these videos. And then if you are interested, you inquire and it goes through the proper channels. It's best if you already have your certified, you know, and all that. But if not, that's fine. You just start the journey. A lot of times people see a video about a particular kid and God will use that kid to in their hearts, heads towards children, and it ends up not being that child that they end up getting connected with.

It's another one. It's another one. But God used one, and they got another child that they fell in love with. So the numbers look like, let's give it just for a complete possibility, 3%. Yeah. So you go from, at the best case scenario, 120 of these 4,000. kids would have found a home to 2,600. Yeah, 20x. That's incredible. And honestly, it's pretty simple. Make a video to show the human being

that these kids are rather than a number and allow God in the human heart to do its work. Right. It's not genius. It was, we did, one of my phrases, one of the phrases of my mentor, Joe said, it was common sense but an uncommon practice. Yeah, that's a great way of putting it. One thing in terms of, I'm guessing, one of your partners, just making me think we should have them on the podcast, is Wendy's wonderful kids, one of them. And Bill's probably not familiar with them.

So if they are a partner, it could be good to tell them. If you go to Wendy's restaurant, you'll usually see something about them advocating for kids in foster care and adoption, because the founder of Wendy's was an adoptee. I did not know that. So they basically, their foundation funds... About Dave?

Dave. Dave was an adoptee. No kidding. Their foundation funds workers who literally just take on like the 10 to 15 most difficult cases. And their like full-time job is to get those kids adopted. So like something like this would be extremely beneficial for them to use. Listen, a buddy of mine named Rick Jackson.

Oh, yeah. From Jackson Healthcare. Uh-huh. You know him? They, I don't know him personally. I know about him. they did just recently help us with a financial grant. Did they?

Yeah. Not surprising because he grew up in Volstergear. Yes. And he's leading the polls for the governorship of the state of future. Oh, is he? He is running for governor. Oh, I didn't know that. He is in the lead.

Wow. Okay. Yeah. So there's tailwind in Georgia. There's tail wind in Georgia. At any given time, 115,000 kids are waiting to be adopted, which is just a enormous number, remembering that most foster kids out of the 400,000 total, cannot be adopted. Their parental rights have been terminated, and they can still be reunified with their family.

So something Alex talks about all the time. If one out of three churches adopted an orphan, those who had their parental rights terminated, there wouldn't be any orphans in America today. Yeah. Circling back to the story of the now Episcopal nun saying it took her three. years to get a single pastor to answer her call. Yeah. There's something broken there, my friend.

As a former, I assume you're a former pastor now because you're doing this or are you doing it. It's true. But I mean, I still have a pastor. Always a pastor. Yeah. Kind of. As a pastor who's gotten into this world, there's something very broken about that.

I used to love one of my pastors would always. always say one of the greatest sins of our country is the most segregated day in America is Sunday. Right. And I know that's overdone, but it's so true. Yeah. This may be a second sin. Yeah. It's just, we're just wrong. And honestly, in a more magnanimous picture, as we think about reduced membership in church, less, less people attending.

worship service, more people being skeptical of it, to some degree we are our own worst enemy when we examine the truth about our own numbers. Yeah. What do you think about that thought? And that's off script and we'll get back to the story, but I think it's germane to this entire conversation. Well, I know for me, and so I feel like I was typical. and it was, and it's amazing how many women are the ones who turn their husband's heads towards this issue.

But foster care, let me put it this way. Let's say, Bill, let's say you and Alex and I, we all go out onto the streets in Memphis, and we have a video camera with us, and we just walk up to people and say, hey, what comes to mind when we say what needs to be, like, what social wounds need to be fixed around here? and you'll probably hear homeless. Education. Education. Addiction.

Mental health. Maybe human trafficking. They won't say that. No, they would definitely say homeless. Uh-huh. Addiction. They would say addiction, but they would combine those two. Okay.

Yeah. Those are, yeah, usually. They would definitely say education's a problem. And then they would say divisiveness based on politics. Okay. That's what. Most people, honest, after doing this three years, I think that would be the answer. And I think I know exactly where you're going to this.

Let's take addiction and let's take homelessness and throw in human trafficking in there. And education. And a lack of education. Uh-huh. They won't say foster care, but if they did, you'd be like upstream. Yeah, well, that's because all of those things, the greatest percentage of the people engaged in all of those issues that are societal ills started in foster care. Yeah.

So they are, if you become a foster parent, you are now fighting against the pimps who will say yes to these kids who age out. So my illustration going upstream, there's only one. That's so interesting. There's one wrinkle to it. I said, you are, you're sitting by the stream and up from you is a waterfall. And you're watching people. You watch a human fall off this waterfall, and they're going, and they're underneath the water,

and you jump in, you rescue this person, pull them to shore, resets us, take them, and somehow you know that this person has been homeless. Then you look up, you see another person fall. You go in, you rescue him, and you're like, and you're like, man, I know somehow that this person has been trafficked. You go in, you pull someone out. I know this person was a school dropout. You're rescuing another. one. I know this person was addicted to drugs. And you can finally go upstream. You're like,

what is happening? You're like, well, the waterfall is 18 years old when they age out of foster care from one problem to another. You're like, what if we can get them? Here's my line. If you care about addiction, you care about homelessness, suicidality, mental health, homelessness, human trafficking, crisis, pregnant. and see all those things, you care about foster care. And if there's organizations working on those issues, thank God for those organizations. But wouldn't it be good to give those kids a family?

So 10 years from now, they don't need those organizations because a good family is better than a great social program. We'll be right back. Hey, it's us, the Jonas brothers, and guess what? We have some big news. What's the news? Huge news. We created our own podcast called Hey Jonas.

We invented a podcast? Well, we didn't invent it. We just contributed to it. We're the first people to do podcasts. Pretty, yeah, pretty wide range of podcasts throughout there. But this one's extra special. So how do we actually come up with a name, Hey Jonas, guys? I honestly don't remember.

I think it was on a call about what we should call it. Well, we were thinking I'm originally calling it one of the early names of our band. For Jonas Brothers. This is how you guys remember it going down? Yes. I have a very different memory of this. We were talking about a thing, a bit for the podcast, where people could call in and say,

Hey, Jonas. And then I wrote down on my little notepad, Hey Jonas, and offered it up as a potential title for the podcast. But thanks for remembering that, guys. Listen to Hey Jonas on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcast. Just listen. We don't care where you hear it.

Another podcast from some SNL, late-night comedy guy, Not quite. Unhumor me with Robert Smygel and Friends. Me and hilarious guests from Bob Odenkirk to David Letterman help make you funnier. This week, my guest, S&L's Mikey Day and head writer, Streeter Seidel, help an a cappella band with their between songs banter. Where does your group perform? We do some retirement homes. Those people are starving for banter. Listen to humor me with Robert Smigel and Friends on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.

Here's something that should not be as complicated. as it is, getting a racist statue removed. And here's something that should be a whole lot easier than it is, getting a new one put up in its place. As long as there's a politics of race in America, there's going to be a politics of remembering the Civil War. To get to school, I had to go down Robert Ely Boulevard. Get to the grocery store, I had to go down Jefferson Davis Parkway.

If you're an historian and you leave out half of what the history is, you're not doing your job. I'm Akila Hughes, and Rebel Spirit Season 2 goes deep on both of those things. the fights, the politics, the people who won, and my personal campaign to add something to the Kentucky State House that's actually worth the wall space. We are more than our bodies. We contain essence. We contain spirit. How do you represent that? They are just fueling a fire that is really catching. You'll see what I mean. Listen to Rebel Spirit Season 2 on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your

podcasts. Keith Giamonka seemed like a mild mass. murdered suburban dad, but secretly he became someone else, a master of disguise who went on a crime spree. At the time, did it seem like a crazy idea? It seemed very crazy, but I felt so desperate that I felt it was the quickest, easiest way out. Did you allow yourself to think about how it could go wrong and what that might look like? No, I didn't want to manifest that. I was trying to manifest success. Every family has its secrets.

But what happens when you discover that your dad has been living a double life? That is not the look of an innocent man. This is going to change my life and my family dynamic forever, because everything that had existed prior in my reality is now untrue. Listen to Deep Cover the Family Man. On the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you, you get your podcasts. This is so funny.

We just did an interview where when it all rolled down to it, the biggest problem was a lack of community. And that's exactly what a family is. People. These kids are, he said people rarely run out of money. They run out of people. Yeah, yeah. And a foster kid runs out of people.

People. Yes. And they were, they were wounded by relationships. You know how they're healed by relationships? relationships, by community, by people. Okay, but back to my question, when examining all of this, do not think that the church is falling down on its responsibility. Yeah, they, again, so. You're talking to a Christian.

Yeah. I'm not anti-church. I'm pro-church. I'm pro-faith. Yeah. So, but I also don't think we ever get to be the best version of ourselves if we don't examine what's wrong with ourselves. So I think I'm going to try to be... Judicious.

Yes. Stop. Just talk to me. Tell me what you really think. I wish that I think foster care one is one of those hidden social wounds. People do see, you do see homelessness. It's in your face. You see addiction.

It's in your face. You don't see foster care. Yeah, because they're hidden away. and insane asylum, so juvie. Yes, I mean, it's... Innocent children. So they don't know. So that's one.

So it is judicious. The second one is when they do know, a lot of churches say, no, it's too hard, or it's not our thing. So here's why we decided, when I was at that church, why we decided it, besides the nun and that conviction that God was talking through her was, I thought, okay, caring for kids, obviously, for many people, is a heart issue, but it's a smart issue, too. because it intersects with all these other ways. If you care about these things, then you care about foster care. It's smart.

And so I would say, but it's hard. So I would say, hey, instead of one and every three churches help one kid, have one and every 10 churches help several. The ones that it fits. It fits them. And when they say when it gets hard, we'll get better. So I got, so I had this young couple. They were in their 30s.

They come up to me and they said, hey, Brian, can we get your advice? I said, what do you want? And they said, well, we grew up in this church. About 800 people attend. We're the only adoptive family. It's a mixed-race family. We're the only adopted family. We're struggling.

We're asking for help. And we are getting nothing. We've asked for a couple years now. We're getting no response. And then they said this, and this is what got me. they said, we feel so alone and our kids feel like they don't belong. And then they said, what should we do? Leave and go somewhere where you will belong.

Exactly. I said quit rewarding bad behavior. Yeah. And that's exactly right. I told me to leave. Vote with your feet. Yeah. And I said, go somewhere where you don't feel alone.

Your kids feel like they belong. You're not the only family. So when you're there, you're like other people know what we're going through. The kids aren't the only one. ones who feel like outside. That's called community. That's called community. So let's have fewer churches do it really well. One in ten. I get it. I love that answer and it's fair. Circling back to something you touched on, which I think you called the outer circle. By the way, when I say fewer churches, we still need more. I mean, we're not in one and ten.

We need more churches. No, I think you called this the outer circle and you. metaphor. But I think it's important to talk about that nearly 50% of foster parents quit within the first year. Yep. Which means there's not enough foster parents, foster kids. Also, before I ask the question that I'm setting up is, it's hard enough to get people to agree to be foster parents, and then you lose half of them in the first year. Yeah. And if the metrics go, those 100% in five years is down to 10, 50%. 15%. Yeah. So it almost seems like you're just swimming as fast as you cam upstream, constantly trying to recruit new foster parents. And it seems to me just a sensible way would be

try to mitigate the loss. Keep the ones you got. Keep the ones you got, right? So we've Talk to some other people who have awakened to, yes, foster kids need support and we need foster parents, but foster parents equally need support to be able to do it. So tell me what America's kids belong is doing about that part of it. Yeah. So one of the things that we started wrestling with was we were looking at a community and said, they're kind of three. Three major sectors. Like, you know, sometimes we talk about it as the three-legged stool. You need, you can't, a stool won't stand on two legs.

You got to have three. And so the three sectors are, you've got government and those, they have the kids. You've got the church and nonprofits. And we think primarily that's where the families are. And then you have the third sector. And we're like, how do you activate them? It's the business community. And you're like, and it's the biggest sector.

It's where people And arguably the most powerful Because they got the money And they got influence And we're like And they're sitting on the sidelines And because What do you

What do nonprofits do with What do they ask businesses to do? They say Write us a check And then maybe close down your business for a day And come swing a hammer Or help somehow

We said What if we said Your business Is your vocation is part of the solution. What you do, that's what we want. And so let's say, you know, your hair salon, give kids in those in that family free haircuts. Some of those kids, they freak out at haircuts. Like learn how to do hair. We have a Nissan dealership here in Central Tennessee. They loan out vans for free so families can keep siblings together.

Wow. Pizza dealer, zoos, all these things. Like, your business can be part of the food. So, poor foster parents. Yes. By helping the foster parents deal with. So it's, and it's, there are, you know, finance, there are, it's a financial help for sure. Like, oh, you know, my daughter is a foster adoptive mom.

And, you know, to go to the Denver Zoo, was five kids, hundreds and hundreds of dollars. Is it really? Yeah. But for net with foster friendly, she can get a pass for a few bucks. That's a huge deal. It's a huge deal. So there is a financial thing, but I don't want this to be viewed as Groupon for

foster families. It's more than that. It's more like, you know, military where you're like, we appreciate you. Right. I get it. We honor you. You're serving our community. You're inviting.

Help us serve you. Yes. Yeah. And that's the sell. That's the passion point. Yes. And the business community is powerful. And again,

and we're saying, and we think what you do can be a ministry. You sell pizza. That could be amazing. So for a guy like me. Yeah. Which I bet most are like me in this particular regard that says,

I could never take on a three-year-old blonde deaf baby. Okay. But I'll tell you what I can do. I could provide something to that nurse that does. Yeah, you got, hey, you're like, you know what? You needed to have your house cleaned. Cleaned.

And maybe renovated, you got, like, the steps need to be ramps or whatever. Whatever. You're like, I got, I got some lumber. I mean, and I got some people who can, go and build that for you. That makes a lot of sense. And you're like, so if foster care matters to you,

and you can't imagine yourself being the actual caretaker, you can be the caretaker of the caretaker through your business and your actions of the community. And so you support that, which stops the parent's from quitting.

Foster parent burnout. So now we have 100 families, and a year from now instead of having 50, we have 90. And they keep, and then the returgeon even shrinks from there. But here's the main thing. It's the kid who's the beneficiary. Instead of them saying, oh, there's another example of another adult who gave up on me.

They're like, ah, I've got adults who aren't giving up on me. And that changes their life. American kids, America's kids belongs, other programs, the foster family. app, trauma training, rap teams, foster parents, night out and support groups, the foster-friendly podcast, resource library, build your village guide. You've been trying stuff. You want to talk about some of these things? Thanks. You want to talk about some of these things? Yeah. So tell me about the most impactful stuff. What is all this? Okay. What is all this? Okay, so let's go back to the church.

And, you know, not enough churches are saying yes. The ones who do say yes, we say, you've got to do this well. I mean, this is, I mean, you're signing up for the Marines here. And so one of the things that we tell churches, we used to go in churches and say, hey, here's two dozen different ideas you can do. And then they'd pick the thing that didn't move the needle or help that much. It was a lot of times it was like, you know, backpacks. the county already had storages of backpack, storage buildings of them.

And so we said there's three things, three essential things that you have to do to be the best. One of those things is that you've got to be trauma trained. Your staff and volunteers who work with kids and teens, you've got to recognize trauma when you see it. And again, so I compare it to like 50 years ago, let's take autism as an example. If you had a family coming to your church and their child was autistic, a lot of people would say that kid is weird. It's true. Today, I think most people would say that kid's on the spectrum.

It changes from... You know what? That is exact. That's interesting. I was wondering where you were going to go with that. Yeah. But it is. It's not, and it's not even that kid suffers from autism.

It's the spectrum. The spectrum has become... Yeah. So it moves from judgment to compassion. It does. And they say, and you know what? We got people who know how to help. So where we are.

It's kind of like kids 50 years ago that suffered from dyslexia. Yeah. Would have been in trouble kids or slow or stupid or slow. Instead of like they just need people who know how to. Yeah, that's really, really interesting. So what you're saying is instead of these teenagers just being bad, maybe they're victims of trauma. So you put on lenses and say, oh, that's not a bad kid. That's a sad kid. And they're just behaving out of pain, behaving bad, but that's because someone hurt them.

We want children's workers, Sunday school teachers, teens, people who are teens to say, look, you don't have to be an expert, but learn about trauma. And so when you see something, I mean, I'll be honest, I'm not blowing smoke here, just watching you how you, on your me how you interacted with some of those kids. I mean, I don't know, you get it intuitively. I don't know. God has gifted you in a way of, like, knowing how to hold a kid and look him in the face. Brian.

Brian. It's my life. I lived it. You experienced, yeah, a lot of experience. And from your own childhood. That's what I'm saying. Yeah. So, you know.

Well, I'm not, there's nothing special. It's just my reality. I didn't know. I have a great dad and mom. And so that was. Listen, when I have to learn by sitting down having people tell me. So you found out these churches need to be trauma trained? So they need to be trauma trained.

And they need to say, oh, that's not a bad kid. Or the nonprofits. That's a sad kid. And we got somebody in the church who knows how to help. That's number one. Number two is we've got an ongoing ministry that supports families. So it could be wraparound, which is like a, small group that says, it's not just an individual that says, I've got your back. It's a small

group that says, we've got your back. Meaning the foster family. Yeah. So, wrap around the foster family to support their work. So if you're a foster family, guess what? This wraparound group, we've got one guy, he's really good at math. He can help with tutoring. Another guy who just loves to mow. Another guy who's got a van who can carpool. Another guy loves to fish. Another lady who loves making lasagna. How about someone who will babysat? says so you as a couple. That's a huge one. That's a huge one.

Just have a few time. You guys go out and so wrap on the ministry. You guys go out and need a $75 dollar cheeseburger at the Peabody. Right? It was 85. 80. And we'll cover it. I didn't order it.

Just so people. No. Yeah. I mean, in context of this entire thing, the fact that Alex didn't cover it makes them a complete bottle of the oil. I could not do it, man. You didn't feel right. You didn't call and ask for permission.

But the wraparound thing, the wrap-round thing speaks to how you get that attrition number to quit being so awful. Yes. And again, and again, immediately it impacts the parents. But again, the real impact, real beneficiaries are the kids because they're like, oh, this. These adults who are taking care of me, they keep going. They're not quitting. And it's usually, again, they don't quit because they don't care. They quit because they're not being cared for.

Right. I get it. Yeah. And then the third thing I would say for a church, for a foster-friendly church, is then once a year, man, you've got to preach about it. You got to say, we are a church who does this. We do the hard thing. We care about kids.

And we care about people who care for these kids. And it's, God said it's a pure and faultless religion in James, chapter 1, verse 27. And it's a strategic thing because if you care about these other issues, you care about these kids. And so teach about it in a responsible way. The other thing is teach about it in a way that a lot of times it is romanticized, like, oh, help these kids. We're like, hey, we want your heart to be soft for these kids, but you've got to be strong, too. Yeah, and there's not much romantic about it. It's not.

I mean, it's hard stuff. I mean, the kid has gone through something so bad that the state has said they're not safe enough to be with their family. And so something really bad has happened. And I used to think, so there's two broad categories while a child's removed. abuse and neglect. And I used to think abuse is really bad and neglect is not so bad. And then one time I had a counselor say to me,

they both have their own unique communication. She says, abuse says, I hate you. Neglect says, I wish you weren't born. She goes, which one's worse? I said, I don't know. I don't either. So she goes, neglect isn't harmless. We'll be right back.

Hey, it's us, the Jonas Brothers, and guess what? We have some big news. What's the news? Huge news. We created our own podcast called, Hey Jonas. We invented a podcast? Well, we didn't invent it. We just contributed to it.

We're the first people to do podcasts. Pretty, yeah, pretty wide range of podcasts throughout there. But this one's extra special. So how do we actually come up with a name, Hey Jonas, guys? I honestly don't remember. I think it was on a call about what we should call it. And we were thinking I'm originally calling it. one of the early names of our band

before Jonas Brothers was... This is how you guys remember it going down? Yes. I have a very different memory of this. We were talking about a thing, a bit for the podcast, where people could call in and say,

Hey, Jonas. And then I wrote down on my little notepad, Hey Jonas, and offered it up as a potential title for the podcast. But thanks for remembering that, guys. Listen to Hey Jonas on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts,

or wherever you get your podcast. Just listen. We don't care where you hear it. Another podcast from some SNL, late-night comedy guy, not quite. Unhumor me with Robert Smygel and Friends. Me and hilarious guests from Bob Odenkirk to David Letterman help make you funnier. This week, my guest, SNL's Mikey Day and head writer, Streeter Seidel, help an a cappella band with their between songs banter.

Where does your group perform? We do some retirement homes. Those people are starving for banter. Listen to humor me with Robert Smigel and Friends on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcast. Keith Giamanka seemed like a mild-mannered suburban dad, but secretly he became someone else, a master of disguise who went on a crime spree.

At the time, did it seem like a crazy idea? It seemed very crazy, but I felt so desperate that I felt it was the quickest, easiest way out. Did you allow yourself to think about how it could go wrong on what that might look like. No, I didn't want to manifest that. I was trying to manifest success. Every family has its secrets.

But what happens when you discover that your dad has been living a double life? That is not the look of an innocent man. This is going to change my life and my family dynamic forever because everything that had existed prior in my reality is now untrue. Listen to deep cover, The Family Man, on the IHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.

Here's something that should not be as complicated as it is. Getting a racist statue removed. And here's something that should be a whole lot easier than it is. Getting a new one put up in its place. As long as there's a politics of race in America, there's going to be a politics of remembering the Civil War. To get to school, I had to go down Robert Lee Boulevard. Get to the grocery store, I had to go down Jefferson Davis Parkway. If you're an historian and you leave out half of what the history is, you're not doing your job.

I'm Akila Hughes. In Rebel Spirit, Season 2 goes deep on both of those things. The fights, the politics, the people who won, and my personal campaign to add something to the Kentucky State House that's actually worth the wall space. We are more than our bodies. We contain essence. We contain spirit. How do you represent that? They are just fueling a fire that is really catching.

You'll see what I mean. Listen to Rebel Spirit Season 2 on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. You know, what we got to remember is when we hear the stories of the neglect and abuse, as adults, I think 90% of us or those that aren't psychopaths cringe at the stories. Yeah. Yeah, there's some, oh gosh, there's some awful, awful ones. cringe at those stories, right? And, I mean, I could have you tell a few, and people on our audience would shake their heads and cringe. And you should cringe at the notion of a 14 or 15-year-old girl or an 18-year-old girl that has nowhere to go being trafficked, being sold as a slave for sex.

You should cringe at that. You should cringe at the notion of children being burned with cigarettes and abused. You should cringe at the notion of a six-month-old and a trap house just sitting there crying his eyes out. All right. You should cringe at that. But here's the thing. Just stop for a second. And imagine if that was you at five years old.

What is cringe-worthy as that story is? This is a child living what's making you cringe. So of just hearing their story makes you cringe. Imagine living it. What's it doing to that? child actual child's psyche it's it's um horrific creating huge wounds yes and um again they're being harmed by those relationships that were meant to protect so is it how could we ever say they're bad they're just damaged yeah they've been hurt so there's different kinds of trauma so a lot of people you know when

think of trauma. And, you know, they do think about a wartime incident. And that's where we learned about trauma to start with. So that's called acute trauma when something horrific happens by a stranger to a stranger in a moment. And, you know, it's life-threatening. But there's also developmental trauma. It's like trauma that's happening as you're growing up. And it's not, and it's affecting your growing up.

It's not only what's happening to you. It's what's not happening for you. There's relational trauma. And again, it's one thing to be wounded by a stranger, another would be wounded by a parent. And you're like, do people are supposed to protect me or hurting me? And then there's complex trauma, which is essentially the developmental and relational, saying, as you're growing up and being harmed by people who are meant to protect you, it becomes complex. And it's just hard to heal.

But you can't. You can't. And it's done through a relationship. The metaphor of go upstream with the waterfall is poignant. And I get what happens if we go upstream. Tell me what happens if we don't go upstream. What happens to our country if we don't start going upstream? Oh, man, it's, I mean, it's happening.

You see the outcome. As one aged out youth said to my, wife in me. Her name, her name is Annie. Oh, that's crazy. She said kids in foster care age out of one crisis and go into another crisis. And so that crisis might be these other, you know, homeless or addiction or, you know, all sorts of things. They commit suicide at four times the rate of their peers and things like that. So there are. there are two trajectories. And the kids start off with the same story.

And one group ends up with all these things that will end up having to take care of as adults because they're now on the streets and causing chaos of their own and having their own babies. Yeah. And perpetually. Do you know who the number one group is

of losing children, kids who've been in foster care? Right. So it repeats the cycle and now you're kidding. They don't have an example of how they're not. Exactly. And then the only difference between that outcome and the outcome of breaking that cycle is an adult stepping in and saying, I'm going to stop what seems to be inevitable. And we're going to break this. And that is quintessentially going upstream.

That's going upstream. And if we don't go upstream, we can continue to expect our culture and society. to suffer all the things we're talking about. And then you can, yeah, volunteer and fund those things as an adult. There's, gosh, who was it that said? Frederick Douglass. Frederick, you know, yes, the abolitionist, he said, I mean, I'm going to get the quote a little bit wrong, probably, but it.

We just posted it the other day, I guess. Yeah, it's easier to, like, what is it easier to? It's easier to build strong children than to repair broken men. There you go. there it is so yeah it helps the kids most people go into fostering thinking they're going to rescue a child your mentor said it's actually kids who rescue us experience oh man you did some great research tell alice there's actually somebody else who does it on the team whoever good job i don't know how you found that one yeah okay so uh here's another at joe story

So it's another time where I'm trying to draw him out. He could be, you know, entertaining and verbose, but a lot of times he was quiet. So one time I said, I don't know how I knew this, but I said, hey, Joe, I heard, well, he was friends with the Wolverine. What's the actor's name? Sorry, Hugh Jackman. Yeah. So they were friends. Got it.

And Hugh Jackman did Lay Miz, the movie. And I said, hey, Joe, I heard Lay Miz is your favorite story. Why is it your favorite story? And he goes, oh, you know, people think it's about this big, strong man, saving this little orphan girl. But it's really a story about a little orphan girl. Saving a big strong man. Yeah.

And I was like, okay, I think that's true of the church. The church thinks they're saving these kids. And actually, if the church steps into it, the church changes. The kids end up changing the character of the church. And finally, God is saying, you're becoming the kind of church, I meant for you to be. You're caring for the orphan, the widow, the disenfranchised. and it's letting you, your heart is getting softer and bigger. And it's not about you anymore.

That's exactly what Gabrielle Cloud is from Settled said to, which she has this amazing homelessness ministry. But she said originally I thought I was starting a homelessness ministry, but I've realized it's a ministry under the church. Yeah. And how it transforms us. So, yeah. So that's another reason.

Church, why get involved in this? Because you'll become the kind of church God wants. One, there's one of my, I quote, one of my favorite quotes, one, one is Mike Tyson. He, he's got a good. I love it. Yeah. He, when he was fighting Evander Holyfield, I think it was before the one where he bit his ear off. That was a Memphis.

Was it here? Yeah. Awesome. But he was asked, he goes, you know, what's your plan? What's your strategy for this fight? And he goes, oh, you know, everybody got a plan. But then you get hit. I love that.

Yeah, we got to play it, but then you get hit. And so the other one I quote is from Lion King. And Simba is now, you know, growing up, and he sees this vision from his dad in the clouds. And his dad says to him, Simba, you are more than what you have become. And I think God is in the clouds telling the church, you are more than what you have become. And I need you to become what I intended for you.

And I think it's the kids who can say, yep, they're helping us become what God intended. We treat foster parents like volunteers, but we expect them to do something most trained professionals couldn't handle. Where's that come from? Okay, repeat that again? I think we treat foster parents like volunteers. They are volunteers, but we expect them to do something that most trained professionals can't handle.

Oh, that's so good. There's a disconnect. Yeah, you know, I think I said it earlier, the foster parents aren't saying, hey, I'm a volunteers. We're going, this is our lives. Right. And we, and, and, and, and, and, and we expect them to be able to handle all of it like they're supposed to. Yeah. They're just us. So there, yeah. And so, you know, a lot of times they get what it's referred to as, you know, secondhand trauma. Like they, now they're getting, uh, they're getting, uh, they're getting triggered by stuff that they're like, oh my gosh, I didn't even know this, this kid can push my buttons like, nobody has ever been

able to before. And I'm now losing my cool or they're, They're putting stuff back on me that I haven't dealt with when I was a kid. So that, again, is just why they foster parents need to be trauma informed. Right. Yeah. And so it's just, it's not, it's not optional. It's not like, here's an elective course you can choose to take. It's like, you got it.

You've got to get to this. And so the. So if you were wanting to be a trauma, I mean, if you were wanting to be a foster parent, I would say to you, again, this is the advice I got from the same gal who told me, which is worse, abuse or neglect, and you know what, that you, I hate you or I wish you weren't born. She said to me, the first thing you need to ask when you're wanting to be a foster parent and you've got a kid in your life who's experienced trauma is what trauma have you experienced that you've not dealt with yet.

That's interesting. We'll be right back. Hey, it's us, the Jonas Brothers, and guess what? We have some big news. What's the news, name? Huge news. We created our own podcast called, Hey Jonas. We invented a podcast?

Well, we didn't invent it. We just contributed to it. We're the first people to do podcasts. Pretty, yeah, pretty wide range of podcasts. We're starting a trend. But this one's extra special. So how do we actually come up with a name, Hey Jonas, Jonas, guys? I honestly don't remember.

I think it was on a call about what we should call it. And, well, we were thinking I'm originally calling it one of the early names of our band before Jonas Brothers. This is how you guys remember it going down? Yes. I have a very different memory of this. We were talking about a thing, a bit for the podcast, where people could call in and say, hey, Jonas. And then I wrote down on my little notepad, Hey Jonas, and offered it up as a potential title for the podcast. But thanks for remembering that, guys.

Listen to Hey Jonas on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcast. Just listen. We don't care where you hear it. Another podcast from some SNL late night comedy guy, not quite. Unhumor me with Robert Smygel and friends. Me and hilarious guests from Bob Odenkirk to David Letterman help make you funnier. This week, my guest, SNL's Mikey Day and head writer, Streeter Seidel, help an a cappella band with their between songs banter. Where does your group perform? We do some retirement homes. Those people are starving for banter. Listen to humor me with Robert Smigel and Friends on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.

Keith Giamanka seemed like a mild-mannered suburban dad, but secretly he became someone else, a master of disguise who went on a crime spree. At the time, did it seem like a crazy idea? It seemed very crazy, but I felt so desperate that I felt it was the quickest, easiest way Did you allow yourself to think about how it could go wrong and what that might look like? No. I didn't want to manifest that. I was trying to manifest success.

Every family has its secrets. But what happens when you discover that your dad has been living a double life? That is not the look of an innocent man. This is going to change my life and my family dynamic forever because everything that had existed prior in my reality, is now untrue. Listen to Deep Cover the Family Man on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.

Here's something that should not be as complicated as it is, getting a racist statue removed. And here's something that should be a whole lot easier than it is, getting a new one put up in its place. As long as there's a politics of race in America, there's going to be a politics of remembering the Civil War. To get to school, I had to go down Robert Lee Boulevard, Get to the grocery store, I had to go down Jefferson Davis Parkway.

If you're an historian and you leave out half of what the history is, you're not doing your job. I'm Akila Hughes, and Rebel Spirit Season 2 goes deep on both of those things. The fights, the politics, the people who won, and my personal campaign to add something to the Kentucky State House that's actually worth the wall space. We are more than our bodies. We contain essence. We contain spirit. How do you represent that?

They are just fueling a fire. that is really catching. You'll see what I mean. Listen to Rebel Spirit Season 2 on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. Against that lens,

and we're not going to end with this, we're going to end after this with something better. But I really do think it's important for perspective. And like I've said, we try to be candid and honest and raw.

Tell me a story. of a kid you filmed or maybe even one you just know of, that's like you left maybe the most desperate, having heard that about that kid. Give us how bad it can get her perspective. Well, this one wasn't film. I mean, well, we did film this. This wasn't revealed in the film,

but we knew this because we, this was a kid in Colorado and we did we found a family for him it was an old school teacher he was he was 15 he had gone into foster care when he was five so he'd been in foster care for 10 years and he got adopted and is now a young man with his own family and doing well he was a smart kid when he was little three four five um his mom was a drug addict didn't have any money So she pimped him out. As a five-year-old little boy. A five-year-old boy, he'd get raped.

And get paid so she could buy drugs. And then they would give her drugs in exchange for raping her son. That level of evil frightens me. It's, you use the right word. It's not just sick. It's evil. Against the backdrop of that. We have to understand how important stepping up as a community for these lost children is.

I cannot believe he was adopted at 15. Yeah, and he's a, he's a young man now, and he's smart. He's got his own family. He's funny. He's kind. Really? Yeah. So, Joe.

Just remember the thought when you shudder and you hear that. Put a face on it. What if it's you? What if it's your own biological child? What, you know, if it makes you shudder just hearing it, imagine what it means living it, which is why this work is so important. Tell me this. Tell me the most rewarding film story you've gotten and the follow up on it and everything else.

Give me a goodie. Give me why this works and why it makes you keep going. Give me the happy one. Oh, gosh, you know, that little boy I told you about blind and deaf. I'll give you one on the other end of the spectrum. It was a girl who we filmed her when she was 17. And what she didn't say on the film but had kept quietly in her own diary was that if she was, When she turned 18, if she wasn't adopted, she was going to commit suicide.

And she wasn't fooling. She had already, I won't say how she tried before because then it's, I don't want her to know that we're talking about her. But she wasn't, she was not bluffing. Let me assure you of that. And so some people found, I saw her video. And which that was not part of it. No. So people weren't stuck in and insane.

They had no idea. If we don't do this, she's going to commit suicide. No, no, no, no. And we would not have shown that. Right. If she had even revealed it. It was legit. It was planned.

And they saw her video. They said, well, we think she's our daughter. They got her into her home. And she was adopted, you know, weeks before her 18th birthday. And she's now, you know, in her mid-20s. and her young 20s and is alive and thriving. Just amazing work. They saved her life.

How long did it take you to get off the couch? I think that was just a couple of nights. I mean, I've had worse. Do you and Julie kind of look at each other and say, you know, wow, how this whole piece of work and all of it has been kind of enveloped you as a couple in your lives. You know? And where it came from and, you know, Mexican taco makeout sessions and and former Catholic nuns falling in love with priests? I mean, it's crazy.

I love the God part of it for sure. But I'll tell you what we don't even look at that. now as much of like the 800 kids or the four over 4,000. I'll tell you what we look at is every Sunday we host a family dinner and I have my parents who are still alive. They come up and our two daughters come over with our grandkids and three of my grandchildren are adopted from foster care. And so every Sunday we get to experience the love of these little ones. who are just, you know, it was out just this, a few days ago on Sunday,

you know, the three adopted ones who were four, five, and six, we just went out, tromping around in the woods and playing in the river. And I am a blessed man. Did, are these three grandchildren biological siblings that you're or they two of the three so one one isn't and then two are biological yeah and so your own daughter through seeing all of this work has taken this up

in in her life as her calling to you know that one of the other things that people say why they might be afraid to say yes to this is so you're like how is it going to impact my own kids. Your biological kids. Yeah. And you're like, it could, like, well, it could change their lives. It can make their hearts huge. I mean, not that they don't have times when they were like, man, this is hard.

Or remember when you had that kid in and he drove us crazy. But it can make your kids be big-hearted. How do people find out? about America's Kids Belong, what's the website? And maybe add on to that. What ways do you recommend people get engaged, other states or bring them or existing states? What should they do? If you go to America's Kids Belong or, you know, little shoulders, AMKidsbelong.org.

And visit there. It does show the states that we work in. It shows it's got about a thousand videos up there right now, maybe 700 or so. So you can see all that. Then you can follow us on Facebook, follow us on, you know, Instagram, all the stuff. And then also then each state, so you can do Tennessee Kids Belong and Virginia Kids Belong and Georgia Kids Belong and Kentucky Kids Belong. Whatever state you're in, you just go that state, kids belong.org. Dot org.

You know, you wrote a book. I wrote a book. Writing a book's not easy. And you wrote a book, go upstream. I love the metaphor. I love the symbolism of the waterfall. How do people find Go Upstream? Yeah, it's easy.

I mean, go where everybody goes for books, Amazon, and go type in, yeah, go upstream, Brian Mavis. And every chapter starts off with a true story of like, here's a kid who, you know, aged out and now is homeless. Or here's a kid who aged out and, you know, they lost their own child, you know. And so it starts off with a true story. Then it shows what the odds are of a kid who's aged out and how, again, you know, four times more likely to commit suicide, three times more likely, you know, to be homeless.

You know, they're the pipeline. Go to prison, et cetera. And then it shares how you can help. Whether you bring a kid into your life or your helper. Where upstream is. Where upstream is. Yeah. It's really cool.

And then how the church can do it, how the business can get engaged. etc. Brian, thanks for coming to Memphis. Thanks for telling your story, but most importantly, thanks for what you're doing for kids

and for our community. And my only regret is you didn't bring Julie. I would have really liked to have murder. She's the even better. Yeah, well, you showed me a picture of her.

You out kicked your coverage. You got the B team on this. But thanks for being in Memphis. Have a safe trip on. God bless you. Thank you. God bless you. And thank you for joining us this week.

If Brian has inspired you in general or better yet to take action by exploring adopting a child, introducing your church or company to their programs, starting a wraparound team in your community, or something else entirely, let me know. I really do want to hear about it. You can write me any time at bill at normalfolks.us and I will respond. If you enjoyed this episode, share it with friends and on social. And one of the best ways to share it with friends is you go to normalfolks. Us, you hit merch and you buy yourself a t-shirt, a hoodie, a cap, something. It's because I want people to wear this stuff because it's a great, when people always look at a hat or a t-shirt and say, hey, man, what's that?

It's a great way for you to just be talking about an army and normal folks. You can get rid of your Ole Miss hat now and put an A&F old one. I never get rid of it, but I'm going to start wearing A&F hats too, for sure. as soon as I get some. So if you enjoy the episode, share it with friends, share it with merch, subscribe to the podcast, rate it, review it, join the Army at normalfolks. We'll join or start one of our local service clubs. My goodness, you can do tons.

So any and all of these things will help us grow. An Army and Normal Folks, I'm Bill Courtney. Until next time, do what you can. Hey, guys, it's us and the Jonas Brothers. I'm Joe. I'm Kevin. And I'm Nick. And guess what?

We created our own podcast called Hey Jonas. We invented a podcast? Well, we didn't invent it. We just contributed to it. We're the first people to do podcasts. We get to ask other people questions because we're sick and tired of being asked questions. Well, sick and tired is a strong way to put it, but, you know, tired and sick. Listen to Hey Jonas on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcast.

Just listen. We don't care where you hear it. Another podcast from some SNL late night comedy guy, not quite. Unhumor me with Robert. Smygel and Friends, me and hilarious guests from Bob Odenkirk to David Letterman help make you funnier. This week, my guest, S&L's Mikey Day and head writer, Streeter Seidel, help an a cappella band with their between songs banter. Where does your group perform? We do some retirement homes. Those people are starving for banter. Listen to humor me with Robert Smygle

and Friends on the I-Heart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. Here's something that should not be as complicated as it is. Getting a racist statue removed. And here's something that should be a whole lot easier than it is, getting a new one put up in its place. I'm Akela Hughes, and Rebel Spirit Season 2 is about both of those things. As I was watching these statues come down, I was thinking about what it meant that I grew up in a majority black city, in which there were more homages to enslavers than there were to enslave people. Listen to Rebel Spirit Season 2 on the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.

Every family has its secrets. But what happens? when you discover that your dad has been living a double life. That is not the look of an innocent man. Is everyone lying to me about who they are? I felt such desperation. I felt it was what I had to do. Listen to Deep Cover the Family Man. On the IHeart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.