Soul Boom - Jeff Hiller Explains Queer Faith & Redefines Religion

Episode Date: July 16, 2026

Emmy-winning Somebody Somewhere & Widow's Bay star Jeff Hiller unpacks queer faith, growing up gay in Texas, and his 20-year trail to overnight success. He reveals why community became his church and how rejection forged compassion. SPONSORS!👇 🛒 ZipRecruiter 👉 https://ziprecruiter.com/soulboom 🛒 Lola 👉 Get 40% off select Lola Blankets products at Lolablankets.com by using code SOULBOOM at checkout. Experience the world’s #1 blanket with Lola Blankets. 🛒 NOCD (book a FREE 15min call!) 👉 https://nocd.com 🙏 Fetzer 👉⁠ ⁠⁠https://fetzer.org⁠⁠⁠ 🛒 Quince 👉 https://quince.com/soulboom This episode was made possible with support from the Wennett and Cader-Frech Foundation. To continue this conversation with your family and friends, download Soul Boom's discussion support guide here: https://soulboom.com/discussionguide MERCH OUT NOW! ⁠⁠https://soulboom.com/store⁠⁠ Sign up for our newsletter! ⁠⁠https://soulboom.substack.com⁠⁠ SUBSCRIBE to Soul Boom! ⁠⁠https://bit.ly/Subscribe2SoulBoom⁠⁠ FOLLOW US! Instagram: ⁠⁠http://instagram.com/soulboom⁠⁠ TikTok: http://tiktok.com/@soulboom Sponsor Soul Boom: [e-mail] Work with Soul Boom: [e-mail] Executive Produced by: ⁠⁠Kartik Chainani⁠⁠ Executive Produced by: Ford Bowers, Samah Tokmachi Companion Arts Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

The Hulu original series Furious is coming to Disney Plus. Starring Emmy Rossum, Furious follows FBI agent Alice Black on the hunt for a mysterious and calculating serial killer. Both walk their own paths toward justice, and as their lives start to intertwine, the line between right and wrong begins to blur. Don't miss the three-episode premiere of the Hulu original series Furious on July 27th, only on Hulu on Disney Plus. church, even the kids who were mean to me at school had to be nice to me. It was a haven. It was a sanctuary. God and faith were about love. How are you going to be against that? I'm pro-love. So much crappy stuff in this world comes from people in positions of power who have never been given love. If you've been marginalized, you'll either be like, I'm going to have a lot of compassion for people, or you're going to be like,

I'm going the complete opposite direction. Speaking of Lecoq, you were gay. I would like to award you for best segue. La Cacques is a clown school, a famous clown school in France. But also, I am gay. Hey there, it's me, Rain Wilson, and I want to dig into the human experience. I want to have conversations about a spiritual revolution. Let's get deep with our favorite thinkers, friends, and entertainers about life, meaning, and idiocy.

Welcome to the Soul Boom podcast. A quick shout out to our sponsors. ZipRecruiter. Lola. No CD. Fetzer. Quince. Links and promo codes on the screen and in the description.

Enjoy the show. If you want to dig even deeper into the conversation you're about to hear with your family and friends, download Soulboom's discussion guide at Soulboom.com slash discussion guide. See link in description. Do you prep this yourself or you have a team? I have a researcher. Cartick. Kartik is like a one-man band

who does like research, edits, social media, hookings. The whole deal. Bullshit, the whole deal. Bullshit. And he's a big comedy fan. When is your comedy show?

Did you have your comedy show? I already had it, yeah. How was it? It went really well. Oh, that's great. Yeah. Where was it? Was it Largo.

Oh, nice. Recently? Yeah, Saturday. Was it a part of Netflix? Yeah. Are you going to do a comedy special like a big comedy special kind of thing. That was sort of the hope is,

this was sort of a getting in front of the Netflix. Yeah. Folk. We'll see. Thanks for coming all this way. Where are you staying? I'm staying in Hollywood. Hotel?

W.? No, no. I'm staying at the dream, the dream Hyatt. It's in like the shittiest part of Hollywood. It sounds so much. You brought here for Netflix. They wouldn't put you up in the W?

No. Do they know who you are? Apparently not. They don't care about them. I mean, rain. Why do you say they don't care about you?

Did they dis you? What happened? No, you know, I'm trying to start up some controversy right on the get-go. They're just not.

The clickbait, Jeff Hiller, Netflix does not respect me. It's not Netflix. It's Hollywood. Oh, come on.

They don't respect anybody. You're certainly one of the tallest comedians. That's true. I'm a huge, literally. That could be the title

you're special, world's tallest comedian. Somebody'd come for a. Yeah. Some guy who's like, Blake Griffin would do a... Oh, no. Oh, yeah, that's true. Some basketball player would do their stand-up act.

Right, exactly. David Robinson's wacky. I jinx. Jeff, thanks for coming on Soul Boom. Thank you for having me. Okay. Do you know what an act off is? Sort of.

I'm going to give us a common scenario. Okay. Okay. And then you and and I are both going to act it out. And then we'll let the audience decide who is the better actor. It is an act off, Rain Wilson. Emmy nominated Emmy winning Jeff Hiller.

Emmy nominated Rain Wilson, not winner, loser. Thanks, Jeremy Piven. All I got was this iconic status. Icon, not yet, icon, almost icon. Here's what it is. Okay. Unemployed guy living in his mom's basement named Carl. The only line that you say is, okay, here we go.

That's the only line we're going to say it four times. Okay. And he's hungover and he wakes up from a drunken stupor in his mom's basement. And it's 11, 14 a.m. and he's hungover. And then he discovers a lottery scratcher in his pocket. So that's the first line. Okay, here we go. So he scratches off what you're going to win and it's really good. Okay.

And that's the second line. Okay, here we go. Yeah. And then he goes and he scratches off three of the four and the fourth one could be it. And he thinks that he's won it and then he hasn't won it. Okay. And then I say. Okay.

And then you say that line again. Okay. And I say it four times. Four times. First when I wake up, then when I look at the lottery. No, find the scratcher is the first one. Find the scratcher who's the first one. Yeah.

Okay. And then first scratch. Yeah, for the prize scratch. Okay. Okay. If I'm remembering scratcher's right, it's been a little while. And then you're scratching them and it's looking pretty good. And then that's the third one.

But then you realize you haven't won. and then that's the last one. The last line is after you discover you have not won the scratcher. Okay. What do you think? I think I can act. Okay. You want to go first?

No, I want you to go first. All right. All right. It sounds like fair. This is Carl, a total failure in his mom's basement. Okay. And you say action. Action.

Here we go. Here we go. Okay. Here we go. Okay. Here we go. All right. Top that, Mr. Emmy winner.

Let's see what you got. Okay. It's getting a character. It's very good. Okay, quiet on the set, please. Quiet, quiet all around. Roll sound. Roll camera.

Rolling. And action. Action. Here we go. Okay. Okay, here we go. Here we go.

Okay. Okay. Here we go. Ladies and gentlemen, 20 years of improv. 20 years of improv. I think I want. I see why you won the Emmy and I came a distant second to Jeremy Piven two years in a row.

Piven. Okay, here we go, Piven. Oh, that's sushi. Never met the man in my life. That was beautiful, breathtaking. Well done. Great performance. You went more realistic.

I went more comical. You made some big choices, but they were grounded. You know what I mean? They didn't seem forced or pushed or anything like that. Too broad. I'm an acting off. Someday. Someday, soul boom. Thanks for watching. I'm always looking for ways to save time. I eat breakfast while answering emails. I listen to podcasts at double speed and occasionally brush my teeth during a Zoom meeting with the camera off.

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That's ZipRecruiter.com slash Soul Boom. Meet your match on ZipRecruiter. My ideal wind down routine is simple. Put on a documentary I claim I'm watching. Scroll my phone for 40 minutes. And most importantly, disappear beneath this Lola blanket. The first time I felt it, I immediately understood the obsession. Lola is made with ultra-soft luxury faux fur and a signature four-way stretch. So it moves with you instead of sitting there like some down. It is also machine washable, double hemmed for durability, and designed not to pill or shed even after repeated washes. I have the large and it's perfect for one person or two people with a legally binding blanket agreement.

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My first ever musical. Well, you did do one before you told me. In high school, I did Oklahoma. I was Judd Fry. I mean, that counts. Who did you play in Oklahoma? Everyone has done Oklahoma. I did do Oklahoma.

Of course you did. I was like farmer number three. My entire role was, come on, A&L, or we got enough. That was it. So you did the cowboy. And the farmer should be friends. That one? Yeah, exactly.

Yeah. That was Judd Fry. Poor Judd is dead. Yeah, that's a great one. It's a good role. Yeah. It's actually a really good role. I know.

That song, so amazing. Yeah. Amazing. But we did Urantown. We did Yurin Town. And I, who was I again? What was his name? No, not Penny Wise.

What is your name? Oh. This is terrible. I can't even remember. It was a year ago. I can't remember his name. They were the main villain. The villain guy.

I was McQueen. I know that. What was your name? Cladwell. Cladwell, Mr. Cladwell. Mr. Cladwell. So we got to sing and dance together. Yeah. That was a lot of fun.

Yeah. It was hard. I hadn't done a musical since before the pandemic. And when I got back in, I was like, oh, my body has really... You were amazing in it. But you did it really well. Thank you. You felt like you did well?

I did it moderately well. I did it. I did not embarrass myself. And people are like, oh, that's a guy from TV. And he's okay. He's pretty good. I remember, I think this was you. I swear it was you.

But it was from so long ago. I was listening to Mark Marin. I think it was you. Because I always quote you as saying this. You said you got into TV just so that you could eventually go back to New York and do theater. Yeah. Yeah. It hasn't even really worked out.

I mean, except for Cladwell. name I can't remember from you're in town. I'm like, I'm still waiting for like, when I'm going to call me to go play Macbeth at the public or something like that, you know? Oh, well, now that you just said it, it'll happen. It'll happen. Listen, the public likes a face. Like a name. They do. It hasn't worked out so well. But that's okay. That's okay. I want to start off mid-story. Because you and I have something really in common that. is kind of rare in Hollywood is that we were both discovered late in the game. So I was on six feet under. I was 38 when that started to kind of percolate. And my episodes were on. And then the

office I shot when I was like 39, but it wasn't airing until I was 40. So I got famous in my 40s, really. And how old were you when somebody, some there somewhere was an airing? Because we've shot it before the pandemic and then we had a year and a half off. Oh gosh. I think I shot it when I was 44 and it didn't air until I was 46. Yeah. And so it was like. And when did you pick up your Emmy?

49. You shot it at 45 and got your Emmy when you were 49. Even that took five years for you to get your statue. Pandemics and strikes and yeah. Yeah. Took a long minute. But, you know, the subtitle of your amazing, funny, hysterical, wonderful book. You don't need me to promote it. You've already been on so many far bigger podcasts

than mine. But my 20-year trail to overnight success is a great subtitle. And because I've felt the same way, I got out acting school and I was 23. And then 15 years later, I started getting some recognition for six, for six feet under. And I was nine, ten years in New York waiting tables. Broadway and stuff, weren't you? Yeah, I did, I did some. You know, I was, understead. study on the Tempest on Broadway. And then I did a, you know, a dumb Shakespearean kind of comedy thing that no one saw, you know, but it's not like I had like a big Broadway breakout or anything like that. Yeah. But we have that in common of those, those years. And I think those years are so delicious. You say in your book, you know, you're not going to tell any glory stories about,

you know, the waiting tables and being broke and stuff. Because it does. it sucks ass. It does. But it also like it is also being on the anvil of, you know, lived experience. That's true. And I do feel like if I had had a lot of success at 23, I would just think that's just how life is. You always have success. And I deserve that. Right. Exactly. And then the success might fade. And then you'd be like, well, might. Yeah, it definitely will. Right. Everything is ebbs and flows. And so I don't know. I might be like, addicted to drugs or like whatever just a shallower human being because yeah that life does shape you there's an authenticity about you now as an actor and by the way i've been seeing you in widows bay

which is a terrific new show on apple i love it it's such a tough tone to have horror comedy because i've done a few actually in my day in the indie film world and it always gets too goofy too easily to keep it grounded. You're a great character. There's more to come from you, I understand. But I think there's something that people don't understand about being an actor is like, really most of us just can't do anything else. I know.

And so there is a, there's a force at work where it's like I was just in it to win it. And I was just going to go as long as I could possibly go and try more and more to pay more and more and more of my bills through acting and less and less of my bills through other shitty jobs. As exciting as it would be to have a big house and laundry on every floor, it wasn't worth giving up this dream. It never seemed more. I think having that, whatever, that life like that would have been more soul killing than just continuing to live in a crappy apartment. Do you ever give advice out to like young actors making their way and starting? And if so, what do you say, having been through what you've been through?

Everybody's thing is specific, you know, but my big thing is don't compare yourself to anybody else because your journey is it's on so on. And the other thing is find some sort of outlet that lets you keep creating. So for me, that was improv. There you go. But like maybe you find a theater company or you find a, Or nowadays, you just do Instagram videos, do sketches or do whatever. Whatever it is, find something that allows you to continue being an artist instead of just a waiter at the Olive Garden.

That's great. Yeah. I would add to that, keep your cost of living down. Absolutely. Because if it starts to creep up and you're like, oh, I think I should get a car and I need car insurance and I should actually pay for my own health insurance, all of a sudden, you're going to be working just to pay your rent every day. Yeah, and then all of a sudden a couple years have gone by and you've been working your ass off and you haven't been able to take jobs because your overhead's been really high. Now, easier said than done in the 90s than now. So true.

It's so hard out there. So mad respect about that. But I agree 100%. I always tell young artists to like, you know, acting is so much about like waiting for the phone to ring or do I get an audition and, you know, the powers in other people's hands. So whatever you can do to kind of like take your power back. And that means be creative. And if it's writing, writing scripts, play reading groups, you know, get together with friends, put things on their feet.

Classes? Yeah, be taking classes, studying, singing or some part of the, I used to take, you know, various kind of clowning classes in New York City from clown teachers. I did. I studied clown. I used to teach clowning. You used to teach it? It was a clown show in New York that brought me to Los Angeles.

That we did off off, we did at NYU, then we did off off Broadway, then we did off Broadway, and then we brought it to L.A. It's called the New Bozina. Wow. This is very surreal, weird clown show. And it was a hit. A surreal clown show was a hit. Yeah, it was, was, was it a hit. A hit is a strong word. It was respected. It was well respected by people with a really fucked up sense of humor.

Okay, great. Great. We actually got a pilot deal at Fox. Oh, my God. we're doing a clown pilot in 2001. Oh my God. On the Fox lot. And I don't think that tape even exists. But it didn't, obviously it didn't go.

They didn't put film on the camera. It was, yeah, it didn't work out so well. Okay, gotcha. We keep threatening to get the clowns back together. You should have. Instead of getting the band back together. Well, now clowning is like such a huge thing. It's like as big as improv now.

It's like, seriously? Yeah. Yeah, in New York? Yeah, and you know, Natalie Polymetus and there's like this group, my friend was just telling me he went to see it, Netflix is a joke, Stamp Town. Oh, no, I don't know. It's like this big movement now, clowning. Oh, great.

Yeah. Yeah. I mean, I think a lot of people have funky ideas about what clowning is. But you think, it's not like honka honka. Yeah, it's peewee Herman. It's, you know, Mr. Bean. Character. Yeah.

Usually like a silent, not language based, more movement based. Usually there's a, there's a surreal element to it. It can be pretty fucked up. Lecoq. Yes. Speaking of Lecoqq, you were gay. And I would like to award you for best segue. No, Lecoq is a clown school, a famous clown school in France.

Exactly. But also, I am gay. You are gay. I saw the segue. Yeah. You saw that coming? I saw, no, not until after, but I saw how your mind worked. What is happening here?

It's like you've done 20 years of improv or something. You too. That was quick. Cartagic, is this any good? Is this funny at all? Are you laughing? Did Kartik leave? Oh my God.

He's so fired. You might think like it was a gay guy and a street lady. That's what my whole life is. Gay, guys, straight lady? Yeah. And they're white. And their pronouns are he him and her.

The way you expect. I don't know if we can use any of this. What's it called? Somebody somewhere? One thing I was struck about on the show was the character Joel and his relationship to the church. And the way all of their relationships to the church

was brought in and they kind of created their own church on the show that I thought was really beautiful. That beautiful relationship those characters had to the church, when I investigated a little bit more, I was, because, no, I am, I'm always interested when a TV show will tackle faith in some unique way and has something kind of noble to say about faith itself. It's pretty rare in Hollywood. And there's no, you know, cannibalistic pastors who are actual serial killers or something like that. You know what I mean? We had a season four. If only, that brought me a little bit to your story.

And I would love to hear a little bit more about this, as you call yourself, a profoundly gay kid growing up in Texas and your relationship to being a youth pastor. Well, I grew up in the church. My family was all in. Which one? Lutheran. Lutheran. Yeah. Yeah.

Mainline Protestant. And it's there are two sort of main. They're actually multiple, but of these two large groups of Lutherans, it's the more progressive that I grew up in. Okay. What's the difference? What are the two sides? Do you remember?

There's one called the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America, which is ironically the more progressive one, even though it has the word evangelical in it. And then there's this other one called Lutheran Church, Missouri Synod, and then there's one called the Wisconsin Synod. And they're both pretty conservative. They won't let women be pastors. they don't believe in queer people. I was going to say believe in making them bastards,

but I kind of think they were like, ah, that's a myth, queers. Yeah. So I grew up in the slightly more progressive side, and I was profoundly gay. I was, nobody was surprised to find out I was gay. So I was very, like, clocked. There was wasn't, you weren't one of those kids

that all of a sudden like, he came out in college and he's gay. Did you know? Wow, interesting. They were like, has it come out yet? You were, you were, And people were like, you know you're gay, right? And so there was a ton of bullying.

Just so much bullying. I'm so sorry. In the 80s and Texas. What town was this? San Antonio. Okay. And so it was, so school life was misery. Like I would, I hated public school, private school.

Yeah. Yeah. And, you know, PE especially. But at church, even the kids who were mean to me at school had to be. be nice to me at church. And, and there were all of these adults who, like, who thought, you know, at school, I was in the choir and people were like, yeah, you faggot in the choir. But at church, it was like, did you know that Jeff sings in the choir? You know, and it was like a, it was a good thing. And, and I, so it was a haven. It was a haven. It was a sanctuary.

Yeah. A little pun. But also, I did, I, the faith thing was. It was huge for me. I love thinking about things that are bigger than us. I love thinking that there's something that unites us. I love this idea of a guiding presence watching over us. And the way God and faith were presented to us at that church was that it was about love. And how are you going to be against that, you know? Yeah. I'm pro-love. Yeah. And so, yeah, it was a super wonderful spot.

And even in college, I went to a Lutheran College, Texas Lutheran College. And even in college, I came out when I was studying abroad. And when I came back, I still was like, I mean, I wasn't completely out, but I was out to certain people. And I found this group of not closeted, but, you know, quietly homosexual people who formed a church service. And we would have church every Sunday night with this group of primarily LGBT folks. Yeah. The pastor wasn't. She was straight.

But it was like, you find those things. And when I saw somebody somewhere come out, come out, when I read that he was involved in the church too. And then when I read the first season, how it was so deeply about his relationship to the church, it was a shock because I've never seen media portray it in such a nuanced way. But it wasn't, everything else about it was absolutely true. I know, I know so many people like Joel who are gay men, who.

love the church and that's where they find their community and they find a church that welcomes them and accepts them and have this incredible relationship. And you dedicate your book to your parents. Just to good parents everywhere. To good parents everywhere. But I say at mine. But I'm so glad I had mine. And tell me about that relationship. That's really beautiful to hear. Yeah. Well, because I wouldn't have, I don't think I would have made it out if I had had that school life and also a bad home life. You have siblings? I have a sister, yeah.

And we're close. And so the only way to be, I don't know, to survive that. Like even if church was great, one hour on a week is not enough. You need someone supporting you more than that. And thankfully, I had my bad. In what ways did they support you? Well, my mom was like, she just really loved being a mom. She was all in.

And totally accepted a kid that was obviously gay from the early get-go and just completely embrace that. Yeah. I mean, you know, she made a couple mistakes along the way. She wouldn't let me have dolls, even though I wanted to have dolls. And I think she thought like she was protecting me. She kept trying to make me play sports. Like, I think with the hope that it might.

make me more socially acceptable, but I hated them so much. But then when I just said, I never want to play basketball ever again, I don't care if I'm tall. She was like, okay. Yeah. And let me not. You draw a line. How old were you at that? I think it was maybe nine.

Okay. Yeah. Yeah. And I know that that must have been really hard for my dad, too. Like, he's a real jock and really loves sports. And I'm sure it was disappointing that his one son didn't want anything to do. with it. But never like, I don't know, said anything about it. That's just me putting together the math. And also I just keep thinking about so much of, I think, the crappy stuff in this world

comes from leaders and and bosses and people in positions of power who have never been given Love. Yeah. And so their only way to find it is to just plunder and steal and hoard. And I think if we had better parents, our world would be so much better. That's very true. That's beautiful. I learned not that long ago in therapy when discussing the concept of narcissism doesn't apply.

just thinking about it metaphorically, purely on a conceptual level, that narcissism is thinking either that you're better than someone or that you're worse than someone, that there's a polar extreme in the narcissist. I think I'm better. I fuck up. I'm perfectionistic. I flagellate myself. I feel shame. I think I'm a worse piece of shit than everyone. So the work in, narcissism, again, doesn't apply. I wouldn't know. Not really what I was talking about at the time. Just theorizing with my therapist was, you know, to just understand that we're all bozos on the bus.

We're all the same. We're all no better than anyone and no worse than anyone at the same time. Right. And I think most narcissists would never think they needed therapy and would never. Case in point. Those positions of power would draw like a magnet, narcissists to them.

Not going to name names, but there's many. There's not just one in the White House. There's dozens or hundreds or whatever that are secretly feeling like pieces of shit and then overting themselves. What's the opposite of subverting? Overting.

Overting is the thing? Yeah. It is now. I guess over anyway yeah yeah you know on to other people because of that internal shame and low self-esteem right and I think that comes from not being told yeah you're important when you're a child yeah and I know that there are all of these things now that talk about like how gen z is so coddled or what have you but I'd much rather that than the opposite right and church camp oh yeah so Tell us about life in church camp.

I think I've heard so many stories from people about how Pete Holmes talks about it. I had Rhett and Link were on the show. They talk about how important church camp and being like youth pastor and connection with youth pastors is seminal in the Christian identity. And how did you rectify that kind of at the time, I imagine you kind of knew you were gay somewhat and was that difficult in your church or at the camp? Was there, was our attention there? around that or was that not on not in play there was there were a couple times that it came up as

being just like very wrong because i actually went to a pretty right-wing christian camp when i was a kid okay um and so i just was like it's wrong i'm wrong and but i was already thinking i was wrong and i was trying to fight it uh i didn't even admit it to myself until i was probably 13 or 14 and then i was like i'll just never tell anyone um But the Christian, it's kind of like the acting thing where it's like it was, like sometimes people are like, what's your most embarrassing acting job? And I'm like, any acting job was a win for me. And that's, even if they were saying, you're wrong, being at that camp was so magical because we sang Christian songs in the morning and in the night. And we had, we had capture the flag and we did Bible study and we and I was up.

member of it and sometimes I got a little bit bullied there but it wasn't nearly as bad as school and it it was just as safest space as it was maybe a little less safe than church but it was still great and you left feeling like your cup was full and feeling so close to god and this idea that you were going to do something good for the world and i mean some of our ideas of what was good maybe I was not my idea of what would be good now. But yeah, it was, it filled you up. It kept you going. Yeah, yeah, that's beautiful.

Did you, and you thought you were going to be a pastor? Yeah. How old were you when that idea came up? Oh, young, very young. Like, I don't know, 10, 11. And I think it's also because, like, my view of a pastor was performing every week. Right. You know, up on the stage.

It is. They're doing a monologue. with a lot of jokes. Did you have a funny pastor? There's always like the one funny pastor. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Yeah, exactly. He would occasionally make some drool comments,

but he was pretty like old school. Oh. But he was kind. He was benevolent. And then- He told stories. Exactly. And we had this other pastor

who would sing. And I thought that was so cool that he like sang the liturgy and stuff. And so I kind of wanted, I think, that more than anything. Like I didn't want to be. going to church council meetings on Wednesday nights by any means. Did you do any youth pastoring?

Did you deliver a sermon as a teenager? Yeah, many times. Many times? Tell me about some of your sermons. Please, I'm not even joking. I would love to hear it. Like, what spoke to you? Right.

And what did you want to impart your 13, 14 years old in San Antonio? I mean, when I was 13. You're seven foot tall. I was only 6'9. It was maybe a little older than 13 or 14. But when I was 13 or 14, we would do like a group, like a skit for the sermon on the Youth Sunday Day. Yeah. But when I was older, I was even like a youth director at a church, at these three churches in Houston for one summer during college where I had to give a sermon at all three of the churches once a month.

and so I would do like, I would do a sermon and song. I would usually, you know, you get the liturgy and you have to. What is a sermon and song? I don't know. How does that work? One time Jesus went down to the water.

Do you just, are you improvising a song? Now, how does, I don't know how does that work. He met the Good Samaritan, everybody. Good Samaritan, good Samaritan, hot, cha, cha, cha, cha. Be nice to people. Thank you so much, everyone. Thank you.

God bless, y'all. It's like where you make a message and then you take a hymn or you take a song and you sing that song that's giving the same message. Oh, okay, great. Yeah. When I think about it now, it is so cringy. So you'd be like, I was really bad, but through God's grace, I forgave myself because I know I'm forgiven. Amazing grace. Like that?

Did I do pretty good there? Yes, he did. I remember one. Oh, God, it's so embarrassing. Please. And it would go there. Because the Lord has us. And I will lift you off on eagle's wings.

But then I sang it for like three minutes. It just kept going. And the next verse. And people were like, okay. I didn't know there were so many verses in the Eagles Wing song. Oh, there are. five. Yeah, but then other.

And you'd almost finish them. Cause I will live. You would never clap in church. But then I would also do a lot of things about like, but some of the top was the big thing. Okay, compassion and topics of the sermons. What resonated with you? Any stories about, favorite stories about Jesus?

Go. Oh. Hit me. I love the parables. I love the beatitudes. I love. What's the difference between a parable and a beatitude for those who don't know? A parable is, you know, is like the Good Samaritan.

That's a parable. Or the woman, I love that woman with the coin. And she gives her one, the old widow with the coin. She gives her one coin. And then a rich man comes in and gives, gives like $1,000. Yeah. And Jesus goes over to the woman and says, thank you for giving so much. And the guy who gives the $1,000 is like, what the heck, man?

Yeah. And he's like, it meant. more from her. Sure. Because it, it, a coin means so much more to her than a thousand dollars means to you. I really love that story. And I love, and like the, the good Samaritan, that's like a story about anti-racism. Sure. That was my big thing in college was. Samaritans were a tribe that were hated and not supposed, you're not supposed to touch them, talk to them, have anything to do with them. And all of these like churchy people ignored this man who's beaten up. on the side of the road and the one person who helps them is the Samaritan, which is like so true to

like there are studies about Samaritans know about Spanagers. Do you know what Spanges? Spanages Spare change, spare change, per change, like beggars on the street today. And there are studies that show that the people who give money to people who are begging on the street are the poorest people because they know what it's like to be in that situation. That's true because I never give money. Yeah. I'm still like the office doing takes at the camera. Arthur Brooks told the most wonderful story.

I forget if it was on our podcast or if it was in this other event I did with him where there was a man begging and you always weigh like, well, what's this money going to use for? Is it just going to get a bottle? little booze at the end of the day. And Arthur Brooks was like, well, I'll give you some money if you do something for me. And the guy's like, what? He's like, I need you to pray for me and my family. And the guy, like, started tear up. And Arthur, like, told him a little bit about his family and what is going through. Gave the guy, like, a couple of bucks or whatever. He's like, I need you to pray

for me. He's, I will. I will. I'm going to pray for you. There was a nice, like, give and take there. I thought it was really beautiful. Yeah. I like that also that it's... It humanizes the interaction too. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. It makes them feel like they're valuable, like this guy who normally is just begging.

I mean, it's true. Like, when I was a social worker, they were like, you should never give to anyone, give money to anyone because it screws up a case plan and blah, blah, blah, blah. But at some point, when you're poor, you lose all what's the word authority

yeah like all what did you say socks usually they have a socks or at least in my experience at the shelter poor thing it was kids they were kids but you lose any sort of control kids don't usually have stinky feet

well this is going to get so many comments I know cut cut this Just never mind, keep going. I think when you're poor, you lose all agency. You don't get to make choices. Right. Because there are so many people telling you, you know, if I give you this money,

you can only use it for X, Y, Z. If I do this. And so sometimes I will give money, not every time, by any means, not every time. But I will give money and just be like, maybe you just need, even if you go and get booze, like maybe you just need to have a little moment where you're, you get to me. make a choice. Yeah. Yeah. But also, if you give money to every single person who stops you in New York where you're walking around all the time, you would never get anywhere because you're stopped, you know, multiple times, which I guess is more of a story. And the idea is that find a

nonprofit you believe in that's doing the best possible work for the unhoused population or people with mental health issues or, you know, which I do. Women that need homes and then you give your money there and think of it, you know, in that context. Right. I think it's hard to be poor. I'll say it. I'll be the first one. I think it's hard to be more.

You heard of here, folks. But I loved giving, I loved the giving the sermons part, but I hated the, like, and I loved listening to people when I was thinking I would be a pastor, but I was terrible at the, like, organizing council meetings and, like, figuring out how to, you know, I mean, that was back in the day when like you would have a personal computer and you'd have to like figure out how to make the bulletin on the computer where it would print on the like all that crap I was terrible at. Yeah. Is that like a dot matrix printer from the 90s with the spool on the side? But you had to figure you'd get these pre these pre printed bulletins from the like church office.

and then you would have to put it through this printer in a very specific way on the copy machine so that it would print on the one side. That's the worst. Yeah, and then you'd have to print out. And did you study pastorship at college? I was a theology major for a moment, yeah. Okay.

For a couple of years. What did you study in theology? The program that I went to was actually quite progressive. It was focused on liberation theology and specifically like theology of the oppressed and how God helps people who are suffering. and how we are called to help people who are suffering. And so that's why I ended up going to Namibia to study abroad,

and that's why I wanted to be a pastor who was working on social justice, not a pastor who was just, you know, I mean, I love the pastors who are just attending a church in a wealthy neighborhood that I think they're doing great work too. work too. It's just, that's not what I felt called to do. And this, and this is a really on the nose question, forgive me for asking you. Was this partially inspired by what you had gone through being called the F word through your entire childhood and being kind of denigrated and oppressed and yet loving Jesus and believing that the church had a way to kind of bring people together? Yeah, totally. A hundred percent. I think that's why I never understand. I feel like there's like

Two ways if you've been in a group that's Whatever marginalized marginalized, thank you You'll either be like I'm gonna have a lot of compassion for people or you're gonna be like I'm going the complete opposite direction and I never wanted to be the person who went the complete opposite direction I wanted to have compassion for as many groups as possible because I mean once you see it you see it it's like it's very apparent that there is And once again, I'm going to say something super profound. There is racism.

There is homophobia. There is misogyny. And so, yeah, I wanted to help. I wanted to help. And to use the church to leverage that. Yeah, because that was where I saw, that's where I saw social justice happening the most. That was where the food bank was.

That was where you went. If you couldn't make your rent that month, they would have an assistance program. Yeah. And so I thought that's what I wanted to do. This episode is brought to you by Fetzer. You know, there's this. tendency in modern life to believe that every problem has a material solution, more technology,

more productivity, more money, more apps reminding you to breathe while you ignore the fact that your soul feels like a raisin. But the folks at the Fetzer Institute believe something deeper. They believe that behind humanity's biggest challenges are spiritual ones. Loneliness, division, disconnection, our inability to see each other, the planet, or even ourselves as sacred. And they're asking a really beautiful question. What if shared flourishing begins with the sacred? grid. Fetzer supports stories, communities, and spiritual solutions from people around the world who are healing division, caring for the earth, and creating deeper human connection through faith, spirituality, and reverence for love itself. Not dogma, not forcing one belief system, just the

radical idea that, hey, maybe the soul matters. Honestly, that's a conversation we care deeply about here at Soul Boom. You can explore their spiritual solutions library and learn more at fetzer.org. That's F-E-T-Z-E-R.org. Thanks, Fetzer. One thing I love about summer is that getting dressed becomes simpler. You find a few things you like, and wear them repeatedly until they deteriorate, and quietly hope nobody is maintaining records. That's why I keep coming back to Quince. They make well-made essentials that naturally become the pieces you reach for,

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and 365-day returns. Now available in Canada, too. That's Q-U-I-N-C-E-com. slash soul boom for free shipping and 365 day returns. Quince.com slash soul boom. I talk about in soul boom, in the early church, one of the things that the Romans were so cruffled about was that these Christians were getting together and helping people, not of their tribe. They were helping, they were staying behind in disaster zones

and in plague zones and helping people that weren't even of their race. And the Romans and early historians, and early historians could not figure this out. Why in God's name, but why in hell? Why in Zeus's name would you possibly ever do that? And so it was this absolutely revolutionary concept. And I think, you know, just look through the Gospels.

And radical. And radical. Yes. Yeah, revolutionary, radical. And you look through the Gospels in the New Testament. And the calls that Jesus made to love one another are dozens and dozens and dozens. And the call to like that there might be some kind of hell image or metaphor is like three, like two and a half.

Right. And there are all sorts of scholars that wrote very thick papers about like the misinterpretation of the Greek. Of hell. Yeah. We have, yes. We had David Bentley Hart on the show. And he speaks all about that, like the concept of hell.

And, you know, and, you know, prohibitions about sexuality are like two or three, you know, and not even in the Gospels. Jesus never spoke of them. So why do we ignore the hundreds of missives to love one another? Right. And the straight up like, you know, when you didn't serve the least of these, you didn't serve me. Jesus. The least among us. Yeah.

Absolutely. What is your relationship with Jesus today and your relationship with God today? You talk, you have spoken about in other interviews and a little bit in your book about a reconception of God that's a little bit different than when you were a youth pastor. Oh, yeah, for sure. I think of Jesus as like someone I completely respect. I love all of his teachings. If you look at the specific teachings of Jesus,

They're all like, kind of like no-brainers and they seem like cliches and nobody follows them. Yeah. And like you said, and they were radical ideas. Yeah, exactly. The red letter Bible when you just go to the red letter what Jesus said and did. Yeah. Yeah. Radical ideas that, yeah, are truly not being followed.

Yeah, especially by the most volume heavy of his followers. Yeah. I don't go to church at like a church church. But I do, I improvise that line in the last episode of the first season of somebody somewhere where I said, this is church. And I do think that for me, church is about community. It's about supporting each other. It's about, you know, being there for each other in times of joy and in times of sadness.

And I think that's why that improvisation. made so much sense to me because in that story, they had come from this very sad moment where Bridget sings my character a song and then they're all partying on this bus. And that's this moment of beauty for this community, this tiny community where they've come together for each other. And that felt like church to me.

And that's kind of what I see church as now too, which sounds a little bit. basic, but it's what I feel. I have felt at times that theater is like church in so many ways because you're creating a community backstage and putting on the show and everyone plays a part, the lighting operator and the set designer and costume wardrobe people and everyone is there to tell a story in 3D with actual spittle flying out of your mouth. And then there's a community of people out.

And it's, you know, there's a, you know, there's. There's a divine connection there, I think. Like you're channeling this story and you're sharing this moment. And I've definitely felt moments of the divine in a theater for sure. Do you have any specific examples of that? This is silly. It doesn't sound like it would be this. Bring it on.

I love it. The revival of Pippin. Okay, I'm going to stop you right. I do think it's true. though. Andrew Martin gets lifted up and she's singing this song about how she's so old. And then she bribes off this dress and she's wearing this sexy outfit and she gets lifted up onto this acrobat's ring and she does this gorgeous dance while she's up there. And it's funny and it's beautiful because it's she's saying like, I don't care. I think at the time she was in her late

60s. She was and it was saying like my age doesn't define me. I'm this beautiful creature. I I enjoy life and life is meant for the living and I'm still living and I wept. I wept. Yeah. Because it felt like, yeah, this great truth. Yeah. That she showed in a way that had a lot of jokes in it too. Yeah.

Yeah. I said the revival of Pippin. You heard it here, folks. Amazing. And your conception of God. how has that changed? I think I really personified God before. He was old and he was masculine and he was male.

And he probably was white. I guess I didn't really think about that, but probably. And I don't really see God as a person so much anymore. Or maybe like a Mediterranean Spanish. Like still white but like swarthy? Yes. I don't know. Swarthy.

That's a word. Yeah, yeah. Your suit. Yeah, exactly. Passing. I think of God now more as like a force, a uniting force with people. And I think that sometimes you can get away from God. And that's when you start hating and oppressing other people.

And we can point to the obvious actors who do that. But I think it's also important to point to yourself when you're doing that. Because I think there is this weird little thing inside of you that often goes to, I'm different than them, you know, I'm better than them or whatever. I'm, I judge them. And I think it's important to look at that because I think that's when God is not present. I love that idea that God is the force that allows us to connect with people, bond with people, love people that are different than us.

Like where that is, God is. Yeah. Yeah, exactly. Do you pray? Yeah, it's not like I used to. It's more of a, it's more of a thought than like I get on my knees and fold my hands or what have you. But I do definitely, like I, I talk to my mom who's dead and that feels sort of prayer. I talk to my dad who's dead. Yeah.

Yeah. And I meditate, which feels. prayer like I imagine. Maybe we could introduce them. Your dad and my mom? Yeah. Not to like hook up or anything. I'm just like,

just to be friends or say hi. Yeah. Why not? Yeah. I bet they, they can have a little Debbie snack cake together. Yeah, that'd be nice.

I often pray to the spirit of little Debbie too. Did you hear how she died? No. Oof. Are you serious? You don't want to know. One question.

we ask everyone on Soul Boom is to define this very hard to define word right on the microphone. Soul. You hear the word soul. What does the word soul mean to you? This is very philosophy 101, isn't it? I think it's your call in the world. Your spirit. What's your purpose for being here?

That's what I think it is. Your soul. It's here. It's queer. Get used to it. I love it. That's beautiful. Oh, man.

I love it. That was great. Moving forward at this time in the United States, what do you think that artists need to do, congregationalists, church leaders, spiritual leaders? What is your hope?

What is your vision for the future? They talk about young people having this hope deficit. And you have been through so much. I think people can really learn from your wisdom, especially going through what you did as a gay young man and man and former pastor and now a successful actor quite laid into your career, which is so exciting to witness. What is your hope?

What's your vision moving forward? On the most basic level, compassion for each other. I keep thinking, about immigrants who were in this country, who came to this country, not because they wanted to, whatever, rape and pillage, but because they were in an unsafe space

and they needed a safe space. And the idea that we would now be, you know, ripping them apart, throwing them back to this unsafe space or to a completely different country or whatever. I know I'm getting really specific, But I just keep thinking, why is there no compassion whatsoever? Just because you don't know that person, it makes me nauseous and so sad.

And so my hope is that we can start having compassion for each other. And my only idea of how to do that is just to keep doing it in my own personal life. And to really try and think about everything that I put out into the world as something. that I put out to the world that is full of compassion, love, and hope. I think that the book talks a lot about hope and, you know, possibly a cheesy or whatever elementary way. But I'm so happy that my, there were times when I started an essay where I was like, oh, this is just like, I'm just trying to get even with someone. And I never wanted any of that to be in the book. So that's, that's my hope. I'm not a leader. I'm not a world leader.

I'm a follower. If, if, if, if, you know how people are like, would you be a cult leader or a cult follower? I'd be a cult follower. So I don't have, I don't have like specific whatever legislative ideas. All I have is this hope for love and compassion, which is pretty cheeseball, but I think it's beautiful. I mean, I think in terms of the immigrants, I think there's a certain set of people that are like, well, first of all, I think, you know, places like Breitbart and Fox News and news and news. max like heighten these are there if you're only getting your news right uh and the news is like there here's a killing and a kidnapping right even if there's a thousand killings and kidnappings

by white american citizens you don't hear about that you hear about the one right you know immigrant case and then there's an idea a relationship to like the rules or the laws supersedes compassion so like they're here illegally we need to adhere to the rules And that's way more important than compassion. It's like fuck compassion rule. Them's the rules. And it's like we certainly need laws. We certainly can't live with open borders.

We couldn't have 50 million people come into this country. It would absolutely destroy the economy. It's just not going to work unless we've set up some kind of method where something like that could happen. But how do you marry laws and compassion? and no one seems kind of interested in that, because that's a very difficult dance. And I'm sure you know that from doing social work. Like, how do you stay in the laws and the social contract?

And, you know, we want people to obey laws and not break them. You know, it's kind of like the criminal justice system. But at the same time, how can we have the maximum amount of compassion so that we can lift everyone up? I think that's what Jesus would want. I don't want to put words in his mouth. Those words are in his mouth. Yeah.

He says, you know, he talks about the immigrant. He's very clear about it, actually. Yeah. He talks about housing the unhoused very specifically. Yeah. I agree with you. I realize it's more complicated than that, but I also think on an individual level, it's not. And I think that there's this weird thing right now where people are saying like,

compassion for anyone who has a different viewpoint than you is wrong. And I think there's a difference between having boundaries and having compassion for people. And you can have boundaries and still have compassion for people. Yeah. Yeah. And compassion, real compassion means taking action too. It's not just a feeling in the chest. Like, oh, I have compassion for that person who's suffering.

But compassion is, it means Latin compassion with passion. then with passion, you're going to do something for that person. Yeah. So it's a great message. Jeff, thank you so much for coming on Soul Boom. Thanks for having me. People can see you on Widows Bay on Apple TV, which is wonderful. And actress of a certain age.

Available wherever fine books are sold. Right next to the bassoon king. I go get one. The Soul Boom Podcast. Subscribe now on YouTube, Spotify, Apple Podcasts, and wherever else you get your stupid podcasts. Thanks.