Theology in the Raw - From Conservative Christian to Post-Evangelical with Jonathan Merritt

Episode Date: January 5, 2026

Join the Theology in the Raw Patreon for bonus content, extra episodes, and more! This is our first in-person episode from my trip to NYC. Jonathan Merritt joined me to talk about his journey from his conservative Southern Baptist upbringing, to what he now describes as post-evangelicalism. We talked about deconstruction, navigating family dynamics, and why he doesn't describe himself as an "exvangelical." Jonathan currently serves as a Vice President and Executive Editor for Simon & Schuster, where he oversees the acquisition of books in the faith / spirituality category as well as select general market non-fiction. authored several critically-acclaimed books, including Learning to Speak God from Scratch: Why Sacred Words are Vanishing - and How We Can Revive Them, named “Book of the Year” by the Englewood Review of Books. He has worked as a collaborator or ghostwriter on dozens of books, with several titles landing on The New York Times, USA Today, Wall Street Journal and Publishers Weekly bestsellers lists.See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

I really love my family and I really loved my evangelical friends and I see the undeniable goodness in their lives and I was forced to reckon with that and a streamlined narrative of good guys and bad guys that kind of binary thinking I couldn't make sense of what I knew to be true. Hey, friends, welcome back to another episode of Theology and around my guest today is Jonathan Merritt, who serves as vice president and executive editor for Simon and Schuster in New York City. Jonathan holds a Master of Divinity from Southeastern Baptist Theological Seminary and a Master of Theology from Emory University's Candler School of Theology and has done additional graduate work focused on Christian mysticism at the General Theological Seminary. of the Episcopal Church in Manhattan. Jonathan has offered several critically acclaimed books, including learning to speak God from scratch,

learning to speak God from scratch, why sacred words are vanishing and how we can revive them. This conversation was recorded in person in Hell's Kitchen, Manhattan, where I sat down with Jonathan to chat about his journey in and sort of out of evangelicalism. It's raw, it's honest,

which is why I think you will, Absolutely love this conversation. Okay, please welcome back to the show, the one and only, Jonathan Merritt. Jonathan Merritt, it's been a minute. Thanks so much for being on Theal General. I am here in your backyard. That's right. Welcome.

Welcome to my city. Welcome to your podcast. You grew up in a pretty conservative, maybe very conservative, evangelical background. Is that right? That's right. How would you describe your upbringing? Give us a window into it. Southern Baptist is so, because I don't mean that as just a denominational marker as much as it is

two words that both described the way I was raised. I mean, I was raised in the deep south and there's a kind of cultural context that comes with that, that is both theological and political in nature, both conservative, and then growing up Baptist. So evangelical, highly independent. So, you know, resistant hierarchies, denominational hierarchies, church hierarchies, kind of free thinkers a little bit. So, you know, my dad was a pastor, is a pastor still of a big Southern Baptist Church. He was president of the Southern Baptist Convention twice, elected president of the SBC. So I grew up really in the inner sanctum of the religious right in the 1980s and the 1990s when the religious right was like off to the races. It had established kind of a cultural

dominance. And I grew up in that world thinking that the way in which I experienced Christianity was Christianity. I didn't. I thought that every other kind of Christianity outside of that was apostate in some sense. So yeah. Was it a good experience? Like when you were a kid, were you like all in? Like couldn't wait to go to church? Or was it kind of? kind of like, ah, this is kind of boring, you know, I just have to, this is my family does, or how did you personally take to that environment? Burdens and blessings, right? So there are good things and there are bad things that, that, and who can't say that

about the way they were raised and we all have some mix, right? So, and it's not like a sort of childhood trauma Olympics where I go, well, I've got more in the burden category. But I'll say, I really love evangelicalism, you know, gives you this, like, this, this, this passion for and knowledge of the Bible. Yeah. And your words have I hidden in my heart, right? So I still have just this, like, library, this repository of scripture that grounds me and I'm rooted in that. And even my friends in the city, you know, they're maybe the Roman Catholic or they're a bishopailing.

And they're like, gosh, you know a lot of the Bible. But that gives me a way of orienting in the world that I still feel really grateful for. There were, I think in evangelicalism, there's a strong sense of community, believing that you belong to something that matters. And so growing up with a sense of purpose in the world, that's awesome. You know, I have friends now in New York City who are just beginning to, ask questions of meaning and purpose in their lives in their 30s or their 40s. And they lack some of the muscle memory that I think I got that's really helpful for thinking of life

as an exercise in living with purpose. And so that's a huge gift. There are lots of things, you know, in the negative column as well. I think that the kind of the kind of concept of God as mostly angry, temperamental, gave me a way of relating to God that wasn't so much based in trust as it was a kind of conditionality and transaction. And so I had to do a lot of work to transition from this transactional relationship with God where every day was sort of like counting beans and making sure that I had enough. I did the things that you wanted me to do and didn't do so many of the things you didn't want me to do. So I still exist within your loving embrace for yet another day. And instead, moving to this understanding of God as love with a

capital L that God loves me because God loves me because God loves me and that there is nothing I can do today to make God love me one iota less or to love me one bit more. more and to begin to to rest in my place, not just in the universe, but in in relationship with the divine, that's been a, that's a really heavy lift. And it's not something that you do. You know, there's not like a, I don't know, like a post evangelical boot camp you can go to where they like, you know, hook you up to like a brain monitor and they rewire your neural pathways. It's a constant returning to what I know to be true about the, um, limitless and unconditional love of God that I'm still having to do that work.

And that's a burden that doesn't exist in the rearview mirror. It sits right in the car with me every single day. So I'm having to continue to do that work. And so I hold all of those things together and believe that both the gifts and the pain of the tradition that I was raised in can all be offered to God as a kind of living sacrifice as I kind of go about my day now in midlife. Yeah. You use the term post-evangelical.

Is that a term? And there's lots of labels. You know, there's evangelical, post-evangelical, axi-evangelical, or just Jesus follower. Like, is there a certain kind of term that you would adopt for yourself the best fits kind of where you were at, where you're at now in your Christian thing? Yeah. I don't know that I would use that term if I was just like out and about because it wouldn't make as much sense to some folks.

But if I was talking to largely evangelical folks or people who know that, that context, I would use that term. And I use that term as a way to distinguish myself from so-called ex-vangelicals, which are, you know, have so many friends who identify us like ex-vangelicals. But there's a kind of posture of grievance that I think. doesn't always serve us well when we when we leave a community and um i find that ex-phangelicals um and again this is a generalization so it's not true to everyone terms of general yes uh my experiences is that is that those folks have have left what what you might call a fundamentalist way of being christian and they've left behind all of the theology, all of the heaven and hell and, you know, the kind of rigorous

piety. But they've taken all of the machinery, the underlying machinery of fundamentalism with them. And so now it has a kind of liberal, theological, and political overlay, but the tools of litmus testing and cancel culture, which was really perfected in. kind of late 20th century evangelicalism and is now being really effectively deployed by the political and religious left. They take that with them. And so I find that it leaves a lot of friends stuck, stuck tethered to the past that they so desperately want to escape. So I really like, you know, I guess one of the patron saints of my way being Christian, which maybe wasn't surprising to people is Richard Roar and he uses this language. I don't know that

this even originates with him of like transcending and including. So to transcend a tradition, but then to be willing to pick through all of the wonderful gifts and to intentionally take those things with you. And so that for me is a post evangelical orientation that still can be helplessly in love with the church and to be hopeful about the role. of Christianity in the world and in my own life, to be serious about the sacred text and about what it means to live within ethical frameworks that are good for us and good for our neighbors. And that doesn't mean that I'm not clear-eyed about the failures of the way that I was raised or even the ongoing failures that I see in evangelicalism. But it allows me to be,

also clear-eyed about the failures that all broken and fallen people in various religious traditions, including my own, are blind to and perpetuate. So I think it has served me well. I don't criticize people who are parts of those movements that are more perpetually aggrieved, but it's just not where I choose to live. That makes so much sense. And I've, yeah, I've seen that too from a distance, like the, whether it's ex-evangelical or just people who were raised in a fundamentalist background and have just really, I would say in many cases have been legitimately, like, really hurt. I mean, they describe their church experiences and it's like, oh, my word, like, that's a terrible.

You've gone through a lot. And some people are more disgruntled and it's like, I don't know if you're really traumatized. You just really didn't like the culture or whatever it is. But oftentimes they embrace a set of values. It just seems so reactionary and is carried with a similar. tone and posture that they left. It's just a new set of beliefs, you know. So I like so post evangelical is kind of like acknowledging a lot of the maybe theological

shifts that you've gone through and yet trying to embody a different posture than the one maybe you grew up in the environment. And it makes sense that Richard Rohr would model that because he didn't have like a, I don't think he had like some kind of like fundamentals upbringing and he just he doesn't know that right? So he's not reacting against anything. He's constructing a way of being Christian. Yeah. And I think if you think about, you know, in fact, I think Richard Gore talks about this as the wisdom order, this sort of cycle that we live in of self-evaluation and social evaluation where you move from construction to deconstruction to reconstruction, this is my characterization.

But I think you can get stuck in any of those phases. And I grew up in a tradition that could never move beyond construction. It was just sort of this is the way that it was and therefore it's the way it should be. And if the words that I use meant this, they should always mean that and we should never add. These questions are dangerous. And so it's a lot of borders and boundaries and fence building and protecting and attacking and attacking anyone one who might question the construction. And in my opinion, one of the worst things you can do is move one stage over and then get

stuck there where you deconstruct and then one day you've gone from evangelical to Episcopalian to some avant-garde, something with crystals on your mantle and talking about the universe and then, you know, everything has fallen apart and you've got like two by fours and nails and nothing to live in. And it takes a lot of courage, I think, because it can be really triggering for folks to rebuild something out of that and say, what good is there in this 2,000 year old tradition that might help me face the beautiful, terrible things that exist in this world. And so that's where I try to live is moving through those constantly and realizing that even once I reconstruct my way of being Christian, it becomes its own construction. And so I even

listen to some of my evangelical brothers and sisters who say, what about that? And that doesn't make sense. And you're doing this thing, but have you left this thing behind that might be good for you? So always being humble enough, even in my own posture to be listening to the critiques from those who I consider to be behind me and those in front of me. I think that's really, really critical and healthy for the Christian life. I mean, it sounds like if I could say, just listening to you and watching you from afar that you, whatever term we want to use, deconstructed from conservative evangelicalism, it seems like you've done that in a pretty healthy way. A lot of people that maybe have had

the same experiences you did and maybe reject a lot of the things that conservative evangelicalism stands for a lot of people don't deconstruct in a healthy way it seems like 25 years later they're still bitter and dealing with stuff and they haven't really reconstructed in a healthy way like what how did you go about that like what was different in your journey like how come you didn't do it in a really unhealthy way and end up just kind of constantly angry at your upbringing? Well, I would say I did do it. I think in many ways it was it was unhealthy. I mean, I for for years, I was a columnist and in sort of the early days of this, right? The days that brought us, the Rachel Held Evans is that was, I was kind of from the journalism side,

I was doing that work with Religion News Service in the New York Times and the Atlantic And I remember I had an editor once who said every time he read one of my columns, I submit one of my columns, he said it felt like a tiny act of patricide, like that I was trying to attack or destroy or kill the thing that I, that had birthed me and had had sort of gifted me to this world. So, and I, looking back, I really see the way so much of that was the, was this energy of demolition and tearing down. And there is a season for that. For everything, there's a season. And there's a time for tearing down. And so I, I don't regret that.

And I also feel really grateful that I was able to move beyond that many years later. For me, it was, I was miserable. I had nothing. I felt so adrift. And so it was like, is this what my life will be now? Is just attacking and destroying this thing that I feel hurt by? Or is there a better way to do this? And I have to say some of it was finding a church again and finding a church that was hopeful.

and that wasn't aggrieved and being invited into that church and and being mentored by men and women who had had uh they were a few steps ahead of me and they had sort of walked through that and they had found really healthy ways uh of being Christian in the world without being mad about it and so uh it was a long long journey the other thing is is that I really love my family and I really love my evangelical friends. And I see the undeniable goodness in their lives. And I was forced to reckon with that. And a streamlined narrative of, you know,

winners and losers and good guys and bad guys, that kind of binary thinking and moral dualism, I couldn't make sense of what I knew to be true. Not just about them, but about me. So I had to have a more complex way of thinking about faith and of locating myself within my own faith. And that posture of anger and demolition just, I had to find something else because it had stopped working for me. Wow. So what church are you part of now or the one you're talking about? Yeah, I go to, I'm a part of good shepherd until until this summer I was an elder there. I served a five-year term,

a three-year term in five years. So I was, I went all the way through, and now I'm just a lay person there. What's a denomination? Well, we, you know, we describe, we're not, we're not a part of a denomination, and we describe ourselves as an ecumenical interdenominational church focused on Christian unity. Interesting. So what we say is, is, um, wherever you come from, we invite you to bring all of your faith and all of your doubt and all of the gifts and all of the pain of your tradition. And we welcome that knowing that we can learn from it, that it is good for us. And so we have folks who are theologically or politically on the right and some who are on the left and all are welcome. So. Oh, so it's not just like a more progressive

or Democrat dominated in New York City. I would imagine a lot of evangelical churches here are not very right-wing at all, you know. That's right. But it's a mix. Yeah. In Brooklyn? It's in, we're in Gramercy Park, actually. Okay.

So it's a really beautiful place. And we, and I realize, you know, like we have, we have a somewhat large LGBTQ population. I would say maybe a quarter of our church is maybe LGBTQ. Okay. And, you know, we don't have a statement on gay marriage. We don't say that you have to believe this about gay marriage or trans identity in order to teach or to lead a small group. And I also understand that there are folks who say, I don't feel safe in that environment. I don't feel comfortable, which is fine because we're not a church for those folks.

But people who really value, I think, coexisting in a space with different kinds of Christians. really can benefit from that. And it's a, it's been a unique place. It's vibrant and it's interesting and it's challenging. But it's a place that gives me, I think, a lot of hope for what the church could be. That's interesting. I don't know if I've heard of a church described that way. Yeah.

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slash t-I-T-R. That's betterwild.com slash t-I-T-R for up to 40% off your order. Betterwild.com slash t-I-T-R. I want to ask about your family because you said you love your family. And I've talked with your dad a few times. I know he's, he listens to the podcast. He's a big fan. He's a big, big fan. Greetings, Dr. James Merritt.

Hi, dad. I've just been, I mean, I hear you here. you said, you know, a very well-known leader in the Southern Baptist Church, led the Southern Baptist Convention for a few years. I mean, and you would probably have as many disagreements, disagreements on probably lots of different things with your dad, from what I can tell. And yet, looking on from a distance and also hearing you two talk together, you seem to genuinely respect and love each other. It's, and I'm, you know, in my line of work, like dealing with a lot of parents with kids

who, you know, don't see eye eye on a lot of things, that's pretty rare because it takes both sides, right? If one side's really trying to be gracious and loving, but the other side is digging in and, you know, it takes two people to recognize the disagreements and yet still love and respect each other in that. Can you, I don't know, as personal as you want to get, like, can you, can you explain, like, how do you guys make this work? And have I accurately described your guys' relationship? Yes, you've described the destination, but not the journey. Maybe the ongoing, unfolding destination. The journey has been very hard. Okay.

I would assume that it would. Very hard. I was in 2012. I was publicly outed. And at the time, I was serving part-time as a teaching pastor at my dad's church. Following that event, I was sort of brought before the church and was asked to share what happened and who I wanted to be in the world, which was really hard in that moment to articulate. And then following that experience that day at the end of the service, Dad preached a small sermon on the adulterous woman. So the inference being which one I was in there, you could sort of figure out. And I think in some ways it was a, there was some compassion in what he was trying to do

because the point was it, you know, the one who could condemn her didn't. And therefore we shouldn't condemn the one who's, before us, but it was a deeply painful experience. And I actually remember that day I was in the car home. And there have been very few times where I've heard the capital V voice speak to me. And I heard what I believe to be the voice say, you have to leave this place. And it took me about a year to leave because, as I say, you know, leaving takes courage and courage takes time. And it took me about a year. And then I decided to move here to New York City with very little money. I signed an eight-month sublite. I sold everything I had and just thought I had to try

to find a way to to be myself in the world and figure out who who I am and that was 12 years ago and in the last 12 years there have been some really low moments I think it's important to say that because I think people will be watching this and and and or listening to this and they need honesty about how hard it is there were months where where we're we didn't speak there were fights with lots of expletives from my part he does not cuss that is not something he does i should say that there have been really really hard moments um but there was always this commitment in both directions that no matter what no matter how much time it took us to kind of cool down we would keep showing up

and keep figuring it out. And so we've continued to do that. And along the way, we've had to establish certain rules that, I think, just sort of wisdom principles for protecting our relationship. You know, we never criticize each other in public. We do it a lot in private, if we feel like we need to. We'll say the, speak the hard truth. but in public we don't we don't criticize each other we respect each other we treat each other the

way that we would like to be treated we give each other the benefit of the doubt um we have learned to refer to each other in ways that are recognizable to the other so I don't call him a fundamentalist because he doesn't call himself a fundamentalist I wouldn't describe yeah from what I know conservative evangelical or evangelical yeah maybe not even yeah maybe conservative yeah that would definitely wouldn't say fun of my own. So we we use language that the other person would use to describe themselves. You know, he doesn't call me same sex attracted because I don't describe myself that way. Um, and he just, he just says gay. Uh, if he says anything, that's what he'll say. And so we use, we use language that is, um, recognizable and respectful to the other. You know,

one, one big thing that we try to model and I think this was maybe St. Francis was, was the one who originated this, but Stephen Covey, I think, popularized it, but seek first to understand and then seek to be understood. So, you know, really challenging ourselves to, you know, if you were to, if you were to print out a transcript of your conversation, how many sentences would end in a question mark versus an exclamation point. That'll tell you a lot about whether you're bringing curiosity alongside conviction into those kinds of conversations. You know, this week, my dad sent me a, like a photo from a book he was reading. And it was like, this is how this person describes progressive Christians.

And he said, I'm just curious. Does this describe you? And I said, well, you know, in some ways, yes. And in some ways, no. And he's like, what about this sentence? Is that what you believe? Is that what you think? Yeah, I mean, I wouldn't say it that way.

Here's how I would say it. And he didn't try to debate me on that. he just wanted to understand, which is a real gift for a father that you love, that you want to be known by. So even though I think there was probably disappointment even in hearing that, because he wishes that I was more like him. But, you know, I have said before, I have traveled to a place where he can never go. and he lives in a place to which I will never return.

And there is a chasm now between us. And so we have a choice. We can choose to throw rocks across that chasm to each other. Or we can try hard as it may be to build bridges to each other to find connection and to love each other as best we can so long as we both live on this earth. And we've chosen to do that. It has not been easy. but I do think it's been worth it.

That's a beautiful story, man. I mean, yeah, it sounds like both of you in the midst of your disagreements and maybe even some very serious disagreements, you have respected each other's authenticity and honesty in which you hold to those, you know? Like whatever theological disagreements you have with your dad, you know he's genuinely going where. the text leads as he's reading the Bible and he's really in good faith getting arriving at those positions and it sounds like you know he would see the same in your journey maybe at the beginning it wasn't that yeah um how about the rest of your family your your your your mom and your you have brothers sisters yeah I have two I have an older and younger brother and I would say both of them and

both of their families we we get along great we've a great relationship my mom I love I I jokingly say that I'm her favorite son, although that may be true. We don't know. We don't know. I'm the middle child, so we have a special relationship. I would say my mom is one of those moms who she prays regularly for her children. She gets up and does her devotions every morning, you know, but she is not looking to have a theological or political debate with me. So there are conversations that I only have with one parent and not the other. And that's, that's our relationship is, is I can, you know, rest in the love of my mother. But we don't even know where, where all of our differences are. Because we just say, that's the minefield over there.

And, and we're not going to walk in that together. So when you and your dad are getting into it, does that stress your mom out? Big time. Oh, I bet she. Big time. Big time. She will be like, stop, stop. You know, when I come home, she's like, that's it. You got to go, you guys got to go downstairs. You got to have that discussion somewhere else. Yeah. Don't ruin. Don't ruin my vibe. So I love that you and your dad, they'll have those discussions. Because if you just swept everything out of the rug, I mean, it's great that you guys don't do that publicly. But I think it's healthy. Yeah. You guys are honest with each other behind closed doors and we'll hash it out. Well, I think one of the best and worst things about

both of us is that we're theologically trained. Yeah. And so. You have two master's degrees in theology, right? I do, yeah. And he has a PhD in New Testament. So, you know, he's not an idiot. And, you know, he's able to say, well, yeah, well, you know, this thing says this. And I go, yeah, well, you know, there are like five ways of interpreting that. And yours might be the minority view. And then he goes, yeah, but you've got to look at. And then so we can kind of like go back and forth. And we, I think then can, we may not convince each other that we are right, but we do convince each other that we are doing best by what we believe to be true. Yeah, yeah, that's good. I never thought I'd care about bed sheets. I mean, who does? Bedsheets are bed sheets, right? Well, I used to think to this until I tried

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But are there some values that you still hold on to today? Yeah. You would say these are some things that I have brought with me out of that environment into my new post-evangelical faith. Well, I think one is that you have to do what you believe is right. You know, you'll hear the evangelicals love that. Martin Luther, here I stand, I can do no other. Or my dad used to quote, you know,

right is right even if everybody's against it and wrong is wrong even if everybody is for it and so um learning not to be persuaded by uh social pressure but by that inner light um that you know father bd griffiths calls it the cave of your own heart when you go down into the cave of your own heart the place where you meet god and you find yourself deeply convicted about something that you you can live in the world with that conviction. And also the humility that you may be wrong, but a strong conviction that this is what I believe to be right. And that is something that continues to guide me

and keeps me from living in kind of a wind-blown way that I think a lot of people who leave evangelicalism often find themselves in. So that is, that's one way. I would say another one is, is that, and it looks really different, but love of neighbor that I live in a very selfish city. I mean, everybody here is looking out for themselves. Everybody here is looking out for themselves.

And to be able to take the natural inclination of. of concern that that sort of folds in on itself and to have the muscle memory from childhood to invert that and to make sure that in a place of great need and great diversity that you're always looking for ways to love and to see the other even when it's incredibly inconvenient I think that that gives me a kind of tender-heartedness that oftentimes evades people who live in New York for too long. Looking at my, got a couple of guests in the room here who live in New York. I'd love to talk to them after and see if they agree with that.

That's funny. So, yeah, so your environment now is, I mean, worlds apart from what you grew up in. Yeah. What's there, what is the average, and this is a generalization because, I mean, you have a church or Christians and stuff. But even there, I would imagine when you tell them I grew up in a Southern Baptist church, they're probably not a lot of them have had those experiences or, you know, or especially like your place of work or just your friends, your neighbors. What's the general perception of like a Southern Baptist, conservative evangelical? Like how do people in New York City view that kind of person? And I'm curious if you would say it's not really accurate or, yeah, it's pretty accurate.

I think that when I, when I got here, so go back to 2013, America was a very different place. It's pre-26th, 2013. If I had to say, if you did a word association game and you said Southern Baptist, I think they would, I think the one word, which would be at the top of the list would be ignorant. that would be the word now I think the word would be dangerous oh if I had to say okay let me guess so before it would be here's this country preacher with no education just kind of spouting off what he thinks the Bible says yes yeah and now it's probably like political power it's Mike Pence it's that's right um how could be in these type people that are have tons of political power are very explicit with their evangelical faith and are making decisions that

are run in the world in some cases. Yeah, I think that it would have been then, you know, like, oh, yeah, those people, they don't believe in evolution. Right. Well, how threatening is it? Right. If somebody doesn't believe in evolution in 2013, not really. I mean, you may think it's stupid if you're somebody who believes in it.

Now you think of it, you think of these, these mobilized rallies of armed people in the South. I mean, because, you know, people in New York, they're, they get their news from certain sources, uh, by and large. And, and they're getting often true, but in, imperfect or incomplete. Selective. Yeah, they're getting snapshots. Yes. And in the same way, by the way, I go home and they're getting snapshots. You know, they're like, New York, how, everybody's just pushing everybody over on the subway and there's migrants all over the streets and people are shooting people on the corners and I'm like, it feels sort of kind of like it's always felt to me. But they're getting snapshots that, you know, these news stories that they're

reading are not false. They're just, they're just incomplete pictures. And the same thing happens here. And so the ways in which that creates misunderstanding evolves with time. And I think that this kind of harmless, stupid, dopey backwoods Southern Baptist caricature has evolved into something that feels much more sinister to the average New Yorker. There is, yeah, it is selective, but there is a lot of truth to that because even the few selective portraits of who they think of when they think Southern Baptist is evangelical, there are some people in positions of power. are making decisions that affect millions and millions of people in both in the country and

globally. How are you thinking through our current political situation? There's so much we can talk about. But I mean, Trump 2.0, two attempted assassinations on Trump, year later, Charlie Kirk, you've got, I mean, global issues going on, Russia, Ukraine, Israel, Palestine. I mean, there's just, it just seems like when I just think politics, it's easy for my anxiety to go up. How are you processing it? And I think through it from like Boise, Idaho and you're in New York City. And we both have an internet connection. We both read pretty broadly. But yeah, I'm curious when you think about our political moment right now, are you scared, hopeful, indifferent? You know, I think it's really hard.

hard to be optimistic about the future. I think even you find people on the right who maybe are somewhat more optimistic because they happen to be the ones with more political power right now. But even there, I hear a lot of pessimism about the future. And part of that is because you know, when you look at social research, the number one thing that helps, that will induce a change of mind about the other, whoever that might be, is relationship, that you, that you have a relationship. And we are becoming in every way more separate from each other. You know, people are even now choosing where they will live in a country, in a county, based on whether they can feel like they're with their kind. Yeah. And algorithms,

work to to keep us separate from each other and we are more disconnected. We don't have to live in embodied ways, that forced connection, the way that they, the way that they used to. And so I can't imagine without some kind of massive shift in the way that we, that we live as humans, that it gets better before it gets worse. And that makes me feel sad. afraid, all of those, those things. And, you know, because I'm, I'm a person, you know, in some ways, I'm sort of like a, like a man without a country, you know, because I go home and they're like, oh, here's this liberal elite, you know, from New York City. And yet there's so much, that's, that is where my heart is. And that is, and there's so much I love and admire about.

the South, about evangelicalism, about my family and my friends who are still there. And then I come here and they're like, who is this like very religious? You know, I feel like I've become more, more Christian, not less Christian in recent years. And I'm very serious about that. And that makes me kind of weird and awkward, you know. I'm at a, I go into my workplace and people don't see faith as a, they see faith as a very unserious thing, again, a generalization. But so, so there's, there's, there's these like, I don't feel like I fully belong wherever I go. And if you were to give me, you know, a list

and go down and say, what do you believe here or there? Theologically and politically, I'd be like left of center, probably. But then there are ways in which I go way off map. and off-grid. And then that can create all kinds of misunderstandings and feelings of separateness or distance with friends in both places. But it does give me the kind of vantage point that can see, I hear these people talking about these people, and I go, first of all, you don't know those people. And I do.

And that's not at all what they're like. And it happens in reverse as well. They don't understand them. So that really, it grieves me, and I don't know what the answer is because most people can't live the way that I have lived. When I hear you talk, I feel like, because I resonate with so much of what you're saying. And we've got, you and I, if we sat down in line, you know, we've got some disagreements, a lot of agreements.

And I almost feel like when you describe your kind of no man's land place or at least understanding kind of these different worlds, I think. feel like almost the same almost like if you said you're kind of leftist center i might be right of center even that i don't like those yeah it's just so hard to those categories don't even work but as one who would still be evangelical depends on what you mean by the term too people people people i'm like i'm always like you got to define that before i sign up for this definition here because there's a lot of people it's like so ingrained with like right wing politics you know or even like checking off all these theological boxes, which I might check off some but not others,

you know, so yeah, I resonate with that. I feel like I don't have a home in the church. And yet when I travel all around, I just got back from an awesome church in Buffalo and I go to a lot of churches that kind of feel the same way. And it's almost like the silent good faith majority of evangelicals. Hopefully it's more, maybe it's not a majority. I hope it is. But there's a lot of evangelicals out there they're just trying to live their life they're truly trying to love people you know they

don't hate gay people you know like they have a gay son and they have a good relationship and they hold their views graciously and humbly and you know like I just experienced so many of those kinds of evangelicals that when I see the headlines when I see the loud voices when I look on Twitter

and everybody you know by fighting and biting and I'm just like with that those people are there but there's so many other really good people out there that will never make the headlines you know the people you're talking about when you go back to your environment um while you know you're like i couldn't stay here this isn't my vibe but like there's some really really good people here yeah you know um and it's sad that people live in such siloed lives both in their location of work and neighborhoods but also social media and everything they just kind of built these walls around them that it just fosters this us versus

them common and so and the big difference is I think when

we say when we talk about social division that that were further

and further apart at the polls and where even is the middle I mean

I remember when I started out as a writer in this space you know

it was who was it Richard Mao or somebody had written a book

on civility no one would publish that book today nobody

wants that book. Nobody wants to pay $2399 for a book on civility. They want a book on why the person I hate is as bad as I think they are. Well, it's not just that those polls have different beliefs. It's that they live in different realities. And that's a big difference. That's an almost unsolvable problem. I listened to a podcast recently where they were kind of dissecting the different ways. that there was a conservative and a liberal and they were talking about different ways they saw history.

And as one example, they talked about Obama. And I just thought, everybody saw Obama as like, you know, the last great American president, the great unifier, here he was, he was hopeful, he's soaring rhetoric, blah, blah, blah. And the conservative tells the story of actually this is the guy that fomented a race war. And I'm going, what?

I had never heard this. I've never heard this before. And he's using real facts, real speeches, real rhetoric that his part of the world ingested. And I can tell you the speeches and the facts, you know, I'd say, oh, we went to Notre Dame and he gave the abortion reduction agenda. What a bridge building. And he'll talk about, you know, Trayvon Martin and the way that the response there felt like it was trying to divide us rather than unified. I'd never heard this. And you can actually,

you can, you can, you can do an autopsy of our respective histories. We don't even, we don't even have, we don't even have a shared reality anymore. We don't, the things that we believe are happening or not happening are true, are not true. We don't agree on, on, on, on those things. So I think that when I was growing up, it was like, we kind of all agree on, it's real, but we have different beliefs about what should be done or how we should live within that reality. But now we lack a shared reality. And I don't know what the solve is for that.

I don't see it getting better because like you said, so, you know, so much of this, 90% of it is the news source, social media source that is feeding off our algorithms and is designed to, yeah, feed off of more ing or more he, more othering. of people who don't aren't listening to those news sources or social media accounts and I don't see that unless there's a major government cracked on on algorithms I just don't see that as getting any better yeah or a mass exodus from social media yeah which doesn't seem to be no likely either no yeah I mean you have you have people have left Twitter but the more people will come back and join you know I yeah that that would be the solution I think yeah

people realizing this is not good for my soul to spend all day scrolling and just sitting there in my basement fuming over, you know, real after real after real. Yeah, it's it's disheartening because I don't, you know, there are people who talk about, you know, we're headed towards a civil war. And I'm like, oh, is another dooms doomsday or, you know, part of me is like, I don't, where does this end, you know? Yeah, I don't know. It's, it's, you know, I mean, what a gift. I think, I think religion is one of the best and most healthy things, one of the best technologies, spiritual technologies we have.

And there are a lot of reasons for that. And if you've ever read Dr. Lisa Miller, who here's at Columbia University, and she'll tell you neurologically, we are built. Religion, people who participate in religion have lower rates of anxiety and depression, and they are better able to face the world with resiliency. And I'm a big, I'm a big fan.

And I'm a Christian, too. So that's the only one that I know really well. And we have such a gift, so many gifts in our faith. And one of them is this, like, simple command to love your enemy. And you can't love what you don't know. You can't love what you avoid. You can't love what you don't spend time with. And most people, I know, don't spend time with their enemies or who they believe.

believe to be their enemies. And I think it's one of the, if I could give like church's advice, it would be to get outside of our theological echo chambers and do the thing that we think is so dangerous is to come into incarnational communion with people we consider to be our enemies, to look those people in the eyes and to experience their humanities. And I think, think without that, we're lost. So good. So good. Do you remember that article we wrote all back on Romans, was it Romans 13? Did we do one or two? I think, I think, well, at least one. I remember that. It's been a minute. It's been a minute. I remember that one. Yeah. Yeah. Before I let you go, are you working on any books? I don't think you've published anything in a couple years.

I published a children's book last year. I saw that. I got a comment. Yeah, yeah. And I I've kind of been working on a couple of columns that I may or may not publish that are a little more personal in nature. But, you know, with my new job, I kind of felt like I had had this moment where I got to say a whole lot of things that I felt like I needed to say. And then I felt like this sort of calling to begin to use my creative energy, finding the next generation of voices and helping the, them to shape their work in the world. So for now, that feels like my primary creative impulse, but God has a funny way of calling me into these weird chapters. And so I don't rule out the possibility that I'll be writing some books in the future. What's it like working for Shimon and Schuster? I mean, this is the biggest, one of the biggest publishers? We are one of the

biggest. There are five big publishers. They're the big five, as they call them. And we are we are one of the big five i think we're number three uh and we are a hundred my imprint uh which is simon and schuster it's the flagship uh it is uh 101 years old so we we have you know we we have the great gatsby in the building we have you know just some of the great literature in in human history i'm working with our scrivener um uh imprint to do a re-release next year of the CS Lewis Space Trilogy, which we published. So it's a wonderful place with very, very smart people who challenged me and stretch and grow.

I feel like until I took this job, it was just cruise control. Yeah. I kind of had got, I mean, I'd gotten through my education. I'd done my work. And I was just sort of, my life was pretty easy professionally. And now I'm with people who, a lot of them are smart. harder than me, and they're more well-read than I am. They're more widely read than I am.

And so I love being in a place like that and then asking really big questions about faith within that context. So I'm kind of loving it. Jonathan, thank you so much for being back on the album. My pleasure. Thank you.