Theology in the Raw - S9 Ep967: A Theological Analysis of Netflix’s Midnight Mass: Daniel Wells

Episode Date: April 28, 2022

Daniel Wells is a pastor at Church of the Redeemer in Cortland, NY. He holds a Bachelor’s in Philosophy and Religion from Erskine College, a Master of Divinity from Reformed Theological Seminary (RTS) in North Carolina, and is in the process of completing his Masters in Christian Counseling from RTS.  In this podcast conversation, Daniel and I give a theological and cultural analysis of Netflix’s provocative show Midnight Mass. The show contains some strong and profound spiritual, theological, and ecclesiastical themes that provoke much thought and reflection on religion as a whole and the church in particular.  https://www.redeemercortland.com/staff/ –––––– PROMOS Save 10% on courses with Kairos Classroom using code TITR at kairosclassroom.com! –––––– Sign up with Faithful Counseling today to save 10% off of your first month at the link:  faithfulcounseling.com/titr or use code TITR at faithfulcounseling.com –––––– Save 30% at SeminaryNow.com by using code TITR –––––– Support Preston Support Preston by going to patreon.com Venmo: @Preston-Sprinkle-1 Connect with Preston Twitter | @PrestonSprinkle Instagram | @preston.sprinkle Youtube | Preston Sprinkle Check out Dr. Sprinkle’s website prestonsprinkle.com Stay Up to Date with the Podcast Twitter | @RawTheology Instagram | @TheologyintheRaw If you enjoy the podcast, be sure to leave a review. www.theologyintheraw.com

Hey, friends. Welcome back to another episode of Theology in the Raw. If you'd like to support the show, you can go to patreon.com forward slash theology in the raw. Support the show for as little as five bucks a month to get access to Patreon-only content like monthly Q&A podcasts, monthly blogs, and other perks like free attendance to the Theology in the Raw conference that just happened. It's too late now, but yeah, all my Patreon supporters got a free virtual pass, half off in-person attendance. It was yeah, all my Patreon supporters got a free virtual pass, half off in-person attendance. It was so awesome seeing several Patreon supporters at the conference. So if you'd like to join the community, patreon.com forward slash theology in the raw. Also, if you

don't want to support the show financially, you can advertise it. You can leave a review, promote it on your social media outlets and let people know about it if you find it helpful and interesting. My guest today is Daniel Wells. I have never met Daniel personally. We know each other on Twitter primarily and also Facebook. And both of us have been sort of chatting online about how we have really enjoyed Netflix's Midnight Mass, which is the content of this conversation. There are spoilers all throughout this conversation. And also, this is a rated R horror series. So what is a theologian and a pastor doing watching it? Well, we do talk all about that. It is morally and spiritually profound, this series. I am not recommending it because I don't know how all of you, how you watch films and movies

and stuff, and some things are more sensitive for other people, other things are fine, whatever. We all have a different way of watching films. So yeah, we found it really provocative and it ignited a really good conversation about other things like deconstruction in the church today. So please welcome to the show, for the first time, Pastor Daniel... Let me start over. Please welcome to this show for the first time, the one and only Pastor Daniel Wells. All right. hey, friends.

I'm here with Daniel Wells, and we are going to talk about Netflix's Midnight Mass. I'm really excited about this conversation. But first, Daniel, tell us a little bit about who you are, and then we'll jump into the show. Hey, Preston. Thanks so much. Big fan of the podcast. Love your work, man. Love'll jump into the show. Hey, Preston. Thanks so much. Big fan of the podcast.

Love your work, man. Love listening to this every week. Yeah, I'm Daniel Wells. I'm a pastor in the Presbyterian Church in America, so in the PCA. I'm a pastor in Cortland, New York. Cortland is like half an hour. It's right in the center of New York State. You put a dot right in the center of New York State, you hit Cortland, New York, kind of close to Syracuse, Ithaca. That's where Cornell University is at in Ithaca. So we're there. I've been here about five years, pastoring a church. Small town, kind of like Crooked Island in Mid-Might Mass. So I kind of know that it's a small town.

But yeah, I have a lovely wife, Ashley. Four amazing, still sinful, but amazing kids. But no, I love my four kids all the way from ages 10 to age 2. So yeah, I'm just glad to be here. Thanks for having me on. I figured after you did three hours talking about Dostoyevsky and Brothers K the rest of us common folk

you talk about some easier artifacts from pop culture so Midnight Mass is the best thing I came up with so there you go I love talking pop culture and I'm learning to watch films and movies and stuff more philosophically, theologically. It hasn't always been that way.

I've got a good friend of mine, Mark Buving, who is huge into just kind of understanding the theology of pop culture. And I've read a few books on it and really enjoy it. The last time I did something like this was my buddy Luke Thompson and I discussed Joker, the movie. I think that was the last time we did yeah that was that movie i need to look that up i would love to look so funny story about the joker movie maybe it's not funny maybe i should get fired as a pastor for this but when that movie came out uh what fall of 2019 um that thursday that opening night i was leading like uh our our community group and we got done around 7. I looked at the guys

and I'm like, hey, let's go see the Joker. Let's go see Y'all Phoenix nail this role. So I was like, you know, settle, praying, go see the Joker. A lot of fun doing that. I'm a very spiritual mind master. I think

we need more of that. I think films can – yeah, I do think there's a legitimate and provocative theology behind all forms of art, but film in particular. So why don't you give us a running start. Yeah, how do you watch movies? I mean, some people, it's just raw entertainment. It's, you know, I'm tired. I want to check my mind at the door.

I'm going to turn on Netflix. And, you know a place for that i guess but um i'm guessing you have a more studious uh lens when you watch films or shows is that is that right dude yeah that's a great app that makes you sound better than i am uh yeah i mean probably my main motivation is just i'm a shallow person that just loves to just turn something on and just kind of veg out relax but um no but i do love um i know like some christians you still do like worldview analysis of films and how do you see a christian worldview underlying this and i think that's helpful, but I just love good, as you said, just good arts, storytelling, pacing. But with a robust view of common grace,

doesn't need to have an explicit Christian worldview or have a Christian director or Christian script or actors, but common grace, we can find just beautiful gems. I think my favorite book on seeing Common Grace in the arts is a it's a play, a story, novel, actual artwork, movie, the best things that really resonate with our humanity in a good way. It does that because these are really echoes of our Edenic past as our humanity. And so he goes through like Jane Austen books and Harry Potter and Narnia, Middle Earth and Shakespeare and all these cool things. Yes, even Harry Potter. A lot of Christian themes in it, which that's why I love Harry Potter. So yeah, I think that notion of the echoes of Eden that we can resonate with in various works of art.

Yeah, that's really influenced me on how I approach movies and TV shows and all that. Good, good. So Midnight Mass was a show put up on Netflix, I believe, was it last fall? An eight series? Yeah, around Halloween. Perfect time to put out a creepy TV series. Halloween, yeah.

So let me give a few caveats here. First of all, this, there will be spoilers here. So if you haven't seen it and don't want to be, have stuff, give it away, then turn off this podcast.

Um, it's a, yeah, one season, eight episodes, pretty sure they can't have a second season the way, well, the way it ended.

Um, but, but who knows, you know, um, it is, the genre is horror. Um, and I would say I'm not a huge horror fan um this one so i don't i can't compare it to a ton but this one seemed kind of

horror light like i i don't the first three episodes could almost if that's all it was the the horror element it was thriller and there's some, you know, kind of scary a little bit, but not jump out and, you know, make you crap your pants kind of scary. It was just kind of like thought provoking. But then, yeah, episode four and onward, you get into some more, you know, explicit demonic vampire horror kind of stuff,

you know, going on. And there's some scenes that are like, yeah, this isn't for everybody. So, you know, people ask me, do you recommend this show? And I'm like i i don't ever like to recommend who are you and what are your what's your way you know like i just can't blanketly recommend anything my wife would never watch this i i haven't let my kids watch it yet they probably my wife just wants a good rom-com that's all yeah or the office or something yeah yeah so there are there's some caveats there i i'm not i'm not

recommending this at the same time uh you and i both agree that it it is a very um religiously provocative series in a way that you know and that's that's true of several films. They can be religiously, morally provocative. This one was, I think, in a class of its own. I can't quite, I don't, people said, why? I'm like, I don't know if I could even tell you why. It's morally complex. It's spiritually complex. morally complex. It's spiritually complex. There's no nice and easy boxes to put people in. The priest in general is such a complex figure. It's hard to know what to do with them. And then you have this dialogue, sort of the center between the atheist and the kind of nominal spiritual person who are, you know, they're kind of not quite dating yet, but I think that those two speeches on the afterlife, they're really lengthy. They're kind of placed in the center.

That seems to be really important for the, for kind of the director, kind of showing his hand a little bit, these kind of two different, one's more of a nihilistic worldview. One's more of a kind of a, I guess, typical kind of spiritual everything will work out in the end we're going to live happily ever after um i thought that i don't know maybe we shouldn't start there but i thought that that that that was a significant part of the show but i would love to hear your thoughts i mean what what is about midnight mass that has provoked you that you know you reached out to me several times on Twitter, like, we need to talk about this.

Yeah, I started to annoy you on Twitter, by the way. Received my confession, Padre, for annoying you on Twitter. Anyway, but yeah, when I first watched this, my desire after I watched it was, wow, if I could do a small group with people in my town who are what I call de-churched. We talk about people who are not followers of Jesus. We talk about different categories.

You may have seekers. You may have just a pure unchurched, just not really any experience with organized religion at all. But you have de-churched folks. And sometimes we now use the word deconstruction um folks a little more adamant about it call themselves like maybe ex-evangelical they go a certain direction but i i know a lot of de-church folks in my town because actually uh central to western new york reminds me a lot of crockett island the the location in the show where there's actually a wikipedia article about this we're central western new york so if like syracuse over to buffalo we're called the burnt over district and um basically after

the history of revivalism from the second great awakening and charles finney in the 1800s um after a while all that revivalism and kind of pent up religious emotionalism but then maybe people seeing hypocrisy in the church and things like that. This part of the country in New York is just hard soil to do gospel ministry. And people may believe in God, people may vote straight ticket Republican or whatever,

but the church is just, people are not a fan of the church around here. So it's actually, and for that reason, a lot of cults around here so it's actually uh and actually that for that reason a lot of cults sprung up in this part of new york um so that's why joseph smith was born just south of rochester new york um he's the guy who started mormonism and things like that so yeah so um this part of the country very unique very hard place um to do ministry um a mega church by anywhere else in the country like 2 000 people you get like 400 folks that's a mega church up here okay so that's

just kind of where we're at uh in our part of the country so a lot of d church folks folks that have um they may like god but a low view of the church and i think this show if i didn't have four kids where i have to like basically be at home every night and help my wife put four kids to bed and console my wife after a tough day, because she's a stay-at-home mom. So I just got to kind of be her therapist and just listen to her, how the day went. And she's got to listen to me about how ministry went that day. So my evenings are just spent in this season of life. But if I had open evenings, I would love to get a small group of folks that are kind of de-churched and watch this series and just have some really raw, helpful discussions about their experiences with the church. I think there's a lot.

And as I have coffee with de-churched folks and whatnot, a lot of those stories and experiences I've heard really resonates with the themes of this show. not a lot of those stories and experiences i've heard really resonates with the themes of this show what what yeah if you if you could imagine that that scenario getting a bunch of d church people to watch it what kinds of discussions do you think would spring up yeah so um i think maybe i think you hit you hit it earlier like you start talking about riley and aaron i think the best way to talk about the show is not like walk through the plot of the seven episodes but really the characters are really significant and are and really i think people look at these characters and they'll say yeah i know someone like riley or i'm o'reilly because i think mike flanagan the the director of the show um who's directed a lot of other horror movies like yeah the haunting and gerald's game and things like that uh i think he grew up Catholic on a small island in maybe Massachusetts

or I don't know where. But he grew up Catholic, and he's basically a de-churched individual. And so I think he sort of makes Riley his avatar in the show, someone who grew up with a really strong adamant faith, but now because of trauma. I think trauma is a big theme for this show. I think it's helpful for even a lot of Christians to realize how trauma affects people's spiritual journeys. That's how it starts.

That's the beginning of the show. That's got to be significant. Obviously, Riley has his alcoholism and the child dies because of him. At the very beginning of the show um i'll try to censor the the language of the first episode there but uh when he's sitting on the side of the road they realize this young woman is killed because of him being a drunk driver and the emt or the cop comes over and says um how come god takes away the kids but lets the's the drunkards walk away just a few scratches and that sticks with him this four years in prison he comes out of that you know a lot of people find god when

they're in prison he like lost his faith in prison um because like to the island his upbringing and he's yeah nihilist or naturalist but he's just like uh if this god's true this is a cruel god i don't want to have anything to do with this god um so that's where riley's at and i feel like that's kind of mike flanagan's avatar he grew up in the church but then trauma and just um even seeing hypocrisy from believers um kind of chases them away from it all um and so i think that's i think that overlaps a lot of people's experience um then erin green kind of a you know counterpart to riley becomes a love interest later she grew she didn't grow up with much faith she went to that church that saint patrick's church but um she had an abusive mother

a mother who would maybe go to mass and say the rosary, but she would, you know, smack her or, you know, verbally berate her and all those things. She gives this emotional talk to Riley, I think in the fourth episode about the clipped wings monologue that she gives. And so she ends up kind of coming back to faith a little bit. So it's almost like they have some similar paths with trauma, but they kind of go in some different directions. But they are kind of parallel in some ways. So I think those are just two interesting characters. As you say, they have some of the best monologues and dialogues in the show.

For a horror-themed show or movie, beautiful, amazing dialogues and monologues. Even if I don't agree with all the theology behind it all, it's just beautifully written. And you don't see that in a lot of horror flicks or whatever. So as you say, even if horror is not your favorite genre, this is not a jump-scare horror thing.

There's some graphic... It's not jump-scare, but I think if you love good writing, if you love deep monologue and it gets into theology and all that and just our humanity in this world i think a person like that would love to watch this show um as beautiful monologue and dialogue but yeah i think starting with riley and aaron is important um i think a lot of their stories overlap with some of the experiences of those who've left the church and have some trauma and baggage from that i like so let's talk about a couple of the characters first of all and i i i'm i'm

terrible with names so you fill me in the names but the the super judgmental nun what's her name um oh bev's at bev keen last name is kate beverly keen her she's like the dana carvey church lady. Oh my word. She plays the best judgy, judgy, but not unlike the church lady. She's very smart. And she rhetorically, you can see how people can wield judgmental power over people through rhetoric. She is not stupid. I would not want to go toe to toe to her with her in an argument even though what she's spouting off is nonsense and horrible she's so rhetorically shrewd you can see where people can for her she represents this kind of like brand of religion where you do have a figure like her that can wield power and gain a following you you know, is obnoxious.

You're like, you wouldn't want to be around her for more than five seconds, and yet she has kind of a loyal following and can be really intimidating. So her role is really interesting, especially for, I would imagine, de-church people who are like, yes, she is who I grew up with. You know? I don't go to church anymore is because of Bev Keene. But, you know, obviously the most – Samantha Sloyan is the actress who plays her.

She does an amazing job. She's so good. That actress nailed it. You're totally right. Just nailed that character. Great job. She does it so well that if I saw her on the street, I'd be a little bit like, ugh. Like, wait a minute.

She's just an actress. She's going to come to your conference in a week. Oh, man, she's sitting in the back. Oh, my gosh. Oh, my word. What are you doing here? an actress she's gonna come to your conference uh in a week she's sitting in the back gosh oh my word here but so the we can and we can talk about her more but the priest obviously is the most interesting yeah complex characters you're you love him you're disturbed by him you he he his sermons are profound i want to know who the story writer was like yeah who wrote those sermons are profound. I want to know who the story writer was. Yeah, who wrote those sermons?

Could they write my sermons for me? I know. There's more scripture in this series than any other series I've ever, and obscure scripture, like verses from Revelation and not just a stereotypical famous psalms, but there's these obscure scriptures

that are integrated into things and in their accurate context. I'm like, they must have had some kind of de-church theologian or somebody. Or a man who grew up in the church and grew up in a Catholic church. He probably knows a lot of Bible and scripture. Actually, to me, that's a huge theme of the show. I think this would be a great thing to talk about with people who grew up in the church but don't want anything to do with it anymore. Lots of scripture in the show,

but wow, how it's even in a slight, small way, they get twisted for evil purposes. Paul Hill or Monsignor Pruitt, spoiler, same guy, just so you know. Sorry to spoil that. I'm listening to this. But Pruitt, he eventually, he just goes more to this kind of cultic worship of what he thinks is the angel, but it's really a demon. And by the way, the scripture that comes to mind is like 2 Corinthians 11. Satan appears as an angel of light. Even this faithful Catholic priest mistakes a vampire for an angel, right? So pretty amazing. But he eventually takes the words of institution of the Lord's Supper, the sacraments, and it's not about the Lord's Supper.

It's now about this vampire's blood, and that's the blood of the New Covenant. And so he twists that um bev keen obviously will just spout off scripture uh one after the other and um this is god's i think it's episode four and five is she really makes that term where she uses scripture kind of the start this cult following we're in the last days and you you know, quoting Revelation and things like that. And even when, after they realize that Paul Hill or Monsignor Pruitt has killed

Joe, he murdered someone. I think it's the mayor, is it Wade? I think Wade, it's Liza's father. I forget his name, but I think it's Wade. But the mayor and Sturge come in and they're like, okay, the priest killed someone. And Bev just draws them in with Scripture.

It's like this is God's will, and she slaps the mayor and gets him on board. But yeah, I think Bev, twisting Scripture – and she probably knows more Bible than almost anyone else besides Paul Hill, right, the priest. Twist Scripture, and also just you say she's very, very smart, and I think she's just a great example of what spiritual abuse can look like in the church and narcissistic spiritual leadership. I'm thinking of Charles DeG groats book about when narcissism comes to church and um it's a great book by the way really helped uh open a lot of things for me um but yeah bev king's uh toxic spiritual leadership spiritual abuse uh not that they're always yelling at you per se but how they twist things and very deceptive they slowly bring you in and it's only to like after the fact that you realize what they did to you um and you know her character made me

mad at paul hill for another reason because you're mad at pruitt or paul hill because you're like why would you bring a vampire to your island like what what are you doing here you're mad at him for that you're mad at him for lying i'm actually more upset with that character for giving bev keen this prominent spiritual place in their community because she's only has this position of authority and influence because you know monsignor pruitt let her do that for years right because she um you know helped lead the service and all that and so he kind of enabled be Keene to be Bev Keene to people on the islands, right? So you're kind of mad at Pruitt for doing that as well, for kind of enabling this sort of toxicity in his own church, his own parish. From my vantage point, it seemed like he didn't really know how bad she was. It's almost like she's a little judgy, a little whatever, but she's a faithful nun.

She's a woman of God and everything. It didn't seem like until he was kind of – ended up being kind of brainwashed or whatever, it seemed like he didn't really know the depths of her toxicity. Would that be fair or do you think that. Although he knew her, he knew her her whole life. Right. So I guess maybe he had like a heart for her. Cause he probably knew her as like a little Bev running around. Right. So, um, but yeah, I think I was just like, Oh,

how could he like give her a place of influence and, um, and after all the things she does and yeah. Um, but it's going gonna be a little more mad at pruitt um lots of reason as you say lots of people be mad at him but he's also kind of admirable and shows a lot of heart and care for people especially for riley and he's would you say he's a genuine he seems and i have to go back and watch it it's been a few months since i saw it for the second time and i didn't get through the whole whole thing again but he just seemed very genuine even when he starts going dark it's like he doesn't he's now kind of demonically possessed or whatever it has this addiction

to human blood and um but almost felt bad for it's like he didn't want it like he doesn't like this about himself he's tormented and like seems to genuinely want to care and care for people. Would that be accurate? Do you think he's darker than that? I think so. I mean, I think, you know, him starting that little private AA group with Riley. Right. Because, you know, Riley grew up as an altar boy, right?

So I think he really cares about Riley. I mean, I think it was in episode one when Riley makes his first appearance back at the parish there. And when he's leaving, he says goodbye to Pruitt. I mean, Pruitt just kind of stares at him. I think he really cares about Riley and knows what's happened to Riley and he's back. So I think, yeah, I sense a lot of care, shepherding care. Just, yeah, kind of a good pastor's heart for the most part in Pruitt. I think I would just call Pruitt self-deceived. And even spiritually self-deceived,

where he has his own trauma, right? Because years and years and years ago, I don't think it was an affair, because I don't think Mildred was married, but they slept together, kept it a secret from the town because as a priest, he should be celibate. And that,

and that's why Mildred gives birth to Sarah, who becomes the island's doctor. But, you know, he lives his whole life where he can't be with the woman he loves. He's got to keep the secrets. And then he sees all that he loves, you know,

basically dying before his eyes. And, you know, she has Alzheimer's and things like that and just kind of on her last legs so that's a little bit of trauma I think that leads to some of the very poor decisions that he makes

he's desperate, he's not in his own right mental state as he's in the Holy Land and he encounters that vampire there in the tombs or whatever but yeah I think self-deception even religious self-deception is a big theme in the in the tombs or whatever um but yeah i think self-deception uh even religious self-deception um is a big theme in the show because um i think you know i think you're right pruitt is genuine yeah he really believes in hopes that this is gonna save the island yeah we look at we're like

you crazy look at this guy he looks like an evil vampire character right but uh but he's deceived and kind of is hoping for the best of this thinking it's an angel so i i didn't cap catch that he brought the demon back i thought that the demon just gave him like his life back and he went back home and i didn't did i miss it that he was that there was like a plan when he came back he knew the demon was going to come back and do this he wanted to bring him back i think in episode three he had like this kind of ongoing monologue he's like giving his confession before he about to lie to the whole parish about you know everything and he it's like an episode long by the end of the episode you realize oh uh he is Pruitt.

But I think, I forget what he says, where it's like either at night the demon would kind of fly to wherever, like fly and travel to wherever he was at because he's traveling back to Crocodile Island. But the first episode, you see that big case or whatever, and you hear like a knock on the inside so the to the the the vampires inside there that's how he traveled to the island in that um that big box right oh i missed that yes yeah so like the first because the first couple episodes like you don't know what it is right oh so he brought the vampire back he's like flying around right so he did

bring the vampire to crocodile island to bring salvation to bring healing miracles and all those things like he was very intentional in that um so yeah big so i think this is a great lesson for pastors like me and so if i was in a group full of um maybe d church folks uh this would be a great part of the discussion where I would say, hey, who ever here has ever had a spiritual leader or a pastor or someone who messed up and they apologized to you? And probably no one would raise their hands because pastors are just not very good at that and we're prideful and sinful. And I hope I could be able to maybe kind of do that blue-like jazz,

Donald Miller's opposite confession, and say, well, let me repent to you. Let me share some of my sins, even though I'm the pastor of the clergy. Because, yeah, I'm sure people have been, because Riley loves, even though Riley lost his faith, he still has a heart, and he loves Pruitt. He has all his memories of Monsignor Pruitt,

and now he's kind of established a relationship with Paul Hill, and he's not spiritual, but he with paul hill and um he's not spiritual but he still has a respect for this this pastor in his life um but this pastor ends up hurting him in the end and um i think uh to help people who are de-churched or just traumatized from the church a little bit of healing can happen if spiritual leaders and pastors kind of led with repentance um and apologizing for how even even with good intentions we can cause abuse we can cause harm um even knowingly or unknowingly uh still reason enough to repent of those things and i'm not enough folks hear that from pastors no that's really helpful. And I feel like apart from being self-deceived and turning into a vampire and all that stuff, aside from that, like Pruitt, he just models such a

healthy spiritual approach to somebody like Riley. Like if there ever is a spiritual figure who's going to win Riley back, his approach is so good. Like he, it's such a great model. Like when somebody is doubting, they're deconstructing, they have a problem with this, they have a problem with that. The way Pruitt like says, yeah, I get it, man. Yeah, I wrestle with that too. And then one time when he calls out his BS and is like swearing, you know, like, you know, just like, hey, let's just cut the BS. Let's just get after this, you know? And no, you do have, you are strong. Or how are you, I forget how he, but he's so encouraging him and validating him. And just, again, it's genius how whoever the writer is, I mean, I don't know if it's Flanagan or whoever, but just the way they portray him, it's like, man, this is the type of pastoral approach that de-church people need in the sense, not that it's necessarily going to win them back, but I think this is like, oh, I can get on board with this kind of religious leadership. Is that,

I mean. Yeah. Yeah. He nailed it. Like all the reasons you can bash Pruitt's on the show, but yeah, he nailed it. Like, so all the reasons you can bash Pruitt on the show. But yeah, he does, as you said, he models really a healthy shepherd's heart and real, like, as you as you would say, raw dialogue. Right. Yeah. Those A.A. meetings are theology in the raw, man. Like they talk about everything, you know, and he gets very raw and he's not afraid to drop a curse word, not afraid to, yeah, say, you know, get a little rough with Riley, you know, maybe later on in the series before Riley dies. But early on shows his heart for him.

And, yeah, it's definitely a great model for, you know, you call it long term relational. I don't want to say relational evangelism, you know, but something like that, right? Where they're just, you know, I'm just going to pour into this relationship and see what the Lord does. And show honesty, vulnerability. Even if you have a rough conversation, this person will know that I still love them, even if it's kind of a tough conversation. Yeah, he does that very well. So I will watch those little AA sessions and things like that and be like, wow, that's some good things to emulate.

I wouldn't bring a vampire to my church, but this stuff he's doing is pretty good, like being a counselor, basically. So how do I say it? I was surprised given how nuanced and complex the storyline was. I was a little shocked at how just explicit and predictable the role of the demon was. He even looks like if a five-year-old was going to draw a demon. Aside from the demon being referred to as the angel, I thought that was creative. I kind of like that. I mean, like is the wrong word.

What is the role of the demon in the larger picture? Is it just as straightforward as it is? It's like, yeah, this is, I don't know what, powers of darkness invading religious territory and religion being co-opted by darkness. Or, I mean. Yeah. There's probably multiple themes overlapping there.

Yeah. I mean, I guess you could critique, in terms of the aesthetics of the show. By the way, I thought the show was beautifully filmed. Yeah. Oh, yeah. The music's great. Like, it kind of makes you like,

listen to old school hymns again, because of all the hymns they play with beautiful choral music in the background like listen to old school hymns again, because of all the hymns they play with beautiful choral music in the background. So if you love him, you'll love this, this, this show.

Yeah. Yeah. You don't be shot. Beautiful dialogue. So yeah. Flanagan's just, yeah. I mean,

that's not a typical horror flick, right? It's actually beautifully done, beautifully shot. And, but you know, I guess if it's gonna be a scary show, you gotta make the vampire look scary. So uh but you know i guess if it's gonna be a scary show you gotta make the vampire look scary so uh but you know kind of dressing them up um he's got a hat and a trench

coat and yeah you know it's an episode four when uh he finally attacks riley and um he comes in first as he's cruet and he just kind of you know, like you see his little vampire finger coming to his lips. He goes, you're like, that's just kind of creepy. I think it works sort of, again, make something scary.

But, you know, obviously there's a lot of themes overlaps with this, the vampire character. So it's like, yeah, is it an angel or a demon? And the second Corinthians 11 passage.

And, um, uh, basically, you know, basically from this beautiful little island parish, a cult starts up because of this vampire. And lots of issues with self-deception. And, you know, you can be told many, many true things, but be deceived and end up believing a lot of wrong things that are destructive. And I think a lot of folks that group in religious contests can identify with that.

That even religious experience, genuine religious experience can involve deception. We can be deceived from others. We can have our own self-deception. Just the other week, I was talking with a person in our town who swore that they had a vision that their loved one was healed. Their loved one had a terminal illness and someone prayed over them and prayed for healing. This person thought they had a vision from God that their loved one was healed and that the cancer left their body, all those things. And then, you know, their loved one eventually passed away just a few days later. And they kind of came back down. They said to me what was i thinking how could i have been so

like deceived of these things it's like that that happens a lot especially to religious folks we get our own uh religious experience can really deceive us and um do a number on us um we can be gullible sometimes we need to to be, so I would tell a good lesson for Christians from the show, the role of the vampire here, we need to be very discerning and very critical, even of what spiritual

leaders tell us, you know, whether you do the Berean test and get your Bible up and look up every passage or really just being discerning and critical of people's character and authenticity right um but also i think another theme with this uh with the vampires what does it mean in a church or religious context to submit to someone who has a position of power and influence um can someone with that power and influence have good intentions yet still abuse that power

the answer is yes because paul hill or pruitt is the best example of that i don't think that bev has good intentions but she probably believes what she believes very genuinely um this is a great show that uh don't just blindly follow spiritual authorities. They can have great intentions for you, but still be abusive with their power. And really, the vampire is kind of the artifact that helps that he drives the story forward. I mean, once Bev discovers what's going on, it just kind of kicks into high gear

and it becomes a cult at that point, right? I think a final theme, kind of this is going to be very doctrinal here, but you just said N.T. Wright on your podcast. This will go along with all that he said, but really it's an over-realized eschatology. Father Hill thinks that heaven's going to come to earth in its fullness right now. His loved one, Mildred, she's going to be fully healed. He can restore his relationship with his daughter, Sarah. All the problems that have plagued this island from the oil spill and just the drowning economy and people have left the island, it's going to all reverse. I think in one of the earlier sermons in the series, maybe it's episode 3,

he quotes Jesus saying to disciples, cast your nets over there. He basically takes that pericope where Jesus is calling his disciples through their vocation as fishermen and he applies that to the economy of the island. God's going to do miracles here too. So he's already kind of twisting scripture, sort of like a quasi health and wealth prosperity gospel. But basically heaven's going to come to earth right now.

And we're going to be like that first colony of, this first heavenly colony here on earth. We're special. God's going to do amazing things with us. And obviously Pruitt falls for that pretty quickly. Bev is all in on that. But gosh, what destruction that leaves in its wake, right? When people get to the end of that,

they're like, oh, we went too far here. Heaven's not going to come to earth quite just yet. Do you think the point is to explain and unpack and critique religious cults or to show that religion is, at the end of the day, fundamentally cultish? I think it's the latter. Yeah, I think it's the latter. Because he really is, not just happens to not be religious anymore, fundamentally cultish or is it i think it's the latter yeah i think it's the latter because he really is not just happens to not be religious anymore but probably has some issues with

institutionalized religion yeah and um so we hit on earlier the the speech from riley about what happens at death yeah i think it's episode four um And then Aaron's speech about death. When she's dying, you hear her earlier monologue that she gave earlier, but now it's kind of playing as she's being killed by the vampire. But she saves. She may have saved the entire world because she clips the wings of the vampire. And it's pretty clear from the end that when the sun rises, the vampire gets eviscerated by the sun.

So really her sacrifice may have saved the rest of the world, preventing that vampire from leaving the island. But, you know, Riley has this speech about death. As you say, it's very nihilistic, naturalistic view of things where, you know, know once he dies his brain cells over the next five minutes will begin to die but he'll be in a dream state and i guess we've kind of discovered this through science like what happens to you physiologically when you die and he says and that's that and then um probably the most significant monologue of the entire series which i did copy and paste on my google doc here i won't read it before i google it yourself for those listening google it and listen to what uh or read what erin says but

she basically it's a kind of a pantheistic um view where her energy gets bound up in the energy of the cosmos and that's what's what eternity will be um so it's almost like uh and i'm probably gonna say this this saturday when i'm officiating a funeral for a 42 year old man who died of stage four pancreatic cancer a couple weeks ago i have to do a funeral but i'm gonna say this at the funeral is that you have some folks today that think that the end is gonna be that we are recycled and that's kind of what riley thinks we were just basically recycled and just kind of ceased to exist other folks kind of go with the reincarnation worldview right and that's kind of what aaron's getting at this pantheism we're going to kind of be absorbed back into the cosmos and still live on in some way. But biblical eschatology says

it's not, we're being recycled, we're not being reincarnated, we're going to be resurrected. Not just our bodies, but this whole world will be resurrected. I'm sure as N.T. Wright and others have said on your podcast, just beautifully what that means

for the new creation and all those things. And so I guess what I would just say to some good friends who are still wrestling with their church background, wondering if the church offers anything good for them, I just would ask, you know what? Forget whether you think it's what's true or not true, but what's a better story to believe in? Like what's a more hopeful story that we're just going to be recycled or

you'll be reincarnated like you know live through the eighth grade again i'd never want to do that by the way i hated the eighth grade i want to be reincarnated and live through middle school again or this bible uh perspective of the the new heavens a new earth the resurrection the life of the world to come um uh i think the resurrection worldview is at least the most hopeful and the best story you can tell whether you think it's true or not um it's a better story than what either riley tells what aaron tells in the end um and so um i think that'd be a great discussion to have with some friends if you are watching this and analyzing these monologues and uh what aaron and what

riley say do you know i'm curious i don't know if this is a significant part of the show but what what happens to aaron's child and what's the significance of that you know she's pregnant and then all of a sudden god is that i i couldn't fit that into the i so the you know the uh pruitt's mistress or whatever you know going from super old and dementia to super young and hot. That's the new life. There is this kind of new life, this heaven on earth. That made sense, but the disappearance of the child in the womb,

I couldn't figure that out. Yeah. I mean, what I would take with that, I think it's in episode three or four when that happens. It's kind of halfway through the series. I think it's just showing the consequences for pruitt's decision um what he thinks gonna bring you know health and life and blessing and miracles now it's bringing like this is the

opposite of a miracle it's bringing death basically we've lost the life of the womb and actually one thought i had i don't know if this was Flanagan's purpose in putting this story into the plot there, but I wonder, as our culture looks at the church and says, okay, the church says that they're pro-life, but really, is the church really pro-life? Maybe they're just anti-abortion, but not really pro-life. If they were really pro-life, they would be more than just anti-abortion. They would be pro- better health care for young women. They would provide for

children born in horrible circumstances. It would just be more what my friend Scott calls womb-to-tomb pro-life Christians. I wonder... Alan Flanagan was thinking of this, but my takeaway from that, a second time was, what is this like a little bit of a critique for the church that the only thing the church really cares about is like the life in the womb,

but not everything else that happens to that life afterwards. Um, I know like I've had a lot of non-Christian friends tell me, ah, you're anti-abortion, but you're not really pro-life because you just care about the womb stuff. But what about after the womb? Okay, so if you take the whole package together, then I had it all in my mind. So you think it is kind of signaling to this abortion theme. I mean, it's a life in the womb that's no more. So it's almost like this complex religious thing going on, which has a blend of authenticity, self-deception, blatant evil, spiritual misuse of spiritual power, has almost a result of going against the very thing we say we're standing for. We love life in the womb, but it's almost like, well, is religion really fostering life in the womb?

Yeah, oh, that's a great way to put it, yeah. I don't know if Flanagan's going that direction, but I think it'd be a great discussion topic to have with some friends that are watching this with you, because, again, another area for the church to repent, right? For the church to show confession and repentance in that area. I read a stat somewhere. Well, I forget the exact stat. I'm going to ballpark it. I'm going to say 25, 30%. It's somewhere within that range. It's a decent percentage of women who get abortions are part of a very conservative religious environment. It may even be like 25% are Baptist women,

and the abortion is in secret because there would be so much shame that they had sex outside of marriage that they couldn't dare tell the very unforgiving community of what happened. So the result is abortion. So that when Christians say they stand for abortion, it's just, is abortion so that when Christians say they stand for abortion, it's just, as I do, we have to look at the complexity of the environments that nurture and perhaps even encourage, unintentionally maybe, abortion. Like, can religion be playing a role in nudging people toward abortion? Like, that's a discussion I don't see happening as much as it probably should. Yeah. I'm hopeful that the church can have these more discussions,

especially after, I think it was Mark Yarhouse's book, Costly Obedience, where he was a statistic that on average, was it seven years between the moments a young LGBT person is aware that they're different, aware that they're gay or whatever, seven years between that moment and the next

and then they confess, they come out and tell someone they trust, like an adult or parent, pastor, teacher. I think it's seven years as the average. So it's like seven years of loneliness and shame and their own thoughts, perhaps even self-harming thoughts to themselves. And it's like, all right, the church needs to do something better. The thoughts of these discussions and make sure that we're a safe haven and a safe place for any kind of person, any kind of center.

Just to say, this is what I'm struggling with, and we can be a loving family for them. Yeah. Yeah. So I never, I've not heard that statistic that you gave, but I wouldn't be surprised if that's true and that the church needs to do better in that area as well. Yeah. I think purity culture stuff.

Yeah. That has an effect on it too. So, yeah. Well, you know, I often say that i did that um i think you're right about the seven year statistic there's another with the lgbt population you know 83 percent are raised in a christian church 51 percent end up leaving the church um but only three percent said they left primarily for the church's teaching on a traditional view of marriage and same-sex relationships. And the reasons for leaving are all largely relational and some pretty

terrible things. And what I often say is, you know, Christians often look at the quote-unquote, air quotes, the loud and proud, angry gay activist who hates Christianity. And I said, in most cases, that loud and proud activist was once sitting in our pews, silent and scared to the teenager, scared to death that somebody in the church would find out that this is what they're going through. Because in most contexts, that would lead to a lot of shame and ostracism and sometimes even abuse and so on. And then, yeah, it's the complexity. This is what I love about men, trying to bring it back, you know.

Yeah, what we're saying about abortion and LGBT stuff, sometimes religion is unintentionally, unintentionally, you know, playing a role in creating the very thing we say we're against or whatever. Yeah. By the way, I don't know if you know,

this is only the second viewing i don't know why i didn't see the first time but i think in the second episode um so sarah gunning the doctor who's also the daughter you find out later of a pruitt um so i didn't know that she apparently is a lesbian or she was she uh she had a she's on a second date with a woman um yeah on the main yeah yeah i didn't see that um until the second viewing so i'm like okay so there's that issue what if um because she's she doesn't go to church um she doesn't attend mass uh until her mom gets healed and then she starts attending again so i wonder what the backstory is there with her, probably her struggle with her sexual orientation, what the church thinks, and maybe what her mom thought at one point.

So I'd love to know that backstory. That had anything to do with her withdrawing from the church community. You know, that's an interesting point. I'm glad that they didn't make that super explicit because to me that would be a little bit like low like yeah a little bit easy you know oh this religious whatever hates gay people or just that narrative it's like it's too i don't know too predictable i'm glad that they left that a little bit open-ended she's not in church you know you see her on a date with her girlfriend on the mainland and then it just kind of leaves it at that like there's probably several reasons why

all these people in the island at least initially you know don't go to church the one church in town has like five people and then all of a sudden you know several episodes later it's a packed house because of the revival happening the demonic revival what do you let's let revival. For the last 10 minutes or so, let's move on to the contemporary discussion about deconstruction. I know we didn't plan on doing this, but it's lingering behind a lot of the stuff we're talking about. You're a pastor in a de-churched environment. There is a very, you know, I guess controversial, maybe that's not the best term, conversation about deconstruction, whether that's good or bad, what are we deconstructing from, how are deconstructors reconstructing and so on and so forth. Have you thought through this conversation that's been going on? Yeah. and if I were to give any little good resource article

on, I think, a healthy way for Christians to think about deconstruction, my old seminary professor, Michael Kruger, he's written a lot of books on the canon of Scripture, and he's a New Testament scholar. He's the president at RTS Charlotte, down in Charlotte. And so he wrote a blog on his blog. It's at michaeljkruger.com.

I think it's from January 6th of this year. It's, is deconstruction the same as deconversion? And basically he says, not necessarily. Just because you're deconstructing doesn't mean you're deconverting, per se. You ask, well, what do you keep deconstructing? And he basically gives a sympathetic view like you know what there may be some good reasons for certain folks who grew up in the church to deconstruct certain things and i think he really has a posture of we need to be good

listeners we need to have humility um honestly when christian twitter is debating hey should we be using this word deconstruction i'm just just like, you know what? What word are our neighbors and friends using when we have coffee with them? Let's just, let's not put a terminology debate. I'm sure, you know, with revoice, it's like you get like a terminology war, right? And it's just like, you know what? I just don't think our neighbors that are,

for some reason want to have coffee with us. I don't think they're into our little terminology warfare, right? That Christian Twitter gets all up in arms in. And so I just think the church needs to be really good listeners with our neighbors and friends and loved ones who, maybe they use that word deconstruction, maybe they're not. But I think the one, my favorite little, I don't want to call it evangelistic or apologetics tool, but my favorite things I've learned from Tim Keller about talking to people who are not followers of Jesus, but maybe grew up in the church and have some trauma and baggage there. When someone is describing, you know, hey, this is what I learned in my church growing up. This is what my pastor taught me. you know hey this is what i learned in my church growing up this is this is what my pastor taught me let's say they give you a view of the gospel or of jesus um that is either not orthodox or

not the same as the gentle and lowly jesus that we read about now in scripture uh keller says that what he'll say to them is you know what i'm glad you don't believe in that jesus i don't believe in that jesus either yeah yeah, and he says that that can really take the conversation in a very healthy direction. I remember a couple of years ago, right beginning of the pandemic, or maybe right before talking to a woman going through divorce, she grew up in a very Baptist church. She went to Oklahoma Baptist university. Um, she, um, just, yeah, I grew up in some more Baptistic, maybe legalistic church backgrounds. But she walked away from the church a little bit.

She's going through a divorce. And she told me, she's like, you know what, Daniel, the problem I have with the Bible, with Jesus, is that this whole notion that God the father was pissed off at us. And so Jesus had to come and like die for us. So that God's no longer mad at us. She's like, how is that good news? And I got really emotional with her. I said, you know what?

I'm sorry that that's what you were taught in a church growing up. Like, I'm sorry that someone taught you you were taught in a church growing up. Sorry that someone taught you that. Because the Bible says that God so loved the world in order that he might give us his only son. It was the Father's love that sent the son, not the Father being pissed off before he sent the son. And that's just an example of how we just need to be really good conversation partners, admit where the church has gotten it wrong, hold up the biblical Jesus, the gentle and lowly Jesus. You can tell I love that book, Gentle and Lowly, by Dane Ortlund. I just love that book.

So, yeah, we really need to do a lot of good work. I think it'll just take a lot of coffee conversations or a lot of conversations at the pub, a lot of patience and just long-term relationships to help people reconstruct. They need to deconstruct an unbiblical view of Jesus that they were given in the church growing up. We need to be their

helpers to come alongside and say, can I have permission to share with you who the biblical Jesus really is? But I think a lot of humility, a lot of listening, not correcting terminology at every single point. We do that so much on Christian Twitter. It's annoying. We seem to not do that anymore. So I haven't really followed the conversation. Well, I know there's been articles written back and forth and i kind of know some of the people writing them so i i don't know what is the debate really like i

wouldn't be able to articulate that um it doesn't to me it just seems what you're saying seems like a no-brainer someone says i am deconstructing. I have deconstructed. My next question is from what? Yeah. I mean, what are you shedding? Like, is it a good thing or a bad thing? Yeah. Is it a total deconstruction?

Are you just like deconstructing parts? Are you just kind of reforming your beliefs? Like, what exactly do you mean? Yeah. Just ask follow-up questions, right? That's what it means to be a loving neighbor, just have dialogue. Hopefully, I think any sound Christian should be able to admit that there are

cultural artifacts embedded within American Christianity, some of which are neutral, some of which are bad, and some of which might be good. Let's sort that out. Within any religion, it's going to be entangled with its cultural expression, and some of that needs to be shedded. And American Christians, I would be on the side of, I think there's a lot, a lot of how we think about our faith, religion, whatever that has been seriously affected by our culture. Again, it doesn't mean it's all bad.

It just means we need to examine the parts that have been intertwined with our faith and see does this resonate with Christianity or does it conflict with it? And so I don't – we have a moral mandate to deconstruct, if we want to use that term, from certain things that don't need to be there. So I just – I don't know. What am i missing like what are um the people that are not that are critical of people deconstructing like what um i don't know i think it's two things i think we just again we get all bent out of shape with the wrong verbiage or whatever um which i think is kind of shallow this just my opinion but uh uh i think the other thing is

that i think when our idol when our own idols get attacked we can get angry um okay i think we get angry when i feel our own idols are being attacked so um even though i'll agree with every conclusion in the book uh when i read um the jesus and john wayne book this year um a lot resonated a lot of it i agreed with and um one part in midnight mass that kind of ties into what she says in the book with like kind of the militarization of the church and like military language. Like we're the army of God. So I think it's in episode five where it's on the Good Friday service that Pruitt's leading. And that's when he finally gets militaristic and says, we are the army of God and our kingdom, no flags, no boundaries. And we're starting now. And so it's like his first

militaristic, um, sort of sermon. And that's when Mildred, his old love interest, who's now healthy and in church, she, her demeanor changes and she walks out and she tells Sarah, that's not the man that I knew. This is not the church that I knew. And she's walks out in anger because of that militaristic sermon. Um, and so I thought that, and I'm pretty sure a lot of folks who grew up in the church have walked away, heard maybe it was on 4th of July or Memorial day or some patriotic holiday, some, um, you know, we are the Lord's army. And lord's army and uh and some of that soldier language is in the bible it's not predominant but it's there but it becomes the

overarching theme by which you describe the whole christian life and i think it's i think it's been very helpful and um pretty traumatizing for a lot of folks um yeah so just seeing that um made me think of the jesus and john John Wayne book a little bit. Like, yeah, I'm with everything she writes in the book, but I think there's a lot there that contemporary evangelical pastors like me need to reckon with and repent of and all those things. And even people that do actually deconstruct their faith. I'm thinking public people like Joshua Harris or somebody. Even that, my response is curiosity. Like, wow, what's – even there I want to know when you say I no longer believe, I want to understand what that even means. Because, again, there might be a Jesus you're rejecting that I reject too.

If it is genuinely rejecting the actual Jesus of the gospels, then man, that's sad. I find Jesus to be a super compelling figure. What is it about him that you don't find compelling anymore? To me, there still is a spark of curiosity, not judgment, maybe a bit of sadness. But could it be this? And my question has to do, again, with people that are concerned and not – they are concerned about the kind of – maybe the glorification of deconstruction where it has become almost like a trendy thing. And I could see that. That could be problematic where it becomes – Yes. That could be problematic where it becomes, you know, almost like how some mental health conditions are almost becoming like celebrated identities. You know, if you don't have a mental health issue, it's almost like, I don't know, in some circles, it's like you're not on the end or whatever. So maybe it can be that.

Maybe an overly glorification of deconstruction. Is that maybe some of the concern? Oh, yeah. I mean, gosh, we're all idol makers. I mean, John Calvin said that our hearts are idol factories, right? That's what we do best. We're good at worshiping these self-made idols. So anything good in this world, we can make into an idol.

So I'm sure that's definitely true. But yeah, you know, with someone like Joshua Harris, when I listened to the episode on the Rise and Fall of Mars Hill podcast where they just interviewed him, which I thought was one of the best episodes of that whole podcast series. I think it's my favorite episode. But, you know, when he basically talked about when he discovered weights, basically the Bible doesn't command Christians that they have to homeschool their children because he grew up in the homeschooling world, right? Like his parents were like a big part of that homeschooling world. And I've seen that. We homeschool one of our kids. unhealthy mentality where, you know,

just an unhealthy way that they twist Scripture like you see in Midnight Mass where, you know, Deuteronomy 6, you know, when your children rise up and walk by the way and they lie down teaching the Word of the Lord, they take that and say, okay, that means they can't go to school. They have to be homeschooled.

People do that? Yeah, and that's a proof text that gets used. As a pastor, I just think, wait, if it's a biblical imperative, you must homeschool your children. What do I tell the single mom working two jobs? She's also got to homeschool her kids. She's sending them to public school. And I think when certain – it's not really the parents, but when the students grow up and they're like wait my mom or my dad they homeschool me because they thought it was a biblical command from god but maybe it was not a good experience

from them maybe it was some harmful things happen and they just kind of fuse that little fundamentalism about schooling and whatever um with their religious upbringing as a Christian and they tossed the whole thing away. And I saw a little bit of that in the Harris interview, plus the whole stuff with Sovereign Grace and the abuse cover-up. That did the most, I think, damage on him, which I think with anyone

would go through that, right? But yeah, that was very Cali, that interview with Harris. Your heart kind of breaks for the guy. Yeah. I had him on this podcast a few years ago. It was before he renounced his faith, but after he renounced his book, where he told the publisher to take it off the shelves and everything,

that I was stating goodbye. So he was on this trajectory. the shelves and everything that i was stating goodbye so it's kind of he was on this trajectory um and even you know i've been raised in a conservative context like i've seen people when certain conservative values or doctrines are associated with christianity like a younger theology or um a literal interpretation of everything in the Bible. You know, Jonah must be literal, Adam must be literal, and maybe they are. But when they're saying, if you depart from this kind of reading of the Bible,

you know, ancient biblical writers must have a modern cosmology. They believed in a round earth. They believed in a heliocentric, you know, all these things. It's like, maybe, probably not, but, you know, but that's not, don't equate that with Christianity so that if all of a sudden you come to the conclusion that, yeah, I wonder if there's more metaphors in Genesis 1 to 11, people say, well, you're equating a certain conservative interpretation with the essence of Christianity. That's a recipe for disaster. I mean, and that brand of Christianity – for people that are nervous about this deconstruction movement, it's like, well, we have to have the humility to ask, what role have we played in that journey? Have we created a kind of Christianity that is kind of fostering that kind of, you know,

byproduct? Yeah, politics is the big one. I remember my church growing up, right before the election, they would hand out those little Christian voter guide things to all of us, like, before that Tuesday. You know, I remember a lot of those things in my church growing up. I thought I had a really good church

upbringing. It didn't traumatize me, but, I see some of those unhealthy things that I'm sure could affect someone negatively. So yeah, I think unbelievers or people that are deconstructing, they need some healthy, gospel-minded Christians that enter into those deconstruction conversations and be a healthy, safe dialogue partner. So I don't think we should, we should not run away. We should forge into that

and have more cups of coffee with folks and have those conversations. Well, Daniel, you seem like a pretty cool pastor. Glad that you're out there in that difficult terrain. So thanks for the conversation, man. I really appreciate it. And you're giving us a lot of food. Thank thanks for the conversation, man. I really appreciate it.

And you've given us a lot of food for thought. And I hope for those of you who haven't watched Midnight Mass, who maybe now want to, I would say still do it. We gave away some spoilers. But honestly, if I put myself in the shoes of somebody who hasn't seen it yet, the stuff we're talking about, it's like they might have a little bit of a running start now, but I think it would still be a very engaging show to watch.

But I'm not recommending it. You should do a watch party next week. You should do a watch party. The after party should be all watching Midnight Mass after everyone's done speaking at the conference. There are a few disturbing graphic scenes. I wouldn't say not just violent, more just dark,

but they don't dominate the show. There's a few scenes that... One guy is exploded by the sun. Not a big deal, but it's all good. Licking up a blood coming out of the guy's head. I mean, yeah, but it's all good. Licking up a blood coming out of a guy's head. I mean, but other than that, it's practically Disney. But some of the most dangerous films,

this is why my friend Cutter Calloway is drawing attention to this. Some of the most dangerous films to ever watch. Do not let your kids go near our Disney films that have such a warped, subtle view of romance and love. And they're dangerous because, oh, these are safe. And so we just freely let our kids absorb these secular views of romance and love and marriage that are so lodged in the heart of millions of Christian kids in America that it becomes so destructive when they do, some of them fall in love and maybe get married. And these romance, secular romantic narratives are so lodged in

their soul because they're not explicitly evil in the sense that we often say that. So we just let it just seep down deep into our spiritual bones. That's the most dangerous thing to do. So I'll let people smoke on that. When I do pre-pronouncing, I'd tell couples I'm like, forget every Tom Hanks and Meg Ryan film you've ever watched. That's not how romance works.

So, so again, we got to deconstruct people on their Meg Ryan and Tom Hanks movie stuff. So anyway. Yeah. I have much more to say about that, but I've got to let you go. I'm sure you have people to go marry and bury and do whatever pastors do. My kids just got home.

It's going to become World War III in a second. Okay. Anyway. All right. Hey, great talking to you, bro. All right. Thanks, Preston. Appreciate it.

See you. See you. See you. See you.