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Speaker 1: If you have your own story of being in a

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Speaker 1: cult or a high control group.

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Speaker 2: Or if you've had experience with manipulation or abuse of

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Speaker 2: power that you'd like to share.

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Speaker 1: Leave us a message on our hotline number at three

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Speaker 1: four seven eight six trust.

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Speaker 2: That's three four seven eight six eight seven eight seven eight.

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Speaker 1: Or shoot us an email at trust Me pod at

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Speaker 1: gmail dot com.

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Speaker 3: Trust Me. Trust Me. I'm like a swat person. I've

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Speaker 3: never lied to you. I've never had a lie about.

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Speaker 2: If you think that one person has all the answers,

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Speaker 2: don't welcome to trust Me. The podcast about cults, extreme

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Speaker 2: belief and manipulation from two friends who've actually experienced.

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Speaker 4: It iom Lo La Blanc and I'm Megan Elizabeth.

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Speaker 2: And Today is part one of our two part episode

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Speaker 2: with Kyle and Carry, former members of the two X

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Speaker 2: two s, which is the group that Megan grew up

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Speaker 2: in Whoop wo. Kyle and Curry have a lot to

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Speaker 2: say about recent developments in the group, which we will

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Speaker 2: get into, but in this episode we're going to focus

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Speaker 2: more on the religion in general and their per stories

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Speaker 2: of deconstructing their beliefs. We'll discuss the structure of the group,

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Speaker 2: which has no official church buildings and is primarily led

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Speaker 2: by pairs of ministers called workers.

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Speaker 5: How Kyle and.

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Speaker 2: Curry joined and met as kids, and the differences between

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Speaker 2: their experiences and Megan's.

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Speaker 1: We'll get into what they believed and the beliefs they

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Speaker 1: never discussed, how the pandemic led them both to question

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Speaker 1: their religion in different ways, and how they found their

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Speaker 1: way back to each other after a difficult period of disconnection,

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Speaker 1: and the next week we'll dive into the Facebook group

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Speaker 1: that they started, which was initially just a place for

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Speaker 1: former two y two folks to get some support and

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Speaker 1: the life shattering experience of leaving their religion. But how

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Speaker 1: when people finally had a place to share their stories,

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Speaker 1: it snowballed into some devastating revelations about the group.

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Speaker 2: Yes, and all that is coming next week, But Megan,

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Speaker 2: I'm curious. So this is the group that you grew

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Speaker 2: up in. This is the religion that you know your

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Speaker 2: family believed in, very much believes in, believes in present

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Speaker 2: tents so corret Yeah, So what are your thoughts on

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Speaker 2: this right now?

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Speaker 4: I mean, just it's.

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Speaker 1: An utter chaotic mindset really and just this complete torn

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Speaker 1: down the middle of trying to protect the good part

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Speaker 1: of the church and the good people in the church

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Speaker 1: and the innocent, wholesome ways in which they worship, and

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Speaker 1: also help show what can happen when these beliefs get

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Speaker 1: taken too literally and you start programming generations of people

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Speaker 1: to look to workers as almost godlike figures.

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Speaker 2: Yeah, this interview really clarified a lot of things for

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Speaker 2: me about the two by twos, which, as we will discuss,

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Speaker 2: don't call themselves the two by twos. No, which kept

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Speaker 2: so many people from being able to share their stories

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Speaker 2: with each other for so long. But it's a very

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Speaker 2: unique structure, and it is uniquely positioned for people to

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Speaker 2: be taken advantage of by the wrong people. Yeah, it's

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Speaker 2: so hard when people you love and people you know

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Speaker 2: are good people subscribe to a belie system that like

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Speaker 2: wouldn't necessarily inherently be harmful if it weren't for the

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Speaker 2: bad people sort of hijacking it.

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Speaker 1: Yeah, and it's also uniquely positioned for like the most

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Speaker 1: wholesome best times ever in family connections, Like most of

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Speaker 1: my high school friends still keep in contact with my parents.

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Speaker 1: My parents don't have a television. People in the group

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Speaker 1: don't when you call home, there's always company. They're playing games, Jenga, laughing.

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Speaker 1: We always went outside, we always spent time together. We

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Speaker 1: always just had, you know, an avoidance of some problems

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Speaker 1: that families have that I'm sure this group lent itself

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Speaker 1: into avoiding. So there's an upside, certainly, but the way

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Speaker 1: that it lends itself to abuse is really hard to

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Speaker 1: see when you're in it, and really hard to unsee

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Speaker 1: once you see it.

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Speaker 2: Yeah. Well again, we'll get deeper into that next week,

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Speaker 2: but for this week, we're going to focus on and

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Speaker 2: Kyle and Carey, who are amazing. Megan can speak to

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Speaker 2: that more than me because you actually talk to them.

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Speaker 1: I'm obsessed with them, and I think just at the

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Speaker 1: broader context of this episode, is leaving any belief system

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Speaker 1: and how do you do it when your spouse and

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Speaker 1: you are at different paces?

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Speaker 4: And like what does that look like? And I think they're.

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Speaker 1: Just a perfect example of successfully moving forward together.

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Speaker 2: Yeah, with a complete upturn life and identity shift and

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Speaker 2: everything and somehow coming back together. It is inspiring. So

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Speaker 2: should we dive in with them?

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Speaker 4: Let's do it.

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Speaker 1: Trust Me is brought to you by Progressive Insurance.

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Speaker 2: not available in all states and situations. Welcome Kyle and

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Speaker 2: Cai to trust Me. Thank you so much for joining us.

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Speaker 5: Thank you for having us, having us.

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Speaker 3: It's exciting.

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Speaker 2: Yeah, it's exciting to have you guys, especially because Kyle

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Speaker 2: is wearing a trust Me.

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Speaker 5: Shirt right now.

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Speaker 3: We're fans.

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Speaker 1: Kyle says, he gets asked about it wherever he goes,

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Speaker 1: So conversation starter.

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Speaker 4: Just FYI for people out there, it's true.

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Speaker 3: Yeah, I like to spread the good word.

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Speaker 4: Thank you, Yeah, thank you. Speaking of the good word,

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Speaker 4: the good word.

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Speaker 1: Yes, Yeah, let's talk about the gospel of the two

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Speaker 1: by twos. Let's give people a little broad explanation of

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Speaker 1: what it is.

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Speaker 2: Yeah, tell us a little bit about who and what

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Speaker 2: are the two by twos.

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Speaker 5: Yeah.

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Speaker 6: So the two by twos are an exclusivist group. They're

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Speaker 6: a worldwide religion, and they're very very secretive, so they

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Speaker 6: don't have anything published, they don't have websites, they don't

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Speaker 6: like track finances or membership. There's been around since the

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Speaker 6: late eighteen nineties, and they are a religion that doesn't

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Speaker 6: take a name for themselves, so those inside the religion

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Speaker 6: don't recognize any official or formal name for themselves. They

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Speaker 6: call themselves the Way or the Truth or the Friends. Yeah,

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Speaker 6: the friends and workers side of the group. They've been

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Speaker 6: known as the Two by.

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Speaker 5: Twos for probably the past one hundred years or so.

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Speaker 6: They originally came from like Ireland, and they're called the

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Speaker 6: two by Twos because they send their preachers in pairs.

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Speaker 2: Who boy too like I think most they think that

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Speaker 2: that is a reference to Noah and the animals.

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Speaker 6: Can you clarify, Yeah, that is not a reference to

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Speaker 6: Noah's ark. It's a reference to how they send their

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Speaker 6: ministers out in pairs. They do that because they believe

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Speaker 6: that Jesus established that in Matthew ten. So they believe

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Speaker 6: in apostolic succession, which means that you can trace them

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Speaker 6: back to the ministry that Jesus established in Matthew ten,

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Speaker 6: and they believe that you can basically trace them all

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Speaker 6: the way from that, so that they are the one

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Speaker 6: true religion that Jesus established.

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Speaker 1: I was taught growing up this was from Jesus. No

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Speaker 1: one started it. So there's no church buildings, there's no

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Speaker 1: official name.

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Speaker 4: We meet in homes. We are Jesus's humble servants.

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Speaker 6: They don't acknowledge like a founder, even though there is

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Speaker 6: one in Kyle, and tell you a little more about that.

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Speaker 5: Yeah, yeah, who is it?

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Speaker 3: They don't call themselves two by two at all. The

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Speaker 3: two by two is sort of a name that people

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Speaker 3: outside them call them. So it's actually easy to identify

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Speaker 3: somebody who's left because they use that term, and nobody

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Speaker 3: on the inside would use that term. They would just

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Speaker 3: say the truth in the way and stuff like that.

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Speaker 1: Yeah, it's really not fair to call your religion the truth.

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Speaker 4: You can be trying to talk to somebody.

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Speaker 1: About it and like, well, the truth is lying to you.

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Speaker 1: But that, oh my god, you know it's hard.

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Speaker 2: Tell us a little bit about the structure of the group,

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Speaker 2: like what does it actually mean that people are going

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Speaker 2: out two by two? Because I think a common frame

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Speaker 2: of reference might be like Mormon missionaries who go out

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Speaker 2: in pairs, right, but that's only for two years of

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Speaker 2: their lives and they still, you know, like have a

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Speaker 2: home that they sleep during that period. So yeah, can

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Speaker 2: you just sort of set up what the structure is.

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Speaker 6: Yeah, So the main things about the church are they

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Speaker 6: do not have an official church building. They meet in

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Speaker 6: homes and then for every Sunday afternoon, they host gospel meetings,

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Speaker 6: which is for a bigger crowd where the minister's pre

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Speaker 6: and it's usually done in like a rented hall or

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Speaker 6: a library or school. We even met in funeral homes sometimes.

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Speaker 6: That's kind of a point that they're very proud of,

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Speaker 6: is that they don't have an official church building and

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Speaker 6: they meet in homes every Sunday morning and Wednesday evening,

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Speaker 6: so you're basically meeting together three times a week most weeks.

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Speaker 6: They believe in like a literal, fiery, eternal hell. The ministry.

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Speaker 6: Do you want to talk about that?

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Speaker 3: The ministry? The only kind of comparison would be the

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Speaker 3: Mormon Church, but it's for life, so it's not compelled

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Speaker 3: in any way. People who want to become we call

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Speaker 3: them workers. The ministers will probably use those terms interchangeably,

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Speaker 3: workers and ministers. The workers is what they're called inside,

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Speaker 3: and most people offer themselves up to be workers for life,

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Speaker 3: and they're celibate. They don't have a home, they don't

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Speaker 3: have really anything except for about it one or two

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Speaker 3: suitcases worth of stuff for their life, and they travel

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Speaker 3: around in pairs. One pair will be over an area

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Speaker 3: they call a field, which might be a couple towns

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Speaker 3: next to each other, and they'll hold some of their

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Speaker 3: mission type meetings, or they call them gospel meetings. It's

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Speaker 3: sort of they're proselytizing, I guess. They usually in a

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Speaker 3: public hall or whatever, like we just mentioned. And then

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Speaker 3: every year or so, depending on where you are in

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Speaker 3: the US, it's every year they'll switch it up and

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Speaker 3: switch up the pairs. And maybe one will stay and

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Speaker 3: the other will go, or they'll both go and they'll

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Speaker 3: switch up, and so every year you'll have a different

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Speaker 3: pair of ministers in your area.

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Speaker 6: And because they're homeless, they live in the homes of

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Speaker 6: church members, which, as we'll see later, is a problem.

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Speaker 4: Right.

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Speaker 2: Are the workers Are they all men? Or are there

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Speaker 2: women as well?

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Speaker 5: Men and women? Okay, but same sex pairs.

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Speaker 4: Got it, got it? Got it?

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Speaker 1: And the male workers have more power. They're the ones

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Speaker 1: making a hierarchy.

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Speaker 6: Yeah, there's a hierarchy where like the overseers are always men,

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Speaker 6: and they hold more power.

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Speaker 5: They make all of the decisions.

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Speaker 6: Basically, so the younger brother workers and sister workers are

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Speaker 6: always in subjection to the older men.

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Speaker 3: And we should say that an overseer will use that

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Speaker 3: term a lot today too. An overseer is one of

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Speaker 3: the senior brother workers over kind of a larger area,

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Speaker 3: so maybe over two or three states something like that, and.

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Speaker 5: They divide them geographically.

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Speaker 2: Yeah, okay, my Mormon references, that's like the stake president

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Speaker 2: and then you got the missionaries. But there's a bishop

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Speaker 2: in between, which you guys don't have.

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Speaker 4: But there's some crossover though for sure. Yeah yeah, yeah.

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Speaker 6: And again like they don't acknowledge leadership as leadership, but

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Speaker 6: it is definitely the overseers kind of approving everything over

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Speaker 6: a certain area, and it would be the workers who

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Speaker 6: would make the decisions as to who has a meeting

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Speaker 6: in their home, who goes to that meeting, like who's

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Speaker 6: assigned to which meeting, who might be allowed to take

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Speaker 6: part or not take part depending on certain.

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Speaker 3: Rules, meaning participate in the meetings themselves. Yeah. So God,

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Speaker 3: when you're when two y two's are usually when they're young,

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Speaker 3: they what we call profess, which is they stand up

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Speaker 3: and make a public sort of declaration during one of

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Speaker 3: the meetings that they're going to be in this group,

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Speaker 3: they're going to be part of it, they forever, right.

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Speaker 3: They'll do it while they're singing one of the church hymns.

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Speaker 3: The ministers will say, whoever wants to, you know, stand

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Speaker 3: up and be whatever you can stand up, and then

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Speaker 3: from that point on they can participate in the meetings

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Speaker 3: by speaking something during a testimony time and praying publicly.

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Speaker 3: And then a little bit later on, maybe in their

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Speaker 3: teens or twenty is still often get baptized, which means

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Speaker 3: that from that point on they can take communion. We

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Speaker 3: don't call it communion, we call it the emblems.

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Speaker 6: But I'm going to say we a lot, but yeah,

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Speaker 6: And professing is usually between ages like six to twelve.

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Speaker 6: Most of the membership comes from people born in the group,

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Speaker 6: so it would be around ages six to twelve that

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Speaker 6: you would like make your choice to serve God forever.

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Speaker 4: I was going to make a few clarifications.

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Speaker 1: Okay, So number one, gospel meetings, Right, Sometimes you have

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Speaker 1: a worker who's a little too zealous, and so you

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Speaker 1: don't just get Sunday afternoon gospel meetings. For example, I

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Speaker 1: had a worker in middle school who had Friday night

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Speaker 1: gospel me O, and we also had Thursday or Tuesday

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Speaker 1: night gospel meetings. So gospel meetings are technically for outsiders,

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Speaker 1: but we had ours a lot of times in a

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Speaker 1: nursing home, so very sorrowful message, already very sorrowful, singing,

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Speaker 1: very like you know, eight people, most of them elderly,

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Speaker 1: came meet us at a nursing home where we'll give

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Speaker 1: you the good word that you're probably going to help.

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Speaker 4: Not popular.

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Speaker 2: What's in it for someone who's not in the group.

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Speaker 4: That's a great question. They rarely join.

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Speaker 2: Yeah, they don't offer like a lot.

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Speaker 1: No.

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Speaker 3: Interestingly, I don't think they often feel a need to

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Speaker 3: because especially where we've been on the West Coast, there's

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Speaker 3: a lot of people. There'll be several hundred people in

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Speaker 3: a field, so a gospel meeting will have sometimes a

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Speaker 3: couple hundred people who are already in there. So they

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Speaker 3: don't feel a real need to spread the words. They

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Speaker 3: would say that's what they do.

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Speaker 5: And not very secretive.

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Speaker 6: So I think there is a little bit of paranoia

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Speaker 6: of being discovered, especially by like the government.

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Speaker 5: They're not registered as a church.

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Speaker 6: Oh really, because it's all kind of yeah, under the table.

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Speaker 1: Because my hope is that this podcast is listened to

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Speaker 1: by people who were in the two by twos or

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Speaker 1: are in the two by twos and can relate see

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Speaker 1: y'all's experience or my experience. So different fields have different

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Speaker 1: amounts of people. So sometimes we would go to like

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Speaker 1: San Diego for vacation and we'd go to a gospel

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Speaker 1: meeting and I'd be like, there's like fifteen cute boys here,

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Speaker 1: and like this is dope. I love gospel meeting.

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Speaker 4: You know, y'all, let's do this.

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Speaker 1: I just wanted to shout out anybody who was in

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Speaker 1: a little bit of more rural situation where the gospel

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Speaker 1: meetings were not hundreds of people, they were much smaller.

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Speaker 4: Yeah, yours sounds really sad.

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Speaker 6: Yeah, yeah, there's probably about pre COVID estimates were about

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Speaker 6: seventy five thousand members worldwide. In the Pacific Northwest, I

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Speaker 6: would say, is one of the most densely populated areas,

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Speaker 6: which is where we both grew up. So our conventions

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Speaker 6: and gospel meetings were fairly large compared to other parts

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Speaker 6: of the country.

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Speaker 2: I think who is making these estimates, Like if there

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Speaker 2: isn't a clear hierarchy your organization, like, how is it

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Speaker 2: all being assessed?

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Speaker 6: Well, the only written information really is worker lists, So

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Speaker 6: if you can estimate that per one to two hundred people,

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Speaker 6: there's a worker or two workers. You can kind of

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Speaker 6: guess based on worker lists overtime what the general population is.

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Speaker 6: I think that's kind of how the population come sure, right,

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Speaker 6: and in the nineteen eighties it's estimated that there were

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Speaker 6: double the numbers. That was like the peak membership time,

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Speaker 6: which is when we were growing up, and it's definitely

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Speaker 6: declined since then. And then because of what we do,

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Speaker 6: which we'll talk about later, we've definitely noticed a decline

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Speaker 6: in membership as well, right since COVID and with recent events.

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Speaker 1: It's super worldwide, even though it meets at homes. So

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Speaker 1: for example, we've gone to like Germany before and been

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Speaker 1: in a tiny village and my parents are like, where's

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Speaker 1: the meeting, And we'll be sent an address of a

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Speaker 1: home and you'll just like walk into somebody's house and

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Speaker 1: sit down, and then you're treated like family because you're

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Speaker 1: in this.

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Speaker 4: I mean, like that part sounds nice. There's a lot

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Speaker 4: of parts that are very people wherever you go.

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Speaker 2: Yeah, you know, I remember when I was a kid

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Speaker 2: and we would go like I would travel with my

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Speaker 2: parents sometimes or like going a cruise or whatever, and

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Speaker 2: if I ever met a Mormon person, it would be like, oh,

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Speaker 2: people were everywhere. You know, I had Mormon radar, a

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Speaker 2: really good Mormon radar. I could tell just by looking

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Speaker 2: at people.

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Speaker 4: That's part of the lore.

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Speaker 1: Of it, isn't it Like it's spirit. I can tell

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Speaker 1: our spirits the same, and it's.

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Speaker 4: Like, hmmm, no, we're kind of just weird in the same.

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Speaker 6: Yeah, exactly, have a very specific way of dressing and looking.

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Speaker 6: If you recognize another one in the store, it's definitely

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Speaker 6: because of the spirit.

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Speaker 4: Yeah, definitely. Shall I get into your stories? Yeah, tell

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Speaker 4: us how you both joined?

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Speaker 6: Okay, Well, I was born and raised in IT, fourth generation,

355
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Speaker 6: so all of my grandparents were professed and several of

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Speaker 6: my great grandparents on both sides of the family. My

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Speaker 6: family kind of was royalty, Like I had a great

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Speaker 6: aunt who was a minister, and my grandparents were very

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Speaker 6: well known. They had a meeting in their home, and

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Speaker 6: they were also kind of a hub for workers, just

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Speaker 6: the place where workers would go stay a lot.

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Speaker 5: And get their mail.

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Speaker 6: And they really trusted my grandparents, so they would open

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Speaker 6: up and talk to my grandparents. So so, yeah, I

365
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Speaker 6: was born and raised in IT and Kyle. I grew

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Speaker 6: up next door to Kyle's cousin and they also went

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Speaker 6: to meetings, which was very unusual I think to have

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Speaker 6: your next door neighbor also be professing.

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Speaker 5: That just kind of happened.

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Speaker 4: Wow, I'm crazy.

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Speaker 6: So I met Kyle when I was like two, when

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Speaker 6: he was five or wow.

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Speaker 5: And in the.

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Speaker 6: Two by twos, that's very highly discouraged that you date

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Speaker 6: or marry outside of meetings and outsider.

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Speaker 5: We would call them an outsider exactly.

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Speaker 3: Worldly.

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Speaker 6: Yeah, so we were. I was very zealous, like I

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Speaker 6: took the Bible very literally. I believed everything that I

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Speaker 6: was taught and told about the Bible and in meetings.

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Speaker 5: I feel like I kind.

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Speaker 6: Of followed all the steps that you're supposed to follow

383
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Speaker 6: at the ages that you are supposed to follow them,

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Speaker 6: Like I profess when I was ten, and I was

385
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Speaker 6: baptized when I was sixteen, and married when I was

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Speaker 6: twenty two, and then you know, if you don't go

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Speaker 6: in the work, kind of the understanding is that you'll

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Speaker 6: get married and have babies for Jesus. So that's what

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Speaker 6: I did. That's kind of my background. There's some rules

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Speaker 6: that we didn't really cover, like how women, especially for women,

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Speaker 6: like how women are supposed to look and dress, and oh,

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Speaker 6: I was very zealous about those rules.

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Speaker 5: Do we want to go into that.

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Speaker 4: Yes, please walk us through the luck.

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Speaker 6: So women are expected to always wear skirts and dresses,

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Speaker 6: at least to meeting. My family was a little more

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Speaker 6: open minded in the sense that I was allowed to

398
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Speaker 6: wear pants outside of meetings, like to.

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Speaker 5: School or just around.

400
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Speaker 6: I never cut my hair until I was probably in

401
00:19:22,640 --> 00:19:25,440
Speaker 6: my late teens early twenties, and even then never above

402
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Speaker 6: shoulder length. I never wore makeup or jewelry until I

403
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Speaker 6: left meetings three years ago.

404
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Speaker 5: I didn't even know how to wear makeup at all.

405
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Speaker 2: You have described back in the like hairpoof is the

406
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Speaker 2: hairpoof thing.

407
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Speaker 4: There's a hairpoof?

408
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Speaker 5: Did you have this a hairpoof?

409
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Speaker 4: Yeah, so it was.

410
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Speaker 5: Big in the nineties, but I feel like it's still

411
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Speaker 5: some people still do the hair poof.

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Speaker 3: It might still be there's the hair is supposed for women,

413
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Speaker 3: especially older married women, is supposed to be worn on

414
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Speaker 3: top of the head. That's sort of a head covering.

415
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Speaker 3: But yeah, it's one translation of the head covering versus

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Speaker 3: so in the US it's always been for women, it's

417
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Speaker 3: been buns, and you know they have hairstyles to go

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Speaker 3: with it.

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Speaker 4: Right, Very victims.

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Speaker 6: And then there were some other arbitrary rules, like people

421
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Speaker 6: weren't supposed to have TVs. A lot of people did.

422
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Speaker 6: They just kept them hidden in cupboards. It was really

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Speaker 6: looked down upon to go to movie theaters or go dancing?

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Speaker 1: Is that where you want to be when Jesus comes

425
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Speaker 1: back to the earth?

426
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Speaker 5: Was right?

427
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Speaker 3: Everyone heard that everybody.

428
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Speaker 4: Always so I want to go go.

429
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Speaker 5: To movie theater, But what if Jesus finds you there

430
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Speaker 5: when he gets back?

431
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Speaker 4: Hell? Is like real.

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Speaker 1: The more I think about it, the more I'm like,

433
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Speaker 1: was this like a apocalyptic thing?

434
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Speaker 4: Because it was.

435
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Speaker 1: Like it was Jesus was always about to come back.

436
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Speaker 1: And I'd be like, oh, I'm stressed about pollution, and

437
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Speaker 1: people would be like, why Jesus is about to come back?

438
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Speaker 1: Like it doesn't matter, and it's kind of a doomsday thing. Yeah.

439
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Speaker 6: You always feel like you have one at one foot

440
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Speaker 6: on the edge of hell, and that Jesus literally could

441
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Speaker 6: return at any moment. And I had scrupulosity OCD also,

442
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Speaker 6: So that's a terrifying thing. And I didn't know what

443
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Speaker 6: that was, of course, but I could not miss a

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Speaker 6: day without praying, sometimes obsessively praying and reading my Bible,

445
00:21:14,520 --> 00:21:18,239
Speaker 6: because I thought if I miss or if God is

446
00:21:18,280 --> 00:21:20,040
Speaker 6: calling me to go pray and I don't do it

447
00:21:20,320 --> 00:21:22,000
Speaker 6: and then I get in a car crash and die

448
00:21:22,080 --> 00:21:24,119
Speaker 6: or something bad happens to me and I die without God,

449
00:21:25,119 --> 00:21:27,239
Speaker 6: then I'm going to hell right right? You know?

450
00:21:27,400 --> 00:21:30,280
Speaker 5: So that was Yeah, that was rough.

451
00:21:30,680 --> 00:21:33,199
Speaker 6: A lot of people like, don't celebrate Christmas or have

452
00:21:33,320 --> 00:21:34,560
Speaker 6: Christmas trees.

453
00:21:35,200 --> 00:21:37,680
Speaker 4: Because Jesus, it's rude to Jesus.

454
00:21:38,000 --> 00:21:43,000
Speaker 1: Ah, You're supposed to celebrate Jesus's birth three hundreds. Yeah,

455
00:21:43,080 --> 00:21:46,240
Speaker 1: that's not his real birthday. It's a commercial holiday. And

456
00:21:46,560 --> 00:21:47,760
Speaker 1: just to speak to your points, Like.

457
00:21:48,560 --> 00:21:50,879
Speaker 4: My parents are were.

458
00:21:50,400 --> 00:21:53,240
Speaker 1: Are pretty liberal, but like we did not have a

459
00:21:53,280 --> 00:21:55,960
Speaker 1: TV hidden in our cupboard, We did not celebrate Christmas.

460
00:21:56,320 --> 00:21:59,760
Speaker 1: And they really kept me away from pants for a

461
00:21:59,760 --> 00:22:03,320
Speaker 1: while long ass time. Like I would roll my skirts

462
00:22:03,400 --> 00:22:06,080
Speaker 1: up really sure I would bring I would have friends

463
00:22:06,119 --> 00:22:08,800
Speaker 1: meet me at school and bring a pair of pants

464
00:22:08,800 --> 00:22:10,960
Speaker 1: for me sometimes. But like I didn't get my first

465
00:22:11,000 --> 00:22:13,679
Speaker 1: pair of jeans. They were Jinkos jeans from good Zooks

466
00:22:13,760 --> 00:22:16,600
Speaker 1: perfect until I was in eighth grade and my mom

467
00:22:16,680 --> 00:22:20,760
Speaker 1: cried and it was a really really really hard thing.

468
00:22:20,840 --> 00:22:22,800
Speaker 1: But I had like i'd gotten kicked out of my

469
00:22:22,840 --> 00:22:25,520
Speaker 1: private school and was going to a public school. And

470
00:22:25,560 --> 00:22:27,800
Speaker 1: I was like, I am not walking in to a

471
00:22:27,840 --> 00:22:29,640
Speaker 1: public school with a.

472
00:22:29,280 --> 00:22:31,360
Speaker 4: Jean skirt on my first day.

473
00:22:31,280 --> 00:22:34,520
Speaker 1: Mid year, and I'm getting these pair of Jinko jeans

474
00:22:34,560 --> 00:22:36,840
Speaker 1: that honestly looked cool as shit, So.

475
00:22:36,880 --> 00:22:37,880
Speaker 5: I would love to see them.

476
00:22:38,119 --> 00:22:39,880
Speaker 4: If you have a picture, I will try to bring

477
00:22:39,920 --> 00:22:40,160
Speaker 4: it back.

478
00:22:40,520 --> 00:22:43,879
Speaker 6: So I was thirty I was thirty three when I

479
00:22:43,920 --> 00:22:46,040
Speaker 6: left meetings, and I owned two pairs of jeans.

480
00:22:46,560 --> 00:22:47,520
Speaker 5: Everything else was.

481
00:22:47,480 --> 00:22:50,080
Speaker 3: Skirts interest because if you're real scrupulous, if you're really

482
00:22:50,119 --> 00:22:53,520
Speaker 3: really holy, you'll play sports and skirts hike.

483
00:22:53,400 --> 00:22:56,800
Speaker 6: And skirts will do that. Yes, So I mean if

484
00:22:56,840 --> 00:22:59,000
Speaker 6: sister workers go hiking or something, though, the.

485
00:22:59,000 --> 00:23:00,639
Speaker 5: Worst skirts, that's that's crazy.

486
00:23:01,200 --> 00:23:04,680
Speaker 1: Underneath there's like a very big okay, black like shoes. Yeah,

487
00:23:04,920 --> 00:23:08,080
Speaker 1: like like those black leggings with a skirt over it,

488
00:23:08,160 --> 00:23:09,960
Speaker 1: and you're like, just wear the leggings.

489
00:23:11,400 --> 00:23:13,360
Speaker 2: I was going to ask about sports, because it's if

490
00:23:13,400 --> 00:23:16,320
Speaker 2: TV's off limits and holidays are off limits, you're kind

491
00:23:16,359 --> 00:23:18,320
Speaker 2: of it's like almost sounding a little bit like Jovah's

492
00:23:18,320 --> 00:23:20,560
Speaker 2: Witnesses and my you know, my best friend was just

493
00:23:20,640 --> 00:23:22,920
Speaker 2: very similar from doing sports as a kid.

494
00:23:22,960 --> 00:23:24,360
Speaker 4: But sports were allowed.

495
00:23:25,960 --> 00:23:26,600
Speaker 5: Not its.

496
00:23:26,680 --> 00:23:27,480
Speaker 4: Sometimes it wasn't.

497
00:23:28,400 --> 00:23:32,560
Speaker 6: Well. The tricky part is practice is often on Wednesday

498
00:23:32,600 --> 00:23:36,480
Speaker 6: evening or Sunday morning, and nothing can take precedence over meeting.

499
00:23:36,760 --> 00:23:40,520
Speaker 6: So if you are in a sport, like because there

500
00:23:40,560 --> 00:23:42,080
Speaker 6: was a time that like I wanted to play soccer,

501
00:23:42,160 --> 00:23:45,520
Speaker 6: for example, and the practices were Wednesday night and Sunday morning,

502
00:23:45,640 --> 00:23:48,320
Speaker 6: so it's just like not a good idea to do that, right,

503
00:23:49,000 --> 00:23:51,000
Speaker 6: and that and that's going to vary by family too,

504
00:23:51,040 --> 00:23:54,679
Speaker 6: Like some families are much more kind of strict and

505
00:23:54,760 --> 00:23:56,520
Speaker 6: conservative than other families.

506
00:23:56,640 --> 00:23:59,240
Speaker 2: I mean, that's true, I think probably of all bigger

507
00:23:59,359 --> 00:24:02,920
Speaker 2: or somewhat big religions. It's true of Mormonism, some families

508
00:24:02,920 --> 00:24:05,160
Speaker 2: were very very strict and some were not. And some

509
00:24:05,200 --> 00:24:08,720
Speaker 2: families kicked out their children for being gay, and some

510
00:24:08,800 --> 00:24:09,919
Speaker 2: families were welcoming, you know.

511
00:24:10,200 --> 00:24:12,080
Speaker 1: Yeah, And you can like kind of cherry pick and

512
00:24:13,119 --> 00:24:15,280
Speaker 1: which ones you're really abiding.

513
00:24:14,920 --> 00:24:16,600
Speaker 4: By, you know, right, right, right.

514
00:24:16,760 --> 00:24:19,880
Speaker 6: That's an important point to know is acting on LGBTQ

515
00:24:20,440 --> 00:24:23,480
Speaker 6: was definitely a big no no, and people could be

516
00:24:23,480 --> 00:24:26,760
Speaker 6: excommunicated for being LGBTQ.

517
00:24:27,600 --> 00:24:31,560
Speaker 1: And if you're excommunicated, you are by their doctrine. And

518
00:24:31,680 --> 00:24:33,719
Speaker 1: some people will say that's not true, but it was

519
00:24:33,800 --> 00:24:38,240
Speaker 1: true essentially down to hell. So it's you know, having

520
00:24:38,240 --> 00:24:42,119
Speaker 1: an overseer in charge of your soul is very scary.

521
00:24:42,320 --> 00:24:45,399
Speaker 4: Yeah, yeah, sounds like it. Kyle.

522
00:24:46,240 --> 00:24:49,960
Speaker 2: You also grew up in do we say the church?

523
00:24:50,000 --> 00:24:51,760
Speaker 4: What do you guys? How do you guys refer to it?

524
00:24:51,840 --> 00:24:53,480
Speaker 5: Meetings? Meetings, meetings?

525
00:24:53,480 --> 00:24:56,480
Speaker 3: Okay, yeah, so yeah, that's what we would say, is

526
00:24:56,520 --> 00:24:58,640
Speaker 3: we grew up going to meetings where we grew up professing.

527
00:24:58,880 --> 00:25:01,080
Speaker 3: That's the terminology we kind of use for people. I

528
00:25:01,119 --> 00:25:04,000
Speaker 3: always say that if you walk into somebody's house and

529
00:25:04,040 --> 00:25:07,920
Speaker 3: you see a picture of their family, you'll know which

530
00:25:07,920 --> 00:25:09,639
Speaker 3: were which because the parents will be like, well, this

531
00:25:09,680 --> 00:25:11,000
Speaker 3: is my son, this is my daughter, and this is

532
00:25:11,040 --> 00:25:14,479
Speaker 3: my son who's not professing, something like that, Like you're

533
00:25:14,520 --> 00:25:18,800
Speaker 3: introduced that way. You're professing first before you're anything else. Yeah.

534
00:25:18,840 --> 00:25:21,960
Speaker 3: I grew up professing as well. My family. One set

535
00:25:21,960 --> 00:25:24,760
Speaker 3: of grandparents professed, and I think their parents may have,

536
00:25:24,920 --> 00:25:28,240
Speaker 3: and the other set of grandparents one one brought the

537
00:25:28,280 --> 00:25:33,480
Speaker 3: other to meeting in college and and yeah they Yeah,

538
00:25:33,480 --> 00:25:35,679
Speaker 3: we just grew up going to I didn't know anything

539
00:25:35,680 --> 00:25:38,320
Speaker 3: else until the last few years. We just I just

540
00:25:38,320 --> 00:25:40,760
Speaker 3: grew up going to meetings. Like I say, we knew Carriy.

541
00:25:40,920 --> 00:25:43,760
Speaker 3: I knew Carrey from the time we were little, and

542
00:25:43,800 --> 00:25:45,240
Speaker 3: it was kind of our whole world. I grew up

543
00:25:45,240 --> 00:25:47,240
Speaker 3: in an area that had a lot of kids about

544
00:25:47,240 --> 00:25:50,919
Speaker 3: my age, so I didn't even have unprofessing friends really

545
00:25:52,920 --> 00:25:54,639
Speaker 3: just it was kind of my whole world. I went

546
00:25:54,680 --> 00:25:58,639
Speaker 3: to school and I did stuff. My family was somewhat

547
00:25:58,640 --> 00:26:02,720
Speaker 3: conservative at least maybe doctrinally or whatever, but not not

548
00:26:02,840 --> 00:26:06,280
Speaker 3: too conservative. I played sports when I was younger, but

549
00:26:06,320 --> 00:26:08,520
Speaker 3: I quit on my own when I got older because

550
00:26:08,880 --> 00:26:11,480
Speaker 3: I knew. I just knew that no one had to

551
00:26:11,520 --> 00:26:12,960
Speaker 3: say anything to me. I just knew that if it

552
00:26:13,000 --> 00:26:16,680
Speaker 3: came in conflict with meetings, which we had a meeting

553
00:26:16,720 --> 00:26:18,480
Speaker 3: in our home, we had once day meeting in our home,

554
00:26:19,000 --> 00:26:21,199
Speaker 3: if there was ever a conflict, I just didn't want

555
00:26:21,240 --> 00:26:23,560
Speaker 3: to force my parents to make that decision. So I

556
00:26:23,640 --> 00:26:27,360
Speaker 3: just quit on my own. Oh, and that was kind

557
00:26:27,359 --> 00:26:28,719
Speaker 3: of That's how it was. That's kind of how it

558
00:26:28,760 --> 00:26:30,880
Speaker 3: was for me, Like hobbies, whys and things like that.

559
00:26:30,920 --> 00:26:33,159
Speaker 3: Like I just knew that there was a certain you

560
00:26:33,240 --> 00:26:35,159
Speaker 3: could You could be yourself to a point and then

561
00:26:35,200 --> 00:26:38,000
Speaker 3: you stop, and then you're a professing person. That's the

562
00:26:38,040 --> 00:26:39,200
Speaker 3: main thing that matters.

563
00:26:39,280 --> 00:26:42,400
Speaker 6: Yeah, And even with like making friends at school, it's

564
00:26:42,480 --> 00:26:44,880
Speaker 6: kind of that way, like you have to remember that

565
00:26:45,040 --> 00:26:47,680
Speaker 6: before being a friend, you have to be an example.

566
00:26:48,080 --> 00:26:52,000
Speaker 6: So it's really difficult to have quote unquote worldly friends.

567
00:26:52,080 --> 00:26:54,639
Speaker 6: It's just easier to have friends who are professor.

568
00:26:54,800 --> 00:26:57,119
Speaker 3: Right, you're told you you may be the only Bible

569
00:26:57,160 --> 00:26:59,320
Speaker 3: anyone ever reads. We've heard that at convention a few times.

570
00:26:59,320 --> 00:27:01,320
Speaker 1: Oh no, that is there's a lot of pressure and

571
00:27:01,359 --> 00:27:03,719
Speaker 1: they're all going to help. Oh so you're just a

572
00:27:03,760 --> 00:27:05,840
Speaker 1: math class like trying to learn fractions and.

573
00:27:05,800 --> 00:27:07,679
Speaker 4: You're like, everybody's going to hell. Everybody's going to hell.

574
00:27:07,720 --> 00:27:08,680
Speaker 4: It's crazy.

575
00:27:09,440 --> 00:27:11,440
Speaker 5: Do people have to be an example to them?

576
00:27:11,600 --> 00:27:11,840
Speaker 1: Yeah?

577
00:27:12,040 --> 00:27:12,919
Speaker 4: Do do people?

578
00:27:13,000 --> 00:27:17,679
Speaker 2: Do any of you feel responsible for like saving people

579
00:27:17,720 --> 00:27:20,680
Speaker 2: at school or like absolutely yeah.

580
00:27:21,880 --> 00:27:24,120
Speaker 6: Yeah yeah. But at the same time, you don't preach,

581
00:27:24,280 --> 00:27:26,920
Speaker 6: so you wouldn't like go up to someone and say, hey,

582
00:27:27,080 --> 00:27:29,119
Speaker 6: I found Jesus do you want to hear about it

583
00:27:29,280 --> 00:27:32,080
Speaker 6: or come to my meetings? But if somebody started asking

584
00:27:32,160 --> 00:27:35,679
Speaker 6: you questions, then it would be like very exciting and

585
00:27:35,680 --> 00:27:37,680
Speaker 6: you would invite them to come to a meeting, which

586
00:27:37,840 --> 00:27:38,600
Speaker 6: rarely happened.

587
00:27:39,480 --> 00:27:41,240
Speaker 3: One time in my entire life actually.

588
00:27:41,119 --> 00:27:46,920
Speaker 5: The same strangely quick, they usually don't come back either.

589
00:27:47,640 --> 00:27:50,920
Speaker 1: I brought a million people to meeting because I was like,

590
00:27:51,280 --> 00:27:53,919
Speaker 1: you're coming to my sleepover on Saturday night and that's

591
00:27:53,960 --> 00:27:55,200
Speaker 1: where we go Sunday morning.

592
00:27:55,080 --> 00:27:57,440
Speaker 4: And I will hate you if you don't do it.

593
00:27:57,680 --> 00:28:05,280
Speaker 2: So yeah, yeah, you know, was it just kind of

594
00:28:05,359 --> 00:28:07,199
Speaker 2: like the culture that you were in or was your

595
00:28:07,240 --> 00:28:08,320
Speaker 2: faith really strong?

596
00:28:08,560 --> 00:28:13,240
Speaker 4: Like how deep in were you emotionally? Spiritually?

597
00:28:15,040 --> 00:28:15,399
Speaker 7: Very in?

598
00:28:15,720 --> 00:28:20,040
Speaker 3: There was no. I don't think I even questioned the

599
00:28:20,480 --> 00:28:23,480
Speaker 3: at least consciously. Looking back, I did, but I don't

600
00:28:23,480 --> 00:28:25,960
Speaker 3: think I consciously even questioned any part of it until

601
00:28:26,000 --> 00:28:29,200
Speaker 3: probably my twenties. It was very very real to me.

602
00:28:30,480 --> 00:28:32,120
Speaker 3: Now if you it's kind of funny because if you'd

603
00:28:32,160 --> 00:28:33,640
Speaker 3: have asked me back then, like are you the only

604
00:28:33,680 --> 00:28:35,639
Speaker 3: ones going to heaven? I would have said, well, no,

605
00:28:35,760 --> 00:28:37,399
Speaker 3: of course not, and I would give some answer. But

606
00:28:38,240 --> 00:28:40,040
Speaker 3: I knew that for me, I had to keep doing that,

607
00:28:40,600 --> 00:28:43,160
Speaker 3: so I was very scrupulous too, in just different ways.

608
00:28:43,160 --> 00:28:46,160
Speaker 3: There's less demands on males as they grow up. We

609
00:28:46,200 --> 00:28:47,760
Speaker 3: don't have to dress a certain way or anything. We

610
00:28:47,880 --> 00:28:49,600
Speaker 3: just have to be you know, it's expected to be

611
00:28:49,640 --> 00:28:52,680
Speaker 3: presented to look like your classmates, right, well, I mean,

612
00:28:53,160 --> 00:28:55,200
Speaker 3: you know, no tattoo's ear rings.

613
00:28:55,040 --> 00:28:58,720
Speaker 5: Whatever, And that long hair was short hair. Yeah, you

614
00:28:58,800 --> 00:28:59,640
Speaker 5: have to have short hair.

615
00:28:59,640 --> 00:29:02,680
Speaker 3: Yeah your male Yeah. And I actually had a minister

616
00:29:03,040 --> 00:29:04,720
Speaker 3: tell me one time, we shouldn't have facial.

617
00:29:04,480 --> 00:29:07,640
Speaker 5: Hair, but but some of them do now, like some

618
00:29:07,760 --> 00:29:08,800
Speaker 5: ministers have facial hair.

619
00:29:08,920 --> 00:29:11,520
Speaker 3: Yeah, that's that's happening now. But yeah, I was a real,

620
00:29:11,680 --> 00:29:14,880
Speaker 3: real true believer, and it did, like even in through college,

621
00:29:14,960 --> 00:29:16,840
Speaker 3: I would think about it in terms of, you know,

622
00:29:16,880 --> 00:29:18,280
Speaker 3: if I met a friend, it's like, well, is this

623
00:29:18,320 --> 00:29:20,880
Speaker 3: a good friend to have? Is this a good Can

624
00:29:20,960 --> 00:29:22,240
Speaker 3: I be an example to them? And are they a

625
00:29:22,280 --> 00:29:25,000
Speaker 3: good influence on me? That that calculation just always running

626
00:29:25,000 --> 00:29:26,280
Speaker 3: in your head one hundred percent of the time.

627
00:29:27,640 --> 00:29:31,480
Speaker 5: Wow, yeah, which makes you very like hyper alert all

628
00:29:31,560 --> 00:29:31,920
Speaker 5: the time.

629
00:29:32,240 --> 00:29:36,320
Speaker 6: I had really awful anxiety growing up, and I was

630
00:29:36,480 --> 00:29:39,800
Speaker 6: very zealous as well. Like I said earlier, I took

631
00:29:39,880 --> 00:29:44,800
Speaker 6: everything very literally. It's just so normalized, like we were

632
00:29:44,880 --> 00:29:48,240
Speaker 6: the normal ones. Everybody else was kind of scary, evil

633
00:29:48,520 --> 00:29:52,280
Speaker 6: worldly aliens. Like that's how it always felt, and it's

634
00:29:52,360 --> 00:29:57,240
Speaker 6: preached that were this world isn't our home. We're passing

635
00:29:57,360 --> 00:29:59,840
Speaker 6: through the next world. The next life is our home,

636
00:30:01,240 --> 00:30:03,040
Speaker 6: which makes you feel like you don't fit in and

637
00:30:03,120 --> 00:30:05,280
Speaker 6: you don't belong pretty much, or at least.

638
00:30:05,120 --> 00:30:06,920
Speaker 4: That's how I felt, and you shouldn't.

639
00:30:07,040 --> 00:30:08,600
Speaker 5: Yeah, And they want you to be separate.

640
00:30:08,680 --> 00:30:11,640
Speaker 6: Yeah, even though you're going to school in the world

641
00:30:11,720 --> 00:30:14,440
Speaker 6: and you're going to work in the world, they want.

642
00:30:14,320 --> 00:30:16,400
Speaker 5: You to be separate and to be proud of the

643
00:30:16,440 --> 00:30:18,120
Speaker 5: fact that you're different in that you're separate.

644
00:30:18,280 --> 00:30:20,560
Speaker 3: Right, You're in the world, but you're not of the world.

645
00:30:20,440 --> 00:30:22,200
Speaker 4: Which is a verse in the Bible. Yeah.

646
00:30:22,640 --> 00:30:26,600
Speaker 1: So the Amish people are completely wrong. They've taken themselves

647
00:30:26,680 --> 00:30:30,719
Speaker 1: out of the world. And I'm like, please just let

648
00:30:30,800 --> 00:30:33,120
Speaker 1: us do that so we can look like we're like

649
00:30:33,560 --> 00:30:35,920
Speaker 1: eighteen hundred dollars in private, you know what I mean,

650
00:30:36,120 --> 00:30:38,560
Speaker 1: Like I always want it. I wanted us to just

651
00:30:38,640 --> 00:30:40,480
Speaker 1: go live on a farm somewhere like the Amish people,

652
00:30:40,520 --> 00:30:43,080
Speaker 1: because I didn't like doing to school or going out

653
00:30:43,200 --> 00:30:48,520
Speaker 1: and looking different. But something you just said reminded me

654
00:30:49,000 --> 00:30:51,720
Speaker 1: we're passing through this life. Let's talk about the funerals.

655
00:30:52,560 --> 00:30:55,000
Speaker 1: What is happening there.

656
00:30:55,880 --> 00:30:56,080
Speaker 6: Yeah.

657
00:30:56,160 --> 00:30:59,600
Speaker 5: I had no idea that that wasn't like a normal thing, right.

658
00:30:59,720 --> 00:31:03,800
Speaker 3: Yeah, I didn't know until we started so many funerals.

659
00:31:03,880 --> 00:31:06,960
Speaker 4: Growing up opens funerals from the time you are born.

660
00:31:08,400 --> 00:31:11,600
Speaker 6: Yes, and the funerals weren't necessarily about the people who died.

661
00:31:11,720 --> 00:31:13,920
Speaker 6: They were they were gospel meetings.

662
00:31:14,080 --> 00:31:17,960
Speaker 2: M And the way you've kind of described it before

663
00:31:18,080 --> 00:31:22,640
Speaker 2: is just because the population in the group is so old.

664
00:31:22,920 --> 00:31:25,240
Speaker 5: Is that also how you conceive of that?

665
00:31:26,040 --> 00:31:26,280
Speaker 3: Yeah?

666
00:31:26,600 --> 00:31:29,640
Speaker 1: Yeah, and also you travel for them out of older people. Yeah,

667
00:31:29,680 --> 00:31:31,520
Speaker 1: it's like, if let's compare.

668
00:31:31,200 --> 00:31:32,560
Speaker 4: It to like Young Life.

669
00:31:33,320 --> 00:31:36,280
Speaker 1: If Young Life is having a dance two hours away

670
00:31:36,560 --> 00:31:38,800
Speaker 1: and Tulsa and you live in Oklahoma, everybody's going to

671
00:31:38,880 --> 00:31:41,200
Speaker 1: go to the dance, and Young Life that's our funeral.

672
00:31:41,480 --> 00:31:44,040
Speaker 5: Oh really, And like you travel for everybody.

673
00:31:44,760 --> 00:31:49,720
Speaker 1: Everybody goes because it's like this huge cultural touchstone of

674
00:31:49,840 --> 00:31:51,360
Speaker 1: like this life means nothing.

675
00:31:51,960 --> 00:31:54,840
Speaker 4: This is like a funeral is the best place to

676
00:31:55,360 --> 00:31:55,880
Speaker 4: to preach.

677
00:31:56,040 --> 00:31:59,280
Speaker 6: Well, you're celebrating that they've moved on to heaven. Yeah,

678
00:31:59,720 --> 00:32:03,600
Speaker 6: there's like a pot luck after. It's a big social gathering.

679
00:32:03,640 --> 00:32:05,480
Speaker 5: Oh my gosh, I didn't realize that.

680
00:32:05,600 --> 00:32:06,440
Speaker 4: It's very macob.

681
00:32:06,880 --> 00:32:09,520
Speaker 1: It's been very hard for me to find like traction

682
00:32:09,880 --> 00:32:13,120
Speaker 1: and actual life or to give a shit at all.

683
00:32:13,360 --> 00:32:16,320
Speaker 1: About what I do and on this life, because it

684
00:32:16,520 --> 00:32:19,120
Speaker 1: was just so drilled into my head, like it doesn't matter,

685
00:32:19,200 --> 00:32:21,360
Speaker 1: it's it's fleeting, like our one of our homes, Like

686
00:32:21,400 --> 00:32:24,240
Speaker 1: life has leading, cleating, cleating, it doesn't matter at all,

687
00:32:24,560 --> 00:32:26,680
Speaker 1: don't care about it, whatever.

688
00:32:27,200 --> 00:32:27,880
Speaker 5: Something like that.

689
00:32:29,680 --> 00:32:30,400
Speaker 3: You should never.

690
00:32:32,840 --> 00:32:34,800
Speaker 2: So it's people you don't even know. You're like, oh,

691
00:32:34,840 --> 00:32:35,760
Speaker 2: there's a funeral, guys.

692
00:32:35,880 --> 00:32:39,880
Speaker 1: Let's all I meant times because we have conventions. Conventions

693
00:32:39,920 --> 00:32:43,720
Speaker 1: are like in your state, a bigger gatherings, like a

694
00:32:43,760 --> 00:32:44,680
Speaker 1: bigger gospel meeting.

695
00:32:44,720 --> 00:32:45,880
Speaker 4: Everybody in the state will go.

696
00:32:46,040 --> 00:32:48,760
Speaker 1: You can sometimes go to out of state conventions and

697
00:32:48,880 --> 00:32:49,920
Speaker 1: so you know everybody.

698
00:32:50,160 --> 00:32:51,840
Speaker 4: It's like a bigger sense of family.

699
00:32:51,880 --> 00:32:54,360
Speaker 1: And I go, oh, my goodness, the old lady that

700
00:32:54,480 --> 00:32:58,480
Speaker 1: makes the pink frosted cookies for convention died right right.

701
00:32:58,600 --> 00:33:01,760
Speaker 6: And one of the favorite pastimes of two by Two's

702
00:33:02,000 --> 00:33:05,360
Speaker 6: is genealogy, not like in the Mormon Church, not like

703
00:33:05,600 --> 00:33:08,840
Speaker 6: literal genealogy you can say, but like figuring out how

704
00:33:08,920 --> 00:33:12,240
Speaker 6: everybody is related to everybody. So if, for example, somebody

705
00:33:12,360 --> 00:33:15,560
Speaker 6: died and I'm just like this little kid, and I'm like, who's.

706
00:33:15,320 --> 00:33:16,160
Speaker 5: Funeral are we going to?

707
00:33:16,360 --> 00:33:16,400
Speaker 3: Like?

708
00:33:16,440 --> 00:33:17,760
Speaker 5: Who is this old person. I don't know.

709
00:33:18,120 --> 00:33:20,400
Speaker 6: They all look the same to me, especially if they're

710
00:33:20,480 --> 00:33:23,480
Speaker 6: like old ladies. Oh you know, it's so and So's

711
00:33:24,280 --> 00:33:28,200
Speaker 6: you know, cousins, aunt and just like everybody. Like when

712
00:33:28,280 --> 00:33:30,680
Speaker 6: you meet somebody that you haven't ever met before at

713
00:33:30,720 --> 00:33:32,480
Speaker 6: a convention, the first thing you do is try to

714
00:33:32,520 --> 00:33:33,480
Speaker 6: figure out who you.

715
00:33:33,560 --> 00:33:35,840
Speaker 5: Know and how you're related and if you're related.

716
00:33:35,880 --> 00:33:38,520
Speaker 6: Which is kind of dangerous if you're dating to like

717
00:33:38,840 --> 00:33:42,080
Speaker 6: you're almost breath inside, you gotta find out first.

718
00:33:42,200 --> 00:33:47,000
Speaker 4: Yeah, right, yeah, are many people related?

719
00:33:47,880 --> 00:33:49,840
Speaker 5: It sounds seems very I used.

720
00:33:49,680 --> 00:33:52,959
Speaker 1: To Yeah, totally. I mean for the last four generations.

721
00:33:53,040 --> 00:33:54,880
Speaker 1: We'll get into when this was started. I guess it

722
00:33:55,000 --> 00:33:58,360
Speaker 1: was almost four or five generations ago. I mean, nobody's

723
00:33:58,400 --> 00:33:58,960
Speaker 1: really joining.

724
00:33:59,480 --> 00:34:02,840
Speaker 2: Wow, well, I can't believe you guys found partners that

725
00:34:02,920 --> 00:34:03,520
Speaker 2: we're not.

726
00:34:03,680 --> 00:34:03,880
Speaker 3: Really.

727
00:34:04,080 --> 00:34:06,480
Speaker 6: It's really funny because we both did DNA tests a

728
00:34:06,520 --> 00:34:10,160
Speaker 6: while ago for like our family history stuff that I liked,

729
00:34:10,400 --> 00:34:13,640
Speaker 6: that's one of my hobbies, and I was actually nervous,

730
00:34:13,920 --> 00:34:15,360
Speaker 6: like waiting for the results.

731
00:34:15,400 --> 00:34:17,360
Speaker 5: I was like, please don't let us be related, Please

732
00:34:17,360 --> 00:34:17,960
Speaker 5: don't let us be.

733
00:34:20,000 --> 00:34:21,399
Speaker 4: And you weren't, but we aren't.

734
00:34:21,440 --> 00:34:21,600
Speaker 5: OK.

735
00:34:22,719 --> 00:34:28,640
Speaker 4: She's like, yeah, yeah, exactly, exactly.

736
00:34:29,120 --> 00:34:32,839
Speaker 6: I also want to like note something that was kind

737
00:34:32,880 --> 00:34:35,160
Speaker 6: of part of a big part of the culture for

738
00:34:35,440 --> 00:34:39,880
Speaker 6: me as a female, and this is important later on

739
00:34:40,000 --> 00:34:41,720
Speaker 6: when we start talking about recent events.

740
00:34:41,800 --> 00:34:43,520
Speaker 5: I think that it's important to.

741
00:34:43,560 --> 00:34:47,480
Speaker 6: Note that there's a culture of girls dating and marrying

742
00:34:47,560 --> 00:34:50,279
Speaker 6: people a lot older than them. So when I was

743
00:34:50,360 --> 00:34:53,719
Speaker 6: a teenager, I dated a couple of different guys who

744
00:34:53,760 --> 00:34:56,279
Speaker 6: are six to seven years older than me, you know,

745
00:34:56,320 --> 00:34:59,480
Speaker 6: who are fully adults. And I think that's important to

746
00:35:00,040 --> 00:35:03,960
Speaker 6: to like acknowledge that it wasn't something that was discouraged.

747
00:35:03,960 --> 00:35:06,840
Speaker 6: It was maybe even encouraged that as long as the

748
00:35:06,880 --> 00:35:09,919
Speaker 6: person is professing, it's a good thing. If you're dating

749
00:35:10,000 --> 00:35:13,160
Speaker 6: somebody professing and who's you know, solid in the truth

750
00:35:13,320 --> 00:35:16,760
Speaker 6: and there So there are a lot of age gaps,

751
00:35:16,880 --> 00:35:20,759
Speaker 6: which is I didn't realize growing up that that wasn't

752
00:35:21,520 --> 00:35:25,200
Speaker 6: normal either, or that was kind of weird sometimes.

753
00:35:25,160 --> 00:35:27,600
Speaker 1: Or just getting married super young to somebody your own

754
00:35:27,640 --> 00:35:29,200
Speaker 1: age also really yes.

755
00:35:29,360 --> 00:35:31,360
Speaker 6: Getting yeah, marriage to be young because you can't have

756
00:35:31,400 --> 00:35:34,440
Speaker 6: sex before marriage. So you know, Mormons, a lot of

757
00:35:34,520 --> 00:35:36,000
Speaker 6: people do get married very young.

758
00:35:36,160 --> 00:35:37,480
Speaker 5: Yeah, yeah, very similar.

759
00:35:37,840 --> 00:35:39,719
Speaker 2: Yeah, a lot of a lot of interesting similarities. And

760
00:35:39,760 --> 00:35:41,440
Speaker 2: then of course a lot of very big differences.

761
00:35:41,680 --> 00:35:41,919
Speaker 3: Yeah.

762
00:35:43,120 --> 00:35:46,200
Speaker 1: Yeah, it's weird how similar it is to Mormonism and

763
00:35:46,320 --> 00:35:50,000
Speaker 1: how also how Mormonism just sounds so much more fun.

764
00:35:50,080 --> 00:35:51,480
Speaker 4: But anyway, I progress.

765
00:35:52,480 --> 00:35:55,839
Speaker 5: Okay, Mormons do community really well, yes, that's true.

766
00:35:55,920 --> 00:35:57,640
Speaker 4: You don't have hell I don't know. It just sounds better.

767
00:35:57,800 --> 00:35:59,680
Speaker 5: And you get to see your families in heaven.

768
00:36:00,120 --> 00:36:03,600
Speaker 2: Yeah really yeah, but not if you aren't in the

769
00:36:03,719 --> 00:36:05,520
Speaker 2: celestial kingdom.

770
00:36:06,600 --> 00:36:07,680
Speaker 5: So you're a good Mormon.

771
00:36:07,880 --> 00:36:10,400
Speaker 2: Yeah yeah, yeah, if you get married in the temple

772
00:36:10,560 --> 00:36:12,879
Speaker 2: and you do everything right, which I did not, then yeah.

773
00:36:13,239 --> 00:36:13,439
Speaker 5: Yeah.

774
00:36:14,440 --> 00:36:18,480
Speaker 2: Anyway, how did y'all get this crack.

775
00:36:18,440 --> 00:36:21,880
Speaker 4: In your belief system? How did you start to deconstruct.

776
00:36:22,840 --> 00:36:25,360
Speaker 5: Yeah, I think you started that process before me.

777
00:36:26,000 --> 00:36:29,440
Speaker 1: It's really hard when when couples, one starts going first,

778
00:36:29,560 --> 00:36:32,600
Speaker 1: and sometimes, as we're seeing right now, one goes and

779
00:36:32,640 --> 00:36:35,560
Speaker 1: the other doesn't. And how do you rectify that because

780
00:36:35,719 --> 00:36:38,399
Speaker 1: the one still in completely thinks that the one out

781
00:36:38,520 --> 00:36:41,800
Speaker 1: has gone completely bonkers, and the one out thinks the

782
00:36:41,840 --> 00:36:43,880
Speaker 1: one and is brainwashed.

783
00:36:44,000 --> 00:36:45,760
Speaker 5: So anyway, it can be terrifying.

784
00:36:45,880 --> 00:36:46,080
Speaker 1: Yeah.

785
00:36:46,560 --> 00:36:48,120
Speaker 3: Yeah, we did it at the same time, but not

786
00:36:48,280 --> 00:36:50,000
Speaker 3: kind of at the same rate, and we were just

787
00:36:50,120 --> 00:36:52,040
Speaker 3: not really together. The whole time, and it was it

788
00:36:52,160 --> 00:36:54,600
Speaker 3: was tough. So for me, it's one of those things,

789
00:36:54,640 --> 00:36:56,640
Speaker 3: like I say, where you kind of looking back, I

790
00:36:56,680 --> 00:36:59,520
Speaker 3: can sort of post date some things from a long

791
00:36:59,600 --> 00:37:03,440
Speaker 3: time ago. But I heard a Mormon term that I

792
00:37:03,520 --> 00:37:05,840
Speaker 3: really like, I've I've co opted from listening to Mormon

793
00:37:06,640 --> 00:37:09,680
Speaker 3: the conversion stories, which is the broken shelf. I think

794
00:37:09,719 --> 00:37:13,799
Speaker 3: a Mormon person one time said that, you know, if

795
00:37:13,800 --> 00:37:15,279
Speaker 3: you have any doubts, or you have any things you

796
00:37:15,320 --> 00:37:16,960
Speaker 3: don't understand, just put them on a shelf. And so

797
00:37:17,080 --> 00:37:21,000
Speaker 3: people who've left the Mormon church ex Mormons will use

798
00:37:21,080 --> 00:37:24,040
Speaker 3: the term broken shelf for the shelf breaking, like one

799
00:37:24,080 --> 00:37:25,640
Speaker 3: extra thing got put up there and they just couldn't

800
00:37:25,840 --> 00:37:27,560
Speaker 3: the shelf couldn't handle anymore and it broke, and that's

801
00:37:27,600 --> 00:37:30,920
Speaker 3: what caused them to leave. And so for me, I think,

802
00:37:31,360 --> 00:37:34,640
Speaker 3: I think there was probably a lot of things up there,

803
00:37:35,200 --> 00:37:39,719
Speaker 3: but for me, it was was COVID. When COVID came,

804
00:37:39,800 --> 00:37:41,400
Speaker 3: it was something that we were really concerned about. We

805
00:37:41,520 --> 00:37:44,480
Speaker 3: both have health issues and so to our kids, and

806
00:37:44,840 --> 00:37:48,400
Speaker 3: we were really concerned about it. And there was a

807
00:37:48,440 --> 00:37:52,040
Speaker 3: lot of there was a lot of sort of maybe

808
00:37:52,080 --> 00:37:55,000
Speaker 3: COVID denial, conspiracy theorists stuff kind of in the group

809
00:37:55,680 --> 00:37:57,680
Speaker 3: and kind of just in the zeitgeist among them. And

810
00:37:58,520 --> 00:38:00,880
Speaker 3: and I don't I don't hold that against anybody for

811
00:38:01,040 --> 00:38:03,000
Speaker 3: you know, their beliefs or political things or how you

812
00:38:03,040 --> 00:38:04,920
Speaker 3: felt about COVID or whatever. But there was kind of

813
00:38:04,960 --> 00:38:07,520
Speaker 3: a there was. It was very disjointed as far as

814
00:38:07,600 --> 00:38:10,360
Speaker 3: addressing it. And you know, we meet in homes in

815
00:38:10,480 --> 00:38:15,959
Speaker 3: little rooms and we all sing and it's it's little

816
00:38:15,960 --> 00:38:18,920
Speaker 3: people and then pass emblems around and all partake of them,

817
00:38:19,120 --> 00:38:21,040
Speaker 3: drink from one cup, you know, share a piece of bread.

818
00:38:21,120 --> 00:38:24,000
Speaker 3: So it's like there's it was just a great peatrish

819
00:38:24,080 --> 00:38:26,400
Speaker 3: for for COVID, right, And so we stayed away for

820
00:38:26,480 --> 00:38:30,200
Speaker 3: a while. We left and and we stayed away for

821
00:38:30,239 --> 00:38:32,680
Speaker 3: a long time, and and there was a lot of

822
00:38:32,719 --> 00:38:36,680
Speaker 3: kind of dissension among people and even among the ministry.

823
00:38:36,680 --> 00:38:38,600
Speaker 3: Even there were some times where we called into meetings,

824
00:38:38,800 --> 00:38:40,960
Speaker 3: they had some call in numbers and we even't heard

825
00:38:41,000 --> 00:38:43,960
Speaker 3: some kind of conspiracy theorist type stuff from the platform.

826
00:38:44,160 --> 00:38:47,680
Speaker 3: And it really started affecting me that that these kind

827
00:38:47,719 --> 00:38:49,880
Speaker 3: of chosen called of God people were saying some kind

828
00:38:49,920 --> 00:38:50,640
Speaker 3: of crazy stuff.

829
00:38:51,520 --> 00:38:54,120
Speaker 6: And yeah, it was more important, I think to be

830
00:38:54,440 --> 00:38:56,800
Speaker 6: in meeting where you could be saved than it was

831
00:38:57,040 --> 00:38:58,960
Speaker 6: to protect your family, right.

832
00:38:59,200 --> 00:39:01,239
Speaker 3: Yeah, So for me, it was a couple It was

833
00:39:01,360 --> 00:39:03,600
Speaker 3: kind of that, a lot of that, and then sort

834
00:39:03,640 --> 00:39:06,600
Speaker 3: of realizing that maybe some of this stuff wasn't really

835
00:39:06,680 --> 00:39:10,040
Speaker 3: led by God per se, adding that to the shelf

836
00:39:10,080 --> 00:39:11,600
Speaker 3: and realizing I got a lot of stuff up on

837
00:39:11,640 --> 00:39:13,759
Speaker 3: that shelf, and I processed it very slowly. I think

838
00:39:13,800 --> 00:39:15,520
Speaker 3: carry went through really quickly. She'll probably tell you I

839
00:39:15,680 --> 00:39:17,239
Speaker 3: was very very slow with it, and it was very

840
00:39:17,280 --> 00:39:22,520
Speaker 3: painful and do not recommend, but the constructing is hard. Yeah,

841
00:39:23,040 --> 00:39:24,879
Speaker 3: But for me, there was there was one point where

842
00:39:24,960 --> 00:39:27,200
Speaker 3: you know you're with it. Your Sunday morning meeting is

843
00:39:27,280 --> 00:39:28,480
Speaker 3: kind of the same all the time. It's the same

844
00:39:28,480 --> 00:39:30,680
Speaker 3: little group of people. And there was one point where

845
00:39:31,440 --> 00:39:35,040
Speaker 3: the disagreement about whether or not you should mask during

846
00:39:35,160 --> 00:39:37,920
Speaker 3: a pandemic was so big that they actually split the

847
00:39:37,960 --> 00:39:39,920
Speaker 3: meeting into two homes. There was a masked meeting and

848
00:39:39,960 --> 00:39:42,440
Speaker 3: an unmasked meeting, and there was.

849
00:39:42,440 --> 00:39:44,839
Speaker 5: One masked meeting and all of the other meetings were

850
00:39:44,920 --> 00:39:46,319
Speaker 5: unmasked meetings, right.

851
00:39:46,280 --> 00:39:47,840
Speaker 3: And we weren't even going at the time, but I

852
00:39:47,960 --> 00:39:50,440
Speaker 3: just thought that, I thought, man, that's that's so crazy that,

853
00:39:51,480 --> 00:39:53,240
Speaker 3: you know, these are the are supposed to be our community,

854
00:39:53,320 --> 00:39:55,640
Speaker 3: these are God's people, and they can't even there's so

855
00:39:55,719 --> 00:39:57,520
Speaker 3: much disagreement with them that they can't even look out

856
00:39:57,520 --> 00:39:59,880
Speaker 3: for each other. And that really bothered me. And then

857
00:40:00,000 --> 00:40:04,040
Speaker 3: and I think the disagreement was a bit public, and

858
00:40:04,680 --> 00:40:07,200
Speaker 3: at one point we had the worker in our field,

859
00:40:07,239 --> 00:40:10,000
Speaker 3: the older brother worker in our field, sent out an

860
00:40:10,000 --> 00:40:14,400
Speaker 3: email to everyone that said, basically, we need to not

861
00:40:14,480 --> 00:40:16,759
Speaker 3: worry so much about this type of thing. Really, what

862
00:40:16,840 --> 00:40:19,640
Speaker 3: really matters is eternal stuff. We need to have more

863
00:40:19,680 --> 00:40:22,120
Speaker 3: of an internal perspective on things. This is just a thing,

864
00:40:22,280 --> 00:40:23,719
Speaker 3: This is just a worldly thing. We don't need to

865
00:40:23,719 --> 00:40:26,920
Speaker 3: worry about it so much. It's really important to come

866
00:40:26,960 --> 00:40:28,800
Speaker 3: to meetings. You know, in the middle of a COVID,

867
00:40:28,960 --> 00:40:31,640
Speaker 3: you know, emergency rooms are full. Everybody's kind of scared

868
00:40:31,640 --> 00:40:34,560
Speaker 3: of this thing and are the leader of our area

869
00:40:34,640 --> 00:40:36,600
Speaker 3: is telling us to just get back into meetings. And

870
00:40:36,760 --> 00:40:39,200
Speaker 3: what actually broke my shelf. If I had to point

871
00:40:39,239 --> 00:40:42,040
Speaker 3: to one thing, it was in this email. I'll keep

872
00:40:42,080 --> 00:40:43,680
Speaker 3: this email for the rest of my life because it

873
00:40:43,960 --> 00:40:46,480
Speaker 3: affected me that much. There was a verse in it

874
00:40:47,480 --> 00:40:49,719
Speaker 3: from the Old Testament. He dug deep into the Old

875
00:40:49,760 --> 00:40:52,960
Speaker 3: Testament and found a verse about God bringing the plagues,

876
00:40:53,400 --> 00:40:56,680
Speaker 3: and he said, you know, God's the one who controls

877
00:40:56,680 --> 00:40:59,040
Speaker 3: the plagues, and so you know, the implication being, if

878
00:40:59,080 --> 00:41:01,080
Speaker 3: he wants you to get COVID, you'll just get it.

879
00:41:02,120 --> 00:41:04,440
Speaker 6: It's up to us to like protect each other because

880
00:41:04,480 --> 00:41:06,920
Speaker 6: God is the one who puts the plague on people's houses.

881
00:41:07,120 --> 00:41:09,120
Speaker 3: Yeah, And so I think I remember where I was

882
00:41:09,160 --> 00:41:10,520
Speaker 3: standing at work. I think I was on my lunch

883
00:41:10,560 --> 00:41:12,439
Speaker 3: break talking to Carry on the phone, and I can't

884
00:41:12,440 --> 00:41:14,120
Speaker 3: remember if you read it to me. You read it

885
00:41:14,160 --> 00:41:16,919
Speaker 3: to me over the phone, and my jaw fell open,

886
00:41:17,200 --> 00:41:19,480
Speaker 3: and I that my shelf broke right there. I was

887
00:41:19,560 --> 00:41:22,759
Speaker 3: just I was done. I said, we can't go back.

888
00:41:23,040 --> 00:41:27,520
Speaker 3: And it was probably another six months before I believed

889
00:41:27,560 --> 00:41:30,160
Speaker 3: it that I was not going back. But I couldn't.

890
00:41:30,239 --> 00:41:33,080
Speaker 3: I couldn't recover from that because I realized that this

891
00:41:33,239 --> 00:41:37,000
Speaker 3: is a bunch of confused people, and they're confused in

892
00:41:37,120 --> 00:41:39,239
Speaker 3: the same way everybody's confused right now. COVID was a

893
00:41:39,239 --> 00:41:42,600
Speaker 3: confusing time for everybody, and you know, everybody had different

894
00:41:42,600 --> 00:41:44,360
Speaker 3: feelings about it and what to do about it. And

895
00:41:44,520 --> 00:41:46,799
Speaker 3: I don't be grudge anybody's individual feelings, but the fact

896
00:41:46,800 --> 00:41:49,000
Speaker 3: that there was no unity and the only place I

897
00:41:49,040 --> 00:41:51,000
Speaker 3: didn't feel comfortable taking my family was to one of

898
00:41:51,080 --> 00:41:53,000
Speaker 3: these meetings. You know, I went to work and I

899
00:41:53,040 --> 00:41:55,960
Speaker 3: wore a mask, I was around vaccinated people. I go

900
00:41:56,080 --> 00:41:57,560
Speaker 3: to the store, I go to the bank, I have

901
00:41:57,600 --> 00:42:00,359
Speaker 3: a mask on. But in these meetings, people are saying,

902
00:42:00,360 --> 00:42:03,160
Speaker 3: you shouldn't do that because that's bad and the government's

903
00:42:03,160 --> 00:42:05,560
Speaker 3: trying to keep us from from worshiping God.

904
00:42:05,920 --> 00:42:08,480
Speaker 5: A it was the fear that was they were considered

905
00:42:08,520 --> 00:42:10,399
Speaker 5: to be bad, like we shouldn't be afraid of things.

906
00:42:10,440 --> 00:42:12,280
Speaker 3: Well, yeah, people were saying things like, well, we shouldn't

907
00:42:12,320 --> 00:42:13,759
Speaker 3: live in fear, and it's like, well, but.

908
00:42:13,920 --> 00:42:16,279
Speaker 1: The thing is they want to live responsibly, so live

909
00:42:16,320 --> 00:42:18,600
Speaker 1: in a different kind of fear. And what was happening

910
00:42:19,200 --> 00:42:21,040
Speaker 1: from where my point of view, which I wasn't going

911
00:42:21,040 --> 00:42:23,520
Speaker 1: to meetings at this point, but was that if you

912
00:42:23,600 --> 00:42:26,120
Speaker 1: don't go to those Wednesday and Sunday meetings and hear

913
00:42:26,280 --> 00:42:29,479
Speaker 1: the message over and over and over and over again,

914
00:42:29,800 --> 00:42:32,399
Speaker 1: very week after week, you start losing a grip on people,

915
00:42:32,480 --> 00:42:34,919
Speaker 1: and you start losing exactly the fear over them, which

916
00:42:34,960 --> 00:42:37,000
Speaker 1: is the only thing keeping them and a lot of

917
00:42:37,040 --> 00:42:39,279
Speaker 1: the times that is, this is the only right way,

918
00:42:39,719 --> 00:42:43,080
Speaker 1: this is and you know, this kind of I've already

919
00:42:43,120 --> 00:42:45,719
Speaker 1: used the term cherry picking, but this very like odd

920
00:42:46,080 --> 00:42:50,800
Speaker 1: interpretation of the Bible. People started listening to other sermons

921
00:42:50,880 --> 00:42:54,080
Speaker 1: online that maybe made perhaps a bit more sense or

922
00:42:54,120 --> 00:42:56,400
Speaker 1: had a little bit more soul and weren't just because

923
00:42:56,400 --> 00:42:57,879
Speaker 1: a lot of the preaching and the two by twos

924
00:42:58,040 --> 00:43:01,240
Speaker 1: is nothing at all except everyone else is wrong. Everyone

925
00:43:01,280 --> 00:43:03,360
Speaker 1: else is wrong, And you're like, yep, okay, but what

926
00:43:04,080 --> 00:43:05,520
Speaker 1: but what do we believe? What do we do?

927
00:43:05,960 --> 00:43:06,160
Speaker 6: Yeah?

928
00:43:06,480 --> 00:43:10,880
Speaker 2: So, yeah, I was curious, like in like, how do

929
00:43:10,960 --> 00:43:16,400
Speaker 2: you conceive of the overseers in that situation, because like

930
00:43:16,480 --> 00:43:19,080
Speaker 2: in Mormonism, it's very clear like, oh, the prophet is

931
00:43:19,120 --> 00:43:21,760
Speaker 2: the one who's in touch with God, and then the prophet,

932
00:43:22,320 --> 00:43:24,319
Speaker 2: you know, has these people under him.

933
00:43:24,360 --> 00:43:28,360
Speaker 5: There's a whole like pyramid of you know, there's.

934
00:43:28,200 --> 00:43:31,080
Speaker 2: A hierarchy, and we know who's at the top and

935
00:43:31,120 --> 00:43:34,360
Speaker 2: he's directly getting the message from God. Do you do

936
00:43:34,520 --> 00:43:37,480
Speaker 2: people believe that the overseers are getting the message from

937
00:43:37,560 --> 00:43:41,040
Speaker 2: God directly or yeah, a.

938
00:43:41,280 --> 00:43:44,040
Speaker 3: Lad baby, Yeah, I mean I think they do. And

939
00:43:44,080 --> 00:43:46,759
Speaker 3: I think that was part of the kind of the

940
00:43:46,840 --> 00:43:49,880
Speaker 3: issue there is because different overseers in different areas. So

941
00:43:49,960 --> 00:43:51,800
Speaker 3: we live in Arizona right now, so we have a

942
00:43:51,840 --> 00:43:54,040
Speaker 3: different overseer than the one that was the overseer in

943
00:43:54,160 --> 00:43:56,640
Speaker 3: Washington at the time, and they had completely different ways

944
00:43:56,640 --> 00:43:59,359
Speaker 3: of handling it. But everyone kind of looks to them

945
00:43:59,360 --> 00:44:02,000
Speaker 3: for guidance because you assume, you know, God's God's leading them,

946
00:44:02,040 --> 00:44:05,080
Speaker 3: and even if you don't take the Bible super literally,

947
00:44:05,200 --> 00:44:07,719
Speaker 3: like maybe I didn't, you still believe, well, these are

948
00:44:08,360 --> 00:44:11,160
Speaker 3: they're going to do the right thing, you know, they're yeah,

949
00:44:11,280 --> 00:44:12,960
Speaker 3: spirit led, God led whatever.

950
00:44:13,280 --> 00:44:15,600
Speaker 6: But that did create a lot of cognitive dissonance because

951
00:44:15,680 --> 00:44:18,040
Speaker 6: you see like one overseer saying, we need to take

952
00:44:18,080 --> 00:44:21,640
Speaker 6: this very seriously, we need to like you know, stay

953
00:44:21,640 --> 00:44:23,839
Speaker 6: away from meetings for a while and do online ones.

954
00:44:24,360 --> 00:44:26,640
Speaker 6: That was happening in the Pacific Northwest and in Arizona

955
00:44:26,719 --> 00:44:30,680
Speaker 6: they were like, we shut down when basically everybody in

956
00:44:30,760 --> 00:44:33,080
Speaker 6: the country did, and as soon as it was legal

957
00:44:33,160 --> 00:44:35,360
Speaker 6: to open back up, they were like, let's go, like

958
00:44:35,440 --> 00:44:39,480
Speaker 6: we're back in meetings, you know, things are going back

959
00:44:39,520 --> 00:44:42,040
Speaker 6: to normal, And that was like June twenty twenty.

960
00:44:42,160 --> 00:44:43,880
Speaker 3: Well, and I also want to mention that there are

961
00:44:44,080 --> 00:44:48,040
Speaker 3: people among the friends the two x twos died from COVID,

962
00:44:49,320 --> 00:44:51,400
Speaker 3: but there was so much denial among the group that

963
00:44:52,120 --> 00:44:54,560
Speaker 3: even even people who knew them or were family to

964
00:44:54,600 --> 00:44:56,799
Speaker 3: those people just pretended that that wasn't it.

965
00:44:57,360 --> 00:44:58,839
Speaker 5: And they wouldn't say why they died.

966
00:44:59,080 --> 00:44:59,200
Speaker 6: Right.

967
00:45:00,000 --> 00:45:02,880
Speaker 3: There was actually someone I knew fairly well, an acquaintance anyway,

968
00:45:03,040 --> 00:45:05,200
Speaker 3: who was a little younger than me, but had a

969
00:45:05,320 --> 00:45:08,239
Speaker 3: kid the same age as one of our kids, and

970
00:45:08,719 --> 00:45:11,719
Speaker 3: she passed away and her husband was in the ICU,

971
00:45:11,840 --> 00:45:13,400
Speaker 3: and so we found out that her kid, who was

972
00:45:13,440 --> 00:45:14,919
Speaker 3: the same age as one of my kids, was living

973
00:45:14,960 --> 00:45:17,400
Speaker 3: with grandparents because one parent had died and the other

974
00:45:17,440 --> 00:45:19,840
Speaker 3: one was in the ICU for a long time. And

975
00:45:20,640 --> 00:45:23,600
Speaker 3: the official story was, well, yeah, she got sick and died. Yeah,

976
00:45:23,600 --> 00:45:27,800
Speaker 3: we don't really know. And I just the denial of

977
00:45:28,000 --> 00:45:30,520
Speaker 3: reality was so hard for me to deal with, you know,

978
00:45:30,600 --> 00:45:35,880
Speaker 3: It's like there's I think being worried about COVID was

979
00:45:36,120 --> 00:45:39,120
Speaker 3: interpreted as sort of a lack of faith, maybe by

980
00:45:39,280 --> 00:45:42,359
Speaker 3: a lot of people. And I realized when I read

981
00:45:42,400 --> 00:45:46,720
Speaker 3: that letter that my faith as I saw it didn't

982
00:45:46,800 --> 00:45:50,120
Speaker 3: even match the groups. You know, I had faith for

983
00:45:50,239 --> 00:45:52,480
Speaker 3: things I couldn't see, like I believe in God. I

984
00:45:52,520 --> 00:45:54,120
Speaker 3: can't see God, but I have faith that He's there.

985
00:45:54,680 --> 00:45:57,279
Speaker 3: And people in the group, and maybe not all of them,

986
00:45:57,320 --> 00:45:59,239
Speaker 3: but some of the people, and some very influential people

987
00:45:59,239 --> 00:46:01,680
Speaker 3: in the group, their faith was not believing the things

988
00:46:01,680 --> 00:46:04,360
Speaker 3: that they could see, and I couldn't square that anymore.

989
00:46:04,400 --> 00:46:06,160
Speaker 3: It was just it felt. It really broke me.

990
00:46:06,360 --> 00:46:08,920
Speaker 6: And we have chronic illnesses in our family, like kyilas

991
00:46:08,920 --> 00:46:11,440
Speaker 6: type one diabetes. So when we finally did get COVID,

992
00:46:11,520 --> 00:46:14,279
Speaker 6: it was even with vaccines on board and packs love

993
00:46:14,320 --> 00:46:16,640
Speaker 6: it on board, it was still a serious illness for him.

994
00:46:17,200 --> 00:46:19,040
Speaker 6: And you know, we have a child with asthma, and

995
00:46:19,200 --> 00:46:22,480
Speaker 6: I have chronic health issues that can be exacerbated by

996
00:46:23,600 --> 00:46:26,480
Speaker 6: viruses and it can make me flare for months. So

997
00:46:27,000 --> 00:46:29,040
Speaker 6: this was something that was like really important to us,

998
00:46:29,160 --> 00:46:31,719
Speaker 6: was protecting our family, and it just didn't seem like

999
00:46:31,840 --> 00:46:32,719
Speaker 6: our lives were.

1000
00:46:32,760 --> 00:46:36,080
Speaker 5: Valuable to the church. It's such except that we be

1001
00:46:36,160 --> 00:46:36,560
Speaker 5: in meeting.

1002
00:46:37,040 --> 00:46:40,719
Speaker 2: It's such twisted religion logic, and so many of them

1003
00:46:40,840 --> 00:46:44,800
Speaker 2: do this where you're like, well, your well being on

1004
00:46:44,880 --> 00:46:49,040
Speaker 2: this earth isn't actually that important. The well being of humans,

1005
00:46:49,120 --> 00:46:51,000
Speaker 2: the well being of the earth, none of this matters

1006
00:46:51,040 --> 00:46:54,759
Speaker 2: because the world's about to end. It's so, it's just

1007
00:46:54,800 --> 00:46:57,320
Speaker 2: so tragic how many people get caught up in that

1008
00:46:57,480 --> 00:47:00,880
Speaker 2: and don't like actually live their life lives and be

1009
00:47:01,040 --> 00:47:04,279
Speaker 2: present and like take care of themselves and take care

1010
00:47:04,320 --> 00:47:06,759
Speaker 2: of their families because of this belief system. That's so

1011
00:47:07,719 --> 00:47:08,719
Speaker 2: it just sucks, man.

1012
00:47:08,840 --> 00:47:10,919
Speaker 1: And I think it also points out just this really

1013
00:47:12,360 --> 00:47:16,560
Speaker 1: divided line between, like you said, overseers, like on the

1014
00:47:16,640 --> 00:47:19,920
Speaker 1: West Coast, marriage and divorce is can can you guys

1015
00:47:19,960 --> 00:47:21,600
Speaker 1: talk a little bit about the difference between the East

1016
00:47:21,640 --> 00:47:22,600
Speaker 1: Coast and the West Coast.

1017
00:47:23,640 --> 00:47:23,839
Speaker 4: Yeah.

1018
00:47:24,280 --> 00:47:28,040
Speaker 6: Yeah, So on the West Coast growing up, we were

1019
00:47:28,080 --> 00:47:32,200
Speaker 6: shot that merit that there are certain circumstances in which.

1020
00:47:32,040 --> 00:47:35,000
Speaker 5: You can get divorced. It's really heavily discouraged.

1021
00:47:35,560 --> 00:47:39,120
Speaker 6: But if you do get divorced, you need to stay

1022
00:47:39,320 --> 00:47:41,600
Speaker 6: single for the rest of your life. It doesn't matter

1023
00:47:41,640 --> 00:47:43,400
Speaker 6: how old you are. You cannot get remarried.

1024
00:47:43,520 --> 00:47:45,200
Speaker 5: Really, if you do get.

1025
00:47:45,120 --> 00:47:49,080
Speaker 6: Remarried, you cannot take part in the meetings anymore. You

1026
00:47:49,160 --> 00:47:51,279
Speaker 6: can still attend, but you have to sit there and

1027
00:47:51,360 --> 00:47:54,120
Speaker 6: listen and not You're not part. You're not professing, You're

1028
00:47:54,120 --> 00:47:54,399
Speaker 6: not part.

1029
00:47:54,520 --> 00:47:57,520
Speaker 1: Meanwhile, an eight year old like me is sharing I

1030
00:47:57,680 --> 00:47:59,400
Speaker 1: professed when I was like eight or nine and was

1031
00:47:59,440 --> 00:48:02,000
Speaker 1: so dislike, like I wrote in my Bible, I love

1032
00:48:02,080 --> 00:48:03,800
Speaker 1: the LORB with the be.

1033
00:48:05,239 --> 00:48:06,800
Speaker 4: So that's so you've.

1034
00:48:06,600 --> 00:48:09,759
Speaker 1: Gotten a divorce from somebody like obvious or something, and

1035
00:48:09,880 --> 00:48:11,360
Speaker 1: you have to listen to my testimony.

1036
00:48:11,440 --> 00:48:15,759
Speaker 4: That's just like wildly uh I love the RB.

1037
00:48:16,840 --> 00:48:20,960
Speaker 6: Yeah uh so, But like in Colorado and Texas is

1038
00:48:21,080 --> 00:48:23,560
Speaker 6: like the line where that changes to the point that

1039
00:48:23,800 --> 00:48:26,080
Speaker 6: like a lot of us growing up were warned to

1040
00:48:26,280 --> 00:48:29,200
Speaker 6: like don't date or marry anyone from Colorado.

1041
00:48:29,400 --> 00:48:29,920
Speaker 4: Colorado.

1042
00:48:30,440 --> 00:48:34,879
Speaker 6: There people they're okay with divorce and remarriage, and it's

1043
00:48:35,000 --> 00:48:37,240
Speaker 6: just a complete it's almost like a completely.

1044
00:48:36,840 --> 00:48:39,279
Speaker 1: Different Oh yeah, you'd go to I'd go to a

1045
00:48:39,440 --> 00:48:42,880
Speaker 1: convention in Colorado and I'd be like, well, or a convention,

1046
00:48:43,080 --> 00:48:45,840
Speaker 1: and I remember, like the conventions are always held in

1047
00:48:45,880 --> 00:48:50,160
Speaker 1: the hottest months of the year, always and no air

1048
00:48:50,239 --> 00:48:54,880
Speaker 1: conditioning tents, like we're dying, We're dying, And like the

1049
00:48:54,960 --> 00:48:58,200
Speaker 1: girls in Texas would sometimes were a little sleepless dress.

1050
00:48:58,320 --> 00:48:59,239
Speaker 5: Oh that bag.

1051
00:48:59,800 --> 00:49:04,800
Speaker 2: Oh okay, wow, so it seems really cool to you.

1052
00:49:05,360 --> 00:49:08,360
Speaker 2: Did you issue or like a West Coaster well, the

1053
00:49:08,680 --> 00:49:11,320
Speaker 2: Texas Texas, Yeah, are you kidding?

1054
00:49:12,400 --> 00:49:15,960
Speaker 5: I was Megan was divorced and remarriage. Okay where you were.

1055
00:49:15,960 --> 00:49:21,600
Speaker 1: From, absolutely not absolutely okay, interesting no, no, no, those

1056
00:49:21,719 --> 00:49:26,160
Speaker 1: like Missouri, Kansas states are very strict and my.

1057
00:49:26,840 --> 00:49:29,200
Speaker 5: Didn't I didn't know that it was not okay over there.

1058
00:49:29,239 --> 00:49:33,239
Speaker 5: That's interesting. Oh no, no, yeah, because like I know,

1059
00:49:33,719 --> 00:49:36,000
Speaker 5: and like the East Coast, it's fine.

1060
00:49:36,600 --> 00:49:39,920
Speaker 4: But it's about possibly not to be is the rumors,

1061
00:49:40,000 --> 00:49:40,840
Speaker 4: so we don't know.

1062
00:49:41,040 --> 00:49:43,720
Speaker 1: But but there's no cohesion, there's no rigs and rules

1063
00:49:43,800 --> 00:49:46,279
Speaker 1: because it's not a real because it's just the way

1064
00:49:46,320 --> 00:49:47,960
Speaker 1: of Jesus. It's just brought down from home, so we

1065
00:49:48,000 --> 00:49:50,320
Speaker 1: can't write down any rules, so nobody knows what is happening,

1066
00:49:50,520 --> 00:49:54,560
Speaker 1: and it's just individual overseers all over the world doing

1067
00:49:54,680 --> 00:49:59,000
Speaker 1: crazy stuff and we're all pretending that it is coming

1068
00:49:59,040 --> 00:50:02,480
Speaker 1: from it's one yeah, right.

1069
00:50:02,760 --> 00:50:06,880
Speaker 3: Yeah, nothing is written down ever, No, there's no written

1070
00:50:06,960 --> 00:50:10,520
Speaker 3: rules or anything. So it's it's strict but not documented.

1071
00:50:10,840 --> 00:50:12,680
Speaker 3: So it does lead to a little bit of that

1072
00:50:12,840 --> 00:50:15,680
Speaker 3: leads to a lot of scrupulosity too. Yeah, it's constantly

1073
00:50:15,760 --> 00:50:17,920
Speaker 3: thinking like, well, where is the edge the edges?

1074
00:50:18,000 --> 00:50:21,000
Speaker 6: You just have to do your best, which with someone

1075
00:50:21,120 --> 00:50:25,360
Speaker 6: with OCD is like oh absolutely.

1076
00:50:26,360 --> 00:50:26,560
Speaker 4: Cari.

1077
00:50:26,760 --> 00:50:29,520
Speaker 2: I was COVID sort of the same. It was sort

1078
00:50:29,520 --> 00:50:31,360
Speaker 2: of the same thing for you, and that's.

1079
00:50:31,320 --> 00:50:33,480
Speaker 4: What like cracked your.

1080
00:50:35,400 --> 00:50:39,280
Speaker 6: Definitely sped up the process for me. I started first,

1081
00:50:39,360 --> 00:50:43,160
Speaker 6: I think, with more of a political deconstruction. I was

1082
00:50:43,560 --> 00:50:47,160
Speaker 6: very very conservative, and there was there was something that

1083
00:50:48,280 --> 00:50:51,920
Speaker 6: flipped in me around like twenty sixteen. I think it

1084
00:50:52,040 --> 00:50:56,880
Speaker 6: was like when Flando Castile was killed and I really

1085
00:50:57,000 --> 00:51:03,000
Speaker 6: started to deconstruct like racism and homophobia and sexism and ableism.

1086
00:51:03,200 --> 00:51:07,160
Speaker 6: And I didn't know that I had chronic illness diagnoses

1087
00:51:07,600 --> 00:51:09,440
Speaker 6: at that time, but I was sick a lot, and

1088
00:51:09,520 --> 00:51:11,560
Speaker 6: I was treated differently in our church because of that,

1089
00:51:11,719 --> 00:51:14,759
Speaker 6: because if you're not there in person all the time,

1090
00:51:15,160 --> 00:51:18,719
Speaker 6: you start getting left out of get togethers and kind

1091
00:51:18,760 --> 00:51:21,120
Speaker 6: of fun events that families are doing with their kids.

1092
00:51:21,280 --> 00:51:24,680
Speaker 6: And you know, the invitations for those things are in

1093
00:51:24,840 --> 00:51:27,080
Speaker 6: meeting is when they invite you to those things. So

1094
00:51:27,520 --> 00:51:29,359
Speaker 6: we started getting left out of a lot of things.

1095
00:51:30,800 --> 00:51:38,080
Speaker 6: My family growing up was very not into science and

1096
00:51:38,160 --> 00:51:41,960
Speaker 6: even medicine really, so in my adult years, I as

1097
00:51:42,080 --> 00:51:45,759
Speaker 6: my kids were learning about evolution, I was learning about

1098
00:51:45,760 --> 00:51:46,400
Speaker 6: evolution and.

1099
00:51:46,440 --> 00:51:48,200
Speaker 5: I was like, oh, this actually makes a lot.

1100
00:51:48,120 --> 00:51:50,480
Speaker 6: Of sense, Like there's a lot of science about this up,

1101
00:51:51,400 --> 00:51:54,279
Speaker 6: and I started reading everything I get my hands on,

1102
00:51:55,200 --> 00:51:59,359
Speaker 6: especially when we physically stopped going to meetings in March

1103
00:51:59,400 --> 00:52:02,880
Speaker 6: twenty twenty because of COVID. That summer, I was just

1104
00:52:03,000 --> 00:52:05,640
Speaker 6: reading everything I could get my hands on, as far

1105
00:52:05,760 --> 00:52:10,360
Speaker 6: as not just science, but like religion too, and philosophy

1106
00:52:10,600 --> 00:52:16,120
Speaker 6: and belief just anything that I had really never again,

1107
00:52:16,160 --> 00:52:18,800
Speaker 6: there's no written rules, but you're not really supposed to

1108
00:52:18,960 --> 00:52:23,880
Speaker 6: read information about other theologies or religions or belief because

1109
00:52:24,320 --> 00:52:27,080
Speaker 6: you might let the devil creep in. So I was

1110
00:52:27,160 --> 00:52:32,440
Speaker 6: allowing myself to open my mind to other viewpoints and

1111
00:52:32,560 --> 00:52:36,080
Speaker 6: that's really what started my deconstruction, and it really bothered

1112
00:52:36,160 --> 00:52:39,640
Speaker 6: me how the LGBTQ community was treated. I didn't understand

1113
00:52:40,320 --> 00:52:46,000
Speaker 6: why love could just be love and just the physical

1114
00:52:46,200 --> 00:52:51,200
Speaker 6: Being away from meeting that summer, by November twenty twenty,

1115
00:52:51,719 --> 00:52:54,680
Speaker 6: I had deconstructed to the point that I was like,

1116
00:52:54,800 --> 00:52:56,600
Speaker 6: if I go back to meetings, I'm going to just

1117
00:52:56,680 --> 00:52:59,200
Speaker 6: have a full on panic attack there. I had already

1118
00:52:59,280 --> 00:53:02,320
Speaker 6: been having panic attacks on the way to meetings for

1119
00:53:02,440 --> 00:53:04,920
Speaker 6: several years. There were Kyle can attest to this. There

1120
00:53:04,960 --> 00:53:07,600
Speaker 6: were times where we had to turn around and drive

1121
00:53:07,680 --> 00:53:11,360
Speaker 6: home because I couldn't breathe or couldn't see, like my

1122
00:53:11,480 --> 00:53:14,120
Speaker 6: vision would go black. I was having such bad panic attacks,

1123
00:53:14,800 --> 00:53:17,600
Speaker 6: and so I told Kyle at the end of twenty twenty,

1124
00:53:17,640 --> 00:53:20,239
Speaker 6: I was like, I cannot physically go back to meeting.

1125
00:53:21,200 --> 00:53:25,640
Speaker 6: And I had also deconstructed belief at that point as well,

1126
00:53:26,400 --> 00:53:28,920
Speaker 6: and I told Kyle that, which kicked off really difficult

1127
00:53:28,920 --> 00:53:30,000
Speaker 6: six months in our marriage.

1128
00:53:31,040 --> 00:53:32,239
Speaker 5: It was really hard for him.

1129
00:53:32,520 --> 00:53:35,080
Speaker 6: I think it felt like a betrayal that I had

1130
00:53:35,160 --> 00:53:38,360
Speaker 6: lost my belief because our whole marriage, that was the

1131
00:53:38,520 --> 00:53:42,399
Speaker 6: foundation of our marriage, not just meetings, but belief in God,

1132
00:53:42,560 --> 00:53:43,680
Speaker 6: like our belief system.

1133
00:53:44,360 --> 00:53:46,239
Speaker 5: And it didn't feel like a choice to me.

1134
00:53:46,360 --> 00:53:49,360
Speaker 6: It felt like a realization, like I realized, I just

1135
00:53:49,440 --> 00:53:52,000
Speaker 6: don't believe this anymore. I did at one point in

1136
00:53:52,080 --> 00:53:54,719
Speaker 6: my life, and now the more I've read and the

1137
00:53:54,840 --> 00:53:57,600
Speaker 6: more I've thought about it, it just doesn't feel right

1138
00:53:57,680 --> 00:53:58,400
Speaker 6: for me anymore.

1139
00:53:59,760 --> 00:54:01,200
Speaker 5: So that's how it happened for me.

1140
00:54:01,360 --> 00:54:03,479
Speaker 6: And it was another six months I think before Kyle

1141
00:54:03,719 --> 00:54:06,279
Speaker 6: was in the same boat as far as like, yeah,

1142
00:54:06,520 --> 00:54:09,000
Speaker 6: we're not going to be going back, right, But Kyle,

1143
00:54:09,080 --> 00:54:11,279
Speaker 6: you still have a Summer of twenty twenty one, you

1144
00:54:11,400 --> 00:54:11,759
Speaker 6: still have.

1145
00:54:12,120 --> 00:54:14,680
Speaker 1: Belief, Kyle, correct, like you kind of you guys are

1146
00:54:14,760 --> 00:54:17,719
Speaker 1: falling on a different page on that and working through it.

1147
00:54:18,760 --> 00:54:21,920
Speaker 3: Yeah kind of. I think I think I'm enjoying not

1148
00:54:22,160 --> 00:54:25,560
Speaker 3: having to know. Yeah, you know, like there's we always

1149
00:54:25,600 --> 00:54:27,560
Speaker 3: hear in the gospel meetings like we know this and

1150
00:54:27,640 --> 00:54:29,360
Speaker 3: we know this, Like it's a point of it shows

1151
00:54:29,440 --> 00:54:31,640
Speaker 3: your faith to know something that you don't really know.

1152
00:54:33,239 --> 00:54:35,680
Speaker 3: You know, our kids, you know, kids kind of mimic things.

1153
00:54:35,719 --> 00:54:38,520
Speaker 3: Our youngest kid really liked one of our workers when

1154
00:54:38,520 --> 00:54:40,360
Speaker 3: we were younger. We had this older sister worker and

1155
00:54:40,400 --> 00:54:42,239
Speaker 3: he really liked her, and he would mimick her and

1156
00:54:42,400 --> 00:54:44,359
Speaker 3: he would he would sit there and read a book

1157
00:54:44,360 --> 00:54:45,879
Speaker 3: and he would stand up and start reading this book

1158
00:54:46,120 --> 00:54:47,920
Speaker 3: and he would start every single sentence with we know

1159
00:54:48,160 --> 00:54:51,799
Speaker 3: something something, you know something something. And I didn't even

1160
00:54:51,840 --> 00:54:54,120
Speaker 3: realize until I saw him do that that It's like, oh, yeah,

1161
00:54:54,160 --> 00:54:56,960
Speaker 3: they say that a lot, don't they. So for me,

1162
00:54:57,120 --> 00:54:59,800
Speaker 3: it's like I think I still sort of believe in

1163
00:55:00,400 --> 00:55:03,680
Speaker 3: a higher power, but I don't. I'm almost at the moment,

1164
00:55:03,719 --> 00:55:06,480
Speaker 3: I'm a bit allergic to saying I know more than that, right,

1165
00:55:06,800 --> 00:55:10,120
Speaker 3: Just Sam, Like I like to just be kind of

1166
00:55:10,160 --> 00:55:11,080
Speaker 3: honest about it where.

1167
00:55:10,960 --> 00:55:11,880
Speaker 4: I am I love that.

1168
00:55:12,360 --> 00:55:15,320
Speaker 2: Yeah, there's such a pathological certainty and I can imagine

1169
00:55:15,520 --> 00:55:18,000
Speaker 2: there's a certain freedom and just being like h cary

1170
00:55:18,520 --> 00:55:20,839
Speaker 2: in terms of the way that the political stuff kind

1171
00:55:20,840 --> 00:55:23,960
Speaker 2: of tied into your belief I mean, did you feel

1172
00:55:24,200 --> 00:55:29,440
Speaker 2: like the religion was had elements of racism, sexism, homophobia,

1173
00:55:29,560 --> 00:55:31,920
Speaker 2: and was that like how how far did that kind

1174
00:55:31,960 --> 00:55:34,359
Speaker 2: of extend into the spiritual part of things.

1175
00:55:35,040 --> 00:55:39,879
Speaker 6: Yes, it's very insidious, but it's it's there for sure.

1176
00:55:41,160 --> 00:55:44,040
Speaker 6: And the group as a whole isn't very politically active,

1177
00:55:44,080 --> 00:55:48,080
Speaker 6: but they are very conservative. It's hard to be liberal

1178
00:55:48,440 --> 00:55:50,439
Speaker 6: or kind of open minded about those things or even

1179
00:55:50,520 --> 00:55:55,600
Speaker 6: call those things out and feel like you fit in

1180
00:55:56,360 --> 00:56:01,480
Speaker 6: with your peer group. And we kind of noticed the

1181
00:56:01,680 --> 00:56:04,320
Speaker 6: more open we were about those things, like on social

1182
00:56:04,440 --> 00:56:09,440
Speaker 6: media or you know, social justice issues or or sharing

1183
00:56:09,520 --> 00:56:13,000
Speaker 6: news articles even that we just were we had less

1184
00:56:13,000 --> 00:56:15,759
Speaker 6: and less friends, and we were invited to things less

1185
00:56:15,760 --> 00:56:16,440
Speaker 6: and less often.

1186
00:56:16,880 --> 00:56:18,200
Speaker 5: Right, it made people uncomfortable.

1187
00:56:18,320 --> 00:56:20,800
Speaker 1: Well, there's also this very interesting story that was like

1188
00:56:21,480 --> 00:56:25,080
Speaker 1: we're persecuted against where it's like, no, yes we're not.

1189
00:56:26,920 --> 00:56:31,279
Speaker 1: Those cities give us their banks, their schools. We had

1190
00:56:31,400 --> 00:56:35,640
Speaker 1: gospel meetings everywhere, funeral homes, nursing homes, banks, and people

1191
00:56:35,680 --> 00:56:39,759
Speaker 1: are like, sure, have a great time, Like there you go.

1192
00:56:40,600 --> 00:56:43,120
Speaker 6: No one think that's why they don't register with the government.

1193
00:56:43,680 --> 00:56:46,160
Speaker 6: Why because they're paranoid of the government.

1194
00:56:47,400 --> 00:56:49,719
Speaker 5: I exist, right, because.

1195
00:56:49,440 --> 00:56:52,359
Speaker 4: They think that there's going to be a prejudice. I see,

1196
00:56:52,560 --> 00:56:55,800
Speaker 4: that's interesting. That is interesting. I'm I'm. I think the

1197
00:56:55,960 --> 00:56:58,800
Speaker 4: FLDS have have had a history of that kind of

1198
00:56:58,840 --> 00:57:00,880
Speaker 4: thing as well. I think they just on this best secret.

1199
00:57:01,360 --> 00:57:01,560
Speaker 1: Yeah.

1200
00:57:01,800 --> 00:57:07,040
Speaker 4: Yeah, so I would love.

1201
00:57:07,400 --> 00:57:10,400
Speaker 2: To kind of shift gears and talk about some of

1202
00:57:10,440 --> 00:57:11,839
Speaker 2: the more recent developments.

1203
00:57:12,080 --> 00:57:13,879
Speaker 1: If you guys are ready, Yeah, let's look about starting

1204
00:57:13,920 --> 00:57:16,000
Speaker 1: the group first and then go into that.

1205
00:57:16,360 --> 00:57:19,120
Speaker 4: Okay, Yeah, so y'all started through.

1206
00:57:19,400 --> 00:57:22,040
Speaker 6: I'll go from here because the group was my idea

1207
00:57:23,160 --> 00:57:26,280
Speaker 6: during that like six month period where I was deconstructing

1208
00:57:27,160 --> 00:57:31,240
Speaker 6: not only the two by two beliefs, but just like God,

1209
00:57:31,480 --> 00:57:34,080
Speaker 6: the idea of God was so wrapped up in that

1210
00:57:34,240 --> 00:57:36,880
Speaker 6: for me, especially because I had been so zealous and

1211
00:57:37,000 --> 00:57:40,760
Speaker 6: taken it all very literally, and because that was like

1212
00:57:41,000 --> 00:57:43,400
Speaker 6: such a difficult time in our marriage and in my life,

1213
00:57:43,560 --> 00:57:47,960
Speaker 6: Like questioning everything about your foundation is just walks your world.

1214
00:57:48,520 --> 00:57:52,800
Speaker 6: I considered suicide twice rather than walking away from meetings,

1215
00:57:53,200 --> 00:57:55,040
Speaker 6: and I thought I was ruining my marriage and I

1216
00:57:55,120 --> 00:57:57,320
Speaker 6: thought I would be dragging my children to hell if

1217
00:57:57,360 --> 00:58:00,520
Speaker 6: I left. Like that's how serious and how difficult it

1218
00:58:00,720 --> 00:58:04,400
Speaker 6: was for me. Luckily, I had like some really great

1219
00:58:04,440 --> 00:58:06,640
Speaker 6: support from friends who had left the church years before

1220
00:58:06,720 --> 00:58:08,960
Speaker 6: and a couple of family members, and that got me

1221
00:58:09,040 --> 00:58:11,640
Speaker 6: through that time, because yeah, it was hard for Kyle

1222
00:58:11,720 --> 00:58:15,320
Speaker 6: and I and it was just incredibly lonely and just

1223
00:58:16,040 --> 00:58:19,080
Speaker 6: we'd always been taught that leaving meetings was the easy

1224
00:58:19,160 --> 00:58:20,960
Speaker 6: way out, and it was not easy.

1225
00:58:21,040 --> 00:58:22,680
Speaker 5: So I was like, what the hell is wrong with me?

1226
00:58:22,880 --> 00:58:24,680
Speaker 4: Like why is this so so hard?

1227
00:58:26,080 --> 00:58:29,080
Speaker 6: So I after we had kind of worked through all

1228
00:58:29,160 --> 00:58:31,360
Speaker 6: of that and we'd got you know, I'd started therapy,

1229
00:58:31,400 --> 00:58:36,000
Speaker 6: which was incredibly helpful, highly recommend and we had worked

1230
00:58:36,040 --> 00:58:39,440
Speaker 6: through some things in our marriage and we're in a

1231
00:58:39,520 --> 00:58:43,400
Speaker 6: much better place. I started thinking, like, what if there's

1232
00:58:43,480 --> 00:58:46,040
Speaker 6: like I don't know, fifty other people out there who

1233
00:58:46,720 --> 00:58:49,760
Speaker 6: are going through the same thing, or who are feeling

1234
00:58:49,880 --> 00:58:52,200
Speaker 6: lonely like I did, or struggling like I did, or

1235
00:58:53,080 --> 00:58:55,640
Speaker 6: wanting to even leave meetings but don't have a community

1236
00:58:55,800 --> 00:58:58,600
Speaker 6: to go to like so I brought this idea to Kyle.

1237
00:58:58,600 --> 00:59:00,840
Speaker 6: I was like, what if we started a Facebook So

1238
00:59:01,960 --> 00:59:04,560
Speaker 6: we also went to our friends Mike and Abby and

1239
00:59:05,400 --> 00:59:07,720
Speaker 6: we were like they they left years before we did,

1240
00:59:07,800 --> 00:59:10,600
Speaker 6: like ten years before we did. And I was like, hey,

1241
00:59:10,640 --> 00:59:12,760
Speaker 6: I'm thinking of starting this Facebook group. Would you guys

1242
00:59:12,800 --> 00:59:14,960
Speaker 6: be on board to like start it with us? And

1243
00:59:15,040 --> 00:59:17,360
Speaker 6: they were like, yeah, absolutely, that's a great idea. So

1244
00:59:18,040 --> 00:59:22,360
Speaker 6: we opened this Facebook support group on Facebook and it

1245
00:59:22,480 --> 00:59:27,280
Speaker 6: was January twenty, twenty twenty two. Yes, so it's just

1246
00:59:27,600 --> 00:59:30,520
Speaker 6: like a year and a half ago. Yeah, And I

1247
00:59:31,080 --> 00:59:36,960
Speaker 6: really we really wanted the community to be a place

1248
00:59:37,160 --> 00:59:41,520
Speaker 6: where it didn't matter what belief system you had, what

1249
00:59:41,800 --> 00:59:45,800
Speaker 6: you had left meetings for, you know, whether you were

1250
00:59:46,240 --> 00:59:51,480
Speaker 6: straight or LGBTQ. Plus, I wanted everybody to who had

1251
00:59:51,560 --> 00:59:54,280
Speaker 6: this shared background to be welcome and have a safe

1252
00:59:54,520 --> 00:59:55,160
Speaker 6: space to go.

1253
00:59:55,280 --> 00:59:58,920
Speaker 1: To because just rejecting really quickly, Karie, like before this,

1254
00:59:59,120 --> 01:00:01,320
Speaker 1: we never talked to each other before this.

1255
01:00:01,440 --> 01:00:03,880
Speaker 4: If you left, it was like nobody talked about you.

1256
01:00:04,480 --> 01:00:04,959
Speaker 4: You're gone.

1257
01:00:05,320 --> 01:00:06,240
Speaker 5: You fell off the map.

1258
01:00:06,320 --> 01:00:09,000
Speaker 4: You fell off the map. Nobody ever asks like why

1259
01:00:09,080 --> 01:00:10,160
Speaker 4: did why did they quit?

1260
01:00:10,480 --> 01:00:13,960
Speaker 1: Because never the reason is because you lost the spirit

1261
01:00:14,880 --> 01:00:19,440
Speaker 1: and there's no there's a good reason. So I'd never

1262
01:00:19,600 --> 01:00:25,320
Speaker 1: talked to an ex member before really, so this idea

1263
01:00:25,800 --> 01:00:26,360
Speaker 1: was very.

1264
01:00:28,200 --> 01:00:28,680
Speaker 4: Interesting.

1265
01:00:29,000 --> 01:00:32,280
Speaker 1: And also just wanted to add that something you said

1266
01:00:32,280 --> 01:00:37,200
Speaker 1: about like leaving meeting is easy. You're told that if

1267
01:00:37,280 --> 01:00:40,680
Speaker 1: you feel freedom after you leave meeting, that's because the

1268
01:00:40,800 --> 01:00:42,600
Speaker 1: devil stopped working on you.

1269
01:00:42,840 --> 01:00:44,240
Speaker 4: Oh my god, what a mind fuck.

1270
01:00:44,560 --> 01:00:44,760
Speaker 1: Yeah.

1271
01:00:45,960 --> 01:00:48,720
Speaker 3: Yeah, so if you struggle after you leave, it's because

1272
01:00:48,760 --> 01:00:50,440
Speaker 3: you really know you should come back, And if you

1273
01:00:50,480 --> 01:00:52,280
Speaker 3: don't struggle, it's because the devil has you. So it

1274
01:00:52,280 --> 01:00:56,240
Speaker 3: doesn't it doesn't really matter what happens. And yeah, I

1275
01:00:56,320 --> 01:00:59,240
Speaker 3: can like what you were just saying. I spent so

1276
01:00:59,400 --> 01:01:01,800
Speaker 3: from the time we went to our last meeting to

1277
01:01:01,920 --> 01:01:06,080
Speaker 3: the time I told somebody that I was out was

1278
01:01:06,120 --> 01:01:08,400
Speaker 3: about a year and a half and in that time

1279
01:01:08,520 --> 01:01:13,280
Speaker 3: I only heard from one professing person. They didn't know

1280
01:01:13,320 --> 01:01:14,919
Speaker 3: if we were in or out. It just didn't matter.

1281
01:01:15,600 --> 01:01:18,240
Speaker 3: And that was a really, really dark time for me

1282
01:01:18,320 --> 01:01:19,880
Speaker 3: as well. I had a lot of the same feelings

1283
01:01:19,960 --> 01:01:23,720
Speaker 3: Carrie had. I feel for anybody who has to, because

1284
01:01:23,720 --> 01:01:26,200
Speaker 3: I'm thankful that I have fairly good mental health, I think,

1285
01:01:26,360 --> 01:01:28,080
Speaker 3: and I didn't for a while. It was a really

1286
01:01:28,160 --> 01:01:30,600
Speaker 3: dark time for me too, and to go through that

1287
01:01:30,920 --> 01:01:32,720
Speaker 3: while Cary's going through it. We weren't good for each

1288
01:01:32,720 --> 01:01:34,200
Speaker 3: other probably for a little bit of that time.

1289
01:01:34,360 --> 01:01:36,640
Speaker 5: Yeah, we we fed into a lot of each other's triggers.

1290
01:01:36,720 --> 01:01:38,720
Speaker 3: Yeah, it was. It was a really, really tough time.

1291
01:01:38,760 --> 01:01:41,040
Speaker 3: And when Cary started to suggest to starting the group,

1292
01:01:41,880 --> 01:01:43,680
Speaker 3: I actually didn't even want to it first, because I

1293
01:01:43,760 --> 01:01:45,720
Speaker 3: was like, I am just come out of the worst,

1294
01:01:45,880 --> 01:01:48,800
Speaker 3: darkest place. I didn't I didn't know I could be

1295
01:01:48,880 --> 01:01:51,600
Speaker 3: in a place that dark for that long. I don't

1296
01:01:51,600 --> 01:01:53,600
Speaker 3: want to talk about this anymore. I don't want to

1297
01:01:53,680 --> 01:01:56,440
Speaker 3: be I don't want to dwell on this anymore, you know.

1298
01:01:57,120 --> 01:01:58,800
Speaker 3: But then we you know, we talked about it as

1299
01:01:58,840 --> 01:02:00,640
Speaker 3: we do. You know, we were in much better place,

1300
01:02:00,680 --> 01:02:02,240
Speaker 3: and we started talking about it a lot, and I thought,

1301
01:02:02,280 --> 01:02:04,040
Speaker 3: oh no, I bet we'd get more than fifty people.

1302
01:02:04,040 --> 01:02:05,840
Speaker 3: I bet there's some people out there who really wanted

1303
01:02:06,880 --> 01:02:09,080
Speaker 3: who do who maybe were just like us, haven't talked

1304
01:02:09,080 --> 01:02:10,400
Speaker 3: to anybody in a long time, kind of like you

1305
01:02:10,440 --> 01:02:12,800
Speaker 3: were saying. And yeah, when we started the group, we

1306
01:02:12,920 --> 01:02:16,960
Speaker 3: had people saying who joined the group saying, Wow, I've

1307
01:02:17,000 --> 01:02:18,840
Speaker 3: been out for thirty years and have never talked to

1308
01:02:18,880 --> 01:02:21,760
Speaker 3: anybody about my upbringing and never processed.

1309
01:02:21,760 --> 01:02:24,960
Speaker 7: You know, my deconstruction like this, and there's no name

1310
01:02:25,080 --> 01:02:27,440
Speaker 7: for it. So some people had never even looked for

1311
01:02:27,640 --> 01:02:30,320
Speaker 7: it on the internet. They don't even know what to

1312
01:02:30,480 --> 01:02:31,200
Speaker 7: look up.

1313
01:02:31,440 --> 01:02:32,480
Speaker 4: I'm so crazy.

1314
01:02:32,600 --> 01:02:34,720
Speaker 5: A lot of ex members aren't even aware of the

1315
01:02:34,880 --> 01:02:35,600
Speaker 5: term two by.

1316
01:02:35,480 --> 01:02:37,000
Speaker 4: Two oh at all.

1317
01:02:37,400 --> 01:02:37,640
Speaker 1: Wow.

1318
01:02:37,880 --> 01:02:42,240
Speaker 2: So how did you find people for the group?

1319
01:02:43,600 --> 01:02:46,400
Speaker 6: Well, we all had some friends on our social media

1320
01:02:46,640 --> 01:02:49,360
Speaker 6: friends lists who we knew had left, and so I

1321
01:02:50,160 --> 01:02:53,320
Speaker 6: started inviting people, and some people didn't want to join,

1322
01:02:53,400 --> 01:02:56,040
Speaker 6: which is fine, and a lot of people did, and

1323
01:02:56,160 --> 01:02:58,640
Speaker 6: then they started inviting their friends and they started inviting

1324
01:02:58,720 --> 01:03:00,400
Speaker 6: and it was just kind of like a chain reaction,

1325
01:03:00,640 --> 01:03:04,960
Speaker 6: like it snowballed, and by the end of March this year,

1326
01:03:05,120 --> 01:03:07,840
Speaker 6: twenty twenty three, we had nine hundred.

1327
01:03:07,920 --> 01:03:09,160
Speaker 5: Members, is what we were at.

1328
01:03:09,400 --> 01:03:09,600
Speaker 1: WOW.

1329
01:03:10,720 --> 01:03:12,640
Speaker 5: Which leads us into a different topic.

1330
01:03:12,800 --> 01:03:15,200
Speaker 4: So, well, really it does.

1331
01:03:16,720 --> 01:03:18,200
Speaker 2: I want to get into that topic, but I also

1332
01:03:18,320 --> 01:03:21,040
Speaker 2: just I feel like it would probably be helpful for

1333
01:03:21,200 --> 01:03:24,320
Speaker 2: some of our listeners to hear how the two of

1334
01:03:24,440 --> 01:03:27,400
Speaker 2: you as a couple, like were able to work through

1335
01:03:27,440 --> 01:03:29,880
Speaker 2: that if you could give us just like the spark

1336
01:03:29,920 --> 01:03:30,800
Speaker 2: notes version.

1337
01:03:32,320 --> 01:03:37,919
Speaker 6: Yeah, we tried couples therapy. Briefly, it was it didn't

1338
01:03:37,960 --> 01:03:40,919
Speaker 6: take I think it like stirred the pot.

1339
01:03:41,640 --> 01:03:43,520
Speaker 3: It did because we were in such different places that

1340
01:03:43,600 --> 01:03:45,800
Speaker 3: we weren't even speaking the same language, right. Yeah, And

1341
01:03:45,960 --> 01:03:48,000
Speaker 3: in hindsight, it's funny to look back on because.

1342
01:03:47,800 --> 01:03:49,320
Speaker 5: We actually probably hilarious.

1343
01:03:50,280 --> 01:03:53,760
Speaker 3: Yeah, it's so funny in hindsight. We were actually in

1344
01:03:53,800 --> 01:03:55,600
Speaker 3: the same place. But that was the problem. We weren't.

1345
01:03:56,040 --> 01:03:59,280
Speaker 3: We were very close. We're good friends first and foremost

1346
01:03:59,520 --> 01:04:03,200
Speaker 3: and always have been. And to be in such a dark,

1347
01:04:03,400 --> 01:04:06,400
Speaker 3: sort of kind of up in the air place where

1348
01:04:06,440 --> 01:04:08,800
Speaker 3: we don't really know where we are in the world,

1349
01:04:09,520 --> 01:04:11,400
Speaker 3: and then to have the other person there too, didn't

1350
01:04:11,440 --> 01:04:12,800
Speaker 3: We didn't have the other one to kind of lean

1351
01:04:12,880 --> 01:04:15,440
Speaker 3: on and go through it. The analogy. I like to

1352
01:04:15,520 --> 01:04:17,360
Speaker 3: use this analogy when I'm kind of describing where we were.

1353
01:04:17,360 --> 01:04:19,080
Speaker 3: It's it's like you know in those old cartoons like

1354
01:04:19,120 --> 01:04:22,320
Speaker 3: Wiley Coyote or whatever. Roadrunner, there's this there's always this

1355
01:04:22,320 --> 01:04:23,840
Speaker 3: scene where they run off the edge of a cliff

1356
01:04:24,040 --> 01:04:25,960
Speaker 3: and then they just keep running, and then there's that

1357
01:04:26,160 --> 01:04:29,480
Speaker 3: moment where they stop and look at the camera, and

1358
01:04:30,440 --> 01:04:32,360
Speaker 3: there's that moment where they have to decide if they're

1359
01:04:32,360 --> 01:04:34,440
Speaker 3: going to fall if they're going to run back or what.

1360
01:04:35,480 --> 01:04:38,400
Speaker 3: And falling is bad because it probably is going to hurt,

1361
01:04:38,440 --> 01:04:41,680
Speaker 3: it's going to be terrible. But running back, you're just

1362
01:04:41,800 --> 01:04:45,280
Speaker 3: running back to whatever you ran from, right, And that's

1363
01:04:45,760 --> 01:04:48,000
Speaker 3: the spot where both of us were for about six months.

1364
01:04:48,080 --> 01:04:50,360
Speaker 3: Probably is just that stop stare at the camera spot

1365
01:04:50,440 --> 01:04:53,760
Speaker 3: of like I don't know what to do and and

1366
01:04:53,920 --> 01:04:55,640
Speaker 3: sort of to me, an indictment of the group that

1367
01:04:55,720 --> 01:04:58,520
Speaker 3: we would come from is that we couldn't go to

1368
01:04:58,560 --> 01:05:00,840
Speaker 3: anybody on the inside. I talked to one person on

1369
01:05:00,960 --> 01:05:04,440
Speaker 3: the inside who was a practicing bleeding two by two

1370
01:05:05,120 --> 01:05:07,720
Speaker 3: the entire time, and the only advice they had for me,

1371
01:05:07,800 --> 01:05:09,640
Speaker 3: and I was in a really dark place. I told them, like,

1372
01:05:09,680 --> 01:05:10,760
Speaker 3: you don't you don't even want to talk to me

1373
01:05:10,880 --> 01:05:12,800
Speaker 3: right now. I'm going to be a bad influence on you.

1374
01:05:14,080 --> 01:05:16,040
Speaker 3: This is terrible. And they were a very caring, kind

1375
01:05:16,120 --> 01:05:19,919
Speaker 3: person and they wanted good for me. And this person said, well,

1376
01:05:20,360 --> 01:05:22,360
Speaker 3: at least get your kids to meeting because their souls

1377
01:05:22,360 --> 01:05:26,360
Speaker 3: are your responsibility. And I didn't need to hear that.

1378
01:05:26,840 --> 01:05:28,160
Speaker 3: Then That's not what I needed.

1379
01:05:28,440 --> 01:05:28,800
Speaker 6: So I.

1380
01:05:30,320 --> 01:05:33,160
Speaker 3: Kept in contact with them, but we didn't It was

1381
01:05:33,200 --> 01:05:35,919
Speaker 3: a short time where I was suicidal. Also, Yeah, there wasn't.

1382
01:05:35,960 --> 01:05:37,600
Speaker 5: We didn't have a lot of friends outside either.

1383
01:05:37,880 --> 01:05:40,400
Speaker 6: I mean I had a couple of really abby like

1384
01:05:40,560 --> 01:05:43,760
Speaker 6: Mike and Abbey had left ten years before us, and

1385
01:05:43,880 --> 01:05:46,400
Speaker 6: another really good friend who was living with us off

1386
01:05:46,440 --> 01:05:50,320
Speaker 6: and on, and that was kind of it. Yeah, so

1387
01:05:50,440 --> 01:05:53,080
Speaker 6: we were losing our meeting friends. They did not understand

1388
01:05:53,120 --> 01:05:53,840
Speaker 6: what we were going.

1389
01:05:53,760 --> 01:05:56,400
Speaker 3: Through and weren't really aware, because how are we supposed.

1390
01:05:56,120 --> 01:05:57,640
Speaker 6: To tell you, Well, we kind of had lost each

1391
01:05:57,640 --> 01:06:00,960
Speaker 6: other through that period because we were deconstructed very differently,

1392
01:06:01,120 --> 01:06:02,240
Speaker 6: it's all of the same.

1393
01:06:02,640 --> 01:06:04,480
Speaker 5: Yeah, not in ourselves.

1394
01:06:04,960 --> 01:06:07,880
Speaker 6: Yes, we had also lost ourselves like it that's what

1395
01:06:08,040 --> 01:06:10,880
Speaker 6: it felt like like. It felt like I had to

1396
01:06:11,040 --> 01:06:15,000
Speaker 6: re examine literally every part of my life, including my marriage.

1397
01:06:15,240 --> 01:06:18,160
Speaker 6: I realized that was bisexual during that time too. I

1398
01:06:18,520 --> 01:06:21,840
Speaker 6: had never known that about myself, Like, I had never

1399
01:06:21,960 --> 01:06:26,320
Speaker 6: been given the language for it to be acceptable to

1400
01:06:26,400 --> 01:06:31,800
Speaker 6: even consider an attraction to women, you know, And I

1401
01:06:32,160 --> 01:06:34,480
Speaker 6: just came out like within the past couple of months

1402
01:06:34,520 --> 01:06:35,280
Speaker 6: publicly with that.

1403
01:06:36,520 --> 01:06:38,200
Speaker 5: But yeah, it was really difficult.

1404
01:06:38,320 --> 01:06:42,600
Speaker 6: Therapy for me personally was the most helpful thing for

1405
01:06:42,840 --> 01:06:46,320
Speaker 6: my marriage, Like working on myself and rebuilding my own

1406
01:06:46,400 --> 01:06:51,800
Speaker 6: personal foundations some sort of uh, you know, when you

1407
01:06:51,920 --> 01:06:54,120
Speaker 6: lose your belief system, it's like, Okay, what do I believe?

1408
01:06:54,200 --> 01:06:57,680
Speaker 5: Like what motivates me? What what purpose do I have?

1409
01:06:57,920 --> 01:07:02,560
Speaker 6: Like? Rebuilding those things for myself personally helped my marriage,

1410
01:07:03,160 --> 01:07:07,240
Speaker 6: and then just really learning about what is unconditional love

1411
01:07:07,520 --> 01:07:09,360
Speaker 6: and what does that mean and what does that look

1412
01:07:09,520 --> 01:07:13,160
Speaker 6: like and applying that to not only myself but also

1413
01:07:13,360 --> 01:07:17,160
Speaker 6: my marriage and those around me, and even family and

1414
01:07:17,240 --> 01:07:20,920
Speaker 6: friends who were professing who felt like us leaving was

1415
01:07:21,600 --> 01:07:25,240
Speaker 6: somehow more painful for them. It was like something we

1416
01:07:25,320 --> 01:07:28,439
Speaker 6: were doing to them, and because they didn't, they don't

1417
01:07:28,520 --> 01:07:31,920
Speaker 6: understand how hard it is, you know, and unconditional love

1418
01:07:32,000 --> 01:07:34,120
Speaker 6: and just kind of learning about that and applying that

1419
01:07:35,120 --> 01:07:38,920
Speaker 6: was most helpful for me during that time and accepting like,

1420
01:07:40,080 --> 01:07:43,640
Speaker 6: you know, I read some books of people written, people

1421
01:07:43,760 --> 01:07:47,800
Speaker 6: wrote who are in mixed faith marriages and realizing, oh,

1422
01:07:47,880 --> 01:07:50,080
Speaker 6: it is possible because the two by twos use a

1423
01:07:50,160 --> 01:07:53,400
Speaker 6: language like if one person professes and the other doesn't,

1424
01:07:53,400 --> 01:07:56,520
Speaker 6: you have a broken home. So these things were integrated

1425
01:07:56,600 --> 01:07:59,040
Speaker 6: in my mind my entire life, like, oh, if you

1426
01:07:59,120 --> 01:08:02,120
Speaker 6: have a different belief system as your partner, it's impossible

1427
01:08:02,160 --> 01:08:04,200
Speaker 6: for your marriage to last like that. I think that's

1428
01:08:04,240 --> 01:08:07,080
Speaker 6: where a lot of our pain was coming from. And

1429
01:08:07,680 --> 01:08:10,440
Speaker 6: we both felt betrayed by the other person because we

1430
01:08:10,560 --> 01:08:13,280
Speaker 6: thought it wasn't like our marriage couldn't last. It didn't

1431
01:08:13,280 --> 01:08:16,360
Speaker 6: seem possible, and that was so scary to both of

1432
01:08:16,479 --> 01:08:19,679
Speaker 6: us that we would kind of either withdraw from each

1433
01:08:19,680 --> 01:08:23,000
Speaker 6: other or lash out at each other. Right, So, just

1434
01:08:23,200 --> 01:08:25,639
Speaker 6: kind of deconstructing all of those beliefs that I had

1435
01:08:25,720 --> 01:08:28,960
Speaker 6: and learning about unconditional love and realizing that it was

1436
01:08:29,080 --> 01:08:33,160
Speaker 6: okay for me to love and accept myself where I was,

1437
01:08:33,600 --> 01:08:35,599
Speaker 6: and it was okay for me to love and accept

1438
01:08:35,880 --> 01:08:38,120
Speaker 6: Kyle where he was, and that was okay that those

1439
01:08:38,320 --> 01:08:42,360
Speaker 6: were different places was really what helped me the most

1440
01:08:42,439 --> 01:08:42,880
Speaker 6: during that time.

1441
01:08:42,920 --> 01:08:45,040
Speaker 3: You can speak, yeah, and it's the same thing. I mean,

1442
01:08:45,120 --> 01:08:47,160
Speaker 3: we did have, Like we did have a couple friends,

1443
01:08:47,200 --> 01:08:48,920
Speaker 3: Mike and a Me for one, and some other friends

1444
01:08:50,600 --> 01:08:52,479
Speaker 3: on the outside who'd been through it before, and we're

1445
01:08:52,479 --> 01:08:54,680
Speaker 3: telling us the whole time, go slower, go slower, you

1446
01:08:54,720 --> 01:08:57,520
Speaker 3: don't have to fix this right now, just like give yourself.

1447
01:08:57,600 --> 01:09:03,200
Speaker 5: Careful, the dog a dog under the table, the.

1448
01:09:05,120 --> 01:09:05,439
Speaker 4: Sorry.

1449
01:09:05,520 --> 01:09:07,840
Speaker 3: So yeah, I mean we had friends telling us, you know,

1450
01:09:07,960 --> 01:09:10,400
Speaker 3: slow down and be patient with yourself. It'll be fine.

1451
01:09:10,479 --> 01:09:12,160
Speaker 3: You guys are be getting fine. You guys are good friends.

1452
01:09:12,200 --> 01:09:16,120
Speaker 3: You guys will you know? And and I didn't. I

1453
01:09:16,280 --> 01:09:18,160
Speaker 3: wasn't even in a good enough place to be in therapy.

1454
01:09:18,240 --> 01:09:20,000
Speaker 3: I didn't even want to talk to a therapist because

1455
01:09:20,040 --> 01:09:22,040
Speaker 3: I just I didn't want to talk to anybody. I

1456
01:09:22,160 --> 01:09:24,160
Speaker 3: was just in such a terrible place. It took all

1457
01:09:24,240 --> 01:09:28,000
Speaker 3: of my you know, mental fortitude to do my job

1458
01:09:28,040 --> 01:09:30,280
Speaker 3: every day and then just come home and be dysfunctional.

1459
01:09:31,000 --> 01:09:33,960
Speaker 5: For the kids, Yeah, kids are watching us go through

1460
01:09:34,000 --> 01:09:34,360
Speaker 5: this too.

1461
01:09:34,960 --> 01:09:39,280
Speaker 3: Poor kids. They'll be in therapy too. But I did

1462
01:09:39,360 --> 01:09:41,320
Speaker 3: start therapy last year for the same reason, because it's

1463
01:09:41,400 --> 01:09:44,040
Speaker 3: like I just needed to talk to somebody that wasn't

1464
01:09:44,080 --> 01:09:46,559
Speaker 3: carry because it's not fair to just keep dumping all

1465
01:09:46,640 --> 01:09:48,000
Speaker 3: of it on her. And because that's what we did.

1466
01:09:48,280 --> 01:09:50,320
Speaker 5: We were definitely trauma dumping on each other totally.

1467
01:09:50,400 --> 01:09:52,559
Speaker 3: Yeah, it wasn't healthy, and there's a lot of trauma.

1468
01:09:55,360 --> 01:09:58,360
Speaker 5: I mean, we're a really good place now though, Like definitely.

1469
01:09:58,520 --> 01:09:58,680
Speaker 3: Yeah.

1470
01:09:58,720 --> 01:10:02,560
Speaker 6: I think actually our marriage is better, Like we communicate

1471
01:10:02,840 --> 01:10:05,240
Speaker 6: more about our beliefs than we ever have.

1472
01:10:06,120 --> 01:10:08,120
Speaker 3: Yeah, So can I say something right? Yeah, So that's

1473
01:10:08,360 --> 01:10:12,479
Speaker 3: that's a funny thing too. We we it's not just

1474
01:10:12,560 --> 01:10:15,479
Speaker 3: a belief, right, it is it's who you are. It's

1475
01:10:15,520 --> 01:10:18,600
Speaker 3: not what you do identity, right, it's your identity. So

1476
01:10:19,439 --> 01:10:21,920
Speaker 3: so you're deconstructing kind of who you are, not just

1477
01:10:22,000 --> 01:10:25,880
Speaker 3: a thing you have, right, but also simultaneously somehow we

1478
01:10:26,000 --> 01:10:29,280
Speaker 3: never talked about it, and it's like, you know, it's

1479
01:10:29,320 --> 01:10:31,680
Speaker 3: so much part of you that you don't actually discuss it.

1480
01:10:31,840 --> 01:10:34,240
Speaker 3: And and when we kind of calm down and got

1481
01:10:34,280 --> 01:10:37,000
Speaker 3: through some of our real, you know, tough parts, we

1482
01:10:37,080 --> 01:10:39,760
Speaker 3: started talking more and more, and then we even started

1483
01:10:39,800 --> 01:10:42,519
Speaker 3: looking back on old conversations like, oh, we didn't even

1484
01:10:42,560 --> 01:10:45,479
Speaker 3: believe the same thing, maybe less of a literal belief

1485
01:10:45,560 --> 01:10:46,040
Speaker 3: than she had.

1486
01:10:46,240 --> 01:10:48,559
Speaker 6: Yeah, I was very literal, whereas you were kind of like, well,

1487
01:10:48,560 --> 01:10:51,760
Speaker 6: maybe some of these Bible stories are like analogies, like.

1488
01:10:51,840 --> 01:10:55,960
Speaker 4: Carrie, were you like dinosaur bones were hidden to trick us?

1489
01:10:56,040 --> 01:10:57,040
Speaker 4: Were you like in that camp?

1490
01:10:57,360 --> 01:10:58,880
Speaker 5: Some families are like that.

1491
01:10:59,040 --> 01:11:00,800
Speaker 1: I I was.

1492
01:11:01,160 --> 01:11:04,880
Speaker 6: I was always raised that dinosaurs were around at the

1493
01:11:04,920 --> 01:11:06,639
Speaker 6: same time. They must have been around at the same

1494
01:11:06,640 --> 01:11:07,640
Speaker 6: time as humans.

1495
01:11:07,520 --> 01:11:10,920
Speaker 3: Got you, And I wasn't. I was totally fine with

1496
01:11:11,000 --> 01:11:13,439
Speaker 3: science like that. That duplicity lived in my mind, just fine.

1497
01:11:13,479 --> 01:11:15,240
Speaker 5: It was not even which was another thing that was

1498
01:11:15,280 --> 01:11:17,559
Speaker 5: different that we never realized. We didn't talk about talk

1499
01:11:17,600 --> 01:11:17,960
Speaker 5: about that.

1500
01:11:18,360 --> 01:11:20,080
Speaker 3: Because we just because we all know we're going to

1501
01:11:20,120 --> 01:11:22,000
Speaker 3: the same meetings hearing the same thing, So we didn't

1502
01:11:22,000 --> 01:11:24,200
Speaker 3: actually talk about what we really believed. And I think

1503
01:11:24,240 --> 01:11:26,000
Speaker 3: we were maybe a little bit scared too, because you're

1504
01:11:26,000 --> 01:11:27,200
Speaker 3: afraid that the other one is going to be a

1505
01:11:27,200 --> 01:11:29,479
Speaker 3: little different, and you can't be unequally yoked of course,

1506
01:11:30,080 --> 01:11:34,080
Speaker 3: so it's not just kind of yeah, yeah, so, and

1507
01:11:34,240 --> 01:11:37,040
Speaker 3: that might have sort of played into why we deconstructed

1508
01:11:37,080 --> 01:11:40,080
Speaker 3: so differently and wildly, because it's like you're deconstructing who

1509
01:11:40,120 --> 01:11:42,240
Speaker 3: you are, and also you might realize that you're not

1510
01:11:42,320 --> 01:11:44,840
Speaker 3: even where you thought you were and in relation to

1511
01:11:44,880 --> 01:11:45,400
Speaker 3: the other person.

1512
01:11:45,479 --> 01:11:47,120
Speaker 6: I just want to say to the point that we

1513
01:11:47,280 --> 01:11:50,400
Speaker 6: never talked the fact that we never talked about that

1514
01:11:50,520 --> 01:11:53,680
Speaker 6: in our marriage is very strange because we analyze and

1515
01:11:53,800 --> 01:11:58,320
Speaker 6: discuss things for hours like that rationalities, and it just

1516
01:11:58,479 --> 01:12:02,000
Speaker 6: goes to show like the teachings that that we had

1517
01:12:02,080 --> 01:12:06,120
Speaker 6: integrated that if you marry someone professing, you'll be fine

1518
01:12:06,320 --> 01:12:07,960
Speaker 6: and you'll have the same belief system.

1519
01:12:08,360 --> 01:12:08,560
Speaker 5: It was.

1520
01:12:08,720 --> 01:12:11,480
Speaker 6: It was so ingrained in us that it never occurred

1521
01:12:11,560 --> 01:12:14,560
Speaker 6: to us to discuss, hey do you think this or

1522
01:12:14,640 --> 01:12:17,519
Speaker 6: do you view this differently? That it just we just

1523
01:12:17,600 --> 01:12:19,640
Speaker 6: there were so many built in assumptions that like, well,

1524
01:12:19,680 --> 01:12:22,080
Speaker 6: you're professing and I'm professing so well.

1525
01:12:23,880 --> 01:12:27,000
Speaker 1: Also weird that we never talked about like we as

1526
01:12:27,240 --> 01:12:29,599
Speaker 1: the general public, never talked about God.

1527
01:12:29,560 --> 01:12:31,519
Speaker 4: Or Jesus like we talked about the workers.

1528
01:12:31,760 --> 01:12:33,800
Speaker 1: Yes, this worker is here, this worker is there, this

1529
01:12:33,880 --> 01:12:36,240
Speaker 1: workers here like it was never like Jesus is really

1530
01:12:36,280 --> 01:12:37,280
Speaker 1: working in my heart today.

1531
01:12:37,360 --> 01:12:39,680
Speaker 4: We don't talk. We don't talk about it.

1532
01:12:39,680 --> 01:12:44,440
Speaker 6: Don't say like God bless you when someone sneezever't.

1533
01:12:43,360 --> 01:12:46,600
Speaker 1: Know no, no, so you don't talk about God or

1534
01:12:46,720 --> 01:12:49,480
Speaker 1: Jesus because we don't really know the workers.

1535
01:12:49,720 --> 01:12:54,360
Speaker 6: No, And it's considered so private and personal that you, yeah,

1536
01:12:54,400 --> 01:12:56,800
Speaker 6: it's not like really up for a group discussion unless

1537
01:12:56,920 --> 01:12:57,559
Speaker 6: you're in meeting.

1538
01:12:57,680 --> 01:12:59,760
Speaker 3: That's the place where you do, even though it's your

1539
01:12:59,840 --> 01:13:02,920
Speaker 3: entire life, like everything you do is through the filter,

1540
01:13:03,040 --> 01:13:06,439
Speaker 3: everything you are is filtered through being professing. But yet

1541
01:13:06,479 --> 01:13:08,960
Speaker 3: you don't ever talk about it in a way like

1542
01:13:09,040 --> 01:13:11,240
Speaker 3: you don't discuss theology. That's just not a thing you do.

1543
01:13:11,800 --> 01:13:13,960
Speaker 3: You know, someone asked me what my doctrine was one time,

1544
01:13:13,960 --> 01:13:15,360
Speaker 3: and I'm like, we don't have a doctrine. We just

1545
01:13:15,400 --> 01:13:15,960
Speaker 3: read the Bible.

1546
01:13:16,360 --> 01:13:16,519
Speaker 6: You know.

1547
01:13:17,040 --> 01:13:19,320
Speaker 5: Someone asked me once like if my church believed in

1548
01:13:19,360 --> 01:13:21,400
Speaker 5: the Trinity, and I was like, what does that mean?

1549
01:13:22,080 --> 01:13:24,200
Speaker 4: There knowledge? None?

1550
01:13:24,280 --> 01:13:27,639
Speaker 5: Wow, they do not. Yeah, that's I actually do preach

1551
01:13:27,680 --> 01:13:28,599
Speaker 5: against the Trinity.

1552
01:13:29,200 --> 01:13:31,240
Speaker 4: Oh wow, of course that's so interesting.

1553
01:13:31,360 --> 01:13:33,320
Speaker 2: And that does I think kind of tie into the

1554
01:13:33,360 --> 01:13:36,160
Speaker 2: next part that we're going to talk about. Because you're

1555
01:13:36,439 --> 01:13:40,160
Speaker 2: so taught, it sounds like to not think about your

1556
01:13:40,200 --> 01:13:43,400
Speaker 2: own faith, your own beliefs, like your own how you

1557
01:13:43,400 --> 01:13:45,080
Speaker 2: feel about anything individually at all.

1558
01:13:45,200 --> 01:13:46,920
Speaker 5: It's just trust.

1559
01:13:47,439 --> 01:13:48,639
Speaker 4: Yeah, and these aren't.

1560
01:13:48,760 --> 01:13:54,720
Speaker 1: These aren't just like people who are uneducated. There's like doctors, lawyers, engineers,

1561
01:13:55,160 --> 01:13:59,400
Speaker 1: people doing like very very smart people who question everything.

1562
01:13:59,479 --> 01:13:59,640
Speaker 7: You know.

1563
01:13:59,680 --> 01:14:02,040
Speaker 6: We're I think it comes from is like for me,

1564
01:14:02,360 --> 01:14:06,679
Speaker 6: a private personal relationship with God was very emphasized and encouraged.

1565
01:14:07,240 --> 01:14:09,120
Speaker 6: But the idea was like if you talk about it

1566
01:14:09,200 --> 01:14:11,320
Speaker 6: with someone else and they have a slightly different viewpoint,

1567
01:14:11,360 --> 01:14:13,479
Speaker 6: it might make you start to doubt in question. And

1568
01:14:13,600 --> 01:14:16,439
Speaker 6: I think it's scared, Like Kyle said this, like it

1569
01:14:16,600 --> 01:14:20,280
Speaker 6: scares people to kind of disagree.

1570
01:14:20,760 --> 01:14:23,439
Speaker 3: Yeah, well we you and I had conversations looking back

1571
01:14:23,520 --> 01:14:26,120
Speaker 3: now we're remembering old conversations where I would say, oh,

1572
01:14:26,160 --> 01:14:28,200
Speaker 3: I watched this video on YouTube. It was a debate

1573
01:14:28,280 --> 01:14:32,040
Speaker 3: between you know, Christopher Hitchins and some Christian and she

1574
01:14:32,240 --> 01:14:34,720
Speaker 3: was so mad about it, and I didn't didn't bother me.

1575
01:14:35,000 --> 01:14:36,400
Speaker 3: It didn't bother my faith at all. I was like,

1576
01:14:36,640 --> 01:14:39,280
Speaker 3: that was kind of interesting. That's said these things, and

1577
01:14:39,320 --> 01:14:40,280
Speaker 3: she's like, what are you doing?

1578
01:14:40,640 --> 01:14:42,960
Speaker 2: You thought it was like contagious almost like you'd get

1579
01:14:43,000 --> 01:14:43,479
Speaker 2: these looks.

1580
01:14:43,640 --> 01:14:45,360
Speaker 5: Yeah, outside of it, which.

1581
01:14:45,240 --> 01:14:47,479
Speaker 3: Made me feel terrible too, because yeah, it made me

1582
01:14:47,520 --> 01:14:50,120
Speaker 3: feel terrible because I don't want to hurt somebody else's faith.

1583
01:14:50,320 --> 01:14:51,360
Speaker 3: And I still feel that way.

1584
01:14:51,439 --> 01:14:54,040
Speaker 5: Like so then you just wouldn't talk about it after that, right, And.

1585
01:14:54,080 --> 01:14:57,320
Speaker 3: I still feel that way. I really don't want to ever.

1586
01:14:58,200 --> 01:15:00,519
Speaker 3: I haven't talked that to that many people about leaving. Honestly,

1587
01:15:00,600 --> 01:15:03,320
Speaker 3: I don't want to hurt other people's faith. I think

1588
01:15:03,360 --> 01:15:06,880
Speaker 3: there's sort of a feeling out there, like maybe us

1589
01:15:06,960 --> 01:15:10,040
Speaker 3: in particular, but Ex's you know, are those crazy worldly

1590
01:15:10,080 --> 01:15:12,240
Speaker 3: people are trying to like care away a belief and

1591
01:15:12,760 --> 01:15:14,320
Speaker 3: ruin the two by twos and it's like, that is

1592
01:15:14,400 --> 01:15:17,240
Speaker 3: not true. I would never do that to somebody. First

1593
01:15:17,240 --> 01:15:18,920
Speaker 3: of all, because I've been through a deconstruction and it

1594
01:15:19,000 --> 01:15:21,920
Speaker 3: was terrible. Yeah, but also because it's just not my business.

1595
01:15:22,000 --> 01:15:23,880
Speaker 3: I want you to do what makes you happy, you know.

1596
01:15:24,240 --> 01:15:26,240
Speaker 3: And so we even I think that might be part

1597
01:15:26,280 --> 01:15:28,439
Speaker 3: of why we don't talk, didn't talk about it that much.

1598
01:15:28,720 --> 01:15:30,800
Speaker 3: It's because we were a little afraid to maybe tip

1599
01:15:30,840 --> 01:15:33,680
Speaker 3: somebody into an area where they weren't uncomfortable somebody being

1600
01:15:33,760 --> 01:15:34,120
Speaker 3: each other.

1601
01:15:34,320 --> 01:15:36,439
Speaker 6: Oh well, yeah, it's like clarify, we're very open with

1602
01:15:36,560 --> 01:15:39,800
Speaker 6: our story. Obviously, we're here sharing it. If people like

1603
01:15:39,960 --> 01:15:43,160
Speaker 6: want to ask us questions, We've always invited that, but

1604
01:15:43,360 --> 01:15:45,639
Speaker 6: they don't. Like people don't want to ask why.

1605
01:15:45,520 --> 01:15:46,479
Speaker 4: Did those on the inside.

1606
01:15:46,600 --> 01:15:50,839
Speaker 2: Yeah, then however, you start this Facebook group and suddenly

1607
01:15:51,120 --> 01:15:55,640
Speaker 2: all of these disparate islands of belief and struggle with

1608
01:15:55,840 --> 01:16:00,760
Speaker 2: deconstruction are now connected and talking. So that includes part

1609
01:16:00,920 --> 01:16:04,400
Speaker 2: one with Kyle and carry instead of our usual question

1610
01:16:04,640 --> 01:16:06,200
Speaker 2: because we know Megan's answer.

1611
01:16:06,680 --> 01:16:09,160
Speaker 1: Instead of our normal outro where you ask me if

1612
01:16:09,160 --> 01:16:11,200
Speaker 1: I would join the group or not, because we note

1613
01:16:11,240 --> 01:16:13,519
Speaker 1: the answer to that, we are going to read the

1614
01:16:13,680 --> 01:16:16,240
Speaker 1: letter that came out a couple of months ago that

1615
01:16:16,600 --> 01:16:20,320
Speaker 1: caused this House of Cards to kind of start falling.

1616
01:16:20,640 --> 01:16:23,400
Speaker 1: I've asked Lola to read it because I'll probably get

1617
01:16:23,479 --> 01:16:28,080
Speaker 1: too emotional. But this regards one of the overseers. After

1618
01:16:28,240 --> 01:16:32,120
Speaker 1: his death, they sent a letter to the elders, and

1619
01:16:32,280 --> 01:16:33,120
Speaker 1: this is what it said.

1620
01:16:33,760 --> 01:16:36,439
Speaker 2: Our dear friends, it is with a very heavy heart

1621
01:16:36,479 --> 01:16:39,240
Speaker 2: we shared the following difficult information, but we feel it

1622
01:16:39,360 --> 01:16:41,760
Speaker 2: is imperative that we do so. We trust you will

1623
01:16:41,840 --> 01:16:44,120
Speaker 2: understand and be in agreement. We have come to the

1624
01:16:44,200 --> 01:16:46,920
Speaker 2: tragic conclusion that Dean Brewer had another side to his

1625
01:16:47,000 --> 01:16:50,360
Speaker 2: life that none of us accept victims, ever witnessed or suspected.

1626
01:16:50,840 --> 01:16:52,800
Speaker 2: It has come to the surface in recent months, and

1627
01:16:52,880 --> 01:16:55,400
Speaker 2: more so in recent weeks, that Dean was a sexual predator.

1628
01:16:55,600 --> 01:16:59,240
Speaker 2: We never respect or defend such totally inappropriate behavior among us.

1629
01:16:59,439 --> 01:17:01,920
Speaker 2: There's a very united consensus among us that the only

1630
01:17:02,000 --> 01:17:03,840
Speaker 2: thing to do is be transparent with all of you,

1631
01:17:03,960 --> 01:17:06,640
Speaker 2: for obvious reasons. Though this is very difficult. We are

1632
01:17:06,800 --> 01:17:08,360
Speaker 2: very sorry for the hurt this will bring to the

1633
01:17:08,439 --> 01:17:10,760
Speaker 2: hearts of many. Thankfully, he is no longer in a

1634
01:17:10,800 --> 01:17:13,479
Speaker 2: position to hurt anyone. Some things have come to light

1635
01:17:13,520 --> 01:17:16,439
Speaker 2: from Dean's own records. Dean had his own Best Western

1636
01:17:16,520 --> 01:17:19,720
Speaker 2: Hotel preferred customer account, and spend a considerable amount of

1637
01:17:19,760 --> 01:17:22,640
Speaker 2: time and money in motels, as we all know. When

1638
01:17:22,680 --> 01:17:24,720
Speaker 2: he died last June, it was in a motel in

1639
01:17:24,800 --> 01:17:28,639
Speaker 2: Government Camp, Oregon, a place that he frequented. The receipts

1640
01:17:28,720 --> 01:17:32,160
Speaker 2: often included two guests. Victims have come forward and there

1641
01:17:32,280 --> 01:17:35,599
Speaker 2: was very confirming and incriminating evidence found on his computer

1642
01:17:35,720 --> 01:17:39,559
Speaker 2: and phone. His actions include rape and abuse of underage victims.

1643
01:17:40,080 --> 01:17:43,080
Speaker 2: He totally abused his authority as an overseer in order

1644
01:17:43,160 --> 01:17:47,160
Speaker 2: to control, manipulate, and threaten his victims. We are strongly

1645
01:17:47,240 --> 01:17:50,040
Speaker 2: recommending our staff look at the Ministry Safe Program and

1646
01:17:50,120 --> 01:17:55,760
Speaker 2: possibly other venues that help understand, recognize, and prevent such problems. Overwhelmingly,

1647
01:17:55,960 --> 01:17:58,320
Speaker 2: our greatest concern in all of this is the victims,

1648
01:17:58,560 --> 01:18:01,799
Speaker 2: known and unknown. We do hope and pray this message

1649
01:18:01,880 --> 01:18:04,599
Speaker 2: somehow reaches the ears of every unknown victim. If there

1650
01:18:04,640 --> 01:18:07,240
Speaker 2: are more, we are strongly recommending our staff look at

1651
01:18:07,240 --> 01:18:11,520
Speaker 2: the Ministry Safe Program and possibly other venues that help understand, recognize,

1652
01:18:11,600 --> 01:18:13,120
Speaker 2: and prevent such problems.

1653
01:18:13,640 --> 01:18:17,120
Speaker 1: Unfortunately, the Ministry Safe Program has been around for a while.

1654
01:18:17,360 --> 01:18:19,840
Speaker 1: It didn't seem to help too much, and a lot

1655
01:18:19,880 --> 01:18:23,200
Speaker 1: of people did know about Dean and didn't report him.

1656
01:18:23,600 --> 01:18:26,320
Speaker 2: And then the next paragraphs talk about how it says

1657
01:18:26,360 --> 01:18:29,880
Speaker 2: that they didn't know that this was happening wrong, but

1658
01:18:30,320 --> 01:18:30,880
Speaker 2: that is now.

1659
01:18:30,800 --> 01:18:34,160
Speaker 4: In dispute, like heavily in dispute, right, Yeah, yeah.

1660
01:18:34,240 --> 01:18:37,000
Speaker 2: It ends with keep close to God, dear friends, there

1661
01:18:37,080 --> 01:18:38,920
Speaker 2: is an immense capacity in the hand of God to

1662
01:18:38,960 --> 01:18:40,519
Speaker 2: help us. Thank you for all the prayers. We know

1663
01:18:40,600 --> 01:18:44,439
Speaker 2: this will generate. Sincerely your brother and then his name.

1664
01:18:45,200 --> 01:18:47,000
Speaker 2: So this is sort of where it all starts.

1665
01:18:47,680 --> 01:18:50,400
Speaker 1: Yeah, next week is when we'll dig into it. So

1666
01:18:50,960 --> 01:18:54,839
Speaker 1: thank you for listening. Thank you so much for sharing.

1667
01:18:55,000 --> 01:18:58,519
Speaker 1: Curry and Kyle. Please, if you know anyone and the

1668
01:18:58,600 --> 01:19:01,880
Speaker 1: two y two's, send us to them. We just want

1669
01:19:01,920 --> 01:19:06,360
Speaker 1: to spread awareness and keep everything grounded in facts and reality.

1670
01:19:06,720 --> 01:19:10,320
Speaker 1: And I think that they're still room for a home

1671
01:19:10,520 --> 01:19:14,360
Speaker 1: based way of meeting to continue. So I just hope

1672
01:19:14,360 --> 01:19:17,000
Speaker 1: everybody gets their head out of the sand, works together

1673
01:19:17,680 --> 01:19:20,160
Speaker 1: and we'd love to help in any way we can.

1674
01:19:20,600 --> 01:19:23,519
Speaker 4: So can't wait to see you again next week.

1675
01:19:23,479 --> 01:19:26,519
Speaker 1: And as always, remember to follow your gut, watch out

1676
01:19:26,560 --> 01:19:27,760
Speaker 1: for rida flags.

1677
01:19:27,600 --> 01:19:31,880
Speaker 4: And an ever ever trust me. Thank you Bye.

1678
01:19:36,200 --> 01:19:38,840
Speaker 2: Trust Me is produced by Kirsten Woodward, Gabby Rapp and

1679
01:19:38,960 --> 01:19:40,200
Speaker 2: Steve Delamater.

1680
01:19:39,920 --> 01:19:42,120
Speaker 4: With special thanks to Stacy Para and our.

1681
01:19:42,040 --> 01:19:44,200
Speaker 2: Theme song was composed by Holly amber Church.

1682
01:19:44,400 --> 01:19:47,240
Speaker 1: You can find us on Instagram at trust Me Podcast,

1683
01:19:47,479 --> 01:19:50,760
Speaker 1: Twitter at trust Me Cult Pod, or on TikTok at

1684
01:19:50,880 --> 01:19:52,520
Speaker 1: trust Me Cult Podcast.

1685
01:19:52,720 --> 01:19:55,960
Speaker 2: I'm ooh La Lola on Instagram and Ola Lola on Twitter.

1686
01:19:55,800 --> 01:19:59,960
Speaker 1: And I am Megan Elizabeth eleven on Instagram and Babraham.

1687
01:19:59,560 --> 01:20:00,559
Speaker 4: Hits on Twitter.

1688
01:20:00,760 --> 01:20:03,040
Speaker 2: Remember to rate and review and spread the word

1689
01:20:08,840 --> 01:20:09,200
Speaker 1: MHM.