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Naughty by Nature is a show about finding a god that accepts all of you.
Filmmaker, performer, and former-Evangelical Christian, Treen (Katrina Lillian Sorrentino) is on a mission to find humor and wisdom in all our spiritual journeys, whether we’re being born again or deconstructing from toxic religious relationships.
In this cheeky and subversive series about how to keep the faith, Treen talks with guests about how they processed their religious baggage and carved out a unique spiritual path for themselves.
Oh, and God will be there too, played by a different mystery comedian on every episode.
To join us on this hilarious ride make sure you follow the show, subscribe to our channel here YouTube.com/@nxnpod, and follow along on Instagram @nxnpod for more goodies!
Produced by:
https://www.rainbowcreative.co
https://www.verna.studio
https://www.treentreen.com
Treen: Hello and welcome to the Naughty by Nature podcast. I'm Treen and I'm your reluctant host on this vulnerable ride. This is a show where we confront what the Christian church told us was taboo through storytelling, humor, and a little role playing so that we can be born again on our terms. In each episode, I've invited a different comedian to play ‘God’ to help us reimagine a god big enough to hold the fullness of our humanity. So, God, are you ready to kick us off?
GOD: This is Episode 3, Deconstruction.
Treen: God! Welcome to the show. It's always so amazing to get this, this time to dialogue with you and to talk with you and, on every episode, I'd just love to take a moment to get to know what kind of God I'm speaking to.
So, um, God, do you wanna share anything about yourself? Any fun facts, any hobbies?
GOD: Uh, cleaning up your mess.
Treen: Oh, which one are you talking about?
GOD: Treen. I'm overworked. I'm underpaid. There's flooding over there. There's riots over here. I'm taking time out of my schedule to sit here with my most gifted child, Michael.
Michael Gungor: Most?
GOD: Most Michaels in my life, they watch over children as they lay in their cribs. But this Michael has ideas, big ones, that make people go, “Hmm, I don't know if you're doing that good of a job?” So, Michael, Michael, I'm glad we're having this sit down because I got some questions for you, pal. I'm getting thousands of inquiries an hour, and they're all because someone threw on your podcast buddy. So, you know what I got some stuff to attend to. I'll be right back.
Treen: I'm really glad that we're having this sit down. It sounds like there's some things that we get to have a conscious dialogue about but before we blast off, I want to take a formal moment to introduce our guest today, Michael Gungor.
Michael is a musician and a podcast host of The Liturgist Podcast and a new, a new friend of mine. Michael, do you want to say hi to our listeners and to God?
Michael Gungor: Hi listeners and God and Treen too.
Treen: Michael, I know I was telling you this yesterday, but, um, yeah, I mean, The Liturgist was a huge, huge, uh, puzzle piece in my deconstruction. And, I'm sure folks tell you that a lot, but thank you for, for being here on this episode today. It feels very full circle to be at this point in my journey now talking to you about this and casual question, but what was the process of making that podcast like?
Michael Gungor: It started as a sort of a supplement to some music that I was releasing and some meditations that I was releasing with a friend and actually a group of friends that we were trying to like put out spiritual material that we were, we could, that we would enjoy engaging with ourselves at that point.
That wasn't so locked up into some of the old dogma and shame and stuff. We found that even in using words like, whatever words we would use, spirit, God. It just so quickly comes with a bunch of assumptions where like, what if we did a podcast almost as like a, a glossary or like, like a, like, here's, here's what we mean when we're talking about this stuff.
And here's some deeper sort of behind the scenes insights to what we're talking about. And then pretty quickly, the podcast sort of overtook even the music and meditations that we were making became kind of this place for a conversation for people to talk about stuff that, at that time, you really couldn't find, uh, in mainstream conversation.
Treen: Wow. Did you expect so many people to resonate with it?
Michael Gungor: No, no. It was a very, it was a big surprise. Again, I thought it was going to be kind of like tiny behind the scenes thing for extra information and all of a sudden all these people all over the world were listening to it and coming together and talking and forming groups and started having events around it and it was, uh, unexpected. Oh, I'm sorry God.
Treen: Yeah, God how did that make you feel?
GOD: Yeah, a lot of people loved it Treen. A lottttttttttttttttt of people.
Treen: How did that change your day? How did that change your day to day?
GOD: You know, the thing about guys like Michael, you know, the questioners, is they create a dialogue that allows more people in the conversation, which is fine.
And I just want to start off by saying I love people. I love everybody.
Treen: Yeah, you created a lot of us, so.
GOD: I just didn't expect so much questioning. We had something good. We had something good going. People listened, they clapped their hands, they stomped their feet, and then they got in their, their Tahoes, their Expeditions, and they, they went to Sizzler. So, I'm busier than I've ever been before. I think I just got to sit with these people and answer their questions.
Treen: But, but let's go back to what we're all beating around the bush with here, which is this word, deconstruction. So, Michael, what, what, what is deconstruction? How would you define it?
Michael Gungor: It's just constructs falling apart, you know, it's just things that we've believed, uh, to be true that we look into and find holes in and, and find, find that we've constructed it even sometimes it's, it doesn't even have to be a very active deconstruction kind of almost gives the sound of that almost makes it sound like an active thing that you have to try to do. We're just like seeing, Oh, I'm actively constructing this imaginary model of something, and I don't have to do that.
Treen: Yeah, I've, I've often thought of it as a really chunky knit sweater that I'm unraveling like one little thread at a time. But if only it were that easy to just stop and be free, right? Like, I don't know about you, but for me, there were many years where it was a painful, uh, unraveling. Uh, that felt like life or death at some points. And, you know, again, I bring up your podcast and other resources like that because I really do feel like this construction is so interwoven with our identity, obviously, and it really took other people talking about these topics to give my own psyche the permission to do so. To think like, Oh, maybe I, maybe I, I will be okay if I let go of that construct or maybe I, I can think of this thing differently, but for a while there, it felt like life or death,
Michael Gungor: but in the same way, the way I look at it now, it could feel like life or death if I really believe right now that I need to hold on to a ledge above my head that doesn't exist and that's what I, what I eventually discovered is my my death grip just couldn't hold on anymore. And I thought I would fall into the abyss. I realized, Oh, they're, oh, I didn't just here because we get so attached to these, these beliefs and these doctrines become so part of our identity that questioning them feels like death. That feels, it literally does feel like an existential threat because what I have defined myself as is something that is threatened by the, by the not having that belief. But what we find out when that grip goes away again, you're just here. The, the infinite mystery in which you live and move and have your being is not threatened by your questions. Like this, as fun as the little joke, God thing is here, that's a joke, obviously, because God could not be threatened by your thoughts, your questions, you're hanging on or you're not hanging on.
Treen: God, are there any things that you're, uh, having doubts about or struggling, struggling to believe right now?
GOD: Well, I can't believe I'm talking with this guy. To my chagrin, I have to admit with Michael that, uh, no, I'm not threatened. I think, the problem is, I've been tasked with helping comfort my children from fears, doubts that came from them. I didn't say these things, but they feel this way and now I sit with them and explain to them why there's not a basement full of fire that they're going to be in for the rest of their lives or end of lives. So there is no penalty for this. There's only extra work for me.
Treen: What is sort of the, the employee structure you have going on over there like how many employees, like, are you in a big, like corporate office building? Like what, what's going on over there God?
GOD: You know, I probably got, let's see, 30, 40,000 cubicles all manned or angeled and, um, yeah, we're getting, we're getting calls consistently. So we're, we're getting anything, uh, from calls about divorce, people angry at me, natural disasters…
Treen: Well God, hold tight. I definitely want to make room for more of your issues to be in this conversation as well. But I want to go back to Michael and, and dig a little deeper into this deconstruction journey. So, Michael, was there a breaking point for you? Like what you said of letting go of the bar where you really were able to surrender and let go?
Michael Gungor: Yeah, there was one particular, I mean, there was definitely like chapter markers, but I was right at the end of my like tightest final grips. I was in a spa and I was, uh…
Treen: Where was the spa?
Michael Gungor: The spa was in Denver, Colorado, and it was a spa I would go to like when I was, I just couldn't clear my mind. I couldn't, I just would go. And this time I just couldn't, nothing was working. The steam wasn't clearing my head. I was reading and there was like a way, a quiet waiting area that I would like, I was reading different books. I was going through my Kindle and like, no, this isn't doing it. This meditation isn't doing it. I could, just couldn't. I was just scrolling my whole Rolodex of like spiritual technologies. Like, okay, meditations. I've gone through sort of like my Buddhist meditation phase, like every variety of Christian thing that you can imagine for, I tried to be Catholic for a while, I grew up Pentecostal. I was trying to be, okay, you know, none of this is working. I had just seen this show where this guy was like praying secretly to Allah doing these Muslim prayers. And I was like, I haven't really explored that. And so I like, I got down in my bathrobe on the spa floor. And I start like, kneeling and trying…
Treen: Grasping at straws.
Michael Gungor: literally like as, as grasping at just thin air. Just what, what can I possibly find? And then I just kind of like saw it. It was almost like the camera zoomed out and I was like, how pathetic have I, like, is this searching become? I'm just like, what could I possibly appropriate or do that I know nothing about, but just try to, grasp to like, find some sense of meaning or okayness. It was like a death of sorts. It was like, I can't, that grasp that I'm like holding on to this ledge, just literally my hands just kind of went, ugh, and just fell open. It was like, I can't do it anymore. I could feel those right as I was like slipping into this death that was like, I know that there's no, like what I said about, like, God couldn't be threatened by my belief or lack of belief, or like, I just knew that to be true on like a deep fundamental level that whatever real is, whatever the capital R real is, whatever God would be, that if it, if God was infinite, why would it possibly be threatened by a tiny little thought in a one brain? Like, who cares? As I just sort of opened my hands. Or my hands were opened, maybe more accurately describing it because it, it, it, that, that death felt also like in a way the most beautiful act of surrender and trust that I had ever experienced. And I would say of God, even though I let go of my belief in God and I didn't need to like fix that paradox it just was what it was. And then I stood up and I remembered that my brother was in town. And I was like, why am I at the spa right now? My brother's in town. Like, what am I, why am I in here, like reading books…
Treen: I’m gonna go hang out with my brother.
Michael Gungor: I’m gonna go see my brother. And then I saw the, the woman standing at the front desk and I was like, Oh, this is a, look at this lovely person. I didn't even notice her walking in. Like, hi, I hope you have a nice day today. And I just. I just noticed like, Oh, I'm just here. It's just here. It's fine. There's nothing. And all of a sudden, all the love and okayness that I thought I would find through these beliefs, through whatever, just was just here.
Treen: Wow. You had a really big lightning bolt shift of a moment. I'm curious, like for you, God, were you worried in that moment that you and Michael were breaking up and he would be lost to you for forever, or what was going through your mind at the time?
GOD: For starters, it was a hygiene and safety issue. I was worried about my son lying on the floor in a public spa.
Treen: Yeah, like how long can he be in, in there for? Like, you're gonna have to send him this awareness soon.
Michael Gungor: End up getting gout or something down there.
Treen: I'm almost a little jealous of your big lightning bolt awakening moment. Mine felt like a very painful, uh, medieval torture device. I did things in reverse a little bit because I talk about this on previous episodes, but I was born and raised Catholic, but like I joke that I learned what the Holy Spirit was when I became an Evangelical, I was like, Oh, there's three of you. I didn't know there was a third thing in this, in this mix. And, um, and so my conversion occurred in my early twenties, and when I turned 24 and got married, that's when I just realized the role that I had signed up for as a, as a wife, as a Christian wife was out of congruence with the way I had been raised or, and maybe just the way that I am. Um, and so I talked about this on previous episodes, but it was a slow sort of ringing out and, and reclaiming of of my actual persona and identity. But similar to you, there was, um, a shift after a long, arduous journey of, of wrestling that occurred on a Reiki table. Um, and it wasn't something that I could consciously, I didn't have any conscious thoughts around it, but I had a somatic, uh, cathartic release and I would say it was this awareness in my body that if I continue questioning, it's it's gonna be okay. It's gonna be painful, but it's gonna be. It's gonna be okay. Were you ever struggling to…like did you ever think you wouldn't have your any faith anymore or, or you had become atheist? Like what was going through your mind at the time?
Michael Gungor: I mean, I had already the redefined God so many times that by that point, I was really trying to hold on to be able to say that I believed in God, because I didn't have any concept of what God was at that time even I would have just said, there's no, like I had long ago given up the, you know, the bearded guy in the sky or even a separate being really. I had long before that, but I could still say, well, well, but that's not what God is. Here's the sophisticated theology to like be able to put quotes around all these words and be like, God is the ground of being and this is like, um, but I could, there was still a clinging to it. And strangely, even though I had long, I hadn't believed in hell for years or any of that kind of stuff, uh, there was still this like shame around it, this clinging. I would still repent under my breath all the time. Even though I didn't believe that I had to, there was, it was just kind of like driven by this need to, um, it was part of my identity and it was part of my shame. So in letting go of God, I wasn't, I knew there wasn't actually anything that I was, again, I was, it was more like I was letting go into God, whatever mystery was, um, but I was letting go of needing to say I believed in God and I was letting go of needing to try to figure it out. Or be able to talk about it or base my identity in it.
Treen: That shame runs so deep.
Michael Gungor: Yeah. And that's, that's the first time in my, my life right there. Uh, after that, I just noticed after a while, like, Oh, I don't do that repenting under my breath thing all the time anymore.
Treen: Wow.
Michael Gungor: I just stopped.
Treen: God, do you hear our prayers and our repenting or like, what is the call center like when we’re, when we’re doing both?
GOD: I do hear it all Treen and I listen to it all and I, I don't need the repenting or even the dialogue as much as I, I need the conversation I need, like Michael said, I'd rather prefer you actually let go of your need for me to be sky, sky tyrant or…
Treen: Sky daddy.
GOD: Sky daddy I like that.
Michael Gungor: Sky daddy's not bad.
GOD: You know what let's, yeah, let's not shelf that one just yet, but…
Treen: But you're letting go of the beard is what you're saying. It’s…
GOD: the beard staying the beard. It's a brand. And you know, it's a branding thing. I'll admit it's, it's, it's worked more than it's hurt. So the beard's gonna stay.
Treen: Michael, you kind of addressed this, but were there resources at this time that you turned to for support?
Michael Gungor: Again, what the, the quote deconstruction like world did not. Like, I've, I had friends like Peter Rollins who could handle a fully deconstructed version of all these things, Christianity and talks about but when I met Mike McHargue, who was the guy that I started The Liturgist with, it was this like lightning bolt of like, Oh my God, you too. Like he had fully deconstructed his beliefs. He was an atheist for a while, um, but he had also had mystical experiences where he's like, I don't know what to do with this. I don't know what to, and same with me. I was like, the most real, some of the most real experiences of my life, or not some of, the most real experiences of my life had been these mystical, you know, absolute mystery dissolved into love experiences. Like I, what do you, how do you talk about that without words like, God? Can we use words like God still? And so those were some of the conversations that started The Liturgist. But I, yeah, I didn't have, I felt totally alone before meeting Mike and starting that journey.
Treen: So, I don't know if you know this, but. I got baptized at age 23. And then by age 24, I was already what I would call like in my dark night of the soul starting to deconstruct. Um, but a friend of mine had paid my, um, like my application fee for Richard Rohr’s, The Living School. So I did The Living School for two years, which I remember like the first time walking into, um, and you know, it's still like, yeah, a Christian mysticism school. I remember listening to some of the teachings, uh, the first weekend that we had our breakout retreat and not understanding, like it hitting my head and it just bouncing, bouncing right off. But, you know, over that two year journey of being in this school and, and really like wrestling with, with other believers that in tandem with my own, um, journey of being a wife. And then ultimately, uh, my body collapsed. So my body, like, got really sick. And that was the straw that broke the camel's back where I had to address my belief system because, uh, I got really ill. Um, that in, that really supported me through, through that time. But what I wanted to say about mysticism and mystical experience is it was very confusing for me because the first conscious mystical experience I had was actually in Christian worship, in church. Honestly, I think took until I could feel it again outside of that container, I was afraid that it only existed there and I would be punished or damned or apart from that love, that connection, that beauty if I left and I strayed.
Michael Gungor: It's for that reason, I, I don't, like, there's a lot of people in it that have deconstructed that um, identify now as Ex something, you know, Exvangelical or Ex-Christian or, and I've never, that's never resonated with me. I see it as continuous. I, if anything, I see it more as like I graduated from Evangelical Christianity in that I followed it to its end. I did, like, I believed it thoroughly.
Treen: You were all in.
Michael Gungor: And I listened to it. I listened to the Jesus that I found in Evangelical Christianity enough to do what he said, which is like, let the traditions fall apart. That's what he said.
Treen: It's literally what he said.
Michael Gungor: He's like, let it freaking fall apart. These traditions, you've made these idols and these whitewashed tombs. Follow me into the, where I am and the streets and the prisons and the hospitals, like love that the people that the Christians were saying were out. I was like, this doesn't sound like Jesus, like what's, when you follow him, the thing, the, the monstrosities made in his name will fall apart. Funny enough and beautiful enough, ironically, those terrible monstrous structures can be like training grounds that introduce you to the living reality that it’s talking about, and it's, it's this beautiful, self destructing, uh, thing. It's like, we don't, we don't despise the training wheels on our, it's like, I'm an Ex-training wheel person, like, or I'm an Ex-college graduate.
Treen: I'm an Ex-training wheel.
Michael Gungor: Yeah, I'm an Ex-elementary school student. It's like, well, no, that was at the time what we had, what we knew, what we understood. And we outgrew it. And shame has a place in, in the development of a human being, shame and fear and all this. That's not, we don't have to like say that it was all bad. We don't have to put it in the categories of bad or good. It's just like, we can, we can go, Oh, that worked for a time. And now I see that I, it's not just this worship service that I can find in this Christian church that I can find the divine in. I can find this everywhere.
Treen: It's good news, I think, to put it into these binaries perpetuates that cycle again of something else that you'll have to get out of. And God, I just want to say that, like, maybe it wasn't Michael, who's the, you know, the, the son who questioned too much. I think Jesus might have been the original bad boy here. So we might have to have a conversation. We might have to bring him onto the next show and have a little, a little chat.
GOD: Jesus is a whole nother discussion. We could talk Jesus another time, but now we're talking Michael. Again, I hate to say it, you're right. Look, at some point, you guys started believing that because there were six guitars on stage and shitty coffee by the front door, that was the only place you could spend time with me. But if that's what you got to go through, I'll let you go through it. As Michael said, faith, I think is knowing that I'm on the other end. We get caught up or you, not me, uh, get caught up in, uh, you're building funds and you're, um, you're, uh, you're the, the songs you write about me. They're not that good. Um, and, uh, and, uh, think that that's the only way to find me or make me happy. And if you don't keep doing those things, you're in trouble somehow. Who said that?
Michael Gungor: They told me you gave them those songs. God.
GOD: No, no, no. That was Adele, Coldplay, and, and a little bit of Explosions In The Sky.
Treen: That makes a lot of sense. I'm glad we're clearing the air. This feels, this feels historical and God, what I'm hearing is that give us some grace because you've got eternity on your side. You're just playing a way longer game than we are here. You're thinking long term. You're like, I know they're going to come back. They're going to have this weird little moment. And they're going to come back. Uh, but for us at that time, I mean, at least for me, it felt like I really do remember feeling if I stray, or if I walk away, I will be damned and punished. And that was just, you know, a moment that I had to really work through. And by a moment, I mean, years.
GOD: Well, Treen, if you two going through that moment means people listen to this and don't have to then, uh, my, my work is complete.
Treen: Michael, do you remember, like, at the time when you were unraveling, deconstructing, uh, these constructs, were there things that you were nervous to talk about? Like
Michael Gungor: Oh, every, yeah, for years, every step of the way, it was scary. It was never an easy letting go of any of it like the first thing was the mark of the beast.
Treen: What's the mark of the beast?
Michael Gungor: The mark of the beast like like I grew up hearing these sermons about like the end times in the Antichrist and you would get you would get the mark of the beast put on your forehead or your hand like 666. And if you got it, you, um, you go to hell. And if you didn't get it, you get your head chopped off by the Antichrist.
Treen: This is some medieval times, and this is how you know I was raised Catholic. That is wild.
Michael Gungor: Yeah. So, uh, there was like movies about it. And so, yeah. My first kind of like a secret question was like, I thought the whole New Testament was about like moving it into the internal space rather than the external like it was about the law and stuff before and it was like now it's about what we believe in our hearts. Why at the end does it go back to external? And then I was like wait the forehead in the hand Is that like a metaphor like your thoughts and your actions and maybe like, is it not a literal thing? And I was like, Oh, I can't, I can't say that, but I think that seems more real. That seems more true. And I had to like, keep that to myself. And I was like, started reading some things metaphorically. That was the first thing. And I was like, Whoa, can't talk about that.
Treen: The mark of the beast. I mean, that's just like a, that's just like a bad Saturday night. I think that's not like…
GOD: Yeah. Yeah. I want to chime in on the whole beast thing. Look, that got out of hand. I'll admit that did get out of hand.
Treen: That sounds like a PR thing gone wrong.
GOD: We sold a lot of books.
Michael Gungor: Yeah, you did.
GOD: Treen, I'm going to send you a copy. I do want to apologize. You know, Tim LaHaye, we really trusted him with that and he kind of fumbled, it, it became a little too real. So, Michael, I do apologize.
Michael Gungor: I forgive you. It's okay.
GOD: Those were, those were were great books. They were great books. We sold, we made a lot of money. We did a lot of good things with that money, but
Michael Gungor: Nick Cage got involved at some point.
GOD: Nick, you know, this, this, this thing Treen, you gotta understand this went higher than I could have ever imagined, even though I knew it would, of course. But, you know, I do apologize. There was some damage done, and I think there's some merit to Michael's point.
Treen: Wow, I'm glad, I'm really glad we cleared the air on that one as well. And thank you for teaching me something about Evangelical Christianity that I didn't yet know. For me, I remember, like, things like, I started masturbating later in life because of Catholicism. And so things like self-pleasure and of course, sex, and of course, considering alternate systems to monogamy, like thinking about what are people doing when they're poly? What are people doing when they're ENM? Just thinking about those things, thinking about reincarnation, thinking about, um, other deities, thinking about that God could have feminine attributes or maybe be feminine, a feminine being. All of that felt so taboo and I had to like, open the soup lid very slowly in order for the steam to get out.
Michael Gungor: Is that, that's what you call it? The soup lid?
Treen: Right now. Will you play the kazoo? I needed that.
Michael Gungor: You said, I believe you said that you begin masturbating because of Catholicism and that's intriguing.
Treen: Oh, oh, oh, oh, oh, wow. What a misspeak.
Michael Gungor: It's like, man, I should have been Catholic. And now, from your kneeler…unzip.
Treen: Cut! I can't recover! No, that was a grave misspeak. I um, I did not even know I had anything. Yeah, I did not know I had anything below the belt for, until I was like 30. I didn't think I knew I saw my feet. Anything between belly button and feet off limits.
Michael Gungor: The soup lid was closed.
Treen: How would you define where you're at now in your faith journey and your relationship to God? I mean, I'm using the word God on this podcast intentionally as a reclamation, but how would you define it now for yourself?
Michael Gungor: I find myself in God. Uh, the word God for me is a word that I use to name the unnameable, the mystery of whatever this is. And if I try to describe what is, I notice it's without boundary, it's without end, it's without beginning. It's completely whole in itself, it, it has no, um, lack of anything. So a lot of the traditional, like, words to describe God, like love, and all present, and all, even knowing in a way, like, all of it still kind of applies, but it's not anymore projected onto a separate being, but it is the ocean in which any wave that I perceive of myself, my thoughts, my feelings, my sensations, all of that is within the ocean. There's, God is the ocean, and any, anything that I witness is a wave, including whatever I might think of as myself. My relationship to that is being subsumed an,d and consumed by that moment to moment in the mystery of existence.
Treen: Wow. God, what do you think? I, I think Michael's got it. He's onto something.
Michael Gungor: God went silent. That's right. There it was. That was the real God for a second.
GOD: Yeah, that was pretty good.
Treen: Well, we are almost at the end of our deconstruction podcast journey today. I thought we could all riff, mainly Michael and I, but God join in, um, from a marketing perspective of like, what are the stages of deconstruction? I thought we could give them some like funny chapter title headings. I do want to bring back mark of the beast because I think that's important. Okay, so stage one. Well, you're kind of like in you're like in tortured bliss, I would say.
Michael Gungor: Well, tortured bliss, I mean, before tortured bliss, you're usually at a place of like, something's wor the construct is working, right? So it's like, feels harmonious, the belief feels harmonious with your identity, with your environment. It's helping make sense of things, it's helping making meaning of things.
Treen: Yeah. And then chapter two.
Michael Gungor: And then, yeah, there's like…
Treen: Chapter two is like a
Michael Gungor: A rock in the shoe.
Treen: Yeah, I was gonna say a wedgie, like a really
Michael Gungor: Yea a wedgie! It's starts riding up the soup can a little bit.
Treen: Yeah, I'm wearing a thong and I've wore way too tight of jeans. And so there's no airflow down there.
Michael Gungor: And then you start chafing.
Treen: All right, let's continue this metaphor. You begin chafing in chapter three is a full blown rash. It's just, you have to go, you actually have to go to the doctor.
Michael Gungor: And then the bleeding. The bleeding and the pustules and then the uh sepsis and death.
Treen: Okay. So you actually die. You actually die in this chapter heading, but then, chapter five, I think?
Michael Gungor: Resurrection.
Treen: Is rebirth. Yeah. God, do you have any, you have any additions?
GOD: I think you two know exactly how you think that experience was so, yeah, let's, let's leave it there.
Michael Gungor: I do think it's like worth pointing out some of the, um, major issues I've seen. Usually, it depends how fundamentalist you were. Like most people aren't so fundamentalist that the mark of the beast is probably that big of a deal. But it could be anything. I mean, for some people, you know, but usually along the path of, from Evangelicalism at least, um, you usually hit Genesis, something about like evolution or the age of the earth or something like that usually comes up. And then at some point, the question of, uh, gay and are gay people going to hell and then hell comes up and the problem of evil comes up. Why would God allow suffering and evil and those are the big ones that I've seen in myself and, and like almost everyone that I've talked to that have gone through this.
GOD: Or some asshole runs for president.
Michael Gungor: Yeah. Oh boy. Yeah.
Treen: That's a big one.
Michael Gungor: But that's like a, that's a catalyst. I think that that's sort of like a, it reveals the, some of the hypocrisy of the community and because the community, I do think is actually more of the source of why people hold these beliefs than the actual merit of the beliefs in themselves. It's actually like the impetus, how do you get a bunch of people to believe like crazy shit? You make them afraid of questioning it, and you make them afraid of questioning it by threatening their place in the community, um, if they question it. So, when the community all of a sudden is shown to be hypocritical and like the dark side, uh, in ways, it's like, oh, there, are we not the good guys? Like, I thought we were the, the rebels in the Star Wars movie, not the Empire. And, when that, uh, gets revealed, then it's like, wait, well, why do I, why am I believing everything they tell me to believe? And so I think that's a catalyst for starting to look at the beliefs, but.
Treen: Coming from Catholicism, but really being raised just culturally Christian, I, I always, my best, my best friend growing up from age two was gay. And you know, the question of dinosaurs, it was always like I was putting those beliefs on hold while I was receiving so much belonging love, you know, um, but I, it was a matter of time before those, those questions came back into my consciousness. Um, but I will say that learning an alternate, alternate orthodoxy from The Center for Action and Contemplation with Father Richard Rohr. This was a moment where I was like, oh, we're just distilling one thread of the history of Christianity, and we're leaving out so many other texts, i.e. one of the biggest ones, Mary's Gospel. When I could then recognize that, Oh, I'm just allergic to what I'm allergic to in society, which is white supremacy, which is all of these, these systems that use fear to control humans, then I could actually reclaim my faith and be like, there's so much beauty in the Christian tradition. And I don't think it has to be thrown out. But what we do need to separate is the history of, of oppression from the actual the faith system.
Michael Gungor: And I love what you're doing with even like what you said at the beginning about reclaiming words like ‘God’ and I think that can be done with all of Christianity because it's, I, the way I see the teachings of Jesus and you see threads of, of mystical Christianity through different times of history, the desert fathers and mothers, you see it in the Celts, you see it in the different, different saints and mystics through history, it's the mainstream Christendom that spreads its message through violence and fear and shame. And that message, that mystical strand of Christianity that hears the mystery of Jesus's teachings and it's often, and yeah, you can find it in the Synoptic Gospels, you can find it in the Gospel of Mary, all these different places. It's a powerful tool, and it's a powerful, beautiful technology, um, that I actually think by those of us seeing what it can be and using the words properly, if you will, not thinking of God as this, no, no offense, God, but as this silly bearded cartoon character in the sky. But the mystery in which we all live and move and have our being, and when we actually begin to use that word in that way, it's salvific. It's, it's like, especially for those of us who have been oppressed by these systems, because if we just try to shove it into the closet and be like, okay, I'm Ex that, and I don't, I, okay, I'm just an atheist now, I, I'm Ex-Christian, I'm whatever. A lot of times what I've seen in people is, it's still kind of like puppets them from the shadows, like, they're like, we're still caring about what these weird religious voices are saying on social media or hammering them because like, who cares? Why do we care about what these all this backwards thinking from these unnecessary dogmas and traditions that we don't believe in anymore? Why not just move on and it's easier to move on when we can actually heal and actually integrate and incorporate what could be beneficial from our past and from our lexicon and our common myths and narratives and technologies that we can, uh, use it to build a better world for each other and, and, and there's a lot there. Um, so I just, that's to affirm, I love your reclaiming of it rather than it's, it's easy to just like throw it away or to try to, but what ends up, again, what ends up often happening is we throw it into the, the unconscious closets where…
Treen: Yeah. And I did that for many years. I couldn't have made this podcast any sooner than I am now because I'm honestly not threatened or angry. Um, I had to heal. In order to speak about it. And there's a part of me that could just go on and not speak about it but I think this has been a beautiful, like you said, reclamation and integration of now being on this side and wanting people to know, look, wherever you're at in your journey, whatever you believe, I think it's perfect. And I love you. And also, I think there is some healing that some of us who have experienced this can do together through huma, huma? We can put on our Hokas and have the humor and, and play and, uh, and yeah, that's the intention behind this so thank you for saying that and seeing that.
Treen: Well, we are at time so I just want to, um, thank you God for holding the space for us today, for taking time out of your busy schedule with the 30 to 50,000 angels at the call center to, to speak with us. And again, today's guest was Michael Gungor. Michael, will you just tell folks what you're up to now, how people can support you, where they can find you all that?
Michael Gungor: Yeah. Um, @michaelgungor is my, or @gungormusic, but I'm, uh, let's see the projects that I'm doing right now. I'm doing a weekly starting tonight, actually at midnight. I'm doing a weekly song that I'm going to be releasing, uh, through my, this kind of side project that I started called Wei Wu. Um, check that out, but you can follow me on Instagram or whatever if you want to hear more about that. And you can, I have like a Patreon and stuff. And if you, if you follow me on Instagram and look at my linktree, you can see all kinds of stuff that I'm doing.
Treen: Amazing. I'll make sure to link that in the show notes. And today's, uh, God was played by John Itiola. John, will you come on camera and introduce us to, introduce yourself to us and to the listeners and I just want to acknowledge that you actually became a real life God this year because you are the father to a one year old.
John Itiola: Yes, I have an only begotten son and his name is Rio. Uh, this was fun. Feels good to be God. Feels good to be God.
Michael Gungor: I can see why God wouldn't want to lose the beard, too. It's looking good on you.
Treen: Yeah it's looking good. John, how can folks find you and support your comedy?
John Itiola: Um, I'm on Instagram. You could, uh, find me at, uh, what's my, what's my handle? I'm, um.
Treen: Oh, isn't it wordgames?
John Itiola: It's wordsplayed. W O R D S P L A Y E D. And, um, you know, I haven't toured in a while, actually. Right now, I've, I'm just doing local shows in San Diego and I'm working on stuff online. Uh, yeah, stay tuned. I'm recovering from year one with this kid. So I've been a little, uh, in the weeds lately.
Treen: Yeah, you've got your, you've literally, uh, got your hands full. All right well thank you everyone for tuning in. Uh, please check in for further episodes and until then stay naughty.
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