A Matter of Faith: A Presby Podcast
Welcome to A Matter of Faith: A Presby Podcast, the podcast where we respond to your questions and comments on issues of faith, social justice and church life. Don't be afraid to write in and ask your question because if it matters to you, it matters to us and it just might be a matter of faith. Whether it be faith in God, faith in others or faith in yourself. We are brought to you by the Office of Faith-Based Investing & Corporate Engagement, the Presbyterian Peacemaking Program, and Unbound: An Interactive Journal on Christian Social Justice for the Presbyterian Church (USA). Submit questions to faithpodcast@pcusa.org. LISTENING GUIDES FOUND IN PODCAST SHOW NOTES.
A Matter of Faith: A Presby Podcast
Rebranding Jesus, Marathons, Humor and the Heathen w/ Kathryn Gin Lum
This week we talk about a recent campaign to rebrand Jesus and we talk about how marathons are becoming more inclusive by adding a non-binary division! All that and more on A Matter of Faith!
Question of the Week:
What are your thoughts about using humor in things like the pastor's sermon or other parts of worship?
Special Guest:
Kathryn Gin Lum, Associate Professor of Religious Studies, Stanford University
Guest Question:
How should we understand the declining membership of mainline Christian denominations using the perspective outlined in your book? These are often the older, more white denominations where young people choose to be “spiritual but not religious”. But we don’t see that as much in the immigrant congregations and people of color where communities are often thriving.
Resources:
Heathen: Religion and Race in American History
For Listening Guides, click here!
Got a question for us? Send them to faithpodcast@pcusa.org!
A Matter of Faith website
Hello, and welcome to a Matter of Faith, a Presby podcast, the podcast where we respond to your questions and comments on issues of faith, social justice, and church life. Don't be afraid to ride in and ask your question, because if it matters to you, it matters to us, and it just might be a matter of faith,
Speaker 2:Whether it be faith in God, faith in others, or faith in yourself. We are brought to you by the Presbyterian Peacemaking Program and Unbound the interactive journal on Christian Social Justice for the Presbyterian Church usa. I am your host, Lee Kto,
Speaker 1:And I'm your host Simon Dune.
Speaker 2:Without further ado, let's dive into today's questions.
Speaker 1:Well, hello everyone.<laugh><laugh>. I just,
Speaker 2:No, I burnt my mouth on this. I have this coffee warmer thing, and it's a lot warmer than I thought it was, so I took a big adult of my coffee, but,
Speaker 1:Okay. Hello everyone. As you as Lee was taking this sip, I started to do our little, little intro greeting, and when he, uh, Grimes, I was like, Oh my gosh, he must have the volume turned up too high. And I just blew his ears out.<laugh>.
Speaker 2:No, I actually burnt my mouth on some coffee. Uh, yeah. Which I shouldn't be drinking at this late in the day, But anyway, How are you, Simon?
Speaker 1:I'm doing all right. Um, welcome everyone to a matter of Faith, a Presby podcast, wherever you are, and whatever time it is, maybe you'll be enjoying a cup of coffee. I hope you are not burning your mouth as, as Lee<laugh>
Speaker 2:Or throat
Speaker 1:Or throat
Speaker 2:This fall day.
Speaker 1:Yeah. How are you, Lee?
Speaker 2:I'm good. I'm a little tired. We've been to see fam we've been to, well, we've been to see family, and then we went to see some friends this past weekend in Long Island, and it was just really nice to be there and to be with friends and haven't seen them in a very long time. And I don't have, This is sound, this is gonna sound sad, but I don't have a lot of friends<laugh>. Um, like I have like a lot of close fr I have a few close friends and that's kind of how I like it. And, and I don't get to see them very often. And so I get to see my close friends this weekend and it was really nice. That's, You have acquaintances and stuff, but
Speaker 1:Yeah.
Speaker 2:You know, nothing like your close friends that you talk to every
Speaker 1:Day. Yeah. It's always good to, to have those people and to be able to see them and reconnect. Yeah. Especially when you're not geographically super close to each other.
Speaker 2:Yeah. So it was nice. How was your weekend?
Speaker 1:It was good. Um, I went hiking in the Tetons beautiful time of the year to be out in the wilderness of the national parks because at, since it's fall, the leaves are changing colors, so you'll have like green and then these splashes of gold and yellow. And what's interesting, interesting out here is that trees don't necessarily turn, they don't, their leaves don't necessarily have that orange color that I'm used to seeing on the East coast. It's more of a goldish yellow. Yeah. But that orange color or reddish orange color is more common in the shrubs, so it leads to some interesting color patterns, which is really neat to see. And yeah, great time to be out hiking. And also on the, I guess just on the topic of fall, I promise I'm going somewhere with this. Everybody, uh, I have some exciting news. I started reading a book
Speaker 2:<laugh>. I was like, You have to make an announce on everybody.
Speaker 1:Yep. No, I started reading a book, Uh, it's been a while since I started reading for fun. Like a while. Actually, the most recent book I read was one that we were reading for the podcast, which, uh, because of a guest who you all will hear from pretty soon. Um, but I picked up a book for fun and was like, I need to read for fun again. It's, it's been probably like a year. And so I started reading. Yeah. And so I, I put some money down, I picked up a book and I like it. And what's cool about it, this is the Fall connection, is that, you know, fall is also the time of Halloween spookiness, and the book I'm reading happens to be about a vampire hunter.
Speaker 2:Oh, nice.
Speaker 1:It's a, so it's kind of on brand, but it's also got a little mix of some fantasy and sci-fi and sort of also a little bit of gothic outlet chin horror elements to it. But it's not scary, if that makes sense.
Speaker 2:What's it called?
Speaker 1:It's called Vampire Hunter d uh, it's actually a series of novels from Japan that there's like 40 of them. Wow. They've been coming out for a long time and they're still ongoing, but it's just, and so obviously translated into English, but it's just really neat to read something that is like kind of appropriate for the, the time period and the season that we're in. That's also very, for lack of a better word, puy or campy in a couple ways. Yeah. And it's just nice to
Speaker 2:I a good campy book.
Speaker 1:Yeah. And so it's nice to be excited about reading, which Yeah. Yeah. So some folks may be like, Oh, what happened to Power Wash Simulator? I'm still playing Power Wash Simulator, but you know, you can't only play Power Wash Simulator.
Speaker 2:Yeah. You can only clean so much, you
Speaker 1:Know? Right, right.
Speaker 2:I like clean
Speaker 1:So much. Yeah. If I were a true multitasker, I would've gotten the book as an audio book. It just listened to a while. Power washing, but
Speaker 2:Love a good, love, like a clean cleanup. And speaking of cleanup, I'm getting better at this. Great. This is a good segue. And speaking of cleanup, we're going in our news segment today. The Washington Post and the Religious News Service also covered this, but it's a new campaign that is supposed to clean up Jesus' brand. And we've talked about branding on here before and what that means for the church and how we probably should be kind of talking about this and marketing and, and so we've talked about this a lot. Like how do we, It's one of the reasons why we started this podcast is to have different conversations about faith and maybe more progressive ways and maybe more ways that we see how Jesus lived his life through scripture and things like that. But this is a hundred million campaign that that is going out, uh, to fix the image of Jesus because of how specifically in the US we have a, in our opinion, like a skewed view of what Christianity is. And this campaign is called, uh, He Gets Us Campaign, The He Gets Us campaign and there's, they're in Madison Square Garden, they're gonna have an ad in the Super Bowl. They've had an ad in the Naac like March Madness tournament. And it's just interesting, but that we've had these kind of conversations before about how we really do kind of permeate like pop culture and culture in our, in our country specifically here to, to change the narrative of, of what being a Christian means. And so it's just really kind of cool to see a huge campaign with millions of dollars going on in it to kind of do this. And they have signs. Now, some of the signs are pretty cheesy. I do like a cheesy moment, but some of these are like, he let his hair down too and, and those types of things. And just trying to, to kind of give a different idea of who Jesus was. And Jesus was someone who loved everyone. I haven't done a lot of research about the actual organization that's doing it. It's called Sign Tree. It's a Christian foundation based in Kansas, and they just got like a new website and all this other kind of stuff, and you can go on there and see. And so yeah, go do your research and, and and see it and see about it. But I just thought it was very interesting that there's this thing that is permeating culture to try to change the idea of what being a Christian means. And it's kind of like what we've been trying to do in this podcast and how we kind of go about the work that we do. So I just thought it was very interesting.
Speaker 1:That is, I'd be really curious to see moving forward what their, what the graphics in particular they come up with for sort of that brand reinterpreting and reimagining Jesus and Jesus' message.
Speaker 2:Yeah. Yeah. It's, it'll be interesting to see. And it's very simple too, so. Hmm. We know we like simple.
Speaker 1:Yep, that's true. Well, speaking of trying to reimagine and, and change things, this comes from the New York Times, the Chicago Marathon, as well as a couple of other larger races and smaller races, has created a nonbinary division or category for runners, uh, you know, that they can compete in if they choose. And this is kind of neat because it's Chicago, which the Chicago Marathon was just run, uh, this past weekend, I believe the Chicago Marathon, um, New York City Marathon added a non-binary division in 2021. Berlin featured the category at its race last month, Boston and London Plan to add the non-binary category to their major races next year. And there's a bunch of smaller road races that are starting to open up to that too. And I think it's just great that we allow people to compete under their identity, under the way that they, you know, that they understand themselves and can be their true selves. And this is also interesting because there's still, you know, a lot of sort of unfortunate controversy about, for example, the, uh, transgender athletes mm-hmm.<affirmative>, um, swimming's, global governing body back in June, barred athletes who have experienced any part of male puberty from competing as women. So there's a lot of issues around inclusion, but it is nice to see that this is a small step in the right direction. Hopefully more races will ro road races and running races will, uh, adopt this category. But just wanted to put that out there again, this, uh, this story comes from the sports section in the New York Times and yeah. I just wanted to bring that to everyone's attention.
Speaker 2:Yeah. That's important. And it's important to remind all of us, like in the church, that we should have ways for people to identify themselves as they want to and whatever that might be like. Yeah. Changing the culture of the church and cuz we still have those very binary ways of, of thinking, especially when it comes to ministry roles and, and all that. So Yeah. That's that's awesome though.
Speaker 1:Yeah. And again, it's, it's easy to be, to have a way of thinking that someone's identity somehow is very objective in some ways. It's like, oh, it's black or white, it's this or this, it's male, female, whatever it is. And not forgetting that they're very subjective, but it's all depends on the individual. Everybody's different and we just need to learn to embrace that.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 1:And speaking of things that vary from individual, from individual to individual, we have a question about a lot humor.
Speaker 2:<laugh> varies a lot.
Speaker 1:Yeah. We have a question about humor for today's episode. So today's question reads, what are your thoughts about using humor in things like the pastor sermon or other parts of worship? Lee, what are your thoughts? Is there such a thing as too much humor? Too little humor? What's, uh, what's your take?
Speaker 2:Yeah, I think there's certain humor. It really is contextual. Like my humor is not the same as yours. We kind of have to say, I mean, it depends, you know, but I do think that it is, there's a fine line between humor and there's a, on the other line of it is like maybe like attention seeking. And then the other side of it is, it's just not, it's more offensive than it is funny. And I think that that is something that I've really noticed in the church. It's like there's, there's a lot of humor around like what we were just speaking about, like very binary stereotypes, gender roles that can get, kinda can get kind of iffy when somebody might make a joke about, about that. Or biblical humor. I don't know,<laugh>, I'm like, I'm always, I don't know, I'm always on the fence about that sometimes I think that like, if that's your thing and it's something you're good at, sure you should, you should live into that. And that is something that you should definitely kind of do because that's who you are and that's kind of like your thing. And if that is your gift, I think humor, a lot of the times humor does stem from a lot of hurt and a lot of pain and a lot of, in some ways well, and and a lot of oppression that you figure out how in which you handle all of that. And a lot of times humor does that. Some people say, I am very humorous and it's the only, the only thing I can think of is that I did experience trauma as a child and growing up like as a person in a small town, but my family was also really funny and my family also relied on humor because they all experienced trauma as children from abuse and things like that. And so it's just how we've always dealt with things. And so I think it's a, I think it is in some ways very, a beautiful thing, but it's also can be, you can also use it as a repressive type thing too. And I think everybody needs to go do their work when it comes to that. But my thing is, if it is your thing, I say like live to it to a point that you don't want it to be like a, you're not up there doing a standup show, you know what I mean? But you are using it in a way that is kind of getting a point across and using it in the smart ways. So I do think it is, it's needed. I think humor's always needed in this type of stuff. I think sometimes we can be very, very like straight laced and a little too uptight in the work and in the church. And if you wanna, you know, if you wanna cut up a little bit, that's okay. But I think there's a line of like, I can get very uncomfortable when it doesn't land. You know what I mean? Yeah. When like a joke doesn't land. Yeah. That's why it's hard for me to watch standup. I love standup, but it's, it's a very vulnerable thing to do. Which I also think people should just try it maybe, I don't know. Cuz it is vulnerable to like try to like do that type of thing.
Speaker 1:I can't tell you the number of times I've been to church and the pastor starts their sermon with a joke. And I'm not saying theres something wrong with it by any means. It's just interesting because when, if it's the same pastor that does it multiple times, it's like, oh, you kind of know. It's like you understand their type of humor in their type of flow. It's like, oh yes, that's a pastor so and so joke mm-hmm.<affirmative>. And I say that as someone who, if you, if you knew me pretty well, you'd be like, Oh yeah, that's definitely assignment joke. Like if it sounds like a dad joke or a bad pun, it's probably me. Right. You know, that's just, that's just one of the ways that I express myself just in regular conversation. Right. In terms of like during the service, there's nothing wrong with humor. I think that you were saying we can get so bogged down in very heavy topics. We can be very theological, we can be very not down to earth at times. And sometimes it is helpful to have a moment of levity and sometimes it, that moment of levity makes it easier to digest and absorb and process the more intense things that we're, we're trying to talk about.
Speaker 2:Right.
Speaker 1:I don't think that it should be necessarily a, you know, like you were saying a standup show. But I do think that there are some things that we can learn particularly in the faith community from people that do stand up and do comedy. Oh, definitely. As you were saying, that vulnerability or that and also that ability to take something that is difficult to talk about that thing that is always sort of off the table or, or in the dark and bring it into the light in a way that you are calling attention to an issue and how ridiculous some things are in our society. That is an art and that's an art and Yeah. And I'm not saying everyone should be doing it, I also don't think all comedians do it tastefully,<laugh>. Um, but when you see it done well, you also go, I know exactly what that person's talking about and they're so Right. That is, that is dumb or that is funny. Yeah. That is, that is something that I should think more about. And so I think that that could be really helpful for not just pastors, but also for any sort of faith leader. It doesn't have to be in a sermon either. It can just be sort of used in a way that is done as another part of the worship if someone wants to do that. I often think that sometimes we think we can only laugh when the kids are out for like the children's message moment. Yeah. And it's because, oh, they're cute and they're kind of silly and they remind us to not take things too seriously. But we also need that in, uh, for lack of a better word, the adult part
Speaker 2:Right. Of church
Speaker 1:For grownups.
Speaker 2:Yeah. And it's, it's, I mean it's interesting because there are a lot of like evangelical spaces that those preachers are pretty funny now. Yeah. When it comes to, so my type of funny is storytelling and a lot of elaboration and a lot of like, kind of just a lot of different things that just kind of happen in a story that I think people can tell a story very well and make it funny. And a lot of, there are a lot of like evangelical spaces to where it is very entertaining and very funny and there are some things that are more progressive, maybe more academic, more, I mean, a lot of these spaces in evangelical circles are white too, but a lot of white mainstream mainline denominational type stuff can kind of learn from and it's like loosen up a little bit, you know, like I do think it is important for us to find maybe different models of what it means to even preach to what it means to even be present with people. I think, like you were saying, stand up, go watch it. I mean, go find somebody who is doing stand up and learn from go take an improv class. The best thing I ever did in, in, in Divinity school was to take a, a, a couple of improv classes with someone who specialized in it and kind of how it adapts to the faith community because it does just loosen you up. And it kind of also teaches you how to be flexible and nimble even in the way in which you're speaking. Like if somebody were to like, where I'm, where I was preaching out in Tennessee, people would ask questions in the middle of sermons and like, you know, it gives you that permission to be flexible and to, to not necessarily perpetuate what it means to kind of be a quote minister or a preacher or, or that type of thing. And I think that takes time. It takes time to kind of, to kind of change the culture of a certain church that may be a little uptight. You know, like that's the only word I can really just subscribe, describe it as. And so I have even been in spaces where I'm kind of just like myself. And I also think that's something to it too is, is that authenticity and people don't know how to handle that<laugh> people dunno how to handle someone being able to not necessarily take themselves so seriously. And it is something you, you work on when you're trying to like find yourself and to be who you are. And I think this is where we can learn a lot from people of color and folk who've had to kind of be in a society that isn't created for them to live their life and to overcome a lot of those things, but to also be very authentic in who they are. Because in searching for all of that and, and really taking a stand in all that. And so I do think it's a little, it's a little different and some people may classify that as humor and other people may see it as like, I'm just being myself. And, and that's kind of the weird line of, of humor. You know, some of this isn't humor, some of this is being authentic and some of this is being who you are. I know a lot of like people are often kind of laughed at or something and how they act or how they speak, but that ist who they are. And so I think that that is also aligned there, you know what I mean? Um, yeah. When it comes to, to all this. So
Speaker 1:It's also interesting, I was thinking about as you were talking about when someone gets up to that pulpit or that podium, one of the things that is different from say standup comedy is that you're often standing in the one spot, right? Right. But if they gave you a mic and you were walking back and forth at the front, you would probably, a lot of people in more traditional Protestant denominations would wonder, Oh, are you trying to turn it into a show? Are you turning it into like an or more like the, like televangelist and, and ministers in the evangelical community? Right. I'm not saying that everyone does that. The only people that do that are in those communities. It's just more traditional in that way, uh, for, for folks in those communities. And I think sometimes even that could be challenging for folks to like initially understand. But I, I've appreciated having pastors who will go up again. They will be funny sometimes. Sometimes they're not, sometimes they're at the podium or the pulpit. Others like to walk around. I mean, I've talked in previous podcasts about attending a church where we did worship literally in the round and like a circle. And that meant the pastor was able to walk around and sort of try to engage with different segments of the congregation and be a little more hands free, for lack of a better word.
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 1:And that was kind of neat. So yeah, the way that we understand humor and the way that whoever it is is up there presenting us with information or stories or whatever it is really, really is important. And I hope that folks will, will write in and also let us know what they think about the use of humor in the sermon or in worship. Or if you have a really good Christian joke,
Speaker 2:Oh God,
Speaker 1:Let us know. I'm not saying we're gonna read it on the podcast, but if it's good we might be like, Hey Lee, Knock, knock, who's there? Or I don't know.
Speaker 2:Yeah. And and that's another thing, it's like, there's so many different types of humor too. Like there are the jokes, but it's also, I work on sarcasm a lot that's like my specialty. And I think there are a lot of great people out there who are doing a lot of work that are using humor in ways because we do talk about tough things and humor is a way to kind of break tension and, and things like that. So, so yeah, we're gonna start a joke book. Y'all call, y'all send'em in and we're just gonna collect all of them and then we're gonna have people judge them about how cheesy they are or how I think that's good. Let's just do cheesy, um, rating on a one to 10 and the lower you get, I mean, we kind of like cheesy on this podcast though, so the cheekiest might get featured and we'll send you a t-shirt with a piece of cheese<laugh> on our lo uh, with that's like branded with our logo.
Speaker 1:Welcome to our new special segment. A matter of laughter or a matter of humor,
Speaker 2:A matter of cheesy jokes,
Speaker 1:A matter of of cheese. There we go.<laugh>
Speaker 2:<laugh>. So joining us today on the podcast is a very special guest, uh, Catherine Jen Lu, who is the associate professor of religious studies at Stanford University, is here to join us. And we have to say she is also the author of a book called He Then Religion and Race in American History. And we are really excited that you are here with us. So welcome to the podcast, Catherine.
Speaker 3:Thank you so much for having me. I'm really happy to be here and really looking forward to our conversation.
Speaker 1:Yeah, we were talking before we started recording for the podcast about how we don't always talk about the intersections of faith and racism or faith and race in sort of a, we always want to distinguish these issues into separate things. And something that I really appreciated about your, um, about your book is that you talk about how religion, faith, and in particular this idea of sort of the he who must be saved or needs to be liberated and civilized is really lays the underpinnings for then for rate things like racism to come in and intersect with and build upon. And so I'm kind of curious how you would apply sort of the lens that you, that you wrote the book from to this phenomenon. We're kind, kind of observing with a lot of mainline Christian denominations in terms of declining membership. Uh, we're experiencing this in the Presbyterian church USA Lee and I maybe too off the cuff say our denomination's dying, uh, because it's, this is again, a majority white denomination and there's this trend of young people becoming sort of more spiritual but not religious or feeling sort of disenchanted with mainstream religion and, and sort of the more mainstream denominations, but we don't see that as much in the immigrant congregations and congregations of people of color, which are often thriving. So I was curious how you might, uh, sort of observe or comment on what we're, what we're experiencing now based on some of your research.
Speaker 3:Wow, that's a hard question,<laugh>. Okay. So, um, yeah, thank you for that. Maybe let me, let me just kind of talk about how the book, uh, discusses the relationship between religion and race and then try to get into how I think this might have a bearing on current denominational issues and just kind of the, the landscape. And I'm a historian, so like I should say that right up front that, you know, I look at the history, but I will, I'll try to see what I can say about how that history affects the landscape that I think we're in. So yeah, I mean one of the, one of the main things that the book tries to do is to argue for the, the relevance, the importance of religion, and particularly the way in which Christianity creates the us versus them of the Christian versus the he, what that has to do with race. So I think oftentimes people assume that, you know, we don't talk about heats anymore, right? That's not really a word that comes up in mainlines denominations. So people have assumed that this kind of religious othering has, has been replaced by racial othering essentially. Right? So once upon a time we used to see the world and look in, you know, and see vast majority of heats. And now we look at the world and we divide and subdivide the world into different, um, supposed races, right? Which, you know, races a social construction. But the idea there is that we have socially constructed all of these differences in humanity based on supposed physiological differences. And so one of the, one of the things that the book claims is that race is not just about physiology, it's not just about skin color. Race is also about, um, positionality. It's about the differentiation of the white savior, essentially. That's, I mean, that's really what the book is about, is what the creation of this figure of the white savior and how the white savior has differentiated themselves from everyone else. And that everyone else used to be called the hes the he world, right? And now we might not use that word anymore, but um, as the book tries to argue, we use other words in the place of, he, we use words like, um, developing countries, um, third worlds or if you look, you know, in a religious landscape, um, the 10 40 window frontier people, unreached people like these are all euphemisms, I would say for he. And in making that, in making that argument that race is not just about skin color, I'm really influenced by, um, a scholar in friend of mine, Sylvester Johnson, whose book about African American religions argues that race is about the division of the world into the European and the non-European, right? It's the creation of this kind of binary where one group claims that they are the people in charge, they're the colonizers, everyone else is the colonized. They need the help of the colonizers of the Europeans to lift them up. And this whole idea of like lifting people up, of educating them, of teaching them, converting them, I mean, this, this traces back to this dynamic of Christians trying to save and convert even, Right? So, okay, so then the question, the hard question about the landscape, I'm totally sorry. I know I went down a rabbit hole and I promised I would try not to do that<laugh>, but
Speaker 2:We like, we like that rabbit hole, so that's good.<laugh>.
Speaker 3:Yeah. Okay. Just trying to like, you know, kind of explain the, the landscape of what I'm trying to do. Um, so how do we get to this current landscape where we have, you know, mainlines denominations declining, declining numbers of especially younger and, you know, you said younger white Americans, uh, in, in churches, but immigrant churches, the, the global church, you know, numbers are not declining in the same way. So why, why and how is that happening? I mean, I think one reason is that, so despite, despite what I just said about how this idea of the continues to be important continues to be with us, with all of these youths, so has pushed back against that concept. So there's been pushback against that concept, like from, you know, for centuries, people who have been labeled heats have been pushing back against this concept. And in the United States, in the American context, by the late 19th century, early 20th century, you know, this pushback really did lead to a decline in the use of this term, a decline in the idea that, um, that there are, you know, vast numbers of people in the world who could be damned because they believed the wrong things. Um, I think that, you know, this idea has influence in other ways, but the term he then, like I said, no longer continues to be used. And I think that a lot of, a lot of the reason for that is because of the, um, the counters, scripts that have been offered by people who've been labeled as he, and a lot of the people who've been labeled as he though, and here's where it's like complicated, you know, some of them have rejected Christianity. Absolutely. Right? Like, you're gonna call me, He, I'll claim that name for myself. Christians are hypocrites, you know, he are superior. But there have also been people who've been labeled, hes, who have become Christians who have adopted Christianity converted to Christianity, and then used that concept to like turn it back on white Christians to call out the hypocrisies that they've been engaged in. And I think that, you know, they've, they've made a difference, right? Like, I think that that has actually made a difference. And I think that younger white, you know, younger white people, Americans are aware of these counters scripts, like are aware of this pushback. Um, and I think that, you know, that might have something to do with the demographics that you mentioned. Um, so it is, it is interesting also to look at, you know, the global church and to look at how, you know, once white Americans thought, you know, it's our job to missionize the world. And now, you know, there are people, people in Korea, for instance, in Africa who see like the United States as the place that needs to be missionized, right? The United States is actually the problem in Europe.
Speaker 2:Yeah. I I witnessed that this a, a few weeks ago in that, you know, in a big ecumenical gathering world council of churches and, and witnessing just also the repercussions of, of colonization, the repercussions of things like the doctrine of discovery, which kind of fueled, right. And also, I just went to the African American museum in DC where I live and, and seeing the, the places in which we're so involved in the slave trade and the transportation of enslaved folks to the US and not only amount of financial gain through that, but in thinking about how every, all of that is so connected within this conversation about the dehumanization by using a term like he then that's kind of clouded in religious dialogue. And one of the things I really appreciated about one of the things you said, and kind of like the intro was that all this was done in the name of saving souls, right? And kind of codified by the church mm-hmm.<affirmative>. But in many ways the church has not grappled with that. And that's something that we've been talking a lot about in our denomination and, and others and how, you know, the church funded a lot of this and the European churches did, and, and how do we have those like connecting conversations to connect what is happening here in the US from the repercussions of what happened in Europe mm-hmm.<affirmative>, which you don't often hear about. And, and having those conversations more that when, when I've had those kind of conversations with people in Europe, it's very, you don't wanna talk about it. Uh, really
Speaker 3:Interesting. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Yeah. No, I think that's exactly right. I think that's, there's this, this grappling needs to happen, you know, And, and I think that, you know, maybe that's also part of the answer to your question, Simon, is that this grappling hasn't happened to the extent that it needs to yet, right? Yeah. I mean, in the book I call this this excuse, this justification, the the get out of jail free card. And, uh, it's, it's used, you know, I still see it today being used as rationale for atrocious horrible things.
Speaker 1:Right. And it's interesting, um, at the beginning of the book, something I really appreciate is that you talk about, you sort of raise your hand at one point and say, I am, I am a he and I am the, you know, my I am or the children descendant of those classified as he then mm-hmm.<affirmative>, but also now am a Christian mm-hmm.<affirmative>. And I love my faith, but I also recognize there's a lot of problems with the ways that faith intersects with many of these other injustices that we're talking about. Right. And so I was wondering sort of in your own personal journey, I don't wanna say how do you reconcile this, but how do you wrestle with that on maybe via a personal level? Because it's something that I, I wrestle with as also an an Asian American who is a Christian. Um, and I've often wondered how do I, I don't wanna say speak back, but, or flip the script or as you say, how do I offer that counter script in a way that is actually productive without also, without just sounding like the angry he that maybe at one point my, my ancestors were in my family were were characterized as
Speaker 3:Yeah. Yeah. I mean, yeah, I write in the book that I'm, I'm both the us and the them, right? Like, I, I come from people that would've been considered. Hes, and I have ancestors and relatives in China. My dad was adopted. So as a kid, I always thought about, you know, like my grandparents, my biological grandparents, I never knew. Um, and I worried about them and I thought they're, hes<laugh>, is somebody going to go save them? And, and yet I also like, Right, I grew up in the church, I am a person of faith and, and I, I grapple with this. And I guess what I would say is that I think my, my decision to go into the study of religion and the study of religious history is a part of this ongoing grappling, and I don't have the answers. And I think this book hopefully shows that I don't have the answers, but I'm trying to raise the questions, I guess. You know, I, I grew up, so I grew up in the Missouri Senate, Lutheran Church of Denomination that doesn't orain women. I think if I had maybe grown up in a different denomination, I might have gone in a different path. I might have gone to seminary, I might have tried to pursue these questions in a different way. Um, but for me, I guess the study of history allows me to see other people who grappled with these issues and to find inspiration from, or like companionship with the people that I, that I find in history who've been dealing with these exact same kinds of, of issues. Yeah. For, for my next book, I'm actually hoping to kind of focus in even more on Asian American, Chinese Americans in the late 19th century Chinese migrants on the religious choices that they faced on the obstacles that, that were in their way. Um, I'm really interested in, um, this character in the book won Chin Fu, who was a migrant in the late 19th century. He converted to Christianity and then he converted, um, he became kind of a self-styled Confucian missionary, like going on the lecture circuit around the country, you know, basically telling Christians that they were, Hypocrites published a piece called Why Am I a Hen? Um, but then there was another, another Chinese migrant who wrote back to him and wrote a piece in the same, you know, North American Review called Why I'm a Christian, Um, and why I'm not a Ahe. And I, I'm just really interested in the choices that people made given me, the options that they had, the constraints that they faced, and how that might help us today think about, you know, the kind of landscape that we're living
Speaker 2:In. And it, it's almost that like, that unwillingness of, you know, you want to, you want to convert the he to the ways in which you think that person should be, but with the experiences of many people in different contexts, there's a natural thing that happens is that it happened with the, uh, people who were enslaved here in the US that the, that the integration of custom and different things like that, that were integrated into Christianity. And in some places in your book you talked about like people just trying to even get rid of any kind of like integration of custom or, or somebody's, um, own tradition, traditional belief or, or spirituality within, even within the contexts, Christianity. And, you know, I am purely Scottish and Irish and I've been reading about, you know, how the English or like a Purita movement came. And, and you talked a little bit about this in your book to kind of dispel any kind of integration of traditional Celtic traditions within Christianity that was just not seen. And so I wonder if you could talk a little bit about, a little bit more about just that like Puritan way of Yeah, Yeah. Going into this type of, the puritanism within colonialism that doesn't mm-hmm.<affirmative> that completely wants to kind of get rid of anything Yeah. That isn't of
Speaker 3:Right.
Speaker 2:The colonizer sort
Speaker 3:Of thing. Right. I mean, it's, it's really interesting because like, even, even the reformation, right? Like you talked about, um, trying to to rid, you know, any Celtic influences, et cetera. So the Protestant Catholic divide,<laugh>, I mean, Protestants believed that Catholics were insufficiently pure or purified that the Roman Catholic church continued to hold to these pagan practices. So, I mean, even, even back to the Reformation, you see this kind of purifying impulse and the language of humanism or paganism being used to paint the other side. And yeah. So this has been a very powerful, I think, impulse all through the history that I, that I write about. And, but it's changed, right? So in the, in the 19th century, missionaries, you know, would try to change like so many aspects of people's culture, like from what they wore to what they ate, to how they took care of their landscapes, um, to how they danced, right? Like all of these things they were trying to change, to look like their version of what they believed the Christian body, the Christian landscape should be. Um, by the 20th century, you see a change in mythology where, um, mainline mythologist are starting to say, no, there, there are aspects of indigenous cultures that are not about religion, right? There are things that we shouldn't necessarily try to quote unquote purify. But then the question of like, where that line is, gets to be really complicated, right? Because religion, I mean, that means that means different things in different cultures, right? This is like the religious studies, um, hat that I'm now putting on the very concept of religion, that there's something called religion that you can, like, separate from other aspects of life is a very Protestant notion of what religion means. And so in a lot of cultures, like what we might call religion is integrated into all aspects of daily life. And so, right, So this question of like, you know, is this stance, okay, is this food okay? Like this comes up in these debates over, it's called, you know, is it indigenous Christianity or is it crystal paganism that are the things that people are practicing actually pagan, are they dangerous or are they, you know, innocuous things that don't actually have to do with religion? Um, and so these, you know, these debates are I think continue to to be with us.
Speaker 1:And it's interesting sort of going back to, to the first question I asked how, in some context now mm-hmm.<affirmative>, it's like, at, at least in sort of mainstream society, we don't always necessarily talk about religion at all. It's just sort of this, it's something that comes up later in very specific circumstances, right? Um, either around certain justice and social issues or at certain times in people's lives, like, Oh, is your child going to be baptized? Right. Or how do we do the funeral? Yes. And, uh, it's actually interesting, a couple, just a couple weeks ago, Leah and I were talking about the different ways that we have observed funerals sort of funeral culture, for lack
Speaker 3:A better word. Yeah.
Speaker 1:And, and you might appreciate this story. Sorry, Lee, you're gonna hear this again. Uh, but I was at a, a funeral right before the pandemic for a Chinese relative who had passed away. And something that was really interesting was when we got to the, the cemetery, we did the sort of, I guess, western tradition of putting a flower or like a mm-hmm.<affirmative> like a rose on top of the casket. But there was also this time where there was a little table set up with, uh, incense that was getting lit and everyone would be handed the incense so that to light it. And then some people could come forward and, um, like sit down on their knees in front of it and do a bow and sort of like a prayer. And what was interesting about it was as they were handing out the incense for people to hold, one of the elderly members of the family looked at, uh, looked at me and some of the other members of like my generation and even the generation just above, above mine, and said, Oh, no, don't take that. We don't do that. We're Christian.
Speaker 3:I have had like exactly the same kind of experience Yeah.
Speaker 1:<laugh>. Yeah. And it, that always, that stuck with me because this is someone, the person who said it is someone who I love dearly and who never says no pretty much to anything mm-hmm.<affirmative>, but this, this, this thing, this action caused this sort of reaction. Right? And it was also interesting because then the reaction, if the other person was, well, you know, they handed it to me and I could tell that that person was operating or the assumption of I'm doing the sort of the respect going along with what other folks are doing, not just in the funeral, but in that sort of respect culture within Yes, a lot of Asian families, these things were, uh, coming to a head in this very specific moment, which was very interesting. And I was thinking about that as I was, as I was reading your book.
Speaker 3:Yeah. Yeah. No, I think that's exactly what, like, that's exactly what I was talking about with, you know, how do we, or how do you know Christians or methodologists, how do they determine what they believe to be indigenous Christianity or quote unquote Christ paganism. Right. Um, that's exactly the question that's at stake in, in what you just described.
Speaker 1:And I also had another question about how we would understand, um, different types of liberation theologies, uh, for folks that don't know, liberation theology is the, the theology of the oppressed. And you talk about, as you said, sort of you talk about, uh, native and black and some of the more, um, Asian liberation theologies. Do we understand liberation theology if we're thinking about hedonism sort of as the perspective, uh, that you've described in the book are we don't understand liberation theology as constantly offering a counters script or sort of an alternative way of critiquing Christianity? Or is liberation theology understood to be something as almost reinforcing it because it's still within a Christian paradigm? Does that make sense?
Speaker 3:Mm, yeah, that does make sense. Yeah. I mean, I guess what I try to do in the book is to, is to paint a as nuanced of a, of a picture as I can, right? Because I think it is easy to say, you know, good guys, bad guys like Christians are bad guys, but that's not what I'm trying to do. Right? Like, I'm not trying to say that, that this Christian script of, I guess I see, you know, as, as one of the characters in my book puts it, this Ishi Azo who's a, a late 19th century Japanese, um, immigrant, you know, people like to see the world in black and white, but what about shades of gray? And he is, he's a convert to Christianity. Um, but he espouses a version of Christianity that one might call a form of liberation Christianity or indigenous Christianity. Yeah. And so I think it's, you know, I think it's really easy to say like Christians have, have always been, you know, on the bad side and racist and colonial and et cetera, but that overlooks the experiences of the many people in the so-called he even world people who've been labeled Christians who've adopted Christianity. And you know, as a person who is descended from such people, like I refuse to call people who have accepted Christianity dos or, you know, blindfolded or whatever. So I guess, yeah, I would say yes, they are offering a counters scripts, and it is not my place to say that that is, you know, that they're just being co-opted and continuing this system of oppression. I think that people can work in many ways to counter the, you know, the injustices that have clearly arisen from this system of labeling people as humans and trying to supposedly, you know, to use the get outta jail free card. Right. There are many ways to oppose
Speaker 2:That. Yeah. I, I really appreciate, I often appreciate historians and their work because, well, good ones like<laugh> who like tell all the story of like, because there is all these narratives and the collectiveness of it just shows that like yeah, like you were saying there, there are many places within where you can kind of fight against oppression. But, and, and it also shows how even the colonizer or the one that is labeling someone, he then is also damaged by systems of colonization. Yes. And oppression. Because it is, I mean, even in the journey that I'm doing as, as a white person in tracing back kind of my roots and where I come from and kind of the indigenous fate spirituality that kind of develop through that whiteness has erased a lot of white rootedness mm-hmm.<affirmative> on purpose. And so white people are damaged, are damaging themselves as, and, and so these systems in which have been created are not necess, are damaging every white body and we're all in in them and we're all kind of implemented in them. And so what I appreciate about the book is that it does depict historically how these things are damaging everyone and how Right, we are losing rootedness and we are losing the beauty that is what we believe as the creation of God within, you know, our fate traditions. And so as you were saying that, I was like, yeah, I really have appreciated the different narratives that are going into it because it just shows how we're just all implemented in this and, and it's kind of, you know, dimming our souls and ways that that is just really sad to kind of see. Yeah.
Speaker 3:Yeah. And that's, I mean, that's a point that like so many of the people who who offer the counter scripts that I talk about in the book make is, so I, you know, another one of these metaphors that I, um, that I use in the book is this idea of the, he barometer the idea that like, heist is something that is in the eye of the beholder. It's something that's detected based on various characteristics and, um, people who've been labeled have turned that back. They've used a barometer on white Christians, on white Americans exactly as you say to like diagnose this, um, you know, loss, right? Like damage at the heart of white America. So it's, I mean, it's a really powerful way I think of, of pointing out the hypocrisies in white saviors trying to supposedly uplift the rest of the world when in reality, you know, they've devastated their land in certain ways, right? Like they've devastated their bodies, right? So all of these tropes that have been applied to the heats can so easily be turned back on white, white Christian America as well.
Speaker 1:Well, Catherine, we are so grateful for you to, you, for coming on the podcast to talk about this with us. And we just wanted to give you another chance if there's anything else you'd like to say about your book or, uh, upcoming works that you'd like to, uh, highlight that we can let folks know about. And we'll also be sure to have a link to the book in the show notes for people to check out.
Speaker 3:Sure. Yeah. Well, thank you again so much and thank you for these like, really thought provoking questions. I mean, this is exactly why I wrote the book cause you know, like I said, to just to raise questions, to have conversations. So yeah, I, you know, love if more people read the book and, and think about, you know, how it's, what kinds of questions it makes, makes you ask, um, about the world that we live in and, and the, the reasons why things are the way they are. Um, so yeah, the book is He Then Religion and Race in American History. It's, um, with Harvard University Press. Um, so it's available on their sites and on other sites,<laugh> and I don't know where else<laugh>, maybe some bookstores. Um, so thank you again so much for, for having me and for the great questions.
Speaker 2:Yeah. Thank you so much for being with us. This was, yeah, y'all, y'all should go get this book and recommend it to people because I think it really does it, it just really does a great job about dissecting the history when you write your next book,
Speaker 3:<laugh>. Thank you. It'll be a while.<laugh>, thank you.
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