Agnostish

Andy and TJ are guest-less (thanks Covid!), which worked out well because they needed to clarify some things anyway. Andy attempts to figure out what the heck TJ actually is, and TJ raises some critiques of Andy's thinking.

Andy and TJ are joined by Andrew Stout, who was in TJ's grade at Living Word Christian School. After a brief homeschooling rebellion, Andrew returned to CHS. He got his bachelor's in Philosophy from Lindenwood (sharing many of the same professor's Andy had in the Christian Ministries program), then got his Masters from Covenant Theological Seminary.

They discuss their shared experiences at Living Word/CHS, the New Covenant church system in St. Louis, charismatic Christianity, the metaphysics of belief in God, and more.

Click here for a photo and TJ and Andrew (Stout) together at a 2nd grade roller skating party.

Andy and TJ are joined by Justin Grimm, a pastor from Ohio. In high school Justin and TJ had overlapping friend/church groups and were vaguely acquainted. After hearing the first couple episodes of the podcast, Justin reached out with some pushback, specifically on some of Andy's arguments in his Manifesto. Naturally they invited him on for a battle to the death. Not really. It was a great conversation.

Andy and TJ are joined by their first guest, Rob Graham. Rob grew up next door to their dad and has been connected to their family for many years. TJ wants to be just like Rob when he grows up.

In the first half of the episode, Rob shares the story of his faith journey while Andy attempts to pin down exactly what the heck Rob actually believes.

In the second half, TJ and Rob recount their story of being temporarily abducted at gunpoint in Guatemala in 2017.

Other Stuff:

- The Thomas Paine work that Andy references is called "Age of Reason" and you can find it on Amazon here.

- The "branching beliefs" cartoon TJ references can be found here.

- On the the trip to Central America in 2017, TJ produced a series of daily social media videos for the trip. Watch this video to see Pastor Alfredo and his children's ministry in El Salvador. Watch this video to see the prison that they visited the day of the day of the abduction.

Andy walks TJ through his "Some Thoughts on Faith" manifesto (found here) and gets pretty worked up in the process.

TJ shares a story from his psilocybin experience and pushes back on some of Andy's arguments.

There's a fart, which may or may not have been added in post-production.

Additional Resources:

Andy talked about John Hick's "Philosophy of Religion" book that greatly influenced him in college. You can find it on Amazon here.

TJ referenced Jordan Peterson's lecture "The Phenomenology of the Divine" from his Biblical Lectures series. You can find it on Apple Podcasts here.

Andy interviews TJ about his experience growing up in the Fundamentalist Evangelical Christian sub-culture. They discuss their experiences growing up in a Christian home, going to a Christian school, their beliefs about God and hell, and other stuff.

TJ dropped a shameful plug for his Object Lesson channel on YouTube, which tackles a lot of the same issues discussed in this episode. Check it out if you're interested in such things: https://bit.ly/3d1hWEM

We both have nasally voices (the 2nd place name for the podcast was "Nasal AF"). So if you don't want to hear two dudes talk through their noses for 2+ hours, turn back now. Sorry... we can't help it.