The Desert Sanctuary

In this episode, Laura and I discuss our growing disgust with our former denomination, the Southern Baptist Convention. Issues center around their push to keep women off the stage and their inability to muster any energy to help survivors of abuse.

Laura Forehand talks to our son, JD (Jordan), who teaches in Taiwan, about all things related to education and religion. Not only are they both educators, but they were also involved in ministry for many years (the Pastor’s wife and the Pastor’s son).

Topics include:

Aaron joined us on The Unlearning Curve to share his views on therapy and spirituality after Deconstruction. Because our crew was out of whack, we moved the discussion to The Desert Sanctuary.

Aaron is a former pastor and, currently, a mental health professional.

If you are wondering what comes next in this crazy desert journey, this is valuable information to think about.

Pastor Wives Tell ALL

The Desert Sanctuary strives to advocate for all people, especially those harmed by religion. This includes queer people, religious abuse survivors, and marginalized people groups.

We do this mainly by letting them tell their stories. One of the hardest groups to access is ex-pastor wives. Rather than making assumptions about why this is, Laura recruited one of the wisest ex-pastor wives we know to discuss it with.

This conversation is solid gold, and I want more!

If that’s the case, this book was created for you. As a former pastor, I made the mistake of deconstructing a bit and then trying to start something new, as I was trained to do. The problem with that approach is that I wasn’t ready to begin something new.

I hadn’t delved deeply enough or asked enough questions. The first stage of deconstruction typically includes assessing our beliefs regarding hell and the afterlife, supporting queer individuals and women in their fight for equality, and achieving a better understanding of racism and privilege.

Many people in deconstruction communities expend significant effort criticizing Evangelicals and attempting to gain a following. While I believe they deserve intense criticism, this strategy fails to address the problem effectively because they generally don’t listen to us!

Our tendency to punish our former organizations sometimes overlooks the challenging process of healing and growth. It is the same trap we fell into in our former associations.

Order Now!

Campfires occupy a special spot in the mosaic of history. They act as communal hubs across different cultures and faiths. The campfire’s circular design fosters equal participation within the collective group. The flames at the center draw our focus and encourage face-to-face interactions as we exchange experiences, wisdom, and insights about the world beyond. It is where legendary myths and tales are born.

Order Now – Study Questions in each chapter!

This book is titled Campfires in the Desert because it stems from nearly 400 discussions we held with individuals on our podcast, The Desert Sanctuary, and from our aspiration to improve.

Available now!

Thanks for considering us, autographed copies are $20

Karl Forehand

Our guest is Tia Levings

From her Website:

I’m Tia Levings, a writer, creator, guest expert, and content specialist. I shine light on the abuses of Christian fundamentalism and offer contextual insight into the true horrors of religious trauma. My memoir, A Well-Trained Wife: My Escape from Christian Patriarchy, releases with St. Martin’s Press on August 6th, 2024. 

My videos on social media have millions of views. Through the lens of my personal experience, I connect entertainment, news headlines, and current events to fundamentalist influences and strategy. 

I write about religious trauma and Christian fundamentalism to educate, validate, and empower those who feel smashed by the patriarchy. To create something beautiful from pain. And because when I went through the hell of church-sanctioned violence, I felt alone, and I wasn’t. There are thousands of others out there. 

Her new book is called: I Belong to Me: A Survivor’s Guide to Recovery and Hope after Religious Trauma

If that’s the case, this book was created for you. As a former pastor, I made the mistake of deconstructing a bit and then trying to start something new, as I was trained to do. The problem with that approach is that I wasn’t ready to begin something new.

I hadn’t delved deeply enough or asked enough questions. The first stage of deconstruction typically includes assessing our beliefs regarding hell and the afterlife, supporting queer individuals and women in their fight for equality, and achieving a better understanding of racism and privilege.

Many people in deconstruction communities expend significant effort criticizing Evangelicals and attempting to gain a following. While I believe they deserve intense criticism, this strategy fails to effectively tackle the problem because they generally don’t listen to us!

Our tendency to punish our former organizations sometimes overlooks the challenging process of healing and growth. It is the same trap we fell into in our former associations.

Order Now!

Campfires occupy a special spot in the mosaic of history. They act as communal hubs across different cultures and faiths. The campfire’s circular design fosters equal participation within the collective group. The flames at the center draw our focus and encourage face-to-face interactions as we exchange experiences, wisdom, and insights about the world beyond. It is where legendary myths and tales are born.

Order Now – Study Questions in each chapter!

This book is titled Campfires in the Desert because it stems from nearly 400 discussions we held with individuals on our podcast, The Desert Sanctuary, and from our aspiration to improve.

Available now!

Thanks for considering us, autographed copies are $20

Karl Forehand

If we hope to fight and eventually heal from misogyny, we must first be able to identify and understand it.

Despite the undeniable progress for women and girls in the 20th and 21st centuries, misogyny is still alive and well in today’s culture—often in ways that are more subtle and more insidious than the outright sexism of the past, and in spaces that we overlook or excuse as normative.

Misogyny has shape-shifted through the generations while maintaining a consistent through-line: it blinds individuals and cultures from seeing women as equal image-bearers, fosters hierarchies rather than partnerships, disdains vulnerability, and prevents all of us—women and men alike—from fully thriving.

In For the Love of Women, Dorothy Littell Greco draws on in-depth research, interviews, biblical concepts, and vulnerable personal experience to explore how misogyny continues to impact six spheres of contemporary culture:

While recent movements succeeded in raising consciousness and initiating important changes connected to misogynistic practices, alarming trends and rhetoric are on the rise in America today. We still have a lot of work to do—and the battle is more urgent than ever.

Like other deeply rooted, systemic injustices, misogyny is neither morally neutral nor random. It’s pernicious and calculated. For the Love of Women is for anyone who wants to educate, inspire, and empower themselves and women collectively to affect real change for everyone’s benefit.

“Holy Disobedience is a visceral portrayal of a daughter’s quest for the dark truth beneath the religious veneer of forced beauty and familial cover-ups. Spiers’s writing is propulsive and intelligent.” -Tia Levings, author of the New York Times bestselling A Well-Trained Wife

Holy Disobedience is a gripping, unflinching story by Melissa Duge Spiers about growing up in the shadow of control, silence, and secrets within the strict, fundamentalist Seventh-day Adventist Church. When Melissa learns that her father, a respected pastor, was a serial child predator shielded by the church, her world implodes. But this revelation is only the beginning.

From being beaten for resisting a childhood home perm to seducing a forbidden public-school athlete to reclaim her autonomy, Melissa’s early years were shaped by repression, shame, and indoctrination. Her escape from high-control religion launched her into a life of risk: Wall Street jobs, New York nightclubs, Hollywood hookups, and a series of abusive relationships. And yet, in these extremes, she was searching. Through self-reflection and finding her voice, and through an unexpected friendship with her father’s first victim, Melissa slowly reconstructs the self she was never allowed to know.

Holy Disobedience is not just a survivor’s tale. It’s a story of fierce honesty, radical freedom, and the beautiful mess of becoming whole.

https://www.instagram.com/the.glory.whole/

Laura and JD have a unique perspective, having been part of a ministry family for 20-25 years. The discussion begins with religion and turns to what truly makes for great people and great families.

You’ll enjoy this!

If that’s the case, this book was created for you. As a former pastor, I made the mistake of deconstructing a bit and then trying to start something new, as I was trained to do. The problem with that approach is that I wasn’t ready to begin something new.

I hadn’t delved deeply enough or asked enough questions. The first stage of deconstruction typically includes assessing our beliefs regarding hell and the afterlife, supporting queer individuals and women in their fight for equality, and achieving a better understanding of racism and privilege.

Many people in deconstruction communities expend significant effort criticizing Evangelicals and attempting to gain a following. While I believe they deserve intense criticism, this strategy fails to effectively tackle the problem because they generally don’t listen to us!

Our tendency to punish our former organizations sometimes overlooks the challenging process of healing and growth. It is the same trap we fell into in our former associations.

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Order Now!

Campfires occupy a special spot in the mosaic of history. They act as communal hubs across different cultures and faiths. The campfire’s circular design fosters equal participation within the collective group. The flames at the center draw our focus and encourage face-to-face interactions as we exchange experiences, wisdom, and insights about the world beyond. It is where legendary myths and tales are born.

Order Now – Study Questions in each chapter!

This book is named Campfires in the Desert as it stems from nearly 400 discussions we held with individuals on our podcast, The Desert Sanctuary, and our aspiration to improve.

Laura and JD have a unique perspective, having been part of a ministry family for 20-25 years. The discussion begins with religion and turns to what truly makes for great people and great families.

You’ll enjoy this!

If that’s the case, this book was created for you. As a former pastor, I made the mistake of deconstructing a bit and then trying to start something new, as I was trained to do. The problem with that approach is that I wasn’t ready to begin something new.

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I hadn’t delved deeply enough or asked enough questions. The first stage of deconstruction typically includes assessing our beliefs regarding hell and the afterlife, supporting queer individuals and women in their fight for equality, and achieving a better understanding of racism and privilege.

Many people in deconstruction communities expend significant effort criticizing Evangelicals and attempting to gain a following. While I believe they deserve intense criticism, this strategy fails to effectively tackle the problem because they generally don’t listen to us!

Our tendency to punish our former organizations sometimes overlooks the challenging process of healing and growth. It is the same trap we fell into in our former associations.

Advertisement

Order Now!

Campfires occupy a special spot in the mosaic of history. They act as communal hubs across different cultures and faiths. The campfire’s circular design fosters equal participation within the collective group. The flames at the center draw our focus and encourage face-to-face interactions as we exchange experiences, wisdom, and insights about the world beyond. It is where legendary myths and tales are born.

Order Now – Study Questions in each chapter!

This book is named Campfires in the Desert as it stems from nearly 400 discussions we held with individuals on our podcast, The Desert Sanctuary, and our aspiration to improve.

Essentia-limited implies exploring whether the fundamental nature of God inherently includes limitations, a concept generally rejected by traditional theology, which defines God’s essence as inherently limitless and infinite. 

Existential impotence is a concept discussed in philosophy and psychology that refers to a person’s perceived lack of power or ability to take effective action in the face of life’s fundamental challenges or to create personal meaning and live authentically. It involves a sense of helplessness or powerlessness related to the core “existential dilemmas” of human existence, rather than a specific physical condition.

If that’s the case, this book was created for you. As a former pastor, I made the mistake of deconstructing a bit and then trying to start something new, as I was trained to do. The problem with that approach is that I wasn’t ready to begin something new.

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I hadn’t delved deeply enough or asked enough questions. The first stage of deconstruction typically includes assessing our beliefs regarding hell and the afterlife, supporting queer individuals and women in their fight for equality, and achieving a better understanding of racism and privilege.

Many people in deconstruction communities expend significant effort criticizing Evangelicals and attempting to gain a following. While I believe they deserve intense criticism, this strategy fails to effectively tackle the problem because they generally don’t listen to us!

Our tendency to punish our former organizations sometimes overlooks the challenging process of healing and growth. It is the same trap we fell into in our former associations.

Order Now!

Campfires occupy a special spot in the mosaic of history. They act as communal hubs across different cultures and faiths. The campfire’s circular design fosters equal participation within the collective group. The flames at the center draw our focus and encourage face-to-face interactions as we exchange experiences, wisdom, and insights about the world beyond. It is where legendary myths and tales are born.

Order Now – Study Questions in each chapter!

This book is titled Campfires in the Desert because it stems from nearly 400 discussions we held with individuals on our podcast, The Desert Sanctuary, and from our aspiration to improve.