Chapel Probation s4: Christa Brown- SBC Abuse Survivor and Activist for Justice

[00:00:00] This is a Dauntless Media Collective podcast. Visit Dauntless.fm for more content. We are a professional, psychological, financial and sexual abuse we experienced as part of Bill Gothards' Advanced Training Institute. On our podcast called Leading the Village, we taught candidly about our journey out and interview

[00:00:44] other survivors whose experiences boggle your mind as scandals continue to rock the twisted world of IBLP. Subscribe to Leading the Village today so you don't miss a single episode. I regret to inform you your on-chample probation. Plotcasts that usually takes a critical look at evangelical colleges and universities,

[00:01:13] and I think we've done that. So today, special treat, author activist Krista Brown is an amazing story. Greetings my reprobates. I was recently sent a book from my publisher David Morris of Lake Drive Books, Shoutout to.

[00:01:43] And I was pleasantly surprised to see that I kind of knew who this person is. I mean, I didn't know her personally, but I had heard the story. Krista Brown. She had been in the news a few years ago as she fought to expose the systemic coverups

[00:01:58] of sexual abuse in the Southern Baptist Convention. Yeah, the fucking SBC. I've said it a few episodes ago, I think, but we have the SBC just needs to go away. It's not redeemable. It's patriarchy, racism, homophobia. All the things that we don't like.

[00:02:23] It's basically the sister organization of the KKK. And if you don't agree, I'll ask you again after this episode because Krista's book. Wow, it just, anyway, booklet you'll hear. Her book, Baptist Land is also about a lot more than just the shitty worthless evil people

[00:02:45] and in the SBC. She talks about her family in Baptist Land. And that family story is a reckoning of kind of middle American mythology that the supposedly good would and will God fearing folks in small town USA are usually part

[00:03:03] or put forth as a model of what a good American family is. But scratch beneath the surface of Sunday services in Bible verses and some coins in the offering plate and him's son and you see a broken system that produces broken families of broken people.

[00:03:27] But somehow Krista emerged from this muck of patriarchy, purical, jurant toxic theology to become a tremendous force for good. Now I don't know if God exists but there is something divine in Krista and her story.

[00:03:50] I'm Krista Brown. My pronouns are she and her and I am the author of a new memoir called Baptist Land. Yeah and it's an amazing book. I can't, I have a, I got the free PDF from David

[00:04:07] but I just ordered a bunch to send to so many people because damn that's a good book that is it feels like you're watching a movie a couple of movies and you write it so well and I'm so

[00:04:21] glad you're here on Chapel Probation to tell to talk about it and talk about your life coming out of Baptist Land. So welcome. Thank you. Thanks for those kind words and thanks for having

[00:04:33] me. I'm really happy to be visiting with you. Yeah so usually at this point I'm asking people why the hell they went to some shitty Christian school but despite you coming out of a pretty

[00:04:45] tough family situation which I'd like to, you to talk about, I'm just glad you did not actually go to any of those schools we usually talk about on this podcast so but you did have a pretty tough family upbringing. Can you describe sort of the Baptist

[00:05:03] Land family setting that you grew up in? Sure, I mean this was in Texas. Suburb North of Dallas which in those days was quite a bit smaller farmers branch and you know my family was pretty well enmeshed in Baptist life and certainly we all grew up

[00:05:25] in the church and that was a big part of things. I mean I think Baptist Land is bigger than the Southern Baptist Convention because it does so permeate the culture particularly across

[00:05:45] broad swaths of the south and you know my family was a fairly high control sort of family kind of like the religion is a high control religion and you see that kind of drive towards domination

[00:06:07] I think both in the faith group among Baptists but you also see it in my family in relationships between parent and child husband and wife and older sibling and younger sibling even. And so I kind of grew up in an environment where domination was kind of normal.

[00:06:31] Yeah yeah in your book you describe it so well like it seems like the family unit is like the foot soldier of the high control it's it's in the church setting culture but it's

[00:06:44] also the family sort of in acts all of that rigorous adherence to morality and culture. Yes and people small little roles that we are given and put in these little boxes of who we are

[00:06:59] supposed to be yeah. Yeah particularly with gender right. Yes exactly yeah oh man it's always funny to me that you know you'll hear like on TV or a comedian even in a comedy club so you know

[00:07:12] I'm Baptist and everyone goes oh yeah there's if they know what that it's almost like they're saying I'm good people when they say I'm Baptist you know and even more so when you say your Southern Baptist and then everyone's like oh you know the implication seems to be

[00:07:28] that you are your good stock moral tough and all these things but man there's a horrible dark underbelly to the whole scene have you observed that oh absolutely yes there is a very

[00:07:45] yes there is a very dark underbelly that that just reeks enormous destruction and all sorts of people's lives and in my view that just impede human flourishing on so many levels and for what for this patriarchal idea that they've got going yeah I think it's extremely

[00:08:07] destructive in our society and families and relationships for both men and women certainly for women it's destructive for children yeah all sorts of horny is being done which doesn't that there are not some good individuals within this institution of course there are but

[00:08:27] institutionally systemistically yeah enormous harm yeah you start the book with this lovely little like image of your father showing you the stars and it's this very tender moments that clearly

[00:08:44] means a lot to you and I feel like everything after that kind of falls apart because your family is all women outside of your father and and I'm pleased to take a fence at this but they're terrible

[00:08:59] to you I thought as reading I know you love them and I know they're your family but reading from as an outsider well heart was just breaking at the way your sister's treated you and the way your

[00:09:10] mom treated you kind of gaslit you and and yeah can you talk about sort of like that gender dynamic in this Baptist culture? Sure that is of course thanks thank you that is what makes

[00:09:27] families complicated isn't it because it's almost like no matter what happens we love them and certainly I love my family but yeah you know one of my sisters was very very much

[00:09:45] a boy she was just one year older than me and no one protected me I mean so so there's all that physical kind of abuse going on and I just kind of grew up with that and it never occurred to me

[00:09:58] to imagine that life could be any other way that's just how it was you know and my mom I think she was really very very depressed through large parts of my upbringing and that wound up manifesting

[00:10:24] in ways that could be very hurtful to us as kids certainly to me and that really continued her lifetime I think her life had been so narrow that it was just so much less than what she had

[00:10:44] imagined when she was young and what she had wanted yeah you do such a good job of I mean you paint the picture and it's it's it's heart-wrenching to see what you're especially that one sister how

[00:10:59] she literally just beat the shit out of you whenever she wanted and you could see the sort of tantrums coming and you sometimes you could stop and sometimes you couldn't and your mom did nothing

[00:11:10] and in fact your mom you know sometimes enabled it even almost encouraged it but you also do a great job of sort of going back and showing clues to how your mom was raised and with her family

[00:11:23] and to see that there's a cycle of abuse that just keeps self perpetuating that you actually do seems like like you do an amazing job of stopping that cycle can you briefly describe sort of what

[00:11:36] your mom would have went through to sort of become the person that she did yeah I mean she grew up with an older brother um and her older brother too is best based on everything that the story has

[00:11:51] I've heard the story she has told was also abusive toward her so for my mom she too grew up with this as kind of just normalcy and of course you know we were people of very modest means

[00:12:09] my mom never had any kind of counseling or therapy so it's not like she ever had the opportunity to try to work through these things but I do think and then that that manifested in her mothering

[00:12:23] that she simply accepted that this was how things are um yeah and you know in the church she accepted that her role was to be a support for her husband um yeah who was also had his moments

[00:12:46] right he had moments of tenderness and love um what was very you know clearly had some kind of PTSD from his military experiences exactly and you didn't have that framework or that language to

[00:13:01] talk about at the time right now we didn't even have the acronym back then all we knew was that you know he was like a doctor jacca linguister hide and then he had these explosive rages and we had no clue

[00:13:13] what precipitated them or what caused them or how to avoid them um yeah and so that was pretty frightening as a kid to grow up with that kind of violence in the house the fear that was always

[00:13:32] there the you know the darkness the waking up in the morning and kind of always listening for whether the house was going to be a safe place or or a scary place that day yeah and has a reader

[00:13:48] who didn't grow up in the setting it was kind of a terrifying thing too to imagine you as children and even as teenagers feeling not safe in your own house and that had to have an had an effect on

[00:14:03] how you viewed God um and yeah can you talk about that as so you're going to church every Sunday probably several days a week and having a relationship so how what is God to you at this point

[00:14:18] well at that point God is God and he's just God is whatever I've been taught God is and what I was taught God is was a pretty angry guy with a lot of anger issues okay that was all normal too I mean

[00:14:34] you know a God who you know it fills up the whole human population and it saves just a few in a boat and God who turns a woman to a pillar of salt just because she turned around and looked behind her

[00:14:49] a God who tells Abraham to plunge a knife into his son Isaac I can't believe I grew up with these stories right because they are truly awful stories and this was the God and of course

[00:15:05] did the God who will have everyone burn forever in a literal hellfire without ever having the relief of burning up right I can these are the stories we that even jellicalism in

[00:15:17] call case and chill your hand yeah yeah especially in your branch because I feel like there's other more gentle branches of evangelicalism we know loving caring or he's kind of a transactional

[00:15:30] God right in the prosperity gospel like you do the right things he blesses you with you know money cars prestige so you didn't you didn't ever get that loving Jesus holding a lamb

[00:15:42] kind of view of God in Jesus well you know I mean this is kind of a doctor jellin this or hide kind of kind of God because certainly you know I grew up with a picture of Jesus you know

[00:15:58] the guy with the flowy hair the white skin the Italian the Italian painting the famous one yeah so whatever you know the picture looks so soft and gentle you know and then the pictures

[00:16:10] of Jesus with with sheep and I don't know you know the Jesus thing that part of God was was gentle but then there was all this other side yeah but don't make a mad yeah so in

[00:16:28] instance your family life went perfectly well with sort of the the theology and the view of God that you were getting in church it did yeah yeah this is this is the way things are this is

[00:16:46] who you are supposed to be and you know I was a very obedient girl you don't cause trouble you just do what you told yeah yeah and that was what was so heartbreaking too because you you can see

[00:17:02] that you're trying so hard to please everyone in your sisters your mom your dad your your pastors which will get to and and you get nothing but grief and and hurt from it so I just want to express

[00:17:18] I just wanted to give you a hug within the first few chapters of the book I was like oh my god this well for greater South there it does get better and we're getting there we'll get it does get

[00:17:30] better and you know I was crying at the end just seeing how things all end up but so to whatever degree you want to can you talk about sort of the beginning of the the grooming

[00:17:45] and assault from the was it at youth pastor high school pastor yes it was the youth pastor you know like I said I was just raised to be obedient and of course you know growing up in a faith that

[00:18:02] took the Bible very literally the Bible says that I believe that that settles it so when the pastor began using Bible verses to try to tell me that God wanted me to be a help meet for him

[00:18:27] it didn't make sense to me I mean not another that made sense but live by faith and then there's a lean knot and two nine on understanding these are Bible verses for those who don't know your

[00:18:40] lucky ones and obey them that have the rule over you for they watch over your soul these were very powerful things and of course I was raised to believe that a pastor was an anointed man of God who speaks with the authority of God

[00:19:01] and so yeah that that went on and ultimately I became compliant and he sexually abused me for seven eight months went on and on yeah and and people like that I learned read read it I don't want you to to

[00:19:24] I don't want to re traumatize you having to go through it again but you you write it so heartbreakingly well that it's just it's the kind of thing where you it hurts to read

[00:19:38] but you also you just like you keep reading just to try and get to the end you know but then it does stop because you you tell people that this terrible thing has been happening

[00:19:52] and you just get punished for it instead of you know counseled and helped and that's kind of culture the Baptist the Baptist land that you talk about. Right the music minister I told

[00:20:08] the music minister he told me to never speak on it years later I learned that he had actually known even before I told him because the youth pastor himself had spoken of it with him

[00:20:19] because he was fearful that a member of the congregation had seen him with me. People knew I know what did anything you know and I hope what people may take from this is the way that faith can be weaponized for the most unholy of in. Right

[00:20:44] because what made me vulnerable as a kid really it was my faith that was what was entirely twisted against me. Yeah in a sense you were in your mind you were being a good Christian by exactly

[00:21:00] knowing this to happen yes. And just sort of taking it I was doing God's will I was doing what did I have the I was chosen by God for that. Yeah and unfortunately it this is not an isolated

[00:21:21] case you know they can't argue that this is one bad apple because as you as you get older you learn that this is systemic this is not and not just in your town or even in your state but

[00:21:38] it's Baptist land wide. Yes so we know there have been hundreds and hundreds of cases very much like mine throughout the Southern Baptist Convention and in with independent fundamentalist Baptist also and throughout evangelicalism and non-denominational churches as well. Yeah I mean

[00:22:02] it's you know the Catholics had their reckoning and I just I distinctly remember the evangelicals kind of like making fun of the Catholics you know like huh well look at that that's because they don't

[00:22:16] like Catholic and and God damn it they were doing the exact same thing and you know just transferring people not getting them in trouble making the victims feel guilty for what had happened to them

[00:22:32] yes um patriarchy it doesn't have one single religion it's and always letting the perpetrators may want complete impunity for the pastors yeah now the SPC isn't the only religious group that weaponizes

[00:22:51] faith against women and children but it sure is good at it so much so that it's basically synonymous with sexual physical and emotional abuse of women and children men particularly white men

[00:23:08] are protected at all costs victims are blamed and criminalized and well it has lost a good chunk of its members it's still the biggest Christian organization slash denomination in the world God damn it so Christa's story is an encapsulation of the SPC it sanctions

[00:23:35] and almost encourages abuse in families establishing men as the heads of the household this man is not to be questioned regardless of what he does and it uses that broken family unit to sustain

[00:23:51] the impunity of the pastors who assault children and women some of them do now there are good people in this denomination of course but they're also complicit in their abuse of children

[00:24:07] and women that's what I say anyway if you're in the SPC today knowing what we know with the information provided by Christa out there what are you doing so how did you get the strength to do well in school you know given all the family trauma you're experiencing

[00:24:42] obviously the church trauma and yet you did well in school and you went to college and you went to law school like to what do you attribute that that drive that would have that would have just flattened

[00:24:55] a lot of us who were listening well you know I always grew up um liking books a lot I mean books were always my safe place that was where I was safe uh was you know in the stats of a library

[00:25:09] in those nice orderly rows of books where there was no chaos every day out of place yeah yes quiet um and so I think just that love of books and reading carried me a long way

[00:25:28] that's it huh I think you're being humble because you clearly are you know academically smart and and obviously you had to sort of become street smarts to to understand people in human nature um because you didn't just do well in school I mean you

[00:25:47] you you flourished in in school and I loved I it was such a um healing feeling to read about your law school experiences where the shit you just came out of you know law school is almost nothing

[00:26:02] compared to the stress and trauma of your family and your church background do I have that right was with law school pretty cool for you no you're absolutely right because in law school I took all the

[00:26:14] financial aid I could get um and I did work as a assistant to a professor there at the law school but that kind of meshed with everything I was learning so it was it was helpful it wasn't like you

[00:26:29] know caring buckets of beer at the local bar um and uh and yeah law school I mean I think law school wound up being a joy for me because it was the first time that I really

[00:26:43] had the time that I could if something interested me I could pursue rabbit trails instead of just trying desperately to get the assignment done for the next day and that was such a joy and yeah I mean people say law school is hard but

[00:27:03] but yeah it kind of depends on what comes before I sure because I didn't necessarily I mean sure you got to work but yeah I didn't necessarily think so. I mean I'm sure it was challenging there's

[00:27:15] a lot of concepts to learn I come from a family of lawyers and judges so and I got into law school too but I didn't go um but I loved the law and I loved the the use of logic in philosophy

[00:27:28] and in precedence and there's something almost scientific about you know having rules that govern our lives or society. At this point though in and undergrad too did you still consider yourself Baptists throughout all this? Or Christian even? I would have said I was Christian

[00:27:53] but certainly I would not have said I was Baptists. Okay no and it's not like I was connected to any kind of organized religion at all and but I just had that background. Yeah it's almost like a cultural

[00:28:13] identification. Yeah yeah so you didn't try to go to church or those college campus ministries like I don't know if campus crusade was out where you were but um those were well in undergrad

[00:28:24] to school ever a few times where I you know visited a church and went to the uh I guess it was the Baptist student center or something just for some event someone would drag me along with them

[00:28:35] for something yeah but it never it didn't take any more. I mean there was something deeply uncomfortable about it. Something that I would not have even thought about much in my head

[00:28:49] it was just kind of an instinct to run. Yeah yeah and no one could blame me for that instinct given all that you had been through. Um and the book gets really great when you you finish grad school

[00:29:05] or law school and you have this amazing opportunity to work with a with a with a judge right can you talk about the Supreme Court Supreme Court right yeah um can you talk a little bit about

[00:29:18] that well it was the the interview was just this very intimidating thing around this huge table bigger than any table I had ever seen in all my life. I don't know what that table was probably

[00:29:30] you know at least 15 feet long uh maybe 20 I'm not sure anyway a very big table all men of course at that point in time since then the Texas Supreme Court has had some women

[00:29:42] justices but at that point it was all white men um and I got the job and uh started as a briefing attorney for them for a judge there and then later became a staff attorney for the whole

[00:30:00] of the Texas Supreme Court um and those were good years you know even when I disagreed with things the court was doing in those days I always felt as though I were actually a part of

[00:30:15] something that was at least trying to administer justice. Yeah and back then I think even Republicans were trying or these pretending to choose. Yes it was those were different days. Yeah we we could

[00:30:31] agree or disagree on on their methods and their reasons for trying but um yeah it was it was a different time and then the heartbreaking thing was every time you go home it's almost like none of that

[00:30:44] mattered well it not it mattered your parents are very proud of you obviously but it was like your mom who told you you wouldn't you wouldn't make it through law school or something like that um it

[00:30:55] was seem to be always looking for a way to downplay uh your accomplishments which were stellar. Well I think that's a reflection of where she came from that even when I first told her I was

[00:31:11] had applied to law school and then I was going to go to law school I waited until after I was admitted even calmer um she literally laughed at me she thought that was ridiculous she couldn't imagine you

[00:31:24] people like us don't go to law school Christa um but I think that's a reflection of how limited and circumscribed her own life had been she could not imagine that for her daughter yeah yeah I was going

[00:31:43] to ask if you if maybe she could imagine it but she resented you for having the opportunity to you well that might be yeah no that might be too and I also think as years went by and I was a lawyer

[00:31:57] that there was some need to put me down or squash me a little because I don't know I think there was something that she feared there is though I would move too far beyond

[00:32:11] my roots or something yeah it really you you describe it very well it's you you show it very well that it was clear that she didn't want you to get so successful that you wouldn't you know need

[00:32:26] her or be there for her and that becomes more and more apparent as time goes on and your sisters at this point like how are they treating you are they is it improving now that you have some standing

[00:32:41] in in the world no I would not say so my youngest sister I had a good relationship with for for many years but my other two sisters no um and certainly the sister who bullied me so much

[00:33:02] when I was a kid in her own way tried to bully me as an adult as well but for myself I simply those were painful times but psychologically I had some distance at that point so it wasn't as

[00:33:22] controlling yeah and yeah it was so it was such it's so great to read that it was almost I just found my blood pressure go down the more you succeeded in life

[00:33:38] but I also thought man Chris that really needs to just get away from her sisters and your mom you know as as if I were your friend I think I would have been really lobbying for you to draw some

[00:33:53] hard boundaries but you're so caring and loving that you always went back and you always tried to help and you always tried to be involved with them did anyone ever tell you to just run and not look

[00:34:07] back well yeah my best friend Elana she pretty much did tell me that we used to walk together take these walks around town like in Austin which is now called Lady Bird like

[00:34:20] once a week and that was kind of a very in hindsight I no longer live there but I looked back on those times of those walks once a week a regular scheduled time that was a very sacred time that

[00:34:33] was holy time and I didn't even realize it but she heard some of my family's reaction and she did tell me at one point Chris so I think sometimes people need to make their own

[00:34:48] families and you probably just need to get away yeah and in hindsight I wish I had listened to this very dear friend a little more closely but you're right I kept trying yeah well I was shouting

[00:35:01] at the book as I read it because I have friends very dear friends who have cut siblings completely out of life because they're abusive and have had to draw really hard boundaries with their

[00:35:14] parents even and it breaks their heart to do so but you know and you experience this too as you get married you have chilled you have a child it's when it's not just you and you have other people

[00:35:27] to consider that it became more apparent is that how you and oh yeah until talk tell us about your husband who I just I just wanted to hug him to seem to be like a really amazing force in your life

[00:35:41] yeah he has been he's a very steady kind of even killed kind of guy and that for me coming from this very chaotic upbringing it really really good thing because over time over lots of time

[00:36:01] I learned to feel really safe with him you know on a visceral level not on some conscious cognitive kind of reason the kind of thing but just to actually feel really and truly safe

[00:36:17] and yeah he's been by my side through a heck of a lot I mean did he ever say like you know let's just not hang out with your family anymore that's I'm you know my wife has some tough

[00:36:33] family situations and not caring about some of these people the way she does you know it's it's rough to figure out how to navigate that to advocate for her but also respect the care and love

[00:36:50] that she has for her family did so what was that like for him to watch you do all this I think it was hard for him because of course I think there was something in him that

[00:37:04] would have liked to have taken control it's just that's it no more and that also very badly wanted to protect me and yet at the same time as you say there's this realization of what all you know this is Christus family

[00:37:23] I need to support her but I don't want to control these relationships because these are her family members yeah and yet I think that was hard for him to because he saw how abusive it could be sometimes

[00:37:40] yeah there's a there's a scene where he's listening to your sister I think toward the core then and he just can't take it anymore he just that's right and he was particularly angry

[00:37:52] because I'm out there sitting at the table talking with my bullying sister and one one of my other and the bully was just going after me she was just reveling in her memories of all the time she beat up on me

[00:38:08] and making fun of me and stuff and meanwhile my daughter who at that point was maybe I don't know five ish maybe a little younger maybe four you know in the next room building her Lego tower or whatever

[00:38:24] and you know how kids are they hear everything and when Jim my husband came back from the grocery store and he heard what was happening is he's unloading groceries there in the kitchen and he just stopped he got

[00:38:43] the stuff into the freezer that needed to go and then he went and got my daughter my hand and he left because he said he just could not listen to this and then when he came back you really wanted to know Christa

[00:38:58] why didn't you shove it back in her face why did you sit and listen to that and why did you let your daughter hear someone demeaning you that way yeah and the truth is I had no good answer because

[00:39:12] that's just how she had always been that was the nature of our relationship and hindsight of course I wish I had stuck up for myself more yeah okay quick writing lesson

[00:39:29] the the rule is generally show don't tell and there's exceptions to this rule but it's a good rule you don't let the read you don't tell the reader that your sister is a deranged abusive monster

[00:39:43] you show it and God damned is Christa's show this but what she is also brutally honest about is her own inability to push back and anyone who writes memoir faces the temptation to make

[00:40:00] yourself look better or less less bad I don't know to you know to alter a story into something more like what you wished had happened but Christa is unsparing in her depiction of herself

[00:40:17] she was completely unable to stand up for herself and we have the SBC influenced childhood to thank for that but she stood up for a lot of other people we didn't talk about it much

[00:40:31] in this episode but Christa created a database of pastors who had been credibly abused of sexual assault and abuse now this put her in the crosshairs of the biggest baddest Christian denomination in the world you know fucking SBC and then she found out

[00:40:51] more recently because this was all on blogs back in the days remember those um she found out recently that the SBC was tracking these assholes themselves and doing nothing to stop the abuse in fact

[00:41:10] they were shuffling these predators around like the Catholic church did to protect the pastors all to the detriment and harm of women and children in their path that was another heartbreaking moment

[00:41:31] because um the reader is sees how far you've come in life and all the things you have accomplished you've got this great marriage you've got a beautiful child an amazing career and I think

[00:41:45] I'm just shouting at your book not out loud that would people would think I'm I'm losing my mind but in my mind I'm shouting like you know just do something say something for yourself because

[00:41:57] you're clearly an amazing person that doesn't deserve this kind of treatment and clearly your sister has a lot of issues yeah so it's it's it's it's it's it's you're credit as a writer you know

[00:42:11] not just as a person an amazing human just the way that you wrote this book um was so visceral to you sure word like you could feel you did a great job of not never editorializing

[00:42:26] I used to teach you credit writing but you you did a great job of just showing what people were by their actions and by their words um I don't think I read a single sentence where you said my

[00:42:39] sister was a raving lunatic asshole you know like but that's sort of what we come away with because he wrote it so let it came across yeah yeah you know I think um I don't necessarily

[00:42:54] think that my approach to how I dealt with my family was healthy certainly as an adult in the hindsight I wish that I had been more assertive much sooner but you know I think that's kind of

[00:43:09] always been true of me that I'm much better at sticking up for other people yeah and defending other people than I am at defending myself yeah and that's a perfect segue into meanwhile at the SPC

[00:43:27] you're you're now at this point aware of all the things that are happening that were similar to what's happening to how how did you how did that get back on your radar and how did you get involved

[00:43:38] with kind of kind of taking down the SPC yeah not down enough no but yeah you you're you're dinged him good yes I guess so you know when my own daughter approached the same age that I had been

[00:44:00] at the time that the pastor was sexually abusing me there was something about seeing it through the eyes of a mother that it just completely shifted my whole perspective and

[00:44:20] everything that I had ever believed that I was at fault that I was you know had been the kind of that I had absorbed even if I didn't consciously tell myself that I had believed it and

[00:44:33] and it had become a part of me when my daughter became that same age it shifted and there was a whole lot that I didn't know and understand but the one and only singular truth that I never doubted

[00:44:49] if was that if anyone had done to my daughter what was done to me that I would not blame my daughter and that I would be furious and it was from that tiny little kernel of truth that I knew without doubt

[00:45:06] did everything else wound up then unraveling and unfolding and then you know I tried to in the beginning I was still naive I thought that oh people will be smarter and wiser

[00:45:19] if I just go back and tell them again though they'll want to help me this time around I believe doll that stuff and of course I was dreadfully wrong and that's been the ongoing saga for the past 20 years of trying to peel back the truth of how pervasive

[00:45:41] clergy sex abuse and church coverups are within this fake group and this is pre-internet right so it's not like there's you can Google this at this time when you have this that's right everything's analog

[00:45:56] yeah so how did you compile what became sort of a database of I mean the SBC was keeping track of their own kind of right and well they started keeping track of their own in 2007

[00:46:13] which of course we didn't know this at the time we had learned that adult 2022 that they had this list that they've been keeping all these years but I actually think that what they were doing

[00:46:24] was sort of you know because I used to keep my own database and posted publicly and in addition I had a blog those were the days of blogging right and I think that they were essentially

[00:46:40] too large degree duplicating what I was doing they would see what I would do and then they would keep it on a list themselves but of course they kept their secret they didn't warrant churches they

[00:46:51] didn't do anything about it and it wasn't until 2022 whatever that is 15 years later that we learned about all these men that they had actually known about and done nothing and not just done nothing but sort of brutalized the families of these victims

[00:47:14] by negating the harm done and blaming them for whatever happened or didn't happen according to them absolutely and I myself have been called just about every ugly name you can possibly imagine and not just by these rogue people out there I've related individuals but I've been called really

[00:47:40] awful stuff by some of the highest leaders of this faith group yeah which is pretty daunting I mean when you have these men who are idolized by a multi-billion dollar 13 million member

[00:47:57] faith group that then it was 16 million members this is the good this has got the small water right but you know when you have high religious leaders who call you an evil doer

[00:48:08] and say you're just as reprehensible as a sex criminal that has a trickle down effect so then you wind up getting hate male from all sorts of other people who see that from these high

[00:48:23] religious leaders and they take it as license to do even more to say even worse things yeah so yeah it was pretty brutal and there's never been any kind of I mean this is now documented because they've had like an independent investigation that documented these things

[00:48:42] but on their part it has amounted to like man sorry yeah and we're back to patriarchy because yeah it's I can't think of an equivalent where you know something happens to a man in these

[00:49:00] in these cultures because nothing ever happens to men or very very little there's no equivalent of this kind of systemic assault and cover up and blaming the victim for men right it's this is

[00:49:12] this is purely uh happens to women well and it also happens to children both male and female and certainly there have been male victims who were victimized in childhood by Southern Baptist pastors who have been treated terribly and these are the pro-life people right these are

[00:49:41] everything that happened all they yeah look at all they did to impede human flourishing yeah I think there's something really sad and small in a faith that tries so hard to negate the diversity of life and you put human beings into these tiny little boxes

[00:50:11] yeah and there are certain boxes you definitely don't want to to be in but these boxes that they've created definitely exist particularly if you're involved with this as you get to the

[00:50:24] end of your story and we haven't and I just want to share a listeners that we haven't even scratched the surface of all the things because you got you just got to read this book it's

[00:50:35] it's it's so important that yeah anyway you get towards the end and you find out your your your family probably knew about the the assaulting right the whole time certainly my mother did that became apparent only much later in my life

[00:50:58] that she had known and part of I don't know whether my father ever knew I don't know that my mom did I learned that the senior pastor had when I was a kid had told her

[00:51:15] that I would simply forget all about it and so I think that she too was kind of manipulated into doing nothing and that was kind of you know I looked back at all these things my mom said

[00:51:34] and at the time I just kind of filed them away and didn't want to dwell on them and really it was only much later than I realized I mean that was my own denial right I did not want to see that my

[00:51:47] mother had no had always known I didn't want to see that because it was much later that I realized of course she always knew it was obvious and I just didn't want to see it.

[00:52:01] Is there a part of you that feels like your mom was completely heartbroken by this happening but just felt like her role as a mom and as a woman in Baptist land was to do what

[00:52:19] she did was to to obfuscate to to downplay it there's a couple moments where it looks like she's acknowledging the pain that you went through but that always is countered by it after that kind of

[00:52:32] gaslighting you and and saying you need to move on do you feel like there was a turmoil in your mom through this I think she felt some measure of guilt and I think I vastly underestimated the level of guilt

[00:52:46] she felt because I wasn't seeing no yeah the truth that she had no I thought it was just kind of this ordinary mom guilt of you know something bad happened to my kid but I think she felt a lot of guilt

[00:52:58] and didn't know how to cope with that. I also think that given her own upbringing that I mean she had never really acknowledged to herself the fact that she was abused by her own brother so how could she see

[00:53:19] how harmful it was of what was done to me given that she never saw that for herself either. Yeah like in my wife's family they're from like South Dakota and Wisconsin very rural folks

[00:53:38] and I noticed this thing and actually I noticed in my Japanese relatives to who've had a hard life when they when they see someone hurting I don't think they have the framework or the language to

[00:53:53] express sympathy or empathy so they kind their way of of dealing with it is to say well you that's what happens when you that you know the in the kind of blame the kid or the person who's

[00:54:05] suffering because that's all they know to do that's the only response that's in their vocabulary or in their brain to handle it because to actually go down that road and acknowledge this pain or

[00:54:19] this suffering would be to sort of question everything that they've experienced and the cultures that they came from did you see that in Baptist land? Yes then then it all begins to unravel you can't start pulling on those threads yeah so if it's almost subconscious right they know

[00:54:38] they can't pull the thread so they just gonna turn on you and hope that hope you're stronger as a result or just hope that I will forget about it move on shut up and be quiet

[00:54:53] as I always did when I was a good little girl for every kind of thing you know yeah and then that was so hard to read but you eventually learned to shout

[00:55:07] not that it made your life any easier but during all the turmoil of viewing a text by the SBC and the adherence to the SBC what was that a little at least feeling better that you're

[00:55:22] you're able to find your voice and find your point of view that there's empowerment in that yeah there is for me I mean in the beginning I vastly underestimated

[00:55:37] the backlash how I just didn't expect to be attacked the way that was and for it to go on and on on and that really was something that startled me and surprised me and had an enormous impact on me

[00:55:57] but as time has gone by yeah I feel so grateful that I am someone who has had a voice and that I've used my voice in the ways that I have and you know I know that

[00:56:14] Baptist land will always be a part of me I mean they just know escaping it for me because it's so much a part of how I was raised so I am always kind of struggling with this thing this

[00:56:28] thing of Baptist land but my daughter it is no part of her life and that is something that makes me enormously happy yeah and that is there's a huge happy point in the book how much does your daughter

[00:56:45] know but I mean she probably read the book so how much did you tell her like like while she was going up and at what point did you feel like she was ready to hear all the shit mom went through

[00:56:57] well you know when she was in college way back when and I can't remember if I talked about this much in the book but this was in 2007 and I was early in my advocacy work then and somehow ABC 2020

[00:57:11] the news program had seen something I'd done I don't know or something I'd said to the associated press and they started an investigation and so they wound up doing this ABC 2020 show so

[00:57:27] you know anyone who tells you that the second Baptist convention that this is all something new that they're just finding out about this oh no there was a huge expose two back in 2007 and it just

[00:57:37] didn't really get as much traction back then but obviously they lost all plausible denied bill at that point yeah so the ABC 2020 show I was interviewed for at length and when I knew

[00:57:53] that it was going to air I told my daughter because she was living in a dorm then at college and I told her some of what I was doing before that but that was when I really thought

[00:58:05] she's going to see this and she'll be with kids in the dorm and I didn't want her to be embarrassed and so I told her that we would you know be sure to take it for her so that she could watch it

[00:58:15] then on her own at home if she wanted to and she was just like mom I'm so proud of you you know we're gonna all sit around and watch and they have popcorn and that was when I realized

[00:58:28] you know she doesn't hold this I mean I I internalized the shame of it even as I'm trying to do advocacy but she doesn't see that as shameful at all yeah that's amazing you're you're thinking

[00:58:46] through your lens uncovering uncovering all this is shameful and there's so much hurt and damaged and that it brings up in you all these feelings but because your daughter was not raised in

[00:59:00] that and doesn't have that experience she's free from that she she can just celebrate wow mom's god damn hero mom is mom is bad ass and so I celebrate that she is free from all that right

[00:59:17] yeah yeah my kids have thanked me you know we we left Christianity when they were little and they hated Sunday school anyway but as they got older you know they watched the news and

[00:59:28] and they sometimes just thank you so much for not making us cultured the way you did and it feels good if you was like yeah you don't have all the guilt and shame that in your

[00:59:43] your life there's other things the world is a tough place there's there's always something I don't think religion is the only major problem in the world but it's one of them and well and there are large swaths of it particularly in white evangelicalism that

[00:59:59] are very fear-based and very shame-based I mean that is the whole core of it yeah and to hear them early on in like middle school and high school talking about sexual identity race issues just so openly without just genuine curiosity and wanting to know how the

[01:00:21] will works without the cloud of guilt and shame yeah it's beautiful and and your book the you do talk about your daughter and a little bit in how she like she avoided having her spend

[01:00:38] summers with her cousins from one when your sister's kids and I remember thinking man that was a huge bullet you dodge there to not have her I look back on that and think exactly the same thing because

[01:00:51] there was enormous pressure for me and I left her go near the guilt and trying to guilt you into this you know and then thank goodness your mom and sting to kick down you're like yeah I don't think

[01:01:04] she should spend the summer with these people yeah yeah no that just I'm so glad because I think that well it just would not have been the right thing it would not have been and it could have

[01:01:16] been deeply traumatizing for her oh yeah and I don't want to spoil all the ending near of your book but you do get to a place of sort of empowerment of your own through very tough

[01:01:28] unfortunate circumstances but you have sort of drawn bar boundaries with your family to date right I have yes I don't see any of my sisters anymore yeah and and we can say right it is but the

[01:01:47] only thing that would be sad or is if they were continuing to insert themselves in my life yeah and I was gonna ask as sad as that is does it feel like a burden has been lifted from you

[01:02:03] it does I think I'm much happier without wondering oh thanks giving you is coming I'll have to see them all or whatever the occasion no it's you know waiting for the phone to ring no

[01:02:15] yeah it's better this way have any of them reached out to you nope oh no it's like a mutual boundary that y'all drew yeah because they have to know how shitty they treat you on some level or do they

[01:02:36] I absolutely think that my youngest sister realized it at the time you know in an adult would she realize how terribly I was being treated but I think you know she has her own problems

[01:02:54] and the way I would see it and the shorty-angoy of saying it is I think she's kind of a dormant and she was never able to stick up for herself and so certainly she couldn't stick up for me

[01:03:11] I mean all four there's four of you right four daughters raised in the same household it makes sense how your older sisters ended up to me because man that is a that is a tough

[01:03:26] that's that's hard to overcome to what do you attribute yourself because the end of your book is so sublimely happy and you know as a reader I think it's a testament to you and your character and your

[01:03:42] intelligence your insights into life I mean everything from race and gender to politics you know you're an admirable person like how like yeah how the hell did that happen how did you get out

[01:04:00] well you know I think that my youngest sister is a good person I just think she was incapable of standing up through the pressure of the family or even extracting herself and stepping away some

[01:04:18] you know two of my sisters have lived lives where they have not had long-term relationships not significantly long-term um and my oldest sister has been married but looking at it from the outside that has never

[01:04:38] ever looked like an happening there no you know and and so I guess I would say that for me you know one of the things that has made a huge difference it's just relationships with other people including

[01:04:51] my husband and in that sense I think I got really lucky because other people have saved me you know the the the caring bonds of other people those shared bonds are what have given my life meaning and have allowed me to grow and become who I am

[01:05:21] yeah is it like you you can see yourself through a different lens when you when you have these relationships and so you are that's such a good point of saying it yes they give you a different way

[01:05:32] to see yourself yes yeah that's that's a beautiful thing and that comes through and you you know again you didn't write this expository but the relationship with your husband Jim really seemed to be like a beacon for you to see your family through his eyes to see

[01:05:52] see your upbringing through his eyes and to his credit he's able to sort of say that's that's not okay that is that is you shouldn't have to go through this and so all right to also then see my

[01:06:09] self through his eyes as someone who deserved so much better yeah and that comes through that's to me that's the takeaway I mean it's you're it's weird we're talking about your life but

[01:06:24] it's in a book now so I'm picturing this as a book but that's why it's I'm so glad to talk to you and hear your voice but seeing everything you've been through with the family with the church

[01:06:37] with the abuse contextualized in this relationship and your marriage and your relationship with your daughter and your relationship is a family to me seems to be the takeaway because it it helps you overcome not just overcome it helps you flourish that is so yeah would you agree

[01:06:56] that that's the takeaway for every book oh absolutely love of others love of self yeah and not just my husband and daughter but I've also been very fortunate to have just a few but a few really really really close friends chosen family those kinds of relationships just

[01:07:26] they are sacred they have if there is anything in this world that is sacred those bonds between human beings that is what is sacred absolutely I finished you know I was I read your David sent

[01:07:40] me the the PDF of your book a couple months ago and I read almost all of it all at once but I just couldn't bring myself to read the very last bit because I don't know there's a part

[01:07:52] of me it was like worried that it wasn't going to end well and it knew us as your life and so I'm sitting on a plane and I'm like fuck it I get my kind of open and I start and I read the

[01:08:02] last chapter and I'm like tearing up and then person is looking at me next next and we're watching you know something like action reveal on the screen and I'm like sitting there like

[01:08:13] sniffling into my into my Kindle and I tried to play it off like it's you know airs dry I turned off the air above me and oh yeah dry air it's um but I just I'm I'm so glad it ended

[01:08:27] the way it did you know this image of peace and happiness and contentment with with life and I just want to say thank you thank you for writing this book like I said I'm sending this

[01:08:39] to just about everybody I know well thank you thank you I feel badly that it was fearful for you that you put off the ending for fear it would not end well I knew where it was going you know

[01:08:54] especially after the incident with the family sit in drama situation but I know it's also part of me that like I don't when I'm really enjoying a book I'm kind of dreading the end just because

[01:09:05] it's gonna be over and so like I think that's why I'm so happy to talk to you because knowing your real person your story continues you know the book is like a bookmark into that

[01:09:17] part of your life but you're still going yeah still still doing the show you're still you're still living life and you know you're you're husband or your daughter real actual people your sisters

[01:09:28] are actual people still living their own lives and again to your credit that the the book feels like you just watched this incredible movie that had so much insight into into life and faith

[01:09:41] and gender and sexuality and all the things that yeah you can't ask anything more out of a book I think thank you thank you Scott that's lovely thank you yeah yeah and thank you for for coming on

[01:09:55] shovel probation telling your story oh this is very much my pleasure thank you I regret only kind of one thing in this episode and that is my if use of fanboying of Christa and her writing ability

[01:10:11] and her story and just the person that she is I was so in awe of talking to her after reading her book and I got a little carried away it's um I'm not a professional you know obviously

[01:10:24] but I meant every word Christa Brown is a hero that more people should know about go get her book share her story there are links in the show notes of more of her writing and interviews

[01:10:39] we can't let the SPC win this just like iBLP and the Catholic Church and all the other abusive groups out there who live off of the suffering and oppression of women and children this needs to be exposed more because people still assume when they hear southern baptists

[01:11:01] they think good good American people and they're kind of right that is a good American person however that is but what they're not acknowledging is the shittiness of it the damage the this organization does to real people but with Christian nationalism on their eyes as well

[01:11:25] this culture of lying and hatred dominating half the country have reality TV not being reality anything the stakes could not be higher so we gotta do something and one thing you can do right now is support Christa Brown

[01:11:43] after years of abuse threats and name calling which still goes on she could use some love it takes a toll she deserves some love so buy her book say her name she survived repeated

[01:11:59] sexual assault by a pastor a trusted pastor as a child she survived a family that reinforced the notion that she deserved what happened to her and she went on to become an incredibly good

[01:12:13] person who likely saved lives because so many victims finally had an advocate who saw them so send her a note review her book on Amazon and if you have family that loves and supports you

[01:12:32] know that you are fortunate like Christa's daughter so thanks again to Christa Brown for coming on to Chapel Probeation and telling her story we'll be back next week with another episode have a great week