S2E10: My Cult Was in a Documentary, Part 3 — with Eric Skwarczynski

[00:00:00] This is a Dauntless Media Collective podcast.

[00:00:04] Visit Dauntless.fm for more content.

[00:00:07] Have you seen the Amazon Prime docu-series, Shiny, Happy People?

[00:00:17] Were you shocked to hear the wholesome American Duggar No. It's a cult. Every IFB church is a Potter tag ready to explode. I hate that he was my first everything. These people are gods. They said, we're going to brainwash you. We're going to brainwash the junk out of your brain.

[00:01:41] Women have to be submissive.

[00:01:43] He would say, this cup is poison.

[00:01:45] Drink it. Yeah. Thanks for getting my last name right. So that's a, it's a point you can put up on the board. So nice. Nice. I don't know that I would have gotten it right, but Nate's better with the language stuff. Good to defer that stuff as, as, as often as possible. So is it, uh, is it Polish? It is Polish, but I don't know anything about my lineage beyond that. So just to cut to the next question, I don't speak Polish. I don't know Polish.

[00:03:03] I actually used to work marketing and I guess maybe start from the top or wherever you feel like is a good place to get the origin story going? Yeah, I mean, the origin story with religion

[00:04:22] is simultaneous with being born.

[00:04:24] I mean, I was born and raised in

[00:04:26] the independent fundamental Baptist world I went to a small private Christian school all within the same campus. So I literally grew up in the same spot Monday through Friday at school, Saturday out knocking doors and inviting people to church. And Sunday morning, Sunday night, Wednesday night attending church services and my parents were on staff. So to say that I spent more time on church property than my own home is not an understatement.

[00:05:45] Like it's the church. So like, and he came from a Catholic background. My mom your application, you go to your grandma's kind of stuffy church in the country, like that's basically what it was with a little extra hellfire and brimstone, depending on which one you're in. Yeah. So yeah. Exactly. I think that would be worth it. We could talk about this a little bit too, because there are, there are various branches, um, at least from how I perceive it to, um, both when I was in the IFB and.

[00:08:25] You know, stepping out of that's the top of the chain of command. So I'm not going to question any further than that. Um, what made me actually question was around the time I was 16, 17 years old, um, a youth pastor from a church in Northern California, who I was familiar with and had known from activities and things relocated to our church in

[00:09:42] Southern California very suddenly.

[00:09:44] And I knew some kids on his Yeah. So I was like super shattered. I started going to leadership saying like, well, obviously they don't know. So I started going to people bringing it up. And I was either met with apathy of like, okay, what's the big deal? Or more frequently from leadership, the mentality was anger. It was like, why are you so bitter about this? You need to

[00:11:03] forget, like, keep in mind, active arrest warrant's a lot for a teenager. I was going into 11th grade. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Like I was thinking, I mean, we all, I don't know, for me personally as a teenager, sure. I had like big thoughts and ideas about, uh, you know, what I wanted to do and,

[00:12:25] and who I left and basically I was registered that went to a church that was connected to it that was out of the IFB kind of freshly, they were still independent Baptist, but they were, you know, they understood the movement had a lot of issues. They were like a lot less heavy on certain translations and music and like, they let go to movies and like, it was just a very like freeing, like very much

[00:15:01] in the JD Greer kind of like we're gospel centered kind of vibe.

[00:15:05] And so I got into that.

[00:15:06] Meanwhile, I was working with a production company.

[00:16:07] But the missions agency, after about two years there, had a pretty drastic falling out and that kicked me out of ministry basically for until now.

[00:16:11] And there's no chance of me going back into that world anytime soon.

[00:16:14] So yeah, I can zoom in anywhere along that journey, but that's kind of like the roadmap.

[00:16:20] It was like four years of just, I'm Christian, but I'm not part of this and I don't feel

[00:16:25] at home in this.

[00:16:27] Where is my home? They've got a fairly legit production crew and they've got, um, actually, I don't know if you saw this, I interviewed recently the cinematographer for Saw X and we started talking and he's like, it was for my film podcast, but we started talking and he says, I say

[00:17:41] like, Oh, tell me a little bit about what sparked your interest in film.

[00:17:44] He starts going down.

[00:17:45] He's like, I grew up super religious.

[00:17:46] You probably wouldn't resonate with this at all. you want to analyze the abuses that are going on there. Why? What, why is this a thing that you felt you needed to do? Yeah. I mean, like I said, I, the minute that I found out as a teenager about that story, it drove me to start researching the movement itself. And so like, literally because I'm a youngster, you know, I had smartphone.

[00:19:01] And so I would literally be sitting there with every guest speaker,

[00:19:04] Googling every time they mentioned a name And basically I would tell my wife all the time, I was like, my background is documentaries. I just want to make a documentary about this. Like, and she would just say, if you're going to do it, do it, don't talk about it anymore until you do. And what happened was in 2019, I was working marketing at a,

[00:20:20] for an auto group in Southern California.

[00:20:23] I was driving home and I was on Twitter,

[00:20:25] which I don't recommend doing both of those

[00:20:27] at the first time I ever like publicly kind of popped off about it. I'd had private conversations, but like that was me kind of saying like, Hey, this is like a culty, bad, weird boys club that's passing around predators. Like ask some questions. And I went inside, I cut together like a little real and said like, Hey, I want to cover this.

[00:21:41] Like if anybody has a story they want to share, you know, let meopening. I mean, just listening to your podcast and getting a sense for the IFB, for me, what's relatable is leaving the IFB because of its legalism. I grew up a musician and I loved all styles of music, but we weren't allowed.

[00:23:02] You have to hide that. All the contraband music.

[00:23:04] Exactly.

[00:23:06] Get in trouble for leading worship with Michael W and my wife to this day thinks that's like so funny. And she was like, you weren't allowed to listen to weezer. But anyway, that was like kind of my, my gateway.

[00:24:20] She doesn't come out of IFB at all.

[00:24:22] She, she grew up evangelical, but had them lining up in the front, these Chick-Chacks you could grab. So you're right. The connectedness, even from the places that you'd assume are not connected, have so many things in common. But it is fun to hear his IFB stories, because I'm like, wow.

[00:25:42] Yeah.

[00:25:43] I think before I ever met him, I was reading up on King James only, and someone was like,

[00:25:47] this is so weird.

[00:25:48] This is so bizarre. on the Pentecostal note, have you read Alice Gretchen's book, um, wayward? No. And, and I also have to say like, I ejected out of Pentecostalism after like I grew up in it, but like by the time I think I was maybe even 14 around there. And, and, uh, and I'd never spoken in tongues. And I think for me, that was the thing that made me start to dig on into it.

[00:27:00] Because I was like that kid that was just so earnest and fervent. I was like,

[00:27:04] God, I just want to be one of yours. And, and they were teaching,

[00:27:06] like, if you don't speak in stuff before you get baptized, I read, I don't think a lot of people do it. Like the terms and conditions for like an Apple product is just scroll, scroll, click, or whatever, whatever software you're downloading. I didn't do that. I read through all the lines of what they want immediate before saying yes to getting baptized. I was like, well, I don't agree that everyone should have to

[00:28:21] speak in tongues to be Christian.

[00:28:23] And then I realized I'm in the wrong church.

[00:29:24] whatever trajectory it was on, I was never able to totally digest the package that was given to me from my church or something in it that was just not making sense to me. And I just kept questioning

[00:29:29] it. But yeah, the non-denominational world that I ended up, I guess, so I don't know that all the

[00:29:34] ins and outs of the Pentecostal movement as much, also grew up in Canada. So I'm familiar maybe a

[00:29:40] bit with like the Italian Pentecostal movement because they don't want to look crazy. It's a more secular culture. But man, they have Rondi Hammerbound, popular in my old church that I grew up in, and that church has just totally gone off the deep end. And like, I mean, I know people where, you know, if something happens to them, anything physical goes wrong.

[00:31:00] Whether it's a limb they lose anything.

[00:31:01] They believe God will grow back and they just need to pray and have faith. listening to stories repeatedly of sexual abuse, emotional abuse, spiritual abuse, the religious trauma that exists in a place like this. How do you work through that? Do you do anything personally? If I were in your shoes, you know, week in and week out, interviewing multiple people

[00:32:22] who all have some stories like what's on your podcast,

[00:33:24] Like I expected this torrent of emotion. It was like months later and we were taking my daughter swimming and my grandpa was the

[00:33:31] one who tossed a swim.

[00:33:32] So like it was then that like I like started crying where I was like, Oh, he's not here

[00:33:37] for this first moment of her swimming.

[00:33:39] Like that's the way my brain works.

[00:33:41] And so like it's really hard for me to And like what I don't think people realize is I'm like almost 300 episodes into the show, but like I've had conversations with people that have never hit the podcast like things that either go to law enforcement because they have a, you know, a legitimate

[00:35:03] case things where I've helped people connect's a revolutionary thing. I go take walks and I space out my podcast, but that's really what it's been, you know, is that, but also some stuff just hurts and it's heavy stuff and you can't fully process

[00:36:26] evil that exists on such a scale. traditions they came from, please feel free to hop onto the server. If you don't know what Discord is, it's a place where communities can gather online for chatting on a wide variety of topics. In our Discord server, we have channels devoted to general deconstruction conversations, some meme sharing, therapeutic venting about whatever religious bulls**t you're currently dealing with, and even a channel

[00:37:42] specifically devoted to talking about the latest episode of the podcast

[00:37:46] you're listening to right now.

[00:37:48] I hope you'll join us.

[00:38:43] event and then you kind of unpack it all and then be done. But there's certain things that can't hit you until certain periods of time in your

[00:38:47] life, certain developmental things you go through and then you always have different

[00:38:52] lenses that you replay your past with.

[00:38:54] And it's interesting how that will change even your perceptions of your own

[00:38:58] experience and how you end up having to process through it again, because it's

[00:39:02] kind of a new thing to realize all of that through a different lens.

[00:39:05] Yeah, absolutely.

[00:40:05] that immediately, as soon as your child starts to cry,

[00:40:09] you are supposed to break the will of that child. And that involved spanking as much as possible

[00:40:12] until that child stops crying.

[00:40:15] Which is impossible to do, but that is what they taught,

[00:40:19] that's what they espoused.

[00:40:22] I can't, like right now, I can't imagine doing that,

[00:40:25] but even more so if I were to have a kid of my own I've been in Muslim majority countries in a back and then you're seeing posts from people, you're like, you've never met a Muslim person in your life. You know, like it changes the perspective. And, um, and it's the same with parenting. Like, you know, I mean, the first time that we got pregnant, like, you know, I was very much in this very John Piper, like heavy what it was and, you know, break the cycles where you can and know that you're probably messing up something else that your kids will be unpacking later on, you know, it's, it's a tricky, it's a tricky thing to work through. Yeah. Yeah. And we, you know, it's, it's as much as we can be like, how, how did our parents, how, how, we also know, yeah, they, they were probably doing the best

[00:43:01] with what they had and we've learned a lot through even, man, I just think of

[00:43:05] like the technology that's available now,, you don't have to answer this, get to leave it out, but feel free to go. What if you don't want to answer it, we'll skip. Um, but you mentioned losing child loss and how it provided comfort to be inside of Calvinism.

[00:44:22] Um, would you care to share a bit about how that affected your faith, how like your

[00:44:24] worldview and what, what that experience did

[00:44:26] for you in terms of your maturity and what you believe this the way that I'm saying it, but it's a beautiful thing to believe that everything has a higher purpose that's outside of our understanding. And that is a comforting thing. However, I also think it enables a lot of times us to brush over things had brought something back with me that was or had lured a demonic attack on us. So like it was a, when I look at that period of my life,

[00:47:00] I was in such a whirlpool of theological ideas and trying to grapple with good

[00:47:05] evil, higher purposes, my place. Like,

[00:48:05] You know which is the sense that you carried a demon back with you would be a sense of control of like Yeah, just random that your child died

[00:48:07] Like you somehow had it was done because you did something right you had a part to play

[00:48:12] So it's sort of a you're still involved in it and there's something, you know, it's not random

[00:48:18] Yeah, and and I think the messaging coming back from them, you know

[00:48:22] Mission feel I hate using all these words but coming back from the mission field, you know

[00:49:26] answer to this. And literally, I remember calling one of the ministry leaders the day it happened and he, and I'm crying and I'm on the phone and I'm saying what happened.

[00:49:33] And he literally said, how's your wife? Is she upset? Is she not going to want to do

[00:49:37] missions work anymore? Like the priority was so much like stay on mission, stay on mission.

[00:49:44] And all that on the background is like, what I said, the black and white super comforting, we start stepping into the gray at all. It's like terrifying. It's like, where does anything go? Because nothing seems to fit. And I definitely don't fit in this. I think when you use the word empathy, that was the piece that I was like, Oh, when I think of the Calvinist movement, and I think of like one of the hardest pieces, it seems to be just to be

[00:51:03] allowed to feel just to be allowed to be like this sucks. And there's no answer. And there's It's where I was drawn immensely to John Piper during that time in that I love that it was this approach to it where you can find joy and I love that there was that that hedonistic Christianity as he calls it like you know and at the time again that was a very comforting thing of like well everything is meant for our joy in his glory and like that's you know

[00:52:24] there's something beautiful again to that while. And if God is able to stop them, he becomes immoral himself.

[00:53:41] Those questions, there's not an answer.

[00:53:43] Calvinism just says, whatever he does is that is happening in the world is God's judgment and wrath is the wind. Eric, you're going to get these songs stuck in his head. They're so repetitive. He's going to be singing them tonight going to bed going, Eric. Hill songs are catchy. Eric, why did you do this to me? Why did you make me remember the words? It bothers me sometimes because I'm like, I'll have a song. And I'm like, man, the song is so good. I have no desire to listen to this song, but also they had some albums that ripped.

[00:56:22] So yeah.

[00:56:23] Oh yeah.

[00:56:24] Thanks for acknowledging that. the next step in this journey. And at least how I've sort of perceived it and listening to your podcast and seeing you in other media. So your work on the podcast then kind of got you in touch with a production company that was doing a documentary series on the IFB. I was like, are we gonna get to the movie? We're gonna get to the movie. We're gonna get to the movie.

[00:57:40] This documentary series is called Let Us Pray.

[00:57:44] And I highly-

[00:57:45] Very clever title, by the way.

[00:57:46] Let Us Pray, P-R-E-Y.

[00:57:48] Yeah. We're working on this. Can we just ask you some questions? We're just trying to do some research. Um, I found out later they were, they had been working since like 2019 already. So like they were already about a year in, they were focused on one church and a specific abuse story, which was Ruthie's in the documentary and had gone and filmed like those early things, like the meeting and some of the early blind eye stuff.

[00:59:02] And they reached out between 20.

[01:00:03] That's when I did that interview with Ruthie that you see in the documentary. Like, and then a couple months later, I'm flying to California to go do a protest that

[01:00:09] you see at Faith Baptist in Wildemar and then in Michigan to go to the sentencing.

[01:00:14] So like it was just always idling in the background.

[01:00:17] And so I was keeping a secret for like two and a half years about this project that's

[01:00:20] going.

[01:00:22] And the way I felt during the process was like a lot of fear that like it was excitement It's a very just black and white kind of look at this, is validating. But also going back to Eric in high school, who feels like the people he loves the most aren't listening to then see, oh, we're number seven on HBO Max and the world is listening. And I'm seeing people tweet about these things, things that I never thought would see the

[01:01:41] light of day was extremely powerful.

[01:01:44] Like to see it all come together was like validating is the word. one of those flaws I see happening over and over again is sometimes the way men take the narrative, grab the story, take over, talk over the women who are harmed in those situations. Um, you know, I've seen that happen in many of, many of those, those, those retellings. And when I saw you in the documentary, there's some stuff that really stood out to me as a man. He thought, Oh my God, here he is.

[01:03:02] It's going to ruin the whole thing.

[01:03:04] I did.

[01:03:05] I, and to be honest, I did have you were saying was out of, and you know, knowing the history you have now, it makes even more sense to me. The tone you had, the approach you had of not, of you probably being on that page as a man of not wanting to override their stories and, you know, feeling

[01:04:21] like you held back a lot of your own story in order to make sure they're

[01:04:24] stayed front and center.

[01:05:26] film nerds out there like that that female POV is there which I think is really cool and I think it's important you know because I think there's

[01:05:29] perspective there even talking to the director after like some of the things

[01:05:33] she was thinking about like she said you know I wanted the sound person to be a

[01:05:36] woman because she's gonna be miking these women up she's gonna be the most

[01:05:39] close contact with them she's gonna be listening to the intonation of their

[01:05:42] voice like it was something where it was going to be like, oh, their story then like, what's this guy doing here? Cause like, even the story I just shared, I don't think really fit the way the documentary was put together. And so they did, when they interviewed me, they recorded like my entire backstory. I named names of my church and background. Like a little bit of that made the extended cuts on investigation discovery.

[01:07:00] But like the director told me, she's like, said, it's the best version of what it could have been. Could there be lots more? Absolutely and hopefully there is. But I've said it before, like perfection is not when there's nothing left to add,

[01:08:21] it's when there's nothing left to take away.

[01:08:23] Like there's really nothing I would change

[01:08:24] about the documentary as it sits.

[01:09:25] the IFB world, but I still, I wanted to move on. I wanted to, I was getting excited about the new style of Christianity, quote unquote, where I could have rock bands and stuff.

[01:09:30] Wear jeans to show.

[01:09:32] Exciting.

[01:09:33] Yeah, it's exciting stuff.

[01:09:34] You're young, restless, and reformed, ready to take on the world now.

[01:09:39] Exactly. So I was sort of, I guess my you have any thoughts? I don't know if you're able to kind of fit things together. I'm curious myself, how does Bob Jones fit into this, especially since BJU as an institution kind of predates

[01:11:05] Jack Heiles in my interview fully, there was a section of the interview where I talked about Jack Heiles. And I described him as like the Walt Disney of fundamentalism. And so I think IFB churches like

[01:12:23] independent fundamental Baptist churches existed where they were hiring, like, they were more on the intelligent side, they tended to be

[01:13:42] more focused on history, and like little know, has, is his power or influence the same now? No. Um, I mean, he's been dead since 2001. So, uh, you know, it would be hard to maintain it, but again, the influence is there even for the guys like Paul chapel that don't mention him as much now, or Bob Jones that would say, well, we're

[01:15:02] not staunchly King James, you know, now or, they were so much an institution unto themselves in a lot of ways where the same way like Jerry Falwell used to be in very tight with the IFB world, but Liberty University now is so radically

[01:16:20] a separate camp and it's become like Liberty University has its own massive sets of scandals. I mean, back in 2014, we had the Grace Report that came out, 300 pages documenting the way that Bob Jones University handles sexual abuse. And that barely scratches the surface

[01:17:42] because of the way that the Grace Report was handled.

[01:17:46] Not a lot of people came forward.

[01:17:47] And yet, when you? And it's like, it's like, yeah, it's, it's interesting covering places like Bob Jones, even first Baptist now, although, you know, with the new leadership, he's very quiet and

[01:19:00] calm versus the explosive Jack Scott, Jack, Kyleists tell you, we hate the gays, we hate the women, patriarchy is great. Like they'll just state it all up front. They'll be like, this is God's way. Evangelicals will say, all are welcome. Yeah. You know, women are valued. You find out once you're in. Yeah. It's all hidden. It's like underneath layers and layers of, we have a woman pastor, and

[01:20:25] then you dig a little bit, but they don't you have the Grace Report out of Bob Jones University, you have the Southern Baptist Convention and the two newspapers that are pointing out that around. So the biggest naysayers of what I do will say abuse happens everywhere. And it does. I, where, you know, if you have a hundred people in a room, somebody's a creep, somebody's a, you know, abusive somebody like purity culture, which disempowers women. You can get into conversations about toxic masculinity in the church, which empowers male abusers. You can dive into all see that the man of God or the pastor within a church, that's a position of extreme authority. And I think it all boils down to the fact that when

[01:25:45] you have someone and there's a role where you get to help move the bus forward or we're going to throw you under the bus.

[01:27:00] Like that is a necessity that comes out of an organization being way too big

[01:27:05] for its own britches and men givening how that leaves so many vulnerable to abuse. Um, but yeah, there's layer after layer of it. Yeah, there's, I feel like that this is a question that could go in so many

[01:28:23] different directions. One that popped into my head right away was, uh,

[01:28:25] in terms of church being different than let's say secular environment would be

[01:29:25] how people are shut up, how people are made to be quiet, how you're taught you gossip if you share your story.

[01:29:27] Some people don't even know that someone close to them has gone through this sort of abuse

[01:29:30] from the past or from a... Because you're not supposed to... So you're a bad Christian

[01:29:34] for bringing up these conversations.

[01:29:36] You're bitter, you're gossip.

[01:29:38] There's a certain Christian language that's used to promote that dynamic you were talking

[01:29:43] about, that unhealthy power, authority, structure.

[01:29:47] There's a lot of lingo that in the thing where, again, when somebody's saying, well, when somebody's saying, hey, just weigh what I'm saying against scripture, but also if your interpretation is different than theirs, you're wrong. Do you really have the freedom to look it up for yourself? Like not really, like it's all kind of the illusion of choice.

[01:31:00] Yeah.

[01:31:01] Yeah.

[01:31:02] And not to mention the fact that if we grow up with. And I was like, I always looked for the commentary on the, like as exciting as the Bible was to me, I was a little Bible nerd as a kid, I wanted to read the explanation for it because the Bible is an ancient complicated text that is not written for us. It wasn't written for us and we're told it is. So then someone has to explain

[01:32:23] how it applies to today. And I remember reading men submit to your wives, wives submit to your husbands. It's like this verse about mutual submission, but the translators took and put the passage break under that. So you go into verses on submission between men and women, and it goes into wives obey your husbands.

[01:33:40] So like it, even in the structure of verses and chapters, it's was really not for you. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. And going back to the whole, and God is at the top of that too, right? Yeah. Like that stops you from doing the asking the questions that you should be doing, right? Sure. If you say that man is at the top and this is his opinion, then you ask, could he be wrong?

[01:35:01] But if you said, I have a problem with this passage too, just like you do,

[01:35:05] but these are not my words.

[01:35:07] These are God's words.

[01:35:08] Right. and telling me this, you know, and start flipping that script. You know, he got in an internet argument with someone recently. It was so funny because the guy was like, you know, first he was like bashing him for not being intellectual and was like, you know, you're, you know, you need to, you need to ask for wisdom and whatever. And then when he started, Nate started showing the history and getting too much knowledge is, is, uh, you're not supposed to, like, you're not supposed to read the Bible.

[01:36:22] Enjoy the mystery.

[01:36:24] Yeah. Right. Right. You just read it.

[01:36:26] Wisdom leads to too much knowledge is foolishness. would get up on stage in front of an audience of 2,000 people at once. And it's a lot of power, a lot of authority. And yeah, and so for your part, I am very appreciative and very grateful of creators like you who are shining a light

[01:37:41] on these abuses of power, it goes back to the many things can be true, you know, like, and even on a, I was on a podcast yesterday and I literally was talking about, um, yes, I benefited in terms of, I wasn't preyed on by male leaders as a female in the church. So that was not my experience. Um, and purity culture,

[01:39:01] you know, on its lowest levels really hurts women in more immediate ways.

[01:40:01] is for me, not for my spouse. You're going into the stress of being in a relationship and it's all on you.

[01:40:07] You're going into business being like, I'm the sole provider in this.

[01:40:09] Like you're doing a lot of damage to yourself.

[01:40:13] And it's why I feel bad for the people getting swept into the red pill,

[01:40:17] Andrew Tate style crate.

[01:40:18] Like they're, it's all the a whole nother episode. We've this episode is titled intros to several other episodes Exactly exactly Anything else you wanted to bring up? No, I think this is a great conversation. I appreciate you coming on

[01:41:42] I appreciate the work that you're doing podcast, right? Yeah. Film Schooled podcast, Film Schooled on YouTube. It's definitely something I'm really

[01:43:03] excited about. And going to 2024, haveMutuality.com, for links to all of the apps that you can subscribe to us on. And if you enjoyed what you've heard, we'd love it if you could leave us a review on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or on our website. A quick review is one of the best ways you can support us. Speaking of support, you can also partner with us on Patreon. For just $5 US a month,

[01:44:21] you'll be helping us produce this podcast and you'll get access to other content,