23: Coming Home to Kansas (Knappsters Review Kansas 25)

[00:00:00] Hello Deconstructionists, this is Maggie, the host of our podcast where we'll collectively

[00:00:38] share our stories and experiences of leaving high control religion along with what it's

[00:00:42] been like for us to find new practices that help us feel good and confident in ourselves.

[00:00:48] I hope that hearing these stories reminds you that your deconstruction is valid and

[00:00:51] most of all that you are not alone on this journey.

[00:00:54] You are good, you are loved, and you are worthy just as you are.

[00:00:58] Hello deconstructionists.

[00:01:03] Hello and welcome to a different kind of episode for our podcast, Hello Deconstructionists.

[00:01:09] Today I have three guests with me and together we're going to talk about Jennifer Knap's

[00:01:13] Kansas 25 album and share our thoughts on it.

[00:01:17] So my goal in this episode is not to make everyone a Jennifer Knap fan or a Kansas

[00:01:22] fan, although wonderful if you are, but it's to show some ways that we can reimagine

[00:01:28] some of our favorite music from our Christian days.

[00:01:30] And for me the Kansas album was one of those and for my guests too I think.

[00:01:35] So we're going to talk through ways that we've reimagined the music and listened

[00:01:39] to it in new ways in our post-faith or new faith eras of our lives.

[00:01:44] And so I hope that this gives you permission to cherry pick through some of your favorite

[00:01:48] albums from your Christian days and take whatever you want from them and give them

[00:01:52] whatever kind of meaning you want.

[00:01:53] So that's the goal of the podcast and if you haven't heard last week's episode

[00:01:59] with Jennifer Knap be sure to go listen to that too.

[00:02:02] The interview that I did with her was super inspirational for me and helpful for me

[00:02:06] to kind of give me permission to reimagine this album, which is why I decided to have

[00:02:12] all of these guests on today to talk about it.

[00:02:15] So I'm going to have our two Hollies and Abethany introduce themselves so you have

[00:02:20] an idea of what kind of background they're coming into this episode with.

[00:02:24] So Holly Daly, let's have you go first.

[00:02:26] You can introduce yourself.

[00:02:28] Thanks, Maggie.

[00:02:29] So I'm Holly Daly.

[00:02:31] I currently live in Grand Rapids, Michigan with my husband and four sons and work

[00:02:37] for Calvin University.

[00:02:39] I'm doing social work in kind of both a micro and macro sense with college

[00:02:43] accessibility and writing some grants for that and also working in a support role.

[00:02:49] So started listening to Jennifer Knap in college early 2000s is when I was in

[00:02:54] college, I went to Taylor University, which is a evangelical Christian university

[00:02:59] in the Midwest.

[00:03:00] But it was during that time that I kind of through high school and into college

[00:03:05] listened to a lot of Rich Mowans, Jennifer Knapp and had these sort of heroes of the

[00:03:10] faith, if you will, that sort of paved the way for what in my view,

[00:03:14] authentic Christianity could be.

[00:03:16] And so kind of started to deconstruct probably about eight years ago through

[00:03:23] just a lot of questioning of different, I think, ideals that were being placed on

[00:03:29] both as Christians and women.

[00:03:31] And spent time where I just really felt like I didn't have any desire to be part

[00:03:37] of the church.

[00:03:38] I think particularly when the 2016 election happened, that was a big moment

[00:03:43] of really questioning people who I had thought were people I respected just did

[00:03:50] not seem to view things in the same way that I did anymore.

[00:03:53] And wondering what does that mean?

[00:03:56] And so then during that time, kind of during that next season for several years,

[00:04:02] I stepped back a bit just in my own personal commitment, I guess you could say

[00:04:06] to the church and to Christianity and started reading.

[00:04:10] I really found a lot of solace in Father Richard Rohr's books.

[00:04:15] He's been able to really give me a fresh perspective away from evangelicalism

[00:04:23] that kind of holds to some of the truth that I still hold to even to this day in

[00:04:28] my faith, but kind of was able to give new language and new meaning to it.

[00:04:33] So I think going into Jennifer Knapp's album, like the re-recording,

[00:04:37] it's interesting about six months ago, I started listening to her a few of

[00:04:41] her songs again, I put them on my Spotify, Faithful to Me and Martyrs and

[00:04:45] Thieves and Hold Me.

[00:04:47] So I've been listening to those not even knowing she was re-recording the

[00:04:50] album. And so then hearing the new album come out, just thinking through where I

[00:04:55] was at that point, you know, 25 years ago, listening to this album, where I am

[00:04:59] now and how that has reframed.

[00:05:01] So excited to get into the conversation with you all in here, where you all

[00:05:05] are coming from as well with it.

[00:05:07] Would you consider yourself a Christian today?

[00:05:10] I do, although I think the meaning would mean something different than it did

[00:05:13] to me 25 years ago.

[00:05:14] So yes, follower of Jesus.

[00:05:17] Okay.

[00:05:17] But I don't like to associate with the current version of what most people see

[00:05:23] as Christianity in our country at least.

[00:05:26] Yeah.

[00:05:26] Okay.

[00:05:27] Cool.

[00:05:27] Again, that's Holly Daly just for listeners to keep track of who's who.

[00:05:31] Okay.

[00:05:31] And Holly Collins, let's hear about who you are.

[00:05:35] All right.

[00:05:36] Thank you, Maggie.

[00:05:37] Yeah.

[00:05:37] Holly number two here, Holly Collins.

[00:05:40] I am in Southern California and I am a mother of two.

[00:05:46] And my connection to Jennifer and also my faith and deconstruction journey,

[00:05:52] they're kind of intertwined.

[00:05:54] So I'd like to kind of share it that way.

[00:05:56] So I became a Christian when I was six years old.

[00:05:59] I was raised in like pretty fundamentalist evangelical Christianity

[00:06:03] and Kansas, the original album actually came out when I was six.

[00:06:07] So I've always had a deep connection to music, like music and especially

[00:06:12] Christian music.

[00:06:14] I was just as preachy about like people should listen to Christian music

[00:06:17] as I was that people should accept Jesus.

[00:06:20] So I always had a favorite and Jennifer and I was my very first favorite.

[00:06:25] It's like I'm really bringing energy here today because I'm like, wow,

[00:06:28] this the lyrics of these songs are so intertwined with my young development

[00:06:37] and my development of my faith and theology and all that.

[00:06:42] So, yeah, I lived the good girl Christian life like all throughout

[00:06:48] my youth and my 20s.

[00:06:52] It was around 2018, 2019.

[00:06:55] You know, I'm a young mother and I just started to have questions

[00:07:00] and feel really uncomfortable.

[00:07:02] And by this time, I was trying out some different denominations

[00:07:06] from the ones I was raised in.

[00:07:08] Really trying to figure out was my discomfort that I just needed

[00:07:13] to switch a denomination.

[00:07:14] And I think that that was where I started.

[00:07:17] And the cracks just began to continue to widen.

[00:07:21] And I actually found myself just having a huge difficulty.

[00:07:25] Like my body was really advocating for me and speaking to me.

[00:07:28] It was like shutting down, not wanting to go to church.

[00:07:32] Around the time where I was like being really brave and honest

[00:07:35] with myself that like everything I built my identity in life around

[00:07:38] might not be what's true for me.

[00:07:40] And it might be actually contributing to some mental health issues

[00:07:43] that I was experiencing.

[00:07:45] I was curious, like, what is Jennifer now up to?

[00:07:47] You know, she's such a big part of like the beginning

[00:07:50] of my journey with Christianity.

[00:07:51] And it was then that I found her book and just read it.

[00:07:56] And I sobbed and I re listened to the music.

[00:07:59] And it was just like a beautiful way to connect with myself.

[00:08:03] And I was also sitting with some like shame.

[00:08:06] And because I remember when she came out, I was like 18,

[00:08:10] still very like fundamentalist.

[00:08:12] And I remember being like, what a shame.

[00:08:14] She was a role model and then whatever.

[00:08:17] So I own that.

[00:08:18] But, you know, in 2019, when I'm reading her story,

[00:08:21] I was just like, I felt like I understood my own story

[00:08:24] and her story even more.

[00:08:26] And it felt like it gave me permission

[00:08:29] to be right where I was at.

[00:08:32] Where I find myself now is I no longer identify

[00:08:35] as a Christian.

[00:08:37] I actually am quite surprised at how easily and freeing

[00:08:40] I was able to put that label aside.

[00:08:44] But I also, I hold a lot of curiosity.

[00:08:48] Curiosity is like my guiding light.

[00:08:50] So I feel like I don't wanna condemn any like Christians,

[00:08:55] but I am just very much against using Christianity

[00:08:58] to control others.

[00:09:00] And I feel very spiritual, which what does that even mean?

[00:09:05] I don't know.

[00:09:06] And I'm still discovering that.

[00:09:07] And I'm okay with that.

[00:09:09] Really embracing uncertainty.

[00:09:11] And the last thing I'll say is I just have been

[00:09:13] really deep in listening.

[00:09:15] Like this whole past year,

[00:09:17] I was revisiting Jennifer's songs and it felt so healing.

[00:09:20] And I felt kind of shocked that it was healing

[00:09:23] because all of the lyrics are all of my conditioning.

[00:09:26] But yeah, I just was able to really connect

[00:09:28] and like see her in concert

[00:09:29] and experienced a lot of healing.

[00:09:31] So it's such a joy to be at this place in my journey

[00:09:35] and joining a bunch of other fans

[00:09:37] and celebrating this re-recording.

[00:09:39] So thanks for having me.

[00:09:41] Yeah, awesome.

[00:09:42] Thank you, Holly.

[00:09:43] And Bethany, can we hear a little bit about,

[00:09:46] I feel like I'm like leading a Bible study or something.

[00:09:48] Like next up to prayer.

[00:09:49] Okay.

[00:09:51] Bethany, can you share a little bit about yourself?

[00:09:53] Sure, sure.

[00:09:54] My name's Bethany Riddle and I am actually in Kansas.

[00:09:58] So that feels cool to have her album.

[00:10:01] Yeah, so cool.

[00:10:02] I'm a mom of three boys and a wife.

[00:10:04] And I just finished seminary.

[00:10:07] Just graduated with a master's in theological studies.

[00:10:09] Then it was just an Old Testament.

[00:10:11] But Jennifer Knapp,

[00:10:12] how I first became involved or got to know her.

[00:10:15] I think I was a junior in high school

[00:10:18] when Kansas first came out.

[00:10:21] And it was my jam.

[00:10:22] It just felt pretty hardcore.

[00:10:23] It felt badass for my little evangelical religiosity.

[00:10:27] Like it just felt like the little badass part

[00:10:29] of contemporary Christian.

[00:10:31] And I just loved it.

[00:10:32] She was my favorite.

[00:10:34] My husband even was telling me,

[00:10:35] we got married super young.

[00:10:36] And he was telling me the other day

[00:10:38] that we went and saw her in concert.

[00:10:39] And I have zero recollection.

[00:10:41] I guess she opened for jars of clay in maybe 2002.

[00:10:45] And I have no recollection of it.

[00:10:46] So I'm not sure what happened there.

[00:10:47] But he assures me that we went to see her.

[00:10:50] But yeah, my journey of faith really has been tumultuous

[00:10:54] to say the least.

[00:10:55] I grew up very evangelical, very churched.

[00:10:59] Like the church was my whole identity.

[00:11:02] And then actually I related to both of you.

[00:11:04] Holly Daly, it hit me.

[00:11:06] It's really Trumpism is what started my deconstruction.

[00:11:09] It was that along with some church conflict.

[00:11:12] And we just started asking questions, pulling one thread

[00:11:16] and it all just started falling apart until one day

[00:11:19] I just kind of like my husband, I looked at each other

[00:11:22] and we're like, are we crazy?

[00:11:24] And so I was deconstructing

[00:11:26] and I had no idea what I believed anymore.

[00:11:27] And everything was up in the air.

[00:11:28] And it really sent me into an identity crisis,

[00:11:31] deep kind of depression.

[00:11:32] We'd lost our church and we were sort of lost

[00:11:35] to be honest.

[00:11:36] And so I wasn't quite ready

[00:11:37] to let go of the story of Jesus.

[00:11:39] It just was too compelling.

[00:11:40] And it had been really the only thing

[00:11:42] that had been true and steady my whole life.

[00:11:46] So I deconstructed and went to Bible college as one does.

[00:11:51] Just really as a way, cause I'm like

[00:11:52] if I'm gonna believe this, I wanna learn it.

[00:11:54] And I couldn't find any church,

[00:11:56] anybody who could help me.

[00:11:57] I was non-denominational.

[00:11:58] Anybody that was pastoring in the churches

[00:12:00] that we were a part of,

[00:12:01] hardly anybody was theologically trained.

[00:12:03] So I had no, I had nowhere to turn.

[00:12:05] I didn't even know where to go.

[00:12:06] So I went to Bible college,

[00:12:07] which feels really privileged now,

[00:12:09] hindsight when I tell this story.

[00:12:11] I think I thought there was gonna be some sort

[00:12:12] of career out of it at some point.

[00:12:15] In that process, just a quick part of that

[00:12:17] is I fell in love with the Old Testament

[00:12:19] in my undergrad and biblical studies.

[00:12:21] And just love that story

[00:12:22] cause it gave me a greater complexity

[00:12:24] to this very Pauline way of looking at.

[00:12:27] The letters of Paul would just tell us

[00:12:29] these hardcore ways of being Christian.

[00:12:31] So the Old Testament gave me a greater complexity.

[00:12:33] So I was able to see the beauty in art.

[00:12:36] And even when I reflect back on

[00:12:39] say Jennifer Knapp's music,

[00:12:41] it's very similar to where

[00:12:42] that I would look at scripture as a way to say,

[00:12:45] who was saying this when?

[00:12:47] And to look at her as a young person saying these things.

[00:12:51] And it was just part of the story.

[00:12:53] So this is what I'm really excited

[00:12:55] to have the conversation about

[00:12:56] re-listening to these same lyrics today,

[00:13:00] but as somebody 25 years later

[00:13:02] who's maybe a different person.

[00:13:03] There are bits of us that are the same,

[00:13:05] but then also brand new.

[00:13:07] So that's excited.

[00:13:08] I'm excited to talk about that.

[00:13:09] As far as right now,

[00:13:10] I do, I think identify as a Christian again.

[00:13:13] I relate to you a lot, Holly Daly,

[00:13:15] that I mean, not if the average person would assume

[00:13:18] when you say, are you a Christian?

[00:13:19] There's a comedian on Instagram

[00:13:21] a lot of times who talks about,

[00:13:22] she's like, I'm a lot of your neighbor

[00:13:23] kind of Christian and not a,

[00:13:25] you know, storm the Capitol kind.

[00:13:27] So is that, that's like the best way

[00:13:29] I know how to describe being a Christian now,

[00:13:31] because sometimes there's just so much

[00:13:33] wrapped up in that word.

[00:13:34] So follower of the way of Jesus.

[00:13:36] I've patterned my life after the way of Jesus.

[00:13:38] And it's just been the only language

[00:13:39] I've always known.

[00:13:40] So I was born into this thing

[00:13:42] and it's the language I know how to speak of faith

[00:13:44] and spirituality.

[00:13:46] Yeah, okay.

[00:13:47] Well, thank you so much for sharing.

[00:13:48] I'll give like a quick background on me

[00:13:50] in case this is somebody's first episode.

[00:13:53] I grew up in a Christian home, evangelical home.

[00:13:55] We listened to a lot of Christian music

[00:13:57] and we went to a lot of Christian music festivals.

[00:13:59] So I saw Jennifer and Apolive a couple times

[00:14:02] and she was just like so cool, so bad ass,

[00:14:05] so like rebellious, but like in a very safe way.

[00:14:09] And so my mom and my sister and I all loved her

[00:14:12] and she's like family icon.

[00:14:14] Her song, Martyrs and Thieves was one of the first songs

[00:14:17] that I sang.

[00:14:17] It's like me and my dad and I sang it in church

[00:14:20] and I like sang it by myself.

[00:14:21] And so anyway, I just feel like that song

[00:14:23] feels very special and important to me.

[00:14:26] And yeah, then I went to a Christian college

[00:14:31] because I think looking back,

[00:14:32] I was starting to question some things in high school

[00:14:35] and you know, I would push back a little bit

[00:14:38] in Sunday school and I just wasn't really happy

[00:14:40] with the answers that I was given.

[00:14:42] I thought if this is real, then I wanna figure out

[00:14:45] what it is and what it looks like

[00:14:47] and if my questions are valid

[00:14:48] and there's not a good answer to them,

[00:14:51] I wanna figure that out too.

[00:14:53] So anyway, I went to Christian college.

[00:14:55] I minored in biblical studies

[00:14:57] because I was a music major

[00:14:58] and my Bible classes did more to add to the questions

[00:15:03] than answer the questions.

[00:15:05] So I slowly kind of pulled things apart

[00:15:08] until I realized that like God and Christianity

[00:15:11] was not my like center, my starting point anymore

[00:15:15] and I think love and caring for people

[00:15:18] is now my center and my most important.

[00:15:21] And if I wanna be a Christian outside of that, I can,

[00:15:24] but I don't have to be and I've just found

[00:15:26] that I really don't need it

[00:15:28] to do the kind of caring for people

[00:15:30] that the church told me was important.

[00:15:32] Like I internalized those messages

[00:15:35] that the church gave me

[00:15:35] and I still hold onto them and I love them

[00:15:38] and I feel like I'm able to do them better

[00:15:40] outside of the church for me.

[00:15:42] So anyway, I would not consider myself a Christian today,

[00:15:46] atheistic, gnostic, no idea, open to change

[00:15:49] somewhere in that realm.

[00:15:51] I love listening to Jennifer Knapp.

[00:15:53] I have always loved listening to her.

[00:15:55] I went to see her, it was before COVID for sure.

[00:15:59] So it was like definitely a few years ago now

[00:16:01] and seeing her perform,

[00:16:03] knowing the journey of faith that she's been on

[00:16:06] was so powerful and helpful for me

[00:16:09] to be able to own some of the Christian parts of me

[00:16:13] that I loved, like Christian music.

[00:16:16] It's like I can still listen to that and that's okay.

[00:16:18] So feels really exciting to listen to her new voice,

[00:16:22] her new self sing these Kansas album songs

[00:16:25] and to be able to talk about them.

[00:16:27] So for listeners, we're gonna go through the album

[00:16:30] just song by song and share our thoughts

[00:16:32] and I hope you enjoy.

[00:16:33] ["Faithful To Me"]

[00:16:57] So the album starts with Faithful To Me,

[00:17:00] the Prelude version and does anybody want to start?

[00:17:03] I could start.

[00:17:05] Go for it.

[00:17:06] When I first heard this,

[00:17:07] I just had this impulse to listen to the original Prelude

[00:17:12] and the new Prelude back-to-back.

[00:17:15] It was such an emotional experience

[00:17:18] and so beautiful to hear her voice then

[00:17:21] and her voice now.

[00:17:23] And also just like the sheer poetry of this song

[00:17:26] just like hit me as so beautiful.

[00:17:29] And her voice just felt so lived in

[00:17:32] and grounded in the new one.

[00:17:35] And I just was like, oh wow, I got a buckle up.

[00:17:37] Like we're in for like a ride here

[00:17:40] and just the listening to it back-to-back

[00:17:43] and also knowing that she very intentionally

[00:17:47] didn't change the lyrics

[00:17:48] and was gonna let this just like be

[00:17:51] really felt like this like grand permission

[00:17:56] that like I can bring all the past versions of me

[00:17:59] into the present too.

[00:18:01] Like all of me is welcome here

[00:18:03] and it deserves to be celebrated the whole journey.

[00:18:06] I felt like the Prelude was like really saying that.

[00:18:10] Yeah, that's such a good way to put that.

[00:18:12] Yeah, to like bring all these versions of yourself to it.

[00:18:14] Yeah, whenever I was first listening to this,

[00:18:17] I listened to it a little bit,

[00:18:18] but in my current season,

[00:18:19] it was really, really helpful

[00:18:22] because the line I've recklessly built on my dreams

[00:18:24] in the sand just to watch them all wash away.

[00:18:26] I just think being able to listen to that

[00:18:29] 25 years later,

[00:18:31] I mean she wrote this as a young person

[00:18:32] and then now that we're singing again

[00:18:34] and even hearing her in her story,

[00:18:35] but to put it into our own situations

[00:18:38] and circumstances was huge.

[00:18:41] That part just to let it be like the idols of stone.

[00:18:45] What does that even mean now?

[00:18:46] And I have a tendency to read things

[00:18:48] or listen to things really critically.

[00:18:50] And so at first when I first heard this,

[00:18:52] that one line,

[00:18:53] you're the only one who's faithful to me,

[00:18:55] it bothered me.

[00:18:56] Like I was really bothered by that

[00:18:58] because my idea of what God is has changed so dramatically.

[00:19:03] So why I might've sung those words a certain way

[00:19:05] 25 years ago,

[00:19:06] like you said, Holly Collins,

[00:19:08] to sing them now,

[00:19:10] understanding that my idea of God is much bigger.

[00:19:12] I can sing it again at first it bothered me,

[00:19:14] but if I sing it through a new paradigm

[00:19:16] or listen through a new paradigm,

[00:19:18] I'm able to say,

[00:19:19] oh wait, so all of this,

[00:19:21] like the reality has been faithful throughout

[00:19:24] like this one thing that is consistent.

[00:19:26] Yeah, it's almost like an ode to faith for me

[00:19:29] that it remained somehow when everything fell away,

[00:19:32] when all of the idols of stone that have crumbled

[00:19:36] that there's still something in there that remains

[00:19:38] whether we call it faith or spirituality

[00:19:39] or whatever you want to call it.

[00:19:41] That there's something true that remains

[00:19:43] even if it's completely defined differently.

[00:19:44] I resonate with both things that everyone has shared.

[00:19:48] So I had listened recently to faithful to me,

[00:19:51] the original version and the new version.

[00:19:53] Like it just made me like suck in a little bit,

[00:19:57] like, oh, her voice is so rich and deep

[00:20:01] and powerful in this and grounded.

[00:20:04] And I think it both gives kind of an overarching theme

[00:20:09] to the album.

[00:20:10] And it's about, I think honoring the commitment

[00:20:14] to the journey to me is what it means.

[00:20:16] It's that what the songs meant to me 25 years ago

[00:20:20] don't necessarily resonate with where I am today,

[00:20:24] but it's about honoring that I've continued to care enough

[00:20:27] to ask the questions, to dig in

[00:20:30] and wherever those answers have arrived at

[00:20:32] for where I am now to honor the journey of it.

[00:20:35] Because when we talk about faith,

[00:20:38] like you can use the word faith

[00:20:40] that can mean a hundred different things

[00:20:41] to a hundred different people.

[00:20:43] But I think it's about showing up

[00:20:45] and continuing to say this is important to me.

[00:20:49] In your notes, you said, Holly Daly,

[00:20:51] this depth and maturity in this song

[00:20:54] immediately sets the tone for the record.

[00:20:56] And I feel like that too,

[00:20:57] like the tempo is slower,

[00:20:59] her voice is just like richer.

[00:21:01] And it's always been so rich,

[00:21:03] but when you hear her matured voice

[00:21:06] and then the slower tempo,

[00:21:07] it's like it sets the tone for the record

[00:21:09] and it feels so reflective.

[00:21:12] Like suddenly you're almost like you're looking

[00:21:14] at the album in a mirror, except like you've aged.

[00:21:16] Like you have like smile wrinkles now

[00:21:19] and like it's like the music has aged,

[00:21:20] her voice has aged, the sound of her guitar has aged.

[00:21:23] Like everything feels deeper.

[00:21:26] And Bethany, I was thinking about what you were saying.

[00:21:28] I think I used to hear it as God is faithful to me.

[00:21:31] Like you're the only one who's been faithful to me.

[00:21:34] And now I hear it like,

[00:21:35] so let me back up for a second.

[00:21:37] I have this saying that I love

[00:21:39] that is God is a woman and that woman is me.

[00:21:41] And I'm like, I am my own God

[00:21:44] and not in like an egotistical way,

[00:21:45] but like I am the one who I can stop and listen to,

[00:21:49] like listen to my body and let myself, my body,

[00:21:51] my intuition guide me, like help me.

[00:21:54] And that's wise.

[00:21:56] And we were taught not to listen to it

[00:21:57] in evangelicalism, but we can listen to it now.

[00:22:00] And so when I hear this song,

[00:22:01] I think about how I am now allowed to be faithful to me

[00:22:06] and like I can be there for myself.

[00:22:08] And so this song feels empowering to me now,

[00:22:11] even though my view of God is so different.

[00:22:14] For the only one who's faithful to me.

[00:22:19] For the only one who's faithful to me.

[00:22:22] Okay, track two is Hole Again.

[00:22:29] And I love this one.

[00:22:31] Holly C, I know you have a lot to say about this one.

[00:22:33] So do you wanna start with this?

[00:22:34] Yes, I would love to.

[00:22:37] This is such a sweet song for me.

[00:22:39] Hearing the re-recording was so beautiful.

[00:22:43] But the reason why it's so sweet to me,

[00:22:45] I actually got to see Jennifer in October, 2023.

[00:22:49] And I got to share this story with her

[00:22:51] and it was so sweet.

[00:22:53] She worked it into the show, some playful banter.

[00:22:56] I was like so grateful.

[00:22:57] But what happened was like,

[00:23:00] I'm listening to this as a six-year-old

[00:23:02] and I'm taking it in.

[00:23:04] And like part of it is really heavy

[00:23:06] that like as a six-year-old,

[00:23:08] I'm like because there's a risk of hell,

[00:23:11] that means I'm broken and I'm not whole.

[00:23:14] But there's this answer, like Jesus is the answer.

[00:23:17] Like so there is a lot of grief

[00:23:20] that this song holds for me

[00:23:22] because it's like my poor little developing brain

[00:23:24] is just trying to belong and stay safe.

[00:23:27] And I felt like you could hear her conviction

[00:23:30] in this song.

[00:23:30] It just felt like she was offering me this certainty.

[00:23:33] But a little cute part about it

[00:23:35] is I miss her the lyrics in the original version.

[00:23:40] At the very end when she like belts it out,

[00:23:42] I thought she was saying,

[00:23:44] can I be made clean by this submarine?

[00:23:48] And I would just sing that like with my whole heart.

[00:23:52] And I actually have this vivid memory

[00:23:55] of being in kindergarten.

[00:23:57] I always had like a really deep special relationship

[00:24:00] with music and I just was feeling particularly

[00:24:03] like moody and melancholy this day.

[00:24:05] And it was like free play in kindergarten.

[00:24:07] And I was like singing the song to myself in my head

[00:24:10] and I was like drawing submarines in art.

[00:24:13] And like the other kids thought it was cool

[00:24:16] and like they copied me

[00:24:18] and I was like, they don't even know this song.

[00:24:19] It's just funny because like I still relate to music

[00:24:22] in such a deep way.

[00:24:24] And it makes sense that I'm still feeling connected

[00:24:27] to Jennifer all these years later

[00:24:28] because she like brings that like depth

[00:24:30] and like that was with me when I was six,

[00:24:32] but she was so cute.

[00:24:34] She was like told the story

[00:24:35] and like worked it into the show.

[00:24:37] Like it was so sweet.

[00:24:39] So I was like, it's just a joy to share that

[00:24:41] with other fans.

[00:24:42] But this song was like everything for me

[00:24:46] and my little brain took it in the best I could.

[00:24:49] So I was trying to be so good and so whole

[00:24:53] and I didn't even hear it right.

[00:24:54] And like, but then hearing the re-recording

[00:24:59] was just so special because something

[00:25:02] that really just is sinking in with me is like,

[00:25:04] wait, I was whole from the start.

[00:25:08] I was never broken.

[00:25:09] And that's kind of how I relate to the song now

[00:25:12] is like too little Holly,

[00:25:15] like and anyone else listening that can relate.

[00:25:18] You never needed something outside yourself

[00:25:20] to make you clean and make you whole.

[00:25:22] And I feel like knowing that Jennifer

[00:25:25] is where she's at now in singing this,

[00:25:27] it's almost like she's with us in that like re-recording

[00:25:31] and rewriting of the story.

[00:25:32] And so yeah, this just feels really tender and sweet

[00:25:37] and like a place where all of my like grief

[00:25:40] and loss and joy and like pleasure can exist

[00:25:43] in listening to the re-recording of this one.

[00:25:47] I also misheard the words in that line

[00:25:50] and I always heard it as,

[00:25:52] can I be made clean by this suffering?

[00:25:56] Which honestly, that's how we like.

[00:25:58] Yes, it made perfect sense to me.

[00:26:00] I was like, oh yes, we suffer

[00:26:01] and that's what makes us clean.

[00:26:03] Yeah, that's what life is.

[00:26:04] It wasn't until I was older

[00:26:06] that I realized it was,

[00:26:07] can I be made clean by this offering?

[00:26:10] But honestly like an offering of ourselves

[00:26:13] is not that different from suffering.

[00:26:17] But as I listen to the words now,

[00:26:20] I feel a lot of compassion for my younger self.

[00:26:23] Like you were saying Holly,

[00:26:24] like I thought that we were broken

[00:26:27] and that we had to do something to be made whole.

[00:26:30] And now when I hear this,

[00:26:32] I just think like I am whole again.

[00:26:35] Like I have left this system of belief

[00:26:38] that did not work for me,

[00:26:39] did not fit for me.

[00:26:41] And I found something that did make me whole again

[00:26:45] outside of that,

[00:26:46] which is to just be myself and to live my life

[00:26:49] without feeling like I needed to suffer

[00:26:52] to be made clean.

[00:27:07] I will share, you know,

[00:27:09] this was never one of my favorites.

[00:27:11] So this was probably one of my

[00:27:13] skip options on the album.

[00:27:15] I think because of the opening metaphor

[00:27:18] and that's always been problematic for me.

[00:27:20] The daddy daddy part.

[00:27:23] Yeah, that was really a challenge for me.

[00:27:25] So I literally in my notes,

[00:27:26] whenever I was writing notes,

[00:27:28] I just put daddy in quotes and I put you.

[00:27:30] So that was my only real comments.

[00:27:34] So in reading it though,

[00:27:36] and in hindsight thinking through all of it,

[00:27:38] I think I can appreciate most

[00:27:40] that she didn't eliminate

[00:27:41] all the problematic parts of this album.

[00:27:43] Like she didn't go in and just rerecord.

[00:27:45] I mean, and just change everything

[00:27:46] to make it make sense to what she thinks now.

[00:27:48] Like she's wholly embracing who she was 25 years ago

[00:27:52] and how she wrote these songs.

[00:27:54] And this is just part of the journey

[00:27:56] as problematic or as painful as that is.

[00:27:58] Like I was terrible and I needed to be made clean

[00:28:01] and this whole thing.

[00:28:02] Yeah, I wouldn't have gotten here

[00:28:03] if I hadn't believed that.

[00:28:04] It's difficult as it is

[00:28:06] and I'm not even gonna go so far as to be like,

[00:28:08] I'm thankful for all the terrible theology I held.

[00:28:10] At the same time,

[00:28:11] I wanna hold space that it got me here.

[00:28:14] So it's a hard tension.

[00:28:16] So that concept of needing to be made clean,

[00:28:20] it's really hard.

[00:28:21] It's cost a lot more damage I think

[00:28:23] than we probably realize.

[00:28:25] Yeah, but you know,

[00:28:26] it doesn't just go away by ignoring the fact

[00:28:29] that we ever held these beliefs.

[00:28:30] So yeah, I agree.

[00:28:32] Like I love that she made the choice

[00:28:34] to not change the words

[00:28:36] and owns the fact that some of them are problematic.

[00:28:39] She's like, yeah, I gotta own it.

[00:28:40] I wrote it.

[00:28:40] So there it is.

[00:28:42] And I think there's some kind of healing

[00:28:44] that comes from listening to them now

[00:28:47] that I don't know if she had changed them.

[00:28:49] It would have been beautiful in a different way too,

[00:28:51] but there is some kind of healing

[00:28:53] that I can look back at myself,

[00:28:55] my younger self then and have compassion.

[00:28:58] When I hear the daddy daddy do you miss me

[00:29:00] line at the beginning,

[00:29:01] I also think all daddy God things are gross.

[00:29:06] But I feel like when she says those lines in that song,

[00:29:10] I literally just picture my child self being a kid,

[00:29:14] like no relationship to God.

[00:29:15] Just like, I'm just like a kid trying to figure out

[00:29:18] how to be made whole and I never needed to,

[00:29:21] like I was okay.

[00:29:23] Yeah, that's true.

[00:29:24] I think it took a lot of courage for her

[00:29:25] to just put it back out there in a different way,

[00:29:28] but oh, I love it.

[00:29:29] I think it's amazing.

[00:29:30] It's like an antidote to shame.

[00:29:33] This is who I was.

[00:29:34] This is who I am now.

[00:29:35] Let's come together and celebrate it all.

[00:29:38] Yeah, oh, it's beautiful.

[00:29:39] I think also I look at it like the change

[00:29:42] in how I would look at this song now versus then.

[00:29:46] Then it was a very personal,

[00:29:47] like my journey with Jesus Christ,

[00:29:50] something's wrong with me, I lay my life down.

[00:29:53] Now I would see it more as like,

[00:29:55] what were the things that were problematic

[00:29:57] that I was bringing to the table

[00:29:58] and placing on other people,

[00:30:00] such as maybe my views on LGBTQ,

[00:30:03] and how did I participate in that?

[00:30:05] And how did that keep me from actually being whole

[00:30:07] in terms of who I was created to be?

[00:30:09] I think that a lot of this album,

[00:30:11] you can kind of reframe some of those

[00:30:13] instead of this like personal relationship

[00:30:16] with Jesus Christ always,

[00:30:18] which is how we saw it back then,

[00:30:20] is like, how did we contribute to the whole of,

[00:30:24] some real pain that was caused by the church, right?

[00:30:27] And how we are part of that

[00:30:28] as being part of the church.

[00:30:30] It's yeah, having to own it and growing up a little bit.

[00:30:32] Yeah, well, Holly, I'm gonna, Holly Daly,

[00:30:36] let's go to track three, which is Undo Me.

[00:30:38] And this kind of lines up with your view in this song too.

[00:30:41] So do you wanna start with this song?

[00:30:44] Yeah, kind of riffing off of the last one, I think,

[00:30:47] when she talks about, sister, I know I let you down.

[00:30:50] I can tell by the fact you're never coming around.

[00:30:53] You don't have to say a thing.

[00:30:54] I can tell by your eye exactly what you mean.

[00:30:56] So I think about the ways that I have intentionally

[00:30:59] or unintentionally kept people out

[00:31:02] or participated in the church in that way.

[00:31:05] I never thought about it that way.

[00:31:24] And that sitting with me is like really powerful

[00:31:26] that when she wrote this,

[00:31:28] she was in that evangelical head space.

[00:31:32] And that is naturally pretty exclusive

[00:31:35] and like how powerful it is to kind of sit with

[00:31:39] the ways that maybe each of us individually,

[00:31:42] that's also a part of our story

[00:31:44] and kind of like the grief there.

[00:31:47] That was powerful.

[00:31:48] Yeah, I think whenever I was listening to the song,

[00:31:51] I thought about like when we prayed that

[00:31:53] or sang it as a prayer, right?

[00:31:55] It like worked.

[00:31:56] Like I feel really undone from who I was 25 years ago.

[00:32:00] I mean, the ways that I, I mean with you Holly Daly,

[00:32:03] like man, the ways I had judged and excluded and harmed.

[00:32:09] So even yes, listening to it collectively and communally,

[00:32:12] but then also it still works for me.

[00:32:14] I mean, I think it's like,

[00:32:15] it's not just communally,

[00:32:17] but then also it still works for me individually

[00:32:19] because I have a lot of ways that I needed to be undone.

[00:32:22] A ways that I was guilty and greedy

[00:32:24] and unrighteous and unholy.

[00:32:26] And I'm really thankful that I have been undone

[00:32:30] from a lot of those ways and still experience them.

[00:32:33] Maybe sometimes just the pendulum is going the other way

[00:32:35] and I tend to do the same thing, right?

[00:32:37] But to know that the one,

[00:32:39] if we go back to the faithful to me, right?

[00:32:40] The one who's always been faithful in a way has undone

[00:32:44] and undone the way that I thought

[00:32:45] and the way that I excluded people,

[00:32:47] whether it be in the LGBTQ community or just anybody.

[00:32:52] I mean, so much undoing I needed and it was painful

[00:32:56] and it was brutal.

[00:32:57] And now to listen to this song, Hindsight.

[00:33:00] I mean, it just creates a lot of emotion

[00:33:02] because it's like, oh, that really happened.

[00:33:04] Like I asked for this.

[00:33:05] Like I wanted it to be undone.

[00:33:06] I literally sang slash prayed it to be undone

[00:33:10] and it worked.

[00:33:11] Dang it, Jennifer Nath, it worked.

[00:33:14] Yeah, this one was hard for me at first

[00:33:17] because of so much language about prayer

[00:33:19] and saying like I get on my knees and pray.

[00:33:21] But then as I listened to it a couple of times,

[00:33:24] I was like, oh, getting on my knees

[00:33:26] and praying actually led to my undoing,

[00:33:29] which I think is like what you're saying, Bethany.

[00:33:31] And again, this like slower tempo

[00:33:34] in most of these songs helps it for me

[00:33:37] to feel so reflective.

[00:33:38] Like it feels like the music is allowing me

[00:33:41] to look back and I can see like I did that.

[00:33:44] And then my faith was literally unraveled

[00:33:47] and here I am and I'm okay,

[00:33:49] but getting on my knees has undone me.

[00:33:52] And I think like when I hear like father I messed up

[00:33:55] or like sisters never coming around,

[00:33:57] like that kind of thing,

[00:33:58] I think about how it's kind of hard

[00:34:00] for our family and friends who are still Christian

[00:34:03] when we walk away.

[00:34:04] And like, it might look like I've just left this thing

[00:34:08] that brought us together, but like I tried.

[00:34:10] Like I did, I got on my knees and I prayed

[00:34:12] and it has undone me and now I am gone.

[00:34:15] It worked.

[00:34:15] Yeah, it worked.

[00:34:17] Your guys perspective on this is like healing for me

[00:34:19] of like, oh, I really did get what I asked for

[00:34:23] because when I was preparing notes for this,

[00:34:25] I was like, this one is lyrically heavy for me

[00:34:27] because it feels like that little girl

[00:34:29] that was looking to role models

[00:34:33] to find safety and belonging.

[00:34:35] And Jennifer and I was very much like posed

[00:34:37] as like all you little Christian girls,

[00:34:41] like follow her.

[00:34:42] So it was like, I drank these songs like water

[00:34:44] and like to listen to undo me is like,

[00:34:47] ooh, that's heavy that I just was so,

[00:34:50] I thought that who I am is just like crap

[00:34:54] and I needed to figure out a way to be different.

[00:34:57] So it's like a beautiful,

[00:34:59] it's beautiful to hear you guys talk about like,

[00:35:02] yes, that pain is there,

[00:35:04] but like look at how far we've come

[00:35:07] in our willingness to be undone

[00:35:11] and become whole again,

[00:35:12] I don't know, string them all together.

[00:35:13] Yeah.

[00:35:15] And it looks totally different

[00:35:16] than what I would have expected.

[00:35:18] I expected to be holier.

[00:35:20] And now depending on who you ask,

[00:35:22] not exactly holier.

[00:35:24] I might still say I'm a follower of Jesus.

[00:35:26] There's a lot of people who would say I'm not.

[00:35:28] We're heathens.

[00:35:31] Okay, track four, Trinity.

[00:35:34] This feels like a missed opportunity

[00:35:35] to have this beat track three, but that's okay.

[00:35:38] There's a couple of lines in this song that I love.

[00:35:41] When she starts with you in the mirror,

[00:35:43] staring back at me, I'm just like,

[00:35:45] oh, okay, let me stop and look at my younger self.

[00:35:57] The other line that I love in this is

[00:36:00] they profess to know God

[00:36:01] but deceive him by deeds all the while.

[00:36:03] And that still feels so true

[00:36:06] when I look at the version of Christianity

[00:36:10] that I was around and evangelicalism.

[00:36:12] Yeah, so those lines just stick with me.

[00:36:15] The line that stuck out to me was

[00:36:17] he died to save a wretch like me.

[00:36:19] And just, like I said, when I was six, seven,

[00:36:23] I'm like, this is normal.

[00:36:24] This is how we should speak to ourselves.

[00:36:26] But now listening to her sing it again,

[00:36:31] I was like, oh, no, no, no, no, let's not say it.

[00:36:34] Yeah, and I feel a lot of curiosity

[00:36:37] around how that was for her to sing it again.

[00:36:39] I certainly hope she doesn't see herself as a wretch,

[00:36:42] but man, we really were all okay

[00:36:45] being that mean to ourselves.

[00:36:47] And so it just was like a complicated thing

[00:36:51] to re-listen to, but also not to sound

[00:36:53] like a broken record, but just like honoring her decision

[00:36:57] to keep the lyrics the same

[00:36:58] so we can kind of take a moment

[00:37:00] to sit in the oof, the heaviness of that.

[00:37:04] I felt like when I heard her sing

[00:37:06] he died to save a wretch like me,

[00:37:09] given the first line,

[00:37:11] you in the mirror staring back at me.

[00:37:13] I feel like I'm listening to her say,

[00:37:16] oh, I used to believe that, but she doesn't anymore.

[00:37:20] And again, this is like,

[00:37:22] I'm just cherry picking and projecting,

[00:37:24] which I think we should all have permission

[00:37:27] to do with our favorite music.

[00:37:28] So I hope it feels empowering

[00:37:29] and not disrespectful to her.

[00:37:31] And I don't think it does.

[00:37:32] I know she doesn't feel like she's a wretch

[00:37:34] or we're a wretch, and so that feels okay

[00:37:38] to say and to do, but yeah, that line is bad.

[00:37:43] Brutal.

[00:37:44] Yeah, it is brutal.

[00:37:45] Yeah, it's interesting that this one's called Trinity

[00:37:48] or talking about it.

[00:37:48] And if you follow it at all the church calendar,

[00:37:51] today's Trinity Sunday.

[00:37:52] So it's just reminding me, I've rethought so much

[00:37:56] and re-imagined even what God means.

[00:37:59] And the one thing, the male pronoun for God here,

[00:38:02] it bothers me.

[00:38:03] I'm so bothered by male pronouns for God.

[00:38:06] So this is what I heard throughout the entire album.

[00:38:08] And we're talking about Jesus,

[00:38:09] that's one thing we can say he, right?

[00:38:11] But when we talk about God and his male pronouns,

[00:38:13] it always makes my skin crawl a little bit.

[00:38:15] So that one part,

[00:38:16] and I think the third verse or something that she uses,

[00:38:19] God, and then she says he.

[00:38:21] I'm like, no, okay, I can't listen anymore, I'm done.

[00:38:23] I'm kidding.

[00:38:24] It's beautiful.

[00:38:25] I love you, Jennifer, I'm kidding.

[00:38:26] No daddy, no he.

[00:38:27] This is why I'm in therapy.

[00:38:29] No.

[00:38:30] This is why we're all in therapy.

[00:38:31] Amen, yeah.

[00:38:32] But this is kind of like the last song,

[00:38:34] kind of like undo me.

[00:38:36] It just speaks so much to history and the evolution of faith

[00:38:40] and letting it be, letting the story hold

[00:38:44] and that it turned out different than I expected.

[00:38:47] I mean, even lines like the truth shall set you free.

[00:38:50] Like when I would have first heard that line,

[00:38:52] confess the Lord and the truth shall set you free.

[00:38:54] My, oh, what does that mean?

[00:38:55] It means something so different

[00:38:56] to be set free by truth now.

[00:38:58] Like freedom feels much better,

[00:38:59] this side of deconstruction.

[00:39:01] And to be able to listen to these lyrics

[00:39:03] through that paradigm, it just feels so much more peaceful.

[00:39:06] Yes.

[00:39:07] Yeah, I think that was the line that stuck out to me

[00:39:09] as being like what Holly Collins was saying,

[00:39:12] like the rich like me,

[00:39:12] like that's the one that just grabbed her like,

[00:39:14] oh, I don't know what to do with this.

[00:39:16] This feels gross.

[00:39:17] Those lines I feel like are calling us to dig deeper

[00:39:19] into well, what does this mean to you now?

[00:39:21] And that was the line.

[00:39:22] It was confess the Lord and the truth shall set you free

[00:39:26] that I'm like, oh, like what does that mean

[00:39:28] to confess the Lord?

[00:39:29] Like, you know, it's not going up

[00:39:31] and confessing my sins

[00:39:32] and taking the communion like I did before.

[00:39:35] But like Bethany was saying,

[00:39:37] there's something actually much more freeing this side

[00:39:40] of where I've come and made peace with like, you know,

[00:39:43] when Richard Rohr, one of his books

[00:39:45] talks about everything belongs.

[00:39:47] And I just think truth is God's truth sort of,

[00:39:50] and not to be like overly universal about it,

[00:39:54] but like that we've boxed it in

[00:39:56] with evangelicalism way too much.

[00:39:58] And it's not freeing at all.

[00:40:01] I think we pretend that it is, but it's not.

[00:40:04] And well to speak to Rohr's language

[00:40:06] sometimes he uses transcend and include.

[00:40:09] And I think that's been this whole journey

[00:40:11] of this remaking of his album for me

[00:40:13] has been transcending the way I used to think,

[00:40:15] but still including it.

[00:40:16] Don't leave it behind,

[00:40:18] letting it just be part of the story

[00:40:19] and being okay with all the ways

[00:40:22] that I may have been in any given time

[00:40:24] and just being able to name it

[00:40:26] and like go the shame around it

[00:40:28] because I think a lot of times

[00:40:30] most of us are doing the best that we can.

[00:40:32] Even the next line that says created me a clean heart

[00:40:35] Oh God renew a steadfast spirit within me.

[00:40:37] I mean, being a lover of the Old Testament

[00:40:39] that has really kept me tethered to even faith at all.

[00:40:42] I let go of so much of it.

[00:40:44] Those lines, oh man, they're beautiful.

[00:40:47] And to see them differently now

[00:40:49] and to sing them in her,

[00:40:50] just the way that she incorporated scripture

[00:40:52] I love in so many of the songs.

[00:40:54] I think it's beautiful.

[00:40:55] Okay.

[00:40:56] In the name is track five.

[00:40:58] This one is a little trickier for me

[00:41:01] because it feels like the message is

[00:41:03] don't trust in the world,

[00:41:04] but I love the harmonies in this one.

[00:41:06] They're really beautiful.

[00:41:07] And the line that stuck out to me is

[00:41:09] when the walls do crumble,

[00:41:10] what will I find to hold on to

[00:41:12] that's stronger than my Jesus?

[00:41:13] And I felt like when I asked myself that question now

[00:41:17] I'm like, me,

[00:41:18] that's been this whole deconstruction process for me

[00:41:20] is like, yes, my Christian walls did crumble

[00:41:24] and I did find something to hold on to that felt stronger

[00:41:27] and that was learning to trust myself.

[00:41:29] And so that's how I hear at least that chorus now

[00:41:32] the rest of it's a little trickier

[00:41:34] because it feels like the world is bad,

[00:41:36] don't trust in it.

[00:41:37] So I'm curious to hear your thoughts on this one.

[00:41:40] I relate so much to what you said.

[00:41:42] Like my journey after putting religion down

[00:41:46] was one of building self-trust.

[00:41:49] So this song was strange to listen to

[00:41:51] because I could totally see a past version of myself

[00:41:55] kind of having this attitude of

[00:41:57] you all can trust what you want

[00:41:58] but at the end of the day, it's not right.

[00:42:00] Like it's sort of how I heard the lyrics now

[00:42:03] and I was like, oh, I was like, ew

[00:42:06] but it was like, I had to reclaim it

[00:42:07] cause I'm like, I don't wanna hide in shame.

[00:42:09] I'm like, I really thought that

[00:42:11] like, oh, poor you,

[00:42:12] you don't have the one thing, which is Jesus.

[00:42:15] So now I'm like, oh wow,

[00:42:17] these lyrics are kind of about who I am now

[00:42:20] and I don't have to prove myself against these lyrics

[00:42:23] or to anyone that might still like think this way

[00:42:26] because I've built such like a self-trust.

[00:42:29] Yeah, for me, the lyrics of

[00:42:32] the walls do crumble and they fall.

[00:42:34] It won't be hard to tell where we place our resolve

[00:42:36] when the walls crumble and they fall.

[00:42:38] What do I hold onto that's stronger than my Jesus

[00:42:41] and looking at the political landscape of our country

[00:42:45] and how much that affected my faith

[00:42:47] or where I was putting my faith, I should say.

[00:42:50] And then also kind of going,

[00:42:52] I found myself sort of clinging then to the Democrat party

[00:42:56] as though that was then gonna be the answer.

[00:42:58] And for a while I did and well,

[00:43:02] I'm gonna do away with anybody

[00:43:03] that has other beliefs than that

[00:43:05] and yet that's not the full answer either.

[00:43:08] And I think I've been really struck

[00:43:10] with going into this next election cycle

[00:43:12] that I can't put my faith in any of that really.

[00:43:16] Not that you shouldn't engage politically,

[00:43:18] but there's brokenness everywhere, right?

[00:43:21] And like people are gonna fail and falter

[00:43:24] and make selfish decisions no matter what, right?

[00:43:27] But I think the way that I view holding to Jesus

[00:43:31] at this point in my journey would be

[00:43:33] when I see the scripture,

[00:43:34] Jesus is I am the way and the way,

[00:43:36] the truth and the life,

[00:43:37] no one comes to the Father except by me.

[00:43:39] The way I view that now is different

[00:43:40] than how we were raised evangelicaly,

[00:43:42] which was like, if you don't ask Jesus into your heart,

[00:43:45] then you aren't going to heaven to the Father, right?

[00:43:48] I look at that much more like I am the way,

[00:43:50] the truth and the life,

[00:43:51] meaning the example that I set

[00:43:53] is the true way to connect the most to our creator.

[00:43:57] And that's a verse that I go over in my mind

[00:44:00] and my heart all the time

[00:44:01] because I think that that's where I find my faith,

[00:44:04] if you wanna say,

[00:44:05] is trying to follow the example

[00:44:07] that Jesus said of loving others

[00:44:09] is really the way to full life here

[00:44:13] and the connection to the spirit.

[00:44:16] That's such a beautiful way to view

[00:44:17] I am the way, the truth and the life.

[00:44:19] I was like, that is tricky to me

[00:44:21] and yeah, that's just a really nice reframe.

[00:44:23] So thank you for sharing that.

[00:44:25] Yeah, a lot of your saying resonated with in this song

[00:44:28] because there's so many parts of it

[00:44:29] that were problematic for me to listen to

[00:44:31] because of all the things

[00:44:32] you just shared Holly daily.

[00:44:34] But there's one stanza or verse.

[00:44:36] I mean, it's like here's the poet Jennifer Knapp

[00:44:39] coming out hugely when it says,

[00:44:41] picket fences may build our defenses

[00:44:43] domestic wars of leisure suits.

[00:44:45] And it says, that's okay, it doesn't bother me.

[00:44:47] You can hold onto your philosophy

[00:44:49] of what's mine is mine and yours is yours.

[00:44:51] But what's the truth?

[00:44:52] I mean, that right there

[00:44:53] is a whole theology in and of itself

[00:44:55] and falling right in the midst of all this other stuff

[00:44:58] that I would find problematic.

[00:44:59] That right there is actually

[00:45:00] those are really good statements

[00:45:02] and really good questions.

[00:45:03] In our society,

[00:45:04] it all kind of feels like a war zone,

[00:45:06] whether it be the political landscape

[00:45:08] like you talked about Holly,

[00:45:09] or when I read those lyrics,

[00:45:11] I thought this is still really true.

[00:45:13] I mean, the rest of it,

[00:45:14] I feel a little bit problematic

[00:45:15] because I really struggle with Christian elitism

[00:45:18] and that portion of the song,

[00:45:20] I just thought it's just still names what's happening

[00:45:22] and maybe even stronger

[00:45:24] that these domestic wars of people in their suits, right?

[00:45:27] We're still just fighting each other.

[00:45:29] And then that our philosophy of what's mine is mine

[00:45:32] and yours is yours.

[00:45:33] Like when we realize we're all in this together,

[00:45:35] that's how I would define spirituality.

[00:45:37] It's like we all belong.

[00:45:38] And that's what I think

[00:45:39] and why I can still hold onto the story of Jesus

[00:45:41] because that's kind of what Jesus was saying

[00:45:44] is that we all belong.

[00:45:45] We're all in this thing together.

[00:45:47] So maybe let's stop fighting our wars of leisure suits

[00:45:49] and building up our picket fences

[00:45:51] because the irony in that line, picket fences,

[00:45:54] is that they're really fragile.

[00:45:55] Like you can kick over a picket fence.

[00:45:57] It's not like this wall, right?

[00:45:58] You can kick it over.

[00:46:00] And I think that it's just such a poetic line

[00:46:02] that you build picket fences as your defense.

[00:46:04] I like the irony in that.

[00:46:10] Okay, track six is His Grace Is Sufficient.

[00:46:14] This song to me feels like,

[00:46:17] almost like I'm just,

[00:46:18] I guess I've said this for every song,

[00:46:20] but almost like I'm just looking back at my deconstruction

[00:46:23] and when my faith crumbled,

[00:46:25] it's like I've exhausted every possible solution.

[00:46:27] And that's what I felt.

[00:46:29] I have tried.

[00:46:31] I really have and it's not working

[00:46:33] and this isn't a place for me anymore.

[00:46:37] I've exhausted every possible solution

[00:46:42] I've tried every game there is to play

[00:46:47] In the search for a Christ-like perfection

[00:46:53] I'm convinced I've only left my gut a shame

[00:46:58] And I think that feels beautiful

[00:47:00] knowing that the Kansas album, for her,

[00:47:03] were journals and prayers that she turned into music.

[00:47:05] And so these were like questions that she had at the time

[00:47:10] that she was trying to work through.

[00:47:12] And so to feel like it's reflective of that time for me,

[00:47:15] like my own questions and I'm trying and it's not fitting

[00:47:19] feels kind of beautiful in a way.

[00:47:21] And I feel like I see her trying to live up

[00:47:24] to these standards that we had in evangelicalism

[00:47:27] of living like a Christ-like perfection

[00:47:30] and looking for new regrets.

[00:47:32] It's like she saw the bad parts of religion right away

[00:47:35] and said, that's not it though.

[00:47:37] The point is His Grace Is Sufficient.

[00:47:39] I feel like even then she had this kind of like,

[00:47:43] all are welcome, come as you are

[00:47:44] rather than learning how to be perfect.

[00:47:47] Kind of like what you were saying Holly Daly about like,

[00:47:49] I am the way, the truth and the life.

[00:47:51] It's not about like Jesus being a gatekeeper

[00:47:54] of our way to God.

[00:47:56] You don't have to be perfect to get there.

[00:47:58] It's like, come as you are, His Grace Is Sufficient,

[00:48:00] we can all be here.

[00:48:01] Which I don't believe in like God,

[00:48:04] whatever we wanna call that, call Him, her, they,

[00:48:07] I don't know.

[00:48:08] Like I don't believe in that anymore,

[00:48:09] but I do think that that can be a really beautiful message

[00:48:12] of Christianity.

[00:48:13] And I feel like hearing her kind of wrestle with that

[00:48:17] in this younger version of herself is really beautiful.

[00:48:21] Yeah, that's beautiful Maggie.

[00:48:22] I wholeheartedly agree with your take on this.

[00:48:25] And I think the only other thing that struck me

[00:48:28] about this song was probably how at the time,

[00:48:30] it was almost like her plea to the church of just stop.

[00:48:35] You know, stop being so gatekeepy

[00:48:38] and so evangelicals throw around grace.

[00:48:41] Like it's just this free thing all the time,

[00:48:44] but yet when it comes down to it,

[00:48:46] we're really just saying, no, you have to earn it.

[00:48:48] Right?

[00:48:49] And I think this was her plea to them.

[00:48:51] And I would guess it's still the same.

[00:48:52] It's still my plea to the church of like,

[00:48:54] please, like live this out.

[00:48:57] Right?

[00:48:58] Yeah, this one, I struggled with this one

[00:48:59] because of all of the things that you guys are saying,

[00:49:01] but this real focus, it felt like on personal sin.

[00:49:04] You guys said it well,

[00:49:05] that it's almost like she's highlighting the reality

[00:49:08] of that our faith or evangelicalism

[00:49:10] or whatever you want to call it,

[00:49:11] had put such a focus on personal sin and individual sin.

[00:49:15] And even, you know, like phrases like stains on my hands,

[00:49:18] like the light comes out and shows the stains.

[00:49:20] I'm like, oh, that is not what light does.

[00:49:22] I mean, it can, but really, yeah.

[00:49:25] This one was hard for me.

[00:49:26] It really triggered my frustration, my anger

[00:49:30] with how the story has been so misconstrued

[00:49:34] to bring shame and done harm.

[00:49:36] So this brought up a lot of maybe grief for me,

[00:49:39] which I mean, that's the goal, right?

[00:49:41] Of art and music is to cause us to emote.

[00:49:44] And I did, it just really, I wrestled with this one,

[00:49:46] probably more than any of them.

[00:49:48] And again, you know, we could talk about

[00:49:49] male pronouns for God,

[00:49:50] but I'm just real hardcore about that now.

[00:49:53] So yeah, that's the basic surface that was difficult.

[00:49:56] I mean, again, still a person of faith

[00:49:58] and I can't be a person of faith in the context of God

[00:50:01] or the divine being some he up there,

[00:50:04] but I can hold onto faith in the story of Jesus.

[00:50:07] But this really did just, it let me wrestle.

[00:50:10] And to see again, what we've talked about

[00:50:11] in all these songs is it let me see where I've been

[00:50:15] me personally and the church or Christianity or the faith.

[00:50:19] It just really names the reality of what we believed

[00:50:23] and what we are wrestling with now.

[00:50:25] It's part of our story.

[00:50:27] Yeah, what stuck out to me to this is just how she was

[00:50:31] and is so excellent at poetically grappling

[00:50:35] with such heavy doubts and fears.

[00:50:37] It's really a testament to who she is.

[00:50:39] So listening to the remake was like

[00:50:43] the frequency of that has so shined through.

[00:50:46] Like back then, like you were saying, Maggie,

[00:50:48] these are coming from her personal journals.

[00:50:51] And like you were saying, Bethany, it's like such a,

[00:50:54] a little of the ickiness of feeling that like personal sin

[00:50:57] and the shame around that.

[00:50:58] You could really feel it here.

[00:50:59] And she so beautifully and like vulnerably put it out

[00:51:03] into the world when she was like a young woman.

[00:51:06] And I really enjoy actually thinking about how

[00:51:12] when she did come out, why was that so confronting?

[00:51:15] It's like, because these prayers are freaking real.

[00:51:18] This is gritty.

[00:51:20] This is honest.

[00:51:21] This is, here's my experience in the church and of myself.

[00:51:25] And like really like sharing with the world

[00:51:28] through her art, her pain and her fears and her doubts

[00:51:32] and the way she's viewing herself through this lens

[00:51:34] of evangelical Christianity.

[00:51:35] So when she comes out, they're like, wait, wait, wait,

[00:51:38] wait, we don't want somebody so honest

[00:51:41] and like so obviously really contending with her faith

[00:51:45] and putting it out there as a role model

[00:51:47] to say that it's okay to be yourself.

[00:51:50] So it feels a little satisfying in that way,

[00:51:53] but it's beautiful and like a little heart wrenching

[00:51:56] to hear her sing it with her current voice.

[00:51:59] But like we're saying, it's beautiful to reclaim that

[00:52:02] and celebrate it and see it climb the Christian charts

[00:52:06] in real time.

[00:52:07] Yeah, I think this one is another one

[00:52:08] that it took courage then and now

[00:52:11] and for totally different reasons.

[00:52:13] The original was courage

[00:52:15] because it was just really her raw feelings.

[00:52:17] And now to be able to have the courage

[00:52:19] to re-record it and put it out there without caveats,

[00:52:23] without edits, which just like here is,

[00:52:25] this is really what I was struggling with

[00:52:27] and 25 years later, still part of my story

[00:52:29] because it was then and I'm still doing this journey.

[00:52:32] Yeah.

[00:52:34] So track seven is Martyrs and Thieves

[00:52:37] and this is such an iconic, beautiful

[00:52:40] like Jennifer Knapp at her finest.

[00:52:43] I love this song so much and her guitar.

[00:52:46] I'm so glad that she didn't change

[00:52:47] the little guitar riff that she does in the beginning.

[00:52:50] It was perfect then, it's perfect now.

[00:52:52] I love it so much.

[00:52:54] There's a place in the darkness

[00:52:57] that I used to cling to.

[00:52:59] It presses harsh hope against time.

[00:53:04] In the absence of martyrs,

[00:53:07] there's a presence of thieves

[00:53:09] who only want to rob you of love.

[00:53:14] This one's impossible to get through without tears for me.

[00:53:18] If you guys have read her book

[00:53:20] or maybe have said it in other places,

[00:53:23] when she was coming back onto the music scene

[00:53:26] after coming out and it was such a vulnerable time,

[00:53:30] she said that this was the only song

[00:53:31] she felt really like okay to sing at the start

[00:53:35] and I listened to it through that lens now

[00:53:37] so how powerful that she was so brave in that way

[00:53:41] and now re-recording it with almost like joy

[00:53:45] of like celebrating her journey

[00:53:48] and then on a personal note,

[00:53:50] like the way I relate to these songs,

[00:53:53] like I cry every time I listen to it

[00:53:55] because it feels like it really speaks

[00:53:57] to where I'm at now.

[00:54:10] I turn on the light and reveal all the glory.

[00:54:12] I'm not afraid to bear all my weakness

[00:54:15] knowing in meekness I have a kingdom to gain

[00:54:18] where there's peace and love in the light.

[00:54:20] I'm not afraid to let your life,

[00:54:23] your light shine bright in my life.

[00:54:25] I just feel like that is so true.

[00:54:28] It's so scary and vulnerable to shed the identity

[00:54:32] of evangelical Christianity

[00:54:35] knowing that there's going to be condemnation

[00:54:37] and to sing this knowing we all made it

[00:54:41] on the other side in our own ways,

[00:54:43] our unique experiences and like differing beliefs

[00:54:46] coming together like you were saying

[00:54:48] a little while ago, Bethany,

[00:54:50] that like that is what spirituality is,

[00:54:52] is that we're all in it together

[00:54:54] and so just like this song feels like

[00:54:56] a coming together and saying like

[00:54:58] we don't have to hide,

[00:54:59] we don't have to be afraid.

[00:55:02] Yeah, I love that.

[00:55:04] The line that stuck out to me

[00:55:07] are there goes from my past

[00:55:09] who've owned more of my soul

[00:55:10] than I thought I had given away

[00:55:12] and that is exactly what it felt like

[00:55:15] when I realized that I had this religious trauma

[00:55:18] that I had to work through

[00:55:20] and it's like, okay,

[00:55:21] I had walked away from church,

[00:55:23] I just didn't look at it

[00:55:25] and then I realized at some point

[00:55:27] it is all catching up with me

[00:55:29] and I have to work through a ton of it

[00:55:31] and it's like, oh my God,

[00:55:33] that owns more of me

[00:55:34] than I thought I had given it.

[00:55:37] Yeah, the line like

[00:55:39] I had squandered till pallid and thin

[00:55:41] and I'm like I just had worked so hard in the church

[00:55:44] but now I have found peace and love

[00:55:46] in the light of knowing myself

[00:55:48] and knowing who I am

[00:55:49] and so this song still feels like

[00:55:51] it really rings true even though it's different

[00:55:54] than how I heard it 25 years ago.

[00:55:58] This song is,

[00:55:59] I mean it's hard for me to even talk about

[00:56:00] without being emotional

[00:56:01] because it is hands down

[00:56:02] one of my favorite songs of all time.

[00:56:04] I'm looking through it,

[00:56:05] I'm like, it's just not even problematic.

[00:56:07] You know what I mean?

[00:56:08] It's just beautiful

[00:56:09] and really I was thinking about it

[00:56:11] in light of the song

[00:56:12] just previously that we talked about.

[00:56:13] One line in there that I just talked about before

[00:56:15] about the light revealing the stains, right?

[00:56:19] But then in this one,

[00:56:20] it's almost like these two are in conversation

[00:56:22] with each other, these two songs,

[00:56:24] almost like they're arguing with each other

[00:56:26] because she says turn on the light

[00:56:27] and reveal all the glory.

[00:56:29] But maybe they're just both sides at the same point.

[00:56:31] We're all a mixed bag.

[00:56:33] So it was this wrestle with some shame

[00:56:35] and stuff in the last song

[00:56:37] and then the martyrs and thieves

[00:56:39] is like it's revealing the glory

[00:56:40] and they're kind of two sides at the same point.

[00:56:42] It's just beautiful, I love this.

[00:56:44] My probably favorite,

[00:56:46] obviously the name of the song

[00:56:47] but in the absence of martyrs

[00:56:49] there's a presence of thieves

[00:56:50] and I thought of that part

[00:56:52] just to bring it more personal

[00:56:55] through the lens of seeing so much harm done

[00:56:57] by pastors or clergy people in the church.

[00:57:01] I'm defining martyrs as a lack of self-giveness.

[00:57:05] When there's an absence of self-giveness

[00:57:08] then what you have are thieves who are gonna take,

[00:57:11] they're gonna rob you,

[00:57:11] they're gonna take power,

[00:57:12] they're gonna take control,

[00:57:13] they're gonna take all the things.

[00:57:15] So again, steal any sense of peace.

[00:57:18] I love that because that rings true

[00:57:20] no matter what your faith or your beliefs are

[00:57:22] or what your religious practice

[00:57:25] anytime there's a lack of self-giveness,

[00:57:27] somebody is gonna come in and steal.

[00:57:29] There's an opportunity to steal

[00:57:30] but when we're self-given

[00:57:31] and again I'm careful with that language

[00:57:33] especially as women in religious communities

[00:57:35] because self-giveness or self-sacrifice

[00:57:38] has been used and abused

[00:57:40] but at the same time

[00:57:41] the idea of when we're not giving,

[00:57:44] being sacrificial, being loving,

[00:57:46] that's the thing.

[00:57:47] And caring for others.

[00:57:48] Right, so if there's a lack of love

[00:57:50] then you're gonna have people come in

[00:57:52] and take power and control.

[00:57:54] Hearing you talking about how this is kind of

[00:57:56] in conversation with the last song

[00:57:57] almost feels like this speaks to a wholeness

[00:58:02] of Jennifer Knapp that comes through in this album

[00:58:04] that there are these two,

[00:58:07] not two sides of her

[00:58:08] but there's this part of her

[00:58:09] that is in the evangelical space

[00:58:11] and using this language

[00:58:12] and trying to be part of that

[00:58:14] and it's not quite fitting what she's trying.

[00:58:16] And then there's also this part of her

[00:58:18] that recognizes that the light shines on our glory,

[00:58:21] not our stains.

[00:58:23] And so feeling the push and pull of that,

[00:58:26] the tension, yeah, of that for her

[00:58:29] is cool to think about it that way.

[00:58:31] Yeah, I think of this song

[00:58:34] as well as Hold Me Now

[00:58:36] as being prophetic in terms of

[00:58:38] they stand the test of time.

[00:58:40] You know, it's just remarkable

[00:58:42] that at the age she was to write these

[00:58:44] and how they have evolved with her

[00:58:47] and with all of us really.

[00:58:49] Yeah, okay.

[00:58:50] Track eight is Romans

[00:58:52] and she talked about Romans in her interview

[00:58:56] and I loved what she shared about it,

[00:58:58] how she really has a problem

[00:58:59] with substitutional atonement theory

[00:59:01] and the background vocals

[00:59:04] just putting in bold print

[00:59:05] Jesus saved me from the laws of sin

[00:59:07] and how she just didn't wanna do it.

[00:59:08] So she didn't record the background vocals.

[00:59:11] I love that she made that choice

[00:59:13] and still didn't change the lyrics.

[00:59:15] She still sang them

[00:59:16] but just kind of changed the arrangement a little bit

[00:59:19] because yeah, the laws of sin is pretty fucked up

[00:59:22] and it's like, we don't need that.

[00:59:24] We don't need that in our lives.

[00:59:26] I love this version.

[00:59:28] I also, I can't unhear the violins from the original.

[00:59:33] I like have a funny little moment

[00:59:35] where I'm having my own little violin solo

[00:59:37] in my head along with the new version.

[00:59:38] I just can't unhear it.

[00:59:40] It's in me.

[00:59:41] Da da da da, da da da da.

[00:59:43] Yeah, yeah.

[00:59:43] Yeah, yeah.

[00:59:45] Exactly.

[00:59:46] And the other thing I wanna say simply is like

[00:59:49] these are some of the lyrics,

[00:59:51] probably the top lyrics from the album

[00:59:53] I've reclaimed for myself.

[00:59:54] Like, I don't have to be condemned, period.

[00:59:58] Not the next line, just period.

[01:00:01] And I do hope everyone listening this far into the podcast

[01:00:05] can like accept that for themselves too.

[01:00:07] You know, like you don't have to hide.

[01:00:10] You don't have to hide again.

[01:00:11] Don't have to be condemned.

[01:00:13] Just really enjoyed taking that in with her current voice.

[01:00:17] Yeah, I love that.

[01:00:18] Those are beautiful mantras for us now.

[01:00:21] Yeah, there's several little lines in there.

[01:00:23] Like you said, I won't ever have to hide again.

[01:00:25] Sometimes whenever I'm listening to these lyrics,

[01:00:27] thinking of what it must've been like for somebody,

[01:00:30] you know, before she came out

[01:00:31] and just thinking about that and that context,

[01:00:33] it just gives me so much compassion for her.

[01:00:36] And this has helped me to see,

[01:00:38] I mean, just to have a deeper compassion

[01:00:40] for anybody who's on the margins,

[01:00:41] anybody who feels that they have to hide

[01:00:44] for whatever reason.

[01:00:45] I mean, this was a gift, more like an artifact

[01:00:47] in a way than looking back and seeing this way of thinking.

[01:00:52] I'm gonna look at this one as an artifact because again,

[01:00:54] this is another one of my skip ones on the album

[01:00:56] simply because it's fast

[01:00:58] and I really just like slow songs.

[01:01:00] So all of her slow songs are my favorites.

[01:01:03] I love that she ends the song with

[01:01:04] I won't be condemned period.

[01:01:06] There's no laws of sin after it.

[01:01:09] Yep.

[01:01:30] Okay, Bethany and Holly Daly,

[01:01:33] this seems like the next one is your jam, refine me.

[01:01:36] It's slow, Bethany.

[01:01:38] And I know you have a lot to say about Holly Daly.

[01:01:41] And I said maybe we should all just listen to this one

[01:01:44] and cry because WTF, it is so good.

[01:01:46] Yeah.

[01:01:51] Come into this place, burning to receive your peace.

[01:01:59] I come with my own chains

[01:02:04] from wars above for my own selfish gain.

[01:02:12] So I had listened to, like I said,

[01:02:15] a couple of her songs more recently,

[01:02:17] but had not listened to the whole album in 20 years.

[01:02:21] So listening to this new recording,

[01:02:24] it was the one that immediately just brought tears

[01:02:27] to my eyes and took me back to a place

[01:02:30] being on my college campus

[01:02:32] in the small chapel that they had

[01:02:34] where I would go to pray and journal.

[01:02:36] And there was such a, I think purity

[01:02:39] and sincerity of this prayer that she wrote

[01:02:42] that I honor in myself back then,

[01:02:46] as much as my theology or life experience has grown

[01:02:52] and matured.

[01:02:53] There was a purity that I resonated with

[01:02:55] that was just really beautiful about this prayer

[01:02:57] and not in a self-condemning way,

[01:02:59] but just in a way that was truly just laying

[01:03:02] before the Lord saying, I wanna be refined.

[01:03:06] I want to grow.

[01:03:07] I wanna continue to know you more,

[01:03:10] to continue on this journey.

[01:03:11] And I have, even though it looks different.

[01:03:13] Yeah, the change in sound for the song was big for me.

[01:03:16] It took me several listens to be able to be okay with it.

[01:03:20] Not because I think it's beautiful,

[01:03:22] but because I think I had worn the old one out

[01:03:25] that I just couldn't accept it.

[01:03:28] But I just love, it feels so much more mature.

[01:03:31] Like the transition of the instruments

[01:03:34] just felt like it needed that.

[01:03:36] It needed to be re-sung the same but different.

[01:03:39] Yeah, I mean, I'm with you, Holly,

[01:03:41] that this song meant so much to me.

[01:03:42] And I again wore it out when I was young.

[01:03:45] But then again, it's kind of like undo me.

[01:03:47] It's like, it happened.

[01:03:48] Like it worked.

[01:03:49] This prayer has worked.

[01:03:51] My will has deceived me.

[01:03:53] Is that not true?

[01:03:54] But it different than when I first used

[01:03:57] to sing those lyrics.

[01:03:59] I thought I was singing about something else

[01:04:01] and hindsight seeing those words

[01:04:04] and thinking my will really did deceive me.

[01:04:06] And it doesn't mean that I'm a wretch

[01:04:08] and it doesn't mean that I'm stained

[01:04:10] or all the things we've talked about,

[01:04:11] but it just means that I was wrong about some things.

[01:04:15] And I'm probably gonna find in 20 years from now

[01:04:17] or 25 years from now

[01:04:18] that I was wrong about a lot of things now.

[01:04:20] So I can almost look ahead with this song

[01:04:22] and think how much more am I going to be able

[01:04:26] to look back and say the same thing again?

[01:04:28] Because there's still enough that I need to unlearn.

[01:04:31] I certainly haven't arrived.

[01:04:32] So I have a lot still to unlearn.

[01:04:34] I think understanding that this is just over

[01:04:37] and over again, this refining.

[01:04:40] Yeah, I think what I'm hearing you say, Bethany,

[01:04:42] is that it's about growth,

[01:04:43] not about like removing the stain to become perfect.

[01:04:47] It's like wherever I am, I hope I continue to grow.

[01:04:50] I hope I continue to refine myself.

[01:04:53] Yeah.

[01:04:53] And however we do that,

[01:04:54] whatever practice we use to do that

[01:04:56] and however we name it.

[01:04:57] And for some of us,

[01:04:58] we just can't use the language of God doing it.

[01:05:01] There's a lot of ways I can't use the same language

[01:05:03] I would have to invite that process.

[01:05:06] But again, sometimes we can let somebody else's language

[01:05:08] like Jennifer now to maybe lead us in those practices.

[01:05:13] I think it's the posture of this song

[01:05:15] that holds true for me.

[01:05:16] Yeah.

[01:05:17] A line that stuck out to me was,

[01:05:19] "'You're my God and my father.

[01:05:21] I've accepted your son, but my soul feels so empty now.

[01:05:24] What have I become?'

[01:05:26] And to me, this was deconstruction

[01:05:29] and this feeling like, okay, I did the thing

[01:05:32] and I'm still left feeling empty and it's not working

[01:05:36] and how to refine ourselves and become whole again.

[01:05:40] It feels like this beautiful process of leaving something

[01:05:43] and becoming something new.

[01:05:45] And again, like you said, Bethany,

[01:05:47] I hope I continue to do that.

[01:05:49] And I expect that I will.

[01:05:50] Like, I don't think I'm gonna be the same person

[01:05:52] or hold the same beliefs in 10 years that I hold now

[01:05:56] just like I don't hold the same beliefs

[01:05:57] that I held 10 years ago that I do now.

[01:06:00] And I almost argue that it might be problematic if we do,

[01:06:03] if we're not constantly asking to deconstruct, right?

[01:06:06] Whether we're asking it of ourselves or however,

[01:06:08] like if we're not constantly re-examining,

[01:06:11] then what are we even doing?

[01:06:12] Like how can we grow?

[01:06:13] Deconstruction is not a one-time thing.

[01:06:15] Right.

[01:06:17] The way I experienced this song,

[01:06:18] I'm relating to all of you and especially you, Maggie,

[01:06:22] when you share that I did everything right.

[01:06:27] I did all the things I was supposed to do.

[01:06:28] Why do I still feel empty?

[01:06:30] This song, like when I get to this one,

[01:06:32] it kind of just has me like in a puddle.

[01:06:34] Like after journeying through the whole album,

[01:06:37] getting to this one and the way that her vocals

[01:06:40] just like invite you in,

[01:06:42] it actually is a place for me to release some grief

[01:06:45] and loss of like, I spent my whole childhood thinking

[01:06:49] I was this broken person and I'm just still crying out

[01:06:53] to be refined, be refined, be refined

[01:06:55] as if like there's just something perpetually wrong with me

[01:06:58] and I can never get it.

[01:07:00] And I guess I'll just keep trying, keep trying

[01:07:03] until I get to heaven.

[01:07:04] And so one, her vocals just like made me cry.

[01:07:09] They're so beautiful.

[01:07:10] I mean, I'm in awe of her vocals

[01:07:13] this entire re-recording, but this one just like,

[01:07:17] I don't need to just like lay down and soak it up

[01:07:20] because even though the lyrics feel like heavy for me

[01:07:23] for the reasons I just stated,

[01:07:25] it's like because Jennifer was such like

[01:07:28] a big part of my life when I was like six, seven, eight,

[01:07:31] it's like my nervous system is like attuned to her voice.

[01:07:35] So I almost felt like protected in hearing this song

[01:07:40] and this re-recording knowing her journey

[01:07:42] and hearing her sing it again and how her voice

[01:07:44] has matured and like, I'm with you girl.

[01:07:47] Like that kind of feeling of like, thank you

[01:07:49] for like being there and being a way shower

[01:07:52] of how to claim your truth and be in integrity

[01:07:54] with yourself because I'm here doing the same

[01:07:57] all these years later.

[01:07:58] Yeah, her vocals deserve a Grammy award.

[01:08:02] I don't know, some kind of award.

[01:08:03] They're so good.

[01:08:04] Her voice has matured so perfectly.

[01:08:08] I love it so much.

[01:08:09] And the piano is so tasteful.

[01:08:13] It is simple and perfect.

[01:08:15] It just like accents her voice

[01:08:17] in these really small, small and subtle ways

[01:08:21] that was just perfect for this song.

[01:08:23] And it felt different than the original

[01:08:27] in a really beautiful way,

[01:08:28] even if like it took a minute to like get used to it.

[01:08:32] Then once you do, it's like, oh, okay.

[01:08:34] I can sit with that.

[01:08:36] So next we have 10, which is Hold Me Now.

[01:08:41] She had talked about in her interview

[01:08:43] that when she wrote the song,

[01:08:45] she was really writing it as a critique

[01:08:48] about the True Love Waits movement.

[01:08:50] And she wrote it in biblical language.

[01:08:53] So nobody could really criticize her for it.

[01:09:06] But yeah, that was kind of her mindset

[01:09:08] or one of her mindsets going into this song,

[01:09:10] which I think was really interesting

[01:09:13] and helpful to hear it through that lens for me.

[01:09:16] Wow, I love knowing that.

[01:09:18] I had no idea.

[01:09:19] That's so sneaky in the best way ever.

[01:09:22] Right?

[01:09:23] This song is like also special to me.

[01:09:25] I use this song to relate to my inner child.

[01:09:29] I feel like she's crying out,

[01:09:31] like she's scared, weak and broken.

[01:09:34] And then it's just like hold me,

[01:09:37] asking to be held.

[01:09:38] And I just feel like current me

[01:09:40] could meet past me in this song.

[01:09:43] There's just like a lot of healing power

[01:09:45] in her poetry and honesty and integrity.

[01:09:49] And so I really appreciate this song.

[01:09:51] It's really special.

[01:09:52] Yeah, I totally relate to you saying that, Holly.

[01:09:55] I just didn't think about it that way.

[01:09:56] Like singing it almost about my little self.

[01:09:59] That is beautiful.

[01:10:00] Thank you for that.

[01:10:01] I'm gonna have to sit with that a bit

[01:10:03] and think more about that.

[01:10:05] Yeah, Holly, that's so good.

[01:10:06] That is so healing.

[01:10:08] I can't wait to listen to it again

[01:10:09] with that mindset of me now holding my younger self.

[01:10:14] It's beautiful.

[01:10:15] I've appreciated both Maggie and Holly,

[01:10:17] your perspectives.

[01:10:19] It challenges me to go back and listen

[01:10:22] in light of my younger self a little bit more

[01:10:25] and dig into some of the brokenness

[01:10:28] that I thought I had at that time

[01:10:30] and listen through that lens.

[01:10:32] I listened to a podcast she recorded like five years ago

[01:10:36] and she shared that really during this time

[01:10:38] when she wrote this,

[01:10:39] she had not really determined her own sexuality

[01:10:42] at that point.

[01:10:43] She said she had kind of shut it off.

[01:10:45] And yet she was feeling really condemned by the church

[01:10:47] because she had been sexually active before

[01:10:50] and just felt like she couldn't please anybody.

[01:10:52] And so wrote this, but now listening to it,

[01:10:56] I look at it in light of how we've treated

[01:10:59] the LGBTQ community.

[01:11:01] And one thing that I really appreciate about Jennifer

[01:11:05] and this new re-recording is just the way

[01:11:08] that she continues to lead in the faith space

[01:11:12] and how much we need her voice,

[01:11:15] how much the church, if you wanna say,

[01:11:18] needs her voice and her leadership.

[01:11:19] Yeah.

[01:11:22] Next track is Visions.

[01:11:24] And yeah, this one is interesting for me.

[01:11:27] I used to sing the line,

[01:11:30] this world is my Jordan someday I'm gonna cross.

[01:11:33] And I used to sing it thinking like,

[01:11:36] this sounds so dark,

[01:11:37] but someday I'll die and I'll be in heaven

[01:11:40] and that'll be beautiful.

[01:11:42] And almost this like,

[01:11:43] I can't wait to die and be in heaven

[01:11:45] and not because I wanted to die.

[01:11:47] It wasn't like that,

[01:11:48] but it was this narrative that the church told us

[01:11:51] and this is from Paul to live as Christ,

[01:11:54] to die as gain.

[01:11:55] It's better to die and be in heaven

[01:11:56] than it is to be on earth.

[01:11:58] And so looking back at that feels really problematic

[01:12:02] to me, but I love Holly Collins

[01:12:05] and I should let you say this first,

[01:12:07] but they say I am much too demanding

[01:12:10] to want a better place than here.

[01:12:12] Hello, to want a better place than the church,

[01:12:15] to leave, to find something better.

[01:12:17] Like that is such a beautiful way of looking at it.

[01:12:20] So yeah, Holly,

[01:12:21] I would love to hear more of your thoughts on that.

[01:12:23] Yeah, I think like this song has packed us so much

[01:12:26] that we can unpack,

[01:12:27] but that was just the one thing I wanted to bring here

[01:12:29] that I had never heard that line

[01:12:33] in the way that I do now.

[01:12:35] They say I'm much too demanding

[01:12:37] to want a better place than here.

[01:12:39] That like when we're in the church

[01:12:41] and like feeling that belonging,

[01:12:44] we can look at outsiders

[01:12:45] or I'll just own that as something that I did

[01:12:48] and be like, wow,

[01:12:50] why wouldn't you want to be on this side of things?

[01:12:52] And now that I'm finding myself

[01:12:54] in the vulnerable place of like an outsider

[01:12:56] and like don't feel I belong there is like,

[01:13:00] oh wow, like I'm okay on this side.

[01:13:04] It was okay that my desires were greater.

[01:13:08] It's okay that I realized I can trust myself

[01:13:12] and I can drop deeper into my intuition

[01:13:15] and my inner knowing

[01:13:17] and I could embrace uncertainty

[01:13:20] and I just have expanded so much.

[01:13:23] Yeah, I love the line.

[01:13:25] I've searched the world

[01:13:26] and found there's one thing I need.

[01:13:28] It's the peace that passes all understanding

[01:13:30] in a world crazed with fear.

[01:13:32] And you know, that used to mean

[01:13:33] peace that passes all understanding

[01:13:35] is like God and Jesus and that whole narrative.

[01:13:38] But now I feel like the peace that passes

[01:13:41] the like certainty kind of understanding

[01:13:43] that you are promised in Christianity.

[01:13:46] And I have peace outside of that.

[01:13:48] Like, I don't have to know if there's a God or not.

[01:13:51] I can have peace outside of that certainty

[01:13:54] and that kind of understanding.

[01:13:56] And that's how I view that now.

[01:13:58] I would resonate with that too Maggie,

[01:14:00] even though I'm still technically part of Christianity

[01:14:03] in the church, but having a lot more peace

[01:14:05] with unknowing and uncertainty and questioning

[01:14:09] and just being at peace with like,

[01:14:12] I won't know these answers while I'm on earth

[01:14:14] and that's okay.

[01:14:16] Yeah, I listened to this one.

[01:14:18] I didn't really think about it as church Holly

[01:14:20] that you had said Collins about being a better place

[01:14:23] being outside of the church, but that makes total sense.

[01:14:25] But for me, this is a total deconstruction song.

[01:14:27] Like this is literally the whole thing

[01:14:29] because I mean, I can still sing this whole thing now

[01:14:32] which this is what I love about it.

[01:14:33] It's similar to Martyrs and Thieves

[01:14:35] is that I can still mean so much now

[01:14:37] and all of them do, but this one I can sing it

[01:14:39] through a paradigm of they say I'm much too demanding

[01:14:43] to want a better place than here.

[01:14:45] That line is the one for me in the song

[01:14:48] because it's not about an afterlife

[01:14:50] and so little of the Christian story

[01:14:52] is about the afterlife if any, right?

[01:14:55] So thinking through it that way,

[01:14:57] like I have a huge draw for justice.

[01:14:59] Like I have this drive saying that I'm much too

[01:15:02] demanding to want a better place than here.

[01:15:04] Like I think this is the place we wanna make better.

[01:15:06] Like this is, it's the now that we wanna work

[01:15:09] for a better place.

[01:15:11] And maybe that is a little demanding of me

[01:15:12] but I do think we can be better.

[01:15:15] We are making this story true now.

[01:15:17] It's not like we're holding out and waiting for some

[01:15:19] which again, it's how I would have sang this

[01:15:21] 25 years ago is waiting for heaven, right?

[01:15:24] But now it's like, no, it's working for justice now.

[01:15:27] It's working for peace now.

[01:15:29] And I love her language.

[01:15:31] It's almost as if she didn't know

[01:15:32] what she was writing about or maybe she did, I don't know.

[01:15:34] But when she says, I'll go into visions

[01:15:36] the prophets gave to me or claim to me,

[01:15:38] I'm like, she's talking about a better place now.

[01:15:41] And even Holly Daly, like you talked about

[01:15:44] the inclusion of the LGBTQ community.

[01:15:46] It's lifting the voice of the marginalized

[01:15:49] whether it be women or LGBTQ or outsiders

[01:15:52] or people of color, like the importance of that.

[01:15:55] And this just resonates, this song,

[01:15:58] it sings that for me.

[01:15:59] So I just thought it was beautiful.

[01:16:00] It all makes sense through that paradigm

[01:16:03] of we're working for a better place now.

[01:16:04] I need to go back and re-listen to that one

[01:16:06] with that lens, Bethany, that's super helpful.

[01:16:10] Okay, last song is Faithful To Me again, extended version.

[01:16:14] And I just think this was a beautiful way

[01:16:16] to start the album and it's a beautiful way to end

[01:16:19] and the line, all the chisels I've dolled

[01:16:22] carving idols of stone will always and forever

[01:16:25] make me feel all the feels no matter where I am

[01:16:27] in my faith journey.

[01:16:29] All the chisels I've dolled carving idols of stone

[01:16:35] that have crumbled like sand beneath the waves.

[01:16:40] I just think the whole thing

[01:16:41] as a deconstruction album is beautiful.

[01:16:44] It talked about the idols of stone,

[01:16:46] but I think about, so the pastor at my church,

[01:16:50] he talks about this a lot about being a metaphor

[01:16:53] for faith, but at the Art Institute in Kansas City,

[01:16:55] not Art Institute, at the Museum of Art.

[01:16:58] Here in Kansas City, there's this thing

[01:16:59] called the walking wall.

[01:17:01] I don't know if you've heard of it.

[01:17:01] It's by Andy Goldsworthy.

[01:17:04] And I'm probably gonna botch the metaphor,

[01:17:05] but just hang with me.

[01:17:06] It's basically the stone wall that they don't use

[01:17:09] mortar, it's just rocks and they moved it.

[01:17:12] I don't even know how far,

[01:17:13] so I'm not gonna pretend to tell you how far,

[01:17:15] but they moved it through the city

[01:17:17] to its resting place at the museum,

[01:17:19] but they like crossed traffic.

[01:17:21] So it took weeks to get this thing.

[01:17:23] It was a walking wall, so it's just the stone wall

[01:17:26] and they would take the rocks from the back of the wall

[01:17:29] and bring them to the front in order to move.

[01:17:31] It didn't move without all of it moving

[01:17:34] and it was slow and it was brutal,

[01:17:36] but it was taking these stones from the back

[01:17:38] and moving them forward.

[01:17:40] And so it's again, this like Holly

[01:17:42] that you talked about, Roard's work

[01:17:43] talks about transcending and including.

[01:17:45] It's like taking the things,

[01:17:47] not having to let go of it,

[01:17:49] but maybe we can reuse them and reincorporate them

[01:17:51] into whatever is our practice,

[01:17:54] whatever is our life, whatever is our spirituality,

[01:17:56] taking those things that were part of it.

[01:17:58] I think that's the gift of this album,

[01:18:00] the remaking of this album,

[01:18:02] because we can take those things, those stones

[01:18:04] that line in the song, the idols of stone,

[01:18:07] and bring them up and make them part of the story,

[01:18:10] part of the wall, just helping us to move forward.

[01:18:13] So we don't have to leave anything behind.

[01:18:14] We can just let it be part of who we are

[01:18:16] and who we've been and who we're becoming.

[01:18:19] Yeah, that's beautiful.

[01:18:20] I love that.

[01:18:20] I think the song, kind of what Holly Collins

[01:18:23] was saying about leaving the church

[01:18:25] where your body literally had a physical reaction to it.

[01:18:28] There was a time in my life where it was the same.

[01:18:30] Like I just physically couldn't make myself go.

[01:18:33] And I think about that,

[01:18:35] about the chisels I've dulled carving idols of stone

[01:18:38] like this, I'm supposed to do these things

[01:18:41] to the point where I don't recognize myself

[01:18:43] and like my body won't let me do it anymore, right?

[01:18:46] And watching that all wash away, right?

[01:18:49] And yet the line that says,

[01:18:52] to one who sees past all I see.

[01:18:54] I think there's a place that I've come to in my unknowing

[01:18:58] where I'm sort of resigned to that is the reality.

[01:19:02] There's just some things I won't see.

[01:19:04] And there's a trust that there's something bigger

[01:19:07] that does see it and cares

[01:19:09] and is orchestrating something.

[01:19:11] And you can give whatever name you choose.

[01:19:14] And I still hold somewhat to the traditional language

[01:19:18] because that's what makes sense to me.

[01:19:19] But reaching out my weary hand,

[01:19:21] I pray that you'd understand.

[01:19:23] You're the only one who's faithful to me.

[01:19:24] Just the weariness of that journey resonates

[01:19:27] I think with all of us that we've talked about

[01:19:29] just coming to those places of weariness

[01:19:31] but kind of a deeper peace,

[01:19:33] a deeper knowing within ourselves,

[01:19:36] deeper grounding within ourselves.

[01:19:38] It always feels beautiful

[01:19:40] like the original to end where it started

[01:19:42] but to have now a rerecording of it

[01:19:44] ending where it started feels like full circle

[01:19:48] and it's like, I'm going to go back to the beginning

[01:19:50] of my journey.

[01:19:51] And I think that's what it does.

[01:19:53] I think about the meaning of these songs

[01:19:54] now that I'm in a different place.

[01:19:57] Thank you all so much for sharing your thoughts

[01:19:59] on the album.

[01:19:59] And again, to my listeners,

[01:20:01] I hope that this gives you some inspiration

[01:20:04] or permission or something empowerment

[01:20:07] to reclaim whatever you want to

[01:20:11] and like cherry pick it

[01:20:12] or find meaning in every word.

[01:20:15] It doesn't matter.

[01:20:16] It's like they were not yours to claim anymore

[01:20:18] since leaving or reshaping your faith.

[01:20:21] I'm maybe an atheist agnostic

[01:20:23] but maybe there is a God based on the fact

[01:20:24] that four of us could coordinate our schedules

[01:20:26] on a Sunday afternoon short notice.

[01:20:28] So thank you all so much.

[01:20:34] Thanks for listening to another episode

[01:20:35] of Hello Deconstructionists.

[01:20:37] If you enjoyed this episode or any others,

[01:20:39] please like, follow or subscribe to the podcast.

[01:20:42] And if you feel like it,

[01:20:43] leave us a review so other people know

[01:20:45] what this show is all about.

[01:20:46] If you have any questions, comments

[01:20:48] or parts of your own experience

[01:20:49] you'd like to share on the podcast,

[01:20:51] you can email me at hello.decoms at gmail.com.

[01:20:55] And as always, you can find me over on Instagram

[01:20:57] at hello underscore deconstructionists

[01:21:00] where together we are building community

[01:21:01] post evangelicalism.

[01:21:03] Huge thank you to Amy Azera

[01:21:05] for writing the theme song for this podcast.

[01:21:07] And when the sweet little bop

[01:21:08] inevitably gets stuck in your head,

[01:21:10] I hope it reminds you of this wonderful community

[01:21:13] that's here with you.

[01:21:14] Thanks to all our guests

[01:21:15] for sharing these parts of their stories with us.

[01:21:18] And of course, to you for listening.

[01:21:20] See you next time.

[01:21:22] Gotta deconstruct, oh.