What happens when the church you trust becomes a source of fear and exclusion? In this episode of Beyond the Surface, we sit down with Kimberley, known as the exvangelical parent, to discuss her journey through conservative evangelicalism, growing up during the satanic panic and purity culture. Kimberley shares her struggles with undiagnosed OCD, vivid memories of being shown graphic depictions of hell, and navigating family dynamics shaped by political conservatism. From supporting her brother as he came out to navigating her own deconstruction as a parent, this is a story of fear, resilience, and finding peace beyond religious teachings.

Who Is Kimberly?

Kimberly, She/Her, is the founder of The Exvangelical Parent. She is a writer, artist, wife, and over-caffeinated mom. Enneagram 9. INFP. She is a queer, neurodivergent, hopeful agnostic who likes long walks in the forest and Zoloft. After spending over a decade in the ministry world, she now writes and creates full time. You can find her work on Scary Mommy, The Mighty, The Huffington Post, The Natural Parent, Parent Co, Her View From Home, and Columbia Mom.

Connect With Us

• You can connect with Kimberly on social media on both Facebook & Instagram
• You can find out more about The Exvangelical Parent via their website.

• To connect with Sam on Instagram - @anchoredcounsellingservices
• Want to contact with Sam about the podcast or therapy? Use this contact form.

00:18 - Sam (Host)

I would like to begin by acknowledging the traditional custodians of the land on which I live and work the Gundagara land and people. I pay my respects to their elders past, present and emerging and extend that respect to all Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people. I also want to acknowledge the traditional custodians of the lands on which you, our listeners, are joining us from today. I recognise the deep connection that First Nations people have to this land, their enduring culture and their commitment to the preservation and care for their country. This land was never ceded and it always was and always will be Aboriginal land.

00:58

Hey there and welcome to Beyond the Surface, the podcast where we explore the stories of people who have survived religious trauma, left high control or cult communities and are deconstructing their faith. I'm your host, sam, and each week I'll talk with individuals who have taken the brave step to start shifting their beliefs that might have once controlled and defined their lives. Join us as we dig into their experiences, the challenges they've faced and the insights they've gained. Whether you're on a similar journey or you're just curious about these powerful stories, you're in the right place. This is Beyond the Surface. Welcome, kimberley. Thanks for joining me.

01:43 - Kimberly (Guest)

Oh, thank you so much for having me, Sam. What a pleasure.

01:46 - Sam (Host)

I'm so excited for this conversation. If people are not aware, you are over on Instagram as the ex-evangelical parent. Is that right? Yes, yes, I sure am. You discuss everything spirituality, ethics, morality, all of those you know messy intersections, post-epidemiologicalism correct, yes?

02:15 - Kimberly (Guest)

Yes, I sure do.

02:19 - Sam (Host)

I mean, there's nothing clean or clear cut about any of those topics, so I love that.

02:28 - Kimberly (Guest)

Yes, we exist in the gray area.

02:31 - Sam (Host)

Yeah, I love the gray. I make so many jokes about Fifty Shades of Gray it makes sense.

02:40 - Kimberly (Guest)

Oh, it fits, it fits with this journey.

02:43 - Sam (Host)

Yeah, and then I remember actually looking it up at one point and I think that there is a vast amount, more than 50, so it kind of loses its flavor. But I love looking at everything that exists outside the black and white. So, and that's kind of what I love about this podcast, because everybody's episode and everybody's story is so different. So where does your story start?

03:19 - Kimberly (Guest)

Ooh, big question. I start with the questions. That's wonderful. That's fantastic. So I was raised in a very evangelical, conservative Christian home. My parents are wonderful people who were doing choosing the best path they could for all of us kids at the time.

03:44

I was born in the mid 80s, so I came of age very much in the peak of satanic panic in the United States and purity culture and it was a very unique time of evangelism that was particularly problematic. I was reading the, the left behind books and like piercing the darkness and things like that, when I was like 10 years old and I was already a very anxious, sensitive kid. So things like that were not great for I mean, they're probably not great for any child, but they were particularly not great for me. Um, I went, I started out in public school, um, and then I went to a private Christian school for just a year.

04:37

It was short but it was very, unfortunately, not great. I have a vivid memory of my being in my first grade classroom so I'm maybe seven years old, six or seven and my teacher, who was a very sweet lady, showing all of us kids these artistic renderings of people burning in hell and like I know, and like there were worms eating their flesh and you know right and so being told at that very, very young age that this is, this is what's going to happen, you know, if you're not right with Jesus, and once again anxious kid and always thought I had to pray the prayer of salvation over and over and over again to make sure it stuck.

05:26

At the time I didn't know I had OCD. I have obsessive compulsive disorder, and that can really particularly negatively affect religious children. I think Absolutely yeah. But of course I didn't know that at the time. So I stopped going to that school. I'm not really sure why. That'd be a great question to ask my parents. Why did we stop going? But then we started homeschooling. So we were homeschooled and that was better than it sounds. It was better because I was a neurodivergent kid, I was a big reader, I was an introvert, so it really suited my personality to be homeschooled. I could, I could hyper fixate on my favorite interests and we were in a homeschool group, a very, very, very Christian homeschool group. But we had group classes and we had prom when you got to high school and we had graduation and those things were lovely and and good. But uh, we went to churches that would be considered like southern baptist evangelical churches um.

06:35 - Sam (Host)

I live in the united states and I grew up in florida, which is becoming a more problematic place by the day yeah, yeah, glad to not be living there, I mean, like every time I I love talking to the americans on this podcast, but every time I talk to them it like fuels and feeds the narrative that the us is a bit of a shit show. Um like uh, that's the only language I have for it.

07:11 - Kimberly (Guest)

um, I wish it wasn't, but unfortunately that is the case and we are entering another insane election year. Um, and I'm I'm not ready for it. I'm not ready for it. I'm not ready for it. Sam, I'm not, and we were very. We were politically conservative growing up. My parents were Republicans and always voted. We were very, very pro-life. That was a very big thing in my family growing up.

07:38

And when you're a little child going to things like walks for life at for crisis pregnancy centers and things, to things like walks for life at for crisis pregnancy centers and things um, it seems so innocent and it seems so like why wouldn't anyone want to save a baby? Why wouldn't anyone want to say like, of course, of course, we all want children to be safe, of course? Um. So it took me. I thought I was just doing the most important volunteer work in the world as a child, with these places, and I thought, I thought I was going to be in ministry forever. I thought I was going to, oh, I wanted to be in ministry. I was in youth group, of course, you know, every time the doors were open, I did our you know, artistic ministry teams. We would do very cringy skits and dance numbers and things like that and travel around. I know, I know and video probably this, unfortunately, yeah, bless, bless my sweet little heart. So I was.

08:43

I was very, very passionate. I remember being in elementary school and like evangelizing to children on the playground because I was taught that that was the most important thing. How could you possibly let your friends go to hell? And hell is the scariest thing you could ever imagine. Uh, so it was very much marked by fear for me as a kid. I was very, very afraid all the time, but then it was balanced with really liking the community that came, you know with, with being a part of something you know as humans the belonging. The belonging, yeah, and you, you know, the friendships and relationships, and that was always that was always really important to me as a child. And that's kind of how they get you the love bombing. The love bombing, yes, um, which I found out later. Not a lot of those people stick around when you change your mind.

09:48

So I was a very fearful child. I went undiagnosed with anxiety and depression and OCD for a very long time, until when I was 16 or so and I was starting to have suicidal thoughts because of my very untreated mental illness. And that's when I finally went to therapy for the first time, which was wonderful. I actually got some diagnosis.

10:12 - Sam (Host)

And probably very rebellious, I would think.

10:16 - Kimberly (Guest)

You know, actually, my family. They were okay with it. They were like, okay, now, nobody offered me medication at that time. I was not medicated until I was almost 30. And I was like, how have I been living my life until this point? Like it was like night and day the difference in my brain chemistry. So I wish I would have done that sooner. I really do, but I just didn't know so.

10:48

But I, you know, I was a high achieving kid. I always got you know, firstborn daughter, perfectionist, always wanted to take care of everyone, save the world, and I thought, ministry, of course that's what I have to do. So I started working at a crisis pregnancy center as soon as I graduated high school. I worked there through college. I was in that kind of ministry for almost a decade. Wow, and yeah, it's a long time. Um, and that's when the cracks started to show. For me, that was was, that was the main, the main thing. Um, that really, uh, started to make me ask a lot more questions, and questions were not appreciated in the ministries that I was in. Um, of course, I thought at the time okay, we're saving babies and we're helping kids. So I worked, um, in the youth programs. That was my primary thing, and we're helping kids, so I worked in the youth programs. That was my primary thing. I taught sex ed, which was a hoot, and totally abstinence focused.

11:55 - Sam (Host)

I was about to say what sort of sex ed are we actually talking about?

12:00 - Kimberly (Guest)

Right exactly Now. We were trained Like we were trained by health departments. We did give like accurate information on sexually transmitted infections and things like that, but the be all end all had to be abstinence period. It was like you just gotta just don't do it, just don't do it. And as a young person who was being abstinent because purity culture was a big deal, I was like this is great If I can do it, anyone can do it, it's fine.

12:32

I started teaching these things when I was like 18, which is hilarious no experience in the world, nothing at all. But I started to see over the years that it was so much more complicated than I thought, especially the pro-life aspect of the whole thing. It was so much more complex. Everybody's story was so unique and we were taught when we were speaking to women, you always had to, you had to present the gospel when you were having a counseling session. We're not counselors, we're just people, while we're like offering a pregnancy test and like trying to be helpful.

13:19

And you know, to be perfectly fair, there were lovely resources that were offered. We did like work with our. We worked with WIC and we, which is our women, infants and children assistance program, we would get people enrolled for Medicaid. We would get people plugged in with providers. You know, if they wanted to carry their pregnancy, we could give them. We could give them some actual assistance, which is cool, but you had to present the gospel. It was required. And that never sat right with me, because you're dealing with people in in often very emotional situations who are scared and don't have resources and like you can't just like lay that on somebody when, when they need help, like that's just not, it just didn't seem right.

14:04 - Sam (Host)

So I very often broke those rules yeah, I mean, my first thought is like that's that's when it's brought out, though, like that's when it is, because the people who, um, the people who are drawn, are those who are at their most vulnerable.

14:21 - Kimberly (Guest)

They're the target audience right now, in hindsight, it's like oh, this was by design. Yeah, absolutely by design. They uh, if you get someone when they're vulnerable and emotional, they're gonna jump in. And we had to record those things like data, like numbers. How many salvations did you get this month? Like that was part. We had to report those things to a board of directors and you know, saying it now it sounds so absolutely bonkers, because it is, but at the time I was, I was the frog in the pot with the water slowly warming. You know, it was the pot I was born in.

14:59

I didn't, I didn't know, but situations would come up. Um, I, I had a girl come to see me for a pregnancy test and she was 11. She was 11 and she was pregnant and, uh, her parents were like, not even wanting to let, would not let her consider abortion, adoption, anything. They were like you're going to carry this baby, you're, you're gonna keep this baby. And this was a child.

15:26

And I just remember when she left, I just went in my office and I closed my door and I sobbed. I was like this this child needs so much more than we can possibly offer her. Yeah, in her situation, and carrying this pregnancy to term is not gonna fix this problem, like, and then the worst thing was she came back three years later and she was pregnant again. Oh gosh, and I was. I, you know, we failed her, we failed her and situations like that would come up that were incredibly complex and in my mind I was like, wait, wait, hold on. This can't be the one size fits all approach. We also weren't allowed to, weren't allowed to suggest birth control yeah, to people as like a reasonable thing to do, to like grown women, who, who have children, who, are in relationship control is playing god right and you know you just shouldn't be doing it.

16:23

You shouldn't be doing it. Quit it, like that's how some of my weirds are in the south.

16:30 - Sam (Host)

Oh my gosh. I mean it is like, as we talk about it, I go like it's absolutely bonkers, but when you're in it, you, you, rationalize it. I mean it's like KPIs for Jesus, like like that concept is insane, but it is what it is um, yeah, it is.

16:54 - Kimberly (Guest)

It is um and the so. In my own, uh, in my own life, even when I was incredibly conservative, um, I was never okay with the way the church treated the LGBTQ community. It it always made me sick. It always I was like this can't be right, because I always the thing that kept pulling me back with every question was, like, I really do like the teachings of Jesus, I do, I. I couldn't get asked. I was like, well, what about the, the love and the acceptance and the uplifting of marginalized communities and, uh, the uplifting of women and the people that nobody like, those are all such one, you know, rebelling against the state, like those are all wonderful things. And so I would keep coming back to that like, oh, I was willing to like look the other way on all of the garbage because I was like but I still like this part of it, still like this part of it. I could be a, I could be like a cool Christian. It could be like not like a normal Christian, I'm a cool Christian.

17:51

Yeah, the progressive cool version yeah, yeah, yeah I was like I could just do that, like that would be fine. And in my, in my job, we were not allowed to affirm our LGBTQ students, and so I had at some points. I had hundreds of kids under my afterschool program and there were some lovely things about it. It gave kids a safe place to go after school, there were some really lovely mentors who could be a part of their lives, and we did talk about a lot of things that did matter, like healthy relationships and self-worth and understanding your value and learning how to set boundaries and consent, and all of those things were really positive. But we always had to put the gospel into it. Always it was required.

18:37

But because I kind of had my own program and I wasn't supervised a lot of the time, uh, I did affirm all of my lgbtq students. I I had a little a sweet, precious little middle schooler who came to me crying one day and said am I going to hell because I, like girls and I just looked her in the eyes and I held her shoulders was absolutely not. You are not. Jesus loves you exactly the way you are, like I was. It just tore my heart out that she felt that way, so I was able to kind of exist under the radar in that way for a while, where I could, you know, still be working for this organization but still teaching things that I was more comfortable with to my kids and then in my own life I was.

19:26

I was being very rebellious which I'm still learning how to do because I'm a peacemaker and I don't like conflict. And in my own life, at the same time, my little brother came out to my parents and he was only 14 at the time and my parents lost their minds. They were so angry, they were so furious. It was a huge upheaval for the family and I was pregnant at the time, so I was already emotional and tired. But I was kind of running point between my mom and my little brother and I was like, listen, mom, your child did not just come to you and say that they're addicted to heroin, they said that they're gay, you need to calm down. And we told my brother listen, we're here for you, we love you. You can come live with us if you need to. Whatever you need, we're here, we've got you.

20:22

And it took my parents a while. It took them a while, but I was constantly sending them podcasts and reading material and articles about all of these gay affirming Christians and all of these people Like, hey, you can still. You can still have these beliefs if you want, um, but you can still like, affirm your kid. And that was my, my little brother. Both of my brothers are. We're very, very close. I adore them. Um, and I was just. I, mama bared out. I was like this is not happening, like unacceptable. You can't just reject your kid because they're gay and, like I said, he was 14. He was a kid, he's just a child at the time. So this was happening as I was being sneaky at work and over the course of about it took over a year but in the end, uh, my parents now today are fully affirming um, go mom and dad, yes, it is.

21:24

Um. It's so encouraging to me because you know they're in their 60s and they grew up very conservative and they have changed their view on they, changed their political party, they changed how they voted. They, I know, like to see people be willing to. You can be older and you can say listen, I was not right, I'm gonna change.

21:43 - Sam (Host)

Now they're fully supportive, um, and it's been beautiful to see, but it took a minute it reminds me, um, yeah, it reminds me of maya angelou's quote when we know better, we do better. Um, and if we give you know, we give people the opportunity, they do have the ability and the capability to change if there is willingness and openness. Um, and yeah, that is so encouraging. Go, mom and dad.

22:13 - Kimberly (Guest)

I know I and now we're all very close still, um, and it's wonderful. In fact, my brother not super recently, but he now lives in my city, um, in Asheville, north Carolina, uh, with his partner. So I'm so happy to have family in town. It's just wonderful. So we're in the American South, but Asheville is we call it a blueberry. It's a. It's a bubble of um little blueberry. It's a. It's a bubble of um hippies and progressives and uh, tucked away in the Appalachian mountains. So it's a very cool place to be. It's very uh, accepting and open and it's beautiful. Um.

22:51

But shortly thereafter, shortly after my child was born, um, I got called into my boss's office to say, hey, we noticed in your training materials because I had about a team of about 20 volunteers under me for the youth program, um, that you're including some resources that could be considered affirming um, because I had all of, I had these training materials say, hey, this is how you for for this 40 year old Southern white woman, here's how you relate to your LGBTQ students, because if you can't relate to them, you can't connect with them. Um, and they said that's, you can't do that, you can't have that information even available in your materials and I was like, um, really, yeah, okay, so that that, uh, they were on to me at that point and, um, that boss at the time was even like I know you, like I saw that you went to the women's march, uh and uh and that's fine. He's like that's fine, but people might have some thoughts about that.

23:57 - Sam (Host)

I'm like, well, I don't mind, but it's not fine but I'm bringing it up to you in this meeting we're having right now I mean for the record, anybody listening if someone says it's fine, but it's clearly not fine, it's definitely not uh.

24:13 - Kimberly (Guest)

So, uh, that was like, okay, it's time, it's time to go. It's time to go, uh, because I loved my kids, I loved my students and I, I I wanted to help them in every way I could, but I knew this was no longer the place that I could do it, so I stepped down. When my child was about two years old, um, so I guess that was about six years ago I was um, I quit before they could fire me.

24:39 - Sam (Host)

I love that, taking the control out of there.

24:42 - Kimberly (Guest)

Um, I'm curious what all of that, uh, the impact that that had on your own relationship with god uh, it was really hard yeah, it was really, really hard um, at the time we were also like attending a mega church um, which was very, you know that has. That's a whole other conversation. Mega churches in the american south, uh but we had a love.

25:12 - Sam (Host)

We're no better we. We're the birthplace of hillsong. We're no better, we're the birthplace of Hillsong.

25:17 - Kimberly (Guest)

We're no better. Oh yeah, yeah, we all, we all, every, we all have our faults, we all have our things, but and we had a lovely community of friends there and people we really cared about. The small group was really the the thing that was great. And there there are people that were. There's some people there that we were still friends with today, although they, a lot of them, have gone on a similar journey which is interesting over the last few years. So, and then I started to see the same things happen, because mega churches in America and it might be like this in Australia too they really like to have the veneer of being progressive. They like to be like we're, we're cool, we're fun, we're. We're not like those old churches that you grew up in, like it's not the same thing we have. We have a sound system yeah, we have talented people.

26:07 - Sam (Host)

Um, it makes me think of that scene in the in Mean Girls where she's like I'm not a regular mom, I'm a cool mom like.

26:13 - Kimberly (Guest)

I'm not a regular church.

26:14 - Sam (Host)

I'm a cool church.

26:16 - Kimberly (Guest)

I'm a cool church. You can drink coffee in here. Our music is great.

26:20

We go out and have air, and wine and yeah, um, and there were things that I once again, it's all complicated, it's all shades of gray. Uh, I remember our pastor at the time once did a, uh, an incredible sermon against racism. Um, that just made every, made the entire church. Just you could have heard a pin drop in that auditorium and I was just like hell, yeah, this is great, you know, to hear this in the south, it's beautiful, um, but to become a member of the church, it was a big deal.

26:57

To be a member, it was a big deal and the way you did it was almost militant and it's it was. You go to, like, a session where you like someone interviews you about your salvation experience and if they, if they assume, if they give you the thumbs up that that like was good enough, then you get sent to the next block of people where you get immediately signed up for what team you're going to serve on, because that's you're going to volunteer, of course, which is a big commitment with this big mega church. Then you go to the team that gets you in your small group. Then you go to set up your automatic tithe. Oh, wow, all in one, and I I remember, because I grew up in kind of little churches and I remember just being like what this is interesting.

27:48

Like they would take down your credit card information so that they could go ahead and start auto drafting that tithe every month, and that just kind of felt weird didn't feel great um, and one of the things they would do on sundays would was make these really beautiful, highly produced interview videos of church members who had gone through like some kind of life-changing experience, you know um, with just the right music and key changes.

28:17 - Sam (Host)

I knew exactly what you were going to say before you even said it, because I was like, yeah, the church loves a redemption story, like I mean, I mean that's why people who are in a vulnerable situation are the target audience. Right, because that we can. We can create that's a story. Like you know, the broken down, the homeless, the addicted, the whatever it is we can flip that script yep, they don't.

28:47 - Kimberly (Guest)

They don't put up the stories of the person who was just, yeah, I was doing okay, and then I said, jesus is cool. Yeah, that doesn't get the highly produced treatment, but one of the stories was of a gay woman in the church who had been in a long-term committed relationship and basically, you know, they tried to spin it like this is so amazing. But this poor, precious woman was like, yeah, I knew that I had to leave the love of my life and I knew I had to be celibate forever and, um, so I could be part of this community with Jesus. And I was just, it was like a slow motion moment of me, like moving out of frame. What Like this is something we're celebrating here here that this person who was in this loving, committed relationship felt they had to leave that so they could be a part of this. Because you couldn't be a member if you were gay, you couldn't serve. If you were gay, everyone's welcome, unless you fit into this box. And I was like, uh, no, no, no, no, no, no. This is not a triumph. My heart broke for this woman. It's like this. This is devastating.

30:03

And what I kept coming back to is like how could jesus, who's all about love, be against love? How, like, I don't, I don't, I don't see it. I don't see it like if something is bearing good fruit uh, as we like to talk about in the church, everything's about fruit. If a relationship, if a person is bringing out the love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, how could that possibly be wrong? And that's what I kept saying and I was like I don't get it, I don't understand. And then having my own child really, really, really pushed me over the edge, really pushed me over the edge because, like this, no matter who my child turns out to be, I'm never going to reject them. Yeah, period, nothing could make me reject this beautiful little creature. And so we, kind of slow, we left with a, with a fade rather than a bang.

30:56 - Sam (Host)

Slow fade From the church.

30:58 - Kimberly (Guest)

We just slow fade and we like kept going to our small group even when we didn't go to our church, because we just like liked our friends and things like that. And then questions were like hey, what'd you think about service on Sunday? It'd be like yeah, it was great, it's terrific, cause you could disappear. You know it was, it was a massive church. Like you're like yeah, I went to the. Oh, you guys all went to the 9am, we went to the 5pm.

31:21

You know, we didn't just. That's why we didn't see, we didn't see you there, Um, but we slowly realized that it just we didn't fit anymore. Um and uh, a big, a big moment for me was after the uh, the pulse nightclub shooting in orlando. Um, I wrote an article, um that went a little via, got picked up by the huffington post and a bunch of other outlets. That was titled jesus would hang out hung out at gay bars.

31:56 - Sam (Host)

Yeah.

31:57 - Kimberly (Guest)

And yeah, you would have Um and and I was still pretty in it at the time, like I was still I w, I still called myself Christian, but I was, you know the cool Christian and the amount of hate I got from people who I thought really loved me extended family, friends, um, my home, my home church's pastor's, wife who, like they, were the ones who gave me and my husband premarital counseling when we were wee little babies and I thought they really loved us and mentored us.

32:33

She was actually my boss at the first crisis pregnancy center I worked at in Florida and she made sure to send me a message to say I'm so glad you don't work for me anymore, because I would have fired you on the spot. And I realized that people who said they loved me and really cared it was very conditional and I I know it's naive to not notice that yet, but when I did, I was like this is I don't know where I fit here anymore and, being a person who had pretty much based my whole identity on who I was, you know, in Christ, I didn't know where to go from there. It was very unmooring, especially being a new parent uh, which is already just a banana's time, um and I. I'm very grateful that my spouse and I deconstructed about the same time.

33:34

We were on our own journeys, but it, it all, they kind of all went together and I'm I'm so grateful for that, because we were both raised in a very similar environment. We got married when we were 20, as christians do. As christians do, we'd known each other four months when we got engaged at 19. Um, it could have gone the other way. Yeah, it really could have, um, but we deconstructed at a similar rate for for a whole variety of reasons and, um, we're very much on the same page now, which is beautiful. Um, we got very lucky in that regard. People be like, oh my gosh, you've already been married 18 years. That's crazy. I'm like, yeah, we don't recommend that.

34:18

Like, we don't like how beautiful the wisest decision yeah I was like no, we wouldn't say anyone else should do that ever. They're like oh, you just knew you were so in love, not really lucky. We got really lucky that we grew in the same direction and we were willing. We were willing to make those changes together as a family. It didn't have to go that way at all, um, so I'm grateful. I'm grateful for that. And now we find ourselves just kind. That's why I started the ex-evangelical parent, because I was like how do I? I was taught the only way you teach your kid to not be a serial killer is to teach them the bible. That's how you do it. And I remember having friends like people I thought were lovely. People say, oh, if it just wasn't for Jesus, if it wasn't for Jesus, I would be so evil, I would be so wicked, and I I remember being taken aback, being like I don't think I would like I don't, I think I would still be the same person.

35:25 - Sam (Host)

Like. It's crazy to people who are not a part of that lifestyle or that faith system to think that, like, morality is so inextricably tied to god and that the two like cannot be mutually exclusive. Like and it's like. Well, no, like, not having jesus doesn't make me a murderer automatically and if it does, that's a whole other. Yeah, I mean my my wife would probably have something to say about that, because, um, I am a slytherin, um, if people know, harry so I mean anything could happen.

36:13

Anything could happen with that but my kid likes to say they're a good Slytherin yeah, I mean Draco turned out all right, like he made some questionable decisions along the way, but he was young.

36:27 - Kimberly (Guest)

But how did we all you know, we're teenagers, gosh oh yeah, oh my goodness so I, I launched the community because I felt like I didn't know, like I was, like I don't know where to go from here, how, how do we do this?

36:47

And, um, we, it was lovely to get a group of other people who were kind of on the, some very different stories, all of us very different journeys, but to be in the same place, and a lot of people wrote wonderful articles for our website, the exvangelicalparentcom.

37:03

We have a pile of resources from a variety of viewpoints, which is just wonderful, and that was so encouraging to me because I realized, oh wait, this whole exvangelical, like we're, we're a thing, and we all seem to be kind of close to the same age, to like we came up around the same moment, the unique moment of evangelism and purity culture, um, and we're trying to do something different with our own families. And it's been so encouraging to know that community still exists outside of the structure of the church, um, and that that's not what, it's not what has to define us. Yeah, uh, at all, and I and I find I'm still when I talk about it, it feels like it was another life, but it really wasn't that long ago and I'm there's still things I'm grieving yeah, uh, the loss of, and there are still things I'm it's like as a therapist. I'm sure you know things just pop up that you haven't considered.

38:07 - Sam (Host)

I have a good friend who, um has the best analogy, which is um. It's a little bit like the whack-a-mole game.

38:15 - Kimberly (Guest)

Oh my gosh, it's a perfect description.

38:18 - Sam (Host)

Yeah, isn't it? She's also a religious trauma therapist, so we, like have the same mindset. But yeah, it's the best analogy, because you might have nothing for a little while and then just bam something what is that? Yeah, where did that come?

38:36 - Kimberly (Guest)

from Absolutely, or something's really triggering. Yeah, um, and it's like every moment a surprise, uh, and I'll tell my spouse that I'll be like hey, listen, we uh, I had a, a song came on the radio, or uh, had this conversation with this person and suddenly it was like I was, I was back there, I was, I mean, I even I didn't even.

38:58

At this moment, I can't even go inside churches yeah like it makes me really uncomfortable, even like historical ones, like on a we. We were thrilled to be able to go to Italy um last year and I was like I don't want to visit. I don't want to visit any cathedral, I have no interest.

39:20 - Sam (Host)

It's just like, yes, they're beautiful and they're full of art and they're wonderful, but yeah, I'm good wait my, my wife and I went, uh, to Italy as part of our honeymoon and, uh, we visited the Vatican and, um, and we, we went with that. Yeah, I mean, we were still in a weird place at this point with our deconstruction and faith. We had just gotten married in a church and um, it was a whole world.

39:49

so, like I wasn't, I'm the same now in terms of like I wouldn't be able to go into a church now, um, but even still, you know you are walking around and you're looking at this beautiful architecture. But as a queer couple, we both couldn't help but feel the heaviness and the weight of just our presence walking around that building, and it was just this weird it was. It was just weird, I don't. I don't quite know how to explain it, but yeah, I mean the building is stunning, like, and the system is incredible. But I think when you have religious trauma or you've been brought up in a high control space, you can't help but look at those places and see that they are more than a building.

40:50 - Kimberly (Guest)

They're more than a building. Absolutely, I feel the heaviness of the people who've been oppressed in those spaces, I think is part of it, and it's interesting because I'm sure there are similar. I know, no religion is perfect, but we were just in Japan this past fall and I didn't feel that same way with the temples and the beautiful sacred spaces there. I don't know what that means, but for me it was like okay, this is cool, like this is cool, that this is sacred and beautiful, but it's not personally attached to any trauma. For myself, it was an interesting contrast to see the difference. But, um, also another experience there I didn't realize how I'm. I'm an artist, uh, I love art.

41:42

I studied art in college so I wanted to go to all the museums when we were in Italy, of course, um, but I hadn't thought about like I was raised on the graphic imagery of crucifixion and all of the. The Bible is a gory book, oh yeah. And it's very. It is very unsettling and, as you know, most Renaissance art is weird stuff from the Bible and I hadn't considered how my child had not been raised with all of that. And my kids walking around one of the most you know famous beautiful museums in the world and going what?

42:20

the heck yeah, I need to go, and I'm like I'm hit like a ton of bricks, like, oh my god, I'm so sorry, I'm so. It didn't even compute, because it was so normal for me to see, you know, like a million paintings of someone being executed in a bloody and horrible way, because that was just what we did. Like, yeah, this, this is awful, we should go.

42:44 - Sam (Host)

I mean and I mean it's really ironic because we are recording this like the week after Easter, and I remember seeing a post that you made about how, you know, let's, let's maybe not do Easter the way that you know. You know, let's not teach our kids that they're the reason for an ancient execution I think was your term and I was like thank you, like let's maybe not instill that, like let's not tell children that they're the reason someone was murdered, like I mean, no one should hear that, let alone children.

43:24 - Kimberly (Guest)

And I was taught that from such a young age. Yeah, I mean I heard like when you said that you were really left behind at like 10 or something.

43:29 - Sam (Host)

You were reading Left Behind at like 10 or something and I'm thinking and yet we have an issue with Harry Potter and Pokemon.

43:43 - Kimberly (Guest)

Are you kidding me? I actually was lovingly making fun of my mother for this recently, because my mom just watched all the Harry Potter movies for the first time and she, she's like they were so good, good. She's like, why was I worried about that? I'm like I don't know mom, why were you worried about that? I?

44:03 - Sam (Host)

mean, I mean just don't let mom research the author of them, because she's awful.

44:08 - Kimberly (Guest)

I know gosh, I um, but the moment I was, the moment I felt free to read harry potter, it became I know problematic I'm like, okay, fine, uh, but it was hilarious to see she's like these are great stories. They're about like friendship and good versus evil.

44:27 - Sam (Host)

I'm like, yeah, they are mom, absolutely it's fine, but I could read piercing the darkness, where demons were latched into people's brains yeah, being literally, not figuratively, literally um I'm curious how like where your sense of spirituality is now amongst all of that and everything I'm figuring it out.

44:54 - Kimberly (Guest)

Um, I, I don't think I could ever call myself an atheist, because I feel like that assumes I know more than I do. The universe is vast. I don't know anything, I'm just a little person. Um, and honestly I would, I think I would really like it if there was some kind of benevolent and loving higher power. I'm still working through the grief of that of, of the loss of certainty. You know, just knowing that I don't know is tough.

45:28

So right now, I find most of my spiritual peace comes from just being in nature. Um, I, I live in a beautiful place surrounded by mountains, and I hike every single day. I'm out in the woods every day. I I love to forage and explore. Um, I've just started just this year, uh, a tiny flower farm on our tiny sliver of land, so I'm always out in the dirt and that has become.

45:58

The most spiritual thing I've ever experienced is just being connected with the seasons and the gifts that the earth gives us, and how lovely that is Like. Right now it's spring here, which is really gorgeous, and if I step outside right now, I can gather five or six wild foods that I could just eat immediately from my backyard, and it's so lovely to me that the earth does that in the spring, that you can just here you go. It's been a long winter. Have all of these lovely fresh greens. They're free, they're not, they are for everyone. Um, and tuning into that for the first time in my life has been a really beautiful experience. Um, and just having human connection, um, that doesn't have to be based on anything other than human connection has been really beautiful.

47:00

It's, but it's. There's moments like Easter hit me harder than I thought it would this past year we had no plans okay, so it's not just me.

47:11

Yeah, no, we didn't have any plans. We did that on purpose. You know, we wanted to just have a really like low-key time as a family, um, but I was still just hit by an unexpected sadness and I find it happened like I get very melancholy around christmas too. Yeah, which um which bums me out, because you know, christmas is supposed to be really joyful and fun and I want it to be magical for my kid.

47:43 - Sam (Host)

Yeah.

47:43 - Kimberly (Guest)

But also not religious. It's interesting I haven't talked to my child's eight, so I haven't like child's eight, so I haven't like laid my religious trauma on. They know I used to went to go to church and then I don't anymore Like. But we had a conversation just just this week because we passed a church on our way home from school and they had a cross out front with the drape on it. You know there was a big thing for Holy week to have and we still live in, live in the south. There's church. You can't swing a cat without hitting a church. They're everywhere.

48:20

And my child said, oh yeah, that cross, that's that's where they killed jesus, like 40 times. I was like what? I was like I have questions, okay, um, I think in the story it was just once and my kid was like, oh, it wasn't like they killed him. He came back and he killed him and they came back and he killed him and he came back like who are you talking to about this? Like interesting, uh, okay, it's like. No, I think in the story it was just like once. And then then they came back to life in the story and it's like, oh, okay, I mean 40 times is probably way more interesting, and way more impressive, to be fair.

48:58 - Sam (Host)

40 resurrections yeah, that's like I don't know where.

49:02 - Kimberly (Guest)

That Totally yeah, that I'm interested. I want to know more about that. But that sparked a car conversation and where a lot of good conversations happen with your kids when you're driving and I told them a little bit about the thing that happened with that article I wrote and how. Because we're a queer family, my child's non-binary, my spouse and I no longer identify as straight people. Like we just didn't. We were just never given the freedom to figure that out People.

49:40

So I just kind of gave a very like as appropriate as I could version of how I said some things supporting the LGBT community and then a lot of my friends left me essentially and that was one of the reasons I don't go to church anymore and my dear sensitive child just started sobbing in the backseat, just crying, and it was like I said I would never not accept you, mama, I would never accept you, no matter what. And I said, oh, baby, I would never. I will always accept you and I will always support you, no matter what, always. And then they got full of rage and said why do grandma and grandpa go to a church then? And I said well, actually, grandma and grandpa, they go to a, a fully gay affirming church. Now um, that does a lot of good things in their community and there are churches that are like that, and I think there are churches that do good things, but I wasn't a part of them. I I wasn't in those churches growing up, and so that's why I don't go anymore.

50:36

And it was a whole moment we had, um, and I was just so grateful that my kid was has not been a part of it, that's just has been spared all of it, um, and that we go. You know, we we live in a place with very wonderful accepting public schools and my child has been fully affirmed by their teachers and their classmates and the that inclusion is really, really important here and I'm so grateful we before this, we lived in South Carolina, which is a very, very conservative place, um, that teaches very scary things in the schools and, of course, florida not a great place to be if you are a queer person in any way. So I'm very, very thankful we are where we're at, um, emotionally and geographically for the stage in our lives, um, yeah, sorry, that was a lot of. That was rambling, that was a lot.

51:42 - Sam (Host)

I love that yeah, I mean, I think it's a real testament that their reaction was what it was in terms of I think it is good parenting to not lay your religious trauma on them. I think that that's kind of what you're supposed to do.

52:03 - Kimberly (Guest)

We'll talk about those things as it's appropriate.

52:06 - Sam (Host)

I mean, I think their reaction probably suggests that what they do know has been, you know, authentic and real, but also age appropriate, and I think that that's, you know, my therapist hat on says. I think that that's how it's supposed to be. You know, children can hold a lot more than we give them credit for, but it still needs to be age appropriate. Yeah, they're still children. Yeah, absolutely, and children deserve to play and um and have fun and have joyous time and not be so worried about eternal torture or damnation. Or, you know, coming home from school and their parents not being there because the rapture has happened, like you know, coming home from school and their parents not being there because the rapture has happened, like you know, children deserve legit, maybe more than once like waking up from a nap and my parents weren't in the house and I'd be like it happened.

53:08 - Kimberly (Guest)

Yeah, it happened.

53:10 - Sam (Host)

I have been left behind no wonder we have people who like have nightmares about it because it's terrifying.

53:18 - Kimberly (Guest)

Yeah, um, you know I did nightmares all the time as a child. Yeah, about the rapture, the tribulation about, about hell, all of it, um it, uh, I probably had just the wrong mental state to be a conservative church kid, you know being very anxious and very sensitive and it's not the best combination not ideal.

53:43

No, I mean, I try to say I feel like. I feel like some people can thrive in, in faith communities. Um, my sister-in-law, uh, their whole family is from Greece and they go to the Greek Orthodox church and they, they have it. They have such a refreshing way of holding things more loosely than than I ever did. Um, like one of the members of the family was telling her kid, who's close in age to mine, like we don't. We go to church for community. Who's close in age to mine, like we don't, we go to church for community, mindfulness and connection, not because there's a sky, daddy, who's going to punish us for something. And I was like what a concept, what a lovely thing. So I guess healthy religion exists. I just haven't personally experienced it in my own life, so I don't know where I'll fall. Uh, in the end, I think the, I think maybe landing somewhere is not the point.

54:44 - Sam (Host)

I think, um, from everything I mean on my own experience, but also just like navigating it with like friends and clients that I think the the biggest part of deconstruction or healing from religious trauma is actually just the permission to say I have no idea, and for that to be okay.

55:08 - Kimberly (Guest)

Yeah, and when you're taught your whole life that certainty, yeah, or a lack of certainty, is a lack of faith, and how that's a real problem, um, that's.

55:20

it's easier said than done it really is to like get to get comfortable with the um, the, the not knowing, just being comfortable with not knowing and being comfortable in the gray area, and that's such a big part of the journey. It's just. And then you know, I have a lot of grief over harm that I could have caused in my you know quote unquote ministry life and I know that my, my intentions were always good, but that doesn't mean that I didn't do harm and that breaks my heart. I know that my intentions were always good, but that doesn't mean that I didn't do harm and that breaks my heart. I hate that. But as you said earlier, when you know better, you do better and you can only change your behavior going forward. I can only hope that the good things maybe outweigh the bad can only hope.

56:17 - Sam (Host)

I can only hope that the good things maybe outweigh them. You still got a lot of life to live and a lot of you know um anti-harm and a lot of advocacy, and a lot of you know stuff that you can do and you are raising another generation and you know that in itself is a whole ordeal. So, um, okay, I've been finishing these episodes by asking everybody what would you say to someone who is deep in their deconstruction? But I want to specifically ask you to speak to the parents who are navigating deconstruction. What would you say to them?

56:59 - Kimberly (Guest)

Oh well, first I would ask if they want a big hug, like, do you need a minute, do you need that? And I would acknowledge that it is so hard.

57:08

It is so hard, but that they are doing the most valuable work by dealing with their own trauma and not just mindlessly passing it on to their children, like that is work that is going to echo through generations because we can say that this trauma stops here, this isn't going any further. I'm not passing this down to my children and I would encourage them that it is going to be okay, but that it's not going to be easy. There's going to be grief, there's going to be sadness, there's going to be anger. I feel like things were stolen from me, like parts of my, my growth and development and humanity, and that grief is very real but it doesn't have.

58:01

It doesn't have to continue and what you're doing, as hard as it is, is worthwhile, because dealing with any kind of trauma is is like cleaning a wound. You know it's. It's going to get grosser and more painful before it gets better and you have to lean into that process and know that and the discomfort like yeah, this is going to hurt, it's going to suck, it's going to be really unpleasant, but it's worth it. For you or your children, for every generation to come to be a cycle breaker is no small thing and it's worth all the work that we're going to put into it.

58:42 - Sam (Host)

Absolutely. I love that Growth demands pain, but it doesn't mean that it won't be worth it. So yeah, yeah.

58:51 - Kimberly (Guest)

I wish it didn't, but it'd be great if it didn't. Yeah, I wish it didn't but it'd be great if it didn't.

58:56 - Sam (Host)

Yeah Well, thank you so much for joining me. This has been wonderful and I love the work that you are doing. I think deconstruction is hard. Navigating it, trying to sort of sort through what you believe, what you think you know, teaching yourself new things is hard enough as it is to be navigating that, and teaching another generation is an extra layer. So I love that there are people in this space who are speaking particularly to deconstructing parents, because it's unique.

59:32 - Kimberly (Guest)

Thank you, sam, I really appreciate it and thank you for having me. This has really been a pleasure. It was lovely talking with unique. Thank you, sam, I really appreciate it and thank you for having me. This has really been a pleasure. It was lovely talking with you.

59:38 - Sam (Host)

Thank you. Thanks for tuning in to this episode of Beyond the Surface. I hope you found today's conversation as insightful and inspiring as I did. If you enjoyed the episode, be sure to subscribe, leave a review and share it with others who might benefit from these stories. Stay connected with us on social media for updates and more content. I love connecting with all of you. Remember, no matter where you are in your journey, you're not alone. Until next time, keep exploring, keep questioning and keep moving forward. Take care.