Former Christian STILL Can't Let Go of God | Justin DZ & Sara LeavingFaith

Added: 2026-05-21

[00:00:00]So we're going to grab our Theist Michael calling in from Virginia is asking if one of the factors preventing deconstruction is fear of community backlash and I I think it's actually a really good question. Michael, welcome to the line you're on with Justin and Sarah. How are you?

[00:00:18]I'm good guys. Thank you for having me.

[00:00:20]I appreciate it.

[00:00:21]Hi.

[00:00:22]>> Welcome in.

[00:00:22]>> So I um I called in a few days ago actually and I was labeled a cafeteria Christian which that was pretty funny and I did some reflection and you know I don't really know if I could call myself a Christian anymore because the version of God I believe in is definitely not one that aligns with the Christian belief system any of the teachings what not. So it made me wonder I still don't want to abandon my faith completely because there's definitely some kind of I don't know if I would really call it fear in my case but there's definitely some kind of block right where it's like this has been a foundation of my uh person essentially for as long as I've been around.

[00:01:10]But it did get me thinking you know whenever I have conversations with people who are incredibly religious about stuff like I think the main one for me is always been LGBTQ+ rights where it's like I'm advocating for these things and I'm showing them these studies that support it all. They're always like no no no no no la la la la um and it's just like no matter how much evidence I present it never seems to make any difference. I wanted to ask you know cuz I heard you talking about your deconstruction um experience and about how you know you were worried you were going to get pushed back but do you think one of the reasons people are so averse to things they perceive to be against their religion is because they're afraid of what their deity will think of them.

[00:02:02]I think so. I mean, or they're depending on how kind of the the environment you're in, I think there's a lot of kind of pressure that if you accept these other ideas, it is evidence of a moral failing. Um that you are backsliding, that you have given into Satan, that you are being of the world, and you are you know, not disciplined, not holy enough.

[00:02:35]And and so I think there's there's sort of that fear of like I don't want to become bad. I don't want to be a bad Christian, or I don't want to kind of go down a slippery slope and end up like if I accept this one idea about the the queer community, does that mean I'm going to go down this slippery slope and suddenly, you know, not believe anything anymore?

[00:03:02]I think there's a lot of that kind of fear, too.

[00:03:06]Yeah.

[00:03:07]It's always struck me as kind of weird though, cuz it's like wouldn't you want your man to have as best a life as they could be as they could have? Uh but then kind of to bring it back to your deconstructions to maybe hit this on a more personal point. Was it scary for you when you were going through it? Was it something that you were like really worried about because kind of as I said earlier, it wasn't uh cornerstone of who we were up until that point.

[00:03:32]Oh, yeah.

[00:03:33]>> for me. Yeah.

[00:03:35]I I would say, I don't know, I think everyone's a little bit different. For me, like the initial stages weren't that scary. Like the the first time like I cracked the door open to could the Bible be wrong?

[00:03:49]That was scary. That very first moment when I was like 21 and I saw the first time two distinct issues. One, that the manuscripts are a mess. We don't really know what the Bible originally said. And number two, that it accounts for why we have so many contradictions in the Bible. It's because the manuscripts just don't agree. And so it opened my eyes at a young age like, oh man, like it's the Bible could be wrong. And that was destabilizing. And then I I kind of reoriented myself to a less fundamentalist viewpoint. And then I was fine after that. But it was never terrifying. It was scary, but it was it was like not terrifying. The part that became terrifying for me is not when I left Christianity. When I left Christianity, I still believed in a God.

[00:04:33]I think going from believing in a generic God into atheism was scarier.

[00:04:38]Going into atheism for me was scarier than than just leaving my religion.

[00:04:43]Because it might be true that your religion is false, but something else is true. But once you get to atheism, now you're stuck. You're like, well, this is it. This is all we have. And you have to learn a whole new reality. Like you have to reorient everything you thought you knew. And like the plans that you had in life, what you thought you were going to do, a lot of times they all change, too.

[00:05:09]Yeah, and I guess that's kind of where I am right now. Cuz like don't get me wrong, I'm totally down with the science. I'm totally down with I think Forrest actually said it best.

[00:05:17]He has his universal moral principles at the top of the morality pyramid.

[00:05:22]Um and I'm totally down on board with those. I think they're absolutely excellent. But for me, I'm I'm kind of like in this place right now where it's like it's it is like you said, it's scary where it's like um I don't believe in Bible. I don't ascribe to those beliefs. But at the same time, is it still wrong of me to want to believe in some kind of higher power?

[00:05:43]I'm kind of No, I don't think it's wrong. crossroads.

[00:05:47]I think it might be I think it's built in and I don't know if everybody has it but I think it's such a universal feature it accounts for why humans are so prone to wanting to believe in gods and I think the best theory I've heard for it is that because of our biological wiring as children we we desire to have parents that are like protectors or there for us, all right? And so but what happens is as we become adults like even though we feel like we don't need our biological parents anymore we still have that internal instinct from evolution to we still want something we we need a protector or covering something that cares about us and so that's why we still look to even as we grow older like more higher parent even cuz we just have that need and I think for a lot of people it even grows stronger as they age and their their real biological parents start to pass on. I think for a lot of people that triggers another wave of like oh even deeper desire for parenting now that my you know my actual parents are gone. And to me that makes sense with with what we see in society and it it seems to agree with evolution. What do you think Sarah?

[00:06:59]Yeah, I mean I think and certainly religion ticks a lot of boxes for us psychologically and I like what Justin said I'm never going to tell someone that no you're totally wrong for believing in a god because I you know I'm an agnostic atheist meaning that I don't think we can ever demonstrate the non-existence of a god and so I I am not ever going to say I'm 100% sure there's no possibility I think it's I think it's intellectually honest to leave that space open you know maybe there's evidence that I just haven't seen yet.

[00:07:40]Um so yeah I think it's I think it's completely reasonable to to believe in a God.

[00:07:48]Okay, and I I guess now that we've kind of gotten deeper and deeper into it, another one of like the reasons that I'm kind of afraid to step away from belief of a higher power is kind of like the fear of what comes next, you know, like after death, where every religion has most of them anyway, has some kind of afterlife, and to me that was always a comforting idea, where like you know, how you spend your time in this world, um you have a chance of seeing the people you care about uh again, and I I so I will admit I am not the most educated on atheism, um so do you guys kind of have anything like that? Cuz that would definitely make it a whole lot easier, but Yeah, I can deeply empathize with that.

[00:08:32]Um my my journey was a lot sort of more condensed than Justin's. I basically went from devout Christian to atheist in the span of a year. Like the whole thing just collapsed really fast. And the hardest thing for me to adjust to was the idea of no heaven.

[00:08:52]Um the idea that um this is it. That was really hard for me, and honestly still is hard for me sometimes. So I I don't want to project like, "Nope, I'm totally cool with it.

[00:09:05]It's great. I'm so happy about it." Um sometimes it still is hard.

[00:09:09]And I think um I just for me I just don't see any evidence that our consciousness could continue on. Like I I don't know how that could possibly happen. Which is why I think this is probably it.

[00:09:27]However, you know, I also know that um like I follow a couple of hospice nurses on TikTok um that are really comforting, I think. You know, they talk a lot about the process of death, and it is while it's not universally peaceful, um, it is a peaceful process for a lot of people.

[00:09:50]And certainly an interesting phenomena is that, um, when people are at the moment of death, death is on its way, um, they often see relatives or loved ones that have already passed. And so, the experience people seem to have is loved ones coming to get you.

[00:10:11]And I think we probably can explain that physiologically, um, although I do think it's interesting that it's only people who have passed, and they're you're not you're not like hallucinating someone who's still alive.

[00:10:25]Um, but I do take comfort in that the actual kind of act of of ending is is probably peaceful and comforting, um, and so that helps.

[00:10:37]I would say too, like it's an interesting field of study, and I think one leap that believers might be prone to take is that if in fact there's some sort of consciousness, uh, that exist existing after death, that it would mean that there's a god. I actually don't believe it to be the case.

[00:10:55]If we if we discover like if the movie Flatliners, uh, W. Kevin Bacon became true, and it turned out that there was some sort of consciousness living on after we're dead, um, to me that would just point towards like more like Buddhism being true, where there seems to be some sort of spiritual component to our biological makeup, but still no reason to believe in a god at all.

[00:11:21]Yeah.

[00:11:22]Uh, everything you said makes perfect sense. I mean, like as I said, I'm very much a scientific oriented person down with the the I guess for me though, it really is just a lot of fear. It's just a lot of fear that you know, this is it. So, if I don't do a good job the first time, I've kind of blown it.

[00:11:41]Yeah, that's such a good point, you know, cuz when when we're in the faith, we we have this idea like this life is a throwaway, it's a blip, we're just passing through. The the real thing is coming next, right? But if this is all there is, like we really owe it to ourselves and others to make the most of it. And even from a selfish standpoint, even if you have purely selfish instincts, you can still get to a point where you have a motivations to help others, even if they stem from purely selfish instincts.

[00:12:13]Like, for example, this is the only life I get to live, I I want to enjoy it, which means I should encourage others to behave similarly because if if I'm discouraging people from enjoying their life or I'm preventing them from enjoying their life, well, then I might live in a society where they're preventing me from enjoying my life, and I don't want that. So, like even from just a purely like, you know, animalistic instinct level, at at the atheist level, you can still develop a really good framework for avoiding the nihilism nonsense. Nihilism is not worth your time. Don't go down that road. There's There's always hope to be alive and to enjoy one more day.

[00:12:57]And I if I can add to that, um my my experience right after I stopped believing in God, for the next few years, I definitely was like, "What do I do? Like, what do Yeah, what is life about? Am I just going to die? How do I" And I struggled for a while, and I remember thinking a lot about my deathbed. And like, what am I going to regret on my deathbed? And how can I live in a way that, you know, I'm not sad about it or upset with myself for doing the wrong thing. And I was in my mid-20s at that time.

[00:13:32]Um and I'm 40 now.

[00:13:34]Um and so while hopefully I have a lot of life ahead of me, I have lived quite a bit of life since then and I've had some really really difficult things happen and I can tell you now just with 15 years more experience, I don't think we're going to be on our deathbeds thinking, I should have done this and I should have done that and um I wish I had really reached my true potential. I think we're going to think about our loved ones, you know?

[00:14:04]And I I think there's you often can look back at your life with a lot more compassion and kindness and know that you did the best that you could. And so I worry a lot less about like deathbed regrets. I think I think building a life with love, any kind of love in any sort of way, um I think is is going to be really meaningful.

[00:14:31]Yeah, I agree. Um I'll try and uh I'll try and follow in your footsteps.

[00:14:36]Um I do have one more question though if you guys have the time. I know it's been a little bit.

[00:14:42]It's okay. So uh the what really kind of set me on this whole journey was well, one, I discovered you guys and I've been a a fan of Forest for a while then I was like, oh, he has a whole talk show he's on. So I listened to quite a lot of your videos. But when I called in that night, the topic was is religion good for society?

[00:15:02]I was firmly no on that one.

[00:15:05]But what I really want to ask you as people who have kind of come out of it, I unfortunately don't think religion is going to go anywhere. So for people like me who are kind of stuck in between but still want to do good things, is there a way for us to make a positive difference within the foundational religions? Uh I think the biggest one in America right now is probably Christianity, maybe more specifically Roman Catholicism. I'm not entirely sure.

[00:15:34]But is there a way we can positively affect these communities to where they kind of start shifting towards, you know, more open belief systems, less less um really awful I think so. So, it's difficult. So, for example, I know pastors right now, uh friends of mine that I I know they really don't believe anymore, but they feel like they can utilize the religion to motivate people to do good things.

[00:16:03]And so, there certainly is that route.

[00:16:05]Um but, I think the the difficulty there is when you have a religion like Christianity or Islam, where it's so just it's has done so much damage, by perpetuating it, even though you might be utilizing it for good, somebody else might be utilizing it for bad. So, I think it's better maybe to find something else. And I really I've always loved that like Matt has championed um like the humanist groups and secular morality.

[00:16:35]Uh we're getting better and better humanist groups now that are getting larger and they're easier to find one near you that you can get yourself affiliated with to do good things. We're getting more and more non-religious charities popping up that you can participate in.

[00:16:52]Um so, like there are certainly are some avenues you can do in the non-religious route, but to be fair to my friends that are that are still in ministry for the single purpose of I feel like I can use it for good. I get it. I really do get it. If you're if you're stuck there and you're like it's better for me to be here as a pastor to move these people towards positive direction, than maybe somebody else to be here that could turn them all into Christofascists.

[00:17:18]Um I I get why you would make that decision.

[00:17:22]And I think with >> Yeah, I I Oh, go ahead.

[00:17:27]No, I was just going to say I I do see where you're coming from and I I totally get it. Uh I guess I've I've always been kind of someone who focuses in a bit too much. Uh just this is really sad, but this the idea that there isn't just as large of a group as of non-religious people who are trying to do good things didn't even occur to me until you said it out loud.

[00:17:49]Yeah, I mean it definitely just look in like near whatever wherever you live, look for secular humanist groups.

[00:17:57]Um even I know it sounds funny, but even look for um a temple a satanic temple. They're typically not Satan worshipers. They're usually just atheists and the whole satanic temple thing is just for fun. They typically do charitable work. It's kind of like nowadays um you guys might not realize this, Hells Angels nowadays is really just engages in mostly charity. They're not out there like doing biker gang stuff anymore.

[00:18:24]Um and satanic temple's a little bit like that.

[00:18:29]Yeah.

[00:18:30]That's actually one of my favorite jokes is they like as as a Christian it's easier for me to get along with Satanists than it is other denominations of the same religion.

[00:18:39]>> Yeah. But no, thank you very much. I'll definitely spend a lot more time now just looking into these causes cuz I'm I don't know if there are I am right now. I definitely live in like a rural conservative Christian area. But hopefully I won't be here for much longer. So, I'll definitely try and make a difference.

[00:18:58]Listen, we got your back.

[00:19:03]I appreciate it, guys. Thank you for having me. You're welcome.

[00:19:06]>> great great to hear from you. Kind of weird, but I appreciate you guys. Thank you very much.

[00:19:12]Anytime.

[00:19:13]Cheers.

[00:19:16]Um well, it interesting we we've got another deconstructee.

[00:19:21]Um So, we started the call with one and we got another one. I I feel like when you when you have a space where people are open to dialogue about it, I think people are are I think they make much more progress when they feel like they're being helped and not judged.

[00:19:37]Yeah, I mean, that's what I was I was going to It didn't fit into the conversation boat. I was going to add when he was asking about like, "Well, what if we try to, you know, change religion from the inside?" And people know when you're treating them like a project, you know, and people know if you are there to change them or convert them or um which is why, you know, a lot of our debates go the way that they do. Um but yeah, I think um trying to Try If you are in a church and your entire goal is to change everyone at that church, I don't think it's going to go well.

[00:20:18]No, and to be fair, like you don't have You don't have as much control over your congregation as you might think you do as a pastor. No matter how many people bring you baked goods and tell you your sermon was amazing, which to be fair, is a really good benefit. I I don't know if there's any pastors out here that are former pastors. One of my favorite benefits was people bringing you baked goods. I mean, to say thank you for showing up, you know, it's it's one of those things. Hey, come on, man. We got to We got to promote that clip we all just watched.

[00:20:52]Well, I'd rather not shill.

[00:20:54]Okay, well, Daddy has a $2,000 a month Red Oak habit, and you're going to I am your production god, and you will shill when I tell you to shill. Dance for me. Dance for me, baby.

[00:21:06]Go God damn it. Why has my life come to this? Go to patreon.com/the official line and donate, god damn it.

[00:21:14]This is what happens when we let live chatters write our scripts.