do you suspect your church might  be becoming a progressive christian  

church this is madness it's madness  i tell you for the love of god

hi beautiful people today we're discussing author  and apologist elisa childers you may know her as  

the woman that pops up every time you search  progressive christianity i am happy to report  

that on that search me and my new friend colby  martin come up first but we're sandwiched between  

ben shapiro's site the daily wire elisa childers  and ali b stuckey which are all videos or articles  

vilifying the progressive movement that said i  thought it was important to speak on elisa because  

as people on the deconstruction or reconstruction  journey i don't want you to feel afraid and all  

three of these sources are attempting to bring  more fear and doubt to you on this earnest journey  

of discovery and i believe it's because they fear  and doubt the progressive movement themselves  

which does not have to be your problem so i  hope this video will bring you peace as we sift  

through elise's problems with progressivism and  alisa i dm'd you because i'd love to talk to you  

instead of about you in the future before we begin  please keep pre-ordering my memoir on her knees  

it comes out on april 6th and i just finished  recording the audio version and please pick up  

some goddess gray merch or consider joining  the patreon community past two months we've  

had exclusive patreon zoom parties and they've  honestly been so much fun last thing i'll say  

justin ko and i had a beautiful interview when  i was in oregon for jacqueline glenn's wedding  

if anyone is curious about my story or wants to  learn how to better align their sexuality and  

spirituality you will enjoy this interview which  i will link below so the brief history of elisa  

childers is that she was a singer in the christian  band zoe girl so we toured all over the country  

and i actually relate to her so deeply when she  talks about her connection to divinity from a  

young age i've loved the bible as early as i could  read and write i would go to church and i would  

do the music and worship and i'd feel the  goosebumps and you know and i i associated  

that with the presence of god that's what made  it real to me after her tour with zoe girl it  

seems that elisa dipped her toe into a progressive  church after seeing the worst of evangelicalism  

i kind of saw christians at their worst in the  church at its worst sometimes not always but  

you know we had some bad experiences and there  were things about evangelical culture that were  

bothering me now let's be real in many cases  pain is what compels us to deconstruct or to  

find progressive christianity or to even press in  and seek the truth and this is the reason many of  

us are generalized as butt hurt or bitter because  we woke up to the toxicity of evangelicalism be it  

through failed marriages failed leaders modesty  culture rape culture misogyny i just don't know  

why those men are you know colonization spiritual  abuse and financial abuse you need to send in 35  

000. if you do not write that p.o box and you do  not call that toll-free number your dream will die  

i don't know what elisa experienced on tour but  i'm assuming it's a combination of these things  

my friend lauren deliri formerly of the christian  band love collide talks about being overly  

sexualized judged for never being good enough pure  enough modest enough and how that christian music  

culture can wear you down whatever the case may  be after tour elisa describes attending a church  

that addressed these concerns this church that  we were at was kind of addressing those same  

concerns and it just felt so authentic here's  where it gets sticky for lisa at a certain point  

she describes being invited to a small group  where she felt there was a bait and switch  

the pastor invited me to be a part of a study  group that was very small very exclusive and it  

was in the context of this group that he revealed  that he was an agnostic it almost seems deceptive  

right it almost does doesn't it from here elise's  journey leads her to apologetics i'm familiar with  

apologetics because my dad loves it christian  apologetics is rooted in the greek word meaning  

verbal defense it's a branch of christian theology  that defends christianity against objections  

i truly believe the main distinction between  apologetics and progressive christianity is  

that progressive christians are simply saying  hey these beliefs or positions you are defending  

happen to be hurting people profoundly not  all christian theology that's why we still  

identify as christian but the points  of contention we've been arguing over  

like abortion racism and lgbtq plus issues and  my greatest frustration with elisa is that she  

seemed to have an experience with a pastor she  deemed progressive even though he self-identified  

as agnostic and is now considered an expert among  conservative voices who are already determined  

to debunk minimize and misunderstand the  progressive christian movement like ali  

b stuckey who had elisa as a guest my first  issue with this interview is that neither woman  

grants validity to either this movement or to our  personal faith they they fancy themselves humble  

when really a lot of times they're just confused  and they want people to be confused along  

with them i think christianity is going to  give you a jesus it's going to give you a god  

but it's not a jesus who can save you it's jesus  christianity yes sorry progressive christianity  

yeah thank you now we're back to the issue i  originally had with girl defined where i tried  

to express it's not our differences that hurt it's  the fact that conservatives tell us we don't know  

the real jesus we're not real christians  and before we dive dive in let's address  

the issue of being kind my interactions generally  speaking with atheists and in my interactions with  

progressive christians um it's it's much harder to  interact with progressive christians because they  

they will go so quickly to the mocking and  making fun and just sort of brutal just mean  

so mean i'm sorry excuse me mrs stuckey you're  one of the most unkind conservative voices i know  

change the world by posting a black square if you  wrap something in sarcasm or condescension it is  

still unkind here ali constructed a fake interview  where the sole purpose seemed to be making  

aoc look like an idiot do you have any knowledge  whatsoever about how our political system works  

yikes and ally often makes a mockery of things  that she frankly doesn't understand or doesn't  

want to understand an example of this is in her  fake ad where she mocks progressives religious  

people are idiots democrats would much rather you  sacrifice yourself on the altar of progressivism  

obviously people can be mean for the sake of being  mean but if you are receiving a lot of cruelty  

it's worth checking in and making sure you're not  leading with cruelty yourself so so that's against  

the rules and you can't sit with us any woman  who disagrees with us on this is a self-hating  

stupid bimbo you can't stick with us i've talked  before about where i've lacked kindness in the  

past i am not perfect obviously but i've learned  that cruelty shame and mocking drive more division  

and hate whereas education and listening to each  other is key it's golden it's beautiful and here  

comes the hot debate who knows the real jesus i  myself have never felt more aligned with jesus  

more alive more joyful than i do now as  a progressive christian but unlike these  

women i will not accuse them of not knowing the  same jesus as me i will however accuse lisa of  

not really knowing about progressive christianity  the first major thing elisa gets wrong is how she  

presents progressive doctrine jesus death was a  sacrifice that paid the price for our sin that he  

was punished in our place and these are all terms  in progressive christianity that are rejected and  

they'll call that cosmic child abuse lisa i'm  a progressive and i do believe in jesus's death  

and resurrection so your generalization is  incorrect here's the thing and conservatives  

may hate this progressives don't have a church or  a set of doctrinal beliefs this is a movement you  

may find a progressive church but i don't have one  and most of the progressives i know don't have one  

either we are simply a large community of people  realizing the evangelical doctrine we were given  

never aligned with our true faith we are  the prodigal sons and daughters who had to  

stay away from our church homes because when our  concerns were brought up to our church families we  

were dismissed i watched my lgbtq brothers and  sisters get treated like second-class citizens  

from whom the church would take their tithes but  not allow them to teach or preach or lead or have  

equal rights in general if there's one sacrament  in progressive christianity it's deconstruction  

you go through your deconstruction and that's part  of being a progressive christian no this is wrong  

elisa the sole reason i speak out is so that we  can all share a faith that doesn't have to be  

deconstructed for its harmful doctrines i want to  restore the church as a safe place for christians  

because for too long we have been harboring the  abusers and abusing the seekers that said i am  

one progressive christian and i can only speak  for myself here because the point of progressive  

christianity is that we are inclusive and that we  honor people on their journeys if you're scared of  

eternal damnation it may be scary to hear someone  say they don't believe in christ's resurrection  

but the point of the progressive space is to allow  for those questions because i promise you there  

are conservatives in your circle who are asking  the same questions but they're not allowed to  

speak them out loud and it's honestly just lazy to  threaten them with hell and tell them to move on  

now y'all listen to how these real life heavy  concerns are minimized in this conversation  

what you often find in progressive christianity  is that the title or the name jesus gets slapped  

on whatever cause they they as a person think is  worthy environmentalism socioeconomic reform green  

energy lgbt inclusion from my view biblically the  burden of proof rests on elisa and ali here not me  

i can show you where jesus commands us to  take care of the poor and needy or what  

progressives would call socioeconomic reform and  universal health care at the beginning of genesis  

god charges us to be good stewards of the earth  aka environmentalism and green energy these  

political policies are not going to be foolproof  they will need to be worked out and we are not  

idolizing them like jesus himself but we are  reading the bible with our own eyes and seeing  

dang these policies really seem to mirror and  reflect things that jesus called us to be that god  

called us to be in fact you'll hear progressive  christians say that i couldn't believe in a god  

who and then fill in the blank so essentially  whatever i wouldn't do i couldn't serve a god  

that would do that so god i'm more moral than god  why are you vilifying us for seeing these as areas  

of importance and maybe you have a different  approach or a different way of getting there  

but don't demonize us don't make us sound like the  enemy as for lgbtq plus inclusion no we are not  

saying we can't believe in a god who is not as  moral as us we are reading our own bibles and  

seeing that god is good god is love we are made  in god's image so when elisa asks us to fill in  

fill in the blank i couldn't believe in a god who  claims to love us unconditionally but will force  

a sexual ethic that causes people to commit that  makes no sense to me your christian sister on this  

and many subjects the accusation from elisa and  ali is that progressive christians live in moral  

relativity the whole concept of deconstruction is  rooted in post-modern relativism so it's based on  

the idea that you know truth can't really be known  if objective truth exists none of us have access  

to it again progressive christian here and to me  it's obvious that objective truth exists to me  

that truth is god is divinity and ali is  super anti-gray forgotten this you know you're  

you're young you shouldn't be so sure of these  beliefs you'll realize that the world is messy  

that it's gray but if you don't concede that  we live in a very complicated and nuanced world  

then we might not be living on the same  planet the elephant in the room of this  

entire conversation is that ali and elisa simply  don't like the conclusions that we are coming to  

as progressive christians our main main difference  is not that you are christians and we are not  

the main difference is how we view inclusivity  and spiritual abuse and how we are processing the  

messy complicated history of our religion  unfairly multiple times both women refer to  

agnosticism when you deconstruct and you don't  have any foundation on which to to build any  

kind of faith except for moral relativism you end  up in this sea of agnosticism which is the belief  

that quote human reason is incapable of providing  sufficient rational grounds to justify either the  

belief that god exists or the belief that god does  not exist which is a blatant misrepresentation of  

us again not agnostic we're christian we're  simply looking at the elephants of religion  

from different angles perhaps i can appreciate  that ali and elisa are both clearly devoted to  

the faith and spreading what they believed to be  the good news but we progressive christians are  

asking you to stop making assumptions about us and  start talking to us we could learn a lot from each  

other we are asking you to listen god is great  community in a future video i'd be happy to dive  

further into elisa's doctrinal beliefs about  progressivism and debunk them or confirm them  

because she's got a lot of things right  but she's got a lot of things wrong and  

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