Understand the thinking atheist. It's not a person, it's a symbol, an
idea. The population of atheists this country is going through the rule, rejecting
faith, pursuing knowledge, challenging the sacred. If I tell the truth,
it's because I tell the truth, not because I put my hand on a
book and made a wish and working together for a more rational world. Take
the risk of thinking feels so much more happiness. Truth, Usian wisdom will
come to you that way. Assume nothing, question everything, and start thinking.
This is the Thinking Atheist podcast hosted by Seth Andrews. Adam L.
Massri is a YouTube post He's got two channels, one in Arabic and one
in English. His website describes him as an Australian Egyptian freethinker, speaker,
human rights activist, author and content creator. He has been on the debate
scene. He founded Faith Crisis Australia and this is an organization to help ex
Christians as they navigate their post to religious life. His most recent book is
titled How Did Christianity Begin Really? Published in Arabic. He is a registered
therapist with the Secular Therapy Project and he also serves recovering from Religion dot Org.
Adam, I guess we don't have time to talk now that I've given
your resume for about forty five minutes at the beginning of the conversation, Adam,
it's great to talk to you. Thanks for coming. Thank you so
much for the wonderful introduction. How do I greet you? If we were
Muslims? Is it a SALAMU? All like them? Absolutely? ISLAMI like
them, Yeah, And then you would respond to what's the reply? Well,
it depends because I'm not fanatic enough. I would say we like them
Salem. But if you're talking to a specific sixt in Islam, they would
just say we like them without repeating Salam. Okay, I'll work on it,
you know, because I want to be able to do it properly.
I guess, uh, you're all over the place, and I mean this
in a good way. On your resume. I'm seeing all right, I
got Australian, I got Egyptian, I got Islam. Can we start with
Islam? With that being all right with you? Adam, Absolutely, let's
start with terms. I hear Muslims, I see Muslims online. They quote
from the Qoran and the Hadith. What's the difference. Does Islam have like
two Bibles. The Quran is the holy book. Think about it as you
think of the Bible. It is the official holy book that was apparently revealed
from God. The hadith is the sayings that are attributed to the prophets.
So most of d hadith come through a chain of narratives. Think of the
Disciples of Christ. It's in the same sense that anything the disciples of Christ
said about Christ that would be the hadith. Is it to be understood or
assumed that Mohammad wrote all of the Koran wrote is a very tricky word here.
Ah. So officially God is the author of the crime. So when
you say who wrote the Crian, it's supposed to be God, but yeah,
transmitted through Muhammad, that would be the official way of saying it.
Well, they say the same thing for the Bible. Moses wrote the Penitug,
so Moses could not have been there before spacetime, before the creation of
the earth and the first humans. So therefore God was sort of, you
know, grabbing Moses after the fact and saying, Okay, here's what happened,
and he sort of guide at Moses's hand. It's that kind of thing
with Mohammad and the Quran hind that yes and no. In the Bible,
what most Christians believe it was inspired by God. God guided Moses revealed to
him in an ethereal sense, while in the Quran, Muslims believe that it
is actually the literal words of God. It was verbatim. It's like a
dictation. So God dictated every word and every letter of the Quran, not
in the sense of inspiring some details and left the rest for the human touch.
There is no human touch in the Quran. And the Hadith was that
written in the same way allegedly, No, the hadith is the actual sayings
of the prophet, So there is no dictation here. It's a chain of
narration. And then the hadith has massive classification. They call it actually the
science of classification in Islam. Where there is authentic hadith, there is weak
khadith. There is somewhere in between semi authentic. And it all comes down
to the chain of narrators who said what and in what way and to what
level they were known to be accurate in repeating the Chinese whispers if if you
want to call it that, the Bible too, like we've got the NIV
Bible and the New American Standard and the King James and the New King James
and all of these thousands of different variations. Any of that going on with
the Koran, or is it one thing and you better not not change it
or will execute your kind of thing. Absolutely, it's the same thing in
the Quran. Wild The funny thing, Seth, I'm glad you asked that,
because most Muslims will tell you that no, actually, the Quran,
wherever you buy it, anywhere in the world, is going to be exactly
the same Quran. But this is absolutely not true. It depends where you
buy the Quran from. There are two major copies. It's like the King
James. The King James is the most known Bible everywhere in the world,
so that there is Huffs and Welsh for the Choran. These are two different
versions of the Koran, and you will find the most spread. However,
if you go to countries like Algeria or Iran or Yemen, you might get
your hands on some interesting versions of the Koran. There's about, as far
as I know, there is about somewhere between twenty seven to thirty three different
versions of the Koran. You were born in Egypt. Is that correct correct
yes to a Muslim family. No, I was born and raised Christian.
I am a Coptic Orthodox Christian. Well, I was a Coptic Orthodox Christian.
What's a Coptic Orthodox Christian? Optic is the word. It's an ancient
word for basically Egyptian. Because you know, how you say Russian Orthodox or
Greek Orthodox. Usually the first word refers to a country or a geographic region,
while the second word is the denomination of Christianity that I belong to.
So Coptic basically means Egyptian and Orthodox is Orthodox Egyptian Orthodox Christian. So if
Islam is the predominant religion in Egypt and you are in a minority faith,
how are you treated? Very interesting? Ah? Sorry, Let's say,
let me think about are you are you second class? Are you worried for
your safety when you know you are walking the streets and someone sees, I
don't know, are you overtly Christian? Do you have Christian apperil or you
know in the States, we have Christian markers that people like, whether it's
the cross necklace or the crown of thorn's tattoo. Let's say you're broadcasting your
Christianity in the streets. What kind of a reception do you expect? So
Funnily enough, I do have the Coptic Christian tattoo. I'm not sure if
it is visible on my wrist here, but this is something most Coptic Christians
in Egypt would have at a very young age. I had this that too,
when I was twelve years old. It's kind of our way of putting
the faith on our in a visible way. It's kind of revealing your identity
in a way. And it's funny because when you say are you a second
class citizen or are you treated differently? Well, it depends on the context
and who's treating you. Are you in a dealing with a government organization,
are you talking about down the street dealing with everyday people. Let's put it
this way. In many, many occasions, I was always on edge and
not sure of the person treating me, whether that is the guy selling me
stuff in the shop or just the next door neighbor, whoever it is.
You always have this sense of I'm a second class citizen and it depends on
the person in front of me how they will treat me. I don't know
that, so so you always have your guards up in a way. If
that makes sense, it totally makes sense. There's a couple of other things
funny about Egypt. Is that one thing, even if you don't have the
cross statued on your hand, your name could very well reveal your religion.
If your name is Michael or Gighis or Paul, you're surely is Christian.
If your name is Ali or Muhammad or any other Muslim, you're surely Muslim,
says Sometimes your name will just reveal your religious affiliations. And the last
thing is it's also on your ID card. That's also unique to Egypt.
I'm not sure if it is in any other Arab country or not. But
if a policeman stops you and asks for the ID on your ID card,
it says, if you are Christian or Muslim, are you allowed to put
no preference no religion on your ID? In Egypt? There is no such
thing. You're either Christian or Muslim or Jew. But I've never seen it
on any ID but you're allowed technically. Okay. So with the name Adam
l Massri, are you named after the biblical Adam? I mean, would
that give you away? Well in a way, yes, Adam is a
very common name in Egypt, well in the whole Middle East. So yes,
I'm named after the Great Adam. So I'm going to ask you the
obvious next question that I ask all heathen activist or he even humanist activist.
You had a deconstruction because you're helping others, But how did you get out
of the faith? It was my own faith crisis, I think about ten
years ago. It's always hard to answer that question, Seth, because you
never go to bed one Tuesday night thinking you're Christian, and then you wake
up Wednesday morning, I'm like, I'm not anymore. So I guess I
went through a phase of doubts and questioning myself and I read a lot and
it was very, very troubling. And it wasn't inner turmoil that led me
eventually to join a very reputable university in Australia to do a degree in Biblical
studies and textual criticism, mainly for my own benefit, because I didn't want
to leave my faith coming from a place of ignorance, so I really wanted
to throw myself into more knowledge, and by the end of that degree,
I openly declared myself agnostic and from there different things led me in different ways.
Were there consequences for you, family, friends, your social circle?
Massive consequences. The first thing is I was excommunicated. I lost my entire
social circle because my whole life was entrenched in the church. So overnight I
didn't have any friends at all, zero friends. It also led into my
divorce, so I was married at the time when I had my faith crisis,
and then eventually that led to a divorce. I had some hiccups with
my family, mom and dad and brother. They are all living in Australia
and it took some time to restore the relationship with them, and luckily for
me, it eventually got to the point that they just accepted who I am
and it's my own personal journey. There was no shunning, but there was
You know that they always have this idea that you probably read a couple of
books that missed with your head. So we will convince you once we just
if you come and sit with Bishop such and such or priests such and such,
they will restore your faith. But more and more they realized that I
know more than that than they can restore. I guess it's interesting how these
cultures like to pinball toward authority at the Capitol because I had the same thing.
I'm coming out. I'm realizing that two plus two did not actually equal
five, and that all this stuff doesn't make sense, and people started throwing
names apologists' books. Someone asked me to attend an apologist seminar because they have
a theology degree. Somehow, even before they heard him speak, they knew
he would speak the truth. They lean into these authorities, and personal thinking
seems to shut down. I don't know if you noticed that, Adam,
I do, and I had this dual understanding. I could see for the
first time how I saw these people I just mere humans after all, while
my family still thought of them as holy figures, that they are the bearers
of light, they are the bearers of truth. So it was very interesting
at that time because I just came out of the faith. I held these
people at some point in my life as holy people and the bearer of truth,
and if I needed to ask about anything, I would go to the
priest or, to the bishop, or whoever it is. Now I'm going
to an academic and I'm going to university to secular academics to get my answers
from. And it was at that time that I started saying, Wow,
my worldview has changed, and I'm saying things for the first time, completely
different from my family. It's funny how we are so conditioned bond to give
extra equity to somebody who begins with the introduction reverend, pastor minister, at
least in the United States. And I tell this story. Forgive me if
you've heard it. Everybody who was watching and listening, but free flow.
The Florida Freethought Convention in Orlando was having its convention and there was a Friday
night costume party and I went as a priest, and so I got a
very authentic priest outfit and I wore it out of my hotel room and got
into the elevator when all the way down walked through the lobby, down the
corridors and to the party. Well on my way. You should have seen
how people deferred to me. No idea who I was. They had no
idea what my degree might have been in I could have been a serial killer,
a gild Miletia. They have no idea. But I walk into the
elevator and everybody's raucus, and they're all swapping stories and laughing, and they
went stone quiet and start almost looked at the floor reverence toward me. Someone
asked me if a patron had died in the hotel, and I was there
to perform like last rites, and I thought to myself, the power that
the clerics hold just perceptions of credibility. Jim Palmer is a guy who he's
not religious, but spiritual, and he and I have our disagreements, but
he says a lot of interesting and sometimes really good stuff. But he says,
you know, somebody who has a pastoral title has no real Credibit is
not more credible than anybody else. I don't know, I'm babbling. Adam,
do you have any thoughts on the moms and the clerics and the pastors
and the reverence. I probably will say exactly what you just said. It's
so funny how in especially in the Middle East, like you're describing how it
is in America, in the Middle East, it's multiplied by ten. How
these people are very much regarded at a higher level. But since you're talking
about your friend as well, who is spiritual but not religious, I went
through that phase when I came out. It's like morphing. It's not like
I know, I said, by the end of my degree, I openly
declared myself agnostic. But there was a phase in between where I couldn't be
completely spiritually naked. In a way. I needed something to hang on too,
So I went out Christianity hanging onto some spiritual elements out there before I
really could have the guts to declare myself agnostic or agnostic, etheist, whatever
you call it. I always say that you're in the center of the bull's
eye, which is high control religion, fundamental literalist, you know, Bible,
Koran literalist. But you start to doubt, and you take the next
step, well, the Bible is partially true or some of it's metaphor.
And then before you know it, you take the next step and you say,
well, that's not a religion. I don't really need the Bible.
I love Jesus. And then maybe you take the next step and say,
well Jesus may have been God, but he had some good things to say
and blah blah blah. And then you end up near the ends and the
next steps are there may be no God. That's terrifying, and it's totally
understandable why people would pause there in this nebulous area of well, I think
there's something out there, and I'm not religious, but I'm spiritual. I
think that's a position of safety because for many the next steps are pretty scary,
and in your work as a secular therapist you probably see a lot of
that. I'm terrified to go the distance. I think maybe I'll just sort
of sit here in the neutral zone, right totally, yeap. And this
is the huge difference you find between Adam the activist and Adam the secular therapist,
because Adam the activist Adam on YouTube. On my YouTube channels, I
promote critical thinking, I challenge scripture, and I basically debunk a lot of
beliefs on my channel. But when it comes to therapy, my role is
not to debunk anything or challenge anything. It's my role is actually to meet
the person where they're at. And it's a completely different position and it requires
a lot of discipline because at that point, you're basically trying to validate where
this person is at. You're trying to assure them that they're not going insane
for doubting. They have every reasonable reason to doubt, how they are doubting
and where they're at. And I get all sorts of different people, some
people who want to leave Islam and embrace Christianity, some people who want to
leave the religion altogether. So yeah, it's an interesting world where you do
the work as a religious trauma therapist. Still to come. It's pretty gutsy
to say out loud there's a bunch of bullshit in the Quran, but Adam
has been doing that. We're going to find out more about this next.
Thanks for your support on Patreon makes a difference Patreon dot com, slash Seth
Andrews. You get the show early, and you get the show absolutely commercial
free. Speaking here with Adam L Masri. He is a former religious person
and he is helping people in their own journeys. Two YouTube channels are they
echoes of each other? I mean, do you do a version of one
video in English and then it's the same content in Arabic? No. I
started the Arabic channel about seven or eight years ago. And when I started
it, I started it just because I was I wanted to share my experience
with others. I wanted to find like minded people who had a similar journey
to mine, and it was my way to connect and share my two cents
wor Little Dot. I knew at the time that it will grow into over
one hundred thousand subscribers one hundred and twenty now I guess fifteen million views.
It grew beyond my expectations, and it wasn't until about two years ago that
I realized that hang on a second here, Yes, while I'm doing this
work in Arabic, there is a huge gap in the English speaking world,
specifically to understand Islam from an Arabic speaking person. So the material that I
present on both channels are in a way completely different. I focus on certain
topics on the Arabic channel that is suited for the Arabic speaker, while in
the English world I try to present my arguments in a slightly different way,
more focused on Islam and more suited to the Western to the Western world from
your perspective, to people, doubters, even apostates, atheists in high control.
Let's say one of the third teen Islamic nations, right with Islamic governments,
Do they have access to your channel? Are they down in the basement
looking you up online and watching you and then secretly reaching out. It depends
who the person and what which country they come from. So I can tell
you that there are some people, let's say in Egypt, a lot of
people are just watching me in the privacy of their own bedroom or office.
Usually my videos are watching private because no one is open about their current state
of belief. But then you have a country like Afghanistan, for instance.
This is a country that officially I received a number of emails from YouTube saying
that a government body in Afghanistan has requested for this video to be banned in
their country. And I have about fifty percent of my channel banned in Afghanistan.
Yet I received messages from people from Afghanistan saying, well, don't worry,
brother, we will use VPN, or we found ways to browse your
videos and still watch you through the VPN. So it depends how tech heavy
the person is. It depends what country and what length they go to ban
your material. So you do videos pointing out things like mistakes in the Quran,
and then what do you go down to your bunker and lock the door
because you know people have declared war on you. Do you worry about your
safety? I always have to ask this to people taking on Islam. Do
you worry about somebody who's going to exact Allah's justice against your physical body.
There is I have to be honest, there is a level of concern.
Yes, not to the level that I am worried looking over my shoulder all
the time. But I received the threats. I received emails and messages from
lawyers in Egypt saying that under the blasphemy law they filed cases against me in
the court. So one thing I am actually, I'm unable to go and
visit my home country. I cannot go to Egypt because if I go to
Egypt, I'll probably be arrested in the airport. The opportunity to be one
hundred percent sure if there are cases against me or not. But according to
the messages that I received, there are cases against me in the court under
the blasphemy law. And I have reached out to the Australian Federal Police a
couple of times to report death threats that I received. But that's more out
of being wise and being cautious in a way. I try to stay private,
not living in a bunker or anything. You're not crawling to the car
and the prone position. Now, okay, So I open that can of
worms, mistakes and misstatements, myths, and lies in the Quran. Uh
Oh, I'm going to have to ask for some examples, because I always
heard the Koran was perfect, the perfect word of Allah. What are we
talking about. I can't remember what I presented in that particular video, but
I can tell you a lot of mistakes in the Koran. Specifically, there
are historical mistakes that are scientific mistakes in the Quran. It really depends.
I can give you example of each if you wish ture. So one good
example, since I'm from Egypt, there's a verse in the Quran where Pharaoh
is calling someone named Herman and he's asking him to bake bricks to build a
massive tower to go up in the skies and find out about the God of
Moses. So Pharaoh was apparently jealous from the God of Moses and wanted to
build a tower using baked clay to reach the heavens. And in that video,
I am arguing that if only the author of the Quran knew that the
ancient Egyptians never built high rises and high towers using baked clays, ABC engineering
would say that the baked clay or the baked bricks will crumble under the heavyweight
of the structure, so the Egyptians knew that, but the author of the
Quran didn't know that. And of course I get all sorts of apologetic responses
trying to say, well, you're you're trying to say that Egyptians didn't use
baked clay or baked bricks. I'm like, that's not the argument. The
argument. I never said that Egyptians didn't use baked clay, but they never
used it in high rises. Specifically, if the author of the Quran knew
that the pyramid, one stone in the pyramid weighed about five tons, wouldn't
have set such averse. So that is one historical error in the Quran,
a scientific error in the Quran. And again there's a lot of refutations and
apologetic response, well, refutation attempts and apologetic response about how a character in
the Quran named as Dulparnaine apparently went to the far edges of the earth and
found the place where the sun sets and it was setting in murky waters.
And while it's very clear scientific error, again people try to refute it and
say, well, it appeared to Dulparnaine in his eyes, in the way
he saw it, that it was setting in murky waters. But that's not
what the Quran is saying. And again, I don't know to what length
do you want me to present the arguments and their refutations and the responses.
Oh, it sounds just like the Christianity apologists. If it happens to line
up with history, it verifies the Bible. If it doesn't, it's a
mistranslation, misinterpretation, metaphor, or the science and historians are all colluding to,
you know, try to kill God. I don't know, it's silly
putty. They can just sort of mash it into whatever they want. Doesn't
the Koran say, and I'm doing this for memory, and it's early and
I need more coffee. But doesn't it say the origin story of humankind is
the first human was harvested from a clot of blood instead of Adam and dirt.
Was it a clot of blood? In the Koran, it's yes and
no. It doesn't necessarily talk about Adam as the first human, but it
talks about how humans are created in the womb, and yes, it says
that all human beings they start from being a clot of blood in the worm,
which is absolutely wrong. Well, when you bring these contradictions and problems
and morality issues to Muslims. Given the fact that I think, as I'm
to understand it, most Muslims are like most Christians. Their scripture illiterate,
and they'll parrot of you, cherry picked things, maybe even chanting them.
I've heard a lot of Muslims do this. It's almost like listening to a
parrot, an apologist parrot, where they've just got this thing and you know,
and God is good, all'll be great kind of thing. Does it
make a dance with anybody? When you point this stuff out? I have
to say, Seth that I found Muslims to be much more literate about their
books more than Christians. It's often the case that you would reveal a verse
in the Bible and a Christian believer wouldn't have a clue or the first time
they heard this verse. But it's hardly the case with Muslims. Perhaps that's
because part of the is faith is to memorize the Quran, so most of
them, whether they understand it fully or not, that's a different question.
But they do remember the verses, and sometimes he gets this stoned face where
they heard the verse before, they recited it a million times before, but
they never really pondered upon the meanings, and the moment you reveal something,
they're like, no, no, no, no, you got it wrong.
The first point of attack is that you're not an Arabic speaker. And
once I revealed that actually I was born and raised and grew up in Egypt,
I am an Arabic speaker, they're like, ah, still, you're
not understanding it correctly, and you get into a different type of argument.
So if they read the story of Muhammad marrying a six year old and then
molesting the child at nine, for to be honest, many people are quoting
that, but they're not really going past they're not scratching past the surface.
And perhaps you have the conversation that causes them to consider what they just have
been parroting in the past, and then they have that moral dilemma. Would
that be an example of what you're talking about, Not with this particular example,
because this particular story about Mohammed marrying a child has been exhausted over and
over and it's kind of that there's this level of stubbornness to say the argument.
Funny that you raised that because literally today I was watching a video by
a Muslim apologist known as Ali Daua, and he was talking about this.
He lives in the UK and most of his work is in the UK,
and he was arguing that what did the prophet do wrong? If in the
UK, in Britain, Great Britain, one hundred years ago, if you
read the law and he presented I cannot repeat what he said verbatim, but
he was arguing that in the UK, child's marriage was allowed up to one
hundred or one hundred and fifty years ago, and the minimum age was twelve
years old or something like that. So he says, if you go back
and see it in the context of time that it happened, the prophet didn't
make anything wrong. This is a very, very famous and well known argument.
So this is not the example that I would get people having an aha
moment or being shocked. Most of my arguments are around areas related to other
things like women's rights in Islam, things related to female genital mutilation, marital
rape, inequality under the justice system. These are the things that the average
Muslim probably never heard about or have minimal knowledge around. It is child marriage
epidemic in islam dominant nations and even beyond in Islamic culture, child marriage something
beyond the fringes. It is, but then you get the contradiction. It's
a it's such a cognitive dissonance because if you look at a country like Egypt,
for instance, child marriage is illegal by the law. However it's happening
right left and center, and you will find marriage celebrants, and you will
find people to do the work, and you can register the marriage, and
you can forge the age of the child, and you can go about it
completely legal despite the fact that it is illegal in the books of law.
So is it epidemic? Yes, it is, But at the same time
someone can argue that how it is an epidemic when the country is actually considering
it unlawful. Imagine in Christianity saying Jesus not the Messiah. Is it true
that the Koran says Jesus is not the Messiah. We're going to talk about
that in just a second. Speaking here with ex Christian and human rights activist
Adam L. Masri, you have a video that's titled the Quran's biggest mistake
in saying Jesus is the Messiah. Again, I need you to educate me.
I always thought that the Koran presented Jesus as just another prophet and not
the Messiah. No, that the Koran keeps referring to Jesus as the Messiah,
and that's exactly what you just said, is the problem in the Koran.
How can the Quran refer to Jesus constantly as the Messiah son of Mary
when it doesn't really understand or endorse and endorses the concept of what Christ really
means. Okay, well, let me make sure I'm understanding. So the
black and white verses of the Koran, you is Messiah, but Islam as
a culture doesn't treat Jesus as the Messiah. So the concept of Messiah in
both Judaism and in Christianity is around salvation, bringing salvation, whether in the
Jewish context that salvation is earthly salvation or in the Christian theology where the salvation
became more of a spiritual salvation and restoring the relationship between man and God.
Christ or the Christ was that anointed figure that is supposed to come and have
salvation for humanity, restore world peace and all that jazz. The funny thing
is that the Quran then comes and endorses Jesus being the Messiah, but at
the same time denies his crucifixion. There is no salvation that came with Christ
and definitely no world peace that came with Christ. So under what basis exactly
are trying to tell me? I'm asking the Qoran here on what basis you're
claiming that Jesus is the Messiah if you're refusing every context that he can be
the Messiah the Savior? Am I then to understand that islamis revere Mohammed more
than Jesus Ah, that's a slippery slope. I mean, I know it's
a subjective, it's your perception and you don't have to answer Adam, but
I just I never hear Muslims talk about Jesus because it's always about Mohammed.
The Quran speaks of Jesus very very highly as the most regarded figure. However,
in the minds of everyday Muslim, they think that Muhammad is the finest
human being that came to earth, and definitely they revere him way more than
anyone or anything else. You will find a very famous chanting in times of
crisis in the Middle East. You will find a lot of people chanting Faedeka
abu umi asula law, which means even my mom and Dad, I consider
a sacrificial to you or prophet. This is how they consider the prophet Jesus.
That's sobering. The mom and dad are raising an eyebrow, going,
oh, you know, sleep with one eye open because we might be sacrificed
for the prophet. Let's pinball to your book. How did Christianity begin?
Really think about the book as one of bart Hrman's books. It's all about
how Christianity urged from Judaism, how they came to form their books, how
they came to form their theology, and the earliest sects or different denominations.
That there was no denominations officially at the time, but there were many,
many different groups that believe different things and they all call themselves Christians. And
in the Western world it's very common knowledge. But one of the reasons why
I wanted to write that book is that one, bart Erman's books are not
available in the Middle East. Two there's hardly any of that material available in
Arabic for the Christian communities in the Middle East. I'm talking about the communities
that they cannot read English, and their English illiteracy in our world is very
common. So I wanted to produce something in Arabic on that topic. And
it was in my own words and in my own knowledge as I learned things
during my university years, and I did, as I mentioned earlier, my
degree in Biblical Studies. I wanted to put that in an easy narrative to
educate the average Arabic speaker. Is there an English version or just in Arabic
right now from my book? No, I haven't. I haven't translated in
English, And I thought one reason is that there are many, many famous
and big authors who wrote on the topics. I didn't feel the need for
my book to be in English as well. So now you're counseling, You're
working with people who are deconstructing. What do they need? What are the
trends you are hearing as people are doing what they do. Finally asking questions
or asking for permission to ask questions. What are you seeing out there?
Brother? All sorts of things, not only as a therapist, but since
I joined RfR or Recovering from Religion, and since also Recovering from Religion,
religion has become an Australian organization as well. So now we have recovered from
religion Australia, and I started working with them a number of months ago,
plus being on the Secular Therapy Project. Working with these two organizations, you
find a lot of people with different needs, and the needs vary all the
way from someone struggling with the mental capacity or the mental burden I should say,
from questioning their faith and losing their faith and all that, all the
way to people who already made peace with the doubts and they already abandoned their
religion, but they are struggling with the social aspect of it, the family
shunning, the coming out. So you have an entire spectrum of how different
people experience trauma. And one of the wonderful things that are both globally and
Australia provide is the support groups for these people. Whatever you're at, whatever
you're experiencing, there are other people who experienced similar feelings and similar questioning and
doubt and trauma. You will find a lot of the LGBTQ communities who because
of their faith, they couldn't come out, or even when they come out,
they struggle with their own sexual identity or sexual orientation. It's a huge
spectrum seth to talk about in I know it's a question, I mean,
you know, you and I are both deconstructed. In my own journey.
I was struck by how freeing it was that I was no longer being told
who to judge. Absolutely, You're spot on and one yes. I felt
liberated and now accepting of everyone and their own experience. And one funny thing
I say to my dad, who is still a practicing Christian church goer till
today, whenever he talks to me about my experience, this is something I
tell him all the time. It's so funny. What I tell him is
it is so funny, Dad, I actually feel that once I abandoned Christianity,
once I denounced Christianity, I became more Christian. And he looks at
me puzzle like, what do you mean you became more Christian after you left
Christianity? Excuse me? I'm like, yeah, Well, if you consider
Christianity as live like Christ except all love people wherever they are, That's exactly
how I'm living my life. If that is your definition of christian then I'm
just living that. I just don't believe in all the fluff around it and
the things that require me to believe. I just don't believe. I just
love the people. Adam, you have a very soothing way about you.
I can see if I was, if I would look, I may just
call you anyway, despite the seventeen hour time difference. Maybe if I'm having
a challenge, I'm just going to call you and let you soothingly walk me
through whatever crisis I'm in, because you have a very gentle, calming demeanor
about you, And I mean, you'd be the call I think i'd want
if I was on that journey. If I ever get down there, I'm
going to shake your hand and also give a big hug to my dear friend
who works with RfR share this us. She's just a precious, precious person
and really fast. Give me your website, tell people how to find you
and your work. Yeah, my website is as my name is spelled on
the screen, Adam Ilmasri dot online. And the way to find me online
is basically if whether you go on Google or YouTube and you just type Adam
and Master, you will find both my Arabic and English speaking channels. Whichever
language you speak, You'll find a lot of material on there. I'm also
on Instagram on Facebook, so yeah, just google Adam and Master and you'll
find it all and I'll put the links in the description box. Now,
if you and I were still, if we were in the Islamic faith,
how would we end our exchange? Would we say a salamo or whatever it
is? What would I say? Well, ask works both as a greeting
to come in and to leave, So you don't say l anymore. So
you say Salam alekum, starting with the s salamok See, it sounds much
more musical coming out of your mouth, So I'm just going to leave it
at that. Adam el Masri. It's an honor to be able to have
this conversation. We've got our problems in the States. Obviously, the front
burner, the wildfire is the looming death of democracy and decency under the shadow
of Christian nationalists, etc. But Islam does remain a critical issue that we
in the West need to be speaking about more. And so I'm honored to
be given the opportunity to be able to use this conversation to stignal boost that.
I'm going to send everybody to your site and your channels and your work
and let's talk again soon. Okay, thank you so much, Thank you
for having me, and I am honored to be with you. Follow the
Thinking Atheist on Facebook and Twitter for a complete archive of podcasts and videos,
products like mugs and t shirts featuring the Thinking Atheist logo, links to atheist
pages and resources, and details on upcoming free thought events and conventions. I'll
go on to our website, The Thinkingatheist dot com.