Speaker 1: And now for this episode, we're going to talk about
Speaker 1: a pastor who compared Trump to Hitler and is pushed
Speaker 1: out of his own church. Eli has the story thunder Katt.
Speaker 2: Doctor Ben Boswell was asked to resign from his position
Speaker 2: as the reverend at Myers Park Baptist in Charlotte, North Carolina,
Speaker 2: as the church's attendance numbers have fallen and not recovered
Speaker 2: since twenty sixteen when Boswell arrived. Several current and former
Speaker 2: attendees were quoted in the article as being less than
Speaker 2: pleased with Boswell's message of love, acceptance, inclusivity, and community.
Speaker 2: Hold on a minute, welcome back to that Boswell had
Speaker 2: a habit of addressing politics and racial justice in his sermons,
Speaker 2: which resonated with with at least one person of color
Speaker 2: in the congregation, to the point that Boswell's dismissal felt
Speaker 2: like a betrayal to the gentleman. Boswell's intent, aside, his
Speaker 2: white congregants just didn't like the idea of acknowledging being
Speaker 2: white and what that means, so they chose not to.
Speaker 2: The church leaders do insist that bossie Well's removal is
Speaker 2: based on the lack of attendance, not his socio political views,
Speaker 2: and that the church does remain committed to the same
Speaker 2: values of inclusivity and acceptance that Boswell preached about. The
Speaker 2: story is from a male online by Bethan Sexton on
Speaker 2: February fourth, twenty twenty five.
Speaker 1: Sol, you know, I'm going to go ahead and just
Speaker 1: stick with you for a moment. What does Reverend Boswell's
Speaker 1: ousting suggest about the balance between political activism and religious
Speaker 1: leadership in modern churches?
Speaker 2: So this particular church does have, like in their mission statement,
Speaker 2: it does suggest that like it is you know, it
Speaker 2: is an opening, a welcoming church. It's identified in the
Speaker 2: article as a liberal church. I wanted to clarify because
Speaker 2: the article headline is misleading. It wasn't that Boswell was
Speaker 2: pushed out for comparing Trump to Hitler for having they're saying,
Speaker 2: you know, like I mentioned that it's not big because
Speaker 2: he's preaching this that they're getting rid of him. But
Speaker 2: it's because he's preaching this that people aren't attending, and
Speaker 2: it's because people aren't attending that they are asking him
Speaker 2: to resign. So it is a sort of clash between
Speaker 2: they're saying they want to preach this message of inclusivity
Speaker 2: and welcoming in community and acceptance. But when it comes
Speaker 2: down to doing that, they don't like the consequences of
Speaker 2: doing that. The social consequences of social justice don't sit
Speaker 2: well with them, so they're like, oh well, let's find
Speaker 2: somebody else.
Speaker 3: Yeah, that actually jumped That was one of the things
Speaker 3: in the article that really jumped out at me was
Speaker 3: there was a quote from Deacon Robert Donlin that was,
Speaker 3: we have got to put more butts in the seat.
Speaker 3: Butts in the seat, quote unquote. So apparently these butts
Speaker 3: in the seat are more important than this message of inclusivity,
Speaker 3: community spirituality, and justice that the church claims to stand for.
Speaker 3: That's what was in its mission statement. But inclusivity, community spirituality,
Speaker 3: and justice just don't put money in the collection plates,
Speaker 3: no matter how many thoughts and prayers you devote to it.
Speaker 3: So you really need, I guess, to get those butts
Speaker 3: in the seats because those butts have wallets and apparently
Speaker 3: at this church, money speaks louder than Jesus, right. I mean,
Speaker 3: I don't know what kind of message that is. If
Speaker 3: you just want to put butts in the steats, why
Speaker 3: don't you just start offering uh, slot machines, blackjack, weed, alcohol,
Speaker 3: and sex workers.
Speaker 2: Kerry, I gotta say money speaks louder than Jesus is
Speaker 2: a T.
Speaker 4: Shirt except when.
Speaker 1: Exactly except what he was actually flipping over, like the
Speaker 1: money changer tables, I would consider that pretty loud. Well,
Speaker 1: you know, Okay, So guys, it's it's kind of interesting
Speaker 1: that you bring up, Kelly, that Reverend bos as well,
Speaker 1: and according to the mission of the church, brings up
Speaker 1: like a mission and also a message about inclusivity and
Speaker 1: acceptance and you know, and all the things that make
Speaker 1: you feel all warm and fuzzy on the inside. Yet
Speaker 1: this is not something that's putting the quote unquote butts
Speaker 1: in the seat. But I'm wondering what would because one
Speaker 1: of the things that I think that a lot of
Speaker 1: us that happen to be in a secular community that
Speaker 1: is in the process of trying to build more in
Speaker 1: community is to be inclusive, is to be equitable, is
Speaker 1: to talk about justice, is to talk about those things
Speaker 1: that are not necessarily something that is considered cool or
Speaker 1: considered acceptable right now, because we want people to feel
Speaker 1: like they're in a community where they are valued. So
Speaker 1: what's the messaging that is going to bring more money
Speaker 1: than Jesus, that is going to assist the congregation to
Speaker 1: grow if we're not allowing the messages that would be
Speaker 1: I would say, more welcoming to people than what they
Speaker 1: are saying that they're not getting. Helen, what are your
Speaker 1: thoughts on that.
Speaker 5: All besides doing a hook or a blow church. I
Speaker 5: think the only.
Speaker 6: Way it's kind of like like we have progressive churches
Speaker 6: you know around my area as well that is very
Speaker 6: pro LGBTQ plus you know do but most of the
Speaker 6: congregation are from those groups because they you know, they're
Speaker 6: spiritual people, but they also want to be around other
Speaker 6: like queer spiritual people, and I get that. You know.
Speaker 6: The thing with you know, Boswell's congregation was they started
Speaker 6: experiencing white guilt, you know, and then they there was
Speaker 6: a woman in the article quote that quoted that she
Speaker 6: was tired of going to church and feeling guilty, and
Speaker 6: I'm like, well, that's the whole point of church. So
Speaker 6: you missed, you missed the point of church. That's why
Speaker 6: you go to church. But also, but the other side
Speaker 6: of that is like to think that you know your
Speaker 6: your pastors going there like you know, talking about what
Speaker 6: may happen, you know, if we don't do something and
Speaker 6: and follow in the words of Jesus as you know,
Speaker 6: if you're you know, all for you know, if you're like,
Speaker 6: you know, have a heart on.
Speaker 5: For Jesus, you know you should be doing that.
Speaker 6: But my she is is that because people had by guilt,
Speaker 6: they were like leaving the church, and then you know,
Speaker 6: the board and the people that ran the church was like,
Speaker 6: oh no.
Speaker 5: We're losing money. We're losing funds, as Kelly.
Speaker 6: Pointed out, So that way he's over there, Kelly's over
Speaker 6: there pointed out, They're like, oh fuck, how are you
Speaker 6: going to make money?
Speaker 5: We need butts in the butts in the seats and
Speaker 5: church membership is just going down everywhere. So what you're
Speaker 5: you want to be a.
Speaker 6: Progressive church, you want to be a liberal church, but
Speaker 6: you don't want liberal messaging. And this is kind of
Speaker 6: the backlash We've been seeing a lot of the show,
Speaker 6: like as soon as you start preaching politics in church,
Speaker 6: you're you know, when you're violating the establishment clause on
Speaker 6: both sides, you know.
Speaker 5: Which, yes, I would love it.
Speaker 6: I wish if you're going to be political, please be
Speaker 6: political for human rights, you know, fighting against the things
Speaker 6: that harm other human beings. I'm all for that, but
Speaker 6: this is a consequence when religion and politics can't stop
Speaker 6: fucking each other.
Speaker 5: You know, you're going to get these issues of people.
Speaker 6: You know, they're got only for you the reason either
Speaker 6: you're going to be too progressive or are you going
Speaker 6: to be too conservative? And people if they don't like
Speaker 6: the messaging it as an online with their values, they're
Speaker 6: going to leave. And this is a natural consequence.
Speaker 3: I don't know if there is anything that they could
Speaker 3: say to bring those butts into the church. I mean,
Speaker 3: because I mean, let's face that the pews are bleeding
Speaker 3: worshippers like crazy right now. It's something it's a trend
Speaker 3: we've been seeing for the last three or four decades.
Speaker 3: So I'm not sure that there's anything that they could
Speaker 3: be doing to bring those those butts back into the church.
Speaker 3: You know, I just don't know that there.
Speaker 1: Is so Kelly, do you think that the church should
Speaker 1: prioritize growing a congregation over prioritizing social justice messaging? Is
Speaker 1: there way to reconcile between the two? Should religion dress
Speaker 1: like you know Mary, and politics stress like Uncle Sam
Speaker 1: and then continue to point one another. How does that work?
Speaker 3: You know, here, here's an interesting question that get that
Speaker 3: gets brought up by one of the things you just asked. Right,
Speaker 3: we want to keep our government out of religion, right now,
Speaker 3: it shouldn't we also be keeping the religion out of
Speaker 3: our government. So when we're going to when we're talking
Speaker 3: about the church rallying for this government issue, is that
Speaker 3: something the church should be doing. Should they be working
Speaker 3: on those political issues or should they just be working
Speaker 3: on other social issues like helping the poor? Right? I
Speaker 3: don't know that churches need to be getting involved with
Speaker 3: anything political at all. And that's probably that's my big stance.
Speaker 3: Nothing no, no, nothing political at all. But there are
Speaker 3: many social issues that you can work on, like I say,
Speaker 3: like helping out the poor. That's I don't know why
Speaker 3: more churches aren't doing that. You know, It's always seems
Speaker 3: like they're more than willing to help the one poor
Speaker 3: person in there within their congregation. But if you're not
Speaker 3: in their congregation, they don't have any interest in helping
Speaker 3: you out. So I mean, I just don't Yeah, I
Speaker 3: don't think, like I said, I don't think they should
Speaker 3: get involved with politics at all, well, I don't know.
Speaker 1: I would have to say, excuse me, Lionel, it's going
Speaker 1: to be a little bit difficult for me to actually
Speaker 1: say that politics is going to completely be out of
Speaker 1: the religious pulpit only because you know, one of the
Speaker 1: things that you mentioned, Kelly, is that there are social
Speaker 1: issues that the church could totally work on that could
Speaker 1: actually make people's lives better. But you know, if we're
Speaker 1: going to be honest, a lot of times that would
Speaker 1: also involve some type of political and policy change in
Speaker 1: order for that to you know, convey For instance, let's
Speaker 1: talk about the poor. We know that we have more
Speaker 1: working poor people in the States then we do people
Speaker 1: who happen to be at the you know, upper echelon
Speaker 1: of you know income, right, So a lot of times,
Speaker 1: in order for them to get out of one area
Speaker 1: into something that makes more sense would concern the government
Speaker 1: actually saying okay, we want to help with that. And
Speaker 1: the ones who would sometimes have a pulse have their
Speaker 1: finger on the pulse to that particular issue with the church.
Speaker 1: So if they're seeing core people come into their domicile
Speaker 1: every week, they're you know, being part of you know,
Speaker 1: feeding programs. If the church happens to have a safer
Speaker 1: instance of shelter. You know, they know how many people
Speaker 1: are coming in in order for them to house them
Speaker 1: things of that nature. Sometimes even some churches like set
Speaker 1: up five oh one c threes in order for them
Speaker 1: to be able to employ social workers in order for
Speaker 1: people to transition into housing things of that nature. Well,
Speaker 1: and if weally think about it, all that stuff is political.
Speaker 1: So even though, like I get what you're SA saying about.
Speaker 1: You know, if we are saying that there's an establishment
Speaker 1: clause and we should keep you know, church and governments separate,
Speaker 1: then they should be separate.
Speaker 4: But you know, we have.
Speaker 1: All these other issues that come up where it's almost
Speaker 1: damn near impossible to do it. How do we reconcile that.
Speaker 3: I agree with your example, but I think in that
Speaker 3: in that example, we're using the church as a means
Speaker 3: of research, right, We're using we're using what the what
Speaker 3: they're doing to get research numbers to make it a
Speaker 3: better to make better conditions for the poor, right. And
Speaker 3: I think that's a far cry from the congregants of
Speaker 3: a church going out to say a maga rilly and
Speaker 3: supporting anti LGBTQ issues and that's the kind of stuff
Speaker 3: I'm talking about. When you're actually got your church congregation,
Speaker 3: when you actually got your minister encouraging the congregation to
Speaker 3: go out and protest against a political issue, that's the
Speaker 3: kind of that's the kind of thing I'm talking about,
Speaker 3: trying that the church shouldn't be doing so. But I
Speaker 3: agree with you. I mean, using them, use using the
Speaker 3: data that they're acquiring for research purposes, that's great. I
Speaker 3: don't see any problem with that.
Speaker 1: So, yeah, I'm picking up what you're pulling down.
Speaker 4: I think we should clarify that it was the case
Speaker 4: in this church, right, So in this case, it was
Speaker 4: more And I was going to point this at too,
Speaker 4: because I feel like in this case it was Ben
Speaker 4: Boswell who was preaching about inclusivity of people who are LGBTQ.
Speaker 2: And and uh, you know, preaching about inclusivity and like
Speaker 2: how to tackle race issues in positive ways, and it
Speaker 2: was kind of like, like, I believe, Helen, you mentioned
Speaker 2: that a lot of the congregants felt white guilt, and
Speaker 2: I think that's something because and I guess I couldn't
Speaker 2: speak for everybody, but I know that what happened to
Speaker 2: me early on and my like learning journey is that
Speaker 2: when I learned about way that I was benefiting from
Speaker 2: things that were harming other people that didn't live the
Speaker 2: same life as me, that didn't you know that that
Speaker 2: you know, people of color, people who are marginalized, and
Speaker 2: it does make you feel guilty because he started realized like, well,
Speaker 2: I don't want anybody else to suffer, but I also
Speaker 2: don't want to give up this benefit. And that's the
Speaker 2: sort of first place that your mind goes. And it
Speaker 2: takes some time if somebody intentionally sitting with that and
Speaker 2: acknowledging it and working on it to realize like, okay,
Speaker 2: like me, losing the benefit isn't the only option. Let's
Speaker 2: just make it so everybody has it, or like, okay,
Speaker 2: it doesn't say anything about me as a person that
Speaker 2: I just happened to be born under circumstances that allow
Speaker 2: me to benefit from this while others were not. That
Speaker 2: doesn't say anything about me as a person. But now
Speaker 2: that I know, I have the option to either do
Speaker 2: something or not. And people typically don't sit with it
Speaker 2: long enough to have that realization.
Speaker 4: And that's why he lost.
Speaker 2: The numbers here. I don't. And to your point, Kelly,
Speaker 2: I don't consider that the church getting involved in politics
Speaker 2: because I don't think you know, issues of like race
Speaker 2: and gender and sex and sexuality are a political issue.
Speaker 2: I think that's just characteristics of personhood. So I think
Speaker 2: I think, you know, Ben Boswell is absolutely in the right,
Speaker 2: Doctor Boswell, I'll say, he'll use the correct honorific for him.
Speaker 2: Doctor Boswell was completely in the right. I think doing
Speaker 2: what he did. I think it's unfortunate that he, uh,
Speaker 2: he lost his position for it.
Speaker 1: Well, if you want to go into the proper honor form, uh, Lionel,
Speaker 1: you should say reverend doctor doctor.
Speaker 2: Reverend Well, he's no longer the reverend of the church, so.
Speaker 5: He's still reverend.
Speaker 1: Yeah, that doesn't.
Speaker 3: It's just like it's like when a senator is no
Speaker 3: longer a senator, you still call them a senator exactly,
Speaker 3: so I.
Speaker 1: Could allegedly, Well, Eli and and Helen, I kind of
Speaker 1: want you to chime in on this particular question, and
Speaker 1: especially Eli, I want you to go first, because you
Speaker 1: kind of brought this up in your thoughts. So, what
Speaker 1: does this particular situation with reverend doctor Boswell bring up?
Speaker 1: Like when we're when we're looking at the situation of itself,
Speaker 1: and how it reveals the limits of progressive faith in communities,
Speaker 1: what happens when confronting issues of race, privilege, and political
Speaker 1: ideology converge. And I know that, And I know that
Speaker 1: you talk specifically, Eli about sitting with privilege and really,
Speaker 1: you know, kind of confronting what does that mean to
Speaker 1: you as a heterosexual white man in America?
Speaker 6: Right?
Speaker 1: And how Okay, yeah, I do recognize this is something
Speaker 1: that I have that not everybody else does. So how
Speaker 1: does one actually, like you know, really sit with that,
Speaker 1: contemplate that, and really confront that particular issue to the
Speaker 1: point where we can say that now that I've done that,
Speaker 1: I can go ahead and be a contributing factor to
Speaker 1: others who may be confronted with the same thing.
Speaker 2: I think that the important, the most important for the
Speaker 2: individual that's confronting it is to recognize that it's not
Speaker 2: a statement about the individual that has the privilege. It
Speaker 2: is not a judgment, it is not a statement of quality,
Speaker 2: it's not a value statement. It's just like, hey, be
Speaker 2: aware of the fact that because of the way you look,
Speaker 2: the way you present, you know, the way that you
Speaker 2: were born in any number of categories, you just have
Speaker 2: a particular privilege that not everybody else has. And if
Speaker 2: you can acknowledge that that's the case and acknowledge that
Speaker 2: it's not, that doesn't mean that you are bad. It
Speaker 2: doesn't mean that you're good either. It doesn't mean anything.
Speaker 2: It just means that you have a privilege that everybody has.
Speaker 2: And when you recognize that, you can, you know, with
Speaker 2: great power comes great responsibility. I don't know if we're
Speaker 2: allowed to use that, but I mean you can.
Speaker 1: Thank you as long as you don't sing it, You're fine.
Speaker 2: Once once you once you recognize that you have that,
Speaker 2: you can then you know, not only it's it seems
Speaker 2: kind of strange as they use that for good, but
Speaker 2: like there are ways in which you can do that,
Speaker 2: and you can then start to find ways that people
Speaker 2: are trying to make changes so that not nobody so
Speaker 2: that everybody has that benefit, so that nobody is suffering,
Speaker 2: and then you can just kind of, you know, just
Speaker 2: don't take it personally. That's it, Like it's not personal.
Speaker 5: True.
Speaker 1: Thanks thanks v though, Helen cats.
Speaker 6: So it's kind of for me, it's kind of it's
Speaker 6: a little weird for me existing like personally existing because
Speaker 6: I'm hight and I'm just presenting, but I'm also a
Speaker 6: woman and I'm queer, so I get certain benefits of privilege,
Speaker 6: but other benefits.
Speaker 5: I do not have. So when you're kind of in that.
Speaker 6: In between space, it's you become hyper aware of the
Speaker 6: things you have privileges of and the things that you don't.
Speaker 6: And I think that the complexity of it too can
Speaker 6: be lost on people, like especially like if you're a
Speaker 6: white CIS woman, you have certain benefits that you take
Speaker 6: it for granted, but you're still in certain circles considered
Speaker 6: a second class citizen because you want a vagina, so
Speaker 6: you know, as it goes, So you know, we're like,
Speaker 6: you know, use a black woman or have it. We're
Speaker 6: both women, but we're having a different experience based on
Speaker 6: our you know, our race. You know, you like you
Speaker 6: have more melanin than me, so.
Speaker 5: You know whatever. I don't know what that means, but
Speaker 5: apparently mean something. And I you have beautiful brown skin,
Speaker 5: so for good something. So when you're when you're dealing.
Speaker 6: With these like intersectionalities of uh, you know, feeling the
Speaker 6: effects of history and society upon you, you have to
Speaker 6: deal with that complexity. And I think, as Eli said,
Speaker 6: some people like I had to sit there and think
Speaker 6: about like what ways I'm privileged and what ways that
Speaker 6: I'm not privileged, and how they intersect. As Eli said,
Speaker 6: some people that as soon as that cognitive dissonance starts,
Speaker 6: you know, wearing this ugly head, they don't sit there
Speaker 6: and go, well, I'm comfortable, you know, I you know,
Speaker 6: like obviously like I don't want anything happened to marginalized groups,
Speaker 6: but they're not thinking about how their privilege, which, as
Speaker 6: Eli said, it's you.
Speaker 5: Just have it. It doesn't say anything about you.
Speaker 6: This is just history, you know, rearing its head again,
Speaker 6: and that's that's what you're facing, you know. And it
Speaker 6: takes work to like sit there with those feelings and
Speaker 6: go is this true and how and how does this
Speaker 6: affect my place affect others?
Speaker 5: And I'm going to lift others up with me?
Speaker 6: Or am I just going to sit comfortably and just
Speaker 6: be like okay, well, you know, let them figure it out.
Speaker 5: Yeah.
Speaker 1: I think that all of us that are sitting on
Speaker 1: this panel right now can identify because of the way
Speaker 1: that we present that we have a certain privilege, you know,
Speaker 1: all of us do, but how that shows up in
Speaker 1: certain spaces is going to differ because of our lived
Speaker 1: experience being who we are. But I think that one
Speaker 1: of the things that Reverend Boswell was trying to highlight
Speaker 1: so desperately to his congregation is that listen, because we
Speaker 1: are all people who are here, there's going to be
Speaker 1: certain privileges that we're going to possess because the majority
Speaker 1: of us are white, the majority of us are sis presenting.
Speaker 1: The majority of us, you know, have not experienced certain
Speaker 1: historical implications and issues that have befallen us that would
Speaker 1: you know, do things like I don't know, mess with
Speaker 1: our income uh to the point where like you know,
Speaker 1: there there's going to be like certain things like redlining,
Speaker 1: that's not going to be as as an effect on
Speaker 1: us than it is going to be like for say
Speaker 1: somebody who is black or somebody who happens to be
Speaker 1: from another marginalized community. Where as a as a cis
Speaker 1: had white male. If I go to the hospital, there's
Speaker 1: not going to be an automatic assumption that I don't
Speaker 1: feel pain right like, but if I go to the hospital,
Speaker 1: that that assumption sometimes is there. So I think that
Speaker 1: if I were to take anything away from this particular episode,
Speaker 1: and especially what the messaging that you know Ben Boswell had,
Speaker 1: it was more so saying that all of us need
Speaker 1: to check our privilege, and all of us need to understand,
Speaker 1: you know, the historical implications that may have been fallen
Speaker 1: on some groups that happen to be in the United
Speaker 1: States versus others, and that growing a church is not
Speaker 1: always about telling everybody what they have, what they want
Speaker 1: to hear, but what they need to hear.