People just kept referring to the podcast.
In late 2021 and early 2022, as the Times Free Press spoke with more than a dozen people connected to Venue Church about the fallout there from an alleged affair involving the megachurch's pastor, those interviewed regularly mentioned the similarities between Venue and Mars Hill, a Seattle-based megachurch led by Mark Driscoll that collapsed in 2014 and was featured in a recent podcast series.
"The Rise & Fall of Mars Hill" from Christianity Today dropped in June, stirring an almost immediate firestorm of takes, memes and arguments. There were those who thought the podcast presented only the most salacious parts of the story. There were those who felt something familiar hearing church members and staff who shared painful experiences.
Then, there were those who pointed to a perceived blind spot in the podcast, how the show offered Mars Hill and its pastor as a kind of lone, cautionary tale rather than part of a Christian system that created abusive environments regardless of who was the figurehead of a particular church.
The podcast was popular in part because it landed during a moment in American Christianity when more and more people are questioning their faith. Whether identifying as ex- or wandering or doubting, these individuals have circled around the term "deconstruction" in recent years to define their experience.
Deconstruction as a process is as varied as the people who experience it, but it largely revolves around questioning tenets of faith. For some, it can mean leaving a particular church. For others, it is a process of understanding their faith in a different way or leaving religion altogether. While the term is relatively new, its tenets stretch historically to writers like Rachel Held Evans, Marlene Winell and beyond.
The critiques it offers to American Christianity go beyond cosmetic changes, such as a new pastor or a new worship style. Instead, deconstructionists analyze and break down the system that has led many to a place of spiritual uncertainty.
One way to describe the experience is momentum away from something, said Phil Drysdale, founder of the Deconstruction Network, which helps people connect and share resources.
"All, really, that we can say, if someone is deconstructing, is that they're leaving their faith tradition. We can't say why. We can't say where they're going. We can't even say how they're going to get wherever they're going," he said. "All we can say is that they are in the process of taking a step away from their faith tradition, which makes this a very broad kind of catch-all term."
HOW IT HAPPENS
Deconstruction occurs more frequently in rigid, fundamental religious frameworks that present the world as binary, Drysdale said. These groups ask congregants to orient their entire lives around an ideology, from how someone interacts with their partner to the job they have.
For Christians in these environments, it is often the pastor who stands in as the authority figure - God's chosen leader, or the voice of God in a way - for discerning moral questions. For example, a pastor with a large platform becomes counsel for medical advice, rather than an immunologist, Drysdale said.
Such religious environments often do not welcome questions or doubts, Drysdale said.
(READ MORE: Former members question culture of Venue Church, a Chattanooga megachurch in crisis)
A single catalytic event that challenges those ideas can cause a deconstruction spiral, Drysdale said. Those events can range from an individual sex scandal to seeing religion and politics mix nationally to the COVID-19 lockdowns.
"There's a scandal that occurs, and it shakes your trust in the institution, and in the person of power, in the God that put that person in power, because that's what I've been told," Drysdale said. "So now it's like, well, do I start questioning God?"
David Gushee, professor of Christian ethics at Mercer University and chair of Christian social ethics at Vrije Universiteit in the Netherlands, said deconstruction in evangelical and many nondenominational spaces looks different than the crisis of faith experienced by Catholics in the late 20th and early 21st centuries in light of the church sex abuse scandal.
For the most part, Gushee said, the problem among Catholics was losing trust or a sense of credibility in the institution of the Catholic Church. People had issues with the priesthood or the bureaucracy of the church more than a theological belief.
In megachurches, the singular leader, or pastor, is the institution and the worldview, Gushee said. If the pastor loses integrity, the whole thing falls apart, he said.
And when it falls apart, what is left can be lonely.
"SO ISOLATING"
Stacey Wynn, who previously worked at a megachurch in Florida, runs the ministry Clarity Unleashed, which aims to help people of faith separate from harmful theology. Many of the women she works with come from religious environments in which women are forced to submit to men, which can in some instances create opportunities for abuse, she said.
Such women are often told to avoid divorce, to just keep praying, Wynn said. And if the woman decides to divorce, the church community ostracizes her.
The same can happen for church members or staff who question the decisions of leaders, she said. Most people Wynn works with are left feeling that having asked questions was wrong.
"What you need initially is just to know you're not alone because deconstruction is very isolating, especially in these communities where everyone's just so happy to toe the line," she said. "The minute you feel out of line, you're just on your own and it can be so isolating."
In the wake of the murder of George Floyd and other Black Americans killed by police, The Witness, a Black Christian collective, led the #LeaveLOUD movement in which Black Christians described painful experiences in predominantly white church spaces, specifically how such churches were ill-equipped to respond to racism and sometimes fostered that racism. In their exit from such spaces, places like The Witness provided a forum to share experiences and find new community.
For Wynn, deconstruction is a form of spiritual formation and advancement. Jacob wrestles with God in the book of Genesis. Questioning belief is a form of that wrestling match, Wynn said, and should not be discouraged.
Deconstruction can be healthy, Gushee said, especially when someone is replacing an unhealthy belief with a more constructive one. It is worrisome when faith communities reject these changes, he said.
SUNDAY BRUNCH
A decade ago, the deconstruction conversation existed on the blogosphere. Today, the conversation is home on social media platforms like TikTok and Twitter, where resources and connections can be made in real-time, as well as in the podcasting world. Groups like Irreverent Media provide a platform for voices analyzing and critiquing forms of American Christianity.
Adrian Gibbs and Josh Link host "Dirty Rotten Church Kids," a popular podcast in the Irreverent network. Gibbs and Link were involved in evangelical megachurches separately and together before stepping away from the model - Gibbs for the perceived dissonance between Christians and conservative politicians and Link from burnout.
Their podcast launched just months before the start of the COVID-19 pandemic, a moment when many churches closed and congregants were forced to watch services on TV. Gibbs said the space created by the pandemic caused a lot of people to question whether they really believed what was being preached or if they were caught up in the entertainment of the services.
Stepping away from a church gives people space to analyze the value of their religious environment, which in the day-to-day they may not be able to do, Link said.
"Once you pump the brakes, once you take a deep breath, kind of assess the situation for the first time in a long time, you realize you have your own agency to make decisions," Link said. "Do you want to go back? You want to try to change the thing you left? You want to try somewhere else? Or do you want to have brunch on Sundays?
Podcasts like "Dirty Rotten Church Kids," and the deconstruction movement more broadly, are gaining momentum pushing against the Christian establishment.
Some prominent pastors have pushed back. For people like Link, this is church leaders attempting to define what "correct" deconstruction is, which typically involves staying in that particular church. In a sense, churches are businesses, and megachurches need to keep people engaged and in the seats, Link said. A megachurch is not going to just up and sell off property, then drop down to 30 members, he said.
Matt Chandler, a megachurch pastor in Texas, explained the issue another way in an August sermon posted online that was criticized by the deconstruction movement.
"You and I are in a day and age where deconstruction and the turning away from and leaving the faith has become some sort of sexy thing to do," he preached. "I contend that if you ever experience the grace and mercy of Jesus Christ, actually, that that's really impossible to deconstruct from. But if all you ever understand Christianity to be is a moral code, then I totally get it. And if you find yourself in that spot, I'm telling you, I love you right now, and we'll sit down with you, and you don't have to punt on this thing. You might not have ever tried it. To receive, to receive the mercy of God in your soul is to forever be changed. I'm not saying you don't struggle at times. I'm not saying you don't get confused at times. I'm not saying don't get bothered at times. I'm saying you can't walk away."
Contact Wyatt Massey at wmassey@timesfreepress.com or 423-757-6249. Follow him on Twitter @news4mass.