Chess Champion Raised in a Cult: Danny Rensch's Dark Squares | Ep. 2060
Mormon Stories Podcast
Dr. John Dehlin
4.6 • 5.2K Ratings
🗓️ 9 September 2025
⏱️ 241 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
Today we are very excited to welcome Danny Rensch to the podcast! Lovers of chess may know Danny as an international chess champion and co-founder of Chess.com—but did you know he was also raised in a cult?In this interview, Danny discusses the release of his new book, Dark Squares: How Chess Saved My Life, which tells the story of his upbringing in the Church of Immortal Consciousness. Groomed by the cult’s leader, Steven Camp, to become a chess grandmaster, Danny was separated from his family at a young age and taught that his ultimate purpose in life was to bring awareness to the religion through chess.Listen along to learn more about:-The Church of Immortal Consciousness, their beliefs, and its founders-Danny’s training with alcoholic chess master Igor Ivanov-Danny’s struggles with substances and addiction, and how these were fostered by “the collective”-Danny’s career as a chess master and how it ultimately led him to co-found Chess.com
Danny Rensch’s book Dark Squares: How Chess Saved My Life is out now! Let’s help him get on the bestseller list by purchasing the book here!
Mormon Stories Thanks Our Generous Donors!
Help us continue to deliver quality content by becoming a donor today:
Our Platforms:
Contact us:
[email protected]
PO Box 171085, Salt Lake City, UT 84117
Social Media:
Transcript
Click on a timestamp to play from that location
| 0:00.0 | Hello, everyone and welcome to another edition of Mormon stories podcast. I'm your host, |
| 0:04.1 | John DeLinn. It is March 3rd, 2025. And I could not be more excited for today's episode. |
| 0:11.4 | Today we have in the house someone who's known globally by hundreds of thousands, if not millions, |
| 0:17.8 | I'm guessing millions of people, but he might be a new name to many or |
| 0:22.9 | most of my audience because his expertise is a little bit niche or not so niche depending on who you |
| 0:31.5 | are. But today we have with us, Danny Wrench. He is the author of a brand new book called Dark Squares, How Chess |
| 0:40.9 | Saved My Life. But Danny Wrench is also one of the co-founders of Chess.com. I think he's the |
| 0:47.8 | chief chess officer. He's an international master in chess, which means his rating at least at one point was what, over |
| 0:55.3 | 2,600 or something like that? |
| 0:57.5 | Around there, 2,500. |
| 0:58.6 | 2,500? |
| 0:59.7 | I'm new to a lot of this stuff. |
| 1:01.8 | But I just read his book. |
| 1:04.6 | I've read a lot of cult memoirs. |
| 1:07.0 | You know, you guys know Tara Westover, Amber Scora. |
| 1:10.7 | The list goes on and on. |
| 1:12.2 | But this is a phenomenal cult memoir. |
| 1:16.2 | I hope you don't mind me calling it that, Danny. |
| 1:18.0 | You call whatever you want. |
| 1:18.8 | It makes sense, yeah. |
| 1:20.0 | And it's coming out, I believe the week that this episode is going to air. |
| 1:25.2 | Yeah. |
... |
Please login to see the full transcript.
Disclaimer: The podcast and artwork embedded on this page are from Dr. John Dehlin, and are the property of its owner and not affiliated with or endorsed by Tapesearch.
Generated transcripts are the property of Dr. John Dehlin and are distributed freely under the Fair Use doctrine. Transcripts generated by Tapesearch are not guaranteed to be accurate.
Copyright © Tapesearch 2025.