I really love my family and I really loved my evangelical friends.

And I see the undeniable goodness in their lives.

And I was forced to reckon with that.

And a streamlined narrative of good guys and bad guys,

that kind of binary thinking, I couldn't make sense of what I knew to be true.

Hey, friends, welcome back to another episode of Theology and around my guest today is Jonathan

Merritt, who serves as vice president and executive editor for Simon and Schuster in New York

City. Jonathan holds a Master of Divinity from Southeastern Baptist Theological Seminary and a master

of theology from Emory University's Candler School of theology and has done additional

graduate work focused on Christian mysticism at the General Theological Seminary of the Episcopal Church in Manhattan.

Jonathan has offered several critically acclaimed books, including learning to speak God from scratch,

learning to speak God from scratch, why sacred words are vanishing and how we can revive them.

This conversation was recorded in person in Hell's Kitchen, Manhattan, where I sat down

with Jonathan to chat about his journey in and sort of out of evangelicalism.

Okay, it's raw, it's honest, which is why I think you will absolutely love this conversation.

Okay, please welcome back to the show, the one

and only Jonathan Merritt. Jonathan Merritt, it's been a minute. Thanks so much for being

on Thealaj and I am here in your backyard. That's right. Welcome. Welcome to my city. Welcome

to your podcast. You grew up in a pretty conservative, maybe very conservative,

even evangelical background.

Is that right?

That's right.

...