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Thank you for daring to listen.

Welcome back to The Bodies Behind the Bus podcast.

Today we have yet another courageous storyteller.

I remain in awe of our storytellers and their willingness to stand up for what is right despite everything that they have endured.

Their voices are helping others to find hope and freedom from abusive systems and people.

Today, Cameron would be sharing his story about his time at a large and influential church in Arizona.

While there, Cameron was on staff and in leadership.

We are grateful for Cameron for his story and for the strength it took to share it.

I am all about blessed subtraction there.

There is a pile of dead bodies behind the Mars Hill bus and by God's grace it'll be a mountain.

By the time we're done, you either get on the bus or you get run over by the bus.

Those are the options, but the bus ain't gonna stop.

You either get on the bus, you get run over by the bus.

Those are the options.

Put the best I can stop.

Welcome back everyone to the Bodies Behind the Bus podcast.

We are honored to have Cameron on the podcast Today we are gonna be talking to Cameron and he's gonna be sharing some of his story about his experience at a megachurch, and I do mean megachurch and the Phoenix area.

Cameron's on staff there for many years, had direct line to leadership, did a lot of things for the church, and we are honored and it's a privilege to have you.

Cameron, welcome to the podcast.

Thanks for having me.

Grateful to be here.

So I do wanna say it is a Mogo church.

This a big church.

You were there for many years and you were on staff, and I'd like for you to start there.

What was your role at this church and then how long were you in that position?

Yeah, so I started at this mega church, capital MEGA in 2006, and I started as a graphic designer on staff.

After a few years on that team got asked to move into a management role and oversee video folks.

So I did that for a number of years and then I spent a total of 16 years on staff.

And when you say mega church, the reason we're all being so weird about this, apparently today is the numbers are bonkers.

Can you give us like a rough estimate of what the numbers are for attendees and the campuses?

Sure.

So I believe they're currently at 17 campuses, soon to be many more.

Their goal is to open one or two campuses every year.

And the attendance numbers are probably pushing close to 50,000 on a weekend, somewhere between 45 and 50,000.

I started at that church when it was one campus with an attendance of about 8,000 people.

So I saw the growth when I left, I believe there was 14 campuses.

So I saw the, the, the growth over, you know, that 16 year period.

And I'm local here in Arizona.

Cameron, you're not anymore.

But I was telling Jay like, you can't go anywhere without seeing a car with a sticker for this church.

Like every couple cars truly like there's billboards everywhere.

There's cars everywhere.

Like this is a mainstay name in Arizona.

You have friends if you live here that attend this church.

Is it?

It is huge.

All the campuses are in Arizona.

Every campus is in Arizona.

The goal is for that church to have a campus, you know, within a 10 to 15 minute driving distance between each campus.

That's crazy.

Mm-hmm.

That might be the biggest church in the us.

Maybe it's, it's one of the biggest, and it's, it's interesting because it's, it's probably the biggest church that anyone outside of Arizona has never heard of.

But if you live in Arizona, you've seen, as Jona mentioned, you've seen the stickers, you've seen the billboards, the, and even the, the buildings.

They're massive.

Wow.

So, I mean, 8,000 to me is also a gigantic church.

Yeah.

And that's the size it was when you started.

Can you describe staff and culture?

I'm sure it probably ebbed and flowed and changed throughout the time that you were there.

But what was it like when you got there and how did it kind of develop?

Yeah, when I got there, the staff was about 75 people, 75 to 80 people.

I remember early on there was quite a bit of turnover at this church.

I think a lot of people used this church as a stepping stone to like get into ministry at a larger church and then move on and get a, a higher role at a smaller church.

We saw a lot of that kind of thing happening and we would get an HR email every time someone left staff, so it was like, there was a lot of turnover in my first few years there.

Staff culture, I would describe it in in the beginning as pretty good.

I enjoyed my time there as I started sort of ramping into my role and getting my roots planted.

I will say that there was, there has always been a level of heavy handed control over the staff.

They use the term alignment to talk about the, the ways the staff is required to participate.

So the alignment areas that they require are to tithe 10%.

And that is tracked, has always been tracked by the HR department and group participation.

So you have to be in a small group of some kind.

They call 'em neighborhood groups or they, they called them neighborhood groups for a time and then I, I think they recently just.

Dropped at any sort of descriptor and just call 'em groups.

So you're required to be in a group of some kind and you're required to attend weekend services and that all of those things are tracked by the HR department.

And as a manager, I would get an alignment report at the end of the year as we went into review season.

And I, that report would have all the information on whether or not the people on my team were in alignment with the rest of the staff and the requirements of leadership.

I, I have to ask, what would happen if you were not in alignment?

Great question.

So if you were not in alignment, you were.

Your manager was required to have a conversation with you about how to get back into alignment and I would say that early on, on my first eight to 10 years at this church, that was less heavy handed or less aggressive in its, I don't know what the word is, punishment maybe would be, so in my first few years as a manager, I had to give talks to employees who were not tithing.

The HR director at the time would sort of give us guidance on this and, and he would just say, just have a conversation and asking if they need any help.

Financially and try to try to bring them along the journey and get them back to the 10% level.

I used my own sort of financial journey during those first few years to kind of share with people my experience with getting out of debt and, and tithing and, and those conversations were always really helpful and healthy from my perspective because I care about people and I want the best for them.

I also had, for lack of a better term, I had drinking the Kool-Aid here.

You know, I was a good foot soldier, so to speak, for making sure that my team was in alignment.

I didn't necessarily agree with these requirements.

In fact, when I was applying for this job back in the summer of 2006, I remember hearing the requirement to tithe and going like, wow.

That's crazy to me that they would require it.

And I was like, surely they don't track that though.

Like there's no way.

And then I found out when I became a manager about the tracking and early on what they would do with the alignment report, you would just, when it came to tithing, there would just be a check mark on whether or not they were above 10% or below.

So they were above 10%.

There was a green check mark there in alignment.

How would they know they were at 10%?

Would they have to divulge salary information?

Yeah, so HR attracts all of that and, and I, as a manager staff, I was aware of the, yeah, the salary levels of everyone on my team moving later into my time there.

I would say in the last five years or so, the alignment report changed from just a, whether or not they were above or below the 10%.

And actually I got a, I had, I would have one-on-one conversations with the HR director at, where he would tell me to the penny how much a staff member was giving.

It was no longer, you know, it used to be that, you know, hr, they would even say this, they would say during review season, when we got our alignment reports, they would say, we don't know how much.

Staff gives, we just know, we just have sort of a, an algorithm that tells us whether or not someone is above or at the 10% mark.

In the last five years or so of my time there, that changed from, no, we actually know how much staff gives and we know it to the penny and we know it to the multiple decibel point percentage.

So I had to have conversations.

E even, even in my last year there, I had to have a conversation with an employee about how much they were giving.

And I was told to the penny how much they were giving turned out to be something like 6.12% of their salary.

And then just another little caveat here, they were getting multiple questions from staff members on, you know, is a reflection of our 10% before taxes or after.

And because they kept getting that question, they lowered the threshold to 7%.

So if anyone was below the seven per percent threshold, that's when they would get flagged and have the conversation with their manager.

And then they, there was in, in addition to the conversation with the manager, there was a form that had to be signed that was an agreement that if the staff member did not get into alignment within I think a 90 day period, their employment will be terminated.

They had to sign that agreement.

So it's like a document work for me and sign this contract that you're going to pay me back.

Ten seven will be charitable 7% of the money that I pay you to work for me.

So you are getting paid by the people that work for you.

And I mean, I mean this is a dynamic on church staff.

This isn't something new, but this is maybe the most brazen.

I've heard this.

Yeah.

Just wow.

It is that's, that's so violating.

It really is.

And what's contradictory to scripture?

You know, I think that's the thing that I was most uncomfortable with is that the scripture that talks about no one should give because of compulsion and or be compelled to give.

That's the part that made me uncomfortable is like if you're purporting to require your staff to give because of the biblical principle of tithing, you should also adhere to the other guidelines that Paul gives on tithing when it comes to giving.

So I think that sort of the contrast between those two things always made me very uncomfortable.

That same level of heavy handed control was also implemented, not just with tithing, but with groups as well.

So I had employees on my staff who were not participating in a group.

And had to have a conversation with myself and HR sign an agreement that they would get into a group within a certain period of time, and if they didn't, their employment would be terminated.

The level of control was not just tithing, which is unpaid hours.

You're being forced to be at.

Yeah.

Unpaid hours that you're being forced to be at.

Yes.

You being a manager, you're, you're being told to do things that you're not comfortable with from a managerial perspective, but then you also have individuals that look to you for leadership and you're then telling them, Hey, you've gotta do this.

So how have you, and you may be in this process still, but how have you reconciled that?

'cause you're, you're feeling the pressure on top.

You're not comfortable with it.

Then you're, you're telling people like your staff, you know, you signed this or you may lose your job, which is not good either.

I mean, that's not appropriate in any way.

All of this is inappropriate.

How have you kind of dealt and reconciled with that from the pressure you felt and how that relationship was?

And I, I'm gonna say this coercive controlling, and then in the same time you're having to tell people, Hey, like your job's in jeopardy, unless you tithe 7% or you join a group.

So what was that process look like for you?

Or has it looked like for you?

Yeah, it was difficult.

It was difficult at the time.

And I'm not sure that I have fully reconciled it.

I think what I tried to do with the, the folks on my team that I cared deeply about and still care deeply about, what I tried to do was sort of put myself as a layer of protection between leadership and them and kind of work around the issue of control and try to get them to understand maybe where, what leadership would say is like, try to communicate the heart behind this.

Well, ultimately the heart behind this is control.

I always tried to soften it honestly, like I, I wasn't trying to be henchman that they wanted me to be.

I tried to, like I said, put myself between leadership and the employee.

And honestly, probably around 20 19, 20 20, there was a shift from sort of being mildly heavy handed to being extra heavy handed in the sort of tracking and, and enforcement of the alignment.

And when that shift happened, there was a clear strategy, I would say, from leadership to make examples out of people to, to scare people into alignment.

And one example of that was the executive pastor over HR said that we need to make examples out of people.

We need to show people what will happen if.

You are not in alignment.

And the one of the other folks in the room said, what we're trying to do is get people to understand that if they need help, they can raise their hand and ask for help.

And I was like, if you're trying to get people to ask for help to get in a group or to start tithing or whatever their issue is, this ain't it.

You're not going to scare people into asking for help.

In fact, that employee is probably going to tell.

All of their fellow staff members about the experience, and those folks are gonna tell their friends who on, on staff about the experience.

And the next thing you know, everyone is going to be terrified, which is exactly the culture that they have created over the past several years, is a culture of fear and terror.

Everyone is afraid of speaking up about anything.

Everyone is afraid of losing their jobs or being made an example of their financial security is at stake.

And this is the culture that is currently at that church.

Yeah, I mean it's, it's highly problematic that HR is involved in these conversations and the sense of.

The, when they become demeaning, threatening, you know, anything like that.

Now that happens everywhere.

I'm not saying HR is perfect, but I always go back to, from a, from a church perspective, you know, I look at churches today as businesses.

They just are.

And if you're gonna operate a church, you need to be of the, have the highest of the high morals and values and examples to other businesses about how you treat people.

And time and time again, I see this as counter like you're, this is a perfect example.

I also just wanna speak to the structure that you're talking about, because.

When I, when I hear these structures, there's multiple layers of intimidation, threats, pressure, that's building, and it's different at every level.

So at Cameron's level, the pressure is to adhere to a policy that, yeah, he may not agree with, but he's, he's buying into it for, you know, I'm, I'm not gonna speak for Cameron, but let's say some people may say job security, some people say may say, well, but it's further greater good.

All of these things still don't justify the policy.

And then when you enforce it at an employee level where the power structure is completely off kilter, they.

Tend to have to adopt these policies for a variety of different reasons, including fear for job.

And maybe they think they're at the church setting, they think they're sinning and wrong.

So the, the structure there is power at each of these levels, but.

All in all, where the pressure is coming is from the top.

So the pressure is building at the top and it's pushing down and each layer has a different influence.

But again, it's still as people.

'cause we've all been in these positions.

I've been in position when I've signed something to say how much I've tithe.

We do have to, we do have to stand up and say, Hey, these things are wrong.

Now, ultimately Cameron stood up and said some stuff and he's not there anymore, and we're gonna get into that.

But I just wanna encourage people of this power structure of this layer of power sounds familiar to you and you're a mid-level manager or a mid-level supervisor.

You do have a responsibility to fight for what's right for the people at the bottom because they don't have the power to do so.

At all.

They never will.

And especially in a spiritual setting, they're not getting paid shit.

And they're probably scared out of their mind from, from failing as a Christian or a believer, but also probably because that may be like a huge source of income from them.

So yeah, the convolution between financial security and spiritual obedience is messy and massively prominent at this church in particular.

But the fact that these are all pastors, these are all people who are supposed to be guiding you towards Jesus and the way of Jesus.

And it's problematic and confusing to be berated for something so minimal from a pastor, from someone who is supposed to be leading you towards Jesus.

So I, I think that is.

Incredibly problematic.

And I would also just add on to, at this church in particular, the HR department eventually became, and currently is more of a enforcer of rules rather than a neutral party between employees and leadership.

The, the HR director currently is, for lack of a better word, just doing the dirty work of the executive pastor above him.

And they're no longer neutral in the organizational structure as I think HR should be.

And I think that's one of the most problematic things as the culture has shifted to be more controlling and heavy handed and fear-based, people having the opportunity to come to HR and share their concerns, share experiences of abuse that they've had.

Without being able to trust that isn't going to put their job in jeopardy, and that's the place that that culture has gotten to.

I do just wanna take a second to point out something that we've talked about a few times on the podcast is how these systems create victims who become complicit in abuse or become abusers themselves.

And there's this cycle that as you go down, that hierarchy that Jay is talking about, we are just seeing it replicated at every level.

And it's so damaging to all parties involved.

It's damaging to the people who are being harmed, but it's also damaging to the people that are doing the harm.

And it's damaging to the people who feel they don't have a choice but to do harm.

And I think it's really important while we think about this story and as we continue forward to think about.

Our board member, Eric Isaac, has in his work surrounding power incentives in spiritually abusive environments that financial security is a huge power incentive for people to not give up power or not pay the cost in these situations.

And it's actually almost coercive.

Like we need to have the conversation about the fact that doing right in a situation like standing up and being like, nah, yeah, I'm not going to enforce this for my team, is coming at the cost of people being able to feed their kids.

Yeah.

So that does, it's not an excuse, it doesn't mean it's okay to not do what's right in these scenarios, especially when it's a church, but it's a factor that we have to grapple with.

And as we look towards what does it look like if we are gonna continue to be in religious communities, and if we are gonna continue to think, do we wanna build.

In the future?

Like what?

What's next?

This component right here is contributing to a lot of abuse of a lot of people.

So a hundred percent we have, we have to consider it.

Yeah.

I wanna move into your story.

So you've done a really good job of describing the culture over your time there.

That's a long time.

Did the senior pastor change and was that part of this shift?

Can you walk us through that a little bit?

Sure.

Yeah.

So there's been two senior pastors at this church that has existed, I think for 37 or 38 years, something like that.

Coming up on 40 years, a founding pastor was in place, I believe until 2017 or 2018.

He passed the baton to a young executive pastor on the team, pastor, a we'll call him.

How many executive pastors are there?

There are three executive pastors.

Okay.

Okay.

Thank you.

Yeah.

So Pastor A takes over from founding pastor.

Yes.

And I believe that was 2018.

So Pastor A took over, I believe in 2018.

Could have been 2017.

I'm not exactly sure.

And I had a pretty good relationship with him.

In fact, he and I were roommates in college for a semester, 20 years earlier.

So there's something like that in in, in the late nineties.

He and I were roommates for a semester, and so we had an existing relationship.

We were on the volleyball team together at a small Christian college.

In Southern California.

And so he and I had a, had an existing relationship and you know, we got along pretty well when he took over, when he was an executive pastor and when he took over the senior pastor role.

So he, he steps in and d does the culture start to change when he stepped in?

Like was it becoming, it became different or what was your, your feeling there?

Yeah.

Initially, I don't think the culture started to change right away.

I think there was an on-ramp to his leadership.

I believe my, my observation would be that the culture started to change in 2020 during the COVID era.

And there's the response to it.

I saw the culture started to shift around then I, and I actually saw this pastor A, his leadership style became more aggressive and heavy handed.

I think his ego.

Started to grow as he took over one of the largest churches in the country.

I think my observation would be that our response, the church's response to COVID and Regathering earlier than any other megachurch in the country, I think that also did something to his ego, and that in turn began to affect.

How he was leading and controlling people and instilling fear in people.

So that that whole time period, end of 2019 going into 2020 was, there's a lot of my experience and my story related to this church that's sort of wrapped up in this timeframe.

At the end of 2019, there was an executive pastor on staff who oversaw marketing and communications, and also at the end of 2019, the fall of 2019, this church offered the staff an opportunity to resign and get a.

Severance package.

So if you're, if you're feeling called to another ministry, if you're a, a wife who has a husband who works, they literally use that example and you don't need the money.

You can resign you, you know, sort of any sort of scenario that you feel like you're, you no longer want to be at.

This church will give you a severance package where based on how long you've been here, you can get a certain amount of salary.

So at the end of 2019, the entire marketing and communications department, with the exception of one person, I believe.

Took the offer, they call it the offer, capital T, capital O, and they all resigned, all of them.

There was also an executive pastor at the time who we received all staff communication about the departure of this executive pastor.

He was moving on to spend more time with his family.

It was a mutual decision and we wish him the best.

So I'm gonna get to that in just a minute.

But moving into 2020 COVID hits, we don't have a marketing department.

We don't have anybody to run social media.

We are paying a contractor at the time, but they wanted someone on staff to oversee social media because of sort of the intensity of the moment.

So.

They asked me to take over social media and my team.

I was at the time leading a team of video and graphic design professionals.

We had about 18 people on our team.

So I was like, we have the resources.

Sure, I'll take, I'll take over social media.

So I take over social media and I decide to open the software that they were using at the time.

I believe it's Hootsuite, to just sort of get a lay of the land and kind of see how they were using the software to schedule out posts and to sort of interact with all the different channels.

And in the Hootsuite software there's a, a section of it that where they had outlined hashtags that they are following and tracking and channels and usernames that they're sort of like tracking and following.

In that list of items was my.

Personal social media handles and no other staff member was listed, so, so I was being tracked actively for any time I would post anything.

Someone on the marketing team, whoever was overseeing the Hootsuite software, was given the task of, Hey, let me know when Cameron posts something, and if it is controversial, we'll make sure to have a talk with him.

Can you explain a little bit more about what the culture at this church was surrounding?

Social media?

Yes.

Yeah, that would be helpful.

Yes.

So when it comes to social media, you know, just as.

As, as much as control as they have over the alignment of the staff when it comes to these requirements.

There was also a level of control over the staff's social media and you know, there was guidance given in the handbook on what you could or could not post.

There was conversations from leadership at all, staff meetings on things that you could or could not post.

And there were one-on-one conversations with staff members around things that you should or should not post on your personal social media handles.

It was, there was a level of control here that is greater than the average organization that says you're a representative of our company.

Be careful.

So what are some of the things that, like you couldn't post, that you would say are an overreach?

Anything related to politics?

Right or left wing, actually, I should say.

There was a, a heavier focus on things that would be considered left wing or liberal or democrat.

There were things that got posted politically by staff members that were right wing or Trump adjacent that didn't get flagged and were not confronted.

However, there were things that were posted sort of the opposite side of the political spectrum, where in, in one instance, a worship pastor.

Was fired for political posts that he had.

It was five or six things that were not, not overly aggressive or extremely political, but would be considered painting Trump or the Republican Party in a slightly negative light.

And that that worship pastor was fired in November of 2020.

I had conversations and I think the reason they were tracking me is because I would post about things that I considered social justice and I, I tried to always, you know, put the things that I would post through the filter of, would Jesus be on the side of this thing that I'm posting here?

Would it be, would be, would he advocate for the same people that I'm advocating for in this post and L-G-B-T-Q content?

Anything related to social justice?

Those things were.

While nobody lost their jobs over those things, they were certainly looked at and confronted in conversations.

What did your body do in that moment?

Like how did it feel seeing that?

Yeah, I was just going to say, I froze.

I sat staring at my computer monitor Slack job when I discovered my name.

My social media handles were on a list, and I was the only staff me person whose name appeared on that list.

I, I was, I froze.

I probably sat and stared at my monitor for 10 to 15 minutes, just jaw wide open.

Like what?

I mean, it was violating, I felt violated.

I felt like it, it, it, it blew my mind.

It affected me emotionally.

In fact, IE even in this moment.

Talking about it, it makes me feel like I just couldn't believe it.

I couldn't believe it.

It was hurtful.

And what I did with it is in the moment I froze, my body locked up.

After that kind of settled, I walked straight over to my boss's office executive pastor, and I told him, I said, I don't, I don't know how to tell you this, but I just discovered that my name and social media handles were on a list being actively tracked by the marketing department and the executive pastor over that department.

To say that I was disappointed by his response would be a massive understatement.

He just kind of laughed about it.

I don't think he understood the feeling of violation that I felt, and you know, he sort of blew it off as like, oh man, that's crazy.

Wow.

Isn't that wild?

Anyway.

Do you think he knew?

To be honest with you, I don't think he knew the, the health of the executive pastor team at that time was bad.

There was a tremendous amount of tension between the executive pastor over marketing communications and my executive pastor, because they both oversaw creative areas that overlapped and they both had different ideas about how those, how content should be created and distributed.

So honestly, I don't think he knew, I think, I think that he was in the dark about it.

I think that he was surprised by it and, and his response was disappointing because he didn't acknowledge the severity of it and the real time trauma of seeing that.

Like on the screen, your name being actively tracked by an organization.

It shook me and his response, I was just like, I, I was disappointed to say the least.

It, it was, it would be an understatement, like I said, to say I was disappointed I was hurt, but his response, he just blew it off and didn't really think there was anything to it.

I'll be honest with you, Cameron, that still blows my mind.

You're living with that for months.

I, I don't know how you did it, but ultimately something happens in the fall of that year that sparks a conversation between you pastor a and your direct supervisor.

So what happened?

What led to that conversation and can you walk us through that meeting?

Sure.

So, you know, as we're moving into election season of 2020, I mentioned that there's a worship pastor who ended up being fired for his social media posts that.

Action.

The firing of this pastor who's a, a good friend of mine still is really fast.

You knew you were being monitored when your friend got fired?

Yeah.

Oh my gosh.

So you're carrying that with you when you watch your friend get fired for his social media posts?

Absolutely.

Yeah.

So I've been carrying that for a couple of months, just like, you know, the, the weight of knowing that over, probably over a several year period, they were tracking my social media several years.

So, you know, November of 2020 rolls around election season, this worship pastor is fired and quite a few of us on staff are, were shook up about that decision and I began to have conversations with my supervisor, executive pastor about it.

I was just like, man, this.

This seems very unjust that he lost, his job was fired, his financial stability put in jeopardy.

His whole livelihood cratered because of social media posts.

And I kept pushing on like, man, couldn't there have been a conversation with him?

Couldn't there have been an opportunity to show some grace in this moment to model the way of Jesus in this moment and lead someone through a situation like this?

And I probably had three or four conversations with my supervisor about it, and he had to remain impartial.

But I do think that he disagreed with the decision also, but he never said that clearly or plainly because we sort of has to.

Tow the party line in this scenario because he's an executive.

So on the fourth conversation, I think third or fourth conversation, we're sitting in his office.

It's towards the end of the day and I'm talking to, to my supervisor and he says, why don't we just go in to pastor a's office right now and talk to him about it?

He's the one who made the decision.

Let's go talk to him.

And I was like, okay, let's do it.

So he walks over to his office to make sure we can chat.

And so we, we walk in, it's pastor a, myself and my boss, who's an executive, and I proceed to tell pastor a about my discomfort with the decision that he made to fire this worship pastor over social media post.

And I was just like, man, I, I don't agree with it.

I think it was a pretty heavy handed, a very heavy handed decision that you made.

His livelihood has been affected, and I really think that there was an opportunity to show some grace to him in this moment, and he sat there and sort of stared right through me and waited until I was done talking and begin to tell me how wrong I was and that this was a decision that had to be made if we want to create a culture of alignment at this church that you know.

The, there was not an opportunity to show grace.

That's not what we do.

We are, we are a business.

We operate business principles.

I'm so sorry.

I just, we are a business when we wanna be a business.

Yeah.

But we are also a business that requires our employees to give back, do the religious thing, and tithe back their money to us.

Like the fact that we are running as a business when it's beneficial to us here.

And as a church when it's beneficial to us here, we take tithes, but we don't give grace as bonkers.

A hundred percent.

What is your, what are you doing?

Like, I mean, obviously I, I mean I, I don't wanna speak this into you, but are you feeling like your job's at risk by speaking up and like, what is, what are you feeling inside?

What are you thinking?

Like how are you processing this real time as this is happening?

Yeah.

Great question.

So I was, I, I have never been afraid to speak truth to power, but in the moment.

I realized like I'm actually questioning a decision that the senior leader has made.

So yeah, I was trembling, I was nervous.

I was like, this might get me in trouble pushing on this.

And then the meeting sort of shifts to a, an intensely heavy toned.

So as I'm, you know, we're sitting there talking about this worship pastor who had been fired.

He looks at me and he says, you didn't get this upset when I fired the executive pastor in 2019.

And I kind of like looked at him, sort of bewildered.

He's referring to the executive pastor who moved on to spend more time with his family, and it was a mutual decision.

He had sent an email to all staff about this, but he admitted to me in the moment, he showed a gap in his integrity by admitting that he had lied to the staff in that moment.

And he looked at me and said, oh, you didn't know that I did that.

You didn't know that I fired him.

That stays in this room.

That stays between you and me.

And I was shellshocked to say the least, because that revealed a massive gap in his integrity as the meeting moved on towards the end, we're wrapping up and I'm still sort of like dumbfounded that the statement that he had made about firing that executive pastor.

Then he like leans in and sort of gets closer to me.

Looks me in the eye and he says, this is gonna be a moment for you, Cameron.

This is a big moment.

You're gonna have to figure out if you can be on board here.

If you can get in line with the decisions that have been made.

This is a big moment for you.

It's a really big moment.

And I was terrified because that was a threat.

That was absolutely a threat.

Well, and he is using his body too, right?

So he's positioned his body in a way.

If I'm reading you correct, if you're saying, if I'm hearing you correctly, to where his body now is, is a form of intimidation, correct?

A hundred percent, yes.

Okay.

That's correct.

He leaned in and he looked me, stared me in the eyes and said, this is gonna be a big moment for you to say, I felt threatened.

Yeah, a hundred percent.

I felt threatened in that moment.

He's a pastor, he's a senior pastor.

He's a spiritual figure.

He has spiritual authority.

At least that's what we're told.

But he's also your boss.

He's using tone, he's using his body and he's threatening you.

Yeah.

Now everybody, just imagine like what you would do in that setting and how disruptive this is and also how wrong.

This is wrong.

It's just not good.

It's evil.

I'll say it.

I said it.

There you go.

It was, it was evil and, and the tone of it was not a tone of care.

It was not a tone of guidance toward Jesus.

It was not a tone of, I understand how this is affecting you.

It was a clearly defined.

Tone of aggression and threat.

It was intense.

So how do you get out of this meeting?

Like what are you, what are you feeling?

How do you get out?

Or how does it end?

It ends with me sort of going along with the line of thinking, yeah, this is gonna be a big moment for me.

I'm sort of scared into making a decision in that moment.

I want it to be.

Secure in my employment, walking away from that, because this, this is a spur of the moment meeting.

I didn't have time to think about the repercussions of this leading into it.

I didn't have time to like, you know, okay, if, if I go into this meeting and he, and I'm fighting for my friend who's been fired and I have to take a stand, well, here's how I'm gonna prepare for that and I'm gonna have potential backup financial options, all this stuff there, there was none of that.

It was a spur of the moment meeting.

And so when I walked out or was the meeting wrapped up, got in line, I agreed that this was a big moment for me, and I think I was affable and agreeable and just said, yeah.

Okay.

Yeah, I'm, I'm on board.

Can I ask you if you're able to, and if you're not, that's okay.

When you're processing through that moment where you're like, all right, I'm getting in line.

I don't have another choice, or you didn't feel like you had another choice.

What emotions are you processing when you look back on that moment?

Defeat and sort of like punched down and felt like I gave it my best shot, but I just gotta adhere to what he's saying.

I have to get in line.

I felt defeated, honestly.

I, and I felt probably a level of sadness.

Just like, man, when you, when you try to stand up for what you think is right and that doesn't go anywhere, but also it's met with a threat towards your livelihood and employment.

Yeah.

It does something to you.

I, I felt sad and defeated and scared.

It's just a lot, like there's a lot of pressure and, and threats and there's this, there's just so much that you're going through that your body is having to hold and you're pushing it down to grin and bear it, like get through it.

Wow.

So I think important twist happen after this.

Mm-hmm.

Which we haven't brought up, but you, like many mid-level managers were part of a mid to senior level.

Were part of meetings each week.

Leadership meetings.

Right.

You had 'em you said weekly.

So talk us through like there was a change in that, that you became aware of as a result of this meeting.

Yeah, so I was invited to be a part of this leadership team, which was a gathering of.

Department directors, a couple campus pastors, the executive team and the senior pastor.

And we would have weekly meetings and regular email exchanges where they would address us as leadership team, where we would discuss the strategy of the church and the direction that we were headed, problem areas that we thought were issues or whatever.

And so I was a regular staple in that meeting for, from 2018 until shortly after this.

I, I, I should say 2017, not 2018, but shortly after this meeting that I had with pastor a where he threatened me.

So that was November of 2020 when that meeting took place.

Just a, a few weeks later, my supervisor.

Called an impromptu meeting with all the folks that reported to him.

There were four or five of us directors to come over to his, to the executive conference room where we met him and pastor a and he was told us that he's gonna take some time off for the next few weeks to get his head right.

His brother had passed away a few months before that.

And so he was gonna take some time to grieve his, his brother's passing, but also get his head right with, with where he was at in his leadership at this church.

And as he sat there and told us that he was taking this time off, pastor A was watching him.

And it felt like a hostage situation, if I'm being honest.

And we were all like, what is this about?

And my observation would be that he was forced to take time off to get in alignment.

That as much as I was pushing back on the decisions that.

The decision to fire this worship pastor and other decisions around social media in, in that era.

As I was pushing back, I think my executive pastor was at the time doing his best to, to fight for me and our team as well.

And I think he was forced to take some time off.

I don't know exactly, but that would be my observation.

So he is out of town for several weeks.

Our leadership team meeting continues and towards the end of December of that year, we are in a leadership team meeting.

And the two executive pastors, mind you, one of them is off getting his mind right.

The two executive pastors tell us that this meeting is canceled.

We are no longer gonna have leadership team meetings.

Thank you for your service and this team is dissolved.

So, you know, in the moment we're like, okay, whatever.

We're not thinking it's a big deal.

Myself and the other directors, I'm gonna fast forward into 2021.

The first quarter of 2021, I started feeling like something was off in the office that I'm in, that I share with other directors, the department directors on the team.

And I realized, I started sort of observing that on Wednesdays at 10 o'clock, which is when we, for years held the timeframe that we held the leadership team meeting.

Those department directors weren't in their offices anymore.

So I started to wonder, did they reform the leadership team without me?

So I walked over to the executive conference room on a Wednesday and I sat in a lounge chair in front of that conference room and watched as all the department directors except for me, filed into that room.

And then a couple weeks later, maybe a month later after, after I realized that they're all going on a trip, which we historically did in the past where they fly their, all the directors and the, the leadership team out of town this time with their wives to go on this retreat.

And I, I told my boss about it.

I confronted him and I was like, what's going on here?

They told me that the leadership team had been dissolved and that we were no longer doing that, and he, it was met with gaslighting and deflection and minimizing my concern.

He said, oh, this is a different thing.

It's a totally different thing.

We're not doing that anymore.

We're doing something different.

This is more related to campus strategies specifically.

We're not talking about overall church strategy anymore.

It's a totally different thing.

You don't have to worry about that and.

I just was like, hold on a second.

Like just in November, I was met with a threat to my employment.

Then you were forced to leave for a few weeks to get your mind right.

Then I was kicked off the leadership team by the canceling of this meeting, and then the leadership team reforms without me on it.

All the same players in the room except for me.

It was confusing and mentally traumatizing to say the least.

I felt like my legs had been cut off.

That I, my authority and my voice had been stripped and removed.

I felt, I, I, I, it, it shook me.

I remember after I sat outside the conference room and discovered that they were still having new, this sort of reform, this team, I walked back over to my office and I closed the door and I sat in my chair and stared at my monitor for about an hour.

Just like what, like the canceling of a meeting?

No conversation, no.

Like, Hey Cameron, we really think maybe you, you're not cut out for this, or we're going a different direction with this team.

Nothing of that sort.

It was while my boss was out of town, so there's no opportunity for him to stand in the gap for me.

They removed me from the team and it felt directly connected to.

The conversation that I had with pastor A, it was retaliatory.

It was retaliatory.

And, and this is also very confusing again, how many years are you in now?

At that point, I had been on staff for, you know, 14 years.

14 years of relationships.

You're not on, are you on performance improvement plans and stuff like that?

Never.

Right.

So like you have led well in their standards and this is like your college roommate.

Like, there's so many things going on here that feel, so, I feel like there's just gotta be so much betrayal.

It was, it felt massively like betrayal.

And the, to, to underscore your point of leading, well my team had the lowest turnover on staff of the entire organization.

0% turnover.

Not one person fired or quit.

In my tenure as a leader, we were highly efficient.

The, the culture on our team was incredible.

I was leading the team at the highest level, hon, honestly, and I don't say that to, you know, to brag, but to underscore the point of I was doing everything that was required of me as a leader and contributing from a management and leadership standpoint more than other directors on the team.

So there, this wasn't a, Cameron is not leading his team well, this was retaliation.

I, I, I, I can't see it any other way.

So again, I want everyone to again, remember 20 20, 20 21.

The job market is horrific too.

So like we lived that not having a job during that season and like.

I mean, it was brutal out there.

So you also have that factor here of like, what do you do?

Like where do you go?

How do you even get another job in the midst of this?

So you just like have to live with the fact this is going on and continue your life, right?

So you're still looking at social media, you're still doing all of the duties that you have already in your work.

Walk us through what goes down in the summer of 2021.

So yeah, I continue to, you know, lead my team and love and care for them the best that I could while also carrying confusion.

And sort of mental trauma.

I actually remember talking to, shortly before the summer, may, June, July, I was seeing a therapist and I told them about this scenario.

You know, what I was feeling, what happened with the leadership team thing, the conversation with my boss.

And she was like, man, she's like, you have been through it.

That is tremendously messed up what they have put you through and, you know, validating my experience because, you know, I was also like, am I crazy for feeling this way, for feeling like, is it really as big a deal as I'm making it out to be?

Like, I was questioning all of that.

I was confused and it was really helpful for my therapist to, to validate my feelings, saying, no, this is not normal.

You have not been treated well.

So fast forward summer of 2021, our daughter.

Comes out as queer and well, she comes out to my wife first.

And it's, it's a lot for us to navigate.

This is a new, this is new territory.

You know, I grew up in the church.

I've been in full-time ministry for a long time at that point, close to 20 years.

And so it was a lot for me to navigate.

So I told my boss about it that, you know, what sort of, where we were at.

And he recommended a book for me called Love Makes Room.

And the book is written by a Christian singer songwriter whose daughter came out as gay.

And how she navigated it in a, in an affirming and accepting manner.

It's a beautiful story.

So this Christian singer songwriter is a friend of my boss.

And so he had read the book and was like, Hey, I think this would really help you.

So.

You know, give this book a read as you're navigating this with your child.

So I read that book, it's a beautiful story.

And then at some point, shortly after I read the book, I posted on Twitter a screenshot of, or maybe it was a, a repost of hers that said something to the effect of, if you're a Christian and you're struggling questioning whether or not to be affirming, let love be the goal, not certainty.

And I love that so.

I repost that with my comment that just said, love this.

And the next morning I walk into my office and within just a couple of minutes of me arriving, my boss walks in to my office, closes the door behind him and says, tell me what you mean when you hear the word affirming.

And I was like, what?

What are you talking about?

And it, it clicked for me that he doesn't have a Twitter account.

He's not on Twitter.

He's never been really a social media guy, my boss.

So I responded to him directly.

Did Pastor a show you my tweet from last night?

And he didn't answer.

He wasn't going to throw him under the bus.

But it was clear to me that Pastor a had seen my post and had sent my boss to have a conversation with me about what it means to be affirming and.

I was like, what is this?

What's going on here?

Like, why are you bringing me heat when I'm reposting something from a book that you gave to me?

I was dumbfounded.

So we have the conversation about, like, you gave me that book.

We're ha we're navigating this with my child.

I'm going to affirm my child.

There's no question about that.

So that's what I, what I mean by affirming.

I'm not going to put my child in a situation where they feel like I don't accept them.

Not gonna happen.

So he goes back to Pastor A and shares with them what's going on in our family.

Really quickly.

How did you feel about your boss sharing that with Pastor A?

Did you know that was gonna happen?

I didn't know it was gonna happen.

He didn't ask me.

I didn't know, in fact, the resolution of that conversation.

There was nothing related to like.

Because he, again, he didn't admit to pastor a having told him about my tweet, so there was no like, well, let me go talk to him and sort of smooth this over.

It was, you know, we had the conversation about what it mean, what I believed, affirming, meant, and sort of wrapped it up and he left.

Well, a couple weeks later, I'm in the hallway of the executive building and I run into pastor A and he says to me, Hey, your boss told me about what you're going through with your kid.

Like, man, I really, I really feel for you.

I really like, it's probably, you're probably going through a lot.

And I was like, yeah, it's a lot.

We're, we're navigating a lot, but we, we accept our child for who they are.

And he says, well, hey, I would love to have you and your wife over for dinner with me and my wife at our home.

So we can talk about this.

And I was like, okay.

You know, it sort of came across as like, you know, we wanna be, we want a pastor, you guys, we want, we wanna love on you through, you know, what might be a very difficult situation.

Were you at all?

Like, did you feel, I, I guess intimidated might be the best word when he asked that question, I was caught off guard.

Yeah.

I was caught off guard, but I wanted to believe the best in that moment of him.

Okay.

I wanted to give him the benefit of the doubt.

Let me rewind a little bit and say as, as threatening as that moment was in his office.

I still interfaced with him on a weekly basis, sometimes several times a week.

I would oversaw the designing of his sermon slides and we would meet on a regular basis and talk about his slides and content that he wanted created.

And you know, so we were interfacing all the time.

It wasn't like that meeting and then I sort of disappeared and that sort of regular time with him where he is as charming and affable as he can be, sort of, you, you, you kind of forget, you go in and out of forgetting that the, the threat of your employment in his office, you know, it's confusing to, to feel that intense, like, oh shoot, my job might be in jeopardy to, you know, the very next week.

A high five and a, Hey Cam, how we doing?

Let's get to these slides, buddy.

That whole thing is like, it's, it's a, it's a regular form of whiplash.

When did this dinner take place and walk us through this dinner.

So that interaction in the hallway was probably in August of 2021, and then we got on his calendar in October of 21.

2021.

So my wife and I go to his house.

We have dinner with him and his wife, and it was confusing.

Because it started out as we're having dinner, we're sitting across from the table from each other.

We're talking about our years in college.

We're laughing and you know, like yucking it up.

It was, you know, we're having dinner.

It was just, it was, it felt nice.

And then he started to tell us about his sister who is gay.

And as he started to tell us about his sister who was gay, we, both, my wife and I both got the feeling of, oh, he's like, he gets it.

'cause we, we've always said, you know, as we navigated this, like with our, our child, you know, we've always sort of talked about like, Christians might not have an idea of what it's like to affirm.

Someone who's gay or maybe questioning whether or not they're affirming until they have a relative or a close friend or someone who's walking through it.

And that changes everything.

So, you know, in the moment we're like, oh, maybe he's an ally.

Like he's, he's gonna be on our side with this because his sister is gay.

And as he moves through the conversation as his, about his sister, it, the conversation, the tone switched from understanding to condemnation and how they had to set boundaries around their relationship with their sister.

They limited the interaction of his kids and his sister's kids because they were in a gay relationship, a gay marriage.

And that felt like incredibly surprising to us.

And also scary because.

If you feel this way about your sister and you have put these boundaries in place with them, how is that gonna affect us staff members on your, on your staff?

So then we went and sat on the couch and, and that's when a more intense conversation developed.

He told us he wanted to, wanted us to meet with a couple in town who has a ministry for parents of gay and queer children.

It's basically a pray the gay away ministry.

They were these, this couple used to be gay in like individually, and then they found each other and got married and started this ministry to help.

People navigate homosexuality in the church.

And that was the moment when he sort of said like, I'd love for you guys to meet this couple.

That was the moment that we felt like this is not an opportunity for him to pastor and love on us through what is a very difficult situation that we're trying to figure out.

That was a, we need you to get in line and as your kid navigates this, here's some folks that you, that you should meet to help you get in line because this is not, this is not going to be a, a, a thing that would be acceptable.

In our ministry.

I just wanna say this, anytime that you have a church that is outwardly trying to push people away because of things that they don't understand, and I do say that they don't understand or have the time to acknowledge that people's life experiences are different and we're all different, and that is a beautiful and wonderful thing.

Hmm.

And when a church can't see that, that decides to say, no, I'm gonna put up the walls and I'm gonna tell you how you should be behaving that.

Is not only a huge red flag that is not of Jesus.

It never has been and it never will be.

We people have put that in place, we, and that makes you uncomfortable.

Read a different translation of your Bible.

Go outside and learn more about how and who wrote the Bible and the influence that the Bible had over our culture through the generations, because it's significant and there have been people who have weaved a narrative that we push people out because they're afraid and maybe they have hate in their heart or maybe they don't understand it themselves, or maybe that's what they've always told, been told, and they just are going along with it.

It all builds something that is not of Jesus at all.

You're preaching so.

So many thoughts, but you're leaving this meeting, what do you do?

What do you do?

What do, like, how do you emotionally handle that?

And I also, there is something that I want to acknowledge in what you just said where there is something so tender and raw.

I think any parent listening to this can, can relate to this when it comes to navigating your relationship with your kids and uncharted territory, and especially if there's like fear in any capacity.

You've mentioned that you were in long-term ministry, so you're, you're coming up against having to reckon with your own beliefs about this stuff.

And you're having to decide like, well, am I affirming and what does this mean for my relationship with my child?

It's so tender.

I don't wanna make any judgment calls on the people like your boss that you had, that you talked to, or even on pastor A when it comes to like the advice he's make giving, because I think that it's so normalized again in these spaces, but the lack of boundaries and protection of your child and you in that moment can't be missed.

That was your story, your struggle, your family, your kid.

And that story was taken from being yours and, and shared in a place that you were not, and that's not right.

That's not fair.

And I think on I not, not just not fair, it's a violation.

And I think so often we in church staff contexts think we are owed.

Deeply personal information of congregants or each other because we're a church and because, you know, we can pray for each other, or we need to know all of these extra details that are very personal and vulnerable so that we know where the person's coming from.

And that's just not right.

We, we continually cross boundaries or insert ourselves into stories or take the, the power and control of someone's own lived experience into our own hands, and then share information in ways that we were not given permission to.

And that's deeply harmful and that culture is deeply harmful.

And I, I wanna acknowledge that that was wrong, that that happened to you.

And I'm sure as a parent you carried some shame and guilt that your kids' story.

Was then shared because you shared a story with someone you thought you could trust.

Like the layers here of betrayal and pain that I'm sure you've had to process can't be understated.

Like I think that we just need to acknowledge that that's a reality here.

There's in your whole story, there's so many layers at every turn, but this one, it's like you've been dealing with all these layers of these interpersonal relationships and church or business and abuse and high control leadership, and then in the middle of all of that confusion and pressure, your kid got involved and now your kid is being used to keep you in line and to control you, and that is so damaging.

So you're walking out of this dinner with that now added layer of your own child and their dignity.

Humanity and your relationship with your child is now being leveraged against your income, your job, your church, your relationships with your pastor.

What do you do?

Yeah, so in the moment, in the meeting, in the di at the dinner, I think I was in survival mode.

I was in, how do I make it out of this, you know, without ruffling feathers and without continued threat of losing my employment.

My wife, however, she was not in a good place.

When we walked outta that meeting, she felt intimidated and manipulated.

She felt like it was a subversive, subtle attack on our family.

With the potential of losing my employment.

So she wanted to sort of remain pretty quiet during the meeting because she also felt like, I don't want to say anything that my jeopardized Cameron's job.

And so she didn't speak up much at all, and I was like, I don't want to say anything that's going to jeopardize my job.

So I remember walking out and we got in the car and started to drive away and she just was like, what the hell was that?

She's like the level of manipulation to, you know, sit around the table, having a meal, laughing, talking about memories, our time together, all this kind of stuff.

And then to move into this like.

Here's sort of guidance on what we want to happen with you and your family.

We want you to go see this couple and see if they can help you pray the gay away.

She felt blindsided, and manipulated and intimidated.

She said it was all done in a very friendly way.

It was all very charming.

They're, they're very likable people, but they're sort of like underneath.

The friendliness and the likability.

There's this subversive, like, we are controlling you and we want, we have an expectation for you to meet.

And if you don't, you might feel some pain at some point.

So that was October of 2021.

We walked away from that.

Like I said, feeling intimidated and manipulated.

But if I'm being honest, I was like, man, maybe we do have to get on board here.

Maybe we, we do need to like keep the story of my family and my child quiet and not let anyone else find out about this.

Because if more people find out, then it's going to sort of raise more awareness and people could start asking questions like, Hey, if Cameron has a gay child, why is he still on staff if he's affirming that child?

And so we were feeling, I was feeling the pressure of like, okay.

I need to keep this quiet.

I need to not let you know our story.

Get out.

Let me fast forward to the end of that year.

We started, there were, there were conversations among the sort of department directors and leadership of the church about how this church navigates homosexuality and the LGBT.

Community and involvement in our church.

There were conversations about that, and I think that was directly related to this sort of bubble up of my story.

And, you know, whenever, whenever anything like this has, has bubbled up with pastor a, he will start to feel like there is, this is a big issue that we need to address.

And so as my story, he, as he found out about it, and you know, he, he, he's talking to my boss about it.

We're having dinner together.

I think he began to ask questions about, of our leadership, other executive pastors, directors, campus pastors, Hey, what do you guys think about how we handle, how we navigate the L-G-B-T-Q community in our church?

So the beginning of the following year, beginning of 2022, they rolled out a policy at an all staff meeting called Alternative Sexual Ethics.

And it was basically.

Limiting the involvement of any L-G-B-T-Q person in the church, my child included, and a very heavy handed approach to what they would call this issue, this alternative sexual ethics.

And I walked out of that meeting, they rolled out this policy, and I was walking with a very close friend of mine and he said, man, that whole thing felt like a direct arrow right at you.

He said it, he was like, dude, this feels like that policy is directly related to you and your family.

That's crazy.

And I was like, yeah, yeah.

I, I think, I think it, it was directly related to me and my family.

Of course, he's, he's trying to broaden the language with, with who they're trying to navigate.

But this, this.

Make no mistake about it, this policy rolled out because it bubbled up with me and my family and felt like a continuation of pressure put on me to eventually push me all the way out of the staff.

Wow.

So what, what happens next?

I mean, you've been there for so long and you're so intertwined.

I mean, this is your career.

This rolls out.

What is your next move?

I mean, when do you decide to leave?

What does that look like?

So that, yeah, that's a good question.

From the beginning of 2021, when I started having conversations with my boss about like why I was cut out of the leadership team and, you know, expressing to him that I feel like my voice has been silenced.

My legs have been cut off from a leadership standpoint.

I don't, you know, I'm leading my team well, but I'm not able to affect any sort of change above me, which I had always welcomed and had been given that opportunity for the, for several years before that.

So, I, you know, these conversations with my boss, him, me telling him like, I am spiraling.

Those happened frequently over a year long period.

Where I was in my head mentally about like what is happening?

I feel like what is going on here?

The meeting with pastor, a being kicked off, the leadership team, the example that was made out of the employee when it, the story that I told earlier about the group story, like all, all of these things where it feels like things are piling up and I'm like just really confused on what my place is in this organization anymore.

It really felt like I was being pushed out over a period of time.

You know, I was having conversations with my wife, I was having conversations with some of my closest friends on the team, one of my closest friends on the team, and just like almost on a daily basis, like, man, what is going on here?

I feel.

Unstable.

I feel unsteady.

I'm spiraling mentally.

Like I, I, I don't know how, how much longer I can do this.

So I started, we went on vacation in June of 2021.

My family and you know, did a lot of introspective thinking there.

We visited a Washington and we started dreaming about what it would be like to move out of Arizona.

And then I saw an opportunity come up at another church in the metro Atlanta area, a church that I had an existing relationship with.

And I reached out to some, a post that they had put on social media.

They were happy to hear from me, courted me for a couple of months and I felt like maybe this was my time to step away from this church in Arizona.

And the thing that was, that confirmed my decision to leave and that.

Was like, oh yeah, maybe I was being pushed out and squeezed until I had to quit was when I told my boss that I was interviewing for another position.

Because we had, we've been having these conversations about where I was at and when I told him like, Hey man, I'm interviewing for another job.

He was like, oh yeah, that's cool.

And there was no like, dude, really, man, what's going, you know, we don't, we don't wanna lose you.

There was no fight to keep me.

There was no like, what can we do to keep you?

It was, it was very much like, great, well, hope it goes well for you.

That was the response.

So the, yeah, I mean they didn't put up resistance, which I mean, which is so hard to hear 'cause you've been there for so long and contributed so much to that place that you do, you put so much into it and it's just, it's just disappointing that that's the response.

So you leave, bring us to now, what are you feeling now?

What would you say to these leaders that were at this church in Arizona, if, if you wanna say anything to them and then, you know, why was it important for you to share your story now?

So it took me a while for me to really have perspective on what I experienced.

Where I'm at now is I want to see change in this organization.

I started sharing my story publicly on my social media channel about a year ago and.

As I started to share what I experienced, I began getting messages from former staff members, current staff members who have been through abusive situations.

Most of them females, several of them sexual harassment related, and as I share, continued to share publicly some of these stories.

The messages kept coming in and there was, there's been some organization, a little bit of, of, of folks who have also experienced abuse from this church.

And I think at this point I feel.

A little bit of a sense of responsibility to help those folks who have reached out to me, not only to process their own healing, but also to help play a part in getting their stories platformed in some way so that there can eventually be some sort of change.

The one thing that, the one experience that sort of pushed me over the edge to start speaking publicly about this, I, after the October 7th attack of Israel and Ba Hamas last year, pastor a put out a video on his social media channel about that sort of, uh, inviting people to come to our services and pray about this experience, and he publicly denounced Tomas and Platformed Israel, which that's a whole other thing.

But anyway, I left a comment on that post about a month later.

After 15,000 Palestinians had died, and I said, do you plan on addressing the way that you address the attacks when 1200 Israelis died?

I left a comment on that post.

He texted me directly after I commented, and he said something to the effect of, I saw your comment on our posts.

It's confusing to me.

It feels like you're bitter and angry at our church.

And he said, you know how much I love your family, and I've been thinking about reaching out to the pastor at your current church to ask them their policy on staff members commenting on other churches', social media.

But I wanted to reach out to you first.

And I sat there.

I get chills now when I'm thinking about it and stared at that text.

Just unbelievable to me that at this point I had been off their staff for over a year and he's reaching out to me again, threatening to get me in some kind of trouble with the friend that your livelihood, my live, he has the, the pastor that he was planning to reach out to was a former pastor in Arizona at another mega church.

He's now on staff at this church out in the Atlanta metro area, and they're buddies.

And so he said, I have an inclination to reach out to him to ask them about this, but I wanted to reach out to you first and you know how much I love your family.

And I just could not believe it.

I was, I mean, I still have that text message in my phone and I was dumbfounded that his attempt to continue to control me and affect my livelihood was so brazen and that spurred.

On the desire to share my story publicly, because I want people to know that the leadership of this church and pastor a in particular, may not be the people that you think they are.

And beneath the surface there's more going on.

They're deceptive, they're controlling, they're manipulating people, they're scaring people by threatening their livelihood.

They're terrorizing staff members.

And man, I could, I could go on and on staff members who've been fired since I left for interacting with my current social media posts.

So yeah, I want, why?

I wanted to share my story.

I want the people of Arizona to know.

Who these people are.

I want the staff to know what's going on behind the scenes, the deception, the manipulation, the control.

I had a conversation with a friend of mine who's still on staff there a couple months ago and I said like, I know you guys see it.

Like you know what's going on there?

Why aren't more people speaking up?

And he said, flat out it's people's livelihoods are at stake.

Everyone is terrified of losing their jobs.

They don't have the opportunity to speak up.

And it's that kind of fear and control that is so counter to the way of Jesus, man, it's so unhealthy.

And I wish more people would speak up.

And so that's why I'm, I decided to share my story.

I want the people of Arizona to know, and I want the staff at this church to know who these people really are.

And I hope for some sort of effectual change.

That these people would hear the stories, my story in particular, and others who have shared and that that they would have an understanding that their actions are actually hurting people, actually leading people away from Jesus.

There are several people who have been fired or have left that staff who are no longer believers, who have said, because of what I experience and the abuse that I experience at the hands of these men.

I no longer want to follow the Jesus that they are purporting to follow.

And I'm no longer a believer.

These men are saying we're pastors.

We get a financial benefit from being pastors and we want to lead people to Jesus, but in, in reality, they're hurting people more than they know.

In fact, one other story I'll share briefly.

I got a message from a person who attends the church is not a staff member, it's not a volunteer, but they somehow came across my social media and the story that they told me of the experience that they had with the executive team about some financial.

Things that they were involved in.

Basically, person was a big giver, gave a lot of money, and they were going through a very difficult time.

Husband was under a lot of stress.

They were looking for help from pastors.

The pastors were basically left them high and dry and, and had some questions about where they gave financially.

Anyway, I, I don't want to get into the weeds of all that, but they felt so betrayed by pastor A and the executive team so much.

They reach out to me to say, Hey.

Can you help?

I've experienced abuse too, and I'm just a congregant, I'm just a member who had given millions of dollars to that organization and got buried emotionally and spiritually.

So that's why, um, sharing my story.

Wow.

I mean, I just wanna thank you, Cameron, just for going through.

First, I just wanna acknowledge everything that, that you and your family have experienced and the, the horrific nature of how you were treated at that church is appalling and it doesn't speak to your humanity or your personhood or your family and a loving, caring way.

So I want to speak to that and just say that deeply saddens me and I grieve it, and we should all grieve that.

But I want to commend you for your voice and your bravery to not only stand up for yourself, but to stand up for.

Your family, your daughter, the people that you love and care for, because that, that is the way of Jesus.

And thank you for that.

Thanks.

Yeah, I, I appreciate the opportunity to share my story and, and hopefully others who hear this will, it will, it will embolden them to do the same.

And I think the only way to affect change is pressure and more people coming out and sharing their experience.

I, I actually heard from a very prominent former leader in this church who said that they have also heard from several people over their, you know, 20 year involvement in this church about church, church.

So this is, this is not just a, an isolated incident with me.

I'm just the one who's coming forward to start the conversation about it.

Thank you.

We appreciate it.

Thank you for sharing.

And if you're out there and you're hearing this and it's resonating with you, just know I live in Arizona, I know the impact and reach of this organization and how frightening it probably is for you too.

Speak up.

And I have a lot of empathy for that.

And if you wanna connect, feel free to reach out off the record and I'd be happy to have a conversation with you.

And it sounds like Cameron is also connecting with people, so we will connect some dots for you so that you feel a little less alone in what you've experienced.

Every single time we release a story, a congregation and its leaders are given the opportunity to choose a posture of reflection rather than defensiveness.

We hope that this church carefully considers Cameron's words and chooses to take the proper steps to root out the abuses of power and overreach that exist within its leadership for the sake of all parties involved, and that they begin to walk towards goodness.

Cameron's kindness is not an act.

Over the past few months of getting to know him, we have seen time and time again his gentleness and his thoughtfulness.

Thank you, Cameron, for your courage to say the hard things out loud.

For J Coyle, I'm Jonna Harris, and this has been The Bodies Behind the Bus Podcast, the views, thoughts, and opinions expressed.

Here are the speaker zone and not those of this podcast.

This content is presented for informational and educational purposes that constitute fair use, commentary or criticism.

While we make every effort to ensure that the information shared is accurate, we welcome any comment, suggestion, or correction of errors.