This week on Breakfast in Hell, I'm joined by Kensey Wynn.

Kensey's an actor based in Nashville, Tennessee, who grew up in South Carolina, and while church wasn't a high priority in her house, Kensey spent her entire childhood in Christian school.

The Christian school environment in Greenville, South Carolina, was intertwined into the culture, with Bob Jones University being the epicenter of Southern evangelicals and their educational movement.

The teachings and principles passed on to Kensi in school were along the lines of what you'd expect if you've ever listened to this podcast, teaching such as the total damnation and torment and hell, the importance especially for women of purity culture, and the undeniable objective evil of the LGBTQ community.

Kensey is an only child and is also, by her own admission, someone with a high level of anxiety.

Pouring these particular ideas into her high anxiety created an imbalance that Kensey sought to alleviate by leaning further into these evangelical teas.

It's not until Kinsey gets into college that she sees that these particular foundations of her faith were actually throwing gasoline on an anxious fire.

She gets out of her bubble and finds freedom in meeting others from outside of her upbringing that share more in common with her than she ever thought possible.

Kinsey is bright, articulate, and self aware.

It's an enlightening and entertaining conversation, and I hope you enjoy it.

Here's Kinsey, Kinsey.

I have known you since I was a substitute teacher at a school where my brother taught, and you and I graduated from that school, Christian school.

You graduated from that school, but I don't know much about you really before then.

So can you tell me and everyone else a little bit about who you were growing up?

Yeah?

Well it's funny because I also you taught at another Christian school, Yeah, in soft RONI and I actually went there before I went.

To Yeah, you know that.

Yeah, So you're like, it's funny.

You're kind of like an invisible string friend, because there there have been pockets of moments where our paths should have crossed a lot and then just bizarrely didn't for whatever reason.

And every time, because your brother and I are tight, and every time I yap with him.

I mean, I'm not kidding.

Almost every single time, there will almost always be a comment he will make, which is.

Man, you should you should be besties with the Ana.

Because of the ship that comes out of my mouth, I guess.

But anyway, Yeah, who who was I before high school?

What a great question.

I mean, I grew up in South Carolina.

I was born in Greenville.

I uh lived in bfy Easley, South Carolina for a good while on a horse farm.

My mom is very passionate about horses.

Uh yeah, two loving parents, only child I was.

I joke and say that I was born with my butt clench.

I I always I always had anxiety.

I like, I.

Genuinely can't remember.

A time that I didn't have anxiety, which I feel like is probably for better or for worse.

A big part of my story.

The mechanisms as a kid.

As a young kid, did you not know that you had it?

Or were there coby mechanisms available or it was just part of who you are?

Well?

I think when I was really young, the word for anxious child was gifted kid.

Yeah that it was for sure.

Yeah, And I mean I had like not you know, I had like a really ridiculous reading level from a really young age.

And I think that's a thing.

I you know, I'm sure there are like medical journals on it and very teacher's pet I didn't really have words for it.

I just remember like feeling like I was always thinking a little more than my peers.

And yeah, and it was very usually manifested.

I didn't have the words for it.

So I always said I have a stomach ache.

Even if I didn't, I was just like, I have a stomach ache.

And my mom, I think, and my dad.

I think my parents caught on after a while.

They're like, oh, she's just she's anxious.

She just doesn't want to be doing whatever we're doing right now.

And a big way I think I coped, honestly was either reading books, escaping into literature, or watching movies and TV.

I loved I loved it so much.

Did you have the support of your parents in like like making that coping feel natural or was it like a reb some dirt on it situation.

Yeah, Listen, my parents are awesome at awesome humans, both of them, And yeah, they're just really great.

And it's so funny because looking back, and I don't think this was on purpose, But my mom has always had kind of a you know, boss bitch corporate America job, even from when I was at a very young age.

My dad up until very recently, he kind of retired, but he owned a restaurant, no he so he co owned it with his best friend.

They have been best friends since they were eleven, super cute, and he sold his share.

Basically he was kind of like, he's ready to retire.

His best friend, the co owner, has younger kids, so he's like, I can't.

I can't quite retire it yet I still have a child to put through college.

So yeah, so my dad retired his bit.

But anyway, so but because of.

That, they both worked a lot, but my dad had a little more flexibility with schedule.

So I grew up in this kind of very feminist dynamic, right because when I was really young, my dad was kind of mister Mom, Like he was the one that was like giving me breakfast in the morning and getting me dressed for school and all that jazz.

Because my mom had to like work with the horses early in the morning and then you know, get her butt to work.

Because corporate America doesn't really like flexibility as much.

So anyway, you know, that dynamic was kind of cool.

I look back on that now it's a modern woman and I'm like, man, that.

Was yeah, that was rare, especially yeah entering and what we're about to talk about, which is what what did faith look like growing up in your house?

Sure?

Yeah, and so it was cool.

And I don't think that was on purpose.

I just think that was just what that was necessity and I you know, I it instilled something in tiny Kinzie.

I think.

Notoriously, like in the evening, do you know what I mean?

So probably is a situation where the nine to five during the day in the evening, so at least one parent's available, Like that makes sense too.

But yeah, all that to say, you know, my childhood was good.

My parents are awesome.

They're incredibly supportive.

I will also say though.

I mean I was an only child and they both worked, and while my dad had a bit more flexibility, like, both of their jobs were demanding.

So I do sometimes joke that like there was a bit of a Matilda vibe, but if the Wormwood's like really really cared, they.

They just had to work.

Yes, Yeah, because I was alone like a lot, you know, I learned to take care of myself.

Again, I don't know that that's necessarily bad thing.

I think it's pretty common only a child thing, the.

Kid with anxiety, though.

I mean, you're now just compounding, you know what I mean, Like you're a low resoughts.

You're gonna you know, at some point that's gonna the damn is gonna burst.

There for sure, for sure.

But yeah, I mean that was that was essentially it.

I you know, but I as soon as I started going to school, I mean I started going to school from a really young age again because working parents pre k kindergarten.

That was kind of at a from what I can recall, it was like a church, but that had a school program, and that's where I went.

And then starting first grade was where I went to.

You know, Shannon, and then yeah, so uh and then sixth grade is when I moved to where your brother worked.

So always private Christian education.

What was church like on Sunday mornings?

Where were we all going?

What kind of Church's?

Great?

Great question?

Again, this is where this is where my parents are cool, right They weren't.

They weren't your typical.

Southern Baptist Christians, which is which is saying a lot, mostly because of my dad.

My dad is from South Georgia, godogs, my mom's from Michigan, so that's not even a thing.

But Michigan Michigan football fans everywhere, like a recent national championship, are all pissed off.

Yeah, they're just the mat all the time.

So I'll be honest.

Church wasn't super regular.

Again, I think it's because both my parents worked their butts off, and I think.

Sunday was like truly a day of rest.

Yeah, they didn't have to be anywhere and go anywhere, and I think they really leaned into that took advantage of that.

Also, for a lot of my childhood, like I said.

We lived kind of in the middle of nowhere, so you know, access to things were slim, especially back then.

Easily has grown a lot now, but then it was.

It was super super small.

But the thing is is if you're going to Christian school always, so clearly there was some sort of impetsis on your parents' part to put you in faith based education, which is like I mean you're taking you're getting Sunday school and church five days.

A week, no, one hundred percent and that so that's where.

So yeah, so I.

We went to church occasionally, but we weren't like super super regular.

My parents I do recall them signing me up to do VBS one summer.

And I hated it because because I always went to a private Christian school.

So I was like, this is.

I'm getting this time as a million Like I don't need this.

So yeah, So the private Christian education of it all is interesting because I'm sure you're aware, South Carolina ranks like forty eighth to fiftieth in education.

Like always bottom five.

Always bottom five.

And my mom was like, well that's unacceptable.

She to go to college and be prepared for college.

So that was her big thing with signing me up to go to private Christian school.

It was mostly because of academics.

The Christian education of it all was like French benefit, right, like because my parents are Christian, they were like this is great.

You know, she'll she'll get a lot of Jesus and also college prep, college prep?

Yes?

When when when?

And I have honest as a former principal of a Christian school that represents at least a quarter of any Christian schools population, just a the Jesus stuff is I'm not against it.

I'm not for it.

I'm really here.

So my kid gets a very specific type of education, that's why they're there.

Yeah, and I think you know, between my two parents, my dad is a little more conservative.

My mom's a little more like loosey goosey.

So my dad was probably like more than one that was like, yeah, Bible every day, and my mom was like, yeah, she will go to college like.

We did it.

So it was perfect combination.

But the the deconstruction of it, all right, is that at the end of the day, as a kid, you're at school, you know so much more than you're anywhere else.

That's anywhere else.

Yes, So my worldview was completely shaped by school.

Like, you know, at the end of the day, it didn't really matter how like chill my parents were, didn't matter that you know, we didn't necessarily very strictly go to church every Sunday.

I was so.

You know, formed by where I went to school and my teachers.

What did that look like, Like you're you're like as a middle school or high school student or even an elementary school suo that like, what did it look like?

What were the confidences that you had in faith?

Like what were the things that you knew were bedrocks of your life from a supernatural student.

Sure, this is that's a great question.

I love the way you word about the bedrocks of my life.

That's how I ves it as a kid.

There are things that are just absolute, lockdown.

Sure, and that allowed me absolute as someone that didn't suffer from anxiety.

I just never worried about him again until I did.

Sure.

Yeah, I mean the absolutes were that Jesus existed and that he died and rose again for a suons.

That was numero uno baby.

And then of course the reality of heaven and hell and spiritual warfare of demons and angels and Satan and kind of the good versus evil of it all.

Those were the you know, no brainer.

Did that affect your and anxiety as a.

Child, Oh for sure?

And I had, and I had.

This is what's crazy, I had no idea.

Oh hold on.

Another absolute that feels really really important because it's a huge part of my journey to where I am now was purity culture.

Of course, purity culture was a huge, huge absolute, which it was.

I mean, culture is I think the perfect word for it, because those like late nineties, early two thousands, true love weights.

Oh it wasn't culture is a perfect word, because it wasn't pure.

It was, Yes, it was this very specific, high control definition of what we knew would control the next generation of people to be raised in our religion.

Is what it was, right right the book I Kissed Dating Goodbye.

I mean it's just yeah, passion and purity.

Oh just crazy crazy town.

Yeah.

So I you know, as an kid prone to anxiety and you're given these really strict black and white.

Rules.

I mean, it just it was it was a doozy and.

When did you start to quite like like, I mean I could see how at someone with anxiety that helping.

I can see you going all right, I have this guidebook, and then I can also see as soon as you start to scratch the surface and those bedrocks are just like cotton swabs, then all of a sudden it spirals.

What was it?

Was that there a transition there?

Or was that which one of those things would have been more of a descriptive of you with with those beliefs in middle and high school.

I mean I think for me in middle and high school, God, being a middle school girl is just it's it's hard.

Regardless, I think.

I think it really manifested almost as like a I want to say, almost like a spiritual OCD thing.

I remember I developed a really intense fear of death and dying.

I remember like praying, like being like I would have to like pray over everybody and be like please you know that really the very fucked up Lord's prayer.

Like now I lay me down to see sleep, I pray for my soul to keep and if I should die before I wake, I pray the Lord my soul to take.

I literally I would pray the Lord's prayer because I was taught that's what you did.

But then I would always end it with but like, seriously, you don't have to do that, though, please please, please, please please don't.

I really like to be alone.

I was on the agenda God, if you could not, it would be great, it would be great.

Yeah, And I And there was such talking about Jesus.

There was such a focus and understandably, such a focus on his perfection, right on the fact that he was a human, but he was also perfect.

And I think there was this little like voice in my head of like, you're just never You're never going to be that, and.

So there's always that risk of hell, yeah, you can.

You don't never feel safe, even even when I'd have amazing teachers like your brother, who was very big on the grace of it all and the forgiveness of it all.

But even then I was like, oh.

Yep, I don't know if I believe you, though.

Yeah, Well, I think that's the thing is is like, you know, I grew up with three very good versions of it, you know, but my mom, my dad, and my brother, And I think that's the the hard part is extricating the goodness that you can feel in people, that that is real and just really there, from the the dissonance that you feel as well.

So when does that When do you really start actively questioning some of these things?

College?

Okay, college, yeah, I mean when when I was all through high school.

Because I was so entrenched in the.

World, I didn't really start questioning until college.

And I do feel like, sorry, just going back to childhood, I do feel like it's important to mention and I'm not going to mention names.

I'm going to be as vague as humanly possible, but I am close to someone with mental illness that went honestly undiagnosed for a ridiculously long time, but I did witness pretty firsthand a really scary spiritual psychosis moment.

Like really entrenched in some Bible stuff.

So that also, I think, is such an important like the fear of God was already there and then that happened, and it was like.

Wow, is this like a thing that was portrayed when it was happening as demon possession or spiritual warfare and then now you've come to realize this is mental illness?

Like as No, it was.

It was very clear from the start that it was.

A breakdown, and it was.

It was terrifying and it but it was you know, the things that that person was saying was very much about the Bible, you know what I mean.

It was it was very.

Hearing the voice of God.

Okay, they were saying that they were they were getting a specific message from God.

Yeah okay, So yeah, sorry, but I just wanted to mention that before leaving childhood because it was that was such a formative.

I always say that day, that day was my villain origin story.

So that day you were like, this doesn't this isn't tracking?

Yeah, yeah, I think, And I was young.

I was seven years old when that happened.

But I remember being like, this is giving me a whole different perspective on God, and I don't know that I like it.

And I think that was when the fear really it clicked, you know what I mean, And I really really wrestled with it for a long time.

But you were you just I mean, like you wrestled starting at seven.

But the reality is five days a week, adults, people in authority that you trust were reiterating, regardless of the packaging of the messaging, which could have been anything like my brother or another teacher at your school.

Yeah, the reiteration of some consistent themes probably quelled that anxiety.

Then, yeah, a.

Little bit, I think, you know, it hushed it a little and I was like, Okay, okay, we're fine, everything's fine.

That's a fun thing about trauma.

Your brain can go that's just ignore push it away.

And so I did.

And then, you know, I went all through high school and it was very whatever.

And then I got to college.

There was such a messaging in private Christian high school that was very like, beware, when you go to college, they're going to challenge your systems of belief, and you've got to be prepared to defend with.

Your whole life.

It's that whole if a school shooter comes in and puts it down to your head and asks you believe in Jesus, Like are you going to say yes?

Like that kind of mindset.

Kinsey, I gotta be honest with you.

I have very little trouble unpacking a lot of things that were told to me, not by my parents, but by Christian school in church.

It's hard for me to open the box of what we were taught to do if a school shooter came in, because it the idea of it existing.

Guys, if you weren't, if you were not raised in this particular culture.

You know, Cassie Bernal was such a big name, like was such a big name in my childhood because she was at the was it Columbine?

I believe?

And then and she, you know, according to this story anyway, basically refused to denounce Jesus Christ and was shot point blank.

And we were basically taught to have that courage by adults in our lives.

Like we're not taught that, you know, to protect others and protect yourself.

We're not taught to like be on the lookout.

We're taught to well, if that moment comes, just to be prepared for a school shooter, and if it comes, be prepared to stand up for Jesus, because that's really what real Christians would do.

It's hard to even talk about that.

I'm forty two.

It's hard to talk about that right now because just I have kids and to think about that is crazy.

But that was such a big like if you can't do this, then you're not really talk about this like seed of doubt that you're not really a Christian.

The idea that you have to talk, you have to you have to kind of amp yourself up every day for the fact that if somebody points a gun in my face, it's my job to stick to my beliefs in that situation, which is like it's unfathomable.

It's it's wild.

And again saying that to an anxious kid, I mean an anxious kid who is putting like sidebars in her prayers of like please don't kill me, you know what I mean, like that, it's crazy.

But so that mindset was so prevalent to the to the extent of you know, sending us off to college.

Teachers were very like okay, you know, be ready to defend your faith in these in these secular in these secular classrooms, there was Peter three fifteen.

Always be prepared to give an answer.

That's it, that's just right in the Bible's right there, a hundred percent.

Yeah.

So I get to college.

I did go to a secular college.

I did do that on purpose.

There was some something in my soul that was like, you need this and U and I went and literally eight thirty am, first class, freshman year, philosophy, one oh one doctor Gandolfo, Yes that was his name.

Unbelievable and unreal, and.

He straight out the gate he asks, well, first of all, he asks us what our.

Favorite book and what our favorite movie is, which was that was cool?

And then he says, hey, you all have been spoon fed systems of belief.

Whatever that system of belief is, just know it is not yours until you make it yours.

Nice and that is what the next four years is going to be about.

Shout out to Gandolfo out there doing the Lord's work.

Shout out to I mean I loved because he wasn't he truly wasn't saying like denounce your face, not at all.

But he was very much saying like own it.

Whatever you believe in, yeah, own it, and it really I was just like damn like that.

It really stuck with me and I kind of made that my mission to be honest in college.

I was like, all right, we're challenging this and we're gonna we're gonna ask the hard questions and we're going to talk to people that don't believe what I believe because I've been very much in a you know, socioeconomic belief bubble.

Yeah, yeah, for my whole life.

And uh, you know, I have an opportunity here to sort of suss some stuff out and that that's that's where the journey really began.

Yeah, So what did that look like?

Like?

What that look like moving forward?

Howd that journey start?

Yeah?

I mean why, I was a theater major, and up to this point I had done a lot of theater in the community.

I did it at school as well, but I did a lot of community theater and I and I also will say, I mean I think seeds were planted then as well, Like because fun fact about the theater community, it's pretty gay.

What it's pretty gay, and you know, these people that I love more than anything in the world.

Are are gay?

You know, and I and I think there's seeds of doubt were planted then, because right, that was also a big thing in the in the Christian community of like it's a lifestyle choice.

That that in purity culture and how we treat uh the LGBTQ community, which wasn't called that when I was growing up, but how we how we treat gay people is what they would say purity culture and the treatment of the queer community or one in one a of the biggest swings and misses in in evangelical culture in my opinion, Like it was crazy.

Yeah, Daniel, it is now now that I'm like a little bit, I can say this.

It is so weird how obsessed evangelicals are with sex.

I'm sorry, so weird.

Hey, you're a freak.

Just own it.

Yeah, you don't have to ride.

It's fine, I said out loud.

I was like, you literally were told that sex is saved for one man and one woman by a dude that fucked more women than Wilt Chamberlain.

Like you like like Solomon had a thousand concubines and he's like, yeah, listen, save it for marriage.

What Like the weird perseveration that happened through that community was just wild.

It's still going on crazy for sure, for sure.

Yeah, no, no, no, it's it's cuckoo, cuckoo.

It's a lot.

So you know that that was already kind of breaking down.

And then you know, once I'm in college and I'm literally that's all I'm doing is theater and hanging out with theater people and a bunch of college kids who are like experimenting and you know, figuring themselves out and who they are in that way, and I just I'd have these deep, meaningful conversations at three a m.

You know, graveyard shift at the waffle House about God and God on the gays, you know, and I just really like, I think that was like the first huge crack in the foundation for me because I was like, there is just there is just no way that this human has any choice whether he loves me, Like this human came out jazz handgag, like there's just no but it's no brainer.

And I think the reason that you and I both had to like unpack.

I had unpacked that for years of my life in my early twenties because it didn't make any sense.

But I think what's crazy is is that there are plenty of Christians out there, and I do want to say this who like are affirming, queer affirming Christians, that they didn't exist.

But when you grew up the way we grew up, what happens is is you're taught that being gay as a sin, and then you're taught that everything in the Bible is exactly literally what you've been taught it is, and if one thing in the Bible is not literally true, then it all falls apart.

And so what happens to your belief system is even though it doesn't say anything about being game at being a sin of the Bible, it doesn't like just go look it up, It doesn't say it.

But the problem is is everything in our dogma, everything attached to our belief system, carries the same weight as if one thing's not true, it all falls apart.

And so we know it.

We know it in our heart, we know in our head, we see it.

We go, this isn't right, but we fear the fact that as soon as we let that go and we go gay people are just like everybody else.

What happens is my whole belief system is going to fall apart.

That was my experience at least, I don't want to put words in your wrap.

That was my experience.

No, I mean, yeah, it's that you pull the string of the sweater and the whole swetter comes unraveling.

You know.

It didn't necessarily for.

Me, at least not immediately.

It didn't necessarily make me oh so then everything is a lie like that wasn't it?

But for me, it was more just like, Okay, I think maybe God is different than what people have been telling me.

Yeah, I certainly think Jesus is different than what people have been telling me.

And I'm gonna like investigate.

A little more, you know, I was it was very just like, okay, okay, hmm, this is this is not what uh, this is not what Bob Jones has told us that it is.

And for listeners who don't know, Bob Jones is a cult school in Greenville, South Carolina.

I've gone I've done a deep dive of the history of the of the institution in two different intro outros.

So if you listened every episode, listener, then you will be well versed.

If you haven't and you're popping in for the lovely Kensey here then yes, it is exactly what Kenzy just said.

Yeah, I'm not referring to like a human, I'm referring to an institution that is imagine.

It is no imagine if this is the only way I can describe it where it gets reaction out of people because there are people who go, but there are good people that go to Bob Jones.

Imagine if German people tried to take back the swastika.

That's like the idea that the school is still named Bob Jones University is his Like, if you want me to believe for a second that you are welcoming and inclusive and accepting of everyone, you can't still have that name on your school.

That would be like German people going, well, the swastika doesn't mean that anymore.

It used to mean that, but it doesn't mean anymore.

That's basically what's going on.

And it's thriving in Greenville.

It gives away more money intuition to the white folks that go there than just about anywhere per capita.

It's thriving.

It's doing just fine.

Yeah, but it is what it is.

Yes, Yeah, it's it's yeah, and that school was foundational to our school, so like there was such a you know, a three line, yes, such a such an umbrella of of that of those systems of belief.

So anyway, yeah, I started questioning a lot and having like really beautiful, meaningful conversations with really beautiful humans in college and then and then I went to grad school in London.

Oh yeah, you really did it.

That's the I The West End theaters in London are the.

Best, the best.

I took my London last year and it was amazing.

It was an amazing trip.

We saw the Lion King in the West End.

It was it's.

So good, it's so good.

I had.

I had the time of my life and just had.

Yeah, I had the greatest, greatest time of yeah ever and yeah, I mean you know, but going over to London to really anywhere in the UK and or Europe, they ironically they're very like.

God, you believe in God, You're silly, you silly human.

That's a great accent to thank you, thank you.

Uh yeah, it's very very much not the vibe there.

They're far they're far too smart, far too smart for that, you know, far too British.

Uh.

And it was really interesting because I had really interesting conversations and that was where the purity culture of it all like really smacked me in the face.

Weird.

Oh yeah, in London.

So you were just kind of put all that stuff away and then it just kind of all.

Repress, repress, repressed.

This is the funny thing that a lot of women do with trauma.

We just we tuck it away until it.

Becomes an autoimmune disorder or even maybe cancer.

Like it's a whole thing.

Yeah.

I didn't really give it much thought.

Uh.

And then I got to grad school and a couple of things happened.

So I started dating this guy, French guy.

Yeah, super cute and kind of he looked like a French Hymnsworth brother.

I was.

I was very missed.

Yeah, it was great.

Yeah, we love it.

And you know, we were hanging out one night and we were kissing whatever, and he stopped and he looked at me in the eyes and he said, do I have your permission to touch you?

Like actually asking for consent?

Daniel.

I immediately started crying, wow, because I was like, nobody has ever asked that.

Ever?

And oh, I'm getting like a little emotional just talking about it now.

It's it just was such a moment of like I felt such visceral anger because here's this young man who you know, he grew up.

He went to school in France, and the lessons they were taught about sex and love were very much like consent forward.

I went to a school that was very much, you know, abstinence only, which ended up very much I think, being just a breeding ground for the opposite of consent culture.

And you're being I think you're being pretty kind knowing some stories that I know from from some folks that were near your age.

I we don't have to talk about that, Okay, That's all I needed from you from being on the same page for me.

But I when I was at our same school, there was a guy and a girl who were involved in a consensual act in the parking lot.

This is one of percent true, And if anybody who taught me is listening, they're gonna get angry.

You can at me all you want.

I don't care.

We can eat lunch.

I'll go get coffee with you.

You know that that's fine by me.

There was a guy and girl caught in the parking lot in a consensual act.

And what do you think happened to the guy and the girl?

From a consequence standpoint.

I mean she probably got expelled.

She got expelled, that's right.

What do you think happened to the.

Guy he got a stern talking to, got a.

Stern talking to.

I think he may have had a day suspension.

He got to graduate, walk the road, the whole tank.

Yeah, so that to put it in and I am older than you, but to put it in perspective, regardless of the good teachers that we had, and we did have some, the environment there was mimicked the environment of a lot of of the evangelical culture of the South, which was you are ladies, you're a stumbling block, and if guys do something wrong, it's because of the way you dress, the way you talk, the way you acted.

And one day these are the leaders of the church that you're going to need to submit to.

That that was the bottom line, and and that's that is going to carry with you until something like this happens with your French Himsworth.

Yeah.

And that's the thing is is you know, that's that's kind of where the anger and confusion and sorrow came in because I was like, here is this, here is this French dude who is very like does not believe in God at all, like all, and and he I feel so much safer with him than I had with any of the Christian boys.

And it just really floor to me.

And it really, I mean it really floored me.

And so then simultaneously, I living in London.

I had like five housemates, lived in this really cute house, and all of my housemates were like dudes.

I was very much like I was a new girl but British.

That was my life.

It was freaking awesome.

And one of the guys, Ryan, who I love so so much, he and I would occasionally he partied a lot, and so Sundays were like a fun hangover days and he would like watch shows with me and we would just like rot on the couch together.

And we watched a documentary that had come out about I don't know if it was like the Duggers.

It was one of those like fundamental evangelical documentaries that was very like here is the CD underbelly of this whole world.

And I was like, oh, Ryan, like jokingly, I was right, Ryan, do you want to see how I grew up the school the school that I like kind of grew up in.

And Ryan was like absolutely let's do it kids.

So we watch.

It and I'm sitting there like ah yeah, like yeah, yeah, this this reminds me of school, like, and slowly as the time goes on, I'm like, you know, checking in with Ryan and.

He is horrified.

Yeah, horrified.

And we get to the end and a lot a lot of that documentary was about purity culture.

And we get to the end and he.

He asks me, He goes, Okay, what were you taught?

Like, tell me, I'm curious what were you taught about your body and sect and I like all these things I just want to know, And I like really spelled.

It out for him.

I gave the licked.

Mint.

Yeah, the bubble gum, the bubblegum, the toothpaste, the licked there's a bunch of crumpled up paper.

Yeah, it's a lot of a lot of classics out there.

We did the lioked mint, which I'm going to put a pin in that because I have a really funny story about that.

But we did the lickment analogy and I told him about it about that and he looked at me.

He was really quiet for a minute.

This guy is like never serious.

He was really quiet for a minute and he was like, are you okay?

Yeah?

Yeah, I was like.

Maybe not.

Maybe it's one of these like check on your evangelical friends.

Like we went through war and we didn't know it.

We had no idea, we had no idea.

It wasn't normal.

M I mean, I ended up, you know, fast forward.

I had to do a dissertation for my grab thing, and because it was an acting school, it's a little different than your normal dissertation.

You got to choose like a character from any play or musical, You write a monologue from that character's POV and then you write a paper that like expounds upon essentially why you choose that character and whatever.

And I chose Abagail Williams from The Crucible, okay and very much because I felt like she was a product of rape.

And no one wants to talk about that.

Well, actually now we do because John Proptria is the Villain is on Broadway.

Everybody should go see that show.

You should read that play.

It's excellent, excellent, so so fucking good.

But anyway, I wrote this dissertation on her, and essentially the whole thesis of my paper was that purity culture is a form of sexual assault.

Yeah, because because it lives in the body of women in the same way that rape and assault does.

Yeah, and it is direct, directly, indirectly proportional to how much it benefits the men of purity culture, you know who.

You might think on the surface, the dudes are like, well, we don't get to maybe have as much fun right now legally as we're supposed to have technically, But nobody cared.

Nobody cared for the dudes, and and we we all, we all came out great on that.

That was whereas like you're talking, I would agree, I've never heard that thesis before, and I think it's genius and I think it's unfortunately true.

It is, And it only because I've since you know, gone therapy and I've talked to my therapist about it, and she's like, yeah, this is a thing in in our field that we're talking about with with religious trauma, but specifically with women with purity culture religious trauma, that it manifests so similarly to to you know, other women that we talked to that have maybe experienced assault or you know or whatever.

The way it lives in your body is so similar.

And yeah, it's it's it's.

A thing, and I think that really really rocked me.

Really was that therapeutic for you to write that, to do this dissertation?

Like was that?

Oh?

Yes, Like did that exercise some demons?

It did?

It really did.

I would be remiss to also not mention we're about to get a little weird, Daniel or are you ready?

Question?

I'm fine?

Can you it?

Yeah?

I can.

This podcast has allowed me the opportunity to really just be comfortable with that.

Great because I'm about to get a little woo woo.

Okay, little bit woo woo.

Because simultaneously, so going back a little bit, when I graduated college and I'm about to go to grad school to my grandmother, my nony on my mom's side, she did our family's genealogy right, like traced back, you know, to the Mayflower where our ancestors came from.

Yeah, yeah, crazy, And come to find out I have not one but two ancestors.

I call them my aunt aunties.

I actually think one of them is more of a great great grandmother or whatever who were killed in the single witch trials.

Oh my god, yeah.

Oh my god.

After you did the dissertation you found this out.

This was actually just before so this was right before I was leaving for grad school.

But it's it's important, and I know you're cool.

It's important because this is so weird and you're gonna be like ken Zie, no, but.

Find this out.

Every single significant new woman friend that I have made since finding this out is witchy to some extent.

I'm not kidding, like like Wickan or like actually like like.

Yeah, Like my friend Taylor who I mentioned to, wrote this amazing script.

She is a witch.

That is her, that is her spirituality, and this is like a thing calling me around.

I started out the finding.

Me, the witches are finding me, so.

You know, fast forward move to London.

That is having a massive resurgence in the UK and in parts of Europe, but especially in the UK.

There's a really.

Fun you kind of political thing I think that's happening.

You see a resurgence of this like either witchy or new age spirituality.

Anytime we're in moments of pretty intense oppression, specifically against women, like when women's rights feel like being stripped away, women start to lean more into this kind.

Of occultish vibe, which really.

Fascinating and I learned a lot about because I'm Irish going way back and Welsh, So I learned a lot about like Celtic pagan culture while I was living over there, and it's really interesting just how colonized these people were in their faith, and that.

Coupled with feeling not great about how.

The church treats the lgbqt I A plus community, and feeling not great about purity culture and like really coming to terms with it.

I think the combination of all of these things has led to where I am now, which yeah, I think, you know, there's this I feel like women were really, really on purpose excluded from the narrative of God and Jesus, and I feel really sad about that because I think we have so much in common with God, Like women are the only other creatures that can create human beings almost out of nothing, and so this like kind of woo woo spirituality feels like a reclamation of that, like for sure, that simple female divinity, you know what I mean?

Yeah, yeah, but I love.

I mean, it's fascinating and I love the fact that people that leave the church either become this like you know in the Prestige, where it's like the world's just rotten to the core and it's just solid and there's nothing spiritual, or they become a conduit for a much more open version of spirituality, which is like they get very comfortable with not knowing, which is how I feel.

I am, like I wish for the love of everything good and decent.

Some teachers in my school would have just been like, I don't know, you know what I mean, Like, can you imagine, like just picture picture any Bible teacher that's not my brother, or because my brother's so bright, like but the picture, but picture any of them going I don't know, I don't know, like I don't know, we're not sure, we're not sure, like how about that sentence.

But so I think when you grow up like we did, and you know, I would never put you in my age bracket.

You're younger than I am, but I think we're both millennials.

The idea that when we leave and you start to question it, you either kind of come to a really like a more depressing, anxious state which is just like nothing matters, or you become open to the fact that hey, not knowing is really the best thing, is really the best knowing because you leave yourself open to go what does divinity look like?

What does something greater than myself look like, and then to have these interactions, you know, with all of these women, and I would I would say, as someone not a woman, I would say that being excluded from Jesus, being excluded from history.

As someone who is a historian, trying to find you know, really great primary sources on the great women in history is exponentially harder then the great the great dudes of history.

And I think that there's, you know, there's a pretty significant concrete reason for that, and so that's tough, Yeah.

It is, and it's yeah, you know, I just think that there's allegedly like a whole gospel of Mary Magdalen that they found hundreds of years ago in Aramic that they conveniently were like, well, we're just not We're just not going to include that.

Yeah.

I read a book which I definitely think everyone, everyone who grew up the way we did everyone should read, called The Making a Biblical Womanhood.

I don't know if you've heard of this book by I've heard of it Beth Allison, who is a Christian.

Like, this is a book by a Christian woman who starts a story about how her husband was a youth minister and they got mad because she taught the twelve year olds in Sunday School and they wanted him to stop her or to reside.

And she tells the story of women in history and how evangelicals kind of basically rob all of like take all these passages and twist them, and she tells it while popping back and forth with this current story.

It is historically unbelievable.

You will be shocked at historically some of the stuff that happened to remove women from the history of Christianity and to make it what it is, not even at the beginning of that list being how the Bible was constructed, right, well.

And that's where I the witchiness of it all right, because it's such such a taboo thing, especially in evangelical culture, right like oh, like the which like whatever, it's so evil, yes, but like when you look at the history and when you really observe the reality, it's women who I mean, well in Salem, right like in the Salem witch trials, it was typically women who were maybe wealthier, who maybe had land for whatever reason, spoke and the government just like wanted it, and so they used witchcraft as this excuse to take it.

Women weren't allowed to be divinely connected to God, to have this christ consciousness, Like we weren't allowed to be prophets, we weren't allowed to be healers in the way that men were.

If men, if men are hearing the voice of God, then they are a prophet.

If a woman is and she's talking about it, she's a witch.

Yeah.

I just that just didn't sit well with me, which also really inspired the dissertation as well.

Obviously the Crucible and the you know, the slit heroes of it all and all that jazz.

But I, yeah, I just really became moved by that.

And then obviously meeting the women friends that I've met who like are practicing whatever, and I'm chatting with them and having conversation with them, and I'm realizing, these these bishes don't they don't believe, Like, they don't even believe in Satan.

There's no none, none of that is even a thing.

They're literally what they're doing is they're walking barefoot in the woods.

Yeah, yeah, how dare they?

You know?

They're they're running some they're running some candles, they're looking in the mirror and they're saying like kind affirmations to themselves every morning like so scandalous?

How dare they?

How like so demonic?

Like how you know, like society ruining society?

Yeah, well I was going to ask what does that so you leave the dissertation, Like, what does that look like for now current kinzie?

Like after leaving college, after doing this dissertation, after going to London, after going to therapy, experiencing different things, different people, different ways of life, kind of finding out your identity and who you are.

Uh, not only how did that change you?

But what is that?

What is that for your current status, both spiritual and just how you live every day?

Well, it's funny because we didn't even we didn't even talk about the politics of it all because like that was We're huge, Oh.

Yeah, go for it.

No, I'm here, I'm here for that.

Well yeah, because you know twenty sixteen, all of the election cycles since twenty sixteen.

Yeah, it's like the final nail in the coffin of you see these evangelical people just showing their asses.

Sorry, there's no other way to know.

It just feels like screaming makes no sense, Like you don't you see people that you grew up with that you know that the things they're saying if you would have been like, hey, ten years ago, you're going to say these things, they would be like no way, and then they're doing it and then they're justifying it, and it's just it's absurd.

It's it's so hard to feel not feel gas lit.

And you want to know something.

I will say this because like the spiritual warfare of it all, I've been a little like, yah, I don't.

Know, Donald Trump.

It makes me still a believer in the demons, honest to God.

Yeah, literally, his existence, his very existence, the things that come out of that man's mouth.

I'm like, there is still prevalent evil in this world.

Well, I mean, I feel like if you, if you were look at the Bible's definition of an anti Christ, I think that it would line up pretty straightforward with our current president.

And I think what's weird about that is like the defense of evangelicals that voted for him typically start and end with but the other side is blank.

And it's like, you know, when my kid hits my other kid in the head and then the kid in response like pushes him a little bit, and then the kid that hit the kid in the head gets mad about the push.

I'm like, you don't have a leg to stand on here, like these are not the same.

These things are not the same, and it just that's what's infuriating, is is it's so clearly not something that I adhere to anymore, Like I don't adhere to an antichrist and spiritual warfare personally, but you, the person that is doing this does.

And it's like the fact that they don't see it is crazy.

And I can see.

I can see the defense of demons.

I can see it.

I don't know if I agree that I can see it.

You know, I just feel like I had to mention it because it was such a what a time we're living in?

I say, was it is?

I mean, you know, every day it's like I don't want to be associated or affiliated with that group of people at all because it feels so opposite to what.

Jesus stands for for me.

And that is a recurring refrain of almost everyone that left evangelicalism, even those who are now atheists, would say, you gave the example of Jesus.

You're the one that did it.

I looked at it.

It was great.

What the hell are you doing right now?

Every one of them?

Yeah, one last little statement and then I will answer your question because I definitely you know, again with the politics of it all and what's going on in the world right now.

You know, for me, another kind of final nail in the coffin of my deconstruction journey was what's happening in Palestine and Goza.

These children, women, men, innocent humans are dying and these people, majority of them are Muslim, right, they're not Christians.

I there, I cannot imagine a world where those innocent souls are going to Hell.

No, right, like that absolutely that.

No sense to me.

And if the evangelical God that I was taught to believe in is real and is damning these innocent Muslim babies to hell, that is a god I want nothing.

To do with.

Yeah, yeah, that is not That is not a.

God worthy of worship at all, right, because that is cruel and.

That's the devil.

Actually, that's Satan.

I think that there's a lot, like there's a lot of different ways to get there with the how could a god do this?

And but I honestly believe the idea of hell is probably up there near the top of the cornerstones.

That is the problem, the.

Right So to answer your question, and here and here is my statement of faith.

I love it, which I'm change.

Yes, absolutely, and it's always evolving.

And I'm sweating a little bit because I am because this is almost like I obviously have had these deep and meaningful conversations with close friends, my amazing husband, like they know, they know who I am and what I'm about.

But this, I mean, this is a proclamation, right, and it's it's a little intimidating because I know it.

I'm asking a lot of people and in the sense of like open mindedness and like you know, maybe read some books, which is a lot to ask if people.

So if I were to maybe be talking to someone who's a little more black and white and I'm trying to be a little more palatable to that person and I don't want to freak them out, I would probably describe myself as like a Christian mystic or like a Christian spiritualist, right, because I do still believe in Jesus absolutely.

And as a person that lived and.

Walked the earth, yes and honestly, and as a person who died for me, I do I do.

I do hold on to that because there is something.

To me feminine God, male, Jesus.

Yeah, okay, love it.

God is God is a black woman.

To me, I don't know in my head, she's absolutely well, honestly, God is not because we were we were both created in God's image.

So God is both equally man and equally woman.

But Jesus is definitely a dude.

And to me, Jesus is my buddy, like he's He's been so a part of my life and even in the scarier moments of like feeling unsure and praying prayers with a lot of caveats, and he always felt kind to me, you know, even even when evangelical God didn't.

Yes, And a large part of that, honestly is because of your brother, I would say too.

You know, he the way he talked about God was very you know, just he made him very relatable and down to earth, which he was.

Anyway.

So I still hold on to that that that that.

Part of that faith in Christianity.

I do not believe in a literal.

Hell at all.

And and I don't believe in a God who would create.

Human beings just to send them to their damnation.

I just don't.

That doesn't make any logical sense really at all.

So yeah, Christian Christian is a Christian spiritualists.

If I'm feeling really bold, if I'm feeling very like, fuck you to the patriarchy, and I kind of want to like ruffle some feathers, and then I'll just say I'm a Christian witch and I like to see people.

I like to see people swarm a little bit when I say that.

I love that well.

And what's wild is is that one of those is just vague and one of them's pointed.

They both mean to say.

You know, yo, if you say you're a mystic, like you can be anything like it's just a universe more of a universalist Christian.

Whres you say you're a Christian witch.

You're trying to pick a fight and I'm here for it, I mean absolutely here for it.

So yeah, that's fantastic.

Uh, Kensey, You're a delight you have.

You're just so much fun and we got to find a reason to to have you on Errtors to talk again because you you're wonderful and I appreciate you.

Doing this, dude, this is such a freaking glass.

Thank you so much for holding space and for your awesome questions and.

Yeah, man, I could I could talk about.

This for hours and hours and hours.

It's one of my same favorite topics of conversation.

I really like that you're doing this.

This is a really cool podcast.

I can't thank Kenzy enough for joining me this week.

Leaving our conversation, the word that kept coming to mind to describe Kensy is not free spirited per se, although you could certainly make that case, but just free.

It's evident that Kensey has been a great deal of time on herself unpacking childhood trauma placed on her by rigid boundaries of a high control, educational religious setting.

It's also clear that Kensy has grasped tightly to the principles from that childhood that still makes sense to her, while freeing herself from the aspects that clearly espouse control or hate.

Don't get me wrong, I don't think Kensey has it all figured out, because I don't think any of us have it all figured out.

But I do believe, in hearing her story, that her freeing herself from high control in her upbringing was an extremely necessary first step in her journey to finding equilibrium.

Kensey clearly draws best outside of the lines.

Kensey's willingness to embrace the spiritual and the supernatural as an untamable force is also admirable.

Instead of knowing, she gladly entertains and dialogues with the possibility of something greater, of divine characteristics she hopes to emulate, of the example of great people in history like Jesus Christ, and of the possibility of well more.

This embraced think and spirituality has allowed Kenzy to be your best self.

I think that looks different for everyone, but I think it should be the goal to be free.

Thanks for listening.

Breakfast in Hell is produced by Will Cown.

It's written and hosted by Daniel Thompson.

If you enjoy the pod, please do us a favor with a rating and review on Apple Podcasts and follow us on Instagram at Breakfast in Hell Pod.

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If you've got questions, comments, or would like to be on the show, dm us on Instagram or send us an email to Breakfast in Hell Pod at gmail dot com.

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