Interviews with experts, writers, psychologists and more on the intersection between psychology, religion and spirituality… with a little bit of cussing.
dan@religiononthemind.com
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Interviews with experts, writers, psychologists and more on the intersection between psychology, religion and spirituality… with a little bit of cussing.
dan@religiononthemind.com
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The nature vs. nurture debate is largely settled (spoiler alert: it's both), but the implications for how and when religious identity forms are striking. The research points to a surprisingly early window for faith formation, and what happens inside that window matters far more than most parents realize. Join me for what I'm calling Study Hall, where I bring you along as I study for my licensure exam and connect the concepts to religion along the way.
Religious formation peaks ages 3–7
Parents trump youth group, always
"Let them choose" backfires
Baby brains resemble psilocybin trips
Trauma may reopen learning windows
Warmth beats doctrine, every time
Episodes Mentioned:
Christian Heavy Music: Theology, Attachment, Power (#139)
Helping Kids Know God in Healthy Ways (#174)
___________________________________________
Follow Dan on IG: www.instagram.com/dancoke/
Or Twitter: twitter.com/DanKoch
Faith deconstruction resources: www.soyouredeconstructing.com/
Join the Patreon for exclusive episodes (and more) every month: patreon.com/dankoch
Email about the "sliding scale" for the Patreon: youhavepermissionpodcast@gmail.com
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Artwork by Nickryanluevano.com
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Meredith Miller returns to talk about something many of us have been navigating in our personal lives: how do you raise kids with a meaningful faith after your own deconstruction? We cover the real reasons to consider church, what the research actually says about faith formation, and why doing nothing is still doing something.
Previous Episodes with Meredith:
How Can Deconstructing Parents Talk About God? (#257)
Helping Kids Know God in Healthy Ways (#174)
Highlights:
Home culture vs. church content
Friendship over theology
Your story is a gift
Doing nothing = a choice
Non-weaponizing Bible scholars do exist
___________________________________________
Follow Dan on IG: www.instagram.com/dancoke/
Or Twitter: twitter.com/DanKoch
Faith deconstruction resources: www.soyouredeconstructing.com/
Join the Patreon for exclusive episodes (and more) every month: patreon.com/dankoch
Email about the "sliding scale" for the Patreon: youhavepermissionpodcast@gmail.com
YHP Patron-only FB group: tinyurl.com/ycvbbf98
Website: www.dankochwords.com/yhp.html
Join Dan's email list: www.dankochwords.com/
Artwork by Nickryanluevano.com
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Brad Strawn of Fuller Seminary returns to unpack the four clinical and theological influences that shape his work as a therapist, pastor, and professor (Wesleyan theology, relational psychoanalysis, 4E cognition, and terror management theory), and we get into some genuinely good “inside baseball” about what all of this looks like in the room with actual clients.
Highlights:
Wesleyan theology: feelings first
Relational healing through new experience
4E: embodied, embedded, enacted, extended
AI can't replace human bodies
Terror management → limits → meaning
Cure soul, not just symptoms
___________________________________________
Follow Dan on IG: www.instagram.com/dancoke/
Or Twitter: twitter.com/DanKoch
Faith deconstruction resources: www.soyouredeconstructing.com/
Join the Patreon for exclusive episodes (and more) every month: patreon.com/dankoch
Email about the "sliding scale" for the Patreon: youhavepermissionpodcast@gmail.com
YHP Patron-only FB group: tinyurl.com/ycvbbf98
Website: www.dankochwords.com/yhp.html
Join Dan's email list: www.dankochwords.com/
Artwork by Nickryanluevano.com
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Things are, objectively, pretty rough right now! But honestly? We can't stop laughing at the "Trump AI Jesus" memes. Religion on the News is back with Mason Mennenga (A People's Theology), and today we're leaning more into the silliness and laughter of it all, with a hearty dose of psychology along the way.
Topics (full list on the full Patron-only episode): Trump/Jesus AI art, the resulting memes and parodies (*chef's kiss*), Riley Gaines, Antichrist/Left Behind stuff, Evangelical art, in-group & partisan psychology, Nazi repentance, high-demand religion psychology, music/film roundup.
___________________________________________
Follow Dan on IG: www.instagram.com/dancoke/
Or Twitter: twitter.com/DanKoch
Faith deconstruction resources: www.soyouredeconstructing.com/
Join the Patreon for exclusive episodes (and more) every month: patreon.com/dankoch
Email about the "sliding scale" for the Patreon: youhavepermissionpodcast@gmail.com
YHP Patron-only FB group: tinyurl.com/ycvbbf98
Website: www.dankochwords.com/yhp.html
Join Dan's email list: www.dankochwords.com/
Artwork by Nickryanluevano.com
Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
Lillian Daniel returns after five years to discuss her new book Defrocked: Good News from a Bad Pastor for a Better Church — a candid, often funny, and deeply human account of the misconduct process she underwent in the UCC, what it taught her about identity, boundaries, and shame, and how she eventually found her way back to ministry.
Highlights:
Power, process, and accountability
Over-identification with vocation
Boundaries (and the lack thereof)
Shame vs. guilt, done right
Lillian's New Book | Defrocked: Good News from a Bad Pastor for a Better Church
Previous episode with Lillian:
The Most & Least Plausible Christian Claims (#117)
___________________________________________
Follow Dan on IG: www.instagram.com/dancoke/
Or Twitter: twitter.com/DanKoch
Faith deconstruction resources: www.soyouredeconstructing.com/
Join the Patreon for exclusive episodes (and more) every month: patreon.com/dankoch
Email about the "sliding scale" for the Patreon: youhavepermissionpodcast@gmail.com
YHP Patron-only FB group: tinyurl.com/ycvbbf98
Website: www.dankochwords.com/yhp.html
Join Dan's email list: www.dankochwords.com/
Artwork by Nickryanluevano.com
Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
This is the fifth and final installment of the Anxious Times series, and we're bringing it home by exploring what existential psychology has to say about community, belonging, and civic engagement. I’m joined by returning guest Kristen Tideman and Brian Adoff, founder of Join Philly, a directory and events platform helping Philadelphians connect with each other.
In the Patreon-only second half, we dig into how Kristen's own anxiety triple crown — MS, new motherhood, and ongoing religious change — has been shaped by her distance from the Philly community she helped build, and what it looks like to find connection in a new chapter of life.
Anxious Times Episode Part 1
Anxious Times Episode Part 2
Anxious Times Episode Part 3
Anxious Times Episode Part 4
Highlights:
Collective effervescence, good and bad
Bowling alone and belonging
Tech, phones, and the dopamine trap
Participation gaps and on-ramps
___________________________________________
Follow Dan on IG: www.instagram.com/dancoke/
Or Twitter: twitter.com/DanKoch
Faith deconstruction resources: www.soyouredeconstructing.com/
Join the Patreon for exclusive episodes (and more) every month: patreon.com/dankoch
Email about the "sliding scale" for the Patreon: youhavepermissionpodcast@gmail.com
YHP Patron-only FB group: tinyurl.com/ycvbbf98
Website: www.dankochwords.com/yhp.html
Join Dan's email list: www.dankochwords.com/
Artwork by Nickryanluevano.com
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Religion on the News is back with Mason Mennenga, and today we're tackling some heavy hitters: the Supreme Court's 8-1 ruling striking down Colorado's conversion therapy ban, the rise of the manosphere and what it means for young men, and the latest alien discourse from Obama and beyond.
Highlights:
Supreme Court conversion therapy ruling
First Amendment vs. public health
Evidence base for conversion therapy
Manosphere, masculinity, and religion
Conservative Christian influencer crossover
Aliens, astrobiology, and Obama
___________________________________________
Follow Dan on IG: www.instagram.com/dancoke/
Or Twitter: twitter.com/DanKoch
Faith deconstruction resources: www.soyouredeconstructing.com/
Join the Patreon for exclusive episodes (and more) every month: patreon.com/dankoch
Email about the "sliding scale" for the Patreon: youhavepermissionpodcast@gmail.com
YHP Patron-only FB group: tinyurl.com/ycvbbf98
Website: www.dankochwords.com/yhp.html
Join Dan's email list: www.dankochwords.com/
Artwork by Nickryanluevano.com
Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
Co-host Kristen Tideman and I work through the final two legs of Emmy van Dersen's triad — the impossible and the desirable — using Kristen's new motherhood, MS diagnosis, and ongoing religious change as real, lived test cases for the framework.
In the Patron-only second half, We move from naming what we can't have, to excavating the values underneath those wishes, to identifying what we actually can do about it — and end up somewhere more hopeful than either of us expected.
Highlights:
The impossible vs. the merely difficult
Extracting values from unmet wishes
Religious change and lost sense-making
MS diagnosis, grief, and clarified priorities
Spiritual grounding after deconstruction
Anxious Times Episode Part 1
Anxious Times Episode Part 2
Anxious Times Episode Part 3
___________________________________________
Follow Dan on IG: www.instagram.com/dancoke/
Or Twitter: twitter.com/DanKoch
Faith deconstruction resources: www.soyouredeconstructing.com/
Join the Patreon for exclusive episodes (and more) every month: patreon.com/dankoch
Email about the "sliding scale" for the Patreon: youhavepermissionpodcast@gmail.com
YHP Patron-only FB group: tinyurl.com/ycvbbf98
Website: www.dankochwords.com/yhp.html
Join Dan's email list: www.dankochwords.com/
Artwork by Nickryanluevano.com
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I sit down with clinical psychologist and author Dr. Jeffrey Rubin to explore his concept of meditative psychotherapy — a genuinely reciprocal integration of Western psychoanalysis and Eastern contemplative practice that goes far deeper than the usual mindfulness-lite approaches. We get into what meditation actually is (hint: not just stress relief), spiritual bypassing, the scandals that keep plaguing Buddhist communities, and why real healing requires both quieting the mind and doing hard psychological work.
Highlights:
Meditation isn't just symptom reduction
East-West integration done poorly vs. well
Spiritual bypassing across traditions
AI, dreams, and idiographic meaning
Three stages of meditative psychotherapy
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I'm joined by my co-host Kristen Tideman for the third installment of the Anxious Times series. We dig into Emmy van Dersen's concept of "the necessary" — the hard limits baked into existence that we can't change, only accept — and explore how resisting these limits is one of the biggest drivers of unhealthy anxiety, whether you're navigating religious deconstruction, a new diagnosis, or just being alive in a chaotic world.
In the Patron-only second half, Kristen shares the raw, emotional story of her MS diagnosis as a lived case study in running headfirst into hard limits, and we explore what it looks like to resist or deny the necessary — from anti-aging culture to political utopianism to religious change.
Highlights:
Defining "the necessary" (hard limits)
Mortality, uncertainty, embodiment as givens
Kristen's MS diagnosis and processing
Religious change and false certainty
Acceptance ≠ approval or minimizing
___________________________________________
Follow Dan on IG: www.instagram.com/dancoke/
Or Twitter: twitter.com/DanKoch
Faith deconstruction resources: www.soyouredeconstructing.com/
Join the Patreon for exclusive episodes (and more) every month: patreon.com/dankoch
Email about the "sliding scale" for the Patreon: youhavepermissionpodcast@gmail.com
YHP Patron-only FB group: tinyurl.com/ycvbbf98
Website: www.dankochwords.com/yhp.html
Join Dan's email list: www.dankochwords.com/
Artwork by Nickryanluevano.com
Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices