Straight White American Jesus

Latest Episodes:

The Orange Wave, Ep. 8: Old School May 10, 2022

Show notes

If you want to take the country back for God, if you want to have dominion over every level of society, if you want to ensure a white Christian patriarchy rules over the land--you have to start with the children. Christian school movements are part of the fabric of the Religious Right. On this episode, Brad examines why the Christian schooling movement--including homeschooling--took off in the 60s, how it has shed government oversight, and what effects its having on our public education system and our public square. This episode features interviews with Dr. Chrissy Stroop and Scott Okamoto.

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The Orange Wave, Ep. 5: Putin's Russia: City on a Hill May 10, 2022

Show notes

Brad explores the alliance between the alt-right and the Religious Right in and through Trump's presidency. In tracing this story, he uncovers how and why the Religious Right now looks to Putin's Russia, Orban's Hungary, and other autocratic regimes as the City Upon a Hill that the USA used to be. This episode features an interview with the renowned journalist Sarah Posner, author of Unholy: Why White Evangelicals Worship at the Altar of Donald Trump.

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The Orange Wave, Ep 10: The Orange Curtain May 10, 2022

Show notes

On the series finale, Brad reflects on his departure from Orange County and evangelicalism. This provides a jumping off point for reflecting on what we've learned through the series, and, perhaps most importantly, how Orange County's politics and culture provides a window into the contemporary moment.

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Abortion, the War on Women, and the Crusade to Save the "Unborn" (re-release) May 09, 2022

Show notes

Many evangelicals are single-issue voters when it comes to abortion. Brad and Dan discuss the historical development of this trend, and why it represents more than just a concern for the unborn. Dan goes through the history that shows evangelicals were in favor of certain types of abortion all the way into the 1970s. The abortion myth, as Randall Balmer calls, it is that abortion has been a perennial issue in this community. That is a lie.

Brad talks about how this kind of myopic focus on abortion led him out of evangelicalism because it's cover for cruelty and selfishness in a myriad of ways.

Subscribe for $5.99 a month to get bonus episodes, ad-free listening, access to the entire 500-episode archive, Discord access, and more: https://axismundi.supercast.com/

Brad's talk at UCSB's Capp's Center: https://twitter.com/GregJoh81863873/status/1518663300409483264/photo/1

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Weekly Roundup: Religion, Roe, and What's Next May 07, 2022

Show notes

In the wake of news that Roe v. Wade will likely be overturned, Brad and Dan begin this episode with a history of how evangelicals have transformed on the issue of abortion. In the 1960s and 1970s many evangelical pastors, theologians, and politicians were in favor of abortion in many cases and without too many restrictions. This changed when political operatives began to use abortion as a wedge issue that could give them control of the GOP--and the country as a whole.

They then discuss what this looks like in states and communities across the country. There are already bills up for debate that would make abortion a homicide in Louisiana, and ideas to ban IUDs and other contraceptive methods in Idaho.

Will this have an effect on the 2022 midterms? Yes . . . and no.

They note that Roe could be codified as law if Dems would kill the filibuster and pass the bill that was already moved forward in the House. But . . . Manchin and Synema.

In the future, the overturning of Roe will only further the cultural divide. The cold civil war will ramp up, leading to two different lived experiences for Americans.

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It's in the Code, Ep. 2: Bible Church May 04, 2022

Show notes

The American Christian landscape is littered with “Bible churches.” It is full of churches that use the word “Bible” in their name, or that claim to be “Bible believing,” and affirm that they “preach the Bible,” and so on. What meaning can we discern behind this code? What can we know about the kinds of Christians who define themselves in this way? This episode considers these questions, cracking the code of the “Bible church” and what it tells us about the profile of those who attend such churches and the Christian identity they express.

Subscribe for $5.99 a month to get bonus episodes, ad-free listening, access to the entire 500-episode archive, Discord access, and more: https://axismundi.supercast.com/

Linktree:https://linktr.ee/StraightWhiteJC

Order Brad's book:https://www.amazon.com/Preparing-War-Extremist-Christian-Nationalism/dp/1506482163

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The Gospel of Climate Skepticism (re-release) May 02, 2022

Show notes

Why are white evangelicals the most skeptical major religious group in America regarding climate change? Previous scholarship has pointed to cognitive factors such as conservative politics, anti-science attitudes, aversion to big government, and theology. Drawing on qualitative fieldwork, scholar Robin Globus Veldman reveals the extent to which climate skepticism and anti-environmentalism have in fact become embedded in the social world of many conservative evangelicals. Rejecting the common assumption that evangelicals' skepticism is simply a side effect of political or theological conservatism, the book further shows that between 2006 and 2015, leaders and pundits associated with the Christian Right widely promoted skepticism as the biblical position on climate change.

Subscribe for $5.99 a month to get bonus episodes, ad-free listening, access to the entire 500-episode archive, Discord access, and more: https://axismundi.supercast.com/

Brad's talk at UCSB's Capp's Center: https://twitter.com/GregJoh81863873/status/1518663300409483264/photo/1

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Weekly Roundup: J6 Pence None the Wiser Apr 29, 2022

Show notes

Brad and Dan begin this episode with a prolonged discussion of the newly released audio of Kevin McCarthy calling for Trump's resignation and the revelations in the 2000+ texts of Mark Meadows revealed this week. Brad argues that in the McCarthy tapes you can see an alternative pathway for the country--one where the GOP and its media entourage called out the traitorousness of Trump and his team before, during, and after J6. But instead, the Meadows texts show, we got conspiracy theories, the Big Lie, and are now on the precipice of an authoritarian takeover in the next cycle of elections.

Take action at startguide.org

The second segment is a mythbuster--Dan uses the various events in Florida (from book banning to the war on Disney to the war on trans people to the war on CRT) to uncover the real nature of contemporary American conservativism. It uses government as a weapon for identity politics, culture wars, and censorship.

This leads to a brief analysis of the debate about forgiving student loans.

Subscribe for $5.99 a month to get bonus episodes, ad-free listening, access to the entire 500-episode archive, Discord access, and more: https://axismundi.supercast.com/

Brad's talk at UCSB's Capp's Center: https://twitter.com/GregJoh81863873/status/1518663300409483264/photo/1

To Donate: https://www.paypal.com/paypalme/BradleyOnishi

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It's in the Code, Ep. 1: "Planting Flags" Apr 27, 2022

Show notes

New Series: It’s in the Code

American Christians speak in a bewildering array of different “codes” that mark their identities, signaling to others who is welcome among them and who isn’t. This series explores how to decode popular religious language, revealing the cultural politics of American Christians of different stripes. What does the slogan on the that church billboard mean? How can we tell which churches value social justice, or are LGBTQ+ inclusive? Learning how to decipher the codes of American Christianity can tell us.

This first episode outlines the aims of the new series, which will explore that ways that different kinds of American Christians express their identities through the language they use in sermons, in denominational statements, on church billboards, and other common expressions. He argues that the significance of what American Christians say is not limited to the literal meaning of their words, but with how they use that language to define themselves and others. The episode highlights the value of the series for anyone who wants to better understand and map the complex terrain of American Christian identities.

Subscribe for $5.99 a month to get bonus episodes, ad-free listening, access to the entire 500-episode archive, Discord access, and more: https://axismundi.supercast.com/

To Donate: https://www.paypal.com/paypalme/BradleyOnishi

Produced by Bradley Onishi and Dan Miller

Edited by Shannon Sassone

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The Psychological Stages of Deconstruction Apr 25, 2022

Show notes

What are the psychological stages of leaving religion? How can mourning religion lead to new forms of faith, meaning, and community?

David Morris, PhD, is a publisher, author, and psychologist of religion. In his new book, Lost Faith and Wandering Souls, he treats the loss of faith as if it were any other kind of loss, and asks, what if we learned to mourn? He turns to psychoanalytic psychology for its interpretive power. With the concepts of mourning, pining, and play, he shines a light on a path forward. He and Brad discuss the zig-zag process of leaving religion and discovering new forms of meaning and hope - what often feels like going between feelings of numbness, self-recrimination, and wandering to playfulness, self-agency, and belonging. If we can feel our loss, he argues, then we can rediscover meaning making.

David Morris, Lost Faith and Wandering Souls: https://lakedrivebooks.com/lost-faith-and-wandering-souls/

Subscribe for $5.99 a month to get bonus episodes, ad-free listening, access to the entire 500-episode archive, Discord access, and more: https://axismundi.supercast.com/

To Donate: https://www.paypal.com/paypalme/BradleyOnishi

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