Note: Can I Say This at Church is produced for audio listening and is transcribed from Patreon version of the conversation. If able, I strongly encourage you to listen to the audio, which has inflection, emotion, sarcasm where applicable, and emphasis for points that may not come across well in written word. This transcript is generated using a combination of my ears and software, and may contain errors. Please check the episode for clarity before quoting in print.
Candice Marie Benbow 0:00
What do I really think about God and what has always been intuited to me about my faith and about who God is? And so Red Lip Theology, the ways that it differs from the system that I grew up in, is that God is much more empathetic and compassionate. And God is not this petty man that is waiting for me to…that always knew I was gonna mess up this way and is withholding certain things for me, because I don't know what to do with it, right. God is impacted by me and my choices just as God impacts me and my choices.
Seth Price 1:05
Oh, man, here we go. Alright, so you don't know this, but I just recorded what I think might be the best intro for the show ever. And when I looked down to stop the recording, it was not recording. So we'll never know, like, I am biased. My daughter's down here with me. She thought it was amazing. But we'll never know. Anyway, welcome to the show. I'm glad that you're here. So a couple quick announcements. Merchandise is finally all in one spot. And I'm done changing providers because I finally found a place that is a quality that I would wear. And I don't have to do anything for I when I made that merchandise store for the show years ago. It was based upon people asking for it less and less people are asking for it. But those designs are still there. If there's something that you want, send me an idea. I'll figure out how to make it and we'll do a thing. But it's in a spot now that doesn't cost anything to have. And so it's something I can continue to offer. And I will say bonfire, who is who is printing this merchandise, they do a fantastic job quite a bit better than what we did have February. If you were like me, and you work in the banking industry, you know that February is one of those months that like the debit cards and the credit cards like the expiration dates change. In somehow over this month in starting, we lost a few supporters over at Patreon, which is fine. That could have been intentional could have just been because we forget that our cards are on file, I get it. However, this show cannot run without the support of each of you in whatever capacity that that is. And so if you haven't yet joined the community, my goal is to end June with 100 supporters of the show. And we're about I don't know not a word 60% of the way there. All that to say if you support the show, I'm thankful if you don't consider it. Now. This week had Candice Marie Benbow on. She wrote a book called red lip theology. It is a fantastic book, even though she said it is not written to white guys like me, if you don't know I am a white guy. Anyway, but it's still a good book, I learned quite a bit from it laugh quite a bit as well. And I thought about Adam and Eve and a new concept of rider die. And you will get that in a minute when you listen to the show. And with that. Let's go.
Candace, welcome to the show. I'm excited. You're here. I'm sorry that we're a week late. That's on me. I think I miscommunicated that doesn't matter. Anyway.
Candice Marie Benbow 4:01
We're here.
Seth Price 4:02
We're here. We're doing the thing.
Candice Marie Benbow 4:04
Here. Yeah,
Seth Price 4:06
I like to start with kind of an existential question. Sure. And then I end with one neither have really anything to do with your book. But when you try to explain like what you are kind of why you are what is that? For people listening? They're like, yeah, yeah, what is that?
Candice Marie Benbow 4:23
I'm I'm a writer because one words make me feel safe. Words are sacred to me. And I really feel like and believe that there was a call placed on my life, to use words to help people figure out how to live better lives.
Seth Price 4:49
Mm hmm. What do you what do you do besides write books? What do you do?
Candice Marie Benbow 4:55
So I am the daily help. Educational, what is my title? My boss is probably gonna listen to me. I am the daily lifestyle education and health writer at the grill, which is a black media news, space. And I so I do that my podcast actually will have a podcast with them. And that will drop soon. And other than that I am as a theologian, the work that I do is I work with churches and nonprofit organizations to really think about bit more critically about issues of gender, equity and faith. And what it means to think much more broadly and much more intentionally about our faith lives and how it intersects with the other work that we need to do in the world to bring about change.
Seth Price 6:07
So, again, nothing to do with your book. So if I was to go to the Grieux, and read your words, like, what am I reading? Like? What what goes into that? Like, because now I'm because I don't know what Reo is, but I only read books, and Fed Reserve reports. That's it.
Candice Marie Benbow 6:26
So for me, when you go to the lifestyle, you got your targets of lifestyle section. i My work is really about what does it mean for us to thrive? What does it mean for us to move from a space of particularly for, for African Americans move out of this space of like survival, to to a place of thriving, and also you're going to read about for me the importance of resilience and grace. So right now we're doing and we're in the midst of a catch 2022 series, where the third week, statistically, the third week of January when everybody abandons their New Year's resolutions, and catch 2022 is a
Seth Price 7:21
great week. And that this week,
Candice Marie Benbow 7:23
yeah, everybody pieces them out. And so catch 2022 is about how do we still maximize and honor the year and what we want to do while also still giving grace to ourselves. So one of the pieces that I did in there were like fun ways to find fitness routines for people who want to work out but are not going to the gym because the gyms are overcrowded. And people don't everybody doesn't want to work out in a mask, right? So. So if those kinds of pieces that really gets you like, how do we think through what it means to live whole and full lives, while also you know, honoring, like the space that we need to give ourselves as we navigate that?
Seth Price 8:15
Yeah, no, I like that. So getting to why you're actually here. So you wrote a book, got it in my hand for people that are, well, you can't see like a tournament there it is. Yeah, so for people that can't see the video, you can't see the book, it's in the show notes, and you can go buy the book. However, however, I have just a really passive aggressive, sarcastic question, and I actually can't find where I underlined it. And that's my fault. I've gotten in the habit of reading books on Amazon. And you can just like click the highlight, and then I don't really have to remember page numbers, I just have to remember. So I'm gonna badly paraphrase your quote, you say somewhere in the beginning, like either in the intro, or like in the very first chapter that like this book is not for me. What can I say that for me is like a white balding, middle aged man. So who's it for?
Candice Marie Benbow 9:06
I wrote this book for, for primarily for black women who black women who were born and raised in the church, or our church adjacent, and are trying to make sense of the world around them. And make sense of their quest, emerging questions around faith and feminism, and then much more broadly, are ready for women, you know, across gender and racial I mean across racial and ethnic identities. Because when you think about faith, there are so many people who are as impacted by the ways that religion and patriarchy and sexism intersect to be sites of oppression. So if it is, it's a black woman story because I'm a black woman and, and share these experiences with so many sisters that I know. But it's also a woman store and and what we have experienced as we navigate faith spaces
Seth Price 10:26
as your dog, I hear him I hear
Candice Marie Benbow 10:29
I was trying to mute but it's not gonna work.
Seth Price 10:31
It's fine. It's fine on this show. So I don't know if I've ever said this out. So there's two versions of this show, Candace, there's the one that I'm too lazy to edit. And that just goes right to the patrons because why not? And in in that one, not not always in that one. But most time in that one, one of my two dogs will always do a little ear flap thing. That sounds like a helicopter. And I've mixed that it's in every single episode. I like put it in there. So but I've had babies on the show and lawnmowers. I had the royal wedding like motorcade when I was talking with Tom, right, like, just random. So it's fine that the dog bark like nobody cares, we let the dog so you, in this story, weave stories about friendship, which I like the way you and your friends are like holding each other accountable. Because I've got friends like that as well, just a few miles away that. I mean, we I don't know what the word is. They they're not friends. They're more like brothers. So what do you feel like is the role of an actual friend when it comes to someone's like, like, not life? But like someone's ability to remember who they are? If that makes any sense? Like, what is the role of that? Because I think that nobody knows how to do that anymore because of social media, fakeness, the internet, etc. So, but I love the stories that you tell about your friends in this book, and you can share any of those or people can read them. That's totally up to you.
Candice Marie Benbow 11:54
Yeah, no, I think I, that's a great question. I think friends are supposed to be narratives for us, right? That like, you know, I mean, read the theology starts and exists, primarily because my best friend came to check on me and was honest, and say, like, you don't look like my best friend anymore. And I had to be honest, and say, I don't feel like her. If we were the kinds of friends that did not have that kind of reciprocity of truth, then that moment, we're not taking place, right? So like, I think that friends, one AR are there to help mirror who you were, but also to reflect who you can be and who you should be. And I would have not I wouldn't be who I am I had I not had those kinds of friends. And I try very hard to be that kind of friend. Because berries, because you want the peace you want everybody to thrive. You want everybody to, to soar in their particular spaces and ways. And you want for everyone to be lifted. And you want for everyone to to feel and know low, right? Even if you don't know them, like a world with no love is a sad, sad place to be right. Yes. So. So there are people who are in my life that I want to know love. I'm going to do what I can do to reflect that. And to show that to them.
Seth Price 13:53
Yeah. So if red lip theology is a systematic theology, why not? Because people like people like boxes, what is the system that you grew up in? And then how does that contrast with red lip theology? So like, let's just, we just what's the tulip of what your what your your upbringing was? And that's a deep cut for people listening. And then what is red lip theology? I don't need an acronym at that's not fair. Oh,
Candice Marie Benbow 14:19
no, no, no, that's good, like so. So I was born and raised in the black Missionary Baptist Church. And so much of what I understood about God was very transactional. That if I did these things, God would do these things. And it created a very black and white understand understanding of what of who I should be or what my fate should be right, and that there was no room for gray and when I veered outside of the spaces There was so much shame and guilt that I had, because it was like, how could you? How could you do that? Like, you know, better, right? And, and internalizing that shame and internalizing that guilt, I did not think and feel highly of myself. And I felt like I would always have to work, produce, to, to show my, you know, my to, to be worthy to be validated. And that's just my who, who God is. And so as I began to, I may want, I always had questions. But college really gave me room to explore those questions being in my young adulthood. And on my own, I really got to experience I mean, I didn't really get to answer a lot of those questions. It wasn't really until my mom passed away unexpectedly that I felt like I had like this crises of faith that really forced me to move into a, what do I really think about that? And what do I what has always been intuitive to me about my faith and about who God is. And so realm of theology, the ways that it differs from the system that I grew up in, is that God is much more empathetic and compassionate. And God is not this petty man that is waiting for me to that I always knew I was gonna mess up this way and is and is withholding certain things for me because I don't know what to do with it, right that like that, but that like, God, it God is impacted by me and my choices. Just as God impacts me and my choices. And, and I had to really come to a space where and relative theology help with this. And this is really the tone of the book. What does it mean to be in relationship, right, like, so everybody talks about healthy relationships, right? Healthy Relationships, people communicate, people compromise. It's not a dictatorship, like, all of these, communicate all of these essentials, to what a thriving relationship look like, are also what I, what I realized I should apply to my relationship with God, that that we communicate, like, I get to say, I'm feeling away about how things are going, and I need you to know that. And that every move that I make, is not something like predestined, you know, before I make before I make the step God, no, I was gonna like, That, for me, is not a healthy way to approach face, if not liberated. And so in those ways, rather, theology freed me from a system that was rigid and really was and really allowed me to be and have more grace in how I come to know God.
Seth Price 18:39
Yeah. Yeah, I am. I had a very similar upbringing of what my view of God was, and predestination and I used to live on purpose. So I'm from an independent regular Baptist Church, which is like, we see Southern Baptist and be like, Nah, you're not, you're not strict enough for us. We're gonna need to go a little bit more, a little bit more. Yeah. And then so I read your stories of college and I laughed out loud on the couch, read your story in the library there of that do this, like, well, what kind of, like I'm this type of theology? Because I went to liberty. So I did not have that open space to guys. I went in. Yeah, yeah. So and then, yeah, instead of working through it in college, I worked through it in a podcast, but um, but But yeah, no, our Yeah, yeah. And I've come to really think that that version of god of the, what you described, it's like, just a sociopathic God that I don't want to be involved with it. It's not love at all. Yes, I can. Definitely. I definitely relate to that. I have a question about a term rider die. And so there's a chapter in here. I don't know where it is, because it's around like page 45. But you're talking about sin. And so I'd like to circle circle the drain on sin there a little bit. But So on page 46, you say, you know, all I know, is that all right, Candace, if I read your own book to you is that fine? So all I knew was Adam and Eve introduced sin into the world. Well actually it was just Eve is a big biblical writers told the pair they could have anything and Garden of Eden but but couldn't couldn't eat the fruit of the Tree of Knowledge good and evil and then you go on to go tell a bit about the serpent and yada, yada yada. And you end up saying when Adam saw eaten the fruit up, he said YOLO took a bite. And you would think this is the first moment of romantic solidarity, which is when I busted out laughing, showing Adam to be right or die. And then you go on to talk about Yeah, that's not how it was. So what does rider die look like? In like a biblical relationship? You're more importantly than after that stupid question. What do we do with sin, but answered the funny one first, just it makes me laugh, right? I've never had Ryder die applied to Adam and Eve.
Candice Marie Benbow 20:48
Yeah, like, right. Like, like Adam really did throw him under the bus. Like, it was like, this woman you gave me. I mean, I didn't pick her. Like, she just was here. She did it. And she told me it was okay. It was this moment where I'm like, okay, so we don't get no, no, I did it. Like, let me let me stand. I mean, remember all of those. The Christian family like things where they use the umbrella? Oh, yeah. Like God is the husband and then the white. Like, he didn't even he wasn't an umbrella.
Seth Price 21:35
He was like, I'm making that a shirt, be an umbrella.
Candice Marie Benbow 21:40
Be an umbrella. Like, he literally was like, she made it. I don't know how to do it. This, this isn't my fault. And so like, what's funny to me? Is, and I think this is probably you know, if my mother was here, and if we had my grandmother on this line, this is probably why I always got in trouble. Because to me, the whole situation is a setup. Like, why would you put something I'll never forget, case in point, my mama bought some chalk. I will never forget, they were from like, death by chocolate cookies. And she put them on a table and she was like, you can't have him. Okay, you put them on the table. And then you tell me I can't have me. So then she left. I ate a cookie. And then I went to brush my teeth, because I didn't want her to know that even the cookie and she came like bust in the house. Because something told her that I had eaten. And so when I got in trouble, I was like, Well, why did you leave them on the table? You know what I was going to eat the cookie. So for me when I when I look at Adam, the story of the garden. There are so many conversations that people have about about the garden. And I wanted to problematize it a bit and say because we have agency and because we have freewill What if we have completely misread he? What if we get to glory? And he was like No, like I like I did it. And it was the best thing that I ever did. Not because the outcome was what she wanted. But because of the ways that the implication of that decision, or the consequences of that decision, opened her up to parts of herself that she didn't know, and ways that she had to grow in ways that she did. Right. And so I think about that often, which is why I don't I try not to use the language of consequences. I think that each choice has an implication like there's some, there's some times that I was I did some foolishness, and I pay dearly for it. There were some times that I did what people expected me to do. And I once I finished it and it was the quote unquote, right decision. It didn't sit well with you. Right. And I and I think that if there's a way for us to particularly because so often, we read Adam II with such this vitriol of the entrance that said, right, this is when the world has fallen. But how can we reclaim it in a way that we give, we extend them gradings so that we give it back to ourselves like I don't want to always I see myself, I don't want to always see people as the worst thing they've ever done. I don't write like, like, there's so much more to me. But, and there's so much more to add there were so much more to Adam and Eve, then the two of them in, and I hope it was good. Like I I used to say when. But that limited time that I taught Bible study before my pastor caught me in office, I was like, so this isn't gonna work. I use this day, like, I hope when we get there, they're like, that fruit was good. Because I told them, I was like, There's nothing worse than biting into a nasty orange, or like, like, there's nothing worse than this of the fruit that just disappoints.
I hope that they're happy. But But I do think that that the space that I try to try to situate that conversation in, and other conversations around this notion of sin moves us out of these kinds of social mores that that people tell us are sinful, but invite us to really think critically about our relationship with God, what we call what we have been called to be in the world who are called to be in the world. And the decisions that we make that are either in service of that, or not in service of that, right. So like, we know that it isn't it is not a sin. I mean that it is like I'm not supposed to go out here and to shoot somebody, right like that. It is it is that is
Seth Price 26:53
wrong frowned upon.
Candice Marie Benbow 26:55
Why? What do we do? Like, literally because because it can mean some places, right? But then what do we do? When I may have to take a life to save mine? Or to save someone else's? Right? Like, do we justify that? Do we, you know, like the ways that we the ways that we find mitigating factors in spaces, and I'm and I'm somebody who I don't believe in violence in any form. But I do know that there are times in which you have to protect yourself and those that you love. Right? Yeah. Um, do I think that when you engage in violence in that way, agree with God's heart? Absolutely. Do I think that God sees you solely in that space? No, I don't, right. Um, my, my parents were not married. Um, there were people who maligned my mother did not maligned my father. Um, but my mama refused to see that act that simple. Because she did not want to raise me in a context that said I was any less loved, and beloved of God. Because, because I, because I did not have to marry parents. Right. So like, that was the that was really my first space of interrogating what it means what sin actually means, like my mind was like, I'm not no, like, Absolutely not like, God had to get you here. Because there's something that you are going to have to do at a certain time. And God is not bound by she said, God is not bound by what we think has to happen in order for something to take place. And so when we think about that, we've got to move out of a space of sin being this very rigid thing, but really looking at it as like, what actions am i doing that's diminishing my flourishing? What actions am I doing that are are working to complicate a fruitful relationship between me and God? Those will differ. There will be some universalities. Yeah. But there will also be some some different decisions and different responses based on who you are in your relationship with God. And we got to create room for that.
Seth Price 29:52
Yeah, yeah, I've I've said this before, and I don't know if I've ever said it the same way twice, but it's the same general vague thing. So What I hermetically probably think sin is and I don't care about heresy anymore, because who cares? I think that sin is like when I in community with you. So you're in, I think you're in Atlanta, right? And that right or somewhere, yeah. So I ride down there. And I intentionally do something on purpose that breaks Shalom. And that is in like, I did it on purpose. And it something died. What I tell my kids all the time is when you make these decisions, intentionally or unintentionally, but specifically, intentionally, things break and things die because that's the wage of sin like zoo, your friendships die, your trust that mom and dad had in you die, your, whatever the thing is, something dies. And when you do the opposite of that, when you hit the mark, you make life because we bear the image of God that creates life. So you choose, you know, that's, that's, you can't preach that in a Baptist church. But that's, that's what I think
Candice Marie Benbow 30:58
what it is. I love that I love anything that breaks shalom, anything that anything that does not produce life, yeah. Like, in all of its forms like that is that his sin and the grace for us should we take it is that we're given opportunities to do better. We're given opportunities to learn and to hold ourselves accountable, and move differently, that allow us to shift who we are and what we think. Right. But like that, that there's space for us to be different and to be better, like we have that capacity. And yeah, I think that that's, for me, really, when I wrote this book, it was about that capacity, like how, like I stood at, I tell people like being walking through the valley of the shadow of death is never fun, like living living life in the shadow of your worst nightmare. And then having all of these other things happen, that you are now trying to make sense of, is never fun, and is never good. And yet there is this ability to rise above it. There is this ability to move beyond it and not in a way that negates all that has happened to you. But in a way that that says that these things opened me up to the possibility and the capacity to be different. And that is a sacred bond and a sacred trust. And so yeah, I hope I hope, I hope that as people read it, that's what they walk away with.
Seth Price 33:17
Do you remember like last year, I had all those weird ad breaks, like it would just randomly be something, we're not doing that instead, I thought I'd do this, I need your help. If you're able to head on over to the website for the show, there are two things that you can do. One is you head over the website, you click the Patreon button or support button, I forget what I call it. And you jump in there, those people helped make the show a thing so that you can listen to it right now, to the easier one, you could just leave a rating and a review on the podcast app of choice that you currently use. Either one of those is fine, but I would love it if you would do either one, specifically the rating and reviewing it's an exponential thing that the algorithms pick it up and that's just math. It's just compounding on top of itself. Anyway, all that to say that was it. That was the ad break. And now we're going to get back into it
before I move on, you talk about like violence against somebody that was messing with you, your family or something like that. The only thing I can think of for some reason in the back of my head when you were talking is that tried Jesus song. Do you know the song? It's not me. Yeah, throw hands. Yeah, if cognitive bias was ever a song, that's it. I will listen to it with my kids. They like it. I like it just like anyway but yeah, yeah, it's that's my that's my anyway, that's my jam. I love you touch me in mind. We're gonna have scrap um, yeah. So no, you got some painful chapters in here. That were hard to read like you got a chapter we're talking about, you know, an affair that you were involved in. Which to be honest, Candace, I don't think I could write that in a book and be like, it's fine. Put it in print, put it out there. Like, and then there's a chapter on some movement in your views on LGBTQ issues. And it's that chapter I want to ask a question about so there's an I can't remember in this book, I think the names have been changed to protect the innocent, but maybe they weren't doesn't matter. So there's a part in here, where a friend of yours named Daryl is calling you out. And he's saying, you know, you got time for this? Dude, you got time for that dude. And that dude was the one and now this dude's a one. But did you see? I mean, that dude, right there? Right, we're riding her die. And I brought my honey crisp apples. Like we're doing this, I brought him you know, but he asked you, how much time do I get as your friend, which was a really powerful question for me. For those that haven't read that chapter, what does that question kind of all entail? And then what are some of the implications of the answer to it?
Candice Marie Benbow 36:01
Oh, I'm remembering that moment. So um, and, and what's funny is I didn't, I didn't tell him until, until he read it. And he called me crying. Because he was just like, I had absolutely no idea that that moment was so pivotal for you. I'm going back to friendship, right there, we started this conversation with that they are to be the mirrors for us. The truth was, was that in that moment, because of my skewed ability to see beyond what I had been taught, I was not a good friend to him. And this is somebody who had prayed for me, who I knew, knew, who I know, knows Jesus. And this is somebody who had lifted me and continue to lift me every time one of those do foods, you know, made clear that they were not the one. And, and I, and I grieved the fact that I allowed religion, to home i here. But I allowed a religion, to keep me from being a good friend. And so I had to really, I had to literally sit back and say, If scripture says, Try to fear by the Spirit, to see if it be of God, and I know that I know that the real walks with God. And I know that God talks to the room and the real talks back to God. What what do I lose, by honoring that his who he loves, have absolutely nothing to do one with me. And two, with his ability to be a good fundamental person who grounds his life in, in wisdom and the teachings of Jesus, right. And that, like we are, and to be very honest about the fact that we had been using and having using doctrine and conversations from centuries ago, to have conversations about sex and sexuality, that continues to be to evolve, right? Like, like, these are conversations that continuously evolve. There is scholarship, biblical scholarship, that says and suggest that sex is not as black and white in Scripture, as we made it, that sexuality may not be as black and white in Scripture, as it made it right. And so how do I take all of that? And honor that, my friends, love looks different, but who my friend loves. It looks different than me, and who I love but fundamentally like he he is a good person, and that God created us all with intentionality, and our differences and our diversities matter to God, and they matter to the world that God intended to create. Um, and so it's sacred, right like I'll never forget hearing Bishop you bless Yvette thunder Say and it just, it just blew me away. She said, I am a same gender loving woman because it is the will of God for my life. And when she said that, I was like, Whoa, like I never saw that, even of just how, how all of us come, every part of us is a part of who God created us to be to fulfill our purpose in the upper
end, you know, lastly, I will say that this world is so full of pain, and heartbreak, and loss and grief and hatred. How dare we really, how dare we say that people cannot have and find love. Because it looks different, like to find love in this world is God to me, like to, to find somebody that you want to walk through this world with? Whether whether for a season or for a lifetime? That's holy, and I just refuse to? I refuse to deny that holiness, because I don't want to think differently.
Seth Price 41:25
Yeah. Yeah. Quick question. Because it's not what your book is about, although I have a few books on it. One of them is from it's called rethinking incarceration from Dominique. I don't know if you know, I can't think of his name right now dominate to boy Gilliard, I think anyway, so your doctoral work, or your graduate work was going to be on like the theology and the intersection of mass incarceration. Like, that can't be something that you just like, just kidding, I'm not doing that anymore. Like, when are you finishing this word PhD or not? Because that's a whole different topic. That's a whole nother hour.
Candice Marie Benbow 42:04
But yeah,
Seth Price 42:05
but can you speak a bit to that as long as you want? Because that's not really what the book is about? Like, it's,
Candice Marie Benbow 42:11
no, it's so funny. It's so funny that you said that, because somebody inbox me the other day, I was like, so like, are
Seth Price 42:17
you gonna read a paragraph? Are you gonna do anything with this? No,
Candice Marie Benbow 42:22
I was like, oh, but what's funny is that I've thought about it for a while. One, I'm thinking through an entire project on sin, like taking, taking sin, and, and really sitting with it, and like, what it means to, to have to reimagine how we talk about it. But, um, but out of that really comes how we recognize what we characterize as what it means to be safe in, in this country, right? That there has to be people who are centered, and who are bad, and they need to be put away from us, right. And then there has to be those of us who do not engage in, in the work of, of iniquity and crime, and we get to we get to flourish and thrive out here in the world. And what does that mean, for for how we see who is blessed? Who is favored? Who is not right. And then how do we use that to justify what is often the inhumane treatment of those who are incarcerated. And it is beyond the it's beyond the ways that that they strike when the food and the plumbing and the living conditions are so poor,
Seth Price 44:04
right. Yeah. Or the vaccination or mass migrations. Right. Yeah, it is.
Candice Marie Benbow 44:09
It's beyond that. It's the way that we have decided that they don't even deserve to be touched. Yeah, right. It's the way that we decided that they don't deserve hugs. That it you know, like, I have a cousin who is currently incarcerated, the way b hoops that I'm having to go through just to send him a book, my book because I want him to have it is crazy to me, right that like that, that there are ways for women who are incarcerated, who are not even guaranteed feminine hygiene products. Yeah, like you gotta buy those and if you don't have them in commissary, if you don't have money or commissary, like you know Oh, yeah. And so it, how have we decided that that's okay? Because they, they may or may not have done made a mistake or done something that we deemed, you know, deserving of that kind of treatment, you know, that work for me was was important. Because for my work, I was going to seminary, we have to have a field education experience. And I got placed at the Youth Detention Center. And I was like, okay, like this is, I don't, I don't want to be here. This is not the work that I'm doing. Um, I was there, I was only supposed to have you having to fill placements, I took that one. And I did not leave. Like, I went back to the field education director and was like, please keep me here. Like, I stayed. And when I graduated from Duke, I cried because I didn't want to leave them. And I've kept in touch with with many of them who have gotten out and gone on to do to do well, some of them, you know, where were we incarcerated, and two of them were killed. And I had to, and that was hard. But that experience, fundamentally changed my life. And I wanted us to really sit with especially because I was in as I was in this, this youth prison context. There was a 10 year old at the time, who had committed murder. Who would be in there until they turn 18. And the likelihood was that they would go from there to the same facility. And when we talked to him, he was like, Yeah, I did a bad thing. When can I go home? Like there was no, no comprehension of the fact that like, a life was gone. But I was in there, and it was majority, black and brown boys. And the people that were coming to preach and teach to them about Jesus were white. And I was like, even that was something that I was like, we actually need to interrogate this too. Right. Um, and so yeah, I think I think even as, as I have moved away from that work, I haven't, because I still do work with, with corrections, I'm a, I am still very much a part of organizations that are working to, to think through these things theologically. I have broached the book. I've booked topic project with my editor do it. Um, yeah, but I do like I, I mean, largest thing is that I really don't have a conversation about sin. Like, I just like, I really just want to write a book called Sin doesn't really sit with like, how have we framed it? What is it really, and because I'm gonna be quiet, because I'm about to talk about when you re I think I think that's the other part for for, for people. When you read other theological works, you get so many different constructions of what sin is, right? And like, there's this, I have a thought I had it, I'm happy to give you the name of it, but I'm either Japanese theologian, and his construction of sin around is basically that thin, is whatever we do that evoke shame. So whether it is shaming us, or whether we have done something that creates shame in someone else, that is sin. And I remember having a conversation with my homegirl because I literally, I want to those are like rife in my book and my highlights in my life. And I just, I just had to screenshot the pages. And I said, this is how we so many people have communal understandings of what The same is like that it moves us out of this kind of like individualistic. Oh, if you have sex before marriage, you know you're sinful. But it moves us out of that kind of like individual individualistic conversation, to what are my actions communally? And how are they? How are they working to lead people to more life? Yeah. Or how are they working to break shalom, right? Like, how, what am I doing and and it for me? I think that's my greens God's heart. Right that when when we do things that diminish people's hope, right that like, I can, I can go into prayer. I can have my conversation with God. And God can tell me like, okay, like, so you own 10 Today, like maybe tomorrow shot to stay at four or five? Did you get a lot like, Yo ain't like I like it's so funny. Because I saw I saw my I saw my friend I said, one time write a piece about living with anxiety. I know that guys some days is like you took me through so I know. You doing life with?
Seth Price 51:18
You know that a clip? That was a timeout for me. I had had enough I had to do a whole just,
Candice Marie Benbow 51:25
you know, when people said, This is big on me this one person asleep. I know there are times a guy has been like, I have taken that cuz she's done a lot. And I need a moment, right? And I and I, and I told her I said, I can't be in my space, and my and my work with God. And God can show me because of the relationship that we have the growing edges that I need to work on. I think where God gives greed and most disappointment is when I do something that has hurt somebody else. Right? That like I don't moved on from it. Say what I had to say grant about my business. And it sparked shame. If sparked guilt. It rubbed the the the the the skin off of an insecurity of an old wound. And now they're having to live with resurfaced emotions and feelings that they would not have had to had are not done that. Yeah, that's what I know God is looking at me like you, which what you are here doing? Yeah. And so I said all that to say that I do think for me, having much more conversations about saying and accountability do encompass the work that we got to do to think about that think about mass incarceration, to think about policing differently. And to think about who gets who gets the power to be the ones who are doing their surveillance and who, who, who is theologically position to be the surveilled. And I think that that is, as we move into what I think will, we will, I don't think that we will, we will be without a generation. I don't think ever again, we will be without a generation that does not consistently call policing to task that does not consistently call correction systems and criminal justice systems to task. And I think that it is incumbent upon us to really think through what that looks like. Particularly from Christian standpoints. And so those are conversations that I'm definitely invested in having.
Seth Price 54:00
Yeah, so let me circle that back up to the beginning. Just write the book. Yeah, yeah. Yeah. Cuz you can see the passion there. And I I agree with that. Like, like, I, I agree with a lot, if not all of that, a lot of that. So I want to two or three questions, and then give you back to your question. So who is
Candice Marie Benbow 54:21
snoring? Oh, I cannot believe that you cannot hear him. Cuz I am over here. Like, oh my God. Oh, my gosh, he sounds like a grown man.
Seth Price 54:34
So you say somewhere towards the last third, that they're like, eight cornerstones are truths for red lip theology. And so I want to read these to you. And I want to ask you, which one is the one and I want to frame this question a little bit differently. So one of the questions that I asked everyone Candice is, what are the things that we should be intentionally talking about in our church bodies, and that if we intentionally avoid them, or literally like, just we're going to just take Splode churches like that's a grenade, everybody sees it. Nobody wants to talk about it. Nobody's gonna call this out over here. So which one of these eight things do you think is that and then kind of how do we move forward and talking about it. So with those being that one intimacy, His Holiness is holy, to God created us for interdependence and connection. When we honor that we thrive, three, intimacy is necessary for touch is vital, which honestly, that makes no sense to me. But that doesn't have to be your answer. Five, sex is healthy, necessary and productive for reasons beyond reproduction. Six, God respects our agency seven, those of us who have the privilege of experiencing physical intimacy should do so as often as we deem necessary for our health, wellness and desires. And eight people who identify as asexual, and those for whom intimacy can be difficult because of physical, because of physical and emotional limitations are no less valuable or important than those who are experiencing intimacy privilege. So of those eight things, what's the one that you're like? Yeah, we're not gonna talk about that in church. But we should, and here's why.
Candice Marie Benbow 56:08
Oh, that, that we said, regardless of marital status, engage in intimacy and physical connection. However we do whenever we deem necessary, and we need to talk about that for all of the other reasons. But we, but again, the ways that we are conditioned to believe that sex outside of marriage or outside of these legal covenants is sinful, and does not really get us to a place of what it actually means to live and come alive. Right. So like, there were there were studies that basically talked about the lack of touch, and with the lack of touch and physical intimacy do to you. And they first started, I can't remember the country. And I hated that they did it. Because they started with babies, and
Seth Price 57:20
say, German, and why not? Yeah, it
Candice Marie Benbow 57:23
was, it was one of them. One of them that when you read this stuff, you were like, it makes sense, they would do stuff like that. Right. They had, at various Jenner at various generations, they withheld touch from whether it was a baby, whether it was a child, whether it was a teen, whether it was a young adult, whether it was an adult, whether it was an elderly, an elderly person, they would help touch and physical connection, and the ways that their body, the way that their organs and their systems began to negatively respond to the lack of touch and physical intimacy like that, those are conversations that we actually need to be having. Right? Case in point what is it also mean for us to be in a moment steel? Where touch is dangerous, right? You know, like, who, in middle who, who in the world, thought that we would get to a point where we will be afraid to hug our parents and our grandparents, right. Like, I I remember breaking down and crying Christmas 2021 Because I was still living in for the most part of the pandemic, I was living in New Jersey alone. And I had a terrible bout with COVID in 2020. And I thought I was gonna die. And I could I have never, I have never been without my family for Christmas. And Christmas is already a hard time because my mother's gone. And so I try to make sure that I'm around my grandmother. And so I went home for Christmas. I remembered for the two to three weeks after Christmas, holding my breath. Every time I talked to my grandmother, because I was listening for if there was something different in her voice, like every time she says she was tired, I was like, is she tired? Because she was out playing solitaire all night, or she tired because she may have called you know, like, and I cried. Because I said nobody should ever feel like that. Nobody should ever feel like that. And I don't even think that we have fully. It will be decades before we are able to really I count up the totalizing cost of what it means, but has meant for us to live in this pandemic, the ways that we did. So how do we bring those conversations, as well as intimacy conversations into a space, marry that with biblical scholarship, that main challenge, how we look at some passages, right? Combine that with broader conversations about sin and flourishing, that give people room to make decisions that they deem best suitable for their life without be attached, shame, judgment and finger wagging? Like, I think that that's where we've got to get to. Those are the conversations that make me excited. But I think that they're so ripe and rich with the truth of what it looks like to be people who, who cared for each other, and who recognize that life. And the conditions of life look different for look different from people that may may look like for you.
Seth Price 1:01:24
Yeah, yeah. Yeah. Can I say that conversation about like, sex really terrifies me, just because of my kids. Like, theologically, I'm right there with you. As an adult, I'm right there with you. But to be clear, I'm happily married. So like, I gotta share, yay. I don't know how to have that conversation with my kids. If I was, and I teach Sunday school to like third graders, so like, it's hard to
Candice Marie Benbow 1:01:49
not think that's not the conversation that we have with. So with kids. So like, the conversation. Yeah, but
Seth Price 1:01:58
if we're doing the conversation, right, the kids will see it modeled in the adults in the church. Like they would like it, I think,
Candice Marie Benbow 1:02:07
but yeah, but I think that part of that, are they healthy conversations? Right? So so the conversations that I had with my cousin, that I have always have my cousin, who is about to graduate high school this year, is that this is a really beautiful thing that I really want you to do with, when you are when you are old enough to really deal with the the weight and that of its beauty. And I tell her and I said and most people, you know, they do wait until they're married to because it's most beautiful, and sacred to them in that context. And then we have a conversation. I didn't wait, you know, and, but I have friends who did. And I want it for you. Because there's so much that comes along with this. And I told her I was like I was I was I was out of high school. I was in college, like I had so many other things on my mind. And I thought I was like, there's so much other stuff I want you to do and focus on that does not include it. Yeah. And then we have the conversation that I want you to promise me that before you do anything, we'll have that conversation. And that's her cousin, you know, and I told her, I told her, I told my uncle who's our father, and my who's our mind, you know, I will not I will hold confidence as long as she's not in danger. Yeah. And I told that to her to you tell me something, you know, and you're in danger. We don't have to have a gun. We all have to have conversation. But my the way that I've talked to her about intimacy, and sex and have always talked to her is much different than a conversation that I have with my home girl who's 36, who still a virgin, and wants to be married, and is afraid that she's running out of time to be a mom. That's a very different conversation. And I think what has to happen when we talk about the children. And what we model is, what we've unfortunately done in church is we've had a one size fits all conversation about sex and sexuality. So what works for the four year old is supposed to work for the 1424 to 34 and 44 year old and there's just not the case, right? Like and there are ways that we can have healthy, honest conversations with young people that prioritize weight write that, like, they say, I want you to, like I, I want you to, to not feel especially, especially in the animal world where they get bombarded with sex, you know. And like, you can't not one of my friends was telling me that they found ways people have found ways to use the algorithms on YouTube kids to put sex conversations on Youtube Kids and in cartoons, and my and so it can't be a situation where you're just letting them watch YouTube now you got to watch and see what's going on. And so I think that there are ways that we can have healthy conversations with kids that prioritize waiting, that that emphasize, one, the beauty and the safety, of waiting, um, to, to, to, to partner in that way and marriage or, or just waiting period. And then I think there's room for us to really have a shift in our conversations, when we're dealing with adults. That does not make them that doesn't infantilize them, but also is very respectful of their agency and the world that we live in.
Seth Price 1:06:29
Yeah, yeah, it's a rough, it's a hard thing. Either way, so. Um, so at the very, very beginning, you would talk about part of what is you is, you know, the power that words have and you know, that that's, that's a big part of your life is writing words, etc. So for you, Candace, when you try to put words to whatever the heck God is, what is that for you?
Candice Marie Benbow 1:06:58
Who, I both honor that and main, their words are going to be insufficient. Guys, God is the most consistent, the most empathetic, the Most Compassionate, the most accountable, the Most Gracious, the Most kind, force in my life. And God is the most consistent that. First, I believe in the world. And in God is if I was to, if I was to describe God. And I've talked about that in the book, too, about like, I think that if we were just to describe God, we would and we had to put God in human form. It would be a person who has, who is loved and cared for us. Um, if I had to describe God and words, I think they will always be the most lush, like, decadent words, like and, and then they will also be the most the most decadent and simplistic words that encompass just sheer being and existence. And then I will still fail. Because there hasn't been a word or anything to just to capture. What and who got is to me, like, when you asked me that question, to be honest, I think it is fully in the like that that feeling that you get right before you're about to describe like, it's almost like when you're at church, and you're about or talking to someone, and you are about to talk about just how good God is and how good God has been and like this joy that you had, and you take that deep breath, like right before it like that little brand, right? refer you back to talk to me, it's in that breath, cuz you're cuz you are acknowledging, I'm about to put this in words. But I really don't have my word for what this makes me feel like so that's all I got. Like, that's, that's what that is. That's what that is for me.
Seth Price 1:09:52
I like that. I like that and that word lush for some reason. Feels good. That's it. That's it does a deep work. blush. That's not a word that people use. I don't use that word ever. Those two times, right their entire, that's the entire year of usage. So I did warn you existential at the end.
Candice Marie Benbow 1:10:15
So I have a I have a now that you told me that you got a you love at least once a month,
Seth Price 1:10:21
once a month and the rest of the year. I'll check it out. Yeah, I'm a man of my word. I mean, I make very few promises, and I will I will do okay. It's easy to keep them when you don't make a lot. I can do that. Yeah. So where should people do the things that are related to you on the web? You know, the things that the weird part of every podcast episode that thing right, yeah,
Candice Marie Benbow 1:10:45
the thing. So one, go by relative theology wherever you. You get your books, and my dog Charlie will thank you. Because that's how he definitely begins. But go get the book as wherever you get your books. You can follow me at Candace Benbow, CA nd ice, be in the ow, and Twitter and on Instagram. And my website is Candice benbow.com. I don't I have a Facebook. I don't know how to. You can probably find me on there. But I'm mostly on Instagram and Twitter. And when I'm not on those, I am on Pinterest pin me some some recipes. I'm probably never gonna try.
Seth Price 1:11:39
That looks good. I'm gonna make that I'm never gonna make that.
Candice Marie Benbow 1:11:43
Like so. Funny you am I agree Oh, I'm about to start Friday recipes, simply because I looked at my Pinterest board. And I have 60 Like I have a one I have them all broken down by by food, vegetables, meats, proteins, drinks, sweets. And I went through and I was like how many of these have actually made like, the, the boards, they have dope names and titles. They're very color coded and beautiful. And I probably have made two things. So now I'm going to this will be the year that I actually do the things that are on my Pinterest board.
Seth Price 1:12:29
That's nice. Candace, I have enjoyed chatting with you quite a bit. It's been it's been a joy so.
Now, I haven't added it up. But there are hundreds of 1000s if not millions of podcasts on the internet, and I am humbled that you continue to download this one. If this is your first time here. Please know that there are transcripts of these shows. Not always in real time, but I do my best. And if you go back in the logs, you can find transcripts for pretty much any episode that you'd like. The show is recorded and edited by me, but it is produced by the patron supporters of the show. That is one of the best, if not the best way that you can support the show. If you get anything at all out of these episodes, if you think on them, or if you you know, you're out and about and you tell your friends about it or..hey, mom, dad, brother, sister, friend, boss, pastor, here's what I heard, what are your thoughts on that? If this is helping you in any way, and it is helping me, consider supporting the show in that manner. It is extremely inexpensive, but collectively, it is so very much helpful.
Now for you. I pray that you are blessed, and you know that you're cherished and beloved. We'll talk soon.