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SpotifyWe dive deep into the shocking downfall of Carl Lentz, former pastor of Hillsong New York, and ask questions about the supposedly eye-opening revelations from “The Secrets of Hillsong” documentary. A former member of Hillsong NYC joins us to uncover what the documentary misses, the culture of celebrity pastors, and the consequences of blind faith in broken institutions.
Partner with us to hear our conversation with documentarian Professor Iwan Russell-Jones on why it’s important for Christians to face the truth.
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Show Notes:
Nate Nakao
Full Mutuality
Dauntless
False Profits: Hillsong
Full transcript
Jessica:
Hello and welcome to Where Do We Go From Here. I’m your host, Jessica van der Weingard.
Devi (she/her):
And I’m your other host, Debbie Abraham. Where do we go from here, untangled sex, self, and community for a new generation of Christians? Lead behind purity culture and save what matters.
Jessica:
Together let’s rebuild life and faith with Jesus at the center and figure out where will you go from here.
Devi (she/her):
You can find out more on our website, wheredowegopod.com, and join the conversation on Instagram and Twitter at wheredowegopod.
Jessica:
You’re listening to episode 128, Looking for Truth in The Secrets of Hillsong, episode 2 recap.
Devi (she/her):
But before we get into it, we want to remind you that in Patreon this week, you can listen to an episode of Purity Culture News where we talk about the latest in Brian Houston’s trial here in Australia. We talk about wedding night sex and a bunch of other things. So if you join us at where do we go pod.com forward slash partner for $3 a month us you can get access to that episode plus all the other things we have in there like romcom special guest episodes and a Zoom call with us at the end of the month.
Jessica:
All right, Debbie, let’s get into the show.
Devi (she/her):
Okay, Jess, we are on our second recap of The Secrets of Hillsong. This episode is called The Prodigal Son. That says a lot already, I think. Who
Jessica:
I’m
Devi (she/her):
is
Jessica:
sorry.
Devi (she/her):
the prodigal son here? Is it Carl Lentz? Well, that’s very interesting. Before we get into it, just want to remind you that we’re recapping all of these episodes, especially if you are in Australia and you’ve never… don’t get to see the secrets of Hillsong because it’s not available to us here. But if you’re in the United States and you’ve watched it already, this is a chance for you to get to hear what some Australians and Americans think about it. We’ve got a guest on our show today who was a member of Hillsong New York, who’s going to be recapping this episode with us.
Jessica:
Yes,
Devi (she/her):
So yeah.
Jessica:
and so we’ve just seen up to episode two, Devi, we are watching this and then doing a recap. We’re not kind of, you know, watching all of it, just so people know that as well.
Devi (she/her):
Yes, I’m going to quickly do a recap of the episode in terms of what happens and some of the cast of characters in this particular episode. So as the title says, The Secrets of Hillsong, so we are expecting that there are going to be secrets revealed, right? So this episode is called The Prodigal Son. It’s really the story of Carl Lentz. How did Carl Lentz become the Carl Lentz? How did he ascend to power in Hillsong? How did he meet Laura and get married? And then what happened to Karl Lentz? So we’re looking at kind of three major revelations that take place here, which is Karl Lentz was under so much pressure from Brian Houston to succeed, to perform, to make the church as big and powerful as it could be. That was too much pressure for him. So he starts abusing his ADHD medication. And then he has all this sexual dysfunction. going on as well. It manifested in what he discloses are, you know, of course the big affair that was in the news with Ranin Karim, as well as the relationship that he calls a consensual affair with Leona Kimes. The Kimes couple did not participate in the documentary, but Leona’s… post in Medium is screenshotted many times, or not many times, but it’s there, it’s present. So Laura Lentz talks about the impact of Carl’s infidelity on her and their family. And then the point of this episode seems to be to kind of go, but what was the big deal with what Carl really did? Did this blow up because Brian Houston was trying to cover up something else? And it’s on that note that it kind of ends. So the cast of characters are Carl and Laura Lentz. Laura Lentz’s parents are in it, Kevin and Marilyn Brett. Then we have the Hillsong, New York survivors. So Tiffany Perez, Abby Ross, Janice Legata, Josh Canfield, and Mary Jones.
Jessica:
So
Devi (she/her):
And
Jessica:
a lot of those survivors are from the first episode
Devi (she/her):
The
Jessica:
as
Devi (she/her):
first
Jessica:
well.
Devi (she/her):
episode, yeah.
Jessica:
So we see them return again to chime in on the Let’s story.
Devi (she/her):
That’s right. And then we have our sort of experts or sort of narrators, Alex French and Dan Adler, the reporters from Vanity Fair. Howie Kahn is in there and Kristin Cobes-Dumay and Mike Cosper. And then from Hillsong, Australia, we have Jeff Bullock and Tanya Levine. So that is episode two, The Prodigal Son. Now, Jess, why don’t you introduce Nate and then…
Jessica:
Yeah, so I found out about Nate through Tanya Levine’s podcast, Leaving Hillsong. So Nate was a guest on Tanya’s podcast. And so I thought this guy has a lot of insights about Hillsong, New York. He was part of the church for some time. So let’s see if I can find him on Instagram and see if he’d be interested. to join us for a recap because we are all the way here in Australia. And just like we see in this documentary, a lot of people in Hillsong, New York and Hillsong East Coast don’t know what’s going on down here, so maybe we don’t know what’s going on as much over there. It would be great to get someone who was part of everything that was going on. So or a part of the church, I should say. So Nate is joining us. Nate Please introduce yourself. So let us know a bit about yourself and then we’ll jump into a bit about your background at Hillsong.
Nate (he/him):
Sure. Hello. Thank you for having me on. Really excited to have this conversation to a degree.
Devi (she/her):
Yeah.
Jessica:
Hehehehe
Nate (he/him):
There’s excitement, there’s a little bit of anxiety rehashing some of this stuff, but I personally think it’s very important to continue having these conversations. I do notice
Jessica:
Hmm.
Nate (he/him):
that you on your show often talk about abuses in the church. And here we are with yet another story of further abuses in in a large church, a very large mega church. So my background is in very, very strict fundamentalist evangelicalism. I come from an independent Baptist background and grew up in that world, ended up going to a university that was kind of, I wouldn’t say affiliated in any official capacity, but was sort of the approved university for independent fundamentalist Christians. So. I was at that university for a four-year degree. After I graduated, I left the fundamentalist world and got into sort of the mainstream, new evangelical world of rock bands at church and ripped jeans and, oh, you know, we can actually like have a beer and God’s not gonna strike you dead. You
Devi (she/her):
Yep.
Nate (he/him):
know, all of
Jessica:
Yeah.
Nate (he/him):
that, that world. Which of course includes places like Hillsong and Hillsong
Jessica:
Right.
Nate (he/him):
music was very much a part of our church life when I left the fundamentalist world that I was a part of for almost 20 years. The whole Hillsong music publishing arm was very much a part of what we did. And Hillsong United and the Hillsong Worship Band came to New York City pretty regularly, I think.
Jessica:
Yeah.
Nate (he/him):
of the upcoming opening of Hillsong NYC, they came to New York City pretty regularly and we would go to concerts as often as we could whenever they were in town, which was quite often. I think it was every year that one or both of the bands, whether it was Hillsong United or Hillsong Worship came to New York City to perform. And the music was really what sucked me in. I ended up working in full-time church ministry for a few years for another mega church that was more in the style of, I don’t know if you all in Australia are familiar with Mark Driscoll’s
Devi (she/her):
Yes.
Nate (he/him):
Mark Church. Okay.
Devi (she/her):
So, Acts
Jessica:
Hehehe
Devi (she/her):
29, you went to an Acts 29 charge. Okay.
Nate (he/him):
I
Devi (she/her):
Uh-huh.
Nate (he/him):
did. It didn’t start off as an Acts 29 church. When we launched, we were independent, but we had a lot of similar doctrines. And the local Acts 29 representative came and saw, you know, oh, this church launched with 1100 people. This is exciting. So of course, Acts 29 wanted to get involved in what we were doing.
Devi (she/her):
Which
Nate (he/him):
And
Devi (she/her):
church was that if you don’t mind me asking?
Nate (he/him):
the church was called Emergence. Yeah. It’s up here in the New York City, New Jersey area. It’s in Northeast New Jersey. So about a half hour west of Manhattan Island for anyone who’s curious.
Jessica:
Hehehe
Nate (he/him):
Not that American geography means a whole lot to Australia,
Devi (she/her):
Hehehehe
Nate (he/him):
but if you have American listeners, they might
Devi (she/her):
We
Nate (he/him):
be.
Devi (she/her):
do, we
Jessica:
Yeah,
Devi (she/her):
do,
Jessica:
so we
Devi (she/her):
yes.
Jessica:
do. And that’s, um, that’s actually an interesting, well, it’s a noteworthy part of the whole appeal of Hillsong to Americans, Nate, this idea of the concerts. Because that’s something we just totally forget about here in Australia. Because like we just, you know, they’re just a church here. And
Devi (she/her):
Yeah.
Jessica:
often for many Christians in Australia, a church that’s not necessarily well liked, even if your church is using their music. But the fact that they kind of had these music tours all over the US and I think in Europe as well.
Devi (she/her):
South America everywhere,
Jessica:
Yeah,
Devi (she/her):
everywhere.
Jessica:
all over the world.
Devi (she/her):
Yeah.
Jessica:
That’s, yeah. Except here, obviously. There’s not a lot of money to be made by touring here in Australia. But…
Devi (she/her):
Well, Christians touring in Australia. Yeah, that’s
Jessica:
Specifically,
Devi (she/her):
right. Yeah.
Jessica:
yeah. So it was almost like the, it’s like wetting the appetite for American Christians for the church to come at some point in the future.
Devi (she/her):
Yep. Nate, tell us why did you join Hillsong then?
Nate (he/him):
So after I left my Acts 29 church, I wanted to find a church that I could sort of hide in. I didn’t want to be recognized. During my years working in church ministry, I had developed a little bit of a network in New Jersey of different children’s and family ministry pastors in the area. And I had traveled to a few other churches and met with a lot of their leaders and spoken some chapel services at different Christian schools around the area. So I knew that almost anywhere I went, I would probably be recognized and I didn’t want to be. So I found that a church like Hillsong was a good place to hide. At the time that I started attending, I think they were getting close to about 15,000 attendees
Jessica:
Wow.
Nate (he/him):
in the New York, New Jersey locations alone. So that kind of worked out as an ideal place to hide. But it didn’t take long. I mean, for me, growing up in the world that I did, I always felt compelled to get involved and serve in various capacities. And so, next thing you know, I was there. serving on Sundays. And I started off on some low profile teams, but my brother had actually been attending Hillsong NYC for a few years before I got there. And he kind of made his way up the creative team. And it ended up one of the worship leaders and very high up, in fact, he was the highest ranking volunteer team member on the creative team at Hillsong NYC and often would be sent by the creative pastor to go lead worship at Hillsong Phoenix and go visit Hillsong LA and just travel
Jessica:
as
Nate (he/him):
around
Jessica:
a volunteer.
Nate (he/him):
as a volunteer, yeah. Now they would pay him a stipend for any time that he was doing anything outside Hillsong NYC, but anything that involved New York and New Jersey and eventually Connecticut and Boston, he wasn’t getting any sort of remuneration for.
Jessica:
Wow.
Devi (she/her):
That’s including transport.
Nate (he/him):
Um, yeah, yeah.
Devi (she/her):
Wow. Okay.
Nate (he/him):
Yeah, they, um, they actually had a last ditch effort because he was, he was definitely like one foot in one foot out at some point and I think it was 2019, uh, shortly before the pandemic. And, uh, I think it was the last ditch effort. And maybe it was a little bit longer than, uh, just right before the pandemic, maybe several months, but, uh, they, they were trying to keep him on board. I think there was this sense that he was disgruntled. He was, he already had a foot out the door. And one way of keeping him on board was an all-expenses paid trip to Sydney. And
Devi (she/her):
Like
Nate (he/him):
yet,
Devi (she/her):
for conference or something like
Nate (he/him):
yeah,
Devi (she/her):
that.
Nate (he/him):
I think for conference and you know, he got on stage during one of the music video recordings and, you know, all of that. But that’s, that’s his story, not mine. And
Devi (she/her):
Sure.
Nate (he/him):
if he ever feels like coming out and telling his story. Though he likes to pretend that none of that ever happened.
Devi (she/her):
Sure.
Jessica:
Hehehe
Devi (she/her):
So Nate, how long did you stay and why did you stay?
Nate (he/him):
So
Jessica:
Or,
Nate (he/him):
I.
Jessica:
sorry, Debbie, before we jump to that
Devi (she/her):
Yeah.
Jessica:
question, I’m curious, Nate, for you to share with the audience, because I’ve heard it on Daniel Levine’s podcast, what areas of ministry you were volunteering in and what did that look like for you in terms of how much of your week was kind of devoted to activities related to church?
Nate (he/him):
Yeah, that’s a good question. So starting off, I initially joined the host team. So it was basically just welcoming people in. And it’s a low impact, low commitment kind of team. Though they really do, as soon as you join a team, they really push you towards doing more, signing up for more events, doing more things. And then I think over time, people discovered that I guess, people found out who my brother was. But also people kind of saw that I had some skills and background and experience in music and music production. So I made my way over to Creative Team and started doing some stuff with Creative Team. And I got pulled into a role that was initially called Creative Producer, and then they renamed it Service Producer, which is essentially the… the organizer of all of the creative elements of a Sunday service. And the creative elements include everything from the, the music, the, um, any videos that go up on, on the screen, the slides, uh, the, you know, PowerPoint presentation, as it were, um, whatever slide deck that the pastor has for them. So all of those things, um, fall under the creative producers. you know, organizational structure. So what I would do on a Sunday is I’d show up along with the music director and the band and everything, keep track of what was going on during rehearsal. I would get a set list on Saturday night and just ensure that, you know, all of the volunteers that were supposed to be there were there. Specifically for me, the ones that I was directly in charge of were or directly responsible for were the video production team. And that included anything that went up on screen, including the slideshow. And I think I would often coordinate with the music director. And we would be texting the night before. And then there was, I forgot his title, but we had a guy, who was essentially the do-all of the service. He was the one who was like our guest, our service technician, engineer. So the three of us were kind of the ones who were in charge of the flow of the service. So I’d show up, I’d have a quick little briefing with the music director to go over the set list, any kinds of elements that needed to be put into place. I would check in with the video team. to make sure that they received the video file for that service and that was brought to us by the video production team that had filmed and edited it probably the week before and then Any elements from the pastor if they had slides that they would put together and whoever was preaching that Sunday if it was a guest Preacher or whatever they would send that over and I’d go around and make sure that everybody had those items and then at while rehearsal was going on. The music director, myself, we would head upstairs to the pastor’s green room. I say upstairs, that was our, the Montclair, New Jersey campus specifically, but we would head over to the pastor’s green room and we would have like a meeting to run through with the events team. What was going on that morning and what needed to be handled, what, at what point? across along the run sheet. So the run sheet was this little card that had all of the elements of the service put onto a time sheet by the second. So if we were off by 10, 15 seconds, we were gonna hear about it. There were clocks everywhere. We had screens backstage that were sort of facing the way to screen in the back of the auditorium, facing the stage. So everybody had a clock within their sight line.
Devi (she/her):
Wow.
Nate (he/him):
to keep everybody on time, especially if we were doing a live link service where Carl lived in Montclair, so he would often just come to the Montclair campus for the first service and preach in Montclair. And so then we would link up with the midtown campus and downtown campus in Manhattan, and we would pipe the sermon out to them. But we had to make sure that we were all on the exact same time. so that when the sermon is getting piped through, everybody is there at the same
Devi (she/her):
Ready
Nate (he/him):
time.
Devi (she/her):
for it.
Nate (he/him):
Yeah.
Devi (she/her):
Nate, how many services then were you running if
Nate (he/him):
Um, so-
Devi (she/her):
on the one camp? So you were at the Montclair campus,
Nate (he/him):
Mm-hmm.
Devi (she/her):
but how many? Yeah.
Nate (he/him):
So Montclair had two services at the time
Devi (she/her):
Okay.
Nate (he/him):
that I was there as a service producer. Manhattan, so there were multiple locations in Manhattan. We had a midtown campus and a downtown campus, and then eventually they merged. But I think the downtown campus was doing two services, and the midtown campus was doing six services.
Devi (she/her):
Okay. So you were, your volunteer role at Hillsong doing all of the things that you just said. You did that, I guess, essentially two times over at Montclair.
Nate (he/him):
Yeah, I do it
Devi (she/her):
Okay.
Nate (he/him):
twice in Montclair and occasionally I would head into Manhattan to do the second set of services. So they broke it up into two sets of three services. And so I would run from Montclair and, you know, quickly head into the city. Hopefully there was no traffic and
Jessica:
Ha!
Nate (he/him):
then grab lunch and run the second set of their three services in the evening.
Devi (she/her):
So you’re looking at like how many hours?
Nate (he/him):
Um, so, uh, call time was usually around 7 a.m. for me. Um, and then we would wrap up in Montclair probably around 1230, one o’clock. And then I would run on, on those Sundays that I was in the city as well, which was, wasn’t very often, but I would run from there. I would get there. I think. Two o’clock. Two. 30 call time and then I would finish up around 930 10 o’clock at night. So that was, and that was just Sundays. Um, the, um, there were, we had our midweek service, um, called the exchange that I was also producing for, um, which that one was a, a nightmare to handle because it was very rough shot. It was, it was a portable, well, everything was portable for us, but, but unlike our Sunday services that take place at concert venues. Um, our midweek services were usually at these sort of empty hall type venues, um, that we would have to set everything up from the sound system to the, you know, video projection and everything. So,
Jessica:
Smile.
Nate (he/him):
um, inevitably something would go wrong. And I was working a nine to five. Um, so it was, and, and the call time was four 30 and the pastor was always asking, Nick, can you make four 30? No, I work a nine to five, I can’t make 430. And it would be inevitable week after week, I’d be asked, can you make 430 next week? No, I can’t make 430 next
Jessica:
Mm.
Nate (he/him):
week. The team knows what they’re doing. Occasionally something might go awry. And when that happened, I would hear about it from whatever pastor was in charge that night.
Jessica:
So in terms of the expertise required to do this role, Nate, it’s not like at a church when they say, hey, can you help with, you know, running the PowerPoint from the sound desk at the back of the church kind of thing. And it’s a high level of creative and technical expertise. And if that’s the kind of talent that Hillsong seeks out in volunteers, if, just to put you on the spot. If you were to be paid like an hourly rate for the kind of work you were doing, what would that be?
Nate (he/him):
Um, God, I, I don’t actually know what the, uh, the going rate for a good audio engineer. I would hope that, I mean, I’m not a good audio engineer. Don’t get me wrong, but as far as like a live show producer, uh, for, for one, for one show, they, the producer would be pulling in. I should hope like. at least five to $600 for a show. Then, and yeah, so like it’s a lot. And I honestly just pulled that number out of my butt. I don’t really,
Jessica:
Yeah,
Nate (he/him):
I’m
Jessica:
I
Nate (he/him):
not.
Jessica:
think it makes sense to me. I would say at least that somewhere around that.
Devi (she/her):
Yeah.
Jessica:
So and then at some point you probably had one foot in one foot out and then
Nate (he/him):
Yeah.
Jessica:
left. So how long were you part of the church and what was the final straw in the end I guess?
Nate (he/him):
So it was a slow Exodus for me. And it actually, the Exodus began before I even started attending Hillsong. I was already beginning, I know the current buzz term is deconstruction, but I was already sort of reanalyzing my beliefs in the evangelical system and theology long before I even got to Hillsong. I had started that journey when I was working for Emergence and that… kind of, and that sort of motivated me going to a place like Hillsong. Emergence is very strictly Calvinist in their theology, so they believe in the sovereign control of every minute detail that God has over everything in the universe, whereas the Pentecostal tradition is a bit more, it’s definitely not Calvinist, it’s sort of Arminian, not quite Wesleyan, but it comes from that kind of tradition where they believe that God doesn’t exert absolute minute control over every detail, rather God kind of exerts God’s sort of authority in this in charge, but people get to choose and act of their own volition. And so I was moving into that kind of territory when I got to Hillsong. I started attending Hillsong in 2014, and my mind had already sort of kicked out certain beliefs that probably were even within Hillsong’s doctrinal statement if they ever had one. But Hillsong was very open about their attendees, not having to make sort of statements of faith per se. So I didn’t actually have to say I believe in X, Y, and Z in order to be a part of Hillsong. And for me, that initially was something positive. I saw that as, you know, they’re not going to test me on what I believe, whether I can make a confessional statement about. sovereignty of God or the eternal conscious torment of human souls after death, you know, and those were things that I was already beginning to shed. And I think when I got to Hillsong, I felt like I could explore theologies and beliefs that were outside of the normal, sort of evangelical stance and still fully participate in the life of the church. And while that might’ve been the case for me as a cisgender, hetero passing person, that doesn’t, that there is a ceiling for people who don’t fit into that
Devi (she/her):
Yeah.
Nate (he/him):
identity. Sure, I could go through the church. believing whatever I wanted to believe. But as soon as I were, if I were to identify outside of the cis hetero normativity that the church never outright stated, but that the leadership of the church believed in, then there would be of course, an inability to continue on. And that was one of the things that started to push me out. As I was sort of growing outside of the bounds of my evangelical beliefs, I was beginning to gain a recognition of what, for instance, the LGBTQ community was dealing with in churches like Hillsong. And over time, after hearing about Josh Canfield, I think Josh’s circumstance took place maybe a year after I started attending. I didn’t know him well personally. I think I came across him at like one or two team nights when I first started serving at Hillsong. But I had heard about it. And then once that news kind of broke, I think I sort of justified it in my mind. As all you know, this is he this is somebody who can’t get in line with the church and what the church is trying to do. And maybe they’re better off somewhere else. And that was sort of my justification for it. Never really recognizing my complicity in the power structures at Hillsong as I kind of held onto that justification. Over time, as I started getting pulled into different perhaps service opportunities, I say opportunities in quotes,
Devi (she/her):
Eh-heh-heh.
Nate (he/him):
the whole, can you believe we get to do this?
Devi (she/her):
Yep.
Jessica:
Mmm.
Nate (he/him):
As a way to kind of mentally prevent you from going into that recognition or reflection of is this healthy? Is what I’m doing here good for me? We never ask that question because we feel so privileged. to be able to do this thing that anywhere else we’d be getting paid a lot of money for.
Jessica:
Hehehe
Nate (he/him):
But I think over time, you know, I started to find myself in circumstances that were really kind of making me tired. And I found myself getting more and more exhausted. I mean, it was not just Sundays, but you had church services on Sundays, then Monday night was… Leadership meeting Tuesday night was Connect Group. Wednesday night was the exchange. Thursday night was team night. Friday night, probably Friday night live or youth. Saturday night, probably having a meeting to prep for Sunday morning. So you didn’t have any time really to reflect on what was going on here to… take stock of my mental health, my emotional health, my physical and spiritual.
Devi (she/her):
Sorry, Nate. So you were at all those events every night of the week?
Nate (he/him):
Um, not all of them, uh,
Devi (she/her):
Okay.
Nate (he/him):
not,
Devi (she/her):
But
Nate (he/him):
sorry,
Devi (she/her):
a lot of people.
Nate (he/him):
not every week, but there were, there would be occasional weeks where I would be at all of them. I was at least, um, Sunday, Monday, uh, had my connect group on Tuesday, Wednesday, Thursday, so Friday I would, would be my kind of off night, um, and Saturday I wasn’t in all of those, uh, those meetings. So Saturday was, was sometimes an off night for me. So.
Devi (she/her):
So what you’re painting a picture
Jessica:
Wow.
Devi (she/her):
of really is that people at your level of volunteering are so totally immersed in the experience. It’s almost like a 360 experience. That it’s almost like you don’t have, as you said, the time to step back and go, is this normal? Because what you’re experiencing is normal.
Nate (he/him):
Right, right.
Devi (she/her):
They have created your normal for
Nate (he/him):
Exactly.
Devi (she/her):
you. Yeah,
Nate (he/him):
Yeah.
Devi (she/her):
okay.
Nate (he/him):
And it was it was conference actually some circumstances that took place during conference that I started to see the disparity between the levels of volunteers. There was almost a class system in place where, you know, they had this army of volunteers for that there was no place for them to rest. They were on their feet all day for three days. And the best they were getting were ham and cheese or peanut butter and jelly sandwiches. And then there was the next step up of volunteers that had access to like a buffet for our meals. and we would get hot coffee brought in for us and we would get bacon, eggs, and sausage, and fresh cut fruit, all of that for our morning meal. And at the time I was dating a girl who was on a volunteer team where she had the ham and cheese sandwiches. And
Jessica:
Sure.
Nate (he/him):
I remember thinking, this feels like a problem,
Jessica:
Mmm.
Nate (he/him):
Again, I was so tired, I didn’t actually get a chance to really reflect on it until at one point I kind of, I broke down. I was reamed out for misplacing my backstage pass and there were different color coded depending on what class of volunteer you were. And I got chewed out by my team lead because my backstage pass had more access than, you the other class of volunteer and you know, what would happen if somebody found my past,
Jessica:
Right.
Nate (he/him):
got into an area they weren’t supposed
Jessica:
Right.
Nate (he/him):
to, which you would have to know that color of past allowed you access to certain areas and you would have to know your way around. I mean, we were meeting in a very large arena. It was like a 20,000 seat arena. So you have to know your way around the backstage area to even find. where all of that was. So it just, yeah. So I got chewed out and I just felt like, why am I putting myself through this? So I got through conference. I got moved to another team or no, that team leader got moved elsewhere. So I didn’t have to work with them anymore. And yeah, so I just made my way through conference. And then I thought, I’m not going to put my team on Sundays through that. So my mentality started to change a little bit and it shifted to, I want to provide, I want to protect my team on Sundays from the sort of toxicity that I was experiencing at like conference for instance. And so that kind of became my mantra. the my last year and a half at Hillsong. And I just kept telling myself, I’m here to protect. And as I was starting to think in those terms, I started noticing even at the NYC campus. Cause I thought of it as, oh, this is Hillsong Global. This is what’s happening. And they’re bringing that culture here and it’s clashing with ours. And there’s like these, you know, all the celebrities are here. So of course it’s gonna create this frustrating, painful sort of experience. And so I thought, okay, well, Sundays, that’s my crew. That’s where I’m happiest. But then I started to notice, no,
Devi (she/her):
Right.
Nate (he/him):
there are masters here that do those things
Devi (she/her):
Yep.
Nate (he/him):
and they’re doing them regularly every week. And that’s when I started to say, okay, well, I’m here to protect, because I saw them yelling at other volunteers and I’m like, I don’t want my team to… end up being reamed out that way. So, and I’ve spoken with a few other people. I know you mentioned Janice Legata, she and I are good friends. And we talked about having that same mentality as we were kind of sticking it out. We thought, all right, no, we’re here to protect the people just below us, our team, from the toxicity that was directly above
Devi (she/her):
Yeah.
Nate (he/him):
us.
Devi (she/her):
All right. Well, that is that’s really, really helpful, Nate, all of that to give really valuable context,
Jessica:
Hmm.
Devi (she/her):
I think to the Hillsong
Nate (he/him):
Oh, and I do
Devi (she/her):
experience.
Nate (he/him):
want to mention though,
Devi (she/her):
Yeah.
Nate (he/him):
real quick, so as you’re saying, you know, providing context, as I want to point out more explicitly the fact that if those things were going on one level above me or two levels above me, then as I’m seeing pastors saying and doing certain things and acting in certain ways, that culture comes from somewhere. And it inevitably, because I don’t see my level, I wasn’t seeing that at the volunteer level at large. For the most part, you had your ladder climbers who were, as soon as they would get a taste of power, they would abuse that power and kind of harass and verbally abuse the volunteers just below them. But that comes from somewhere. And that was the observation
Jessica:
Hmm
Nate (he/him):
that I was making that that this is a top-down thing, because almost all of the pastors that I interact with, they have had interactions, and I’ve heard stories from my friends of pastors reaming them out, chewing them out, the way that my team lead had chewed me out at conference. And this happening on a regular basis. And as I was hearing about those things and seeing those things, it became increasingly clear to me that culture was created. um, Explicitly here and somebody had done that someone had brought that to uh nyc And the best way to explain that is that’s top down, you know
Devi (she/her):
Yeah. Well, that’s really, really helpful. And I think like, let’s keep that in the back of our minds as we think about this episode that we’re going to talk about now, which is The Prodigal Son. So this episode begins with kind of Carl Lentz’s origin story. And there’s a beautiful contrast at the start between Tiffany Perez’s story and his, where Tiffany is this young woman from New York. She flies to Sydney to go to Hillsong College. And she says, I just wanted to be a pastor. That’s what she says. And Carl Lentz shows up in Sydney and becomes Joel Houston’s best friend. And there’s this sense to which we get, there’s this group of people, a different survivor in the story. Her name is Abby Ross. She says, hang on, I’m just going to find it. There were people earmarked for particular attention. That’s what she said in the episode. And the trajectory of Tiffany’s story is she goes on to become the nanny of a pastor in Hillsong, Boston, whereas Carl Letts becomes this megastar pastor. Jess, I’m curious, how did you take that part of this story of how Carl ascended to leadership?
Jessica:
Yeah, it makes some, I mean, from the first episode, you already see that there’s some connection there to the Houston’s that he has through Laura. And then, yeah, seeing here, you know, him becoming friends with Joel, and you’re like, ah, so, you know, the old adage, it’s not what you know, it’s who you know, is true again. And, you know, notwithstanding, It would seem the natural talent Carl had, the charisma he had to be that guy with the microphone.
Devi (she/her):
Well, let’s say specifically the talent for public speaking,
Jessica:
Yeah, yeah.
Devi (she/her):
not necessarily a talent for teaching the Bible, not necessarily a talent for pastoring people or any or leadership even actually.
Jessica:
We’re talking about just being impressive with a microphone. Like
Devi (she/her):
Yes.
Jessica:
he can speak well. He’s a good motivational speaker. He can rally the troops. He can cry on cue as we found out in the first episode.
Devi (she/her):
Yeah.
Jessica:
Um, yeah. So, I mean, that’s, um, it made it. Yeah. It was frustrating to just see again. We have here, we have a white guy. like a man of privilege, like his father was a lawyer who became a pastor and he wrote a book called The Business of Church. All of this I’ve found out as I’ve gone down the rabbit hole listening
Devi (she/her):
Yeah.
Jessica:
to a lot of Leaving Hillsong podcast. And you know compared to Tiffany who like genuinely loves Jesus, she is motivated in a you know she wants to teach people about Jesus, she wants to be a pastor, she wants to help people, and she is not white, she is not a man, and where does she get placed in her quote unquote ministry, where is she allowed to serve? She’s looking after the children of a white family.
Devi (she/her):
Yeah, whose wife is looking after the children of the pastor,
Jessica:
Which seems
Devi (she/her):
which
Jessica:
just so bizarre, like,
Devi (she/her):
it’s just, yeah, it’s insane.
Jessica:
ugh.
Nate (he/him):
There
Jessica:
And this
Nate (he/him):
is a
Jessica:
is like the layers of the tears of power. So she will have to look after their kids. Then that mother, the mother of those kids is looking after the lens’s kids. Yeah.
Nate (he/him):
There’s a lot that I, and I don’t want to spoil it for you, I know you’ve only seen, as of right now, you’ve only seen
Jessica:
I’m sorry.
Nate (he/him):
the first part.
Devi (she/her):
That’s right.
Nate (he/him):
But I do want to mention, so I was involved in the production of this documentary series. And unfortunately, there were some decisions that were made, and I don’t have any hard feelings about editorial decisions. as somebody who’s worked in film production before, I know how difficult those decisions are. What I found frustrating was that there was a need to, it almost seemed like there was a need to get Carl’s and Laura’s interviews at the expense of the survivor’s narrative. And I think by the time By the second episode, if I’m remembering correctly, we do get this impression that they are recognizing, to a degree, the necessity to tell the survivor’s narrative. And that juxtaposing of Tiff’s story with Carl’s story, I thought was fascinating because it does
Devi (she/her):
Mm-hmm.
Jessica:
Mmm.
Nate (he/him):
draw that contrast. But one, there were a few things that were missing, and I wished that they had asked certain questions. of Carl.
Devi (she/her):
Like what?
Nate (he/him):
For instance, what, or even Carl and Laura, for example, what were, what was Laura doing that she needed a nanny? Because we didn’t see her very often at church. And she was around, but it didn’t seem like she was doing a job. It just seemed like she would occasionally go on stage and say hi to people. And then that was it. So there was no transparency as far as what was going on in her life, what was her job, why did she need a nanny? Was she working for the church full time?
Devi (she/her):
Yeah,
Nate (he/him):
And it.
Devi (she/her):
because I mean, Brian, that’s one of the things in the aftermath, right? Is Brian Houston was like, Laura was not fired. And Carl and Laura talk about the fact that she was on
Nate (he/him):
Push.
Devi (she/her):
staff at Hillsong, but as what? Or was she just past her Laura lens?
Nate (he/him):
Right.
Jessica:
Cause it’s always the couple is the pastors of the church. It’s not, you know, here’s Carl Lentz. It’s like Carl and Laura Lentz, Hillsong senior, Hillsong, New York senior pastors. Right? Like it would have been that on the website.
Nate (he/him):
Right, exactly, exactly. And another concern that I have is there are documents that are out there that have been leaked to the press of the investigative report that Hillsong’s own lawyers, Hillsong Global contracted a law firm to investigate what was going on at Hillsong NYC because there were multiple issues. And it wasn’t just Carl cheating on Laura with the model
Devi (she/her):
Yes.
Nate (he/him):
and Carl sexually abusing Leona. There were other complaints as well. And the recommendation from the lawyers was that there’s no way to spin it. You have to get this campus in line. Something has to happen. And I find it a little frustrating that those narratives, those questions weren’t asked because it’s out there. I mean, there was another documentary series that was released. It’s available on Macs now in the U.S. It was originally on Discovery+. Yes,
Devi (she/her):
This is Hillsong, a mega church exposed, I think is
Nate (he/him):
yes.
Devi (she/her):
what it’s called.
Jessica:
another one we wouldn’t have access to here in Australia now.
Nate (he/him):
I find, so I guess if I were to like write a review of the two,
Jessica:
Mmm.
Nate (he/him):
I think one thing that the Secrets of Hillsong does well is that they address the theft of volunteers’ time and effort and the question of how LGBTQ people were treated at church. And what was going on with Carl Lentz and race and how Hillsong NYC addressed race. And those things were things that I thought the secrets of Hillsong did well. I feel like they dropped the ball in a few other areas. And one thing that I think that Hillsong and Megachurch Exposed did very well was they dug into Carl Lentz and his past. So prior to working for Hillsong, Carl and Laura were pastoring a church in Virginia called Wave Church. And there are a number of people who have come forward with their own stories of abuse at the hands of Carl. And those questions weren’t asked. And that
Devi (she/her):
Yeah.
Nate (he/him):
thing that kind of bothers me as well is that there are stories out there that are available been digging into, but.
Devi (she/her):
Yeah,
Jessica:
Hmm.
Devi (she/her):
agreed. I think that’s one area where they make it sound like Dan Adler and Alex French make it sound like Karl Enns just went to Hillsong College and
Nate (he/him):
Hmm.
Devi (she/her):
then started Hillsong, New York, as opposed to the trajectory was actually quite different. He had been in New Jersey after Hillsong College. He had been doing something else and then he started Hillsong, New York, right?
Nate (he/him):
Yeah.
Devi (she/her):
Like it wasn’t just, yeah.
Nate (he/him):
Right. And the draw at the beginning, because I remember, even though I hadn’t started attending, you know, my brother got involved very early on, the draw at the start prior to the launch of the church when they first announced it, it was supposed to be Joel and Esther. That was the draw for Hillsong NYC. Carl wasn’t announced as the lead pastor until much later in the launch process. Um, and, and so for, and I think part of that might’ve been deliberate. I think part of that might’ve been the fact that, um, Hillsong United had been touring the U S so often the last, the, the previous several years. Um, and Joel Houston was becoming, um, a bit of a face in the New York City church area, um, because there were so many people attending the concerts in New York City.
Jessica:
Mmm.
Nate (he/him):
So, um, Joel was a draw. And when they announced that Joel Houston would be one of the lead pastors, that was exciting for a lot of people. Carl wasn’t announced until much, much later.
Devi (she/her):
Yep. Well, let’s talk about one of the big points of this documentary of this particular episode, which is the Leona Kimes situation. So you have Carl and Laura, in fact, at some point, Laura Lentz says that the Leona Kimes, what she calls an affair and a betrayal was almost worse than everything else. that came out about Carl. That’s how it’s sort of treated. Carl makes it very clear that this was an affair, that it was consensual. Laura believes that it was an affair, and it was consensual. Jess, any reactions
Jessica:
Yeah.
Devi (she/her):
to this
Jessica:
Um,
Devi (she/her):
part? Yeah.
Jessica:
there’s a term that, um, in the living Hillsong from like, or it was another podcast I listened to going down the rabbit hole where, um, from the lens report that, um, the word that Carl used for what was going on manipulation in or manipulated is not the right adjective, but it was, it’s another adjective that basically means manipulated intimacy. So that
Devi (she/her):
Coerced.
Jessica:
was kind of coerced or it wasn’t
Devi (she/her):
Yeah.
Jessica:
coerced, it was something, I’ll find it for the next episode. But like that’s the way, so to say consensual affair is, is like a really soft way to say what was in the lens report, which was more essentially coerced or manipulated intimacy. So if the person who has been accused of something is the one to call it that, I would say that means it was non-consensual. Because especially if you’re the one in power and you’re saying, Oh, it was kind of coerced, but you know, intimacy. I’m like, well, I don’t know if you’re the expert to say about whether or not it’s consensual or not. It kind of made me quite frustrated.
Nate (he/him):
Yeah, there’s
Devi (she/her):
I think,
Nate (he/him):
a question.
Devi (she/her):
yeah.
Nate (he/him):
All right, go ahead.
Devi (she/her):
Well, there are layers here too, right? Carl is her pastor, Carl is her boss, because she
Jessica:
Yeah.
Devi (she/her):
and her husband are also pastors at the church, right, and then become pastors at Hillsong Boston, where he’s still in charge of their lives, their careers, whatnot. And then he’s also, she’s also their nanny. So, I mean, there’s no way to slice this where Carl is not the one in charge.
Nate (he/him):
Right.
Jessica:
Yeah.
Nate (he/him):
There is
Jessica:
Yeah, go ahead, Nate.
Nate (he/him):
a question of the ability to give informed consent when those kinds of power dynamics are at play. And I think most mental health professionals would agree that this is a scenario in which Leona is actually unable to give consent because too much is riding, you know, her employment status, her husband’s employment status, all of that is up for grabs in this moment. Regardless of what is going on in her mind at the time and how this quote unquote affair is playing out. I don’t really see any other way to slice it than sexual abuse because this is non-consensual. She doesn’t have the ability to give full informed consent.
Jessica:
Mmm. You’ve said that much more eloquently than I just did Nate. So thank you. Thank you for that
Devi (she/her):
Well,
Jessica:
with
Devi (she/her):
I
Jessica:
them.
Devi (she/her):
have, I had
Jessica:
Oh
Devi (she/her):
just,
Jessica:
Go ahead
Devi (she/her):
there’s footage of her in this
Jessica:
Yeah,
Devi (she/her):
that I assume
Jessica:
yeah
Devi (she/her):
is Lent’s personal footage. What did you think of the documentarian, of the filmmaker even using that? Like she’s refused, so Leona Kimes has refused to participate in the documentary, but then her face, her body is in it, in this footage, right? And
Nate (he/him):
that
Devi (she/her):
that
Nate (he/him):
still
Devi (she/her):
felt like a layer, yeah.
Jessica:
I think that’s from a special on, because when Carl was ascending to power and getting more and more attention in secular media, they did a whole special on him and his family. And so she would have signed a release at that point that she was happy to participate in this matter being 2014, 2015. And this production would have paid the royalties to that company to use
Devi (she/her):
Yeah,
Jessica:
the
Devi (she/her):
but
Jessica:
footage.
Devi (she/her):
that’s still a choice of the filmmaker to say,
Nate (he/him):
Right.
Devi (she/her):
I
Nate (he/him):
You.
Devi (she/her):
need this woman’s face and her relationship to the lenses as their nanny. I still want it in there.
Jessica:
And I think it was interesting that, I mean, they used a bunch of footage that shows her smiling, very happy, helping
Devi (she/her):
Yeah.
Jessica:
out with the kids, but then she’s also assembling some gym equipment. Um,
Devi (she/her):
Yeah.
Jessica:
and the thing that they, um, and I even think the way Laura Lent says it is pretty like a bit passive aggressive, you know, um, to Leona, she said, well, you wanted to do it, like assemble this gym equipment. And they have kind of that echoing a little bit into the next scene. So, and I thought that that’s a really interesting choice. As you were saying earlier, Nate, in production and the editing process, you choose what you include, what you’re cutting that had no direct relevance to the story they’re telling, but they choose to include this moment where Leona is doing something that, for a nanny, it’s well outside of her. her scope of job description to be assembling gym equipment, but she’s there saying, she’s there being told, or reminded, you wanted to do this. So
Nate (he/him):
Hmm.
Jessica:
it’s just, it’s really, yeah, it’s interesting in it. And it, because Leona and her husband did not opt in to the invitation, we’re told to give comment or participate in this documentary, we are left to take the lenses word for it essentially. Um, from a, from a documentary perspective, Nate, do you think that is good enough? Because we’re kind of like, Oh, well, they chose not to participate. So we’ll, I guess we’ll just believe these people who are participating.
Nate (he/him):
So, I have, my thoughts on that are multifaceted, because if you have someone who can provide a counter narrative or a challenge to the narrative that you’re presented with, and they have opted out, I think it’s incumbent on you as a documentarian, it’s incumbent on you as a journalist to provide that narrative, that counter narrative in some way, shape or form. And to hold the people who are participating, hold them to account, particularly if they’re in a place of power in the story. So in this instance, I think it was incumbent on Stacey and her team to bring that to Carl to ask Carl and Laura. pointed questions and not let them get off with the easy, like here’s our side of the story, but to actually present, well, okay, so if I’m reading Leona’s story correctly, X, Y, and Z, and to present that, right, and ask that question, and force Carl and Laura to give, you know, straight yes, no answers in those scenarios, and not dance. around the way that they are known to. The other thing, too, that’s frustrating about this is Carl is known to be a con artist and he is very adept at lying. He’s very adept at pulling the curtain over people’s eyes. So the fact that they didn’t have someone in the room who could see through that, like you can be
Jessica:
You
Nate (he/him):
the
Jessica:
mean
Nate (he/him):
mo-
Jessica:
from the production standpoint, someone in the interview room, someone in the editing room.
Nate (he/him):
Yeah, yeah, yeah. That there needed to be somebody there who can at the very least see through Carl’s narratives. If you can’t have somebody who has experience with Carl specifically, someone who has experience with the sort of manipulative behavior that Carl is known for. I mean, he said it, like it was there. You know, Mama Jones put it there that she… She knew that Carl could cry on cue and there’s that footage of him crying on cue. And in his interview, he starts to cry.
Jessica:
Hmm.
Nate (he/him):
And I think the second episode does a decent enough job of presenting that, but I feel like that plot, that narrative, that characterization sort of gets lost later on. I don’t wanna spoil it all for you, but I think it gets lost a little later on in the series.
Jessica:
I mean, to me, Nate, watching this episode, I kind of feel like the questions that Stacey puts to Carl or the kind of the hard hitting questions to get to the truth,
Devi (she/her):
EWWW
Jessica:
a kind of phrase and answers or at least what we see in the final cut are answered in a way. that to the audience, it’ll make us feel like, oh, well, they asked that they did put him on the spot,
Devi (she/her):
Yes.
Jessica:
they did do that, but they’re not really making him accountable. It’s kind of, it just, it gives the impression of where asking hard questions without it actually being that way. And I mean, I’ve, I’ve said to Devi, my initial thought before watching this is that Carla Laura. were received some kind of financial compensation for participating in this. Whether or not that’s true. There was definitely a contract that his lawyers looked at to decide what his participation looked like. Because there’s a reason he’s in this one and this one only, and not the other ones where say the, the filmmaker behind the discovery Hillsong documentary wanted to ask him really hard questions. And. at great lengths sought him out and he just ignored every attempt at conversation. Or yeah, so I don’t know what your thoughts are on that as well.
Nate (he/him):
Yeah, I don’t want to get into speculating too much, particularly given my own sort of, and like frustrated involvement with this production. I think, so one of the things that we were told when we were contacted was that this was going to be the survivors narratives, that it was going to, answer the question of spiritual abuse in these sorts of churches. And that didn’t actually play out. And granted, there were a lot of things that were happening behind the scenes that I felt as the time was progressing, I started to get the sense that, okay, this is not going that. direction and I think one the announcement of Carl’s interview in the in this in this documentary series sort of Initially I was like, oh, okay. I this is this is where they’re going with it, but then you know Janice Posted about something like her thoughts about how this could go for Carl so that kind of softened me a little bit on it and I think I think on the entirety of the production, it doesn’t actually play out well for him. To the average, you know, non-church person, Carl kind of looks a little ridiculous.
Devi (she/her):
All right, well, let’s talk about racism in Hillsong, New York and that section on racism, which kind of picks up from episode one. Nate, how do you feel like the documentary handled the story of racism in Hillsong, New York?
Nate (he/him):
I think it was handled better than I’ve heard it handled by any large production before, but
Jessica:
Hmm.
Nate (he/him):
it’s still kind of, I guess, and again, I think the shadow that looms over this entire production is the fact that there almost appears to be this need to allow Carl and Laura their say over the different narratives that are playing out, right? So I think… The fact that we hear from Mama Jones and Ashley and Janice, a little bit about, they pulled back the curtain a little bit on Carl’s ability to get on stage and say, black lives matter. But there is a caveat there. He always seems to couch it in another statement, right? You would often hear him say, Yes, it’s true all lives matter, but let’s not forget that black lives matter. That’s what or that’s why black lives need to matter so it’s he You know, he finds a way to sort of couch his statements and um, and I think It’s been a little while since I watched the documentary series. So my My recollection is a little bit foggy, but I think they touched on it Sufficiently to sort of scratch the surface and to let us know that there’s something not healthy that had been going on at this church. There, the approach to racism at Hillsong was insufficient at best and much more harmful than I think, than I think a lot of people might assume. I don’t remember if this was in the documentary series or not, but I do recall the fact that there was this meeting that a number
Devi (she/her):
Yes.
Nate (he/him):
of black people and other BIPOC people at Hillsong NYC called a meeting with Carl to address
Devi (she/her):
Yes.
Nate (he/him):
the problems of representation and that’s after about three or four weeks of them working at it, it sort of disappeared.
Devi (she/her):
Yeah, so Janice, Janice Lagata says that in the, in episode one and maybe even episode two as well about how for five weeks after that meeting, there were, I think, people of color who did the offering message. And I think, and then it just kind of petered out basically after that.
Nate (he/him):
Yeah.
Devi (she/her):
Yeah, I think it’s interesting because to me, the section on racism is one of the strongest sections in terms of what
Jessica:
I’ll just,
Devi (she/her):
It’s… Yeah, go on.
Jessica:
um, I heard on another podcast and I’m fairly sure it was Janice talking about that meeting, um, Nate, and she, and she said that, you know, Carl agreed, okay, yeah, we need to do this. We need to have more representation. I can run a training event. Um, so you guys know how to give an offering message, right? Which is, you know, it’s kind of like this five minute mini sermon right before they take up the tides and offerings. Uh, and so he was saying to this, uh, meeting of, uh, people of color, you know, I can, you know, I can teach you how to give that, um, give, give that sermon. And he probably thought that was very nice of him, but Janice said, well, you didn’t have to teach all of the white guys how to do that. Why do we need like, we’re here every week. Like we know how to do it. And when I heard that, that made me mad. Cause it’s just like, it’s. It’s a layer of racism, maybe he could say it’s unintentional, but in this documentary, in this episode, he says this is the race thing or the race issue was something we were best at. We did really well.
Nate (he/him):
Yeah.
Devi (she/her):
Right. So I think that to me is the interesting thing. Like the voices of the survivors on the race section are really strong. But then Carl, you get the feeling that Carl truly believes this was one of his great successes.
Nate (he/him):
Yeah, I mean, he actually texts. I don’t remember if Janice said this in the documentary series or if this was something that I heard her say somewhere else. But in her text exchange with Carl on her way out when, you know, she was done with Hillsong, he said, you’re not going to find. Anywhere else that does it as good as we do it, you’re not going to find what you’re looking for anywhere else.
Jessica:
Wow.
Nate (he/him):
And that’s telling. It says a lot about the arrogance of LeParle and Hillsong as a church and how they see what they’re doing in the world.
Jessica:
Mm.
Nate (he/him):
Yeah.
Jessica:
Yeah. You know, this is as good as it gets basically.
Nate (he/him):
Mm-hmm.
Jessica:
Yeah.
Nate (he/him):
Yeah.
Jessica:
Dang.
Devi (she/her):
Yeah.
Jessica:
Um, wow. So, okay. Um,
Devi (she/her):
Now,
Jessica:
and for anyone
Devi (she/her):
yeah.
Jessica:
listening, um, obviously this is a, an audio medium. It’s not a visual medium. Uh, people wouldn’t know that Nate, you’re sitting here talking to us and, um, where you are on the East coast. and you are an Asian American yourself. So in the show, in the issues of racism, we talk a lot about the black and the white kind of thing in terms of race. How do you as an Asian American feel like, because obviously diversity is not in the New York church or everywhere is not just black people and white people. So do you feel like that discussion of racism was adequate? and anything you want to say on the topic of representation or diversity at the church.
Nate (he/him):
I think regarding representation, one of the concerns that I have in a lot of church environments, you know, like, yes, there is something to be said for, you know, platform representation, and what that means for the congregation, members of the congregation who are not white. Impact us and so yeah when I see you know when I see another asian person up on platform that says something to me I think um There needs to be people in the room um At the table of leadership not just being heard but where their concerns are Given just as much weight and listened to and they’re provided the opportunity to drive the direction of the church. And I think, you know, for me, one of the, you know, one of the great narratives of, you know, the Asian American experience is one of invisibility. It’s, and yeah, I think there’s also a bit of tokenism that was starting to take place. I think… My own jadedness was starting to hit when I would see, okay, well, yeah, there’s my brother up on stage. You know, it’s funny that during Black History Month, you know, they would try as much as possible to have an ethnically diverse band every Sunday where no white people were up there. So that meant that my brother was leading worship very often, like it’s Black History Month. Why is my brother having to be tasked with leading worship every Sunday? You know, I think there is a need for the people who are driving the direction of services, the direction of a church in general, to have those voices in the room. I think that the necessity for that is, it’s immeasurable and it will change. how a church functions, it changes how the church addresses race, it becomes less tokenizing, where you feel the need to put people of color up on stage and more just a natural outflow of the life of this congregation. And then I think it also starts to take into account the felt needs of those communities. What are black people asking for? They might not be asking for more people up on stage. Maybe that, and that’s possibly part of it, but ultimately there’s something else that needs to be addressed inside the church leadership structure. And then what the church is doing in the community. Because then how are we as the church getting involved in, Hillsong was a notoriously political church. Brian Houston famously shows up at the White House under the Trump administration. And so what are we as a church doing? Of course we have to maintain a separation and distinction, but of course the churches in the US are becoming very active politically without officially becoming political agents.
Jessica:
Hmm.
Nate (he/him):
So are we addressing the policies that are harmful to people of color in this country, right? Like, yeah, so.
Devi (she/her):
Well, and you get the feeling that Carl Lentz was really delighted to have the optics of multiracial congregation and delighted to surround himself with sort of the, sorry, that’s my baby with the music, everybody
Nate (he/him):
Go on.
Devi (she/her):
is listening.
Jessica:
Hehehe.
Devi (she/her):
He is delighted to have the optics of black culture on him. So via celebrities, via the basketball, via his clothing, all of that. But then not so invested in actually developing multi-ethnic leadership in his church. And that’s, you know,
Nate (he/him):
Right.
Devi (she/her):
those are two very different things.
Nate (he/him):
There are so many layers to this question and conversation that need to be talked about openly. And I think, you know, even if you don’t have that at your church, if you’re having those conversations and if you’re exploring them and listening to the voices that are bringing these things to light, I think that is a very important first step towards changing the dynamic of how race shows up in your church.
Devi (she/her):
Um, I think we’re probably heading toward an ending, right Jess?
Jessica:
Yeah, we’ve taken
Devi (she/her):
Is
Jessica:
up
Devi (she/her):
that
Jessica:
a lot
Devi (she/her):
good?
Jessica:
of your time, Nate. It’s been really
Devi (she/her):
Yeah.
Jessica:
great, but we’ve gone over time.
Devi (she/her):
Yep. All right. Well, I think let’s end with the episode is sort of pushing toward this idea that Carl couldn’t possibly have just been fired in this huge way because he had an affair. There needed to be a different reason. And the idea is basically that Carl has become, Carl’s star has shown so brightly, he is starting to upstage Brian. And there’s this revelation that So Carl, I think it’s just Carl who says it. I’m not sure if it’s Laura as well. It’s just Carl. No one is offered as a substantiation for Carl’s claim that he was thinking of leaving Hillsong. It’s worth mentioning that this documentary runs very thin on, except for the survivor part. There’s not a lot of, hey, there’s other people confirming what Carl Lentz is saying here. There’s literally just Carl and Laura, not even Laura’s parents. are offered as they are to substantiate Carl’s statements on some of this stuff. So Carl says, and we don’t have any evidence to believe from anybody else that this is true, that he was thinking about leaving Hillsong, that he had even mentioned it to Brian and Brian had just kind of said whatever. And Jess, I know you mentioned that in the 2014 Hillsong Conference, Brian always does the closing sermon of Hillsong Conference in Sydney, but Carl had done the closing sermon
Jessica:
Yeah,
Devi (she/her):
that year.
Jessica:
yeah.
Devi (she/her):
So there’s this idea that maybe, I mean, that is a little bit significant, I think. So the idea that’s being suggested is that Carl was fired ultimately, not because of moral failures, but because he became a threat to Brian’s fame, authority. Whatever. What do you make of that? I’m curious what all of us think about it. Do we believe it? Do we think there’s something to that?
Nate (he/him):
Um, I think that there, there is the potential. I think it’s, it’s enough. There’s, there was enough kind of floating around Hillsong NYC that there, that we were so far removed from Hillsong global, um, that the problems over there were the problems over there and we have our own thing that we’re doing. Um, and. I wonder how much of that narrative might have been Carl sort of seeping that into the congregation in some way, shape or form. I don’t really know and I don’t want to, I mean, I guess, you know, there’s room for some speculation here because it’s kind of that’s what we’re doing tonight. But I think there’s a yes and no. I think Carl might be exaggerating the level to which that laid in to Brian’s decision, though at the same time, I don’t think that, I think Brian was being opportunistic because I think he knew more about what was going on in Carl’s life over time, prior to, in years leading up to them firing Carl and Laura, that I think it was the opportune moment. I don’t think… I think Brian is the type of person who can’t share the spotlight.
Devi (she/her):
Okay. So hang on. I want to just back up. So what you’re saying is that Brian might have had evidence that Carl was abusive, corrupt, all the different things, but he needed almost something like this to justify firing him because Carl wouldn’t have gone quietly.
Nate (he/him):
I think so, yeah.
Devi (she/her):
Yeah, that’s what you’re saying. Well, that is very interesting. That’s very interesting.
Nate (he/him):
Yeah, because there was definitely a feeling at the time that I was at Hillsong. Now granted, I left in 2017, so my memory of all of this is a little foggy. And, you know, I wasn’t in a lot of those conversations, but I think there was a sentiment that should things go south, we all knew that Carl was a little bit of the black sheep at Hillsong Global. And should things go south, that Carl could have taken a sizable percentage of Hillsong NYC with him. Yeah, he commanded that
Jessica:
Yep.
Nate (he/him):
much at the church.
Jessica:
And so they, and so he couldn’t be gotten rid of by senior leadership on a global level until there was something public come out that would disqualify him in the eyes of the congregation for leadership, if he were to leave, um,
Nate (he/him):
Right.
Jessica:
you know, and then take, uh, you know, take some of the church with him, um, because
Devi (she/her):
This is it.
Jessica:
yeah.
Devi (she/her):
Yeah.
Jessica:
Well, people are known to follow the impressive preacher wherever they go. It’s the
Nate (he/him):
Yep.
Jessica:
pine piper. Um, yeah. Uh, what I think Devi is, I, I think we’ll find out more about Brian. Brian, I think is going to come into focus in the next episode, I feel. But, um, from what, what we’ve seen of Brian Houston over decades here in Australia is he. I don’t think he’s naturally that great a preacher. His theology isn’t, it’s not like he’s, you know, got a PhD. I think he’s got an honorary PhD, but it’s not like he’s done a lot of study in this. I think he’s a good manager. Like he’s good at running something behind the scenes and pulling the strings and making things work. And he has always found people who are far more talented
Devi (she/her):
Yes.
Jessica:
than he is. to put up front to push, and this is something you’ve said, Devi, to push the brand forward like Carl, like Darlene Check, like Geoff Bullock in the 80s, like Brooke Leigetwood,
Devi (she/her):
Ligertwood, yeah
Jessica:
even his own son, you know, Joel, who is in the first episode, I think he’s called by one of the journalists, one of the greatest Christian songwriters of all time. It was like, oh, okay. Um, um, but yeah, Brian seems very calculated in, you know, in hindsight, looking back in kind of go, ah, so, and, and he gets to kind of ride the wave. So as, uh, you know, Carl is getting all this attention, he’s showing up on. I don’t know, 60 minutes, all these outlets and then Brian, all of a sudden is next to him. So, Brian wouldn’t have, Brian’s been known about in the US for years. He hasn’t been able to get that interview. All of a sudden he sits next to Carl. He gets the interview.
Nate (he/him):
Right.
Jessica:
But he, yeah. And he, but even in that moment, he is like subtly saying to Carl, I’m in charge, you know, with that comment about his tattoos and Anderson Cooper’s like, Oh, so you don’t like the tattoos? He’s like, Oh, they’re okay. So he’s like, that’s a subtle like. I’m in charge kind of thing.
Devi (she/her):
Yeah. I think to me, this is, we mentioned this in our last episode, Jess, one of the weaknesses of this documentary is that there’s no one from Hillsong,
Jessica:
Australia.
Devi (she/her):
New York,
Jessica:
Oh, sorry, go
Devi (she/her):
well,
Jessica:
ahead.
Devi (she/her):
Hillsong, Australia, Hillsong, New York, from a pastoral level. There’s no one from staff.
Jessica:
Hmm
Devi (she/her):
So ex-staff. So Geoff Bullock is in this one and Geoff Bullock is offered as sort of the, here’s the one example of somebody who’s worked with Brian, saying Brian was a bad leader. He got angry. He yelled. But that’s it. It’s just Geoff from, and he’s referring to things that happened in the eighties and nineties. This story really needed the ex pastors from Hillsong, New York. It needed that layer of people commenting. So I’ll just mention this. I don’t know if you knew of Nathan Finocchio, Nate, when you did. Okay.
Nate (he/him):
I, yeah, I actually, I’ve had some run ins with him online recently.
Devi (she/her):
Yeah,
Nate (he/him):
He
Devi (she/her):
he’s
Nate (he/him):
and
Devi (she/her):
a
Nate (he/him):
I,
Devi (she/her):
bit of a-
Nate (he/him):
we got along-ish while I was at No Song, but he was never somebody I felt comfortable in a room with.
Devi (she/her):
Okay, so there you go. So Nathan Finocchio has a sub stack and he wrote two posts about the secrets of Hillsong. I paid $20 to access that sub stack.
Nate (he/him):
Wow.
Devi (she/her):
Yeah. So thank you everybody for, I paid for it so you don’t have to, because he has since deleted these two posts, so I am very glad I documented
Nate (he/him):
and I’ll see
Devi (she/her):
it.
Nate (he/him):
you next time.
Devi (she/her):
So, so here is what he wrote. And I, as much as I would like to read the whole thing, because I think it is very interesting. Here’s what he says about Carl and Joel Houston, because I think this feeds into what you were saying, Nate, about Brian knowing what was going on with Carl. So this is Nathan Fanocchio writing.
Brian built a successful brand carefully for 40 years and entrusted it to Carl and Joel. Joel tried to recreate Sydney and brought in legacy leaders like Gabe Kelly, who were chased out by Carl. I can re-record this on my own, but I’ll read it for you all. Carl verbally and emotionally dominated Joel, controlled him, manipulated him. spied on him, twisted him, used him. Carl cannibalized the fame of the Hillsong brand, which at the time brought hundreds of thousands of people into the church. It was initially all about Joel and the music. Brooke was there, Ruben was there, Taya was there. The conferences came to NYC, but Carl was the one with the microphone. Carl ran the church exactly how he wanted the entire time. Brian would push back and Carl would pay lip service. Brian’s major contributions to the failures of Hillsong, New York, were that he didn’t fire Carl the multiple times he should have.
Nate (he/him):
That is interesting and it’s also interesting coming from Finocchio.
Devi (she/her):
So he says he was there for eight years at Hillsong New York. First four years he volunteered as a worship leader. Then he says the last four years, I was an evening college pastor and then teaching pastor.
Nate (he/him):
Yeah, it is very unclear to the congregation who the pastors are. I know we said that towards the beginning, but it is
Devi (she/her):
Right.
Nate (he/him):
very unclear what roles people have unless you are like directly working with them or have had direct interactions with them where they’ve told you what they’re doing. The only people that you know what their roles are, are um, the lead pastors so during my time there was carlin laura lenz, um, you know, there were a few people on staff who I knew were on paid staff like, um matt and lindsey barges who were Supposedly the campus pastors in montclair, but they were often doing other things They had Steve Degrossa, I don’t know what he was doing, who he was, what his role was at Hillsong, New York, but he was on paid staff and then ended up at Hillsong, Boston where he is sort of one of the main characters in Noemi Uribe’s story. And Noemi has their own podcast. kind of covering some of what went on at Hillsong and I highly recommend checking their podcast out. I think it’s called False Prophets.
Jessica:
Yeah, we’ll put a link in the show notes.
Nate (he/him):
Yeah, yeah. So yeah, Steve DeGroza plays heavily in their story as well as Josh Kimes. But yeah, I think for me, sort of how I feel about all of it is this, we just end up with more questions. than answers and that’s sort of what Hillsong is known for doing. They tend to obfuscate the narratives. And I think so many narratives are taking place and so many abuses are happening and so many people are simultaneously abused and abusers in that world, you know, both victims and complicit in other people’s victimization that it’s just, it’s so complex. But I think That speaks to I Realize, you know Hillsong is a very sensationalist type of place and it grabs headlines for a reason But Hillsong I think is a microcosm of the larger mainstream evangelical world in a lot of its Operation in the way that it teaches the way that it talks about Jesus. And we see it happening, not just in Hillsong, in the larger Pentecostal world
Jessica:
Wow, well, this conversation has been really fascinating and there’s so much more we could go into from the episode where the episode kind of ends. Just kind of bringing this conversation to a close for people in Australia who won’t get to see it. After the Jeff Bullock sequence, we see Carl again and he’s talking about his own experience of sexual abuse as a child. And that will lead into the third episode, which from what I’ve heard, deep dives into a lot of the history with Frank Houston and sexual abuse and coverups. So the second episode kind of is leading us towards that, which, which I guess we’ll see more of to come as we continue to recap this here on the podcast. But Nate, before we let you go, and we’re so grateful that you could come on. with us today. Tell us after you left Hillsong, where did you go from there?
Nate (he/him):
I took some time off from church entirely, sort of reflecting on my own beliefs in theology. And also when it comes to human sexuality, that was another thing that I began to explore. I know your podcast dives a lot into purity
Jessica:
Hmm.
Nate (he/him):
culture. That was something that I had to work in my own life. And over time, I ended up landing in a relatively, I would say agnostic place, whether agnostically theist or agnostic, agnostically atheist, depends on the day. But I am also very active in the United Church of Christ. I am a member of the First Congregational Church of Montclair, and that is a very justice-oriented church that does a lot of work in the community. And there’s a lot of work for, for the LGBTQ community in New Jersey. There’s a lot of work for, climate justice here in New Jersey as well. It’s a very active congregation. So I’m very proud to be a part of it. And yeah, so that’s where I’m at now. And of course, I also, I’m on with my fiancee, we run a podcast called Full Mutuality. And we have a lot of conversations there about equality in society, whether that’s gender identity, sexuality, race, all of that and how justice is needed to sort of bring about mutuality in various areas of society. And we also, it’s a deconstruction kind of podcast. So we do sort of pick things apart and work through analyzing various structures and systems predominantly in the evangelical world. And then I’m also co-founder, along with a friend of mine of The Dauntless Media Collective, which is a network of podcasts and a community of people on Discord who are working through their own spiritual abuse, religious trauma, after coming out of highly controlling, whether evangelical or non-evangelical, religious environments. So yeah, that’s the kind of work that I’m doing.
Jessica:
Mm.
Devi (she/her):
We’ll put links to all of that in the show notes
Nate (he/him):
Yes.
Devi (she/her):
so that people can find it easily. Jess, should you and I do the outro?
Jessica:
Yes, yeah. And
Devi (she/her):
And
Jessica:
Nate,
Devi (she/her):
then we’ll finish
Jessica:
did
Devi (she/her):
up.
Jessica:
you want to share, you can or you don’t have to, your like handles for Instagram, Twitter.
Nate (he/him):
Oh, yeah, you can find me on Instagram, Twitter, at Nate Nakao. It’s that you can find me literally anywhere. And I’ll actually give you my link tree because it has links to all of my stuff in there.
Devi (she/her):
And Nakao is N-A-K-A-O
Nate (he/him):
Yes.
Devi (she/her):
everybody.
Jessica:
Great. Well, if you have thoughts about this episode, we definitely wanna hear them. Email us at wheredowegofromherepodcast.gmail.com. The links mentioned in this episode and where you can find Nate and his podcast for mutuality, all of that will be at wheredowegopod.com forward slash 128. And we hope you’ll connect with us on Instagram and Twitter at where do we go pod.
Devi (she/her):
If you’re listening in Apple Podcasts, one of the best ways you can support us for free is to pause right now and write a review. Those reviews really help people to find us in Apple Podcasts. And if you’re listening for the first time, you can hit follow or subscribe in whatever app you’re using to listen to us.
Jessica:
Thanks so much for listening. I’m Jessica van der Weingard.
Devi (she/her):
And I’m Devi Abraham. Join us in another week as we continue to answer the question, where do we go from here? Hooray!