Grief 2 Growth Podcast- Jeremiah Camara- Race, Religion & America- Ep. 48
In this eye-opening and maybe controversial conversation, I sit down with accomplished filmmaker, speaker, and author, Jeremiah Camara to discuss his films: Contradiction: A Question of Faith and Holy Hierarchy: The Religious Roots of Racism in America. My good friend, Dr. Terri Daniel, a chaplain, grief counselor, and theology scholar joins us. Jeremiah Camara is the director and producer of the documentary film Contradiction: A Question of Faith, which examines the saturation of churches in African American communities coexisting with poverty and powerlessness.
Camara is the author of the books Holy Lockdown: Does The Church Limit Black Progress? and The New Doubting Thomas: The Bible, Black Folks & Blind Belief. Camara is also the creator of the widely watched YouTube video series Slave Sermons… a mini-movie series addressing the harmful effects of religion. His latest and upcoming documentary project is titled, Holy Hierarchy: The Religious Roots of Racism in America. Holy Hierarchy… explains how the presumptions of a Supreme Being in colonial America led to precepts and beliefs in supreme human beings and how these beliefs morphed their way into the legal system and ultimately turned racism into an institution.
Both films are available for viewing on Amazon Prime.
ℹ️ You can find Jeremiah at: https://www.jeremiahcamara.com Dr. Daniel is at https://www.danieldirect.net
The transcript of the episode follows:
Brian Smith 0:00
Hey, everybody this is Brian Smith back with an episode of a special episode of grief to growth and today I’ve got with me two very special guests dr. Terry Daniel and Jeremiah Kamara. And I’m going to read Jeremiah’s introduction and I’ll let her introduce herself. Jeremiah is a director, producer of the documentary film, contradiction, a question to faith exam as a saturation of churches in Africa, African American communities coexisted with poverty and powerlessness. contradiction can be viewed on amazon prime video Camaros also the author of the books holy lockdown does the church limit black progress and the new Doubting Thomas the Bible black folks and blind belief. Jeremiah is also the creator of the widely watched YouTube video series slave sermons, and many movies series addressing the harmful effects of religion. His latest and upcoming documentary, which is actually out now is titled holy hierarchy. The religious roots of racism in America. Holy hierarchy explains how the presumptions of a supreme being in colonial America led to precepts and beliefs and supreme human beings and how these beliefs morphed away into the legal system and ultimately turned racism into an institution. So in a welcome Jeremiah and Terry, why don’t you go ahead and introduce yourself?
Terri Daniel 1:15
Thanks, Brian. Hi, everybody. I’m Terry Daniel, I work with Brian on many different projects, most notably the helping parents heal, project and we do some podcasts also for the afterlife conference. And this, that and the other thing, and we kind of discovered Jeremiah together and got so excited about his work that we said, let’s put him on a podcast because we’re very excited about it. So we hope you love him too.
Brian Smith 1:44
Yeah. So Jeremiah, why don’t you tell me a little bit about your your background? Well,
Jeremiah Camara 1:52
I was born and raised in Cincinnati, Ohio. You’re there in West Chester. Got two with Western Not too often, you know, up north, everything is really close. But when we went to West Chester you know, we had to take overnight bag and a toothbrush down here to Atlanta was a little shocked because you can’t even go visit your dentist without door 4050 miles. So West Chester now would be around the corner, you know, Wonder raised here and I was attended one of the largest black churches in the state of Ohio at that time it was called treadstone Baptist Church is still a pretty big church. I guess you would consider it a mega church. I think it’s been surpassed by a few churches now. And I had parents that were somewhat liberal, you know, they were believers. They were Christians, of course, but they didn’t force it on us. We can go to church and we wanted to we didn’t want to we didn’t have to it wasn’t mandatory that we that we attend to church. And, but I still wanted that feeling that I saw in church, I saw people speaking in tongues and I saw people shouting, I needed that because I was like, you know, what is it that makes you do this type of thing to me? You know, it was john Coltrane. You know, it was the loneliest monk, it was Earth, Wind and Fire those things gave me that type of feeling. And I was thinking, Well, what is it that you all have that can make me feel the way that music makes me feel? Because I grew up, you know, my father’s a little older. So I was exposed to, to jazz at a very early age. You know, in elementary school, I was listening to, you know, Charlie Parker and people like that. And so you know, of course I would get laughed at but of course, we had the fountas nadie or and Dayton i think is the home of funk the heart and home of funk music in the United States and probably the world but I want to know what type of feeling what was producing those kinds of feelings. So I left and moved to Cleveland. At 20 years old, I believe, and I started attending church, you know, two or three days a week. I live with the preacher. I was hanging out with church people. And I wanted to speak in tongues. And I found my I found myself you know, 21 years old, I had the lights off from Friday night to Saturday night with Casa lism, studying, you know, Herbert Armstrong, and people like that. So I was really deep into it. And
a guy invited me to attend church
with him and he was talking about how dynamic his preacher was that I really, if I really wanted to speak in tongues, and I really wanted this experience, I needed to attend his church to visit It’s pastor see what his pastor was preaching about. So I did that. I couldn’t wait. I was like, finally, I’m going to see, you know, this is it. And when I went there, he, you know, they sang for about an hour, which is quite common. But then after this thing, I was still enthusiastic and still waiting on this, you know, thing to drop from this guy. And the whole time he was just saying all of the things that I had already heard. You know, he’s, he’s, he’s a doctor in a sick room. He’s a lawyer in the court room. He may not come when you want him, but he’s always right on time greater is he better than me? I mean, the same things I had been hearing. And so I was thinking This can’t be. I can’t be maybe I’m hearing something incorrectly. So then I started visiting other churches. And I would visit a church every week of course on Sunday. different churches on Wednesday, the ones that were open on Friday, I would visit I was going to church again three or four times a week, but this time as a visitor, and I noticed, I was hearing the same thing that I had been hearing since I was five or six years old. So I came back to Cincinnati stayed for a while, that my wife there, and we decided to move to Atlanta, in 95 or 96. And I noticed that if you didn’t go to church here in Atlanta, it was a felony. Really committing a crime. You didn’t go to church in Ohio. So okay, but down here in the Bible Belt, you were really, you know, committing a deep crime not going to church. And I realized people would ask you what church you went to before they would ask you your name. And then I saw these big mega churches and I’m The church was big business. And I had also remembered what I had experienced in Ohio. And I started putting these things together and then again, started visiting these churches here in Atlanta. And again, I was hearing the same things. I’ve been here since I was five or six years old, maybe louder, maybe more bombastic way, but essentially, the same thing. And I was really disappointed because, you know, I had a view of the world that, you know, things were possible. And there were information was coming in so many different directions from different places. And I couldn’t be confined only to this teaching of the Church. And so I knew the time had come for me to write a book. And that led to my first book, holy lockdown. Does the church limit black progress?
Brian Smith 7:49
Wow, that’s that’s a fascinating background, and I can relate to something much of what you said, I grew up as a Pentecostal. And my grandfather actually was the founder of the church that I went So I went through some of the same experiences and you know, I
Jeremiah Camara 8:05
father was the pastor.
Brian Smith 8:06
Yeah, my grandfather was a pastor and the founder of the church. Congratulations for
Jeremiah Camara 8:11
being on this podcast.
Brian Smith 8:13
Well, you know, it’s an interesting legacy. It’s, yeah, it’s been an interesting journey. But I, you know, I wanted to be baptized and I was a little kid because I was scared of going to hell, they’re like, you’re not baptized, you’re going to hell. So I’m like, let’s do this. And so I was baptized like 13 spoken tongues, you know, the whole thing. So I can definitely relate to ever get
Jeremiah Camara 8:33
to do that.
Terri Daniel 8:34
Well, and I am like, so the odd man out here because my family I was raised in a Jewish family, but they were totally secular. And anytime they ever said anything about God, it was like wink, wink, and roll their eyes. It was all a big joke, like clean your room or God will punish you. That was it for my religious upbringing. And so I came to be interested in this topic, because didn’t understand why everybody was so scared of this stuff and so scared of health because I never got any of that growing up, just absorbing it from the culture. And now I help people get over it so
Jeremiah Camara 9:12
well. That’s interesting because I grew up in a black and Jewish pretty much half and half area. It’s this night, North Avondale in the 70s. And, and my boy scout leader was Jewish. My baseball coach was Jewish. I’ve been to three or four bar mitzvahs. And so you know, I would I would spend the night over my friend’s house who’s made that he had was cousins with the Jacksons microjet I never knew how big that would be. But it’s funny and they never were religious. They just never talked about religion, right? Yeah, you know, Pentecostalism right. I want to ask You to me that along with along with I would say probably cuz cuz holiness Pentecostal pretty much the same but Jehovah Witness and Pentecostalism to me would be the hardest ones to kick because they come at you so differently they say well we don’t we don’t call him Jesus we say Jehovah and we worship on Saturday like Pentecostalism a lot holiness, we don’t wear we wear dresses we don’t wear pants and we don’t do this and we have a very dark
I guess you would say demonstrative approach to our
kids and stuff like that so it’s real hard to kick because they already feel like they’re on a different path than your average. You know, Christian
Brian Smith 10:59
Yeah, you know It’s interesting, as you said, I was thinking about the parallels between that and say that the Israelites, they were they separated themselves from the culture now my, my family won’t they were kind of like that because it was like women couldn’t wear pants. We weren’t allowed. We weren’t supposed to go to the movies. We weren’t supposed to obviously drink, you know, play cards, we could play cards, but they had to be rook, you couldn’t play with regular, regular playing deck. So yeah, there’s this whole, this whole culture, this whole thing of being, you know, separate from the world, which does make it hard to kick in a sense, but it also that the whole health thing just never sat right with me the whole thing that everybody else is going to hell and it was everybody else. It was, you know, not only Jews and non believers, but Catholics, because Catholics weren’t baptized the right way. And Catholics didn’t speak in tongues. So what, you know, there are 9990 you know, 98 99% of people in the world going to hell, what kind of, you know, kind of God is that so that always bothered me.
Terri Daniel 11:57
So I have a question for both of you about that. I just recently learned in Catholicism about how there were there are multiple levels of purgatory. There’s not just one. Yeah. And like one of them is where the babies go if they die before they had a chance to get baptized. So in the background that both of you came from, there isn’t a purgatory, right, you just go straight to hell, there’s no levels, there’s no conditions.
Brian Smith 12:25
There’s a cop out.
It’s one or the other, it’s heaven or hell, and, but it was interesting because they would have these little like, caveats aren’t really that aren’t really in the Bible, like these little loopholes, for example, babies. No one can really believe babies are going to go to hell. So we had this thing called the age of accountability. So there was a certain point we got to the point where you were able to make a decision, you know, for yourself, but this wasn’t this is not biblical. This was just something that people I think, with their common sense said, we gotta have there’s gotta be some server loophole here. We got can be sending babies to help
Terri Daniel 13:00
Was that just in your church? Or is that in the denomination?
Brian Smith 13:03
I don’t think it’s really an official doctrine. It’s just something that gets said when people would start to question some of these things, you know, would say, well, there’s you know, don’t worry, because, again, I was a little kid, I was taught this from the time I could I was, I could speak. So like five years old. I’m like, when are you going to get me baptized cuz I don’t want to go to hell. They’re like, well, you’re too young. And I’m like, Well, I’m old enough to go to hell. So let’s just do this.
Jeremiah Camara 13:25
Yeah, I had the same experience. I was terrified of going to hell. I remember meeting a guy. He lived across the street from me. His name was Stanley wills. He was a few years older than I was. This is really, I left this part out when you talked about my upbringing. But this was monumental in where, you know, leading where I am now. But his he lived across the street from me, he was a few years older than me, his name was Stanley wills. And so I was about maybe 1314 probably 13 it was a summer. And as before I went to ninth grade. So anyway, Stanley told me asked me was I in, you know, a Christian? And I said, Yeah, you know, I believe in Jesus. Now this and he told me how wrong I was. If I still did this, I still said this. And if you if you watch this, and all this kind of stuff, and I was really interested in him being older than me, of course, I was very attentive. And he told me something. He says, you know, there’s a part in Revelations where he showed me where they’re going to be gnashing of teeth. And boy, when I read that, I mean, I went home that night, and I had my head buried under the covers and I was sweating. And I said, From that day forward, you know, I wrote a little letter, you know, to God, if I could mail it, but I wrote a letter and it says, you know, guy when I die, I want you to look at me and say a job well
Brian Smith 14:58
done. Yeah,
Jeremiah Camara 15:00
I need this to happen in my life to say a job well done. And so where we are now, you know, I understand where people are and and I’ve been able to connect with them in a way because I do understand the religious trauma.
Brian Smith 15:15
Yeah. But I’m really glad to hear you have that background and I think it’s important people understand that when they watch your films, I understand you’re coming. You’re coming out of this. I, you know, you talked about I remember getting my cousins and I got a hold of the of the Bible and read the book of Revelation. When one day at their house we were, I remember being in the bathroom reading this book, and it terrified me. And I was, I was I was terrified. I mean, I was like, I couldn’t believe it, just like you were saying. It was worse than any Stephen King novel I’ve ever read in my life.
Terri Daniel 15:47
And it comes out of nowhere. I mean, if you you know, if you study the origins of the Bible and how the Bible was created, it, you know, supposedly was written by some dude alone on an island, who was delusional in insane. And it just it doesn’t relate to any of the other books or any of the history. It just flies in from some buddies crazy mind out in the universe and somehow it got included in the canon. Yeah, cuz it’s so scary.
Jeremiah Camara 16:17
It’s important, because it’s apocalyptic. We need revelation to really scare you to the degrees that we want to books like Daniel. Yes, well, and all these apocalyptic type books, you know, Jehovah Witnesses are very, very aware and, and they promote Daniel a revelations to, you know, like no other sect of Christianity. So it’s an important book when you talking about monsters and seven heads and swallowing you up in Hellfire and things like that. It’s enough to drive people to the point you know, I say that Religion actually has perverted our brains. I think religion is a perversion of the brain. You know, if we look at New York City right now, all of these buildings, all these skyscrapers, if we were to just leave New York alone, if humans left and just leave, you know, in 1000 years or so, or less, I don’t know. But in significant time passing, it will become a rain forest, if you will just leave it alone. You know, it’s like our brain. If you were to just leave our brains alone, and stop messing with it, it would revert to thinking properly. Because the only way that we can believe something like there’s, you know, a god watching me right now, watching you guys, there’s a lady in Switzerland that he’s watching, there’s a basketball team playing somewhere that he’s brand that he is the shop, and he’s watching all these people at the same time. And the only way the brain can accept something like without proof without evidence is if it’s consistently indoctrinated. So I needed Wednesday, I needed Friday, I needed Saturday, I needed every Sunday, of course, I need to hear from my, my, my peers, I need to see it on TV, I need to see the athletes making the side of the cross before they go into the game. I need to see Tim TiVo like this. I need to see this constantly. And when you see these things and hear these things on a consistent basis, and you’re indoctrinated on a consistent basis, it has a way of perverting your brain over time, because your brain has now relegated itself to a three pound ball of gray matter that doesn’t use reason and doesn’t use logic and doesn’t think and that’s not what it is. It’s you’re supposed to The thing but it’s been perverted by religion.
Terri Daniel 19:04
Yeah. So if everybody was left alone, like New York abandoned and going back to the rain forest, I imagine that what humans would come to on their own with all the religious stuff erased would be some sort of nature based spirituality, where I think left to our own devices, we might start in creating sky gods, because the sky The sun, and the rain is the most powerful thing we know. It’s what gives us life, the crops coming out of the ground. That’s all we need. That’s the only kind of belief system I would think that you ever need. And that’s what we did create, you know, way in the beginning before it became political and we had leaders and profits and all this stuff. It was the sun was gone. The rain, you know, if it’s raining and the crops are growing, and the people have food to eat, everything is right with the universe. And if there’s no rain and it’s drought, and people are dying, and there’s no crops, Something’s wrong. And so maybe we should do a rain dance or something to get things balanced again. And to me, that’s like the beginning of the end of all you need. That’s religion, right? That’s good religion. Anything beyond that is just politics.
Brian Smith 20:14
Well, Terry, is that you just touch on what you and I were discussing the other day about the Hebrew Scriptures, and how political that that people started becoming it. I think, for me, I still have a faith of a kind, if you will, but it’s more based on reason and evidence. I still believe that we’re spiritual beings, you know, having a human experience. I do believe that but politics, I think the power structure, as well and in Jeremiah, this is what you touch on your films. It’s the it’s the power structure is the fact of making one. One group of people bow down to another group of people saying that we are superior because we have God on our side. So that’s to me where religion kind of falls off the rails.
Jeremiah Camara 20:56
Yeah, and you know, religion and church have always been joined That hit record many separate. You know, like the Bible is not this organic document that comes from the trees. To have a Bible you need ink, you need paper, you need the government, you need attorneys, you need the approval, I should say, of the government. There’s a lot of things that have to line up in order for you to have this book that became the greatest selling book of all time. You know, and as far as faith is concerned, like you were talking about, Terry, having faith in the sun and the rain, things like that, you know, people say, Well, what am I going to have faith they will have faith in those things that have already proven themselves to be faith worthy. You know, I have faith that night will come tonight. I have faith that winter will come I have faith that spring is going to come in in March. You know, I have faith that the oxygen will still be here for us to breathe. I have faith in those things that have proven itself to be faith worthy. So you got it, you can’t talk about, like I say, to Christianity, to me is white supremacy. That’s what Christianity is. You can’t really talk about racism without talking about Christianity and white supremacy. You can’t talk about white supremacy without talking about the Bible, and the role that the Bible is played. It is our first teacher that there are differences that need to be dealt with, if there are favorite groups in the eyes of this God. And so it teaches us this separation and you know, in the film, holy hierarchy, you know, it has many examples of how Christianity and racism and white supremacy are joined there. They’re inextricably linked. And I know that’s painful for a lot People, but I mean, this past holiday season that we just were in, look at some of the things that we may see as non threatening or innocuous. If you look at a, a white nativity scene with his baby Jesus, that is a very racist implication because you’re teaching your children who, what race God belongs to, who supreme who isn’t Supreme. And you see all of these, this iconography that exists. You know, I can go a Walmart right now and see candles with a white Jesus that’s on it. You know, during this Christmas season, you saw so much white iconography in Walmart, and I tell people Jesus is white, so bright, you can tell that black Hebrew Israelites to get a grip. He’s not black and the reason why he’s White is because he’s white in Walmart. Okay. Art is the largest retailer, it doesn’t matter what, what what you what you think what matters is perception. Yeah, millions of people they go into Walmart and going Walgreens I’m going to Walgreens and CVS right now and look at the magazine rack and some of them have religious and you’ll see a white Jesus there. So is the perception that matters. You can go to the various airports around the country, you Hobby Lobby is one of the most
Europe euro century stores that you can ever go in. It tells you that white is supreme third, you walk into Hobby Lobby, you’re going to get that and so if you’re black and you’re working there and you don’t have, you know, your racial esteem intact, you’re going to be really affected by it. So I think that when we look at religion and we connected to white supremacy and we look at the last because You would not have had Jim Crow, Jim Crow was a law. apartheid was a law. So you don’t have racism unless you have laws and these laws became laws, because of belief in a supreme being. It’s an easy transition, you believe in a supreme being to believe in a supreme human being. And so your, your, your God is going to look like, you know, if your God comes from your area, he’s probably going to look like you. And so that has been imposed on everybody else. And it’s done in measurable psychological damage to those people who do not fit those descriptions. And the sad part is, is that blacks would say, oh, what difference does it make what color and see they don’t really, really get it? We’re not talking necessarily, always about the color. We’re talking about what you’re implying with this is supremacy and the the inferiority notions that you are applying with iconography because the image always speaks louder than words
Terri Daniel 26:05
and marketing is everything. You know, I really stood out for me in in holy hierarchy where you had the clip of that little boy who got really famous because he had a near death experience. They made a movie about him.
Jeremiah Camara 26:19
Little Yeah, right.
Terri Daniel 26:20
And he’s sitting there going, and I sat on Jesus’s lap and he had sky blue eyes and long brown hair. movie and that book sold millions of him that’s the messaging that people are getting, that’s the teaching that everybody could get
Jeremiah Camara 26:36
if you had saw a black Jesus from birth. You would not have had that same story.
Terri Daniel 26:43
Yeah.
Jeremiah Camara 26:45
This was embedded into your consciousness. And so there are people you know, if if, if, if, if I’m walking down the street and someone you know white person does something to me Simply because I’m black, or does some violence toward me. That’s not that’s a that’s a hate crime. I wouldn’t call that racism because we’re all prejudice to some degree. But when we go to court, and it’s backed by law, it becomes racism. Because racism is the legal backing of a person’s prejudice and bigotry, stereotype, you know, and an ignorance is legally backed. So we are now a products of society where racism has been legally back, just like go once gave $1 value. It was the god fantasy, this god that gave them their value as white people to treat you in such a way that you create a whole institution of racism. And it all started with belief, religious belief, that is the crux of racism in this country.
Terri Daniel 27:59
I’m curious I’ll go ahead Brian.
Brian Smith 28:01
I think Jeremy, you made some excellent points there and I really I really wish I could get everybody to watch both of your films because whether you hundred percent agree with them or not, I think the especially the second film explains white privilege better than maybe anything I’ve seen and trying to get this point across the people that it’s systematic that it goes back hundreds of years that just because slavery ended 150 years ago doesn’t mean any of this stuff was over. I mean, we still had Jim Crow we still have we still have things today and like you said, the iconography is extremely important and we were talking about the integrity see my neighbor has an activity scene. White Jesus white Mary and Joseph Wiseman or black
Jeremiah Camara 28:43
black in the native
way but he’s not the main character that the Holy One is
Brian Smith 28:50
white. Let’s don’t
Terri Daniel 28:51
get in the wise man technically should be Asian shouldn’t be.
Jeremiah Camara 28:57
According to our IQ, they should be Yeah, I think that
Terri Daniel 29:02
No, I didn’t mean it that way. I mean, they came from the east, they would have come from like India or Tibet, you know, they would have been some sort of Asian.
Jeremiah Camara 29:12
Yeah, absolutely. But I mean, just to just to traverse those mountain ranges. Yeah. A lot of know how to do. Yeah, yeah. I mean, you not you’re not in Tibet, and Nepal and places like that. And, and cultivating rice and not know what you’re doing. You have to bet a lot of knowledge just to be in those regions to begin with.
Brian Smith 29:37
interesting how that, you know, we were talking again tonight about the Hebrew Scriptures that we call the Old Testament Christians call the Old Testament. And it’s interesting how the Europeans co opted that and somehow identify with the Israelites, who were the people who are the downtrodden people, but they were the chosen people, right? So that the Europeans take that and they said, well, we’re the ones dominant everything, but we’re going to We are the chosen people to wear the world. actually chosen people. And then when the slaves read the Bible, they’re like, they identify with Israelites because they were the ones that were actually enslaved. So this has got this whole mishmash of things going on. But yeah, the the the people just co opted Christianity in my opinion. Because if you look at Jesus Jesus was he was killed by the state. So he was not he was not hand in hand with the government is exactly the opposite.
Jeremiah Camara 30:24
And I say Brian, that people like myself, people like you and people like Terry, if you think about it, I can speak for I can speak for me, I just know what I do throughout the year. I don’t really participate in a lot of, of the culture of this in this country. You know, I don’t do Christmas, I don’t do your Halloween, things like that. I live a Jesus kind of life. And I’m not even a believer. I’ve found 2122 saviors with the same story of Jesus mama named Mary or derivative of the word Mary died on the cross. Call. themselves a light of the world, ascended to heaven was born of a virgin at 12 disciples, this is a very old motif. So there’s nothing original about Jesus. But he came at a time where, you know, Rome once were in power and they can enforce this on you. Okay? But when you look at my life and my peers, we live the life, you know, because it says turn the other cheek. So I mean, the do they just mean turn the other cheek in a physical way? What about turning the other cheek to the ways of this culture? Because they have taken us off the natural cycle. Like you’re trying to convince me that this is New Year’s. So here we are January 23. I think it is. And we’re in the dead smack of winter and you want me to think this is a new year. New leaves blossoming on the trees. There’s no bugs and new bugs emerging from the ground. There’s new no new, you know, flowers blooming. Things like that in the day of smack of winter. So they’re taking a lot of the things, you know that and have perverted them nature. You look at July the fourth, Frederick Douglass told us as a black man how you were mocking us on July the Fourth of July, the fourth in black, we were still in slave. We don’t give the same attention to June teens as we do July the fourth time, right. So I mean, we don’t even call it Thanksgiving. I mean, maybe show me a peak white, Native American that celebrates Thanksgiving, maybe I will do that was a time in 1000 of them were slaughtered. You know, so these days, so I don’t take part in a lot of these things. But you take these Christians that are so godly, they do every damn thing. It doesn’t matter. Yeah, here it is. I’m not a believer. I don’t even acknowledge Jesus’s existence. There’s no evidence of them. Although you can Find people that can so call claim evidence. But they’ll say this is most likely where Jesus where there’s nothing definitive about where he lived. I mean, we can say the white sequined glove of Michael Jackson and the blue suede shoes available. But you can see me saying that the wood that Jesus was at the stake on or the or the nails, you would think you would have the foresight to say those things. But when you abandon these beliefs, to me, is where I found my freedom.
Brian Smith 33:33
Yeah, well, you know, it’s interesting, we were talking about Jesus just today I was thinking about, you know, the Gospels, there’s a gospel that like you don’t know about call the Gospel of Thomas, which was left out of the Bible. And and Jesus was countercultural enough. If you read the New Testament, I think properly, but if you read the gospel, Thomas, Jesus was all about the kingdom is within you, you know? So that’s the that’s the Jesus. I’m a follower of Jesus. By the way, I don’t call myself a Christian anymore. But I am a follower of Jesus, whether exists or not. I’m a follower of the Spirit of Jesus.
Jeremiah Camara 34:04
Oh, absolutely, whether he existed or not his ways, set an example for us. You know, like I’ve said, the more that I have gotten into this, the more I see that I actually live that type of life that he would have embraced that he would have approved up. I don’t participate in any of these things. Certainly Jesus would not have stood in line for a damn Popeye’s chicken sandwich. When he know he knows the chicken industry and how the chickens are treated. Can I ask you can’t mass produce chicken that way without having all of these antibiotics and the hormonal things and growth hormones that that they need to make this man stick and so he wouldn’t do a lot of things. She wouldn’t partake in a lot of the music that is objectifying. You know, things like that. I mean, I love all types of music. I definitely prefer jazz Music because it’s improvisation is improvise. Meaning it’s important at the moment. It is a momentary art form which you have to have certain mastery over your instrument. So I get that I think that if there was a Jesus, he would have probably been into something like that as well. Where there was not demarcated. It was not for commercial use. I love it. You buy it. I mean, the greatest selling jazz album of all time was 1959. Miles Davis is kind of blue. But it was still improvisational, which I definitely see Jesus liking something like that.
Terri Daniel 35:35
So, here’s what I’m curious about. You know, I mean, I, I’m a theologian, I have degrees in theology. I’ve studied how the Bible was constructed. And I am wondering what you think about when in this whole process of history did Jesus become white because when you think about it, there is not one white person in the entire older New Testament. Not one character in any of those stories would have been a white Caucasian person, they would all been Middle Eastern, and North African around that area. So when the Romans started taking all the pagan holidays like soulstice and superimposing Christmas over it, and that whole thing, so the Romans would have been the introduction of white people, right? Does that sound right? And so that’s where those depictions would have begun, like the Renaissance with the paintings and the stuff that we didn’t have before. Right?
Jeremiah Camara 36:36
Yeah, I mean, when you own a store, you can put whatever images and artwork that Yeah, you own the store. You have the power, you know,
Terri Daniel 36:43
it was the Romans I mean, they made Jesus look like them,
Jeremiah Camara 36:46
basically. No, absolutely. Because like I said, when you own the store, you own the, the the operation. So for you’re going to make him look like you he’s from your region. So God, like Darrel Ray said in the film holy hierarchy, if your God is from your area? No, he’s probably gonna look like you.
Terri Daniel 37:11
And speaking of Darrel Ray, I’m going to interrupt and put a plug in here. Brian, if I may, for the conference on religious trauma, where Daryl is going to be speaking, Jeremiah is going to be speaking there. I’m going to be speaking there. It’s coming up in Vancouver, Canada. April 23, I believe is that right? Yeah. And and the website for that is co RT conference on religious trauma 2020 dot com CEO RT ct 2020 dot com. So anyone who’s listening who’s interested in this topic, come and join us. It’s going to be great.
Jeremiah Camara 37:48
You know the thing about it, and that Congress, I’m really looking forward to it. I’m glad you plugged it with you think about it. Because I was just in Madison, Wisconsin. And speaking at the Freedom From Religion Foundation, right? And we had 700 people, I think there were like four or five black people. And which is okay, but it’s perplexing, because black people should be at that event in droves. They should be there. And I think that black people should be the least not only the least religious people, but the most skeptical people of a God. That there is and the reason I say that is because of the history. You know, you get certain groups that want to talk about this what God that we had in Africa. Before we came to America, there were many blacks are already here. Forget what you’re about group of lovers, but many blacks were already in this country. But that’s another topic. But
no, God kept you off that slave ship.
No, God kept you from being a slave for hundreds of years. No, God prevented the prison industrial complex from happening. You’re still on the bottom, you know of society. So if anybody should be skeptical of a god, it ought to be black people. What does he done?
Terri Daniel 39:23
Well, so you know, I and I loved what you did in your first film, where you asked all these people what’s more important, the blood of your ancestors or the blood of Jesus? And they all said, the blood of Jesus and I, I wondered that too, like, what’s the reason why so many black people cling so hard to this religion?
Brian Smith 39:44
You know, it goes back again to I think what’s covered in the film as well is that we’ve been taught to defer happiness that’s, that’s part of the whole part of the whole game. It’s like, you don’t need to be happy here. You’re going to be happy by and by, you know, in the sky. So You just kind of you look forward to to heaven. And you know, right now we just have to deal with what we have to deal with. But then again, there’s so many so many mixed messages because I think by people again, when the slaves are reading the Bible, they identify with Israel lights, even though the masters are saying, Okay, well this is great, because now you’re saved at least you know, Jesus, and they’re like, but yeah, we’re, we’re literally in bondage. I mean, we’re literally in chains and being whipped and murdered. But they’re like, Yeah, but but you know, Jesus, but on the other hand, they said, but you’re not quite human. So that’s why we can keep you enslaved because you’re not really fully human.
Jeremiah Camara 40:36
Right, exactly. That was the just Oh, justification for I think Anthony pin made a very poignant statement in the film holy hierarchy when he said, you know, considering Black History Why would you think that you were the people that Hicks those are the people you know, the gap slaughtered? Why do you think that you’re the ones that that just that the God is speaking to, you don’t have that type of history. You know, We black people were to invent a god like this God in the Bible is simply a character. He’s a character in a book. That’s that’s pretty much it because all the people that he associated with, if you don’t have Moses, if you take away you know, without the Bible is this is your source of information where you’re getting about your, your guy, what he likes, what he dislikes, where he goes, You know what he does, etc. If the information about your God is found in this Bible, well, if you take the Bible away, that necessarily means that you take your God away, as well. Where is he now? Because you learned about him through this book. And I’m trying to figure out where do all like, if what you know about Jesus is not organic, it doesn’t come naturally. And you only can find him in a book. But there are no people that you can point to our people that exist today that actually saw him. We know people that knew Einstein, we know people that are alive that knew many great people, you know, I could talk to people now who actually met, you know, great people such as john Coltrane and people like that. We don’t know anybody who’s ever taught. Even Paul never
Terri Daniel 42:16
laid eyes on Jesus, and none of the disciples, nobody was there with him,
Jeremiah Camara 42:20
nobody. So now, this is suspect right here. This would not hold up in a court of law, he would not be able to we would not say that this man existed. If we were to take the information that we have now and put it in a court of law. He couldn’t exist. So if the information that you have about this, Jesus and his God only can be found in a book, and basically if you take that book away, and everything you know about this, God is gone now. So I asked people named me one of my first documentaries, why would I let him document the little features little mini films? I did. YouTube back in 2007, or six, or eight or something like that. I asked people, and I still do it to this day, I still haven’t gotten an answer. I’d say maybe three things that you’ve learned in church that you would not have learned through life tenure.
Just three things that what have you learned? Nobody can answer that question.
Terri Daniel 43:23
Well, there wouldn’t be good things, they would be bad.
They learned that.
Jeremiah Camara 43:30
Yeah, I mean, you know, three things that you learn, you know, like not not non biblical related, but just three things that you’ve learned that you’re carrying on in your life that you actually pretty useful things that you learned that you would not have learned for me because just being on earth long enough to tenure, like, I’m a grandfather now. So I know things that I didn’t know, you know, seven years ago. My team You’re has now made these things available this knowledge. So I asked people that have been going to church for 4050 years. What have you learned?
Brian Smith 44:12
Well, you know, it’s Jeremiah, it’s interesting, because we were talking about this, you know, why would people believe in this, you know, because of such flimsy evidence, it reminds me there’s a guy, I think his name is Lee Strobel, who wrote a book actually called the case for Jesus from the lawyers point of view. So there are people and I was part of that. And I read all those things. I learned all this stuff. And I had a book called The Encyclopedia biblical difficulties. So I can answer all these questions. So people, when they dig into a position, they’ll defend it no matter what. And I give you an example, I interviewed a lot of people who had near death experiences. So these are people who have actually say, I’ve been to the other side, I saw this, this is what I’m reporting. And I was walking with one of my van jenica friends one day, and we were talking about this and he’s like, well, I believe the Bible over this person that you talk to you. I said, Okay, you believe the Bible. So Paul was on the road with them. Ask us had to light blind it heard the voice of Jesus from the sky and the whole deal. To me, I think that sounds like a lot like a near death experience. So so if you believe that because you read it in your Bible, why wouldn’t you believe married the woman that I interviewed yesterday? Who said something very similar happened to her. But this is how indoctrinated people are, they’ll believe, a book that was written thousands of years ago.
Terri Daniel 45:24
How did you answer that question? Brian, do you remember? Did he give you an answer?
Brian Smith 45:27
It was just based upon the fact that he just believes the Bible. I mean, he didn’t give me a real solid answer. And I when I when I put that to him, it just kind of like we moved on to the next thing. But it’s all and it’s interesting, because I was evangelical, I was a Pentecostal that was evangelical, and this guy with church together he goes, Brian, I really just wish you’d read the Bible. I’m going to send you some passages. And if you just study about Jesus, then you know you’re going to come back around and like, I’ve read the Bible cover to cover many times I’ve read and said, I’ve read all these other books. By the way. Outside of the Bible, and I have, I think, a much broader picture. And I’m talking to people who are giving me contemporaneous reports. Okay? This is something that happened yesterday. I don’t have to go read what happened to Paul 2000 years ago. But they’re just it’s it all comes back to I have faith in the Bible. I know. Yeah. And even to me, I don’t need to read anything else. I read the Bible,
Terri Daniel 46:19
they worship the Bible, instead of the teachings of Jesus. It’s, you know, or it’s Paul, or they worship the writings of Paul, where they worship the book, not this stuff is going to figure out Lee Strobel.
Jeremiah Camara 46:31
To this day, I still have read the book. I’ve got the DVD years ago. Hmm. It doesn’t make sense to me. But people will defend their stance regardless, it doesn’t matter. I guarantee you if you go on Google now and type in because you’re the way we search is very bias. A believers go search why Jesus exists. A non believers are why he You’re going to, if you go on Google right now and search, why cigarettes are good for you, they’re going to be there’s going to be a ton of stuff, saying why cigarettes are good. You know, what the benefits of heroin? You’re going to get that. So no matter what, you’re going to have opposing views, but I also have read the Bible. It took me a while I’ve done it three times. The whole Bible, but specifically, the Old Testament from Genesis to I think, was a Malik I believe. So. There are only a few pages in that book that did not allude to some type of violence or death or me from you. I think there was six to eight pages and most of that time it was talking About It was describing the Ark of the Covenant covenant, or describing scribing the tabernacle, you know, the purple and gold and all this kind of stuff. And then it certainly was sent with those scripts back to its death. So as a person who, you know, tries to do, right, you know, I hire a lot of felons, you know, at my business, and a person who really enjoys giving to people. I found the Bible very offensive. And so when you say that God is good, my next question is Which one are you talking about? You’re talking about that God of the Bible. I know you haven’t read the book. Because there’s a man I can’t remember. I’m sorry, but he just chronically detailed the people that God murdered in the Bible, it estimated to be about 25 million. Yeah, that’s right, Bobby. Everything was destroy this and kill this and kill the children and smoke and smite. And I mean, it is very, very graphic. And it’s very offensive to a person who considers themselves to be righteous. I say this. If you do see God that as a righteous person we are all obligated to whip is you know what? for allowing all this stuff, this God is not a preventer See, we go to this God to protect, to, you know, after things that happened when someone dies or when some tragedy, but God would serve humanity best if he operated in the realm of prevention. Why didn’t you prevent the Hurricanes from happening? Why didn’t you prevent the earthquakes that have taken place in Puerto Rico? Why did you Why did you stop the bullets to prevent this from happening to this person, so he’s not a person venture, but he would best serve humanity in that realm of prevention as opposed to coming to him after the damage has already been done.
Terri Daniel 50:12
One of the really good theories about why that God that the God of the Old Testament was created to be a psychopathic murderer is because this is Richard Elliot Friedman’s theory, and I think it’s a good one, that all of those stories were told orally for about 1000 years. And then at around 500 bc when the Israelites were taken into captivity, in Babylon, they started writing it down and they started writing it down because it’s all our stuff our culture’s gone, our temples gone, our history is gone, we better start writing this down or it’s gonna disappear. So that’s when they started writing. After telling it verbally for thousand years, and in this theory, they’re writing the creating this God because it’s an expression of their oppressors, because the Babylonians behaved like that. So they created a god that was expressing what they were experiencing in real life. Everyone’s beating us up and killing us. That’s where it all came from.
Jeremiah Camara 51:13
That is it that if you look at the map, and you know, because the Jewish nomads were expelled from like, 22 or 23 countries, right? And if you follow the map, you can tell the one foot because it all hugs the coastline where they where they wound up, okay? And so I need a god, I need a kick ass God, someone that you do this to us, you know, you read the Old Testament, like, if you mess with the Jews, this guy is going to destroy you is going to kick your butt. And so we’re the chosen people. It’s like a person who is an orphan who never really had any friends. They make up these stories that you know, my mom really liked me the best, you know, because you were an orphan. So you have these fantastic stories. And then you have the Jewish nomads saying that we’re chilling In, because you basically were not chosen, you were getting kicked out and you were you were being discriminated against you were being killed and murdered. So you needed this vicious type of God that will come to your everyday defense. Now, here we are in 2020, according to the Roman calendar, and we’re still accepting this stuff is mind boggling. But just goes to show you how vulnerable the brain is. Yeah.
Brian Smith 52:27
Yeah. Well, I, you know, I think we’re, I think we’re making some really interesting points here. And and, you know, most people, unfortunately, don’t dig this deep into the history of the Bible, the history of why did it come about where who were the people that wrote it? Why did they write the way they did? When was it changed? You know, they don’t know about the Council of Nicea. They don’t know about how Romans, you know, totally co opted it and you’re, it takes a lot of work. You know, as we talked about Jeremiah to come out of this to say, let me take a critical look at this because it really rocks people world and to even get people to, like us I’ve been trying to get I’ve been posting your film on Facebook and I’m like, you know, people need to watch this. But we have this, like you said, we search for what we what reinforces what we already believe.
Jeremiah Camara 53:14
So absolutely it is, you know, it’s right now. Where we are people, people are intellectually non curious, in order where we arrived at where we are now because it took a lot of research, you see the books behind me, but not just the books as to traveling. You know, I’ve been to many places and I’ve seen where the resurrection came from, and where the, you know, the flood stories and all this stuff have come from, but it takes work. It’s very easy for me to just accept what my preacher says and just parts of the Scripture that he tells me to read, just read it and go home and repeat these things throughout my lifetime. It takes a lot of mental work, and people just don’t have the time for that. we’re inundated with our jobs. we’re inundated with our family. So it’s much easier for me to just continue to believe. Because you, I hear you, and I’m, I have cognitive dissonance. now. I’ll never forget what you said, Jeremiah, but you’re rocking the boat a little too much. And I do notice that a lot of the people that I know who are non believers, they have a little more time on their head. You know, people who are inundated with work, they just don’t have the time to figure out, you know, to study where this Bible came from, and how, you know, I gotta tell you, we’re still studying the Bible, study how it got here, and people just don’t have that type of time. But if you take a little bit of study every day, and keep an open mind about it, you can begin to take strides that will free you mentally.
Terri Daniel 54:52
And here’s one thing that helps people get free which is a good segue to the area where Brian and I both work in grief and loss is just jumping on top of what you’re saying. Most people get their Bible story and their religious teaching when they’re like three, four or five years old, right? And you grow up with the Sunday school version of it. And most people, like you said, don’t study any further. Don’t think about it, they just go through their life, and then all of a sudden, one day, they’re 45. And their kid dies. Now, that’s not supposed to happen. And what that does when you encounter a trauma like that, and you’re dealing with it, with a theological mindset of a five year old, dealing with a huge adult traumatic situation like that, you have zero tools to deal with it. And what happens to a lot of people is that trauma pushes them in to questioning and ultimately post traumatic spiritual growth. So we can, you know, we don’t hope that people have those kinds of traumas, but they do every day. And that’s what will shake people up and wake them up out of that lethargy.
Jeremiah Camara 55:58
We’re here. I’m glad you’re brought that up because my question has always been, what does this guy do? Like, what is his job description? Okay? And you can believe in your whole life, guess what, you still don’t get arthritis, you’re going, okay? You’re still going to get high blood pressure, your team is still going to lose. You’re going to experience what everybody else experiences, whether you believe or you don’t believe
Terri Daniel 56:24
or not only that, when you’re praying for your team to win some other guys praying for the other team to win. Absolutely. How does that work? I know,
Brian Smith 56:35
you know that. That’s again, that term, which is that’s that five year old image of God. That’s this. That’s this big sweaty guy that we put up there that says he’s just a big strong man. Santa Claus.
Jeremiah Camara 56:45
Right. Well, I mean, you get people like Steph Curry, right. And now you get James Harden’s doing it. You know these NBA players, and after a free throw, he points to the sky right now. They asked that Kurt you know, how long have you known Jesus or something like that? He said he knew Jesus at eight years old. But I mean, give me a break. Your mom was a missionary. Okay? You went to Davidson school. Davidson is a is a Christian College, you know, so you this is all you’ve ever known? Right? You know, but this, but and I doubt if he would even be open to hearing another side. And that’s what I tell people. I’m not trying to convert anybody. These are not i’m not part of any crusades or any type of mission. I have no weapons. No, my thing is to get people to see a different perspective. And something that will take the anks off of them because it’s a lot of pressure. Worried about what Jesus would do and what Jesus wouldn’t do and going to hell. You stress the hell out of people you’re stressing people out. And in Sweden, you know, they year after year, they always win this happiest people. Kind of In these magazines, People Magazine, whatever, the happiest people on earth, and they’re among the least religious people on earth. They’ve got one of the best health care systems, one of the best educational systems, right? And they asked one of the people there they said, Well, what is it about you got he said, we don’t have any expectation. We’re not expecting someone you know, to come and save us or rescue us, will save ourselves. To me that leads to happiness. But when you pick praying for a parking spot, a good parking spot you give thanks to this God over great parking spot that you got at the mall. It just shows how embedded our beliefs are within our everyday lives. And when you shake all of that you can breathe and begin to function and live normally and your break and now do his job.
Brian Smith 59:00
I would, you know, I would just want to say again, I don’t call myself a Christian anymore. I’m not a Christian. I don’t know if I call myself a believer because I don’t believe I, my, my, my position now is based on evidence. But what I encourage people to do is just to open up their minds, it doesn’t mean that you if you if you watch this film, or you read this book, you have to give up everything that you’ve ever known. But just understand what’s being done to you understand where it came from. Understand in the first one, we talked about how they lay out this, this, it’s a sales technique. The first thing we want to do we want to sell somebody something you have to convince them they have a problem. So you come to somebody and say, this guy’s living a happy life, you come up and say, guess what, you’re going to hell. What? Yeah, you’re going to hell and and but I can save you because I have Jesus and there’s a story it’s it’s kind of funny because they did this to an Indian guide and Native American. And he goes so if you hadn’t told me this, would I not be going to hell and I go, Well, no, you wouldn’t be going on. If we hadn’t told you something, why did you tell me? But we have to create the problem, right? So we create the problem, we create the solution. And then we’ve got overlaid on top of this, this political thing that’s been done. The white supremacy, which I think is an excellent point, I don’t think most people look at it from that perspective, Jeremiah, and it’s been used, especially in this country, to keep us separated and to keep a certain, you know, group of us oppressed. And we bought into it wholesale without even questioning, you know, why am I Why is this why is it that I believe this and I was like, What 13 I think when roots came out, and that was the first time I realized I saw acoustica tape being brought over here, and it’s like, this guy had a faith. He had a language, he had a family, you know, they Africans had all the stuff we’ve been taught to believe, you know, they couldn’t even speak to each other. They had no no religion. And they were so lucky that know that these people gave them all this stuff. So I think it’s really good for people to go back and examine say, okay, where did this come from, and how many This do I want to hold on to? How much of this Do I need to let go?
Jeremiah Camara 1:01:03
Right? I mean, when you you complain about racism, but you, you have a very narrow view of what racism is and where it came from. You don’t think you never are going to link it to religion, you’re just not going to do this. Listen to me the last place you go look for racism. Why do this? Why is this happening? And I’m telling you, you cannot escape religion, you just can’t.
Terri Daniel 1:01:29
Religion is such a sacred cow. I mean, I blame so many things on religion. You know, I mean, so many things in the culture. Racism is one of many, but you’re right religion, you’re not supposed to touch it. And for most people, if you said the roots of racism in America are in theology, they would just be horrified. You do not touch our theology with that and every just violent behavior, you know, mental illness, suicide, so much of this stuff is already rooted in theology, but you know, I’m so glad Jeremiah that you’re here in the world, showing people the connection between bad theology and racism because it’s really time for that to come out of the closet and and not to teach religion like this untouchable, sacred cow thing that everyone sees it.
Jeremiah Camara 1:02:17
You know, Terry and Brian, my hope is that you know, we take this off the Do not talk about list, right? Take God off the do not question list, you know, and I think that it’s important for people who are skeptical, who are beginning this journey to put the article articles the are in front of God. Because when you say, you know, I don’t believe in God, you are implying that there is one to believe in and not to believe it. So say a God, or gods, you know, or this guy or whatever. But you know, I think it’s very insulting to You to God when you ask me. You don’t believe in God. You know, no one would say Do you believe that Terry and Brian are right now having this interview? You would never ask that question. You know, could you could see it right here. So it’s insulting that your God, we actually have a choice. Yeah, there’s a choice that we can exercise to believe or disbelieve. Well,
Terri Daniel 1:03:27
the 10 commandments say that, you know, you shall have no other gods before me, which right there suggests that there are other gods
Jeremiah Camara 1:03:35
exactly in India has what 33 3030 million gods and 30 million gods in India but of course, your God is the right one. And I just think it’s time to just grow up. You know, here we are. We talked about this is this the technology that’s available but if you look at the church is the the only institution from slavery that’s still in existence that’s still in operation. You dress differently. Now you talk differently, you have different music, but the church is still the same thing that you had when you were enslaved. And I just think that it’s time to grow up and stop focusing on the there and then and focus on the here and now. That’s what religion does. It keeps us focusing on that there and then and so it doesn’t matter black people about it, you know, there’s no there’s no question about the future. You know, we look at the Japanese, for example. And their creation of Honda, okay. That didn’t have hundred, I think the first one was the early 80s or late 70s, something like that here in the United States. They started that in the 50s. They wanted that to happen, you know, they saw the New World isn’t going to happen to 2030 years from now. Black people don’t think like that. We know, set programs in motion that we’re not going to benefit from today. The reason is, is because it doesn’t matter. Heaven is where we’re trying to get to. We’re not really trying to establish a future for our children. As long as you have Jesus, and heaven. That’s all that really matters. It really is a sickness. And like I said, I’ll say it again. I’ve said it once. I’ll say it again. Religion is a perversion of the brain.
Terri Daniel 1:05:35
You know, I love that you keep saying growing up, because I’m Bishop john Shelby Spong, who is a friend of mine says, and he’s all over YouTube saying this in
Jeremiah Camara 1:05:46
the interview.
Terri Daniel 1:05:50
He had a stroke a couple of years ago. Yeah. So he’s not doing any interviews or traveling. I gotcha. Yeah, that’s been about three years but he says, you know, being born again means that you if you’re born again, you’re a newborn baby. You’re an infant, you’re just a blob of brainstem. You don’t need to be born again. You need to grow up. The idea is to mature not to go back to infancy. These books,
Jeremiah Camara 1:06:17
I’m often, you know, I asked, When do we graduate? You know, how often are you going to refer to this scripture? Yeah, no, throughout my life, like, what other books do we read and just continue like for 15 years, say the same thing when we already know it. The Bible is is an exception to that because it’s based off of life and death, eternal hell, which is so it’s so crazy to think that you’re going to burn for eternity. I mean, this is listen, we all should notice that the sun has a time limit. It’s got a time limit. So we see stars dying all the time and creating these massive black holes and in quasars and things like that. Our Sun is going to expire. So this notion of forever is like the winds of living on earth with the lions and tigers and bears. Is he rhodius? Because this earth will one day expire.
Brian Smith 1:07:26
Yeah, yeah, for sure. Well, I’m Jeremiah. It’s, it’s been really fascinating. You know, talking to you, I really appreciate you taking the time to do this and discuss your two films type film are very important work. So I hope people watch them and I want to review what they are their contradiction, the question of faith, which examines exaggeration churches and Afro American communities. And the new one is holy hierarchy, the religious roots of racism in America and they’re both available on amazon prime.
Jeremiah Camara 1:07:55
That’s correct. That’s correct. And I want to thank you guys. It’s been fun, bro. Thank you so much man. I love your whole setup here. I’ve I really liked this set I’ve done 1000 interviews but this is one setup I really like Terry, thanks for reaching out to me and I looked at your work you’re fascinating I can’t wait to meet you in person and it’s been a blast I appreciate you having me on the show.
Brian Smith 1:08:19
Yeah I want to give people are then contacted to its film freeway comm slash Jeremiah Kamara and that’s Jeremiah, gr e m i a, actually the best way is through slave sermons that g Okay, slave sermons at gmail,
Jeremiah Camara 1:08:32
like the mini series on YouTube slave sermons, plural. Okay, calm. You can reach me there. You can also visit Jeremiah tomorrow.com Awesome, man. It’s been great meeting you.
Yeah, same here. Thanks so much, guys.
Brian Smith 1:08:46
Terry, any last words? I
Terri Daniel 1:08:48
just I’m so thrilled to meet you Jeremiah and I cannot wait to hang out with you. And all these other brilliant people that are going to be there in Vancouver including Nathan Phillips. The son of Fred Phelps from the Westboro Baptist Church. He’s going to be there. Marlene, well, these are really important people. And I just feel so thrilled that I get to be around them. Congratulate subordinate, Marlene would know. I met her about six years ago in San Francisco. And we’ve stayed in touch. I just love what she’s doing her
Jeremiah Camara 1:09:23
her patience and her love for people comes blaring through in her work where she can she’s got me she does retreat. She lives near me and she has retreats. I don’t know how often which is recovering from religion. Retreat. So your array their array does the same thing you guys yeah, yeah. And I really thank them for considering me to be a part of this big event. I’m looking forward to a Brian. Will you be there?
Brian Smith 1:09:48
I won’t be there. But I’m sure I’ll find you somewhere man.
Jeremiah Camara 1:09:52
If I mean no doubt, man. Listen, when I come home I will get together man for sure.
Yeah, down. Okay.
Terri Daniel 1:10:01
Thank you. Thank you very much
Transcribed by https://otter.ai
