Rhett McLaughlin is best known as one half of Rhett and Link, an iconic YouTube duo who host the internet’s most-watched daily talk show, Good Mythical Morning.
Less known is the fact that he and Link used to be intimately involved in what was then called “Campus Crusade for Christ”; committed Christians, both would routinely evangelise to college students in an attempt to bring them to the faith. Rhett expertly debunked evolution, confident that it was a lie, and had come to terms with the damnation that awaited those who didn’t listen to his message.
At some point in his early adulthood, Rhett began to wrestle with some confronting realisation. He read Francis Collins’ The Language of God, and at some point became convinced that natural selection is undeniable. Despite many intelligent Christians also believing in evolution, Rhett’s realisation that he (and those “experts” he looked up to) could be so fundamentally and confidently wrong caused something of a crisis of faith.
When he told his wife (a former student of Bart Ehrman in North Carolina!) that he believes we are all descended from a common ancestor, she burst into tears. She has since more than come round, but the beginning of Rhett’s “deconstruction” of his faith was far from easy.
Today, he joins me to discuss that deconstruction, and in a manner which demonstrates that he obviously still has a keen and educated interest in theology and biblical studies.
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TIMESTAMPS:
0:00 - Deciding to Talk About Religion
06:28 - Rhett’s Christian Activism in College
18:12 - Rhett's Certainty That Christianity Was True
24:50 - Does Hell Exist?
29:31 - How Rhett's Christianity Began to Crack
46:11 - How Evolution Shook Rhett's Faith
53:34 - Jesus and the Resurrection
01:10:21 - Double Standards in Christian Apologetics
01:14:21 - How Rhett’s Deconstruction Impacted His Life
01:22:55 - Rhett’s Relationship to Christianity Today
01:41:17 - The Risks of Speaking Publicly on Theology
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