The Unintentional Heretic
The Unintentional Heretic is a podcast for spiritual explorers, questioners, and ever-expanders who believe faith should be deep enough to survive honest inquiry. Together we’ll explore theology, spirituality, doubt, and the evolving search for truth—trusting that God is not threatened by our questions, and that sometimes heresy is just tomorrow’s orthodoxy.
Episodes
18 episodes
Theosis: Do We Become Divine?
This episode of The Unintentional Heretic explores the ancient Christian idea of theosis — the startling belief that salvation is not merely about being forgiven or going somewhere after we die, but about humanity becoming divine by gr...
The Crusades: When The Church Went To War
This episode of The Unintentional Heretic explores the Crusades as one of Christianity’s most sobering examples of what happens when faith becomes entangled with empire, violence, certainty, and political ambition. It traces the Crusad...
Gnosticism: Christianity's First Great Heresy?
In this episode of The Unintentional Heretic, we explore Gnosticism—the ancient Christian movement that taught salvation comes through awakening to the divine spark within—and the profound influence of Platonic philosophy, the Demiurge...
Why Did Christianity Become Obsessed with Sex? Desire, Embodiment, and the Sacredness of Creation
For centuries, Christianity wrestled with a profound question: are our bodies, desires, and passions obstacles to God or places where God is revealed? In this episode of The Unintentional Heretic, we explore how Greek dualism, Augustin...
Jesus Said “Follow Me,” Not “Worship Me”: When Christianity Became a Religion About Christ Instead of the Way of Christ
In this episode of The Unintentional Heretic, we explore how Christianity gradually shifted from being a movement centered on following the way of Jesus to a religion increasingly focused on worshiping Jesus and defining correct belief...
Is the Bible Inerrant? Scripture, Authority, and the Evolution of Truth
In this episode of The Unintentional Heretic, Greg explores the history and evolution of biblical inerrancy, distinguishing it carefully from literalism while examining how modern Christianity came to equate certainty with faithfulness...
Satan, the Devil, and the Evolution of Evil: From the Divine Council to the Cosmic Devil of Modern Christianity
This episode explores the fascinating evolution of Satan from “the accuser” within the divine council of ancient Israel to the cosmic devil of modern Christianity, revealing how ideas about evil, suffering, and spiritual conflict developed acro...
When Orthodoxy Changed: The Crises That Forced Christianity to Evolve
This episode explores the moments in Christian history when long-held “orthodox” paradigms were forced to evolve through crisis, discovery, and changing human understanding — from the fall of Rome and the Copernican Revolution to Darwin, democr...
Who is my neighbor? Immigration and the way of Jesus
In this episode of The Unintentional Heretic, Greg explores immigration through the lens of Scripture, history, and the teachings of Jesus, tracing the Bible’s evolving relationship with outsiders, strangers, and the vulnerable. Challe...
The Evolution of LGBTQ Doctrine: Jesus, Scripture, and the Expanding Circle of Grace
In this episode of The Unintentional Heretic, Greg explores the long and complex evolution of Christian doctrine surrounding LGBTQ inclusion, tracing the conversation from ancient purity codes and Greco-Roman assumptions to modern unde...
Evolution and Christianity: Darwin, Teilhard de Chardin, Ilia Delio, and the God of Becoming
In this episode of The Unintentional Heretic, Greg explores the often-contentious relationship between Christianity and evolution, tracing the journey from Darwin and the Scopes Trial to the visionary theology of Teilhard de Chardin, I...
What Does it Mean to Trust God? The Illusion of Control and the Promise of Presence.
In this episode of The Unintentional Heretic, Greg explores the illusion of control, humanity’s deep evolutionary longing for certainty, and why Jesus consistently offers presence instead of predictable answers or guaranteed outcomes. ...
Heaven: Escaping Earth or Healing Creation?
In this episode of The Unintentional Heretic, Greg explores the evolution of heaven through Scripture, theology, Greek philosophy, mysticism, and church history—challenging the common assumption that Christianity is primarily about esc...
What are We Saved From? Plato, The Devil and the Evolution of Salvation
In this episode of The Unintentional Heretic, Greg explores the fascinating evolution of Christian salvation theology—from the mystical and diverse world of the early church, through Plato’s influence on Western Christianity, to the ri...
Is Christianity Exclusive? Is Jesus the only way to heaven?
In this episode of The Unintentional Heretic, Greg explores whether Christianity was ever meant to be an exclusive system focused on who is “in” and who is “out,” or whether Jesus was inviting humanity into a deeper way of love, union,...
The Evolution of God: From Canaanite Pantheon to Cosmic Christ
In this episode of The Unintentional Heretic, Greg explores the fascinating evolution of YHWH—from a regional storm-warrior deity within the ancient Near Eastern world to the universal, cosmic vision of God revealed in Christ. Drawing ...
The Problem with Hell: Fear, Judgement and the Love of God
In this episode of The Unintentional Heretic, Greg explores how modern ideas about Hell were shaped much more by Dante, medieval art, and fear-based theology than by the Bible itself. Journeying through Sheol, Hades, Tartarus, and Gehenna, the ...
The Unintentional Heretic
In the first episode of The Unintentional Heretic, Greg Farrand shares his spiritual journey—from growing up as a third culture kid in Japan and Taiwan, to finding certainty in Evangelicalism and becoming a Presbyterian pastor, to eventually qu...
