73: It's Okay to Have Jesus and a Therapist, with Joseph Yoo

Host: Brandon Nappi 

Guest: Joseph Yoo 

 

Instagram: @theleadersway.podcast berkeleydivinity.yale.edu/podcast 

 

You can support our work at https://tinyurl.com/support-transforming-leaders 

Brandon:    Welcome to the Leaders Way Podcast. If you are a frequent listener over time, you will know of my great love and appreciation of the medieval Italian poet Dante Alighieri. I thought at one point in history I would pursue a PhD in Dante studies. It didn’t happen for me, although there’s still time. 

But one of the things that I really appreciated about what Dante was trying to do was drawing from high and low culture, that Dante was drawing upon the great Western classical intellectual tradition, but then he was also drawing on the pop culture of his day, and that it all could be of service. That it was all worthy of being integrated into poetics of the highest magnitude, that there was no disqualification, that everything could be revelatory, and that everything would be used. Something that I often hear myself saying when I’m working with folks in spiritual direction, right?–God uses everything. And this is a theme of my upcoming conversation with a wonderful, spirited, funny Episcopal priest Joseph Yu, who is a pop culture savant. And so, you know, this conversation will feature the gospel, it will feature an exploration of progressive Christianity, it will feature, you know, an excoriation of Christian nationalism, but in this episode, you’ll also find references to the WWE, Andre the Giant, Sabrina Carpenter, Bono, Instagram, TikTok. 

So there’s a little something here for everyone, and it all serves. Joseph was really generous in sharing his story, but also his book and all his content creation that he does on Instagram is the way I came to know him. So I hope you enjoy this really fun conversation about faith and social media and the needs of the world today. If you don’t know Joseph Yoo, follow him on social media. He’s an Episcopal priest, writer, and professional overthinker as he describes it, trying to live the gospel one interruption at a time. He’s a church planter. His church is in a suburb of Houston, Texas. He is the author of When the Saints Go Flying In, stories about faith, life, and everything in between. I hope you have as much fun listening as I did hearing Joseph tell his story.

Welcome to the Leaders Way podcast, a show for people who are not ready to give up on the world. We convene sacred conversations with luminaries, scholars, and spiritual leaders who explore the creative vision needed to lead change in our aching world. I’m Dr. Brandon Nappi, lecturer at Yale Divinity School and executive director of the Office of Transforming Leaders at Berkeley Divinity School at Yale. I’m so glad you’re here.

Joseph Yoo, welcome to the Leaders Way podcast. We’re so glad you could be here.

Joseph:        Thank you for having me. 

B:         In a moment, I want to ask you about your journey to priesthood. It’s one of the great gifts of this podcast that we get to have conversations where we really learn about the twists and turns of someone’s personal journey, but I can’t help but notice the belts above your head. For those of you listening and not watching on YouTube, there are what looks like sort of Hulk Hogan WWE or F. 

J:           Yeah, so the one right here is the previous WWE Championship, and that’s the one on my left, is the one that Andre the Giant had. I never grew out of wrestling, so still very, very in it. 

B:         Oh my gosh, well, as a young boy growing up, I saw Andre the Giant and Hulk Hogan wrestle together, and so… 

J:           That’s wild.

B:          Yeah, yeah. And the fascinating documentary about the WWE, maybe on Netflix, right? 

J:           Yeah. There’s a couple right now. 

B:         There’s a lot to learn about the human drama. I didn’t watch them, that’s all. I didn’t see this conversation going there, but… And I’m sure we’ll find a way to connect it all and loop it back, but tell us, how did you get to the place where you are now? What sort of work did God need to do in your life such that you’ve ended up doing what you do now? 

J:           So, it’s our family business, basically. My father is a retired United Methodist pastor, and on my dad’s side, my oldest uncle is a Korean Methodist pastor, and he had three kids. So, my three cousins, two of them are pastors, and one of them is married to a pastor. On my mother’s side, my grandfather was a Presbyterian pastor, my uncle is a Presbyterian pastor, my aunt is married to some kind of pastor, and my uncle’s, the pastor’s kid is right now in Fuller Seminary, so he might be going into ministry. And then my wife, she is an ordained deacon in the Methodist Church, and her father is a ordained, retired ordained Methodist pastor. So, it’s like a family business. 

But the story goes is that when I was four years old, I mean, four, like, who knows what’s happening in the world when you’re four? But when I was four, I approached my dad and asked him if I could be a pastor just like him. And I guess my dad held those words against me because from that point on, he was certain that I was going to be a pastor. I mean, he would tell his friends that “my son’s going to be a pastor,” he’ll tell his church members, you know, “my son is growing up, and he’s going to be a pastor.” So, you know, when I was born in the 80s, we didn’t have the technology to figure out the sex of a child before they were born. So, my mom said, you know, she would go to church almost every morning and pray that if God gave her a son, that she would dedicate him to the hand of prayer, basically, she would dedicate him to ministry. 

So, on one hand, I felt like I had no other choice in my life. But, you know, when I was about 12 or 13 or 14, I realized that that’s not what I wanted to do because, you know, like, it’s not like I didn’t have anything against my dad. I just thought I just saw how stressed out it was. I saw how mean the church can be. 

B:         Oh, yeah. 

J:           And I also knew that you don’t go into ministry for money. So, I was going to… I had plans about doing something else with my life. I don’t know what it was back then, but, you know, I would tell my parents, of course, I’m going to be a pastor, I’m going to be a pastor, I’m going to be a pastor. My last year at University of Hawaii, Manoa, I was a psych major and I had decided that I was going to apply to graduate school of psychology in the University of Hawaii because then they had a… I don’t know about now, but they had a pretty decently strong psychology program. And my plan was I was going to apply and if and when I got accepted, I was going to sit my parents down and say, “Hey, I’m going to do this first. I’m not saying no to ministry, but I want to pursue this.” 

But before I even got a chance to do that, it was November of 2003. My dad told me that there’s a conference, the United Methodist Church often holds a biannual conference every two years called Exploration and it was meant for people, kids from 15 to 25, interested in the call of ministry. So this three-day weekend is geared to people who are called into ministry or who think that they’re called into ministry. It happened to be on the weekend of my 23rd birthday and I told my dad, “Oh, I’m not going to go, it’s my birthday.” And he said, “Oh, happy birthday, you’re going.” And the funny thing is I tell all of my immigrant and non-white family friends the story and they’re like, “Oh, yeah, yeah, you couldn’t go.” But whenever I tell my white friends the story, they’re like, “You’re going to be 23, why couldn’t you say no?” I was like, “No is not an option.” You know, like I’m turning 45 this month and my parents just found out about this big tattoo and I hid it for a year because I’m still scared of them. 

So there was no choice, I had to go. And when I got there, you know, just a light bulb went off or everything just started to fall into place and I knew without a shadow of a doubt that seminary was my next call. I didn’t know if ministry was my next call. And so for the next three years in seminary, I had to go through, you know, like, “Is this my calling or is this my dad’s calling? Like, who’s calling is this?” and whatnot. But I finally, you know, like we went through seminary, we graduated and I realized that this was indeed my calling and my faith because my theology and my wife’s theology is completely different from both of our families. So we are the outliers of theologians in our family because we’re the ones that are the most progressive. 

And so I went through the process with the United Methodist Church because I was born, raised, baptized in the Methodist Church. I got ordained. There’s two levels, you know, like in 2008 I was ordained as a provisional and then 2012 was when I got my– when I was full-on an elder in the Methodist Church. And then we moved to Texas, ran into a conservative bishop and the bishop was sending– was fixing to send me– and for those of you who may not be familiar, the Methodist polity, the Methodist system, you’re sent by the bishop. You don’t get to choose where to go. The bishop sends you to within the geographical, you know, within the diocese or conference or whatever you want to call it, the geographical area. And he was fixing to send me to a place where it would have been detrimental not just to me, but to my family’s development. My son is on the autism spectrum and we’re going to be sent to not quite in rural place but somewhere in East Texas where it was hybrid between like suburbs and rural. And that was– and on top of that, you know, Houston is one of the most diverse cities in the United States but where I was being sent to had 0.1% Asian population. And I was like, “I’m not gonna do that.” I spent most of my life being the only one of my kind. I was like, “I don’t want to do that anymore.” 

So I said no, and you’re not really supposed to say no to the bishop. And it– I was already on the bishop’s bad list for various reasons and it just blew everything up. And I had three choices that the first one was either accept this calling and go, two, take leave of absence and then reapply for full membership, the following year, and– or three, leave the conference to go to a different conference. And I wasn’t going to go to that church. The second choice, I was worried that if I took a year off and then came back into the system that the bishop was sending somewhere even more rural, you know, like I’m not saying that he would but I’m saying that there’s a possibility and I didn’t want to risk that. So I was trying to move back to California and all the doors were closing and I was, you know, feeling it. And then finally a friend I had met randomly. I knew he worked for the diocese of Episcopal Diocese of Texas but I didn’t know what his role was. And one day I called and I was like, “Hey Jason, I need to vent. Will you get coffee with me?” And Jason met me for coffee. He sat me down. He didn’t even—he didn’t even say hello. He says, “Let’s just cut to the chase. I have a job for you. What would you think about planting a church in the city that you’re in? The only caveat is you’d have to do it as a Episcopalian.” And I was like, “No, I’m good.” You know, it’s like I spent all of my life in the Methodist Church. I know the ins and outs of the denomination. I know the ins and outs of the institution. I know where we lack and so I didn’t want to learn a whole new polity and learn a whole new like mess and whatnot. And so at first I was reluctant and I said, “No.” I said, “Let me think about it.” But once that seed was planted, I couldn’t stop thinking about it, right? 

And then finally I was on the edge and Jason sent me a video of them presiding bishop Michael Curry. And he tells a story about his parents experiencing communion for the first time. His father was– he talks about two African couples. I ruined the story. If you ever watched the story, he doesn’t say that his parents, but an African American couple went to a church. The man was a Baptist, the woman was an Episcopalian, and this was during the 60s. And when it came time to receive communion, the man looked at how the priest was going to treat his wife because his wife is black and it was a white church. And back then you couldn’t share a cup and the priest did not hesitate to offer the cup to the woman. And from that point on, that man said he was going to become an Episcopalian.  

And then we found out that was his parents. I was walking and watching that video at like 11 o’clock at night and it just moved me so much. I stopped and I started crying. I was like, “Oh my gosh.” I always had a deep appreciation for the sacraments, especially for communion, but it took it to a deeper level with that story. And I was like, “Okay, that’s it.” That’s the answer I was looking for. And that’s when I decided to turn in my credentials as a Methodist church and apply for priesthood in the Episcopal church. 

I went through two ordination processes. And in September, in August of 2021, I was a priesthood, officially a priest, ordained as a priest of the Episcopal church. So that’s bigger than a nutshell sum of where we got here. 

B:         Oh, I love it. Thank you. Thank you for taking us through the twists and turns and the small blowups. And of course, Bishop Curry; a dear friend of Berkeley’s graduate of Berkeley’s. So anytime he figures in a story, we get really excited. 

I have a few questions that are stirring within me as I listen to your story. One is, you named… Let’s go. You named progressive Christianity and of course, the Episcopal church can be purple in many places, but is for many a kind of home where they found a more generous, more flexible, more inclusive expression to Christianity. But for those who may be new to the Episcopal church or maybe even really new in this Christian community, and they hear these words, progressive and Christianity, and they think, “Hmm, I didn’t know those words belong together.” Can you at least share from your perspective in terms of your journey, what was the discovery for you? What in terms of theology was really important in terms of drawing you in this new way that may have been different from how your parents were believing? 

J:           Yeah, I grew up evangelical, basically. I went through the whole purity culture and can’t listen to secular music and all that stuff. The funny thing was, it was never done by my parents. It was always done by the youth pastors that my dad hired. But also, we’re immigrants and traditional immigrants, and sex was never talked about at home. The only time we talked about sex was to tell us not to do it or they’ll bring in a story like David and Bathsheba and see what happens when you, you know, that kind of stuff. So I grew up very traditional and conservative and, you know, I still remember this. I was 23. I had an interview with Garrett Evangelical Seminary and I was in Hawaii, so I was kind of sheltered. Not only was I sheltered, I was sheltered by geography as well. And one of the interview questions for scholarship was talking about progressive and conservative Christianity. That’s the first time I ever heard those two words ever.

So I’m like stressing out saying, “Isn’t just following Jesus enough?” And I still cringe at my answer. But it’s in that context that I went to Wesley Theological Seminary in DC and I only went there because I got a full ride. So I just want to point out that I entered our marriage with no student debt. And it was a progressive seminary and there were gay students and that really messed me up. And on the first day of seminary, the very first day, Dr. Bruce Hopkins didn’t even introduce himself. Hebrew Bible. He says, “This is Hebrew Bible 101 and I got to tell you, if you believe that a full grown man was swallowed by a fish and spat out three days later, you’re gonna have a hard time in this class in the next three years because that story is an allegory. It is a metaphor.” And that was my introduction to day one. And I’m like, “Oh my god—”

B:         Grenade thrown right into the middle of it.

J:           Yeah. It’s not a real story. And so I’m already, the word that we have now is deconstructing, but in 2003 that wasn’t there. I’m just, I’m just hurting. I’m like, “What is going on?” And I try to avoid all the gay students because, like, I didn’t know how to deal with it. I don’t know how to like …  in my mind, I’m thinking, “Why are they here and wasting money because, you know, they’re not, don’t they read the Bible?” That kind of thing, right? But here’s the thing, seminary, especially Wesley Seminary, was really, really small. We, the kids that entered in 2003, we were the first experiment of recruiting students right out of college, undergrad. So there were about 15 of us who were under the age of 30. So much so that the school wasn’t prepared for young students is they closed the cafeteria at 5:30. So like after 5:30, we can’t eat. So like we’re scrounging around, you know. American University is the campus that we shared on and every quarter American University would do a 25-cent chicken nugget special. You can bet that we were there stuffing our faces with …  I know this is probably a kind of TMI, but one time, one point my friend and I ate so much chicken nuggets that when we started sweating but playing basketball, we could smell the chicken nuggets emanating from our skin. 

But because it was small, like you can’t avoid everyone all the time, right? We have the same classes, we have the same schedule. Granted, I wouldn’t eat lunch with them, but some of my friends would eat lunch with them and, you know, on days that I don’t want to be alone, I just go. And here’s what happens, you know, I think Richard, no, I think it was Gregory Boyle who talked about saying Kateri, whose Native American name means “she who bumps into everything.” 

B:         Oh, is that right? I didn’t know that that’s a translation. Kateri Tekewita, yeah. 

J:           Yes, thank you, I can think of it, I didn’t want to butcher it. And so, I kept bumping into these people so much so that at some point, you have to ask them their name or it’s just going to be awkward, right? And once you know someone’s name, it’s hard to keep them non-human, right? It’s hard to dehumanize, you know, a farmer once told me, “You don’t name the animals you’re going to eat because it makes it harder to, you know, go through the process.” So, I started talking to people and I started noticing that these gay students were actually really kind and smart and intelligent and even more surprising, very devout and faithful people. 

B:         Devout, yeah, interesting. 

J:           There was one student who I still talk to, I don’t want to call him by name, but he worked at the bookstore, always wore fancy bow ties. And I saw that he was studying, he was at school, he was working part-time at the bookstore, working part-time at his church, going to all the protests and rallies and, you know, just fighting for inclusive rights, not just for the LGBT community, but for the people with low economic, you know, class. And I’m like, “This guy is doing so much more than me. What is going on?” 

And, you know, luck, spirit, God, fate would have it that for my preaching class, we had to, you know, one, we had to preach one sermon, we had to write one sermon. The sermon I had to write on happened to fall on the lectionary week of the Cornelius story. And I’m trying to, like, you know, where God says, “Don’t call it anything, I’ve created profane.” And then, you know, he goes to this Gentile’s home and Peter makes it, “No, hey, you guys know I’m not supposed to be here, but who am I? I’m still gonna go in.” And then, so I’m working on the sermon and, like, everything is turning in my head. And then I come across this Billy Graham quote–of all people. Someone asked him about something, and he responded, “It’s God’s job to judge, it’s the Holy Spirit’s job to convict, and it’s my job to love.” And so, with what I was experiencing, with bumping into all these gay students all the time … 

B:         Wow; I didn’t see that coming, Joseph. 

J:           With the Cornelius story, trying to figure out how to preach a story. And then the fact that my job, my one and only job, is to love. I was like, “Okay, the best thing I can do right now is it’s not up to who goes to heaven or not, that’s not my house. So, I’m just gonna befriend these people and get to know them and continue to just, you know, be a good friend and not just, like, be awkward around them, be a good friend. And we’ll see where, we’ll let God decide that, you know?” And so, that was the start of this whole progressive thing. 

And these labels, progressive and conservative, don’t really help because when I was in California, I wasn’t progressive enough. And now that I’m in Texas, I haven’t changed, but I’m too progressive. It’s just … it’s a spectrum. If people want to call me progressive because we fully value that every human is a beloved child of God, that whether they’re gay or straight or trans or whatever, however they identify, that they still are children of God and we’re gonna treat them as such, then I will take that label anytime, any day. 

You know, I don’t like calling myself a progressive Christian because I feel like that puts me in a box because they’re, I …  a couple years, about five years ago, when everything was happening, when, you know, things were still up in the air, not five years, ten years ago, I decided that I needed to have non-negotiables and everything else is up to, you know, debate depending on the season. And my non-negotiables just happen to be the creed, everything I find in the creed. And I told people even if I can’t explain it, I’m gonna just full-on believe it. So, like, a lot of my progressive friends do not believe in the virgin birth. They don’t think it’s necessary. And I’m like, that’s cool, but for me, I got ahold up to this. Yeah, I know it doesn’t make sense to me, I don’t need to explain it, but I need to hold on to this and that’s gonna resonate with me. 

I have a friend who was questioning resurrection and I’m like, cool, but for me, if I question resurrection, everything I’m holding on to will fall apart, you know, because for me, the resurrection is the driving engine of Christianity. So, I have my non-negotiables that I hold on to dearly and some of them will call those things a bit conservative and I’m like, okay, but it works for me. 

And so, that’s how I move forward and, you know, like, everything else, I might believe something in one season and then I might hear someone argue a very good counterpoint. I’m like, you know what, that makes more sense and I might go that way. But the Nicene creed is where that is not negotiable to me. I’m gonna hold on to that till the day I die. But you can ask me to explain it and I’m gonna say sometimes faith doesn’t need to be explained. We need to live in the mystery, so let’s just reside in the mystery of this and move on. And I know for some people, that doesn’t sit right with them because they want to have answers, but I’m like, well, good, you figure it out. This works for me.

B:          If you’re enjoying the Leaders Way podcast, you might like to join us in person as a Leaders Way Fellow. The Leaders Way at Yale is a certificate program exploring spiritual innovation for faith leaders. The Leaders Way at Yale combines the best of divinity school, retreat, and pilgrimage. Fellows meet in person at Yale for a week over the summer, then continue their learnings and mentor groups online. You can also take an online course or workshop with us here at Yale. Our learning space for faith leaders is hopeful, practical, and imaginative. Learn more on our website at berkeleydivinity.yale.edu. Clergy and leaders from every country, denomination, and seminary background are warmly welcome to join us for all of our programs. Now, back to the show. 

B:         I’d love to talk about the book. It came out a few years ago now, but When the Saints Go Flying In is terrific. I’ve begun reading it and it’s funny, not surprisingly. It has a characteristic Joseph Yoo humor, but what I love about it is you’ve got Vincent van Gogh, you’ve got contemporary figures, you’ve got stories. Tell us the story of the book. How did it all come together? What was that writing process like for you? 

J:           Yeah, I had like four stories that I wanted to share. I just didn’t know how, and I figured if I got those four stories in, the others would come out, but there was no way to like connect them, and I was sitting on like stories about my son and Vincent van Gogh and all the stories for like a couple of years, and it wasn’t until I became an Episcopalian. I went to my first clergy conference and we were sitting around the table, and since I was new, they were getting to, you know, we’re getting to know each other, and then one of the priests asked me, “Who’s your favorite saint?” and I looked at them, I was like, “Is that a thing?” and then the whole table, they’re like, “Yeah, so everything on the table told me their favorite saint,” and I was like, “Oh,” and because, you know, again, from the context I grew up, Catholicism was a sin, right? Like, like every Catholic is going to hell because of the saints, because of the way that they treat saints and whatever. So I was like, “Whoa, what is this?” So then I started looking at—

B:         Here at Berkeley Joseph, just to give you perspective, it’s hot. It’s been Halloween lately, right? And so, so many students dressed up as their favorite saints, and there was one group of folks, I think they were like five students, and they all dressed up–your evangelical roots are gonna shake when you hear this–but they dressed up as Marian apparitions. One was Our Lady of Lourdes, the other was Our Lady of Guadalupe, we had Fatima, it was fantastic. 

J:           That’s hilarious. So I was like, “Well, I need to find a favorite saint so that I could answer this question,” and so I started looking at some saints, and I was like, “Wait a minute, I found the Saint Catherine of Bologna, or–” Or Sienna, yeah. Or Sienna, how she was really into the arts, and I was like, “Wait a minute, I can use this story to tell the Vincent Van Gogh story that I’ve been sitting on,” and then I was like, “Okay, so what can I use?” And that’s how it started, and in doing so, I picked about nine saints that I kind of resonated with, but more nine saints who actually used their story to tell the story I really wanted to tell. Couple that together, and no one wanted to buy it, so I went to self-publishing/indie publishing company route, and this was a passion project, and I just wanted to– I just wanted to want to know what it was like to write an entire book, and it wasn’t as romantic as I thought it was.

You know, when I had the four or five chapters I had in mind, that was great, because you’re writing and writing and writing, and those come out, and then you have to fill out five more chapters, and you have nothing, and so this cursor just blinking at you, taunting you, saying, “You got to think of something, you’re going to meet with your publisher in a week, and you got your editor in a week, and you got to give them something,” and also, I thought that maybe if I bought, like, Saint Francis wine while I was writing about Saint Francis, that would help, but no, drinking wine and writing does not help. I woke up the next morning, and I was like, “What did I write?” and I had to delete everything. 

B:         Oh my gosh. Well, is there a favorite story from the book, or one of your favorites that comes to mind that you want to share to give folks a flavor of kind of the storytelling? 

J:           The last chapter is about my son, who’s a saint to me. So, he’s autistic, and he was in a special ed class. This was when he was in fifth grade, and there was one particular student who was very grabsy when she got excited or angry or any kind of emotion, she would just grab and scratch, not intentionally, and a couple of times with Daniel, my son would come home with scratch marks on his arm, and of course, we’re like, “We understand the situation, but it doesn’t make us feel good.” So, my wife and I were like, “Okay, you know, we’re both Asian. Let’s teach him some martial arts that we remembered, because, you know, like, being an Asian, you have to take some kind of your martial arts as you’re a kid, as a rite of passage.” So, you know, we’re just teaching Nathaniel, just like, “you know, if this girl comes at you this way, you know, just do this or do that, or, you know, like wax on,” and kind of be like, really, like, digging into our pop culture stuff, too. And so, we modeled it to him, so my wife was, you know, like, student, and I was gonna be him, and it’s like, “this is what happens, you just gently push the hand that way, and then, okay, and it’s your turn, Nathaniel, what would you do if this girl is coming after you?” And he goes, “I give her a hug, because I love her.” 

And both, both my wife and I are looking at each other, and this is such a, like, here’s two ordained clergy trying to teach our son self-defense or whatever, and our son’s response was, “No, I love her, I’m gonna hug her.” And I was like, “That’s what makes him a saint.” So, it’s just, just like, little things where I realized that a lot of our faith journey isn’t about the big grand moments, it’s about the small things that happen in ordinary spaces that really, really resonate with … that stays in with me for long, for the rest of my life. 

B:         Right, right. And I also know you use the story of Saint Dymphna to talk about mental health. I wonder if you’d share a little bit why that was an important story for you to tell, especially, gosh, at this moment in time. 

J:           You know, I was, I majored in psychology, so I wanted to be a psychologist, I wanted to be a therapist, so that was part of it, too. But I also grew up thinking that prayer is enough, right? That’s what we tell people, or that’s what churches, if you pray hard enough. And it took me a long time to realize that, you know, God calls people to certain things, right? You know, Paul says, you know, to prophets, to teachers, and we have therapists and psychologists because God called them to be such. So I really wanted to do my part in letting people know that it’s okay to have Jesus and a therapist. It’s okay to pray and go to a therapy, go receive therapy. 

And that, I’ve been doing that for about, you know, like, since 2017, since I was in Santa Barbara, and we were working with college students and a lot of mental health issues there. And then, funnily enough, starting in February of 2024, was the beginning of this headbutt between myself and the institution. So much so that on Holy Week of 2025, I was diagnosed with moderate depression. And I was like, “Perfect timing, God, because Holy Week is not busy enough.” Now, I’m glad that I was doing all the, you know, being open about trying to destigmatize mental health because once I was diagnosed, of course, I naturally felt the shame and, “Oh, you know, we’re Korean, we’re supposed to suffer. There’s no such thing as depression.” You know, that kind of like ego and pride. 

But turns out, I was, you know, like my wife talked to me, you know, saying, “It’s okay, you know, like, we got you,” and all that stuff. So it was, maybe God was preparing me for this moment. I don’t know, but I’m just, I would have– it would have been really bad if I was like anti-mental health and then this happened, but it flowed naturally into my story. And I joke about it now, it’s like, now, you know, it’s like the Hair Club for men. Not only am I, you know, I’m also a client, you know, not only do I talk about mental health, I’m also dealing with it too, you know, I’m on antidepressants and all that stuff. 

So I think it’s really, really, really important for us to be open with that because a lot of us clergy go through lots of mental strain that it would help if we swallow our pride and go see someone. A lot of our church members are not okay and they need to know that it’s okay to not be okay and that you’re not alone. And the more we hide behind platitudes and faith and say, “Oh, you know, you just need to go to church, you just need to pray harder,” that causes more harm. And doubly so, like, I am very well of my limits and how I can help someone and I am not a therapist nor am I ever going to try to be a therapist. I would, you know, people, you know, we will have meetings and they’ll share something. I’m like, “You need to go see a therapist. I can’t– this is beyond what I can do. But you know what I can do for you? After your therapy appointment, let’s come. We’ll walk and talk and, you know, like, we’ll talk, we’ll break that down. But I recommend you to go see a therapist because that’s– because if I try to do it, we’re going to mess both of ourselves, you know, I’m going to mess you up, I’m going to mess me up, and it’s going to be bad. So let me help with the processing part of it, but with the heavy lifting, you need to go see someone.”

And so, you know, like, pastors need to do that more because we are not trained counselors. I took– my seminar required two classes of pastoral counseling and blessed– I mean, I’m not saying anything bad about my professors, but those kind of things you learn on the go. There’s nothing that you learn on books and in classrooms that prepares you for the– you know, I’m sorry for the craziness that’s in this world and some of the things that our parishioners carry. For instance, one time I got reamed for wearing a wrong color tie by a parishioner, and it’s like, “What the– what? This is not–” And, you know, like, I was old enough, mature enough, to be like, “This is not about me and my tie. Let’s break this down.” And then it turns out, I had offended her a lot a year ago. Instead of talking to me, she held it in and held it in and held it in and just grew and grew and grew, and the tie was what set her off. You know, like, no one prepares you for that. 

Pastoral counseling class– I shared this recently in the ceremony, like, people told me that I was going to be a shepherd when I said I am going to be in ministry. Not a single soul, not even pastors themselves, told me that these sheep bite. They have teeth. (Laughter) And sometimes they bite and the bites go away. It’s just a little nip, it’s a nibble. Other times, they bite and leave a permanent scar. No one told me that. And not even my pastoral counseling class has talked about, like, just how broken people are. And nor did they talk about how sometimes pastors end up– clergy end up being the spiritual punching bag of their parishioners, right? Because they’re so angry at God, they don’t know how to release this, and they see you as a clergy, you’re the closest thing to God, so they take their anger out on you. And if you’re not aware of that, you also bite back, right? And then it starts to get toxic. So, like, therapy is important for everyone. 

And I’m glad I had a chance to put it out there in print, and I’ve been openly talking about it. I first talked about it for selfish reasons because I realized the more I talked about it, the less stigma it had– like, the less it made me feel like I’m different. And so, on one hand, you know, it’s making me feel better. On the other hand, I’m trying to normalize as much as I can that, “Hey, look, I believe in God. I believe I am a disciple of Christ. I, you know, like, I’m a professional Christian in the sense that I’m being paid to be one, and I have a therapist. I see a therapist once a month, and I’m on a low dose of Zoloft, but I’m with you.” And nothing of what I just shared makes me less of a child of God. 

So, and that’s just– I just want people to know that you can struggle and still be a God’s beloved. In fact, that’s who you present yourself as, God’s not going to accept that because God just wants who you are and nothing more and nothing less. So, that’s one of the reasons why I felt like, you know, more clergy need to talk about trying to destigmatize mental health and I should be– I shouldn’t just tell the clergy that I should be the one doing it too. 

B:         Oh, thank you for talking about that. I know so many folks still, even in this moment, I think we’ve come a long way with the destigmatization of mental health, but I know that’s like a burden of shame that a lot of folks still carry, especially seminarians, priests, folks in ministry. You know, there’s this old kind of inner critic that lives inside of us that says that I failed, right? A person of deeper faith, a wiser person, right?–wouldn’t be holding this. 

J:           You know, like the– I got the call and I was like, “Oh my God, what am I doing wrong? What have I done wrong?” Like, the first thing is what’s wrong with me. In fact, after I got diagnosed, I had an emergency therapist session with my therapist and as I was walking out, he says, “Joseph, you’re not broken.” And I was like, “Okay? I’ll take your word for it.” Because, you know, you can’t help but feel like you’re less than. But thankfully, with my wife, she let me know and I do have to admit, I haven’t told my parents yet. I didn’t know how to approach it. My parents don’t speak English very well, so they don’t follow me on social media. And I was like, “I should tell them.” And then there was a perfect one to tell them and I chickened out and now that moment’s passed. So I don’t want this to be my therapy session, but part of it is also the Asian community, immigrant community doesn’t understand mental health, whatever. And so part of it, I don’t want my parents to ask silly questions that I don’t want to deal with. And two, I think the bigger thing is I don’t want to burden them with this knowledge because I’m okay. I’m okay now. So that moment has never come up, so my parents don’t know. So there’s still a little bit of like some kind of shame or whatever you want to call it where I’m not too terribly comfortable telling my parents. 

But in 2025, it is still very, very prevalent. I think someone sent me a video of a pastor saying that you just need to pray more. Like, yes, you know, like a prayer requires action. Like when you apply for a job, you don’t just pray for a job, you pray and go apply for jobs. When you pray for healing, you also pray and go to your doctor meetings. And when you pray for your mental health, pray for your mental health, but also go see professionals to help you with your mental health challenges because that’s what God called them to be. 

B:         Well, and I think you bring up a good point too about, you know, never sharing about your depression probably isn’t so healthy. Always sharing about your depression. David Isn’t healthy either. You know, so I think there’s some discernment, you know, that all of us can use around like, who can hold this and, you know, is this telling? Is this sharing for me? Is it for them? You know, what does this serve? And yeah, there’s no formula, there’s no one right answer. So, I mean, that’s a good reminder. 

One of the things that I’m curious about, if we could change gears a little bit, because it’s really unique to your ministry, you know, again, as we say, look at Andre the Giant’s wrestling belt behind you, the references to pop culture. I think that was first what caught me on social media. I was like, “Who is this dude? Oh, he’s a priest. Oh, he is like so conversant in pop culture. I’m loving this!” Right? And it’s part of what makes your voice so unique. And I mean, I suspect it’s just totally natural and authentic for you, right? Tell us about this.

J:           I actually told a story in the book. I called my mom when Princess Diana passed away because I was so shocked, and it was on all the channels. So, I called my mom at church. 

B:         Right—1997? Something? Yeah, mother Teresa died the same week, right?

J:           Yeah. I was thirteen, fourteen or something; yeah, I was a teenager. Yeah, and we didn’t have a cell phone. So, I know my mom was at church. So, one, I interrupted her at church. So, that’s a big no-no. And I was like, “Princess Diana died.” And she’s like, “Joseph, worry about the stuff that, you know, like, don’t worry about that kind of stuff.” And I was like, “Oh, okay.” Turns out, that was her fault. I became obsessed with pop culture. I think if I pinpoint it, it’s from that point on where I started being obsessed. And so much so, like, pop culture, sports culture, I think I know more about, I think I could recite some random facts more than I can name the 12 disciples.

I know I can name you the starting 11 of the 1994 defense of San Francisco 49ers, but I cannot tell you all 66 books of the Bible. 

B:         Oh my gosh. 

J:           But I’m just, you know, I like it too much. I love celebrity gossip. I used to watch all the E-news and Entertainment Tonight and all that stuff. And it’s just, I love TV shows. Basically, I love everything that my parents had, like, really, really wanted to beat out of me, both figuratively and literally. 

B:         Like, “Love Island” style? 

J:           Not so much anymore. We used to watch “Vanderpump Rules”, “Real Housewife”, but we got rid of cable. Once we cut the cord, it was kind of hard to keep up. But the one thing I do keep up with is my reality show– is WWE wrestling. But also, it turns out that it helps me stay “relevant”. And part of it was also, you know, I was a youth pastor for over 10 years. And in order to get to, like, to just understand what the kids are going through, I read the whole “Twilight” trilogy because my junior high girls were talking about it. And I fully believe, in what Rob Bell once said in this big, like, “Everything is spiritual”, that everything is spiritual. There is no, we try, I grew up, you know, trying to separate the secular world and the spiritual world. Like, my youth pastor would say, “Oh, if you listen to U2, you should listen to “Jars of Clay”. And I’m like, “No, because “Jars of Clay” is not U2!” You know, like, I’m listening to U2 because it’s U2, not “Jars of Clay”. And I realized, like, it’s also kind of, like, arrogant because we’re saying that God can’t reside in this area, right? It’s secular, so God’s not here, God’s only here. And it’s like, No, we have that beautiful song. Where can I go to flee from your presence? God is everywhere, so everything is spiritual. 

And I feel like you can use anything to tie it into faith. One of the most recent videos I did was my son was flipping through Youtube because he can’t watch anything for more than 30 seconds. And for–somehow, someway, he landed on the ending of a Sabrina Carpenter skit, the Saturday Night Skit where they did the bingo. 

B:         Oh, it’s so funny. 

J:           And then she’s saying off key and I was, you know, on purpose. And I thought to myself, “Man, if we only saw that clip of Sabrina, everyone would think that she’d be a horrible singer.” And I’m like, “Wait!” And so, and I made a video about context; of how scripture is need to be read in context, because if you just look at Sabrina for this one second clip, you could assume that she’s a horrible singer. But if you know the context that, “Hey, where was this being performed? Oh, a show called Saturday Night Live? What is Saturday Night Live about?” It’s about satire. They’re satirizing and they’re making fun there. And you’re like, “Oh, this is a performance.” So then, you know, 3000 years later, you come into this, you can conclude based upon all the context that Sabrina was playing a role and was supposed to be satirizing. And we need to do that with the Bible, you know? Like you take out one verse or half a verse, you can’t make your entire agenda about that one verse because you have to know the context. It’s important to know why it was written, who was written, because it makes you help you, it helps you understand it better. 

When I talk about relevancy and being and resonating with people, for whatever reason, the mind of my colleagues go to, “Well, we don’t want to water down the gospel.” I’m like, “Who’s watering down the gospel?” I’m not saying that you can do whatever and it’s just saying, “Here’s how the gospel can meet you in your life right now.” And, you know, like people know Sabrina Carpenter, let’s leverage that to teach something about how to approach the Bible. Do I think I’m watering around the gospel? Absolutely not. But for those who are, who do think that, you know, a lot of times they have a hard time connecting with people because they’re so insulated by their spirituality.

B:         It seems to me what you’re doing really powerfully is you’re building bridges, right, between people’s everyday experience or between pop culture and a sacred text, right, and the gospel. And of course, the Latin word for priest is just “pontifex.” It’s “bridge builder.”

J:           I did not know that. I should have known that. Yeah, right. 

B:         So, of course, what we’re doing here in ministry is we’re building bridges, and of course, at the end of the day, really, there’s no separation, right? There’s just the world and the gospel falls in the middle of it and God loves the world and our ministry is, you know, to continue that love. But, I mean, to use your example of, you know, sacred and secular music, Jars of Clay versus U2, you know, I’ve just been absolutely moved by Bono’s autobiography, right? And of course, nearly the whole band grew up in a youth group, right? And the pastor told him, “You cannot make rock and roll music. It’s antithetical to the gospel,” right? And so, they sat down, Bono and the Edge and said, “We’re done. That’s it. We’ll put this away. We want to follow Jesus.” And they had already signed their music contract, right? And so, they’re like, “We’re stuck. Well, we’ll make this one record and then we’ll go back to following Jesus.” And then, of course, what they discovered is, you know, along with success and fame and the rest of it. 

J:           They reached more people then they could ever have reached. 

B:         They built the bridge, right? Yeah. Yeah, yeah. So, I love the bridge building that you’re doing. 

J:           And this might be very generalizing and if you like probe it, it might fall apart. But I think that what’s the opposite of the gospel is fear and certainty. And, you know, like, when we’re so adamant about it being a certain way, I think that’s more the opposite of the gospel than trying to find Jesus in a rock-and-roll genre or whatever, you know? So, but it works for me. And I’m also very well aware that some people feel really, really uncomfortable when you bring in. I got a couple of emails saying, “Oh, did you have to use Sabrina Carpenter? She’s so overly sexualized.” And I was like, “Well, that sounds like more of a you problem than me.” But, you know, so it’s just finding what works for you and moving forward the way that God has created you. 

B:         Yeah. I wonder before we go, if you talk a little bit about your ministry and social media, it’s how most folks know you. Can you talk about that journey? What was it like to start out? What’s the process of creation like for you? Are they going to take us behind the scenes a little bit? 

J:           Yeah. I still don’t know how this all happened. I got on TikTok because during the pandemic because all the kids at my former church and all the people under 20 were talking about it. I was like, “What is this TikTok?” I downloaded it, made an account, and then six videos in, I got hooked. You know, like it’s so addictive. And then I was in one of my scrolling sessions, I ran across a video from a pastor who was talking about, and I actually got to meet, we’re friends now. A pastor from Oklahoma, Jeremy Coleman. And I saw his video and I was like, “Wait a minute. You can do that here?” 

So I started trying to, you know, make my own video just to see what it’s like. You know, I think one of the first videos I ever posted was when I was long boarding through the sidewalk near my church and having a, you know, selfie stick. And then I remember this incident I had at Spex years ago. Spex is a national, like, liquor wine store. Okay. And there was a miscommunication of sorts, but I decided to kind of like, make it funnier and told the story that I walked in with my caller on and the cash register said, “Oh, we don’t usually see your kind here.” And immediately, I thought she was talking about my, you know, my ethnicity and I was getting really upset and I realized I was wearing a collar and she meant “we don’t really get”– and that was my first viral video. 

And then from then on, I was like, “Okay, let’s just continue to do– talk about the way that I want to talk about the Bible.” And it just grew from there. And now it serves as a creative outlet that I can’t use in church, right? Like, there’s some topics that I can’t preach from, only because it’s so controversial and preaching is a one-way– it’s not a dialogue. It’s me telling you something that I believe God has placed in my heart. So, you know, like, real controversial subjects, I don’t like to preach from the pulpit because I know that people disagree and I want them to feel like they can voice their disagreement. So, you know, we’ll have Bible study sessions on those things but on my social media account, I don’t care. I’ll just say whatever I want, I could delete all the– like, so it now has served as an outlet of creativity that I can’t use in church and it’s a hobby. And once it feels like a job, I’m gonna stop but for now, it’s basically, you know, I have a– I have some of whatever– Sunday morning is just a quick, like, a 90-second version of my entire sermon and then I try to post two more times throughout the week and it’s whatever– whatever seems– some– I have– I have scripts that– oh, and my biggest recommendation is to use the teleprompter app that goes on the screen. That’s– people ask, “Do I have the whole thing memorized?” I’m like, “I’m reading right off the screen.” 

I have a bunch of scripts that are in reserve just in case I’m out of ideas and I need– feel like I need to post something, and sometimes, you know, like the Sabrina Carpenter thing where I– where one thing hits, I’m like, “Oh, wait, I need to– I need to write this down before it goes away.” But the big boom in Instagram happened this year and finally, after four years being on social media, people are slowly finding my church and they’re slowly coming in because … people think that once you get viral whatever, people come in– no, it took four years for people to– Four years. To come in. Now, we have a study of, like, one new person on average a Sunday, and that’s because they found me and they were in town or– and out of all those people that visit, maybe less than ten have stayed. So, you know, like, we’re not doing a good job of retaining. 

But it’s just– yeah, it just serves as a way to be creative, talk about things I want to talk about, reach certain people and I never would have imagined that I would have gotten this notoriety as I’ve done– as I’ve– I still don’t understand it, my wife doesn’t understand it and I’m like, “Why me?” 

Like, I– but I’m glad that it happened to me in my 40s rather than– if this was in my 20s where I was very egotistical and I wanted to save the world, and I want to change the world, I wanted the bishops to pick me to pick– to speak at the big conferences because I had the answers. Had this happened to me during then, I– I’m done, you know? Like, I’m no longer useful to God. But I’m turning 45. I feel silly trying to chase algorithms so, you know, I’m like– I stopped doing that, I just post whatever I feel like, whatever I want, whatever feels authentic to me and– and the biggest joy I get about the big– as big as my platform has gotten is that my friends receive DMs from people that don’t know me about my videos and they text me like, “I– I’m seeing your face without my consent,” you know? And that’s my favorite part, that people are sending them videos and I’m like, “Do you tell them that you know me? Just tell them that I’m a jerk in real life,” and they’re like, “I tried to but they’re like, “There’s no way he can be.” 

And so– but I’m also a type of person that is waiting for the other shoe to drop. I know this isn’t going to be forever. I know that one day I’m going to say something that’s going to be controversial and– and whatever. And so I’m not making anything of it, I’m just enjoying the ride and once it stops feeling– giving me joy, I’m– I’m okay. I’m gonna walk away and– and find something else. But for right now, selfishly, it’s been good for me and I’ve been receiving lots of emails from people all throughout their faith walk and– and just having that– being somewhat of a digital pastor and them sharing really personal stories about their fallout with the church, their fallout with the family,  I feel very honored and blessed that– that they are– they see me as a person that can share that type of story. 

And now this past month, I just hit a limit where, you know, like, now I’m receiving too many of those emails and I’m like, “Okay, how do I– how do I navigate this?” Because I– some of them are really, really– like, I don’t want to leave them on read because some of them are so deep. So if you do send me an email, I will get back to you eventually. Just please be patient. But it has helped me have a .. more reach, and the one thing I am trying to do right now in this season is to offer the idea that there’s another way to worship and follow Jesus and it doesn’t have to be the nationalist way. 

So that’s– that’s my current mission right now is to say that there’s a different– there’s a different way to approach Jesus and it’s not this bullying and cruel, cruel way of dehumanizing everyone that doesn’t fit in your tribe. 

B:         Well, if there’s one thing– we’ll give you the last word– if there’s one thing that you’d like people to take away from your– from your social media account, what’s the message at the center that you hope they hear? 

J:           Yeah, um, I stole this from Andy Stanley. It’s been our church’s slogan but I never really give Andy Stanley– I’m not like I know him, but he once said, “Everybody matters to God even if God doesn’t matter to them.” And the one thing I want people to walk away with: You matter to God even if God doesn’t matter to you. 

B:         Well, thank you so much for your ministry. In real life, online, of course it’s all real life and we’re just so– you know, we’re so moved by your innovative way of bringing the gospel into this space. So thank you. Would you– would you bless us and the listeners and the podcast and we will bid farewell through your blessing? 

J:           What we say at church, at Mosaic Episcopal Church, we remind people that love is the only way that we change the world. And we have a little call and response. I’ll say something like, you know, “Go forth in love because first we were loved and now we love.” So my blessing to all of us is, May we continue to go first and forward in love because first we were loved and now we love. 

B:         Joseph, you thank you so much for being with us on the Leaders Way podcast. We’ll see you on the interwebs. 

J:           Yes, sir. Thank you. 

B:          Thank you for joining us today on the Leaders Way podcast, a show for people who are not ready to give up on the world. We hope you found the episode expansive and nourishing. If you enjoyed the episode, please be sure to subscribe, rate, and review the podcast on your favorite platform. Your support helps us to continue bringing you sacred conversations with luminaries, scholars, and spiritual leaders who are dedicated to transforming our world. 

For more information about our guests and to catch up on past episodes, visit our website at berkeleydivinity.yale.edu. Follow the show on Instagram at theleadersway.podcast to stay updated on future episodes and events. Until next time, I’m Dr. Brandon Nappi, walking with you as you lead with courage, wisdom, and compassion.