If you want to talk about anything from this interview or anything at all for that matter, please go to the message board.

NOTE: (From Stephen and Matt) The purpose of this was to interview Scott and get his opinion on things. Not to question what we didn't agree with. We do no necessarily agree or disagree with anything Scott said.

sg = Scott mb = Matt sj= Stephen

sg: Check, check your mama one two.

sj: Were keeping that on tape.

sg: This is Scott; it is 8-5-02 at 8:49 in the evening, fuck 1, 2, and 3. (talking to matt)Did you go on the website this morning?

mb: Which one? gravattville.

sg: Did you read it? It was good huh?.

sj: What was it?

sg: None of your business.

mb: What the second part?

sg: It was there seems to be some controversy to our band name, part 2.

mb: Yeah, it was just talking about how your making people think now because their mad about the name.

sg: Yeah.

[Scott taps on the tape recorder]

sg: Ok, what's the first question?

mb: Are you gay? No, I'm just kidding.

sg: Some tim...oh. Never mind, ok now I'm good.

sj: Did you get that on tape!?

sg: Only with Richard.

sj: Why you did hump me at the beach yesterday in the water?

sg: Richard humped me yesterday, like 4 times. In the water he humped me 4 times.

mb: And you can't blame him.

sg: He grabbed my butt.

mb: Ok, first question, how was your day today and what did you do?

sg: awwoo, what kind of question is that?

Umm, last night I got home at about 1:30AM, couldn't sleep, watched [christopher nolan's film] Following. So I was up to like 3:30AM in the morning, went to bed, got up at 8:00AM because I couldn't sleep again. So I got up, did some stuff on my website, I was on your site, went to daniel miller's site, downloaded the new David Bowie cd, (which is great). Then I ran some errands and bought the book "No Logo". You'll never find it, the whole purpose of the book (and this is so stupid) is anti-consumer, anti-materialist, anti-branding. You know where I found it? In the business section under marketing! That's Crazy. It needs to be in the philosophy section, or the pop culture section, they don't know what they're doing. So then I went home and worked all day, I was so tired. Didn't eat anything all day. I'm having coffee for dinner and here I am.

mb: Ok second question, what are your thoughts and feelings on the band 1984?

sg: I think (these are my thoughts and feelings and their kind of general) local high school punk rock bands are the best thing in the world. I don't like the record industry in the sense that they really exploit the musician so as soon as you get signed, you've sold out--but selling out is not a bad thing, you need to make a living so if someone is going to give you a million dollars so you can play music then you should do it. But, you kind of lose the purity of what a band is all about, which is: hanging out with your friends, playing music, playing gigs, getting nowhere, not making any money and being dirty. It's the best times of your lives and you don't know it, until it's gone. And I like 1984 because instead of just playing bubble gum pop (whether your realize it or not or you want to) there is a message. I'll listen to any music that has meaningful lyrics. If the music is good, I'll listen to it, if the lyrics are meaningful, I'll listen to it and love it. If the music sucks, I won't listen to it. If the lyrics are stupid, I won't listen to it. I can't. Even if the music is good and the lyrics are cheesy, I can only listen to it for a couple of days. But when the lyrics are meaningful, I can listen to it and it doesn't even matter what kind of style it is (except for country, I can't listen to country) Like this morning [for instance], I listened to David Bowie, The Pixies and Bruce Springsteen and old 80's Donnie Darko stuff.

mb: What does the book 1984 mean to you?

sg: This is a good question. George Orwell: do you know what year he wrote that book?

mb: It was like 1948.

sg: 1948, and the book is a prediction of what 1984 was going to be like. He was right, but he was early. It's typical science fiction in that you have this fear of big brother and the government taking over your life with new and crazy technology that you never knew about and in that sense it's good science fiction. But he's got a very spiritual twist on life and his view on the government taking over people is the government imposing their philosophy's on people and it's just as harmful as taking over [for instance] how fast [people are] allowed to drive.

I just spent a week in Washington D.C. and I went to the international spy museum. I paid 11 fricken dollars--it was the only thing I paid for all week. I went to the art museums and it was free but when I go to the spy museum, I had to pay 11 freaking dollars, it's so ridiculous. In the international spy museum they had an American spy satellite online so you sit down on this touch screen and it says "here are your coordinates, go find these 17 mig's [Russian fighter jet's] at an Afghanistan terrorist training camp" so I type in these coordinates and *bam*, the spy satellite takes me to this camp and you can zoom in from 500 miles from the sky, and read the serial number on the side of these mig's. Alright. So I do this and it says this, this is the scariest part, it says "assignment number 2, type in these coordinates, find this man in central park and read the time on his watch" and they give you a picture of him, so then I find him and I can read the time on his watch. So now, you realize, there's a guy in Washington D.C. that can read the time on your watch when your sitting down in central park. He can read the letters that your mom wrote you as your reading them in central park and you can't even see the camera because it's 500 miles from the earth. That's weird huh? They can't angle it into windows but they can follow you for the rest of your life and watch what you do and nail you for whatever they want to nail you for. So in reality, if they want to put you in jail, they could because all of us--when were about 30 year old, we'll all do something wrong [eventually] and there's always some reason they can pull you over, as long as they watch you long enough, no one can live under the law that long. So George Orwell predicted that in 1984 that they were going to launch satellites into space but he didn't predict the video cameras, he predicted audio: that there would be microphones in the satellites and that they could hear everything that we were saying. He was wrong because they can't do that but he had no idea they would have camera's. So it's good science fiction, but long story short, it's the government imposing their philosophy's on people and it's going to happen and if you look at it right now, it is happening.

sj: Do you think that's basically what the church has done?

sg: If you use it as a metaphor (which [in all fairness] George Orwell didn't mean to do), for how the church [leadership] deals with their congregation, then yeah, 100%. I mean if you think about it spiritually, no one has any authority over anybody else, no one's supposed to on earth, that's the whole point of judged not, less you be judged. No one has this spiritual authority over someone else unless you give it to them. Like if I gave you spiritual authority over me, that's like a positive thing, you can hold me accountable, you can call my actions into question, but I gave that authority to you and that's not right for anyone to take it, and if I give it to you, I can take it away whenever I want to. That's part of what freedom is all about. I'm going to govern my own spiritual life. I'm not stupid enough to do it by myself. I have people that I can trust that can say that kind of stuff about me but at any given point if I don't like their judgment or trust their judgment, then I can just take it right back from them, and you can't do that in the church. By going to the church your saying that, ok, this group of people have spiritual oversight over me and they can impose any sort of ridiculous rules and regulations and if I don't obey them, then I'm not deemed to be "spiritual enough".

mb: What are some of your favorite movies and why?

sg: dang, ok. I have a quote on my website and I'm not going get it right so go there and get it, it's by George Muller, and he [basically] says that "the makers of the cinema have become the priest for our generation" [now] A priest is someone who stands between the people and God and he's a go between, he goes to God for the people and to the people for God, that was what a priest was supposed to be. And the guys that are making movies today are doing that better than the church. They are bringing God to the people, the church isn't bringing God to the people, they are bringing God to the Christians. A person that makes a movie is able to take concepts like holiness, or God, or faith, or anything like that and put it in the middle of a story, tell the story in a beautiful way and when you walk away, because of the way it was told, you come away with a message.

Now, that's why I like Fight Club. The whole message of Fight Club is that life in American in the 20th century, just by virtue of living in this country and in this time, is draining. The constant barrage of advertising completely makes your life avoid meaning. From the second you were born, you were taught to consume, to buy things, to appreciate brands and buy them based upon how cool they are and not on how good the quality is of the product. That's entirety of American life. If you think about it, most people wake up in the morning, they go to work so they can make money so they can buy things that they can't really afford so they can impress people that they don't really like. And they don't just do it, they do it their whole entire life and then they die. There's something wrong. And the whole point of Fight Club is [to] "wake up". You're working your life away to buy things and there's no meaning or purpose in that whatsoever. It's one man's journey to break away from that mold and to say that I'm not going be defined by my job, I'm not going be defined by the clothes I wear or the things that I buy. And he's really spiritually honest and he says, "America has spiritually killed me, I'm dead." and I don't know how to wake up and I've tried everything I could try. Except getting my ass beat. I've never tried that before so he says ok, "I want you to hit me as hard as you can". The whole point is if this doesn't wake me up, then nothing will. Now that's his epiphany, but for other people it could be something different like watching the movie Fight Club could wake you up. But the point is: you have to take extreme measures to actually live, not just to walk or exist day to day, whatever it takes to break out of that cycle. People are trying; they jump out of airplanes, snowboarding, the whole extreme sport thing, it's people just trying to wake up and live their lives and in that sense it's a good thing. But I don't think it's working because as soon as you find something cool like skateboarding, it wakes you up, but as soon as it becomes cool, all these companies like Nike put their brand on it like the X-Games and oversell it and all of a sudden it's just like everything else. And it loses the power to wake you up.

Favorite movie was Fight Club. Just for that reason.

Another favorite movie of all time, Hedwig [and the angry inch]. Because it was just ridiculous. It was just a ridiculous story and the music was really good. I liked Memento and I liked it because it's a good metaphor for life. If you see life as going from point A to point B then it just doesn't work like that, because life's a series of circles on levels and you may live a certain segment of your life out of order. Life's not so pretty that you can just break it up into nice little pieces and chunks. Unfortunately, some people didn't get the privilege of having sex with someone that they are really committed to and loved. They were tricked into having sex when they were 12. So they had to grow up quicker than they wanted to grow up. They didn't get to live their life in the order that it should have been lived so in that sense a movie like Memento is true to life. It puts life out of order and it teaches you to think not in a linear fashion about everything, not from A to B. I don't know, there's probably another 5 or 6 movies.

mb: What about Donnie Darko?

sg: Hold on, I'll get to Donnie Darko. When I was 13 years old, my dad left when I was a really small kid and I got a step-[father]. Out of his mind. He's still my step dad today, he's name is Steve and I love him to death. This is what he made me do. I'm 13 years old, he thinks [to himself] that I don't know enough about the world culturally as he does, like he introduced me to Led Zeppelin and Black Sabbath and rock and roll and [since] I've never seen some of the cool movies that he's seen while he was growing up so he decided to that I needed to see some of these movies. Back to back on 3 days, he makes me watch, Deliverance, Deer Hunter, and the Exorcist. I'm 13 years old right, scared the hell out of me. I couldn't go to sleep. I wouldn't sleep in my bed. How is that making a 13 year old watch the Exorcist? it's like a mind game! But he gave me appreciation for movies because I realized that someone could take a camera and make a movie that would just scare the death out of you.

sj: My dad took me to see that too.

sg: The Exorcist? When did he take you?

sj: When I was probably 16 or 17.

sg: Scares the hell out of you doesn't it?

sj: If you believe in it.

sg: Yeah, dude, there's scene where a little girl has a crucifix and she's stabbing it into her vagina and saying f* me Jesus, f* me Jesus. Your 13 years old and your watching this. I've never been so scared in my life. But it woke me up and made me realized that movies are the coolest thing in the world. But then when I became a real fundamental Christian, I didn't go to Rated R movies and I missed out on so many movies at the time. All the 80's movies, I missed out at the time.

sj: Have you seen Ferris Bueller's Day off?

sg: I saw it like 3 years ago. How bad does that suck. The church completely deprived me of Ferris Bueller's Day off. Crazy.

mb: Why do you think the church made you feel that these movies are bad to watch?

sg: Because they have curse words, nudity, and devious behavior but that stuff isn't necessarily bad, to see that stuff. I mean I see it everyday, I see it all the time and seeing it in a movie just makes the reality of the point all the more drawn home. It makes it feel like it's a more real life situation. Have you ever seen those crazy Christian movies about the end times? They don't make any sense because they don't feel real. No one [in the movie ever] says, "Holy Fuck, here comes the anti-Christ"! You know what I mean? But [that's] exactly what I would say if I saw him walking down the street. But [in those Christian movies] don't say that kind of stuff. They just say, "oh man I'm scared", I mean come on, you don't say that kind of stuff Kirk Cameron!

mb: We had this guest speaker at youth group and the whole time he was basically telling us how he went to go see Titanic and he was mad that he saw it because there was nudity in it and he kept telling us not to go see movies like that.

sg: Ok, if I went to [your] Youth Group, I would tell you not to go see Titanic because it sucked.

It took one of the biggest epic story's of the last 100 years and turned it into a soap opera with Kate Winslet. What the hell is that? Do you know the epic story of the Titanic? This is important because this has a lot to do with the church:

The Enlightenment was a period of history where people in a sense came out of the dark ages, out of a time, where they really didn't understand the world or science. And they started to begin through science to understand things like vaccines, medicines, great literature, great art. That period of time is called the Enlightenment. Basically what happened [soon afterwards] was people got cocky. They thought they knew everything. They understood that the world wasn't flat, it was round, and what the Enlightenment led to was the Modern Age or Modernity. The Enlightenment led to all sorts of different inventions like the car. We learned all this stuff and we built stuff and we took the application of what we learned and we made vaccines so we wouldn't die young and we built ships like the Titanic.

And they basically got so cocky that they relied so much on science that they said "hey, were at the top of the food chain, we do not need God anymore". [Before the] Titanic sank, there's a quote in the newspaper that says, " ..... not even God could sink this ship ..... " and then the freaking ship goes down, that's the story of the Titanic. It is that Modernity doesn't work and that you can't invent things and you can't reason your way out of God, He has to be there and He has to exist and you have to rely on Him no matter how smart you get or how much you learn. That's the story of the Titanic, right? Freaking, they get a hold of this movie with Kate Winslet and they ruin the whole story of the Titanic and ruin the whole point of how important it was that it went down and then you have freaking people going to church and talking about the boob scene. See what I mean. You've completely missed the point. The movie sucks, period.

sj: Just so I can get it on record, did you see Pearl Harbor?

sg: Same deal, same deal.

sj: Exactly, one of the most devastating events in the history of our country and they just turned it into a soap opera, a love story which didn't even happen.

sg: And then you have Christians going around telling people not to see it because it has curse words in it. Christians should be saying don't go see it, you should boycott it because it's shit, and it takes the most important aspect of our time and it belittles it. This is where it's important: Today's church, the modern American Evangelical church, all it did was take the Enlightenment ideals and the whole thoughts of Modernity and applied it to religion, and what you have is this church that took all the great business practices of all the great companies of the 20th century which were influenced by the modern age and the Enlightenment and the church took it and ran with it and now what we have are mega churches. All it is, is Microsoft applied to church. All this talk about core values and leadership structures, and leadership seminars, all it is, is that they took the exact same formula that business took and applied it to the church and here's the clincher:

They point at everybody else and they say "don't be like the world", you shouldn't go to that movie. Why? Beacuse Romans 12:1-2, don't be conformed to the pattern of this world, like you shouldn't go to that movie because it's the world's values.

sj: So then we shouldn't go to church either?

sg: What the hell? You should go to the movies because it [can be] counter cultural and it may wake you up! You shouldn't go to church because you are just being like the rest of the world.

All the church has done is conformed itself to the pattern of the rest of the world. All the church is today is one big modern machine. And as the youth of today, my generation and younger, we never grew up in the modern era, we never saw the transition from horse drawn carriages to cars. We grew up in the digital era, we grew up in the information age, we grew up with the Internet. We grew up with computers and mp3 players. You've never seen an 8-track. We don't know what the older generation knows.

When they look at the church or when our mom and dad look at the church, what they think to themselves is that this the most well tuned and oiled modern machine ever invented and they are so freaking proud of it. When we look at the church, what we think is that is the most well tuned oiled machine ever invented and we hate it.

Were both seeing the same thing, they love it and we hate it. We hate it because it's impersonal, it doesn't apply, it's not one on one, there's no direct transition of ideas. [as it currently stands] It's "I'm teaching it, open up your bibles, listen to what I have to say, go home and apply it to your lives and don't ask me any questions because I really don't want to answer them". And that's how our parents like it. That's how they grew up. They grew up in an educational system like that.

mb: For people who go to church every Sunday and listen to someone preach, do you think it's partly their fault because they don't put their faith into practice for example by witnessing to someone?

sg: Yeah, it's partly their fault because like I said growing up in modern 20th century America, you don't have much of a choice. You're fighting a losing battle.

From the moment you wake up, Nike wants you to buy their shoes. That's just all there is to it. And the whole materialism of growing up in America, dulls your senses to spiritual Enlightenment, to any kind of spiritual truth.

I say this a lot and I really believe it to be true: The worst enemy of Christianity isn't Satanism, it isn't Buddhism, it isn't the movies, it isn't the media. The worst enemy of Christianity is apathy. That's the worst thing you could do is not think, or not care. That will never lead you to Christianity. You get involved in Satanism, you get the pants scared off you, you start thinking about God whether you want to or not. You get involved in Buddhism, you're thinking about God. Heck, you go to an evangelical Christian church, it'll suck like crap, but you think about God once in a while. We grew up in that, we think about God, we care.

But if you grow up in the mall and you go to Abercrombie all your life, and you just spend money at the mall, you never think about God. All you think about is money and things.

The worst enemy of Christianity is the mall. It's apathy. It's becoming a materialist. Materialism dulls you into not caring. So in a sense, from the minute you're born, you don't ever get a fighting chance. You're just taught to consume things, to be a materialist. So in one sense, it's not your fault. You kind of grew up that way, like I said earlier, it's a losing battle.

But there's a moment in your life ( [usually] when your about 13 or 14 years old), where you see the truth, you see the other side, and you either decide to go counter culture and not care about that kind of stuff and you lose your friends and you get depressed, but go looking for God, or you decide that it's not worth it and you [choose to be] lazy and you just kind of fall back to that.

So in a sense, it's half [those church kids] fault, but in another sense, they are 16 or 17 years old and too stupid [and dulled down] to realize that their life sucks. I know they've been told once or twice, they've all seen Fight Club, they've all listened to music that's stirred their emotions. But the problem is they just turn it off because they don't want to hear it. So in one sense, it's not their fault and in another sense, it is their fault. And in one sense I think you can hold them completely responsible because they choose not to wake up.

When I choose to wake up, it got me fired from my job, I had no money and I had a wife and 2 kids. And I looked at the church and I said to myself, you know what, this a crock of shit and I'm not going to work here and I'm not going to be apart of it and I don't like it and I don't believe in it and I'm going to speak out against it and I'm working for the church so I got fired, so I had no job. And in another sense when I realized that my faith [as it was] was a crock, that evangelical faith that I had learned that tells you not to go see movies, that tells you not to listen to Weezer, that tells you not to act like that or to do that, to always wear pants to church, and to have your quiet time everyday like it does something, to read your bible everyday, to sing these praise songs everyday when the songs are crap. You know what I had to do; I actually had to cut everything I ever knew about God. [When I did that] there was a moment, I remember it as clear as day, I didn't want to do it because I knew as soon as I cut that cord, I'm going to go freaking floating off into space and I don't know where I'm going to end up. I could end up never believing in God again, I could end up an atheist. I don't know where I'm going to end up. And I cut the cord to everything I ever knew about God and I tried finding Him in new ways that I've never seen Him before. And then there was a year where life just sucked (or God was not in my life). I had to let that old spiritual self die before I could come back and approach things like God or the Bible or any of that stuff because it's just been shoved down my throat for so long in an incorrect way, that I didn't want it anymore, I didn't care about it, I didn't even want to know it.

Anyone that's in the church today (think about all the kids in your youth group). Anyone of them can do that [cut that cord, and go find God] , but look at the price. Their mom and their dad.

mb: Exactly.

sg: You're going to have to in one sense, step up, grow up and develop your own faith, but there's a tension their because your mom and your dad aren't going to embrace that faith. But it's nothing to be afraid of because it's no different than what they did when they went to Wookstock. It's the exact same thing as they did when they protested or when they smoked pot. I have news for you, your mom and your dad smoked pot, and you know what, they didn't do it because it was cool. They did it because they were trying to experience something, they wanted to learn something spiritually and they smoked pot. And their mom and their dad were from the 50's.

Can you imagine, no offense, but can you imagine Ruth Bubar smoking pot and Betty Sharman finding out? [Editors note: that's just an example, it almost certainly never happened, but the point is that it is a shocking and funny thought that something like that could have happened in those kinds of families.]

That's the exact same tension. For example: right now you see Christianity different spiritually than your parents. But it's nothing to be afraid of because your [the bubar] family has so much love and so much tolerance that your mom and dad are not going to disown you. I mean look at Tim, he's gay and your dad still loves him. Look at Ben, he still lives at home and his mom and dad still love him.

But take some other person, can you imagine if one of those people didn't like the faith that the way their mom and dad were practicing it. They have no choice. You can't deviate, and your stuck in this position where you can't even express yourself spiritually and you [spiritually] die. Because you see what it's going to take to really know God and to really understand God, and your not willing to go there because it's going to isolate you from your friends, it's going to isolate you from Abercrombie, it's going to isolate your from your money, it's going to isolate you from your parents and it's going to get your ass kicked out of the youth group.

sj: I've been waiting for that to happen.

But in the end, you actually get God, and I'm not telling anyone to do it.

sj: I think because of my raising in the church I think that the bible to me is probably the scariest most confusing book that I've ever touched. I'm almost afraid of it.

sg: In one sense you should be.

Everyone Sunday morning, tens of millions of churches, get up and they read from that book. Out of all those churches, how many do you think are afraid to do it? Do you know what the bible calls itself, it calls itself a sword, it calls itself fire. In other words, it could cut your head off. It's deadly, but all we do is freaking read stuff about it, [in kids voice] "a strand of 3 chords, is not easily broken ... we can all be friends forever" [end kids voice]. You know what I mean? It's so cheesy, your not even understanding anything it has to say. Not even getting the point. The last time Jesus went to church, they killed him. No one understands that. The last time Jesus walked into a church, they hung him from a cross. They didn't like what he had to say. Do you think if Jesus went to your church today ..... no wait, ok, do you think Jesus would go to your church today? Not your church specifically but any of these churches today.

sj: Wait; let's be specific, Boca community, no way.

sg: Go back and read in the book of acts about what the church was like. And right away it had problems, there's always going to be problems.

mb: Wait, let's go back to the part where you were saying what God would do if he were to walk into the church. *Scott laughs*

sg: He would look at the bulletin and the first thing he would think is "oh look, no one invited me" because they've had the freaking thing planned out for 6 months, what topic their going to preach, what songs their going to sing, what order their going to do it in. What room does that leave you for the spirit to creatively guide you? What is that? You're just getting together. And the whole reason you get together is so you can pass around a plate and collect money so someone can get paid and lord spirituality over you and tell you to sing these songs and listen to this.

mb: So they can buy shit they don't need too.

sg: Exactly

And when they get that money, what do they do? They buy stuff they don't need to impress people they don't care about with money they don't really have. They're all buying it on a credit anyway. You're buying stuff with money you don't have to impress people you don't really like. You know, and the church is doing it. You think they repave the gym floor for 10,000 dollars because it's going to bring them closer to the Lord Jesus Christ? Hell no! They're doing it so they can attract more people to their school. They have good high quality facilities that attract more people to their school. And when they attract more people to the school, they can get more money. And you know what they are going to do with that money? Guess? Build more high quality facilities. But they're doing it under a guise and you know what, i am sure that there are some really good-hearted people doing it is so they can "preach the gospel". But they've been told that's how you preach the gospel. It has nothing to do with the gospel.

mb: Do you think God is in control of the church?

sg: No. And this is where theological people are going to pick me apart in what I say. I don't think God is in control. I don't think God is in control that the way the church has always told me He's in control. I can't see how God can be all loving and all powerful and then September 11th happens. Ask anyone this question. How can God be all loving after September 11th? And they give you this big thing about free will and how it happens and God still cares about people and see where all still here and only 10,000 people died instead of the whole city of New York. All kinds of stuff. But the bottom line is, it's an atrocity. Look at the holocaust, 12 million Jews died. God is not in control in that sense. He has given man the chance to govern themselves and to rule themselves and we screw the whole thing up and He interjects power but with love. I don't think he interjects and changes things as much as he interjects and adds things to the equation. [September 11th:] If it didn't happen, something else would happen. God interjects and adds love to the situation and adds grace and adds peace. *tape stops* So I could throw this coffee across the room and God is not going to do anything about it. There's no way in the world and you could prove that over and over again, and in that sense God is not in control. Now that doesn't mean God isn't sovereign, people say, "oh God is sovereign" but it's all semantics. Sovereign, it means whatever you want it to mean, it means God's in control but not really. You know what I mean; it's all word play.

mb: But do you think God is in control of your life like he already has your future planned out for you and what's going to happen in your life?

sg: No definitely unconditionally not.

sj: But do you think he knows?

sg: Yeah, I don't think that's exclusive. I think God can be all knowing and all loving. [but not those things and] all powerful.

mb: But doesn't the bible say that he's all powerful and all loving and your saying he's not?

sg: Yep it does and I'm saying one of those things can't be right. Somewhere along the line, were missing a piece of the puzzle. I will say this, the bible does say that God is all powerful and that God is all loving, but I'm saying that there's no way in the world that God is all loving and all powerful and all three of those things are true. They're not mutually exclusive. We just don't know everything. We just don't know how it all works. There is a piece missing that we don't know and you know what, there is a piece missing in everything that we don't know, we just don't know how it works.

mb: So you think God is too big for us to understand?

sg: God is too big to even communicate himself to. When God sent Jesus to communicate himself, it was still confusing. You still don't understand what's going on. Read John 1:1 "In the beginning was the word and the word was God and the word was with God. The word is with God from the beginning" Just what the hell is that? That's how you describe what's going on? Is that not confusing as all get out? How are you calling a person the word, and what does that mean? Were missing a huge piece of the puzzle here somewhere. Not only do we not understand God, [because of our limitations] He cannot communicate. He can't. He is not communicate-able. You can't just communicate Him like that, and that book [the Bible] is like the best we've got but it's like 1/1000th of a percent of what he is.

mb: So when were praying to God, are we really communicating with God?

sg: Yeah, but were so ignorant and feeble, that we just think were talking to God. You do realize that God doesn't speak a language. I mean, you're praying to God in English, someone else is praying to Him in Spanish. People are praying to God in languages they only know and God hears them all because he's above language. You're communicating with your language. He doesn't even need that communication line. He doesn't even need the language. He can read your mind; he can read your heart and your thoughts. He knows everything about you. Prayer is for us, it's not for God. When we ask God to change things, it feels good to say, "hey this is fucked up, would you change it?" but he's not going to change it based on that. It's just [like] therapy for us, it makes us feel good to say it. We have someone to talk to.

sj: It's like an exit door procedure at 5000 feet.

sg: Exactly, it feels good to know that it's there. Your not ever going to jump out of the exit door at 5000 feet, you know what I mean. I don't really pray. I don't ever stop and fold my hands and close my eyes.

sj: You don't ever get down with the rosary?

sg: No, I don't really get down with the rosary but if I were to pray, I'd probably pray like that.

mb: What are some of your favorite books and why?

sg: These two books right here. [Editors note: he's talking about two books on the table that he'll start talking about in a little bit] They are decent books, not like the best freaking books [in the world].

[Editors note: in the background, someone's coffee is being made which makes a loud buzzing noise] I'm going to pause for a minute while that guy's Grande Mocha Decaf Frapacino is getting mixed up.

These books are really important to me. The way that Fight Club woke me up in a social sense, (it woke me up in a spiritual senseas well), but the way it woke me up in a social sense, spiritual, political sense, these books woke me up in a Christian sense. That's what these books did to me. They're scary. They talk about what life is like without the church and what it should be like. And both these guys have been completely isolated from any kind of church whatsoever once they wrote their books.

The first book is by Mike Riddell and it's called "Threshold of the Future". It mainly talks about the decline of Modernity. The Modern Age is coming to an end, dying. The next generation [of people] that are alive right now are completely Post-Modern, post meaning after, and modern meaning the Modern Age. They are completely Post-Modern.

sj: Would you say that the essence of Post-Modernism is apathy?

sg: We'll get to that. These Post-Modern kids can't fit into that Modern framework. They can't fit into that structure. There's a tension there, but it's always been there, that's just the basic generation gap tension. But this is going beyond that because Modernity is coming to an end, and as it dies, everything is dying with it.

Everything that Modernity stands for is dying. Were not going to put up with Microsoft. [they are] in court battles daily because it's people like us that don't want to turn to Microsoft for our computer software. We don't want to turn to McDonalds for a hamburger. We don't want to turn to Nike for our shoes, because for one: their business practices suck and their exploiting people to do them.

So in that sense, when Modernity dies, everything dies with it. Well, what do we think is going to happen to the church? It's going to fight for as long as it can because it's so freaking far behind the times and maybe a 100 years after Modernity dies, guess what? The church ain't going to be here. It's not going to make it. Do you know why? It's not open to change. It's going to hang on to the structure that it's got, and once the rest of the world is gone, and once you are the president, and once I'm 80 years old or even 60 or 50 years old, what do you think going to be left? Were going to be running the world the way we want to run it because everyone else is going to be dead.

The church lives in it's own culture and it's not going to let it die. So were going to be 60 years old, running the world and this church is going to look like a bunch of freaking idiots because they're going to look like their Modern, stuck in the Modern Age and they're going to be saying, "no no no, were not modern, were Christian". You are not Christian. We are Christian. And their going to sit smug, thinking that they are being Christian, but they are not. Thinking they are holding onto the truth's of God's word when they are not. They are holding onto a dead system of the world, and one day, we are going start whatever we think the church is supposed to be, were going to form it, it's going to be what we want it to be, and it might not be that today because your only 16 or 18. What happens when I'm 70 years old and your 50? Oh yeah, it's going be whatever the hell we want it to be, and no one is going say shit about it because they'll be 700 million of us and 20 of them.

mb: And all those old decons [at Boca Raton Community Church] will be dead.

sg: Seriously, they're dying, like everyday they're dying now.

Watch this: you know who's in place of the [dead and dying] decons right now? Our parents. Right, your parents don't believe the same kind of Christianity as those decons do. Those decons are from the 50's man. Think leave it to beaver. That's their version of Christianity. Your parents think the partridge family. That's their version of Christianity. Our version of Christianity, think American Beauty. Think Donnie Darko's family. Look at the family.

Take movies and look at the family structure. Our grandparents think leave it to beaver. Our parents think the partridge family. We think Donnie Darko: You're sitting across the table and you're telling your brother to go "suck a fuck" and the little girl's like, "what's a fuck" I don't know whatever. And so our grand parents are pointing at the movie screen and saying, "whatever happened to father knows best" and your parents are saying, "I don't know if I like that". It's all going change because that's going be the norm. Same thing is happening in the church. There's a 50's version of the church that those pinked robed decons [at Boca Raton Community Church] want it to be. There's a 70's version of the church that your parents want it to be. I got news for you; there is no 90's version of the church because we don't even care. So right now, you parents are taking over for those decons. But what happens when they're gone. You're not taking over for your parents.

sj: I guess the Jones's were cut out of that.

sg: Well, I don't know your family that well. Look at Mr. Lucas taking over the decons. Seriously, do you think Nate Lucas is going to take over for his dad? It's not going to happen. *Scott looks at me* Are you going to take over for Steve [Bubar] ?

mb: No.

sg: Do you think Megan is going to take over for Dan? Maybe. [*everyone laughs*]

sj: And I'm not taking over for pat either.

sg: You see what I mean. It's not going to happen. It [the church] will not be there.

I want to say the names of these books. The first is the "post evangelical" is by Dave T. It talks about how to spiritually live after the evangelical church and "Threshold of the Future" is by Mike Riddell. I read those two books like two years ago and they made me what I am today but I feel like in my journey I'm so far past these books. They still seem kind of Christian to me. But when I read them, they were extremely revolutionary in my life, they were really liberating. So I would totally recommend them to anyone in your shoes. I know from experience and I've met a thousand people like me that have had the same experience reading these books. I see people and their like, "oh you've read that, I'll never go back to church" and in that sense they are banned books. Either you love them or you hate them and people have opinions about them and they know about them.

mb: Ok, what would you say to people who think that since you think different and that you don't want to go to church and they go to church everyday and they think you may be bending the truth or forming some cult, and I've heard people say that they think Impact was a cult, what would you say to these people?

sg: I would say first of all, Impact was kind of a cult. A cult is not a bad thing in a sense. And in a sense in the way they were using the word, it wasn't a cult like that where it's satanic and you have secret rituals. But in a sense it was very cult like because we had our own rules that we lived by and we made them up and everyone lived by them. So if you wanted to be apart of our group, you had to live by our own rules. So in that sense it was kind of cult like but it was necessary. I mean we had to do that kind of stuff because it was the only kind of spiritual life we had.

sj: Do you feel that you've grown from that?

sg: Yeah, I wouldn't give up [that experience] for the world and in that sense, Impact was a cult and everyone [that was criticizing us] was right when they said that. And at the time, I don't even think I saw that [it was cultish], but it was true. But it wasn't a cult in a bad way. I don't think it was a negative thing. And now, I don't have a cult because honestly I'm not trying to organize anything or teach anybody anything. My way is my way.

sj: Do you feel after your alienation from Greg, you've grown more?

sg: Yeah. I think the main difference between me and Greg would be our lifestyle [choices]. We might be in the same place spiritually; we were for a long time. I don't know where he's at now; I haven't been involved in his spiritual life. I haven't really seen or talked to him for 2 years. I would guess that were in the same place spiritually but for me, my spirituality and my lifestyle are too different to actually have friends like that. To me it's a spiritual decision to not make a lot of money. I don't play the lottery because I don't want to win the lottery because I'm afraid it would rob me of my spirituality and I don't care, people don't believe that. They honestly think that I don't make a lot of money because I can't. But like I said, I really don't care what people think. I know what I really feel and for Denise and I, it's a spiritual decision to not make a lot of money and to have all of our free time to travel, and to be with our family. For us, it's a spiritual thing to not buy a house or trade our car in for a new car. [for us] It's a spiritual thing to not buy things. That's just the way we want to live our lives. Anyone else can do it any way they want, I'm sure there's people who have intense spiritual lives and are millionaires. I'm scared to death to do it. I'm not going to go there right now.

[Editors note: We go to Denny's now because Starbucks is closing}

mb: Ok we were at the question of what these people who think that your going a different way with Christianity and not going to church.

sg: I'm not telling anyone to go my way. That's the main difference between where I'm at and where I was. I have no ambition whatsoever to go out and tell people to be like me.

Ambition is your enemy. It is. Just let people do what they want to do. [that] sounds so, I know they are going to accuse me of being spiritually stupid or soft or just going with the times. But what's right for me is right for me and it may now be right for you and what's right for you may not be what's right for me. I don't mean that there is no right and wrong although I don't really think there is. It's my way.

As far as what they're saying about me, I really don't care. I actually have so little respect for people that are in the church ... Actually, I have absolutely no respect for people who just decide to take it [the whole church culture] mindlessly. If they are there for social reasons or they love the people or it has a great social atmosphere or it's something to do or they feel like they get something out of the services. I totally understand, God bless em'. But the people that are their acting as mindless drones are usually the people that are yelling the loudest about me and they are just stupid mindless idiots and then they're yelling about me. But in actuality, I'm refusing to become like that. So the more their yelling about [people like] me, the more I'm like, hey I must be doing something right.

waitress: Hi.

sg: Do you have beer?

waitress: No.

sg: [to matt] No [i'm not being funny] I [honestly] didn't know.

mb: This is a family restaurant.

sg: It's a family restaurant?

waitress: Yes.

sg: Hey, I think beer is a family thing; [although I've found that ]a lot of beer is not a family thing.

waitress: No, would you give your kid a beer?

sg: Sure, not mine though; he's like 4 1/2.

waitress: That's what I'm talking about.

sg: He won't like it though. I've let him try it and he just spits it out, he won't like it till he's 18.

waitress: No that's not ok [being 18 and drinking].

sg: Oh, it's ok. It's ok in Europe. America's backwards.

waitress: Yeah I drank too much when I was young young, but now that I'm 18, 19, I'm over it.

[Editors note: *we all order our food and it's back to the interview*]

sg: So I don't really care what they think. I have so much to do right now. I have a wife and two kids.

sj: A hot wife.

sg: Nothing else matters. I don't care what people think about me. I don't care about the plight of the American Evangelical church. I just don't care [about those things]

mb: What are some of your favorite bands and why?

sg: I'd say 1984 is my all time favorite band. No just kidding. Favorite bands of all time? You know it's hard, I can't really do that. I have favorite albums. Radiohead is probably my favorite band of all time because I like about three of the albums.

mb: Which three?

sg: The Bends, Kid A, and Amnesiac.

mb: You don't like Ok Computer?

sg: Nah, and I like them in reverse order. I like Amnesiac the best and then Kid A is close second.

sj: Matt, which one did you give me?

mb: I don't know, I think it was the Bends.

sg: Does it sound like space opera or rock and roll?

sj: Rock and roll.

sg: Yeah, it's the Bends.

mb: Space opera, I like that.

sg: Isn't that a good description? It's like space opera. I think Radiohead would be one of my favorite bands.

I think U2 would be one of my favorite bands because I like more than one of their albums [as well].

But for the most part, I have favorite albums of all time. Jeff Buckley - Grace is probably one of my favorite albums of all time. Surfer Rosa by the Pixies is one of my favorite albums of all time. You know, some of my favorite albums are soundtracks. Only because the cinema means more to me than music. They mean more to me when they have the story of the movie behind it. I love the Hedwig soundtrack, it's one of my favorite albums of all time. I love the Fight Club soundtrack. The Donnie Darko soundtrack is awesome, it's really, really good.

mb: What do you think of the consumer driven world and the book No Logo?

sg: I haven't read the book yet, but I understand the premise pretty well. I think the consumer driven world just lulls people to sleep and it's the main cause for the spiritual death in America. It's 99% of the reason and it has nothing to do with morality. America is not a dead country because of homosexuality, abortion, sex, the lack of the family. That has nothing to do with why America is a dead country. America is a dead country because of the consumerism, the materialism, the capitalism, and the economy all lead to the death of America spiritually.

mb: Tonight I was supposed to go to a high school camp but instead I'm doing this interview with you and I bet I will learn more by just listening to you then listening to someone preach at church. What are your thoughts on that?

sg: I'm not going tell you what to do. I'm going say what I think of church or I'll tell you what I think of church youth camps.

sj: Well I just want to say something. The reason I might not go at all, well maybe one night if we play, but the reason is because everyone gets together, someone speaks, everyone goes out on an emotional high, and then maybe one week later one person is still thinking about God if at at all. The majority of them there, what happened to them will not affect them at all.

mb: I will admit though, I've heard Eulie, our high school pastor say things like, I don't want people to leave on an emotional high.

sg: Do you have any respect for any of your peers spiritually?

mb: Some.

sg: I mean do you look at any of your peers and think, spiritually, I wouldn't mind being like them?

mb: Very few. I would say most people go to church and think they're good and they have no idea what's going on.

sg: Do you really think that they think they're good?

mb: Yeah, I bet some of them think they're good just because they go to church.

sg: That's so whacked out!

sj: I think Iris is one person I have respect for spiritually.

sg: If you don't go to church or high school youth camps, it's because you decided not to for whatever reason, because you don't get anything out of it, it's stupid, it's socially backwards or you don't like the people or the leadership. And in that sense I can't deny that I've influenced people because I talk about it all the time. But in another sense, I'm not going be responsible for it. I'm not going be responsible for other people's spiritual lives. That's the exact reason I got out of what I got out of. I don't want to be responsible for other people's spiritual lives. I want everybody to be able to make their own decisions. I mean I have to be responsible for my own spiritual life and I can't even control that so I'm not going tell other people how to live or what to do. It's like the exact opposite of the kind of life I'm living. But I get more our of hanging out with friends than I ever got at church.

mb: Likewise. [For clarification: if I'm talking about God and spiritual things with my friends, I personally get more out of that, then listening to someone preach at church. But I'm not saying that I don't get anything when I have gone and do go to church now)

sj: Are you getting something out of tonight?

sg: Oh yeah.

mb: Can you tell me why or what provoked you to start wearing a rosary?

sg: Just for the record, I saw this question and cheated and wanted to answer it. The rosary for me is a symbol of my spirituality that I can wear for everybody to see and in doing so, I can state some pretty simple beliefs before I ever come in contact with people. When someone sees my rosary, they don't think that I don't go to rated R movies, they don't think that I go to church on Sunday, they don't think that I listen to a pastor preach and then I've learned to apply the word of God to my daily life and have my quiet time.

They think that in some sense, I believe that Jesus came, lived, died, and is important to me. So I wear it because it is as far as I'm willing to go with Christianity. I'm willing to say that I believe that the crucifixion was the most important thing that ever happened and ever will happen in human history, ever. And I think it has everything to do with my life today and that is as far as I'm willing to go with Christianity. So when I wear a rosary, I say yeah, I believe in the apostle's creed, I believe in God the father, I believe Christ was His son, I believe that when we die, were going somewhere and I believe there's a Heaven and a hell, and I believe in a holy spirit and that's it. Period, end of statement. I don't believe in anything else. I don't believe in the way that people apply it, but I do believe in it and I feel comfortable with that level of spirituality. That's kind of like the bottom line statement, that's where I'm willing to start and end, no more, no less and I can wear it on my sleeve for everyone to see and I'm proud of it.

sj: So were not just poser's if we want to get one?

sg: You know it wasn't my idea. I did it because I saw Bono wearing it. Bono was wearing a rosary that the Pope gave him and that was a big statement about the Irish, the protestant and catholic killings in Ireland, it was a big deal for him to wear a rosary, especially since it was handed to him by the Pope and him being an Irishmen. So that's why he wore it. I wore it because I thought it looked real rock and roll in a spiritual sense.

mb: Although U2 is a "Christian" band.

sg: U2 is not a Christian band. There's no such thing as a Christian band. In my sense, the music of U2 has more spiritual power than every single church in America combined. People listen to that music and learn more about Christianity than a pastor could ever teach. And there are people that don't consider Bono a Christian. In other words, the only way you can be a Christian is if you look and act like that pastor that says Bono is not a Christian and that is such a load and a crock.

If Bono says he's a Christian, well then he's a Christian. It's just as simple as that. I mean, were talking on the same terms and I say hey, you believe in this and you say yeah, then your in the same boat as I am. And I'm in the same boat as Bono and the stupid evangelical pastor down the street who says he's a Christian. I don't get to choose whose in the group and who's not in the group. I have to live with it just like everybody else does and neither does he, he doesn't get to choose, Bono doesn't get to choose nor does that Pastor get to choose whose in and whose out of the boat.

Here's how I see it and this is another way Scott sees the world and it will make a lot of sense [for you to see] how I'm looking at things. I picture myself standing in space looking down at the earth as if it was a big map. Every single person on the earth is represented by a dot. The red dots are the Christians. The black dots are everybody else in the entire world. When I look at church on Sunday morning, it's all black dots with a little bit of red. When I look at a U2 concert, it's mostly red dots with a little bit of black. I honestly in my heart of hearts believe that. I really believe that the people who love God dearly and are spiritual people in a sense that they think about God continuously and their not lulled to sleep by the rest of the world. I don't think you find those people in the church. At least not from my experience and I've worked in six of them [churches].

I see them [the spiritual people] everyday where I work. I meet them at every concert I go to, or online talking about movies or music, or at bars. I never meet them at church. I'm not saying your a Christian or your not a Christian based on your morals, I'm saying it based on what you believe in a philosophical sense, in a thought sense. You can't be a Christian and not believe that Jesus didn't die on a cross. You can be a Christian and have sex with whoever you want to have sex with, girl or guy. It's not morality, it's not intellectualism. It's more of a philosophical sense; it's more of a worldview. And then you have to back it up with some sincere application of that belief. Because Jesus died on a cross, I'm curious when someone wants to talk about Him. And I meet those people at bars and at concerts, but not at church.

mb: You'd consider this fellowship then?

sg: I'd consider this church.

mb: Was it you who started the band Christian Porn Machine and if so, why and what are your views on the band and what are your goals?

sg: I don't play any instruments. I don't sing and I've never been on stage. Christian Porn Machine is a band started by Daniel Miller, Aaron, and Calvin. It's meaningful rock and roll. We choose the name Christian Porn Machine because of the quote that we apply to the church on how it just whores it's self out to get people "saved", like the gospel is pornography, instead of treating it like art and having meaningful discussions about it. So when I look at the church, I just see one giant Christian Porn Machine. The band isn't a Christian Porn Machine. The church is a big Christian Porn Machine and were pointing that out to everybody.

mb: And then making people think in the process.

sg: Yeah, it doesn't matter whether you love us or you hate us. You're still sitting at the dinning room table talking about Christian Porn Machine. I think that's hysterical. I think that's a reason to live right there.

mb: So this band gives you hope?

sg: Yeah, I see results. I've seen people stop me and ask me, what the heck kind of name is that? When you choose a name like Christian Porn Machine, people get pissed off. But that was the goal because you're thinking again.

Look at it like this, when was the last time the church made you think? You don't even know me and I'm making you think. I mean, wake up, something is going wrong [with the church] here.

mb: So in a sense, Christian Porn Machine can be something like Fight Club where you just want people to wake up.

sg: Yep. The way I make people wake up is I frame it in the most ridiculous and preposterous of situations. Like Fight Club, that's just ridiculous. You don't get beat up to wake up. But when you see that happening on a screen, you think to yourself, holy crap and it makes you think. It's got be radical enough to make you think. People won't listen if I named the band Johnny B. Good.

sj: That'd be a cool name.

sg: People wouldn't really care what I have to say. Were not like U2, who are [already] popular enough to get the message across. So you resort to a gimmick to make people think. You call yourself Christian Porn Machine. You know how many gigs that's got us? Just from the name. And sex is a really funny thing to talk about when you don't really care.

sj: What do you think about our choice to use 1984 as a band name?

sg: I think it's great.

mb: What are your biggest points of disagreement with the modern American evangelical church?

sg: That it's not really a church. It's not a church. It has nothing to do with Christianity. It has nothing to do with the gospel. It has nothing to do with what Christ set it up to be. All it is, is one big leadership structure. The church today is about power and control and authority, leadership, and money; it's not about spirituality.

mb: Is this your belief?

sg: Everything's my belief. This is my experience; this is what I've seen. This is what I've seen working for churches, not just one but all of them at one point. I've actually gotten paid to work at six different churches before I was ever 25. It's about power and control and not spirituality. Let me ask you something. If it was about spirituality, do you think the church would own 25 million dollars of property? That's how much land is worth on N.W. 4th Ave. from Palmetto to Glades. If I gave you 25 million dollars, do you think you would please God by building that building or what would you do with it? It's a pretty simple equation. You'd find people that need 25 million dollars and you'd help out with things like food and shelters and it sounds cliché and it's easy to pick on but we've gotten ourselves into situations where were doing 10,000 dollar renovations and the price of up-keeping a 25 million dollar facility is a shame. It's more money [just the upkeep] than any of us are going to make in 10 years.

sj: Isn't it like a million dollars a year for air conditioning?

sg: Yeah, just imagine it's probably about a million dollars a year just for lawn cutting and air conditioning, and other stuff.

mb: That's why they have the first service in the chapel and not the sanctuary because they can't afford it.

sg: Matt, if I gave you a million dollars a year to do spiritual good, what would you do with it?

mb: I don't know, I'd have to think about it.

sg: I bet what you think off the top of your head is better than maintenance at BRCC. Not a million dollars, a million dollars a year.

mb: What are your thoughts on the Catholic religion?

sg: I think it's got a bad rap. I don't think it's all that bad. If I were to go back to church, I'd go to an episcopal church or I'd go to a church like that where the routine was the same routine every single Sunday without exception and they didn't apologize for it. They weren't trying to make it more spiritual than it was. This is the routine, people have been doing this, saying this and acting like this for the 1500 years. So when I go to church on Sunday, I do the same thing. You know why? Not because it's a dead rote ritual. It's because I can bring my experiences to that liturgy and it would make sense. It would work for me. When you go to a American evangelical church, you don't get to bring anything of yours. You're supposed to leave it at the door and let the leadership guide you. When you go to a Catholic church, you bring everything with you right into the pew. You walk through the same motions as you did before, but now you have a choice as to whether or not they're going to mean something for you. You don't even get that option at other churches. So if I were to go back to a church, I'd probably go to a episcopal church or maybe even a catholic church. I find the people to be very sincere and I don't find the theology to be as important as people make it out to be. Yeah they believe differently than most other Christians believe but the difference between Catholics and Christians isn't as big as the difference between Christians and materialist.

mb: When it says in the bible God calls us out to witness to people and to share the gospel, how important do you think that is?

sg: You've got to figure out what the gospel is first. It's not a group of truths that you can express in a sentence. It's not something you can write down. The gospel is the power of Jesus Christ dying thousands of years ago and it makes sense to you today. That's like where the gospel starts. And in living it, you're able to communicate to people something more powerful than just a life they are living. That there is a God and He does care about you and He is concerned about the world and He's concerned about you specifically and it all starts at the cross. I don't know where it goes from there but it all starts there.

I think the gospel can be defined as pointing people to the cross as a starting point. Not as an ending point. Not as a beginning of church discipleship but pointing people to the fact that, that did happen and it was very important and the affect that it can have today.

So that's the gospel. So how can you best communicate that? Not by saying it, you're just going to screw it up. Not by a church service, it's not going do it. There's got to be another way to do it and it's got to be important to you and if it is, then people will notice it.

You've never met Bono in your life but you know it's important to him. You can tell that it's important to him and that it means something to him. You think Americans think that's cool? Watch what people think when he's in India. What do you think people think when he's in Africa and he's campaigning to let all of those African's free of debt. All these African countries owe the U.S. so much money that they can't buy food to feed their people. Because they're paying us 80% of their gross national product. We don't need that and Bono's got this whole campaign going to release them from their debt, to say now you don't owe us anymore money, now go buy HIV kits for your people or health care. What do you think people in Africa think when they see Bono doing that? They think about Christianity. It's important to Bono, that's why he's doing it and they know that.

One of the best ways to show you're faith today is to be involved in Human Rights. Some kind of international Human Rights but on a local level. To treat people with dignity and respect no matter who they are or what they do. I mean it's true, you watch Fight Club, Your are not your job. You are not your khakis. You have to treat other people like that, it's not just you. You have to realize people that pump your gas and who bring you your 'moons over Miami' [Denny's food] are people. They're real people with a soul and their mom died when they were six or their boyfriend just dumped them or they hate fucking working at Denny's. Christianity means showing that person dignity, it doesn't mean passing them a track with a tip in it on the way out. You have to treat them with respect.

mb: It sounds like a lot of responsibility when you don't want to go to church and you want to do your own thing.

sg: ten times as hard. It's harder. It's harder and it sucks. If you're lazy and you re not really concerned about God then just stay in church. It's so much easier. You can do the routine once a week, please everybody and get away with it. You can pretty comfortably be a materialist, you can just be a consumer. You can just be whatever you want to be and it's all good.

sj: I don't think I could live like that.

sg: That's why I'm talking to you right now in this conversation and not someone else. (just for the record I love Megan Colucci).

sj: I think if I knew I was living like that then life wouldn't be worth living.

sg: It's not. It's not life, it's un-life.

sj: It's a lot better than being dead.

sg: Barely.

sj: Well I just want to say that I've kind of stopped going to church or at least more sporadically and it's probably the scariest place I've ever been in, in my entire life.

sg: Because you don't have any guides [now]. You know what though, Christianity is described as a pilgrimage. You get a map but it's not very detailed. It tells you to walk through the desert but it doesn't give you step by step. And about a quarter of a mile of the way into it, you realize you're screwed, you don't know where your going, you don't know what your doing, you don't know how your getting there and you don't know what's going to happen along the way but the only thing you do know is that your not alone and at the very least, you have a real sense about your life that God is there because you seem to know the people and [they] know [about] the pilgrimage.

mb: What are your thoughts on a proposal of a revolution of change upon the modern church?

*Scott laughs*

sj: A revolution that is embraced by 1984.

sg: I think the best revolution you could ever do, one man's opinion, is to stop going and never look back. Take as many people with you as possible. that's just one man's opinion.

If there weren't 10,000 people at Calvary Chapel, there wouldn't be a Calvary Chapel but there's 10,000 people. And you can't do anything to talk to those 10,000 people but you may know 5 or 6 of them and they may know 5 or 6 of them and that's what it's really going to take.

I mean, I speak so harshly and I know I speak so harshly but honestly not everyone sees it the way I see it and I have to say it a million times but this is just the way I feel, this is just my experience, it may not be everyone's experience but I think the modern American evangelical church has got to be the most evil thing in the world. It's horrible, it lulls people to sleep, it creates apathy, which is the exact opposite of what the gospel is all about. The gospel is about life. You don't see alive people, they are just not there. You don't go to the church and meet live people, you meet dead people and that's just the bottom line. I can't find them there, but I meet them everywhere else.

Chris Carrabba hasn't gone to church in years and he's one of the most spiritually alive people I've ever met. He's an amazing guy, he's just alive and he doesn't go to church anymore.

mb: Do you think being spiritually alive is living for God?

sg: Yeah, I mean it's waking up and it's this kind of attitude: "No matter what it takes, at any costs, I'm going to find Him, what God's like, no matter what it takes at any costs. I'm going learn more about what he's like and try to become like that. If the whole world is against me, then the whole world is against me".

And anybody you know in the church is going to say that. But I did it and that's where a lot of people can't stand on the same ground that I'm standing in because I really did it. I thought to myself, you know what, no matter what it takes I'm going learn about God and you know what it takes: I quit, they fire me. I'm gone, I'm out of here. You know what I mean? That's just what it takes. I don't know what I'm going to do for a job and then years later I end up working at Island Water Sports and I love my life but still there were six months there where it was harsh and I didn't know what was going on but I was willing to do it because I didn't believe in what I was doing [when i was working at the church] . And I know a lot of people at Boca Community for example that do not and did not believe in what they were doing and weren't willing to [leave the job security]. It [finding God] didn't mean enough to them. But it means that much to me that I can't just sit back and watch decons in pink vests hand out bulletins and pose like that's Christianity. It means too much to me. That has nothing to do with it.

mb: I know there's this verse...

sg: I know where it's at, freaking six years of theological education, two years of Bible College, four years of a theological degree and I began seminary. I guarantee that when you start this verse, I'll finish it and tell you exactly where it's at.

mb: Well it just says pray continually...

sg: 1 Thessalonians 5:17

mb: Well you said earlier that you don't really pray that much so...

sg: I pray like that.

mb: How's that?

sg: I have a constant communication and a constant dialogue in my mind with God, especially when I'm alone.

mb: So you just don't want to call it prayer?

sg: I don't fold my hands and I don't close my eyes. When I say "prayer" to you, we both know what were talking about. Were talking about bowing our heads before meals. I don't do that. I don't pray at night. I don't like pray every night before I go to bed or every morning when I wake up. I never have a quiet time or anything like that. I actually never bow my head and I haven't prayed out loud in years and I don't know if I will. I just have a constant dialogue and God doesn't really speak to me like that. I don't think He's ever spoken to me, if He spoke to me, I'd be scared . He doesn't speak to me. But I have a constant inner monologue going on between who I am, who I want to be, who I'm becoming and God. And there's like four people wrapped up in me, (we're pretty complex). Who I am and who I want to be are completely different people and there all just actually talking to each other and then both those two people have their own conversations and dialogue with God. And it wraps up to make my psyche, my soul, my inner being. A lot of times right before I go to bed, I'm very spiritually attuned to those things and kind of like when I'm talking to God. When I'm alone or when I'm listening to music, that's when I'm talking to God.

mb: When your talking to God, do you ever ask for anything in your life?

sg: Nah, not at all.

mb: Why, do you feel like you don't deserve it?

sg: That's a good question, [but] no. Honestly because I don't think He's going to give it to me.

mb: Have you ever felt like God has done anything for you, like wow I prayed for this and He did it.

sg: No, that's never happened.

mb: Do you think He could do that?

sg: Probably not to me because I don't ask and I don't really care. I don't really see it like that. You know, I don't ask God for things because I really don't think He's going to give it to me. What if I ask God to not let 9/11 happen? It wouldn't matter if I asked Him. What if I asked Him to stop the war in Iraq that's going to happen? Is He going to stop it because I asked Him to?

mb: Well He already knows your going to ask it so...

sg: Yeah see? It's this huge philosophical argument that He knows your going to ask it and you ask it so...

mb: but He wants you to ask it...

sg: but that's just too much thinking down the line for me. I'm just not going to ask.

mb: So you don't want to worry about all that?

sg: No, it doesn't have much to do with me. It's just not where I'm at. It's more of a dialogue with God than asking Him for things. It's not a jukebox where you put in a quarter and I get the songs that I want. I've never really seen it like that. Even on like a really high level or low level-thing. I don't ask Him how to become a certain thing. But that's just me.

mb: What is the most spiritual experience you've ever had?

sg: Last summer, I was in the pool with Ransom, it was a hot day, I was in the pool. A.J. was on my back and I threw Ransom into the air and I watched him as he went into the water and the whole thing was in slow motion, like everything was just slow and deliberate and I had this overwhelming sense that life was perfect. I thought to myself, no matter what happens, everything is going to be ok. It was one of the most spiritual experiences I've ever had in my life, it's the one that comes to my mind right now. Another one that comes to my mind is when I heard Jeff Buckley for the first time. Everyone had told me about him and I had the cd, but I was just waiting for the right moment. Then one night when Denise was gone and the kids were asleep, I put headphones on and I connected them to my cd player and I turned it up and I laid on the couch and I just pressed play. I didn't know what was coming next, I didn't know the names of the songs, I didn't have the album cover in my hand and within the middle of the second song, I just started crying and I cried for like an hour and I just cried throughout Hallelujah. That was one of the most spiritual experiences I've ever had in my life. Again, I just have this overwhelming sense that God really does exist. It's because if God can speak to Jeff Buckley like this, and Jeff Buckley can put it into art, like into music and sing about it and do it so darn perfectly, well then there's hope. God definitely exist, He can communicate for sure. I can know something. Just an overwhelming sense that God exists. I might have had only three or four of those experiences in my life.

mb: How has film inspired and affected you?

sg: Movies have been church for me. For a lot of people, music is the most important thing in their life but I can't play an instrument and I can't sing on key, I'm completely tone deaf. And I appreciate music because it's mostly lyrical to me. So there's only so far I can go with music until I can appreciate the difference between G and B (chords). And I've tried a million times and I can play the songs on guitar, but I can't hear them, it doesn't sound like anything to me, even though it's right. It means a lot to me but it's only secondary to film.

You know, it's not even film per say, there's something about a story, a true story, a big story. The drama of a good story is a very spiritual thing to me. I like people because they all have stories. When I see people, I break them down into the 50 [or so] events that shaped their world. And these are the people you can meet in Denny's like that girl over there with the long black hair. You don't know her but there have been 50 things that have shaped her world. It could have been anything, it could have been a good thing or a bad thing. Her mom could have left her when she was 3 and all she's ever had was her dad. Or she could have gotten in a serious car accident when she was a kid and ever since then she's felt very close to God because she cheated death. There's like a million stories going on in that one person's head. When someone is able to take those stories and communicate them, it's a spiritual thing because you're communicating your soul and their doing it in an artistic way.

A guy like Christopher Nolan has got all these stories going on in his mind. A guy like M. Night Shyamalan, a good example, has got all these stories in his mind.

Like that movie Signs. He's got this story of a priest who's wife died and it makes him struggle with his faith and takes an alien invasion for him to believe in the goodness of God again. But you see this guy's life in several stages and you see his faith develop and then die and then come back and that's the whole point of the story. But the guy tells this story in the middle of an alien invasion and it scares the heck out of you. It was one of the scariest movies I've ever seen in my life. The whole part with the home video from Brazil and you didn't know what was going to happen, my heart was pounding so hard it was coming out of my chest for like 2 minutes. The whole point is wrapped up in a story that's told so well that it makes you laugh and be scared within 30 seconds of each other. But when your done, all you really come out with is the real story of the priest. It's great pop art. Some people watch that and they just see the story of the aliens when it's not even the point. And some people watch that and they don't even understand the story of the aliens but they catch the message and in that sense, it appeals to everybody. Because the guy is so smart, he can make 10 million dollars for everyone to go see a thriller and at the same time, he can do something meaningful with his life.

All he's doing is telling a story and a story is the foundation of all spiritual learning in my opinion. Just like the Bible, it's just a bunch of stories back to back. When you tell a story, it just drives the point home so much better. You can either say hey: "God is very faithful" or you can flood the whole earth, kill everything, save a couple people, give them a rainbow and you'll never forget the story. The Old Testament is like a bunch of movies strung back to back. You don't think of them as words, you see them in your mind. Like when I say to you Noah, you think of the ark and the old man with a beard. That's your imagination working. That's God's way of communicating his faithfulness, He tells it in a story. The church doesn't do that anymore, they don't call them stories at all. It's like stories are for kids, when you grow up, you listen to preaching. That's so backwards. Kids, you tell them what to do and they do it. As they get older, you tell them stories and you let them learn. The church has just got it all backwards again.

Wait, this is my pet peeve. You know what the best part is. I still hear this line all the time. "Why do you go to church?" "Oh, I go to get fed." people say. And people freaking don't realize what they're saying. You only feed babies. The whole part of growing up is to learn to feed yourself. If I sit at the dinner table and my little six year old is like, "daddy will you feed that to me" i'd be like "hell no, you feed yourself your own food, you are six years old!". And yet there's freaking 30, 40, 50 and 60 year old people going to church to be fed. You know why? Because they can't feed themselves because they're infants. Their spiritual babies.

mb: In 2nd Corinthians, chapter 10, it talks about Paul's defense of his ministry. In verse 4, it says, "The weapons we fight with are not the weapons of the world. On the contrary, they have divine power to demolish strongholds." What do you think this verse means?

sg: Well, this is huge, you have to understand the whole point of 2nd Corinthians. You have to understand the whole point of the New Testament. Paul is writing to a church, he wrote them a letter telling them how to behave when they get together and eat and have spiritual oneness. They didn't listen to him though. They didn't want to have anything to do with what he said. So he waited another year and he wrote them another letter and we don't have that letter. 2nd Corinthians is the third letter he wrote to that church and he was pissed when he got to them. When he finally wrote the third letter, he says things like, "hey I'm coming to you and when I get there, I'm coming with a whip" I mean he's pissed as all get out. You have to understand that in 2nd Corinthians he's talking about the weapons he fights with, he's saying listen, life is a spiritual war, life is about spirituality. It's not about living like eating, buying, and dying. Life's about spirituality and if you're going to fight that war, you can't fight it with non-spiritual weapons. You have to fight it with spiritual weapons. You have to fight it with your mind, with creativity, with intellect. You can't fight it with flesh and blood. And he was saying this to these people because he's telling them listen, you and I are in a spiritual war and when I get there, I'm going to show you exactly what it's like to be in a spiritual war. I'm not going to punch you in your face. I'm going to put you in your place and I'm going to show you what it's all about. But that verse and all those verses are taking so completely out of context. It's a story. 2nd Corinthians is a story about a group of people who lived in Corinth, who were followers of Christ and wanted to start a church and wanted to be together, to eat together, to fellowship together, wanted to live their lives together and love each other. But they just kept screwing it up. And the whole point of 1st and 2nd Corinthians is different. It's not about the little tiny verses. It's about the whole epic of the church. It's about their crazy out of whack morality and how they were such an early church and they didn't know what to do and Paul was guiding them along the way and telling them really basic things like this isn't a war you fight with your hands. It's a war you fight with you're mind. It's your spirituality. I'm sure that verse has been used against me a million times, go ahead.

mb: What do you think when you hear bad words? Do you think these are curse words?

sg: No. I think they are disrespectful to old people.

mb: Do you think God doesn't want us to say these words or He doesn't care?

sg: No, [again] God doesn't understand language, He could care less. God could care less about our language, He could totally care less. You know, sometimes, there's no more appropriate word then fuck. That's just the bottom line. Sometimes it's inappropriate. But sometimes anything else is inappropiate and that's just the only word in the situation, you know. And it's just usage. You know what the word means? It's a Victorian term from Victorian England and it stands for Foreign Unlawful Carnal Knowledge. It was a term used to describe people who knew too much about sex, which they weren't supposed to know. They said "oh no don't talk about that, that's fuck". You couldn't talk about sex publicly back then and the slang was fuck and you weren't supposed to talk about that and now it's turned into a slang word for shagging. But at the same time, it's a great attention getter and it relieves stress and it's just a word. It doesn't mean anything.

mb: So when it talks about in the Bible, don't let any unwholesome talk come out of your mouth, how can we even begin to understand that?

sg: You know what's unwholesome? There's so much more unwholesome talk than curse words. You can completely destroy someone's life with your mouth. Boca Raton Community Church completely destroyed my reputation when I left. Completely destroyed it with their mouth. Here I am on the sidelines saying fuck, fuck, fuck and they're telling me Ephesians chapter 4, don't let any unwholesome word come out of your mouth.

But you know what's so unwholesome? Is to go behind someone's back and ruin their reputation to their friends. That's so much more unwholesome then saying fuck or shit or damn. Those are just words. But the power that comes with ruining someone's reputation, I would never go there. You know what I mean; I don't want to ruin someone's reputation. I don't want to tear them down and ruin their lives. That's the way I understand that verse.

mb: Last question comes from Richard A. Paolino. He asks if you had to either touch Richard's nipple, wiener head, or left butt cheek and if you didn't touch one of them, you'd be shot in the head, which one would touch?

sg: I'd pick the nipple. I don't really want to touch anything in his bathing suit area. The whole bathing suit thing is kind of off limits. But I'd touch his nipple. If it was between touching his nipple and being shot in the head, I'd opt for his nipple.

mb: Well I'd just like to end by saying, Scott; you are by far the most interesting single serving friend I have ever met.

[Scott laughs]

sg: Thank you.