What Did Purity Culture Take From Us? With Amy Butler

In the season’s eighth episode, Jonathan, Katie and Annie put the “submission” language of “household codes” in Ephesians 5 into context. Katie then interviews pastor and author Amy Butler for a focused conversation about purity culture and its effects.

Amy Butler is the senior pastor at Community Church of Honolulu and the founder of Invested Faith. She is also the author of Beautiful and Terrible Things and the co-author of Holy Disruption. She holds a bachelor of arts in religion and political science, and a master of arts in church history, from Baylor University, a master of divinity from the International Baptist Theological Seminary, and a doctor of ministry in preaching from Wesley Theological Seminary.

Resources for this episode:

“Beautiful and Terrible Things: Faith, Doubt, and Discovering a Way Back to Each Other” by Amy Butler ~ https://www.penguinrandomhouse.com/books/546293/beautiful-and-terrible-things-by-amy-butler/

“Household Codes” graphic ~ https://ms.fortresspress.com/downloads/9781451469929Introexcerpt.pdf (see p. 15)

“Pure: Inside the Evangelical Movement That Shamed a Generation of Young Women and How I Broke Free” by Linda Kay Klein ~ https://www.simonandschuster.com/books/Pure/Linda-Kay-Klein/9781501124822

Audre Lorde ~ https://www.poetryfoundation.org/poets/audre-lorde

Amy Butler ~ https://www.pastoramy.com/

About the podcast:

The first season of “Sunday School Rejects” delivers nine episodes on the topic of purity culture, which partly defined the Christian youth experiences of the Rejects. From pledge cards and rings to ceremonies and conferences, the purity culture of conservative Christianity left its mark on these three friends from Texas, who went on to earn advanced degrees in theology and related fields.

The season’s first four episodes drop together as they offer a foundation for what’s to come. After that, episodes drop weekly and take deeper dives into purity culture. The Rejects tell their own stories and also solicit the expertise of Amy Butler, Matthew Paul Turner and Jeremy Williams.

Episodes start dropping Wednesday, May 6, 2026. Subscribe wherever you listen to podcasts.