Can Christians Tolerate the "Furry" Community | Season 3 Episode 6

Welcome back to the Point Taken Christian Podcast. This is the podcast where we make and take spiritual and biblical questions and we chat them up. And we chat them up. Dude, Anna really dropped the ball on that one with her unsweet tea.

Wow. Okay. It's not unsweet. It is unsweet. Okay, look, I'm going to try again. I put half and half. So half sweet, half unsweet.

Half and half is for coffee. No. Yes, it is. I put half and half. This is classic. Half of sweet, half of unsweet. Glass half full, half empty. And you're the one who keeps drinking it and complaining about it.

You know, that is true.

Thank you for sharing. It's really half empty and sweet. I had some of Lowell's coffee, but it was lukewarm. And I almost Jesus-ed it. Lukewarm. Oh, okay.

There it is. It's a biblical reference. Can we try it? Can we try it again? Yes, sir. This is the podcast where we make and take spiritual and biblical questions and we chat it up. My name is Hunter. I'm the host of this podcast.

To my right is the wonderful Anna, who's never dropped a ball in her life. I'm perfect. Her glass is half empty of sweet tea. And to the farthest is our beloved, wonderful pastor, Josiah Shibley.

And the crowd erupts that I am not hosting anymore. Yes. I'm erupting. And I am one of them, and so is Anna.

But then I said, Anna, can you do me a favor? She goes, absolutely not. We need a Hunter back. That's exactly what happened. Look, we want to talk about the crowd erupting. That phone looks girly. Oh, it's Anna's.

Okay. It's Anna's. I can't even get to the code. I'm so sorry. Is there a code? You forgot the code? No, I can't get to the point where it asks a question. Oh, okay. Well, that was my fault. Is that an iPhone?

Android. Android. Yeah, so that's why I don't know how to use it. It's the only reason why I have it. We want to talk about crowds erupting. This episode is going to be, dare I say it, a hoot. Maybe even a hoot and a half.

What was that Facebook meme I saw? Hootin' is the gateway drug to hollering? Yeah, I posted that. Hootin' is the gateway drug to hollering.

Listen, you guys clicked on this video. You know what it's about.

And maybe you should have, but you're locked in now.

Pastor Josiah doesn't know what it's about, but we know what it's about. I don't.

This will be a pure reaction. Yeah, sometimes on this podcast we have opener questions. And we talk about our week and how God has blessed us. And that's something that I really enjoy. But you know why you're here for this episode.

You know what we're talking about today. And we need to get into this. And we need to talk about this immediately. But again, I don't know what it is yet. Now, Pastor Josiah is the one in the room that does not know what this is at all.

Okay. We all know in this room at least to some type of extent.

And just so everyone be aware, there's eight people in this room.

I'm so excited. And I apparently roasted him in the group chat.

And his exact phrase was, since you would have to be living under a rock to not know what this is, we can't do a reaction to it. Or be extremely sheltered.

And Pastor's just like, dot, dot, dot. Why would it be unusual? I believe I put like six dots.

Sheltered? I was like, crap. Hey, this is Pete the rock I'm living under.

Guys, let's get right into this. Okay. Now we're going to take it seriously. The funny part is watching our pastor be, I don't know, sullied by this knowledge.

Should we put a disclaimer on this if you have children around?

A Listener Question About Furries and Alternate Identity

Yeah. Okay. Listen, what we're about to be talking about is somewhat explicit. And it's certainly not wholesome. So if you are the type that would like to, you know, shield children from this knowledge, take away every piece of internet that they have access to first and then don't let them watch this podcast.

Okay. Put your earbuds in. Because if they have a phone, they probably know it's something about this. Okay. But Pastor Josiah doesn't know what it is. I have a phone. He uses his phone to text and watch Yellowstone.

Am I wrong? Those are two things.

I watch Yellowstone with my wife. On the TV. Yeah. Well, I cast it from that to that. Oh my gosh.

That's awesome that I got that. Okay. Guys, this is a listener question that we have. And we'll keep the name private. I'm just going to I'm going to read this to you guys. And we're going to talk about it.

Okay. Hello. Hello. I've been watching your podcast for a couple of months now. And I think it's really good. Thank you. We think so, too. I saw you guys had your email listed. I want to ask you a question.

She told me recently that she's this thing called a Therian or a furry. Now, I've never used the word Therian. That one was actually new knowledge to me. So I learned something there. I'm still not quite sure what it is.

Well, do we have news for you? But I asked my mom and dad about it. My dad said that it's something that sinners participate in. And he's right. We'll get into it. All right. I just loved that wording because that's exactly how I would have said it.

I want to support my friend, but I don't know if it would be okay or not. If you would answer my question, I would greatly appreciate it. Now, that's a very fair question. It's very awesome that you asked.

Okay. I can go ahead and short answer it for you. No. Okay. It's not okay to support. Now, here's the why and how and all that. So for those watching that looked on your YouTube page and you saw the word furry.

We're going to put that in the title. Good. Oh, yeah. Yeah. Okay. All right. Sure. Nick, there it is, bro. And you saw the word furry. Now, I don't know if YouTube allows that or not. Can you spell it?

F-U-R-R-Y. Okay. Okay. F-U-R-R-Y. Don't say that yet. I love you, Anna. Okay. Hold on. I want to get his reaction. Yeah. Once we've said what it is, I want you to show that to Pastor Joseph. Okay.

For those of you. I'm laughing already. I mean, dude. He's about to. Who saw either. He's been gone too long. Keep trying to get him. Who either saw the word furry in YouTube or that wasn't allowed. Maybe we can use the word therian or something.

You might not know what it is. So, let me go ahead and tell you a couple things. And I can tag team with Anna on this. A couple things about our furry friends. Okay. All right. So, Pastor Josiah, I'm going to talk directly to you.

All right. I'm ready. And you are going to be the stand-in for every listener out there today. Okay. Here we go. And I want to go ahead and apologize both to.

This is the most pre-emptive work I've ever seen for a definition.

I would like to go ahead and apologize both to my God, my country, and my father for having this information. Bet your dad would be so proud. Okay. So, a furry. You know about bestiality. Yeah, buddy.

Yeah. Okay. Now, a furry is not exactly somebody.

Like, to be fair. The fact that you use that as your starting point. Yeah. Okay. There has to be a basis. I now have the mode for where we're going.

Yes, but there's a depth to it that you need to understand. To get to our question, you need to understand what our listener's friend is really doing. Right? So, it's not necessarily that they look at the family dog and say, nice.

You know. Please tell me this isn't their hope. Alright, go ahead.

It's not. It's not necessarily. Now, there are exceptions to every rule. Maybe there are some who also are just straight up into real animals. But, a furry typically wants a humanoid version.

They want a person pretending to be an animal.

Correct. Have you ever seen the movie? No, I haven't seen that. No, no, no. You're going to say yes to this. Have you ever seen the movie Zootopia?

Is that the one where the DMV is a sloth? Yes.

Yes, yes. That is one of their favorite movies in the world. It's a bunch of humanoid animals. They want, most of the time, they're walking on two feet. They have their abs and their pecs. The women have all the normal stuff.

It's just they're covered in fur and they have tails, ears.

These are humans who want a human partner that looks like an animal.

Now, I want to go ahead and hit them with this flashbang of a picture. Gee.

I was going to say zoom in.

I think this is perfect timing just to absolutely slap you on the side of the head with that. Now, that pastor is what they call a fursuit. It's almost like a mascot. Y 'all aren't making this up. No.

No, furry costumes. If you go to college today, you will see somebody wearing No, it's just a mascot now.

No. It looks like a mascot costume, but people wear this. It's almost like a cosplay thing. Some people do it for sexual fetishes. Others do it as they identify as something else. It's like they're

Yeah. They identify.

I'll tell you Yes, you can identify as something else. No, I'll tell you the real word for it. They will hire artists if they're not one themselves. I have noticed most of the sexually depraved have artistic ability.

You can turn your I don't know if anybody else has noticed that. Turn off now. If they're not already an artist, they will hire an artist and describe what they want to look like in this animal form for them to draw them for them.

That is called their fursona. No way. That's a real thing. Not persona. It's your fursona. They'll have the fursona as their profile picture. Then they'll get online and they'll roleplay with other people in a chat room.

You mean like these people are barking?

Yes. They'll lick their cat and they'll lick their hand. They'll do this, Pastor.

They speak in roleplay script.

My next question is how do you know this exists? I have a phone. Internet.

This is the most made fun of thing.

If you were to go to my YouTube search right now, you'd find some basketball highlights.

Not on YouTube. You have to find screenshots of things on Reddit, Tumblr, all Twitter or whatever. Most of the time if you come across these chains of talking and all that stuff, you'll find it. Then memes is huge.

This is one of the most made fun of fetishes or whatever that exists. That's their fursona. I've been to Comic-Con. Not the big one, but a small one in Arkansas. Dude was just walking around full fursuited.

There were two of them. Some people on college campus at U of M, I've been there. They will have the tail. I won't tell you how the tail is connected to them, but they have the tail. Sometimes they'll just walk around with the paws.

They not usually wear the helmet. You're not talking about Go Tigers Go?

No, I'm talking I am a dog. Do you remember, people tend to forget about this, but this is a real thing that happened. A couple years ago in the United States of America, there was a revolt on the northwestern side.

I believe it might have been Seattle. They rose up and created their own city called Chaz. They were very liberal. They were against guns and everything. They guarded their borders with guns. A whole lot of people were trapped in Chaz.

It was a few city blocks. A lot of people were trapped in Chaz. One of the things that Chaz had was a furry dog park. I did not know that. You could go to the furry dog park in your fursuit and you could doggy style in public in your fursuits.

Like we said, not all furries have the sexual kink, if you will. For real, though. Some of them like to just do it, kind of like the comic con like you had mentioned. Some of them like to do it just as you're dressing up.

Granted, I've never been to a comic con. Not really my thing. Some people dress up as one of the characters that they might from a book or anime. These people like to identify as that. Have that as an altered identity.

Basically, because there's not really like a source of media for furries. I don't think you're going to find somebody who's going to dress up in a fursuit that isn't doing it because they're attracted to that.

They're just not necessarily attracted to the family dog.

I think, too, that it's kind of, I mean, you're putting on a costume and so it gives you the option to hide, if you will. It's unanimous. Not unanimous, anonymous.

My bad. Certainly not unanimous. It's anonymous. When anonymity reaches away from the computer screen into public, dude, that's dangerous.

What part of that makes it sinful? Okay. Is it sinful just to dress up? Answering our listener's question, is it just a sin if it's like the sexual kink or is it a sin also if they were to just dress up and have that as an alternate identity?

That is a fantastic question.

I want to answer it so bad, but I think it would be so much better if we let Pastor Ghost and I speak on it first. Do you need time to process it? No.

It looked like you were so processing. I'm having trouble taking this listener question seriously, but I'm going to pretend and give the benefit of the doubt that it was a serious question.

I'm saying kids these days are growing with it. So that's what I'm saying. I said 50 chance somebody's just playing with us, which, you know, I find very funny if you are. It makes for great content.

Yeah, like that stuff that I find very funny. It's one word for this. Yeah, but if it's serious, you know, this is something that a whole bunch of kids deal with because a lot of kids are what we call iPad kids who were raised by the Internet.

Gen Z, like all of that. I mean, you see all of this stuff on the Internet. Well, then I guess we got to respond to it. Yep. All right. Would you like first honors? I don't mind. Since you've gone through the most trauma today.

Yeah, that was a lot, man. He's like, you can stop scrolling. Okay. And the question Anna's raising in response to the listener question is, is that sinful? Is that right?

Well, I know the answer. The part of just having, like, the alternate identity. Is that sinful? Okay.

So moving past the obvious sexual morality. That's a given. Right. The answer would be yes, absolutely. Why? Human beings are created in the image of God. And that is something that I don't think we understand very well.

Creating the image of God does not mean that God looks like us. That's not what we mean when we say we're creating the image of God. We are creating the image of God, first off, that as God is a trichotomy, so are we.

Mind, body, spirit, father, son, spirit. But more than that, of all of his creation, in all galaxies, in all the universe, throughout the planet, of all his creatures that he created, only one was created in his image, which is the ability to know him intimately and love him deeply.

To know him intimately and love him deeply. Only humans have that ability. You know, Isaiah says that the trees clap their hands for God, but they don't know why they're doing it. Okay? So the heavens do declare the glory of God, but they don't know why they're doing it.

Lions do glorify God, but they don't know how or why they're doing it. They don't know what that concept is. Humans are created in the image of God in that we can know him intimately and love him deeply.

That is a special creation of God. He has a blaze of miracles of creation in the first two chapters of Genesis. I mean a blaze. Like, one sentence. Trillions upon trillions upon trillions of stars are created in one sentence.

Right? And then he stops, and he stoops down, and he hand-forms man and breathes his life into them. That's about as intimate a creation as you can imagine. When we say we are created in the image of God, we are able to know him intimately and love him deeply because we are created unique and special from all other creations.

So, that is why it would be sinful. It's because, purposely or not, you are making a mockery of the image of God that you bear. Every human being on planet Earth, believer or not, is an image-bearer of our God.

To downgrade yourself to something different, and look, just a total side note here. The Bible speaks several times about taking care of our animals and beasts and all that stuff. Don't muzzle the ox, watch trying to tread the grain.

He who cares for his beasts, all that stuff. But there is not an equality of creation. One creation, he said, subdued the Earth. One creation, he said, the rest of creation answers to you. The fear and dread of you will be on each of them.

That creature is the one who has direct communication with God. So, to not to ramble any longer. To make a mockery of that and pretend to be something less than that is a mockery of the image of God. Very true.

Boom. Pow.

Boom bop. Bop. Bee bop. Bee bop boop. Bee boop boop. No, no, I think what you're talking about is bee boop bop bee. Yeah, now let's talk about why, okay, you asked, our listener asked, is it wrong to support my friend because I want to support my friend?

I get wanting to support your friend. I get it because they're your friend. But you're not called to be nice and kind all the time. You are called to make your stand and to stand for what is good and what is right.

So, I am very careful about what I sign my name off on. Right? I'm not going to recommend every friend I have to my boss to work with me. I'm just not. And if somebody puts in their application and my boss says, hey, do you know this guy?

And I'll say yes. Is it a good worker? If I think you're not, then I would say no. Tell the truth. Yeah, because I'm not going to sign my name off on something that I cannot believe in or put right. You know, so morally and ethically, biblically, if it is not sound, then especially to my friend, I cannot sign off on that and say, go get them, Tiger.

You know, literally. Stop. And here's why. Here's why. OK. Take, for example, fornication. OK, why is it a sin to have sex with somebody outside of marriage? Right. Why is it a sin for a man to sleep with a man or a woman with a woman?

Why are these things wrong? Because we are given sex with a definition the same way we are given all things. When God makes something, he makes it to be a certain way. For example, marriage is a biblical concept.

God made it. He made it with the definition. One man, one woman under God. Yep. That is what marriage is. Any other thing other than that? It's called a legal union. So gay marriage was legalized because people and people groups have taken marriage from the biblical concept because they realize governments realize, hey, this really works and this can really help and can, you know.

So for the overall benefit of this kingdom or this nation, marriage should be adopted into that. And that has gone all the way up to the United States of America. So they adopt the term marriage. But if two men are married, they're not.

That's not a marriage. That's a legal union. OK. In the same way, sex falls under that category. It is between a married man and a married woman. As long as they're married to each other under God. Right.

Mirroring the love God has with this church. That's what sex is. And anything outside of that is no bueno. So, for example, covering each other in fur and pretending to be animals would not fall under that category of OK.

Pretty simple.

I hope we've said this before on this podcast. I hope everyone just heard how Hunter perfectly explained that referring to marriage. People react so emotionally and so much hostility when a Christian says there is actually no such thing as gay marriage.

Well, Hunter is exactly right. It's not that we are saying the United States or Canada or England does not recognize gay marriage. That's not what we're saying. That would be ludicrous. Obviously, that's true.

We're saying that the fact that government chooses to recognize marriage as something they deem beneficial to society is acceptable. Sure. But they are not even the arbiter of marriage. God is. Right.

God predates the United States of America. God predates France and England. If the government decided that marriage is no longer something they wanted to participate in. Christians would still do marriage because it is a biblical mandate long before it's a governmental ideal.

That's what people don't understand. Even without the tax breaks. Exactly. Exactly. That's why the government is like, yeah, sure. Yeah. So, there is no such thing as gay marriage because the government or polygamy or because the government is not the creator or arbiter of marriage.

God is. The fact that governments choose to recognize it for other gains is acceptable, but that doesn't make them the creator of it. That's what Hunter was saying.

I think he said it exactly right. Yeah. Going back on the listener's question, though, with her asking or with the person asking, I don't remember if it was a girl or guy. Should I support my friend? You can still love your friend, but you don't have to support everything that you do.

And that's one thing. I grew up with a friend of mine. He was gay. He still is gay. And I think he's engaged and whatever. And I would tell him, I love you, but as a Christian, I don't approve of that.

And you can't get mad at me because this is what scripture says. And I'm going to do what God calls me to do and I'm going to be obedient to that. But just because you don't support your friend in something doesn't make you a bad friend.

This could actually give you an opportunity to talk to said friend and like, hey, what's really going on? Why do you feel like you need this second identity to escape reality? What's going on? Let's get to the root of the problem.

It makes you a better person. Exactly. As insane as I guess I'll use the word. This will be the first time this is passed through my lips. As insane as the idea of someone being a furry is. Clip that.

It is not Anna's exactly right. No, you can't support that if you're a Christian. No, that's a mockery of God. That doesn't mean I would not take that person out to lunch or invite them to my home in certain circumstances.

Or invite them to church or go to a That's not the question. That's not the question. The question is bad example there, I guess. The question is so support and love. If you love someone, you tell them the truth.

If you love somebody, you tell them the truth. Sometimes we use the word support as a euphemism for lie and let people be deceived and double down on their rebellion. That's not what support is supposed to mean.

Yeah, and I'll say this. When I was young, my dad taught me this.

I don't remember what prompted it. Thought he was about to give a testimony about this. No, no.

When I was young, my dad taught me what a furry was. He said, son, sometimes you'll see these paws around the house. Poor Marty. No, I don't know what prompted this conversation. I just remember it because I was just like, oh, dang.

Because it kind of hit me with the reality check that sometimes no matter how blinded by society and your day-to-day routine and your friendships can make you, you have to remember that as a Christian, you are required to hold a different level of righteousness.

And you have to draw a line. I'm very, very big on drawing lines. These are things I will not do. These are things I will never allow myself to do even if nobody's watching. These are the things that if I do that, then I am not a man.

Like my dad would tell me, a man is only as good as his word. And that goes on to your, what am I thinking of? If you're trustworthy. Character? That's not the word. Integrity. There it is. Thank you.

I was, in my head I was spelling it and it started with an E and I was like, that's not right. Yeah, integrity. But anyway, he was telling me, you can have atheist friends. You can have friends that sin and do all these other things.

But they can never be your best friend. Your best friend cannot have God not in common with you. It's like your best friend.

It's like iron sharpens iron. That's scripture. It's like you need your best friend to be able to kick you in the butt and sharpen you.

He said, if God is the most important thing in your life that you care the most about, how can you be best friends with somebody who does not share that in common? And so I was just like, that reminded me and has helped me so much in my life, choosing and picking, you know, the levels of friendship I have with people.

I can be good friends with somebody who's a furry. But I will never be very close, intimate friends with somebody who practices stuff like that. Because I can't. Because we do not share.

Hunter would make fun of them and just laugh in their faces. Yeah, oh my gosh.

Which we've seen here today. Oh my gosh. And I do that to all my friends, you know, who have any eccentricity at all. Or even if they don't. But I'm just like, I can't do that because they don't share my God with me.

So it's like maybe if you two are besties, you know, and best friends, that might be a chance to say, maybe I need to evaluate the level of friendship I allow myself to have with people who do not share my God with me.

But I would also say.

I'm not saying screw them. I'm just saying, you know. Well and like I said earlier, it would be a good opportunity for that friend to show grace and mercy. Yeah. You know, to the other. And just be a witness, you know, to your friend who is, I don't know how you would put it.

Just like being a furry. Like dressing up as a furry. Doing whatever.

So yeah, that's kind of where I stand. Okay. Yeah, but it's also. And I just want to cover our bases here. There's a difference between people who have shared, hey, I struggle with this. Or hey, like these are the things that I do behind closed doors.

What do you think? Versus the people who show up to school with, you know, the tail popping out of their pants and all that stuff. And are openly practicing things as well. So I feel like there is a level of witnessing that should be coming from you.

In other words, they should be able to see a difference in you. And if you don't know what to do and if you are having trouble wondering, how do I go about this? I know that I can't support it. I know that I want to be their friend.

You need to make sure that they see a light in you that is different from everybody else that they see. So that when you take those hard stances, you can fall back on everything else that they see out of you.

And stand on a solid foundation of look what I did today, yesterday, and tomorrow. Like you can know that this is the type of person I am. And so when I make that stand, I can fall back on, you know, the beliefs that you've seen in me.

Well said.

Very well said. Do we want to move on to the next? Sure. Is that everything?

Are there any questions? No, I think you've answered all of them successfully.

There's so much that I haven't said. But you know what's amazing?

That feeling that I had 20 minutes ago of pride, I didn't even realize that existed. The way this world is going, that will be true of all of us, not 50 years from now. One year from now. The Bible calls it inventors of evil.

Inventors. In the last days perilous times will come, for men will be lovers of themselves.

Inventors of evil. And I'll say, just as clarification, current day furries, or whenever they started really being a thing, didn't invent that. What he's saying is there are different ways to do the same sin.

Oh yeah. Because just back in the old days, you can look back at mythology and the creatures that they'd create, and you're going to tell me that nobody thought, you know, and was just like messed up.

And just looking at those things, I guarantee that furries have been a thing for a long time. Just in the 21st century, they said, we have the materials to take Disney characters and do terrible things.

I mean, some of the Canaanite gods, let me talk about this, some of the Canaanite gods were half-men, half-fish, or whatever. Merman. Yeah, Dagon, the god of the Philistines.

Yeah, yeah. That was a good point, Pastor.

A Prosperity-Gospel TikTok and the Abuse of Malachi

So we have this video that we're going to react to and talk about to close us out.

And some of you need to step into blessing, and you do that with an act of faith. Yes. $300. Why is that significant? It's significant, number one, because it got your attention. And it's significant, number two, because that's what the prophet said.

It got your attention.

First of all, the first thing I want to point out, it's significant because it got your attention. $300. So imagine trying to convince somebody to give you $300 U .S. cash, and you're going to say your number one most important point.

That number got your attention, didn't it? Like, that's a crazy amount, isn't it? $300, that's a crazy amount, right? Is this a pastor? I pray not, but I don't know. Is there a name associated with this?

We can't say the monitor's far away, would it?

We'll figure it out later. Keep playing this garbage.

But if God spoke, you say, but I may not have $300 right now. Well, what do you have? Do you have $100? Do you have $150? Take a step of faith toward God right now. But everyone who wants to move to greatness, listen to the voice of God.

$300.

That was the voice of God. That was the voice of God, yeah. That was a lot more annoying than I expected.

Okay, so I just want to make sure I'm being fair. This is not in the context of he is in his church preaching to just his people. This is a public commercial.

And it's the greatness and the blessing for $300. You know what I kind of feel like? I messaged in the group, and I was just like, what does this greatness entail? It's pretty vague. Spending $300, I want to know what I'm buying.

This little commercial reminds me of, do you know those shows that only come on certain channels? But it's just these dudes, and they have an item on the spinny table. And they're saying, call now for this.

And it really targets old people who don't really know any better. Saying, this is worth $3 ,000. And you can get it today for only $299 .99. Yeah, little shopping channels. And they have all the gas station knives and bad jewelry.

Trying to get money from old people for basically nothing. That's kind of how I feel like this is. He's like, do you want greatness? Do you want greatness? $300.

But if you saw on the bottom, like on the screen of that TikTok, it says we accept all major credit cards.

And this is a commercial for his, quote, ministry. Yeah.

I mean, like ministry of what? Greatness? That's what I said. What is the greatness?

It says, great prosperity. The two kings. For, it's the number two kings, number four ministry.

The two kings for ministry. So I very much would love to sit here and make fun of this guy for the next 20 minutes. But let's go ahead and do this. Can somebody explain to me just for the argument's sake of somebody out there who says, well, why can't that be real?

Why is he not referring to Micah when he says that greatness will be given to you when you give your money? Because didn't Micah not say? We talked about it this morning, actually, which is really funny.

Bring the tithing to the storehouses. Test me. Just see if I won't open up the store gates and bless you. Malachi did say that. That was not Micah, Malachi.