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There Will be No Further Posts About Dr. David Tee

dr david tee's library
Dr. David Tee’s Massive Library

It is no longer in my best interest to write any further posts about Dr. David Tee, who is neither a doctor nor a Tee. Tee’s real name is Derrick Thomas Thiessen.

My posts referencing Thiessen are typically responses to something he has written about me, but I’ve decided I am no longer willing to provide him the attention he needs and craves. I will leave him to his own devices, choosing to not cast my pearls before swine.

Thiessen will try to provoke me to respond, but those days are over. While I despise the man and his incessant attacks, lies, and mischaracterizations, nothing I say will change his mind. He is pathologically unable to play well with others.

Rage away, Derrick, but I will not respond to you. I am removing your site from my RSS feed reader, so I will no longer see or read your posts.

Bruce

Celebrating the Tenth Year of This Blog

ten years

I restarted this blog in December 2014. Before that, I had several other blogs, such as Bruce Droppings (my all-time favorite), NW Ohio Skeptic, Restless Wanderings, Hungarian Luddite, and Fallen From Grace. I first started blogging in 2007. Because I was an Evangelical-pastor-turned-atheist who used his real name to write, my blogs attracted much attention from the get-go. In 2007, I was still a Christian — barely. I operated blogs such as Rethinking Church Life to flesh out my increasingly post-modern, emerging/emergent views.

Initially, I attracted a lot of Independent Fundamentalist Baptists (IFB) and Evangelicals who were anti-emergent church. As I blogged through the evolution of my beliefs and eventual deconversion, the comments and emails I received increased in volume and hostility — so much so that I would stop blogging. I thought then that if I just told my story and honestly and openly shared my beliefs, that people would, at the very least, understand and treat me as Christ commanded them to do in the gospels and Paul did in the Epistles. Boy, was I naive. Nasty, hateful comments and emails wore me down after a time, so I stopped blogging and deleted all of my writing. With the help of my therapist, I would eventually get back on the proverbial horse and start riding again.

Time and therapy helped me learn how to deal with unChristian Christians, so in December 2014, I decided to restart blogging. One last time, I told myself, and if I can’t make it work, I will give up. Here we are ten years later, I am still writing — 5,203 posts. Have I wanted to quit, at times? You bet. The reasons are mainly health-related these days, but I will have moments when I think I am done or that I don’t have anything more meaningful to say. When such low moments come, instead of quitting, I stop, taking time off to mentally regroup. And then I start writing again. I can’t promise that my health will not one day win this titanic struggle, but for now, I have enough strength and energy to keep pecking away on my laptop keyboard. I no longer make promises, but I will say that I hope to keep writing as long as physically possible.

Blog traffic numbers somewhat leveled off in 2023, but this site did, once again, surpass 1,000,000 page views. And for that I am grateful. 212,000 people came to this site for the first time in 2023 via Google, making up 95% of the searches. Social media plays a small part traffic-wise. 14,000 people came to this site via Facebook, 12,000 from Twitter, 3,200 from Reddit, and 2,500 from WordPress. Somewhat surprisingly, YouTube only generated 400 clicks. The most-read post on this site is the same as last year: The Scandalous Life of Jack Hyles and Why it Still Matters.

Over 45,000 comments have been left since 2014. I appreciate everyone who comments, even those who disagree with me. I am especially grateful for those of you who are frequent commenters. I find your comments encouraging, and they add measurably to the life of this blog.

Currently, only a handful of people are banned from commenting on this site. Dr. David Tee, whose real name is Derrick Thomas Thiessen, is NOT banned from commenting, despite him saying otherwise. In 2023, I lost several commenters due to my trans-friendly posts. A handful of other readers exited stage right over my liberal political and social views. I learned long ago that I can’t please everyone. All I know to do is to be open, honest, and transparent in my writing. If that offends people, there’s not much I can do about it. I am who I am. 🙂

Currently, I am spending $125 a month to host this blog through Flywheel — a managed WordPress company — and pay for the various software and plugins I use on the site. Thanks to loyal readers who make monthly donations through Patreon or contributions through PayPal, site costs are covered with a little bit of money left over. With the leftover money, I was able to buy a brand-new Lear Jet! 🙂 Thank you for your continued financial support.

I still hope to complete my book and get my podcast up and running soon. Of course, I hoped in 2023 that the Cincinnati Bengals would make it to the playoffs. Sadly, life (and torn tendons in your team’s quarterback’s wrist) gets in the way of hope. No promises outside of “I will do what I can, Loki-willing.”

Have a blessed year.

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Bruce Gerencser, 66, lives in rural Northwest Ohio with his wife of 45 years. He and his wife have six grown children and thirteen grandchildren. Bruce pastored Evangelical churches for twenty-five years in Ohio, Texas, and Michigan. Bruce left the ministry in 2005, and in 2008 he left Christianity. Bruce is now a humanist and an atheist.

Connect with me on social media:

Your comments are welcome and appreciated. All first-time comments are moderated. Please read the commenting rules before commenting.

You can email Bruce via the Contact Form.

Update: RSS Feeds Not Working

blogging


Update: The feeds have been fixed, I accidentally turned them off when checking out some new features in the Yoast Premium SEO plugin.

The RSS feeds (posts and comments) for this site are not working, and haven’t been since November 17, 2023. According to Flywheel, my managed WordPress provider, the Yoast Premium SEO plugin I’m using is causing the problem. I am waiting to hear back from Yoast.

Thank you for your understanding.

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Bruce Gerencser, 66, lives in rural Northwest Ohio with his wife of 45 years. He and his wife have six grown children and thirteen grandchildren. Bruce pastored Evangelical churches for twenty-five years in Ohio, Texas, and Michigan. Bruce left the ministry in 2005, and in 2008 he left Christianity. Bruce is now a humanist and an atheist.

Connect with me on social media:

Your comments are welcome and appreciated. All first-time comments are moderated. Please read the commenting rules before commenting.

You can email Bruce via the Contact Form.

Facebook Friend Requests

facebook

I have a Facebook account, one that I treat as a place to hang out with like-minded people. I don’t use my personal Facebook account to debate politics or religion. I am more interested in personal photos and cat videos. These days, I rarely post on Facebook, but I like to peruse my friends’ stuff as time and health allow. I reserve my religious and political writing for my blog and my public Facebook page. As a result, I only have 200 or so Facebook friends. This is by design. Currently, I have twenty-five pending friend requests. The problem I have is that I don’t know who these people are. They may be readers or they may be stalkers, trolls, and hot chicks. I have no way of knowing.

If you send me a friend request and I don’t know you, please send me an email or message telling me who you are or how we are connected. Say nice things about me. 🙂 If not, I won’t approve your friend request.

Thank you for your understanding.

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Bruce Gerencser, 66, lives in rural Northwest Ohio with his wife of 45 years. He and his wife have six grown children and thirteen grandchildren. Bruce pastored Evangelical churches for twenty-five years in Ohio, Texas, and Michigan. Bruce left the ministry in 2005, and in 2008 he left Christianity. Bruce is now a humanist and an atheist.

Connect with me on social media:

Your comments are welcome and appreciated. All first-time comments are moderated. Please read the commenting rules before commenting.

You can email Bruce via the Contact Form.

Annual Blog Moderation Purge

worst blog

Once a year, I clear the email addresses of readers who are moderated, giving them another opportunity to comment again. You may see comments from people that you haven’t seen in a while. More often than not, given the opportunity to play by the rules, these commenters — all of whom are Evangelicals — will take the rope given to them and hang themselves all over again.

Currently, thirteen readers are permanently banned from commenting on and reading this site. When they try to access my blog an error message is returned. This means they can’t read my writing, comment, or send me emails. Of course, my writing is published to other venues, so if someone is determined to read it, they will find a way.

Elliot leads the pack in failed attempts to access this site. As of today, he has tried to read my writing and comment 2,230 times — four times a day, on average. “The definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results.”

Bruce Gerencser, 66, lives in rural Northwest Ohio with his wife of 45 years. He and his wife have six grown children and thirteen grandchildren. Bruce pastored Evangelical churches for twenty-five years in Ohio, Texas, and Michigan. Bruce left the ministry in 2005, and in 2008 he left Christianity. Bruce is now a humanist and an atheist.

Connect with me on social media:

Your comments are welcome and appreciated. All first-time comments are moderated. Please read the commenting rules before commenting.

You can email Bruce via the Contact Form.

Updated Dear Evangelical Page

writing a letter

Updated August 3, 2023

Dear Evangelical,

Thank you for stopping by to read my blog. You probably came to this blog via a web search, social media, a link on another website, or a link in an email sent to you by someone asking if you had seen this blog. Whatever path you took to get here, I want you to know that I appreciate you taking the time to read my blog.

Let me tell you a little about myself. Here’s the short story:

I am a sixty-six-year-old man who lives in rural Northwest Ohio. I have been married for forty-five years. My wife and I have six adult children and thirteen grandchildren. I was in the Christian church for fifty years, and for twenty-five of those years, I pastored Evangelical churches in Ohio, Michigan, and Texas. In 2005 I left the ministry, and in 2008 I left Christianity. I am now an atheist and a secular humanist.

If you want more details about my life, please read the ABOUT page. If you want to learn more about my journey from Evangelicalism to atheism, please check out the WHY?  page.

I have been blogging since 2007. Most Evangelicals who visit this blog fall under one of four categories:

  • They have questions and doubts about Christianity and are seeking answers
  • They are a former friend, family member, or member of a church I pastored
  • They are curious about my life
  • They want to let me know they are praying for me, or they want to evangelize me, correct me, preach to me, lambast me, quote Bible verses to me, tell me I am going to Hell, or tell me how wrong I am

If you have questions or doubts about Christianity and would like my help, I am more than happy to help you. Please send me an email via the Contact form and I will get back to you.

If you are a former friend, family member, or member of a church I pastored, I appreciate you reading my story. I know it must be painful for you to read about my deconversion, but I hope you will do your best to try to understand my journey. I try to be open, honest, and transparent — character traits you at one time admired. If you are perplexed by the fact that I am now an atheist, I think you will find these posts helpful:

Dear Family, Friends, and Former Parishioners

Dear Friend

Dear Jesus

Dear Wendy

Dear Greg

Dear Ann, A Letter to My Fundamentalist Grandmother

Dear Bruce, A Letter to My Youth Pastor

From Evangelicalism to Atheism

You can check out my media interviews here.

Here’s a recent interview I did with Tim Mills, the Harmonic Atheist:

Video Link

If you are curious about my life, it is likely you have read a number of my posts. I appreciate you being willing to try to understand my journey. There are three posts I would like to point out to you that I think would be very helpful: Why I Stopped BelievingThe Danger of Being in a Box and Why it All Makes Sense When You Are in a Box, and What I Found When I Left the Box. If you have any questions or need me to clarify something, please email me via the Contact form.

If you came to my blog so you could let me know you are praying for me or you want to evangelize me, correct me, preach at me, lambast me, quote Bible verses to me, tell me I am going to Hell, or tell me how wrong I am, I want you to know that I am not interested in what you have to say. After sixteen years of being psychologically brutalized and bullied by people like you, I have zero interest in what you have to say. Based on years of experience, I know you are likely not interested in dialog or in understanding my point of view. In your mind, you already know all you need to know. You have read one, two, or five posts and are now ready to pass judgment. You are ready to leave the mother of all comments, and I am sure you will be peacock proud when you are done.

To save you some time, I have made up a form that should make your commenting easier. This information also applies to Evangelicals who are “led” to email me via the contact form.

Here’s the form that should make things simple for you:

Name: (Put in fake name because you are so fearless)

Email Address: (Put in fake email address because God knows who you are)

Reason for Contacting Bruce Gerencser (Check all that apply)

_____To tell him he is wrong

——-To tell him I feel sorry for him

_____To preach at him

_____To quote Bible verses to him

_____To evangelize him

_____To tell him he doesn’t know anything about the Bible

_____To let him know God still loves him

_____To let him know I am praying for him

_____To tell him he never was a Christian

_____To tell him he is going to Hell

_____To tell him he is still saved and can never be un-saved

_____To tell him he was/is a false prophet

_____To tell him he was/is a wolf in sheep’s clothing

_____To tell him he is angry

_____To tell him he is bitter

_____To tell him his writing shows he has been hurt

_____To tell him he is fat

_____To tell him I hope he burns in Hell

_____To tell him that I am praying God will kill him

_____To tell him that he has a meaningless, empty life

_____To tell him he is going to die soon and then he will find out THE TRUTH!

_____To tell him that I know THE TRUTH about him!

Once you have completed the form, cut and paste it into your email or comment.

Please understand that the purpose of this blog is to help people who have doubts and questions about Christianity and to help and encourage people who have already left Christianity. Those who frequent this blog are like family to me, so I hope you will understand if I don’t let you fill up the comment section with your trollish, abusive, argumentative, and judgmental comments.

Please don’t try to claim that you have a First Amendment right to say whatever you want on my blog. You don’t, and you know it. But I will make you an offer: I will allow you to say whatever you want in the comment section IF I can come to your church on Sunday and preach my atheistic beliefs. Deal? That’s what I thought . . .

Generally, I give Evangelicals one opportunity to say whatever they want. I know my writing constipates them, so I want to allow them one Fleet soft-tip enema to clear out their metaphorical bowel. Just one. Say what you think “God” wants you to say and move on. And 99% of the time, I will not post any other comments after the first one. For the 1% of Evangelicals who leave a decent, thoughtful comment, I am willing to continue approving their comments if they can abide by the comment policy:

All commenters are expected to use a functioning email address. The use of a fake or non-functioning email address will result in your comment being deleted.

Pseudonyms are permitted. Please use the same pseudonym with every comment.

All first-time comments and comments with more than one HTML link are moderated.

Before commenting, please read the ABOUT page to acquaint yourself with my background. You might also want to read the Dear Evangelical page.

Evangelical commenters will be given one opportunity to say whatever they want. One, not two, three, or ten. Just one. Quote the Bible. Preach the sermon God has laid upon your heart. Put in a good word for Jesus. Deconstruct my life. Call me names, attack my family. You have one opportunity to impress readers with your John Holmes-like Bible prowess. After that, the following rules apply:

The following type of comments will not be approved after your first comment:

  • Preachy/sermonizing comment
  • Extensive Bible verse quoting comment (limited Bible-quoting permitted)
  • Evangelizing comment
  • “I am praying for you” comment
  • “You are going to Hell” comment
  • “You never were saved” comment
  • “You never were a Christian” comment
  • Any comment that is a personal attack
  • Any comment that attacks the readers of this blog
  • Any comment that is not on point with what the post is about
  • Any comment that denigrates or marginalizes abuse victims
  • Any comment that attacks LGBTQ people
  • Unsolicited medical advice of any kind (and I mean ANY)
  • Any comment that disparages my wife, children, or grandchildren

Please be advised that personal threats of violence or stalking will be reported to your service provider and law enforcement.

I write about issues that might not be child-friendly. Please be aware of this. I also use profanity from time to time, and I allow the use of profanity in the comment section. Any butt-hurt comment about language will be ignored, and if warranted, ridiculed.

The Life and Times of Bruce Gerencser is not a democracy where anyone has a right to say whatever they want. This is my personal blog and I reserve the right to approve or not approve any comment. When a comment or a commenter is abusive towards the community of people who read this blog, I reserve the right to ban the commenter.

If you can be respectful, decent, and thoughtful, your comment will always be approved. Unfortunately, there are many people — Evangelical/Fundamentalist Christians in particular — who have a hard time playing well with others. They often use a passive-aggressive approach towards me and the non-Christian people who frequent this blog. This kind of behavior will not be tolerated and will result in a permanent ban.

This blog is also not a place for hardcore atheists to preach the gospel of atheism. While I am an atheist, many of the people who read this blog are not. Frank, honest, open, and passionate discussion about religion, Christianity, and Evangelicalism is encouraged and welcome. However, I do expect atheists not to attack, badger, or denigrate people who still believe in God. If you are respectful, decent, and thoughtful, you will be fine.

My writing is direct and pointed and so is my response to comments. Please do not confuse my directness and pointedness with me attacking you or your religion. This is a grown-up blog, so crying that I offended you or “attacked” your religion will fall on deaf ears.

If you can play by these rules, I hope you will become a part of our community and join the discussion.

Here’s one thing I have learned over the years: most Evangelical zealots will ignore the comment policy. They think they have a right to say anything they want because they think they speak for God. But, invoking the name of God carries no weight here. If God really wants to speak to me, I am sure he doesn’t need you to carry the message. God knows where I am and he can speak to me any time he wants. So far, God has not said a word. Either he is busy, mad at me, taking a shit, or doesn’t exist. I am going with the latter.

If my unwillingness to allow you to foul the comment section offends you, I encourage you to start your own blog. You can have your own blog in as little as five minutes (BloggerWordPress, and Tumblr) and then you can rage against me and deconstruct my life all you want. Be aware that several people have, in the past, decided to do this and they have found it hard to faithfully and regularly deconstruct my life. All of them have abandoned their efforts.

Most of all, I hope you will consider what your words and actions say about you as a person and the God you say you serve. What in your behavior would draw me to Jesus and compel me to come back to the Christian religion? Thousands of Evangelical zealots have come before you. And in every case, if given enough space to expose who and what they are, they have proved to be poignant reminders of why I am glad I am no longer a Christian.

I wish you well.

A sinner saved by reason,

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Bruce Gerencser, 66, lives in rural Northwest Ohio with his wife of 45 years. He and his wife have six grown children and thirteen grandchildren. Bruce pastored Evangelical churches for twenty-five years in Ohio, Texas, and Michigan. Bruce left the ministry in 2005, and in 2008 he left Christianity. Bruce is now a humanist and an atheist.

Connect with me on social media:

Your comments are welcome and appreciated. All first-time comments are moderated. Please read the commenting rules before commenting.

You can email Bruce via the Contact Form.

Dr. David Tee is a Petty Man

dr david tee

Dr. David Tee, whose real name in Derrick Thomas Thiessen, is a Christian Missionary & Alliance preacher without a church to pastor; a man who abandoned a child years ago and fled to the Philippines to avoid legal accountability; a thief who regularly uses content from this site without giving proper attribution; an obsessive-compulsive man when to comes to my writing and that of my British friend Ben Berwick. He cannot and will not stop molesting us.

Tee has written more than one hundred posts about me, and a substantial number of articles about Ben. Over the past six weeks, Tee has written a post that mentions me every few days. Ben has figured out how to completely block him from accessing his site, but I’ve been unable to do so. There was a time when I would respond to his attacks, lies, and mischaracterizations, but I no longer do so. I only respond now when he says something so egregious that I feel compelled to reply.

As you know, I’ve taken a break from writing. (We are going to a baseball game in Cincinnati on Monday.) I’ve been trying to catch up on a few things, especially emails and the Black Collar Crime Series. My goal this coming week is to get my podcast up and running. Imagine my surprise, then, to read this from Tee:

They [Ben Berwick and Bruce Gerencser]are never honest. The owner of the BG website [The Life and Times of Bruce Gerencser] said he was taking a break from writing, yet aside from 3 guest posts, he has published more articles since that notice went [where?] than any other given week he was writing.

He then goes on to say this about Ben:

Honesty and integrity are two things we do not expect from unbelievers. But we can call them cowards as their actions are just that, cowardly. The MM [Meerkat Musings] website owner [Ben Berwick] is exactly like the little boy who didn’t get his way and takes his ball and goes home.

He wants to call the shots even though he has no credibility, or legitimacy to call the shots. We laugh at him and his actions because he has not grown up but likes to bully those who are different from himself.

He is supposed to be an adult yet acts in the most childish manner. he should change the name of the website to chicken little. If we are being harsh it is because his actions exemplify everything we have just written.

We are getting more of a laugh than anything else and write this in a lighthearted manner even though he will make false accusations about us. He always does.

What a prick. Tee says he is a follower of Jesus, but his behavior says that he is anything but.

Most of the readers of this blog understand that I took a break from writing. The posts that have been published recently, don’t fall into that category. Sounds of Sacrilege, Sounds of Fundamentalism, and the Black Collar Crime Series? These series’ require very little work on my part. I use templates that allow me to push out content quickly. I have a big backlog of potential posts for these series. So, during my time away from writing, I’m trying to clear this backlog.

Of course, all Tee cares about is calling me a liar.

Bruce Gerencser, 66, lives in rural Northwest Ohio with his wife of 45 years. He and his wife have six grown children and thirteen grandchildren. Bruce pastored Evangelical churches for twenty-five years in Ohio, Texas, and Michigan. Bruce left the ministry in 2005, and in 2008 he left Christianity. Bruce is now a humanist and an atheist.

Connect with me on social media:

Your comments are welcome and appreciated. All first-time comments are moderated. Please read the commenting rules before commenting.

You can email Bruce via the Contact Form.

I Am Taking a Break From Writing

gone fishing

I will not be posting for the next seven to fourteen days. I am quite exhausted, falling farther and farther behind. I need to take care of some personal things, along with catching up on my email, making a podcast, thanking financial contributors, and working on my book project. I am becoming increasingly frustrated over my inability to keep up, catch up, or even stand up some days. I need to take some time to lessen my frustrations. I hope to return to writing sometime after my birthday on June 19.

If you have a guest post you would like to write, this is a good time for you to submit it for publication.

See ya soon! Thank you for your continued support.

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Bruce Gerencser, 66, lives in rural Northwest Ohio with his wife of 45 years. He and his wife have six grown children and thirteen grandchildren. Bruce pastored Evangelical churches for twenty-five years in Ohio, Texas, and Michigan. Bruce left the ministry in 2005, and in 2008 he left Christianity. Bruce is now a humanist and an atheist.

Connect with me on social media:

Your comments are welcome and appreciated. All first-time comments are moderated. Please read the commenting rules before commenting.

You can email Bruce via the Contact Form.

My Upcoming Book of Short Stories

short stories
Cartoon by Charles Schulz

Since 2007, I have done a lot of writing. Millions of words in various formats. One well-received format is my short stories. I am in the process of writing new short stories, rewriting past stories, and putting them in a book format. I hope to have this project done by mid-summer. Readers should expect more short stories than normal as Carolyn and I work to bring this work to fruition. Once all the stories are collated, I will need a handful of readers who have professional writing, editing, or proofreading skills to read my manuscript, checking for grammar and spelling errors. If you are interested in helping with this project, please let me know. Carolyn will be the gatekeeper, or maybe the pitbull at the end of the lane. 🙂 Regardless, she knows my writing style inside and out, so she will have the final say on edits. When Carolyn offered to do my editing years ago, I promised her a book. Well, here we are. 🙂

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Bruce Gerencser, 66, lives in rural Northwest Ohio with his wife of 45 years. He and his wife have six grown children and thirteen grandchildren. Bruce pastored Evangelical churches for twenty-five years in Ohio, Texas, and Michigan. Bruce left the ministry in 2005, and in 2008 he left Christianity. Bruce is now a humanist and an atheist.

Connect with me on social media:

Your comments are welcome and appreciated. All first-time comments are moderated. Please read the commenting rules before commenting.

You can email Bruce via the Contact Form.

Bruce Gerencser