The Life and Times of Bruce Gerencser

What you have done to the least of these my brethren you have done to me”. That verse seems to imply Bruce that who you were really telling to f%#$k off is Jesus not me, because I belong to Jesus.

— Evangelical Joe Sperling

• Part One
• Part Two
• Part Three
• Part Four

Despite telling me four times that he would stop contacting me, Joe continues to send me emails:

Being human my curiosity caused me to check back on your site tonight. I was surprised you had extended the thread to a “Part 2”. I am not “outraged” at all. Just still shaking my head a little in disbelief that you told me “f$#$k you Joe” and then “f%$%k off!” That was in no way warranted. In fact, I didn’t say anything about your mental health until AFTER you had cursed me. I was using sarcasm (as I am sure many who read my email could easily surmise) when I said I was writing a chapter for a book about Abnormal Psychology. That was purely tongue in cheek.

I was just very surprised that you would find it “easy” to address someone in that way. I had even posted a message for Michael because of his civility, and his taking the time to list (4) points he wanted me to consider. The only post that had caused a truly negative response was when I spoke of slavery to point out they had no formal education due to their being in chains, but were very wise people. Sage took offense that I used slavery in my analogy. I told her she was being “touchy”. She is entitled to say whatever she wants to say though, and I need to learn to use different analogies in the future. But I never once found it within my right to tell her or anyone else for that matter to “f$#%k off”!

A blog like yours is set up to allow discussions to take place, so I was very surprised that you “silenced” me so soon. And then on top of that thought you had the right to tell me to “f%$%k off.” I disagree with people but never feel I have the right to say something like that to them. I do appreciate your allowing me to post my thoughts though. It is YOUR blog so you can run it as you see fit. I am only sending this email because you said you would allow me one more.

By the way, I never said you were on your way to hell. I said I felt intense sadness that deconverts will “miss out” and feel deep embarrassment when standing before Jesus one day. I will not take back that thought. I DO feel intense sadness when thinking of that. I know you don’t believe in a Judgment seat, but I do. One of the “laws of physics” says something to the effect of “for every action there is an equal and opposite reaction” (again, just a paraphrase if I’ve gotten the quote wrong). You believe we all just die and that’s it. You see I think the “law” I mentioned above can also apply to the spiritual realm. Did Heinrich Himmler just “die” and everything about him is now gone? Perhaps you can believe that, but I cannot. His “actions” caused untold grief to thousands and thousands of people. I believe one day, before the Great White Throne he will be asked to explain why he did what he did, and will be judged for it. I think we ALL must stand before God and explain why we did what we did.

“What you have done to the least of these my brethren you have done to me”. That verse seems to imply Bruce that who you were really telling to f%#$k off is Jesus not me, because I belong to Jesus.

I will not contact you again. All I can do is hope that any of the deconverts on the board might think twice about their decision. I know that 99% will say there is no need to re-consider. But there might be that 1%. And as that famous line Jim Carrey says in “Dumb and Dumber” “so you’re telling me I still have a chance!!??”

God bless you.

Where, oh where do I begin? As you can see, Joe is just a poor, misunderstood bloke who didn’t do anything to warrant me telling him to “go fuck himself.” His words speak for themselves. Joe tries to paint himself as a victim. He states that he was surprised I “silenced” him so soon. 🙂 Uh, Joe left twenty-five comments and sent me a dozen emails. He more than said his piece, even after I asked him repeatedly to stop contacting me.

Joe believes he is Jesus, that when I told him to “fuck off” I was really saying these words to Jesus. No, Joe, I am telling YOU, flesh and blood Joe, to “go fuck himself.” Not Jesus. Jesus is a dead man. Why would I tell him to “fuck off.” Besides, I don’t have a problem with Jesus, It’s you, Joe, and others like you I have a problem with.

Joe thinks that his words on this site might “help” a few deconverts who read my writing — maybe one percent. I think I can confidently say that Joe has helped them, reminding them of how glad they are to be free of Jesus and away from those who say they speak on his behalf.

I replied to Joe’s latest email. Here’s what I had to say:

Trigger Warning to Joe. This email contains swear words.

Joe,

You seem to think I give a shit about what you think. I don’t. You’ve told me four times you wouldn’t contact me again, yet you continue to email me. Why is that?

Stop the gaslighting, Joe. Own your behavior instead of blaming everyone else for how people responded to you. Stop lying. I never told you that you could email me one more time. Why the fuck would I do that? You know I told you that you could leave one more comment, which you did. So, don’t even suggest I said I wanted to hear from you again.

I don’t buy for a moment your claim that you were being sarcastic about the book blurb and my mental health. You intended your words to wound. 

You are supposedly a grown-ass man, Joe. You can’t handle someone telling you to “fuck off” in an email?  Especially since my response to your behavior was warranted. You seem to think you can say and do whatever you want without people responding to you. Not on my blog. I’ve dealt with countless Joe Sperlings over the years. I refuse to let them bully me, attack my character, or shit all over my blog. You ran into the wrong atheist, dude. 

You say you are a Christian. You say you are a follower of Jesus. Yet, your behavior is anything but Christian. What did Jesus tell you about how to treat your enemies? How would Jesus have responded if someone told him to “fuck off”? WWJD?

I intend to make our email interaction public. This allows my readers a look at how Evangelicals behave, exposing the ugly underbelly of Evangelicalism. You have done a good job advancing the cause of atheism.

If you want to continue to harass me, I suggest you start a blog. It’s free, takes five minutes, then you can deconstruct my life to your heart’s content.

Bruce Gerencser

Bruce Gerencser, 68, lives in rural Northwest Ohio with his wife of 47 years. He and his wife have six grown children and sixteen 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.

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.

• Part One
• Part Two
• Part Three
• Part Four

After I wrote Part One, Joe took to commenting on several posts on this site. You can check out his comments here, here, here, here, and here. All told, Joe left twenty-five comments before I cut him off.

I gave Joe one last opportunity to say whatever he wanted to say. After that, move on. I told him that I would approve no further comments from him. Joe tried to continue commenting, but I deleted his comments.

I stated in the comment section:

As sure as the sun comes up in the morning, give Evangelicals enough rope and they will reveal their true beliefs and character. I’ve seen it over and over and over again. Joe Sperling is the latest example of this.

As time went on and he got pushback from readers, his pronouncements became more aggressive. This is one of the reasons I typically only give Evangelicals one opportunity to comment. Joe wasn’t Revival Fires — a fucking low bar if there ever was one — so I extended to him commenting privileges. And sure as the sun comes up in the morning . . . 😂

I finally asked him to make one last comment and move on. Do you think he could do that?

Tonight, he sent me two emails. Here’s what he said:

“I’m not whining. All you had to is ask. However from now on when someone mentions Bruce G. I’ll think of a little kid sticking his fingers in his ears and running to another room to avoid hearing things he doesn’t like. lol. See ya later.“

“I’m sending from here in case the other didn’t go through. I’m not whining Bruce. All you had to do was ask. I’ll always remember you though as a little kid shoving his fingers into his ears and running away because he is hearing things he doesn’t like. lol. You are too much ha ha.”

Evidently, he thought I needed to hear this twice. I know I’m a little slow these days 😂😂

Well, you can probably figure out how I responded:

Go fuck yourself, Joe. You said your piece. I have no interest in talking with you further.

Let’s see if you can respect boundaries.

I quickly learned that Joe is a bully, someone who has no regard for personal boundaries.

What follows is a transcript of the emails he sent me and my responses:

Joe: Seriously— what makes you believe you can say something like that to someone and it’s totally OK? Is this how you normally address people you disagree with? I’m actually flabbergasted [sic]. Unbelievable.

I guess you’ll use this now with your laughing emojis. That’s cool. Be my guest. See ya.”

Bruce: No, I’ll just tell you again, Joe, fuck off 🍆🍆🍆🍆. Second request, don’t contact me again.

Joe: “Go f&$&#k yourself Joe? Really? For quoting 1John 2:19? And then you put up your own article where you allow someone to quote it once again? OK— carry on. I feel no need to curse you back. God bless you.”

Bruce: Once again, Joe, fuck off. Third request, please do not contact me.

Joe: “Can I have your permission to quote you? I’m writing a chapter for a book on abnormal psychology and your statement would fit in well. They ask to get approval first though. I probably wouldn’t include the four purple thingies, but your statement would work great as a segue into the next chapter. Let me know. And thanks!”

Bruce: “No, I’ll just tell you again, Joe, fuck off 🍆🍆🍆🍆. Fourth request, don’t contact me again.

You are officially being a passive-aggressive bully.

Thank you for proving exactly the kind of man you really are; someone who has no regard for boundaries; someone who thinks he can control how people respond to him.”

Today, I woke up to two more emails from Joe. I did not respond to them.

Joe: Bruce— you are too much. You tell me to f@#@#k off and then say it’s ME who is showing who they really are? You are the control freak not me. Whose “boundaries”? You are the one with the Blog. I won’t contact you again. But seriously Bruce, get some psychological help. If you think it is your “right” to tell people to f$#&$k off you have some SERIOUS mental problems.

Joe: I forgot to add one thing: you are shooting yourself in the foot Bruce. Anyone can clearly see YOU are being the bully not me. I will send no further emails. It’s hard NOT to respond when someone tells you to f#$&$k off. It’s called being human.

As you can see, Joe is a Jesus-loving, Bible-believing (but, not practicing) passive-aggressive bully. As Sage, a long-time reader and my friend (she encourages me to take up pole dancing as Santa, the Stripper) :), observed, Joe is skilled at gaslighting:

You are quite skilled at gaslighting. Someone takes offense to your analogy, and point out how it fails, then you respond by claiming they are the problem and they need fix their views. That is classic gaslighting – when someone questions you, attack them and try to belittle them. You even carry it over to a different post, praising one poster while belittling the other. Now Michael,is the “good” deconvert and Sage is the “Bad” deconvert.

I clearly understood the point you were making. I even gave you ways to make the same point without using slavery. But it appears you are so determined to defend yourself and your analogy that you justify any type method to dismiss Sage. I have called you out as judgemental. I haven’t attacked you personally, I’ve attacked your analogy. You respond by attacking me personally, belittling me, gaslighting me, dismissing me and hope that doing so will destroy my point, or leave me unable to argue with you

I made a good faith effort to respond to and interact with Joe. He “seemed” like a decent Christian. However, after fifteen years of responding to countless Joes, I know that decent, thoughtful Evangelicals are few and far in between. Such people are typically “nice” until they are challenged or someone says something they don’t like. Then they reveal their true character. Such was the case with Joe. His comments became more hostile, more personal. I tried, as did others, to correct his factual errors, to no avail. Joe knows what he knows, end of discussion. Joe began his interaction with me saying that I never was a Christian and I was headed for Hell, and his interaction with me ended the same way.

Joe’s upset that I told him to “go fuck himself.” Tough shit. No one is going to control what I say or the language I use. I rarely tell people to “fuck off,” but in Joe’s case, it was warranted. Occasionally, a reader will object to me using curse words. Evangelicals, in particular, seem to have their freaking 🙂 sensibilities offended when someone tells them to go fornicate with themselves. I suspect there are times that I deliberately tell Evangelicals to “fuck off” because I know doing so riles them up. I do the same with some of my letters to the editor of the local newspaper. I call it “poking the bear.” Poked Evangelicals will quickly show that they are not Holy Spirit-controlled or following in the steps of Jesus. In Joe’s case, I was genuinely angered by his personal attacks on me, his refusal to accept my story at face value, and his unwillingness to admit that he was wrong. I corrected him three times, using facts and evidence easily found on the Internet, but Joe just doubled down and refused to admit he had erred.

I’ve dealt with scores of Joes over the years. In that time, I have taken various approaches to the Joes of the world: full engagement, limited engagement, or I just ignore them. I respond to every email I receive — thousands of them over the past fifteen years. In Joe’s case, I answered numerous emails from him before saying “enough.” I was thoughtful, honest, and open until he became aggressive and started making things personal. It was then, and only then, that I told him to “go fuck himself.” Joe asking to quote me in a book (a story I don’t believe is true) was nothing more than a threat of exposure. I am a public figure, so Joe is free to write or say anything he wants about me. I am quoted in several books written by Evangelicals. None of them asked me for permission to quote me (nor did they let me know they had done so). I am a big believer in personal responsibility, so I own my words; all of them, including telling someone to “fuck off.” Have I ever said things I shouldn’t have? Yep, and in every instance, I have owned my words, apologized, and, if warranted, changed what I had written. But, apologizing for telling a passive-aggressive bully and gaslighter to “fuck off”? Not a chance . . .

Joe’s ultimate attack came when he suggested I have mental health problems. Why? Because I told him to “go fuck himself.” 🙂 🙂 🙂 Joe doesn’t care about my mental health. If he did, he would have behaved differently. Regular readers know, of course, that I have been seeing a secular psychologist for a decade. Not one time have I been told that I needed to clean up my gosh darn 🙂 language. (Please see Evangelical Swear Words.) I just talked to my therapist today. We talked about real stuff; you know: gastroparesis, fibromyalgia, osteoarthritis, chronic pain, trauma, and how my Independent Fundamentalist Baptist (IFB) upbringing caused untold trauma and harm, to me, my wife, and my grown children. You know, REAL issues.

I am sure Joe won’t like what I have written here. I’m sure he will send me at least one email to register his outrage. If he does, I will post his email below.

Thank you for reading. I appreciate your love and support.

Bruce Gerencser, 68, lives in rural Northwest Ohio with his wife of 47 years. He and his wife have six grown children and sixteen 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.

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.