{"podcast":{"title":"The Allender Center Podcast","slug":"the-allender-center-podcast-1093683","podcast_index_feed_id":1093683,"rss_url":"https://theallendercenter.libsyn.com/rss","website_url":"http://theallendercenter.org","image_url":"https://static.libsyn.com/p/assets/e/8/f/f/e8ff350178e26c4c/TAC_Podcast_LogoBadge-UPLOAD-V2.jpg","author":"The Allender Center","episode_count":616,"summary":"The Allender Center Podcast features Dr. Dan Allender and his team engaging topics on healing and restoration through the unique intersection of theology and psychology. Through questions submitted by listeners, stories, interviews, and conversations, we engage the deep places of heartache and hope that are rarely addressed so candidly in our culture today. Join us to gain refreshing insight into understanding your story, handling relational struggles, recovering from trauma and abuse, and more. The mission of The Allender Center is to help people tell their stories with awareness and integrity, and to train them to listen to the stories of others with care, artistry, and skill so that they may foster redemption and healing in their lives. The Allender Center is a pioneering organization committed to boldly engaging the impact of trauma and abuse, providing healing and teaching to individuals, couples, and communities, and training professionals to listen and enter into stories in a way that facilitates transformation and hope. For information on all our programs and live events, visit theallendercenter.org","last_synced_at":"2026-08-01T00:18:44.426745+00:00","page_url":"https://stenobird.com/podcast/the-allender-center-podcast-1093683"},"episode":{"title":"\"Growing Up Pure\" with Lauren D. Sawyer, PhD","slug":"growing-up-pure-with-lauren-d-sawyer-phd","published_at":"2026-03-06T18:16:00+00:00","page_url":"https://stenobird.com/podcast/the-allender-center-podcast-1093683/growing-up-pure-with-lauren-d-sawyer-phd","show_page_url":"https://stenobird.com/podcast/the-allender-center-podcast-1093683","url":"https://theallendercenter.libsyn.com/growing-up-pure-with-lauren-d-sawyer-phd","audio_url":"https://traffic.libsyn.com/secure/theallendercenter/tac625-Export.mp3?dest-id=214185","summary":"What if healing from purity culture requires more than naming how you were hurt? What if it also means asking how you participated? In this episode, Dr. Dan Allender and Rachael Clinton Chen sit down with their colleague Dr. Lauren Sawyer, to explore her new book, Growing Up Pure. Lauren names something many haven't had language for: as teens, we weren't only victims of purity culture; we were also moral agents within it. We made choices. We found belonging. We sometimes resisted in small ways. And at times, we participated in systems that harmed others and ourselves. That tension between vulnerability and agency, harm and complicity can feel destabilizing. Yet Lauren invites us to see accountability not as punishment, but as a sacred, even hopeful, practice. What if repentance wasn't shame-driven, but a pathway toward integration? What if healing meant not only tending to the wounds purity culture caused, but also examining how we were formed by—and sometimes upheld—it? This episode is honest, nuanced, and tender. It creates space to grieve the damage of purity culture while also imagining a different story. One rooted in the belief that we are made in the image of God as embodied, relational, sexual beings… and that restoration is possible. About the Allender Center Podcast: For over a decade, the Allender Center Podcast has offered honest, thoughtful conversations about the deep work of healing and transformation. Hosted by Dr. Dan Allender and Rachael Clinton Chen, MDiv, this weekly podcast explores the complexities of trauma, abuse recovery, story, relationships, and spiritual formation. Through questions submitted by listeners, stories, interviews, and conversations, we engage the deep places of heartache and hope that are rarely addressed so candidly in our cult…","meta_description":"What if healing from purity culture requires more than naming how you were hurt? What if it also means asking how you participated? In this episode, Dr. D…","key_points":[],"chapters":[],"topics":[],"duration_seconds":2865,"processing_state":"not_requested","actions":[{"name":"request_transcript","method":"POST","url":"https://stenobird.com/v1/public/podcasts/the-allender-center-podcast-1093683/episodes/growing-up-pure-with-lauren-d-sawyer-phd/transcription-requests","description":"Idempotently request low-priority transcript generation for this episode."},{"name":"read_markdown","method":"GET","url":"https://stenobird.com/podcast/the-allender-center-podcast-1093683/growing-up-pure-with-lauren-d-sawyer-phd.md","description":"Read the agent-friendly Markdown representation of this episode resource."}]}}