Turns out you can have the chuppah, break the glass, do the hora, and still not have to mention God once. Or you can mention God exactly once, specifically for grandma, and everyone goes home happy. Humanist celebrant Bethel Nathan has been building ceremonies around real people and real love for 17 years, and her secret weapon is a questionnaire, a puzzle metaphor, and the radical idea that tradition should actually mean something to you personally. She will ask you things nobody else thought to ask, keep your answers a secret from your partner until the day of, and send you your vows every year on your anniversary just to remind you what you promised.

If you are getting married and you want a ceremony that actually sounds like you, her information is below.

ABOUT BETHEL NATHAN

Successful business owner and award-winning Humanist Celebrant, Bethel Nathan of Ceremonies by Bethel knows how to build and run a successful wedding industry business.

Combining her background in both very large companies (at two global investment banks in Tokyo, New York, and London) and small companies (including her family’s now-40-year-old business), Bethel found the right way to build a business that fit her. Focusing on her ideal couple and having a rave-worthy customer experience, as well as her strong support for marriage equality, Bethel has now married 1400 couples over the past 17 years and has built up more than 500 5-star reviews.

Her couples come from a wide variety of backgrounds, but all are looking for a ceremony that is uniquely theirs, and that is personal, meaningful, fun, and non-traditional. So, Bethel enjoys getting to know her couples, becoming their voice in a meaningful moment, meant to celebrate what they share, all in a fitting and worthy way.

Bethel's Official Site: www.ceremoniesbybethel.com
Bethel's Instagram: www.instagram.com/bethelnathan

LEARN MORE

For more on humanism: https://linktr.ee/americanhumanist

Salem, Massachusetts. Austin, Texas. Kingston, Pennsylvania. Turns out if you know where to look, Satanists have been quietly securing the best real estate in America for decades. In this episode, Shay sits down with Taylor Leigh of The Antibot, a Satanist-humanist and former evangelical missionary kid who grew up in Indonesia, came back to the States, and somehow ended up with a pentagram necklace from an occult store in Cleveland. As one does.

They cover the Satanic Temple, Baphomet, why most Satanists are not actually worshipping the devil, and why Taylor reclaimed a label that people were already throwing at them for having a septum ring. Shay learns a lot. Shay still knows very little. Both things continue to be true.

ABOUT TAYLOR LEIGH

Taylor Leigh runs the YouTube channel The Antibot. On her channel, she discusses life after leaving the Christian church and also provides commentary on the modern Evangelical movement from the perspective of a nontheistic Satanist.

YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@theantibot

LEARN MORE

American Empathy Project: americanempathyproject.org
For more on humanism: https://linktr.ee/americanhumanist

A man chose Liberty University over the University of Toronto because it had a conversion therapy program. That man is now a postdoctoral fellow editing anthologies about surviving it. You really cannot make this stuff up, and Dr. Lucas Wilson does not have to. In this episode he and Shay talk evangelical fictions, weaponized women, the anti-trans argument and why it falls apart the second someone has to show their receipts, and the very real possibility that Dr. Dino, a creationist whose doctoral dissertation allegedly opened with "Hi, my name's Ken," is responsible for Luke's entire life trajectory.

If you're queer, survived religious trauma, or went through something you didn't even have a name for until just now, Dr. Wilson is actively seeking submissions for his next anthology, Queer and Trembling: Stories of LGBTQ Religious Trauma. Contact email is below to learn more.

ABOUT DR. LUCAS WILSON

Wilson is a Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council Postdoctoral Fellow at University of Toronto Mississauga and was formerly the Justice, Equity, and Transformation Postdoctoral Fellow at University of Calgary. He’s also the editor of Shame-Sex Attraction: Survivors’ Stories of Conversion Therapy.

Shame-Sex Attraction Book: https://us.jkp.com/products/shamesex-attraction
Contact Lucas for submission details: anthology.submission2026@gmail.com

LEARN MORE

American Empathy Project: americanempathyproject.org
For more on humanism: https://linktr.ee/americanhumanist