Michael Bahry

[00:00:01] Speaker A: Good afternoon, everyone, and thank you for coming back to the Tron podcast. This is your host, Rashad woods, special guest today, who does great works. He's obviously been very involved when it comes to his community and teaching people to be better versions of themselves through his nonprofit work, as well as being a professor. Thank you very much, Mr. Michael Berry. [00:00:21] Speaker B: Yeah, thanks very much for having me. Rashad. [00:00:25] Speaker A: You have a very interesting background. You came from carpentry and construction work and then you became an executive and then you made a career pivot later on in life. I'd love to hear about that. [00:00:36] Speaker B: Yeah, my dad was into construction also, so it was pretty much a natural thing for me to go into it. I tried to go to college right after high school, but it didn't work out too good. I joke around that it was like a five week plan and I was off and working for a while. So about five years later I started to go. I went back to school at night while I was a carpenter and got an undergraduate degree. By the time I finished with that, I had two kids. So I stayed in construction with the degree. And yeah, eventually I was. I wanted to be a teacher, but I ended up staying in construction and got. Was blessed with being a manager and then got some executive positions and then started a firm. So. Yeah, and when I turned 53, I decided I wanted to continue to pursue. What I was interested in when I first went back to school for after five years of being out of high school was I wanted to teach. I wanted to teach about faith. And I was very much interested in history. So I got a degree and graduate degree in early church history and theology. And after I finished that, I was really hungry for to learn more. So I, I got another graduate degree, a master's degree in biblical studies. And. Yeah, so that's how I made the pivot and. [00:01:57] Speaker A: Wonderful. I should say. You're a professor now too. [00:02:00] Speaker B: Yeah, I tell the kids, don't call me professor because that's like an official title for professors. They call it an adjunct professor. I'm just, I teach two classes a week during the day today, students. And I absolutely love it. I mean, I just love the kids. It's a fascinating class. I teach a world religion class, which is interesting. I've learned a lot from. So I probably learned a lot. [00:02:28] Speaker A: Yeah, that's. That's fascinating. So I hate to. I apologize for cutting you off. Looking up religion is so fascinating to me. [00:02:35] Speaker B: Well, thank you. Yeah, it's a little different, but I do love the kids and I'm Very interested in a world religion. And when I, for the second masters that I did, I. I wrote a thesis on hell and the Savior of the World it was called. And that's what I was really ended up being interested in. I got interested about the afterlife. So I've learned a lot about how other faiths view the afterlife too, since I've been a world religion teacher. And yeah, it's been very fascinating. The whole transition's been great. [00:03:08] Speaker A: Now, have you traveled to places to look at? Because I always, I get fascinated by things like this because when they go to historical sites of where things have occurred, whether they go to, you know, Egypt, Jordan, Israel, places where all of these massive religious events have taken place. Have you had a chance to travel to any of these locations? [00:03:26] Speaker B: No, I've always wanted to go to Israel. I just haven't made it over that. I've been to Italy. I went to Rome and saw the Vatican and all that. That was fascinating. So that part of it historically and then also being a construction person, I was, you know, just blown away by the way they built buildings back then and just the old churches was really fascinating. But I haven't made it to Israel yet and I'm half Arabic, so I'm Syrian and Lebanese and I haven't made it there. I've wanted to go there also, given all the problems now, who knows when I'll be able to go there. [00:04:02] Speaker A: Understood? Understood. When you say that other religions view the afterlife, can you go a little deeper into that as to what each religion would view the afterlife in your research and understanding? [00:04:13] Speaker B: Well, I guess the Eastern religions are probably the most fascinating. You got probably 1.6 billion people between Hindus and Buddhists, and Hindus are about 1.1 billion. And they believe in many, many gods. Right. And they believe that there's something called samsara. It's kind of a circle of reincarnation that you keep being reincarnated over and over until you exit that system and achieve moksha. Which would you do that by? Good karma would finally outweigh your bad karma and you'd be drawn back to the Brahman, which is the source of all that's Hinduism. In Buddhism, it's not so much going back to God, it's not going back to God at all. It's really just reaching personal enlightenment, reaching nirvana. That's about a half a billion people. But it's interesting, both of them in this cycle of reincarnation, they have a place that I guess you could call in English, it would be hell. There's a God. Not the God, but a God. And Buddhists believe in gods, but they just don't believe in one overall God. Most Buddhists don't. [00:05:31] Speaker A: Right. [00:05:33] Speaker B: He reigns in a place called Naraka or Nakia. I don't know exactly how to say it, but he reigns there. And people are punished for their bad deeds in this life before they're reincarnated. So it's kind of an in between punishment and there's a. Various ways they're punished and so that they subconsciously remember it so they don't do it again in the next life. [00:05:56] Speaker A: That's fascinating. [00:05:57] Speaker B: So that's. Yeah, it is. It's interesting. That's really fascinating. But. But for them, Naraka or Nakia. I forgot how to say it. It's not an eternal condition. It's just an in between. A kind of like a way to teach you a lesson for all the wrongs you've done until you can get off the wheel of Samsara, we'll call it. [00:06:16] Speaker A: Okay. [00:06:17] Speaker B: Yeah. [00:06:17] Speaker A: Okay. Now do they have, do they have like the equivalent of a Bible in this? In those religions, is there some sort of book or is it more oral? [00:06:26] Speaker B: Yeah. Nope. They all have holy books and there's a plethora of them. There's nothing really. And the thing that's interesting about Hinduism, there's so many gods that it's really hard to pinpoint exactly what Hinduism is and Buddhism is, other than it's really focused on reincarnation and that this life is a delusion and to really see things clearly in one. In one of the religions, Hinduism, it's to make it back to the Brahmin. And in Buddhism, it's just to reach personal enlightenment. [00:07:03] Speaker A: Right. [00:07:03] Speaker B: So, yeah, it's very, it's very different than, you know, the Abrahamic religions, you know, Judaism and Islam and Christianity. Much different. [00:07:14] Speaker A: Correct. [00:07:15] Speaker B: You know, the, you know, I always. [00:07:17] Speaker A: Find it fascinating the. These Interesting. Very interesting. [00:07:20] Speaker B: Yeah, yeah. I think that most Christians, if they knew more about world religions, their view of Christianity and Jesus of Nazareth would be a little bit different because there's so many people out there made in the image and likeness of God that are trying to do something to make it right. Right. They know that there's right and wrong and they try not to do the wrong. So. [00:07:50] Speaker A: Right. [00:07:51] Speaker B: Yeah. It's fascinating just how many people are in the world and how many are struggling and they're in strife. Like In Hinduism, there's 1.1 billion Hindus in the world and about 200,000 of them are outside the Caste system totally, which is a hierarchy of social status. And they're there because of the religion of Hinduism. It has to do with whatever they did in their previous life, where they are now to try to reach moksha. And there's 200 million that aren't even in a caste. They don't even make it into a caste. So there's about 335 million people in the United States. 200 million are a caste list. In India, they're in abject poverty. You know, I don't know if you ever seen the slums of India. They're amazingly dense. And we think that we have problems with homeless here. It's just unbelievable. In India, Mumbai has. [00:08:53] Speaker A: The population is staggering. You know, the population level alone is just. It's stag. You know, it's an amazing amount of people. [00:08:59] Speaker B: It is. They surpass China. There's 1.4 billion people just in India. There's 1.4 billion in China also. But there's just a little bit more 1.4 in India now. It's amazing. [00:09:18] Speaker A: So how does someone who comes from your background approach another religion's beliefs? I mean, I know religion is very, very dicey topic. Is it more just from an understanding standpoint? Is it like curiosity or. Now how does. How does that whole go? How does that come across? [00:09:36] Speaker B: Well, I'm a. I'm a convicted believer in Jesus of Nazareth. You know, I think that. I think he's the way, the truth and the light. He's the fullness of any approach to trying to reach God. And so I. That's my compass is Jesus of Nazareth. That's my standard of religion. A God that would leave heaven to rescue his creation, that in some way got broken along the way. I in no way believe that I'm reborn to someone else, that my consciousness goes to another soul. I believe that we live in a broken world. I am who I am, and someday I'll be made right with God in the afterlife. But I try to approach all those other religions with some humility, understanding that some of them have never been exposed to Christianity or Jesus of Nazareth or Bible or when they have been exposed to it. It's been extremely negative by people that are saying that they're a follower of Jesus of Nazareth, but may not be conveying in a way that is anything that they would want to be associated with. So I think I come from a place that everyone is made in the image and likeness of God and in some way God is going to make everything right at some point. I don't believe necessarily in universal salvation, but I do believe that everyone gets a chance. And how, that how God administers justice in the afterlife is just, you know, way too big for, you know, someone like me to kind of try to guess at. So I don't try to guess at what happens in the afterlife. The book I wrote, Hell is a bad word. A place of never ending punishment that Jesus of Nazareth never spoke of. Really delves into that. [00:11:28] Speaker A: I saw you mentioned that. [00:11:30] Speaker B: Yeah, it delves into the specifics of what he actually said and how it was interpreted or how it's been interpreted as a place of never ending punishment. So I go through those things and found that fascinating. So that's probably been the most fascinating part of my life is, is really researching that. And how does. [00:11:54] Speaker A: Yeah, and I was looking at, on your website, it said only four of 27 New Testament documents use the two words associated with hell. Right. And so, you know, obviously you would know that more than I would. How does, how do you think the forefront of damnation took the forefront of a lot of conversations for deeds that we do while we are alive? Like, how did that become to be. [00:12:20] Speaker B: I think at some point, it really is a turning point in church history. According to a lot of scholars, it has to do with Augustine of Hippo. He's a 4th century scholar, he was a priest, he became a bishop, and he was very influential in the early church. And. But before Augustine, the verses that contained what is written down as the English word hell, when the Bible is finally Translated to English 1500 years after Jesus of Nazareth was crucified and resurrected from the dead, those words back then were seen by a lot of scholars as having to do with purification. One of the ones that is translated as hell is a valley on the outskirts of Jerusalem. It's called Gehenna. And that's still translated as hell in some Bibles. Interesting statistic is that in the first Catholic Bible, the word hell appeared 109 times. In the Bible, that's used every day of the week, seven days a week, 365 days a year. In the Catholic Church today does not include the word hell. It's been decided that the word has been misused. It's been a mistranslation of four other words. So it doesn't appear that way in Catholic Bibles. And it's not just like that in Catholicism. The King James version has the word hell 58 times. And the new international version and the new American Standard version has it 13 times. And those 13 times in both of Those refer to a valley south and west of the city of Jerusalem are called Gehenna. The theology of the time, whether it's Catholic or Protestant, when the first Bibles came out, was that there is a place in the afterlife where God burns people eternally for their sins. When I researched it, the verses that contain those words don't really bear that out as far as I'm concerned. And, you know, it's. There's a lot of that goes behind explaining that because it's such a position that's outside the norm for Christianity. But basically Christianity took on some of the forms of the afterlife punishment that came from other religions like Buddhism and Hinduism and also something called Zoroastrianism, which is a. Was practiced by the Persian Empire, a very dualistic religion that has a good God and a bad God, and the bad God presided over a place of fire. So, yeah, it's interesting. A lot of words in the Bible that have been. Were translated to hell. [00:15:04] Speaker A: Wow. Because, you know, for so many times, I mean, for the, you know, it's the classic good versus evil do this. Certain things are happening for you in the afterlife. You know, things, you know, if you don't xyz are the consequences for it. So subsequently, and this is my own personal curiosity, if there's a dispute about whether hell is what it is, is there definitively then a heaven? [00:15:28] Speaker B: Yeah. And it's interesting, Jesus didn't talk that much about heaven either. So there's not a lot about heaven and hell, really. Jesus of Nazareth was more concerned about loving God and loving neighbor. You know, that was the greatest. That was the greatest commandment, you know, the Shema. Hear, O Israel, the Lord your God, the Lord is one, and you, Israel, should love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your soul and with all your strength. He was basically concerned with that and Leviticus, which is love your neighbor as yourself. That's really what he was concerned with. That's what the parable of the Good Samaritan is all about. And you know, that's really. Jesus was concerned what happened in the here and now. Now he did talk about the afterlife, but it's really not the focus of his ministry. It has much to do with what happens here. And that's Judaism, you know, that's not anything different. He was. He was a Jew. [00:16:24] Speaker A: Right. Is the prevailing notion, you know, is. It's. So this is what your interpretation. I'm not in any way coming. You know, this is. I'm just listening. Is that a prevailing notion of what you have, you know, how has that message been received based on what you've researched? Has it come across to anybody else that's similar said this is the same point of view when you've talked to other people in religion, you know, in particular followers of Jesus or what's the, what's the reaction and response been? [00:16:53] Speaker B: That's a, that's a great question. So it's definitely outside the mainstream of Christianity, whether it be Catholic or Protestant, no doubt about that. But the thesis that I wrote for my second master's at PC, I graduated with distinction. So I made theological points that were correct in some way. I certainly interpreted the Scriptures in a way that was logical or they wouldn't have accepted the thesis. So I think the answer to that is yeah, there's a lot of other scholars, great scholars that are much smarter than I ever thought of being, ever even dreamed of being that think this way. There's David Bentley Hart, there's Alara Romelli, and then in the Catholic Church, my own faith is a guy called Hans von Balthazar. And he, he asserts that we can hope that eventually everyone will be saved. That's not the genesis of my book. I'm sorry, the thesis of my book. The thesis of my book is that there's really, it's really not conclusive that Jesus ever even talked about a place where you go to in the afterlife, that God's mercy expires, that God no longer cares about anyone. It's really not definitively taught by him. It's interpreted that way. And if you read some of the verses, you can understand it. You say, well, what is he talking about then? And then the more you look into it, you look into those verses, the more you can see is that it doesn't make sense that he would be talking about an afterlife place of torture for someone who's maybe not baptized at all or someone who hasn't professed their faith in Jesus and been born again, right, Professing their faith in him as personal savior and Lord, which I've done and I'm baptized. But I certainly don't think all Hindus, all Buddhists, all Muslims are going to a place of never ending punishment because Jesus is the way, the truth and the light. And they don't believe that I no way think that they're going to everlasting torment for that. How that gets adjudicated in the afterlife. And I do believe he is the way, the truth and the light. But I'm not sure exactly what that means other than it's the fullness of, I think how God communicates himself to the world through self giving love, through self giving love so great that he laid down his life for his creatures. Can't explain. [00:19:25] Speaker A: You know, I just think like this is the reason why I did a show like this was to be able to talk to people like you. Because even in my limit, you know, I know enough, a little bit about religion to where I can navigate the nuances. I mean, anybody who somewhat, you know, whether it's Google, whether they brought to church as a kid, whether they've gone to a place of worship at any point in their life, you know, you know the basics to get down to the very, very grains of sand of it all and to. It's. It's a taught, it's a, it's a, it's a long lasting wormhole of knowledge. It is because it is, it really is. [00:20:01] Speaker B: It's hard to navigate through. Christianity is supposed to be good news, right? The word gospel means good news. And the way it was used in the first century was when a king made sure that you weren't going to go into bondage, into slavery and be conquered and have everything taken from you. So I'm not sure in what way it can be good news that everyone besides just a chosen few is going to burn in fire forever in the afterlife. I think it's much better news that God has made a way through the cross for his creatures to find their way back to him. How he does that and how that becomes fair, I think I'll leave to him. I'll just try to follow the teachings of his son, my life, do the best that I can, and leave the justice to him. Right? Focus on loving God and loving neighbor. [00:21:01] Speaker A: How does your nonprofit 535 go? I think that's very great work that you do and I'd love to get a chance to speak. [00:21:11] Speaker B: Well, what we do is every single week we make lunches, bagged lunches for the homeless. Some we deliver directly to the street and others we deliver to two homeless shelters in Providence, Rhode island, right next door to us here. Besides that, we also once a month we bring clothes to the shelter and we pass them out to the guys, try to get to know them. We also preside over a service once a month before they eat dinner and we just tell them a little bit about Jesus of Nazareth and the gospel and try to pass out something at that time too. Besides those, those things that the rest of ours is really Thanksgiving and Christmas we do Thanksgiving dinners, we pass out on the street, we coordinate with a couple of local churches. [00:22:02] Speaker A: Beautiful. [00:22:03] Speaker B: And yeah, we also do presents at Christmas time for the homeless. We deliver poinsettias to the elderly and bring them an excerpt of Luke's gospel about, you know, the infancy narrative of Jesus. We try to keep Christ in Christmas, so that's, that's what we do. And it's growing, it's getting much, much bigger and much better every year. So touch more people every year. Try to focus on that part of Jesus ministry, you know? [00:22:33] Speaker A: Right. [00:22:34] Speaker B: Say that again. [00:22:34] Speaker A: I could pick your brain. I'm sorry about that. I just said I could pick your brain all day about, you know, your research and the things that you, you know, because I'm the kind of person that I would watch a documentary on the things that you, that you went to school about because you'll be like, how did, how did things formulate from this area of the world and then spread amongst the rest of the world? And then also how did this other portion of the world get to this belief system? Right. And it is, yeah, it is the biggest wormhole that you can go down and it's a lot of conflicting information and you'll find a lot of overlaps. And it's just hearing you talk about it is very, very fascinating. [00:23:14] Speaker B: Yeah. I mean, my anchor is, you know, the teachings of Jesus to love God and love neighbor. And he says he gives a new commandment to love one another as I have loved you. So how did he love the world or how did he love his disciples? He laid his life down for them. I think that if the world's religions, specifically the Abrahamic religions, focused on that more than, you know, whose piece of land this is and whose piece of land that is, there'd be peace in the Middle East. I think it's a big problem that we don't listen to the teaching of Jesus of Nazareth. [00:23:49] Speaker A: Yeah, it's a complicated ordeal over there, that's for sure. [00:23:52] Speaker B: It is. Yeah. [00:23:54] Speaker A: How do you, how does. So obviously you're doing great work and the things that you do are very. Not only, you know, fantastic, but, you know, very self fulfilling for you. But how can people find you just for the, just for the basis of this show? [00:24:10] Speaker B: How can they what, I'm sorry? [00:24:12] Speaker A: How could they find you like Michael Berry? How would they be able to. Obviously, you know, you don't need me to spread what you do, but just for the people who would be on the show listening, how would they find out in Rhode island what you do? [00:24:23] Speaker B: They could, they could go to 53.5.org is probably the best place. That's where the website is for the nonprofit. And the thing that's interesting about it, Rasheed, is that we don't make all the lunches. A bunch of different people make them. So a family or a couple of people or one person will take it. So we try to make it so that 52 weeks a year, it's spread around about a lot through a lot of different people. Like, we've had a law firm do it a couple of times. A guy who owns a bunch of Dunkin Donut franchises, his employees have done it. So a lot of different people do it. And what it is, it gives them a chance to see their neighbor in a homeless person. I think that's one of the wonderful things about 535 is that we live in such a rich country. We often don't know the best way we can help the homeless or the inner city poor. And they're right there ready to help. We're too busy worried about politically which side is winning rather than. Yeah, there's. There's homeless people, there's inner city poor, the working poor that just need help. And so this gives an opportunity with the homeless part of it to do that. And then at Christmas and Thanksgiving, we get to help out homeless inner city families. You know, we also have an essay contest at a couple of schools where we ask a theological question and we give them some scholarship money. So it's trying to invest in the inner city poor. [00:25:57] Speaker A: Wonderful. [00:25:59] Speaker B: Our neighbor is in need here. So. [00:26:03] Speaker A: How did you pick the name? [00:26:06] Speaker B: It comes from a verse in the Old Testament in Isaiah. It has to do with the suffering servant, someone that God chooses to suffer for the sins of Christians. Interpretation interpreted as the sins of the world. So he was wounded for our transgressions. He was bruised for our iniquity. Upon him was a chastisement that makes us whole. And by his stripes, we're healed. So we think it prophesies about the coming of a suffering servant who comes to save his people. So we picked that because out of gratitude for that and recognition that God is among us. [00:26:52] Speaker A: Yeah. I was like, wow, that's a really interesting combination of numbers to put together. But obviously that deeper meaning for it speaks for itself. And I can't thank you enough for the great deeds that you do, the time that you take out, the lives that you have touched, and the goodness that you're spreading. So thank you so much for your time. I really appreciate hearing the things that you do. [00:27:13] Speaker B: Yeah. Really grateful to talk to you, Rasheed. And you know, I wish I knew a little bit more about you. I looked a little bit up online about you, and you look like an interesting guy. So I wish you all the best in everything you do. [00:27:27] Speaker A: I appreciate it. That's, you know, my mind spins and, you know, seeing, you know, being able to. That's part of my curiosity. There's things that you can. You always have to be thinking in life, and you always have to be fascinated. And the best thing about children is their curiosity. And for some reason, you're supposed to lose that as an adult or it's not cool to ask questions as an adult. I, like, I had to lose. I had to say, I just wanted to be a kid and figure out all the fascinating things that are around this world. [00:27:55] Speaker B: Yeah. Yeah. There's so much to learn, and you're not too old to learn. I mean, I started pretty late, but I've seen people older than me going back to school and interested in it, you know, so. At 53, to go back was an honor. It was great, and I. I enjoyed it. So since I was so interested, I got the most for my money, you know, so. [00:28:17] Speaker A: Right, right. [00:28:18] Speaker B: But thank you so much for your time. [00:28:21] Speaker A: Oh, no problem. And no problem. I'd love to pick your brain further. You. You take care. And thank you for being on the TROD podcast, sir. [00:28:27] Speaker B: Yeah. Always interested to talk you. You take care. You too. [00:28:32] Speaker A: Thank you.