Curtis is a former senior pastor of an evangelical covenant church in California. He has struggled with anxiety his whole life, but didn't have the categories to make sense of it. In Christian circles, he says, there can be a lot of shame around anxiety. And so instead what happened was that the anxiety just built in me over time.
Curtis Chang, the regular host of the Good Faith podcast, takes a turn in the “guest seat” in this special episode in which Nancy French interviews him about his new book, The Anxiety Opportunity: How Worry Is the Doorway to Your Best Self. Curtis, who has suffered from anxiety to the point of losing his job as a senior pastor, offers up hard-earned wisdom that could transform one’s view on parenting, relationships, and even politics. Curtis also talks about the way the church gets anxiety wrong, how Jesus dealt with anxious people, and how grieving is a necessary component of effectively walking through loss.