Bring It Home

The Adventure of Finding Yourself after Being Lost in Religion

Matt Kendziera

Bring It Home—here’s a spiritual memoir that will make you laugh as it touches your heart. Matt Kendziera knows where to find you, and how to help you find what you’re looking for.
—Brian D. McLaren, author of Do I Stay Christian?

If our quest to explore faith leads us through experiences that leave us disappointed by systems and people who claim to have the corner on the “truth,” what are we left with? We are left with the place where it all began.

For podcaster, speaker, former pastor, and musician Matt Kendziera, much of life has been spent with people telling him who to be and what to believe, knowing deep inside that he was losing himself. After being kicked out of the church he started, Matt suddenly found himself on the outside looking in and decided to attempt a new approach.

In Bring It Home: The Adventure of Finding Yourself after Being Lost in Religion, Matt will take you along as he discovers that the stories of his life help him unearth the more true and authentic parts of himself that have been there all along. Through remembering a sense of wonder at his childhood church building, his failed attempt at being a teacher, and his unbelievable moments as a prison chaplain, you’ll find stories of discovering faith not just through beliefs but through experiences, relationships, joy, sorrow, success, and failure. With simple takeaways in each chapter, Matt’s engaging, often funny, sometimes touching stories of rediscovering himself after being lost in too much religion will perhaps help you, too, better see the original blueprint of your life.

You were created for a real and meaningful life and a deep connection to the divine. Time to “bring it home.”

Featured in Publishers Weekly’s “Books Multiply on ‘Deconstructing’ Faith”

Matt Kendziera is a full-time speaker, podcaster, writer, and creator. He is the host of the Chasing Goodness podcast, engaging authors, activists, and influencers on questions that most people run from. He’s also a collaborator with several other incredible organizations such as Fierce Freedom, Rachel’s Challenge, Ashoka, Celtic Way, and Soularize. Matt currently lives in rural Wisconsin with the love of his life, Suzie and his two teenage children. Learn more and follow him at www.mattkendziera.com.

Praise for Bring It Home

Even though people are leaving church systems in droves, the desire is still so strong to seek a deep, meaningful, and simple life of faith. Matt Kendziera’s story reflects so many others and he does what he does best—tell honest stories that heal, inspire, and help people feel connected and less alone in our wrestling and in our dreams for a better future, together. Matt is a trusted and seasoned guide on the path “home” so many are seeking and he encapsulates it so clearly in Bring it Home: “maybe we can find God by finding ourselves.”

Kathy Escobar, Co-Founder of The Refuge and author of Faith Shift: Finding Your Way Forward When Everything You Believe is Coming Apart and Practicing: Changing Yourself to Change the World

Matt Kendziera’s tender book is a balm to those who long to come fully alive. In beautifully-crafted short chapters, he vividly describes the journey involved in accepting the mystery of the divine in ourselves and finding our own unique, “beautiful, flowing river of faith.” His tales are filled with energy, humor and humility. I laughed and cried, and couldn’t put it down!

Anne Evans, leadership group member at Ashoka: Innovators for the Public

What a life provoking surprise this turned out to be! I laughed out loud, had moments of reflective tears, but all throughout I was slowly being drawn into the invitation of becoming—more accepting of my own journey, more deeply of others, and more open to the acceptance of God’s acceptance of us all. This is not a “church bashing” piece. This work slowly turns into a mirror and whispers, “LIVE!”

Scott Jenkins, creative director of The Celtic Way, chaplain, and pastor emeritus

Bring It Home – here’s a spiritual memoir that will make you laugh as it touches your heart. Matt Kendziera knows where to find you, and how to help you find what you’re looking for.

Brian D. McLaren, author of Do I Stay Christian?

Everyone has, at least once, felt the bottom fall out of our worlds, our compasses spinning, with only despair for company. When that happens to someone you love, you’ll want them to have a guide as humane, honest, funny, heartbreaking, and heart-enlarging at Matt Kendziera. In his company, all of us can find direction, and a path to bring our full selves home.

Raj Patel, author, academic, and filmmaker of The Ants and the Grasshopper

The familiar and stable settlements of church, belief, and security are being transformed into unfamiliar and dynamic paths of doubt, deconstruction, and unknowing. Right now, we need guides who have experienced this path, can show us how it unfolds, and even reveal how there is more joy and peace ahead. This is who Matt is and what this book can be for so many people. The wisdom and authenticity within his story can call us further ahead and back home at the exact same time.

Kevin Sweeney author of The Making of a Mystic and forthcoming book The Joy of Letting Go