Radical Unity | Arsenal Stories | Eric Villalpando
You don't have to believe what I believe to belong in this space.
Eric Villalpando tells his story, and it starts in two rooms on the same morning — a Catholic church and this one. He grew up fully Catholic: Catholic school, every sacrament, a theology degree from St. Mary's. He's careful about what happened next. He didn't deconstruct, exactly. He demystified.
The hinge is a summer at Deer Creek Camp — forty counselors from wildly different backgrounds in one room with an open Bible, led by a Calvinist. Nobody liked it. Then everyone walked out and got on the zip line together. What he took from it is that you don't have to believe all the same things to belong in the same place, and that your first experience of God is far more likely to happen in loving the person next to you than in a book.
It ends with his father at the hardest moment of his life, and then at the cross with two thieves Eric refuses to sort into good and bad. One of them asks to be remembered, and Jesus doesn't ask about his sacraments or his position on baptism. He just says: you'll be with me.
In this episode:
- Two churches in one morning, and the question "why is it always one or the other?"
- Catholic school, every sacrament, and demystifying instead of deconstructing
- Deer Creek Camp: forty counselors, one Bible, and a Calvinist leading the study
- Llamas, turkey vultures, and why the people outlasted the positions
- "We didn't need to believe all the same things to belong in the same place"
- 1 John 4 — no one has ever seen God, but if we love each other
- Why your first experience of God probably isn't in a book
- Richard Rohr on the Two Incarnations, and "the opposite of faith is not doubt, it is absolute certitude"
- Samwise, Frodo, and the stories that stayed with you
- His father at absolute zero — and the hug that came back
- The two thieves: both hurting, both scared, no clipboard at the cross
- "Go love them till they ask why" — the Deer Creek motto, and why it's the same thing Arsenal says
???? References: 1 John 4:7–8, 11–12 · John 17:21 · 1 Corinthians 12 · 1 Corinthians 13 · Ephesians 4:2–3 · Matthew 11:28–30 · Richard Rohr on the Two Incarnations · J.R.R. Tolkien, *The Two Towers* (Samwise's speech)
Series: Arsenal Stories
Speaker: Eric Villalpando
Date: 9/13/2026
Location: The Arsenal, San Antonio, TX
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The Arsenal | San Antonio, TX
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