Frontline Health
Troy Duell with Centurion is providing you with health information and guests to elevate your health and help make your life better. Centurion is a pharmaceutical company that chooses to put people over profits and allow science to dictate what products we bring to market. Our goal is to provide products that you can both afford and are beneficial to your health. It doesn't matter how good a product is if you can't afford it. This podcast will provide you with the best health information possible through sharing studies and current data. We will also interview the leading health experts across the country. We will share sides of the story you may not have heard. Our promise to you is to source all of the information we share with you and speak the truth. We hope this truth is used by you and your loved ones to elevate your health and life.
Frontline Health
#109 - The Intersection of Faith, Health, and Politics with Jon Root
When government health authorities and pharmaceutical companies demand compliance without transparency, is it truly about public health—or something else entirely? This powerful conversation with Jon Root explores how COVID policies revealed both institutional overreach and personal complacency that threatens the foundations of medical freedom.
Root shares his journey from trusting mainstream narratives to questioning pharmaceutical influence, especially as a new father navigating pediatric care decisions. "If you're telling me I have to get this to keep my job...I need real answers as to why this is essential," he states, challenging the 80-year timeline Pfizer proposed for releasing vaccine studies. His candid assessment of how fear of conflict and social ostracism silenced legitimate questions resonates with anyone who felt pressured to comply without sufficient information.
The discussion takes a fascinating turn toward the church's responsibility in health stewardship. While many congregations closed during COVID, others like John MacArthur's Grace Community Church stood firm, recognizing worship as essential. Root challenges believers to develop better "cultural discipleship" that addresses health from a biblical perspective rather than relying on politically-motivated media for guidance. He points out the inconsistency of churches that emphasize certain health concerns while neglecting others like proper care of the body as "the temple of the Holy Spirit."
Beyond vaccines and institutional trust, Root addresses modern health challenges like technology addiction, acknowledging his own struggles as a content creator constantly connected to devices. His vulnerability reveals the complexity of health stewardship in a digital age that Scripture doesn't directly address, emphasizing the need for community wisdom and spiritual discernment.
Whether you're questioning conventional medical narratives, seeking a faith-based perspective on health, or simply tired of being told what to think without evidence, this episode provides refreshing clarity on taking ownership of your health in an age of institutional gaslighting.
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Today on the Frontline Health Podcast.
Speaker 2:RFK Jr. I love what he's doing because it's just like what we talked about. You're pushing back against the established status quo. They should be able to answer every question and if big pharma is hiding just like you, tell me this. I can't remember exactly how long they said they would be able to release studies from all these COVID vaccines like Pfizer, where they said like 80 years or something.
Speaker 3:Yeah.
Speaker 2:And it's like that should be like. No, we need answers. You're telling me I have to get this if I'm going to keep my job and then on the other side with vaccines for the kids and stuff, you're telling me like I need this if I'm going to continue to go to this pediatrician's office. I need real answers as to why this is essential.
Speaker 1:Hello, welcome back to the Frontline Health Podcast by Centurion, where we share health news, tips and insights to help you take ownership of your health. I'm Evan Patrick. As always, troy Duhl, founder and CEO of Centurion Health, is here with me, and today we're thrilled to be joined by John Root. He is a content creator, speaker and writer who covers topics like faith, sports and culture through a Christian worldview. John, you're so knowledgeable about a variety of topics and I just want to say I appreciate your ability to think freely and have nuance, even when it kind of causes you to criticize someone or someone's ideas who's a Christian or conservative like yourself. It's this type of thinking that I think really allows us to pursue what's good and true as a society. So thank you for the way that you handle issues and thank you for being on the show today.
Speaker 2:Well, thanks for having me. I know how much I need it myself, so hopefully I can present it with some grace. And when I need some rebuking or some accountability, hopefully I can present it with some grace. When I need some rebuking or some accountability, hopefully I can receive it with grace as well.
Speaker 1:Definitely we all do. This is not the focus of this podcast episode, but I have to ask you a sports question, if you can call this a sports question. To get things started, how excited were you when you heard the news about Travis Kelsey and Taylor Swift's engagement?
Speaker 2:I've had a lot of critiques for both of them. Obviously, travis Kelsey being Mr Pfizer, I thought that was one of the best nicknames ever given Aaron Rodgers shout out to him, I think. For me, I was happy for them, I was kind of hoping that it would lead towards that. And then, obviously, like God can work in mysterious ways. They're not Christians, they're not going into it where she's going to be submissive to him and he's going to serve her like and love her, like Christ serves and loves the church, his bride.
Speaker 2:But you know, who knows, like this could be really used for good for a lot of the you know feminists that follow taylor swift. They're like oh yeah, maybe I do need a man, or maybe a man in my life, like isn't really a bad thing and marriage is actually something worth pursuing and I don't need to constantly talk about my ex-boyfriend friends and feel like I really need to connect to some of those taylor songs. So, who knows, like it might just turn Taylor into singing about sourdough and homesteading, but I'm happy for him and it's it's a funny kind of cultural moment. But, you know, maybe it can just really spark a marriage and dating well and dating for marriage, uh, even though they aren't Christians, and espousing kind of Christian values and ideals throughout the process.
Speaker 3:I look forward to the next Taylor Swift sourdough and homesteading album and song. That'll be great. Looking forward to that.
Speaker 1:Yeah, thank you for that. So kind of jumping into the meat and potatoes of what we want to talk with you about today, we just kind of want to pick your brain. You know, back in 20 and 2021, we kind of saw a weaponization or not kind of we definitely did see a weaponization of public health to push forward political agendas. The claims about the COVID vaccines which we're learning so much now just in our current time, about things that were not known, that were stated as fact, all kinds of issues that there were back then, and it really became a political weapon. So I just want to kind of ask you how did we get to that point?
Speaker 2:I think we just fell asleep. You guys would know it better than I would, obviously, being involved with what's going on with big pharma and what other institutions are doing. We just started trusting the government and we were coasting and I think I was definitely. I think we were all kind of in that boat. We weren't questioning things as much and it felt like things were smooth sailing, and then we would never believe that the government would take advantage of us to this extent or lie to us to this extent. I don't feel like we're all just living in this fairy tale land, thinking that you know the government's always good. We've always had conversations about, you know, smaller government and accountability, smaller government and accountability. But once something like that happens, they, I think, really take advantage of maybe some of the goodness we have in this country.
Speaker 2:Obviously, I know there's so much vitriol. We see the political conversations, but I think there's a lot of people that do care about their family, their friends and their neighbor. So when they hear something that might be not just affecting their family but the people around them, they want to be careful. And then that turned into just complete and utter indoctrination and gaslighting to where obviously, you guys have heard the same thing People listening. It's just people couldn't go to weddings, they couldn't go to funerals, they couldn't visit their dying grandparents in the hospital these things are awful and what happened was we just didn't feel like we needed to ruffle feathers, we didn't want to make people angry and we just felt like the best way to go about things is, I guess we just got to trust the government, we got to trust the medical establishment, because I'm not a cardiologist, you know all those things that the media gaslit with people.
Speaker 2:They're like I just and final, final thought there too, I think a lot of us don't enjoy conflict. I don't think there's anybody that should really enjoy conflict. For me. It's kind of like the nature of like what I do for work, um, you know, kind of being a cultural, sports and faith commentator like there's a lot of pushback, there's a lot of conflict and hopefully there can be fruitful discussions and fruitful content presented and produced. But people just were afraid of pushing back against the status quo. They were afraid to ask the questions and be called something that they'd just never been called before and unfortunately that led to a lot of people just hoping somebody would do something for them. It's the bystander effect. Somebody gets in a car accident. I hope somebody does something to help them or calls 911, that's what happened, in my opinion.
Speaker 3:Yeah, and it's amazing that not only worried about conflict, we're worried about what people think of us, and to me, the biggest thing that came out of that was our fear of being canceled on Facebook or social media, which 20 years ago we didn't even have this stuff. So why do we even have this newfound fear of being canceled and you can't say what you want on social media? It shouldn't stop us from doing those things still personally, with our friends, with our family, and speaking truth, and I think you know, when we go down that path, what some men mean for evil. God certainly can turn to good. What are some things out of that that you feel like turned into a good thing and kind of? We saw an awakening among people, especially within health care, but what are some things that you saw?
Speaker 2:Specifically what I saw with the church the church that stayed open, you know, or at least reopened after just being closed for a short time. Because I can totally understand churches being like, ok, we're not sure what's going on here. They're telling us this two weeks of solidified kind of thing. Let's wait for details to come in. But when you see churches like John MacArthur Rest in Peace Grace Community Church in Southern California, their stand was unbelievable, and there's obviously so many other churches and pastors and Christians and lay people like us just in the congregation that did a lot of amazing work. But when you have people telling you that church is no longer essential and you can't gather but feel free to go into the grocery store, bars are open, strip clubs are open, I think people started realizing maybe I have a fear of man and I should have a fear of the Lord and we should not neglect the gathering of the saints. And you see, the gaslighting started to escalate there, because you're getting inundated with every single institution telling you that you are literally killing grandma, but they can't compartmentalize to be like, okay, even if I'm not a Christian, why should I be telling these Christians they can't gather for church on Sunday, but I can go to Safeway, no problem, these kind of things. It hopefully started to push more people towards the word.
Speaker 2:And a big thing I saw too is it's super sad when you see people even now that are still masking. They're terrified of dying and not like as Christians we should be like on this suicide mission that, like you know, jump in front of a car. I'm going to heaven. I should feel fine.
Speaker 2:There's more of this, like this world is not my home and you know my life is in God's hands and I'm not going to live in fear and I don't want to hurt other people, but if some reason, you know this is where my life ends. I have peace. But we know also too, it's not like you hang out within six feet of somebody, it's going to hurt them or even kill them. You know these too. It's not like you hang out within six feet of somebody. It's going to hurt them or even kill them. You know these kind of things I think started to, you know, light up some light bulbs for some people and realize that I'm allowing the government to dictate the way I should live my life, how I should feel, when God's word should be doing that my church community should be leaning into how we can help and how we can pursue truth, and doing it in a loving and gracious, but at times a bold way.
Speaker 3:Yeah, totally agree. Yeah, and you know, what I think is interesting is the church in the South, which we would consider the Bible Belt of the nation, was probably one of the worst culprits of staying closed greater metro area that stayed open. That opened after a month or two and stayed open where most of them just felt I've got to love my neighbor by closing down. But really loving your neighbor is staying open and speaking truth and loving them well, because they missed out on the opportunity to serve people when they had the greatest need and I think that was the biggest disappointment of the whole thing. You know, something else that I think for me, that I also recognized, was how it changed people's perception of health and really starting to question things. And some of the headlines that have happened recently with autism and vaccines and what RFK Jr has mentioned with that, I think, has even opened up more. What are your thoughts on the government going in and looking at these vaccines again and how they may affect autism or health as a whole?
Speaker 2:Well, let's reference the dad gang hat that I have here. I'm a dad now, so you know, not only am I worried about my own health, I'm worried about my wife's health and probably most importantly, it's the kid's health.
Speaker 2:So, going through that process. It's like the woman's always wondering you know, what am I putting in my body? And then this is going to be going into the kid's body and then, once that kid's born, they're trying to inject that kid with so much crap. And it's weird now, even going to I mean we, we had a great uh ob. Um, awesome delivery, good hospital, didn't feel like people were pushing stuff on us too much. But when you say like no, we don't want that, you know it. Almost people are like, well, what? Even when you're going to uh pediatricians offices now, um, if you're refusing a vaccine, certain pediatricians will not see you. They will refuse to see you after a certain point.
Speaker 2:And that's the crazy part about what RFK Junior's doing, cause, unfortunately, my wife's not able to breastfeed, so we're doing formula and a lot of the formula we have in the states is absolutely garbage. And then you combine that with a lot of the vaccines and the eye goop they're trying to put in there and, um, hepatitis shots and like all these, all these things. It's like they don't have a good explanation as to why my kid needs this right here, right now. Um, and you know, formula, which is like a huge issue with all our other foods. It's got so much junk in it so we need to now get formula from Europe because it doesn't have that crap in it.
Speaker 2:But RFK Jr, I love what he's doing because it's just like what we talked about. You're pushing back against the established status quo. They should be able to answer every question and if big pharma is hiding just like you, tell me this. I can't remember exactly how long they said they would be able to release studies from all these COVID vaccines like Pfizer, where they said like 80 years or something, and it's like that should be, like no, we need answers. If you're telling me I have to get this if I'm going to keep my job and then on the other side with vaccines for the kids and stuff, you're telling me like I need this if I'm going to continue to go to this pediatrician's office. I need real answers as to why this is essential and if you can tell me straight up you're getting kickbacks for this or this is just kind of what I'm taught.
Speaker 2:I would respect that a lot more than gaslighting me and other people during the COVID times and praise God for RFK Jr. I think he's doing the Lord's work in a lot of ways and it's sparking conversation, just like Rogan was, mccullough and all these amazing, just like you two, uh, saying, ask questions. Here's the truth. We, we went over the peer reviewed studies, we know the history of this stuff and you know. It's similar to when you're going to church, um, and you got your pastor preaching out of the good book and he's like don't just listen to what I have to say. Preaching out of the good book, and he's like don't just listen to what I have to say, test it with God's word. And if I'm off here, god's word is the foundation. That's the truth. So when you present people the truth, peer reviewed studies, the real truth behind this kind of stuff, they can be like oh okay, like maybe I shouldn't just listen to the snippet and the headlines.
Speaker 3:Well, and the crazy thing to me is, if there was nothing to it, why be even afraid to share those studies? Reveal all that stuff, because ultimately, you're supposed to be about making people better, you're supposed to be about health, and if you can't share all the studies, then there's way too much to hide, that. It needs to be totally transparent. We need to get everything out of the way so you and I and everybody listening can make our own educated decision. And if I come to a decision that's different than yours or Evan's, then that's really me being a steward over my body and my family and what we're trying to do. But it's so infuriating that they can't just allow people to make those decisions on their own, and it's almost as though they think we're not smart enough or capable enough to do that on our own, and that is really really frustrating and that's why I hope that people start realizing all these terms Marxism, communism, authoritarianism.
Speaker 2:That's what it's rooted in. It's like we're going to tell you what you can read, what you can listen to, what you can watch. What is the truth?
Speaker 2:That's right and hopefully people start to realize like we live in a beautiful country with so much freedom and maybe a little too much tolerance to certain things like some sinful things, and maybe a little too much tolerance to certain things like some sinful things.
Speaker 2:But in general there's a lot of places that still do look to America and they're like, yeah, I kind of wish that we had that, those kind of freedoms, but once we give those freedoms up, they're pretty much gone forever.
Speaker 2:And that's what I hope that people start to realize that we, the people, is the foundation outside of, obviously, the foundation of God in this country that we run the show. We don't need to just let mainstream media and politicians that also refuse a lot of accountability on both sides of the aisle that maybe they don't have your best interests in mind and maybe you have a lot of power within yourselves and even within your local community to make some real change. But a lot of times we just want things done for us. I can fall into that at times, too, we can get an answer from chat GPC in half a second and I think it's only going to get worse that we want things done for us, but when we need to finally stand up for not just ourselves and our family and our community. Like the push comes to shove, and I think especially men need to be better leaders.
Speaker 3:Totally agree.
Speaker 1:Yeah, John, thank you so much for that. I'm sorry, Troy.
Speaker 3:I don't want to go ahead.
Speaker 1:Just going to ask. I'm really curious. You know you've clearly like taking it upon yourself as a new father to really educate yourself about a lot of these decisions you're making for your child when it comes to vaccines and formula and that kind of thing. So kudos to you for that, for really taking care, taking ownership of your health and your family's health. I'm kind of curious, like do you have any just sort of like disciplines or practices that you plan on putting into place, like for you and your family, to make sure that you're living a healthy lifestyle in, you know, just kind of being a good steward of of the health and the lives that you and your family have been given?
Speaker 2:Yeah, I'll preface it with my wife does a really good job of researching and connecting with some awesome people, like I used to work at turning point USA for a time. Alex Clark is over there and I think she puts together a lot of like really thought provoking conversations. When it comes to kind of naturopathic health. We got some good friends that are naturopaths, so we connect with them quite a bit and then just through social media, just kind of bouncing some things off of each other, because we always get the information overload and you know, especially too, it's like anybody that's gone through a pregnancy with their wife, their wife is looking up stuff online and they're like, well, I feel like I'm kind of feeling this and then the Google's telling me that. But I feel like we've been able to really hone down who we can really trust. They can point us in the right direction if they don't know certain things or the right person.
Speaker 2:And I think a big thing when it comes to health is technology. If I'm just going to focus on one thing, I am a content creator. I am on my phone all the time I'm on my laptop. Content creator I am on my phone all the time I'm on my laptop and I just know, with some of the research we've done, and even just you know, you walk around the mall and you're just seeing these kids just glued to a tablet. We don't want that for our kid and I know that I can say straight up that I'm addicted in a sense to my, my phone, and it's not good.
Speaker 2:There's times where it's just not good for my health in the sense of, like, my posture's not as good as it used to be. I'm dependent on it and my, you know, it's just the dopamine levels. It's not healthy. And I think that's one of the main focuses we have with our four-month-old right now is make sure that there's not a dependency on technology. But man, I'm just wondering what things are going to be like when he's five or six years old. Technology is going to continue to take off. So how do you find that healthy balance?
Speaker 2:We can't just go into the Bible and it says like Opinions 316, here's what you need to do about watching TV shows and technology but hopefully, like the Holy Spirit, provides us some good wisdom and discernment and community around us that can point us in the right direction. To be like technology will be a part of our kids' lives and our lives, you know, as we continue to grow. But making sure they're not addicted to those things they get outside, build immunity, and I know there's tons of different. You know routes, I could go with that question. But technology, I know, is something that we constantly bring up.
Speaker 1:No, it's huge. And you also mentioned the community aspect of that and how important that is. I mean, there are studies connecting community to longevity and I mean just any variety of of measurables that you could have for somebody's health with community. And I want to just kind of wrapping this up towards the end, I want to, I want to briefly get your take on like how the church has kind of fallen short in certain ways in really taking ownership of our health, because it is something that I feel a lot of Christians have neglected, specifically when it comes to certain areas. In your more kind of Southern Baptist circles, we're very quick to call out things like drinking and alcohol and that kind of thing. We're very quick to call out things like drinking and alcohol and that kind of thing, but maybe when it comes to other issues like gluttony or overeating or basically just neglecting these other areas of health, we don't really take as much concern for that. So why is it important for?
Speaker 2:Christians specifically to really take ownership of their health.
Speaker 2:I think it's such an important thing to bring up because we can get kind of lost in the sauce if we're saying, oh well, what about these overweight pastors? I think there still is an importance there and even like an overweight congregation, like our body's a temple, I can take care of my body better. So, like number one, I can preface it with that and we can all do that. But if you're telling people to live by the word and for the word and by the word, when you're not doing that, you know as a shepherd, and I'm not saying like you also have the stephen ferdick's out there, that, and then uh, the carl lenz's, like they are for sure everything is about their body. They're not really giving you, you just the truth of scripture. Yes, we can always find those examples, but I think Christians should be the best example of taking care of their body. And a conversation I've been having a ton lately and I think that's definitely another kind of like Holy Spirit moment here is having a conversation around how are we discipling our congregants from a cultural perspective? Because the vast majority of congregations are getting discipled by the world. A lot of people are not sure how they should go about. You know number one we're talking about health, immigration, other cultural issues, right, and you got to go to some like conservative commentator. You're going to go to Fox News and you might find some like snippets of truth there, but it's not grounded in God's word at all. So I understand there's a lot of churches that don't have the ability to put all these crazy courses together. But praise God for my church out here and pastors and some people like myself together to make some solid cultural statements that can be a part of our other church statements so people can look to that. That can be further discussions for maybe cultural discipleship, things that can go on, because I think people need that and they're only getting so much. And when you're getting discipled by the world, you're getting this idea of am I on the straight and narrow, but it's maybe a little disguised in this Christless conservatism and it's just going to lead to conservatives trying to get more of your votes and more of your money and I would really hope that churches start to take an onus, and I don't.
Speaker 2:I number one, I like expository preaching and I know this is a long-winded answer. I think biblical illiteracy is a huge issue in our country. People need to be more biblically literate so when cultural issues arise, they know what the Bible says about it, or at least they have some sort of understanding that will point them to the scriptures, if it's not already memorized and totally written on their heart. Some of these cultural issues need to be discussed within the walls of the church so people can go out and actually live the gospel and be a good representation of Christ and his word, because I think a lot of times we are very, very lost and we're hoping that somebody online will give us the answer and those little snippets of maybe hot truths can kind of steer us off the path that we should be as Christians.
Speaker 3:That is well said and I think it's interesting because the church is getting blamed or accused of being political now if they bring up any cultural issue.
Speaker 3:But the truth is Scripture and the church should never have left anything, and it's really the culture starting to come into the church.
Speaker 3:And when we start to speak truth, I think the number one thing that people will throw back at us and to pastors to try to get them to cower is to say, well, you're being political, but I don't think you have to go far to see that that's not the case. I mean, scripture starts with God created man and woman, male and female, and that in and of itself now is considered political, which is crazy, because that is the starting point of science. And if you can't get that piece right, whether you're talking political or you're talking medical, then you're really going down a path that is going to lead to true destruction, and I think that's what we've got to come back to within the church. We've got to come back to, even if you're a non-believer, having a standard to say this is true with science, that there are male chromosomes and female chromosomes, and we can all agree on that. I think that's when you start to make a change in the culture as a whole and hopefully point people back to a true biblical foundation. That's there.
Speaker 2:Go ahead. Sorry to cut you off, troy. This reminded me of something I saw on X today. I think the guy's name is Scott Jennings from.
Speaker 2:I think he's on CNN or like MSNBC now and he was like I just can't take people serious and you have zero credibility if you're going to say something like birthing people. Exactly, those are the kind of things where, like as as the church, there should be a really good apologetic uh, just a breakdown of how to give a defense for you know, the hope you have in christ, the authority of god's word. In situations like that, you're not only going against the truth and legitimate biology, you're going against God and you are becoming your own gods throughout that process, and I think that's what we see with a lot of the trans issue too, unfortunately, I think if we polled a lot of self-professed Christians in the country, I'm guessing we would the majority would look a lot more like the world when it comes to gay marriage, other aspects of health, maybe some things like transgenderism and definitely, unfortunately, abortion. So these are the kinds of things we should be like salt and light in these areas and we should be the leaders in fighting against a lot of this destruction with transgenderism is destroying kids. Abortion is actually killing kids and not saying that transgenderism isn't, because obviously the suicide rates we can go over those stats all day long. It should break anybody's heart and then it leads to some things, like we saw, unfortunately, in Nashville and Minnesota and other places.
Speaker 2:But like the church really should dive into some of these tougher cultural issues. There's some things that have a little bit more nuance. I don't think maybe churches should give such a solid say. Out of my dog over there I just wanted to make an appearance, but you know, there's some things at times we're really going to disagree with what Trump has to say and some Republicans in office. But there's some foundational truths that we can really lean on as a church, as the full body of Christ, not just only in America but worldwide. Brothers and sisters in Christ, that we should be discussing these things a little bit more and I think it can be really fruitful and hopefully just start making a difference in a lot of these areas. Because with abortion, we need to do a much, much better job of being leaders in that area so we can save lives and hopefully transform the hearts and minds of men and women that decide to go through with something like that.
Speaker 3:You know the church's lost understanding of what love really is. We think that love is tolerance and letting people do whatever instead of speaking truth and pointing them that way. But appreciate your word, your conviction, and congrats on the new baby.
Speaker 1:It's such a good word, John. Thank you so much for sharing all of that and just for everything that you've said in this podcast. It's just been spot on and we appreciate you so much. And thank you everyone for listening to this episode of the Frontline Health Podcast. As always, we encourage you go out, take ownership of your health today, because you are your best health advocate. If you enjoyed what you heard today on the podcast, please consider leaving us a review. We would love to hear your feedback and connect with you further. You can also follow us on instagram, x, tiktok and youtube, and, for effective and affordable health and wellness products made in the USA, visit wwwcenturionhealth. Thanks for listening. We'll see you next time.