When a self-proclaimed defender of Christianity is caught carrying psychedelic mushrooms while publicly burning the Quran in a restaurant — calling out entrepreneur Patrick Bet-David and urging Puerto Ricans to discard the 5,000 Spanish-language Qurans distributed by a Muslim outreach brother — the contradiction exposes itself. On this episode of The Deen Show, host Eddie welcomed Joshua Emory, a former Christian minister from the Bronx who spent 13 years in Catholic school, converted people to Christianity as a street minister, and once deeply disliked Muslims, yet whose sincere pursuit of truth ultimately led him to Islam. Now a filmmaker and creative director based in Fort Worth, Texas, Joshua is directing Rifts — a documentary exploring religious freedom, Christian nationalism, and who truly gets to define what it means to be American — and he has cracked the code on exactly what drives these provocateurs, and why Islam, the fastest growing way of life in the world according to the Guinness Book of World Records and Pew Research, cannot be stopped by burning books or political pressure.
The Quran Burner Exposed: When Anti-Islam Hate Is Just a Hustle
Joshua dismantled the performance with surgical clarity. The man on camera, burning the Quran in a restaurant with butane and bacon while attacking Patrick Bet-David for distributing Qurans in Puerto Rico, was not acting out of sincere religious conviction — he was running a hustle. “What he’s doing — burning the Quran, shoving bacon in it — you know exactly what his motive is,” Joshua said. “That’s not normal, that’s not natural. That’s not organic. That’s all a show. He’s a fraud.” His subsequent arrest for possessing psilocybin mushrooms — the very psychedelic substances his “Christian nationalist” brand would theoretically oppose — confirms what thoughtful observers already knew: the spectacle is about clicks, controversy, and platform growth, not faith, not Christ, not genuine spiritual guidance. Eddie and Joshua both noted that the real teachings of Jesus — the Beatitudes, mercy, love of neighbour, peacemaking — have been entirely abandoned by this strain of political nationalism, which uses Christianity as an identity weapon rather than a spiritual path. As Joshua put it plainly, the people riding this bandwagon “nine times out of ten, if they saw Christ himself, they would probably try to oppress him too” — because he was Middle Eastern, not the blue-eyed Caesar Borgia image hanging in their churches.
- Arrested with mushrooms: The Quran burner was found in possession of psilocybin — exposing the gap between his “Christian values” brand and his actual lifestyle.
- Patrick Bet-David targeted: The provocateur attacked Bet-David for distributing 5,000 Spanish Qurans in Puerto Rico, calling him a “race traitor” and demanding the Qurans be thrown away.
- America is not a Christian nation: Joshua, a Black man from the Bronx with Puerto Rican heritage, corrected the false premise directly: the US is a secular republic built on freedom of religion, and Islam was present in America since the 1500s — centuries before Puerto Rico became a US territory in 1898.
- Religion weaponised by ego: Both host and guest agreed that those driving Islamophobic nationalism are not motivated by love of Christ but by identity politics, supremacy, and the desire to control — the exact forces the founding fathers designed the Constitution to guard against.
- Islam is the fastest growing faith: By conversion alone — removing birth rates entirely — Islam is the fastest growing religion in America and globally, confirmed by Guinness World Records and Pew Research.
“Islam is the fastest growing religion — not just in the world, but in America by conversion alone. So if you remove birth rate, conversion alone — it is time for y’all to get comfortable.” — Joshua Emory
Thomas Jefferson’s Quran and Islam’s Forgotten Role in Founding America
Among the most revelatory segments of the episode is Joshua’s account of his visit to Monticello — Thomas Jefferson’s Virginia estate — where he interviewed John Raasta, the head historian of Jefferson Studies, whose entire academic focus is religious freedom. Jefferson acquired his Quran in 1765 while studying comparative law and comparative religion under a legal scholar of the time. When Joshua asked directly whether Jefferson drew upon the Bible, the Torah, and the Quran in establishing American law, Raasta’s response was unambiguous: “I think that’s right.” Jefferson also hosted an iftar — the breaking of the Ramadan fast — in the White House, acknowledging that enslaved Africans who built this country included Muslims. His gravestone at Monticello carries three legacies he chose to be remembered by: the Declaration of Independence, the founding of the University of Virginia, and religious freedom. The founding fathers designed the republic specifically to prevent the “oceans of blood” that religious persecution had caused in Europe — yet today, that same pluralist vision is being weaponised against Muslim Americans, including a peaceful Muslim Eid celebration at a Texas water park that was shut down under political pressure from Governor Greg Abbott, despite every other community holding its own religious events freely. The Muslim community in the Dallas–Fort Worth area is growing rapidly, and Joshua and his colleagues confronted the mayor personally over the decision — a mayor who, as Joshua noted, already knows he is in hot water.
- Jefferson’s Quran (1765): Obtained during legal studies for comparative law and religion — the lead Jefferson historian confirmed its influence on the American legal framework.
- Iftar in the White House: Jefferson hosted the breaking of the Ramadan fast, recognising that Muslim enslaved workers were among those who built this nation.
- African Muslim slaves preceded all: Muslims were among the enslaved Africans who constructed the foundations of America, with an Islamic presence dating to the 1500s — long before Puerto Rico became a US territory.
- Texas Eid event shutdown: A Muslim community water park event with modest dress and family atmosphere was cancelled under pressure from the Texas governor — an act of discrimination Joshua personally challenged.
- Sharia law irony: The very freedoms Islamophobes claim to defend may have Islamic legal precedents woven into their foundations — as the top Jefferson historian confirmed to Joshua on camera.
“Some of the freedoms that you love — these quote-unquote American values — you are actually fighting against them without even knowing. You are standing on Sharia law and don’t even know it.” — Joshua Emory, on the Islamic influence embedded in American legal foundations
From Catholic School to Christian Minister to Muslim: A Journey Guided by Sincere Faith
Joshua Emory’s personal story carries the most weight of all. After 13 years of Catholic school — with a Jehovah’s Witness father simultaneously teaching him to question graven images and the Trinity using Exodus 20:4 — Joshua grew into a critical thinker who became a baptised Christian minister, knocking on doors and leading people to Christianity with genuine zeal. After 9/11, he admits openly: “I was 100% a victim of the hate machine propaganda. I did not like Muslims at all.” Yet sincerity has a way of finding its own path. The autobiography of Malcolm X cracked the door open. Research, intellectual honesty, and the habit of questioning — cultivated since fourth grade — did the rest. Today, Joshua not only lives as a Muslim and praises Allah subhanahu wa ta’ala, but many of the very people he once led to Christianity have themselves since taken the shahada. That ripple effect — from one man’s spiritual awakening outward into a circle of guided souls — is something no propaganda machine manufactured and no political agenda engineered. It is, as every sincere Muslim understands, entirely from Allah. Islam does not ask its followers to burn other people’s books, weaponise their faith, or chase approval from political movements. It asks them to place their foreheads on the ground five times a day — to step out of the dunya, release the ego, and return to the One who created them. That daily surrender, that structured embodied remembrance of God, is what Joshua identifies as Islam’s irreplaceable gift to humanity, and it is precisely the kind of spiritual discipline — rooted in purpose, grounded in humility, and open to all — that no psychedelic drug, no viral stunt, and no burning book can ever hope to replace or extinguish.
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