Miley Cyrus and Hailey Bieber went on Instagram Live to talk about religion, how it shaped their young adult lives and the role it currently plays.
On Friday’s episode of Bright Minded: Live with Miley, the two talked about everything from their best makeup tips and tricks to the role the ways in which their relationship with religion has transformed from childhood to adulthood.
“I think there’s a difference between being raised in church and being an adult and having your own relationship with God and Jesus and spirituality because what my relationship was with faith getting raised that way is completely different than me in my own journey as an adult,” Hailey explained. “I found a church community that works for me, where I feel supported and loved and accepted.”
In response, Miley talked about her own relationship with religion, being raised “as a believer,” while also sharing why “fell off that path” as an adult.
“I had a hard time finding a relationship with God that worked for me as an adult,” Miley explained of being raised in church during a less accepting time in the ’90s. “I think what I just took away from you is I’m allowed to decide what my relationship is with spirituality as an adult that doesn’t have to be aligned with the way that it was when I was brought up.”
“I had some gay friends in school. That is the reason why I left my church is that they weren’t being accepted,” she added. “They were being sent to conversion therapies…I had a hard time with me finding my sexuality too.”
In October 2016, the singer came out as pansexual. “My whole life, I didn’t understand my own gender and sexuality,” Miley said at the time in an interview with Variety.
Further, Miley shared, ”So I think now you telling me that I’m allowed to redesign my relationship with God as an adult and make it how it feels most accepting to me would make me feel so less turned off by spirituality.”
In response, Hailey told Miley, ”I think it’s about your journey between you and God. It’s not your journey and 10 other people’s journey. It’s just yours. It’s been you and Him. I believe that Jesus is about loving people, no matter where they are in life. I’ve always had a hard time with church making people feel excluded and not accepted and they can’t be a part of it because of what they believe in and who they love.”
When Miley asked Hailey how she stays “bright during dark times,” the 23-year-old model responded, “I think that there could be times where you feel really good, really positive, confident… but obviously one event can happen that can totally throw you off, that can totally just put you in a dark place, or put your mood in a completely different place.”
She went on, “I think what I’ve learned for myself is that having people to be able to go to and say ‘I feel this way right now’… I was always the type of person where I felt I could figure things out by myself, I felt so independent… I’m good, I don’t need anybody’s help [but] then I realized as I’ve gotten older, you can’t always be the person that is strong enough. Sometimes we do get weak. Sometimes we need the support of other people. Having a confidant and having people you can depend on, that you know are always going to be there, like your family or a therapist… sometimes we need that outside person to say ‘This isn’t accurate, you’re overthinking it.’ And you need people to speak into your life like that, to call you out in a loving and a healthy way.”
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