Review of Asian American Apostate

R. Scott Okamoto’s Asian American Apostate is a sharp, deeply personal memoir that lays bare the racist, misogynist, and anti-intellectual culture of the Christian university where he once taught—an institution that also happens to be my alma mater. Though I never had a class with Okamoto, reading this book made me wish I had. His storytelling is vivid and engaging, bringing to life not only the toxicity he encountered but also the resilience and humor with which he navigated it.

What makes this book particularly striking is Okamoto’s grace. Though he has left Christianity, he recounts his experiences with more generosity than the institution he critiques would likely offer in return. His departure from faith does not come across as bitterness but as an honest reckoning with a community that too often failed to reflect the love and justice it claimed to uphold. As someone who has remained a Christian—indeed, a more committed Christian than I ever was as an evangelical—I found his journey both convicting and encouraging. Convicting, because it forces me to reckon with my own complicity in a culture that wounded so many; encouraging, because Okamoto seems to have found more grace outside the church than he found within it, which speaks to the urgent need for repentance and reform.

I found Asian American Apostate to be a delightful and necessary read—one that challenges the church to be better while honoring the dignity of those it has failed.