Jump to content
Goodbye Jesus

What Denomination Are You From?


R. S. Martin

Recommended Posts

Maybe this has been done before but I'm not sure where to look or how to find it. The idea comes from LosingMyReligion's thread on which denomination is worse--Southern Baptist or Roman Catholic.

 

I decided to do a poll on what denomination we deconverted from. There are thousands upon thousands of denominations world-wide. There is no way I can make an option for all of them. I will list some broad categories of main denominational names I can think of and also have an option for "other." If you belonged to a specific variety of Mennonite, for example, check Mennonite. If you choose "other" please write a post to indicate the name. Thank you.

 

My impression is that we have more ex-Southern Baptists on here than any other denomination. I don't know if that indicates that Southern Baptist is worse than all other denominations. Even if it isn't, it would still be fun to see what denominations we're from.

 

If you belonged to a variety of different denominations at different times in your life, I don't know what you should check--the last one you belonged to before you deconverted from Christianity? the one you were born into or the first one you converted to? all of them? Do as you think. A post to explain would be helpful.

 

I will list them in alphabetical order so no one can say a certain denomination is worse because it's listed first, or that it's best because it's higher in the list. They are all religion. Period.

 

EDIT: On the list below I added some of the denominations people mentioned that I missed. I don't know how to add them to the poll but I can add them to this list. Maybe I'll do another poll later that includes these. Let me know what you think about:

  1. Doing another poll later that includes a better representation of the spectrum of denominations.
  2. The way I now list them. I group some together that are closely related. I don't know too much about many denominations but some people gave info on theirs. Let me know what you think about

    1. the way I group them together or
    2. separate them. I made some changes in that (on this list only; not the poll because I can't).

[*]How to decide on what to combine or separate.

[*]Denominations you think should be on the list but nobody on exC belonged to it.

Anglican/Episcopalian/Church of England

Apostolic

Assembly of God

Brethern

Baptist (all types except Southern and Fundamental)

Calvary Chapel

Church of God

Congregational

Evangelical (if this was main identity)

Fundamental Baptist (KJV only)

German Lutheran

Hutterite

Jehovah's Witness

Latter Day Saints

Lutheran

Mennonite/Amish

Methodist/Quaker

Missionary Alliance

Nondenominational

Pentecostal/Charismatic

Plymouth Brethren

Presbyterian/Reformed Church

River Brethern/Dunkard

Roman Catholic

Salvation Army

Seventh Day Adventist

Southern Baptist

United Church of Canada

Other (please indicate what)

Link to comment
Share on other sites

  • Replies 67
  • Created
  • Last Reply

Top Posters In This Topic

  • R. S. Martin

    14

  • pandora

    5

  • Casey

    4

  • Grandpa Harley

    3

Okay, I did it. Since I am the only one who did it so far it shows that one hundred per cent deconverted from Mennonite. Now isn't that a hoot?

 

I think it's set so you can choose more than one if you want to.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

I'll just qualify my choices here a bit. I chose Anglican, Evangelical, and Other. I was primarily an Evangelical for most of my sojourn in christendom; I converted into an Evangelical Baptist (NOT southern, hence i didn't select that one - they are quite different, i'm told). However, i took a wild swing into non-denominational charismatic xianity, hence the 'Other' choice, for several years. In the year before my deconversion, as a last-ditch effort, I tried the Anglican church and attended regularly there for about nine months. So there you have it.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

I was raised in the Ass of God..

Link to comment
Share on other sites

I was going to put 'other' for the church of sadomasochistic self-hatred, repression, guilt complexes, pain and humiliation...

 

But then I realised it was already on the list, so I checked 'Roman Catholic'.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

I'll just qualify my choices here a bit. I chose Anglican, Evangelical, and Other. I was primarily an Evangelical for most of my sojourn in christendom; I converted into an Evangelical Baptist (NOT southern, hence i didn't select that one - they are quite different, i'm told). However, i took a wild swing into non-denominational charismatic xianity, hence the 'Other' choice, for several years. In the year before my deconversion, as a last-ditch effort, I tried the Anglican church and attended regularly there for about nine months. So there you have it.

 

Thanks for the explanation, Sarahgrace. Somehow, I am really interested in the different kinds of xianity or denominations so I'm glad you listed yours. I've already learned a lot simply from being on this forum. I thought there was another kind of Baptist than Southern Baptist but I never hear about it so I wasn't sure. There's a First Baptist on my street and I attended a few times but I don't know if it's Southern Baptist or Evangelical Baptist like you mention, or maybe it's just an independent church. It's a large set-up with a school attached. They seem not to allow women in the ministry, based on what I saw. I never talked to anyone.

 

I like it in that church because of the music and just the feeling of the place. But they are really strong into being saved. I don't know why I like it. I am also scared that if I attend regularly I will be approached about my status with jesus. I don't want to see the reaction I'd get for an honest answer and I don't want to lie so I haven't gone for a long time. The modern Mennonite church where I go sometimes doesn't pressure people to convert so I feel "safe" there if I go just for the music and community.

 

Oh sure, people think I've "come back to god." I let them think that.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

I was going to put 'other' for the church of sadomasochistic self-hatred, repression, guilt complexes, pain and humiliation...

 

But then I realised it was already on the list, so I checked 'Roman Catholic'.

 

LOL!!!

 

I think the sadomasochistic church comes with a lot of different names. I listed as many as I could think of.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

I was raised Methodist, but they don't stress the "born again" experience at all. They are pretty liberal.

 

I was saved in a Non-denominationall church, but did some stints in Church of Christ, Baptist (not Southern Baptist who are considered too worldly by Northern Baptists), Assembly of God, and Missionary Alliance. I also visited occationally Presbyterian, Lutheran, Congregational, and Evangelical Free.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

I forgot, after my deconversion I went to a Unitarian Universalist church, mostly because all the churches that I had been to before said they were EVIL and the minister was demon possessed, because he made the public schools in the area stop saying a prayer on a certain field trip they took every year. I loved it. There were many atheists, agnostics, and Wiccan's there.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

I was Industrial Strength Roman Catholic. By that I mean it was really rammed down my throat as a child and as a teenager.

Casey

Link to comment
Share on other sites

I was raised United Methodist, but I stopped attending church when I was about nine or ten years old. I did go through their "confirmation" process, though. I attended a Southern Baptist church briefly in my mid-teens due to the influence of some fundie friends, but religion didn't really "take" at the time. When I was 19, I was gloriously "saved" in a Southern Baptist church after seeing "The Jesus Film" and after several talks with a fundie friend of mine. Not long after that, I got involved in the Charismatic movement and that is where I stayed until shortly before my deconversion in 1999. I tried one last time to believe again at my cousin's Fundamentalist Baptist church, but that didn't last long. I deconverted right in the middle of a church service while the preacher was pounding the pulpit and raving about the supposed holiness of god. I just realized right then and there with total clarity that this was BULLSHIT! Glory!

 

I am now an Independent Fundamentalist Baptist, Charismatic, hand-raisin', tongue-talkin' Assembly of God-attending Catholic Atheist! Glory!

Link to comment
Share on other sites

I was raised Southern Baptist and going to a Southern Baptist church regularly since I was born. Finally in February of 2005 after all this indecision and uncertainess about being Christian I became an atheist. One of the best decisions I've ever made. :D

Link to comment
Share on other sites

At this point, there's a tie between RC and SB.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

I don't know what the US Southern Baptists are like, but catholicism to me was like fascism. School life was regimented and rigid, critical thinking was not encouraged. Oddly however, they had to teach a certain amount of science and maths that required critical thinking and once you started doing a bit of that, along with reading a few banned books like Boccaccio's Decamarone, you saw them for the hypocrites and liars they were. Being abused helps a bit too, it makes you hate.

Casey

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Hmm... I was the first the Lutheran.

 

To be fair, even though I didn't check it, I was exposed to Southern Baptists and their loonyness made me very skeptical of Christianity.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

For the entire time I was a believer in xianity I was in a non-denominational church, 3 different ones, but all non-denom. I did go to a Calvary Chapel for a short time. Last time I checked Calvary Chapel didn't consider themselves a denomination, because they believe there shouldn't be any, but honestly at this point I think they really are.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Lutheran/Other here (with all the differences between US and European christiaNUTTY, I figured I'd better check "other" too for my former German Lutheran religion)...

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Baptist - specifically, my church belonged to the Baptist Association of New South Wales (Australia)

Link to comment
Share on other sites

I was raised a Free Will Baptist. I'm not sure where the *Free Will* part came from, but I felt like it was shoved down my throat until I was 17 when I moved out of my parents house. I was told at age 14, as long as I lived under my fathers roof I would go to church. That lasted for about 3 more years until I rebelled at 17 and moved out of my parents house and out of the cult of Christianity. After that I lived a very confused life for a long time, until about 4 years ago when I came out of the closet as an Atheist.......with most people, not my whole family :P

 

BTW I'm not sure where*Free Will Baptist* is in the denominations so I checked other :shrug:

Link to comment
Share on other sites

The school I attended for 7 years was under the auspices of the Reformed Church, but I was raised Anglican. I only went to that school because it was local and it was the cheapest private school in the area.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

I was raised Salvation Army. Yes, it is a christian denomination and not just a charity!

 

When I was deconverting I went to Baptist church for a while (In England - I think our Baptist churches are a little different to 'Southern Baptist')

 

I clicked 'other' anyway :)

Link to comment
Share on other sites

I was baptized Episcopalian (which I guess is considered Anglican, so I misvoted by putting other, LOL) and now have deconverted down to Unitarian Universalist. Tough to deconvert out of UU, since Atheists are just as welcome as Christians (as long as the Christians don't try and mention Jesus in church too often).

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Mother is Methodist, father was a Roman Catholic. To have been raised in the common tradition, I'd be Jewish. Baptised Church of England.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

As a child, I was taken to a very fundamentalist holiness church called the Church of God. They weren't the pentecostal Church of God, which is what most people think of first. They were founded in the 1880's by D. S. Warner, although they don't admit it. They simply thought that Brother Warner recognized the Truth in the Bible, where as all other denominations up to that point had only portions of the Truth. They believed in holiness, the sainthood of all believers, the existance of only ONE church instead of multiple denominations, salvation makes you a member of God's church not signing your name in a book, according to the Bible the name of the church was to be "The Church of God at (city/town/location name) with no denominational or founders' name added, the headquarters of the church was not on earth but in heaven and the founder/leader of the church was Jesus, the total free will of the believer (as opposed to predestinationalism)...and other such nonsense. I checked "other" to indicate this church.

 

As an adult, I also attended a Church of God, but it was different. It has the same roots as my first church, but with the passage of time it had mellowed out and became more generally evangelical. They were still very much into free will, no formal church membership, and other of the original teachings, but not to the point of being so negative and condemning of other Christians who didn't believe like they did. They even admitted that they were a denomination, and had set up headquarters in Anderson, IN. The "other" box applies to this church too, but I also checked "evangelical".

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Roman Catholic and Southern Baptist still running almost neck and neck. RC=6 and SB=5.

 

The high percentage of "other" and the accompanying posts begin to give some picture of the vast number of denominations or whatever each faith group chooses to call itself.

 

BTW, thanks for writing the explanations. That's really helpful.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Guest
This topic is now closed to further replies.
×
×
  • Create New...

Important Information

By using this site, you agree to our Guidelines.