What Would Have Made You Stay?

[Vomit Comet]

I got saved in 1994. I came within inches of deconverting -- literally seconds of renouncing it all, before pulling back -- in 2001. I didn't even again consider deconverting until last year, really, and then I bit the bullet and went through with it in December 2007. So, basically, I was no stranger to doubt and had been on the brink years prior. Still, I stuck it out. Here are some things that might have pulled me back from the edge for the second time. These are in rank order:

 

1. I wanted a Christian woman. For all those years, that's the one thing I wanted, far and above all else. Ever since my late teens, I wanted a Christian girlfriend that would possibly become my wife. And it just never happened. (All the churches I went to were either sausage fests or were full of preppy sheltered girls that couldn't handle the likes of me. Incredibly rare was the Christian girl that could have gone for the likes of me, whereas outside the church I definitely know my type.) I was so sick of being alone and having everyone repeat the bullshit line that God would bring me someone in His time and that I should stop worrying about it. Meanwhile, I had just broken an atheist's girls heart, and then I found out that another lovely non-Christian woman wanted me. So I said "fuck it" and decisively went for the girl. Now she's my girlfriend and I might marry her.

 

I think if, in my early or mid twenties (right around the age of 24, let's say; I'm 29 now), if "God" would have brought the perfect (for me) Christian girl into my life and it would have been all good and perfect and happy, and it wasn't a sham but she was really a good match for me... I think that would have done a lot to placate my restless heart and mind.

 

If there was one thing that pushed me over the edge, this was it. Or maybe it was the straw that broke the camel's back.

 

2. I was tired of seeing the efforts of me and my fellow young people amount to a diminutive pile of shit every time. We'd wrack ourselves to put together big events, Christian concerts, outreaches galore, in a desperate balls-to-the-wall effort to attract unsaved people in our age bracket. We'd attract maybe a dozen fellow Christians at the most, and our little group would again fail to grow. I had always believed that all things were possible through God, and even though it was a tall order to convince people of something so crazy ("foolishness to the Gentiles"), the Holy Spirit could do anything if we were ready for the Spirit to work through us.

 

I think we were pretty fucking ready. But it just never happened. It's like God didn't give a shit. Didn't He, in His infinite love, want people to be saved? Wasn't His desire infinitely greater than what we could muster as His finite, merely human servants? And we tried so hard, and it hurt so bitterly, but we kept trying and trying. Jack shit. Where was the Holy Spirit of Acts? Why weren't the streets of Los Angeles being taken over by a Christian revolution? Where the fuck was Pentecost 2.0!? I started to think it was all a bunch of bullshit, and that in the words of Nomeansno, "if God exists / He must be the biggest fucking jerk."

 

3. The Problem of Hell. Oh, the mental gymnastics involved! Towards the end I adapted the it's-not-that-bad C.S. Lewis "Great Divorce" idea of the afterlife. And then I somehow interpreted some Scripture or another to mean that 1/3 of all humanity would be saved in the end. So I made myself believe that was an acceptable number, despite still being in the minority. I figured the church was at a standstill in the West, even in the USA, but that the 1/3 number would be reached by the church in the Third World.

 

After a while it was just too much. It just didn't fucking add up. It was madness.

 

4. Put this together with #2 and #3. One of the encouragements that kept me going for so many years was reading about the church in the Third World. The church in Europe was a skeleton that had maybe a few bits of meat left on it, and the church in the USA was an obscene bloated joke, but the church in Africa, in China, in India, in Brazil, was pure. Just like back in the 1st Century AD. Especially in China because they were thriving despite gov't persecution. The church even existed in North Korea!

 

Well, there's parts of Africa where the born-agains are just as nasty as any other faction. Swaziland is a Christian theocracy ruled by their kooky queen. Evangelical mobs go on killing sprees against Muslims in Nigeria, and vice versa. There's born again militias elsewhere committing atrocities like everyone else. Finding out about all that really soured me.

 

Also, there was something Dawkins once said, about Christian rhetoriticians trying to appeal to educated people. Even I knew it was a fool's gambit, as I myself have more or less been in academia for a number of years now. There's just virtually nothing you can say to win over a truly educated person, I've come to realize. Dawkins said "you might as well just continue to chase after the uneducated, with Virgin Mary sightings and racuous revival meetings and emotional manipulation." I knew he was right. Not to sound like some kind of elitist neo-imperialist, but all those poor Third Worlders were falling for it because they have even less formal education than Bible Belt trailer trash!

 

I think if my idealization of the Third World church wouldn't have been shattered, that might have helped keep me going.

 

5. Related to #1. I got bitterly sick of not getting to have any fun. Since moving to Las Vegas I turned down 5 or 6 opportunities to lose my virginity, and many more opportunites to date women that would've fucked me within a month of the first date. The last time, she was there naked in my bed after declaring that she loved me earlier that night... and I broke her heart into a million little pieces. I also damn near drank myself to death my first year here (26 years old). I had never been drunk until I moved here. In fact, I'd never touched hard liquor until moving here.

 

One reason that I was getting so fucked up all the time was that a Christian ladyfriend made me promise never to drink beer again, because that was the only thing I drank. Well, I actually started drinking nothing but whiskey and vodka because it was a way to get around that! Eventually I broke my promise and started drinking beer again, because I was getting too fucked up all the time and hadn't yet learned to pace myself.

 

I damn near became an alcoholic my first year here.

 

Well, I got sick of not being able to fuck, drink, party, and so on. I draw the line at hard drugs, and I might try weed one of these days to see if I like it. Otherwise, I don't ask for much! I now subscribe to the classical Greek notion of moderation in all things, as well as the modern notion of informed consent. I've also become much more of a hedonist, more interested in luxuries, more disdainful of asceticism of any kind, and so on.

 

What about y'all? Is it really possible that if conditions were different, your doubts might have been quelled some?

 

There's no going back now, of course. Once the mirror is shattered, that's it.

[Trev]

You raise some pretty good points Vomit Comet, and you have covered a lot of what I would have said I think, but I'd like to add my two cents worth.

 

Part of what kept me around was the honest belief that God could make me straight, and being bi that arguably might not have been too hard. Now that I'm the whole way out though, I feel spared having to act 'wholly straight'. Just as an aside there's a(n oversimplified but somewhat valid) concept in the bi community called 'heterosexual privilege' which basically means that bisexual people might be able to pass themselves off as straight more easily than a gay person in order to gain any real or perceived benefit of being straight; there's an opposite concept called 'homosexual privilege'. This is probably where the 'having your cake and eating it too' reputation bis have probably parly comes from . . . but I digress.

 

I probably could have kept attempting to fit in and probably would have succeeded, honestly, but I guess there comes a time when you don't want to fake it any more.

[AKR]

A hell of a lot would have to change. There would have to actually be evidence. Why waste my life believing in something simply because it says to? A shit load of belief systems tell me to believe without proof. Fuck that. Most of the bible would have to be changed. Too many contradictions; too many scientific fallacies, and so on. The misogyny would have to disappear, along with homophobic bigotry, slavery, murderous punishment for children's simple disobidience or the breaking of other silly rules by any members of society. The whole "gee, I wish I had never created humans, so now I'm going to pout and murder them all" story would have to be gone. And then, there are the verses about how christians are those who do not sin at all, ever, and that god chooses who goes to heaven and who goes to hell. I could go on, but you get the drift. There is a shit load and a half of things that would have to change before I came back to a religion I never understood in the first place.

[hereticzero]

I think that if the first 32 years of my life had not been such shit trying to keep a job, buy food, rent, utils, the bare necessities of life, had they not been so difficult for me to obtain and the church had helped when I asked, I would probably still be a xtian. I ate garbage for a couple of years because I could not find and keep a job due to my disabilities. The good church goers ridiculed my efforts and beliefs and none helped when asked, though they did make sure to hand me a tithing envelope every Sunday. 'Go get a job,' was all I ever heard. Can't get a job if no one gives you one. Can't start my own business without money. The good xtians never even offered me a job or groceries--but they did the big tithers and church workers. People who never went near a church helped out with food and rent. I asked one member of our church for a job pushing a fucking broom in a mine, fer god's sakes, and I was denied that job because I had been a cook in the Air Force. Now how much fucking training, that I did not learn as a cook, does it take to learn to push a piece of wood with bristles on the end of it? Couldn't even get a job as a cook because I'd been a cook in the Air Force. Go USA!

 

Fuck the church, they won't get me back.

[Mike D]

I would have stayed if 1.) God exsited, 2.) The Xian god was him, and 3.) the Bible was true. When it comes to anything in life (whether relationships, employment, religion, etc), I am pretty much a "no bullshit, lets cut to the chase" kind of person, and I just want to know the facts and what is expected of me. If I smell a rat or if something doesn't add up, eventually I am going to figure it out and i'll be on my way. Life is short, I don't have time for games.

[R. S. Martin]

If the theology had made sense and hung together. For starters, the Plan of Salvation does not hang together and one is not allowed to even ask the central questions. Of almost equal importance but on a different level is question of god's existence, or the existence of spirit. There would have to be evidence of something for which there could be no other explanation. No such phenomenon has been found.

 

I don't know what I would have done with all the other inconsistencies if these problems had been solved but these two items were key. When I concluded that Bible God does not exist I realized that I could not rightfully identify as a Christian. I had a lot to lose and would have definitely remained Christian if I could have done so with personal integrity.

[gradstu09]

I do not think the Roman Catholic Church was going to undergo a major doctrinal overhaul just for me.

[Grandpa Harley]

The bible making sense...

[Crazycatlady]

Never meeting other former Catholics who gave me the courage to accept myself and actually question.

[L.B.]

One little shred of integrity in the stressful situations that I observed. Really; that would have done it. EVERY TIME there was an opportunity for someone to show their ass, out it came. EVERY TIME there was a chance to either gossip or encourage people, out came the fucking chit-chat behind people's backs. I just wish the typical, telegraphed, obvious bullshit had been passed by for a little decency, just once. Nope... they won't get me back, either. It's too easy to look ahead and see what I could expect if I tried it again.

 

That, and jebus and the stories in his fairy-tale book are as imaginary as Feokaa, the mystical amphibian deity that rules this world from its throne in Wkwerg.

[Mongo]

I'm responding to the topic headders as I haven't time to read the topic right now...

 

But I'd argue that had something developed between me and a certain brunette that I fancied, I'd still be entangled with the church.

 

I find that the greatest single predictor of any person's persistance in the faith is marriage to a like minded fundy.

 

That would not however be guaranteed.

 

Mongo

[Skiergirl24]

If Jesus Christ appeared to me or spoke to me and told me he was real, then I would be a believer. Also, if I hadn't seen so much suffering and pain I might believe there was a loving God.

[Mongo]

If Jesus Christ appeared to me or spoke to me and told me he was real, then I would be a believer. Also, if I hadn't seen so much suffering and pain I might believe there was a loving God.

 

I agree but I think Jesus would have to do some 'splainin.

 

If he were able to sit with me and explain the foolishness that humans spew about god and make it cling together intellectually then heh... I'm in. The assumption being that Jesus is at distinct disagreement with Pat Robertson, Hal Lindsay, the Pope and other prominant fucktardians.

 

Of course... if he were to appear and say that Pat Robertson et al were generally right, I'm sure I'd have to ask him repeatedly "So MY job is to do what I'm told? Did I get that right? You are god and if your rules make no sense to my finite mind... I just have to follow them because I'm a piss ant and you are god?" AND he would then have to appear to me every month or so and tell me over and over again... "Mongo, I love you so do as I say and you won't get hurt.".

 

Even then, I might simply assume I'd just gone mad and go live in the woods.

 

Mongo

[kozimoto]

If I wasn't a scientist, perhaps I would have stayed. It was just very grating on me to hear the crap ID apologetics and ad hominem attacks on science during the sermon. My pastor would often "show me off" to visiting preachers as a scientist and christian, as though I was some kind of freak-show.

 

If my pastor hadn't told me explicitly how much money I was to give to a building fund - this above my tithes and offerings. When I challenged him that it was not his place to tell me to the dollar how much to give, he went a little crazy on my arse, and in front of my peers I might add. That started me investigating about money and tithes in the bible. What I discovered made me think that so much of my church experience was cultural and that nothing that happened in church was necessarily absolute. And once that came out... all of a sudden I didn't see the point.

 

Like you, VC, I thought, "but the third world countries! And China! They have revival!" but again, a little digging revealed that was not true either.

 

I'd like to think that my brain would have won in the end anyway, but perhaps it was the bubble-burst that stimulated it a few years early.

[ogilvy]

 

There's no going back now, of course. Once the mirror is shattered, that's it.

 

1. if someone had been able to answer my questions re God's cruelty.

 

2. if i had found more people to be 'real' about it all, i.e. no excuses, no just saying what everyone else says, no pretending to feel what you dont feel e.g. enrapured with God, 'on fire for God', no silly signs and wonders.

 

3. if i'd thought messages and prayers were inspired by the holy spirit, rather than just 'the flesh'.

 

4. if God had really made me different

 

5. if God put out a new bible without any of the horrible parts..

[Franciscan Monkey]

Quite simply, I would have stayed if Christianity were true. It clearly was/is not.

 

Respectfully,

Franciscan Monkey

[IndigoShe]

What Would Have Made You Stay?

If it was truth about a loving god and his loving son and if no thing like sin had ever been invented as its curse upon us, it would have been a faith that inspired the heart, bolstered the sense of self-worth and praised life and the living of it as what honors the creator that made it all possible. Had it been truth and love, I would have stayed.

[Guest eejay]

Of course there are some things that may have made me stay. Many of those were already mentioned by previous posters. Had the presence of god really been there in some of my trying times, or prayers being answered. I've experienced an awful lot of suffering and loss. There never was any sign of a god, even though I tried with all my heart to find him. Several years back, I lost nearly everything that was important in my life all at the same time. No...god doesn't answer prayer, because the bible god does not exist. Fortunately, I did come to realize that I was the only person who could make a difference in my life good or bad. It was only me who could get back up after being knocked down, and try to pick up the pieces. No god would intervene and make things better.

[LtJayson]

I thought for SURE I had put my 6000 cents in on this one :-)

 

I think I agree with some of the others...if it were true, I would have stayed. Well, I think I would have. I cannot say for sure considering that if it were true, that would make god just as evil as his children make him out to be...so, I guess I don't know if anything would make me stay haha

[xequar]

There was a non-demononational ministry-esque thing at my college. The people were all really good people, and their Sunday morning worship was very new age, laid back with mostly modern music and just a couple of bible readings, and honestly, if I had found a group like that after leaving college, I might still be there.

 

Luckily for me, I found my way back into a traditional church much like the one in which I grew up, and that helped to show me just how bad Xianity really is.

[twincats]

If I hadn't found out that my church wasn't immune to petty politics, I might have stayed a bit LONGER but meeting the people I met and learning the things that I learned made sure it was pretty inevitable that I couldn't stay forever.

[dunany77]

Hey, great post. I definitely would still be a fundi today had I not found actual errors in the bible. Of course I never went looking for them and I was good at explaining away contradictions. But finally finding things that were just plain wrong like Pi, bats being the same as birds, rabbits chewing cud etc definitely shattered the mirror forever. Finding these errors was just the first step, the next step was not finding any valid arguments to explain them. Through real objective study of both sides, I realized how irrational and ignorant people are to stick steadfastly to the inerrancy of the scripture. You have to literally bury your head in your arse to believe it. If god can make a mistake then he ain't no god now is he?

 

But it scares me to think how long I would have stayed a believer had I not found the errors. Most likely for my entire life. What a waste that would have been!

 

-on a side note, beer and whiskey sure do taste good now that I can drink without the condemnation coming down. The occasional puff of the wacky tabacky is a good thing too (all in moderation of course).

 

Cheers!

[Deva]

Honestly, I might have been able to stay and be a Baptist Fundy like I was brought up to be if they hadn't tried to shove creationism and "divorce is a sin" at me. They made it into a big deal and that was the final straw for me. I was into the choir participating quite a bit around 1991. But the creationism thing and the segregation of divorced women into a special Sunday School class became increasingly annoying. There is NOTHING in the Baptist Church for divorced single women without children. Never mind the circumstances of the divorce - its just a big SIN. Finally I just couldn't take it anymore and chucked the whole thing when I recovered from the shock of divorce and became healthy enough to stop beating myself up over it. Later I found the Biblical errors, etc., but that wasn't the reason I left. I can tell you that a real fundy can rationalize almost anything.

[Brother Jeff]

I could have remained a fundie if all - or at least most - of my many questions and doubts could have been answered honestly by my fellow Christians or by apologists. But they couldn't and they can't. And then there is creationism. I actually bought into it for a time when I was young and uneducated and naive, and when I found out how far from the truth it was and that I had been deliberately lied to I became very angry, and deconversion wasn't far behind then... Education is the natural enemy of religious belief. I learned too much and lost my faith - in an independent baptist church, of all places! I was attending my cousin's church and the preacher was raving about the supposed holiness of god, and I just had the sudden realization that it was all BULLSHIT! I deconverted right then and there, though I have never told my fundie fanatic cousin what happened... Glory!

[Neon Genesis]

I think if I had never read about all the immoral actions God committed throughout the bible, I might have converted to some sort of LGBT-friendly liberal denom that didn't believe in hell. But even without the hell doctrine, some of God's actions in the bible just really disgust me like the story about the virgin daughter who was sacrificed to God or the stories where God commands the murder of innocent children and the raping of virgins. So far I have yet to hear any convincing justification for God's actions that either does not end up justifying mass infanticide and rape or doesn't make 90% of the bible a metaphor which at that point makes the bible completely useless to me if only like 10% of it has any worth left to it. Of course, it also would have helped if any of it was actually true.