Disappointed

[Ellinas]

I still tag along to the church with Mrs Ellinas each Sunday.  Keep up appearances for her sake, etc...

 

Anyhow, a person who had, as many as 20 years ago, severely limited his involvement in the church (to his wife's great upset at the time) has decided to reappear as a full member.

 

In a way I'd always regarded him as an example of someone who'd had enough and had managed to find a balance between not caring about the church but keeping things together with his wife.  Seems somehow (and I suspect via one of his children) the Christian establishment has got its' claws back into him.

 

Now it may be that he had always been fed up with rather than actually against the belief system - I don't know as I try to have not too much contact with his wife, he's usually with her and so conversation is rarely about anything more important than our shared dislike of barbeques.  And I am generally happy to see anyone go the way that is right for them, regardless of what I might think of that path.  Nevertheless, it does sadden me to see someone I thought had made a bid for freedom re-submit to this nonsense.  And it annoys me that the fundamentalist oppressors are now feeling - as they would put it - "encouraged".

 

Pity...

[pratt]

i remember those moments where the lord has renewed the his spirit and called his sheep to the fold,,,,,,,

 

i would have said hallelujah 20+ years ago,,,,

 

now, i would say,,,,, oh fuck,,,,,, what happen?

[AManWithOutAGod]

Did something recently happen in his life that might have made him "go back deeper" into the faith? Like medical issues, a death in the family, etc?

 

Often seems when that kind of stuff happens, people often start getting more active in the church.

[Ellinas]

Did something recently happen in his life that might have made him "go back deeper" into the faith? Like medical issues, a death in the family, etc?

 

Often seems when that kind of stuff happens, people often start getting more active in the church.

 

Not so far as I know.  My own take on this is that his daughter has gone to university and struck up some friendships in the Brethren assembly there.  I suspect this is the result of pressure, or at least influence, from the daughter and the families of her friends.

 

I may be completely wrong, of course.

[Deva]

If there is one thing I have learned, its that humans are unpredictable.

 

I think your disappointment is very understandable, but there isn't much you can do, unless this person wants to have a serious discussion with you about religion.

[Ellinas]

Indeed - and that's not going to happen any time soon.

[RipVanWinkle]

There are a lot of reasons for the return to the church other than a reconversion. He may have decided that it was easier to go to church than not because of pressure by his wife. He may have feared

he had missed something important in Xtianity and needed to give it another try, Who knows? But if his deconversion was real he won't go to church for long.  Rip

[Guest Furball]

I wouldn't go back except for reconversion. Though if the conversion was a fake in the first place....I just don't get why people would go back at all, i mean why go back to something so horrible and sit there listening to a hypocrite preach stories that you know aren't true just to please someone else. Maybe i am just too hard hearted of a person to understand this, I came out to my mother and anyone who would listen, and i didn't care what anyone thought, and no one stopped loving me. I guess i am in the minority here where christianity really, and i mean really pissed me off. 

[RipVanWinkle]

Ellinas: I don't know that it is all that bad, If he is satisfied with the church and doesn't turn into one of those radical fundamentalists, he will

probably do just fine. If cognitive dissonance is not a problem for him, what's the harm? I for one do not see myself as being challenged to de-convert

Xtians. That was what I thought for a while after I deconverted. But no longer. Rip

[Ellinas]

Ellinas: I don't know that it is all that bad, If he is satisfied with the church and doesn't turn into one of those radical fundamentalists, he will

probably do just fine. If cognitive dissonance is not a problem for him, what's the harm? I for one do not see myself as being challenged to de-convert

Xtians. That was what I thought for a while after I deconverted. But no longer. Rip

 

I think you misunderstand me.

 

I have no interest either in deconverting anyone from anything, or converting them to any alternative for that matter.  However:

1. Radical fundamentalism is pretty much the name of the game among the Brethren.  He was interviewed by the elders before the Assembly was invited to receive him back (acceptance and active participation is not automatic in conservative Brethren circles) and must have convinced them that he was in the right ball park.
2. I am disturbed by a number of recent examples of people finding renewed religious vigour purely though family influence.  I am unconvinced that the resulting "faith" is in any sense genuine.  If it is not, it will eventually cause more distress to his family than if he'd stayed away in the first place.
3. It gives cause for the real hard liners to feel "encouraged" and to come out with even more extreme nonsense.

 

Bottom line, if he is happy - good luck to him; I just find it disappointing that someone I thought had a degree of good judgement and independence has apparently thrown it away under what is ultimately no more than peer pressure, and has given cause to celebrate to those whose religious prejudices I have come to despise.  Whether his current position is genuine will be revealed in the process of time.