Leaving church

I'd like to start a series of posts here about something Cathy and I are in the process of. Around the middle of 2012, we decided to stop attending the church that I grew up in and to find something different. We each had different reasons for this, but we agreed that it needed to be done. My reasons for this change are complex and add difficulty to a search for a new church, so I think this experience should provide fodder for a whole series of blog posts.

Cathy has never connected all that well with people at that church. She's found people friendly but hasn't formed any strong friendships or had deeper conversations with people there. When I was younger, I had good friends there, some of my best friends. For a variety of reasons, we've drifted apart. As most of them had kids, they reached a significantly different stage of life from me (one that I'll be entering soon, but I digress). This factor combined with geography--everyone seems to live in a different part of the city, not the same part as me anyway--and not very persistent effort on all of our parts led to weakening friendships. These are among the reasons why Cathy never connected well either.

But in this series I'll focus more on my reasons for leaving and my thoughts and experiences with a search for someplace new. If Cathy decides to write about her experience, I'll post that too if she wants.

My views have been drifting away from typical evangelical Christianity over time. I believe evolution, I don't believe in the infallibility of the Bible, I experience doubts about pretty much every aspect of Christianity, stuff like that. In my former church, those views didn't get me in trouble, but I rarely felt like people understood me either.

This isn't just about changes in my beliefs and opinions though. It's about the way evangelical churches do things, and some deep-seated feelings that I can't entirely explain and justify, but can't let go of either. Something about his just doesn't feel right.

The pastor has an idea: we need to change _______ so the church can reach out to the community better. He encourages people to read books or go to seminars and conferences, changes are made in how the church does things. Maybe the church grows a bit. Maybe the church shrinks a bit. Long term, not much changes. Then the pastor has an idea: we need to change ______ so the church can reach out to the community better...

After a while, we get a new pastor. A similar cycle repeats itself. Maybe the pastor claims it's not so much about growing the church, but simply about serving others. But it feels the same to me. Sometimes good changes happen, and occasionally those changes have a lasting effect. But much of the time, this whole way of doing church feels dead.

Meanwhile, I've been drifting. As I said earlier, my views have been changing and I don't feel understood. I read stuff saying this "church growth" focus takes people's eyes off the Gospel of Jesus Christ and makes people cogs in a machine, and that resonates with me. A blogger or two suggest churches shouldn't even have "vision statements" or much for goals because those interfere with community, and that resonates with me.

My enthusiasm for community outreach through the church is near zero. The church still wants me to reach out to others. But why would I want to bring others to something that leaves me feeling this way? It's not that they've mistreated me. The people there actually mean a lot to me, and some have been part of my life for all of my life. I have a good relationship with the pastor. This church and this pastor are probably a better fit for me than most evangelical churches and pastors are. And yet so much to do with church programs makes me feel so cynical or just weary. Feeling this way has made it clear to me that something about my relationship with God and his church needs to change.

Jesus inspires me. When church is about Jesus, that can inspire me too. When it's about programs for reaching out, I get weary of hearing about it.

I'll unpack some of these thoughts in later posts and talk about things that have happened more recently. If you found this through my Facebook profile and you'd like to keep following it, you'll have to check back here or subscribe to an RSS feed, because I don't plan to post links to any more posts on Facebook.

Big change on the way

I'd like to share some news with both of my faithful blog followers. We're expecting a baby! This will be our first. We're both excited and nervous. Admittedly, we're not as excited as a lot of parents get, at least not as excited as the stereotypical ones. But we are looking forward to it.