Leaving the Fold: A Guide for Former Fundamentalists and Others Leaving Their Religion

by Marlene Winell

I had had lingering doubts: was it to forge my own approach to life? I had been taught that there was one way — the revealed truth — and to believe otherwise was arrogant and risky. My unconscious conflict between safety and integrity had been resolved by an unspoken agreement that if I chose to live in the way I thought best I would have to take the risk of going to hell.

In conservative Christianity you are told you are unacceptable. You are judged with regard to your relationship to God. Thus you can only be loved positionally, not essentially. And, contrary to any assumed ideal of Christian love, you cannot love others for their essence either. This is the horrible cost of the doctrine of original sin. Recovering from this unloving assumption is perhaps the core task when you leave the fold. It is also a discovery of great joy — to permit unconditional love for yourself and others.

He resented the guilt he felt over sexuality and the fact that he hadn’t been given full support needed for essential self-worth.

My faith was central to my life for many years. In answer to the challenge “But were you ever really born again?” there is no doubt in my mind that my Christian experience was genuine. The benefits were real, especially as an adolescent. Later the cost became too great. Leaving the fold was then a long and wrenching process which tore at the fabric of my existence. The changes I went through created confusion, fear, anger, and grief. I had to find out who I was and redefine reality.

“Losing” God was like losing parents. Family and friends were never the same afterwards, and I no longer had a readily available community. The magnitude of the reconstruction only dawned on me some ten years later.

A dogmatic religion is one that does not truly honor the thoughts and feelings of the individual. It is also one that is static, without room for development. Doubt is considered sinful, and contradicting information is screened out. The divine and sacred are seen as derived from outside, with no recognition afforded to a person’s inner resources of wisdom, strength, and love.

The very nature of dogma is to separate, because these kinds of systems claim to have the only truth. Therefore, no matter how altruistic its announcements, a rigid religion will produce judgment, because there will always be “others” who believe differently. Judgment leads to discrimination and, all too often, to persecution. Dogma can never bring us together to understand each other in our shared humanity.

My way of answering the question of self-indulgence or self-pity is this: Becoming whole, healthy, and self-responsible involves two parts, What happened? and So what?

“adopt” your inner child, and actively create the life you want.

Life transitions in general are challenging because of the loss of the familiar that occurs when you let go of accustomed places, roles, and relationships. This is true of geographical moves, career changes, divorce, and other major transitions. Changing your religious point of view is equally significant, if not more so, because your entire life can be affected. For a time you may feel like a trapeze artist suspended in midair. Emotions can be intense and long-lasting so I would like to reassure and congratulate you now. If you dare to live, you will find your way.

The following sections offer a very general outline of the recovery pattern that I have observed and facilitated in clients: Separation Confusion Avoidance Feeling Rebuilding

Whether sudden or gradual, breaking away usually creates a state of serious confusion. This can be a major upheaval because your religion essentially defined your entire structure of reality and your old definitions no longer hold. Notions of who you were, your purpose in life, your relationship to others; needed explanations about the world; interpretations of the past; expectations for the future; and directions about how to feel, think, make decisions, and lead your life have been lost.

fears instilled by the religion itself can produce additional anxiety. You were taught that if you did not believe you would go to hell. So it makes great sense if you have been nervous and scared about leaving. There may be times of near panic, when you wonder whether you’ve made a terrible mistake and will be forever damned. You might have trouble with intense feelings in this phase because you have been taught to interpret them as “conviction of the Holy Spirit.”

But the experience of leaving can also be liberating, like breaking out of prison. If you feel oppressed by all the formulas and judgments, the rules and regulations, you might now feel a great relief, able to think and feel and experience much more of yourself. Some people describe a wonderful, almost euphoric, feeling of “coming home” when they settle in to the notion of just being alive and living life now, in this world.

Those who feel they have been abused by their religious experiences may also avoid any contact with church members or even church buildings. A number of people have trouble participating in organizations of other kinds as well, in political or social groups, for example. These patterns of avoidance and numbness seem to be methods of self-protection.

Most people experience some amount of anger. You might feel like an angry child losing Santa Claus. In thinking over the time spent being faithful, there can be rage over the damage done — life lost, negative self-image, ignorance about the world and real life, guilt and suffering, denial of pleasures, missing skills, hurt relationships, spoiled careers. If you have parents who used religion to justify severe discipline, or if you suffered actual abuse at the hands of church leaders, you could be very angry.

As you progress out of the avoidance phase, the other major feeling you will likely experience is grief. You really have had multiple losses. Uncovering and grieving these losses will be key to releasing you from your pain.

Within fundamentalism, your worth was based on being a redeemed child of God. The atonement was essential to cleanse you of original sin. Now you may struggle with feeling bad and worthless. It will be important in your healing to fully accept yourself, to appreciate and love yourself, and learn about the kind of self-esteem that does not depend on external approval.

Accompanying grief are fear and anxiety. When you have lost your place in what was once a safe cocoon, your status as a protected child of God and your part in the cosmic scheme, it is natural to feel adrift. At first, this feeling of total disconnectedness can be very frightening. The world can seem like an ominous place in which you have no defenses. Old fears of hell and Armageddon can resurface, even after you have rejected them intellectually. Your task in this area will be to build trust within yourself and the skills needed to deal with the world.

Guilt is often a continuing issue, because it is one of the only feelings indulged by religion. You are probably used to feeling bad for many things, and now you no longer have the old means of forgiveness. Because fundamentalism splits everything into black and white, you may have developed an unrelenting perfectionism. You will need to allow yourself to be human now, understand old messages about mistakes and “shoulds,” and learn flexibility and compassion. The result will be a much more relaxed and open way of being.

Fully appreciating the here and now usually takes some learning.

Other people are not saints or devils, and life is a rich mixture of pleasure and pain.

Taking charge of your own life is central to recovery from religious indoctrination. If you learned to wait passively for God’s will and to feel guilty for making your own decisions, this will be a challenge. Notions of responsibility were confused in fundamentalism, since you were at the same time accountable for sin, for making the choice to accept Christ, and for leading others to God.

to feel what you feel. Processing emotions for yourself and expressing them to others may be areas you will need to work on, since you were probably taught to repress and deny your feelings.

For those who find spirituality to be a continuing source of meaning and purpose, their spirituality needs to be redefined and made more personal.

I don’t know when I was actually saved. I believed in Jesus most of my life, I guess.

I made a great effort with all these study projects, but I continued to have emotional needs that were unfulfilled. The energy and time that went into my faith is actually rather amazing in retrospect. It is sad now to look back and understand the tension between my normal teenage need to belong in a peer group and my desire for spiritual acceptability. My faith taught me to glorify the idea of being different, which psychologically fostered a feeling of alienation that I tried to justify in my writing.

We understood each other because of our common belief system. My faith also gave me a continued meaning in life.

The factors involved in something as broad as religious commitment are always complex and include conscious choice, external pressure, and internal drives. Some of your motivations may still seem reasonable and natural, such as wanting to be safe after death or wanting to belong to a group. Others may now seem obscure and can be better understood as manipulations. Examples of manipulations include the inculcation of severe guilt for minor behaviors, and the obstruction of alternatives.

we will also examine the strengths gained from religious involvement. While there may have been significant damage, it may also be true that you have grown as a result of this involvement. Appreciating this can provide a foundation for further growth.

Physical needs, basic safety, and emotional security are all at risk. As John Bradshaw (1990) a leading writer in the field of recovery, explains, “Every child needs desperately to know that a) his parents are healthy and able to take care of him, and b) that he matters to his parents.” This dependence is why children will sustain their loyalty to parents despite abuse. Rejecting even a truly dangerous family situation is simply not possible to children who usually lack options. In working with clients on recognizing their childhood realities and developing compassion for themselves, I often ask, “What were you supposed to do? Judge your parents as incompetent and go shopping for new ones?” The truth is that children will adjust their views of reality to survive, sustaining a belief in their parents no matter what, because that is all they have. To question is essentially to risk death.

Sometimes I crave that feeling of safety that being in the fold and following all the rules might bring. It feels cold and lonely out here even though I know that I am psychologically healthier where I am. But I envy my siblings who are still in the fold basking in the sunshine of approval from the church and my parents. — Margaret

the community aspect is something you miss but at what cost

primitive survival needs, or “deficiency needs,” that must be met before we can seek more complex goals, as follows: Survival — food, water, and shelter Safety — physical and psychological security Belonging — love and acceptance Self-esteem — approval and recognition

With these needs satisfied, humans can then fulfill their more complex “being needs”: Intellectual achievement — understanding and exploring Aesthetic appreciation — order, structure, and beauty Self-actualization — full realization of one’s potential, the process of becoming who you are

With God as your protector, the dangers and insecurities of life are not so threatening. All a believer has to do is “trust and obey,” as the song goes. “Lead me on,” says another hymn. Followers are called little sheep or children, needing and deserving protection.

Fundamentalism preys on the normal concerns people have by painting the world as completely out of control and humans as essentially helpless.

The fundamentalist belief system exploits what may be a natural inclination to escape the challenging work of achieving personal maturity. The self is untrustworthy because of its essential evil and weakness; thus salvation from the dangerous self is as absolutely necessary.

In the fundamentalist framework, decision-making is a matter of discerning God’s will, to the point of looking for God’s blueprint for your life. The only clear desire that you are really permitted to have is to love God and do His bidding,

freedom from choices

Fundamentalist Christianity relieves the burden of responsibility very thoroughly. When one is “born again” and finds a place in the “family of God,” one’s freedom and responsibility are traded for the comfort of following the plan.

In the fundamentalist framework, guidance often takes the form of “do’s and don’ts” — right and wrong behavior. This can create a sense of safety through set limits, much as a parent provides limits for a child.

Individuals who do not trust their own judgment can use religion for self-control and conclude that without it there would be certain disaster.

Even as an adult you can get by with avoiding the clear thinking that needs to happen for ethical maturity.

ethical maturity is difficult to form

Because we humans do indeed need some agreements about behavioral limits, it may appear that a divine authority is needed. The neglected point is that people have intuitive knowledge of ethics. They can develop their own codes of behavior and create healthy social contracts.

a good response to how you can be moral without a belief in a god

We all want to be loved and accepted. A longing for unity, for connection, for unconditional love, is a natural desire. Yet as humans we face the existential dilemma of isolation — the condition of being ultimately alone in spite of our many relationships. This aloneness can be frightening at a core level so much so that people often avoid awareness of it. The fundamentalist Christian solves this problem by having the ultimate, most intimate connection — a perfect, unending relationship with God:

and yet because this relationship is imagined, it remains unfulfiling

Fundamentalist Christians constitute a full-blown subculture with a common language, belief system, and behavioral code. As with other subcultures, but even more so, it can be very comforting for members to find safety and understanding so widely.

For centuries, philosophers have questioned whether the universe can be random and meaningless. Existentialists have eloquently described the terrifying idea of an indifferent cosmos in which the individual is merely an accident without significance. For someone disturbed by such angst, religion can offer meaning and purpose. It says the world is not chaotic after all, that there is an underlying order that explains everything, a cosmic coherence that makes everything seem reasonable.

This is interesting because my experience was the opposite. It was when I stopped believing in god that the world began to make sense.

For those deeply immersed in religion, it becomes an escape from the world. As described by Father Leo Booth (1991) the religious addict uses heavy church attendance and religious behavior as an avoidance of life. The payoffs are real and addicting. Furthermore, the believer can look forward to the ultimate future payoff — a promise of blissful paradise in heaven when God will wipe away all tears

At the deepest level, all of us want to be valued for simply being, instead of doing. We want unconditional love.

This is the heart of the prodigal son story and it could be beautiful and yet this story is used as manipulation for children who do not abide by their parents beliefs

The acceptance is always understood as being vicariously earned through Christ’s atonement. The message is not “You are acceptable as you are and have always been.” The doctrine of original sin still predominates, and you will always be considered a sinner, albeit “washed in the blood.” The bargain is to admit your sinfulness and then be accepted. For many people eager to be free of self-loathing, this is a bargain indeed. They are willing to accept the whole package deal of religious dogma that the church requires in order to get the relief of such a reprieve.

This is a great example of how something as simple and kind as "you are loved unconditionally just as you are" is twisted into a way that keeps you indoctrinated

For some Christians, the most meaningful and persuasive aspect of faith is their private spiritual experience. The Christian methods of prayer and devotion and certain group practices can bring about altered states of consciousness. These experiences can be intensely satisfying, and of course they are always interpreted according to Christian dogma. There is no recognition of the similar experiences described by people in a wide variety of settings, religious and otherwise. The mystical experience is taken to be proof of the Christian belief system.