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

by Marlene Winell

Membership in a religious group can provide such an opportunity. The attraction of group involvement may be stronger for those who struggle with personal meaning as individuals. In his classic analysis, The True Believer, Eric Hoffer (1951) examines the psychology of all mass movements, both religious and political. One of his conclusions is that joining a group provides new self-esteem and purpose for someone who has failed in life. When the present is spoiled, hope for the future is a seductive lure.

Power is a primary theme in the worship rituals of many churches. I once made a content analysis of hymns sung in fundamentalist churches, expecting a majority of songs to be about love and praise. It turned out that power was by far the dominant subject, exemplified by such hymns as “All Hail the Power of Jesus’ Name” and “Onward Christian Soldiers.” (Interestingly the second most frequent theme was safety.)

makes me proud that my favorite hymns were about love

unlike religions that expect you to engage in a spiritual discipline such as meditation, you are not asked to do anything. In fundamentalism, there is no understanding of character development, only miraculous transformation due to God’s grace. Rather than attending to the process of self-awareness and personal growth, you simply channel the Holy Spirit in your life. Being happy and being a good person are due to the power of God — an appealing shortcut.

a convenient shortcut that lets you avoid any real thought or internalization

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The most powerful technique of fundamentalism is a terror tactic. Fundamentalism teaches the existence of hell, a place of eternal torment.

The fear of hell is frequently powerful enough to keep a person trying to conform. If the salvation formula was tried but no dramatic effects were felt, a follower might answer many “altar calls,” repeating the ritual and trying to believe. Evangelists often threaten people by suggesting they imagine a sudden accidental death, perhaps in an accident on their way home from the meeting. The fear is kept alive as everyone constantly speculates about whether they are ready to meet their maker. And, as if the danger of Satan weren’t enough, God is a source of fear as well, often portrayed as jealous and vengeful in the Bible. Jesus said: “But I will warn you whom to fear: fear him who, after he has killed, has power to cast into hell; yes I tell you, fear him!”

it certainly scared me enough to "get saved" twice even though i always believed

Within fundamentalism, there are those who believe a doctrine of “once saved, always saved,” also called “eternal security.” This means that once you are born again, you are permanently a part of God’s family. You cannot be unborn. If you backslide and stray from the fold, you will eventually return because Jesus the good shepherd will seek you out and bring you back. The anxiety of this doctrine is determining whether you were ever truly saved. Especially for those who did not have a dramatic experience of rebirth, this belief is not much comfort. Believers work hard at making their salvation “take” and blame themselves for not believing enough or not being humble enough to be accepted. This problem is especially relevant to children of fundamentalists. Since they inherited their belief system, they often have not had a distinct conversion experience. Or if they have, there is no lasting evidence that salvation has definitely taken place.

even though my family believes this doctrine they are quick to say "well they were never saved in the first place." that paired with the fire and brimstone preaching with moving goal posts did nothing to provide me any comfort in my salvation

For it is impossible to restore again to repentance those who have once been enlightened, who have tasted the heavenly gift, and have become partakers of the Holy Spirit, and have tasted the goodness of the word of God and the powers of the age to come, if they then commit apostasy, since they crucify the Son of God on their own account and hold him up to contempt. (Hebrews 6:4–6) This and other verses serve to keep believers worried and conforming. When does mere doubt constitute apostasy? Blaspheming the Holy Spirit is also said to be unforgivable (Matthew 12:31), but since it is never defined, believers are confused and anxious. Rather than take a life-threatening chance, believers take pains to remain faithful and suppress unorthodox thinking.

According to the dominant view, Christians will be “raptured” off the earth and the rest of the world will experience seven years of intense tribulation under the Antichrist. Then Jesus will come back with all his saints and fight the battle of Armageddon, culminating in a millennium of Christ’s rule on Earth. Finally, all will be judged and either go to heaven or burn in the lake of fire. The frightening part is that the first event will happen suddenly, “in the twinkling of an eye, at the last trumpet.” Anticipating the rapture can create intense anxiety for the believer who is not absolutely sure of salvation. The other metaphor in the Bible is that of the Flood in Noah’s day. In that story, people were busy making merry when they were suddenly swept away. The implication is that you must not relax. You should live in fear about being right with God at all times. Especially for a small child, this can be terrifying. Another unfortunate aspect of this end-times focus is its effect on thinking about the future. The impact on political issues, such as environmental concern and peace making, is profound. Fundamentalists are generally unmotivated to better the world because they see it as doomed. In fact, believers are often excited when war breaks out, particularly in the Middle East, because it could mean “the end” at last. For an individual, personal life planning can be negatively affected. As Cindy expressed it: I was always lonely and afraid because I believed doomsday...

This reminds me of something strange that i felt when i deconverted. Rather than ferling that id lost an eternity in heaven, i felt that i had gained my own future

In testimonial meetings, new converts stress the contrast between their previous lives of sin and their new lives as Christians. The most moving stories are ones describing severe conditions of depravity and hopelessness — drug addiction, crime, suicidal depression, and other scenarios of desperation. If you were raised a Christian, you were led to believe that this is how your life would be without Christ. The world is an evil place that will eat you up. Even Christians with little life experience talk with fear about life outside the fold, about how horribly depressing or meaningless life would be. The group reinforces these imagined situations, making them seem more real and frightening.

from what ive seen this is also self fulfilling and serves to keep people down

An important aspect of this indoctrination is a literal belief in Satan and his legions of demons. As a Christian, the “blood of Christ” is supposed to protect you, and you have the Word as a sword. Thus if you leave the faith, you can feel very vulnerable, to the point of having terrifying nightmares or delusions.

I had these as a believer and they persist now as a nonbeliever as well

People who leave are assumed to be interested in sin. Years ago, I asked a relative why she’d never wanted to know why I left the faith. I was shocked to hear her say, “Well, all the people I’ve known who left the church wanted to go back to their old ways — sleep around or do drugs and not feel guilty.” Part of the control mechanism is shaming.

The fact that this is the assumed reason with no chance to defend your own beliefs is infuriating and yet with fundamentalism any protestation to this point is a waste of energy

How many times have you heard that Christ died for you, for your sins? This is a heavy responsibility, especially for children. The guilt induction can vary in intensity, depending how the message is presented, but the bottom line is that the Son of God had to come to Earth and die a horrible death because of our failings.

a horrible weight to put on a child

Once you are saved, you are taught that your duty is to spread the gospel to others, or else their destiny is at least partially your fault. This mission to evangelize is often presented as your only reason for remaining on earth.

Guilt about others serves to sustain the group. The effect of proselytizing is to reaffirm and strengthen a belief system. The psychological term that applies is cognitive dissonance. Humans need to experience internal consistency. You cannot repeatedly say one thing and believe something else without being very uncomfortable, without experiencing dissonance. Therefore, if you are preaching a certain message out of obligation, the easiest thing is to believe what you’re saying. “Witnessing” is a way of convincing yourself on a regular basis.

Additionally if you are busy doing "the work" like you should be then you won't have time for doubts

Despite the redemption promised by Christ’s sacrifice, Christians are expected to live lives free of sin. This is not possible, of course, since so much is considered sin. Therefore you must continuously repent and receive God’s grace. Each time you “sin,” you are to acknowledge again your incompetence and gratefully ask for forgiveness. And because you cannot achieve perfection, you live with some level of guilt all the time.

And if you have an anxiety disorder, this impossible situation is a living hell

Christians are also made to feel guilty when they focus on their own priorities. It is seen as wrong and sinful to be aware of your feelings, honor your intuitions, or seek to meet you needs. You should be above this kind of selfishness and consider God first and then the group. But, since people naturally have needs and feelings, sincere Christians who want to avoid guilt must, in essence, annihilate themselves. This makes for more cooperative adherents.

this is why i revel in every piece of myself that i have recovered

Church services often include ritualized group processes that can induce trance states. Music, prayers, and a mesmerizing preaching style can create a state of relaxation and suggestibility. When a congregation proceeds to sing and pray aloud together with enthusiasm and speaking in tongues, an individual can easily conform. The aroused emotions and the group consensus about reality are convincing enough to inspire a response to get saved, “rededicated,” or “filled with the Spirit.” In the typical evangelical service, after a rousing sermon comes the “altar call.” This routine is strikingly similar to hypnotic induction methods in other contexts: The key is to get people to focus attention inward rather than outward, so that they see, hear, and feel internally rather than externally, through the five senses. At such times, you are much more susceptible to suggestions and less able to use your critical abilities. After an emotional sermon, which has likely already employed manipulative techniques such as fear and guilt, you are asked to bow your head and close your eyes. Soft music plays while everyone focuses inward. Quiet hymns repeat “Jesus is calling” or “Just as I am.” The minister then speaks softly into the microphone, suggesting that the Holy Spirit is present and moving in the congregation.

prompt: is this what made the difference between what i felt was a good sermon and one that had me falling asleep

The religion co-opts anything you might consider spiritual, taking your private experience and making it proof of the entire religion. Thus it becomes difficult for the born again Christian with personal mystical experience to leave the faith, because this would seem to be a denial of firsthand evidence. The former believer has been brainwashed to accept everything as a package deal; thus trying to salvage and honor this part of religious experience creates enormous guilt. This manipulation can legitimately be called spiritual abuse.

spiritual abuse: a form of emotional and psychological abuse characterized by a systematic pattern of coercive and controlling behavior in a religious context

Most people experience feelings of inadequacy at some time; these feelings are then exaggerated and exploited. The assault on the self goes beyond guilt for sin. If that were the case, most people could reasonably be forgiven by virtue of their own remorse and willingness to make amends. Few of us deserve to be crucified. The key is that you are considered fundamentally wrong and inept, beginning with the doctrine of original sin. Everything about you is flawed, and you desperately need to be salvaged by God.

The damage to self is more than hurt self-esteem. Your confidence in your own judgment is destroyed. As an empty shell, you are then open and vulnerable to indoctrination because you cannot trust your own thinking. Your thoughts are inadequate, your feelings are irrelevant or misleading, and your basic drives are selfish and destructive.

this makes you a target when leaving religion as well as i discovered

Once you are a believer and no longer have your own mind to rely on, it becomes possible to accept everything you are taught. You can accommodate incredible problems in the religion because you need to avoid cognitive dissonance, as discussed earlier. The stretching of credulity in fundamentalist Christianity is a frequent occurrence. Followers are expected to believe contradictory, nonsensical, and offensive “true stories” in the Bible and church teachings. This serves to strengthen blind adherence because your intuitive reactions have been annihilated.

Who are you to question god?

This controlled focus on the spiritual and the afterlife instructs Christians to maintain an aloofness from the world, and to withdraw any emotional investment from worldly affairs. Thus the first reason to discredit the world is because it is simply irrelevant. The things of this world are vastly inferior to “things above.” For the devout Christian longing to be with God, this can amount to a death wish. Taken to the extreme, in cult-like groups it can even lead to suicide.

This is especially scary for those who believe but are outcast as the likelihood of suicide is high. Why suffer on earth when you can be close to god in heaven. I think this is also another reason why this is inappropriate for children who dont understand death.

The biblical image of the Christian life that fundamentalists recognize is one of total immersion. Believers are to turn to each other for support and reinforcement of their beliefs. Outsiders are discredited as sources of valid information or enrichment simply by virtue of being unbelievers. The substantive content of anything from a worldly source is immediately suspect, and often dismissed out of hand. Information that appears good is especially suspected because believers are taught that Satan can appear as an “angel of light.” Worldly knowledge that seems reasonable is labeled “temptation.”

"self policing"

In the fundamentalist view, unbelievers have only two relevant attributes: They are potential converts and sources of temptation.

Since Christians are already full of truth, there is no need for them to listen, nothing for them to learn, and much for them to lose by admitting alternative views into their consciousness.

This is why conversations go nowhere and my desire to be understood (not even accepted, just heard) is far too much to ask

Conformity is reinforced within the group. Members feel more secure when someone gives their testimony, when doctrines and beliefs are repeated. Self-criticism is encouraged, individual differences discouraged. Expressing doubts or ideas that are unorthodox usually means punishment of some kind, from silence to criticism to outright ostracism. This group approval or disapproval is powerful enough to manipulate behavior. Especially for those who are attracted to the social support of a religion, the threat of shame is an effective deterrent for any deviance.

this caused paralyzing fear in me

A number of thought-control techniques are used: Believers are indoctrinated with beliefs on every subject, they are taught to think in black/white, good/bad terms, information is filtered, words are controlled, truth is owned, and the system claims answers to all problems.

Fundamentalist churches, schools, and families do not provide information about other belief systems and usually discourage members from reading widely. In very conservative groups, college education is frowned upon. Christian groups are known for banning books and objecting to certain curricula, such as the teaching of evolution. Clearly there is a fear that too much outside information will threaten faith, so it should be controlled. Children grow up thinking that what they have been taught is all there is. If you control the information people receive, you restrict their ability to think.

control of information = control of thought

Thinking in ways that are contrary to orthodox doctrine is dangerously sinful. Therefore, believers are taught techniques to prevent too much independent thinking. The open mind is considered to be vulnerable to Satan’s influence.

thinking indicates lack of faith which equates to sin

In fundamentalist circles and in the Bible, many words are used in unique ways, with distinct meanings. Part of joining the culture is learning to use those words. The language changes may appear subtle and innocent in the beginning, but eventually, through repetition, believers’ thoughts become controlled by the very words that are used to describe reality and the specific meanings that are assigned by the system. This manipulation of thought is powerful and nearly invisible.

life, death, truth, wisdom, righteousness, justice, liberty, bondage, love, hate, will, grace, witness, and word.

words that are redefined under Christianity

Freedom in the Bible also means something very different from our usual notion of being able to make choices. It compares more closely to being free of lice. In the following verse, it is clear that the believer is no closer to having free will. Freedom simply means “available for subjection to God” instead of to sin. But thanks are to God, that you who were once slaves of sin have become obedient from the heart to the standard of teaching to which you were committed, and having been set free from sin, have become slaves of righteousness. (Romans 6:17–18)

love is removed from the realm of human affections. Human love is disparaged as frail and fickle, while agape — unselfish, altruistic love that is from God — is held up as the ideal.

A Christian “loves” a sinner because God “loves” the sinner and one must follow suit. Love to the evangelical is simply a willingness to put up with a sinner in order to obey the commission to preach the gospel. Thus the fundamentalist can say, without noticing the inconsistency, “I love the sinner, but not the sin.” To the uninitiated, this is a strange kind of love, that tries to divorce persons from their activities and then judges those activities with amazing ferocity.

This warped love is something that can and should be rejected as it bears no resemblance to the real meaning of the word

In order to control someone through his or her emotions, feelings often have to be redefined. Happiness, for example, is a feeling everyone desires. However, if happiness is defined as being closer to God, and God is unhappy (as He apparently is in many religious cults), then the way to be happy is to be unhappy. Happiness, therefore, consists in suffering so you can grow closer to God.

clear as mud

Giving words a superstitious power works to unconsciously control people through fear. A phobia about words can continue even after a believer leaves the fold, lending a residual power to the former belief system.

Fuck that ;)

Fundamentalist Christianity rests on circular reasoning and pat answers. The belief system is brilliantly constructed to provide its own support — if you don’t look too closely at the logic. It is a closed system, satisfied with its own internal evidence of truth. It is closed in that any information or argument from outside is rejected a priori because, as discussed above, it is a “lie,” not of the “truth.” All questions are answered within the belief system itself, usually with circular reasoning, for example: Whoever knows God listens to us, and he who is not of God does not listen to us. By this we know the spirit of truth and the spirit of error. (1 John 4:6)

circular reasoning - makes perfect sense when you dont understand logic and reason

The new convert is often enormously impressed with the seasoned believer who can repeat all of the canned responses, most of which either “answer” simply by denying the validity of the question or by evoking the perfection of God and the sinfulness of mankind,

Another aspect of this closed system is the way all of your personal experiences can be explained. If good things happen, God is blessing you. If bad things happen, God is teaching you. No matter what, you cannot fault God or the religion.

In general, people make changes of all kinds based on integrating information from new experiences.

A minister once told me he wished he knew who or what burned me so badly I left Christianity. I didn’t answer. I wasn’t burned. I evolved.

For me, I wasn't burned. I learned.

Believers hold that every word in the Bible has not only been inspired but also literally dictated by God. Thus we are to believe every verse and every story as spoken directly by God, and this creates some serious problems, including: Intellectual difficulty with overgeneralizations, conflicts with science, and contradictions. Moral difficulties where God is portrayed at times as partial, vengeful, and deceptive, while in other parts of the Bible universal love is taught; the history of the Hebrews in the Bible shows progress in moral concern rather than a static code; injustice in the Bible including the slaughter of innocent people and minor transgressors. Moral difficulty with concept of endless torture in hell. Problem with occasions of Jesus expressing vindictiveness, discourtesy, narrow-mindedness, and ethnic and religious intolerance. Intellectual difficulties with the human decision-making process for deciding the books of the Bible and questions of the value of other writings not included. Non-uniqueness of Judeo-Christian teachings and practices. Other religions have similar rituals and beliefs, including sacrifice and vicarious atonement through the death of a god, union of a god and a virgin, trinities, the mother Mary (Myrrha, Maya, Maia, and Maritala), a place for good people who die and a hell of fire, an apocalypse, the first man falling from the god’s favor by doing something forbidden or having been tempted by some evil animal, catastrophic floods in whi...

The fundamentalist mindset feels stifling to the individual and cruel in its implications for others. A believer who becomes more open-minded toward diversity of lifestyle can become unwilling to toe the party line in condemning others. In the past slavery was approved, and bigoted attitudes are still common in conservative churches. At present, the rhetoric about “family values” is strangely intolerant of varieties of family structure and women’s issues. The most glaring condemnation is of gays and lesbians, which can result in violent assaults, not Christian love.

"God is love" …except…

Christians are promised huge benefits for becoming “born again.” You expect to feel different, to have more love, joy, and peace — the “abundant life.” You also expect to have mastery over problems in your life. And you want to grow in strength and wisdom. In the church group, you expect a superior level of Christian love. These expectations for personal change and meaningful community are critical for many. Thus when they are not fulfilled, or not satisfied completely, doubt sets in about the system.

The best thing I learned out of all that philosophy was not distaste for philosophy, but a strong feeling that one has a right to reserve one’s judgment. As a scientist, you reserve judgment on enormous numbers of things, and it’s important to keep very clear in your head as you’re working that you don’t know this and you don’t know that.

it becomes a great effort to keep on the intellectual blinders when you are exposed adequately to new information.

Learning about other interpretations of Christianity and the Bible can also be quite the revelation. Reading about the Gnostics was an eye-opener for me personally — the idea of a very different group of early Christians with more personal and feminine views on Christianity. They were wiped out by the increasingly political force of the dominant church group (Pagels 1979). In modern times, there has been a rediscovery of the Gnostics and also the ancient goddess religions. Importantly, more data about the history of Christianity and the Bible itself can be very enlightening. A good starting point for some of this critical information is the impressive collection of essays in The Book Your Church Doesn’t Want You to Read (Leedom, 1993).

I read quite a few books, trying to determine if the Bible could actually be the Word of God or if it was just another historical document — a religious document. I ran into this clear-cut, very plausible explanation of how the Christian church evolved under the Roman Empire — what the social conditions were that led to the rise of an institution like that. And that was what I was looking for. It even had a little bit of analysis of scripture, pointing out some of the process of change, the revisions in the gospels, like the Sermon on the Mount.

Part of breaking away can be finding self-esteem, meaning, and love from sources outside of religion.