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

by Marlene Winell

the impulses and achievements of mere humans are seen as dangerously anti-God, making Scripture itself appear to be the deity worshipped.

By focusing completely on the virtues of God, of another world, and of the future, fundamentalism and other similar systems create separation and distance from what we know as humans.

Otherwise, no matter how motivated you are to be

After having been born again, leaving your faith can feel like being lost again.

the 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.”

Since the source of all the benefits offered is external, requiring dependence on God and the church, internal resources atrophy. This process degrades the self and becomes a serious threat to human well-being.

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

Being right while others are wrong can be very satisfying. It is a way to feel safe and superior. Thus various religions and different sects within fundamentalist Christianity each claims to have the ultimate doctrinal truth. Despite the strife and anxiety that this produces, many are motivated to find security and self-importance by being right. In fact, more people have died in holy wars throughout history than in any other kind of war. Even Christians who decry violence will secretly enjoy the belief that inequities in this life will be settled in the hereafter. In the process of spreading a gospel of love, the Bible says to dust off your feet if your words are not received, trusting God to punish in the manner of Sodom and Gomorrah (Matthew 10:14–15). If you are in the Christian family, you get to have God as your big brother, ready to hurt anyone who hurts you. This is a potent and vicious fantasy of specialness, sufficient probably to comfort the most downtrodden.

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.

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.

The most powerful technique for emotional control is phobia indoctrination. People are made to have a panic reaction at the thought of leaving: sweating, rapid heartbeat, and intense desire to avoid the possibility. They are told that if they leave they will be lost and defenseless in the face of dark horrors: they’ll go insane, be killed, become drug addicts, or commit suicide.

The notion of personal responsibility in fundamentalism is a curious one. You are responsible for your sins, but you cannot take credit for the

good things that you do. Any good that you do must be attributed to God working through you. Yet you must try to be Christ-like. When you fail, it is your fault for not “letting the power of God work in you.” This is an effective double bind of responsibility without ability.

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. You cannot challenge the religious system because your critical abilities are discredited and your intuitions rendered worthless.

there is constant debate in church circles over whether various teachings or practices are “of God.” This is always an either/or argument because of the dominance of black-and-white thinking. For safety’s sake, much is then relegated to being “of the world” and thus discredited. Consequently alternatives are cut off and rich human knowledge lost — most of science, social science, the arts and humanities. The true believer, then, is to trust neither inner guidance nor any information from the environment. Conveniently for the Church, this paranoia leaves the person as vulnerable in the hands of religious leaders as a child in the home of abusive parents.

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.

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) The tautology in this passage is absurd when you think about it, but deceptive and powerful for the person fearing for salvation. In essence, it says “We’re right and the world is wrong because we say so, and the proof of being of God is whether someone listens to us, while the proof of being wrong is listening to them.”

seems to be no way out of shame...” In fundamentalist families, there is a core belief that people are basically bad. Therefore, human errors are interpreted as sins instead of as innocent mistakes. Children are seen as small adults, with the same sinful tendencies and the same need to be saved. There is little recognition of child development, that children are different from adults and that they progress through various stages of cognitive, emotional, and moral development. From a fundamentalist point of view, issues such as egocentrism, aggression, sexuality, and teenage rebellion are treated as problems instead of natural processes.

Children in religious families are often disciplined through shame. Such messages include “Shame on you,” “You’re so selfish. What’s the matter with you?” “You know Jesus sees you when you do that,” “How would you feel if Jesus came back when you were doing that?” This kind of belief system and these kinds of statements can obviously take a heavy toll on a child’s self-esteem.

Consequently, the fundamentalist household rarely encourages children to explore their own thoughts, to be open-minded about ideas, or to come to their own conclusions. In fact, fundamentalist parents are typically vocal in their opposition to the teaching of critical thinking skills or values clarification in schools.

The biblical attitude toward human feelings is one of great suspicion. Feelings like anger, jealousy, and fear are condemned as of the flesh and the devil. Consequently, many Christians struggle with guilt when experiencing ordinary emotions. There is little help from the church in understanding the function of such feelings, including sadness. In the family, feelings are more likely to be punished than heard. Conflict is considered sinful instead of an opportunity for learning. Yet feelings are inevitable, and without understanding or skill they can be very painful to handle. Individuals can learn self-hatred for having feelings, as well as helplessness for not knowing what to do.

In the fundamentalist family, avoidance of feelings can become an actual fear of feelings. Again the costs for the child are heavy. It means a loss of self-respect and trust. In learning to deny their own feelings, children lose touch with themselves.

The well-being of children can never compare to parental loyalty to spiritual matters. In fact, the more dedicated the parents are to evangelical causes, the greater the risk that the children will feel unimportant. Ordinary human relationships in the family rate a distant second to the importance of following God.

What happens when children become secondary to a greater good is similar to the neglect that happens to children in families where one parent is addicted to drugs, alcohol, work, or money. Religious devotion, however, tends to involve both parents and can thus be especially problematic.

Even more troublesome is the insistence that devotion is a higher calling. Children cannot question this without feeling guilty, selfish, or absurd. With other kinds of neglect, society is more likely to respond with censure or punishment, require treatment or suggest alternatives, but this kind of intervention is very unlikely within a religious family system.

Rigidly religious families also can avoid the responsibility of teaching interpersonal skills (such as communicating needs clearly, listening, or resolving conflicts). Rather than being seen as attempts to cope, “negative” behaviors are viewed as evidence of a child’s inherently flawed nature. Since people are not given credit for good intentions and capability, there is little if any effort to actually teach skills for healthy human relationships. The only principle taught is to ask God for help — for patience, love, understanding — and to be humble, open, and receptive if and when he bestows them. (And if he doesn’t, you didn’t ask properly.)

In fundamentalist Christianity, the spiritual kingdom of God is described metaphorically as a family. God is a heavenly father, Jesus is the dutiful son, union with God is called marriage, the church is a bride, people who are saved become his children, the church community is called a family, and fellow members are called brothers and sisters in the Lord. (Notice that there is no mother. I find this puzzling and disturbing.)

Problems which would appear blatant to the outside observer simply go unnoticed and, consequently, unaddressed, because these parents cannot admit any fault. Thus the dynamic is not so much willingness to neglect or abuse children, but an outright blindness to problems. This kind of denial can be even more intense than what occurs in nonreligious abusive families that are incapable of processing the truth. This is because the religious person would have to examine his or her foundations in order to admit imperfection. Values and assumptions about reality and the meaning of life would have to be assessed. If the family is hurting, then something must be seriously wrong. The spiritual system may be inadequate (since problems are considered spiritual rather than human), and if so, then God must be inadequate — and then all is lost. The resulting panic would be devastating.

Many human achievements cannot be celebrated because of comparison to spiritual, heavenly ideals. For example, instead of rejoicing in the wonders of a symphony performance, the music of angels is considered superior. The same goes for the natural world — a spectacular sunset is seen as only a hint of God’s glory, a “foretaste of things to come.” Thus the believer is never really allowed to be here, immersed in the joyous experiences of this life. Instead, the present world is seen as essentially hopeless, the dominion of Satan in which no amount of human endeavor can ever amount to anything, and which is doomed to Armageddon besides.

With such a belief system, it makes no sense to treasure the planet, preserve a healthy home for future generations, or work for peace. (In fact, it is frightening the way that some Christian groups get excited when war breaks out, hoping that the end may be near.)

Thinking for yourself can also feel dangerous. Thinking independently was a sin, an audacious flaunting of God’s authority. (Adam and Eve were ejected from Eden because they ate of the knowledge of good and evil, rather than giving God strict obedience.) Therefore, the religious attitude toward critical thinking is not merely one of dismissal, but a vehement condemnation of an act seen as rejecting God. To commit this sin of pride is to risk separation from God and eventual damnation. So as you explore new ideas in your life now, it is likely you will experience some real anxiety.