Leaving the Fold Quotes

“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.”
― Marlene Winell, Leaving the Fold: A Guide for Former Fundamentalists and Others Leaving Their Religion

“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.”
― Marlene Winell, Leaving the Fold: A Guide for Former Fundamentalists and Others Leaving Their Religion

“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.”
― Marlene Winell, Leaving the Fold: A Guide for Former Fundamentalists and Others Leaving Their Religion

“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.”
― Marlene Winell, Leaving the Fold: A Guide for Former Fundamentalists and Others Leaving Their Religion

“When you no longer consider yourself one of the chosen elite, there is no need to look down on others. In fact, the human flaws and struggles you see around you might become a valued part of your new sense of shared humanity.”
― Marlene Winell, Leaving the Fold: A Guide for Former Fundamentalists and Others Leaving Their Religion

“The first step in processing feelings cannot be overemphasized: stop everything and take a time out. Your brain works so automatically that if you do not interrupt your usual thought patterns; you will continue to have exactly the same feelings and reactions over and over again. So when you have a strong feeling, just stop. Give yourself a chance to look at it. You may need to get away from the situation by physically removing yourself from other people.”
― Marlene Winell, Leaving the Fold: A Guide for Former Fundamentalists and Others Leaving Their Religion

“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.”
― Marlene Winell, Leaving the Fold: A Guide for Former Fundamentalists and Others Leaving Their Religion

“The most powerful technique of fundamentalism is a terror tactic. Fundamentalism teaches the existence of hell, a place of eternal torment.”
― Marlene Winell, Leaving the Fold: A Guide for Former Fundamentalists and Others Leaving Their Religion

“Neurotic guilt,” like that often fostered by religion, is a different matter. It tends to be excessive and inappropriate, based on the expectations of others instead of personal values or dwelling on the error rather than using the guilt feelings to make a change. In your religious experience, committing a sin made you a sinner, a bad deed made a bad person. This global condemnation creates low self-worth and more neurotic guilt and misery.”
― Marlene Winell, Leaving the Fold: A Guide for Former Fundamentalists and Others Leaving Their Religion

“when you address a real person, you should not attack their core being. This would be the same as the abuse you received. Instead, you can focus on behavior.”
― Marlene Winell, Leaving the Fold: A Guide for Former Fundamentalists and Others Leaving Their Religion

“After the security of fundamentalism, you may have attacks of fear that are quite irrational. You were taught to fear the world and to fear hell. Now you feel like you are without the “armor of God” or the “blood of Christ” to protect you, and this can leave you feeling naked and vulnerable. Like a little child without a guardian angel, you may have intense feelings of abandonment. Apart from the church family, you may feel as if you face life alone, and this can test your coping abilities. You may even have moments of panic or nightmares. You might also experience a persistent free-floating anxiety or paranoia. These fears are all based on restimulation of old conditioning, not analysis of real threat.”
― Marlene Winell, Leaving the Fold: A Guide for Former Fundamentalists and Others Leaving Their Religion

“The Bible does not offer any guidance for processing feelings. You may remember feeling frustrated and being told, “When God closes a door, he opens a window.” The Christian Church has developed many such clichés. In being faithful, you learn to twist very normal emotions and reinterpret them beyond recognition.”
― Marlene Winell, Leaving the Fold: A Guide for Former Fundamentalists and Others Leaving Their Religion

“As each of us proceeds with personal development, we return again and again to family issues. Little else in life has the same profound impact. In a sense, you carry your original family inside you. Father, mother, and other primary caregivers become internalized and form a permanent part of who you are. Thus to ignore family is to ignore yourself. Understanding your family experience is to understand yourself and move on with your growth.”
― Marlene Winell, Leaving the Fold: A Guide for Former Fundamentalists and Others Leaving Their Religion

“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.”
― Marlene Winell, Leaving the Fold: A Guide for Former Fundamentalists and Others Leaving Their Religion

“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.”
― Marlene Winell, Leaving the Fold: A Guide for Former Fundamentalists and Others Leaving Their Religion

“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.)”
― Marlene Winell, Leaving the Fold: A Guide for Former Fundamentalists and Others Leaving Their Religion

“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.”
― Marlene Winell, Leaving the Fold: A Guide for Former Fundamentalists and Others Leaving Their Religion

“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.”
― Marlene Winell, Leaving the Fold: A Guide for Former Fundamentalists and Others Leaving Their Religion

“For those who find spirituality to be a continuing source of meaning and purpose, their spirituality needs to be redefined and made more personal.”
― Marlene Winell, Leaving the Fold: A Guide for Former Fundamentalists and Others Leaving Their Religion

“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.”
― Marlene Winell, Leaving the Fold: A Guide for Former Fundamentalists and Others Leaving Their Religion

“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.”
― Marlene Winell, Leaving the Fold: A Guide for Former Fundamentalists and Others Leaving Their Religion

“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.”
― Marlene Winell, Leaving the Fold: A Guide for Former Fundamentalists and Others Leaving Their Religion

“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.”
― Marlene Winell, Leaving the Fold: A Guide for Former Fundamentalists and Others Leaving Their Religion

“adopt” your inner child, and actively create the life you want.”
― Marlene Winell, Leaving the Fold: A Guide for Former Fundamentalists and Others Leaving Their Religion

“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?”
― Marlene Winell, Leaving the Fold: A Guide for Former Fundamentalists and Others Leaving Their Religion

“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.”
― Marlene Winell, Leaving the Fold: A Guide for Former Fundamentalists and Others Leaving Their Religion

“In general, you can enhance your control over your experience in two basic ways: By fully accepting and receiving the many good things in your life. By actively choosing and creating the events of your life.”
― Marlene Winell, Leaving the Fold: A Guide for Former Fundamentalists and Others Leaving Their Religion

“Another common pattern for the fundamentalist is to become over responsible to work very hard and feel terrible for any imperfect behavior.”
― Marlene Winell, Leaving the Fold: A Guide for Former Fundamentalists and Others Leaving Their Religion

“You may remember hearing a negative opinion expressed about liberal Christians who said, “God helps those who help themselves.” I recall being taught that such an attitude was arrogant and unscriptural; helping yourself doubted God. Thus it is probably very different now to think about taking charge in your life.”
― Marlene Winell, Leaving the Fold: A Guide for Former Fundamentalists and Others Leaving Their Religion

“The premise of this chapter is that it is both your right and your responsibility to make your own life decisions. While you do not have absolute control over all the conditions of your life, you do have the creative power to design the life you want to a large extent.”
― Marlene Winell, Leaving the Fold: A Guide for Former Fundamentalists and Others Leaving Their Religion