Why ExVangelicals are Angry

In my experience the “exvangelical” (ex-evangelical, faith deconstruction — whatever you want to call it) journey ultimately leads to healing, wholeness and health. However, along the way, most of us have uncovered some kind of outrage deep within ourselves at the Evangelical church.

There was a point where we realized that we were indoctrinated with ideas and beliefs that — for a variety of reasons — were no longer serving our best interest.

We made a decision to see those ideas, beliefs, and traditions in a more critical light… and we may have gotten angry. We may still be angry.

We are angry because:

• We were taught that Republican is the only way (because abortion) so we wasted precious votes for candidates we didn’t like or agree with before we learned we didn’t have to do that.
• We spent hours in Christian school or Bible class learning about cults, what was wrong with each one, and how to argue with them if they came to our door … without realizing we were right in the middle of one ourselves.
• We had beautiful, gorgeous bodies in our teens and 20s but were taught to be ashamed of them.
• We felt pressure to “feel the holy spirit” even when we didn’t. And now we don’t know whether it was all just a sham or if any of it was real.
• We were pressured to marry before we were ready, just to avoid “living in sin” or having sex outside of marriage.
• We were taught that alcohol was evil so we never had moderation modeled for us.
• We couldn’t let ourselves be happy in healthy relationships or friendships with good people if they weren’t also Evangelicals, lest we be “unequally yoked”.
• We were never allowed to question whether we wanted to have children (or were taught we were wrong or selfish for not wanting them in the first place) so some of us just started reproducing, without being ready or understanding what it would mean.
• We were taught that our physical ailments or disabilities were the result of not having enough faith to get healed.
• We were taught to ignore or dismiss doubts because it showed a lack of faith.
• We were taught not to question church leadership, even if we had good reasons for concern, because they are God’s authority on earth. Submit, submit, submit.
• Women were raised to aspire to marriage, and marriage was held up as the ultimate goal of our adolescence and early adulthood.

The list goes on.

For me, it has taken years of slowly discovering many of the above reasons for anger, one at a time. Much of my frustration comes from realizing that so many people — including some of my loved ones — are still forcefully imposing these ideas, beliefs and traditions on others.

Thankfully, anger is not the end state, but many of my friends and peers who have left the Evangelical church have a hard time moving past the outrage.

Like any toxic relationship, our relationship with the Evangelical church will have many phases and anger is an important one.

The most therapeutic way I’ve found to process it all, is to find like-minded people who can relate to the experience of leaving the Evangelical church. Reading others’ stories and commiserating online has helped me process my own experience and find healthy steps forward.

What would you add to this list? Can you relate? If so, please leave a comment below, I would love to connect.