October 18, 2021
I recently wrote an article about the possible reactions people can have to you leaving the Church. After I was done, I thought it’d be interesting to share my own personal story of how I left my own church.
As I’ve written about before, I was a youth leader at my old church. I volunteered for years and I stayed with the same group of guys from when they were in middle school all the way through their senior year of high school. They were all great guys, and still are today.
This was during my time in college. When I finally graduated, I got my first job working long shifts on the weekends. Working sixteen hours on Sundays meant I could no longer attend church nor the youth program on Sunday evenings.
I surprised myself here. I thought that I would’ve struggled with the decision to accept that particular job. Working with the youth, attending their Sunday evening program, and going to church on Sunday mornings had been such a big part of my life for so long. And now here I was, about to accept a job that would make all of that impossible. After a long time of living as a broke college student, I felt like I was choosing money over God.
But… I was surprised by how I didn’t feel all that guilty about it. I didn’t have the language for it yet, but I had already begun deconstructing my faith. I’d finally decided to read the Bible and study what it really said, even from sources that approached it from a non-secular perspective (such as Bart Ehrman). I’d already determined that much of what I’d always been told about mission trips, the Christian lifestyle, and Biblical inerrancy was off and that I very likely hadn’t been given the whole Truth.
Deep down, I sensed that taking a break from regular church attendance was what I needed—just some time to catch my breath, sort my thoughts, and finally grow into a faith that was my own.
But it was more complicated than just my own church attendance. I was also considering the youth group guys who I’d hung out with every Sunday evening. I was fine with skipping church—and even skipping the youth group program itself—but I wasn’t fine with not seeing these guys who’d I grown close to over the course of many years.
When I spoke to the youth director about it, he was quite supportive. He told me that he was of the opinion that the best way to engage the youth was during the mid-week Bible study. He said it was easier in that environment to go deeper in the Bible studies—as opposed to the youth program, which was more focused on outreach toward new kids with their video games, contemporary worship music, and short sermons.
This reassured me at the time and I accepted the job. I missed seeing the youth group guys on Sunday evening, but I continued to lead their Bible study on Wednesday nights and appreciated the time I had with them then.
I carried on like that for several years. It kind of scared me how I literally never missed going to church. Then, as more time went by, the more books I read that were critical of the Bible and the Church. I learned about the actual history of the Church and Christianity. I began spending more time with people who had never believed in God at all and discovered they were often a lot nicer than some of the people I knew from my church.
After several years, the youth director decided to make some changes to the structure of the church’s youth program. He’d realized just how busy middle school and high school students are (and he was right, in my opinion). Not only do they go to school eight hours a day, but they also have homework and studying, they have sports, they have hobbies, and they have friends who they want to hang out with. On top of all that, here was the church asking these students to attend a program on Sunday morning, Sunday evening, and a Bible study in the middle of the week. The youth director figured that if they could consolidate the youth activities, he might increase attendance and retention. He decided to move the mid-week Bible studies to Sunday as well. With my job, I would no longer be able to be involved with the youth group at all.
And that’s precisely what happened. The change was made and I was “laid off” so to speak. It wasn’t anything terrible or mean. The youth director took me out to lunch to thank me for everything. The youth group guys in my small group did nice things for me when they learned I would no longer be leading their Bible study.
And just like that… it was all over.
I understand I was incredibly fortunate. Many deconstructing people have to carefully navigate how they finally leave their church. For me, a handful of circumstances came together that gave me an “out.” Further, I got to keep my deconstruction and subsequent deconversion a secret for longer because everyone in the congregation just assumed I’d be at church if it wasn’t for my job. They never suspected for one second that there was a change in my faith or belief. And I just let them continue to think that.
I eventually left that job and took another job overseas. So even then my absence from the church was “excused.” I stayed overseas for many years.
Now, people I knew who went to that church have moved away or moved on. Much of the staff have also changed. There’s hardly anyone there anymore who would still remember me.
And I’m definitely okay with that.