Leaving the Church: A Welcome Relief or Trauma?

It can be a mixture of both

By the time I finished my PhD in Biblical Studies in 1975 (Boston University), I had become an atheist. Primarily because questions raised in the course of those years were not given credible answers, e.g., where can we find verifiable information about god(s)? Moreover, from my teenage years, growing up on the northern Indiana prairie, I had been fascinated by the night sky. I studied astronomy in college, and had come to appreciate that there are billions of galaxies and trillions of planets. Yet our theology was not aware at all of what other thinking creatures out there might have discovered about god(s). The faculty theologians were not at all bothered by this. In our profound isolation, how could we be so sure about what god was like? I had served as pastor of two congregations, and had been disappointed by the realities of church rivalries and politics. I gave up my ordination, and made my escape. It took a while—and it was a bumpy road—but I managed to make the change to a secular career.
 

 

This was a welcome relief! To no longer be expected to defend and promote ancient superstitions and magical thinking, and to navigate church feuds and politics. 

 

Just recently I became aware of a 2022 book written by Karl and Laura Forehand, Out Into the Desert: Thriving Outside Organized Religion. This husband-and-wife team—Karl was an evangelical minister, and Laura was the preacher’s wife—roles that they pursued for about twenty years, primarily in small churches. In this book, we find Karl and Laura writing their own sections for each chapter/topic. They offer helpful analysis of the faults of the church. Although their faith in The Divine and Jesus usually held steady, they became increasingly frustrated by the church organization, and eventually gave up on it.

 

The minister preaches his message from the pulpit, but what if there is resistance? Karl commented on this situation:

 

“No one ever sat down and said, ‘Help me understand your viewpoint,’ they were just intent on changing my mind. To be fair, it was mainly their fear that the ministry would somehow be hurt, but they didn’t trust my judgment and they didn’t trust the Spirit to lead; they had to take control for fear of what might happen. When you add to these years of inner circles, secret meetings, and various experiences of exclusion, it finally becomes too much. I resigned from the church and again sought solace in a larger church which really didn’t heal the wounds, it just gave us a little space to examine them. But eventually we stopped going to church altogether.” (p. 67)

 

Laura is blunt as well:

 

“I admit, the pageantry of many modern-day churches does tap into my emotional side. I have found true worship and truth spoken in all the churches we have either pastored or attended. However, as I have gone further into my deconstruction, the pageantry begins to fall flat. The routine of the service is what has become too predictable.” (p. 37)

 

I was stunned that Laura confessed her lack of interest in the Bible—but this is not all that surprising since so many devout Christians betray the same lack of interest. “This enormously daunting book that supposedly holds all the mysteries of God and the universe was simply handed to me without any instructions on how to read it or dissected. Nothing.” (p.127)

 

“Today, as of this writing, I still have not picked up the Bible to read it. I have no emotion toward this book, and I refuse to beat myself up over it. Maybe, one day I will find a way to read this text and see it as a love letter or a history book or maybe something else. Right now, I am okay with where I am.” (p. 129)

 

One of the aspects of Christian theology that bothered me, even when I was in seminary, was why worship was appropriate. Does god have such a big ego? Karl addresses this as well:

“Lately, I have been questioning whether God really even desires worship. To me, that is kind of like my boss giving me a job and accepting me into the organization, then demanding that I praise him every day for hiring me instead of just thanking him once. It seemed immature to demand that someone worship you.” (p. 33)

 

It is understandable that Karl and Laura describe leaving the church as going into a desert, but it is not as grim as one might assume. Part 2 of their book includes 14 chapters on how they are able to cope in the desert, e.g., finding community, new practices, acceptance, and comfort in the desert. In the Afterword of the book, they offer this analysis:

 

“Church: the organizational structures we have developed over time are mostly not relevant for the 21^st century. The internet has rendered them all but obsolete. Most are plagued with toxicity and produce trauma. They are breeding grounds for political unrest and there are better ways to heal, thrive, and grow and we don’t need professional clergy.” (p. 219)

 

I have appreciated their critique of the church, but in this book we find that faith itself didn’t take much of a hit. They had both been raised in religious environments, so deconstruction of the church stopped short of deconstruction of theology. Karl assumed that the Sermon on the Mount was actually preached by Jesus, and in chapter 13, Finding the Word in the Desert, he makes this observation:

 

“Sometimes the Bible can be confusing, but I do not find Jesus’ words to be difficult to understand. They are challenging to live by but quite easy to comprehend. He says Love God, Love your neighbor, Love your enemy, Do to others what you would want them to do you, Turn the other cheek. These are the things that bring life! When I live this way, life is not hard to understand. I no longer treat the Bible as an idol. It is useful and I am thankful for it because it points me to Jesus! And Jesus points me to life!” (pp. 126-127)

 

This book was published in 2022; writing it apparently began in 2020. But from a recent Substack post—just days ago—titled What Did Jesus Really Say? it looks like Karl has done more in-depth study of the gospels. He seems far more skeptical:

 

“Even the Gospels were written 40 to 70 years after the crucifixion. Recent research suggests that these accounts were probably written in a different country and that the authors might not have been eyewitnesses to what happened during Jesus’ ministry. Most of the stories were preserved through oral tradition, which we now know in inherently unreliable and prone to changes.”

 

“Is it possible that the holy book and the words of Jesus we have today are more of a retrofit by the early Christian church that were later revised as various groups, individuals, and organizations gained power?”

 

“Before we say, ‘Jesus said,’ we need to consider how likely it is that these are actually his words.” 

 

I’m glad to see that he has grasped the problems that the gospels present, but this does not diminish in any way the value of this book that he and Laura wrote about the many problems that do so much harm to the church.   

 

 

 

David Madison was a pastor in the Methodist Church for nine years, and has a PhD in Biblical Studies from Boston University. He is the author of Ten Tough Problems in Christian Thought and Belief: a Minister-Turned-Atheist Shows Why You Should Ditch the Faith, now being reissued in several volumes:

·      Guessing About God (2023) 

·   Ten Things Christians Wish Jesus Hadn’t Taught: And Other Reasons to Question His Words (2021). The Spanish translation of this book is also available. 

·    Everything You Need to Know About Prayer But May Not Want to Admit (2025)

 

His YouTube channel is here. At the invitation of John Loftus, he has written for the Debunking Christianity Blog since 2016.

 

The Cure-for-Christianity Library©, now with more than 500 titles, is here. A brief video explanation of the Library is here.