Thread by @mcjulie

Reading this, what you see is the inevitable evangelical urge to make sure leavers and critics never get to define themselves, give their own reasons, and have that stand as the narrative.

https://twitter.com/christianpost/status/1392279607194398720

"They SAY they're leaving for [x] reasons but we don't like those reasons... what if they're just mad at God?"

"To publicly denounce a particular congregation, not to mention a particular denomination (not to mention an entire faith tradition), because of how people behaved is to misunderstand what Christianity is."

But what is Christianity, if it's not made up of Christians?

"Claims of who Jesus is and what Christianity teaches must be evaluated on their own merit, but many churches have failed to prepare young people to do this."

Untrue.
What churches failed to do was provide was satisfactory answers.

This argument seems very familiar:
"if only you understood Christianity *correctly* you'd have no choice *other* than to believe!"
And the answer is nope
Nope in two ways.

The first nope, is, there's nothing inevitable about Christianity.
Some people just don't believe because they don't, and you have to respect that. You won't, but you should. There's no apologetics you can supply that will change their minds, you need to let it go.

The second nope is that very evangelical notion of the Platonic church that exists but doesn't exist -- that if only you understood the *real* church, the holy church, the church that isn't found here on this earth, you wouldn't be leaving... the one found here on this earth.

You see how that doesn't make any sense?

I mean, if you're going to say "well, it's all about you and your *personal* relationship with Jesus" then I'm going to say, "great, then what do I need *your* church for then?"

If it really is just about me & Jesus, well, I can relate to Jesus all on my own, over here, without the rest of you jerks.

"Considering these two factors makes me wonder if “leavers” who blame people in the Church for their own leaving are in reality just upset with God. "

Here, let me save you some trouble: no. The answer is no. They're not "just upset with God"

I can't say this too many times, apparently, because evangelicals will never listen: nobody in the world sees your God, your Jesus, they just see YOU.

The church is YOU.

When people reject your God, they're rejecting YOU.

Maybe that hurts, but it's the truth.

"So many [..] begin by lamenting the bad behavior of fellow churchgoers end up rejecting the Bible’s moral claims about sexuality,"

No.
They're rejecting YOUR claims about sexuality.
Stop hiding behind the Bible, cowards.

"The more that the wider culture finds Christian teaching outdated and outrageous, the harder it is to distinguish between the various motivations of those who leave the church, and/or the faith."

It's not hard at all, actually, you just find it hard to hear.

You built a church for yourselves, for your own purposes, your own comfort, and now people are leaving, and it drives you crazy that you can't do anything about it, so you do what you can: you lie to yourselves about WHY they're leaving.

The crazy thing is that I was already here, like, thirty years ago, having this same argument with my own family. '
"Why do you want to leave?"
"Well, I have these concerns -- "
"Is it sex? It's sex, isn't it."
"That's only part of it, I question --"
"I KNEW IT, IT'S SEX"

I mean, surely, you've NOTICED that your insistence on "Biblical morality" only seems to apply to women & LGBTQ people, patriarchs in good standing like Josh Duggar or Donald Trump get away with any kind of abuse --

And even if YOU haven't noticed, WE noticed.

Did you really think you could just say "our hypocrisies aren't important, it's all about Jesus" and we would have to accept that?

And it's weird, because you'd think after thirty years I wouldn't care, but it still galls me to have church-apologizers speak for me, tell the world that they understand my religious feelings more clearly than I do.

And I guess that's the end, for now.

But these things never seem to end, do they?