The deconstruction of my faith

I am no longer a christian

DECONSTRUCTION
by Mary Ruefle

I think the sirens in The Odyssey sang The Odyssey, for there is nothing more seductive, more terrible, than the story of our own life, the one we do not want to hear and will do anything to listen to.

Faith is believing something to be true, regardless of the evidence or information available. As strange as this will seem, I still have faith in Jesus Christ. The reason I am no longer a christian is because the word has lost its meaning to me. Though someone says they’re a christian it does not mean they have decided to be a good or bad person. In the process of evaluating my beliefs, thoughts, and actions and what it means to be christian, I realized that most of us are not self-aware enough to wonder about that for too long. We seem to decide quite easily that to be a christian is as simple as reciting (or even thinking quietly in one’s mind) the sinner’s prayer. That kind of faith is cheap.

Theology has always intrigued me. It is an abstraction of sorts, taking basic roots and rules of religion and expounding on the logical consequences for the truth of these matters. I accept the fact that I will likely be called a heretic for things I say. The good news is we seem not to take accusations of heresy as seriously as we used in historical accounts of the crime; death is cruel to visit on someone whose mind and heart should be won by reason, not extinguished by religious elitism. I have learned of church history and have a favorite early writer (St Augustine) but my philosophy is more attuned with the likes of Kierkegaard, Chesterton, and N.T. Wright. I do not claim all their beliefs as mine, but their written thoughts are the ones I return to again and again for perspective and clarity of mind.

Photo by Marcus Cramer on Unsplash

The roots of my deconstruction were planted when I confessed in 2015 that I disbelieved the resurrection of the dead. I achieved some measure of peace with that disbelief until I returned to church in 2017, where I found myself alone, though surrounded by people who claimed they would only tell me the truth. The consequence of this “truth” was that I felt no respect, no community, and no understanding on a basic level. The least they did for me was accept me for who I was, which is the standard too many ‘christians’ today fail to reach.

What deconstruction means is different to every person who chooses to examine their religious identity and community, but ultimately the metadata pops up and patterns begin to emerge. Boundaries. Trauma. Authority, power, abuse.

The language of deconstruction is often augmented with ideas from emotional intelligence. I would not be surprised to learn that people who deconstruct their faith are more emotionally intelligent than those who never question themselves. Finding people who are able to empathize and acknowledge that much of the trauma ignored by the church is a common cause for deconstruction allows for honest communication and can generate authentic, self-determined roots in belief.

I tend to be anti-authoritarian. For many years I always felt most challenged by established leadership because that is the structure I naturally orient myself against in community. Those same years, I used this to my advantage because I recognize that authority is useful for an ordered society—and for my own learning.

An ordered society is inherently non-violent, and yet much of christian (xian) politics today enables or encourages violence on the bodies of the imprisoned, the elderly, the widowed, and the orphaned. In America, xian politics visits violence on other nations to advance imperialist agendas under the flag of ‘democratic ideals.’ Oftentimes there are real threats being addressed. It seems too often those threats are rooted in American intervention of the past. I make these claims about xian politics because the majority of the elected officials representative of the country identify as christian and American war has been perpetual under this xian hegemony. I recognize that society has a bargain for those who are willing to kill in order to guarantee the survival of their friends, family, and community through the formalized military and armed services. Such brave citizens take on the mantle of their neighbors, yet their sacrifices can be twisted by the politics of the day. Hero worship is a problem among any group of people, but it is pernicious and stench-ridden inside the American christian home. It is this sick, idolatrous, violence-promoting xianity I reject.

I am an ignostic. I may be an ignostic christian given that I am unable to get over the story of Jesus Christ, but I believe the reality is that it cannot be known who God is and therefore most Christian claims to authority today are only present echoes of long-told lies used to describe everyman’s invention.

“The Invention” is a Spanish-language poem written and performed by José González

a primer on non-religious belief systems

atheism — the belief there is no supreme being
agnosticism — the belief that no one knows if there is a supreme being, but one might exist
ignosticism — the belief that it is unknowable if there is a supreme being;
alternatively, the belief that assertions of the existence of a supreme being are inherently meaningless