Commencement
August 6, 2008
I was once a Christian. In fact, I was something of the Über-Christian. I grew up the golden-boy in a conservative evangelical Christian church. My parents are Christians. Everyone in my family are Christians. I was.
I was a pastor. I was a worship leader. I was a counselor. I was an evangelist. I worked in the church since my early teenage years. I grew up in the church, quite literally. I went to a Christian college. I led many Christian ministries. I believed that Jesus Christ was my Lord and Savior. Now I don’t.
This blog is meant to explore the reasoning that led me away from Christianity. But I’d like to say at the absolute beginning that one of the reasons is NOT that I don’t like Christianity or Christians. As should be seen from the shape this blog takes, I wish I were still a Christian! I want to be. But I don’t believe it’s true. And most likely, I can’t be a Christian if I don’t believe it’s true.
You are invited, dear blog reader, to leave any comments you would like and I will respond as I’m able. I would love to be challenged on any ideas posted here! If you have some insight I lack which might illuminate a post, please share it. If you see a flaw in my reasoning, likewise, please share it! I will even go so far as to happily invite any reasoning that attempts to help convert me back. As I said, I wish I were a Christian. If you can help me overcome these intellectual objections, I would love to be welcomed back into the fold. But otherwise, the force of these things I share herein (and elsewhere) compels me to admit: I am no longer a Christian.
Why don’t you believe that it’s true?
I think you should write about what specific event has made you doubt. There is always one thing that causes man to doubt. Always. There is, conversely, always one event that makes you believe.
@Ed: No, there wasn’t one thing that made me doubt. There was not even a single point in time where I said, “Ok, now I don’t believe anymore.” It was a long and gradual process. As I grew more and more familiar with the objections for which Christians have no answers, I increasingly identified myself as non-Christian. If you want to make a case for why you think there has to be exactly one thing that causes someone to doubt, I’m willing to hear it. But if nothing else, I am myself proof that that notion isn’t true.
For why I don’t believe Christianity is true, please see the other posts in this blog. I mentioned this briefly in my post on Tim Keller’s book: there is no single thing which compels my disbelief; instead it the gestalt of many inductive reasons combined.