How Donald Trump Broke the Spell of Evangelicalism
S E E D E D C O N T E N T
When you’re inside evangelicalism, when you’ve grown up in it, and it’s the only way you know how to do “Christian,” when most people you know and respect live by its tenets and defend against those who don’t or even gently dismiss those who are different, when there are radio stations and celebrities and movie industries and TV evangelists dedicated to supporting it, followers have a hard time seeing through to the problems.
It’s like looking at one of those Magic Eye puzzles that were so popular in the ’90s. On the surface, the picture is just a bunch of dots. Then you catch a glimpse of something out of the corner of your eye. You have a feeling there’s something else there behind all those dots, but you can’t put your finger on it. Then someone points out that there’s actually a T-Rex in the middle if you stare long enough. So you stare, and sure enough once you’ve seen the T-Rex, you can’t un-see the T-Rex. It was there all along.
That’s what it’s like to finally emerge from evangelicalism.
Of course, I didn’t know when I left my church after the Trump election in 2016 that I was leaving evangelicalism. I didn’t realize that I had spent nearly 40 years in a fundamentalist institution. We never saw ourselves as fundamentalists. Evangelicals reserve that term for other religions (namely those with jihadists). When news anchors talked about Christian fundamentalists, we told ourselves we were just being labeled and misunderstood. Persecuted by the media.
I didn’t consider the three churches I’d faithfully attended starting at age 5 and until I was 39 to be abusive or extreme. They were my community. They taught me in Sunday school about how much Jesus loved me. They slipped cash into our mailbox when my husband and I were struggling in college. They brought my family meals when my middle son was in the NICU for 20 days.
I prayed with them when they struggled with depression and marital problems. They prayed when I suffered three miscarriages and found eventual motherhood completely overwhelming. We worshipped and served on the mission field together. We fed the homeless downtown and gave underprivileged kids new shoes for school.
We were good people who wanted what was best for our communities and our world. And what was best for them was to see things the same way we did.
It was this single-minded obsession with one inherent, unchanging truth that finally shattered the magical illusion for me. As I grew up and went to school and lived in the world and raised a family, I discovered that no where else was that the case. In every other healthy institution, questions and doubts and equality and diversity were valued. As a good American and modern person, I believed that everyone benefited from less hierarchy, more equality, and more open dialogue. Even church people.
In contrast, every church I knew functioned as a form of patriarchy and bonded around a Statement of Beliefs that included an unquestioningly literal interpretation of an inerrant 2,000-year-old scripture. Our church was no different, and we were proud of our culture of “unity.” Until I started questioning those beliefs, I hadn’t considered they were also a way of keeping us in line.
There was also the disconnect between an insistence that we only follow what the Bible says and the many accepted and unspoken rules about what it meant to be a ‘good’ Christian that weren’t found in the Bible. Like not associating with sinners and abstaining from wine and voting Republican to name just a few.
When I started teasing out (through devotion, life experience, and scripture) the differences between what Jesus seemed to want from me versus what my church culture demanded, I discovered a huge disconnect. One was leading me toward more peace and acceptance and wholeness. The other came loaded with shame and guilt and exhaustion. Suddenly, the unspoken requirements of church acceptance looked a lot like the ‘religion’ evangelicals are so fond of belittling in other denominations.
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Once, the typical evangelical Statements of Belief told us we belonged. As our beliefs shifted, we realized that we were becoming outsiders. We hadn’t believed in young earth creationism in decades, but we were no longer interested in hiding it. We began to see LGBTQ brothers and sisters not as a problem to be solved but as equal and whole and worthy of love and acceptance. And we realized that reading the Bible as inerrant and literal from the lens of an American culture was toxic and even unfaithful to the original meaning and intent.
If it is all you know it is easy to accept nonsense because it seems normal...
I grew up in Evangelical Fundamentalism (Pentecostal no less) and can attest to that very thing. The author is right on the mark.
When all around them profess the magically implausible is real and to be feared we end up with lots of really delusional people. Fundamentalism of any strip is an illness. A plague. A literal interpretation of scripture is by definition the least informed and most misguided and simple minded understanding imaginable. Yet, evangelical fundamentalism is a booming phenomenon. Children raised in cultlike circumstances are disadvantaged regarding being emotionally prepared to function in our modern reality. I find the whole situation confounding and unfortunate...
slipping the bondage of that type of religious oppression can even be more treacherous for younger people. I've witnessed the worst results. not only is trump trashing the republican party, he's sending the teavangelicals over the cliff with them, and they're going along willingly.
sorry, way off topic, but this seed triggered a childhood memory of mine
I had a favorite aunt whose father was a fire and brimstone church of the nazarene preacher that traveled thru the small sundown towns of texas from the late 20's to the mid 50's. he drove a new cadillac every year, even during the great depression. my aunt and her 2 sisters grew up in the back of those cars singing the gospel in the local saloons on friday and saturday nights after prohibition ended, while daddy passed the hat and promoted his sunday revivals, where they were also the choir in the 30's and 40's. daddy bought his own whites only hellfire and damnation church in texas in the 50's, after his daughters had all been married off.
aside from buying a few bags of groceries for any poor white families to grease the local wheels for a sunday go to meeting at the park, grange hall, or whatever while they traveled, the collection plate was his. local room and board was usually free on the weekends, provided by those most obsessed by some type of guilt or wishing to elevate their social position. he paid cash for a big house when he retired in the late 60's, and supplemented his retirement by selling the gold coins he had hoarded from the collection plates over the years to collectors.
once my aunt had married my uncle when she turned 18, the dancing heels and red lipstick went on, and she never set foot in a church again. she was an awesome chef and could replicate any candy or snack food ever made in her home kitchen. her daughters fought over her recipe collection when she died, until they decided to make copies of it, together. going to her home on the holidays was always an extra special event in my childhood.
her weakness was coca cola, and the coke truck delivered cases to her home once a week, when having a bottle of pop was a special occasion in my family. Xmas eves at the Lotus Room when she would order ala carte for the 20 of us and have all the "chinamen" running around like the kitchen had caught fire was an experience worthy of a TV sitcom. she was 4'8" and 90 lbs. of magic and dynamite and made everything fun. I miss her always happy personality very much. She produced 3 business owners, a senator's wife, a congressional chief of staff, a past presidential appointee, and 1 of her grandsons is now an astronaut.
Thank you for publishing this seed, Larry, and for letting me take this trip down a cherished memory lane.
Honestly devangelical I should be the one thanking you: that story is more than welcome.
From your namesake alone I bet we have similar experiences to share. May I ask you about your experience with Evangelicalism?
everything from jews to snake handlers in my family the last 100 years. my moms family bounced around as protestants. never missed a sunday at church until I was around 12 or so, then the preacher hit on my mom, no more church. turned out later that church was a wife swapping club. local scandal that rocked the town.
better things to do on sunday than impress hypocrites since then. no sense belonging to a club and paying dues when the most popular member never shows up. not big on attending pointless pep rallies when you can live an honorable life without the weekly reminder. don't mind if it provides comfort to others, it just isn't for me. I like to deal direct and bypass the middlemen. adults that need regularly scheduled reminders to not act like scumbags in this short life are beyond my care or concern.
my church is this earth. it's members are my family, friends, and other honorable people we meet along the way. attendance is unscheduled 24/7/365. I despise the proactive born again types and place them somewhere between panhandlers and door to door hucksters. I believe they exceed the reasonable boundaries of the 1st, the 4th, and modern civilized society in general. they promote unconstitutional ideals while using the Constitution to protect themselves as they do it. I consider it my patriotic duty to confront them every time they step outside their property lines or church property lines with unamerican non-secular ideologies.
AMEN.
Your aunt sounds like she was a great lady. Thanks for sharing with us
if I could have turned her personality into a mood altering drug, I'd be a fucking zillionaire. just the sound of her voice gave me a grin from ear to ear that would last all holiday long. she invented holiday foods that are still traditional across our extended family today. she could dissect and replicate the recipe of any food by taste. she cooked/baked everything from scratch. I'd choose to sit at her table over any restaurant anywhere. she was simply amazing. the best aunt ever to me and my 2 sisters. I loved her very much.
IMO they should be voting for the one that will do the best job of representing them on the issues like immigration, taxes, gun control and foreign policy. It would be nice if they could let go completely but they are still searching for something that doesn’t exist.
I agree Dean. Those who are not letting go would also do well to vote for those who best represent the teachings of the Jesus they proclaim, such as caring for the poor, taking care of widows and orphans, standing against religious and political corruption...
the differences between what Jesus seemed to want from me versus what my church culture demanded, I discovered a huge disconnect.
I'm not religious in the typical way, but I'd say this is common in many churches. Along with much else you describe in different degrees.
thus why, I'm not religious in the typical way. I belong to no organized religion and haven't in many many years. I read all the major religious books then went and mediated on WTF I really believed. I came up with whatever arranged all the atoms to be all that is, is my GOD, I know nothing else for sure and really dont believe any other living human does either.
I have no problem with others believing whatever they chose, just do not try to force those believes onto me. That's why my GOD gave me feet !
To me this is a story of critical thinking slowly overcoming indoctrination. I think we would be in much better shape (as human beings worldwide) if we could discard the ancient shackles of religion and holy books and simply think for ourselves.
We have plenty of information available to us. We have nothing on a supreme entity but if someone concludes that there must be a higher order somewhere, that belief could be correct. Our current information can lead us to rational speculation on existential matters. We need not blindly follow the writings of ancient men.
Very nice and interesting article. Thank you. All people need realize is that is it the duty of a believer to share what s/he has with others. However, true change is spiritual in the inner man or woman. God effect it. Other than God's work in us, we are just a social network of people banded together for a cause and a purpose. A cultural Christian.
An authentic Christian goes on to learn in time that God is love and love need not steer away from people who are different. Especially in the west, where diversity is a way of life for us all. The saddest Christian is the 'stunted' one who never completely matures in his or her faith. Who in doing so, realizes that we can be who we are spiritually anywhere we are, even as we let others be who they are, thereabouts.