Why I Am No Longer Christian

Introduction, Part 3

The second seed of doubt was entirely unrelated to biblical interpretation. Instead, it was due to a growing dissatisfaction with the Christian community of which I was a part.

While my "worldly" friends wouldn't accept that I didn't want to drink or party, my church friends expected me to "act like a Christian." I was perpetually walking on eggshells around them. I had to prevent myself from swearing, talking about cute guys, mentioning my queer friends (and most of my friends are queer), discussing my doubts about Christianity, or, heaven forbid, telling them that I might not be straight. None of that fit into their idea of a "true" Christian or a "good Christian girl." Basically, I couldn't be myself.

They also pestered me constantly about going to Christian events with them, something that began to wear on my nerves as time moved on.

"I'm already experiencing God more this semester than I have in years," I wrote in my diary, "and I understand that they want me to continue to grow in my faith, but I don't appreciate how persistent they are."

Once a week, they asked me if I was going to group worship with them, even though I had already explained my discomfort with large crowds. Before two different fall conferences, they spent weeks bothering me to go, even stopping by my room to make sure that I wasn't misunderstanding God's plan for me and encouraging me to "talk to God about it and see what he wants for you," as if I hadn't already!

It was as if they were questioning my faith and decision-making, under the guise of offering me "good advice." As I wrote in my diary,

"I'm NOT saying that my faith is perfect; far from it, in fact. But I don't need other people poking their nose into my faith and making judgments about what I need to fix."

What I wanted was a community that could help me grow spiritually and show me the love and compassion that my two devout friends had. But I was quickly realizing that maybe my friends' exceptional kindness wasn't because of their faith. I had made wonderful atheist friends who were phenomenal people, and I had met an entire community of Christians who were less than phenomenal. The majority of Christians I had met were judgmental, hypocritical, self-righteous and arrogant, close-minded, and ignorant. Instead of finding love and community, I found people putting on a facade of holiness while judging me for being myself.