#exvangelical

[owl-maiden-36]

as much as i understand growing up religious wasn't good for me, sometimes i see a sign for vacation bible school and get all nostalgic for the secular summer camps i never got to attend

[jrbsfx]

One aspect of growing up in American Christianity that never gets talked about is how you can’t hear someone say “I was thinking the other day-” without immediately thinking “what if cartoons got saved?” and being unable to make this reference without completely derailing the conversation for 20 minutes while you explain that for years, the #1 most requested song on Christian radio was about how various cartoon characters would sing ‘hallelujah’ if they converted EXCEPT for Beavis and Butt-Head, who explicitly are beyond the reach of God.

And how this became the creator’s career-defining hit despite it only being a secret track that he recorded as a joke for kids, and how he wrote it because he thought it was weird that Christians feel compelled to make shitty Christian versions of pop culture, yet his audience took it 100% at face value.

And how in 2020 he was accused of sexually assaulting a minor while leading worship at church camp, an investigation found the allegations credible, and he promptly vanished off the face of the Earth.

So now an entire generation has a child molester’s song about Beavis and Butt-Head not deserving the light of Christ permanently stuck in their heads.

[dalilronin]

Was greatly inspired by this passage from Chapter 4 of Jesusland by Joelle Kidd, so I made this short tribute 🥰

[punkpastor]

LEND ME YOUR EARS!

I promise I'll only post about this once, but I want to share my exciting — yet terrifying — new adventure as a Brand New, Freshly Minted, Baby Pastor.

SO... WHY ARE YOU SHARING THIS ON TUMBLR?

Honestly? While I'm excited, I am also terrified. Being a transgender, Christian Anarchist pastor online has frankly not been the most fun and chill experience. I love it, I wouldn't trade it, but I get a good number of threats and such, even with my microscopic reach. I'm sharing this with Tumblr because there are other queer folks, trans folks, activists, anarchists, and exvangelicals here who get it.

I want to keep doing this work — not conversion or evangelism, never those, because frankly the modern church institution is so abusive that it feels irresponsible to bring people into the church — but stripping the power from this monolith of Christian Nationalism by outing them as a cult? Reminding the world that Jesus was a poor man of color executed by the church and state for calling out the elites of his era? And reclaiming faith community for the people the modern church persecutes most? It's my passion. I want to give my life to it! But it Is Real HardTM some days. So I'm coming here, looking for safe companions for this journey. I hope I can find some.

THE PITCH

Starting this Sunday (tomorrow now I guess), I’m beginning a 3-week, daily educational series on Instagram and Substack. I’ll be teaching about:

Prophetic legacy & imagination

Jesus, the Gospels, & the early church

the usurpation of Christianity by Empires

modern prophetic revolutionaries

theological interpretations by minorities

You can follow the project on Instagram here, and Substack here. You can also find me on both at @punkpastor.

GOALS

The goals are education and hope. By the end, we‘ll have some answers to the questions:

What was the original Gospel message? How did modern Christianity get so far from it?

What work has been done to reclaim Christianity from the hands of oppressors?

What makes theological interpretations by minorities more faithful interpretations of Christ’s original message?

What does it mean to be a good Christian?

(And hopefully, you’ll also heal from some religious trauma!)

IN CLOSING

If this sounds interesting to you, I hope you'll follow along! I want to welcome Christians and deconstructists, exvangelicals, and curious folks from other faiths.

This is also, forever and always, a safe space for all the following:

The LGBTQIA+ Community (ESPECIALLY trans people)

Non-white folks, especially African, Arab, Latino, First Nation, and Asian Americans

Immigrants and refugees

Women of all kinds (this pastor is pro-choice and for the Dolls)

The disabled community

And this pastor is anti-war, anti-ICE, anti-AI, anti-billionaire, and stands with the people of Palestine, Lebanon, and Iran.

People are welcome. Hate is not.

Peace out.

[celestialplan3]

thank god for iron lung cause now whenever the rapture is mentioned it's no longer trauma and it is just an iron lung reference

[churchb0rn]

If you grew up evangelical Christian like me or are still battling with figuring out what you believe, please know that you do not have to share every detail of your life with everyone you meet.

Evangelicalism often promotes the idea that fellow Christians are your brothers and sisters. That if someone states they believe the same things as you, they do. You don't question it, that's the way it is.

There were so many times in my life where this turned out not to be the case. Someone is not automatically safe because they are religious. Media is not automatically good because it is Christian.

You get told over and over again not to question, so it feels wrong just to have thoughts show up in your head that something doesn't feel right. But this is your inner voice fighting back.

My trust was betrayed by many people who claimed they were my brothers and sisters in Christ. Who said they were praying for me, that they cared about me, that they were family. Yet as soon as you start asking too many questions or don't believe exactly the same things they do, they flee. This is not real friendship. Friendship is not a string that frays every time you say things they don't want to hear.

Please protect yourself as early in life as possible. Knowledge is power. Evangelicalism and other strict religions dislike their members obtaining knowledge because of this. This is called information control.

Whether you choose to continue to believe or not, learn as much as you can. Don't put 100% of your health and livelihood into the hands of other people. You deserve to have a decent quality of life. Fight for yourself. If not for yourself, fight for those you care about.

[the-maladjustedjester]

New conspiracy theory: if I was allowed to grow up with regular media I’d either be allo or fully ace, but since I listened to Odyssey I am now stuck in a weird limbo of only being turned on by voices and the ~concept~ of a hot person rather than real physical appearances

[rootbeerrex]

One of my least favorite things about being ex-christian is having religious friends who come to me for advice and I'm not allowed to say "the problem here is that you are christian and that is harming you a lot and you should leave the church" when the problem is in fact that they are christian and it is harming them and they should leave the church