Where do I fit in now? How shall I find a community in which I have the freedom to be myself?
Conservative, evangelical Christianity considers me an outsider and a heretic. I am unable to subscribe to inerrancy, eternal conscious torment, complementarianism and spanking, to name a few. The Christian homeschooling groups require a faith statement that I cannot sign.
Liberal Christianity alienates me the minute politics are brought up, for I am unable to identify with the left or the right (and generally too ignorant to join in these conversations anyways).
Progressive/emergent conversations seem overly focused on correcting the perceived ills of conservative Christianity. I'm not interested in debate, particularly since I have not relinquished all of the views that I valued as an evangelical. I'm both pro-choice and pro-life. I support abstinence and LGBT marriage. I'm likely not green enough, and have fallen short of the ideals for social justice.
Secular communities find me too restrictive socially with some of my old-fashioned views. Particularly with the homeschooling communities, I've discovered that I'm just not crunchy enough, and not anti-religion or anti-schools. I still value our public school system...and will reconsider our options year-by-year, depending on my child's needs and wants.
To complicate matters, in our high-paced society, people are often too busy to invest in long-term, authentic friendship. Friends ebb and flow, fading with a change in churches, playgroup or where my children attend classes. As I interact with these various communities, I often find judgment, not acceptance. Admonishment, not encouragement. Rules on how to interpret the Bible. How to parent, diaper, educate and vaccinate your child. What to eat, wear and consume. How to vote and how to live. Apparently, fundamentalism is not just limited to evangelical Christians.
I'm out-of-sync with so many of these communities, and find myself subconciously reevaluating my own views. I've been wrong many a times before...maybe I'm wrong again. My transition from evangelicalism to a confused agnostic was just the tip of the iceberg that led to a total deconstruction of everything.
This has to stop.
I cannot scrutinuze every detail of my life. I must accept that I cannot live to an ideal. I have no set paradigm for living. I have an inconsistent set of beliefs, some of which might evolve, some might not.
I will make mistakes.
I will fall short.
And I'm learning to love myself in spite of my imperfection, keeping alive the hope that one day soon, I'll rediscover a long-lasting community that provides respect and humility in spite of our differences -- a community in which I can finally be myself.
****
How has doubt affected your life? Did you dissect your values after altering your spiritual beliefs? Where have you found community?
****
General Update: I'm 18 weeks pregnant now and coming out of hibernation as the 24hr nausea slowly diminishes. We intend to visit an Episcopal church when I'm up to it, although we've grown content staying home on Sundays, avoiding the emotional and intellectual baggage tied to church. The most pressing issue for me is finding a homeschooling group, which has been a challenge due to the inherent segregation within the various groups.
You wrote: "And I'm learning to love myself in spite of my imperfection, keeping alive the hope that one day soon, I'll rediscover a long-lasting community that provides respect and humility in spite of our differences -- a community in which I can finally be myself."
ReplyDeleteAll I can say is, learning to love yourself in spite of all of it, is key, in my opinion. :-)
You know Like a Child, I'm not even sure that if we have a community that we are truly ourselves while in it because it seems as you've pointed out throughout your post that in some way or another we all hold back a certain part of ourselves out of fear.
My values didn't change. I'm the same in most every way.
Good news that your nausea is slowly subsiding.
You've said the same thing my husband and I have said for years: We are too liberal for the conservatives, too conservative for the liberals; too crunchy and alternative for the neighbors, too conventional for the freaks and weirdos; too heretical (me) or agnostic (him) for the religious, too spiritual for the atheists.... we are just too far outside everyone's box to fit into any group without visible twitching. After 15 years of trying to fake it enough for friends but always finding myself chewing my foot off to get out of the trap, I finally am finding an assortment of equally outside-the-box, free-thinking, individuals online.
ReplyDeleteI think it helps that online relationships by definition can only include the parts of you that you put out there. Real life relationships are messier by virtue of being participated in with a whole person. But there is also the component that religious or homeschooling or other "lifestyle" groups tend to want to live in each other's pockets--probably as a way to bolster their sense of righteousness of lifestyle choice.
Glad you are feeling better! I find I don't really fit well anywhere either….I'm trying less and less to "pretend" to be something I"m not just to fit in. It's been nice for us to stay home on sundays too…although now I"m not sure where to go from here. We are thinking of homeschooling too and I find the same things either it's very, very christian or anti-christians. Not a lot of middle group….although I'm sure there are people out there in real life, because there are online.
ReplyDeleteI'm learning to love myself as well, LAC. I think maybe we're having a hard time finding a community because, not only do we not "fit in" anywhere, even if there was a group we "fit into" we might not know it. Because our thoughts and beliefs are evolving we don't really even know where we belong.
ReplyDeleteHere's what I've decided: I don't need to announce that I'm agnostic. I don't need to tell the world, or my closest friends for that matter, that I'm no longer a fundamentalist, evangelical blowhard. If they hang around me for any length of time they'll figure that out on their own.
The biggest change I feel that I've made is my personal acceptance of others. I'm with you on changing my core values. They really haven't changed all that much. I'm still, with regards to myself, very conservative. What's changed is that I don't feel the need to make anyone else that way and I'm free to like/love them as they are.
Yeah, I don't fit in much anywhere either, except online.
ReplyDeleteMy values are pretty much the same, I'm just less judgmental of of others now. I'm pro-choice and pro-life, I will not condone my children have sex at a young age when that time comes, yet I will educate them because I know it happens.
I am not the homeschooling type, if there is a type.
I'm with D'Ma in that besides telling my mom, I don't go around telling people that I'm and unbeliever. They will figure it our sooner or later or not.
I'm learning to love me for me and not be ashamed of who I am and what I believer or don't. It's a process and one that I feel more comfortable in most days now.
I would like to broaden my friendship circle as well and wonder how to go about it. I am lucky to still have very good friends at church, though I sometimes do feel a need to be guarded with my thoughts (with some more than others.) I've never done homeschooling, so I had no idea about this extreme dichotomy you face.
ReplyDeleteZoe made a good point about it always being a challenge to be entirely one's self in community. A major role community serves is socializing and influencing the behavior of group members to conform to a certain standard. Typically, that is a positive thing. Obviously, there can be real problems with it.
The moderates are out there. They're just not organizing themselves and being loud about it :) Apparently, we're all online. :)
Thank you Ladies for sharing your own struggles in finding local community. I am finding it so difficult to keep such an important part of me (the one you see on this blog) a secret. It can be exhausting to play the mental gymnastics required to filter yourself when talking to people IRL, and as I mentioned, homeschoolers can be particularly passionate. My son starts preschool next week and I am looking forward to connecting with the more moderate, open-minded and friendly moms I meet there. I suspect I would be having an easier time connecting with parents in public school -- and while I treasure our homeschooling days, I do look forward to putting them back in school eventually.
ReplyDeleteBut still, I still dream of a community where I can ask these deep theological questions that we all only seem to be able to discuss online. I'm perplexed at why I cannot find one, in my own town, where Bart Erhman teaches, and there exists a fairly liberal divinity school. This is partly why you see me continue to search, b/c while I live in the Bible Belt, there has too be more resources...they might just be still unknown to me.
Maybe look for discussion boards (or old fashioned real bulletin boards) at the divinity school library, dedicated to families of the schools students. They all have to live in your town and their families have to move in community, too, right?
ReplyDeleteSandra: Some of the difficulty is that we are trying to focus on churches near UNC due to our location (i.e. Less than a 30 minute drive). Furthermore, the bulk of the churches we visited were conservative evangelical to conservative mainline. Now we are going to branch out as we've become more knowledgeable of the more progressive options in town, although I was surprised to learn even one of the Episcopal churches in town practices closed communion (almost a deal-breaker for me). I should also divulge that part of my reason for even resuming my church hunt is for the very superficial reason of finding a place for my kids to get plugged in...and for ourselves to contribute to social justice causes. Much of my spiritual passion and excitement has been squeezed out of me, replaced with a more practical, less ideological self.
ReplyDeleteI wasn't thinking so much of church as a source of community. I thought the university itself might be a source. With so many divinity students--who by definition *ought* to be open to a thinking, undogmatic, spiritually open family Being--the school has to provide or allow some organized community functions.
ReplyDeleteLaC,
ReplyDeletehttp://rachelheldevans.com/journeys-religious-misfit-2
I don't know how to make that link clickable but you gotta check out Rachel Held Evans post today "Accidental Fences" So a propos to your struggles with community (and mine).
Sandra: Thanks for the link..I have actually noticed a general focus on discussing community on many of the blogs I read. While I do relate to Rachel's struggles, I also feel a bit alienated since I'm more agnostic/less spiritual. I hope to eventually write about my difficulty in accessing any spiritual dimension within me as my ignorance over the Bible faded.
ReplyDeleteOn another note, I am excited to report the fall semester is going well, and I'm finding community in the various educationaland extracurricular activities of my kids, even within homeschoolers. The fact is most people around here don't discuss religion in routine conversation, and outside of very conservative circles, Christians don't really care about your spiritual status.
Hi LAC,
ReplyDeleteHow has doubt affected your life? Did you dissect your values after altering your spiritual beliefs? Where have you found community?
Doubt has affected my life dramatically because that's what brought me out of Christianity. That doubt was brought on through scientific study and questioning the evidence of all that I believed.
I dissected my values a great deal. Post deconversion I started asking myself what sins could I now commit and be free of guilt from. It was a weird position to be in but it didn't last long. In the end I came to the conclusion that my desire to do those 'sins' was no different now than it was before. In essence, my values survived the dissection and they are just the same as they have always been.
Part of my community is those blogs I read and occasionally comment on which are written by people who are on a similar journey. I count your blog among that community.