I wrote the text below in August/September 2007. It's now June 2008 and I've had quite a few people contact me in various ways about what I wrote - I appreciate people's thoughts, thanks, and I'm sorry I've not been terribly efficient at replying or responding. I thought therefore that it might be useful to update this page a little with where I feel I stand on the whole faith issue. If you've not read this page before I suggest you go and read the first thing I wrote below before this newer bit!
So, June 2008 - has anything changed? Well, no, not significantly. I'm a lot more content with my situation, and to be honest it's been quite liberating not having to worry about any of it; I no longer feel guilty in team or church or prayer meetings, nor do I have to behave in a certain way, or indeed do I feel I have an obligation to study Christian-related stuff (whether the Bible or having to buy into the whole Christian subculture). I don't actively research faith/Christian/Bible related stuff any more - because I don't feel I need to, which is quite helpful!
With regards to work - I have felt a little awkward at a couple of our gigs of late, but nothing major; I found myself more cringing at the odd aspect of a presentation than the content, really. I mentioned below that I'd probably be moving on job-wise; well, yes, I'm stepping up my search for a new job but not in a massively active way. This may seem a bit odd but preliminary investigations seem to suggest that I'm actually in a reasonable situation where I am! Add to that that I'm hopeless in new situations and frankly quite scared of becoming a little fish in a big pond again and I've not really got anywhere. That said, if anyone has any ideas or opportunities that you think I might be interested in - please do let me know! I'm open to the ideas of not sticking with lighting/techie event stuff but also a bit short of inspiration!
So, there we are; I'm still not a Christian, and don't really envisage turning back in the near future (although anything can happen...!). Christians would argue that it's arrogant to turn one's back on God - but then again, if one can't believe the fundamentals of the faith then it's not arrogance but more being independent and not being held into the religion by guilt. It saddens me to see people being held back by fear of the consequences of walking away, in one sense - but for me, that fear isn't there as the consequences are part and parcel of the faith and Bible package that I don't believe in. I hope that makes sense. Looking at it from the other direction - if God has created me, and has somehow created me in such a way that I cannot believe in him - will he condemn me to hell (for whatever value of hell you happen to believe in)? Isn't it a bit unfair to make someone who can't believe in something and then penalise them for not believing that thing? That doesn't sound like a loving, just God to me...
Anyway, as before, comments and emails are very welcome - and I promise to try to be a bit better at responding in the future!
Thanks for reading.
Some people are aware that my faith position has shifted fairly signficiantly over latter months and I thought it would be useful to write a webpage about where I'm at and what I believe. The main problem with this idea is that I'm not entirely sure where I stand, but still. I write it not to appear arrogant or self-centred, simply to share my thoughts.
I'm going to temper what I say a little here as it's a public webpage - just being careful how I put things. If you want to know any more about my situation, feel free to drop me an email.
I should also state that this stuff below has been cobbled together from various emails I've and letters I've sent people, either individually or as part of my quarterly work newsletter - so if you recognise some paragraphs, it's because I'm being lazy and recycling them.
I currently work for a well-known Christian charity based in Manchester, The Message Trust, and have done so for over six years now, in IT and also in the Operations Team (doing stage lighting etc). At university I was a hall group leader in my hall of residence and on the exec committee of MUUCU, now UMCU, the university Christian Union. That'll do for now, other than to say (for people that don't know me) that I've got a physics degree and I'm quite practical. Hope that allows you to categorise me suitably.
I no longer consider myself to be a Christian.
To some people this will come as no surprise as you'll know me well enough to realise that I've been sitting on the fence for a long time - not exactly doubting but more struggling with the intellectual side of my faith. For others it might be more out of the blue.
I've never thought that the whole 'becoming a Christian by praying a prayer' thing is a helpful way of looking at conversion (I'm not even sure it's entirely Biblical, although it's clearly useful as an affirmation of commitment and decision) so I don't think that becoming a non-Christian (for want of a better phrase) requires any specific cutoff point either. Indeed, my process of becoming a Christian didn't involve any day or meeting which I could point to to say that I 'prayed the prayer' or whathaveyou - I just sort of became more convinced of it and then took it from there. Similarly therefore, I've come to realise - particularly over the past months, although doubts and reasons to investigate different things have been happening for a few years - that I can't in fact honestly call myself a Christian with any integrity. I've not prayed for ages, and when I do nothing seems to happen; opening my Bible has only really been in conjunction with investigating its authority and for similar reasons; I've never quite got to the bottom of what a 'relationship with God' is, my experiences as a Christian haven't seemed to be anything more than ritualistic and finally, any sort of evangelical 'this is what makes you a Christian' saviour-acceptance hasn't been happening on anything other than a theoretical level for years.
I've obviously been continuing to consider my position since earlier in the year but I'm a lot more comfortable having made that decision, or otherwise realised, that I don't think Christianity is actually right.
Non-Christians out there might at this point be jumping for joy and thinking, "Hurrah, he's come to his senses at last"! Not so fast! It is clear that a lot of my identity is derived from Christianity - not just the lifestyle choices I may have made but obviously particularly the experiences I've had and the friends I've made in the past ten years since I came to university has shaped me significantly. There's also the small, unignorable fact that I work for an evangelical and evangelistic Christian charity. so I can't just jump ship and expect there to be no implications to my decision.
Intellectually, I'm still continuing to investigate stuff like the authority of scripture, the compilation of the canon and similar issues. It's this sort of thing that has been the biggest hurdle that I've encountered; of course Christianity is about personal faith to a certain extent (which I've also foundered with) but it seems to me that the logical, evidential and scriptural backup for Christianity is lacking in a few significant places, too. I still have a big pile of books to read that I've not quite got as far as reading properly yet and I still enjoy chatting about these issues with friends because it's good to engage with these topics. It is however sometimes frustrating having serious discussions and reading about opinions on the internet and in real life hijacked by frankly tangential arguments about such things as literal 6-day creation; filtering through the prejudice to get to some hard evidence, faith and opinions is not as easy as it might first appear. It's not that I don't have views on that sort of thing - it's just that it's largely irrelevant when it comes to supporting the premises of Jesus as saviour and the Biblical authority which is used to form modern Christian theology I encounter. The worst thing about all this is that I really don't like studying theology and stuff like that - I just want an answer! (I don't think that's going to be forthcoming quite as easily as all that...!)
I'm no theologian and perhaps that's part of the problem, but I just can't satisfy my mind with some of the issues. I think basically I'm a lot less ready to write stuff off and 'just take it on faith' that it's right. Sure, Christianity is built on faith and I need some if I'm going to get anywhere, but I'm just not willing to make leaps of faith that others seem content with doing (which is what I tend to term 'fluffy Christianity'). This is reflected mainly in my 'relationship with God' - or lack of it. I've never really had any form of personal experience of God and my prayers have always been pointless. I can't point at any prayers that I've prayed that have been answered that wouldn't have happened in the fulness of time or on average anyway. I don't know, it's just all a bit... fraudulent for me to continue trying when in reality nothing's there. A hampering factor in investigating all of this is that - well, frankly, I'm really not terribly interested in it all either. I've got several books about some of the issues I am/was particularly pondering but it doesn't hold my attention - and I must admit, it's not really done so much in the past either.
One thing I've tried to be careful about is to distinguish my gripes with Christianity from any gripes I have with church, Christians and the Christian world in general. I don't often manage to be totally objective about it all but I just wanted to be clear that although I have a lot of issues with the way Christians behave (and the stuff that they believe that just isn't Biblical sometimes!) - perhaps I'm including myself there as a hypocrite too - hopefully I've made my decision on the underlying Christianity and not the overt behaviour and observations of Christians. It's interesting however that there seems to me a gentle movement happening in the Christian world at the moment - which perhaps the 'emerging church' is part of - which is trying to peel off the layers of 'church' and 'Christianese', particularly of the charismatic church, trying to get at the faith inside (recent web pages I've read recently include this blog post about New Wine for example). I agree with a lot of what is said in this and some of the books that are out there at the moment. Perhaps I've just peeled too much off my faith and been left with nothing, but I just can't reconcile anything (eg relationships with God, 'proof' of things etc) which means that it is inevitable this is where I end up. Hmm. I don't know; if God made me and wanted me as he designed, to make me 'unable' to believe in him and then to reject me on that basis is a bit unfair, isn't it? If he's loving and just, then I think there's a justice linked in there on his part that he wouldn't reject me. I don't know. And actually, I'm not too worried. I'm having enough trouble coping with life here to start worrying about eternal things - and I'm not being threatened or scared into a faith - for me it's got to be at least intellectually plausible. I'm not saying people who "Love Jesus" are nutters - just that I can't love (what is love? That's another topic entirely) Jesus/God/whoever/whatever when it/he/they aren't there.
I must point out that none of this is a recent happening, really. Lots of things haven't made sense for a long time and I hope it's a rational and thoughtful process that I've been through; my decision's not directly affected by my depressive tendencies nor a season of stress - more that it's the culmination of lots of rumblings of discontent and it's not just a sudden out of the blue thing (I'm not a spontaneous type of person, you may have noticed!). I just wanted to clarify that I've thought about this.
What's interesting is that my biggest concern about declaring myself out hasn't been losing the time I've invested in my faith (although that is a bit of an issue), or wasting my past few years at The Message (although, again, that's a problem), or even 'condemning myself to hell'. I'm more concerned, by giving it up, is losing access to the community - the readiness for friendships and feeling of being in it together - of the Christian world.
I've never felt myself a big part of the Christian community but in other words, it's losing access to the 'Christian club' that is making me stop and think. When you feel like you struggle to fit into the world and people and stuff, like I often do, it's the fear of giving up access to almost ready-made friends and communities and condemning oneself to roam the world, struggling even more to make relationships, that's more scary. It seems to me that far too many people are in the church for a ready made social club and I'm not prepared to sign up to a statement of faith just to join. Perhaps there are other organisations without that doctrine that you have to agree with that I can fit in with better - I don't know.
So, where does this leave me with work? In short, I don't know. It allows me to feel more comfortable at work at times, knowing that I don't have to agree that 'prayer is the best thing I could be doing' at work (compared to fixing lights or something I'm actually good at and employed to do) and it makes me feel better when I can shed all the emotional baggage that goes with a task. The problems arise with me otherwise 'wasting' prayer days and prayer meetings and whether I can support the evangelism that we do. Even disregarding the faith side of things, I think that all of the social and personal benefits that our projects bring to a community are worthwhile - self-worth, respect, love etc - are desperately needed in our inner cities and so I don't think I should need to leave the moment I forget God.
I think it's inevitable that given where I'm at now I'll end up leaving the Message at some point in the nearish future, however. I have no idea where to go though, and that's my concern at the moment - the big wide world out there beckons. So if anyone knows of any jobs going that I'd enjoy - anything from physics to technical theatre to event production to computery stuff to... well, who knows? - please please let me know!
If anyone wants to discuss this then that'd be great. My ideas on this are constantly evolving really. I'd love for it to continue as I am at the moment, able to discuss stuff openly and honestly and intelligently. The last thing I want are fluffy responses from fluffy "It'll be alright" Christians; what I need are solid, personal, honest answers to the points I struggle with and having these issues shrugged off isn't helpful.
If you know of anyone that might be interested to read this then please point them to this page - if you've made it this far yourself then congratulations, and thank you.
My email address is webmaster @ scandrett.net [take out the spaces] if you want to email me...
In the meantime, does anyone want to join me for a bike ride?!