Religious Switching Patterns

 

I have a lot of topics on my mind but this article by the Pew Research Center caught my eye and I read it.  From everything I know about the Pew Research Center, they are pretty reliable.  I could be wrong.  The article focused on how religious affiliation might look by 2070, noting that Christians won’t be the majority anymore.  I’m not surprised but I’m sure the white supremacists and white right wing “Christian” nationalist and evangelists are freaking out.

I was really interested in their findings about who switched religious beliefs and when they did.

As for me, I started out going with my family to the Islip Presbyterian Church.  My extended family lived all around my parents, brother and me.  Half the family went to that church, and there was a cozy, “family” feel to it. 

We moved to Baltimore when I was 10.  No more church filled with family members and friends.  My parents attempted to get my brother and me into Sunday school at a local Presbyterian church while they went visiting friends but that didn’t last long.  My brother and I felt awkward, out of place, and we just didn’t feel welcome.  We told my parents we didn’t want to go there anymore, and that was the end of Sunday School.

I’m not sure where to place myself.  I sort of grew up with a Christian faith but it ended before I was 11.  We just didn’t go to any church, didn’t watch any evangels on TV nor read the Bible.  I had vague memories of what I’d learned in Sunday School but that was it.  I believed in God but He was remote and distant.  I didn’t think much about religion.

When I was 16, I joined Weight Watchers and discovered a group met at the Christ Church for the Deaf.  My parents, who were profoundly Deaf from birth, were aware of it all along but chose not to go because they didn’t want to give up drinking and gambling at the Deaf club.  Even though I hadn’t learned to sign fluently yet, I felt a connection to this church and congregants.  The minister was inspiring, he himself the adult child of Deaf parents.

My parents were bemused but didn’t try to stop me from going to that church.  They offered classes on American Sign Language to hearing people who wanted to communicate.  It was there I became fluent and worked my way up through the interpreter classes.  I sometimes interpreted church services both in Maryland and then in New York.

Church felt good through my first marriage and the births of my three children.  Rich and I moved from New York back to Maryland and attended the local Presbyterian Church.  Our kids went to Sunday School as I did when I was little.  I enjoyed volunteering on outreach committees.  Two controversial issues began to sour me on congregations, boiling down to Not In My Backyard (NIMBY-ism) and prejudice.  We are to love each other and lend a helping hand or provide support, yet people objected to a shelter in the church for homeless families and to welcome openly gay members.  Several of our deacons felt compelled to hide in “the closet”.

In my early 40s, I stopped going to church.

I tried to go again with my second husband but I couldn’t reconcile myself to that church’s dogma and could see there was a lot of the usual back-stabbing and hypocrisy here too.  I haven’t been to a church service since and it’s been almost 10 years.

What about my kids?  They are in their 30s now, and I am not sure what they believe.  All three seem to be non-affiliated.  Will they seek out a connection to a particular religion, a church?  I don’t know.  I have shared what I believe with them and they change the subject.  I don’t pursue it or push it.

This is what I believe: yes, I think there is God.  There must be a higher intelligence to have created this universe and beyond.  I have faith in Jesus and feel the Holy Spirit.  But do I need to go to church?  The Bible says I should but I don’t.  I don’t like the drama, the back-stabbing, and the complaining.  I can commune with God out in nature or here in my room or anywhere, really.  I can pray and I am heard.  When my spirit leaves my body, it leaves a lifeless shell but my spirit is energy and it goes on.

There are no Presbyterian churches close by in my town.  Over the years, I have been to Methodist, Lutheran, Episcopalian and Baptist churches.  None were a comfortable fit and so if I’m asked which religion I’m affiliated with, I say Presbyterian by rote.

I wonder where I’d fit in the Pew Research results.

Next up: why are there so many stupid people?