Rarely does a week go by without comments and emails from Evangelicals telling me that my life lacks meaning and purpose. Just today, an eighty-three-year-old Evangelical man named James Verner told me:
I used to be on the outside looking in, so I have a good idea of what you feel like now, much of which includes a terrible feeling of emptiness . . .
He just knows that I have a “terrible feeling of emptiness.” He doesn’t know me. He didn’t read any of my autobiographical material. Yet, he is certain that my life lacks meaning and purpose. In this man’s mind, life can only have meaning and purpose if you have a personal relationship with Jesus. This approach is typical of Evangelicals, who have a binary, black-and-white view of the world. Either you are saved or lost, in or out, headed for Heaven or Hell. This is a perfect example of us vs. them thinking; God’s chosen ones against Satan and the world.
Verner lacks imagination. Unable to see and understand peace, happiness, purpose, and meaning as a possibility outside of Jesus, he sees his life and experiences as a blueprint for others. Get “saved” and you too can have a life just like mine! Little do Evangelicals know that this is not the selling point they think it is. Why would I want to be like Verner? I like my life as it is just fine. My life isn’t “perfect,” whatever the hell perfect means. I have had a lot of pain, suffering, trauma, and adversity in my life, yet I am grateful for still being among the living. I have been married to Polly for almost forty-five years. By all accounts, we have a good marriage. We deeply love one another, and more importantly, we really like each other. We are best friends who enjoy one another’s company. We are blessed to have six grown children and thirteen grandchildren — ten girls and three boys. (I love using words such as grateful and blessed. Drives Evangelicals nuts. Why? In their minds, there can be no gratefulness or blessing without Jesus.)
My life and that of countless atheists, agnostics, pagans, and other non-believers repudiate Evangelical claims that having purpose and meaning in your life requires a salvific experience and relationship with Jesus. We are undeniable proof that it doesn’t.
So to the Verners of the world, I say this: I don’t want nor do I need what you have. If you need God/Jesus/religion to give your life meaning and purpose, that’s fine. I am a live-and-let-live kind of guy. Whatever floats your boat, right? You will search in vain on this site for a post written by me that tells people how they should live their lives. I spent fifty years in Evangelical Christianity. I have had my fill of preachers telling me how I should live my life. I have no interest in telling people how they should live.
I am sure that the Verners who frequent this site are befuddled by my unwillingness to drink their flavor of Kool-Aid. They can’t imagine a life worth living without their peculiar version of Jesus. And make no mistake about it, they love, worship, and adore a Jesus that they have shaped and molded into a being that meets the felt needs of their lives. There is no singular Jesus. That’s why there are countless Christianities with their attendant deities.
Let me conclude this post by talking about why Evangelical Christianity doesn’t appeal to me; why no amount of pleading, argument, prayer, or Jesus himself showing up on my doorstep will facilitate my return to faith. Evangelicals have written thousands and thousands of words and prayed countless prayers hoping that I will see the light. That ain’t going to happen — ever. Why? Christianity doesn’t make sense to me. (Please see The Michael Mock Rule: It Just Doesn’t Make Sense.) I am a rational man. To quote atheist firebrand Matt Dillahunty, I want to believe as many true things as possible. In my mind, Christianity is fundamentally irrational.
Where does a personal relationship with Jesus begin? Not in your “heart” — which doesn’t exist — but in your mind. Evangelicals believe that when a person is born from above (saved), the third part of the Trinity, the Holy Spirit or Holy Ghost comes into their lives and lives inside of them as their teacher and guide. The Holy Spirit literally talks to and moves, prompts, directs, motivates, challenges, and corrects them. How do they know this to be true? The still small voice of the Holy Spirit they hear in their heads (and to a lesser degree what is written in the Protestant Christian Bible).
This voice in their head tells them that their peculiar version of God is the one true God of the Bible; the creator of the universe; the giver and taker of life; the sovereign ruler, king, and potentate. How do they know these things are true? The voice in their head and the words of an ancient religious text written by fallible men, tell them so. This same voice — the witness of the Spirit — tells them that the Bible is inspired (a faith claim), inerrant, and infallible.
Believing that God is really speaking to them, Evangelicals read the Bible, believing that it was written by God himself through holy men of old as they were moved by the Holy Spirit (the voice in their heads). Thus, Evangelicals believe the Bible is literally true, without error. This means that have committed themselves to believing all sorts of nonsense.
Fundamentally, Christianity is a blood cult based on the fantastical claims of an ancient religious text that a voice in their heads tells them is God’s words. I cannot and will not believe such nonsense. This doesn’t mean that I am anti-religion. It does mean, however, I will not embrace a system of belief and practice that I think is irrational. Becoming a Christian would require me to deny and repudiate things I know to be true. I am unwilling to sacrifice my intellect on the altar of faith.
Bruce Gerencser, 67, lives in rural Northwest Ohio with his wife of 46 years. He and his wife have six grown children and thirteen grandchildren. Bruce pastored Evangelical churches for twenty-five years in Ohio, Texas, and Michigan. Bruce left the ministry in 2005, and in 2008 he left Christianity. Bruce is now a humanist and an atheist.
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Dear Mr V,
We secular folk have resources aplenty to which we turn during life’s biggest trials,like wise philosophies, consoling practices, each other. We don’t have the need to appeal to something outside of ourselves, to a power beyond us. We do turn outside of ourselves but to art, to nature, to the insights of literature or philosophy. We turn to other people, our friends and families, our communities. Personally my life is so much richer and fulfilling now than it was when I was an ardent x-tian cos I acknowledge and appreciate all these great things in my life. I don’t have to spend hours shrieking at the ceiling, shouting into the void to an imaginary being, a sky-fairy who was actually conspicuous by their absence when I appealed to him/her/it to ameliorate the world’s, and my personal traumas and tragedies. Hope you can free yourself too from the shackles of irrational belief in a so-called ‘loving god,’ and step out of your darkness, as I and others here did. It’s great out here in the sunshine. (Oh, I’m not much younger than you BTW.)
Did you know there is a place in the brain which, when stimulated, gives a person an awareness of an otherwordly being nearby? https://www.smithsonianmag.com/smart-news/scientists-figured-out-how-induce-neurological-seance-180953272/
Mr. V,
You do you, and I’ll do me. If your religious beliefs make you happy, give you comfort, fulfill you with a sense of purpose, that’s great for you. But please do not assume that those of us who live differently do not also have fulfilling lives. I know people who come from a variety of backgrounds, different religions, no religion, who also live fulfilling lives. I know people deeply involved in religion who are incredibly unhappy, unfulfilled, lonely. There’s no magic formula. People are different, and while as humans we share some basic needs, not all of us share other types of needs. For example, I have zero need or desire for a purpose or “calling”. Hearing people talk about needing purpose doesn’t resonate with me. I hear that it’s important to them, but I can happily and contentedly live my life without purpose. I have learned not to assume that what works for me will work for others.
it’s always a shame when christians feel they must lie to try to get people to join their cult. That’s all that James is doing.
Much of the flak coming from evangelicals is likely related to worry over their continuing decline. The proportion of people attending church at least once a month, pre-pandemic to spring 2022, decreased from 75 percent of the population to 68 percent, with young adults, singles, and self-identified liberals showing the greatest decrease. The proportion of young adults aged 18-29 who never attend church, pre-pandemic to spring 2022, increased from one-third (33 percent) to 43 percent. (Source: Baptist News Global, January 12, 2023.) Religious conservatives are panicking over the accelerating pace of decline. One easy way to deal with anxiety over these demographic realities is to attack Bruce. Copium is a heckuva drug.
One thing that Christians (or anyone who finds fulfillment in their particular organized religion really) may mistake the comradery that comes from the social club for the invisible product of a personal god. I’ve observed that it does seem to have value, the actual list of beliefs could actually be anything (such as opening the egg up from the little end). By acting as a community with shared values, the fact that people helping people makes things happen, not entreaties to the almighty is an easily ignored irrelevancy.
Reason and rationality are anathema to fundamentalist Christians – so much so that they feel the need to mock these concepts. I recall a puppet play presented at our Baptist church in the 70s. The villain of the piece was a giraffe named Voltaire. Why a giraffe, I ask? And why Voltaire? I asked the preacher after the service if he’d read any of the French philosopher. You can guess his response. ‘No. But I’ve read about him.’