Here’s a great piece from Glenn Regular, with a couple of my rambling musings tacked on at the end. I must say right at the very beginning that I do not consider that the things expressed in this essay apply to my ‘home’ church here in Devon (which I haven’t been to for a couple of years); they’re not like that at all. Given that they welcome the poor and homeless, they don’t fit the description at all, in fact. So, not all churches are like this by any means, but those that are are the ones who are driving people away. And I have been in churches like that, so I do know they exist 🙂 So, please accept this essay knowing that I am not criticising any and every church with it. Just the ones who deserve it.
The Exodus from Religion
People are questioning and exiting Religion in unprecedented numbers. The empty pews stand as a monument as to how toxic the institution of Religion is to people of the Exodus.
The religious hierarchy expend their energy trying to cover up religious abuses within the system and marginalizing people who are leaving the fold by saying they really don’t have relationship with God, they have an undying love for sin and are heretics doing the devil’s bidding, and are on a damnation slope to eternal hell-fire.
But, ‘Us Escapees’ from Religion don’t buy into that religious lying hogwash anymore.
Religion has been declining in membership for a long time. They throw all kinds of religious theatrics, hell-fire and brimstone damnation fear-mongering, etc., to boost it, yet without any lasting spiritual success.
Here’s why: To be successful, Religion depends on a delicate balance between the illusion that it is the way to God, it is the path to heaven, and the way to find out how to escape the torture chamber of hell fired eternal suffering they so heartily believe in. It is a fear-mongering tactic as old as Religion itself. They tell you, you are going to hell and sell you a rotten bill of goods to escape it.
To Religion, personal vulnerability, which is completely essential to have a healthy shared community, is too messy. Not only does it make people uncomfortable, because it makes them face their shortcomings and insecurities, it’s impossible to gain huge amounts of influence and make millions of dollars when people are being messy and real in living life.
The articles of Religion are:
“Believe. Because our way is the right way.”
“Membership. Become one and maintain a good standing.”
“Tithe. You will be giving to God.”
“Conform. We will respect you.”
“Change. We will accept you.”
“Submit. We will value you.”
“Serve. We will let you speak.”
‘Assimilate. We will love you”.
“Obey. We will let you lead.”
Religion will start to mold you into the Religious Lifestyle the moment you show interest. The push of performance is ever-present. It actually doesn’t matter if you truly follow Jesus as long as you look like you are “a good religious person” by showing up to programmed meetings when the doors are open, pay your tithes and offerings and speak the Christianese language.
But if they see you straying from the religious path, if you question whether the Bible is the Word of God or Bible literality, or whether eternal suffering in the torture chamber of hell-fire is a Bible doctrine, they will dismember you, demean you, demonize you and tell you, you are on a fast train to hell’s dungeon.
Religion is a thinly veiled capitalistic money-making machine whose framework is based on people’s ignorance of God, the Bible, the finished cross-work of Christ, the Gospel, and is of the devil, devilish.
People are deceived into giving their money, time and identity over to a religion that refuses to treat people as family unless they conform to Religion’s standard.
People who are too insecure, spiritually deficient, too queer, too old, too poor, too ugly, too needy, too mentally ill, not white enough, not middle-class enough, not straight enough, not submissive or assertive enough, not attractive or talented enough are not fully welcomed into the religious fold.
Have you ever wondered why Religion weeds-out unwanted people?
Because it’s extremely important that Religion keep up the illusion that they’re doing good so they can keep profiting from people’s ignorance.
And if Religion is going to survive, it has to weed out all the people who want to show up and be a part of them, that will make them look bad. So rather than lift up the broken and help the needy, Religion invites and promotes the people who are really good at pretending they’ve got their spiritual ducks all lined up in a row. The Bible readers and thumpers, the Bible literalists, the hell-breathing white, supportive, married straight couples. The kinds of people who don’t make them feel uncomfortable when you are performing on stage, or when they sit next to you in a Sunday morning meeting. The kinds of people who will dutifully shut down anyone who questions denominational doctrine or the literality of the Bible while sporting a fake religious smile as they shift their uncomfortable asses on the pews.
Religion wants members who will willingly submit themselves to a system that lets con-artists pa-stars make millions feeding off other people’s insecurities, unchallenged, while claiming tax-exempt status, and they are ‘successful’ because God favours them.
Religion is a hell fear-mongering business that profits off people’s fear and ignorance.
Religion is a shame and blame game that deceives people into donating to the religious business and buy their gimmicks, all the while believing they are giving to God’s work, when in fact the deceived ‘pa-stars’’ are laughing all the way to the bank.
That gives con-artist leaders the audacity to claim that their wealth and status are a direct implication of their authority on the identity and character of God.
And that quietly suggests that these wealthy “pa-star” celebrities desperately need your money and your time. That you couldn’t possibly invest it in a better way than by giving it to these God-ordained leaders because they know what God wants for you.
They pretend that when they say “give all you have!” it’s an invitation to serve God and your community, not to simply build the pa-star a bigger house, buy airplanes, luxury cars and a fancier church building with flashier lights and a more expensive sound system so they can continue their circle-of-deception, instead of offering genuine help to people.
Is there any good in Religion? Somewhat. However, their show of good does not erase the evil they do.
People are leaving Religion because they are done with the blame and shame game, the perpetual bait and switch illusion, where the carrot is always held out just a little farther in front of the mouth. They have realized that a far more accurate message from Religion would have been:
“All are welcome, you will enhance our image by giving far more than we will ever advance your relationship with God”
Thus we have exited the religious denominated corrals. Unsure of how to interact with the real world much of the time because we’ve been so incredibly deceived and insulated from it for so long. And we’re doing what many of us call “deconstructing from religious deception and illusions”. We’re confronting the fact that we were deceived. No matter how much we gave, no matter how many times we let denominations treat us like spiritual paupers we would never break free from religious deception.
People realize that the way to successfully deal with Religion’s religious system is to walk away from it. Religion cannot be fixed from the inside by anybody, not even the system’s leaders and architects, because they do not want to lose a single bit of the power, recognition and wealth they’ve robbed from the people.
Religion is a man-ordained, man-led, man-fed, man-run, man-indoctrinated, man-controlled, devil inspired system.
You know that religious denominated box you have confined God to? Why not open the box and set God free. Then stuff your dead religion in and seal it. Set it on the edge of a steep cliff. Pull your foot back and kick the box with a forceful motion. Now turn to God and walk away and let Him show you who He really is. You will find that He is not the God that Religion believes in.
I wonder, is Religion an abomination unto God?
What do you think?
– Glenn Regular
Great piece.
I mean personally I think it’s humanity’s natural tendency to do this sort of thing. All down the ages it’s been like this in one form or another. Beginning in prehistoric times, most likely, humans saw nature as being both hostile and good at the same time, so they invented ways of placating ‘the gods’ who were of course angry and therefore the cause of all the bad stuff that happened – earthquakes, volcanoes, famine, drought, all the natural disasters you want. Skip a long way to Jesus who showed us what the Real God is really like. And over the years ever since prehistory, people still have this fear of death, and fears of all kinds of things, and live out of that place of fear. Then religion comes along and offers a way out of those fears for those who will conform…and there you go. Sorted. Modern-day Religion tragically/conveniently forgets that the fear of death – the ‘shroud that covers all nations’ (Isaiah 25:7) – has been defeated by Jesus once and for all. Of course, it’s not really in Religion’s interests to make sure that people lose that fear, or at least not without ‘balancing’ the good news with a load of bad news too. Like, conform or you’re toast. What I find amazing is how people love to cling to the bad stuff even once they have heard the Really Good News of Grace. Maybe that’s what ‘sin’ is?
The irony of the Religions position is that they try to get you to pray the ‘sinner’s prayer’, and make Jesus the ‘Lord of your life’. This means that you give your heart, your life, every decision, your possessions, your entire will, to Jesus. I have done that in the past. Jesus is placed in charge of everything that you are.
Now, when that’s Jesus Who you’re giving all that to, you can be sure that He is trustworthy. But bear with me. The thing is that the Religious actually don’t like it when Jesus really is the ‘boss’ of your life, because it means that they are not. And if you dare to claim that Jesus has told you one thing, but that they are telling you something different, then it’s you that’s not hearing correctly and they are the ones who are hearing God properly. And that’s gaslighting by any other name – getting you not only to believe what they tell you, but that you are wrong in everything that you are independently hearing from God. And it’s easy for them to do this. A new believer is characterised by being hungry to learn about God and His ways. He longs to know more of the things of God and he is still finding his way. But by grabbing that new believer as soon as he emerges from the egg, so to speak, the Religious are the ones who devour him. Maybe what’s needed for a new believer is to do like St. Paul did and to go off into the desert by himself for some years and hear the things they need direct from God (Gal 1:17-18)
But I suppose it’s going to be different for everyone. I do get the impression that, for those who have the hearts to receive it, the Grace message of Jesus is the thing they have been looking for all their lives!
On meeting Jesus, some of us were sidetracked into rule-keeping. Some of us were snatched away into legalism as soon as we heard the message, after we had met Jesus for the first time. Some of us needed to know we were accepted by God before we felt free to learn more about Him. And, to be fair, some of us in fact needed to enter through the path of legalism, because only by seeing its hopelessness could we even begin to look for something more. Religion did have its uses.
But once our eyes were opened to Grace, oh! the wonder! Oh, the freedom! For some of us, detoxification was needed. For others, straight in to Grace with no messing about. But however we got here, God has His hand on us, and He will never let us go!