Deconvert At Your Own Risk (CH1PT4)

The title of this book and the method it uses was selected very carefully. Atheism is a rising concern to the Christian faith. And it should be. My own experience with Atheism should attest to this. But I do not think it raises the concern it ought to for most Christians. Many Christians think Atheists are a threat to the Christian faith. They think that atheists reject the truth and that they suppress it with their arrogance and pride. Many Christians would be shocked to learn and understand that atheists are right about many things. In many ways, if Christians learned this, they might think that they would loose their faith.

It is never a good thing for Christians to loose their faith, or for anyone for that matter. I hope no one reads this and thinks that there is no reason to be a Christian, or that because atheism is correct in many things it means that Christianity is now doomed. I don't want people to become "unconverted". This book is not about promoting doubt, or the endless despair one realizes when doubt cannot be overcome. I am not out to get Christians to question their faith, but rather to question their beliefs. And in many ways, it needs to be recognized that if Christianity is a cause for atheism then we must certainly consider why this is, and what changes need to be made to prevent this.

Beliefs and faith are two very different things. Beliefs are formed through the acquiring of information or data. We package this information into beliefs. The many sources that provide information are varied. There are reliable and less reliable sources. There is a long tradition of debate concerning what are the reliable sources of information for beliefs. This is represented under the philosophic discipline of epistemology. But to put simply, faith informs belief. It is not the belief, itself.

There is a special kind of Christian language which speaks of faith as the content of one's beliefs. For instance, the Christian faith can represent a certain set of beliefs, but faith proper, that is faith in its most basic sense, is not a set of beliefs, but an orientation that allows for certain beliefs to form. So it is entirely possible for a Christian to question his beliefs without ever experiencing a threat concerning his faith. It may turn out that a particular set of Christian beliefs is wrong. It may turn out that the entire set of Christian beliefs is wrong, but this says nothing of faith. Nor does it say anything of whether or not God is deserving of faith.

A deconversion does not question a person's faith, nor does it seek to change it. A deconversion only seeks to purify faith. A person who becomes an atheist turns his back on faith, he may hold unto a certain sense of hope and optimism, but he denies the kind of transcendent orientation required to achieve faith in God. He may have a kind of proto-faith, one that is intrinsic to all people who try to live to their highest potential, but he is not open to faith in God, unless there is some kind of evidence, or syllogistic argument to do so. The atheist for all intents and purposes is unconverted.

Now it is true that the line between a deconversion is dangerously close to an unconversion. I will be the first to testify to this reality. Many have sought the purity of their faith and have ended up as atheists. I know of many atheists who have gone down the road to understanding and have ended up not believing. It is a very common narrative. And it is one that should not be ignored or underestimated. Because of this the modern church has seemingly taken an anti-intellectualist stance in the culture war, and it has not fared well. As a Christian you should be afraid of loosing your faith. It is a very real possibility and one I cannot guarantee will not happen if you apply yourself to deconversion. For many, when our beliefs change we reconsider the reliability of the source we received that information from in order to form that belief. This is a prudent action and one that cannot be repudiated, and we have to accept this risk if we are going to commit ourselves to a pure faith.

Deconverting is dangerous. Just as it is dangerous to walk around with gold in your pockets. In fact, one can say that converting your gold to money provides security and safety to walk around in the land that you are visiting or living in. There are risks and reward for every decision we make. The decision to deconvert or discover the purity of faith has the same implications, and it very well could result in the abandoning of Christian belief. One has to decide whether or not the risk is worth it.

If there is one thing I have learned from my own story it is that everyone relates to their faith differently, uniquely, and personally. I cannot give you a formula for faith. I cannot tell you what will happen once you seek to purify your faith. We all have different perspectives and will all react differently to information and how to process it. Some of the greatest harm done to me was by Christians treating me like a devil because I questioned some of their most cherished beliefs. It is a hard reality to overcome, but just like thieves will gather around a man carrying gold in his pockets so will hypocrites gather around a man with a pure faith. The danger can cause hurt, pain, and unnecessary suffering. It can cause some to become angry, bitter, or even calloused. In the quest for a pure faith our hearts can turn and we can become the very antithesis of what we wanted to become.

This happened to me. When I desired to be the best Christian I could be, I began talking with atheists, thinking I could convert them. I studied them and their beliefs, and I further studied what the Christian responses were to their arguments. Arguments turned into arguing, and intellect became passion. My personal reactions were revealing to me that my faith was not as strong as I believed it actually was. It only opened me to the reality that at heart I really believed that my faith was powerless and reason could ultimately defeat my faith, which it did. I was not prepared, I did not have a guide, and ultimately I did not have the right understanding of faith in order to persevere it when it came against great opposition. I could have really used this book.

That is what this book is for. I not only believe Christians should seek a pure faith, one unencumbered from the bias of their conversion, but that every Christian at one point or another will face a crisis of belief, because they are being confronted with the reality of what is required to have a pure faith, and will be unprepared for such a confrontation, and they will either betray their faith by hunkering down into legalism, traditionalism, or authoritarianism, or they will betray their faith by abandoning it all together. This book is meant to show a third possibility. Conversion is not fated to meet the extremes of hypocrisy or abandonment. It can be deconverted.