Christians need a healthier approach to deconstruction
Roughly one year ago, I was finally forced to deconstruct my faith. It’s been a long and painful journey that’s ended with me coming to terms with some harsh truths about American evangelicalism.
Breaking down my faith was triggered by the gaping disparities between the life of Jesus and personal experiences in a church that was rotting from the inside out. Doing this in 2020 made it all the harder, with worsening disparities coming in rapid-fire succession.
I certainly haven’t been alone in my generation. I know more people under the age of 40 who are deconstructing their faith right now than the past several years combined. The reasons why are myriad. The us vs. them mentality that is endemic in American evangelical culture, nationalism, and abusive leadership are all rejected in the teachings of Jesus, yet they are central tenets in large swaths of church life today.
Deconstruction, explained
Faith deconstruction is the systematic taking apart of one’s belief system for examination.
This can mean asking a wide array of questions ranging from the theological to the practical. It can mean questioning concepts such as biblical inerrancy, the culture of their church, the practical application — or misapplication — of the Gospel, and much more. Faith deconstruction can begin at many different points for many different reasons.
If this just sounds like an intellectual exercise it definitely is not. Deconstruction is confronting hard questions triggered by grievous experiences that a believer has suppressed for years, forcing them to finally deal with the doubts and concerns that have always been there, lurking in the shadows.
Doubt stemming from church hurt is usually what drives deconstruction. The question underneath all the other questions is relatively straightforward: Can I trust my beliefs and the way I operate in them anymore?
Many people begin this journey due to the nationalist and fundamentalist ideologies that are antithetical to the Gospel, yet widespread in American evangelical churches. It may even be appropriate to define these deconstructions as more cultural instead of being about faith. Rejecting false teachings or challenging unhealthy behavior are primary goals. It’s not an event, but a journey.
Why many evangelicals control and abuse believers who deconstruct
In American evangelical spaces, deconstruction is often treated as destruction. To understand why, we have to see much of American evangelicalism for what it is in the real world: a socially conservative subculture built around the worship of rigid hierarchy and consumerism, rather than being representative of the greatest commandments Jesus gave in Matthew 22:36–40:
“Teacher, which is the great commandment in the Law?” And he said to him, “You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind. This is the great and first commandment. And a second is like it: You shall love your neighbor as yourself. On these two commandments depend all the Law and the Prophets.”
Simply put, evangelicalism in the American context is driven by a deep desire to be right instead of doing right. Jesus commands us to love, but many white evangelicals seek to know and control. Ask just about any evangelical what it means to be a Christian and they’ll tell you accepting Jesus as your personal savior, followed by a cultural list of issues and lifestyles you have to be for or against. Greater emphasis is often placed on these cultural things in practice. You’ll almost never hear anything about loving God and your neighbor.
I’ve written about this phenomenon before. American evangelicals often take conservative cultural views and inject them into the Gospel, corrupting the hope Jesus gives with fear, political idolatry, and nationalism. They vote Republican regardless of the candidate, commit open idolatry to patriarchy, and decry cancel culture and socialism despite their engagement in both practices.
This kind of culture is incredibly brittle and can be found in most evangelical denominations today. Virtually every issue is non-negotiable and nothing in the culture can be questioned. Discussing changing an approach or shifting a belief, even when it concerns the most unimportant of issues, puts the entire system at risk of collapsing. This is why discussions about tweaking styles of worship or updating communication strategies in a church steeped in evangelical consumer culture are often met with hysteria and fierce resistance.
It’s no surprise that many evangelicals become controlling and abusive —or fall on their fainting couches— when they learn a believer is deconstructing their faith and their church’s culture. When a Christian starts the journey of deconstruction, they are often questioning this broken culture that many evangelicals have placed on a pedestal over and above Jesus. Many evangelicals feel threatened by someone deconstructing because they fear the person will stop supporting their culture, which in turn weakens their power and provides space for others to ask hard questions. In this context, controlling and abusive behavior aren’t knee-jerk reactions, but part of a fear-based system that actively combats change.
Simply put, much of American evangelicalism is about conformity, not community. It’s about sameness, not unity.
Of course, not all evangelicals respond to deconstruction in such destructive ways. There are certainly Christians who identify as evangelical and also put loving God and their neighbor before being right and wielding supposed absolute truths like a cudgel. Sadly, the growing numbers of people leaving evangelical churches will tell you from personal experience that those types of evangelicals are a minority.
How evangelicals hurt deconstructing Christians
Those who are deconstructing are often seen as threats to be managed or destroyed, not human beings and fellow believers who need community and support.
Slipping up and expressing genuine doubts and good-faith questions to the wrong evangelical can lead to verbal abuse. Christians who are deconstructing often face accusations that they are abandoning the truth and being corrupted by the world.
I can speak from personal experience. During my deconstruction last year, I received an onslaught of gossip that I wasn’t a true believer and was told that my personal and professional lives would fall apart if I abandoned the truth that is evangelical culture. This despite my love for Jesus being stronger than ever before and my personal life outside of evangelical spaces arguably being in the best place it has ever been. While the uneducated and self-worshiping arrogance behind these words stung, they helped me realize much of what I was deconstructing was the broken church culture I found myself in.
Disturbingly, Christians who deconstruct can also be ejected from their church homes. For example, last year I watched several Christians around me be forced into deconstruction during the peak of the Black Lives Matter protests.
What triggered their deconstructions wasn’t the murder of George Floyd, but the depressing response to Black Lives Matter — and their desire to help — that they were met with in their white churches. They watched elders and congregation members lean hard into All Lives Matter narratives and the culture wars attached to them, completely oblivious to the reality that their fellow citizens were hurting, and had been for a long, long time.
These believers were incredibly restrained despite what they were seeing and hearing. They could have easily decried the racially-charged rhetoric and anti-Gospel behavior, but they quietly tried to nudge their leaders in a better direction and fellow congregation members to be more open-minded and loving. All the while, they were dealing with deep questions concerning these cultural beliefs and practices in their faith communities.
They paid a high price even though they were gentle and asked questions instead of making demands.
Two of these young men were asked to leave their church. Another woman who told her Bible study group she was questioning how her church leaders had responded to the upheaval and some other issues more broadly was told she would no longer be allowed to attend the group, even though she was a founding member. Less than half of these believers are still at their churches today. Most have become so disillusioned that they haven’t bothered to start looking for a new church home.
Many believers who are deconstructing inside of American evangelicalism are understandably cautious about who they share their doubts with because of well-known realities like these. Some never make it through the journey. Instead, their faith is destroyed by evangelicals attempting to control them.
Evangelicals need to take the “love your neighbor” approach when they see a Christian deconstructing
In reality, deconstruction is not destruction. While some Christians decide to walk away from their faith, many do not. In fact, they flourish after entering a new faith tradition and change components of how they live their beliefs. Deconstruction is only the first part of a two step process. Reconstruction comes next: when a believer puts things back together, often making practical changes based on their experiences and coming into contact with much deeper and richer Christian traditions.
Evangelicals would do well to embrace the teachings and model of Christ when they see a Christian deconstructing. Frankly, they need to live up to their own ideology. People inside of American evangelicalism are constantly being told that they need to go deeper into their faith. Deconstruction and reconstruction are arguably the purest version of that. Punishing believers to do what they have always been told to do is not just damaging, it is also incredibly hypocritical.
Instead of placing someone in a spiritual pressure cooker that turns deconstruction into an anxiety-ridden catastrophe, evangelicals should embrace one of the greatest commandments Jesus gave: love your neighbor.
Unsurprisingly, Jesus gives us an example of how to work with believers who have doubts in John 20: 24–29:
Now Thomas, one of the twelve, called the Twin, was not with them when Jesus came. So the other disciples told him, “We have seen the Lord.” But he said to them, “Unless I see in his hands the mark of the nails, and place my finger into the mark of the nails, and place my hand into his side, I will never believe.”
Eight days later, his disciples were inside again, and Thomas was with them. Although the doors were locked, Jesus came and stood among them and said, “Peace be with you.” Then he said to Thomas, “Put your finger here, and see my hands; and put out your hand, and place it in my side. Do not disbelieve, but believe.” Thomas answered him, “My Lord and my God!” Jesus said to him, “Have you believed because you have seen me? Blessed are those who have not seen and yet have believed.”
Jesus recognizes that doubt is simply part of the human experience. So what does he do? Jesus greets the disciples with a message of peace. He encourages Thomas to come closer. He is kind, loving, and understanding. Jesus sees a believer who is struggling and decides to help.
It’s also important to note what Jesus does not do. He doesn’t dehumanize Thomas, nor does he punish him for having doubts. Jesus does not eject Thomas from the community, nor does he view Thomas as a threat to be managed.
What can evangelicals learn from this? When it comes to deconstruction, they should reject their destructive cultural ritual of decimating doubters and embrace the ways of Jesus. After all, what value does faith have if you never allow it to grow or be tested?
Closing Thoughts
Every year, I watch more and more people my age and younger —including ones who strive to live their faith well— flee their churches following a season of quiet desperation. They begin deconstructing in hopes of liberating themselves from nationalism and fundamentalism, only to be brutalized by an evangelical subculture that puts the desire to control everyone and claim absolute truth about everything over the beauty of a community built on loving God and their neighbors.
By the time they are running for the exits, their faith is a shell of its former self. The culprit is often seen standing in the background: an evangelical reveling in their exercise of raw power over others. They warned that questioning their culture and the patriarchy was dangerous, and that “liberal media” was corrupting. Cosplaying as some sort of warrior for a militarized, cheap version of Jesus, they openly engage in self-worship around the false belief that they are a “true believer.”
One wonders if such evangelicals realize that their words and actions show the depths of their own distrust, not just of others and the brittle culture they worship, but also themselves. To act like your belief system depends on others not questioning those beliefs in their own lives is to have a tragically low level of trust in the strength of those beliefs, much less your ability to live up to them.
Perhaps this deep level of introspection is simply too much to ask of evangelicals who engage in such repressive behavior. When you’ve confused rugged American individualism with the hope the Gospel offers, or elevate out of context passages of Scripture above Jesus, your life becomes about retaining cultural and political power.
Control of others to retain that culture becomes the religion. It is a religion completely devoid of hope and humanity. And for what?
So they can keep fighting their precious culture wars? So their church avoids racial integration, much less building bridges to other communities or even talking about doing so? So women aren’t allowed to have a say in leadership or even a voice at all? So leaders of the boomer generation can lord their coveted power over younger generations, demanding respect that has not been earned and idolatry that is antithetical to the Gospel?
For evangelicals, this is about power, both clinging to it and accruing more of it. Not for good or just cause, but for power’s sake. It is arguably the most corrupt form of Christianity in the United States today, because many evangelicals have replaced Jesus with a militant savior attached to an idolized culture, even as they invoke Jesus’ name.
For now, many in the fold who are forced into deconstruction by the realities around them have few good, immediately apparent options, even as they stare down the barrel of an identity crisis. Not dealing with the disparities between evangelicalism and the life of Jesus is no longer on the table. Asking for help is a move fraught with risk. Going public with doubts is inviting brutality. In this climate, deconstruction is akin to climbing a cliff with no rope or harness, all the while not really knowing what lies at the top, much less at the bottom if you are pulled down by abusive evangelicals.
As bad as this moment feels, I believe there is hope to be found in the future. Many former evangelicals are landing in living rooms, back yards, and new evangelical churches that truly are centered around Jesus. Perhaps even more are discovering the many other vibrant traditions in the Christian faith and joyfully entering those spaces. They are drawn in by these denominational cultures that are deeply rooted in history, liturgy, and the mindset of the early Church after having little to none of these anchors for years. And some seem comfortable living in exile for now, finding community through random meet-ups with fellow believers they can have real conversations with, podcasts, and messaging threads.
Admirably, some have decided to stay in the places that view their reconstructed faith with suspicion and anger, knowing that their own experiences can help others. Despite the suffering that inevitably comes with deconstructing inside of evangelicalism, more and more believers find themselves forced into asking hard questions following years of idolatry exposed by a national political crisis and global pandemic.
An older generation of American evangelicalism may never change, but perhaps that’s all the more reason to stay to help others, or go elsewhere for a season and wait out this ideology’s decline that is already underway.
Time is on the side of those seeking change. There is plenty of good work to do and bridges to build in the meantime.
I explore faith and American church culture from Memphis, TN. Never miss an article by signing up for my newsletter and subscribing to the podcast. You can also become a member or leave a tip to help keep this site free and open to all.
