Liberal Christian at sea with evangelical church

[overwhelmed2023]

I am part of a home group connected to an evangelical Christian church. I thought at first , having been at Baptist and C of E churches previously, that due to the relaxed nature of the meetings, it was fairly relaxed.
However I'm realising that noisy meetings, free prayer, guitar playing in worship songs etc aside, the church is quite conservative/ extreme in views on abortion, marriage, homosexuality, trans issues , feminism and now Im wondering whether to leave. I believe the Bible can be read in context and with some interpretation and this seems at odds with their views. Some things make me feel really angry, other things just seem really off the wall and I feel out on a limb and as if I'm not a ' real' believer.
Can anyone relate or help ??

For me, fundie usually is a package of claiming to be a Bible-based church with much word by word analysis of the text - with no acknowledgement of historical context or issues of translation, noisy worship usually with guitars or a band, encouragement of semi-ecstatic experiences such as speaking in tongues or at a lower level putting a hand in the air halfway through a song.

These are usually coupled with strong beliefs against homosexuality, abortion, rights for women. There may be women in ministry but they will be doing 'soft' roles such as pastoral care or youth rather than independently leading the church. Most charitable works of the church will be aimed at evangelism rather than practical things such as foodbanks, warm spaces or other local community help.

Oh yes that's very like the church. Often we will go over words/ sentences to get the exact meaning. They do pray/ speak in tongues at times and definitely arm in the air and clapping. Definitely anti homosexuality abortion and feminism.

Apostolic have you heard of it?

Honestly if any Christian church is openly supporting or encourages abortion I would be running from that church instead.

There is absolutely nothing biblical nor Christ-like about it. It's the murder of a human life. No other way around it.

Good. That church and everyone in it would be better off without you.

@victarion I know right? I'm just a terrible person for speaking on behalf of those most vulnerable without a voice of whom millions are killed each year.

You mean all the women killed by lack of access to safe legal abortion?

Anyway, have you got anything helpful to say to the OP or are you just here to preach your anti-choice misogynistic bile?

It probably is quite helpful to the OP to realise that there are people who idolise their narrow interpretation of being 'biblical' to the extent they've no qualms about being homophobic and misogynistic.

Psalm 137 v 9.
Happy shall he be, that taketh and dasheth thy little ones against the stones.

Don't assume that there are any absolutes in the Bible, even when it comes to killing children.

I regret the amount of my life I wasted in a church like yours OP. With hindsight I should have left when I was at your stage with it or earlier. They won’t budge an inch or show any respect for you or your views. Unless you agree to be converted to their views it will all get very nasty. You can be a Christian without joining what is effectively a cult.

BS. And I'll stick with St Thomas Aquinas on the issue rather than some half-educated random on MN. You are aware, aren't you, that the whole life-begins-at-conception malarkey never even occurred to any theologians until the 19th century?

Absolutely, very much my own feelings. I was profoundly damaged by my contact with a church that was lively and welcoming on the outside, but brutally controlling and narrow minded on the inside. It's left a terrible mess behind.

I find that it is often the more traditional churches that are the most Liberal.

The newer churches try to appeal to the youth with chirstian pop/rock, pastors in jeans strutting on the stage and exicting lighting but actually have very conservative (I would argue fundamentalist) beliefs ... no female preachers, not accepting to LGBT etc. Oh and also pushing for tithing ALL THE TIME.

I would find a church that aligns most with your beliefs.

That's my experience too

I've been feeling a bit stressed about leaving the home group. It does feel a bit like leaving a cult or Masonic circle or something. One minute you have these automatic friends who you 'do life' with the next not sure if I'll see them again.
The leaders have gone cold on me and when I mentioned a different group I'd have to have a chat with the overall leaders of the groups - what would I have to say I'll be ' good' from now on ???

yes... a lot of my 'friends' at uni were the 'automatic friends' from the CU ... they didn't last.

It's a hard step but I don't think you can truly be yourself in company with this set of people and a different group from the same organization is unlikely to be any better.

I have just found your post OP, I hope by now you have left this controlling church and moved on to one that is mainstream liberal Church of England. You discovered their immovable views on some topics, but what these 'complementarian' churches do not make clear is their basic bigotry towards women. People have stayed in such churches and become involved, and only find out later that women cannot be elders or preachers. Not only that, but they are scripturally supposed to be submissive to men and never in authority over men This is called male headship, and extends to marriage. So the woman has to submit to the husband, who is her head. Yes really, in 2023, and in a growing number of evangelical churches. This exists even within one minority sector of the C of E. They never, say this, but the clues are there. If you look at a church website, they rarely if ever mention their central belief in male headship, but the list of priests and elders will be exclusively male - apart from perhaps one or more women doing womens or youth ministry (they are not allowed to preach to mixed congregations, or even to boys over age 13). Another major clue is that they may say they regard the bible as inerrant , which has become a euphemism for weaponising parts of it.
I hope this post may help others who are thinking of joining a church. Ask the vicar his views on these issues. Even a few men who support womens ordination, still believe in male headship. They will say men and women are equal before God, but go on to say women are subordinate in some ways.

Don't let this put you off going to church and finding God. Most churches are inclusive and welcoming and support women.

Just brief msg as am on tube.
Thankyou for reply.
You are right about the inerrancy of the word of God, and male headship which the married leaders of my home group believe( took me ages to find this out).
A year or so I challenged the fact it was all male leaders but this has recently changed and now women can preach/ be leaders. Though there are no female national leaders yet and the ones who have become leaders in the church are basically married to the male leaders. I don't know of any single leaders who are female.
The headship belief is not taught by the pastor but still prevalent. I could'nt believe it when I found out.

I had a similar sense of shock, OP when I found out about this - in fact I was so upset and angry that it made me physically ill. I really hope you have left this toxic church environment and found a better, more loving and normal one. God is love, Jesus is love. We should be worshipping Him, not some false reading of scripture in order to preserve human male supremacy. Good luck with it all.

I had a problem wondering which of the details I believed in. I tried Low and High Anglicans, Methodist, United Reform and Baptist. Over many years that is.
I fell out with Anglicans because our Bishop and out vicar were opposed to ordaining women. Methodists have started drifting back toward CoE. Getting wound up about unconsumed wine after communion.
For the last 5 years I have been going to a spoken Communion on Wednesday morning. Village church been holding services for everyone local for hundreds of years. Peaceful.
OP Beware of Congregations that are heavy on Old Testament. Much less tolerance or forgiveness with them.
If you have a United Reform near you, give them a try. We moved away from a good one. Really miss them.

to notfeeblebutPhoebe
You say you moved away from Anglicanism (a huge movement worldwide, and the predominant one in the UK) because of a particular church where vicar and bishop did not agree with women's ordination. I would not stay in that particular church either, because where you get opposition to women being priests, you also get the male "headship" beliefs that subordinate women in otgher ways too including in their marriages (think having to obey husband). But I just wanted to point out that most Protestant churches do not operate under this belief, particularly in the Church of England which is generally more liberal. You will find these beliefs (though carefully hidden usually) in a minority of C of E churches, but more likely to find them in the big urban evangelical churches rather than the liberal rural "choral and floral" ones.

I'm not a regular attender but have gone to church previously and I would totally agree with this. I've found Anglican churches (even high church) to be thoughtful and inclusive. I went to a couple of more evangelical churches with a friend who liked that kind of worship and found them much more narrow in their outlook and attitudes.