A Churchless Faith

by Alan Jamieson

Foreword: Prof James Fowler

Faith journeys beyond evangelical, Pentecostal and charismatic churches

Publication info ISBN 0-473-07021-9

Published 1 November 2000.

What’s on this page?

About the book

What others say … (to reviews page)

Foreword by Prof James Fowler

About the author

How to order

Extracts from the book

About the book

The numbers of people who claim to be disciples of Jesus but want nothing to do with a church are rising, a trend that is expected to continue.

Focusing on the evangelical, Pentecostal and charismatic movements, this book talks about people’s journey out of the church, the struggles this involves and how they find a meaningful church-less faith. It also suggests ways that churches and their leaders can better understand and respond to members who are thinking about leaving.

Foreword

“The book you hold in your hands addresses a set of challenges that face more and more persons of faith, and their churches, in the 21st century. Its author knows the terrain he describes from personal experience, professional responsibility, and academic research. Alan Jamieson, pastor and scholar, uses personal interviews, his work with groups, and his research to help us understand how people may outgrow the patterns of faith offered in their churches. He studies how members who are drawn to the fellowship of evangelical and Pentecostal churches may find that for their faith to grow, they have to experience struggle and doubt, and in some cases, form or find new communities of faith.

Dr. Jamieson is a pioneer in the use of faith development theory and research. He illumines how pastoral care and spiritual direction — for persons and for groups — can help people make necessary transitions in their stage of faith for the sake of being faithful to Christ.

You will find in Alan Jamieson an excellent writer, a trustworthy interpreter of theory and research, and a compassionate counsellor and pastor. He offers a book both scholarly and practical. It stays close to human experience. It brings a compassionate spirit to the task of understanding the dynamics of growth and change in faith.

Written for professional researchers and pastoral leaders, Jamieson’s book is also accessible to thoughtful laypersons who want to study alone or together to better understand and grow in their faith journeys. I commend the book and its author to you with confidence and appreciation.”

James W Fowler

Candler Professor of Theology and Human Development, Emory University, Atlanta

Author, “Stages of Faith: The Psychology of Development and the Quest for Meaning.”

About the author

Alan Jamieson is a pastor who has also trained as a sociologist. His PhD, on which this book is based, researched why people leave their church and their journeys of faith outside the church.

From this study he and others at Wellington Central Baptist have created resources for individuals who leave church and are developing resources for churches to help them respond to and care for those who leave. This work has already helped many people in their ongoing journey of Christian faith.

Extracts from the book

Here are quotes pulled from each of the 11 chapters. >

Face-to-face with those who leave …none of the group members I met considered the group as church.

“… there is no real doubt that God exists and that he is real and cares and is concerned about me and everyone else.”

Many are people of deep Christian faith who are longing to continue and develop in their faith.

… the number of leavers from EPC churches is much larger than previously anticipated

… these same churches also have a wide open back door through which the disgruntled, disillusioned and disaffiliated leave

… the children’s attendance was generally short lived

The interviewees had all been involved as adults in their respective EPC churches for over 15 years.

They are unlikely to return to an EPC church again.

… they have moved outside the church but … claim to have continued in their Christian faith.

2 EPC churches

… the most significant single event in the history of the Christian faith in New Zealand was the 1959 Billy Graham crusade.

Evangelicalism, once regarded as marginal, has now become mainline.

… none of the senior pastors I spoke with described either themselves or their church as ‘fundamentalist’, each preferring to call themselves ‘evangelical.’

There is nevertheless a clear dependence on an uncritical reading of the bible as an external authority in matters of belief and ethics.

One of the great attractions of the EPC churches is the extended family feel …

The previous emphasis on theological training and ministerial induction gave way to charismatic leadership based on exceptional qualities or personal giftings.

Without the sheer weight in numbers of Christians in other countries, New Zealand Christians had to work together

… churches put enormous amounts of time, leadership energy and money into making their church more seeker-sensitive

3 The leaving process

Jane knew that church was becoming “very destructive” for her.

“I lost 99 percent of my support network.”

… followed by a reduced frequency of church attendance to the point that they woke up one morning deciding they wouldn’t go to church again.

Disillusionment with leaders or the church structure can be seen as a catalyst that acts as a trigger to the doubting phase.

“… after 12 years in the ministry I obviously had some seriousness about my Christianity, so I’m not talking out of nowhere.”

… people frequently give out clues that they are dissatisfied. Clues which may be noticed by others.

“But I certainly disengaged mentally and I started to build support networks outside of the church …”

… all that remains is a final decision to make the transition

… the majority of the interviewees went through a period of feeling anxious, scared, at loose ends, that they didn’t belong.

“And my kids … would get accosted. ‘Where’s mum? Why isn’t she here?'”

… pastors in the EPC churches have some feeling for the final factor that entices people to leave the church but not for the underlying process of leaving

… for many their leaving has lead to a deepening of their faith.

“I’m still sad about having to leave our church.”

Very few church leaders talked of incidents where they had sat down with leavers … to hear people’s reasons and learn from them.

One of the most disturbing results of the research is that the majority of those leading and pastoring in the EPC churches are ignorant of the crucial reasons why people leave the church.

4 Disillusioned Followers

Keith saw the introduction of this new focus as a man-made phenomenon rather than something from God. Laura saw it as evil.

“We would come home and we would feel physically ill.”

the leadership began to question their actions, accusing them of “bad body language,” … and “resisting the Spirit.”

… the focus of their disillusionment … was the dictatorial way the senior pastor was seen to control their church.

… when asked to outline the basis for these beliefs they inevitably refer to an unquestioned acceptance of some external authority source.

“I think the fellowship aspect with other Christians is very important.”

… the Bible is … always approached in a relatively uncritical fashion.

“There was never any doubt as far as shipwrecking our relationship with the Lord Jesus.”

“Pouring myself out and having to face that hurt, that disappointment — I just couldn’t do that.”

… the form of the church they left is not something they wish to return to …

“I used to believe blindly what the preacher was saying … but I think I question more now.”

5 Reflective Exiles

“It gave me a sense of identity, and for the first few years it was really good for me …”

Meta-grumbles question the deep rooted foundations of the faith itself.

“I acknowledged that I wasn’t being an honest person. It’s been a really good opportunity to just say ‘Well, what do I believe?’”

It is not easy to think a new thing; harder still to live in a condition of exile.

“I’ve had a deliberate policy of de-churching myself …”

“It has taken a really long time for me to sift out what was the church stuff and what was my faith …”

When I asked Jane about which theological questions she was struggling with she replied “All of it, basically.”

These people are moving beyond the sense of powerlessness they felt in the EPC church and are now looking at their faith for themselves.

“I don’t even know if there’s a Jesus Christ.”

“I don’t know about prayer.”

“But now I don’t see the Bible as the absolute word of God.”

6 Transitional Explorers

“When you don’t meet up to your own expectations of what a Christian should do and be, a crisis takes place.”

“I remember trying to tell a guy at church once how I was feeling. He just went sort of cold turkey.”

… they tended to ask not why, but what do you think; not why do you feel the way you do, but what do you feel?

“He very much allows us to trip and make stupid mistakes.”

“I still tithe regularly … but not to a church.”

“With my marriage breaking up, I’ve spent that many days on my hands and knees on the floor sobbing my heart out, just crying out to God.”

… she saw herself more as a “spiritual person than a Christian.”

“I don’t read the Bible any more.”

Bruce and Alison hope that their children don’t get caught up in some fundamentalist Christianity

Such rejection is generally considered as tantamount to a ‘guaranteed one-way trip to Hell.’

7 Integrated Wayfinders

The end result was a sense of being required to support ideas that he couldn’t accept as being truthful.

“I am closer to God now than I have ever been …”

The final factor that helped Tim and Karen rejoin a church was the way the minister and the church in general functioned.

“For me at this stage of my faith pilgrimage, my faith is self-sustaining, by and large.”

“… to me, that’s being close to God. It’s not only how I speak to my husband and kids, how I live out my wifehood, motherhood, but how I speak to the person in the shop.”

“… my faith now is far more personally profound than it’s ever been.”

Here people have a new willingness to use their time, energy, skills and resources in pursuit of their faith.

… we have a reaping-centred Christianity but we don’t know what to do with people as they mature in their Christian faith.

They’ve put themselves in the centre of a collection of perpetual spiritual babies.

8 Bringing it all together … where’s the map?

Jake quickly found that he was not alone in the feelings he had.

… faith has to be viewed as a dynamic, changing and evolving process not as something relatively static.

… people tend to stay where they are until the pain of staying where they are becomes unbearable.

“Then God is in this cup?” … “Goody! I’ve got him!”

It is very much a tribal stage, where being part of the tribe is powerfully significant to the person.

They … prefer to bury conflict than allow it to surface and potentially destabilise the sense of community …

At this stage the individual is increasingly uncomfortable with being asked to conform to the beliefs, teachings, values and actions of the group.

… truth must be approached from at least two or more angles of vision simultaneously.

… such cross-cultural experiences are generally sought after and often important aspects of the individual’s life and faith.

These are people of a rare faith quality encapsulated in the title ‘saint. ’

… for a growing number of people who are comfortable in an increasingly postmodernist society many EPC churches are going to be seen as personally faith limiting environments.

Many people who remain part of EPC churches also journey through the faith stages although they never leave the church

9 Jumping ship — making your own way

Having left the ship, leavers need some time to get their bearings, work through their grief, and plan the next phase of the journey.

The important change is what is going on within the individual.

What the leaver needs now is time, space, resources, understanding, validation and support for their own inner journey.

If you can’t leave the ship, get some distance between yourself and those aspects of ship life that cause you the most distress.

… they would ask that the person use the time they would have spent involved in church in other ways that nurtured their faith.

Another important gift someone can give the struggler is to connect them with an experienced and empathetic companion.

Perhaps most significant is the loss of a community of people to be a part of.

The old trust in the beliefs of the faith of the time are now replaced with unanswered questions and deep doubts.

… nothing compares with the intensity and struggle of the journey through the wall.

Now instead of arguing with his companions … Job chooses to pray for them.

Beyond the wall is a place of deep forgiveness.

10 Leaver-sensitive churches

“…that would never happen in the corporate world because that information is like gold.”

Now, when they are nearing the height of their earning capacity, have developed a well-honed skill set and have some maturity of faith, they leave.

… it can significantly reduce the negativity of their experience and their story. The story they will inevitable tell to those that are close to them.

… children need leaders who can act as strong role models and encouragers.

… faith is built on the tension between doubt and trust …

… it is important to speak openly about the dark places of the Christian faith, the absence of God and the times when God hides his face from people.

This means learning to lean into the difficult times and hang onto God even when there seems to be no answer and the heavens are barred.

Nearly 100 years ago Bishop J C Ryle said … ‘the vast majority of professing Christians did not pray at all.’ I am sure that little has changed since.

… church leaders need to understand the leaving process and be able to pick the early and relatively obvious clues that people are going through a faith struggle.

11 In search of Turangawaewae

“I feel I share things which are very costly for me to share, which make me very vulnerable and I feel that I am known all the more deeply for it.”

In all difficult journeys, including the difficult phases of the Christian faith, companionship is an enormous strength, motivation and reassurance.

“… even though you find things being stripped away, you also find that foundation of faith there.”

… in their discussion of women church leavers they speak of the ‘I don’t know’ that is paradoxically full of knowledge.

… to define oneself as marginal is to define one’s self in relation to someone else’s centre …

“I just would never ever take someone like that into a normal church. I mean, I just would be too embarrassed.”

… churches have much to learn from the gatherings of their ex-members and non-church-based groups can still learn from the EPC churches they have left.

Yet the Integrated Wayfinders and liminal groups have not rejected scripture’s basis to knowledge.

… space needs to be made within EPC churches for people’s questions, doubts and experiences of life that do not fit neatly into EPC faith doctrines.

The liminal groups, in contrast, had a more holistic focus on the wider lives of the participants. They are places of laughter and tears.

People see in the church just more of what they see and reject in the outside world: hierarchies, bureaucracies, and power struggles.

When you have only openness you don’t have much. A window stuck open is as useless as a window stuck shut.

The biggest danger area of people dropping out of faith is that they leave before they hit that stage of feeling responsible for the next generation.

Those within EPC churches may be right in asserting that such groups will not attract many teenagers, young adults and those outside the Christian faith

… we find ourselves in a unique position to model new ways for the future.