Skip to main content

Trapped with Mennonites

By Ivan B ~

Reading various stories on exchristian.net has been very helpful to me as I realize that there are many other people who are going through the same experiences and thoughts. I do not feel so alone although in my day-to-day life I basically am very alone. I would like to share my story and elicit your comments and suggestions.

Throughout my life, I have had many epiphanies. My learning style is: Get curious, go to the library, read, read, read, read, think, think, think... epiphany! For some reason I have difficulty making sense of the smaller facts that accompany a concept until the missing piece drops into place, and voila! I have the whole picture.

I have learned many things this way-- concepts of science, business, human relations. One thing I did not learn this way was my Christian faith. I learned it from my mom. And from other folks in the Mennonite church that I belong to and have attended basically every Sunday for my whole life. I learned it slowly and tediously. I was indoctrinated with the fear of hell from a very young age, and since I was very curious, I learned a lot of the church doctrine at a young age. But I remember having lots of thoughts of skepticism, even as a pre-teen.

However, I was lulled to sleep for over a decade since then with the teaching of the church elders. They taught that questioning is wrong. One time when I innocently asked a question I was told that “The apple that is too high, you let it hang.” One really horrible thing that they believe and teach is that everyone who does not believe as they do is eternally damned. I mean even all other Christians. The belief that Jesus existed is not enough-- no, you have to believe all of his teachings according to the interpretation of this church. If you don't believe in a woman's head covering, you're a gonner. You will be in question if you own a TV or play anything competitive (sports, games) or wear anything non-conforming to the unwritten dress code.

These people talk about the hypocrisy in other churches a lot, and so it was not hard for me to believe that there is nothing substantial to the other churches. The Catholics are wrong because of this, and the Amish are wrong because of this, and so on. I am almost ashamed that it took so long to realize that the group I am in is no different. I excuse myself by saying that it has been a tough nut to crack. I had to figure it out for myself.

I have always been a regular at the library, which is a little odd for a Mennonite youth. I was often accused of being lazy because I spent a lot of time reading. I was also told that my reading was not “profitable”. I read very little fiction (that is highly discouraged), but rather non-fiction. I self-censored myself in that I avoided subjects such as biology, feeling it would be displeasing to God. I did not pursue a post-secondary education as that was also discouraged. I began to become very guilty for reading “un-profitable” non-fiction. So, with completely pious intentions, I read all the “approved” church books I could-- huge musty tomes of fine print such as Menno Simon's Complete works and Martyrs Mirror (not to mention regular reading of the Bible all along).

As I read these books and learned more, especially of the history of the Mennonite churches, I began to see more and more conflicting information. As I read these books and learned more, especially of the history of the Mennonite churches, I began to see more and more conflicting information. I began to become afraid of this other literature, and decided that I was safe with the Bible only (because it's straight from God, you know). The same bible that I had read over and over, believing that everything in it harmonized and was perfect, began to reveal more and more contradictions. Strangely, that just made me read it even more. I was in a frenzy, looking for the truth, trying to figure this out, and praying as hard as I could for light, guidance, understanding. I spent a lot of time thinking about it all as I went about my work. I was meditating on the Word of God. And then I had an epiphany. I awoke.

That should be the end of the story, but sadly it's not. I am still a member in good standing among my fellow Mennonites, am a hymn leader, and am responsible for some of the administrative work in the church, although an agnostic within. Why have I not made my true beliefs known? When I leave, I will be excommunicated and shunned by the church, including by my closest relatives. Thankfully, I am not married. When I am thus shunned, they will not hug me, eat with me, or agree to any exchange of gifts or money in either direction. I know that this is what's ahead of me. However, I operate a business on the premises of another church member, and basically it's for my business that I'm still in the church. I love my work and I love my customers and it's my dream job.

It is almost inevitable that I will have to give up my business. I am renting from these folks because I can't afford to buy my own farmland that I would need to carry on. It is not a type of business that is easily moved, or I would move it. I will not get my investment out of it if I liquidate it now. There is a slim possibility that I could sell it as an operating business. If I would openly share my beliefs and be excommunicated now, the conflict between me and my landlord would be unbearable. To evict me would be against their beliefs, however, to make my life miserable is not against their beliefs. They would not do any business with me (collect rent, etc.), so essentially in the eyes of the community I become a huge squatter taking advantage of them. I want to somehow get out of here without totally destroying my reputation. So in the meantime, I'm thinking. I believe in the power of the human mind. Just being able to share my story is helpful, because it's difficult to hold my true self inside. I have not told anyone in my real life, because I don't want anyone in the church to become suspicious. I don't want to get called in by the elders to be examined. I have better things to do, and when I leave, I want to leave on my own terms when I am ready. I don't want to be booted out. In the meantime, I need a shoulder to cry on sometimes. Thank you for listening.

Comments

Popular posts from this blog

Are You an Atheist Success Story?

By Avangelism Project ~ F acts don’t spread. Stories do. It’s how (good) marketing works, it’s how elections (unfortunately) are won and lost, and it’s how (all) religion spreads. Proselytization isn’t accomplished with better arguments. It’s accomplished with better stories and it’s time we atheists catch up. It’s not like atheists don’t love a good story. Head over to the atheist reddit and take a look if you don’t believe me. We’re all over stories painting religion in a bad light. Nothing wrong with that, but we ignore the value of a story or a testimonial when we’re dealing with Christians. We can’t be so proud to argue the semantics of whether atheism is a belief or deconversion is actually proselytization. When we become more interested in defining our terms than in affecting people, we’ve relegated ourselves to irrelevance preferring to be smug in our minority, but semantically correct, nonbelief. Results Determine Reality The thing is when we opt to bury our

So Just How Dumb Were Jesus’ Disciples? The Resurrection, Part VII.

By Robert Conner ~ T he first mention of Jesus’ resurrection comes from a letter written by Paul of Tarsus. Paul appears to have had no interest whatsoever in the “historical” Jesus: “even though we have known Christ according to the flesh, we know him so no longer.” ( 2 Corinthians 5:16 ) Paul’s surviving letters never once mention any of Jesus’ many exorcisms and healings, the raising of Lazarus, or Jesus’ virgin birth, and barely allude to Jesus’ teaching. For Paul, Jesus only gets interesting after he’s dead, but even here Paul’s attention to detail is sketchy at best. For instance, Paul says Jesus “was raised on the third day according to the Scriptures” ( 1 Corinthians 15:4 ), but there are no scriptures that foretell the Jewish Messiah would at long last appear only to die at the hands of Gentiles, much less that the Messiah would then be raised from the dead after three days. After his miraculous conversion on the road to Damascus—an event Paul never mentions in his lette

Christian TV presenter reads out Star Wars plot as story of salvation

An email prankster tricked the host of a Christian TV show into reading out the plots of The Fresh Prince of Bel Air and Star Wars in the belief they were stories of personal salvation. The unsuspecting host read out most of the opening rap to The Fresh Prince, a 1990s US sitcom starring Will Smith , apparently unaware that it was not a genuine testimony of faith. The prankster had slightly adapted the lyrics but the references to a misspent youth playing basketball in West Philadelphia would have been instantly familiar to most viewers. The lines read out by the DJ included: "One day a couple of guys who were up to no good starting making trouble in my living area. I ended up getting into a fight, which terrified my mother." The presenter on Genesis TV , a British Christian channel, eventually realised that he was being pranked and cut the story short – only to move on to another spoof email based on the plot of the Star Wars films. It began: &quo

ACTS OF GOD

By David Andrew Dugle ~   S ettle down now children, here's the story from the Book of David called The Parable of the Bent Cross. In the land Southeast of Eden –  Eden, Minnesota that is – between two rivers called the Big Miami and the Little Miami, in the name of Saint Gertrude there was once built a church. Here next to it was also built a fine parochial school. The congregation thrived and after a multitude of years, a new, bigger church was erected, well made with clean straight lines and a high steeple topped with a tall, thin cross of gold. The faithful felt proud, but now very low was their money. Their Sunday offerings and school fees did not suffice. Anon, they decided to raise money in an unclean way. One fine summer day the faithful erected tents in the chariot lot between the two buildings. In the tents they set up all manner of games – ring toss, bingo, little mechanical racing horses and roulette wheels – then all who lived in the land between the two rivers we

Why I left the Canadian Reformed Church

By Chuck Eelhart ~ I was born into a believing family. The denomination is called Canadian Reformed Church . It is a Dutch Calvinistic Christian Church. My parents were Dutch immigrants to Canada in 1951. They had come from two slightly differing factions of the same Reformed faith in the Netherlands . Arriving unmarried in Canada they joined the slightly more conservative of the factions. It was a small group at first. Being far from Holland and strangers in a new country these young families found a strong bonding point in their church. Deutsch: Heidelberger Katechismus, Druck 1563 (Photo credit: Wikipedia ) I was born in 1955 the third of eventually 9 children. We lived in a small southern Ontario farming community of Fergus. Being young conservative and industrious the community of immigrants prospered. While they did mix and work in the community almost all of the social bonding was within the church group. Being of the first generation born here we had a foot in two

Morality is not a Good Argument for Christianity

By austinrohm ~ I wrote this article as I was deconverting in my own head: I never talked with anyone about it, but it was a letter I wrote as if I was writing to all the Christians in my life who constantly brought up how morality was the best argument for Christianity. No Christian has read this so far, but it is written from the point of view of a frustrated closeted atheist whose only outlet was organizing his thoughts on the keyboard. A common phrase used with non-Christians is: “Well without God, there isn’t a foundation of morality. If God is not real, then you could go around killing and raping.” There are a few things which must be addressed. 1. Show me objective morality. Define it and show me an example. Different Christians have different moral standards depending on how they interpret the Bible. Often times, they will just find what they believe, then go back into scripture and find a way to validate it. Conversely, many feel a particular action is not