By Fernando Alcántar ~ T he United Methodist Church has proposed a historic split over gay marriage and LGBT clergy . And it was a long time coming. How do I know? I lived it. You see, I worked in high levels of leadership for the United Methodist Church in the peak of my Christian ministry from 2008-2011. I was the Director of Leadership Development for Young People for the California-Pacific Conference of the UMC (Cal-Pac)—which in that time oversaw almost 400 churches across Southern California, Hawaii, Guam and Saipan. In my job, I oversaw youth and young adult ministries across the region, ran conferences, led leadership councils, and took part in the activism young people had in legislation—among them the always hotly debated issue of acceptance of gay marriage. Fernando Alcántar on the cover of the last edition of The Aquila , an e-magazine he had created for youth and young adult ministries. I came to the UMC after spending 8 years at Azusa Pacific University (APU)—the ...

By Fernando Alcántar ~ Facebook keeps making friend suggestions of people who de-friended me when I came out of the closet and To the Cross and Back was published. Understanding how the Christian mind works, I get it—they are afraid of my story. C hapter 14: “The Valley of the Shadow of Death” is one of the hardest passages I have ever written. Leaving (what I believed to be) Christ and Christianity was so difficult that it literally drove me insane, taking me to a place so dark and painful it is hard to believe I made it out alive—the story forever bleeding on those pages. When I came out of the closet as both atheist and gay, I came in the most vulnerable state I had ever been to the people who meant the most in my life. I visited people around the country, spending time with them, laughing, drinking, joking, crying, and at the end of the conversation I told them where I was, that I loved them, and that I wanted to stay part of their community. And over and over I was told tha...

By Fernando Alcántar ~ I ’m sorry. I used to challenge the veracity of your love and doubted your understanding of it on a regular basis. I believed you didn’t really know love, or understand the fullness of love, because you didn’t know Christ like I did. At times, I’ll admit, I wondered if that hurt you—but to be honest, at times I also hoped it did. I figured that if you felt that way than somehow that would discomfort you enough into seeking what I considered to be the source of true love—Jesus. But, I also did it for selfish reasons. I boasted of some proprietary rights on love because I considered that to be my greatest evidence toward the existence of an invisible being. That feeling inside my chest was really the one true “tangible” piece of truth I could sort of really hold on to. Let’s face it, not much else can truly be proven between Genesis and Revelation. 1 John 4:8 reads,  “Whoever does not love does not know God, because God is love.”  This theme is nar...

By Fernando Alcántar ~ I just finished watching the movie MILK — yeah, for the first time. It came out on Netflix and I added it to my list. When the movie first came out in 2008 I was at the peak of my Christian career. I was just leaving my role as Senior Coordinador of North American Partnerships for Azusa Pacific University and starting the one as Director of Leadership Development for Young People for the California-Pacific Conference of The United Methodist Church. I was leading hundreds of churches, speaking in front of thousands of believers, and traveling the world as an evangelical missionary, all preaching a gospel I believed to be true and able to save lives from eternal damnation. And part of this “true gospel” that would save us from filthy sin included that God was against gay-marriage, that homosexuality was a mental disorder, and that it was our duty as servants of The Lord to impose his will on earth—even if people couldn’t see it themselves yet. Some peopl...

By Fernando Alcántar ~ A set of news has been making the social media rounds lately. In it they mention how “According to the American Psychological Association (APA), a strong and passionate belief in a deity or higher power, to the point where it impairs one’s ability to make conscientious decisions about common sense matters, will now be classified as a mental illness.” To read one of those articles click here . ( Editor's note: the quote above attributed to the APA was debunked as false. However, the basic premise explored in this article was written about in an authentic 2011 Psychology Today article linked here: Religious Beliefs: Divine Revelations or Mental Disorder? ) Many people have attacked me, criticized me, and ridiculed me since I left religion. “You really didn’t know God,” they tell me, among other colorful terms, because it is the only way they have to cope with the idea. Religion is something so real so them that leaving it behind feels in the least like a...

By Fernando Alcántar ~ I I am a man with no past. And you are probably one too. When I was born, my family put the seal of Catholicism on me and taught me that since I was Mexican, I was Catholic just as much. The rest is a story I’ve shared on the book To the Cross and Back: An Immigrant’s Journey from Faith to Reason . A story of how as a teenager I converted to Protestant Christianity trying to escape loneliness and seeking healing from childhood trauma. I then became a state leader for the Foursquare denomination in Baja California —where I was a tongue speaking, demon-casting young leader. I then became a globetrotting missionary for Azusa Pacific University —one of the largest evangelical colleges in the nation. And then became head of youth and young adult ministries for the almost 400 churches in the Southern California-Hawaii region of the United Methodist Church . For about 30 years I obeyed the rules of the Bible as best as I could, including hiding the darkest sec...