Reading Time: 3 minutes I am a fully-fledged secular atheist. I also love Christmas. It is probably a learned thing involving decades of cultural normalization following a childhood ensconced in an at least nominally Christian Christmas tradition. What I mean by this is that I, like many people of my era, spent Christmases at school singing carols and hymns, […]
Christian music
Posted inMusic
The lived contradiction of atheist choir directors
Reading Time: 6 minutes After I put out a call for atheist public school choir directors to interview for a research article, I received an email from a colleague: “The choral music education program of any school must include music from the masters, which of course will include some sacred music. It is a part of our culture.” I […]
Posted inLeaving Religion
How Phanatik’s faith pool drained
Reading Time: 10 minutes Last week, popular Christian rapper Brady Goodwin, aka Phanatik, announced his deconversion. He released a video on his Facebook account describing how it happened. And his extimony perfectly illustrates a concept I call the faith pool. Today, let me show you what this concept means and how it worked for Phanatik.
Posted inGeneral, Religion
‘Christian Rock’ During the Satanic Panic (LSP #158)
Reading Time: 8 minutes Hi and welcome back! I’ve wanted to feature this topic for a while now, and today seems like a great day for it. Way back when, evangelicals clutched their pearls over an imaginary Satanic plot to take over the world. A big part of that plot centered on demons influencing the hearts and minds of […]
Posted inReligion
Hillsong Songwriter Marty Sampson Has Left the Jesus Building
Reading Time: 9 minutes Marty Sampson, a songwriter for the Christian band Hillsong, recently announced his deconversion on his Instagram account. Today, we’ll look at that announcement, and at the main reason he gave in it: the stuff Christians don’t talk about.
Posted inUncategorized
Promises, False and Discovered
Reading Time: 9 minutes Now, you’d think that sensible salespeople would want to avoid making promises they can’t possibly keep. Alas for Christians, these promises are so much a part of their overall sales pitch that they can’t. Join me for a look at false promises, and why they devastate Christian evangelism attempts.
Posted inLGBTQ, Religion
Another Christian Band Bites the Dust.
Reading Time: 8 minutes I saw this one video the other day and thought it was really good–but something twigged in my memory about the band in it. From there, I began tallying up similar bands, and now I’ve got to ask: what’s going on with Christian music lately? Is it just me, or is there like a lot of them who started out Christian and now aren’t?
Posted inReligion
Kim Burrell’s Homophobia.
Reading Time: 5 minutes Kim Burrell is a gospel singer and minister who wants us all to know that she thinks gay people are ickie. But in displaying her homophobia, she’s accidentally illustrated something about where her religion is going, and why.
Posted inReligion
Evangelical Churn: The Fury of the Tribe
Reading Time: 9 minutes You can probably imagine that Christians aren’t terribly happy about Shannon Low’s deconversion. Today we’ll look at what his onetime tribe is making of his defection, because most ex-Christians have encountered much the same treatment–and if you’re a newly-deconverted person and haven’t yet, hang in there because you probably will at some point.
Posted inReligion
Evangelical Churn: A Defection, Observed
Reading Time: 10 minutes Thousands of people every day join the ranks of the ones who know. That number comes from Christian leaders themselves, who might have reason to misrepresent and inflate it–but I see no reason to think it’s not accurate.
Well, our ranks just expanded recently with the deconversion of the leader of a Christian rock band. I want to show you how his story fits in with the experiences of other people who’ve left Christianity (including me!), because next time we’ll be talking about why the tribe reacts to poorly to deconversions.