Stuck in the tumult

Christian nationalism, theological rigidity, and moral militarism

“Ships in a Storm,” Ivan Aivazovsky, 1860.

My girlfriend and I talk sometimes about our friends from college. “Remember so-and-so? Do you think he’s still a Christian?” Most of the time the answer is, unfortunately, a no. Deconstruction happened for them and slowly or quickly they slipped away from the faith. I am almost more surprised when I find out someone is still claiming Christianity.

I think I understand why many of them walk away. The 2016 election, Trump, Covid. Masking, livestream, vaccines. The 2020 election, (white) racial animus, supreme court selections.

I mean, when I list it out, I kind of wonder what kept me around, what keeps me around still.

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It’s been four years since I last saw my Grandma Sue. She was, hands down, the holiest person I’ve ever met. As a kid—whenever she would stay at our house—I’d sneak out of my bed in the morning and tiptoe to her room. Each day, inevitably, her light would be on and she’d be sitting up in bed.

I’d crack the door open and smile, and she, each day, inevitably, smiled back and motioned for me to climb up onto her bed with her. I’d sit next to her, my little body leaning into her side like Moses in the cleft of the rock, and she would tell me stories. It was my favorite time of the day.

As I got older, I learned why she was up so early. She was praying—praying for me and my brothers and my sister. Praying for Mom and Dad. Praying for each of us kids’ future spouses. Praying, praying, praying.

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I’m the director of admissions for a seminary, and as a part of my job I get to visit Christian colleges and universities across the country to recruit future pastors, counselors, and social workers. Today I’m at a university in the Pacific Northwest and attended their chapel.

I stood for worship and watched as students across the room held their hands in the air and closed their eyes. One student knelt on the ground, another slightly rocked back and forth on her feet, her hands in front of her. It was beautiful, heavenly.

Still, though, I wondered how many of them would persist once they left college; how many of them would deconstruct because of some future crisis.

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In elementary school, I was terrified of tornados—an outworking of the OCD wrapping around my little mind. I’d check the windows of my classroom at least a hundred times a day, looking for a gray cloud or a potential funnel. I feared going to sleep at night because a tornado could come then. My mom—in an act that epitomizes who she is—wrote down verses from Psalms on little notecards and put them by my bed. Whenever I was scared, she encouraged me to read those verses.

They helped; God helped. As I got older, the Psalms became my resting place when OCD continued to grow and churn. They remind me that God is near, even when God feels far away. I can pray with honesty to God; I can ask God to save me.

I kept those notecards by my bed for years.

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The woman who preached today in the chapel told a story about her time in college. She took a Christian beliefs class from a professor who, a few years prior, lost his mother, his wife, and his young daughter in a car accident. He stood in front of the class—still a believer, still a Christian—and told them about the people who surrounded him during that time, other Christians who showed up in substantive ways to care for him and carry his burdens.

She said that was the Christianity she was attracted to, that was the Christianity which helped her stick around when times were hard.

Why is that version of Christianity so quiet in the face Christian nationalism, theological rigidity, and moral militarism? The 2016 election, Trump, Covid. Masking, livestream, vaccines. The 2020 election, (white) racial animus, supreme court selections. It’s all just so loud.

And we blame people for deconstructing?

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2016 and 2017 are my angsty Christian years, my own deconstruction. The communities I thought I belonged to felt more like wolves in sheep’s clothing. They were taking sides I couldn’t believe, preaching a gospel that felt privileged, elitist. I had a hard time discerning who was a disciple and who was a pharisee.

But my dad stood in the gap. As a kid, there was never a question I couldn’t ask him, and he always told me that I could talk to him about anything. So, as an adult, I decided to put that to the test: I brought him my angst, my indignation, my anger.

He took it all. He had conversations with me, he disagreed with me, he challenged me, and he told me he loved me. He held me to Christ. When everything felt out of orbit; when gravity—the people and places that kept me tethered to Christianity—dropped away, my dad stood there and held onto me with a malleability—a love—that let me question, pivot, and grow.

I credit my conversations with him along with my Grandma Sue’s prayers and my mom’s Psalms with keeping me in the faith.

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Many of those deconstructing have been tricked by chest-beating Christians who tell them there is only one version of Christianity—a Christianity bent towards Christian nationalism, theological rigidity, and moral militarism. They tell them to either take it as is or leave forever, that there is no room for differing interpretations of things like the 2016 election, Trump, Covid, masking, livestream, vaccines, the 2020 election, (white) racial animus, or supreme court selections. Either agree with it all or move on.

It’s no wonder so many move on, but I mourn because that doesn’t have to be the case. There is a Christianity—often quiet—that vibrantly cares for others and carries the burdens of its neighbor. It celebrates the fruit of the Spirit rather than uniformity in ideological lockstep. It is found in my Grandma Sue’s prayers, my mother’s Psalms, and my dad’s conversations. My prayer is that those deconstructing will be surrounded by this type of Christianity and loved into abundant life.

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When people were leaving Jesus, he once turned to his disciples and asked if they would leave also.

Peter answered. “Lord, to whom shall we go? You have the words of eternal life.”

May your deconstruction—your disentangling—bring you to the arms of Christ.

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