In Name Only (part 3)
It doesn’t matter what the Constitution says. This is a Christian nation.
This is the midpoint of the chapter. We’re in the thick of it now: navigating the deconstruction community, naming what’s broken, and seeing how the infection spreads beyond the church walls.
Part 3: What the Deconstruction Community Got Wrong
Being part of the deconstruction community over the past few years, I tried to stay aware and keep in mind what an outsized influence evangelicalism had and was still having on my life.
Content creators in the deconstruction community spend most of their time thinking and talking about things that most people (because most people are not in the deconstruction community) aren’t thinking and talking about all day, every day.
And sometimes, when dramas would pop up in the deconstruction community, I would feel crazy, because the things that were such a huge deal online were complete non-factors and non-issues to my friends in real life.
And trying to explain why this person was mad at this person, and the history of whatever beef — it was a waste of time.
And living between those two worlds helped me stay focused and kind of keep track of myself.
Because sometimes I would find myself trying to figure out how to explain something that was going on, and then just realize/remember — it wasn’t worth it.
Because it would literally have no effect on my friends’ lives.
And probably shouldn’t have been having such a huge effect on mine.
And ultimately, being able to make that distinction both helped and hurt me — I realize now that I made a mistake in thinking the problems surfacing in exvangelicalism weren’t as entrenched or deeply rooted in “the real world.”
Even as our government is literally falling apart all around us — being burned to the ground and dismantled — in the name of this faith.
Even as we know that and name that in the deconstruction community.
Somehow it never occurred to me that evangelicalism has been able to wreak so much havoc because Christianity is mainstream.
And people don’t even realize to what extent we are all purveyors and perpetrators of this thing.
Evangelicalism is running rampant.
Because its toxicity is sewn subtly throughout our whole society.