The False Illusion of Free Will in Christianity

Sheldon’s note: Though I use the word “Christianity” in the title when talking about the Christian doctrines of salvation and hell, I am primarily referring to understanding of these doctrines from a fundamentalist perspective; I do understand that some Christians, especially Christian universalists, don’t even believe in the doctrine of hell at all.

My understanding of Christianity primarily comes from my fundamentalist upbringing and former beliefs, so that is my frame of reference when discussing theological matters.

Though fundamentalism both annoys and repulses me, few strains of fundamentalism (other than cults like the Independent Fundamental Baptist group and Sovereign Grace Ministries of  course), annoy me more than people on the more extreme end of Calvinist theology, what the writers of the Christian website The Wartburg Watch like to call “Neo-Calvinists” or “Calvinistas”.

There’s many reasons why I find their theology highly repulsive (and probably still would feel the same way if I had become a more moderate Christian instead of leaving Christianity altogether), but primarily it’s the way they view god, and the way they view humanity. This line of thinking, to me, completely strips away all sense of human dignity, and free will, all while claiming to believe in free will at the same time.

Due to the popularity of ministers/theologians like John Piper and R. Albert Mohler, and the influence of the denomination’s deep connections to the cult Sovereign Grace Ministries, which I mentioned earlier, Neo-Calvinism has become extremely popular among Southern Baptist churches, including the one I am undercover in.

“Jason”, my Sunday school teacher, and co-worker, who makes quite a few appearances in my Undercover Agnostic series (I talked about him just last week), has fully embraced this kind of theology (sometimes I can almost hear John Piper’s voice instead of him when he is speaking about theology).

I was having a discussion with him a few weeks ago about theology, it’s odd that whenever we are outside the church, he still wants to talk about and debate theology, I suppose it’s because he’s one of the few people I have come out to about my change in beliefs, and it’s like a fun challenge to him, he wants to know if he can hold his own in a debate with an agnostic.

The Allegations Against Sovereign Grace Ministries Are Getting Worse

The evangelical group Sovereign Grace Ministries, which has heavy ties to the Southern Baptist denomination, is facing a class action lawsuit by former members over sexual abuse by it's clergy and adult members.

5 of the 11 plaintiffs have had the courage to come forward and let their names be revealed, and face the accusations and attempts at silencing that often come in these situations.

I have a great deal of respect for the writers of The Wartburg Watch for calling out SGM, and standing with the victims. Some of the details coming out in the amended lawsuit (court filing can be read here), are extremely disturbing.

 SGM leadership refused to follow mandatory reporting laws, and took bribes to hide abuse:

From The Wartburg Watch (quotes from the lawsuit text):

109.  Defendants Ecelbarger, Mullery and V. Hinders, conspiring together with Mahaney and Loftness, violated the mandatory reporting obligations and conspired together to cover up [name withheld pending court ruling on defense motion]'s molestation of children. (p. 25)

Loss of Faith: My Guest Post at The Wartburg Watch

This is only my second time writing for a Christian website (the last time is when I was interviewed by liberal christian blogger Lana of Wide Open Ground).

I have have been reading TWW for a while now, and though I obviously don't agree with them on spiritual matters, I applaud the courage of the writers, Dee and Deb in their willingness to confront the problems within evangelical and fundamentalist circles.

They are not afraid to take on issues like young earth creationism, patriarchal pastors, cult groups like Sovereign Grace Ministries, or churches that try to protect pedophiles. I also admire their willingness to listen  to former Christians like me and Christian Agnostic, and let us explain why we have left the faith. The site has become a refuge for people who have been pushed around by fundamentalist/evangelical churches, whether they are agnostic, questioning/doubting, or still Christian.

Why Am I Still Blogging?

I have been blogging for nearly two months now, and I have truly been humbled at the response to the blog. Never would I have imagined that I would be average about 500 readers a week (who knew that many people would want to read my rambling posts?), and as of right now, 3,124 readers total over the life of the blog. I never knew it would take on such a life of it's own. I enjoy interacting with fans of the blog on comments, and on Google +, I've had some great guest posts written for the blog along the way, and even wrote a two part guest series for the blogger that inspired me to start blogging in the first place (Godless Poutine of My Secret Atheist Blog), which was a great honor.

I've exposed some dangerous Christian extremist groups like the IFB movement, and Sovereign Grace Ministries, shared some poetry from a great poetry writer, shared some laughs with a guest post written by Andrew Hall of Laughing In Purgatory, and shocked a few people with the guest post Happy Clappers, the bizarre story of a Google + follower's childhood exposure to fundamentalism. It's been a wild ride.

Despite all the fun, I'm beginning to wonder why I am writing the blog. I'm wondering why I'm spending so much time talking about religion, why it's become such an obsession for me.In some ways, I feel like I'm doing something important, exposing the horrors inflicted on people in the name of religion.

Many people who have never heard of groups like the Independent Fundamental Baptist (IFB) movement are downright appalled when they hear about the rampant pedophilia, (and sometimes retribution against victims and people who speak out against it, as I talk about in my post on Bob Jones University), the way they isolate themselves from the outside world (and force their young people to do the same), and their extreme beliefs and hatred including homophobia and misogyny. (Side note, see my post I Actually Don't Hate Religion as to why I use the term fundamentalist instead of Christian).

Sometimes, I feel it's necessary, and in a large part, I think my past experiences are driving this, but I have to wonder, what is my point in posting this? What am I hoping to accomplish? Why am I doing this?

I appreciate my readers, but most of them are skeptics and non-religious people, as to be expected from a blog like this. Is there anything that skeptics like us can do about the horrible acts committed by religion? The  people who really should be reading this blog aren't reading it, the fundamentalists that need to be confronted about this, and called out on their claim that you can not be a good person without believing in their religion (or at least in a god). Anyone with a skeptical mind (or has read my Exposing the IFB/Exposing Extremism series), can tell you that those who are part of fundamentalism aren't doing a very good job at being moral with a belief in god.

Many fundamentalists won't listen, though, they would rather try to explain it away, or attack the messenger, but there's a small subsection out there that though they may not respond, it will take effect eventually.

You see, there's people out there just like I was around a little over two years ago, who was teetering on the brink of unbelief, someone who didn't know if I truly believed in it all anymore, I was confused, felt guilty for doubting, and searching for answers

 It was during this time, that my faith was shaky that I started noticing just how awful the morals of people claiming to be hard core, fundamentalist believers in Christianity actually were. The people around me who were not Christians were actually more moral people, and lived out more the love others attitude that Jesus advocated. I talk about this in part 2 of my guest post for My Secret Atheist Blog, it led me to think: "If God truly is real, why isn't that reflected in the lives of the people who are supposed to be following him?" Aren't they supposed to be the moral example to the world?

If only I could reach this kind of audience, I feel like I could do more for this world, but I don't know if I am having this kind of impact at all. For every person who comments about the blog on Google + or directly on the blog, there's 40 or more people who read without commenting, how do I know who I'm reaching, and what kind of impact these posts are having?

I have also been questioning my motives in all of this. Fundamentalists often call former Christians/fundamentalists like  myself "bitter". The condescending tone they use when saying this implies a petty person who can't get over minor slights and annoyances, they almost draw a picture to the effect of a child screaming because mom won't buy them candy.

I think they get this picture from the number of "re-converts", prodigal sons/daughters who come back to fundamentalism. Many of these people claim that they only left out of "rebellion" or :"wanting to sin". This may lead them to think that those who have left, and won't come back are only using the pain of the past as an excuse to leave, so they can lose all sense of self-control. To be fair, some people to lose their sense of self control after leaving Christianity (especially young people), but it's because of an over reaction to the new found freedom they have found from the suffocating, impossible to meet standards they were raised into.

Others nearly have a nervous breakdown when they finally leave, they feel lost, their whole world was wrapped around their faith, what do they do now, especially since they came from an extremely isolating environment, and never got to experience the world before, and the outside culture. This was my experience when I left for college at 18, it was overwhelming, and led to a complete mental and physical breakdown, complete with depression, fatigue and panic attacks. This was 3 years before I even left fundamentalism, but just the exposure to the outside world that I was never allowed to experience was enough to create this reaction.

I have been questioning myself, have my past experiences actually made me "bitter"? Is this why I keep going after fundamentalism with such a fury? Is it nothing more than a personal vendetta, spite  against those who have wronged me? Should I be bitter?

Sometimes I think I'm more angry at myself than I am at people around me. After all, I'm the one who for 21 years, believed in all of it, the entire lot. Talking snakes? Yes, that's true! Noah's Ark? It actually happened! Hate anyone who doesn't look, think, act, like me and the people in my fundie circles (especially gays and people of other religions)? Yes! Try to make everyone live life according to the way I was taught by the church through the force of government? Absolutely!

How could I have been such a fool?

I know I was raised into this system literally from birth, but shouldn't I have seen the contradictions in the Bible, the damage that this belief system causes to the world, and the evil committed in it's name much sooner before I did? What does this say about me that it took so long to finally see it all?

I really don't know, maybe I'm just in a bit of a burnt out state right now......

Exposing Extremism: Sovereign Grace Ministries

In reading the great blogs of former fundamentalists like Bruce Gerencser, reading the responses to the promotion my blog on Reddit, and doing research for my posts on fundamentalism, I'm starting to realize that there's a dark world out there of various cult like fundamentalist groups out there, even more than I ever could have imagined, despite my personal experiences in that world. So many ministers, so many different churches and denominations that I need to tell the story of.

For this reason, I'm announcing a new series for the blog, Exposing Extremism. I know, fun, right?

It may be a depressing topic to talk about, but believe me, it's necessary. I'll try to break up these posts with other posts to keep from making this blog too depressing of a site. If you would like to help to try to improve the mood of the blog, you can submit a guest post that I can publish.

For the first installment in this series, I'm diving into the denomination known as Sovereign Grace Ministries (SGM), a group with 90 churches and 28,000 members, although at least 2 churches have left due to a major scandal.

SGM started in the 1970's, then named People of Destiny International, as a Pentecostal style movement, with it's two founders, CJ Mahaney and Larry Tomczak coming out of the Charismatic Catholic movement of the mid 1900's. Tomczak left the leadership in 1998, citing CJ Mahaney's slide towards Calvinist theology, he returned to the organization in 2011, but later said that his departure was an "unbelievable nightmare" and that his family had been threatened.


SGM's slide towards more Calvinistic theology won it some famous fans in the religious world, and the group has deep ties to major Southern Baptist Convention ministers and institutions.  Popular SBC pastor and speaker John Piper is a fan of Sovereign Grace Ministries, here is a transcript of a panel discussion he had at SGM's annual Together for the Gospel Conference on the subject of pornography. John MacArthur is also a supporter, here is a transcript of his panel discussion at Together for the Gospel on "prosperity gospel" ministers. Support for Sovereign Grace Ministries is growing in the Southern Baptist world to such an extent that they recently moved their headquarters to Louisville, Kentucky because of a dispute with it's former headquarters church in Maryland, and so the organization could be closer to Southern Theological Seminary, a Southern Baptist university whose president, Albert Mohler is a close friend of SGM co-founder CJ Mahaney.

Albert Mohler has stood behind CJ Mahaney despite accusations of having a very abusive and coercive leadership style within his organization, by several leading church members and leaders.A leading member of the movement, Brent Detwiler, released hundreds of pages of documents detailing statements and communications made by Mahaney and other leaders that he felt showed that evidence of dishonesty and abusive tactics on the part of the leadership. Some SGM pastors also have a reputation for harsh leadership tactics that include interfering in the lives of their congregants, ostracizing members they thought were not moral enough, and trying to cut them off from close friends.

Another criticism of the group and it's social structure is it's avocation of "courtship", a growing movement within fundamentalism to return to the old ways of thinking about marriage and family, no dates between young couples without adult accompaniment, no sexual contact, or even physical contact between young couples before marriage, etc. . Leading the charge is SGM pastor and popular author (in fundamentalist circles) Josh Harris. In his book I Kissed Dating Goodbye, he outlines his views on dating and marriage. The title of his book is rather ironic, because he believes that couples should not even kiss before marriage!

This kind of thinking has been criticized by former members as leading to young adults with limited social skills, and afraid to approach the opposite gender because of fear of people judging them , feeling that anything they say or do could be deemed inappropriate. Here's a few quotes from a blog opposed to SGM and Josh Harris' book:

"It has been reported that in some courtship circles including Sovereign Grace Ministries there is a lot of social “segregation” of the single men and. That is the pastors and parents don’t allow single men and women in their teens and older to interact much (with those of the opposite sex). This includes limiting this interaction even in group settings."

"One clear affect of this “isolation” is that it doesn't allow these single men and women to develop social interaction skills with those of the opposite sex. In other words, it leaves these young people with immature and underdeveloped social skills with those of the opposite sex. This would include the young men having problems approaching and talking to a single women and single women being shy and “unapproachable.” Put another way the singles become afraid of any interaction with the opposite sex."

"When singles don’t have these social skills it makes them more dependent and easily controlled by their parents. Without having the opportunity to develop the interacting skills needed to meet a mate, they can become dependent on their parents and others in finding a mate. I value the opinions and input of others on finding a mate but seriously question if parents should be the ones deciding who you should marry."

 What is more disturbing than this, however is the recent sexual abuse scandal that has come to light about SGM. Allegations have surfaced that sexual abuse was widespread throughout the group and committed by a large number of members,. Church leadership is said to have done their best to try to avoid having victims file charges against their abusers, and in some cases even retaliated against abuse victims for trying to seek justice. Some former members have sued SGM for the church's role in trying to cover up the abuse.

From an AP report:

"The plaintiffs allege a conspiracy spanning more than two decades to conceal sexual abuse committed by church members.  The alleged abuse happened in Maryland and northern Virginia in the 1980s and 1990s.  The lawsuit accuses church representatives of permitting suspected pedophiles to interact with children, supplying them with free legal advice to avoid prosecution and forcing victims to meet with and “forgive” the person that had molested them." 

"One of the three plaintiffs, a high school student in Virginia, alleges she was sexually assaulted when she was 3 years old and that the mother of the boy who abused her revealed the molestation to the church.  But church officials discouraged her family from reporting the allegations to police and, instead, repeatedly interviewed the alleged abuser and worked with him and his mother to determine how best to prevent any prosecution and publicity regarding the abuse. "

"A second plaintiff, a college student in Maryland, says she was sexually abused as a toddler by a church member.  She says the church pastor scolded her parents after they called the police and then tipped off the accused that he had been reported to the police.  She says her parents were instructed to bring her to a meeting with her alleged abuser so they could be “reconciled,” but that she was “visibly scared and crawled under the chair” after being brought into the same room with him."

"The third plaintiff says her adoptive father, a member of the church, sexually abused her older sister for three and a half years.  She says the church warned her mother not to pursue a prosecution, then kicked the family out of the church and denied the children reduced tuition to the school.  The man was ultimately prosecuted and imprisoned, the lawsuit says."

What is unusual is that though the church tried to cover abuse the rampant abuse, the abuse was committed by church members, not clergy, such is often the case with groups like Catholic church and the Independent Fundamental Baptist movement.

 I do not understand why that prominent Southern Baptist ministers would continue to support a group like this. Traditionally when a group has been going down the road that SGM has, the group either isolates itself from the rest of the world, even other Christian groups, or other Christian groups tend to start trying to keep their distance, scared that the group will drag down their reputation or they are scared of the extremist turn the group is taking.

This isn't happening with prominent leaders in the Southern Baptist Convention, and it's members should be questioning why. Why is a denomination which sees itself as mainstream evangelical having it's leaders associate with a group like this, and defend their leaders despite clear evidence of their extremism?
Should we all be worried that an already fundamentalist denomination, which also happens to be the largest Protestant denomination in the US with 16 million estimated members is developing an even closer relationship to a group like SGM? Should we be concerned that they will slide even further into the world of fundamentalism, and that their large numbers will mean more influence for the worse in US society?

I wonder how many Southern Baptists even know about their own denominations ties to SGM. Maybe we should tell them, and see their reactions. If you know anyone in the Southern Baptist denomination, pass this post onto them, they need to know who their leaders are associating with, it might be an eye opener for them.