New to this...
Posted: Sun Sep 02, 2018 9:56 pm
So for the time being, I'm going to stick with the user name only. Eventually it'll hit a point where I'll reveal my name, but because of family, I am not wanting to cause more trouble at the moment. The minute it goes public will cause some big infighting.
I'm originally from southern California and grew up in some of the strictest congregations there. The process of questioning started about the time I was baptized, even with years at the FC camp and all the studying. The forest congregation read dying 20 years ago, but is still holding on with a very small group. They remain loyal to a toxic elder and a preacher who should have left five years after getting there. The deacons were just as toxic (some physical abuse was observed between one and someone younger than me).
Leaving there, I was at another congregation for about five years. I stopped going during a bad break up, no one bothered to contact me during the six months until I withdrew. No one contacted me after, they just wrote me off. At that point, they were rushing head long to the more conservative side anyways.
Many family members are still in the NI COC and even consider themselves liberal, but are still hard and fast to the very conservative end of even that. One cousin is a deacon.
My wife and I are at an Anglican church, but not diehard members.
What got me to find the ex-COC community was my parents visiting the area I'm in now and going to church with us. The conversation was cordial, but still very much "you know the truth" in push me to drag my wife to a COC in order for me to come back.
Funny thing is, after that visit, it really confirmed the decision to not go back. So this is still new to me, 25 years of strict doctrine, a couple years of questioning, and now several years of being on the fence brought me to this point. I'm glad to have found a community with people who have been there with many of the same experiences to get different views from.
I'm originally from southern California and grew up in some of the strictest congregations there. The process of questioning started about the time I was baptized, even with years at the FC camp and all the studying. The forest congregation read dying 20 years ago, but is still holding on with a very small group. They remain loyal to a toxic elder and a preacher who should have left five years after getting there. The deacons were just as toxic (some physical abuse was observed between one and someone younger than me).
Leaving there, I was at another congregation for about five years. I stopped going during a bad break up, no one bothered to contact me during the six months until I withdrew. No one contacted me after, they just wrote me off. At that point, they were rushing head long to the more conservative side anyways.
Many family members are still in the NI COC and even consider themselves liberal, but are still hard and fast to the very conservative end of even that. One cousin is a deacon.
My wife and I are at an Anglican church, but not diehard members.
What got me to find the ex-COC community was my parents visiting the area I'm in now and going to church with us. The conversation was cordial, but still very much "you know the truth" in push me to drag my wife to a COC in order for me to come back.
Funny thing is, after that visit, it really confirmed the decision to not go back. So this is still new to me, 25 years of strict doctrine, a couple years of questioning, and now several years of being on the fence brought me to this point. I'm glad to have found a community with people who have been there with many of the same experiences to get different views from.
