When The penny drops.

It seems to me in most cases apostasy occurs in those who were raised as Christians. They unquestioningly went along with it and basically aped being Christian. Then when they got older, and especially if they started taking theology courses, they started questioning Christianity for the first time. And basically decided they didn't like it. Most likely they never had any roots and had just been going through the motions. They started listening to worldly atheists celebrities like Rickey Gervais and Bill Maher, along with atheist intellectuals like Richard Dawkins and Christopher Hitchens, and liked what they heard.

I would be willing to bet, that many of those people had a belief in some type of work based salvation. And after awhile the burden of tying to earn eternal life by the way they were living just took it's toll.

I will also add that if a person has believed in Jesus for God's free gift of Eternal Life. It does not matter if they now identify as an atheist, they are still a born again child of God and will spend eternity with God.

Xeno.of.athens said:

Do you think so?
Presbyterians are Calvinists and eschew "works righteousness" more than most. So I do not think that former Presbyterians would have been taught to work their own salvation, with or without fear and trembling, as a means of gaining heaven.

Click to expand...

Calvinist are highly work oriented- with repentance of sin, making Jesus Lord of ones life. You can not make Jesus Lord without works.

They also have no assurance of Eternal Life. One of their preachers R.C. Sproul does not even know if he has Eternal Life. You can go to the 4:30 time place to listen to R.C. Sproul saying "I sure do not want to end up in hell"

Xeno.of.athens said:

In my experience, people who leave evangelicalism turn to atheism, and they generally don't turn back. There are exceptions. But generally, they go to atheism, and that's where they stay. And my observations of people I've known who were Jehovah's Witnesses, and some of them have been good friends, is the same.

This gets me to wondering if the shock of leaving evangelicalism-the transition away from that quite encompassing system of faith, and similarly with Jehovah's Witnesses-is so great that when the person leaves, they tend to reject all religion, and to do so permanently.

After I had become a Catholic, I had an SMS conversation with a Presbyterian minister who expressed fairly profound surprise that I had embraced Catholicism and thus had returned to Christianity. What he wrote in his SMSs gave me the impression that he expected that I would have become an atheist and would have never returned to Christianity, in any way, shape, or form. I can only guess, but I imagine that what he was saying was both based on his reading of Hebrews 6 and possibly pastoral experience as well. He will be one of the readers of this perhaps. I'm not sure if he will read it or not, and he will recognise that conversation if his memory is good. I mention the conversation only as corroborative evidence for what I'm about to say and what I've already observed.

It seems to me that Evangelicalism, along with Pentecostalism, possibly Jehovah's Witnesses, and maybe Mormons and others have a tendency to produce ex members who are atheists. I think the same may be true to a degree of Catholicism and Orthodoxy. But I think it's probably more pronounced in those more encompassing religions, such as evangelicalism. My thinking is that the devastation of the loss of that whole complex and embracing system of religion leaves such a strong vacuum that the person regards all religion as a write off. And if I'm not mistaken, that is the expectation of Calvinism to a degree, seemingly the expectation of those who are very strongly five pointed Calvinists (TULIP embracing Calvinism). But I may be wrong.

If anybody cares to comment, I would appreciate hearing from them. Especially anybody who has some direct experience with this or direct interest in it.

Click to expand...

It is called " recovery " especially when leaving a denomination that does not teach the Gospel of truth. When someone is recovering they're typically going through a complex process of de-indoctrination and reintegration. This involves deconstructing the beliefs and thought patterns which involves a period of neutrality ( which you call atheism). Of course there are some that never find truth through Jesus Christ of Nazareth but, the process of de- indoctrination is necessary in order to purge the lens of deception.
Blessings

Xeno.of.athens said:

In my experience, people who leave evangelicalism turn to atheism, and they generally don't turn back. There are exceptions. But generally, they go to atheism, and that's where they stay. And my observations of people I've known who were Jehovah's Witnesses, and some of them have been good friends, is the same.

This gets me to wondering if the shock of leaving evangelicalism-the transition away from that quite encompassing system of faith,

Click to expand...

Or is it because in evangelicalism, they are presented with a more Biblical Christianity and are in a position to better evaluate the real thing which, without their having the Holy Spirit, will clearly have no appeal for them, the real thing being lacking in man-made "improvements."

Speaking only for myself.

I left the Roman Catholic Church and became an agnostic. It was not a hard transition in beliefs.

The greatest moment of my life is when I accepted Jesus as my Lord and Savior. The Word became alive to me like never before. As I explored my new found relationship with Christ it was an easy choice to join the Pentecostal Charismatic community. 40 years later, I am closer to God than I ever have been.

d taylor said:

-
​

Calvinist are highly work oriented- with repentance of sin, making Jesus Lord of ones life. You can not make Jesus Lord without works.

They also have no assurance of Eternal Life. One of their preachers R.C. Sproul does not even know if he has Eternal Life. You can go to the 4:30 time place to listen to R.C. Sproul saying "I sure do not want to end up in hell"

Click to expand...

They believe in Once Saved Always Saved. A very strong form of the assurance of salvation if one is a 4 point Calvinist - it is bullet proof in terms of having assurance.

Xeno.of.athens said:

My thinking is that the devastation of the loss of that whole complex and embracing system of religion leaves such a strong vacuum that the person regards all religion as a write off. And if I'm not mistaken, that is the expectation of Calvinism to a degree, seemingly the expectation of those who are very strongly five pointed Calvinists (TULIP embracing Calvinism). But I may be wrong.

Click to expand...

But if they are 3 or 5 point Calvinists then they can retro-delete their assurance all the way back to the first day they were converted -- if it turns out that they turn away from God later in life. The problem is in that case - how can they ever know they have come back and been restored since in fact it feels just as the same as before when they claimed to be saved.

It is a question I don't see many of them asking themselves which might be an indicator as to how that leads to rejection of religion.

BobRyan said:

They believe in Once Saved Always Saved. A very strong form of the assurance of salvation if one is a 4 point Calvinist - it is bullet proof in terms of having assurance.





But if they are 3 or 5 point Calvinists then they can retro-delete their assurance all the way back to the first day they were converted -- if it turns out that they turn away from God later in life. The problem is in that case - how can they ever know they have come back and been restored since in fact it feels just as the same as before when they claimed to be saved.

It is a question I don't see many of them asking themselves which might be an indicator as to how that leads to rejection of religion.

Click to expand...

Actually it is not (once saved always saved), because they believe a person must preserver in the faith. So they will say in the parable of the soils out of the three soils that believed (2nd, 3rd, 4th), they say only the 4th soil was a true believer.

Why Most Calvinists Lack Assurance of Salvation – Grace Evangelical Society

I think there are a number of reasons. Assuming we're talking about people who were committed Christians, JW's or whatever, what underpins the sea change in becoming atheist is "disillusionment" in some form. Maybe they had a personality clash with somebody, a bad experience, or did some research and found the teaching they'd received had been inadequate. And they would have had no experience of God.

As with any convert, to or from a religion, they tend to take their new faith, even atheism, more seriously than their previous belief. I've gone from Protestant to Catholic and I take it seriously. But then I've had the advantage of certain spiritual experiences which have left me in no doubt God and the devil exist. A lot of people don't.

St. Paul for instance didn't owe his conversion from Judaism to Christianity to theological arguments - Christ Himself made it very clear to Saul that He was alive and well. His theological insights came later as he put his rigorous pharisaical training to Christian use. When CS Lewis was being trained in the art of dialectical thinking, he was an atheist being taught by the atheist "Great Knock", William Kirkpatrick. But after his conversion he put this training to good use as a Christian apologist.

He went the other way - from atheist to Christian, and took it more seriously than his previous atheism.

As for atheist converts listening to or reading the works of public atheists, we all tend to follow the opinions of those who think the same way we do. I'm Catholic, so I don''t go reading the opinions of John MacArthur or the Dalia Lama. Moslems will follow those who think like they do, Buddhists will do the same and so will atheists. That shouldn't surprise us.

It's a by product of the way we're made - Matthew 6:24 NIV “No one can serve two masters. Either you will hate the one and love the other, or you will be devoted to the one and despise the other." We will serve Christ or something else, but not both.

There was a time when I was an atheist, although I had been a nominal "Christian" when I was younger. Part of the reason I drifted away was the theory of evolution, but I also didn't come from a religious family background. I had a somewhat diffcult family background as well - my father, in his own words the night he died and appeared in my room, stated "I've been an absolute mongrel to you!"

For what it's worth "someone" turned up briefly in a vision when I was about 18 and said "What you've been through already would have destroyed a lot of people". Since God didn't seem to be much help, I turned away from Him, and really only turned back after I'd made a mess of things. If my life had been a bed of roses, why would I need God? I'd become disillusioned with atheism - it led nowhere.

In the final analysis, I think "disillusionment" is the key term whenever someone converts to another set of beliefs.

Hypocrisy is huge in all churches in the West, and it maybe in part, due to the lack of server persecution.

People call themselves “Christians” but are not true disciples of Christ and this will come out over time.

People leave the hypocrisy to be part of atheism which does not have hypocrites, but people that are admittedly seeking pleasure.

I don't think there's a one size fits all theory to explain "deconversion".

I also think that perhaps, as Christians, we might do a better service if we actually listen to our non-believing friends and neighbors when they tell us their stories, especially their stories of why they left the faith. Shoveling everyone into a hole and saying, "They were never real believers anyway" is a proverbial ostrich with its head in the sand. There may be valid lessons to be learned as we take our neighbors seriously--especially when they share their real hurt, their real confusion, and are being genuinely vulnerable. If we truly want to take Jesus seriously, that means we are obligated to take our neighbors seriously--even when what they say may not be pleasant. There's no use in clutching pearls when our goal is to be Gospel people.

-CryptoLutheran