The Christian’s Guide to Ex-Christians: Ex-timonies and Deconversion Stories.

~by Captain Cassidy from "Roll To Disbelieve"

I should have guessed that one of these fine days Christians would discover ex-Christians and our custom of sharing deconversion stories, or (as we often call them) ex-timonies. As usual, Christians have totally gotten the whole matter wrong about these stories–and they’ve revealed a few very unpleasant aspects of their own tribe in the doing. So here, at last, is the real skinny: here’s what an ex-timony actually is, who tells them and why, and how they differ from Christians’ testimonies.

A Quick Primer: Christian Testimonies.

A Christian testimony is a narrative that Christians are encouraged to develop and rehearse after they either convert to or confirm their faith, in order to share it with both Christians and non-Christians.

Usually, a testimony takes three parts. First, the pre-conversion life (which is meant to sound either hopeless and dreary, or else wracked with dysfunction, or else excitingly fast-living–but in all cases the Christian longs for something more). The second part moves into the conversion moment itself, often presented in conjunction with some miraculous occurrence. And the third inevitably involves how much happier and better the Christian thinks life is since conversion; this last part will often be an exact inversion of the first part.

All three of these elements are typically exaggerated at least.

If aimed at audiences that are largely already part of the correct flavor of Christianity, then the testimony is offered up as a way of reinforcing tribal beliefs and to gain the tale-bearer some attention. If aimed at other audiences, particularly at those who are hostile to the tale-bearer’s ideology, then it will be told with an eye more toward selling the Christian’s ideology to those folks. If you like narrative structures as much as I do, then you might find them interesting from that standpoint!

Remember, though, that these stories are developed for a reason that goes well beyond just seeking camaraderie and attention. Christians think that testimonies are excellent sales tools, and so every Christian within these groups must have a testimony. Most Christian websites have at least a few pages devoted to the task of creating and honing an adherent’s testimony, and Christians can easily find books and video series as well.

And what’s so comical is that Christians are actually flat-out wrong about the power of testimonies as a sales tool.

In reality, I’d be hard-pressed to think of anybody I’ve ever known who heard a testimony and was impressed by it–even (especially?) if it involves miracles. I’m including my actual years as a true-blue Christian in that count–and boy, was that a deflating experience. Typically most people know to discount any mentions of miracles at all, especially claims of miraculous turnarounds in personality. But as with any other bad or wrong idea that enters into the ideology of a broken system, now that this misplaced trust in the power of testimonies has entered into Christians’ belief system, it can no longer be examined or criticized.

(You’ll know when Christians are finally starting to get serious about their churn rate when they start asking what really works to reverse their declines.)

Ex-timonies.

A successful deconversion means that at some point you realize there is absolutely no going back to Christianity. You realize that you have seen enough, that you couldn’t possibly believe it again even if you wanted to. It’s not a case of God “changing the locks” when you leave the house, it’s more a matter of realizing that faith is not a sound guide to what is true. ~ThereAndBackAgain, May 2017

Now that we’ve lined up what testimonies are and why they’re created and told, we’re ready to look at what deconversion stories, or ex-timonies, are.

An ex-timony is a usually-spontaneous telling of the story of a Christian’s deconversion from the religion. No websites, books, or videos exist to coach an ex-Christian in making these. That said, they do usually feature an essentially three-act structure as well. Usually the first part of the story involves establishing the person’s Christian bona fides through a quick summary of their time in the religion. The second part involves the moment that they finally realized that they’d been sold a bill of goods about Christianity–though sometimes their deconversion follows a series of small discoveries and is more a drifting-out experience than a dramatic ending. And the third involves how they’re doing since deconverting. Sometimes the third act is an inversion; often, however, it isn’t.

Read more at [patheos.com]