Leave Your Church

Not quite sure where this is from- Patheos

I've left a lot of churches in my short life—from the Pentecostal church of my childhood, to the Assemblies of God church that took its place when I was in high school. I left that church when I entered college and it didn't seem quite "smart" enough. Then, in college, my friends and I discovered a church staffed by, and rife with, seminary students. For a long time, this felt like the right place to be. My wife and I were married in this church, but we eventually left it too, when it became clear that a few stodgy elders were holding back women from access to church leadership.

When we moved to New York City we, of course, headed straight for Manhattan's megachurch, but despite everybody's best intentions we were swallowed up in the enormity and, as artists who couldn't afford to live on the island, we always felt like outsiders. From there we tried a smaller plant of the mother church where, in that microcosm of Presbyterianism, our hunch that we simply weren't Presbyterians, or reformed in our theology at all, was confirmed.

Despite all of this, I wouldn't say we were ever church shopping, so much as intentionally exposing ourselves to the rich variety of Christian traditions. The Pentecostal church of my youth was where my parents' Jesus Movement conversion landed them, for a while. My 20s were spent experiencing as many traditions, theologies, and orthodoxies as possible, and figuring out where I belong. This inter-Christian multiculturalism has tremendous value, as does all multiculturalism, despite the recent hyperbole-laden screed against it by World Magazine's Joel Belz.

More here-

http://www.patheos.com/Resources/Additional-Resources/Leave-Your-Church-Jonathan-Fitzgerald-04-06-2011.html