Faith is dividing families. What does lament look like in our relationships to God and our loved ones?
Traditionally, the phrase “home for the holidays” has conjured up feelings of warmth and welcome. So much so that advertisers give us an annual slate of commercials linking their particular product to our shared longing for family connection and tenderness.
But increasingly, the holiday table is marked by frustration as families live out the demographic realities of an increasingly divided society. The holidays can be especially fraught for those questioning their religious upbringings—the very upbringings that the people sitting across from them were key to creating.
At first glance, religious deconstruction appears to be a question of changing one’s beliefs. Because evangelicals tend to center the experience of conversion, de-conversion also takes center stage. As scholar Karen Swallow Prior observes in her new book, The Evangelical Imagination, “what experience gives, experience can take away.”
But faith is a complex matrix of believing, doing, and belonging. Yes, we confess certain things as true, but we also act in ways that accord with them and live in relationship with like-minded people who bolster our confession. As a result, exvangelicals are not simply dealing with changing beliefs—they also face shifts in community, with family relationships often taking a direct hit.
As an elder millennial leading a multi-generational congregation, pastor Ben Marsh finds himself in the unique position of walking with families through this process. “I just sat in a room with several of my older members who shared the pain of separation from their children who have cut them off,” he recently posted on X, the site formerly known as Twitter. “When …
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