People Divulge The Final Straw That Made Them Leave Their Religion

Referred to by social science as the "Great Dechurching," people in the United States are leaving organized religion behind.

Here are just some of the statistics researchers gathered in 2023:

• Number of people leaving—in the last 25 years, about 40 million Americans left churches and other religious institutions
• Percentage of people unaffiliated—in 2023, 26% of Americans identified as religiously unaffiliated, a 5% increase from 2013
• Percentage who left a religious tradition—18% of Americans left a religious tradition to become religiously unaffiliated
• Percentage who identify as atheist or agnostic—the number of atheists (from 2% to 4%) and agnostics (from 2% to 5%) doubled since 2013
• Percentage under 30 and unaffiliated—43% of 18 to 29-year-old Americans reply "none" when asked about religious affiliation
• Percentage who left due to LGBTQ+ teachings—almost half (47%) cited negative attitudes about/discrimination of LGBTQ+ people as one of their reasons
• Percentage of Gen Z women—54% of Gen Z adults who left their formative religion are women
• Percentage who still believe in God(s)—over two-thirds (68%) who are non-affiliated with an organized religion claim to still believe in a God/Gods

Reddit user PizzaBliAnanas asked:

"People who left their religion, what was the final straw that made you leave?"

Tithing

"Asking me for a paystub to verify I was actually tithing 10%. Pastor was driving a new Cadillac."

~ Reddit

"Kind of the same thing. My parents had a college fund for all the kids, in one account. My sister drained the account when she dropped out and left home."

"I was a sophomore in high school, so my parents started saving money for my college everywhere they could, and so they stopped tithing. Still went to church every weekend."

"We got a letter from the church saying they noticed we had stopped tithing and asking if everything was okay. They didn't actually care that we were still going to church, just that we had stopped giving them money."

"Incidentally, that pastor was removed while he was part of an investigation for embezzlement of church funds."

~ daabilge

"A tithe is defined as 10% of something—money, crops, livestock, goods, services."

"In religion, a set percentage of income (usually 10%, but higher in some sects) is asked for from members to be given to the local church or the religious institution. Because the custom of tithing is mentioned in religious texts, many Christians and Jews practice it as part of their faith."

"However, the direct teachings of God nor Jesus call for it and historically tithing was a secular practice of taxation by a monarchy or other authority such as the landowner or government. It entered religious texts as a practice borrowed from the secular world to maintain churches and provide for the needs of members of religious orders—rabbis, priests, monks, etc..."

"There is no holy or divine call or payoff promised by God nor Jesus in religious texts for tithing, but many religions teach there is as a means to guilt, shame, bribe or frighten members into giving them money."

~ piejam

Judge Not, Lest You Be Judged

"I left when I noticed that my 'community' felt more like a 'judgmental audience'!"

~ FairySleek

"That has deeply annoyed me. Visiting somewhere and having to 'explain' myself is something that I abhor."

"Being judgmental but rarely charitable. I made enemies out of brothers and sisters in my church by speaking up in favour of charity."

"The judged had to confess and convert, then they would receive worldly goods like food and shelter or education. You can fertilize your roses with that substance."

~ Woodfordian

"I grew up in a Southern Baptist Church. When I reached high school, I got into metal music, but the kinda sh*tty Christian metal."

"I started to grow out my hair and played guitar. I thought I was still a perfectly good Christian, apparently not though."

"The only thing that changed was my hair, but men in the church would tell their sons not to hang out with me, or they'd go up to my dad and tell him they're praying for him to find the strength to 'correct' my behavior."

"I was still behaving exactly as I ever did. So I just stopped going and I'm far better off now for it."

~ Judge_Bredd3

Do As We Say, Not As We Do

"I left my church at 16. I’m now 37. It was a Southern Baptist church and the hypocrisy is what drove me away."

"The judging a woman for not being a virgin. Referring to them as a used up piece of chewing gum if they have sex before marriage."

"The drinking is as bad as murder thing. I worked at a bar in college, and some of these good God-fearing people were regulars."

"Also, guess who has sex before marriage? They did."

"I’ve also been interested in science and was told that I wasn’t ladylike."

"My parents still attend that church, and the new pastor is my age. They no longer preach the old-timer ways, but I won’t go back."

~ klsprinkle

"Ugh, relate so hard to this. I never understood how a lot of them would dress up in their Sunday best, but also go around sleeping with each other before marriage."

"Then pretend that they’re oh so holy. I can’t stand that level of hypocrisy now."

"So much judgement too. Figuring out who I am outside of that lifestyle now. Hope you’re doing okay too!"

~ HanaBananaBear

"Well, why do you think they are so into church? Gotta wash away all the sinning of drinking and premarital sex."

~ Manic-Stoic

Eternal Damnation

"I left when I was 15. It had been a long time coming, but I did have a final catalyst."

"Backstory: my sister is 9 years younger than me, and she is my 'half sister.' Our mom and her dad were not married when she was born."

"She came home from Vacation Bible School in tears because they told her that since she was born out of wedlock, she was going to automatically go to Hell."

"She was six f-ing years old!!! Who the hell tells a first grader they're going to burn for all eternity because their parents weren't married when they boned‽‽"

"I marched down there and gave them a piece of my mind, told them what I really thought of them and their church, and told my mom we were never going back there."

"My mom still went, my siblings and I did not."

~ ShinyUnicornPoo

Biblical Illiteracy

"Fellow former Baptist. Same."

"Eventually I got into high school, critical thinking kicked in, and I could only assume no one in the church could read the book they were all teaching/preaching from. At best."

"At worst, they were all cherry picking a**holes that like to use scripture to suit their own arguments."

~ zirwin_KC

There Are Other Potlucks

"I left when I realized the church potluck was the only reason I was still going!"

~ IndependenceOwn7865

"Well, to be fair, there’s usually pretty good food there."

~ Junior-Gorg

"I have a friend whose parents stopped going to church when they stopped serving coffee and donuts on Sundays after the service."

~ manatee1010

Like An MLM

"Youth pastor went on a tirade about how your life is worthless if you're not converting people regularly—to a bunch of 13-year-olds."

"My parents finally agreed that I didn't have to go to church anymore."

~ False_Pace286

Denial Of Reality

"Ehh, just the bullsh*t was enough. I won't mention exactly which one it was, but it's a problem in almost all of them."

"Several years ago, I dared challenge the beliefs of community with some Darwinian knowledge and facts like the Earth being round.."

"Needless to say, I was asked to leave just so they don't have to kick me out."

~ StarrySkyMeli

Celebrating Bigotry

"I was in the church youth group. A boy I had a big crush on bragged about his summer vacation activities."

"He and his brother visited their cousins in Texas. They liked to go out and find homosexuals to beat up as a fun family activity, like visiting an amusement park."

"We went to different schools. I had gay friends at my school. He and his brother were huge."

"Everyone else was very impressed and congratulated him for being such a good Christian. I was horrified and stopped going to church not long afterwards."

~ MariaLynd

One True God

"I asked questions that no religion has a good answer for. The first question I asked was 'Why is my religion more correct than others?'."

"At first I was afraid of that. Then I decided that if there was a God and he was good, my faith shouldn't matter. Any God that would punish a person that is trying to be good with eternal torture just for disbelief is a monster and not good."

"That let me start exploring further and the questions began piling up."

~ leonprimrose

"'Why is my religion more correct than others?' is what stuck with me too."

"I remember going to seminars about the 2nd coming of Jesus and some dude predicted that the world would end in May 2011. I panicked, but I didn't know what exactly was the right thing to do."

"Even one religion has several different versions and some people go by their own rules. If there isn’t an obvious concrete way of getting into heaven, then that must mean it's all made up."

"It doesn't make sense for God to tell one group of people to avoid pork and praise him on Saturday and another that pork is OK and church is on Sundays."

~ butterflyempress

"Exactly, every religion claims to be 'the truth' and anyone with basic objective reasoning should be able to see that and rationalize that it's all probably bullsh*t."

"I've tried to explain this to my sister who used to be rational but has dove head first into Christianity, and it's frustrating that she just refuses to understand."

"She'll poke fun at and dismiss all other religions, but when I try to convey that members of those religions do the exact same thing to people like her, she hand waves it and doubles down on them just bring ignorant."

~ SousVideDiaper

Suffering Is Good

"For me, the big sticking point was the problem of suffering. Why would an all-powerful, benevolent God allow suffering."

"The worst part was, although very few people would say it out loud, the answer was: suffering is good."

~ kitskill

The Hell You Say

"Similar epiphany, I just didn't believe that Satan could give God so much trouble if God was truly omnipotent and omniscient. So I started questioning why God lets Satan exist, if Satan is the antithesis of God. Like, why tolerate an upstart usurper of significantly lower power than you."

"Ultimately, I told my youth leader that either god wasn't as all-knowing and powerful as I was being led to believe or God and the Bible was lying about the threat Satan posed. This led me to stop believing satan/hell existed at all."

"I told my pastor at the time that I straight up felt like he was lying about Hell and the devil because otherwise he worships and promotes an all-powerful God who can't even keep his own soldiers in line."

"I was sent home with a note to my parents about how I'd fully fallen to Satan and needed to be sent to a Christian boarding school to get me back on track. My parents didn't send me because neither of them were particularly religious, and I ultimately decided that the whole thing was either made up entirely or a faith based on a God not worth worshipping."

"People really handwave a lot of evidence that there is no God with 'He works in mysterious ways'."

~ BestDescription3834

God Takes Attendance

"At my dad's funeral, the pastor told us that we'll never see our dad again if we don't get right with God & start going to church."

"That was the final straw."

~ amyjrockstar

Drinking The Hater-Aid

"When I was 14, my brother got AIDS. He hid his diagnosis from everyone. He didn't want people to know he was gay. All the while I was forced to go to a church that ranted against gay people."

"When he died because he'd hidden his diagnosis so long from everyone and would rather die than put that on his name or our family name in our very redneck town, I had to listen to them tell us that gay people go to Hell, while also hosting my brother's funeral."

"I still have nights just thinking about my brother dying... knowing he was dying, dying alone because he was scared of the judgment. Knowing he could never tell us how he really felt, admit if he was scared, tell us what he really wanted us to know before he went. He never got to be himself. We never got to really know him."

"First they told us it was hepatitis, then they told us it was cancer. Then he had Kaposi's sarcoma. I think my mom knew by then, but my dad and the rest of our community and our extended families just wouldn't have accepted it. I still to this day have family members who just say he died of cancer."

"My brother was a good guy. He didn't deserve that. When I saw how they treated a normal innocent person who I cared about who was really no different than me, I knew it was all bullshit. All just made up stories to control people."

"My other brother was gay as well, and the minute he turned 17, he ran away from home. That's just how bad it was around us."

"After the torment both my brothers went through, my mom became a home hospice nurse for AIDS patients, and she's been a staunch advocate for LGBTQ+ and pretty much my entire family as well."

"Just thinking about it again tonight has me in tears again. It's been 20 years. He was a good person; my family are good people, and yet that misguided persecution killed my brother and left us all to suffer for the rest of our lives. It's so wrong and sad."

"The messages churches are sending out about trans people is the same exact rulebook, the same bullsh*t bullet points they used in the Bush era when gay marriage was being proposed, when gay men were getting hate crimed."

~ Protect_Wild_Bees

At the birth of most organized religions, superstition and ignorance helped create devoted followers. However, as our understanding of science and information becomes more readily available, those tactics no longer work.

Churches that embrace a message of hatred, othering and promises to get rich—like "prosperity gospel" Evangelical Christian mega churches—are seeing the fewest losses in members.

Churches that don't espouse or emphasize those points are taking the biggest hits in church attendance.

For the current and future generations, the ideas of those churches may appeal to them, but giving money and time to a building or organization for something they can do independently has lost its allure.

If you left organized religion, what were your reasons?