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I will state once more that I spent over forty years believing the typical Christian perspective, that the Earth is six thousand years old, humans were created from scratch, and physical death came into the world by original sin. Even after leaving evangelicalism and beginning to seek factual truth, I first turned to Young Earth…
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PROLOG I suspect that many readers will wonder why I am writing about this topic. Three years ago, I had the privilege of filling in our church’s Adult Ministries team. Coming out of several years of cancer-driven isolation, it was a chance for me to test the waters to see if my ideas were still…
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Introduction I was taught, as a child in the Bible Belt and later as an adult in an evangelical discipleship group, that the Earth is only 6,000 years old and that Genesis is a literal, historical account of the Earth’s creation and the origin of the human species. Therefore, humans were created fully formed in…
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I hate to use the term “serious” in the context, as the everyday disorders, such as anxiety and depression, can be life-threatening. Introduction I had an interesting conversation a few years ago with a psychiatrist. I had called her about a lady in my church, whom I—rightly—feared was having a psychotic break or a dissociative…
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I write a lot about the declining church in America, and that’s where my heart is, with those who are leaving. I have no qualms with those who enjoy American Christian culture just the way it is. But my purpose is to relate to those who are leaving, to explain why they feel the way…
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I wanted to elaborate on how the concept of godliness harms the cultivation of good mental health in a Christian society. I have already stated that the idea of someone achieving a state of godliness is a misunderstanding of our nature. We are anchored in the material via our brains. We have a specific genetic…
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After reading several papers on the role of religion in general with mental illness, the pattern is clear. In a well-functioning church that offers a community of acceptance and encouragement, people’s mental health fares better than that of non-religious individuals, especially those without a social network. But an ill-functioning religious setting can be corrosive and…
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I came across this meme/photo, and it resonated profoundly with me. Life is a masquerade ball, religion a competitive game. I played the game and wore the mask for the first half of my life, but the mask didn’t fit, and I didn’t like the rules. In 1990, I promised myself and, if there were…
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I apologize but the copy of the article that I published this morning of this article was the very first rough draft, some voice recognition, that was full of typos. I thought I had deleted that copy and replaced it with the edited version but something happened where the draft was published instead. Sorry. I…
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This is a re-post of an article that I wrote this morning. This is embarrassing, but the published article was a very rough draft that was supposed to be deleted. It was full of typos. This is the proper one. I apologize. This may sound strange, on the heels of my writing about peace, and…
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J. Michael Jones 