Friday, January 21, 2011

Common emotional barriers to faith

I've told some stories about emotional barriers to faith, but today I just want to give a list of some of the common emotional barriers I have seen when talking to people over the last few years.

My question for you is what you think the appropriate response to these barriers is.  Is there a way to engage those barriers within a relationship?  Do you have any resources that you use to help people walk through these barriers?


Common emotional barriers/questions

Hell
•    How can God send people to hell?
•    If I believe in God, then I have to believe that my recently deceased family-member is in hell.
   
Suffering/Evil
•    I could never serve a God who allows so much suffering in the world.
•    How can God be good and allow people to starve?

Effect of faith on my life
•    If I become a Christian, I will have to give up my favorite parts of myself and the things I like to do?
•    If I become a Christian, will I have to look and act like all the [fake, annoying, disconnected-from-reality] Christians that I know?
•    If I become a Christian, will I have to forgive . . . [my abusive father, the man who raped me, my spouse who left me]?

Church/hypocrisy
•    I believe in God, but the church kicked my family out when I was 5.
•    I believe in God, but the church is mean to people.
•    I believe in God, but the church takes a political position that goes against my values.

Excluded by the Church
•    I am a strong, professional woman.  There is no place for me in your church.
•    I am a homosexual.  There is no place for me in your church.
•    I am a minority.  There is no place for me in your church.
•    I am divorced or unmarried.  There is no place for me in your church.

Other
•    I’m doing just fine on my own, thank you very much.
•    Things are a mess right now, but I’ll start going to church again once I have my life together.
•    I don’t trust you, and I don’t trust God.
•    I’m not good enough to be loved by God.
•    If God the Father is anything like my father, I don’t want anything to do with him.

A pdf version of this list is available here.

1 comment:

  1. wow--- lots to think about with this post....

    ReplyDelete