367: Angela J. Herrington and Accepting Your Questions

Have you ever tried to ask hard questions about your faith only to run into a roadblock somewhere?

Sometimes it's simple answers. Sometimes it's others who don't want to acknowledge the questions. Sometimes it's your own heart begging to keep life simple.

Our guest today says it's worth asking the questions and offers a path through the uncertainty.

Angela J. Herrington is a faith deconstruction coach and host of The Deconstructing Faith Summit who helps people break free from toxic religious culture & empowers them to recover from church hurt.

Today, Angela shares the situation that caused her to wonder if everyone could be included in her community and the questions that arose from it. She explains how an accepting community can help, and why you can't outrun yourself. Avoiding the questions doesn't work so Angela shares how she helps others release the stigma and follow where the questions lead.

Angela's story reminds us that following Jesus isn't always easy but it is always worth it.

Listen to Angela's story now in your favorite podcast app!

Stories Angela shared:

• Growing up in Indiana around the church

• Being a VBS kid, steeped in Christian culture and giving her life to Christ as a young girl

• Getting involved in youth group in high school and college

• Deciding to raise her children in church for their good

• Finding a groundedness in her faith as she got more connected

• The decisions that started to crack her understanding of faith worked out

• Why viewing others as “projects” is harmful

• The Bible study that became a safe place to ask questions

• Deciding to go to a more liberal church and finding the same problems

• Feeling weary about finding safe places to discuss and the church that created that space

• The ten years of deconstruction she experienced

• Growing wiser about her involvement

• Why fundamentalism isn’t good on either side of the spectrum

• Learning how much her pursuit of connection was driven by trauma

• Why you can’t outrun yourself

• What she does as a deconstruction coach

Great quotes from Angela:

Would I have been welcomed? Or would I have been a project?

What’s missing is a really humble understanding of how much in the church is influenced by power.

The more you try to outrun yourself, the more damage you’re doing to yourself.

The longer you've been in an environment that says you're bad, the longer it will take to discover your own goodness.

Resources we mentioned:

• Angela’s website

• Deconstructing Your Faith without Losing Yourself by Angela J. Herrington

• Angela’s free Facebook group for people experiencing deconstruction

Related episodes:

• Brian Zahnd and The Beauty of Christ

• Jacci Turner and Tumbled People

• Paul Ybarra and Discovering Kingdom Character