*-PERHAPS NOT QUITE AS BAD AS OF A "LUNATIC FRINGE" BUT CERTAINLY, AS THE TERM OF REFERENCE RECORDS, OF QUESTIONABLE WORTH, IS WHAT YOU FIND IF YOU TAKE A BRIEF SIDESTEP HERE.
NEW YORK (NYT)--At a time of growing religious awareness, when thousands of Americans are joining fundamentalist Christian groups, thousands are also leaving them in disillusionment.
According to sociologists and experts on religion, many of those who leave may experience
loneliness, anxiety, guilt or other problems.
"Many people have trouble leaving authoritarian systems, especially one that threatens them
with hellfire and damnation," said Dr. Ruth Tiffany Barnhouse, who teaches at the Perkins
School of Theology at Southern Methodist University in Dallas. "Not everyone has this trouble,
but many are subject to a great deal of fear, depression and feelings of unworthiness."
To provide support for those who have left the fundamentalist fold, Fundamentalists Anonymous was founded in New York last April and now offers discussion groups, newsletters and a help line.
"Fundamentalists Anonymous seeks to diminish withdrawal symptons by creating a support network for ex-fundamentalists," said Richard Yao, the group's founder who is a graduate of the Yale Divinity School and a former fundamentalist.
At a recent group meeting at the Madison Avenue Baptist Church in Manhattan, one woman, who asked not to be named, said: "It's easy to think you're the only one in the world going through this, and that makes it worse."
Another woman, Valerie Marino, said: "When you are in that world, everyone you know thinks the same way, and trying to leave is like being dumped in a desert." Marino, who is blind, said she left her fundamentalist group when another member burst into her home and started shaking her, trying to chase away the demon that was said to have made her blind.
"The problem has not been talked about in public," said James Luce, who left his job as a Wall Street banker to become chairman of the organization.
As passionately as people such as Marino praise the group, fundamentalist preachers and some experts in religion denounce it. These critics say that Fundamentalists Anonymous wrongly characterizes the entire fundamentalist movement by the excesses of a few churches.
"It generalizes to put me in a category with a lunatic fringe," said Truman Dollar, pastor of Temple Baptist Church in Detroit, a fundamentalist church with 11,000 members. "People in all religions have had bad experiences. Why not start Jews Anonymous or Protestants Anonymous?"
(text of February 22, 1986 Vancouver Sun article)
*-PERHAPS NOT QUITE AS BAD AS OF A "LUNATIC FRINGE" BUT CERTAINLY, AS THE TERM OF REFERENCE RECORDS, OF QUESTIONABLE WORTH, IS WHAT YOU FIND IF YOU TAKE A BRIEF SIDESTEP HERE.