I didn’t stop believing in God when I stopped going to church.
But I understand how, from the outside, those two things might have looked the same.
For a long time, church was woven into my weeks. I attended Sunday services, came on Wednesdays for groups, participated in Bible studies & helped photograph services & events. I was involved. There were times I chose church commitments over plans with friends because being involved mattered to me. I wanted to show up, contribute, & feel connected. I cared about the people there. I wanted to be part of what we were building together.
So when I talk about stepping away, I’m talking about leaving somewhere I had wanted to belong. Somewhere I thought I did belong.
That’s part of why it hurt.
At the time, it had just been me & my cat at home. Then I found myself caring for seven foster children at once…an enormous change that I was trying to navigate while carrying a lot myself. During that time, I reached out to church staff. I was going through something extremely difficult & wanted someone to talk to. I needed guidance. Prayer. A conversation with someone who could listen while I tried to make sense of everything I was carrying.
I wasn’t expecting someone to have every answer. I didn’t need a perfect response.
I just needed a response.
But no one followed up with me. No one reached back out.
I don’t know everything that was happening on the other side of that silence. I can’t tell you what anyone intended, what they understood about my situation, or why the conversation never happened.
I can only tell you what receiving that silence felt like.
I felt brushed aside.
& when you’re already overwhelmed, reaching out takes something out of you. You have to admit you need support. You have to let someone see beyond the version of you who shows up, participates & finds a way to keep going.
I had done that. I had opened the door to a difficult part of my life.
Then I was left wondering whether anyone had noticed.
That hurt followed me into how I felt about being there. Somewhere I had associated with connection began to feel lonely.
There was another feeling I didn’t know how to name without sounding unfair: sometimes, I felt like I was outside a circle I couldn’t quite find my way into.
I hesitate to use the word “clique.” It feels like a judgment about people whose intentions I don’t know. But avoiding that word doesn’t erase the feeling underneath it. I could be involved in the church & still feel unsure of my place among the people.
I don’t know how much of that feeling existed before I reached out, or how much the silence intensified it. I just know that afterward, belonging didn’t feel as certain.
Eventually, I stepped away.
It’s been two years since then. For a long time, I wasn’t ready to talk about it. I needed time to understand the hurt, & what stepping away meant for my faith.
There wasn’t a neat conclusion waiting for me when I did. Leaving didn’t immediately resolve the hurt or answer every question. It gave me distance, but distance came with its own grief.
Because I missed the connection.
I still do.
When I think about what I miss, it isn’t primarily the building. It’s having people to talk to about faith & life in the same conversation. People to pray with. People who know something about what I’m carrying because they’ve taken the time to ask.
I miss the possibility of being known beyond whether I was there on Sunday.
That’s a difficult thing to explain: you can step away from a community & still long for community. You can feel hurt by an experience & still miss what you hoped it would be.
Both have been true for me.
My faith didn’t disappear in the middle of that. I still believed in God. I still talked to Him. But I had to spend some time considering what my relationship with Him looked like outside the routines I had associated with it.
I’m still learning how to talk about that without feeling like I have to defend myself.
Even writing this, I feel the urge to soften every sentence. To explain that I know people are busy. That I know church staff are human. That I never expected anyone to handle everything perfectly.
I do know those things.
I also know that I reached out during a hard time & felt alone when no one responded. I want to be able to tell that part of my story honestly, with room for what I don’t know about theirs.
It has taken me time to get here. For a while, I didn’t know how to share the experience without it sounding like an accusation. Now I’m beginning to understand that I can describe what happened & how it affected me without deciding what kind of people anyone else must be.
I can leave their intentions unknown.
I can name my hurt.
& I can acknowledge that underneath it, there is still a desire for connection.
I don’t have a tidy ending about finding a new church or knowing exactly what comes next. I don’t want to write one just to make this story feel finished.
What I have is faith, some hurt I’m finally ready to talk about & a clearer understanding of what I’m longing for.
A community where I can contribute, but also ask for support. Where there is room for the difficult conversation. Where reaching out can lead to someone reaching back.
I stepped away from church.
I still love God.
& I still hope to find that connection.
xx
drae. ت
