Theistic Satanism: Home > Politics > Support groups > Ex-fundy



Ex-Christian/ex-fundamentalist-related issues

by Diane Vera



Copyright © 2004, 2006 by Diane Vera. All rights reserved.



On my Counter-Evangelism site, there is a page which lists Resources for ex-fundamentalists, ex-"cultists," and ex-Christians. Most of the ex-Christian/ex-fundy support groups I'm aware of are online only. Offline ex-fundy support groups tend not to last long, for whatever reason. Even online, there aren't very many ex-fundy support groups, which surprises me. There are a lot more support groups and other resources for ex-members of specific "cults," such as the Jehovah's Witnesses and the Mormons, than there are for ex-fundies in general.

Most of the few ex-fundy/ex-Christian support groups that I know of are dominated by atheists and typically have a few members who are Pagans too. Some ex-fundy (but not necessarily ex-Christian) support groups have a few liberal Christian members Attitudes toward Satanists vary. Except for my own Theistic-Satanists-ex-hard-Xian forum, none explicitly welcome Satanists, but none explicitly exclude Satanists either. Most - though not all - will be reasonably friendly toward Satanists who come across as both intelligent and polite. (I won't single out which ones are friendly and which ones not, because this probably varies from time to time, depending on who the other subscribers are at any given moment.)

If anyone decides to start an online support group for ex-fundamentalists in alternative religions, explicitly including Satanists, please let me know. I would suggest that the group have a website as well as a forum, and I would suggest that it advertise via link exchanges with lots and lots of Pagan sites. (There are so many Pagan sites out there that, even if a majority refuse to link to you, you'll still be able to exchange links with quite a few.)

Besides Theistic-Satanists-ex-hard-Xian, I also run the Counter-Evangelism email group. The latter forum is not, specifically, a support group for ex-fundies/ex-Christians. However, among its other purposes, it does serve as a support group for people coping with pesky fundies in their personal lives. It is thus an example of a support group explicitly welcomes people of a variety of alternative religions, explicitly including Satanists, among others.

Another Satanist-friendly group which ex-fundies may find helpful, although it isn't specifically an ex-fundy support group per se, is the Spiritual_Conflicts Yahoo group run by Marie RavenSoul, who also has a blog on Spiritual Conflicts. This group describes itself as being "for anyone who has had or is going through any kind of spiritual conflict. This can include, but is not limited to, a struggle of going back and forth between religions, confusion about one's path, not sure what deity/deities to follow, having family and/or friends that don't understand one's path, fear, doubt, and any kind of struggles that one might have spiritually. This group is open to Satanists, Setians, Luciferians, Pagans, Neo-Pagans, Wiccans and anyone else that feels they would benefit from this group."



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