The Post-Evangelical Post

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đŸ“±Discourse Whiplash & Social Media

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đŸ“±Discourse Whiplash & Social Media

When the conversation shifts and I can’t keep up.

Blake Chastain
Feb 21, 2022
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đŸ“±Discourse Whiplash & Social Media

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Last week, I published another RNS piece that I shared here, called “Evangelicals must stop consulting themselves for guidance.” In that vein, I was trying (as I have before) to contextualize the current push from elite evangelicals to obscure just how deeply troubling the current state of evangelicalism is - and how they have rejected people who tried to reform their movement from within many times before.

At the same time, it’s been difficult to situate the current State of Discourse surrounding “deconstruction,” the current catch-all evangelical bogeyman. The Gospel Coalition has published an article saying it shouldn’t “be redeemed.” Christianity Today’s current cover story addresses the subject (albeit without talking to anyone; it is an opinion piece). Skillet’s singer wants to “wage war” on it.

There’s also an endless conversation happening about whether “exvangelical” is a useful term to describe where one is personally. And all of these various things jumble into one single timeline, talking about very different things—or at the very least, the same thing but with very different lenses.

It’s a lot to take in, and I don’t always process it well. I feel my anxiety tighten my chest, I feel my codependent tendencies kick in, I feel the tension build in my shoulders. I feel my CNS become enmeshed in the words and feelings of others. And it’s then that I come back to the passage I quoted and sketched out above.

Because while I intellectually know my own intentions and can accept responsibility for my own role in harm & being harmed (I am reading adrienne marie brown’s We Will Not Cancel Us right now, which is where I learned this language and framing)



and while I know that #exvangelical as a hashtag has an SEO use



and “exvangelical” is valuable in creating what Corinna Laughlin calls “counter-publics” to “combat” evangelical rhetoric (to use General John Skillet’s metaphor)



and I believe “exvangelical” as an identity has limits



and I think we need to get better at delineating between cultures, followings, and communities-all of which have different purposes



that’s impossible to get across in any single tweet or interaction. It’s simply too much to take in simultaneously, mentally or emotionally. Especially at the speed of twitter.

Reading through some of my weekend posts, I can see how this played out within my own posts to twitter. First I was responding to elite evangelicals:

Twitter avatar for @brchastain
Blake Chastain @brchastain
If Alisa Childers, TGC, and others want to understand why these conversations are happening outside the church now, it's because historically evangelicals have quashed efforts to have them within the church. I cite many examples in this piece:
religionnews.comEvangelicals must stop consulting themselves for guidance(RNS) — The United States cannot afford to give evangelicalism the benefit of the doubt again, and evangelicals cannot afford to just talk among themselves any longer.
3:35 PM ∙ Feb 18, 2022
27Likes5Retweets

Later, I was trying to respond to evangelical characterizations of “deconstruction:”

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Blake Chastain @brchastain
What continues to frustrate me about evangelical framing of the big ol’ deconstruction bogeyman is that it seeks to place those who criticize evangelicalism as hostile outsiders instead of former insiders who changed their minds. It’s a vital distinction.
2:49 PM ∙ Feb 19, 2022
722Likes80Retweets

Then I was trying to frame why, if this is supposedly a “war,” then it is incredibly asymmetrical:

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Blake Chastain @brchastain
TGC had $3.26M in income 2020, but I'm glad they keep punching down on people who make content online and piece together income through Patreon and day-jobs.
4:52 PM ∙ Feb 18, 2022
64Likes2Retweets

Then I stumbled across a twitter conversation about folks who were formerly evangelical but don’t relate to or use “exvangelical,” and went deep into my feels:

Twitter avatar for @brchastain
Blake Chastain @brchastain
Replied to a tweet that asked about people's relation toward the term 'exvangelical' that twitter's home feed recommended, but I deleted it. Not really my place, and honestly it feeds my co-dependent & insecure tendencies.
2:23 PM ∙ Feb 21, 2022

Then I struggled with how difficult it is to talk about something as massive as the impact of evangelicalism:

Twitter avatar for @brchastain
Blake Chastain @brchastain
perhaps it's asking too much of any moniker to represent the breadth of human experiences spanning centuries and continents under a dominant religious form. perhaps it's ok to not identify a certain way for your entire life. perhaps more than one thing is true at once.
4:34 PM ∙ Feb 21, 2022
6Likes1Retweet

Then I realized I should recognize when to log off. And that’s ok.

Twitter avatar for @brchastain
Blake Chastain @brchastain
getting discourse whiplash b/c i can't keep up with the pace of conversation, so it's time to disentangle my nervous system from the internet (log off twitter) âœŒđŸ»
4:45 PM ∙ Feb 21, 2022

Then I made the sketch above.

These are the sorts of things I am processing as I continue to work on my book and participte in what danah boyd calls “networked publics.” But part of doing so, especially in a point in time where many of us are locally lonely, involves knowing when to step away from these networked publics.

It’s something I’m still learning, at least partially, in public—as these tweets demonstrate.

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How do you manage your emotions, expectations, and interactions? Let me know in the Discord or in the comments.

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3 Comments
LeeAnn Summerfield
Aug 10, 2022

Thank you, Blake. I only just now realized what a wonderful recommend you gave my book :) Grateful. I can use all the help I can get! The story is still largely undiscovered. :)

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LeeAnn Summerfield
Mar 24, 2022

I am late to this discussion,but wanted to relate that your work and honest sharing is appreciated. I am a boomer and struggle just to understand. I did manage to self pub my deconstruction story with paid help as to the technology. Hope u don’t if I mention here
gonna have to assume you’ll forgive it. “something to say” by LeeAnn Summerfield (Amazon). I feel that the whole relevance and only great meaning of my life is contained in this painful story. Only in the last two years have I discovered that I am not alone

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