Teresa MacBain’s Return to God is Distressing to Many Closeted Pastors
October 24, 2016
by Hemant Mehta
Usually, when someone either stops believing in God or suddenly finds God, it’s a personal decision that doesn’t affect scores of other people.
But when you’re Teresa MacBain, the former pastor who publicly announced her atheism in 2012 but recently (and quietly) said she was a believer again, the ripples can be fairly large.
The reason her reconversion reverberates is because she was one of the public faces of The Clergy Project, a private online forum for pastors who are grappling with their own disbelief. While forum users may be anonymous online, there’s a vetting process to even be admitted into the forum. For example, the moderators have to know who you really are. It would be devastating for many people, as you might imagine, if someone infiltrated that forum and outed pastors before they were ready.
As a “graduate” of the Clergy Project, MacBain was a member of that forum for several years and also helped screen new members. The concern isn’t that she outed anyone. But according to her own testimony, she “found” God again this past summer. It took a few months before she said as much on her website and we posted about it here.
http://www.patheos.com/blogs/friendlyatheist/2016/10/24/teresa-macbains-return-to-god-is-distressing-to-many-closeted-pastors/
= new reply since forum marked as read
