{"id":856904,"date":"2025-09-18T05:00:46","date_gmt":"2025-09-18T10:00:46","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/churchanswers.com\/?p=856904"},"modified":"2025-09-16T13:11:02","modified_gmt":"2025-09-16T18:11:02","slug":"the-exvangelical-narrative-is-overblown-what-the-actual-numbers-reveal","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/churchanswers.com\/blog\/the-exvangelical-narrative-is-overblown-what-the-actual-numbers-reveal\/","title":{"rendered":"The Exvangelical Narrative Is Overblown (What the Actual Numbers Reveal)"},"content":{"rendered":"\n\t\t<div class=\"content-restriction-preview\"><p>When speaking with Christian parents, I often sense a quiet anxiety about the faith journey their children might take. Many of them, especially those who are very active members of an evangelical congregation, worry that they might do or say something that causes their children to abandon their Christian faith and join the growing number of people who identify with no religion. I believe they are concerned, of course, about the eternal souls of their children, but they also worry about the social scorn they could face from other parents once it becomes known that their children \u201cfell away\u201d from the church.\u00a0<\/p> <p>There are notable examples that highlight this concern. Tony Campolo, a sociologist, was renowned for his passionate sermons about God\u2019s grace and the importance of forgiveness. However, one of his sons, Bart, became a prominent secular humanist as an adult. Similarly, John Piper\u2019s son Abraham gained a significant<\/p><\/div>\n\t\t<div class=\"content-restriction-block\">\n\t\t\t<div class=\"content-restriction-block-login login-toggle\">Already a member? <a href=\"#\">Log in<\/a><\/div>\n\t\t\t<div class=\"content-restriction-block-content\">\n\t\t\t\t<h2>Unlock premium content!<\/h2>\n\t\t\t\t<p>Get access to all Church Answers premium content from our expert contributors plus many other membership benefits.<\/p>\n\t\t\t\t<h3>$9.97 per month<\/h3>\n\t\t\t\t<p>Unlimited access<\/p>\n\t\t\t\t<a href=\"https:\/\/churchanswers.com\/join\/\" class=\"button\">Join Now<\/a>\n\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t<\/div>\n\t","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"\n\t\t<div class=\"content-restriction-preview\"><p>When speaking with Christian parents, I often sense a quiet anxiety about the faith journey their children might take. Many of them, especially those who are very active members of an evangelical congregation, worry that they might do or say something that causes their children to abandon their Christian faith and join the growing number of people who identify with no religion. I believe they are concerned, of course, about the eternal souls of their children, but they also worry about the social scorn they could face from other parents once it becomes known that their children \u201cfell away\u201d from the church.\u00a0<\/p> <p>There are notable examples that highlight this concern. Tony Campolo, a sociologist, was renowned for his passionate sermons about God\u2019s grace and the importance of forgiveness. However, one of his sons, Bart, became a prominent secular humanist as an adult. Similarly, John Piper\u2019s son Abraham gained a significant<\/p><\/div>\n\t\t<div class=\"content-restriction-block\">\n\t\t\t<div class=\"content-restriction-block-login login-toggle\">Already a member? <a href=\"#\">Log in<\/a><\/div>\n\t\t\t<div class=\"content-restriction-block-content\">\n\t\t\t\t<h2>Unlock premium content!<\/h2>\n\t\t\t\t<p>Get access to all Church Answers premium content from our expert contributors plus many other membership benefits.<\/p>\n\t\t\t\t<h3>$9.97 per month<\/h3>\n\t\t\t\t<p>Unlimited access<\/p>\n\t\t\t\t<a href=\"https:\/\/churchanswers.com\/join\/\" class=\"button\">Join Now<\/a>\n\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t<\/div>\n\t","protected":false},"author":17635,"featured_media":856912,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"publish_to_discourse":"0","publish_post_category":"1","wpdc_auto_publish_overridden":"","wpdc_topic_tags":"","wpdc_pin_topic":"","wpdc_pin_until":"","discourse_post_id":"","discourse_permalink":"","wpdc_publishing_response":"","wpdc_publishing_error":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[1,184,190,179,175,177,178,191,14796,180,194,18058,185],"tags":[21196,21197,21194,19090,21195,21193],"class_list":["post-856904","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-church-answers","category-discipleship","category-family","category-first-impressions","category-grow","category-lead","category-membership-and-assimilation","category-mind-body-and-spirit","category-monday-wednesday-featured","category-outreach-and-evangelism","category-preaching","category-premium","category-worship","tag-faith-unraveled-by-rachel-held-evans","tag-the-exvangelicals-by-sarah-mccammon","tag-exvangelical","tag-nones","tag-religiosity","tag-the-exvangelical-narrative-is-overblown-what-the-actual-numbers-reveal","membership-content","access-restricted"],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v26.7 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/wordpress\/plugins\/seo\/ -->\n<title>The Exvangelical Narrative Is Overblown (What the Actual Numbers Reveal) | Church Answers<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"When speaking with Christian parents, I often sense a quiet anxiety about the faith journey their children might take. 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He served as a pastor in the American Baptist Church for over twenty years, leading First Baptist Church of Mount Vernon, IL for 17.5 years until its closure in July 2024.","url":"https:\/\/churchanswers.com\/blog\/author\/ryanburge\/"}]}},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/churchanswers.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/856904","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/churchanswers.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/churchanswers.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/churchanswers.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/17635"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/churchanswers.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=856904"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/churchanswers.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/856904\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":856914,"href":"https:\/\/churchanswers.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/856904\/revisions\/856914"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/churchanswers.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/856912"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/churchanswers.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=856904"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/churchanswers.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=856904"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/churchanswers.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=856904"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}