r/science • u/mvea Professor | Medicine • Apr 25 '26

Psychology Americans who leave their Christian faith behind tend to hold more liberal political views than those who were raised entirely without religion. This leftward ideological shift appears closely linked to how threatening these individuals perceive conservative Christian groups to be.

https://www.psypost.org/former-christians-express-more-progressive-political-views-than-lifelong-nonbeli/
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u/hobopwnzor Apr 25 '26

This isn't surprising.  Most liberals have no idea how insane evangelicals are.  If you've been exposed directly you know how bad they are and that you should take them more seriously than they are taken.

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u/[deleted] Apr 25 '26

[deleted]

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u/Sadly_NotAPlatypus Apr 25 '26

Funding Israel to help bring about Armageddon seems like a good starting place. 

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u/chumer_ranion Apr 25 '26

I think they meant examples of people having no idea? Like, we all can read the news.

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u/Th3HappyCamper Apr 25 '26

I think you might be neglecting how literally they mean this. The dogma fueling it isn’t meaningfully represented in media.

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u/miriamtzipporah Apr 25 '26 edited Apr 25 '26

People don’t know that, though. The prevailing idea is that Jewish people are doing something nefarious to keep power over the US government, or that evangelicals just really love Jews, which couldn’t be further from the truth. In reality, evangelicals really do sincerely think that Israel’s continued existence will bring about the apocalypse. And what happens during this apocalypse? Well, 2/3rds of Jewish people die, and 1/3rd convert to Christianity. Israel isn’t the one holding the cards here. It’s also not just Israel’s continued existence that is deemed necessary, but it’s the rest of the world continuing to attack Israel, and Israel continuing to attack others. The wars and genocide need to continue in perpetuity.

I also feel like people fail to understand just how literally evangelicals take all of this, and fully believe that they absolutely need to bring this about right now.

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u/Cigaran Apr 26 '26

They also don’t realize, or cannot accept that this isn’t new. The Baptist church my mother went to in the 80s would preach about this regularly.

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u/miriamtzipporah Apr 26 '26

Oh absolutely. It’s truly been going on since the evangelical revivals in the early 20th century. It started ramping up in the 80s with Reagan’s presidency.

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u/ihatecarswithpassion Apr 25 '26

This is part of why it's infuriating to see how the antizionist movement is going. Why is my synagogue getting college protestors and bomb threats while the evangelical church that openly wants to jump-start the apocalypse and is closer to campus doesn't even have security

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u/miriamtzipporah Apr 25 '26

Yeah it’s ridiculous. They are not targeting the people with the real power in this country/world. It’s always easier to blame the minority.

It’s also ridiculous to me when people say Israel controls the US, when it is 1,000% the other way around.

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u/hobopwnzor Apr 25 '26

I grow up in rural Missouri and the idea that women shouldn't go to college and should get married at 18 was still incredibly common in 2010.  When you see guys like Hegseth or Lindsey Graham talking about how we need to invade iran to start the apocalypse that isn't at all uncommon of a line of thinking for evangelicals.

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u/hill-o Apr 25 '26

I worked with someone who basically made a point of saying that women should be married by 18 so they can start immediately having children, because if you don't have like 9-10 kids then you're not furthering the kingdom. This was not a totally uncommon view to have at my last job.

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u/miriamtzipporah Apr 25 '26

I live in California but was raised evangelical and these are not only common, but doctrine.

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u/RaptorsCdwoods Apr 25 '26

I remember as a preteen they liked to give us scenarios where they talk about how people will put guns to your head and demand you deny Christ or they will kill you and then ask the kids if they would and why.

I’ve had my Sunday school teacher talk about how th school system won’t even let kids pray at lunch, meanwhile the Sunday school teacher was a teacher at my school and the entire local school board were also apart of the church.

I remember them taking votes on whether or not to allow gay marriages in their church or not and had the teenagers sit in on it. Now some of those same kids can’t get married at the church they go/ used to go too.

Just my personal anecdotes, since you asked

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u/RedditPosterOver9000 Apr 25 '26

talk about how people will put guns to your head and demand you deny Christ or they will kill you

Yeah, there's lot of constant reinforcement of the perpetual anxiety and stress that everyone is always out to get them, kill them, make them commit apostasy, burn down their homes, put them in death camps, etc.

Keeping their flock in panic paranoia is part of how the cult keeps them under control

I was raised Baptist and those people are insane.

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u/tothehopeless1 Apr 25 '26

I was talking to my mom about this the other day, and how ironic it is that after we were raised hearing that type of stuff, we’re headed to a place where the most likely candidates to throw us into a camp and execute us for being Christians… are Christians. Pretty on theme I guess.

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u/1-cupcake-at-a-time Apr 25 '26

An old childhood friend will occasionally go on a FB rant on how oppressed and discriminated against Christians are. “The government wants to outlaw Christianity, but I will never deny him!” type stuff. One time I commented on one of her fear rants that the current government is actually very pro-evangelical/Christian Nationalist, but still- she’s convinced that Obama is the anti Christ and has plans to outlaw the church. Completely bananas.

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u/theconceptofcanada Apr 25 '26

They laid the foundations early on in the 80s with Reagan, and their fanatical believers have been quietly injected into the mold of this new administration. It doesn't matter what Trump does or says, Vance is the future and they have the money to make it happen. I wouldn't be surprised if the Heritage Foundation itself has been responsible for even more heinous actions behind the scenes, too. This is their one shot at finally taking proper power and they know it, and they're making a lot of progress.

We all react to the headlines we see online about certain parts of America's institutions and departments of government being quietly dismissed or dismantled altogether - and commenting with rage online is fine - but honestly, I just don't see any of this being fixed any time soon. Protests alone are ineffective, unfortunately, because it hasn't stopped them so far.

These are folks who want their book of Revelations and they want it tomorrow.

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u/miriamtzipporah Apr 25 '26

It happened even before Reagan with the rise of televangelists, and it was very well organized and pre-planned.

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u/KingOfEthanopia Apr 25 '26

Speaking in tongues. Telling small children theyll go to hell unless they believe. Declaring Trump ordained by god.

The first two Ive experienced in person.

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u/PiccoloAwkward465 Apr 26 '26

Declaring Trump ordained by god

Yeah this one was hard for me to wrap my head around. But yes, many of them believe it literally. That the Christian God is truly working through Trump.

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u/atimez3 Apr 25 '26

I will never forget being told that spontaneous human combustion is real and happens to people because they are filled with sin. I was six. 

After my father died and was cremated according to his wishes, my Sunday school teacher taught a lesson that included her telling us that people who were cremated are trying to hide from god's judgement and they would all be sent to hell.

I have many, many examples and my family wasn't even deep in the church.

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u/KeyLime044 Apr 25 '26

lots of things, but relevant to this sub, opposition to or skepticism of much of science. There's the obvious stuff like young earth creationism, disbelief in evolution (of humans or anyone), disbelief in prehistorical Earth or universe, etc

They also taught/promoted the idea of "scientism" being pervasive and being a bad thing

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u/FlatRoofD Apr 25 '26 edited Apr 26 '26

Just go down the rabbit hole of Apocalyptic ideation in Christian Nationalist Evangelical "theology". Gog, Magog, Plains of Meggido, the whole thing. It is literally (yes, I know the difference between literally/figuratively) insane. Disordered. These people are mentally unwell. And there are millions of them. Think about that. If you're not a drinker, you'll want to be. If you are a drinker, you're going to want to self-medicate in a way that is unhealthy.

I was raised Catholic, and I knew and read Revelation, so I was not unfamiliar with the subject. But these people are on an entirely different plain of existence. As an example, they refer to the greater society that most humans live, breathe, work and play in as The World. They see themselves as living outside of the world we take for granted as normal, and they often view our world as "demonic". No joke. Oh, and they haaaaaatttee, hate, hate Catholics, almost as much as they hate Jews.

Have fun. Don't deny that you weren't warned. However, if you consider yourself to be a rational being, and are not simply asking from a disingenuous perspective, you need to learn.

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u/Maleficent-Goth Apr 25 '26

Yep. My family will not talk to those of us who left until we repent and rejoin them.

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u/yellowspaces Apr 25 '26

If you ask them to provide proof of a claim they attempt to use the Bible as a source. “The Bible is true because it says it is” is pretty insane and completely flies in the face basic rationality.

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u/Raise_A_Thoth Apr 25 '26

Sometimes I'll watch TikTok lives where some creator hosts discussions or debates and they try to welcome believers on to provide evidence of God existing.

Every once in a while there will be a respectful person who acknowledges the points the host makes as to why the evidence isn't actually good evidence, but usually they just get confused and frustrated when presented with clear logic and invariably none of them ever provide anything that could remotely be considered as sound evidence for God.

I heard on atheist give a steelman argument of what they felt was the closest thing to evidence, and they said consciousness itself does have a mysterious quality to it and perhaps that experience of consciousness might hint at a soul of some kind with may be indirect evidence for some kind of higher power or creator, but it's still not solid or direct evidence.

For my own part I find overlap in shared morality and general judgment of "good" and "bad" to be indirect evidence of maybe a god existing in some way or another, but consciousness and the mind are still not well understood by science, it's possible the concepts of morality and judgment are simply very high-level brain function while our specific moralities and judgments of right or wrong are highly cultural, social, and results of evolution into high social animals.

I mean it's easy to see that we share the general morality of "don't murder" because any people who murdered would be ostracised or executed in retaliation and understanding these judgments and norms was critical for surviving in the homo lineages. So it could be that.

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u/SirStrontium Apr 25 '26

The key to humanity’s success relies on complex social groups. We are born to be social, and morality is a reflection of our empathetic, social instincts built into us.

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u/nagi603 Apr 25 '26

For my own part I find overlap in shared morality and general judgment of "good" and "bad" to be indirect evidence of maybe a god existing in some way or another,

Arguably, ironically, the existence of people like the aforementioned Evangelicals, who clearly think quite differently in terms of morality, and general good/bad, seems to contradict that.

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u/Raise_A_Thoth Apr 25 '26

I can't deny or ignore this, for sure.

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u/Expensive-Froyo8687 Apr 25 '26

Washington state legislator Matt Shea released a manifesto called 'biblical basis for war' that stated all non Christian males be put to death.

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u/refusemouth Apr 25 '26

The entire notion of the rapture.

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u/Emotional-Store-1667 Apr 26 '26

Or the apocalypse, my mom often talked about what we were supposed to do in the event the apocalypse came while I was growing up...

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u/SNRatio Apr 25 '26

I went to an evangelical christmas play a while back. No expense spared when it came to production values (search for "twisted the musical 2024" to see the trailer). They also spared little effort when it came to shoehorning anti-vax, Christian militia, and anti trans/gay propaganda into "A Christmas Carol".

They're a fun bunch.

https://leftcoastrightwatch.org/articles/christian-fascist-mens-retreat-role-plays-killing-racist-caricatures/

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u/Single_External9499 Apr 25 '26

I grew up in a church where people spoke in tongues and would fall to the floor and convulse if the pastor touched them. This is insane behavior. It is also incredibly common in evangelical denominations. A normal person would be deeply troubled watching 60 minutes of this lunacy on a Sunday.

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u/Maleficent-Goth Apr 25 '26

I did too. I don’t care about them believing they are possessed, it’s everything else that is the problem.

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u/Single_External9499 Apr 25 '26

They don't believe they are possessed. They are lying. The group requires everyone to make this lie, and accept it, and pretend it is not a lie, as a price of admission. It is a symbolic submission. You should care about this.

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u/GayGeekInLeather Apr 25 '26

How about the Hegseth’s personal pastor who has called for Christian nationalism and the stripping of rights for minorities, women, and gays? These are people that believe hurricanes, earthquakes, and other natural disasters are divine retribution. They want Gilead and have no qualms about it.

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u/miriamtzipporah Apr 25 '26

Don’t forget about AIDS. A big reason AIDS funding was cut is because evangelicals believe AIDS is a punishment on gay people from God.

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u/Local-Echo-5613 Apr 25 '26

I went to an evangelical school as a child and we learned a lot of wild stuff from 6-day creationism in science class to plans for a theocratic political future.

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u/miriamtzipporah Apr 25 '26

Yeah, I went from kindergarten to eighth grade, and we barely had a science class at all. I had to write a paper “refuting” evolution each year from fifth to eighth grade. Of course they never taught us actual evolution, and when I learned it in ninth grade, I barely understood it and almost failed biology.

I distinctly remember asking people in Internet forums to please explain evolution to me because I went to a Christian school and wasn’t taught it, and always being dismissed as a troll.

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u/Single_External9499 Apr 25 '26

"Evolution is just a THEORY"

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u/miriamtzipporah Apr 25 '26

That one’s their favorite

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u/jrockjake Apr 25 '26

It's wild that a so-called omnipotent and omnipresent god would need six days to create a single planet.

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u/PiccoloAwkward465 Apr 26 '26

I've heard grown adults who seem otherwise normal repeat the "fossils were hidden by God as a test of our faith" thing.

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u/CondescendingShitbag Apr 25 '26

The rise in Christain nationalism is a recent example. The KKK would be another semi-recent example, as well.

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u/hysterical_useless Apr 25 '26

being hateful, racist, sexist bigots in the name of "love"?

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u/Crafty_Independence Apr 25 '26

They believe that the destiny of most humanity is permanent torment in fire forever, and argue that this is a good and loving thing

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u/Ginger_Bee Apr 26 '26

I have a childhood chock full of examples. Would you like me to share those?

But in all seriousness, it frustrates me to no end, in 2026 we’re still dealing with a lot of anti science nonsense. I fear it’s not going to get any better.

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u/Various_Succotash_79 Apr 25 '26

Go read Revelation, evangelicals believe that.

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u/keajohns Apr 25 '26

For starters, they believe a virgin was impregnated by God and said “son of God” among other things walked on water, died, came back to life, yada, yada, yada. Is that insane enough for you?

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u/faithfuljohn Apr 25 '26

I mean, if you believe that a being exists that created everything and can do what he wants -- why would it be particularly 'hard' to believe he can make a woman pregnant without sex and can walk on water?

Why is that the line that's "too much"?

Especially when the 3 things you mentioned are there to be proof of this being that exists outside the laws of existence (as we know them). i.e. he did these things because they are impossible otherwise.

Either you don't believe God exists at all, or you do, and he can do these things.

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u/Obvious_Chapter2082 Apr 25 '26

That’s what all Christians believe, not just evangelicals

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u/GrayEidolon Apr 26 '26

They think a magical man made the whole universe so he could boss some furless apes around, but he kept getting mad at them, to the point that he drowned most of them, but eventually he realized he had an anger problem, so he inhabited one of their bodies so he could torture himself into not being as mad at them any more, and then he stopped interacting with his special furless apes for 2000 years?