{"id":735,"date":"2014-04-25T09:55:00","date_gmt":"2014-04-25T09:55:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/admin.patheos.com\/blogs\/rhetoricraceandreligion\/2014\/04\/losing-my-religion-clergy-who-no-longer-believe-gather-online.html"},"modified":"2014-04-25T09:55:00","modified_gmt":"2014-04-25T09:55:00","slug":"losing-my-religion-clergy-who-no-longer-believe-gather-online","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/rhetoricraceandreligion\/2014\/04\/losing-my-religion-clergy-who-no-longer-believe-gather-online.html","title":{"rendered":"Losing My Religion: Clergy Who No Longer Believe Gather Online"},"content":{"rendered":"<!DOCTYPE html PUBLIC \"-\/\/W3C\/\/DTD HTML 4.0 Transitional\/\/EN\" \"http:\/\/www.w3.org\/TR\/REC-html40\/loose.dtd\">\n<html><head><meta http-equiv=\"content-type\" content=\"text\/html; charset=utf-8\"><meta http-equiv=\"content-type\" content=\"text\/html; charset=utf-8\"><\/head><body><div style=\"background-color: white;line-height: 1.5em;margin-bottom: 22px;padding: 0px\"><span style=\"font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif\">Catherine Dunphy came to seminary in her mid-20s, full of passion to work in the service of the Catholic Church. By the time she left, for many reasons, she had lost her faith.<\/span><\/div>\n<div style=\"background-color: white;line-height: 1.5em;margin-bottom: 22px;padding: 0px\"><span style=\"font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif\">\u201cI had this struggle where I thought, \u2018I don\u2019t believe this anymore,\u2019\u201d said Dunphy, now 40 and living in Toronto. \u201cI felt I had no space to move or breathe. I felt like an outcast.\u201d<\/span><\/div>\n<div style=\"background-color: white;line-height: 1.5em;margin-bottom: 22px;padding: 0px\"><span style=\"font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif\">Now, 10 years later, she is part of a new online project aimed at helping others like herself who are isolated by doubt in a sea of believers. Called Rational Doubt: The Clergy Project Blog, it debuts this week on Patheos, an online host of religion and spirituality blogs.<\/span><\/div>\n<div style=\"background-color: white;line-height: 1.5em;margin-bottom: 22px;padding: 0px\"><span style=\"font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif\">Rational Doubt is an extension of The Clergy Project, a private online community of clergy who, for a range of reasons, no longer believe in God. Started three years ago, the initiative has grown from just a handful of anonymous members who supported each other on online forums and discussions to a current roster of more than 550 priests, ministers, nuns, rabbis and even a few imams.<\/span><\/div>\n<div style=\"background-color: white;line-height: 1.5em;margin-bottom: 22px;padding: 0px\"><span style=\"font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif\">The blog\u2019s goal is lofty: to engage and support clergy and laypeople who are not members of The Clergy Project but who doubt or reject religion and feel they cannot confide in friends, family and colleagues. Clergy Project members \u2014 all former clergy who no longer believe in God \u2014 will write posts, answer questions and engage in discussions about religion, nonbelief and the journey between the two.<\/span><\/div>\n<div style=\"background-color: white;line-height: 1.5em;margin-bottom: 22px;padding: 0px\"><span style=\"font-family: Georgia, Times New Roman, serif\">Read the rest <a href=\"http:\/\/www.washingtonpost.com\/national\/religion\/losing-my-religion-clergy-who-no-longer-believe-gather-online\/2014\/04\/24\/401e07d8-cbcf-11e3-b81a-6fff56bc591e_story.html\" target=\"_blank\" class=\" decorated-link\" rel=\"nofollow\">here<\/a><\/span><\/div>\n<\/body><\/html>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Catherine Dunphy came to seminary in her mid-20s, full of passion to work in the service of the Catholic Church. By the time she left, for many reasons, she had lost her faith. \u201cI had this struggle where I thought, \u2018I don\u2019t believe this anymore,\u2019\u201d said Dunphy, now 40 and living in Toronto. \u201cI felt [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-735","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v21.1 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/wordpress\/plugins\/seo\/ -->\n<title>Losing My Religion: Clergy Who No Longer Believe Gather Online<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"Catherine Dunphy came to seminary in her mid-20s, full of passion to work in the service of the Catholic Church. By the time she left, for many reasons,\" \/>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.patheos.com\/blogs\/rhetoricraceandreligion\/2014\/04\/losing-my-religion-clergy-who-no-longer-believe-gather-online.html\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Losing My Religion: Clergy Who No Longer Believe Gather Online\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"Catherine Dunphy came to seminary in her mid-20s, full of passion to work in the service of the Catholic Church. 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