Shortly after my last post, and in very quick succession, I lost my job, separated from my wife, got a new job, and moved to a new town. I had many things competing for my attention and the blog got neglected.
Also, a few other concerns were mulling around in my head:
- My new town was much smaller and more rural.
When I started all this, I was living in the Toronto area, where millions of people I had never met and would never meet again were all a short drive away. It would have been a lot harder to anonymously blog about religious communities anonymously. Also, being in a much more religiously homogenous area, there was a shortage of "interesting" blog subjects (or subjects I found interesting, anyhow).
I've since moved again (though not back to Toronto), so this is less of a concern, but still there. Where I am now isn't as multicultural as Toronto.
- I wasn't sure how to broaden the blog to include other religions.
As unfamiliar as Christian churches feel to me, I have at least some background with the religion to give me a background knowledge. I don't want this blog to only focus on Christianity, but I'm also a bit daunted at the idea of just showing up at a synagogue, mosque, or mandir. In a Christian church, I can blend in. In a Buddhist temple, I wouldn't have the first clue of where to go, what to do, and when to do it.
- I started to feel drained.
As you probably know if you read my introductory post, I'm an atheist. Not only that, I have major problems relating to religious points of view. When my ex and I would go to Mass together, I'd often leave feeling depressed at best or angry at worst. Either way, the energy would be sucked out of me. I wondered whether this was something specific to her church... but my experience since then suggests it's not.
- I worried about how what I was doing would be taken.
Around when I launched the blog, we got into a discussion on a discussion forum I participate on about a podcast where two atheists "infiltrated" the LDS Church. While I knew that this blog is quite different - I wasn't misrepresenting myself, for one - it still got me to thinking about how the people in the congregations I visited would feel if they knew I was blogging about it.
So... with all that, I'm struggling to decide on what sort of direction I should take this blog. If you have any thoughts on what you'd like to see or on the points I raised, please chime in below in the comments.
