The 3 B’s of Religion
Understanding How Belief, Behavior, and Belonging Impact Your Religious Views
Hi Thinkers!
Welcome to the Deconstruction.Zone newsletter! Thank you for reading.
Today we’ll discuss the 3 B’s of Religion and how they can help us better understand why someone changes their worldview.
Be sure to subscribe so you don’t miss the next post, “Jesus Taught Deconstruction — and the Religious Hated Him for It”. For a preface to that article, check out last week’s “What is Deconstruction and Why it Matters”.
Now let’s get started!
Take a moment to think about why someone might leave your specific faith community…
What reasons come to mind? Especially if they claim to no longer believe in God all together?
I can tell you exactly what I concluded as a few close friends left my Christian faith:
Somehow they were hurt by the church. Either their perception of God, or their interaction with someone in the church, brought them tremendous pain — causing them to leave the faith.
They wanted to live in sin. There is some expectation God places on believers that this person doesn’t want to follow. Perhaps they’re cheating on their partner, wanting to do drugs, or becoming overly obsessed with worldly wealth.
If only I could fix their hurt or convince them that their sinful desire wasn’t worth giving up eternity in Paradise, I could bring them back into the fold.
And actually, sometimes those are reasons play a role in why people leave. But I was missing one very prominent reason — and that’s where the 3 B’s of Religion come in.
What are the 3 B’s of Religion?
Christians and non-Christians alike have used the 3 B’s of Religion as a sociological tool to evaluate why people join and leave faith communities.
The three Bs are:
Belief: The actual faith claims and tenants of the religion.
Behavior: The rituals and lifestyle expectations of the religion.
Belonging: The community and connection someone feels in the religion.
These 3 B’s give us an easy rubric for evaluating why someone joins or leaves a specific denomination or worldview. All three can play a role in why someone church hops, with different people prioritizing the three differently.
But, when someone is desiring to pursue truth, only one of these matters.
How the 3 B’s are Perceived by the Faithful
Take a moment to ponder, once more, the scenario where someone leaves your church.
Looking back, I realized that the only justifications I considered for my friends leaving were:
They were hurt by the church (belonging).
They wanted to live in sin (behavior).
I never seriously considered they didn’t believe we had the truth! I couldn’t fathom this because the evidence was so overwhelming. We can’t be wrong.
People frequently claim to accept their own worldview based on beliefs, while declaring those who left did so because of a lack of belonging or unaligned behaviors.
Why? Because it allows you to disregard the intellectual claims of the person — instead writing them off as emotional or angry.
This person grew up with the same views, education, and experiences as you.
An outsider can be written off as never having known the truth. But this person grew up knowing the same “truth” as you and determined it wasn’t truth at all. To intellectually accept them means to admit that your beliefs may be wrong.
And to admit that you might not have the truth is a belief that cannot be held by an evangelical religion like Christianity or Islam. Your entire mission is to convince other people your view is right — and that’s hard to do if you admit it might not be.
Beliefs are All that Matter — Start Here for Intellectual Conversations with Non-Believers
People may jump from one church to another because of the behaviors or belonging associated with that congregation, but they won’t give up the faith altogether.
A religious person will never be able to have a meaningful conversation with an ex-believer as long as they start with the assumption this person left solely because of behaviors or belonging.
This requires you to assume that the person you’re communicating with is so dense and short sighted that they would choose to give up an eternity of never-ending joy, happiness, and purpose for a triviality like trying marijuana (behavior) or because someone stole their parking spot at church (belonging).
While people may retroactively recognize aspects of their prior faith community tied to behavior or belonging, that’s not the reason they left.
Every person I’ve met who left their religion left as part of a journey toward a deeper understanding of truth. They’ve left to remain in moral alignment with their beliefs.
And this willingness to pursue truth over tradition is a GOOD thing! At least, according to Christianity. As we’ll discuss next time — it’s the kind of thinking Jesus taught.
Thoughts? Do the 3 Bs resonate with your understanding of what worldview someone holds? What do you currently think is the main one or two Bs for why you’re part of your currently faith/worldview community?
Until next time, stay inspired!