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WHAT IS A “BACKSLIDER”?
Backslider is a term used by Evangelical Christians for people who have left the church, or had fallen away.
One day it hit me, that’s what I would have called myself back in my Church days. It was a sobering realization. The old me, would refer to the new me as a Backslider.
I knew people who had left the church, I remember how I thought about them, how I judged them and felt sorry for them. I remember how once they were gone, no one really talked to them anymore. They were no longer one of the “Us” they had become one of the “Them”
And now that was me.
WHY IS THE ZINE CALLED “BACKSLIDER”?
Leaving was a challenging, confusing and lonely time for me. I wanted to make something to honour my time growing up in Church, as well as my leaving. “The Backslider Project” was an open tab on the desktop of my mind for a handful of years. An idea that I didn’t know what to do with.
At the same time, I had also been looking for an opportunity to do my version of a zine. So when I realized the two ideas should be combined into one project. Everything just started to click.
WHY A ZINE?
Nothing feels like holding physical media in your hands. I love the feeling of opening a new record and looking through the lyrics and the art. I wanted to make something that felt the same as that. A zine is an affordable way to make that.
Another great thing about a zine is that it can be anything.
I had never written publicly in the way that I do in this project. I felt hesitant and insecure to share my voice in that way, but when I combined those written pieces with this theme and style of design… it just clicked. The zine became a way for me to expand my style of writing, while using skills I felt stronger in. Backslider wrapped all that together and was the perfect container for it.
ZINES ARE ROCK and ROLL
When Jack and Meg White made a White Stripes record, I’ve read that they went into the studio with “nothing” prepared and would jam out the record in the weeks that it took to make it. That’s rock and roll.
A zine is made with that same intention and spirt. It’s an approach that’s of the moment. It takes all your talent/skill/previous experience and wraps it in the thing you cranked out in a handful of weeks. That was my approach and my hopes for Backslider.
IS THE ZINE “ANTI-CHRISTIAN”?
The zine is about some of my experiences growing up in Christianity, why I left, and what that has been like for me. Your involvement with Christianity may have been healthy and helpful in your life. That’s great, I’m happy for you.
As a whole, that was not my experience and I had a bunch of unresolved feelings about it that needed to be worked through. Some of it was good, and parts of it may be true… but as a whole it left me broken and confused.
Backslider is my expression of that experience: 33 years of Christianity, what that was like and why I left… designed, written and jammed out in a few weeks.
I’m thankful for my time, and feel at peace about why I left.
I’m ready to move on. I just had to make something about it first.
Thanks for reading.
You can buy your copy of the Backslider Zine here
- Ryan Leacock