It must have been difficult if you took a deep dive into the Greek of the New Testament to continue to believe in textual inerrancy. Just take the census of Quirinius during the reign of Herod the Great. Luke reported that Jesus was born during that census. Matthew reported that Jesus was born during the reign of Herod the Great. Both accounts cannot be true. The timelines don't mesh. Herod the Great died before Quirinius became governor of Syria.
Most New Testament scholars simply accept that Luke made a mistake. Either the Quirinius detail came down to him in mistaken oral tradition, or he assumed something from facts not in evidence. It's not a big deal for Catholic scholars to accept this, because the Catholic Church has never insisted on textual inerrancy, which is pretty new fangled as Christian ideas go. (Distinguishing between "sola scriptura" principles and inerrancy, which are not the same thing.)
Anyway, professional biblical scholars (who are Christians!) say that when they start diving into the New Testament in Greek, they have to abandon the principle of inerrancy, which is just obviously not possible.
I'm sure you know what I mean.
Part of the trouble, in my opinion, with Evangelical Christianity and other sorts of fundamentalist Christianity is a great reluctance to do real scholarship, but to engage in foggy apologetics instead. On issues big and small.
Like insisting that Quirinius must have been governor of Syria twice, which is not at all supported by the historical record.
And that's on a rather inconsequential matter. Nothing about Christian theology has to change no matter what anybody thinks about Quirinius. The only reason it matters is that Luke clearly made a mistake.
When conservative Christian leaders are unwilling to acknowledge even something so theologically trivial, they certainly aren't about to budge on their biases and prejudices in more important matters — like being kind and accepting toward queer people, despite the fact that by doing so they would be emulating Jesus.
It must have been very difficult for you to break out of that mindset. Thank you for sharing your journey!
