Meet the 20-year-old who’s on a mission to rank, rate and review just about every church in Auckland.

George Michael said it best: you gotta have faith. Whether that’s faith in your Eftpos card not declining at the counter, or in the prime minister when he says everything is back on track, it’s good to have something to believe in. But for the spiritually inclined, finding the right omniscient power to put your faith in can take a bit more trial and error.

Case in point: 20-year-old Amia, who has been holy-hopping churches in Auckland and towns further north in the hopes of finding out whether she was raised in the right religion. Her Instagram page Diaries of a Church Hopper has reviewed nearly 30 churches around the city belonging to nearly 20 different Christian denominations, from the Coptic Orthodox church to literature evangelists, with equal amounts of earnest belief and healthy scepticism.

Her church-hopping series reveals not only the best and worst of local church life, from the small things that set different denominations apart (Catholics love candles, Mormons drink water instead of grape juice or wine) to the dramas within youth groups. Though controversial to some believers, Amia reckons church hopping is the most effective way for young believers to reexamine their faith and find the most effective place to nurture it. She told The Spinoff what brought her on the journey in the first place.

Tell me about yourself and your faith journey – you were raised as a Seventh Day Adventist, right?

I’m a student – born in Whangārei – but I moved to Auckland to study arts and fine arts. I’m from quite a devout Seventh Day Adventist family, for six generations. But when I moved to Auckland, I realised that no one was making me go to church any more, and I had so many more options here, which is really what started this whole journey.

Where did that scepticism start? It’s a classic story, right: a young believer moves to a big city and starts to question everything they know. Do you make it a point to put curiosity first, faith second?

It goes hand-in-hand. I do enjoy visiting churches, but I go in there with my doubts; my biggest ones are trust in the Bible, the idea of free will and whether an all-powerful, all-knowing and all-loving God can possibly exist. I would say I’m more of a practising Adventist than a believing Adventist.

How does church in regional New Zealand compare to church in urban New Zealand?

There’s a lot less youth going to church in Whangārei – there were pretty much no 18- to 30-year-olds at my home church at all. Whereas in Auckland, there’s tonnes of university students. That was quite shocking to me.

So, you were bouncing around churches, but what made you decide to review them and chuck those reviews on Instagram?

I was at church, and this service was all about the dangers of church hopping, and how you should stick to your own church. I hadn’t heard the term “church hopping” before, and I kinda liked it. So I decided to use that term when going around different churches, and thought it’d be fun to put some reviews on the internet.

For a lot of people, when they move to a new location, it’s common to check out different churches in the area. I’ve gotten a few messages from people saying, “I’ve gone on a similar journey, trying to find a church that works for me.”

Have you found one?

Yeah, I have found one really good church: Royal Oak Seventh Day Adventist. I’m currently in the process of transferring my membership from the Whangārei Adventist Church to that one. I’ll still be church hopping – Adventist Church is on Saturday, so there’s still a lot of options to hop around on Sunday.

What are you looking for in a good church? Is it all about the people? The worship? Is it purely vibes based? 

The main thing I look for is a youth group I can get along with. And also, if they’re accepting of my doubts and questions – I know they’re not going to have all the answers, but being OK with me questioning stuff in the first place … Some people get uncomfortable with it, so I try to find people who are openly comfortable with my questions.

Do you think you’ve found any answers to your questions?

To be honest, it’s not so much answers, but interesting ideas from people I speak to. It’s changing my perspective on how I see things – someone suggested that Calvinism is something I should look into if interested in free will.

I bet your comment section can be absolute hell sometimes.

Most [commenters] are friendly, but [the ones that aren’t] don’t bother me too much. They’re usually directed at the church itself, not me, and I guess people can have their own opinions, but it’s sad to see that some people can’t be accepting of other people’s beliefs.

Have you considered reviewing places of worship outside of Christian denominations?

I’ve had a few people suggest that I visit a synagogue or a mosque. I’m open to doing that, I’m just not sure about the etiquette and rules around visiting these religions, so I’d have to do a bit more research before doing that.

So, what’s the best church you’ve visited so far?

I’ve been to a lot of good ones – there’s obviously the church I’m transferring to, which is really good – but I’m not sure if there’s one single church that I’d consider the best overall.

Has there been one that’s made you think, ‘OK, I’m never going back there again.’

To be honest, I wasn’t quite keen on the Jehovah’s Witness Kingdom temple. It felt quite cold, sterile and business-like to me. That was quite an interesting church experience – but I don’t know enough about their theology to criticise that.

Has it been eye-opening to see how other denominations celebrate their faith?

It’s been very interesting. I feel like in the Adventist church, they tend to be a bit anti-Catholic, so it was quite interesting to experience a church that was usually frowned upon in my community.

I think churches with younger members have quite a specific vibe: they’re louder and more “out there”. Whereas churches with older members tend to be more quiet and conservative.

I guess the layman would assume that church is something young people don’t go to as often as they used to – is that something you see to be true?

Not really. At Auckland University, there’s tonnes of Christian groups, and there’s churches with majority young people around [Auckland Central]. I think there’s quite a big movement of young people who want to go to church – and I’m not exactly sure why – but I think that, being uni students and young adults, we’re searching for meaning in community. And church is a place that can provide this.