Category: recovery | Page 31 | Spiritual Abuse Blogs

Guilt Trips

The church I just left taught that everyone needed to pray a specified amount of time each day. I never did follow this teaching since that wasn’t how I was taught by my first pastor. Religious activity just shouldn’t be so forced. And any time I’ve ever been with friends, I didn’t say, OK, I have one hour. We need to spend one hour together. OK, starting… now! And watch the clock for the next hour to make sure I got my time with them in. Absolutely not. So why should I do that to God?

Lately my internal timer has been going off every once in a while… “Mary, you haven’t prayed yet. Mary, pray more! Are you still a Christian? Do you have the Holy Ghost?” Blah. And the annoying thing is that I know it isn’t God doing that- He knows that all He has to do is gently say “hi”- not throw a guilt trip on me- to spend some time with me!

I never did understand that: I was taught that guilt tripping was God. That makes absolutely no sense. If a kid wants to go to the park, you don’t need to say, “Go to the park! If you don’t go to the park, I’ll be angry! I’ll spank you!” Good grief, no! All you have to do is say, “Wanna go?” and you won’t be able to keep up with them, they’ll be moving so fast! So if God has good things for us in prayer or Bible study or going to church or whatever, and we once enjoyed those things and wanted to do them, were eager to do them, why would He start guilt tripping us with those? The answer is He won’t, of course. God knows us well enough to know- He will lead us gently, speak softly, and love us deeply. Sometimes I think maybe He leads so gently that we don’t quite realize we’re being lead, but we are.

OK, now to rambling… I know many people in church that would disagree with the following, and it blows my mind. I’ve seen these people work with their pets, but they don’t think people can be handled with similar compassion. However, when an animal is partly wild or is hurt, a person can approach the animal if he knows enough about it. The animal must be approached a certain way. Most shouldn’t be approached directly. Walk in at an angle, eyes averted, shoulder more toward the animal, and it will feel less threatened. Don’t walk steadily. Walk to a certain distance and stop.

Especially with a small animal, sit on the ground there, and assess the animal’s reaction. Maybe walk backward a little rather than directly to it after this pause. Let it know you aren’t going to hurt it. Reflect its body language if non-threatening- blink slowly if it’s a cat, nod if it’s a horse. No sudden moves, just walk slowly and gently, patiently. Speak softly, in a low, gentle voice. Think calm.

It can take hours or weeks, but the time spent is essential, and if we do it right, eventually that animal will learn to trust. Sometimes I think God does the same thing with us. Not pushing, not forcing, not requiring certain actions from us at specific times, just being calm and letting us adjust to Him.

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Good Things Do Happen

One of the hardest things for some who leave an unhealthy church is to acknowledge that along with the abuse or wrong teachings, there were good things and experiences that happened at their old church.

People leave with hurts and damage ranging from mild all the way to very extreme. Some are quite angry at first and may lash out at anything to do with their church. These people need to be able to openly express their feelings, something that often is not allowed in unhealthy churches.

Usually as time goes on and they learn about spiritual abuse and what happened, you start to watch their transformation from anger into one of healing. Being able to see that there were good things, along with the bad, is a sign that the healing process is at work.

Unless a person was involved in an extreme situation, they really did have some good things happen during their involvement. And even in extreme cases, there is often something good that took place. They may have made close friends, had some good teachings, enjoyed times of fellowship, and so forth. Seeing and acknowledging these things does not set aside the fact that they were hurt and damage occurred. It is by no means placing ones seal of approval on a church/group.

If you find yourself regularly lashing out in anger toward your former church or group, especially if this has lasted many months or years, please find a safe place to work through all the issues. You may want to consider professional licensed counseling. It is one thing to disagree with doctrines and point out abuses which happened, but it is different when you are in anger mode, lashing out much of the time. It is hurting you and possibly others around you. Healing is attainable.

The spiritual abuse website offers a safe place for people to discuss, share, heal and encourage others along the way, even sometimes get free books and media that may be helpful. Don’t allow your former bad church experience to continue to have a negative effect on your life.

Leaving An Unhealthy Church #5: Don’t Listen To The Gossip

“I overheard the pastor telling Bob that you had a rebellious spirit and we aren’t supposed to contact you. He thinks you’ll soon be a drunk or on drugs.”

“Liz said that if you had been under submission to your husband, you never would have cut your hair and that’s why your son broke his leg.”

“Doug said that the reason you left is because you were never really one of us and were faking it all along.”

“One of the women at church caught you wearing make-up and now you’re being called Jezebel.”

You’ve left an unhealthy or abusive church and start hearing what current members, and maybe even the pastor, are saying. You are hurt, heartbroken – maybe angry. Though you recall seeing this happen to others who left, and expected it to occur, it hits hard.

Unfortunately, being human we sometimes have this desire to want to know what others are saying about us. Curiosity gets the best of us. But remember the old saying that ‘curiosity killed the cat’ because listening to this kind of talk can temporarily kill your spirits. There is more than enough to deal with in sorting through all the emotions and issues involved in leaving, than to add unnecessary turmoil to it all.

The best way to handle this is to stop the talk before it hits your ears. If someone from the former church starts sharing what anyone else there is saying about you, stop them in their tracks and tell them you do not wish to hear it. Some church members have nothing better to do than to talk about those who left, make up stories and believe things without ever stopping to determine their veracity. Through it all, most don’t call, write or visit.

These were people you bonded with and loved and you don’t need to hear the latest gossip about yourself or why you left and what you are supposedly doing now. If listened to, you will most likely be hurt and don’t need to get angry enough that you say or do things which will later be regretted and that will be used against you to ‘prove’ you are backslid, rebellious, reprobate, etc.

Remember, you decided to move on and are no longer a member. Don’t get pulled into the nonsense and run around trying to put out all the fires. You know your character, why you left and how you are living. All the talk in the world won’t change that truth and you will never convince otherwise those who are determined to believe a lie.

If you allow people to report these negative things, fighting your thoughts will prove more troublesome. You will need to guard your own spirit more carefully and will have additional ups and downs due to thinking about all the gossip and how wrong and unfair it is. Save yourself some heartache and turmoil by not listening. Don’t allow your curiosity to get the best of you.

Yes, There is Always Hope

So far, I’ve written about my stepdad’s difficulties with church that have arisen because of his toxic religious upbringing, his adoptive mother’s unhealthy beliefs, and issues with United Pentecostal Church family members. Now, I’d like to focus on the positive – a few people who have been instrumental in helping him start to break out from the spiritual abuse.

The first person who played a major role was Rev. Laura, the then-rector of the church we started attending when we moved back from Houston. Jon had never dealt with a female clergy member from a mainline church before, so this was a new experience for him. However, his friendship with Laura turned out to be good for him, and he actually started attending services from time to time, although his level of participation at this time was low. There was just too much stuff going on during this time with the UPC folks that it was hindering his progress.

Around the time Laura accepted a call at another congregation, things were starting to come to a head with the frustrating religious differences between him and the UPC family members. The experience of having a clergy member go to another church after a tenure of about 12 years (she had been at our church for close to ten when we started going) was new and took some adjustment. His experience with previous Baptist congregations, for example, had involved pastors with such long tenures that the congregations had more or less been shaped into the pastor’s image.

Our most recent rector, Fr. Les, arrived about five years ago, and he and Jon hit it off right off the bat. Even though he’s still gone slowly about getting involved with church stuff, I think Les has been a very positive influence on him, and I’ve noticed some subtle positive changes in Jon’s outlook during the time Les, who is now at a church in another state, was in charge. He’s actually given formally joining serious consideration, which is a major step. However, he’s also aware of and grateful for the fact that membership is not an absolute requirement to be fully welcome.

A few other good friends from church have also had a positive influence on him. By making him feel welcome, without a hidden agenda, he now knows that you can make real friends in a church setting. The fact that people at our church come from various backgrounds and have an assortment of interests outside the church has made a good impression. With the people in his family that were involved in the UPC and other groups, everything was all about goings on at the church, all the time. I think knowledge that the body of Christ is about the people, rather than where they meet, has been refreshing for him.

This has been most obvious when Les visited him in the hospital both when he was an inpatient and when he was having outpatient surgery. Being able to receive communion and the laying on of hands/anointing with oil without being a formal member has helped him be able to approach his involvement on his own terms. Knowing that he can participate as much or as little in the life of the congregation as he wants has made him more willing to be a part of things.

This part of the story is still ongoing, but I have every reason to believe he’ll continue to recover from the toxic beliefs he was exposed to growing up. With God, all things are possible! Please keep Jon, my mother and I in your continued prayers.

Some new favorite quotes

I loved Rich Mullins’ music. Tonight I found one of his old concert videos on YouTube. Some of the the things he said really floored me. So tonight I’m quoting:

I know vengeance is mine saith the Lord. I just want to be about the Lord’s business. …Proof-texting is a very dangerous thing. I think if we were given the scriptures, it was not so we could prove that we’re right about everything. If we were given the scriptures, it was to humble us into realizing that God is right and the rest of us are just guessing.

He went on to say that one of his favorite verses is “whatever you’ve done to the least of these my brethren, you’ve done to me.” He said he believed God has a special place in His heart for the poor, the weak, the oppressed, the small and the insignificant.

https://www.youtube.com/vQnFU5JvuWY

Well, I’ve posted the link… (the link is no longer available) I can’t do it justice. He was killed in a car accident within about a year of this video, and he was one of my favorite artists.

The rest of this is just me talking for the fun of it…

I finally got some songs uploaded to MP3 today. Mary has finally caught up to within a decade of current technology! Almost, anyway. Guess I need to find a TV and DVD to be really caught up, but a computer has all I really want for technology.

I’m guessing most people at church now know, either through gossip or pulpit, that I’ve left. Not one call. And I’m OK with that now. And finding myself less cautious online with letting people know where and who I am… which I haven’t totally decided is a good thing or not, so I’m trying to be less cautious but still careful. Life’s just too good to live intimidated and scared of every shadow or possible situation that could happen. I’d rather rejoice.