Category: fear | Page 5 | Spiritual Abuse Blogs

How can you be a Christian and [do a certain thing]

A couple years ago a friend posted on Facebook, “How can anyone call themselves a Christian and [do a certain thing]?” If I named the ‘thing,’ it would cause an argument even now. The Bible is silent on the matter she was referring to.

Her statement upset me. I’d left a church where you were “backslid” if you did or even thought certain things. And suddenly I was hearing the same type of thing again, from people who were supposed to be healthy Christians. “How can you be a Christian and wear stretch pants?” “How can you be a Christian and not tithe?” “How can you call yourself Christian and not go to church every Sunday?”

I’d heard eerily similar things in my former church, though there they were statements: “You’re backslid if you wear pants.” “You’re backslid if you don’t tithe and give at least 5% offering.” “You’re backslid if you aren’t in church every time the doors are open.” They were overly judgmental statements meant to control by fear. Fear of losing out with God, of being a bad witness, of being declared not good enough. And so when I started hearing similar statements from mainstream churches and Christians, I was angry.

The questions are not, “Why do you think like that? Why do you do that?” in a way that would lead to open discussion and consideration of other perspectives. The questions are meant to shame, to shut down the other person, and to draw into isolation or polarize. The questions are not healthy… they are actually abusive.

I do not want to be a part of that abuse anymore. I don’t want to be abused by it and I do not want to be the abuser. I will not draw lines in the sand that indicate who is and isn’t Christian based on perspectives on stretch pants or skirts or tithing or church membership. Definitely not politics or social stances. What makes a person is no more or less than whether or not the person believes and has put their faith in Jesus. That is Christianity. Other things have to do with denomination, theology, philosophy, or maturity, perhaps, but not Christianity.

I was asked on a survey if I was a Christian… and I hesitated. Christianity has come to be tied to some pretty bad things for me. And above all, the question rang in my mind, “How can you call yourself Christian and…” My belief in God and my faith in Jesus hasn’t changed. But in my mind, the term “Christian” has.

Someone stated half-jokingly recently that she was not a Christian, but a Jesusian. I like the term. I’m no longer a Christian. I’m a Jesusian, too.

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The Sin of Truth Speaking

“And you will know the truth, and the truth will set you free.” (John 8:32, ESV).

The church I grew up in claims to be one of the few “with a revelation of the truth.” There were many comments continually about other churches “not having the truth,” and after I married, my husband and I taught our children that other groups “don’t have the whole truth.”

Never did I dream just how unwelcome the truth would be in such an environment. Speaking anything against a preacher was automatically wrong–no matter how truthful. Speaking a firm truth to a preacher was also damning. This was normal, as far as I knew…after all, I came in as a newborn baby and it was my father who was the preacher.

Then I grew up. Because preaching was such a lofty position–right up there next to God, if a preacher was “caught in sin” of a sexual nature, he would lose the right to be a preacher permanently. God would forgive, but he could no longer be used in that way.

This was a scary setup. Anyone who dared suggest any impropriety against a preacher was accused of “trying to ruin his ministry.” So, the culture bred silence. The few who did speak up were cast out of churches, accused of rebellion and lying, and treated as dangerous vipers. People became afraid to speak up.

Pastoral positions came with unquestioning authority, and corruption festered. People were taught to have a hero worship for pastors. It was not uncommon to see congregants kneeling before a pastor, shining his shoes. They pinched and scrimped to buy him lavish gifts–a crocodile Bible case or a $1,000 pair of shoes. I saw people share their food stamps and commodities with their pastor in an attempt to “tithe.” I saw them buy a sofa for one pastor’s Christmas, and present it in front of the congregation.

I dreaded Christmas when I was a little girl and my whole family were presented with gifts. We sat at the altar and opened them in front of everyone and I didn’t know why it made me feel so bad. I was just a kid trying to be a kid, but it’s hard to be “one of the kids” when you’re the only one getting a present you have to open in front of others who have none.

It was within this atmosphere that I began to notice that truth really wasn’t welcome.

The first case I remember was in Missouri somewhere. A preacher was arrested in a rest area for propositioning an undercover policeman. He claimed innocence. He said it was a set up. Then he said he didn’t realize what he said to the policeman was a proposition. It went to court with all of his preacher friends backing him and supporting his side of the story. He was found guilty. Still, he had the support of his preacher friends, who utterly defended his innocence, in spite of the court decision. Was he guilty? Who knows? The point is, he sure looked to be, and yet, even in the face of a court decision, he was not removed from preaching, and continued fully supported by his colleagues.

The truth was not welcome.

Another case occurred in New Mexico. It didn’t involve the courts. It involved a female in the church. This lady was historically upright and loyal, very dedicated to the church. The new pastor took advantage of that, making sexual advances to her. Confused and hurt, she contacted her former pastor for advice. He took the matter to the “board of elders” over the church–a group of three preachers chosen by the pastor to provide oversight and accountability. They performed an “investigation” where they listened to the pastor’s story but never interviewed the lady. They decided he’d been falsely accused. The former pastor was livid. He knew this lady, and she was not one to make things up. Again, truth was not welcome.

Then it happened to my friend.

She was a pastor’s wife. She’d been dealing with the domestic abuse for years. She shared with me that she’d gone to preachers, who’d “counseled,” but little changed. In some respects, it grew worse as time went on. It wasn’t just my friend who was suffering, several kids were involved. Finally, some frightening things took place and she shared how she had finally felt “release” to leave. The local women’s shelter carefully helped her plan for safe departure.

Once she and her children were safe with family in another state, she called to let him know. She said she told him if he’d see a professional counselor, then she’d talk to him again. He refused.

She saw a professional counselor for the first time herself, who, upon hearing the details, called the child abuse hotline to report what he’d done to the kids. An investigation was opened. She showed me the order of protection from the courts.

The response was an email, forwarded to a list of preachers by one of his “board of elders.” In it, the verse “bring not an accusation against an elder except by two or three witnesses” was used. It was a request to keep the matter “in the church” and let the “board of elders” decide innocence or guilt.

Domestic abuse doesn’t have witnesses. That’s how it thrives–fear and silence. I couldn’t believe this was going down again!

Needless to say, the matter went on to the courts. In the end, he lost custody of his children and ended up with limited supervised contact. But did this mean anything in regards to his “ministry?” No.

His board of elders refused to see the documentation, only looking at what he chose to show them, and believing him without wavering. Today he is still preaching within that group, bragging about the financial support he gets and the places he preaches. She deals with this frustration even now, years later. No one ever contacted her to hear her side.

Truth was not welcome.

When I left the cult myself, my dad asked me what I could possibly be seeking. “You already have all the truth.”

Really?

What I saw was a lot of propaganda and precious little appreciation for the truth that was tangibly right in front of their faces. Their belief in a mystical “truth” but their blindness to real truth turned me away.

No, thank you! I’ll go where speaking the truth is not referred to as “sin”.

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Toilet Training Your Emotions

Weird as that title might sound, we all have a load of emotions to deal with. Especially if you’ve been in a spiritually abusive environment, sometimes the feelings can be very overwhelming. he thing is, you were probably taught that some of those feelings were sins. I know I was.

For me, since the pastor was also at home as my father, and the pastor’s wife was naturally my mother, there was no escaping church or rhetoric. While I love my parents and I feel they did whatever they did as a sincere attempt to instill in me their values, they were wrong about some things. For example, I was raised to think that showing any anger was a sin–for females at least. There was always that double standard. I saw my dad slam doors and spew anger when people crossed him, but it was certainly not something a “shamefaced” woman should do.

I remember several times where I was told as a child and teen “you need to go pray through” because I was angry about something. This shamed me and made me feel that every time I felt anger I had sinned. It follows, naturally, that I would be very attractive to a dominant male with an abusive nature. My marriage was full of abuse, while I prayed for God to help me be more submissive and to learn to pray for my husband. My parents saw what was going on, and they were very upset. My dad had always treated my mother with utmost respect and kindness. Little did they understand the groundwork that was laid when they raised me to be submissive.

I remember crying in relief when I realized the Bible never said not to be angry. (Eph. 4:26, ESV “Be angry and do not sin; do not let the sun go down on your anger.”) It was okay to feel angry, as long as I didn’t sin in that anger. What a freeing concept!

All of these years later, I work in mental health. I find all sorts of dysfunctional ideas about emotions, but the most telling issue is when I discover a family is uncomfortable with a certain emotion. For my family, it was female anger. For another family it is sadness. Everyone yells and slams doors, but if you cry, that is weak and effeminate. If you feel depressed, suck it up “buttercup”, because life is full of tough breaks.

Some emotions are just messy.

The following story is an example of how I work with kids to teach them about emotions. Please note the character is fictional, although this scenario has played out in my work with children many times.

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Little Damion comes into my office with his red hair standing up in every direction. With a streak of dirt across the knee of his pants, and the sheen of sweat on his face, I gather he just came from recess. As I ask about his day and settle in for the intervention necessary to his treatment plan, I am reminded of his family.

Damion’s dad is a gruff farmer with no patience for nonsense. He has always worn his cowboy boots in for family sessions, his piercing blue eyes steely above his untrimmed beard. Mom is plump and friendly, with large dark eyes and a vivacious nature, but she is all business too. Old fashioned and unlikely to change, they have a real challenge in Damion. My goal in family sessions is to help them find other ways of disciplining Damion besides just using a belt and yelling at him, but change is not going to come quickly or easily.

My objective today is to help Damion understand that the sadness in his brown eyes is okay to express in words. He has issues expressing any other emotion besides anger, and it is causing a lot of problems in school. He hits playmates and throws terrible tantrums in school, climbing under the desks and screaming at anyone who comes close. I know that if he ever could learn to express the underlying emotions he feels, then it would release this pressure valve and he could get through a whole week of school without his parents being called.

I start out with something most every little boy finds amusing. “Did you know that feelings are like pooping and peeing?”

His eyes crinkle slightly and he half smiles as he shakes his head no.

“Well, they are. Would you say pooping and peeing are good or bad?”

He looks confused. “I dunno.”

“Well, they can be kind of gross and stinky, but they are good. Pooping helps our body get rid of things that our stomach cannot digest so that we don’t have old food in there rotting. And pee? Well, pee helps clean our blood and get any poisons out of our body. What do you think would happen if we couldn’t poop or pee?”

Damion scratches his cheek with a grubby finger. “We’d die?”

“That’s right. If we can’t poop, it can make us very sick because of all that rotten stuff inside of us. Eventually we could even die if we weren’t able to poop it out. The same is true for pee. If we can’t pee…even just for a whole day…we start getting sick. We’d have to go to the hospital and get a machine to help clean our blood because if we didn’t, we would die. Just like that, our feelings are super important because they give us important information about our safety and our health. Just like pee and poop are good because they help us, all feelings are good. Some of them, like poop, might be kind of gross or we might not like them that much, but all feelings are important to help us.”

He nods that he understands. “It even hurts real bad in my tummy when I need to poop.”

“That’s right. It can hurt us in our heart if we can’t get our feelings out. But I have a question for you. Would it be okay for me to go poop right on the principal’s desk?”

He looks shocked. “NO!” He exclaims, “that would be awful!”

“Right, it would be. Would it be okay if I climb up on a table in the cafeteria and just pee all over the table?”

He chuckles. “No. That would gross us all out.”

Smiling with him, I continue making my point. “Well, would it be okay then if I went into the bathroom and put my pee and poop in the toilet?”

“YES!” he shouts.

“Okay. What I want you to understand is that when you were a baby it was okay for you to poop and pee in your diaper. But mom taught you to put your poop and pee in the toilet. Just like that, I want you to know that our feelings are all okay, but we have to learn when and how to show them. It is like toilet training our feelings. Would it be okay for me to go into the principal’s office and scream in her face?”

“No.” he says, frowning.

“What about if I went in the cafeteria and started yelling at all the kids, stomping my feet and calling them names?”

“That would be very bad.”

I nod. “So, ALL feelings are okay. Sad, mad, happy, glad, grumpy, frustrated, scared…and all the others. They are all important to show. What we are going to do today is learn how to show our feelings in a polite and healthy way.”

I pull out my “I messages” game and continue the intervention with him.

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So what we have to realize is that every single one of our emotions are okay. We can give ourselves permission to feel. After all, God is the one who created emotions in the first place. In our journey to healing, it is of utmost importance that we do not allow that old guilt and shame from the spiritually abusive environment to keep us from feeling. Some of our feelings will be very infuriating. At times we may feel like screaming. At other times, we may cry until we feel we have no tears left. Sometimes we might laugh at the ridiculousness of what we were told. It is okay. As long as we can feel emotion we are healthy, we are alive, and we are moving forward.

My therapist explained to me that depression is often caused by stuffing one’s emotions inside and not allowing oneself to feel and to be okay with those feelings–whatever they are. He told me to keep a journal and write down every day a list of feelings that I felt. He explained that new research is showing that simply doing an inventory of our feelings can create new patterns in our brains and can help us begin to feel better over time.

I was so used to rationalizing all my feelings that I didn’t even know what I felt. I googled “emotion wheel” and got a nice graphic that I use to help me figure out what it is I’m feeling when I’m not sure.

The important thing is that we do not stop having those emotions. They are messy and we have to learn what to do with them, but toilet training our feelings is certainly better than the alternative of mental death and stagnation.

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Coping with the Cults – Part #2 – Judgmentalism

Since leaving a cult, I have delved into studying, writing, reading, talking and coping with the very real, sometimes hidden, but obvious affects cults and their teachings have on lives. Most certainly the very word ‘cult’ conjures up the worst horrors to hit the news headlines, like Jonestown, or Waco, TX, but the majority of cults are far less obvious and insidiously covert, and right next door.

The most common fear or result we have seen as a result of leaving a cult is the harsh judgmentalism that is felt by those who leave, or ‘change.’ You don’t obey their dress standards anymore. You can feel the whispers, the stares. You can even see it in their children’s eyes.

Part 1 (Please see Part 1 for my definition of a Cult)

In Part 1 we dealt with coping with rejection and separation from all you’ve known and been connected to, in the cult. One of the most glaring and obvious signs of a cult is that they require your entire social circle to revolve around them. Your friends, your family, sometimes your job.

Fellowship with ‘outsiders‘ is forbidden. Friendship with the ‘world’ they say, is enmity with God. This is Scriptural, but their definition of ‘the world,’ is twisted and perverted. To them, that is everyone who doesn’t believe and perform in their predefined mold.

To the JW and Mormon structures, absolute avoidance of non-members is required. To my ex-Oneness Pentecostal cult, you can wave and be nice to the family member that has left the ‘way,’ but you should avoid them as much as possible. To the Scientologist, destroying the reputation and value of those who have left, and hate for them is nearly required.

What is Judgmentalism?

So the end result of this mentality is judgmentalism. Judgmentalism exists by believing that there is a superior, or only way, believing that you alone have that only way and thus have found perfection. Anyone who rejects your way, or doesn’t line up is sub-par. They are rejected by God due to these performance standards, and thus, can/should be rejected by you.

For instance, the holiness standards of the United Pentecostal Church, International hold the following ideas simple ideas:

Women cannot wear pants or they violate ‘Wear not that which pertaineth unto a man.’ (Deut 22:5)
Men cannot have long hair, and women cannot cut their hair (short) to any degree. (1 Corinthians 11:14-15)

My particular church held the additional standards:

Watching Television/Movies is sinful (Psalm 101:3)
Wearing short sleeve shirts or shorts (men) is sinful (no Scripture for this)
Men are not to have facial hair (no Scripture for this)
Women need to wear pantyhose when in public or at church events
etc

Follow peace with all men, and holiness, without which no man shall see the Lord: – Hebrews 12:14, KJV

They have defined all these things as ‘Holiness,’ and then use Hebrews 12:14 (wrongly) to enforce the idea. Why am I saying this?

Because with this mentality, you can now judge those who do not follow this lifestyle choice. For instance, I know a woman who is still in this church standard, and she saw another woman on the side of the road who had left the ‘way,’ in pants. This woman said, ‘Well look, you can see she obviously isn’t going to make it…she is in pants after all.’

A judgment about her status was based on her outward appearance, which, in this case, alluded to her spiritual well-being, as in, she (the women wearing pants) was lost.

Another example of spiteful judgmentalism is how they ignore those who have left their circles. For instance, the bishop of the church I once attended pulled up in a truck to a driveway I stood in with another local businessman, ignored me completely, and refused to acknowledge my wave and greeting. He spoke to the other businessman, then drove away without looking at me.

Recently, the pastor of the church sent a Christmas card to my home and wrote the label to specifically exclude me from their holiday wishes. They could have labeled the envelope, ‘Brickley Family,’ but instead they singled out my wife and daughter.

They and their followers will say, ‘You are the one who chose to leave.’ Yet, I’m not sure how you can justify dropping respect and decency for another person simply because they disagree with you, and/or choose not to attend weekly services at your building.

Another young man decided to leave the church and this same pastor told him spitefully, ‘We will compare how our kids turn out in 30 years to decide who is right and who is wrong.’

This is why judgmentalism is a stumbling block. It can never bear good fruit. Jesus rightly said, ‘Ye shall know them by their fruits,’ and the pastor used the Word spitefully and incorrectly. Judgmentalism overrides common sense, decency, and wisdom. It is not a fruit of God’s Spirit.

But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, longsuffering, gentleness, goodness, faith, Meekness, temperance: against such there is no law. – Galatians 5:22-23, KJV

How to cope with Judgmentalism

1. Realize only God can judge you!

First, and foremost, come to grips with the reality that God is the only one capable and worthy to judge you, and when it came right down to it, He doesn’t do so superficially. If other flawed humans are judging you, they do it at their own peril and in our their own ignorance, violating Scripture commandments not to judge.

But God commendeth his love toward us, in that, while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us. – Romans 5:8

Let us not therefore judge one another any more: but judge this rather, that no man put a stumblingblock or an occasion to fall in his brother’s way. – Romans 14:13

The cult will demand perfection for admittance, or to maintain your membership, which is truly a stumbling block to faith! God simply demands you strive not to sin, knowing of course that you will again. Consider again the adulteress of John 8, an illustration I’ve used many times.

When Jesus had lifted up himself, and saw none but the woman, he said unto her, Woman, where are those thine accusers? hath no man condemned thee? She said, No man, Lord. And Jesus said unto her, Neither do I condemn thee: go, and sin no more. – John 8:10-11, KJV

We can also take comfort that while God definitely has an opinion about our outward appearance (dress) he is most concerned with the condition of the heart.

But the LORD said unto Samuel, Look not on his countenance, or on the height of his stature; because I have refused him: for the LORD seeth not as man seeth; for man looketh on the outward appearance, but the LORD looketh on the heart. – 1 Samuel 16:7

2. Surround yourself with non-judgmental people

Human nature tends to be judgmental, so we are going to face this issue throughout our life. Yet, when Coping with the Cults, your primary step towards healing is to get connected with ‘outsiders.’ And this will feel unnatural at first! You’ve been taught for years, perhaps your entire life, that this is absolutely wrong, to connect with people outside of the ‘way.’

More pointedly, find both religious and non-religious people that you can speak to, maybe even family that you had before the cult that would listen to your pains and understand them.

Look, when entering a cult, you cut off the entire world outside the cult. When exiting a cult, they cut you off from them. You are like an infant again in a world of strangers and now, it feels like limbo. Who do you have to turn to now? You must find them!

There are great Facebook groups like SpiritualAbuse.org and their website. These places will connect you to hundreds, thousands of people with similar stories and experiences that can listen, understand and help.

3. Do not become bitter and offer the same treatment in return

Lashing back at them is hard to avoid but is ever so important to avoid it. However, do not confuse exposing the hurt and the behavior of these groups as just being bitter. I expose them all the time, and they accuse me of being bitter.

But in my exposure of these cults, I have had many people come and say, ‘Thank you for sharing this! I was going through this and felt alone and didn’t know where to turn!’

You can be an instrument for a change! Those people who judge you are watching and waiting for your reaction. It may just be that in healing, you cause them to see you didn’t turn into the demon the cult said you would.

I have an in-law that calls me names because now I wear facial hair, which he is not allowed to have. I could in turn label and judge him, but my impact on him would diminish and it would just be a spitting match.

My son watched my words and behavior after I left the cult and had to start admitting, dad might be right… If I had become vile and bitter, he would have believed the worst of me, and been justified to think I had ‘gone astray.’

Conclusion

Coping with the Cults will not be easy, whatever brand, label or type it is. The judgmentalism runs deep in the roots of these organizations. Gossiping is generally the most visible sign of their spirit, both in organizations and in people.

When my sister left our church, years ago, people talked about her all the time. My dear mother, God rest her soul, would ask me at times, “Why do they have to be so mean to her?” They were the church leaders.

The answer is because they must. To be part of the gang you act like the gang. To be accepted into a social circle, you must morph with them. To be considered one of us, you need to act like us.

If you realize this and pray for them, silently forgive them, and count it an opportunity to show them a more real truth, a more real God, and a more real faith, you can endure and spring forth fruits from the judgmentalism.

More importantly, you can slowly etch away at the scars within yourself. Someone who has been deeply ingrained in a cult like society must battle out the judgmentalism they carry in their hearts. There are moments that you’ll look at other people and make decisions based on their appearance. Perhaps even looking back at those you escaped from and judge them.

Battle it out, pray it out, and be thankful you got out!

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It’s about relationship

I’ve struggled for years with Bible reading. After I was thrown out of a church in 2000, I started having more and more difficulty, but particularly after I moved to a new city and a new church. So for 16-17 years, I’ve struggled. I knew the push for reading the Bible in a year was part of the problem, but recently I’ve realized there is a whole lot more to it.

So much of what I was taught in the church I was thrown out of was oriented to a judgmental, punishing god. This was a god who wouldn’t answer prayers (at least not mine), who would stand by and watch as someone tried everything and was still thrown out, a god who would give up on people or turn his back on people. This was a god who would send people to hell for wearing pjs or brightly colored tights or a wedding band. Sermons that were respected were about god cutting people off, about people never being able to get back to god if they ‘fell away’, of warnings about people going to hell… I was told that they didn’t even know if I could be saved, and then was warned at the interim church I ended up in that I should never talk about what had happened or that I’d been kicked out, which added more fear to what I was already dealing with, and with no outlet but only shame and secrecy.

When I moved to a new state and a new church, there were many more ‘good’ sermons about how people were going to hell in addition to what I’d already heard. People quoted scripture at me to justify themselves and excuse their behavior as well as to blame me for whatever was happening. It became harder and harder under all the condemnation to see God in any other way.

I could see that the god my former churches taught about wasn’t a realistic picture of God, but I couldn’t reconcile what I read in the scriptures (as much as they’d been twisted) with what I thought should be a loving, faithful, forgiving, merciful God. So I avoided the Bible. I didn’t need another daily reminder of a malicious god.

In all this time, all these years, I didn’t realize how long it had been since I’d heard that God valued us or that he loved me personally. Not as a platitude, but as a real, heartfelt statement. I didn’t realize how much I’d been taught and how much I believed that Jesus died the death he did because he had to die the most gruesome death possible to take the punishment that I deserved. I didn’t realize the guilt or even the illogic of that — there are plenty of types of death that are gruesome and involve torture. Crucifixion was terrible, but men have thought of other gruesome modes of death, too. It’s not about my sin. It’s not about how awful I am, but about how much God wants a relationship with all of us — not so much that he would die, but so much that he came as a human, grew as a human, lived as a human, and died as a human, experiencing everything that we do in order to relate to us, even including death… to restore relationship. The one who relates best, after all, is the one who’s walked in our shoes. And so Jesus did.

Sin doesn’t separate us from God because he can’t be around sin… it separates us from God because we are too ashamed, too guilty, too whatever to be with HIM. God knew Adam and Eve sinned, but he still came for his walk with them in the garden. It was they who hid, not God. God never stopped trying to connect to us. Everything I was taught even as a child was so backward.

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