I asked my daughters how their experiences at church affected them. Although not surprised, I was saddened and filled with righteous indignation against the church when I read their response.
I think my church experience has affected me in a pretty negative way, and I have basically no desire to go back to those times. Not that I’ve left spirituality or anything, I just see christianity as one big hypocrisy and that’s even wrecked my idea of Jesus. I don’t know how to explain…..
And honestly, when I think back to that song “Jesus, Lover of my Soul,” it brings me back to some youth group retreat where we were indoctrinated with fear and self-loathing, and no one wanted to talk to me.
D
Reading this arouses tremendous anger in my spirit. R thinks back on our church years with resentment and pain as well. They both have come to a place of peace with their Spirituality, D through theology courses at her liberal, catholic college, and R through dialogue with various people and listening to her own spirit.
… I’ve come to a place of peace, I think after taking a lot of theology classes at college from people who I feel like are much more, umm… reasonable. Honestly, as geeky as it sounds, learning from the liberal nuns at college helped me to not hate christianity.
However, Christian pop music still brings me there lol.
D
Here is how R came to her peace with God:
…I had a moment of reckoning with my ‘god’ (which was not really mine, but someone else’s perception) when I was 14. Every now and then it comes back to me, which is why I’m a deist…I had a discussion with a pretty right wing, conservative, christian (from the cult church that lucas goes to) and she was open to discussion and could back up a lot of her stuff (but it was still very disputable). She asked me something about how I find God in life.(She assumed that I would come to some “A ha” moment and realize that God is all around in talking to her)We were walking near a lake at sunset – probably the most ’spiritual’ setting that I know for myself. I told her, “I see God in the sunset, and the sunrise – in the hills and in the fields. I hear God when I hear children laughing, birds in the morning, and crickets in the evening. I smell God in the rain, in the spring when the snow is melting, and in the decay of fall. I touch him when I hold those that I love.” I was not a Christian at that point. (Because I converted back, sorta, though not entirely, when I dated “L” (ex-boyfriend). Ann (the Christian Friend) was part of the “L” plot to convert me – though she was a good friend as well.
I feel such remorse that I didn’t listen to my gut and keep my daughters away from that destructive atmosphere. Early on, I remember feeling very uneasy at services when altar calls were accompanied by people being slain in the spirit. I remember not wanting my kids to witness that, thinking that it would scare them, thinking that nothing about God, Jesus and Church should scare anyone, let alone little kids.
When the girls were young, 3 and 5 years old, they were involved in Sunday School. At the time, WOTC was on a Warrior for Christ kick and this is what was taught even to those young ones. Again, I felt really uncomfortable with this teaching but felt that my discomfort was sinful, that the church knew what they were doing so I turned a deaf ear to my inner wisdom.
The girls remember being taught that they were part of the Army of God. They remember thinking that this army was literal, not figurative. One Sunday, all the kids in Sunday School marched into the congregation, some holding banners, to the tune of “Mighty Warrior”
Mighty Warrior, dressed for battle. Holy Lord of All is He.
Commander in Chief, bring us to attention.
Lead us into battle to crush the enemy.Satan has no authority in this place,
He has no authority here.
For this habitation was fashioned for the Lords presence,
No authority here.
I kept them out of Sunday School after that. I just couldn’t let that burden fall on my very young girls. The image of all of those young children being trained up to be Warriors of Christ seemed obscene and so very sad.
What absolutely amazes me is that the leadership, youth and adult, thought at that time anyway, that they were in the will of God. They were absolutely certain that they really had to train these little ones up to be warriors and that the burden that must have put on those little kids was the will of God. It didn’t even cross their mind that this burden was not appropriate for little, impressionable children to bear. On the contrary, they felt that children should be trained to be warriors as early as possible.
Their experiences at Living Waters was worse. Old enough for Youth Group, they felt assaulted by shame and guilt ridden teachings. They felt pressured to conform and speak in tongues and they didn’t fit in, they didn’t toe the line, they were ostracized.
I think all of the youth, aside from my girls, were from the same area and went to the same schools, so they were close. They did not want to let my daughters in to their clique.
When I finally realized this, I stopped making them go.
The hypocrisy astounds me. The preachers would preach the parable of the lost sheep:
luke 15:3-7 He told them this parable.
“Which of you men, if you had one hundred sheep, and lost one of them, wouldn’t leave the ninety-nine in the wilderness, and go after the one that was lost, until he found it? When he has found it, he carries it on his shoulders, rejoicing. When he comes home, he calls together his friends and his neighbors, saying to them, ‘Rejoice with me, for I have found my sheep which was lost!’ I tell you that even so there will be more joy in heaven over one sinner who repents, than over ninety-nine righteous people who need no repentance.” (web)
with such compassion, such certainty that they would never allow one of theirs to wander in the wilderness while my daughters were lost and hurting, not allowed in the fold for whatever reason, right before their very eyes. But they did not see their lost sheep, for they were busy rejoicing over their 99 righteous.
“Whoever causes one of these little ones who believe to stumble, it would be better for him if, with a heavy millstone hung around his neck, he had been cast into the sea. Mark 9:42
When I spoke with my sister, who was in a positon of leadership and who’s son was in the same youth group, about my daughters who were being left out, no one would talk to them, etc, she blew me off, saying that her son didn’t have a problem with it, the implication being that the trouble was with my girls and not with the group.
My daughters did not learn the love of Christ at that church. They learned the pain of being an outcast. They learned rejection and fear and shame, all while the love of Jesus was being proclaimed and their self righteous proclamation that the love of Christ would be found with them. This makes me very, very angry.
And I ignored that still small voice that screamed foul and instead submitted to the teachings of this church. I held out hope that they would find acceptance and love in the church, but it wasn’t to be.
How can I forgive myself for being a part of this, for exposing them to this pain at the hands of the church, the one place where they should have found unconditional love and acceptance?
