s/o prayerful betrayal & other church related nastiness

[Katy]

What's the worst thing that's happened to you or someone you love where someone hid behind their religion?  The other thread and how many people liked my toxic narcissist hidden by Jesus comment had me wondering.  I'll share some of mine, all three from the same church. 

When I was young and unmarried a woman who claimed she was my friend at a nondenominational but charismatic church (we believe in the gifts of the spirit, but don't do them in public) got really angry because the celibate but gay man she thought she was in love with complimented me on the pen I handed him to borrow one day.  It was an archival art pen and he started asking me about it. She was convinced he was going to fall for me so she went to my boyfriend's parents and warned them I was going to trap him into marriage by getting pregnant.  She claimed she had a vision and the Lord told her I would do that and that she knew me well enough to know I would.

I also had a woman at that church get in my face and tell me there was a demon I was allowing to possess me that was causing the chronic autoimmune condition I had going on.

And another woman try and warn my boyfriend's mother that I was trying to sleep with her husband.  She'd seen his dad tease me one day and thought we were flirting, unaware I was seriously dating his son and was planning on going over to their house for lunch I guess.

Needless to say I left that church when that relationship was over.

[Selkie]

Nothing has happened to me personally because I'm not religious or a churchgoer, but I've seen some disgusting behavior - mostly from my dh's family. The worst was his (literally) evil stepmother, who vehemently claimed that the Catholic Church molestation scandal never happened and was completely fabricated. Then there was his aunt, who also didn't believe it happened and said that "kids who get molested shouldn't tell anyone because it's embarrassing for their families".😡

And people wonder why we cut off contact with them...

[marbel]

22 minutes ago, Indigo Blue said:

<snip>

The most demanding thing of all is being a deacon at our church. They put so much pressure on him every time the church years ends. It has always bothered me very much and to me looks more like manipulation. It is relentless. You have to be a strong person to firmly say no and mean it. Dh loves doing all these things, but he is getting to the point where he realizes he needs to take a little bit off his plate. I've done a some convincing as well.......that he needs to have time for himself and rest more. Well, another deacon spoke to him one day and told my dh that God had spoken to him (the other deacon) and told him that dh needed to be a deacon again this year. Ummm, well.....really? Dh will feel this pressure and it will be hard for him to say no because that's how he is. It really makes me a bit angry, if I'm being honest. I just don't like that. At all. At some point, it has to stop because he can't continue on like this indefinitely. Sigh. I'm getting angry just typing this out.

<snip>

"Interesting... God told me that I should take a sabbatical this year and give someone else an opportunity to serve."

[DawnM]

23 minutes ago, Indigo Blue said:

Maybe my example is more benign and not on the toxic end of things, but it concerns dh. He has always been deeply involved in church. He works hard. I mean HARD. He does physical labor and lots of stuff on the side. He does anything anyone asks of him. He wears many different hats at church and also sings in the choir. Just being a choir member alone is a huge commitment at our church because our choir is really, really good...and lots of practice hours as a group are expected. Dh gets up at 5:30 every morning and works in all kinds of weather. This has not ever been a big deal for him, but he's aging and constantly doing so much is taking its toll on him. But he has served and served and served some more. He needs to rest.

The most demanding thing of all is being a deacon at our church. They put so much pressure on him every time the church years ends. It has always bothered me very much and to me looks more like manipulation. It is relentless. You have to be a strong person to firmly say no and mean it. Dh loves doing all these things, but he is getting to the point where he realizes he needs to take a little bit off his plate. I've done a some convincing as well.......that he needs to have time for himself and rest more. Well, another deacon spoke to him one day and told my dh that God had spoken to him (the other deacon) and told him that dh needed to be a deacon again this year. Ummm, well.....really? Dh will feel this pressure and it will be hard for him to say no because that's how he is. It really makes me a bit angry, if I'm being honest. I just don't like that. At all. At some point, it has to stop because he can't continue on like this indefinitely. Sigh. I'm getting angry just typing this out.

When someone is unable or unwilling to do a job, they have their reasons. It should be respected. There should be no relentless prodding, guilt or manipulation....especially under the guise of "God told me that you need to......."

I'm a Christian, but I have to say a lot of this stuff is just not how things should be. And I can see so much toxicity and narcissism (not speaking of our church specifically) in religion in general. I feel bad saying these things, too. But it's true.

And the other thread where someone "prayerfully" had an excuse for dishonest behavior.....just ugh.

 

Right there with you, and I am a Christian.   I am struggling with a lot of "the church" right now.  

[Janeway]

I saw an adult who admitted to have been a foster child and adopted by her foster parent get fired from staff at a church, where they prayed about it and realized no one wanted to have the risk of someone like her at their church. She was even told not to return as a member. I saw someone who was a member at another church who came out of an abusive relationship but was a teacher, be told she was not welcome to volunteer to work in the nursery or Sunday school. Then oddly, they made an exception and had her care for a severely disabled teenager who was non-verbal because no one else would. That was a different church from the first.  I saw a family being ..I was unsure if they were actually told they had to leave or if they were treated like they had to leave, but their son was gay. They had been with the church since he was young, grade school at least but not sure how much younger when they joined. They ended up leaving. These are things I have seen with others. For me, it was my inlaws. My inlaws would claim our marriage is not real because it was not approved of by them and did not happen in a Catholic church. Even after we had several children, my mother-in-law continued to call me "the girlfriend" and would try to set my husband up with other women, claiming she had the right as he was not really married.  She claimed that the bible says he is only married if his parents approve and he is required to obey his parents. We are talking he was a 35 yr old and 40 yr old grown man, with a career, fully supporting his family, and she would call me his girlfriend and try to set him up with other women. My husband has said he will never pay a penny toward a Catholic college as a result and considers himself to not be a Christian at all. 

[gardenmom5]

the worst was my grandmother.  "you'd better (give me the deference I want) or God will smite you (to hell)".   she used religion as a weapon of control.

 I was able to dissociate Christianity from my covert narcissist grandmother.  just because she called herself a Christian - and lectured others - didn't make her a follower of Jesus Christ in reality.  as she most certainly was not.  wolf in sheep's clothing comes to mind....

eta: I think there is a difference between clueless/thoughtless comments, and downright nasty.

 

 

Edited July 28, 2019 by gardenmom5

[bolt.]

There's an elderly lady at my church who is *convinced* that my husband (who has chronic migraines and other health concerns) stopped coming to church because he's lost his faith (and is probably unfaithful to me as well, or something equally bad). She thinks I'm covering for him, but she 'knows' that things are 'so much worse' than I'm willing to say. She feels so, so, sorry for me and my kids that she tears up and holds my arm for a long time every time she asks me 'how he's doing' and I tell her the same thing -- he's not well, that's why he didn't come to church. He'd be here if he could. The long loving gazes of deep (mis)understanding are SO uncomfortable.

[brehon]

Every time I hear/hear about someone using God to badger or bully someone else, I think about that line from Ladyhawke where Phillipe’s character says, “I talk to God all the time and, no offense, but He’s never mentioned you.”

After my parents divorced, my mom, brother, and I moved to a small town. One of our neighbors, when he found out Mom was divorced, told her that she needed to start attending his family’s church and get married because she was a Fallen Woman (you could hear the capital letters) and we were all damned to hell. My Mom made him blush with her reply. 

[Laura Corin]

A friend's daughter went to the Christian school in an overseas town, the only English-speaking school in the town.  The whole class was invited to a girl's birthday party, but it was kept secret from my friend's daughter - all the invitations were handed out at church, to which my friend's family didn't belong.  The party took place at McDonalds, and by chance my friend walked by the branch when it was going on.  She was very angry, but was told that it was a 'fellowship' party for the girl's birthday, not a class party.  It seemed an odd kind of fellowship if it deliberately excluded one small girl from a birthday party.

[BusyMom5]

I left my church about a year after I married (DH went with me, but was a different denomination).  I had a few concerned calls, including one that told me without God/church, my DH would cheat on me (it's a denomination that thinks it's the only real one, so anything else is not a true Christian or church).  It upset me, but if my DH was faithful only bc he feared God if he wasn't, we'd have a terrible marriage.  We've been together 20 years 😉

[Liz CA]

3 hours ago, gardenmom5 said:

the worst was my grandmother.  "you'd better (give me the deference I want) or God will smite you (to hell)".   she used religion as a weapon of control.

 I was able to dissociate Christianity from my covert narcissist grandmother.  just because she called herself a Christian - and lectured others - didn't make her a follower of Jesus Christ in reality.  as she most certainly was not.  wolf in sheep's clothing comes to mind....

eta: I think there is a difference between clueless/thoughtless comments, and downright nasty.

 

 

Agree - there is a difference between clueless and manipulative. It is very sad that there seems to be so much manipulation in churches instead of it being a safe place of peace, worship and learning and supporting each other instead of burdening each other.

Nothing horrible ever happened to us because dh always appeared to see the red flags but my poor SIL and now deceased BIL suffered through years of maltreatment during which they "loved to death" the husband and told him that my sweet SIL was of the devil and a demon needed to be exorcised. BIL finally realized how manipulated he was and broke off all contact, went to counseling and profusely apologized to his wife.

It makes me mad just tyipng this so I will stop right here. Suffice it to say that it took her years to enter a church again but her faith in her God is as vibrant as ever.
 

Edited July 28, 2019 by Liz CA

[Liz CA]

2 hours ago, brehon said:

Every time I hear/hear about someone using God to badger or bully someone else, I think about that line from Ladyhawke where Phillipe’s character says, “I talk to God all the time and, no offense, but He’s never mentioned you.”

After my parents divorced, my mom, brother, and I moved to a small town. One of our neighbors, when he found out Mom was divorced, told her that she needed to start attending his family’s church and get married because she was a Fallen Woman (you could hear the capital letters) and we were all damned to hell. My Mom made him blush with her reply. 

 

Now I want to know what she said...🤣

What a twisted concept - she was a "fallen woman" so some man at church needed to step up and make her "legitimate" again??? Jesus must be having a headache from shaking his head.

[itsheresomewhere]

My most recent one involves DS.  He had a job lined up for summer that was a great thing.  They knew he had HFA and were willing to work with him.  When it came time for the job to start, he no longer has a job. Found out from the workers in there the owner changed his mind as DS doesn’t go to church and has HFA. Funny, they can’t get any new employees right now as they are massively understaffed. 

[gardenmom5]

I find it interesting how many of these "wolf in sheep's clothing" are obsessed with s3x.  my grandmother tried to convince me dh was cheating with his female coworkers on an out of town business trip (everyone had their own rooms) - because "everybody does it".  we'd been married for two weeks.

I had a baby nine months and four days after I got married.  AAAGGGHH "*what will people say?????" (yes, she actually asked me that.)… um, we had s3x on our honeymoon?   I'm sure she was profoundly *relieved* my sister (her favorite) - had a miscarriage at four months the day after she got married.

but she was obsessed with other people's sex lives.  please... T. M. I.  

 

 

[Katy]

Yes, many of them are obsessed with sex, aren't they?  The last of my trilogy of stories above involved one of the pastor's wives.  Well, ex-pastor.  He'd cheated on his wife with another staff member and gotten fired.  Which may have been her excuse.

And frankly I'm surprised how many of the bad behavior stories I hear are women preying on other women. I wish we were more supportive of each other.

[Corraleno]

My mother is the queen of "I prayed about this and God told me He wants you to do X" (i.e. whatever my mother wants them to do). It's truly amazing how often God talks to her, and how He just happens to agree with her 100% about everything, even the most trivial issues.

After my sister got divorced, my mother told her that God was very angry at her and she went out of her way to make my sister feel as guilty and worthless as possible. Then she pushed my sister into a relationship with a very narcissistic, legalistic man at their church, who gave her a long list of things she needed to fix or improve about herself. Of course, it was fine for them to sleep together, because my sister was already "used," so it wasn't as if being celibate could restore her virginity or anything. If she would sleep with him and do everything he told her to do to make herself worthy of him, he might consider lowering his standards enough to marry her. 🙄 She eventually broke it off with him, but then married the first guy who asked, because my mother made her feel like complete trash that no decent Christian man would ever want anyway. It's not a happy marriage — my BIL complained to me during a visit several years ago that she pretends to fall asleep early to avoid sex and he isn't getting what he is owed. 😳 Incredibly inappropriate and one of many reasons I don't visit them any more!  My sister was successful and financially independent before they married, but now they live hand-to-mouth because my BIL is terrible with money and she is not allowed to question his decisions. Their church is extremely patriarchal and incredibly toxic — so much gossiping and backstabbing and judgement and hypocrisy. ☹️

[Corraleno]

4 hours ago, gardenmom5 said:

I had a baby nine months and four days after I got married.  AAAGGGHH "*what will people say?????" (yes, she actually asked me that.)… um, we had s3x on our honeymoon?   I'm sure she was profoundly *relieved* my sister (her favorite) - had a miscarriage at four months the day after she got married.

My mother once made a photo album for my brother & SIL, and they noticed that all the dates were wrong on their wedding and engagement photos, and a few other photos were out of order. When they mentioned it to her, my mother said she had done it on purpose, so their daughter, who was born 4-5 months after the wedding, "would never know of their terrible sin." Which is hilariously hypocritical because I know for a fact that my mother was 2 months pregnant when she and my stepfather got married! I remember her panicked attempts to plan a quick cheap wedding on very short notice, and then my half-brother was born 7 months later. She still insists he was a preemie — a 10-lb preemie. 😂

[Shoeless]

Very long, difficult story to discuss, but here is the short version: my dad's ex wife threatened to make my son disappear as if he "never even existed", and used God as justification for this threat.  It's taken 2 years for my blind, incoherent rage to decrease to where I only cry until I vomit when I think about what she said.  

She then went on to insist I needed to forgive her for her threat because after all, Jesus forgave Judas, so if I *didn't* forgive her, that meant I was saying I was better than Jesus (and she said what she did wasn't nearly as bad as what Judas did), which would mean I was I was a blasphemer, which meant that she was right to be horrid to us in the first place, because she doesn't have to be good to people that go against God.  So, if I don't forgive her that meant I and my son deserved to be threatened and it was all our faults anyway.  She also liked to rant on about how she prayed about it and God was a-ok with everything she did, but that I was an enemy of hers and thus an enemy of God or something. 

Yes, I suspect she has NPD.  

Edited July 29, 2019 by MissLemon
Typo

[Garga]

10 hours ago, Indigo Blue said:

Maybe my example is more benign and not on the toxic end of things, but it concerns dh. He has always been deeply involved in church. He works hard. I mean HARD. He does physical labor and lots of stuff on the side. He does anything anyone asks of him. He wears many different hats at church and also sings in the choir. Just being a choir member alone is a huge commitment at our church because our choir is really, really good...and lots of practice hours as a group are expected. Dh gets up at 5:30 every morning and works in all kinds of weather. This has not ever been a big deal for him, but he's aging and constantly doing so much is taking its toll on him. But he has served and served and served some more. He needs to rest.

The most demanding thing of all is being a deacon at our church. They put so much pressure on him every time the church years ends. It has always bothered me very much and to me looks more like manipulation. It is relentless. You have to be a strong person to firmly say no and mean it. Dh loves doing all these things, but he is getting to the point where he realizes he needs to take a little bit off his plate. I've done a some convincing as well.......that he needs to have time for himself and rest more. Well, another deacon spoke to him one day and told my dh that God had spoken to him (the other deacon) and told him that dh needed to be a deacon again this year. Ummm, well.....really? Dh will feel this pressure and it will be hard for him to say no because that's how he is. It really makes me a bit angry, if I'm being honest. I just don't like that. At all. At some point, it has to stop because he can't continue on like this indefinitely. Sigh. I'm getting angry just typing this out.

When someone is unable or unwilling to do a job, they have their reasons. It should be respected. There should be no relentless prodding, guilt or manipulation....especially under the guise of "God told me that you need to......."

I'm a Christian, but I have to say a lot of this stuff is just not how things should be. And I can see so much toxicity and narcissism (not speaking of our church specifically) in religion in general. I feel bad saying these things, too. But it's true.

And the other thread where someone "prayerfully" had an excuse for dishonest behavior.....just ugh.

 

I was taught that if someone told you that “God told me that you need to X,” then that person needed to do the same thing along with you.  Because if God can’t tell you directly what to do and you are forced to know what God wants only through someone else, then that someone else better hang around you everywhere you go to tell you how to do the task and when to stop.  Of course, the person saying this was saying it tongue-in-cheek and meaning that you can’t take someone else’s word for “what God wants you to do.”  

Your husband can ask God directly what to do and only do what he senses God wants him to do.  Forget what the other guy said unless the other guy confirms what your dh already has heard.

9 hours ago, DawnM said:

 

Right there with you, and I am a Christian.   I am struggling with a lot of "the church" right now.  

 

I still have a vibrant faith in God.  Not so much in a lot of his people right now.  We left the church we were heavily involved in about a year ago.  I’m content right now to be a bench warmer on Sunday mornings at a new church where I don’t know anyone there.

Edited July 29, 2019 by Garga

[Xahm]

I went to a Christian college, so there were a lot of funny little ones as the result of young people maturing and making missteps ("God told me we should date." "I didn't do the assignment because I felt that book wasn't godly enough."), but the over arching culture kept those in check and people grew out of them. The one that hurt was that I was friends with a seminary student with dyslexia. I helped him a lot on his papers, spending hours each week helping him to edit them, and he really improved as a writer. Not only that, my friends rallied around him, attending his sermons and being encouraging. He really wasn't a good preacher at all, but he was still a student and learning. As a group we had loss of interesting conversations and debates. It's funny because some people aimed he and I were an item. One of my friends asked each of us separately if we were interested in the other and our answers matched. We were friends, but he was looking for a submissive wife and I wasn't looking to be a submissive wife, so no way. Anyway, I helped him out a considerable amount, my friends helped him as a favor to me, and we all enjoyed each other's company. Then, one day in our conversation it came up that I was unwilling to say that people who died as non-Christians were going to Hell. That, I said, is between them and God. I was very willing to say that Jesus is the way to salvation as that is one of my core beliefs, but I thought it was hubris, not to mention unnecessary, to claim we know all there is to know about how Jesus saves people.  This was apparently a line in the sand for my seminary friend. He told me I was dangerous and refused to speak to me again. Like, cross to a different sidewalk to avoid me. On a very small campus, we saw each other daily. Then one day years later I saw I had a Facebook message from him. It had been plenty long enough I was ready to forgive and forget. It was a request for money to support him as a missionary. I quickly deleted and moved on with my life. 

I've had friends hurt in much worse ways in the name of the church, but that was my most personal, and very confusing, rejection. Now I mostly fell bad for him as he hasn't found a job in his vocation ten years after he graduated seminary.

[kbutton]

In case any of these resources are a help to someone...I know that what helps one person is not necessarily what another needs (and not all of us have the same theological convictions), but here are some options I've found.

Blogger who has a lot to say about church trauma and racial trauma (or both together), power dynamics in the church, etc.: https://kylejhoward.com/

Book: https://www.barnesandnoble.com/w/wounded-in-the-church-beeson-hayward/1124809031;jsessionid=551F9D4DC53C76F37922F48E92BD6B19.prodny_store01-atgap09?ean=9781629118147

 

[Faith-manor]

I wrote out a long post to describe the hell, living hell, heaped on my husband, kids, and I when my mother's husband did something unthinkable, truly devastating. However, there was no way to describe it without risking that it would be triggering, and potentially very painful for people here to read. So I erased it.

Suffice it to say, the threat of hell is kind of passe. I've lived hell, for two straight years I lived hell on earth, and when I desperately needed my then friends, all of them committed christians, the most, they couldn't run away fast enough, and the church was just wicked. We were told to "get right with god" before something worse happened. They got it in their heads that god was punishing the extended family because well, who knows. I try not to spend time speculating on what it was they thought we were up to in our private life that would cause god to smite others just to issue us a wake up call. It's a rather depressing line of thought.

[Frances]

Not my own personal experience, but one of our state Senators is suing several people, including the Senate President. In the lawsuit, which he filed himself, he details them discussing theological issues and attending the same Catholic Church. He claims the Senate president’s soul is lost, that his political positions are counter to Catholic doctrine, and on the Senate floor he said hell was coming to visit the Senate president.  There’s lots, lots more in the embedded 40 page lawsuit in the article.

https://pamplinmedia.com/pt/9-news/434700-345067-boquists-federal-lawsuit-blasts-courtney-for-discipline-after-threats-?wallit_nosession=1