Brief interludes in which I give my readers smaller prompts or ideas to consider as they explore their own deconstruction path.
As someone working through my own religious trauma, I have come to both comprehend and try to own the fact that both our bodies and our souls carry our history, often in ways we do not expect. Working through my trauma is therefore a lifelong process in which I am learning how to pay attention …
Continue reading Exvangelical Meditation: How Our Bodies Carry Our History
"Signs of the Times" is a popular Evangelical phrase derived from a speech Jesus gives in Matthew 24 in which he foretells of "wars and rumors of war" as the way to know that the Kingdom of God is at hand. The chapter -- along with strange apocalyptic imagery in the Old Testament books of …
Continue reading Exvangelical Meditation: “The Signs of the Times”
I was indoctrinated from a young age into believing that I had a "God-shaped hole" in my heart that only a personal relationship with Jesus could fill. In its way, teaching the exclusivity of this theological belief (as if it is a one-size-fits-all salvation package) is very deceptive, because when a "relationship with Christ" didn't …
Here is today's brief reminder that Hell Theology is child abuse, and I am doing what I can to be a part of the change that will make it reportable to children's services. To those of you who have experienced the psychological trauma of Hell Theology: There is help and resources, and the anxiety you …
Continue reading Exvangelical Meditation: Hell Theology is Child Abuse
Whether or not religious abuse is real isn't up for debate, as the recent discovery of mass graves at residential schools for Native American children continues to prove. I've heard some evangelicals use gaslighting language to try to isolate the issue (and to shift blame exclusively on the Catholics, as they are keen to do), …
Continue reading Exvangelical Meditation: Mass Graves and Residential Schools
Marlene Winell's book LEAVING THE FOLD, in which she coined the phrase "religious trauma syndrome," was immensely helpful in my own healing -- particularly in recognizing the ways I still carried abuse and trauma from my experience in church. (I left the church in 2006, but did not read the book until 2018.) For example, …
Continue reading Exvangelical Meditation: The Sin of Pride and Religious Trauma
Surviving the Spirit 