IBLP/ATI – Page 5 – Homeschoolers Anonymous

Reflections of a Homeschool Graduate: Part Two

April 15, 2015May 11, 2020HA Editorial Team3 Comments

HA Note: The following is reprinted with permission from Kallie Culver’s blog Untold Stories. It was originally published on June 16, 2014 and has been slightly modified for HA.

<Part One

Homeschooling: The Girl Behind the Mask

For my family, homeschooling was both a calling my parents felt and a practical venture for a season. I am the only child, in my family of nine children, who was homeschooled from Kindergarten through 12th grade. My parents initially started homeschooling my older sister and I for practical reasons. At first it was because the Christian school my older sister attended did not have room for both of us the year I was supposed to enter – so, rather than put us into two different schools, my mom chose to school us at home that year.

At that time, we lived in California, where my father was completing his Master’s in Divinity with the Master’s Seminary under the leadership of John MacArthur. It was also during this time that my parents befriended and came under the mentorship of Gary and Ann Marie Ezzo, the founders of Growing Families International, the authors of the well- known parenting book Baby Wise, and subsequent parenting curriculum Growing Kids Gods Way. After graduating from seminary, my father took the position of Texas State Director for Growing Families International, which allowed us to move back home to our family ranch in the Texas panhandle. For the three years my father held that job, it required him and my mom to travel all over the state of Texas and to surrounding states for numerous leadership and parenting conferences, often on a weekly basis. Given how extensive their travel schedule was, my parents found that homeschooling was a practical choice to continue.

However, after my Father resigned from that position and settled into life at the ranch permanently, the decision to homeschool moved from just being a practical one to something my parents felt God was calling our family to continue. Some of my parents’ best friends in the area were already homeschooling as well, and through them we had discovered an active homeschool group in the Texas and Oklahoma panhandle area, known as the Santa Fe Trail Homeschool Association. We soon joined this group and met many family friends in the area who also homeschooled. Many of these families were also members of ATI, (Advanced Training Institute, under the leadership of Bill Gothard) so although we never officially joined ATI, we soon began to actively participate in several of their events, programs, and social networks. As we began to get more deeply involved with these homeschool circles, adopting the mindsets, teachings, social norms, and beliefs became second nature. The more time we spent and the deeper relationships we formed, the more natural it became.

Never for a moment did I ever think I would leave that community, much less question it, feel betrayed by it, or have aspects of it haunt me for years after I left it.

One of my greatest struggles in life stems from the fact that I have been a people pleaser from a young age. For a long time I believed my worth as a person and happiness in life were determined by the number of friends I had, making people happy, keeping the peace, and fitting in. I see now how that drive and belief affected everything about my young life. I can even see it intricately interwoven into my choice to adopt my family’s faith at eight years old.

For years, if someone asked me to put Jesus or my faith into one word – it was the word “Friend.” I remember, as a child, watching my friends and other members of my family go to the front of the church every first Sunday of the month for communion, but I was never allowed to go. So one Sunday when my father came back to the pew, I asked him, “Why can’t I take communion?” His response was that communion involved having a relationship with Jesus, and this was a way for those who wanted and lived out a relationship with Christ to remember Him and commune with Him. Of course he put that message in words that an eight year old would understand, but the heart of what I remember him saying was that you had to be friends with Jesus to take communion. That was something I could understand and was something I did not want to be left out of. So that day, right there in that pew I asked my dad if he could pray with me. In my simple understanding, I asked Jesus into my heart and to be my friend that would never leave me. That friendship is what I have clung to for years.

From then on, for many years, prayer for me was talking to my best friend. I could pray about whatever I was really feeling and I was never rejected or admonished for that. This is also what led to my first love for writing, as I began journaling at the age of nine, where I wrote to Jesus instead of in the common Dear Diary format. I have numerous journals saved in a box under my bed telling the saga of my childhood in letters to Jesus. That tradition stayed with me well into college, until I began to doubt whether even that friendship I trusted for so long would survive. Even then the journaling habit remained, while I just left the salutation off and continued writing in a conversation style wondering some days if the God I had been writing to for so long was really listening or had ever actually listened for that matter.

Through these years of being in a spiritual wilderness questioning everything, it has also been that foundational friendship that I keep coming back to. I know from both friends and others with similar backgrounds that, once they found the courage and were willing to strip away every aspect of their faith adopted because of family expectations, the community, a sense of obligation, or a lack of knowledge about any other alternative – for many there was nothing left. For those who have chosen to walk away from faith altogether, I value and respect them just as much as those who I know have wrestled to find new understandings of faith, because I know that, growing up the way we did, to make that decision is probably one of the hardest they will ever make. Choosing to hold up our beliefs to the light of truth and be deeply honest about what we can really stand behind with integrity is no small feat.

It would be so much easier in many cases to just be silent about how you really felt and keep up a mask for appearance’s sake. For me, when I strip everything away that I am holding onto just for loyalty, for loved ones, or for fear of the truth – I could never completely dismiss the relationship I have felt and built with God from a young age. It’s not for a lack of questioning the idea; it’s more that I know now, through countless sleepless nights wrestling over it with gut wrenching sobs, or laying there in the blackness with silent tears coursing down my cheeks, that despite all my confusion, my anger, my deepest fears, or my unanswered questions, I still can not deny that a relationship of a lifetime is there.

What makes me believe that? It’s not the numerous hours I spent in church, reading scripture, memorizing scripture, studying or debating doctrine, or living the quintessential Christian life. It’s the comfort I found as a child in believing I had a friend who actually cared. It’s the peace I grasped for as a teenager, who spent years hiding a paranoid fear of the dark and of rape. I can never forget the number of nights that I spent with a lamp on knowing that God was the only one listening and how prayer was often the only means for finding any sleep. It’s the faith and expression of God my husband saw in me that I couldn’t even see myself. Even though my faith and how I daily experience a relationship with God have changed, and even though there have been many days questioning its very existence – I know it is still there. Christ’s life still draws me with his exemplary compassion to serve and love people around him. There is a mystery, a silence, a peace, a love, and a source of life beyond me that still beckons me to rediscover faith on my own.

When it comes to honestly evaluating my thoughts, feelings, beliefs, and experiences concerning homeschooling, however, I see now that it was a perfect mask. It was a place where my people-pleasing personality, self-doubt, and self-hatred made me readily embrace the more legalistic homeschooling culture I was surrounded by.

I was twelve when I attended my first ATI Basic Seminar, and I went home vowing to never listen to music with a drum beat in it and to memorize all of Romans 6, 7, and 8. Next came the Advanced Seminar, followed by the Anger Resolution Seminar, both of which I came home from with lists of notes and new resolutions to follow. It frustrated me to no end at the time that my dad would never commit to actually joining ATI, and so I did my best to be a loyal follower without actually being a member. My sister and I excitedly signed up for the King’s Daughter Magazine, which we looked forward to every month to read about other girls out there living just like us learning how to be godly young women preparing to be godly wives and mothers.

I lived and breathed teachings on purity, modesty, and courtship, making sure I was a pristine example with every outfit, action, word, and thought. I watched the Character First! videos countless times, memorized the poems and songs, learned how to play them on the piano, and began to dream of the day I could go to a training center to teach it myself. That dream would later come true when I was seventeen and moved to the Oklahoma City ATI Training Center for my spring semester to work with the Character First team. The list of experiences I had and the norms I adopted are too many to list.

So what began as a lifestyle and calling for my parents, for me became a lifestyle and mantra of my own.

Homeschooling was the only right form of education, because even considering the alternative would mean admitting my doubts, questions, and envy of other kids my age that went to school. Those emotions I felt were weak and selfish, so I hid behind judging them for being different and felt sorry that they didn’t have parents who heard God like mine did. Judging them, preaching at them, pitying them, and praying for them became second nature, hiding the honesty of my envy and confusion. Just writing that makes my heart ache, when I think about the girl that I was back then. I think of the friends and extended family that I know who put up with me, while I pushed them further and further away with my arrogant self-righteousness. A girl so desperate to hide the world of fear I lived in. A girl who touted the good girl routine like her life depended on it, because to ever put down that mask was unthinkable.

Emily Freeman could not have worded my life more perfectly when she wrote, “I was a good girl and I wanted to be a good girl, but it often kept me from saying what I really meant.” In fact, my desire to be good even kept me from exploring my own opinion, and I grew up to believe that my opinions didn’t actually matter much anyway. I avoided vulnerability for fear of being rejected or being labeled as needy. Good girls aren’t needy; they are needed. And so instead of living free, I lived safe.

To admit I wanted or needed something different meant I questioned God and my parents. To be myself was something I was convinced no one wanted or cared to even notice. I gobbled up legalism, rules, and doctrine like they were food for my soul. A list to perform… Perfection and routine… I could do that. It would take years before I realized I was on a train headed for nowhere but endless heartache. It would take my entire world being shattered before I would come to understand that not only was God not looking for me to be perfect, but also people who really loved me weren’t looking for that either. In reality, all I wanted was to feel I belonged, but instead all I knew how to do was to try to fit in, and my efforts continually left me wanting.

Brene Brown so poignantly states, “We either own our stories (even the messy ones), or we stand outside of them— denying our vulnerabilities and imperfections, orphaning the parts of us that don’t fit in with who/what we think we’re supposed to be, and hustling for other people’s approval of our worthiness. Perfectionism is exhausting because hustling is exhausting. It’s a never-ending performance.”

This was my world.

Homeschooling for me was a never-ending, exhausting performance.

Part Three>

Reflections of a Homeschool Graduate: Part One

April 13, 2015May 11, 2020HA Editorial Team11 Comments

HA Note: The following is reprinted with permission from Kallie Culver’s blog Untold Stories. It was originally published on June 13, 2014 and has been slightly modified for HA.

Homeschooling: Where I Came From

One of the core reasons for me wanting to start Untold Stories is because of the healing and hope I have found through reading other blogs by homeschool graduates who have had similar experiences and difficulties in growing up, moving into society, and facing the reality of growing up in the conservative Christian homeschool world.

While I realize that many of our experiences differ, common threads reveal themselves in story after story of pain, exclusion, confusion, betrayal, abuse, doubt, faith crises, questioning loyalties, and more.

Growing up all I heard and was surrounded by were glowing reports of how homeschooling was everything God meant education to be. Then when I moved out on my own, I had such a difficult time adjusting to the real world that I spent years feeling like I had been duped and left on my own to figure out how to “de-weird” myself. Finding sites like Homeschoolers Anonymous and Recovering Grace proved to be beacons of hope after years lost in the dark seas of doubt, hating myself and my past, and doing my utmost to hide any signs of it from my peers, while at the same time mask the pain and anger I felt from loved ones still within its circles.

It has taken me a long time, but I am realizing that I can be honest about the confusion, pain, trials, and dangers of the world I grew up in. In doing that, I also don’t have to be ashamed of it anymore or try to paint a rose-colored picture of it. For so long I felt like I had to choose one option or the other. I have found that people put pressure on you from all sides on this subject.

Outsiders grow uncomfortable with your lack of familiarity with pop-culture, or find it wildly funny and strange when you miss an obvious social cue – so easily make you the target of yet another awkward homeschooler joke. Insiders still within the community exude a variety of emotions from growing angry with you for questioning the norms and potentially damaging homeschooling’s reputation, to reminding you that it wasn’t all bad and to not hurt good people by making them feel bad for well-meant efforts, to shunning you altogether. Folks interested in homeschooling want to know if I would recommend it, but then when I hesitate or speak truthfully, they usually don’t want to hear my experiences any more as they assume I am bitter, had an extreme experience, and am not worth hearing out. People who get to know me think it doesn’t bother me when they make fun of my upbringing or my family or immediately assume I won’t understand something. The thing is, while I have learned how to laugh at myself and laugh with others – there is a difference between when you are laughing with people and when you are fake laughing to cover your embarrassment for allowing it to happen yet again.

One of my favorite authors, Brene Brown, wrote “Fitting in is about assessing a situation and becoming who you need to be in order to be accepted. Belonging, on the other hand, doesn’t require us to change who we are; it requires us to be who we are.”

My journey with Untold Stories is a journey in belonging. It’s about learning to accept myself and all that comes with me from my past to my present. It’s learning to be vulnerable in healthy ways and at the right times with the right people. I have been working on this homeschooling factor for a long time. For years I was an emotional time bomb, just waiting for a person to hit the button, where I would either explode outwardly if I felt safe enough or implode inwardly all the while putting on a good face. For years all I did was assess each situation I found myself in and become the person I needed to be to fit in.

Being Kallie wasn’t an option, because I had believed the lie that being myself wasn’t good enough. A belief like that is so pervasive that even when you start to realize it in one area of your life and attempt to change, there are one hundred other areas in your life where it has spread that you are still oblivious to. I am learning that the process of moving from striving to fit in to acceptance and belonging is a constant cycle of trying, failing, trying again, succeeding, and finding yourself doing it yet again. Because of this process, and because homeschooling was such a huge influence on my life – it is important for me to stand up and take a seat at the table of voices weighing in from personal experience.

I know that many parents out there believe they have a right to stand up and defend their choices. I know that many parents out there today who are considering homeschooling often find it easier to hear from someone who talks about it in glowing terms that ease frustrations, downplay limitations, and contrast negative experiences with a public or private education experience. However, in the end, when making a healthy decision what’s really important is to hear all the facts before making the best decision for you and your family. Parents who have homeschooled can speak from experience on what it’s like to be the parent, but they can not speak from experience as to what it will be like for your child. To know that, you have to speak to those of us who were those children.

I know in my own family this can be an emotional subject, as we have all changed over the years, and processing through the past honestly is never an easy feat. However, for parents all I ask is that you take time to quietly and patiently listen. There is a time and a place for sharing your emotions and reflections, but know that for us, as adults speaking to our parents, attempting to voice the truth of how we felt, knowing how you might question our decisions, and striving to be honest about what it’s been like to live away from home—these are some of the hardest things for us to ever do. Even for those of us who weren’t abused, or for those of us who haven’t already been rejected by parents, the fear of rejection or dismissal claws at us.

The pressure to respect and to never dishonor your parents sits in your stomach like a brick.

Emotions of hatred, anger, and blame that have piled up from every time you were made fun of, misunderstood, felt cheated of a life most other kids had, felt behind in your education, had to add one more thing to your list of stuff you missed out on and are trying to catch up on – all of these feelings and more rise up like bile in your throat. You want to lash out. You want to direct it at someone, and yet you can’t because you look at your parent whom you love so much and whom you also know loves you, and you can’t blame them. So you stuff it down and you blame the system for duping your entire family, rather than honestly admit to being angry at God, the system, and your family. I have had many of these conversations with my own parents. I have handled many of them poorly, as it is often so much easier to redirect emotion and refuse to face what you are actually feeling.

I also know that I have parents who have listened, even when it hurt them. I am blessed in that I have parents who daily live out the reminder to me and my siblings that parenting is never perfect but a process. They have communicated again and again with their words and their actions that what matters most is fighting for relationship, honesty, and vulnerability even when it’s painful. And that means rethinking decisions, agreeing to disagree, or apologizing.

For those of you potentially considering homeschooling, check out resources like Homeschoolers Anonymous. Listen to stories from parents and children who grew up homeschooled. Embrace accountability, structure, high academic standards, and work to make sure that your child is truly getting the best educational opportunity and experience that they need, not what you want or only what is convenient. Make decisions with the question in mind, will my child thrive from this or live to regret my decision for them?

For those of you who meet us homeschool kids, instead of following the crowd in laughing at them or making indirect sarcastic remarks that you know go over their heads—come to their defense. Help them feel more comfortable and take time to try and understand where they are coming from. Just because it seems like they don’t pick up on everything doesn’t mean they are oblivious. I can’t tell you the number of times I have been in a social setting, where even though I may not have understood all the references being made, I knew I was being mocked, made fun of, or was the topic of conversation. Also know that as we grow more comfortable with our past and ourselves, we can also learn to joke about it ourselves and with others. It’s a balancing act really that differs for every person, but honesty, a listening ear, and some quiet observation will go a long way.

So, with this introduction, in the upcoming weeks I am going to be sharing my Home- Schooling Untold Stories. I would love to hear from you all on what your experiences have been, or thoughts you might have on the topic!

Part Two>

Man Shares Personal Testimony of How Bill Gothard Used Bible Verses Which Led to the Abuse of Children: Part Two

April 4, 2015May 11, 2020HA Editorial Team12 Comments

<Part One

HA note: The following is reprinted with permission from Julie Anne Smith’s blog Spiritual Sounding Board. It was originally published on March 31, 2015 and has been slightly modified for HA.

The following is Part 2 of Dash sharing how the teachings of Bill Gothard influenced his parents to “spank” his siblings. Although I know Dash’s identity, he has asked to remain anonymous. Dash’s account shows that they were not spankings, but abuse:

I am a survivor of Gothard’s cult. I experienced unspeakable physical, sexual, and emotional abuse from my mother and father, who were at one point among Gothard’s “model parents.” Gothard is not human. Gothard does not deserve compassion. Gothard is not a man, and he does not have the slightest shred of decency or humanity within him. Bill Gothard is a monster in human form, and as far as I am concerned, he can’t die soon enough.

I asked Dash questions about his childhood and more specifics about how he was disciplined. Again, I must issue a trigger warning to those who have experienced abuse. There may be some parents reading who used to follow Gothard’s teachings and have now left that behind. This, too, might be difficult for you to read.

In the following, Dash responds to my questions. My questions are in green:

What kinds of things did you and your sister do that resulted in “spankings?” Can you give an example of what disobedience looked like, i.e, talking back, not doing what you were told to do, etc.?

It’s hard to dredge up specific examples of behaviors that resulted in beatings (I’m going to use the term “beating” rather than “spanking,” because that’s what they were), because frankly my recollection of the events leading up to the beatings are hazy. However, punishable offenses included: Not getting a chore done on time, or to the required degree of perfection (chores included dusting, vacuuming, taking out the trash). Arguing or fighting with my siblings (to clarify, I have an older sister and younger brother), and I mean trivial things like arguing over which record we were going to listen to or who got to play with which stuffed animal. Arriving home late from a friend’s house, arriving home late after school, not getting out of bed promptly in the morning, complaining about going to church. The list is endless.

As our family began to seriously decay and slide toward doom, punishments extended to include: making a salad incorrectly, accidentally dropping a dish or a milk bottle, getting the bathroom floor wet during a bath, not setting the table for dinner quickly enough, forgetting to put clothes in the laundry basket, putting a book back on the bookshelf in the wrong place.

In other words, any trivial perceived imperfection became grounds for beatings.

One of the worst beatings of my life was administered by my mother around nine years old when we were making chocolate chip cookies. I was given the task of running the hand-held mixer, which I was happy to do because then I might get one of the detachable beaters with cookie batter on it after. I was standing on a stool, and I turned to ask my mother a question. Being an absent-minded kid, when I turned I unconsciously lifted the mixer out of the batter and cookie dough flew all over the wall. My mom went livid and slapped me full in the face, knocking me sprawling off the stool. She then dragged me bawling upstairs and beat me with the 3/4″ dowel rod for almost 30 minutes.

What made them stop the beatings after an hour or however long? Was there something you or your sister did that helped them to stop? Were your parents looking for signs of remorse? Did they finally give up?

The stipulation was that we had to hold still and submissively accept the beating, and we had to stop crying and be silent and not make a sound. This was a specific part of Gothard’s beating protocol, found in one of his pamphlets: the silent, limp submission to a beating was his metric for a “repentant spirit.”

To this day, I cannot show normal emotional responses to my environment as a result of this aversive conditioning; I reflexively suppress every emotional response.

I cannot maintain a long-term relationship with a woman because of this emotional dysfunction, which is why I am still single at 44. I have had therapists hint that I might be a sociopath because of the superficial appearance of this emotional dysfunction, which I know not to be the case. I have emotions; I just cannot show or express them properly. It makes me want to kill myself.

Did your parents talk to you while you were getting spanked? How was their tone of voice? Were they yelling or did they use a normal tone of voice? Did they use scripture while “spanking?” Did they pray with you after?

They would yell and scream and bellow. They would tell us what bad, awful, evil, horrible, sinful children we were. In the beginning, there was no pretext of spiritual context; later on as I got older and the beatings continued, my father began making attempts to pray with us after a beating, as if it was a spiritual exercise. For the most part, however, the beatings took place in an atmosphere of apoplectic, psychotic rage, especially when my mother was administering them. I use the term “psychotic” because my mother has been diagnosed as bipolar, and her fits of apoplexy were probably manic fugues. It was terrifying. To this day I have nightmares about it.

Did they realize you were bruised? Did they ever acknowledge they went overboard or apologize?

The bruising and other injuries (which at one point for me included a broken finger, and for my brother once included a broken forearm) were never acknowledged by my parents. It was implied that we deserved it.

“That’s what you get for your sinful disobedience” was the message.

My parents have never really acknowledged the specific details of what they did. Both of them have acknowledged that hitting us was wrong, but we can’t discuss details properly because they are so horrified and humiliated by the recollection of what they did to us. My mother has sobbing fits when I try to bring any of this up. Both my parents have tried to make amends through financial reparations: paying for therapists, occasionally helping with rent or medical bills. But I’m still broken, so everyday life is a constant struggle. I wake up every morning and look in the mirror, and I have to find a reason not to kill myself.

I have a cat that I adopted 13 years ago who snuggles with me and is my little buddy. Having a cat is the only thing that keeps me going; I have to take care of my cat, so I can’t kill myself. I have to focus on something other than myself in order to go on living. It’s pretty bleak.

I’d like to state again for the record that Gothard apologists are remorseless sadists, and this includes that Alfred character who comments on your blog. These people KNOW THAT THESE THINGS ARE HAPPENING IN THE IBLP/ATI PROGRAM, AND THEY ARE FINE WITH IT. They are sociopaths.

And Gothard is a monster, because he knows about these events and he ENCOURAGES THEM.

photo credit: bark via photopin cc

Man Shares Personal Testimony of How Bill Gothard Used Bible Verses Which Led to the Abuse of Children

March 28, 2015May 11, 2020HA Editorial Team11 Comments

HA note: The following is reprinted with permission from Julie Anne Smith’s blog Spiritual Sounding Board. It was originally published on March 26, 2015 and has been slightly modified for HA.

Last month, “Dash” commented on an older SSB article, Bill Gothard’s New Program/Ministry: Total Success Power Teams. He used some strong words to describe his experience:

I am a survivor of Gothard’s cult. I experienced unspeakable physical, sexual, and emotional abuse from my mother and father, who were at one point among Gothard’s “model parents.” Gothard is not human. Gothard does not deserve compassion. Gothard is not a man, and he does not have the slightest shred of decency or humanity within him. Bill Gothard is a monster in human form, and as far as I am concerned, he can’t die soon enough.

In the comments, Dash was asked to share more, and did so with me privately. I have compiled them into this article (and at least one more article). Dash’s words were difficult for me to read, especially because of my own abusive childhood, but also because of many years of teachings I was subjected to as a parent, including Gothard’s materials, so I am going to issue trigger warnings for anyone who might be triggered by childhood abuse, by spiritual abuse, etc.

Dash Explains Why He is Telling His Story Now

I have chosen to share my story with you because I’m 44 years old and it’s time for me to start talking, to anyone who cares enough to listen. I’ve already lost more than half my time to Gothard, and I want my life back. He’s 80 years old and I believe he is still damaging people in alarming ways, and he is leaving behind a deeply rooted, vile and secretively violent institution that seems to be poised to grind forth in his absence and continue churning out his awful work upon the next generation. I want to put a stop to IBLP, and I want to end Gothard’s legacy as utterly as possible. Everything he has ever written, touched, or talked about is poisoned and poisonous, and it must be destroyed.

Specifically, I’d like to talk about those aspects of Gothard’s teachings which were protocols for physical abuse: examples include blanket training, beating children with rods, and the sheer exasperation of parents whose children failed the rules of the program which would result in explosions of rage and indiscriminate hitting. In particular, Gothard’s distortions of the following verse were extremely detrimental:

Proverbs 23:13- Withhold not correction from the child: for if thou beatest him with the rod, he shall not die.

Gothard devoted a great deal of written material, both IBLP and ATI, to using this verse as a premise for encouraging brutal beatings, albeit using roundabout phrasing and “soft” language which absolved him legally of any actual responsibility. At least, that’s how my parents interpreted it.

Part of my frustration in confronting Gothard stems from the fact that my family threw out a lot of Gothard’s most offensive ATI literature, some of which included blatantly racist arguments encouraging white followers to apply the “Quiverfull” practice, and to avoid miscegenation (in addition to the pamphlets encouraging beatings). So I can’t document a lot of these anecdotes. The basic literature quoting Proverbs 23:13, however, is part of the Red Book I believe; so it begins there.

“Spanking” vs Beatings

Also, I would like to be very clear about this point: “spanking” was not what we experienced in my family. These were actual beatings, ranging anywhere from five minutes to an hour or more. The beatings were delivered to the buttocks, thighs, and lower back, and sometimes the hands, fingers, and forearms (defensive injuries), in response to any perceived slight, offense, or rules violation.

Depending on the severity of the punishment, anything from a wooden spoon to a 3/4″x2′ dowel rod was used. My parents actually had an array of dowel rods to choose from (at least a dozen) ranging from a thin one about 1/8″ thick to the 3/4″ terror previously described. Occasionally my dad would use his belt, a heavy leather belt with a weighty brass buckle. Not often, though, because the belt would leave visible bruises.

My sister and I would go to school with huge black and purple welts across our buttocks, carefully placed so that they were covered by our clothes, and we would sit at our desks in excruciating pain with tears streaming silently down our faces. This was during our initial participation in ATI, but before we enrolled full-bore in home-schooling.

My parents were very clear that these practices were part of our Gothard instruction.

On the few occasions when I met Gothard in person, he actually stated that he believed spanking made children healthier and more successful. He would then quote the proverb about beating. He was very good about mincing words in order to evade responsibility.

If you have questions at this point, it would help the dialogue. I’m happy to type everything I can think of, but I get so bogged-down and blinded with rage that it becomes difficult to think clearly. Answering questions is very focusing for me.

(JA note: On the next post, I have asked Dash specific questions and he responds to those questions.)

I’m not interested in confronting Gothard on Christian terms, in accordance with church protocols. He forfeited that privilege decades ago. I want worldly justice. I want a genuine reckoning from the man. I want to burn his entire legacy to the ground, and stand amid the ashes and say to the world, “This was a man who ruined thousands upon thousands of lives. Nothing to see here. Please move along.”

The greatest and most dangerous fallacy that I keep hearing from Gothard apologists is the argument “Gothard may be imperfect, but his teachings are still right.” No, no and no. This is a lie: an ugly, flat-out foul and evil lie, intended to continue perpetuating Gothard’s abusive legacy. Everything Gothard teaches is wrong, all of it, even his direct Scripture quotes, because the CONTEXT is wrong. It places Gothard in the seat of worship instead of Christ. Everything Gothard ever taught or ever will teach must be discarded. If people want answers, they should listen to the Holy Spirit, and not any human teacher.

The Dangerous Fallacies of Gothard Apologists

I’ve stated this in a previous email, but it bears repeating. The greatest and most dangerous fallacy that I hear from Gothard apologists is the argument “Gothard may be imperfect, but his teachings are still right.” This is blatantly false. Everything Gothard teaches is wrong, all of it, even his direct Scripture quotes, because the CONTEXT is wrong. It places Gothard in the seat of worship instead of Christ.

Everything Gothard ever taught or ever will teach must be discarded. If people want answers, they should read the Bible and listen to the Holy Spirit. They should not listen to Gothard or any other human teacher; they should make up their own minds.

The second greatest fallacy I hear from Gothard apologists is “Many families have a great experience in IBLP and ATI. If your family had a bad experience, it’s because you misinterpreted Gothard’s intentions.” This is also blatantly false. I believe Gothard does in fact intend for parents to beat their children. I would argue that anyone who claims to have had a good experience with Gothard, IBLP, or ATI is either lying, deluded, or sadists themselves. If you got 4-5 years into ATI and you actually applied everything in the publications that Gothard sent you, especially the material based on Proverbs 23:13, you would have had an identical experience to mine.

I would argue that those who believe that they had a positive experience with Gothard are the ones who are in fact misinterpreting his intentions… just as I would argue that those who defend his behavior from the ongoing accusations of sexual misconduct are deluding themselves as to his true nature, and are blind to the damage he has inflicted.

Dash Believes Bill Gothard to be a Con Artist and Explains Why

I believe that Gothard is a consummate con artist. In spite of the endless documentation of the damage he has done, Gothard still manages to convince his inner circle of friends that he is a good man with good intentions who merely stumbled a little bit, and his victims are more to blame than he is for making such a big deal out of “nothing.” There are two explanations for this phenomenon:

The first explanation is that genuinely hurting people, like my mother, who are desperate for real answers and a real connection with God, are easily misled by Gothard’s overpowering charm, his carefully crafted image, and his claims of secret knowledge and a special understanding of the Bible. These people are broken to begin with, and the hurt piled on hurt that Gothard inflicts is too much for them to comprehend; they defend Gothard out of reflex as all abuse victims will defend an abuser, due to Stockholm syndrome and an inability to comprehend their own damages and failures.

The second explanation is that Gothard appeals to genuine sadists and sociopaths, such as your commenter Alfred who obviously has zero concern for Gothard’s victims and is committed entirely to defending Gothard and behaving as vindictively toward his accusers as possible. These people are reprehensible scumbags. I would use a more graceful word to describe them, but there isn’t one.

JA note: Alfred, who was mentioned above, is Alfred Corduan, who commented on this SSB post. You can also see his comments on articles at the Gothard survivor site, Recovering Grace website, where he continually defends Bill Gothard.

I would like to close at this time by saying that while I no longer call myself a Christian, I never gave up on Christ. I still believe in the Great Commandment:

“‘Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind.’This is the first and greatest commandment. And the second is like it: ‘Love your neighbor as yourself.’All the Law and the Prophets hang on these two commandments.”

I don’t do so well with the first part; loving God is next to impossible when I don’t know who God is, and I blame Gothard for that. I may yet end up in hell, and there’s nothing I can do about it. So I focus on the second part, and I try to love my fellow-man as best I can. That’s the best I can do. I can’t save myself. Only God can do that, if he wants to.

Part Two>

photo credit: bark via photopin cc

Bill Gothard’s Brother Accused of Racketeering, Stealing Millions from the Elderly

January 14, 2015May 11, 2020HA Editorial Team13 Comments

By R.L. Stollar, HA Community Coordinator

Bill Gothard, who resigned last year from the Institute for Basic Life Principles (IBLP) on account of sexual abuse and harassment charges, is not the only member of the Gothard family to face accusations of illegal activity. Florida State Attorney General Pam Bondi filed a lawsuit last December against Gothard’s brother, David Locke Gothard. The lawsuit alleges that David engaged in racketeering and fraud, stealing millions of dollars from his victims — primarily elderly people — by means of a Ponzi scheme. According to Naples Daily News,

The state’s lawsuit alleges that since 2003, David Locke Gothard and his companies engaged in racketeering and other illegal activity in Florida that continues today. The defendants transferred patents between themselves, solicited investors by using false representations about patents, their “alter ego” companies and products, which produced no sales, the lawsuit says, alleging they then created bogus documents to operate a “patent assertion entity,” collecting millions in illegally-obtained funds.

Roger Nixon, an alleged victim of David’s Ponzi scheme, told Naples Daily News that David used his brother Bill’s ministry — IBLP, which created a popular homeschooling curriculum, the Advanced Training Institute (ATI) — to attract potential targets. Nixon says Gothard defrauded him out of his entire savings:

“He’s defrauded us out of our life savings,” said Nixon, adding that he lost $285,000 after meeting Gothard through his church a decade ago. “We’re flat broke. We didn’t have hot water for a year.” Nixon said Gothard used his brother’s church ministry “to lure victims in the name of Christianity.”… “David Gothard makes Bernie Madoff look like a kid playing in a sandbox,” Nixon said.

This is not the first time that David Gothard has been in trouble with the law. He was sentenced to 2 years in a California prison in 1986 for illegally selling over a million dollars in securities. David is also not the only Gothard brother to be in trouble. Another brother of Bill’s, Steve Gothard, was accused in the 1980’s of sexually preying on his employees.

You can read the full story from Naples Daily News here.

A Quickie on “Defrauding”

December 22, 2014May 11, 2020HA Editorial Team3 Comments

CC image courtesy of Flickr, Photo Monkey. Image links to source.

HA note: The following is reprinted with permission from Darcy’s blog Darcy’s Heart-Stirrings. It was originally published on January 3, 2013.

It was a popular teaching by Bill Gothard that clothes on women could “defraud” their brothers. He used a verse in 1 Thess. 4 to prove this:

“3 For this is the will of God, even your sanctification, that ye should abstain from fornication: 4 That every one of you should know how to possess his vessel in sanctification and honour; 5 Not in the lust of concupiscence, even as the Gentiles which know not God: 6 That no man go beyond and defraud his brother in any matter: because that the Lord is the avenger of all such, as we also have forewarned you and testified.” (A better interpretation of verse 6 says: “and that in this matter no one should wrong or take advantage of a brother or sister.”)

He took this verse to mean that all women should be careful how they dress so as not to “defraud” their brothers in Christ with their clothing, which he defined as causing them to stumble or lust. Besides the obvious stretching of the context and content of this verse, there are a few problems with this definition of “defraud.”

de·fraud

verb (used with object)

to deprive of a right, money, or property by fraud

Some synonyms of “defraud” are: “bamboozle, beguile, burn, chouse, circumvent, clip, con, deceive, delude, do number on, dupe, embezzle, fleece, foil, hoax, jive, outwit, pilfer, pull fast one, rip off, rob, shaft, sucker into, swindle, take to the cleaner’s, take, trick, victimize”

In order to say that a woman’s clothing can “defraud” a man, you would have to prove that

1. A woman’s body is the right or property of another person

2. A woman is wrongfully offering her body to any man who gazes on her

3. A woman is lying by offering her body to another without intent to follow through with the deal

4. A woman is taking something from any man who looks at her, just by the piece of clothing she is wearing.

5. A woman is responsible for a man being deprived his rights any time he thinks something immoral about her

I really hope I wouldn’t have to detail why all of the above is wrong, but in case I do, here goes:

I am not anyone’s property or right. No one owns me except myself. I am not offering anything by the clothes I wear. If you think I am offering you something by my clothing, I am not responsible for your wrong thoughts.

I cannot steal anything from you by the clothes I wear, especially not something that is owed to you, since I owe you nothing.

I cannot control the thoughts of everyone who sees me, as I do not expect everyone else to control my own thoughts. I am not responsible for your thoughts or actions, as you are not responsible for mine. You are not a victim of my clothing if you desire me sexually. I have not bamboozled you out of your property by wearing a short skirt. I cannot dupe, hoax, trick, or rob you of anything by the jeans I wear. It doesn’t even make logical sense.

Quite simply put, one cannot “defraud” anyone else by one’s clothing. Or, as another wise person once said, “I do not think that word means what you think it means”.

HSLDA Gave This Man Their Prestigious Lifetime Achievement Award Just 4 Years Ago

August 31, 2014May 11, 2020HA Editorial Team15 Comments

By R.L. Stollar, HA Community Coordinator

Every year the Home School Legal Defense Association (HSLDA) puts on the National Leader’s Conference, where the biggest names and leaders in homeschooling come together to network and hear educational and inspirational talks from both HSLDA’s staff as well as outside speakers invited by HSLDA. During the conference, HSLDA gives an annual award: the Lifetime Achievement Award. According to HSLDA, this honor is bestowed upon “a leader who has demonstrated valuable leadership to the homeschool community, inspired and motivated others to effective action, overcome hardships and obstacles to succeed, demonstrated a servant’s heart while exhibiting the qualities listed above, and maintained a clear witness concerning Jesus Christ and the Gospel.”

The Lifetime Achievement Award was dubbed “the Gregg Harris Award,” named after homeschool leader Gregg Harris. It was first bestowed upon its namesake in 2007. In 2008 it was given to Brian Ray “in recognition of his pioneering work in the field of homeschool research.” In 2009, HSLDA awarded it to James Dobson. According to Focus on the Family President Jim Daly, “HSLDA presented Dr. Dobson with its Lifetime Achievement Award during its annual National Leaders Conference here in Colorado Springs.”

Which brings us to 2010, a mere 4 years ago.

Who did HSLDA bestow the “Gregg Harris” Lifetime Achievement Award on at the 2010 National Leader’s Conference?

HSLDA does not have the answer to this question on their website. However, the event page for the conference is still available. You can view it here. First, some background: HSLDA’s 2010 National Leader’s Conference was held September 22-25, 2010, at the Westin North Shore in Chicago (Wheeling, Illinois to be precise). Invited to speak at the conference attended by state and national homeschool leaders were Dr. Henry Morris (from the Institute for Creation Research) and Erwin Lutzer (from Moody Church and Worldview Weekend). HSLDA’s Michael Farris gave the plenary session.

But there was one particularly significant speaker I have yet to mention. On the afternoon of the last day, the conference attendees are divided into two groups: ladies and men. The ladies attended a “Ladies Tea,” and the men attended a “Men’s Huddle.” And who did HSLDA invite to led the “Men’s Huddles” at their conference for homeschool leaders? Bill Gothard, of course:

HSLDA invited Bill Gothard just 4 years ago to teach state and national homeschool leaders at the 2010 National Leader’s Conference.

But that is not all.

Gothard was not simply invited to speak. He was also chosen by HSLDA to receive their Lifetime Achievement Award at that same conference. According to Kiri Kincell, a conference attendee, “During [Saturday] evening, the Greg Harris [sic] award (named after it’s first recipient) was awarded to Bill Gothard for his huge contributions to the early homeschooling movement.”

Just a reminder: this was in 2010, just 4 years ago.

This fact has not gone unnoticed. An anonymous commentator on a blog criticizing Michael Farris’s recent “Line in the Sand” article pointed to the 2010 conference:

As a former board member of a state home schooling organization, I clearly remember HSLDA, during their national conference for home schooling leaders that was held just 4 years ago in Chicago giving a lifetime home schooling achievement award to none other than Bill Gothard. HSLDA gives this award annually to those that they judge to have made significant contributions to the home schooling movement. This award has gone to men like Greg Harris and the now deceased and former HSLDA attorney, Chris Klicka. HSLDA even had Gothard conduct a Sat afternoon session at their conference that was geared toward fathers and sons…just 4 years ago!

You can read the full comment here.

Let’s put this into perspective:

HSLDA’s Michael Farris just released a blistering white paper condemning Bill Gothard and Doug Phillips. In that paper, Farris declares that Gothard’s teachings “usurp the role of God,” “threaten the freedom and integrity of the homeschooling movement,” are “dangerous,” and have “harmed” “families, children, women, and even fathers.” He also admits that he and the HSLDA board have believed this for years, which is why HSLDA “did not directly promote their teachings.”

So. Let’s get this straight: HSLDA believes that Bill Gothard as a teacher is anti-biblical, freedom-threatening, dangerous, and harmful — and has believed this for years — and despite all that, invited Bill Gothard to be the teacher of state and national homeschool leaders just 4 years ago?

And then gave Bill Gothard the highest honor they could?

And then had the gall to publicly lie to all of our faces and say they “did not directly promote their teachings”?

I mean,

Either Farris and HSLDA have suddenly contracted temporary amnesia or there’s a troubling lack of both sincerity and transparency to this “line in the sand.”

Gothard’s Sex Rules: Marital Consent? What’s That?

July 23, 2014May 11, 2020HA Editorial Team7 Comments

HA note: The following is reprinted with permission from Libby Anne’s blog Love Joy Feminism. It was originally published on Patheos on May 13, 2014.

My family never attended one of Bill Gothard’s seminars, and we didn’t use Gothard’s curriculum. We children were, instead, raised on the outskirts of Gothardism. We knew people who were followers of Bill Gothard, and we imbibed a few of his teachings (umbrella of authority, anyone?), but that was the extent of it. As things began to snowball over the past months and Gothard was exposed as a sexual predator and ultimately relieved of his leadership position, I wanted to learn more about what Gothard actually taught, in his own words. So I purchased Gothard’s “Advanced Seminar Textbook,” which was published in 1986 and can be found used on Amazon. I’m not going to blog through it page by page, but I do plan to write some posts on various sections. Today I offer my first of these posts.

In his textbook, Gothard covers his rules for periodic abstinence during marriage, which centers on a woman’s menstrual cycle (pages 175—185). Of all of Gothard’s teachings, this may be the one I’m most unfamiliar with, as it is foreign to anything taught in the evangelical church my family attended. In this post, I will cover the first pages of this section and then finish with a letter Gothard received from a follower.

To start out, here are the rules Gothard lays out as “God’s laws on abstinence”:

What Are God’s Guidelines for Times of Abstinence?

During the menstrual cycle—Ezekiel 18:5-6

Seven days after the menstrual cycle—Leviticus 15:28

40 days after the birth of a son—Leviticus 12:2-4

80 days after the birth of a daughter—Leviticus 12:5

Gothard’s critics tend to do two things: they call him a “legalist” and argue that his teachings in this area come from the Old Testament and are therefore invalid, as the Old Testament is superseded by the New Testament. Here, on the first page of this section, Gothard directly counters both of these arguments.

First, Gothard urges his readers to “distinguish between legalism and godly living” and states that: “(1) Legalism is trying to earn salvation; (2) Legalism is trying to live the Christian life with the energy of the soul; and (3) Legalism is following ‘the letter,’ not ‘the spirit.’” Gothard uses Bible verses to back all of this up, focusing especially on II Corinthians 3:6. Gothard argues that he is not teaching legalism but rather godly living.

Second, Gothard pulls up each time the New Testament references “uncleanness” and uses that to claim that the Old Testament teachings regarding a woman’s menstrual uncleanness is still valid. This is a fascinating attempt, but it does not actually work, as it’s pretty clear he’s proof texting and he comes across as being unaware that the New Testament was written in a different language from the Old Testament. Still, that he at least tried is fascinating.

Now I want to turn to the first of the “Benefits of Abstinence” Gothard lays out.

1. It builds self-control.

When sex drives are misused, they become self-consuming and can never be satisfied. Burned-out lusts call for new forms of perversion, which become even greater tyrants of unfulfillment.

Okay, so here’s the thing. If I’m overeating and I know I’m overeating, and it’s making me feel unhealthy, I can fix that by moderating what I eat. I don’t need to spend time fasting to do that. In fact, fasting in order to lose weight can easily lead to binge eating when the fast is over. I guess what I’m saying is that there are better ways to foster a healthy and balanced sex life than abstaining and then (presumably) binging.

But what’s actually going on here becomes more clear with the letter Gothard prints from one of his followers, and it’s not pretty.

How a Commitment to Abstinence Transformed a Marriage

I am writing to report what has happened in our marriage since our decision to follow God’s guidelines for abstinence. To be honest, I was waiting to see if the changes in our lives were short-lived or permanent. Now after a third of a year and five menstrual cycles, I am encouraged that our decision was correct, Biblically-based, and that the Lord is blessing our marriage more than ever before.

Let me start at the beginning. Our dating relationship was based on the physical, not on the spiritual. It ended in pregnancy and then marriage. She was sixteen, I was twenty.

Depending on the state, this might not have been legal.

After we married, our sex life became a shambles. My physical drives were impossible for her to satisfy, and even with a daily physical relationship, I became involved in pornography and other impure habits.

If you’re having sex daily and yet you’re not sexually satisfying, it’s probably worth seeing a doctor or a therapist.

After ten years of marriage we attended our first Basic Youth Seminar. When you went over the consequences of defrauding in dating, I suddenly realized my problem and our marriage problem.

And exactly how do we explain all of the couples who had sex before marriage and are currently in healthy, sexually fulfilling relationships?

I asked God to forgive me for defrauding her before marriage, and for the first time in my life, I began exercising self-control.

Also for the first time in ten years of married life, we began to experience true sexual intimacy. Our relationship continued to improve, but my wife still felt forced to submit to me, and she worried daily about whether or not she would have to ‘make love’ that night.

Wait. Wait wait wait. So the whole time this guy was having sex daily, his wife was only participating because she believed her role, as his wife, was to submit to him and be sexually available. You know, the fact that she felt she had to have sex with him whether she wanted to or not might just play some part in why their sexual relationship wasn’t fully satisfying him.

I began having difficulty exercising self-control.

I really want to know what this means. Was he raping her?

Then we attended your Corporate Leaders Seminar and learned about abstinence during the menstrual period and for seven days after the period. I knew immediately that this is what God wanted me to commit to, and it scared me to death! I couldn’t picture myself being committed to anything like that!

However, God gave me the strength and encouragement to talk to my wife. We discussed it and that day, with her permission, I made a commitment to follow that principle.

Now he’s concerned about getting his wife’s permission?

The relief within my wife was almost visible. The “fear” is gone from our marriage.

Well of course her relief was almost visible! His poor wife knew she would have have two weeks of blessed relief from her husband’s constant (and unreciprocated) sexual demands!

We now have a freedom we never experienced before. We are blessed to the point that we almost feel guilty when we are around our Christian friends who are completely loaded down with problems. Our lives have been transformed by applying this and other principles from God’s Word.

You replaced consent with biblically-mandated periodic abstinence, you asshole.

A Confirming Report from the Wife

I cannot tell you how much the material on abstinence has meant to me and our marriage. I have never experienced what has been happening in our marriage since we began following the principle of abstinence.

It is indeed a miracle!!!! Through the power of the Holy Spirit, my husband has exercised real self-control in the area of our sex life. I feel so loved, cherished, and protected! I have been able to respond to him as seldom before. The difference in our relationship is difficult to describe, but very wonderful to experience. Thank you again for motivating us to choose God’s best.

Someone tell this poor wife about consent and marital rape.

I didn’t expect to be this frustrated when I opened the volume to these pages, but I am. I am really, really frustrated. It appears that Gothard is using abstinence during the period and for seven days after the period as a replacement for consent within marriage. With these teachings, women who find themselves forced to submit to sex they do not want—forced by their believe that that is the wife’s biblical role—can find relief in two solid weeks of freedom from those demands.

This is sick.

I Fight These Demons So I Can Explain The Scars: Shiphrah’s Story, Part Two

July 10, 2014May 11, 2020HA Editorial Team7 Comments

HA Editorial note: The author’s name had originally been changed to ensure anonymity. “Shiphrah” was a pseudonym. I am editing this today because I am ready to say that Shiphrah is me. I wrote this and asked that it was posted anonymously because I had only begun to explore the depths of my memories and my pain at that time and I needed an outlet to work through it. I no longer feel the need for anonymity, no longer am I afraid to claim the darkest parts of my story. I am Darcy, and this is my story and my pain and my healing. ~Darcy Anne, HA Editorial Team

< Part One

Part Two

I grew up thinking I was unworthy.

Unworthy of love, nice things, friends, God’s favor. I strove to be the kind of person who would be worthy of these things, but always fell short. I did everything I could to look the part on the outside: I dressed modestly and acted like a godly young lady and played the part as best I could.

“Fake it til you make it,” my Mom liked to say to me.

My journals of that time are so filled with anguish and desire to be accepted and to be good. I can barely read them. I want to go back there and hug that girl and tell her that she WAS worthy, she WAS good, she was enough. But I can’t. I can’t go back there and comfort that girl with the broken heart that was broken by the ones who were supposed to protect it. I am left with the woman she has become. The woman who has had to teach herself how to be loved and how to accept worthiness and how to see herself and the world through different eyes.

When a boy fell in love with me, and I with him, they all did their best to convince him that I was a terrible, selfish person and he would be sorry if he married me. That they knew me better and I was just putting on an act to impress him. He was skeptical, but thought maybe they really did know better. So he watched me, befriended me, and realized I was every bit the person he thought I was and my mom and sister were crazy.

I coudn’t understand why he would persist in loving a person like me, but he did and it was such a wonderful feeling.

I was so afraid he would find out who I really was and would run far away. But that didn’t happen. We fought for our relationship against my parent’s wishes and we married very young and very in love. Not too long after we were married, we were talking and I said “Well, I am a selfish person”. He looked at me in surprise and said, “Why do you say that?” It was my turn to look at him in confusion and say, “Well, my mom and sister always told me I was selfish and I struggled my whole life to not be, but I guess it’s just who I am and I thought you knew that.” He took my face in his hands, looked right into my eyes, and said, “You are the most selfLESS person I have ever met. Never let anyone convince you otherwise. You can’t fool me. I know who you are. They don’t know who you are.”

I cried that day, at 20 years old, for the first time thinking that maybe I wasn’t the person my family had tried to convince me I was, that my religion tried to convince me I was, that I needed to hide and pretend not to be so people would love me. Maybe I really was loveable and the fact this man had married me wasn’t because I had fooled him into it. But it would be 5 more long years before I was able to clearly see how dysfunctional my past was, the part that fundamentalist religion and homeschool culture played, and began to heal and figure out who I was really and to fight for myself. It would be 10 more long years before I was able to put a label on the treatment I received from them.

Emotional Abuse. The systematic diminishment of another person….their worth, their dignity, their character.

“Emotional abuse is like brain washing in that it systematically wears away at the victim’s self-confidence, sense of self-worth, trust in their own perceptions, and self-concept. Whether it is done by constant berating and belittling, by intimidating, or under the guise of ‘guidance,’ ‘teaching,’ or ‘advice,’ the results are similar. Eventually, the recipient of the abuse loses all sense of self and remnants of personal value. Emotional abuse cuts to the very core of a person, creating scars that may be far deeper and more lasting than physical ones.” (University of Illinois, Counseling Center)

Spiritual Abuse. The use of religion and spirituality to control, manipulate, coerce, dominate, and beat down. To control behavior and thoughts by religion.

“Spiritual abuse occurs when someone in a position of spiritual authority, the purpose of which is to ‘come underneath’ and serve, build, equip and make God’s people MORE free, misuses that authority placing themselves over God’s people to control, coerce or manipulate them for seemingly Godly purposes which are really their own.” (Jeff VanVonderen, The Subtle Power of Spiritual Abuse)

I can’t tell you what came first: the dysfunction or the religion.

But they worked together to create a complete brain-washing and erasing of my self-worth and self-concept. Our religion taught that self-esteem was really pride and God hates a prideful heart. We were not to think highly of ourselves but to remember that we were nothing without God and probably nothing even with His help. To be told that I was a selfish, horrible person but that they loved me anyway “because you’re our daughter/sister” is no different than this view of God that makes us all worms who are only worthy of anything because God created us and therefore must love us. Turning the idea of a “relationship with God” into an abusive relationship between a narcissist and a victim. A manipulative power-play. Is it any wonder that “God’s people” turn out abusive when they see Him as such?

If I try to say any of this to my family, to recount my experiences and feelings, I am told I’m overreacting, too sensitive, too emotional, that these things never happened or “didn’t happen like that”. I’m told that even if they did happen, I should forgive and move on because family is the most important thing in life and I’ll regret making a fuss over the past. That I was raised in a good home and was loved and am ungrateful. I am denied, belittled, and word has spread that I’m a crazy, unstable person who has a chip on my shoulder and is trying to tear apart our happy family. But I am done accepting their definition of who I am, their portrayal of my identity.

I am not who they think I am. I am so much more.

I am worthy of love. I am a good person. I am a human being, wife, mother, and friend. I love unconditionally and fiercely. I fight for the people I love and for people I don’t even know because I desperately want them to know that they are worth it. I fight my own demons to give my children a healthy mother and so I can explain the scars to them someday and they can know that I valued them by valuing myself —

— That I fought for them by fighting for myself. That I broke the cycle.

“Adult survivors of emotional child abuse have only two life-choices: learn to self-reference or remain a victim. When your self-concept has been shredded, when you have been deeply injured and made to feel the injury was all your fault, when you look for approval to those who can not or will not provide it—you play the role assigned to you by your abusers.

It’s time to stop playing that role, time to write your own script. Victims of emotional abuse carry the cure in their own hearts and souls. Salvation means learning self-respect, earning the respect of others and making that respect the absolutely irreducible minimum requirement for all intimate relationships. For the emotionally abused child, healing does come down to “forgiveness”—forgiveness of yourself.”

~Andrew Vachss, taken from this excellent website: The Invisible Scar.

I Fight These Demons So I Can Explain The Scars: Shiphrah’s Story, Part One

July 9, 2014May 11, 2020HA Editorial Team3 Comments

Part One

I was never good enough.

From as far back as I can remember, I was never good enough. I was told I was selfish, lazy, prideful, rebellious, and argumentative. I was told I needed to ask God to forgive me and make me a good person through Him (because we could never be good on our own, only with Jesus’ help and then it was never to our credit, only to His).

When my little sister picked fights with me and I lashed out at her, I was the one scolded, grounded, spanked, had things taken from me, forced to spend time with her to “help us get along”, told to get along and be nice and stop being so selfish and be a better example because I was the oldest. She often got away scott-free, even when she started it. I was told numerous times that if I couldn’t learn to get along with my sister then I couldn’t have friends. Family is more important than friends and how you treat your family tells you how you will treat friends. And if you treat friends better than family, you’re a special kind of hypocrite. I tried to explain why it was easier to treat my friends better. Because they were nice to me.

I was then told that Jesus said “what good is it if you love those who love you?” but loving people who aren’t nice to you is much better in God’s eyes.

Everything I did was criticized. It was never good enough. There was always something to be fixed, some way to do things better. I remember being about 12 years old and telling my mom in exasperation, “All you ever do is criticise me. You never tell me what I do right, only ever what I do wrong.” She first acted surprised and denied it, then promised to try to notice the good before telling me the bad. That didn’t last very long and felt very fake even when she tried. Like she was straining to find something good to say to get it out of the way so she could go on to grasp “this teachable moment”. Of course, when I resisted the “teachable moment”, I was the one at fault for being “unteachable”.

To this day when someone says “teachable moment” I recoil.

I was always “unteachable” because I often argued with my mom’s criticism. Because her words stung and fighting them off was my only defense, as little as it was. I was good with words and knew how to wield them as weapons of defense. I often had Proverbs quoted at me that said that people that were unteachable were fools and only those willing to listen to constructive criticism were people of good character whom God loved. So I guess that was just another thing that God hated about me too.

I was told constantly that I was selfish, and it didn’t take long for my sister to take up that anthem against me. Of course, sister had “a servant’s heart” and was selfless and kind and I should be more like her. She was generous and I was stingy. I only thought of myself and my needs and God was not pleased with that. I should ask God to give me a servant’s heart. I spent many hours as a child crying to God to give me this elusive servant’s heart that I apparently lacked and needed before my mom would accept me and my actions. Then maybe my sister wouldn’t hate me either. We were given roles very early in life and we played them well. She learned early how to manipulate our parents against me and she was always believed over me.

I was a child of many emotions. Sensitive, thinking, opinionated, deeply feeling.

But I quickly learned that some emotions were not acceptable, maybe even a sin, and I was not allowed to express them.

I learned that if I was angry, it was “godly” to forgive and forget that anger and definitely don’t express it. “Be angry but do not sin” meant “be angry but never tell anyone or show it”. There were times I wanted to scream because of the pent-up feelings of anger at my parents, anger at my sister, and anger at myself for being angry with them. I must be the terrible person they said I was because I couldn’t stop being angry and sad all the time. I begged God to make me nice and happy and sweet. “Why can’t you be sweet like your sister?” was something I heard often. I often escaped with a book into my favorite tree, away from everyone I could possibly sin against, away from the constant criticism of my actions and “bad attitudes” and the reminders that I was rebellious against God and my parents.

When I was an early teen, things only got worse. Thanks to a cult leader called Bill Gothard and his seminars and his followers, my family finally found answers to all our problems and embraced the promises to have the perfect godly life if we followed the Basic Principles. I was 14 and I thought, yes! This is the answer! The rule list that will finally make me a good person whom my family will love, who will be worthy of their love and acceptance. I poured my heart and soul into the materials, spending hours praying to God to forgive me for all the ground I gave to Satan. For not accepting my parents as the hammer and chisel that were molding me into the diamond I was meant to be. My resistance of their umbrella of authority must be the reason I’m a bad, selfish person. I was determined to finally fix my broken soul. I befriended many “godly girls” who were homeschoolers and whose families understood and followed the secrets of a godly life, hoping their goodness would rub off on me. Eventually, those girls popped into arguments between me and my mom….”why can’t you be more like them? They would never treat their parents and sister the way you do.” I wanted nothing more than to be “more like them” and tried even harder.

I had many teary confessions to my parents for being rebellious. They piled on the modesty books and the courtship books and all the books that told me I was a naturally bad person and needed my parents as my authority because I couldn’t trust my heart to know what was best for me. I ate them up, thinking i would find the answer to all my problems. When my sister would lie about me, get me into trouble, pick fights with me until I snapped at her, I would take a breath, search my own heart for any evil thoughts, and beg her to forgive me for being selfish. She always did, of course. It was very magnanimous of her as a good, generous person to forgive my selfish actions.

There were some dark times in there. For a while I was convinced that since I was such a terrible person and my family hated me so much, that maybe God hated me too and what was the point of me living? I began to fantasize about ways I could kill myself and relieve my family of the burden of me. I never went through with anything.

I was afraid of death, that God really did hate me and would send me to hell and I couldn’t die until I turned into a better person.

Part Two >