Reviewing the Exile Part 4: Church War PTSD

This is Part 4 in my intentional review of my spiritual position on the 5-year anniversary of my expulsion from church.  (Read Parts 1, 2, and 3 by scrolling down at the bottom.)

I'm hurt.  And I may never be normal again.  The personal and relentless verbal attacks that were launched upon me at the time of my expulsion from the church have left me with latent psychological and emotional issues, a sort of church-fight Post Traumatic Stress Disorder.  These issues are not manifested all the time, only at random and unexpected moments.  More than one social worker has tagged this phenomenon as Post Traumatic Church Syndrome (PTCS), and professional counsellors recognize it as a very real and not uncommon condition.

  After our violent exile from church, the first time that Kaye and I approached the front doors of a neighboring church that we were obliged to attend (because of a family event), we were both suddenly afflicted with upset stomachs and a sense of dread.  Several of our fellow exiles have reported similar symptoms that are brought on by any encounter with the former church setting. These symptoms do not evidence themselves exclusively in association with thoughts or memories of the people who viciously expelled us, they carry over into every aspect of our subconscious beings that may or may not be related to the former church life in any way.  Here are a few that I've seen:

• Anger toward the people who hurt us - and disgust for everything they represent.
• Anxiety issues related to proximity with all things church.  We may get nervous near religious people and institutions.  Church potlucks can even seem threatening now.
• Fear of recurrence.  Avoidance of former church friends.  We spot them in the store and quickly dart to a different department to avoid them and the unpleasantries that might come with a chance conversation with them.
• Antipathy toward worship music.  Listening to Smile FM is repugnant and results in a quick twist of the tuning knob to any other genre of music - even Country!
• Aversion to the Bible.  Some former pastor friends of ours have barely picked it up since their expulsion.  It is associated with the pain they have experienced.
• Resentment toward the entire church world.  Just driving past any church can bring up feelings of angst.  A former pastor friend's daughter gives a wave every time she passes the church that ousted her dad; it's a wave that features the middle finger.
• Reversals of political position.  If the church is for it, I am now against it.
• Avoidance of confrontation.  We take extreme measures to not place ourselves in situations where any kind of reprimand may take place.  At work, at family reunions, in public locations, even on Facebook, we avoid any setting that might result in condemnation.
• Disgust for dogma.  We have been known to de-friend Facebook friends who post radical political or religious rhetoric.
• Contempt for religious cliches, slogans and pat answers.  That stuff just seems sappy now.  Denominational orthodoxies seem hollow and superfluous.

  And finally...

• Disdain for God.  Many victims of church abuse throw the baby out with the bathwater and walk away from God.  Many of the atheists and agnostics that we know personally, were once church members and were deeply injured in some way by their closest friends, and all in the name of some dogmatic religious point of view.

  

  In the past, I did not understand or empathize with people who left the church after being hurt in some conflict.  I remember saying that they should just get over it, that they should make every effort to reconcile with their adversaries, that the church was more important than the feelings of any of its individual constituents.  But I was wrong.

  I have changed my mind.  And, though I have forgiven and gotten past the anger with the folks who abused me, I have discovered that the underlying psychological feelings are not so easily fixed.  Time and space are great healers and my hurts are not an overbearing force anymore, but I will probably have recurring symptoms for the rest of my life.  And I do not blame any of my fellow exiles who demonstrate similar symptoms.

 They can't help it, any more than a traumatized soldier can easily get over the effects of the trauma that he has experienced on the battlefield.

  Nor will they readily return to that dangerous environment.

  The church will never again be a place of pleasant worship or sanctuary for me and my wife and our friends and thousands like us.  Understand this.  And if you are still in that environment, try not to be the next dogmatic bully that calls forth the next fight that results in another battlefield strewn with church fight casualties.

  Put a higher value on the individual than the man-made institution.  Put your relationships ahead of your religious orthodoxies.  Or you may be the one responsible for the next mass exodus and accompanying spiritual and psychological casualties.

And now the good side...

  Those who know me often hear me say, "There's good and bad in everything," and the same is true here, so now I'm going to come back to what's good about church fights and the resulting emotional upheaval. 

  My expulsion from the institution has caused me to examine what's real about my faith.  I have jettisoned the harmful traditions that I grew up with, and I have rejected the oppressive doctrines that give rise to the dogma which encourages the abusive behavior.  (In the church, behavior is often dictated by belief, so a belief in bad doctrine results in bad behavior.)

  The very essence of an exodus is that it leads to freedom.  Though I had to struggle through hell and high water to get here, I would not trade my liberty for anything.  The emotional wounds are reminders of a former life to which I will never return, and I am really happy about that.

  I may have battle scars, but I am free!  So, as my dad used to say, "It's shoutin' time!"