The topic of historical abuse keeps popping up lately. Today I want to explain why I keep talking about my story. Some people might think, well this all started way back in 1981, shouldn’t she be past it all by now? There tends to be this misconception that just because I continue to speak about it means that I’m not trying to heal or move on with my life. Nothing could be further from the truth. I have worked and continue to work very hard on my own healing while recognizing that I will always have C-PTSD. It is not my desire to have to keep fighting this fight, nevertheless I press forward because I cannot turn my back on all of the children who are still in church. My conscience will not allow me to stop fighting until the church has been brought to justice. I’m not saying that all survivors should follow my path. We each have to do what is best for ourselves.
I know that my abuser has at least one other victim.
“Most perpetrators will continue to abuse children if they are not reported and stopped. Nearly 70% of child sex offenders have between 1 and 9 victims; at least 20% have 10 to 40 victims. An average serial child molester may have as many as 400 victims in his lifetime”
These statistics are what keep me awake at night. We know that abusers rarely stop at one child, I know my abuser had at least 2 victims. We also know that they do not stop unless they are brought to justice. My abuser still has access to children through the church he leads and the community that he has become very involved with. I am left to wonder how many more victims he has picked up over the years? These abusers are life ruiners. Once you become caught in their web you will likely spend your entire lifetime dealing with the damage they have caused. These acts are not something that you just move on from. It takes so much time and money to heal from these abuses, time and money that could be spent on so many other wonderful things. Every day I live with the fact that my abuser is still out there. People will say well he can’t hurt you now, and I understand that, but I am also aware that he can still hurt others. I think he should be on the sexual offenders list and be monitored by the authorities. At the very least I continue to speak so that others know to steer clear of him and the United Pentecostal Church. If I can save even one child from the pain I’ve endured it will have been worth it.
When abusers and those who cover for them are not brought to justice the cycle continues. Not only are the abusers able to continue their sick practices but those who cover for them are most likely going to be willing to cover for others like them. As long as these people remain in power the cycle continues and the victims pile up. In my case my pastor, John Grant Sr., was the district superintendent for the state of Wisconsin. I am sure he counseled others beneath him on how to handle cases like mine. He also had multiple cases within his own congregation that he swept under the rug. Because he has never been held responsible for his behavior the Madison church developed a policy of covering up crimes against children. His son is now in charge and has his own problems with being inappropriate with minors. How driven do you believe Roy Grant to be with regards to reporting abuse? So far it appears he is not shown himself to be willing to take responsibility for what he has done or how the congregation has a history of covering up crimes against children. He has shown himself to be unwilling to make any kind of amends towards survivors and so the cycle continues. Because it was not dealt with way back in 1981 we are still dealing with it in 2022. I know of so many survivors who once sat under Pastor John Grant and I’m sure there are so many more who are too afraid or just weary to come forward. Are you starting to see the cost? When crimes go without being brought to justice the cycle moves on and on. When institutions allow a culture of covering up abuse and then nepotism allows churches to pass from father to son children will continue to be at risk. Why do you think Calvary Gospel has so many survivors? I feel it is because abusers clearly saw that those in leadership were not moved to stand for children and because of that they felt safe to carry out their crimes. Men might have to stand before the church and confess but no one was going to call the cops. Also the men knew that the young girls would most likely be standing right there beside them because the church rarely sees these things as crimes against children but chooses to see them as adultery. Children were and are sacrificed on the altar of the church’s public image. Men who abuse minors are not weeded out and when they invite their friends to church often their friends are just like them. Over time the number of men willing to abuse minors grows while none of them are ever really removed from the congregation. This is how churches become rotten. Anyone who has ever had a garden knows you have to weed. I have to ask myself do the men in power cover up the crimes of congregants because they are afraid that maybe the finger will be pointed at them? Are they in hiding because of their own misdeeds?
We rarely ever speak about the women and their role. I can tell you from my own experience that the women within my home church were the meanest of them all. When I needed support or maybe someone to report on my abuser these women had nothing for me but accusing eyes and gossip. I think because women within the church are treated as second class citizens they try to garner status in any way they can. It might come in the form of who has the longest hair or the best clothing, whose husband has the highest position, or it might come in the form of looking your nose down on a little girl that you see as beneath you. Either way the women within the UPC are not free from responsibility. They support the church and keep the secrets just like the men do.
All of this creates a legacy of abuse and my story is just one small part of it. As long as the cycle continues I feel I have to keep telling my story and speaking about the systemic nature of it all. What we refuse to acknowledge and deal with will continue to fester and spread. What can you do? Well, you can uplift the stories of survivors. You can speak out regarding abuse you have witnessed and you can call out the leadership of your church. You can report abuse when you suspect it and you can speak the truth when others are too afraid to. For my part I’m going to continue to shed light where I can and I’m going to continue to seek my own healing.
When I was a little girl one of my favorite passages of the Bible was 1 Corinthians 13. In a Bible that often seemed confusing and unclear to my young mind this verse rang out with its clarity. When I think about how the UPC is handling the abuse cases coming into the light I have to wonder if they have read these verses lately.
“1 Though I speak with the tongues of men and of angels, and have not charity, I am become as sounding brass, or a tinkling cymbal
2 And though I have the gift of prophecy, and understand all mysteries, and all knowledge; and though I have all faith, so that I could remove mountains, and have not charity, I am nothing.
3 And though I bestow all my goods to feed the poor, and though I give my body to be burned, and have not charity, it profiteth me nothing.
4 Charity suffereth long, and is kind; charity envieth not; charity vaunteth not itself, is not puffed up,
5 Doth not behave itself unseemly, seeketh not her own, is not easily provoked, thinketh no evil;
6 Rejoiceth not in iniquity, but rejoiceth in the truth;
7 Beareth all things, believeth all things, hopeth all things, endureth all things.
8 Charity never faileth: but whether there be prophecies, they shall fail; whether there be tongues, they shall cease; whether there be knowledge, it shall vanish away.
9 For we know in part, and we prophesy in part.
10 But when that which is perfect is come, then that which is in part shall be done away.
11 When I was a child, I spake as a child, I understood as a child, I thought as a child: but when I became a man, I put away childish things.
12 For now we see through a glass, darkly; but then face to face: now I know in part; but then shall I know even as also I am known.
13 And now abideth faith, hope, charity, these three; but the greatest of these is charity.”
I know that I have stated this before but whenever I read David Bernards responses regarding the church and the sick acts that are being perpetrated within its congregations I get so angry. It always comes across to me as deflection, blame shifting, victim blaming, and nowhere in his words do I see love in any form. Yes, it is true that in many cases they (the UPC) are not required to report crimes to the police, but when has the letter of the law ever been their concern? I was under the impression that they believed the Bible in its most literal form and it is believed to be inerrant. The Bible is said to be the focus of their lives and not man’s law. If the Bible is truly their focus then doing the right thing should matter more that protecting their organization and certainly more important that protecting ministers who have committed crimes against children.
“Take heed that ye despise not one of these little ones; for I say unto you, That in heaven their angels do always behold the face of my Father which is in heaven.” Matthew 18:10
I do not believe for one minute that the powers that be within the UPC believe that these abused children have tempted these grown men into sin. I feel they understand that children are not the ones with the power within the situation and I also believe that they do not care. They only care about protecting their money and organization. Reputation is what matters and that makes them look like Pharisees. Wanting to be seen as holy but with rotten hearts.
“And whosoever shall offend one of these little ones that believe in me, it is better for him that a millstone were hanged about his neck, and he were cast into the sea.” Mark 9:42
When I read David Bernards words I see a worried man with the walls closing in around him and the organization he leads. If I could give him one piece of advice it would be this, you can change all of this right now, there is still time. I would suggest starting by apologizing to all the victims the UPC have ignored. You would be surprised at how healing that message could be. Then I would make a commitment to clean house of all of the ministers who have perpetrated crimes and those who support them. Don’t count crimes by who has been arrested but who you know have done terrible things to the little ones. Put into place a zero tolerance policy regarding child abuse and start implementing it immediately. Reach out to the wounded and offer love and real help.
“And the King shall answer and say unto them, Verily I say unto you, Inasmuch as ye have done it unto one of the least of these my brethren, ye have done it unto me.” Matthew 25:40
Rather than speak about who has a license and who does not I would suggest reaching out to the victims and their families and seek to find ways to help them heal. Embrace them rather than casting them out. When choosing a side to stand on be found on the side of the wounded child instead of seeming to want to protect the men who have decided to walk with the devil.
“Not every one that saith unto me, Lord, Lord, shall enter into the kingdom of heaven; but he that doeth the will of my Father which is in heaven.
Many will say to me in that day, Lord, Lord, have we not prophesied in thy name? and in thy name have cast out devils? and in thy name done many wonderful works?
And then will I profess unto them, I never knew you: depart from me, ye that work iniquity.” Matthew 7: 21-23
Now I can already hear all of you UPC folks saying to yourselves, why should we listen to her? She is an unbeliever. This may be so but remember that you raised me and I consumed this scripture day and night and I know it as well as you do.
The UPC is very concerned about holiness and especially about the holiness of women. It seems odd to me that they care so little about the lack of holiness in some of their men. There is a toxic plague running through their churches but what matters to them is what the young woman was wearing and if she flirted with a grown man that should know better. Dovey Ensey, a pastors wife, was quoted as saying, “All I’ll say is, it takes two to tango.” When I read this the first thing that came to mind were the things the church said about me. It was like a punch in the gut and it drove home how much the church has not changed since I was a child. They claim they have evolved and they claim to teach their ministers how to respond properly to situations involving abuse but from where I stand its seems like the same old playbook.
If you are a victim/survivor of the UPC church I want you to know that I am here for you. Feel free to reach out at any time and I will be happy to chat with you.
Over time I became attached to SD as other parts of my world fell apart. My parents were divorced, my mother was constantly struggling to keep us fed and to keep the lights on, and being in the Christian school did not turn out to be the way I thought it would be. I became a master at disassociation and I felt trapped in a life that I did not want and did not know how to escape. None of my fears about God, the devil, and hell went away during this period. I only felt more distant from grace and I feared that my sin had crossed the line into being unforgivable. Was I the reason we did not have electricity? Was my sin keeping my mother sick? I just knew I was some kind of horrible Jezabel and maybe I hadn’t fallen far from the tree. My father was a dirty cheater after all. My mother told me all about his dog-like inability to control his impulses. I was like my father in lots of ways, maybe I was a dog too.
Eventually, I blew the whistle. I do not know how I gained the courage to tell someone but I did. I worked for the church’s popcorn wagon. We had a little food truck that sold popcorn, soda, and fruit downtown near the state capital. The minister who baptized me ran this little operation and I would work up there a couple of days a week. It was unpaid and a part of the church’s fundraising efforts. My partner was a young woman named Shannon. She was about 19 years old and she lived with a young couple a few blocks from my house. We became friends and I trusted her. One day when we were done for the day and sitting on the curb waiting for Brother O’Neil to take us home I blurted it out. To her credit, she did not react in a surprised or horrified way. She asked me questions in an interested way which made it easier for me to tell her. It felt good to tell someone. I had been carrying around this secret for nearly two years. At this point, I had no idea what was coming.
Shannon was one of the only adults who did not fail me in this situation. She may have only been 19 but she acted much more mature than the other adults. When she went home for the evening she discussed what I told her with Sister Cox. To her credit, Sister Cox who was a friend to me tried to do the right thing. She told Shannon to tell me that if I did not tell pastor Grant what was happening she would. At the time this sounded like a threat but now I actually believe she was trying to help me. Within the UPC this is what you do. No matter what the issue is, you take it to the pastor. No one went to the police or even talked to a mental health professional and the last thing you would do is call social services. This is the part of the story where I’m in awe of the strength that I had. After all, I was only 12 or 13. The next day I set up an appointment with pastor Grant. This took guts! I was afraid of him and I avoided the church secretary like the plague. She had always made it clear she was judging me and everyone else and I firmly believed she did not approve of me or my parents. Once John Grant came in for the day he called me to his office. There I was in the lion’s den! We were never this close and I was never alone with him. He asked why I wanted to see him and I started to explain. He stopped me and got out a small (for that time) tape recorder and started taping our conversation. The distance between us seemed enormous. John Grant is known for his ridiculous oversized desks. If you talk to any survivor of Calvary Gospel Church they will tell you about his gigantic desks. I felt like Lily Tomlin’s character Edith Ann, everything in the room was huge and I felt small in my chair. He asked me questions, very generic questions, and I answered very generically. He knew what happened but he did not ask and I did not give details. He knew enough to know SD had been molesting me for almost two years and that he had tried to have intercourse with me. Our conversation ended with John Grant telling me he would get back to me but he never did. I then left his office and took the long lonely walk back to my desk. I bore this burden alone. No one checked in on me or asked if I wanted to speak to a therapist. No one offered to pray with me or even offered a hug. It was almost like it never happened. The only proof that it ever happened came in whispers and innuendo.
At this point I did not have much trust in adults. It took a lot of courage for me to tell anyone what happened to me. What crushes me as I write this is how strong I had to be to reach out to an adult and how thoroughly they all judged me and offered no help. The lesson I learned from this is to keep my sadness and pain to myself because no one would care or help if I shared. I received the message that I was not worthy of help. If my world was lonely and dark before now it had darker and more ominous clouds.
The most painful fall out came from my mother who called me a little hussy and was mad at me for a long time. I’m actually not sure how she found out. I know it was not pastor Grant because she told me, “I had to find out through the grapevine!” My guess is that Shannon told her. They had developed a friendship. All I know is she picked me up from school one day furious. She did not see me as a victim; she saw me as a whore, probably because she did not see me as a child. If I was a child I would need more from her and she had too many other things to worry about. Around this time she read my diary and saw the things that I wrote about SD. She mocked me and called me names. I never wrote in a diary again until I was in my own apartment. I was not surprised by her reaction. Around this time she had also referred to me as, I won’t use the word but you’ll understand, lover because a young boy my age who rode the Sunday school bus with me had started calling the house. This made absolutely no sense to me. She was disowned by her own parents for a time because she married a Mexican so one would think she would be more understanding. She did not seem to have problems with black people except if it seemed like interracial dating might be going on. To look back on this makes me so sad. This sweet boy never tried anything with me and our interactions over the next couple of years involved him following me around like a lost puppy. We were children, after all, not even teens yet. One day a friend and I met him and his friend at the mall. He won me a little red furry heart out of the crane machine and the four of us ate pizza. To this day that memory warms my heart as one of the few happy memories of childhood associated with the church. My mother thought his friendship was a sin and I had to hide it from her, and she thought my sexual assault was at least partly my fault, and this is why I never went to her for help.
During this time I felt completely estranged from my mother. As I grew older she became more cruel and crass when interacting with me. She would even mock me and make fun of me in embarrassing ways in front of other adults from the church. As time went on she became more and more like Jim and less and less like the mother I thought I knew. I spent almost all of my time in my room alone. She and Jim were wrapped up in their lives with each other and my father wasn’t around much. I had an old tape player/recorder, the kind you would see in schools in the ’80s. It made a kachunk sound when you closed the cover. I would listen to Amy Grant and others for hours in my room. I had to use batteries when we had no electricity and so sometimes the music would be very slow due to the batteries running low. I read a lot and thought a lot about SD and what he was doing and if he was ok. I took long bike rides alone. I moved through the world feeling a great sense of loneliness and sadness or just being numb and dissociated.
Shannon and Jeanette (sister Cox) never treated me badly but they never offered help or went to the police. I think the assumption was that pastor Grant would deal with things. Everyone who knew about this John Grant, his wife Darlene, Jeanette, Shannon, and my mother just went on with life. My mother gave me the side-eye a lot but she never asked if I was ok or offered her support. Everyone else just went on with things but I could tell the undercurrent had changed. People were less friendly and seemed kind of standoffish at times. There was a change in the wind, things were colder now and I could feel their eyes on me. Writing this reminds me of a scene from the film Age of Innocence when Newland Archer figures out that everyone knows about his affair with Madame Olenska. “He guessed himself to have been, for months, the centre of countless silently observing eyes and patiently listening ears…” As a child, I was never really sure who knew. I knew that the pastor’s son knew because he brought it up to me in front of my peers at school. I knew that most of the younger adults knew because DD was friends with them and a husband doesn’t just disappear and no one notices. He would not be playing trumpet at the front of the church and his wife would be sitting alone. I’m sure that John Grant would have called a meeting of the elders to discuss what had happened and at that time there were around 12 couples serving as elders. As an adult almost everyone I have spoken to who is a survivor of that congregation knew something about it, most of it gossip that they were unsure about.
Many times when young girls are abused they become promiscuous. After SD stopped abusing me I did not interact with a boy physically for about a year. It wasn’t anything big, just normal puppy love stuff. Over the years I started to become more physically involved with the boys I dated and when I was 16 I had sex for the first time. I think I was chasing the feeling of friendship and closeness I had with SD but all of these encounters only left me more hurt and disappointed. Chasing my father and my abuser would be my pattern with men even going into my adult life. Both SD and my father were often unavailable and would disappear for a period of time and then come roaring back into my life. This led me into so many relationships with unavailable males. I always felt abandoned and my self-worth sank lower and lower with each relationship. Most of my relationships involved controlling and angry men. Men who would cheat on me and sex was always something to check out of. I just went away somewhere else in my head. Probably because I was having sex with men who were distant and who were not really connected with me emotionally. I wonder if all of this could have been avoided if I had received counseling about both SD and my father. I did not have any female role models to really show me how to value myself. Every woman I knew seemed to have to grovel for male attention. I grew up under the teaching that a woman should be submissive and I internalized that to mean a man can do whatever he wants and you just have to love him until he straightens out.
I learned the hard way that things can always get worse.. Soon after I spoke with pastor Grant I received a very unexpected phone call from SD. He spoke in a clipped way, “I have to leave town, it is not your fault.” That was it. I said nothing but held the phone for a long time after he hung up. I wasn’t super surprised that he was leaving town, I figured his wife was probably pretty upset with him. I think I was surprised by how little he gave me in the end. No apology, no remorse, and no comfort. I loved him much in the same way that I loved my mom and dad. My family had its faults but my parents always told me they loved me. Within the church telling people you loved them was common. “I just love you so much!” Bleh. I had once told SD that I loved him and his response was to say, “I know.” It was cold and at that moment it stung. I was alone again. As bad as the abuse had been, it gave me something to look forward to. An escape from my home and the constant arguing and poverty. Don’t misunderstand me, the abuse was scary and wrong but it wasn’t the whole time we were together. Remember he fed me and talked with me, or groomed me, and that part felt good.
Soon after the phone call was our midweek service. I went and I was worried and again alone. I had no idea who knew and what people would say to me. Why my mother would allow me to go back there without an adult is beyond me. I faced it like I faced all things in my childhood, like a brave soldier. Being assaulted for two years, being heartbroken, and traumatized was no reason to miss church. No one said anything except for SD’s wife. She was waiting for me. She looked stiff and angry. She pulled me aside as soon as I walked into view and she growled in my ear, “We need to talk right after church.” I was really freaked out and how I made it through that service is beyond me. It felt like the shortest service ever.
After the service was over she found me and led me down into the basement of the church. She was in her early twenties and I was 12 or 13. She led me into one of the Sunday school rooms and turned on the light. She clearly did not see me as a victim, she saw me as an adulteress. She told me she had always believed she could trust me with her husband and that she was very hurt that I would betray her this way. She insisted that we pray for my forgiveness. Other than a quiet, “I’m sorry” I was silent during this whole encounter only being able to eek out a mumbled prayer through my tears. She, on the other hand, started to pray loudly and spoke in tongues in a way that scared me. She was having an experience but mine was completely different. She laid her hand on my shoulder and pushed me back and forth much like the women did on the night I got baptized. When her frenzied prayer ended we both silently went upstairs. She never spoke to me much after that. I had lost a friend but I really couldn’t blame her. Now when I look back on this I see her in a different light. I feel for her but what she did to me was wrong. I was a child. I know I keep repeating this but I have to for no other reason than to remind myself.
DD has three sisters, One older and two younger. Her older sister attended church now and then but I never got the impression she was a true believer. Her younger sisters still lived at home with DD’s parents a couple of hours away when I first met them. One day I was driven out there by SD and DD. SD was already abusing me at this point and so the whole situation was pretty uncomfortable. I’m pretty sure DDs parents lived on a farm and they seemed to be pretty poor. Both SD and DD thought her sisters and I might become friends and we did. Both of her younger sisters would write me letters and we became pen pals. In those days it was all colored scented pens and stickers. I would always get excited when they came to visit or when SD would take me and other girls out for a fun day. Eventually, AD, the youngest sister, came to live with SD and DD. I don’t know the reasons why but at the time I was very excited. My friend was coming here to stay and she was planning to attend the same school. AD was always shy and quiet but friendly. Once she arrived in Madison she seemed to change. She became cold and standoffish. I was heartbroken and I could not understand, had I imagined that we were friends? To make matters worse she started hanging out with the kids who were kind of mean to me. I’m sure some of it was the age difference. She was 3 years older than me. When I would speak to SD about how sad I was about AD and I’s friendship seeming to vanish he would just smirk and act as if it was just girls being girls. He seemed to enjoy the tension between AD and I. He never tried to mediate but would actually throw us together and then laugh at our discomfort.
This is where things take a turn for the weird and unexpected. OK yes I know that sounds funny, my whole childhood was weird and unexpected, despite that this next event shocked me. I have debated how to tell this part of the story or if I should tell it at all. I have decided to tell these events as I understand them. Some of this was told directly to me and some of it was pieced together from scraps of information I have discovered doing research. On the night of or close to it that DD pulled me down into the basement, that first night I was back at church after SD left town, I found out why SD was gone and also why AD seemed to be nowhere in sight. I was standing in the vestibule and someone whispered in my ear that SD was caught in bed with A. I cannot remember who passed this info onto me. This shook me to my core and I had this feeling that SD was not driven from the church because of me but because of AD. You’re never supposed to bring the police or social services to the church’s door. Those in authority seek to protect the church and its image at all costs. I believe they thought I was under control, but AD had parents outside the church, who knows what they might do. They might call the cops, they might bring a scandal, plus DD’s older sister had not drunk the kool-aid so she could be trouble too. This is all my opinion but it makes sense to me. I have not been able to speak to anyone who has the whole story. I have only heard bits and pieces from people who heard something or maybe spoke to DD. My 12/13-year-old self had so many feelings about this. Part of me felt abandoned. If he was going to flee, why did he leave me here with my depressed mother and impoverished life. Part of me was shocked that he was molesting my friend and I was angry thinking that he might have been the reason I lost her as a friend. I was confused, all this time he made me think that it was all about me and my impossible to resist sinful body when in fact he was obviously struggling with other impossible to resist sinful bodies. I wondered how long it had been going on, and if there were more of us. I wondered If AD knew about me. All I knew for sure is that SD and AD got out and I was left to bear the shame and stain of everything that happened. I got up the nerve to ask one of SD’s friends where he had gone. He told me that SD fled to Vegas. He was still in contact with some of the men in the church. He was seeking restoration, now I wonder if he was seeking a quickie divorce. I don’t know where AD went but I was told eventually she was allowed to go be with SD. They are married to this day. They got married after she turned 18. The church allowed SD and DD to divorce because SD committed adultery. Adultery was the only reason you could get divorced within the United Pentecostal Church. Let that sink in, adultery not pedophilia. She was 15 and I was 12 or 13 when this all blew up. Together the two of them, SD and AD pastor a church in Oconto Wisconsin. Yes, you read that right, dear readers, SD is a pastor.
I’m not going to say much more about AD. In my eyes, she is a victim whether he married her or not. Her story is not my story to tell. I only hope she is ok. SD is not ordained through the UPC organization but he still socializes with them. It is very complex. For a while, he was pastoring a daughter work of a UPC church but now he is independent. My guess is that they would not ordain him because of his divorce and remarriage. What I do know for sure is that he has been welcomed back into fellowship with UPC ministers and members. That is very uncommon. UPC people do not associate with people outside of their organization, they are very insular, but SD is an exception. He has had UPC ministers at his church to preach which is against the rules of the UPC, but again somehow he gets by with it. On social media, he is friends with people who attend Calvary Gospel and who attended when he was molesting me. These people know what he did but they say he is forgiven and so that makes it all ok. No one talks about what he did to me in terms of child molesting, they call it adultery and so does he. To this day I have received no justice. No one from Calvary Gospel has apologized to me for not reporting the incident and for not offering me any help. When confronted they claim that they did report and have always reported but the police have no records of them ever reporting anything. I am not the only victim who had crimes against them covered up by Calvary Gospel, I’m just one of the oldest. I see myself as a test balloon. They covered up SDs crime and no harm came to the church. After my situation came many other young girls, and boys too. They were not victims of SD but of other men. SD was not an exception; he was part of a systemic problem that has infected the UPC organization. When the choice is to protect the church or the young life of a victim Calvary Gospel will always choose the church.
My day to day life at home did not change much, my mother eventually got over it. My life at church and school changed a lot. The adults around me started to give me a knowing side-eye and I knew they were talking about me. Adults withdrew from me and I could feel the silent judgment. No one offered me help or compassion. These adults who saw me day in and day out never asked why I was so thin or so sad. I tried to make friends with the church kids and I was able to establish some friendships. Most of my friendships with peers were with other kids on the margins. Race played a big role in this. They were on the margins due to being children of color and also due to being poor. I had friends whose parents were considered more “in” but my friendship with them could only get so close. Their parents always looked at me as if I was dangerous and I wasn’t invited over for dinner or sleepovers. I never felt the same after what happened between SD and I. So many things caused me to have to grow up so fast and the abuse SD inflicted on me only sped this process up even more. It was like he threw gasoline on a raging fire. I was never the same. Now I fully understood how my mother felt at church. Silently judging eyes and smiles that seemed so forced and fake. I could be in the same room with these people but somehow there was an invisible wall between us. When I look back on it now I think that maybe they thought the sin that had come into my life through SD might be contagious. The UPC church teaches God’s forgiveness but in practice, Calvary Gospel never really forgave me for being a victim. From what I have observed they tend to have an easy time forgiving men but women are another story. Once your reputation has been ruined in some way you cannot ever be truly restored. At 12 my reputation was obliviated and no amount of hard work on God’s behalf or asking for forgiveness would ever remove the stain left by SD’s abuse. I spent my teen years striving for transcendence. To this day I would say that transcendence is a goal of mine. I set my sights on being and feeling worthy both in God’s eyes and the church’s but I never got there. It wasn’t until I was well into adulthood that I realized that only I could grant myself worthiness. My parents bear some of the blame for my feelings of worthlessness and it would be unfair to say otherwise that being said when SD decided to abuse me he set in motion a terrible storm. His acts against me caused me to seek relationships with males as an escape from the pain of my life. Those relationships always had a price and always left me alone to mend my broken heart. His actions made me feel like a Jezabel like I could never get clean or be good enough to rise above what happened between us. His actions left me alone to bear the stain of what he had done to me and his wife. He moved on to another city and I was the living reminder of what had happened. His actions caused the church to view me as damaged goods. Within these sorts of churches once you have been used by a man or even choose to be sexual and they see your purity as damaged you become something less than worthless, you become a temptress and something to be feared.
Violence was not uncommon in our home. It wasn’t just the big altercations between my parents but all of the little everyday things that happened. The worst spanking I ever received was when my father spotted me standing close to a man outside. He was standing near the fence that divided our yard from the grassy field above. He was watching a softball game. I was outside and when I saw him I went to say hello. What my parents did not know is I had been talking to this man for a long time. He lived down the hall from us. One day I spotted his open apartment door when I was exiting out the back door of our complex. He had just moved in and so I stopped by to say hello. Yes, my parents had taught me not to talk to strangers but I was desperately lonely. He chatted with me and was always friendly. I know I was actually in his apartment at least once. I have no idea what this man was actually like. I do not have much memory of him but I remember his apartment and I remember his figure standing by the fence watching the game. My father spotted me outside with this man he did not know and he came out to fetch me. Once in our apartment, his anger boiled over and he started to interrogate me about the neighbor. He yelled about talking to strangers and I remember crying very hard. I don’t remember what I said to him but I know that I attempted to explain and that only made him angrier. I was in elementary school at this point, maybe 7 or 8 years old. My mother seemed unconcerned until he reached for the dog collar to spank me. He was not wearing a belt and the dog collar was the closest thing within reach. I lurched to get away and my mother yelled at him. The collar had metal notches in it and a metal clasp and she thought it was too dangerous to spank me with it. He did not listen to her and started swinging at me hitting whatever he could, mostly my legs. It was expected that I would sit still when being spanked, if I moved they would hit whatever was where my butt was supposed to be including my hands. In this case, I tried to get away because I could sense the fear in my mother’s anger. He grabbed my arm and let me have it. After he was done my mother and father argued about what he had done and I cried alone in my room away from their fighting. I believe the big concern to be whether or not someone might notice and call social services. Eventually, they tried to make peace with me by giving me a flour tortilla. As weird as this might sound, they often tried to comfort me by handing me a tortilla or banana. They explained why talking to strangers was dangerous and life went on. As angry as my mother was with my father she was often the more violent of the two of them. She spanked me but she also pinched me and twisted my ear when she wanted my attention. She would pull my hair when she was really angry and that hurt the most. It amazes me that they would believe that a child left alone for 10-12 hours a day would have the self-control to not talk to strangers given how lonely I would naturally be. My mother cried over her loneliness all the time and my father sought out other women to keep him from being lonely. I feel like they did not see me as a real person. They seemed unaware that I was a human and not a doll. I had needs and emotions. I felt all the same things they did. To this day I wonder if they did not understand or did they just push away that understanding because had they acknowledged it they would have had to change how they were interacting with me.
When you are a kid there is so much to worry about. I worried about losing my keys and being locked out of our apartment. I worried about people breaking into the house and strangers. It was the 70’s and stranger danger was a big deal. Then there was the alarm clock! I was always concerned with being late for school or oversleeping. So I developed little rituals around checking the clock and checking the locks on the doors. I looked over my shoulder when walking down the street alone and always checked the back seat of the car when I got in. The keys around my neck were like a security blanket. At various times during the school day I would feel for them just in case they might have fallen off of me at some point. I learned all of this from my mother. She was never diagnosed with OCD but she definitely displayed some of the behaviors. She drove me nuts checking the knobs on the stove and having to go back and check to be sure the door was really locked. She planted this worry into me. No amount of checking and rechecking life was enough for her. She was always preparing for doom. I would stare off into space as I waited for her to check and recheck. I was trying desperately to be somewhere else.
When I left for school in the morning my dog Muffy was the only one there to see me off. She was also the only one there waiting for me when I returned. She would be watching at the window when I left for school and waiting for me there when I came home. Every day I would run home after school and feel for the key around my neck. Sliding it in the lock I would fight to turn the stiff deadbolt. Immediately a walking cloud would come bounding towards me. Her fluffy white tail curled over her back and I would bury my face in her neck. The apartment was always silent. After putting my things down and taking off my coat anxiety would wash over me. With Muffy by my side, I would wander through each room checking for who might be hiding and waiting for me to come home. I checked every closet, under the beds, and behind the shower curtain. There was never anyone physically there, just me and fear. Dread would wash over me and I would remind myself that you can’t see the devil.
The devil or Satan as he was sometimes called was a part of my daily life. He was as present as any person I could see with my eyes. God felt like light years away but Satan felt as close as the breath in my lungs. All of the adults in my family seemed to be very concerned about him. I knew one thing, he was tricky. I was taught that he and God had some kind of falling out and now he was the enemy of God. Because God created me the devil wanted to steal me away and take me to hell with him. Some day the devil was going to burn for all eternity and if I chose him over God I would burn too. In Sunday school we learned a lot about how the devil might try to trick us. He might tell me lies and I had to question every thought, action, and emotion, to see if they were of God or of Satan. This was tough because the devil was so manipulative and how would I know if I was right? The adults in my life made it sound like Satan was always lurking around every corner, under every bed, and in every closet just waiting for a chance to deceive me or worse yet drag me to hell. Later in life, I would learn about the AntiChrist and in many ways, he was even scarier than Satan. He would be in human form and as the church and my family would often say, “He might be alive right now!” There was much speculation about who he might be. The Pope was always a popular candidate but some people said that Ronald Reagan might be as well after all his name added up to 666 just like the Bible said to look out for. As an adult, I look back on those teachings with disgust. I have raised four children and thankfully none of them have had to deal with fear the way I did, I am 50 years old and it has taken me decades to let go of that fear. I cannot remember any time in my childhood or up through my 40’s when I have not been afraid. My childhood was soaked in teachings about an angry God and so much of what I endured during childhood is wrapped up in those teachings. Fringe religiosity and mental illness do not go well together and my family had equal amounts of both. I am descended from a long line of very religious people. My mother’s roots pass through both the Assemblies of God and the Church of God organizations. Eventually, she ended up attending a United Pentecostal Church. It was this church, Calvary Gospel United Pentecostal, that had the biggest impact on my life. The combination of the end-times theology of the 1970s and on through the ’80s and untreated severe mental illness created a childhood full of uncertainty, worries about abandonment, and child neglect. I did not come through this childhood unscathed but I have managed to survive and I keep leaning into the hope that I can continue to get closer to being whole and healthy. Most people who know me see me as a driven and fairly successful person. I have a devoted partner and I’ve raised 4 children. I am politically active, and I participate in volunteer initiatives within my community. Some might tell you that I am creative, a lover of furry creatures big and small, a collector of books, and driven by a desire for transformation. If they know me well they might tell you that I never sleep, have to be reminded to eat, and that at times my anxiety is crippling, and sometimes depression follows me around like a fog threatening to swallow me whole. If they know me even better they might tell you that when I do sleep I tend to be plagued by nightmares complete with guillotines and often involving me running from some sort of One World Government authority figure. Writing this book is one way I am trying to heal myself. As you continue on this journey with me, I will tell you about the other ways I am working on healing and helping others to heal. None of this is easy but it feels necessary.
I have often wondered why so many people seem to turn a blind eye when they see something that doesn’t seem right regarding a child. Maybe they did not see anything but they heard a rumor and maybe they thought it was none of their business. As a child abuse survivor, I’m here to tell you that when you make the choice to turn a blind eye you’re abandoning that child. You might feel that it isn’t your concern or that the child’s parents should be the ones deciding what to do. If you only take one thing away from reading my blog I’d like you to take away that you may be the only thing standing between that child and a lifetime of trauma.
In isolated churches where the outside world is not welcome, children have no one to turn to but those inside of their little community. If the community is more interested in protecting its reputation than protecting the life of the child than that child really has no chance. Not only will they deal with the trauma of whatever abuse happens to them but they may deal with the trauma of not being believed or of feeling unworthy of protection. It may take a lot of courage to speak up and you may have to endure criticism but in the end, is it ever wrong to try to protect or save a child?
If any of the adults around me had stopped to think about how odd it was that a 30ish-year-old man was spending so much time with me they might have asked some questions. The heat of that attention may have scared Steve off from abusing me, he may have felt he was being watched. Had one of the women who knew about this come to me just to check in and see if everything was ok maybe that would have given me a chance to open up, or again it may have scared Steve off. I told him pretty much everything about what was going on in my life. The time he was spending with me was so out there in the open for anyone who was paying attention to see. If you were one of the people who went out after church and shared a meal then you knew he was driving me around. If you were part of his group of friends you knew he was taking me on road trips with him. These adults could have saved me from some of my trauma.
When Steve Dahl was abusing me our church averaged around 250-300 depending on the Sunday. Steve played his trumpet in every service. He and his wife sat in the second row. He was popular and well liked. A man like that doesn’t just disappear from a church and nobody notices he is gone. A woman doesn’t have her husband suddenly leave and no one know what is going on. Her sister was suddenly gone too, so there is another person gone. Pastor Grant would have said something to the elders. The women of the church would have had some idea what was going on with Debbie, Steve’s wife, it would have been out there amongst the congregation. That is a lot of adults choosing to turn a blind eye. Choosing to say nothing. As a child, I could feel everyone stepping back from me like I had some disease they might catch. I knew they knew. I felt judged and unworthy of love. No one reached out to me in love, no one checked in on me, this added to my trauma. I am sure they assumed that pastor Grant would take care of it but maybe they should have checked to be sure. If love and compassion were present then I feel that backing away from me wouldn’t have happened. How do you back away from a wounded child? If they really thought I was a seductive child or whatever they are trying to say now, why didn’t that drive them to ask questions? Even if they had chosen to reach out to me at this point they could have saved me some trauma. If love and therapy had been applied here things could have turned out very differently for me.
In all of the intervening years running right up to the present if any of the adults who heard rumors or flat out knew about what happened had come to me and checked in they could have reduced my trauma.
C-PTSD encompasses trauma coming from many different sources over a long period of time. Food insecurity and poverty featured heavily during my childhood. This was no secret. I can remember one day when my mother took me for a school uniform fitting and another woman who was there commented on how I was so thin I looked like I could just blow away in the wind. On another occasion, I worked very hard to be on the honor roll at school and the reward was to go on a field trip out of town to a museum. I was sooo excited! There was only one problem, my shoes developed a sudden hole in the bottom and I was too embarrassed to go. We had no money for another pair of shoes so my mother called Roy and asked if he could help. He asked another student if she could loan me a pair of shoes for the day. I was mortified. I wore the shoes and the young woman who loaned them to me made sure everyone knew what had happened. Then I gave them back. Well, that solved the issue for that one day, but what would have really helped was if someone had offered to buy me some shoes. Maybe Roy who worked in the school and was my youth leader, or maybe this girl’s parents who were elders at the time. Instead they turned a blind eye. There were adults who knew we did not have electricity from time to time. One person, Ida Cox helped my mother. I remember it was such a big deal and made my life so much easier for a time. The other times we had no electricity no one helped. I know people dropped me off to that sad dark house after church. There were never any lights on. I would open the door and this dark heavy oppression would hit me like a wall of despair. Sometimes my mother would be sitting on the porch outside to greet me and other times the house would be silent. I would feel the way to the stairs leading up to my bedroom and then feel for the oil lamp to give me some light. Didn’t these adults wonder why they never saw a light come on? On one occasion a young adult man dropped me off after a service and I invited him in. My mom and stepdad were not there for some reason. I had nothing to offer him but Koolaid and at one point he asked me about the cooler on the floor. I explained to him that we have no power and that is where we kept our food. I even opened it up briefly to show him the contents. He smiled tightly and soon was out the door. I felt embarrassed and immediately wished I had not invited him in. Another blind eye.
I grew up feeling like everyone could see my pain and no one would help me. I grew up feeling unworthy, sometimes hungry, sometimes lonely, always unloved. This is the garden my trauma grew out of. The harvest of my childhood is an adulthood full of unraveling. First you have to figure out what is wrong with you. You can sense early on in adulthood that you are not like most people. Then you start the long journey of trying to heal. You try dozens of things until you land on some that help. Most help a little but there is no magic pill. Mine is a life of lost potential. I was too busy struggling to survive to do what most people do in their young adulthood. I had no one to help me figure out how to go to college. I had no desire to live with either of my parents and so I moved out at age 17 and got my own apartment. I worked hard to survive but there was no time to nurture myself or think about how to fix what was broken. When you think about turning a blind eye think of me and maybe reconsider. Would one adult be able to solve all of my childhood issues? Probably not, but if I could have entered adulthood with one less layer to my trauma it would have made a huge difference to me.
I believe that churches give too much power to pastors. They often feel that the pastor knows about things and is taking care of them. In legalistic churches, they often blame the victim and stand in judgement instead of applying love and compassion. They may gain salvation but they lose their humanity. The people at Calvary Gospel certainly seem to have lost their heart. How can they side with the abuser over and over again? They pray for the abuser and the victim becomes the problem. This may be why some people feel it is better to turn a blind eye. If they side with the wounded it will not be long before they are also wounded. It is selfish self-preservation. If you are in a group that causes you to silent that inner voice that tells you something is off then I advise you to run! Don’t let an organization like Calvary Gospel take away your humanity and care for children, the poor, elderly, and suffering. Don’t turn a blind eye, say something, reach out and offer your help. If you do this you can hold onto your heart and maybe help someone else to heal theirs.
Age 11
As I look at the photos above all I can think is that she deserved better from all of the adults in her life.
Today I’m sharing a new story with you. Another victim of Calvary Gospel Church has decided to tell her story. I have always intended this blog to be a place where victims other than myself can also share their experiences. This is Rebecca’s story.
It’s my turn now. I’ve left Debbie high and dry while I’ve done a lot of processing, now it is time to tell my story. I struggle with where to start, as my story starts in the UPC when I was very young. How do I choose what to say in my first post? So please bear with me as I give the highlights and the can of worms will follow.
My parents joined Calvary Gospel United Pentecostal Church when I was in the 3rd grade. Soon after my sister and I were enrolled in the church’s school. My childhood was completely enveloped by the UPC. Parents were expected to take a backseat roll in favor of teaching whatever the church dictated. My parents questioned nothing, and allowed everything, as long as it was within the church’s walls. Needless to say, we were easy targets for anyone wanting to take advantage of vulnerable kids. If we questioned anything or any of the leaders, we were disciplined and labeled rebellious. Calvary Gospel is a tight-knit community, where any independent thought is quashed and shunning is commonplace, it can be frightening to show any independence. I witnessed parents who disowned children and teenagers forced to make public apologies in front of the congregation. It was built into all of us if the “man of god” said it, it was unquestionably true. I could say more about this but I need to move on.
So I was unlucky enough to catch the eye of one of my Sunday School teachers, who also helped out as a youth leader. Everyone knew he favored me and teased me about him constantly. I was called his “little girlfriend”. He would give me rides, leave notes in my school desk, show up at my house or my friend’s houses if he knew I was there, he came to every youth function, every service, everywhere I was.
In the eyes of Calvary Gospel Church, my predator was a great young man, a burgeoning minister. He was also 17 years older than me. I’m going to refer to him as “Ben”. I was 12 the first time he sexually assaulted me. He never even noticed or acknowledged that I never responded when he’d kiss me. I clearly wasn’t enjoying what he was doing and I resisted when he’d make me touch him. He would take my hand and force it onto his pants. This went on for years until we had full intercourse when I was 14. He was 31. I took my first pregnancy test at his job after hours when I was 15. I went on birth control shortly after.
During this time I wrote letters to a friend of mine telling some of what was happening. She told her sister and her older sister went to the pastor. One night after the evening service Ben found me and was very angry. He pushed me up against a car and told me I had to lie. He threatened me, telling me it would be my fault if he got into trouble, that he wouldn’t be able to able to become a minister. I was terrified of being caught, being humiliated, kicked out of the school, and shunned. So I lied. I told Pastor John Grant Sr. that I made it all up. Strangely, Pastor Grant accused the girl who brought him the letters of making them up herself to get attention, and he kicked her out of the choir. I felt completely responsible. It silenced me even more. Sadly this made me that much easier to manipulate, control, and abuse.
I can’t wrap my head around how all of the church adults knew we were a “couple”. How was it appropriate and acceptable for a 33-year-old man to be dating a 16-year-old girl? And of course, the sex continued. He would show up wherever I was. At my school, my job, at my friend’s houses, and my driver’s ed class. He once picked me up and took me to the duplex he shared with a few other guys. He was on top of me in his bed when he heard one of his roommates come home. He shoved me into his closet and shut the door hiding me so his roommate wouldn’t see. I don’t know how long I was in there. Maybe minutes, maybe an hour. It was long enough that he grabbed some old fast food cups and gave me one so he could tell my mom that he took me there to eat instead of where he had really taken me. All I know is, I felt so demeaned, so ashamed, so lost. I felt hopeless. He controlled my every move. I couldn’t date anyone else, I couldn’t go anywhere, I couldn’t do anything, without him. After every sexual contact, he would make me get down on my knees and read Psalm 51 out loud and repent. Thinking of it makes me sick to this day. I hated it. I never liked praying out loud. I never saw the point in wanting others to listen to me. My prayers were between me and god. But I did it, read the Psalm and begged for forgiveness. “Ben” would assure me that he forgave me too.
Now I see the absurdity of it, forgive me for what?! Being a temptation when I was 12?! But in the Calvary Gospel culture, it was my fault. Men were never held accountable for their actions. I saw younger girls that were also preyed on by older men and watched how the men would be sheltered and protected while their victims the young girls would pay the price. It was reinforced again and again that the adults around me knew and would do nothing. Once when I told Pastor Grant what had happened, when I actually built up the courage, he told me not to “rock the boat” because it would “make the church look bad”. I knew I was being eaten alive by this system. I was hopeless, but like any good UPC’er, I made it look good.
I should wrap this up for now. It’s like a plate of spaghetti, one thought/memory leads to another and another…It’s difficult to stay on one path when I have so many stories and details to add. But I want to add my voice to Debbie’s, and many others, that were and probably still are being victimized by the UPC. After all of these years, I’m not the scared and depressed little girl anymore. It’s my time. I will be heard.
I have been away from this blog for a little bit. Truth be told I think I needed to take a break from thinking about it all for a while. I have been working hard on political activism all spring and summer, pouring all of my energy into making the world a better place. I really try to keep politics out of this blog because I do not want to alienate any survivors who might find help here. That being said I am also devoted to honesty and telling my story from that place and current events definitely have affected that.
Art Heals
All of my social media is awash in Kavanaugh coverage. Because of the volunteer work that I do within my community, I am on social media a lot. I connect with others online about actions, events, and the news. When I’m away from it for even one day I feel like when I return I have all of these fires to put out and folks to support. This summer has required me to give all the emotional support I can both to those I love and to myself. I count myself lucky to have such an amazing partner who makes sure that I eat, sleep, and smile as much as possible. It helps to know that he is beside me every step of the way. He also keeps tabs on my abuser which is very comforting to me. Knowing that Steve Dahl loves Madison and visits often has made my home feel unsafe.
My Sweetheart
As I have observed everything going on with Kavanaugh I hear echoes of things that have been said to me regarding my abuse. It weighs heavy on my chest like a large boulder that I cannot lift off. Some days rage threatens every moment and every breath I take, other days I have to try desperately to keep the tears from flowing because I know that if they start I will not be able to turn them off. Then there are the days when I sit and stare into space, those days are the worst. I feel immobilized, frozen, like prey trying not to be detected by a world that feels unsafe to me.
I have heard people say they do not understand why Dr. Ford did not report when everything happened to her all of those years ago. I cannot say that reporting would have helped. Often when someone is caught not much happens to them and the accuser pays a very heavy price if she is even believed at all. What I hear those in power saying is, we believe this happened to her but we do not care. That was my experience. No one ever said they did not believe me, they just did not care. They still do not care. What they care about is protecting their male ally. They care about male authority and the sacredness of their organization. They don’t care about me and they never did.
Age 11
I hear some floating the idea that maybe she is just mistaken. It was really some other guy who just looks like Kavanaugh. I’m here to say that is unlikely. I remember my trauma very well, in fact, I remember it better than almost anything in my life. That is how trauma works. I remember what I was wearing, what he was wearing, where we were, what it smelled like, and what music was playing in the background. I might not be able to tell you the date but I know what season it was and what grade I was in. C-PTSD will ensure that you never ever forget.
The survivor knows that when she comes forward she is about to stand trial. There is always a price to be paid when you are a truth teller. Dr. Ford has paid and will continue to pay a heavy price for coming forward with her truth, for trying to do the right thing. When I started writing this blog last winter I braced myself for the backlash and it came like a storm into my life. I was accused of trying to ruin a good man’s life. They said he has led a clean good life since taking my childhood away. Apparently, the crimes committed against me mean nothing because he has been a good guy ever since. Remember these men rarely offend only once. Some questioned whether I even attended the church at the age I claimed all of this happened. All they need to do to figure that out is to look at their Sunday School, School, and Baptism records. The worst part is who came at me. Men mostly, many who have never met me, and some who knew me throughout childhood. Some of them wanting to protect the church and worst many who wanted to protect their friend. They have tried to shift the blame to me and my parents. They are happy for anyone to bear the blame as long it isn’t pastor Grant or Steve Dahl. They have been full of advice for me about how I should forgive for my own sake, take it to Jesus, and get on with my life.
Friends and supporters
Friends and supporters
The silver lining to this storm is women so many women and a few men. By telling my story I have opened the door and now I have so many allies. I have been telling my story since it happened but when I brought it completely out into the sunlight women came from all over to give me love, support, and even better they stood beside me and confronted my abuser. I hope that Dr. Ford sees all of the women protesting, holding vigils, sending her postcards, and sending her love and support. I believe her and I’m hoping my silver lining can be hers as well.
*If you are triggered by rapture anxiety tread carefully with this post*
I have complex PTSD. My condition comes from many different sources and for multiple reasons. One of the biggest causes is rapture theology. I know that I have written about this topic often so today I want to come at it from a different angle. If you spend any time on the internet you have probably heard about triggers. I have many of them and some days they can really make life complicated.
I have spent much of my adult life trying to undo the damage done to me by the church. I know in my conscious mind that I no longer believe what I was taught but because it was taught to me at such a young age it did permanent damage. Over time things have become better but my triggers never go away completely. I have been putting this off because I know how crazy it sounds but I am also very committed to being honest here and so here it goes…
On most days these things don’t bother me that much but it only takes letting one in to start a cascade of anxiety. A bad day can come out of nowhere and before I know it it has taken over everything. I had a day like this recently and it all started on Twitter. I got up in the morning and I started to mindlessly scroll through Twitter. Another survivor retweeted a tweet featuring a photo of a guillotine. That person was talking about how that photo triggered her and seeing her post triggered me. I immediately felt a sense of dread and my pulse quickened. I started to breathe fast and shallow and I had to self-talk myself out of an unexpected panicked state. Once that door is opened it can be very hard to force it closed again. I start to move through my day trying to keep “I wish we’d all been ready” from playing on a loop in my brain. That first trigger opened the door for the second (that damn song) and that leads to the next, the dreaded white van. So a little later in my day I head out to walk my dog. I have my headphones on and I’m listening to a podcast in part to keep the rapture thoughts at bay. I turn a corner and there is a white van parked on the side of the road, my pulse speeds up again as I rush past it and try to push out the memories of the Unite van from A Thief In The Night. No, men are not coming to get me in order to force the mark of the beast on me, but my lizard brain doesn’t understand that. I talk to myself about how it is just a movie and how we don’t believe in that anymore but the dread lingers all day. My brain keeps shoving things in my face the guillotine, the song, the van. Over and over. Weird looking clouds and loud horns can add to my anxiety when I am in this state. Is that god returning in those creepy clouds, is that horn signaling the start of some apocalyptic hell scape? Later I decide to take a hot bath and pamper myself a little bit, while in the bath my eyes fall upon the shampoo bottle with the UPC code facing out towards me here again is another trigger. I try to resist my impulse to turn all of the bottles away from me so I can’t see the bar code. I don’t want to give into the anxiety soon I just turn them because I want to enjoy my bath, the song returns and my bath is ruined. Before long it is bedtime and I’m laying there trying to sleep. I’m on edge because the anxiety will not let me rest. I look out into the darkness and try to will my mind to be quiet. My inner child will not rest. She knows the danger out there, Unite might be coming for me at any moment. What if you are wrong lingers on the edges of my mind. I sometimes get up and go get a drink in the bathroom. As I walk into the room I see his electric razor sitting on the counter and I’m triggered again.
I know how this sounds, which is part of the reason it has taken me so long to write. It. Things are much better now than they were when I was younger. I don’t respond to these triggers in the same way every day. They have to catch me in the right moment, maybe I’m tired that day or feeling emotional. Maybe I’m already thinking about the church or rapture for some other reason. Sounds and visual cues affect me worse than words but occasionally words can do it especially certain Bible quotes. “No man knows the day nor the hour…” “Two men will be in the field, one will be taken…”, 666. This is why I don’t participate in conversations online about the rapture because people will bring up these verses and always the Thief in the Night films, and then it is all over for me. When it gets really bad my brain just starts flashing images at me to force me to pay attention. When I was a kid this sweet woman from the church came to give my mother a Bible study. The Search for Truth Bible Study. This Bible study was very popular within our congregation and they wanted all new converts to go through it. It was a huge flip book that stood on the table by itself with large full-page black and white drawings. One of these drawings has stuck with my mind my whole life it featured the white throne judgment and after all of these years (I was 8 when I first saw it) I can still bring it up into my mind easily.
Start at page 54 and go through to the end and you will see what I mean. The night I had my salvation experience my pastor preached a fire and brimstone sermon that scared the crap out of my 10-year-old self. I fully believed that if I left that service unsaved I would burn forever. From my childhood church experience I have almost no memories of anyone talking about god’s love, it seems like it was mostly turn or burn on repeat. I heard it at home, at church, and at school. It was inescapable.
I wrote this to give you all an idea of what it is like to deal with C-PTSD. When the church exposes young minds to ideas, images, and thoughts they are not ready for or able to fully understand they are committing child abuse. My young mind was damaged in a way that I cannot fully fix. I cannot predict when all of these thoughts will rush at me. Rapture theology is not the only thing contributing to my condition but it is a HUGE part of it and the most unpredictable.
There are many things to be afraid of from my childhood but the thing that has scared me the most is rapture culture. It still haunts me at 47 years old. I have complex PTSD due to this teaching. I have had to work with a therapist who specializes in spiritual abuse in order to stop having flashbacks and nightmares. None of that is gone completely, it is the monster under my bed and just behind every door, always threatening my peace of mind. If I let it in even a little bit I will spend a week fighting it back into its cage. It is real and more dangerous than any man who ever put his hands on me.
My mother was tormented by fears about the rapture. She could never be perfect enough so she spent long hours on her knees praying and that meant she was not really looking after me. As a small child, I would sit outside her door and worry about if she was ok. She would cry and speak in tongues for hours, I would listen and try to play with my toys…alone. I know that much of my adult anxiety comes from the rapture culture I was raised in. I was always worried about what unconfessed sin I might be missing that would cause me to miss the rapture. I could never rest easy and I could never just be a kid. Add to that those grown men trying to creep on me from the 6th grade on, my life was always about trying to be purer. I thought something I was doing was causing them to lust after me, and that might make me be left behind.
In 1972 a film came out called Thief In The Night. It spawned a series of 4 films and my church would show them once a year. I was two in 1972 and one of my earliest memories is of my dad taking me out of a showing of that film at the Assemblies of God church we were attending. There is not a time I can remember when I did not have nightmares about those films. I could not sleep alone as a kid because I was afraid of being left behind. My mother finally forced me to sleep alone in the 5th grade and I think that is when my insomnia really kicked in. I have had horrible insomnia for most of my life. Tired is the rule, not the exception. I don’t believe in the Christian god or the rapture any longer but my poor lizard brain still does. That is what is so awful about this teaching. When you start teaching it to very young children it becomes part of them and they are stuck with it for life. My therapist explained to me that the brain cannot always tell the difference between something it sees that is a movie and something actually happening, especially when you see it at such a young age. This is why my brain thinks it witnessed a beheading. I am traumatized like a soldier who actually witnessed someone being executed because my child mind could not logic out the difference. This is an interesting thing to research if you are into brain science like I am. I have been trying to hack this out of my brain for many many years.
When I was in early elementary school I fell asleep under a plastic sled. I had been using it to create a fort in my living room. When my mother came home from work she could not find me. My little body was completely hidden under the sled. She screamed and ran to our neighbor’s house sure that I had been taken and she had been left. Suddenly all of these adults come crashing into our living room screaming my name, it was not a nice way to wake up. She was relieved and I was freaked out, it really drove home that she and her friends really believed this stuff.
Since starting this blog I have spoken to many people who suffer the same fears that I do, we all attended the same church. The aftermath of this teaching is anxiety, fear, nightmares, and depression. I wish someone could explain to me why my parents and church leaders thought it was ok to show small children these films. They are violent and if they had been rated they would have not been appropriate for kids. They showed people being beheaded via guillotine and they featured a child awaiting execution. They showed babies starving due to parents not accepting the mark of the beast. Oh and the people running from the One World Government. I spent so many sleepless nights due to dreaming of being chased by men in white vans and armbands. To this day white vans, helicopters, barcodes, and guillotines can still trigger me. It is an awful price to pay if you are an adult raised in this culture. I can be just out enjoying my day and suddenly I’m triggered and I will often have a panic attack. All this because I see a white van parked on the side of the road. My logical brain could care less but my hindbrain really thinks it is a threat. I will have heart palpitations and I will experience fight or flight sensations. I just have to power through it so it doesn’t take over the day.
So once a year my church would show these films 4 nights in a row. They said it was to save the lost, but really it was to keep the congregants in line. After the film, the altar would be filled with congregants and maybe a stray “lost” person. You may be saying to yourself, yeah but they are just movies. The thing is when you are shown them in early childhood, and then the pastor reinforces the teaching all year-long until you watch them again, that all feels pretty real. Every adult in your life tells you it is real. In your world it is real. Our pastor would make a speech before every film saying that we don’t actually support everything in these films. What he meant was that they were softer than his teaching. The films showed people being saved after the rapture and he did not teach that. If you missed the rapture your only hope was to be killed for not taking the mark. Add to that constant talk of demons and devils trying to deceive you and oppress you, and you can start to see where all of the anxiety comes from.
This is child abuse. I have to wonder what I would have accomplished in my life had I not been fighting to keep my sanity. Not turning in predators is child abuse. Who would I be if I had not been preyed upon by those men? I’m happily married now, but I have been through two divorces because I have an awful track record with men. One of my exes was emotionally and physically abusive and the other one ran off with a much younger woman. By the way, the second one grew up in the same church as I did. I have to wonder if that has anything to do with his upbringing and what he saw happening all around him. He basically told me I was too old. My relationship with my parents suffered due to what they exposed me to and the resentment I felt about that. All of the people from my childhood I basically avoid like the plague, which has left me alone to struggle through the wreckage of my childhood. I’m going to end this post with gratitude. I have found others and I think they understand my struggle, I feel validated and their compassion has warmed my heart. I have 4 amazing kids who I love more than anything. They will never know the sorrow of being raised like I was. Lastly, I have a husband who has stood beside me as I reveal this story and I know he understands. I’m grateful for having survived.
Debbie McNulty 