Flippant Thoughts on Forgiveness / Pain, Part 4

I recently applied for a writing joh. When they asked for a writing sample, I realized all my writing exists at an intensity level of roughly +487,000,000.

Here at the blog, it's all pain and suffering, all the time.

So, instead of titling this "Pain, Part 4," I'm calling it "Flippant Thoughts on Forgiveness." Let's dive headfirst into the shallow end, shall we?

Moo... Photo by bertknot

Forgiveness is hard, particularly when you can barely identify the source of the pain, particularly when you can't even bring yourself to write the words, "I'm hurt" or much, much worse, "I'm still hurt."

That's not how it's supposed to work, is it? I'm not supposed to still be hurt. Forgive and forget. Deal with it and move on. Positive mantra about moving confidently into the future. Hoorah.

This is the pain that never ends, it just goes on and on my friend...

I've found, unfortunately, that ignoring unresolved pain is a lot like ignoring all that C-4 you have buried in the backyard (analogy credit to labullets). It will explode in your face. You will wonder what happened. And then you'll be like, "Oh yeah, remember that time I buried all that C-4 in the backyard? Guess it wasn't as stable as I thought."

My buried pain usually turns into anger.

But why? Why am I so angry?

I'm standing outside the dorms on the second floor landing, watching his light blue pickup pull away from the office, and suddenly, I'm filled with uncontrollable rage. I kick at everything in sight, including a bright orange safety cone. Writing this, I still wonder if it is my fault. If I am a bomb waiting to explode.

I've written before about a traumatic experience that left with me with the kind of pain that doesn't get better. About how I blamed myself for hurting the person who had hurt me.

I actually apologized to him years later for using him as an emotional punching bag. At the time, it felt good to realize and acknowledge what I had done, to have a ready-made slot that I could comfortably slide the experience into, neat and snug.

I can see now how I reframed the experience, making him the victim, myself the perpetrator. I had blamed him unfairly for causing my pain. I projected my pain onto him. I hated him instead of hating my dad. I was angry at him without justification. I refused to forgive him—worse, I didn't want to.

I could label it, "That time I took all my worst inclinations out on an innocent person because I'm broken" and move on.

Telling the Truth

Except, that wasn't exactly the truth. But it made me feel better. I didn't have to alter any of my pre-existing ideas, particularly the one where there was something deeply and indelibly wrong with me.

I mean, what was the alternative? I needed someone or something to blame, and the only person available was me. Because the alternative was too dark to consider:

That what he had done to me was wrong.

That what he had done to me was wrong, though well-intentioned.

That what he had done to me was akin to spiritual, emotional "rape." 

That what he had done to me perpetuated for years the very shame that he sought to heal. 

And in the aftermath, I was left alone, emotionally shattered and unable to breathe.

This is what makes me feel a little sick to my stomach, now that years have passed. It's one thing to drag out someone's deepest shame by force—it's another to blame them for feeling wounded and angry after the fact.

You Need Witnesses

There's that famous passage in Matthew 18 about confronting someone who has sinned. About going back, again and again, trying to reason with the person, trying to get them to see your point of view.

This passage is often used to shame Christians who don't follow this exact procedure in every and any conflict with another believer, such as Christians who complain about Mark Driscoll on the internet, as if the correct thing to do were to show up on his doorstep tomorrow with a Bible and a stack of good intentions. 

But considering it now, I wonder about the part where you bring a friend or two with you as witness.

Because what if the other person refuses to see your point of view or denies that anything happened? ("No! I did not steal your oxen. These are my oxen. I've owned them for years, years I tell you!").

If this happens, you need other people who will stand with you in your truth, who will bear witness to your grievance: 

Yes, you were abused.

Yes, what happened was wrong. 

Yes, that is Buttercup and she is your cow.

Yes, I believe you. 

Yes, you are not imagining things. You are not crazy. 

You can't forgive someone for something that never happened—

I can't forgive him or anyone else if I don't acknowledge and accept the truth of what happened. And I need someone else to bear witness to that truth, someone else who can drown out the accusing voices that tell me that I'm crazy, I'm imagining things, I'm too sensitive, I'm making it all up to get attention, a unicorn gored me and I'm filing a formal complaint.

I've become convinced that forgiveness cannot happen without truth. Healing cannot happen without truth. You don't need the person who hurt you to say, "I was wrong. Please forgive me" but you do need someone in your life to say, "Yeah, I totally get it."

This happened for me last year. And in that moment, I could finally breathe.

When Churches Abuse

I've been reading survivor stories from people who were abused by Mars Hill Church (pastored by Mark Driscoll--possibly my favorite person ever).

It's brutal stuff.

One of the more OT (Old Testament) methods Mars Hill used was "shunning," which is exactly what it sounds like. A person or an entire family would be formally ostracized from the church with all their remaining friends (or, if you like, brothers and sisters in Christ) instructed to go no contact--all in the name of biblical discipline and restoration.

I read one account by Jonna Petry, whose husband was abruptly fired from leadership in 2007. She describes how the church turned on her and her family, and the devastating spiritual, emotional and relational consequences.

It might not be physical, but it's still violence, and all in the name of God. Petry writes:

Spiritual abuse occurs when someone uses their power within a framework of spiritual belief or practice to satisfy their own needs at the expense of others. It is a breach of sacred trust. Christians are commanded by Jesus to love one another. When that is projected, articulated, enjoyed and then treacherously betrayed, the wounded person is left with “a sense of having been raped, emotionally and spiritually” – not by a stranger, but by someone who was deeply trusted. (See Recovering from Church Abuse by Len Hjalmarson)

One of the biggest selling points of today's evangelical Christian church is "family"--belonging and love and connection and acceptance, as in "You belong here."

I've talked to friends about the almost mythical nature of "community" in Christian churches. There's this idea that real community can only happen in the context of church-that a church is the only place that you as a Christian will ever belong.

Your sewing group? Heathens. Your coworkers? They want your promotion. Your college friends? They've moved on. Your biological family? They may or may not be there for you when you need them.

When these expectations for community aren't met--or when you never really feel like you belong in the first place--the emotional pain can be devastating. After all, churches often hold this out as an enticement: One church I attended had as part of its mission statement, "To give every orphan a family."

Furthermore, when Christian community is the only genuine community, it can take over your entire life. Often, members are encouraged to become more and more invested in their church, particularly by serving or by taking on a leadership role. The underlying assumption is that this is both a means to and a sign of spiritual growth.

Church Bubble

The people you worship with Sunday are the people you community group with Tuesday are the same people you party with Friday. If you are single, often you expect to date and marry within your church. Don't get me started on how depressing that can be.

Christians are encouraged to make non-Christian friends, but only from the standpoint of evangelism--convincing them to join the family (wow, that sounds creepy).

When you spend all your time with the same people, you tend to get attached.

Petry reflects on her own culpability in the abuse, in a narrative that I've heard many times from other Christians, and from myself:

I have come to understand that I was wrong in the way I entrusted my heart to people, looking to them for approval and affirmation, finding my identity in my relationships and in my ministry instead of completely and solely entrusting my heart to the Living God and finding my identity and security in Jesus Christ alone, who loves me and died for me and calls me His own. For we are all capable of great sin. And, no doubt, the wrong way I entrusted my heart to others coincided with the depth of my pain at their betrayal and rejection.

In sum, "I didn't love or trust God enough. If I had, I would have avoided some of this pain." I disagree. To me, it seems perfectly human to entrust your heart to other people--especially people that you have laughed with, cried with, served with, suffered with all in the name of Christian community. Emotional and relational attachment is less a conscious choice than a gradual, organic process that happens when people spend a lot of time together.

Hyper-vigilance about loving God more than I love my friend, my  boyfriend, my spouse, my children, does not solve the problem of human attachment or somehow make betrayal hurt less.

We were meant to love and trust other people. It's one of those things that makes us so incredibly vulnerable.

How many times have I emerged from a relationship feeling broken and empty, only to conclude that my mistake (or sin, as Petry characterizes it) was growing attached to a person instead of to God.

I can't tell myself this story anymore. It doesn't hold up.

I will say that based on Petry's story, I would advocate for diversifying your social portfolio--don't invest all of yourself in any one social group, whether it's a church or a motorcycle gang. Diversify. Make friends with people who don't share your religious or political or sports affiliation.

If you are embedded in a single group, when and if abuse does happen, it can be even more overwhelmingly devastating. Not all churches are abusive, but any church can let you down.

What's striking about Petry's account is how doggedly her family sought healing and reconciliation with the church that destroyed them. Some of it was just shock and disbelief--that those who had "loved" so much could now be so cruel. It reminds me of a woman who returns again and again to an abusive relationship before finally leaving for good.

You never know who will be there for you when everything falls apart--it could be someone you only have a tangential connection with, a friend of friend, an atheist, a Republican, a Lakers fan, a devout Christian, someone who watches Bachelor in Paradise for fun. We just can't predict these things.

Inspiration:
Jonna Petry's account
My friend labullets for calling my ideas "blog-worthy"

More about church:
Why is church cliquey?
Why is church cliquey? Part 2
Why is church cliquey? Part 3
Why is church cliquey? Part 4