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How Christianity Cosigns Abuse
If it’s excuses we’re after for failing to evolve as individuals, the Bible is the perfect book for that.
I was born and raised into the religion of Christianity; taught at a young age to fear and defend a God I didn’t quite understand. As my youth pastor put it, a fair and just God, but one whose jealousy and rage roared from the eve of Exodus to Revelations’ rapture. You didn’t ask questions; faith guided our footsteps, not sight. The Word was God, and God was the Word; what more did we need to know? Occasionally I’d get a little too curious, start asking why a loving, forgiving God would slaughter babies and burn entire towns. “Lean not on your own understanding,” my mother would remind me, “and in all your ways, submit to Him.” But my submission was not without suspicion, and that suspicion grew as I grew in the Word.
I struggled to make peace with a pathology that condemned many of the same behaviors that it encouraged. Accountability was an afterthought; it was tough to be Christ-like with your flesh in the way. There was always a theological defense for evil deeds, a justification for mental and emotional injury, no matter who or how it damaged. This not only made Christianity the perfect cover for abuse, but it also made many Christians unapologetic and apathetic abusers of themselves and others. It was almost as if the Bible was a blueprint on how to abuse…
