In my last blog entry, I talked about my experience with reframing or challenging faulty premises in my life. Today I am going to share the specifics of how I work through this process. I will use a specific example from my life that was very difficult but also empowering for me.
My mother/abuser was a “religious nut.” She started taking my sister and me to church when I was eight years old, and we bounced from church to church every few years because she was asked to leave so many times.
My mother has very strange views about religion, and she raised my sister and me to believe that she had this special connection with a higher power that we did not. If we only had more faith, we would have this special connection, but we didn’t try hard enough.
I bought into this premise hook, line, and sinker. I truly believed that my mother had this strong connection with a higher power while I was not “good enough.” This premise shaped my views on religion well into my late thirties (when I was in therapy for healing from child abuse). I held onto this belief despite all of the memories I recovered of being sexually abused by this allegedly religious person.
I spent one Easter pushing my baby in his stroller on a two-mile walk. Since we did not go to church, I thought I would meditate on scripture as we walked. During this process, I faced my frustration with not wanting to connect with a higher power who viewed my mother as religiously “right” and me as religiously “wrong.”
The thought hit me like a ton of bricks – What if my mother isn’t actually a Christian? This is probably a “duh” question for all of you reading this since you know my mother was my first abuser. However, this was a groundbreaking thought to me that felt like heresy even to ask!
When I chose to challenge the premise, I experienced amazing clarity. If my mother wasn’t actually a Christian, then her abuse, whacky versions of faith, etc. made complete sense. I no longer had to wrestle with trying to make sense out of the contradiction of my mother being a Christian and being an abuser. My premise was faulty, so when I challenged my premise, my life suddenly made much more sense.
More tomorrow…
Photo credit: Lynda Bernhardt
Faith, I totally “get” what you are saying. My mother was my primary abuser, and also very religious. I have tried for years to make sense of this incongruency. I believed she was always “right” and I was always “wrong” and was I really being abused because she was an “upstanding” christian. It wasn’t until I questioned whether she really was a christian, that I could go beyond this seeming paradox. My thought process went something like this: “Mother is a christian; she has a relationship with God, and God is right and good. He gave me to her, as her child, and mother is always right, because God is always right, so therefore, if I don’t go along with what mother does and says, then I must be wrong, because God is ‘on her side’.” I am still working through some of this. Strange as it sounds, it was very frightening to approach the idea that she may not be a christian after all. I look forward to your blog tomorrow.
Deb,
I without effort live that the gift is I get to be with my children. I was not given to my parents nor were my children given to me.
yes, very important distinction. I was not given TO my m/a but rather but rather THROUGH her. no credits go to her, all courtesy to life.
I find it helpful to be accurate with the term belief.
Say you believe a certain book or collection of writing is the word or a god or gods. There is no conflict with me. If you state that a book or collection of writings is the word of god there is not conflict with me there is however a conflict with you and I. Good news for me is I will always win the conflict as I know you do not know and only believe.
I am early in the process of working through recovery, and central to her control over me, is that it was drummed into me that I was HERS. She’s 86 today, and still treats me that way. Because of where I am with this, I limit my contact with her, but I still have to see her from time to time, because of care issues. Your replies are food for thought for me. Thank you.
I don’t think I ever thought of my mother as a Christian; she had too much disdain for everyone – including the people in our church – for me to believe that. But she dragged me to church when I was young (although she pretty much gave up once my younger brothers came along). I’ve posted about this before, but I have this image of the devil sitting there in the pews amongst all the well-meaning parishioners – none of them able to see her scales, horns and pointed tail. All of them thinking she was such a wonderful mother. Certainly makes me distrustful of any faith groups.
I’m amazed to read, Faith, that your mother was asked to leave several churches. Sounds like they didn’t think your mother was a Christian either… I just can’t picture any church doing that – at least not the church I grew up in. That must have been another major disconnect (and trauma?) for you and your sister. I’d appreciate if you could post about how much you were aware of at the time, and how it affected you and your sister.
Hi, birdfeeder.
Yes, it is unusual for a congregant to be asked to leave a church. She went to more and more radical churches as a result (the big charismatic movement in the 1970′s-80′s). She would get ultra-involved in a church at first. Then, she would claim she was a prophet who had been told that the pastor was going against G-d’s will because of X, Y, and Z. She would confront the pastor, who did not agree. Then, she would rally people in the church to try to get the pastor fired. At this point, the elders would step in and ask her to leave.
When we were kids, all I knew is that we kept going to new churches every few years and that we were leaving because the pastor was not following G-d’s will. I developed a broad view of religion because we would try one denomination followed by another, finally settling in with smaller charismatic churches (which seemed to have a higher tolerance for her). Even as a kid, I was amused by how each denomination was certain that its particular brand of religion was the “right” way, and I would think, “Hey, don’t tell X church because they do it differently.” :0)
Here’s the real kicker — As an adult, I met up with an old high school friend who is close with several pastors. She had dinner with these pastors, and the conversation turned to “granola Christians,” which they define as “fruits, flakes, and nuts.” They said that one woman in this very large, metropolitan area is the queen of the granolas, and they named my mother! This woman almost fell out of her chair! LOL
~ Faith
I grew up being taught that my dad, who was an alcoholic, couldn’t hold down a job, tormented and beat his children, (he fathered 15 and had three step children) that he was an apostle of God- one of the twelve apostles. We would get our accumulated “spankings” from what was supposed to be a “rewards” chart, but we called it the “spanking” chart because that’s all it resulted in, right before we would have “church” and sing, “There is Beauty all Around, When there’s Love at Home.” Faulty premise alright.
But you know what? I am determined that I am not going to let that experience steal away from me, faith in a loving, merciful, and just God! I do not have to let it take that from me!
[...] Comments « How to Challenge Faulty Premises [...]
My mom always advertised herself as a ‘witch’. Not Wicca or any specific belief, but over the years I’ve identified her belief system as “Spiritualist”. Not so bad unless you count the Voodoo dolls in the back seat that we had to play with on our way to ‘church’.
Church WAS a church, BTW: Episcopalian religion. I even went on to be an acolyte! But when I was 7 or 8 my dad came home from Thailand (on military duty) after a year – giving away all our money to missionaries so he would look good over there – and making us so poor over here that our neighbors would literally come over and check to make sure we had food and clothing – and they were poorer than us! But . . . like you, Faith, I remember long walks to get ‘religion’ at the churches overseas – and once my father taking me by the hand and beating me with a switch every single frickin’ step of the way! By the time we got there the congregation was singing “Jesus Loves You” (a song that still give me goosebumps) and all I could think (my face red, bare legs red, tears on my face) was “If this is how Jesus loves me – then I want none of it!!!” (shrug). Oh well, that was before my acolyte year(s?). I must’ve learned something . . .
It wasn’t until last year when that dude, mistaking me for something I wasn’t (an MKULTRA student) – took me under his wing and tried to ‘damage’ me or change me for something. I think he mistook my childhood training for something else; perhaps something HE went through. I don’t know. All I know for certain is that he was ex-Army Intel (South American), connected with the CIA (he couldn’t – wouldn’t! – let me say “MK” without freaking severely) – and in a superstitious culture. I think it was what I would call “MKULTRA” fans. Really some weird stuff. And I didn’t appreciate the kidnapping! But as a result of his tampering something ‘weird’ went on and “WE got it” – got “IT” big-time. I’ve never . . . well, just way beyond words. If I had to put a word to it (and I did), I experienced the same feeling as God. Was ‘part’ of “Him”, went through ‘Him’ – just way too much. Of course ‘I’ (and all my others) “died” – but we reassembled and came back here to “do some good” – though I didn’t want to. Made me sick as hell to find I was still alive – but just this one ‘part’ of me.
The nice part? “Our” religion agrees with every religion – to a degree. “We” were extensively trained by our religious nut dad (he was into exposing us to every religion – so he could prove them ‘wrong’). Which is a problem, since the religious fanatics believe you a) can not talk to god, b) cannot be or have an ‘angel’ inside of you, c) cannot have multiple souls and are a source for them (more than 1), and d) – well, if they knew the rest of it? They’d freak out. But then again: they’ve never experienced infinity – just a limited concept. Even ‘I’ can not quite recapture it all – but I remember the wonderful feeling; how GOOD ‘I’ felt; how it (the world) was no longer “about me” – but me about THEM. Sacrifices were no longer an issue. A BIG Deal.
I think each person should be presented with the varying facets of religion and allowed to chose their ‘own path’. These religous nuts who say “Believe what I believe!” – I ask “Why? Is your belief, your faith so weak that you need MY faith to sustain it??” Because that’s how it seems to me.
Of course we are all just monkeys at the core, but in some ways? I got religion. A party of “ONE” tho’ (in my mind) there is no “one god” anymore – and yet there is.
I “get it”, got it – and am looking forward to death. For then ‘we’ will be released from “this dimension”, this plane – and the true journey will begin.
This information about religious fanatics is most enlightening to me. I had to deal with it from age 0 to about 3 1/2. When I started to live with my family of origin at age 5 it was not a daily issue. before age 3 1/2 it was pretty much everything that the abuser/programmer could read about. She was intelligent in that she could do research and such.
As far as I know the only real issue is trusting my own spirituality. Religion for me is totally social and always will be.
The family I lived with is some foreign county were deeply religious. It was pretty much all social to them at least from my view.
I was actually a head deacon of a church for about 10 years. Pretty much for me it was about a way for me to do good in the world on a personal level. Pretty much the pastor would let me know someone was in need and I would go figure it out. I do miss that. I used to do the logistics of the service. Not much different than building a building to me.