I wrote this piece in the summer of 2020, when we were deep in the throws of the Covid-19 pandemic (as we are currently), protests for racial justice swept the nation, and an inordinately toxic political battlefield was playing out around me. I witnessed yet again why I do not identify with evangelicalism. My feelings on the subject have been kept low key and quiet for years in order to avoid offending or stepping on toes, however, when I lived thru the blatant disregard for human life over the last year by conservative self proclaimed Christians, I realized that I’ve taken the wrong course. Instead my voice and my experiences should not be silenced to appease those who choose to hurt and cause harm in the name of religion. So here we are and here I go.
Summer 2020
Today I had a doctor’s appointment because I’ve had some serious concerns about my health, specifically my reproductive health. Things haven’t been right, there has been pain, and I know that certain cancers run in my family even at a young age so I needed to get some answers.
I drop Luna off with a good friend and have gotten all my work shifts covered because the last time I had tests done I couldn’t get off my couch for 3 days from the pain. Going into this morning I was scared. Sleep had evaded me the night before and I am on the verge of tears all the way up to my appointment. I Stop for a quick latte and a pastry so the ibuprofen i’ve already taken wont make me dizzy.
I’m a frighted uninsured woman who is going to the only place I can get proper health care . As I walk up to the clinic, what do you know? Old white men. At this point you know where this is going because when a woman in 2020 says the phrase “old white men” it’s never going to be positive thing. Let’s be real.
Yes, old white men wearing sign boards with a multitude of religious slogans painted in red. Then they address me as I try to hurry by with my latte for my exam.
“You don’t have to do this”
“God hates abortion”
“Abortion is murder”
*Random Bible verses taken out of context as the book is waved over his head*
“Young woman you have other options”
Rage. Pure rage is what I feel.
No I don’t have other options, I cannot afford health insurance because this country is so far behind other modern nations so I have to go to a clinic or just let my body rot from the inside. Insurance is not something that many of us have access to so we go to clinics that can give us annual check ups, provide birth control, provide access to counseling for depression, anxiety, suicidal feelings. Clinics that provide the basic medical care that we need and can’t afford in this country
I wasn’t going in for an abortion. It’s none of their business either way. What is happening with my body is between my health care provider and me. No one else. Not the government, not the church. It is nobody’s business and no one should be interjecting themselves into ANYONE’S medical care.
Those men consider it to be a ministry to harass women taking care of their reproductive health.
The evangelical church considers it a ministry to harass women taking care of their reproductive health.
It’s nauseating.
Jesus broke bread with those rejected by the current “moral society” at the time. He was empathetic to their plight and admonished the wealthy and pious to use their resources to provide love, care, and assistance to those who were struggling.
He didn’t say to shout at people on street corners and condemn them to announce how much better you are than they. Remember the Bible story about the guys praying loudly on the corner? It wasn’t in favor of the loud corner yellers.
Christians are out here telling us that we can’t give the homeless anything because then they won’t have incentive to work.
Christins say we have to stop all abortions but provide no resources for the women who do not have the means to support and care for a child or provide proper education which is proven to reduce the amount of unplanned pregnancies.
When that child is taken from its mother because she cannot support or care for the child, it is then chucked into the foster system which is so desperately broken and failing. Where is the church then? When those kids are being abused and abandoned and falling into crime or drugs, where is the church who advocated so hard for these lives? Probably sending thoughts and prayers while remodeling and updating its sound system with projectors and new music equipment.
Evangelicals especially love to say All lives matter when we know that’s not true. We know immigrants, homeless, gay people, drug addicts, Black people who aren’t part of your circle….we know those lives don’t matter to you.
Christians love to cherry pick whose lives matter based on how little those lives will effect them and their constructed morality.
Do I sound angry and bitter?
Well that’s because I am.
I grew up in the evangelical Christian community, attended Christian college and did all of the things I was supposed to do. Participated in church groups, choir, Bible memory club, Sunday school teacher, the whole nine yards. This was my community, where I belonged, where I was accepted and loved.
Except I wasn’t accepted and loved aside from my own parents. I was NEVER enough for the others. I didn’t dress right, act right, talk right, sing right, cook right, read the Bible right, participate right…never ever enough. I was reminded constantly by my peers and my peers parents who would let my parents know how I was not enough in some aspect of what constructed conservative homeschool “right” was.
I even had one of my inner circle girlfriends tell me I was disobeying God by going to college and abandoning my father’s home. She was the most righteous. Funnily enough when she decided to go to nursing school years later it was God who called her.
At college I tried. I participated in children’s ministry and taught Bible verses to kids. Never enough. I wasn’t in enough ministry. I didn’t volunteer enough. No one cared that I was struggling with depression and desperately trying to pass my classes and work my tail off to pay my tuition so I didn’t have to drop out.
And then I was assaulted by a male classmate. The cops wouldn’t do anything. The school wouldn’t do anything. I couldn’t tell anyone because who would believe me if the two institutions that were here to protect me didn’t care at all?
So I made the mistake of confiding in another friend from my childhood inner circle while at a friend’s wedding.
“What kind of good man would want you now that you’re used goods?”
That’s the empathy of a fellow Christian who had known me my whole life. I’m less than trash through no choice of my own. I am simply a commodity with no value outside of the ownership of a man.
That was it.
That’s when I knew that the organized religious institution of evangelicalism would never ever be a place I could belong.
They would tell me I had to belong there or go to hell, but then never actually accept me. Always moving the goal line so that I could never succeed, just like the many abusive relationships I gravitated towards after that. I was so used to being gaslit and put down and made to feel so inadequate that I didn’t see abuse for what it was.
Now I’m 30. I’ve been to a church building twice in 5 years. I practice my faith my own way without anyone beating me over the head with what a failure I am. I’m in a healthy and loving relationship with man who does not prescribe to any religion, who always reminds me that I am loved and I matter and I am enough and what I choose to put my faith in is ok.
I have peace and love and am surrounded by people who are truly kind, not just in order to achieve an end, but truly and purely kind.
I don’t have any friends left from my evangelical past. They have long since written me off as one of the seeds that fell on rocky soil. That’s ok with me. My peace and sanity is more important than guilt ridden and problematic relationships. It’s rather tragic that the movement that was supposed to be the most like Christ, turned out to be the most toxic.
My community now is full of caring, broken, honest, raw, and real friends who don’t judge me for failing and cheer me on when I succeed. My community cares deeply and takes actual action to value human life, the lives walking all around us that do not have advocates or do not have the same rights as others in this country.
I’m proud of how I’ve healed over the last decade.
I’m thankful God isn’t just for evangelicals.
I finally have joy.