Guest Post: Overturn The Tables

This guest post has been written by two individuals who reported their experiences with Mike Pilavachi into the Church of England investigation.

Overturn your tables, pour out your coins,

Stop making these temples marketplaces!

Almost 150 people, with varying degrees of power and status in relation to Christian communities, have now stepped forward to share personal experiences of abuse at the hands of Mike Pilavachi and Soul Survivor. The public response from those considered to be ‘leaders’ within these communities has been mixed. Some have chosen to remain silent; others have spoken a little here and there, being careful not to appear overly critical of their friends or those in high places; still others have expressed support for Mike Pilavachi. Those vocal in their support of victims and others impacted by events have been in the minority.

Until the release of Matt and Beth Redmans’ documentary this week.

At the root of this week’s sudden flurry of activity among ‘leaders’, and underlying their response to the public revelation of Mike Pilavachi’s abuse more generally, seems to us to be the market logic that permeates our Christian communities. This logic is geared towards generating capital, as well as sustaining institutions and maintaining the power and status of the individuals within them. It provides both motivation and justification for the pursuit of these things. And under this logic, all bodies – including the bodies of the abused – appear not as temples of the Holy Spirit, but as commodities to be valued or disposed of. The market logic is unable to recognise their humanity and inherent dignity and worth, and cannot register their suffering on its own terms. It simply assesses them according to their marketability and treats them accordingly, weighing up the potential brand-related impact of any response to their pain.

One need only look at Holy Trinity Brompton’s (HTB) public response since news of the Church of England’s investigation was announced in April 2023. Having platformed Mike Pilavachi and maintained a close relationship with Soul Survivor that brought mutual benefit to both ministries, HTB have chosen to remain silent over the past year (see here for a detailed timeline of key events). This is despite many people, including victims, repeatedly asking for a public response, not least during HTB’s 2023 Leadership Conference (see here, for example). Following the release of the Redmans’ documentary this week, however, HTB released an opinion piece on leadership and accountability that referred to Soul Survivor, the Redmans, and the ‘scandals and failings within church leadership,’ while also plugging their 2024 Leadership Conference (see here for a thread about this).

While we recognise that the lure of the market logic is both subtle and powerful, its action in this situation needs to be brought into the light and challenged. Because it is perpetuating the abuse we ourselves experienced through Soul Survivor, where we were not treated with dignity and worth, and where our suffering – which is now being used by others for personal and institutional gain – was not seen as being of equal importance to sustaining Mike’s ‘ministry’.

In John 2:14-16, Jesus drives people out of the temple. Overturning the tables of the money changers and pouring out their coins, his words to those selling doves are: ‘Take these things out of here! Stop making my Father’s house a marketplace!’ Jesus later refers to his own body as a temple, so we could take these words as relating both to our churches and Christian communities, and to the people within them.

To those who have used this situation as an opportunity to capitalise on the abuse others have experienced, or who are benefitting from the status quo and therefore continue to choose silence:

Overturn your tables, pour out your coins,

Stop making these temples marketplaces!

Guest Post: New Frontiers and Mike Pilavachi

For those unfamiliar with New Frontiers (NF), they are a network of evangelical charismatic churches founded in 1979 by Terry Virgo. In 2011, Terry Virgo retired as the “apostolic leader” of New Frontiers, and at this point New Frontiers had 800 churches in 70 nations. As a result of this, New Frontiers reorganised itself into 8 “spheres”, where NF churches with similar theology and mission join together. The names of the spheres are: 1) Advance, 2) Catalyst, 3) ChristCentral, 4) Commission, 5) Confluence, 6) New Ground, 7) Regions Beyond, and 8) Relational Mission. “New Frontiers Together” is the name of organisation that oversees the spheres. New Frontiers is led by a group of male “apostolic leaders”. There isn’t much clarity externally as to what qualifies someone as an apostolic leader but from what I can establish from HERE, the Apostolic Leaders include: eight Sphere Leaders, five New Frontiers Together leaders (four of whom are also Sphere Leaders), three NF church leaders who also run NGOs, and two NF church leaders in specific countries (Ukraine and US).

While New Frontiers themselves would probably be quite uncomfortable with me paralleling their leadership structure with Anglican structures, for those more familiar with an Anglican structure, New Frontiers looks a bit like this:
– Church leader/Lead elder = parish priest and/or archdeacon.
– Church elders = PCC.
– Sphere leader = bishop.
– Apostolic Leader = a) bishop, b) NGO leader, c) national leader.
– New Frontiers Together Leader = archbishop.
– Sphere = non-geographic diocese.

Unlike in the Anglican tradition, the process to become a NF leader or elder is that the process does not take months or years long. As NF has no centralised safeguarding or leadership process, the length of time taken to choose/discern an elder as right for the role is decided locally. The decision is concluded with often a short meeting with the elders and an Apostolic Leader. Feedback from the congregation is often taken at some point in the process but the decision is really in the agreement of the elders, trustees, and apostolic lead. The process of becoming a leader seems to be quite opaque and so it is unclear how exactly men end up in leadership roles. One of New Frontiers’ core distinctives has been their commitment to complementarian theology. While more recently, some of the spheres allow women to preach and lead, all of the spheres only allow men to be elders.

All of this gives some context to the following guest post written by Phil Duncalfe. He was an elder in the Guildford New Frontiers church for 6 years and a member of the church since being a student at the University of Surrey. He is a staff worker for Friends International and Chaplain at the University of Surrey and you can find his story HERE.

New Frontiers and Mike Pilavachi

Who we align ourselves with as Christians is important. The collator of the Psalms thought this was so important he placed it right at the start.

“Blessed is the one who does not walk in step with the wicked or stand in the way that sinners take or sit in the company of mockers,but whose delight is in the law of the Lord,and who meditates on his law day and night.” (Psalm 1:1)

We don’t expect churches and church movements to get who they platform right 100% of the time. Obviously they can’t know the hearts of people. However when things go wrong, communication and repentance is important to build trust. More on this point in a moment.

Discernment and New Frontiers’ Platforms

New Frontiers has repeatedly found themselves platforming people who turn out to not be who NF thought they were. Terry Virgo was connected with CJ Mahaney – until he wasn’t. Bill Hybels books were highly recommended – until they weren’t. Mark Driscoll was huge in New Frontiers in the early 2000s and was given the stage at Together on a Mission, their 2008 summer conference and Terry Virgo’s son, Joel, interviewed Driscoll that year, with the interview still on Terry’s website. Some things were said about Driscoll soon after his downfall; most notably by NF leaders Andrew Wilson and Matthew Hosier, with NF church leader Phil Whittall saying more about this after podcast series Rise and Fall of Mars Hill chronicled the history of New Frontiers and Mark Driscoll. Despite Andrew and Matthew being fairly well known leaders when they wrote the articles, I don’t fully recall much being said about it through official NF channels. They may have done. Those were the early days of my involvement with New Frontiers as a university student; no one reads emails as a student do they?

New Frontiers’ response to the Mike Pilavachi allegations

My recollection generally (happy to be proven wrong) is that NF has rarely said anything about their past failings of giving a platform to men who went on to have high profile failings. With the knowledge that at least one sphere of New Frontiers platformed high profile Christian leader Mike Pilavachi a number of times, I decided to hunt down New Frontier responses to Mike Pilavachi’s resignation of the wider investigation into allegations of him being abusive. What I found was that Mike Pilavachi and New Frontiers were far more connected than I initially realised. Despite this deeper friendship at all levels of New Frontiers; there has been total silence bar three social media posts – two by Terry Virgo (one being a clarification/faux-apology for praising Mike in the first) and a third by Andrew Wilson which simply links to a statement by Matt Redman.

New Frontiers’ relationship with Mike Pilavachi

I found that Mike Pilavachi has been to at least two UK New Frontiers Leaders’ conferences (2019 and 2023) and one global New Frontiers Leaders’ conference in Cyprus (2019). These weren’t for all church elders, not even lead elders; but only for Apostolic Leaders. In addition to this, Mike was repeatedly booked by New Frontiers Spheres and Churches for the last 10 years or more. The most notable connections are collated below, but a full list can be found on THIS Twitter thread.

Relational Mission 2012: Early to get Mike Pilavachi involved was the Relational Mission Sphere; particularly Mike Betts, who recently shifted from being the sole Apostolic Lead of that sphere to a team model, with Mike Pilavachi speaking at their 2012 “Elders and Wives” event (each sphere would independently hold one of these annually). Mike Betts seems to be fairly close with Mike Pilavachi given there is a photo on Facebook of them together in 2021 where Mike Pilavachi states he “loved spending today with some of my favourite people”.

Relational Mission 2018: Pilavachi was also at the Relational Mission Sphere’s Sent Event 2018. Either advertising for this event on Twitter didn’t include Mike Pilavachi’s name or has since been deleted.

New Ground 2012: New Ground, led by David Holden (a Sphere Leader and New Frontiers Together leader) also hosted Pilavachi in 2012 for their “Empowered” summer festival. Later in 2016 Pilavachi was part of their leadership training programme (New Ground Academy).

Catalyst Network 2013 and 2019 and 2020: The Catalyst Sphere hosted Mike Pilavachi at their summer festival in 2013 and then booked him again at the renamed festival Multiply in 2019. In 2020, he spoke at a large Catalyst Church as part of their Sounds of Glory conference.

Christ Cental 2020: Mike managed to also be at Christ Central’s Devoted Festival in January 2020 having just been at or going to the Sounds of Glory conference either that day or the day prior.

Commission 2019: I was still an elder in a Commission church in 2019 and at our annual elders and wives retreat, which had been renamed Amplify, Mike was the speaker. He was booked in for the summer festival in 2020 which was delayed due to COVID. He remained booked in for the 2023 festival but was uninvited once the news broke. There was no public message regarding this removal but an internal email was sent to participants:

Commission 2022: In September 2022, Mike Pilavachi spoke at A Time of Refreshing, an event at Guy Miller’s Westminster Chapel. Guy is the Apostolic Leader of the Commission Sphere.

Confluence 2022: Mike spoke to the “Confluence Sphere Team” over 2 days in 2022. Upon Ian Ashby sending this tweet, David Holden (leader of New Ground) made the comment “Tell Mike I said his honorarium for endlessly imputing(sic.) Newfrontiers needs to go up !! [sic.]”.

Only two of the eight New Frontiers’ spheres do not seem to have had Mike Pilavachi speak at their events; Advance Movement and Regions Beyond.

Even as a guest speaker, this is a lot of events! There are times where Mike Pilavachi spoke over multiple days for multiple sessions – which, for my experience of 16 years with New Frontiers, wasn’t the norm. They usually use leaders from within New Frontiers to speak at these events.

However, Mike Pilavachi wasn’t just a guest speaker. While further investigation and detail is needed; in the 2019/20 tax year, under Mike’s direction, £2,487 was paid to New Frontiers (p.29 HERE). Perhaps this was just payment for the trip out to Cyprus, but if it was it is curious that his expenses weren’t paid as part of his speaker honoararium.

Calling New Frontiers to account

In all my searches of each NF Sphere and NF leader’s feed, there is not a single post about the issues surrounding Mike Pilavachi stepping down. There is not a single post about care for victims or those affected by what Mike has done. Mike influenced thousands of young people over Soul Survivor’s decades of festivals and there are a many of us who are deeply impacted and working out what it means for our theology. For many, our very calling which we heard while at Soul Survivor camps, is now being questioned. There isn’t a single message from anyone within NF about how to parse that with Mike Pilavachi being platformed and praised in their churches. All we got was Terry Virgo publicly telling Mike Pilavachi via social media that he was a blessing to New Frontiers and then a second correctiv post admitting he didn’t know much about what was going on or why Pilavachi was standing down.

The Psalmist calls us to be aware of who we stand with. When we get it wrong we should reflect and, if needed, repent. We should recognise those who have been hurt and we should help disciple those who are confused or distressed due to the failings of someone they thought they could trust; particularly if we have been the ones commending them as trustworthy.

Some might say it is wise to remain silent while there is an active investigation. I think it is a misguided position, especially for New Frontiers Spheres that have so regularly platformed Mike Pilavachi, because silence makes it all about Mike Pilavachi. Those who are hurting or confused are left isolated as they waiting for their church/sphere/leaders to say the right thing about Mike Pilavachi. No matter if there is criminal behaviour or not, the allegations suggest Mike Pilavachi’s behaviour towards young people while he was speaking on NF platforms was deeply hurtful to them and that he is likely no longer fit for Christian leadership. We can all read the stories of those hurting people, many who have personally experienced the pain described in the allegations. Church leaders should be prioritising them!

What might it look like if leaders who had been influenced by Mike Pilavachi, loved his teaching, found their calling while under his guidance and encouraged others to learn from him were open and honest with their congregation? As I was keenly searching, and desperately hoping, for public acknowledgement of the hurting by at least one New Frontiers leader who had platformed Mike Pilavachi, I found an excellent example of what a good response looks like. Tom and Lesley who lead Croydon Vineyard, show HERE what it means to lead their congregation through a sensitive issue such as this. Take some time to read their repsonse and see what it looks like when leaders recognise they have platformed someone who they later learn has hurt so many.

I’ll finish with a quote from Tom and Lesley as to why New Frontiers’ leaders, of all Spheres and churches who platformed Mike Pilavachi, should take time for the sake of their congregations to communicate the issues and reflect on who they have platformed, not for the sake of Mike Pilavachi or their reputation, but for the sake of the hurting:

“This situation affects us and if we don’t talk about it we run the risk of suggesting some things are “off the table” of discussion due to their sensitivity or complexity. Jesus has asked us (Tom and Lesley) to lead and pastor you through life, to help you become all Jesus has called you to be. This means we must engage with topics even when they are sensitive, complex or where we have a possible vested interest. If we talk about these situations it should help us together work out how to navigate them with integrity and honour and how to learn lessons from them so we all grow as disciples of Jesus.”

Guest Post: Dear Pete Greig

On 19th May, Pete Greig (founder of 24-7 Prayer) wrote a Facebook post reflecting on the situations of abuse within evangelical Christianity. Rather than focus on those who have been harmed, Greig was keen to defend church leaders and requested his followers comment on the post celebrating faithful leaders they know. This post came not long after he extricated himself from the Anaheim Vineyard situation, with a statement which while likely giving him splinters from sitting on the proverbial fence, managed to insist that Alan Scott (now credibly accused of spiritually abusing a dozen people) and his wife Kathryn are “people who listen diligently to the Lord and simply seek to obey.” Last year, Greig’s organsiation 24-7 Prayer had their own abuse situation (detailed in THIS blog). Greig has yet to make an explicit statement on the Soul Survivor statement.

Within the various comments objecting to Greig’s Facebook post was one from Tony Brooks, which summed up a lot of what was wrong with Greig’s approach. I asked Tony if he could send me a “blog ready” version of his comment for a guest blog and he kindly did. Although Greig has now deleted the post, I feel that the approach Tony has taken is really helpful in enabling others to see what it wrong with posts which focus on leaders, in a crisis of abusive leadership.

Pete,

I read your post yesterday which had been shared by a friend and was rather troubled by it. I understand why people feel like they need to say this stuff but I really don’t think it’s helpful for the people that have been at the sharp end of it all. Especially as many evangelicals and the evangelical church has a habit of minimising the affects and reality of spiritual abuse.

There are lots of lumps underneath a lot of rugs.

Not every rug, of course that’s obvious – I don’t think that needs pointing out. In the same way that every policeman in the Met hasn’t raped a woman, but some have, so lots of church communities and leaders are not toxic. But some are. They really are.

Furthermore can you begin to imagine what it might feel like for someone that has been very seriously spiritually abused, gaslit and victim blamed to read a post like this? How might those lads (some now grown men) feel reading this that were allegedly asked by Pilavachi to strip down to their pants and have a massage on his bed? Would they feel heard by this post or would they feel like it’s minimising their abuse? I think they might think it is minimising, especially as a victim of abuse is more than likely to blame themselves and have others blaming them too.

When it’s someone that is ‘God’s anointed’, (the one that tells you what God is saying) perpetrating the abuse it’s extremely harmful and is what sets this apart from other types of abuse. I would have much more respect for you Pete if you just held your hands up and said there’s a massive problem and we all need to deal with it. That’s what I think the message should be. That’s what victims need to hear. They don’t need to hear ‘we’re not all bad’.

Especially as it’s unlikely that many victims would, if asked, say every element of the church is corrupt and all leaders are abusive. Perhaps a better line would be:

‘At this time across the evangelical church we need to examine ourselves, our theology, systems and our structures. We need to root out everything that creates environments where abuse can happen and we need to be brutal and ruthless with those things so there is no room for this kind of systematic abuse of power.

And we will put the needs and voices of victims at the heart of everything we do until we learn and change our theology, systems, behaviours, structures and communities. I am going to use this platform and the influence I have to share our churches journey to understand and deal with this problem.’

Why are you worried about people being disillusioned and disappointed?

That’s exactly what people should be feeling. They should feel remorse, regret, anger, frustration and be disturbed by it enough that they have the courage to face up to it and deal with it. I totally get why you would post this especially trying to encourage people that are working hard in what they do to care for people and their communities. But right now they are not the priority as they are not the victims. Not to say their roles aren’t difficult, challenging and stressful or that they don’t need support.

I don’t follow you so I don’t know what else you have said about all of this. What I do know is that you have nearly 35,000 people following you on Facebook and this is the only post I have seen anyone share about spiritual abuse. This is the post I am seeing evangelical Christians share.

I’ve not seen any posts from influential leaders being shared being honest about spiritual abuse and saying what they are going to do about it and encouraging others to do the same. You have encouraged your 35,000 followers (and the thousands that will read it from sharing) not to face the challenge of abuse in churches but to celebrate leaders.

At best that feels to me like a missed opportunity. At worst it seems somewhat irresponsible. Of course I appreciate your intent in this post but I think perhaps its a bit misplaced. I hope you can prayerfully reflect on and consider some of these points. Some of these Nomad podcasts may be a good place to start, with some very nuanced and thoughtful consideration of the issues:

Surviving Spiritual Abuses with Joy Brooks and Justin Marsh HERE.
Freedom from Unhealthy Religious Systems with Joy Brooks HERE.
Jemimah, Joy and Jezebel HERE.
Stories of Deconstructing Faith with Olivia Jackson HERE.
And THIS is my friend Olivia’s book, “Un)Certain: A Collective Memoir of Deconstructing Faith”.

I would encourage everyone, especially those that hold a position of power in evangelical spaces to pause, take time and do some research before sharing their thoughts on such a difficult topic on social media or from their pulpits.Please be assured – I have no issues with thanking and supporting people. That’s an important part of life, living and community. I think that celebrating leaders is not the thing to be doing right now. Particularly when there is so little attention being drawn to the reality of spiritual abuse and how churches and people with lots of influence are going to be working to understand it and deal with it.

That’s the piece of work that needs doing now.

This is especially as it seems to me the evangelical church has little (or no) understanding at all about power dynamics. It doesn’t understand how its theology supports and creates environments where abuse can happen, where abusers can thrive and even be defended for their behaviour as ‘the Lord’s anointed’. And Pete, trust me, I am not having a go at you in anyway. I’m just a bit confused about another aspect of your post.

You wrote about people quietly getting on with things but then listed a load of people with enormous platforms. Like, really big ones. Whoppers even! One of these was Tim Keller. I know it’s sad for many that he’s passed away but oh boy does he have a life littered with facilitating spaces that are rife with abuse, as shown HERE. And of course you mention Nicky Gumbel who was very much entwined with Mike and Soul Survivor. THIS video where he praises him on a number of occasions now feels pretty dreadful. I find it hard to believe that Nicky and others around him will not have at some point come across what Mike was doing or at the very least got wind of it. Maybe they didn’t but this is hard to watch now.And then there is THIS account of the culture and ‘values’ at Soul Survivor that is absolutely stomach churning. How does Nicky Gumbel, who you celebrate as a great and humble leader, not know about the toxicity of the culture Pilavachi curated?:

I have also been advised from a friend that the Bishop Stephen Croft, bishop of Oxford and formerly of Sheffield, (along with Sentamu, who has now had his licence revoked, while Croft remains in place) did nothing when Matthew Ineson complained that a vicar had raped him as a child, has a son, Andy Croft – who is senior pastor at Soul Survivor. Please, please take some time to read THIS article.

Again, I cannot see how we should be celebrating leaders at this time. At the very least some consideration of the stories and lives of victims and a cursory glance at the reams of evidence of systemic abuse and cover ups would illustrate that celebrating leaders is not in anyway the priority. Again Pete, I am not having a go, I am just asking for some active evidence-based reflection followed by action.

Yours, in hope,

Tony Brooks

Guest Blog: Soul Survivor’s Elephant Navigating Service

My friend “Sarah” watched the Soul Survivor Watford church service today. It’s been one week since Soul Survivor Watford and the Church of England delivered statements to the congregation about Mike Pilavachi stepping back from the church as a result of a safeguarding investigation. Sarah has written this post about watching the livestreamed Soul Survivor Watford service.

Well that was one well navigated-around elephant in the room, if ever I have seen elephant navigating…

Do they teach you that at church leader school these days? Elephant navigating?

If the words ‘inappropriate relationships” or “massage” are used in relation to a senior – the senior – leader of your church or parachurch organisation, here is what you do the following Sunday in church:

Be deeply inauthentic. Say how much you have been looking forward to the service – when probably you’ve been dreading having to be the face of this and praying you don’t cry on stage.
Open the service with “O Happy Day”.
Smile, lots.
Whatever you do, don’t be real. Don’t allude to the fact that this has probably been the hardest week in the 20 year history of the church, and personally in the life of the person leading the service.
During your sermon, mention that for some of you, there are people you love who are going through a hard time at the moment – and that Jesus understands what it feels like to be out of control and lost. But even then, DON’T MENTION THE ELEPHANT!!!!!!

My name is Sarah (*not my real name) and I am many things. One of the things that I am is a survivor of abuse in a Christian context. As of about 12:45pm today, another thing I am is newly depressed, intensely triggered, and feeling so so small.

I made the decision today to watch the Soul Survivor Watford 11:30am service, which was livestreamed on YouTube. I watched it because I needed to. It felt like quite an automatic, driven act. I just had to see – what next?

Since “The Statement” was published online last Sunday by Soul Survivor Watford, informing us that Mike Pilivachi is under some form of investigation for some form of… whatever you get investigated for… Things he should not have been doing, that impact others… I’ve been rather On Edge.

Not because I was ever particularly involved with Soul Survivor. I think I went to a Soul Survivor festival once; maybe twice. And not because I know people who did the Soul61 internship, or even because I know Mike Pilavachi. Because I don’t.

I’ve been On Edge because being pushed to the Edge is what happens to me every time a new church safeguarding case is raised against someone we were supposed to think was literally “God’s gift”. Since I had the misfortune of encountering an abusive man in a Christian organisation I worked for, and then the “misfortune” (which is not the right word, but I’m in an Easter egg coma so it’s hard to be articulate) of being subjected to institutional abuse of power in the way my report was handled. Since then, being On Edge is what happens. The public statements and then the fallout and “here we go again”, I am re-living my traumatic journey through the Legal Jargon Christian Power Jungle all over again.

Let me make it simple. Because sometimes, less is more. This is the crux of my trauma and why watching this morning’s Soul Survivor Watford service required a 2 hour recovery nap afterwards:

It. Is. All. About. Power.

That’s it.

That’s why I have been On Edge and why I felt compelled to watch Soul Survivor Watford’s service this morning. And that’s why I am now totally depressed all over again. That’s why I have Post Traumatic Stress Disorder. That’s why going to church these days is an act of sheer obedience and some weeks, even that doesn’t get me through the church front door. That’s why I get really angry, really easily. When those in leadership, in politics, or in church make “statements” that use all that familiar legal, banal, inhuman language that says so little and yet says so much.

When these sorts of allegations are raised against well-known Christians like Mike Pilavachi, John Smyth, Ravi Zacharius etc., there are two very distinct camps that are formed. On the one side there is the “small people” camp. That is inhabited by people who had bad experiences, sometimes traumatic ones, sometimes life-altering ones. They are disbelieved, ignored and assumed to be insignificant.

On the other side of these situations, when allegations are raised against well-known Christian leaders, they often have the sort of finances required to hire a lawyer or, as in the case of Soul Survivor Watford, Mike’s church even has a barrister on the Trustee Board. They have YouTube streamed services from the church he founded and led. And they have all the social and interpersonal power within that church so that even without asking, he can be sure his needs and feelings will be the priority in the Sunday service.

And you see, I knew all this before I asked Alexa to “find Soul Survivor Watford on YouTube”. But I still did it, didn’t I? It was a bit of a sad sight to see really, if you could have watched me “GoggleBox” style.

I sat on my sofa, listening to every word, every breath, the intonation of every phrase coming out of Andy Croft’s mouth as he led the service and preached. I exercised such naïve hope that – this is it – he’s about to… oh, no… Nearly… Ok… Now… I think this could be the segue… he’s about… Oh… no. It’s “Oh Happy Day” now.

Then my friend came in the living room and I assured her, “They’re going to say something in a minute. Just wait until after the worship songs. I imagine they just didn’t want to say it at the start as it’s a bit heavy for Easter Sunday.” I still had some hope then. The music ended and I was right back on the edge of my seat again. Okay, here it comes, come on Andy, help me out here. I’ve been in pieces all week over that statement, and since the last service, a Telegraph article included the word “massages” in it. Come on, show your cards. Tell us you’re on our side. Tell us you believe survivors. Tell us you encourage reporting. Tell us you stand shoulder-to-shoulder with anyone who has been hurt. Tell us the power has shifted this time; that we learned the lessons from the scandals with Ravi Zacharias, Hillsong, John Smyth and this time, we will get it right. This time, power will not be wielded to silence the victims.

Nothing.

Then it was the sermon.

Then more singing.

And I kept it on right until the bitter end, still saying to my friend, “Just wait, they will say something at the end. They’re going to say something about how to report or where you can get support. Just wait. He will do it.”

Then the service ended with “let’s all go eat chocolate” and I just cried.

Other blogs about this situation:

Guest Blog: Why Doesn’t She Leave?

This is a guest post from a Christian woman who left her abusive husband. She found this entry in her journal and felt that it might be helpful for other women who are currently trying to navigate leaving an abuser, and to help others better understand why leaving an abuser is so hard. Please feel free to leave a comment to communicate with the author.

Sunday 3^rd May 2020

It’s a strange and torturous thing, to be in that liminal space between being free and letting go. To only be bound by one remaining, fragile thread, tantalizingly breakable and yet profoundly necessary. As necessary as breathing. A precious thing that tentatively binds you to everything known and certain and familiar. For good or bad, what might life look like if it breaks? Or worse still, if you take responsibility for the decision and consciously let it go? Will the ensuing freedom live up to your expectations and hopes? Or was Janis Jopling right when she lamented that “freedom’s just another word for nothing left to lose”?

You finger the thread lightly, stuck, frozen in a place that isn’t really a place at all, more of an in-between space. You muse and wonder. Could I move forward but leave the thread intact, just in case? But you find there’s not enough slack, it doesn’t reach far enough. Could I retrace my steps and go back to where I started? No. For one thing, the past doesn’t actually remain frozen, like we see it in our mind’s eye. The minute I stepped away it no longer existed. And secondly, I don’t want to. I just don’t want to leave it either.

So I stand still, afraid to move one way or another, afraid to breathe or turn in case it breaks yet at the same time, wishing it would because the journey cannot continue until it does. And the light is beckoning and guiding, the journey is waiting to be continued, as I stand there in the wood, two roads diverging, knowing that the choice will make all the difference and yet also knowing its not really going to be a choice at all. It will be a breaking, a shattering, a separation into a million broken pieces that will take weeks, months, years even to piece together into something new. Perhaps not all the pieces will end up on the same road. Some may get left behind. Whether they are pieces I love or pieces I hate, they will be desperately missed. And I won’t get to choose which ones go where, that will be up to chance and the breeze and the poetry of the break. What if they don’t land where I want them to? What if they do?

A voice whispers….or maybe it’s just the wind:

“All of the pieces are mine,

All are held, all are precious.

Let them fall”.

Guest Blog – Dear Discomforted

Recently I connected with a Christian woman (let’s call her Jane) who recently realised her husband was abusive. She was able to leave him and get herself and her children to safety with the support of her family. As she has learned more about abuse, Jane began realising one of her church leaders’ behaviour towards his wife seemed to be abusive. She wrote the following letter (that has been anonymised) to this woman. She is not yet sure whether she is going to send it, but I suggested it would be a really helpful blogpost to help people learn about abuse and particularly how an abuser operates in Christian communities. She was happy for it to be published on my blog. I hope it helps you learn more…

Dear Discomforted,

I’m writing this because I care about what you’ve gone through and are going through. It’s been hard to know how or whether to contact you. If you’re reading this it’s because I have decided that I simply can’t say or do nothing, and because you’ve recognised that something isn’t quite right, and it might not be your fault. I’m sure there’s a part of you that is confused about what I’m going to say and what this is all about. I also think that there’s another part of you that knows exactly what this is about, exactly what I’ve seen and exactly what I’m going to say. It is a strange truth, that you can, in the same moment, be certain of your own pain and grief, but also deny its existence and source. That was my reality for 8 difficult years.

There is of course the chance that I’m wrong about what I think I’ve seen and what I think is happening. You are the only one who really knows and all I can do is share my own personal experience and pray that if anything resonates with you, that you would feel able to pursue a greater understanding for yourself, with an offer from me of support and love in any form you need. Absolutely anything. I have come to understand the many resources available to women and how right it is to respond with all the practical and emotional support it is humanly possible to give. There are also a great number of agencies and professionals who understand and want to help, even ones specifically for women who are married to church leaders and pastors.

In my marriage I prayed for, supported, loved and cherished my husband. I adored him and genuinely found great delight in the good times. In the beginning he was particularly attentive and loving. Everything I did was impressive and wonderful in his eyes, it felt like I could do nothing wrong and I was completely swept off my feet by a man who I thought was amazing – a Christian, musical, talented, funny, successful, charming…

I have since learnt that the cycle of good times and bad times is one of the many strategies of the abuser. It engenders a deep love and longing for your partner, a belief in their ‘good heart’ even with the sharp edges, a belief that compels you to work harder, be better, try more. But the more you try, the less you are appreciated, respected, listened to and truly loved. The more secure he feels in his possession and control of you, the more tactics of abuse and control he uses to keep you there, living under fear and threat. In the last few years I lived every day not knowing what mood my husband would be in, but being certain that the next assault was never far away – and I’m not talking about physical violence. Walking on eggshells in your own home is exhausting. It is also the strongest indicator that your partner is an abuser.

For some time I knew that I was unhappy in my life, I knew things weren’t great, but I didn’t fully understand that my marriage was the source of that unhappiness. I kept up a pretence of happiness, love and unity because I wanted that to be my truth. It was also a way of managing the stress of not being able to talk to anyone about anything I was feeling. He had convinced me that any outside involvement in our personal stresses and strains was disloyal and showed a lack of integrity and commitment to each other. I could not see the truth that such secrecy and isolation is in fact damaging and not God’s design for human relationship. It is merely another tool for the abuser to control and manipulate, but my mind, my emotions, my deepest self was so afflicted by the psychological and emotional abuse that I didn’t know what was real or true anymore.

He made me believe that my own mental issues were to blame for any dissatisfaction I experienced. My unhappiness was my fault. Our arguments were due to my inability to communicate well. Any tears I cried were a demonstration of how manipulative and controlling I was. My attempts to discipline our children were my anger issues making them cry. He minimised and deflected any suggestion that there might be something wrong with him or with our marriage. There were times that I thought I was going mad, such was the heartfelt denial and convincing rhetoric from him over things that I just felt weren’t right. Somehow I always ended up apologising for hurting him, for not listening to him or not trusting him and never the other way round.

Ironically, admitting to my ‘anger issues’ (genuinely believing this was a problem for me) gave me a reason to pursue counselling. He reluctantly let me attend these sessions, but I was compelled to share everything I had discussed in them, which he often criticised and belittled. However, my counsellor saw more than I could see and our conversations explored the deeper truths of the anger I was experiencing. I started to regain clarity in a mind that had long since lost the ability to find it. Even now I know I am only beginning the journey of healing in terms of the damage to my mind, but these counselling sessions were a vital start. I honestly don’t know how long I would have been imprisoned and trapped otherwise.

When I got married I made my vows for life; I knew how much God hated divorce and how much I hated being the child of divorced parents. Divorce was not going to be in my future, nor did I think I would even have to consider it. I was happy and excited to embark on this new adventure with the love of my life. I trusted him in every way. I have since learnt that abusers target the most trusting, empathetic of people; we are the easiest to manipulate and control and to accept abuse as our fault. I fit the bill. I had always been very empathetic, wanting to help, support and understand the suffering of others, but I was also very naïve and trusting too. No-one had ever taught me about healthy boundaries in relationships or warning signs of abuse. I had no idea to even look for them or that such people in this world even existed.

After getting married the change in our relationship was gradual and insidious. Over time, criticisms about my clothes, appearance, friends, family and interests prompted me to give up more and more of the things that made me me. I became the wife that he wanted me to be because if I tried to exert my independence then I was attacked for being disloyal, for not understanding his needs, for disrespecting him. I desperately wanted to be a good wife, to make my husband happy and to love him as a good Christian woman should, so I began to bend and compromise and serve. What I didn’t realise was that he did not return that love and respect for me. He never bent or compromised or served, unless it met his needs, his interests, his desires. Still somehow I was the one who ended up feeling bad when I challenged him on this.

His treatment of me became more obviously abusive as the years went by, but you don’t see it that way when you’re in it. He convinced me every time that it was just more evidence of how much I antagonised him and didn’t understand him, of how I needed to change, be different, be better, try harder. When I was pregnant with our first child, we had an argument about going to the cinema; he threw a vase, smashing it on the floor. He had chased me into the corner of our spare bedroom and I raised my arms in fear of where he was going to throw this vase, but I was the one who ended up apologising for being selfish and causing him to get so angry. I became accustomed to his anger. I remember watching how he talked to the girls so nicely sometimes, wishing he would be that nice to me, then I’d tell myself I was being stupid and dismiss the familiar feeling that something wasn’t right. It was somehow easier to accept his assertions that I was to blame for him being late for work, for the children not liking their dinner, for buying the ‘wrong’ toothpaste or toilet roll. He never took responsibility for anything himself, which is another sure sign of abuse.

In the back of my mind I excused it all because he seemed such a great Daddy and I couldn’t deny his relationship with his children. However, having some distance and professional support, I’ve been able to see the abuse they suffered too, not least in witnessing the abuse I was subjected to, where my oldest would often try to defend me. My youngest once commented “Daddy doesn’t like Mummy very much.” A mother is not protecting her children by accepting abusive behaviour from their father. In many ways the opposite is true.

If any of this feels familiar, then another aspect for you would be the ministry of your husband. How can you be responsible for the demise of his ministry, where he is doing so much good for so many people? Such responsibility is not in fact yours, it’s his, but this must be so hard for pastors’ wives who go through this. I have read the testimonies of a few and it seems that this is the very argument their husbands use in order to heap guilt on them for even contemplating that there’s something wrong in their marriage. However, the thing these women seem to say is that they knew deep down that their husband’s ministry was not the fruitful, Godly ministry that many professed it to be. In fact, these wives had repeatedly seen hurt and discord as a result of their husband’s behaviour.

I’m sorry to say that your husband has been directly responsible for a great deal of my own personal hurt – suggesting I might be pursuing a new relationship in the immediate aftermath of my decision to divorce, and that I would lie to the girls about their father and countless other insensitive and inappropriate comments and actions. I felt like I was being treated with suspicion, not love, judgement, not grace. My last communication was an email I wrote to your husband, my pastor, that was challenging, but respectful and honest. I wrote it with great care, out of a desperate concern for three things – 1) my own healing; 2) providing every opportunity for my husband to come to true repentance and change and 3) ensuring that the church I loved was a safe place for abused women to come forward. To date I have had no reply from a man who was employed to be my pastor. I am living outside of any church fellowship at the moment because I don’t know who to trust and what to tell people. This is surely the time I needed the pastoral support and resources of the church I’ve called home all these years. Instead I feel abandoned by the church at large and supported only by a handful of friends from my fellowship who have chosen to remain in touch.

You are very dear to me, and I can only imagine how hard it may be to read this and how difficult it may be to process even a fraction of what I’ve said. I suppose I decided that this was still the right course of action because I wish that someone had done this for me. I wish that someone had said “Hey, I’ve seen how your husband treats you and it’s wrong. You don’t have to put up with it. He has broken your wedding vows by choosing to abuse you instead of loving, cherishing and respecting you. That is not your fault. God doesn’t like divorce, but he hates abuse even more.”

You are beautiful, loved and cherished, made by God to fulfil His purposes for your life, not the purposes of your husband. I have not liked how I’ve seen him treat you, I recognised so much of the subtle behaviours and dynamics that were true in my marriage. I saw him ignore and belittle your health concerns over drinking wine that night, I saw him disrespect you by giving you barely any acknowledgement or attention when you explained how he likes to be on time for things, with no mention at all of your preferences and needs; I saw a complete lack of interest in praising and acknowledging you when you heaped praise on him. You do not deserve to be treated like that. If you are being abused, you have a right to divorce and a right to know true freedom.

I am currently reading scriptures that explore our identity in Christ. It is so affirming and life-changing after allowing even my relationship with God to be weakened and diminished by my marriage. There is so much more I could say and so much more I am happy to tell you if you want to speak, but in the meantime, seek after God and His truth, trust Him, follow Him. He is our only constant, a bright light in the darkness. If you want an informal, anonymous chat with people who know what abuse is and how to recognise the red flags, then there is also the national domestic abuse helpline – 0808 2000 247

I will continue to pray. Get in touch any time, when you feel it is safe to do so. I am very familiar with the fear instilled by an abusive partner. I know how they promote that fear in you so that you offer complete submission to them, always telling them everything to show that you’re loyal and supportive, constantly reiterating your love for and commitment to them, as I saw you do that time when you patted his leg and praised what a great husband you had. He was so tellingly cold and unresponsive to this, I couldn’t help but feel desperately sad. I know that if I had received a letter like this during my marriage I would have felt both relief and intense fear. Relief that my experience finally had a name – abuse – and that it was not my fault, but fear over what would happen next if I began to try and regain the control and independence that was rightfully mine.

I would not advise that you speak to your husband about this, unless you are absolutely certain that this is not at all your experience. I do not care about my reputation here. If I’m wrong, that’s wonderful! However, if there is any part of you that has read this and is feeling even a little disturbed or disrupted then get help and advice. You are not alone and you are worth fighting for. Living under someone else’s control is not living – it’s imprisonment and you need to get out, but it is your decision and such a choice is risky, scary and dangerous without the right support and help.

Of course, if I have misread things please forgive me and know that you always have my utmost respect. Either way, feel free to get in touch any time.

Yours,

A loving friend who has been there

If any of this seems relevant to your life or the life of someone you care about, you can find your local domestic abuse service here: https://www.womensaid.org.uk/domestic-abuse-directory/.

Guest Blog – When the Youth Bible Hurts

I’ve got a guest post today from Judi Gardener who is a Christian feminist and also a survivor of multiple abuse including spiritual abuse that contributed to staying far too long with the perpetrator. She eventually ended up with PTSD and as a result lost her children through the family court. She is passionate about outreach to the unchurched, support around domestic violence and understanding of mental health issues. Somehow she ended up in an Anglo-Catholic (ish) Church and now has a Morning Prayer habit. She sometimes wishes God had not given her such broad shoulders.

It’s unacceptable. Whatever way I looked it was still unacceptable. I had opened a Youth Bible at random, it was a New Century Version but what I was reading actually seemed more fitting for the 19th century. It was not the Bible verse itself (Psalm 51), but the devotion that accompanied the text which got me so steamed up. The back cover informs me that the devotions are real life stories. For the sake of the young woman who was the main character in this story, I sincerely hope there was more to it. If not, yet another young woman has been drastically failed by the ignorance of church leaders and will, years later, likely still be struggling through life.

The box was headed “sexuality”, with a subheading of “whiter than snow”. It contained a not unfamiliar story of a young girl called Barbara who at nine-years-old was physically and sexually abused by her uncle. Apparently by thirteen she was sexually active with numerous guys and often dated guys four or five years older than herself.

What the devotion then focuses on is not that Barbara had obviously been abused by a number of men, but that Barbara was a sinner. In other words, the Youth Bible victim blames Barbara, in a rather big plot twist. At no point in the text are the sins of the men who had sex with an underaged vulnerable girl mentioned. Apparently, Barbara needed to turn to God and have her sexual sin forgiven. Excuse me. Barbara, whilst no doubt a sinner just like all of us, had been more sinned against than she had been a sinner in her short life.

One of my go to Bible stories is that of the Samaritan Woman. Jesus did not condemn her, but instead stayed in her company despite the cultural taboos. He would have known why she had multiple husbands and was now living with another man outside of marriage. Had she been sexually abused? We cannot know.

God certainly does not condemn all promiscuous women, Rahab the harlot is also described as a woman of faith. In John 8 1-11 Jesus deals with the adulterous woman, a familiar but for some quarters of the church a difficult story to stomach.

The truth is, a child who has been sexually abused such as Barbara, will feel filthy. The Youth Bible reflection explains, ‘“I came to church feeling like a tramp” she told Jan after they prayed. “But now I feel God has made me clean again.”’

This was supposedly after Barbara had asked to receive forgiveness for her sins. Now I am not doubting her experience and the peace that comes on giving your life to Christ, but for me, as an adult survivor of child sexual abuse, that dirty feeling did not instantly disappear. I was raped, for the first time at no older than seven and in hindsight I am grateful that I was not aware of what was happening to me. The experience left deep scars that lasted well into my adult life, way beyond my conversion. It was being led into inner child healing and meeting up with my abuser years later that finally freed me. The former because it gave me some control over what I had suffered and the latter because I managed to see what a wounded man he had become and forgave him. The rape, like Barbara’s, was incestuous and was completely mishandled by my family when I choose to reveal it out of fear for another relative. I know now why. Put simply, it was about shame. That sort of thing doesn’t happen in our family. It is the same in church. I think we can all recall situations where the reputation of the church was more highly valued than the welfare of the victim.

You may say this is an old version of the Bible and today’s teenagers get a different message, yet many of today’s church leaders would have been brought up on such Youth Bibles at the turn of the century and just as your music taste reflects your youth so do your values. It’s scary, and no wonder misogyny still rears its ugly head in our churches.

It needs to stop. Churches (if they have not already done so) need understandable child protection policies which include being able to deal with spiritual abuse and sexual abuse. Victim blaming is spiritually abusive and psychologically damaging. Victims need high quality pastoral care alongside support for reporting crimes. No further Barbaras, please, in Jesus name.

GUEST BLOG: Reproductive Loss

I was recently contacted by someone saying that their experience of Christian culture and Scripture suggested that women were only valuable if they had children. She asked me if I knew of any resources about this. And the first person that came to mind was Karen O’Donnell, who is an extremely wonderful woman! I asked her if she’d be up for writing a guest blog for me and she agreed. Karen blogs at Verum Corpus and is on Twitter @kmrodonell.

“You give and take away. My heart will choose to say, Lord blessed be your name.”

I remember hearing Matt Redman sing this song at a Christian festival, surrounded by the youth group I led. They were loving it and I was too. It was months later that I discovered this song had been written by Redman and his wife in response to reproductive loss. I remember thinking that it was incredible that they could say this after such an experience. Little did I know that their experience was about to become mine.

In my twenties, I experienced repeated reproductive loss whilst trying to have a baby. I was a worship leader and youth leader in a lively, evangelical church. After the first miscarriage, so many women comforted me and told me stories of their own loss. These stories were, unanimously, stories that led eventually to them giving birth to living, healthy children. No one blamed God for my loss. But children were clearly a blessing from God and having a family was taken for granted.

But that first loss led to more. A four-year period of my life was constant peeing on sticks, appointments with doctors, and regular heart-breaking loss. And this church, that I had been part of for fourteen years, didn’t know what to do with me. People avoided me because they just didn’t know what to say. The leadership team (all male, all fathers, of course) barely spoke to me. Sometimes, well-meaning women prophesied that I would have a baby by this date or that year. Those dates and years came and went. No baby. I couldn’t worship because I couldn’t sing about God’s love and faithfulness without bursting into tears. Over time I started arriving at church late to avoid the worship time (and the dreaded risk of the “you give and take away” song). Then I started avoiding church all together – I couldn’t handle seeing more pregnant women. Eventually, I just never went back to the church.

Lots of good has come from this. I don’t have any children. But I do now have a PhD, and academic career, a new life and some objective distance from these events of my twenties. There are two issues to highlight in this experience of mine. First, it’s really hard to know what to do with reproductive loss theologically. Lots of the things that are written are sentimental and don’t take the horrific experience of such loss seriously. Lots of the literature around this issue from a Christian perspective, assumes that eventually you will have a living, healthy baby. And that’s just not true. Culturally, we are not good at handling reproductive loss. It’s caught up in taboos around acknowledging early pregnancy, taboos around bleeding, and sex. So, we don’t talk about it.

The second issue is that having children is taken for granted for Christian couples in many churches. We have few narratives of the Christian life that do not include children for married couples. There is an expectation that, once married, children will follow in reasonably quick measure. Again, this just isn’t the case! Infertility is common in both men and women. Tommy’s charity estimates that anything between 20-50% of all pregnancies end in reproductive loss. Not all of those who are infertile will want to go through the intrusive and fraught adoption process. And, let’s be honest, not all people want children. This can be difficult to admit in churches that are orientated around the family, where children are seen as a blessing from God, and the ‘be fruitful and multiply’ command is taken literally.

No two situations of reproductive loss and childlessness are the same and people feel very differently about their experiences. So, what helped me might not help you. But these are things that I found healing and restorative.

If your church can’t (or won’t) support you through the experience of reproductive loss and/or childlessness, then find some support elsewhere. For me, that meant leaving not just the church I had been part of all my Christian life but leaving the whole evangelical tradition. I worship in a liberal Anglican church now which isn’t perfect but has a broader understanding of the varieties of Christian life. Whilst it is welcoming for families, it also has many activities and experiences that are not shaped around the family. And no one has ever asked me when I plan to have children.

Seek out places where you can tell your story. This is especially true if you have found your experiences to be traumatic. It is vital that you can tell your story to witnesses who can hear it and love you. This might be an online forum like Saltwater and Honey, a support group, or a group of friends who love you and have experienced similar things themselves. If you can’t find one, start one.

Don’t go to church on Mother’s Day.

Read theology that gives you life. For me, it was Serene Jones’ “Rupture” in Hope Deferred: Heart Healing Reflections on Reproductive Loss that helped me reflect on my experiences and come to terms with them. It helped me be whole again. It helped me pray. And eventually, it led me back to Church. You might also like to read the brilliant Dawn Llewellyn’s work on voluntary and involuntary childlessness. Or Nicole Johnsons reflection on Invisible Grief in reproductive loss.

Over the last few months I have been working on a theology of reproductive loss. My research revealed that very little has been written on this topic, and very little research has been done with people who experience such loss. So, I’m seeking to rectify this. This is the outworking of my own recovery – engaging with the world and offering something out of my experience. I’m working towards a theology of reproductive loss that begins with the miscarrying body and offers hope, not in the form of a future baby, but in the form of a future life in all its fullness.

Karen has created Reproductive Loss Reading List that you might find helpful.

#metoo – Guest Blog

I am really honoured when women choose to share their stories with me. Today is a guest post from a woman who has told me some of her story. She writes about the abuse she was subjected to and the ways Christian culture colluded with the man who hurt her. I’m really grateful that she has chosen to share her story here.

It makes shudder like hearing nails scraping a chalkboard as I think about the way he touched me. The passion that was between us was so strong, yet very one-sided. Tears fill my eyes as I remember what I let him do to me. I wasn’t raped but I didn’t enjoy the somewhat forced sexual relationship we had.

He said he was a Christian, that he’d asked God for forgiveness and when in prison his church – my church – prayed for him. He knew he did wrong but said it was a massive misunderstanding, he was immature and shouldn’t have engaged in sexual activities with an under-aged girl. I trusted him, because the church trusted him so we began dating.

As with many churches, they love a redemption story – especially when it includes a romantic twist. I quickly became a mini celebrity at the local church for not believing his conviction was real and that it was all a misunderstanding. Girls cry rape all the time, right? His parents adored my Christian nature of forgiveness and welcomed me into their family.

I was away at university whilst we were dating. He came to my halls of residence, met my flat mates and showed me off proudly to others. It was going well and, even though it was only a few months, everyone seemed to think it was a great relationship. My low self-esteem had been boosted up and I felt like I was the one who had changed him; I was the one God used and we would be that story of forgiveness – hoorah!

The Church isn’t good at talking about sex – yes, I know that is a generalization – and no one spoke to me about the added complications of dating someone that had links to rape. No one thought it might be a good idea to offer to mentor this vulnerable couple. Even though I wasn’t a virgin going into this relationship, I didn’t know how forceful sex could be and that I had a right to say ‘no.’

My throat fills with vomit as I think about his convincing, or perhaps more appropriately, conniving nature to touch me. The words he said and the backhanded compliments I received – just so he could undress me. His eyes which once looked full of love, turned into a stare like a predator.

Only a few months in and he was talking about living together and a future of marriage. His dreamy words kept making me forgive his persuasive nature in the bedroom. I come from a ‘broken home’ and a ‘blended family’ so the idea of an idyllic marriage being possible was so tempting.

After being undressed whilst on my period I decided that it was enough. I didn’t want to participate in any sexual activity whilst on my period – I was bloated, hormonal and tired. I’d say no but he thought it was foreplay. He watched so much porn that I was no longer a person, but rather a doll for him to play with.

Something in my mind told me that I needed to get out of this commitment, before a ring was on my finger. I ended it, taking the shame of not being the one who could ‘fix him’ like I thought God wanted me to. His family and the church turned a blind eye to me and I felt ashamed for years afterwards.

A year or so after our relationship ended his family contacted me. He had been accused of rape and was facing another prison sentence. They asked if I’d go to court and testify about my positive relationship with him. I politely declined saying I could not advocate in a positive way about his sexual nature.

Dear church, please talk about sex. My situation may not be the norm for every Christian woman, but many do use Christianity as a way to manipulate others into sexual acts. If we could get over the embarrassment of saying penis and vagina, then we might just be able to talk about healthy boundaries and communication.

Even now as a married woman that experience affects my life; the intimacy I have with my husband both emotionally and physically. To look into my husband’s eyes and see love and care and engage in sex because I want to, not because ‘I have to’ is still a challenge. I am grateful to be with a man who journeys with me in this and echoes God’s love for me.

I shake with fear at the thought of other 19 year olds being in these relationships. It drives my work to educate others around sex and relationships and break down the lies that porn teaches us. God does forgive and he does change people but let us be wise in how we engage in these topics with his people. Let us not shy away from these conversations but rather embrace the beauty of learning about relationships from a relational God.

Hannah’s CU Story

I’ve been posting people’s university Christian Union stories for a few weeks now and we’re at the final one! This one comes from Hannah Mudge. She’s a marvellous woman and you can follow her on Twitter @boudledidge. If you’d like to read the other CU stories, you’ll find them all HERE.

I started university in 2003, having been brought up attending a C of E church. In the year or so before university I had decided to explore other options and checked out various denominations and church groups, which led to me doing the Alpha course at my local Baptist church and also visiting church – an evangelical, charismatic ‘new church’ – with my boyfriend and his family.

On visiting my university for the first time I had heard a lot about the Christian Union (CU) and was impressed by the number of members, the amount they seemed to have going on and how exciting everything appeared to be. Coming from a small town I had never had much experience of Christians my own age and was really looking forward to meeting some. Like most people going to university, I just wanted to make lots of new friends and ‘get stuck in’ to socialising.

People at church had encouraged me to get involved with the CU so I signed up at the Freshers’ Fayre and started attending meetings, also becoming a member of my hall’s cell group. A few years ago I dug out a lot of leaflets and notes I’d kept from that time. My leaflet from the first main meeting of term tells me that there were four prayer meetings a week, three ‘cold contact’ sessions a week (in which members went out and about on campus to evangelise), one ‘lunch bar’ per week (lunch and a talk on one aspect of Christianity, which we were encouraged to bring friends to) – and of course the main meeting. Then there was ‘Mission Week’ in Semester Two, the main outreach event of the year and a ‘house party’ at a residential centre in the countryside. The first flyer I received also included details of the now-infamous PURE course, which received a lot of attention from the national press in the mid-2000s.

I think I came away with quite a positive impression of the CU from that first meeting. My notebook tells me that it focused on being fearless about proclaiming the truth of the gospel in a world where people are ‘afraid to stand up for what they believe in’. My notes included: “God is the most important thing. We live in a society where tolerance and doing what you want is most valued but it requires great courage to speak up and say that we know how to live the right way.”

Topics covered at a later date included: ‘The church is the Spirit’s megaphone to the world’, ‘False teachers and the world leading us astray’ and ‘The persecuted church’. As time went on, I began to make some observations that went beyond my initial impressions – observations that weren’t always positive. I should probably point out that at first, I didn’t know or hadn’t understood that the CU wasn’t some sort of ecumenical organisation, so was slightly surprised that almost everyone was evangelical.

The emphasis on quite in-your-face evangelism seemed quite obsessive and intrusive.
There was an expectation that you’d attend all meetings and get-togethers, which I wasn’t always able to do due to visiting my boyfriend or simply due to wanting to spend time with friends.
I therefore didn’t feel as ‘included’ as many other people. I also ended up feeling quite paranoid that people felt my lifestyle was unacceptable. I came from a sheltered, middle-class background but one that was outside the evangelical bubble and I often felt as if I was saying the wrong things and doing things – like going on nights out, having close friends who weren’t Christian – that were disapproved of. There was a definite sense of ‘concern’ about people whose social life didn’t revolve around church and CU activities and the problem of non-Christian friends ‘leading Christians into sin’ was often discussed. Your non-Christian friends were people you invited to CU events and asked along to church, but not people you should spend too much time with.
Talk about sex and relationships was a key focus. Let’s expand on that:

I know it’s inevitable that it’s going to happen at a university. It’s full of young people – it’s unavoidable – and so there was plenty of discussion on ‘purity’ and ‘modesty’. Most of the people in my cell group were in a relationship – and like me, all but one of them were in relationships with someone at a different university. There was a lot of talk of ‘temptation’ and the importance of resisting it.

So during my first semester, I attended the PURE course – billed as ‘Sex and Relationships – God’s Way‘. This took some commitment for a fresher – it was held over breakfast and involved getting up at 6.30am and trekking across campus in the cold and dark when no-one else seemed to be up. Interestingly, I looked back at the notes and handouts from the course some years later when PURE was making headlines about its allegedly homophobic teaching and interestingly there was absolutely nothing to be found about LGBT issues – so this may have been added into the course at a later date. Some session outlines were as follows (taken from handouts and my notes):

– What does it mean to be a man/a woman? Man: work in and take care of the earth; be united with women. Women: Man’s helper on earth, be united with man. Equal but different. The world says men/women are not different and focus now is on empowered women and demeaning marriage. I was young; I’m not sure I had any critical thinking skills; I hadn’t yet encountered feminism and this was the first teaching on gender and Christianity that I’d ever heard. So it wouldn’t have registered that this is was complementarian teaching or that many Christians would not agree with it.

– What’s wrong with relationships these days? Sex used wrongly – flirting, promiscuity, jealousy, control.

– What can men/women do to help the opposite sex? Good communication, respect, friendship, modesty. girls can be helpful to guys by being careful what they wear. It was claimed that ‘Girls want friendship from guys, but guys need us to be helpful’. ‘Helpful’ was defined as dressing and behaving modestly and not ‘obsessing’ over getting into a relationship.

– Pure sex Stay away from sexual sin and avoid immorality. Don’t lead people on, flee temptation, be accountable to a friend, control your thoughts. The ‘Big Five sexual problems for men and women’ were highlighted, with no. 1 for men being ‘masturbation’ and no. 1 for women being ‘fear of singleness’.

After the course, my hall group leader let me borrow her copy of Joshua Harris’s I Kissed Dating Goodbye. It confused me, bemused me and angered me. It was my introduction to the idea of ‘courtship’ rather than just ‘going out’ with a person and I found it bizarre – never being alone with your partner, chaperoned dates, the idea that women shouldn’t make any moves and are ‘in need of protection’. It seemed totally irrelevant to UK culture and I didn’t find much to take from it, but at the same time felt vaguely ashamed that I might not be conducting my relationship with my boyfriend the ‘right way’ in the eyes of God.

As my first year wore on I attended CU meetings less and less. The feeling of having very little in common with other members had deepened. I remember feeling that the topics discussed were too repetitive (evangelism; resisting the evils of the world; relationships) and I had picked up that other students were quite hostile towards the CU and its methods in a way that they weren’t towards other Christian groups on campus. I was also struggling with mental health issues – becoming quite reclusive – and didn’t feel I could talk about this to my CU friends. They were nice people, well-meaning and committed Christians and just like me, young in their faith and their ways of relating to and understanding the world – but I just didn’t feel at home among them and I also felt that there was a very particular stereotype of being a woman promoted that I could never live up to. This point in particular was something that I struggled with for years after starting to attend evangelical churches.

It was after I left university that I started to understand more about gender and the church and it was around the same time that controversies over Christian Unions began to make headlines – the PURE course, a refusal to let women speak at main meetings or include women in leadership, negative attitudes towards other Christian groups, the UCCF doctrinal statement. My former university’s magazine ran a feature on sexism within the CU, in which the President affirmed a complementarian position.

It had never occurred to me to think too much about these issues as a first year student – but I was essentially new to evangelicalism and completely new to any church teaching on gender. It also didn’t necessarily occur to me to question anything I was told was fact. A couple of years down the line, it gave me great cause for concern that complementarian teaching seemed to be the default and that there was a lot more about gender going on in CUs that I had probably been oblivious to.

	maxward1 on The Soul Survivor Situation…
	LauraC on Open Letter to Stormie Om…
	missjillyp on Finally breathing out
	Beverley Murrill on Finally breathing out
	rachelriveros on Finally breathing out

	maxward1 on The Soul Survivor Situation…
	LauraC on Open Letter to Stormie Om…
	missjillyp on Finally breathing out
	Beverley Murrill on Finally breathing out
	rachelriveros on Finally breathing out