Can I remove my “Christian” label, please?

Why sometimes I wish that I wasn’t labelled a “Christian” …and other stream of consciousness ramblings…

“It was just verbal,” said the very “put together” woman who had just shared how she isn’t one to judge, carrying around a “Jesus Calling” book, bible in her lap. What she was referring to was abuse.

There is no such logical statement as, “it’s just verbal” in regards to abuse. Abuse is abuse is abuse. 

After I got out of my relationship, as I was trying to fight and fend for myself he said, “I never laid a hand on you, Emily.” No…that’s true, he didn’t. He didn’t need to. Throwing pillows, phones, books…screaming, cussing, belittling, mocking…it was enough. I knew my place. I knew the threat of what could happen if I continued to push too hard. 

. . . 

We were on our way to taste our groom’s cake…I had been trying to talk to him about something that is seemingly unimportant now, but he began driving so fast screaming so loudly, gripped the steering wheel so hard…I thought I was about to die and might have possibly been safer throwing my car door open and jumping out.

An apology ten minutes later could not mend what had been broken.

. . . 

I was seventeen, I lifted my shirt to show my father the small piercing that now hung in my belly button. Just returning from my Junior year spring break that I had spent with my freshman sister, a bunch of her friends, and my mom in Panama City…while my friends were 1.5 miles down the strip drinking and drugging…a little removable piercing felt good to my very innocent spirit.

He looked at me as if I’d punched him in the gut. His face turned bright red and he proceeded to scream at my mother and I about how disrespectful we were. How I looked just like trailer trash and how he wanted nothing to do with either of us if this is what he thought of him. (Which was confusing considering it didn’t really have anything to do with him. It certainly wasn’t a personal assault.) He said he was “done” and walked out the door.

. . .

I am broken. I am trash. I am stupid. I am dishonorable.

. . . 

I had moved home from college…my mind just beginning to form it’s own thoughts and opinions–many of which differed from my family.

My father and I fought…I was taking up for the inappropriate way he was speaking to my mother (not my job). He got in my face, pointed his finger at me, and screamed, “you may not love me, but you will respect me.”

Funny…I thought that I was a young adult at that point and respect was a two-way street. I hadn’t felt disrespectful–though, apparently, I do tend to be a “know it all,” but I know I felt disrespected.

. . . 

I am not worth being respected. I am to be treated as a child. I am not worth a civil conversation with healthy communication. That is too much to expect.

. . . 

My father was a well-known pastor for the first part of my life. He studied daily and preached on the bible regularly.

. . . 

A girl had just finished describing her childhood…that of being an “unwanted” child born into a home where she “had the shit beat out of her” regularly.

And then she says…”and I was so confused because it was all cloaked in religion. Ha”

. . .

I wanted to shrink in my chair. “God! Why!? Why do you allow us to get away with such things?“

. . .

Abuse: “the improper use or maltreatment of an entity.” 

. . .

Belittling, mocking, screaming, threatening, harming…can all be done emotionally, verbally, and physically. The scars of the physical are simply easier to see faster. The scars of all bury deep within and manifest in scary, sad, and painful ways.  

. . .

I wrote to him, “If my physical body bore the emotional and verbal abuse you committed against me…I would be unable to write this to you right now because I would be an unrecognizable, bloody, pulp lying in a hospital bed in a coma due to brain injuries.”

. . . 

No…no hands have to be used. “Sticks and stones may break your bones…and words can cut a dagger through your heart and spirit…to your death” The more commonly known version of that is pure, genuine, BS. Abuse labels you. Trash. Worthless. Stupid. Ugly. 

You never even have to say the words…it’s only more blatantly obvious when you do.

. . . 

The good, “Christian” woman who wanted to take no responsibility for the ways in which she (had “just verbally”) hurt her loved one, my Father who is still unable to see the irreparable damage he has emotionally inflicted, the family who beat the crap out of their children and cloaked it in religion, the people who stood around our undergrad campus and intimidated and bullied people screaming and shoving bibles and tracks in our faces, the priest who sexually abuses…”My God, please help. People are doing atrocious things…with the label of ‘Christian.‘”

. . .

The problem is that there is a group of loud “Christians” who are judgmental and filled with fear and make biblical “statements” against other, crucifying them on the cross of religion…I will not use “facts” here because the bible is open to interpretation in my opinion. And this group of Christians have made it seem as though if you are not following X set of rules then YOU ARE WRONG; YOU ARE BAD. It’s not that you may be making unwise decisions or that you may be misinformed, but that there is something innately wrong with you.

The bigger problem here is that there is something innately wrong with all of us and to throw judgments on others leaves them wanting to see all Christians meet the rules of X and no one is capable of doing that. 

. . .

The little girl I nanny for cried tonight because she wanted to draw “the champion.” I didn’t at first understand, but with more probing came to find out that she wanted to draw a butterfly precisely the way I had because she had been mocked at school for her drawing and she wanted her butterfly to be “perfect.”

I could not make her understand that there was no such thing as perfect…that we just couldn’t do it…and that her interpretation of a butterfly was just as beautiful as mine.

. . .

Rules…standards…expectations…judgments…I’m overwhelmed thinking of just my own that I want to live up to. We are not one a perfect being. We are not one immune to failure and screwing up.

. . . 

Just saying…if I believe God is love (1 John 4:8), and that the definition of that love is that it is patient and kind, that it is not arrogant or rude or insistent upon it’s own way; that it does not envy or boast, is not resentful; that it endures all things; that it does not insist on it’s own way and doesn’t rejoice with wrong doing but does rejoice with the truth…and that it ultimately, bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things, and never ends…(1 Cor. 13:4-8)…and if I also believe that I will be judged according to that which I judge other people (Matt. 7:1-6)…I would not want to be known for the hate I have stirred, the slanderous words I have cast, the shame I caused within another, or the pain that I thrust upon a stranger.

I want to be known for that incomprehensible, all-encompassing love that is so grand you cannot even fathom.

I’m not saying having morals is wrong. I’m certainly not saying having beliefs is wrong. (In fact, I support them.) I am saying though, that judging others for not sharing in those morals or beliefs is not your job. Love them. Love them so hard they want to know why and how you are able to do so. (::ahem:: –> Jesus.)

. . .

The other week a man made me feel quite small for holding the beliefs that I do. In fact, he told me that he felt sorry for me for believing what I do.

. . .

Regardless of what I believe or the way that I want to live…I never want to make another person feel so stupid, naive, and wrong as this person did me.

. . .

And this is why I sometimes wish that I could be a total lover of Jesus (which I am) without having to be a “Christian.” I don’t want to be shut down before you know me because you’ve encountered a “bad egg” (which is usually just a mal-adapted hurt egg…but that’s for another day).

I want to be that yogi, redheaded, writer girl that just loves so well. That beams out an undefinable spirit of acceptance and joy that you can’t get enough of. That just loves to give hugs, sing, and dance with whoever, whenever…

. . .

If the point of all of this “judgement” or “preaching” is to bring people to Jesus…as a “believer” I can assure you that I am turned away by “my type” who do this. And then I can’t help but wonder, “do you know the same God I do? …because he loves SO big that you just would know you don’t need to do that.”

. . .

Alas, this isn’t a social political piece…just the ramblings of a hurt heart that wants to see beauty, joy, peace, laughter, and happiness for all. I know my source of those things and I don’t want that to be tainted.

I love you all.

And not that this has anything at all to do with what I am writing about above (you will know that it plays into my words simply because of all the reactions that this “argument” causes, but do not lose the intent of my words with this song. My intent of this post is a general idea as a whole…how well are we loving?) …I am kind of hung up on Macklemore these days. And since I never do things in timing with pop culture…I am just discovering my love for this song. It’s beautiful. It doesn’t matter if you agree or not…the root message is pure love. And you can’t argue with pure love.

~~~~~~~~~~~~

“We cultivate love when we allow our most vulnerable and powerful selves to be deeply seen and known, and when we honor the spiritual connection that grows from that offering with trust, respect, kindness and affection.

Love is not something we give or get; it is something that we nurture and grow, a connection that can only be cultivated between two people when it exists within each one of them – we can only love others as much as we love ourselves.

Shame, blame, disrespect, betrayal, and the withholding of affection damage the roots from which love grows. Love can only survive these injuries if they are acknowledged, healed and rare.” 

{Brené Brown}