I've been meeting with a therapist on a pretty consistent basis, and today we were talking about my most recent episode of extreme distress. In talking to her I realized something and I am hoping it helps me in someway to move past this chapter in my life and get back onto my walk with Jesus.
I realized that the incident that happened to me in that parking lot, being ignored at a time when I needed care and compassion, didn't stop there. I was ignored when it happened, I was ignored when I reached out for help to the ONLY person from the church that bothered to call me. I know other leaders and pastors knew what happened and nobody, not one other person, cared enough to call and offer me a kind word, an apology or even to try to make an excuse. THEY ALL IGNORED THE FACT THAT I WAS IGNORED! Does that seem strange to anybody else? If someone had reached out to me, how drastically would my path have changed? Would I have continued to ignore my misgivings and kept going to church, week after week, giving my all, paying my tithe? I don't think I would spend so many weekends at different churches, trying to find one that doesn't remind me of anything there and actually uses the bible, IN CONTEXT, to preach services about Jesus' life, not Eric's life. I certainly don't think I would have ended up going to support groups to deal with the pain and try to understand why it happened. I would not have met so many other people that have all been hurt in many different ways by this "church" of "Christians". I have never personally known any other church that has left such a bloody trail of broken people, with such drastically different stories to tell.
Crossing Church people talk a good talk, show lots of love and care (I believe it is called Love Bombing), constantly promote themselves as people that truly care about broken people, but now that my vision has cleared, I realize I should have never believed the hype. If something seems to good to be true, it probably is. From what I have learned on my journey; lots of reading, therapy, support groups, etc., many of these people are moving from their alcohol and drug addictions right into a religious addiction. If you spend all of your spare time serving the church, how do you have time to feed your addiction? Instant sobriety or something far more sinister? Eric Dystra is the all new drug.
Defend Eric all you want, I'll stick with Jesus, thank you very much.
Jen
