Abusive relationships and the church

There are some in my newly-adopted Episcopal Church who accuse the wider church of persecuting them, of forcing a liberal, un-Biblical interpretation of sexuality down their throats and of silencing them when they try to speak. They are having delusions of persecution. Additionally, just because it's Biblical doesn't make it right. Lot, as we know, is the only righteous person in Sodom and is visited by angels. The people of Sodom surround his house, and demand that the angels be brought out to that they may rape the angels. Lot protests, and offers his daughters instead. God is said to incinerate Sodom as a result. But God (presumably) doesn't condone violence against women; why didn't God at least reprimand Lot? If I were in the mood to incinerate Sodom, I would have, as a result of that incident, incinerated Lot along with the rest of the city.

One fellow blogger I've read accused conservatives in TEC of being abusive toward the wider church (http://wildernessgarden.blogspot.com/2006/10/thing-that-has-helped-me-most-in.html). Her thesis:

Here are the warning signs:
· Abusers use emotional abuse. They put you down in many ways, make you feel bad about yourself, call you names, try to make you think you’re “crazy, play mind games, humiliate you and make you feel guilty.
· Abusers use coercion and threats. They make or carry out threats to do something to hurt you. They threaten to leave you, to commit suicide or to report you to authorities without cause. They make you drop charges. They make you do illegal things.
· Abusers use economic abuse. They take your money. They refuse to give you money. They prevent you from getting a job. They make you ask for money. They won’t let you know about the family money or let you have access to the family income.
· Abusers use gender privilege. They treat you like a servant. They make all the big decisions. They act like “master of the castle.” They define “men’s” and “women’s” roles.
· Abusers use intimidation. They make you afraid by using looks, gestures and actions. They smash things. They abuse pets. They display weapons.
· Abusers use the children. They make you feel guilty about the children. They use the children to relay messages. They use visitation to harass you. They threaten to take the children away from you.
· Abusers use isolation. They control what you do, whom you see and talk to, what you read and where you go. They limit your outside involvement. They use jealousy to justify actions.
· Abusers minimize, deny, blame. They make light of the abuse. They don’t take your concern seriously. They say the abuse didn’t happen. They shift responsibility for abusive behavior to you.

This list could well be a strategy memo for those conservatives who are determined to wreck the Episcopal Church and/or to replace it with their own “purified” NeoPuritan version.
One can go down the list and check it off.
Uses emotional abuse and calls you names? Try “pagan” and “revisionist” and “heretic.”
Tries to make you feel guilty? Try claiming that Christians are being killed in majority Muslim countries because TEC elected and confirmed an honestly gay man.
Plays mind games? Try claiming that Lambeth resolutions have the power of laws, or that TEC has been “kicked out of” the Anglican Communion, or that the Windsor Report is some kind of judgment from on high against us.
Uses coercion and threats? Try threats of leaving, again and again and again and again.
Uses economic abuse. Try withholding money from the national church.
Uses gender privilege. Surely I don’t have to explain this one.
You do it. Go down the list and see what you come up with.
So. Once it is determined someone is in an abusive relationship, what happens next?
The number one thing to do is GET AWAY FROM YOUR ABUSER.


I disagree with her thesis. Those who are trying to tear my newly-adopted church to pieces may be behaving badly, but they are in the minority. We do not have to suffer their idiocy. In fact, we have power over them. We have the power of being recognized as the Anglican franchise in the US, former US territories, and other churches affiliated with the Episcopal Church. In addition, those who have left have had to leave their churches and property behind; the buildings are generally recognized by law as property of the diocese held in trust for the congregation. And even if Canterbury invites the pro-schismatics to Lambeth and leaves the rest of us behind, we still have considerable moral standing among those who belive that we should include the LGBT community in our attempts to live in God's love.

No, the correct parallel of an abusive relationship is this. LGBT Christians, some closeted, some not, are in abusive relationships with the broader, catholic church (NOT specifically the Roman Catholic Church). My thesis is as follows.

Emotional abuse: homphobic pastors call gay people depraved or objectively disordered. They insist that you're on a path to hell if you "choose" a "lifestyle" that includes loving someone of the same gender or displaying a variant gender identity. They threaten expulsion from church. They promote "reparative" therapy to change sexual orientation.

Gender privilege: Gender privilege is specific to abusive interpersonal relationships where the abuser is male and the abused is female. But, the church claims to have a hold, usually exclusive of all others, on eternal truths. Homophobic churches claim that the fact that homosexuality is a disorder is eternal truth.

Intimidation: threatening people with eternal damnation can reasonably be described as intimidation.

Use of children: homophobic Christians tell gay Christians that they're destroying the family, and they warn us that those gays are out to recruit children.

Use of isolation: can't think of a specific example right now ... would anyone care to post one in the comments?

Minimizing the situation: homophobic Christians pick verses from the Bible to justify their prejudices. Given that some verses condone violence against gays (mainly Leviticus, which prescribes stoning), a minority still find the use of murderous violence justified. To their credit, many conservative Christians have condemned violence against the LGBT community. But, when you use such phrases as "depraved" (Southern Baptist Convention, 1987) and "objectively disordered" (Roman Catholic Church), you legitimate violence.