Hännah Ettinger blogs, tweets, is the founding publisher of The Swan Children Magazine, and dishes feminist critique of YA novels over at The YA Wallpaper.
Christian church culture is notoriously careless about protecting victims of child abuse, and this week, I was appalled to discover that Christianity Today’s imprint publication, Leadership Journal, ran a first-person piece where a child sex offender/former pastor narrated his internal thought process as he went from youth pastor to felon. A few years into my marriage and ministry I began to believe a lie. The realities of parenthood and marriage were sinking in, and I felt unappreciated at home. From my perspective, I was excelling at work and at home — and this perceived lack of appreciation led me to believe I deserved more. The first big problem (besides the part where he essentially says it was his wife who drove him to this, which is next door to saying he didn’t have a choice in the matter) is that he never really seems to get that what he did to this minor was rape. Instead, he swaddles the entire story in Christianese, using it to distance himself from his actions and make the whole situation sound… normal. As if it were, at worst, an affair. Just look at the very next paragraph: Read more
It’s a pretty common tradition among celebrities to observe a downward spiral in their public reputations by getting some religion. So when we learn that Justin Bieber got baptized last month (in a bathtub, apparently for privacy reasons?), questions are naturally raised about the sincerity of his faith. This news follows the release of old videos in which he used racist slurs. Coincidence? Probably not. Read more
The same week that Laverne Cox made history as the first transgender cover girl, the Southern Baptist Convention affirmed: … God’s good design that gender identity is determined by biological sex and not by one’s self-perception. The SBC went on to say that transgender people should “trust in Christ and… experience renewal in the Gospel.” Read more
Last week another “church survivors” blog got started. This time it’s about Mars Hill, and the stories are so familiar to me. In 2007, another similar blog got started, called SGM Survivors, and on June 9th a second civil suit is being opened in court against the parachurch ministry. When SGM Survivors first got started, I read everything, ravenous to discover that I wasn’t alone in my cognitive dissonance in what the church taught and what I was experiencing there as a member. I suspect that there are many in Mars Hill churches who will be contributing to this new We Love Mars Hill blog with their stories. Perhaps discovering that their experiences with spiritual abuse there are common will be the sea change for many bound in bondage to abusive religious leaders (like Mark Driscoll, below) to start asking hard questions and begin to leave. Read more
