"But most of all I am the one who got up from the altar and walked away, determined never to let anyone tie me down again." Oh my god, what a powerful (and resonant) declaration of autonomy!
DL, this is beautiful and heartbreaking and necessary. Thank you for being your authentic, kaleidoscopic self and choosing to share. Your words remind me of Hamilton (haha, v millennial), "And when my prayers to God were met with indifference / I picked up a pen, I wrote my own deliverance." I think about that a lot, on this road of healing.
I resonate so hard both with the feeling that I grew up to be everything my parents hoped I wouldn't be and also with feeling like the more closely I tried to follow Jesus the more my actions strayed from my parents approval. I wrote a poem a couple years ago about this Bible story while struggling with my feelings about how I was asked to sacrifice my wellbeing for the good of my family. Hope it’s ok to share.
I never told you this
but I prayed to hate you
I asked god to make my heart hard
Every time I dragged myself off the sacrificial altar
I’d petition anew,
“Don’t let me do this again, don’t ask me to do this again.”
what I should’ve asked for were boundaries
Because I don’t want a hard heart
I love my soft heart
this strange little thing that kept on loving you
despite everything
Do you think when god asked Abraham to kill his son
they were hoping that Abraham would be ready for the next step in the way of love?
To know, without a divine arbiter
that to harm his child was wrong
He didn’t need to prove his obedience to divine authority
he needed to prove his obedience to love
For what is god if not love
What if Abraham had never put his son on the altar
never lifted the blade
what if he could’ve known already
that sacrifice without purpose is cruelty
the way of love is choice
the way of love is protection
but maybe that’s something a god can’t teach
if they spell out every option is it truly free will?
Wow. I appreciate what it takes to write this down and put it out into the world.
When you said "To understand, at a cellular level, that this is what God wanted from your parents: devotion, even at the cost of familial love," I remembered sitting next to a man on an 8 hour flight a couple months ago, and he was reading a book about being a godly man. One section was about how evangelism is the most important thing, and if believing the right stuff and saying the right stuff and focusing on saving souls costs you your beloved spouse or your kids, so be it. I wanted to scream at him "no don't do it!!!!" but instead I just cried in the airplane bathroom.
I have a poem saved on my phone by Nikki Mayeux - What Really Happened Up On The Mountain
What they don't tell you about that story
is that Abraham tied a slipknot,
and when he leaned over to kiss his son goodbye,
knife behind his back, he whispered: run.
And when Isaac looked back
he saw his father swallowed up in flame,
a burnt offering on the altar
of love.
[I resonate with being the one set up into position with the knife but deciding to set my children free, even though parts of my life burn up in the process.]
I am so thankful for you and I celebrate you today! My parents weren't religious at all but I did wander into a mega in my first year of sobriety and experienced all of this doctrine and teaching for the first time. This really hit me in the heart because it is exactly how I felt about trying to please the pastors and publishers of my past:
"I would have kept my hair long. I would have kept trying to follow Jesus perfectly. I would have kept pleading with my mother and my father to care about others. I would have absorbed the pain of the world, the pain of the hierarchy, the pain of the patriarchy, the pain of white Christian supremacy in my bones and nervous system until the very day I died. A martyr for the cause, a sacrifice for the greater good, a good Christian daughter until the very end. I would have kept making myself small and miserable and unable to experience joy and pleasure and the present, if it meant I could make my father proud of me."
Thankful to be out of that and remembering the beauty of my childhood as I parent my kids. Thank you again, D.L. - we are better because you're here.
D.L., I feel such a kinship with you. The things you write resonate with me powerfully. They strengthen me, help me keep going. I love knowing I live in the same world as someone with the deep and powerful courage it takes to admit a terrifying and enraging truth to themself, to admit to themself that NO. No, in fact, they do not love this god. Actually, they recoil at the idea of a deity who, in demanding parents inflict suffering on themselves and on their helpless children (and what is sacrifice other than some infliction of, and bearing of, suffering) in order to prove their devotion to it, shows itself to be ***bloodthirsty.*** That is what it is your parents were worshiping. Not God, but their interpretation of who or what "God" is. What does it tell us about a person to know that that person worships a bloodthirsty god? Your parents' behavior reflects on them, not you, even if every cell in your body is convinced otherwise, still. According to me, a random stranger using the internet, who am no one, nothing, and nowhere, you are worthy. You are beautiful. You are you and endless. Thank you for waking up to your infinitude, and getting up off the altar and walking away. I cherish you.
I’m floored by this. So painfully expressed and so painfully true. What extraordinary strength and courage lies in all of us who walk away, but especially our LGBTQ+ friends.
Oof. A lot of feelings and echoes in this one. Thank you for sharing your voice (I heard a few really standing strong!!) and making a place for belonging.
This is beautifully written! Thanks for the insights into your experience.
I didn’t grow up in a high control religious environment, but this did make me think about the parallels of growing up in the high control environment of conventional schooling and generally the way children grow without agency.
Thank you for the opportunity to accompany you in this amazing year of transformation and liberation. I’m sure I’m not the only one who’s been inspired by your journey to undertake a fresh examination of our own lives, and begin to find our own joy of self-discovery.
After writing seven pages in my journal as I read this, I am nearly speechless. There is so much here. It is so good to not be alone. I am strengthened a bit more every time I read one of your essays.
"But most of all I am the one who got up from the altar and walked away, determined never to let anyone tie me down again." Oh my god, what a powerful (and resonant) declaration of autonomy!
DL, this is beautiful and heartbreaking and necessary. Thank you for being your authentic, kaleidoscopic self and choosing to share. Your words remind me of Hamilton (haha, v millennial), "And when my prayers to God were met with indifference / I picked up a pen, I wrote my own deliverance." I think about that a lot, on this road of healing.
I think about the line "I wrote my way out" all the time!!!
I resonate so hard both with the feeling that I grew up to be everything my parents hoped I wouldn't be and also with feeling like the more closely I tried to follow Jesus the more my actions strayed from my parents approval. I wrote a poem a couple years ago about this Bible story while struggling with my feelings about how I was asked to sacrifice my wellbeing for the good of my family. Hope it’s ok to share.
I never told you this
but I prayed to hate you
I asked god to make my heart hard
Every time I dragged myself off the sacrificial altar
I’d petition anew,
“Don’t let me do this again, don’t ask me to do this again.”
what I should’ve asked for were boundaries
Because I don’t want a hard heart
I love my soft heart
this strange little thing that kept on loving you
despite everything
Do you think when god asked Abraham to kill his son
they were hoping that Abraham would be ready for the next step in the way of love?
To know, without a divine arbiter
that to harm his child was wrong
He didn’t need to prove his obedience to divine authority
he needed to prove his obedience to love
For what is god if not love
What if Abraham had never put his son on the altar
never lifted the blade
what if he could’ve known already
that sacrifice without purpose is cruelty
the way of love is choice
the way of love is protection
but maybe that’s something a god can’t teach
if they spell out every option is it truly free will?
Or do we need to be able to choose love
to know it when we see it
and know when it’s time to stop sacrificing
Oh Bex, this is so beautiful and heartbreaking. Thank you so much for sharing it here.
You’re welcome and thank you for the work you are doing both here and on Strongwilled that is a welcome restorative through this season.
Wow. I appreciate what it takes to write this down and put it out into the world.
When you said "To understand, at a cellular level, that this is what God wanted from your parents: devotion, even at the cost of familial love," I remembered sitting next to a man on an 8 hour flight a couple months ago, and he was reading a book about being a godly man. One section was about how evangelism is the most important thing, and if believing the right stuff and saying the right stuff and focusing on saving souls costs you your beloved spouse or your kids, so be it. I wanted to scream at him "no don't do it!!!!" but instead I just cried in the airplane bathroom.
I have a poem saved on my phone by Nikki Mayeux - What Really Happened Up On The Mountain
What they don't tell you about that story
is that Abraham tied a slipknot,
and when he leaned over to kiss his son goodbye,
knife behind his back, he whispered: run.
And when Isaac looked back
he saw his father swallowed up in flame,
a burnt offering on the altar
of love.
[I resonate with being the one set up into position with the knife but deciding to set my children free, even though parts of my life burn up in the process.]
Whoa this poem!!!! Thank you so much for sharing it.
I know what it's like to wish you could be something you aren't anymore, and never really were. 💐
I am so thankful for you and I celebrate you today! My parents weren't religious at all but I did wander into a mega in my first year of sobriety and experienced all of this doctrine and teaching for the first time. This really hit me in the heart because it is exactly how I felt about trying to please the pastors and publishers of my past:
"I would have kept my hair long. I would have kept trying to follow Jesus perfectly. I would have kept pleading with my mother and my father to care about others. I would have absorbed the pain of the world, the pain of the hierarchy, the pain of the patriarchy, the pain of white Christian supremacy in my bones and nervous system until the very day I died. A martyr for the cause, a sacrifice for the greater good, a good Christian daughter until the very end. I would have kept making myself small and miserable and unable to experience joy and pleasure and the present, if it meant I could make my father proud of me."
Thankful to be out of that and remembering the beauty of my childhood as I parent my kids. Thank you again, D.L. - we are better because you're here.
Thank you so much for your words of encouragement Ashley. It means so much.
D.L., I feel such a kinship with you. The things you write resonate with me powerfully. They strengthen me, help me keep going. I love knowing I live in the same world as someone with the deep and powerful courage it takes to admit a terrifying and enraging truth to themself, to admit to themself that NO. No, in fact, they do not love this god. Actually, they recoil at the idea of a deity who, in demanding parents inflict suffering on themselves and on their helpless children (and what is sacrifice other than some infliction of, and bearing of, suffering) in order to prove their devotion to it, shows itself to be ***bloodthirsty.*** That is what it is your parents were worshiping. Not God, but their interpretation of who or what "God" is. What does it tell us about a person to know that that person worships a bloodthirsty god? Your parents' behavior reflects on them, not you, even if every cell in your body is convinced otherwise, still. According to me, a random stranger using the internet, who am no one, nothing, and nowhere, you are worthy. You are beautiful. You are you and endless. Thank you for waking up to your infinitude, and getting up off the altar and walking away. I cherish you.
Thank you so much for taking the time out of your day to write such beautiful and encouraging things!
I’m floored by this. So painfully expressed and so painfully true. What extraordinary strength and courage lies in all of us who walk away, but especially our LGBTQ+ friends.
god, D.L., this is so good, and I'm so fucking sorry.
Oof. A lot of feelings and echoes in this one. Thank you for sharing your voice (I heard a few really standing strong!!) and making a place for belonging.
Ah, man. Thank you 🙏
This is beautifully written! Thanks for the insights into your experience.
I didn’t grow up in a high control religious environment, but this did make me think about the parallels of growing up in the high control environment of conventional schooling and generally the way children grow without agency.
Thank you for the opportunity to accompany you in this amazing year of transformation and liberation. I’m sure I’m not the only one who’s been inspired by your journey to undertake a fresh examination of our own lives, and begin to find our own joy of self-discovery.
thanks so much for sharing this
DL, thank you. I am grieving with you, and also so damn proud of the way you live your life. I draw courage from your story.
After writing seven pages in my journal as I read this, I am nearly speechless. There is so much here. It is so good to not be alone. I am strengthened a bit more every time I read one of your essays.
I'm so glad you could write in your journal and process some of this heavy shit!
You made me laugh with that comment! Someday, I’ll be able to say the s word. It’s a worthy goal!😂