It Wasn’t “God.” It was Spiritual Abuse.

If you’ve been hurt by the church, struggled to trust God again, or felt confused about what’s true… you are not alone.

In this powerful conversation, trauma therapist Tabitha Westbrook sits down with Rachel Clinton Chen from The Allender Center to unpack:

🚩 What spiritual abuse actually is (and why it’s so hard to name)
🚩 How abuse distorts your view of God, yourself, and relationships
🚩 Why so many people feel like they’re “losing their faith” after church harm
🚩 The role of power, fear, and control inside unhealthy church systems
🚩 How to begin healing, disentangling, and rebuilding a resilient faith

This isn’t about walking away from faith entirely, it’s about reclaiming what was distorted—and finding something real, whole, and life-giving again.

📚 Resources Mentioned
👉 Spiritual Abuse & Healing Course (Allender Center) - https://theallendercenter.org/offerings/online-courses/spiritual-abuse-and-healing/
👉 Learn more + resources: https://theallendercenter.org

🎧  If this resonated with you, please like, subscribe, and share to help others who need this information!

At The Journey and The Process we strive to help you heal. Our therapists are trauma specialists who use evidence-based tools like EMDR, Brainspotting, Somatic Experiencing, and Internal Family Systems to help you heal - mind, soul, and body. Reach out today to start your healing journey. https://thejourneyandtheprocess.com/

 This book is for every Christian woman who has been harmed sexually, whether that happened in childhood, adulthood, or even within your coercive controlling marriage, and you're longing to feel safe in your body again. We talk about the hard stuff, shame, desire, faith, and even questions like, is this sin or is this trauma?

You don't have to untangle it alone. Body & Soul, Healed & Whole is for you. Get a copy here today - https://a.co/d/8Jo3Z4V

👍 If this episode resonated with you, please like, subscribe, and share to help others who need this information!

📖 Order Body & Soul, Healed & Whole: An Invitational Guide to Healthy Sexuality After Trauma, Abuse, and Coercive Control

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📩 Connect with Tabitha & The Journey and The Process:
💻 Tabitha's Website - www.tabithawestbrook.com
📲 Tabitha's Instagram - www.instagram.com/tabithathecounselor
🎙️ Podcast Homepage - https://heytabi.buzzsprout.com

💻 The Journey & The Process Website - www.thejourneyandtheprocess.com

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🚨 Disclaimer: This podcast is not therapy and is intended for educational purposes only. If you're in crisis or need therapy, please reach out to a licensed mental health professional.

Need to know how to find a great therapist? Read this blog post here.

Transcript

Welcome And Purpose Of Show

SPEAKER_02 0:39

Welcome to Hey Tabby, the podcast where we talk about the hard things out loud with our actual lips. We'll cover all kinds of topics across the mental health spectrum, including how it intersects with the Christian faith. Nothing is off limits here, and we are not take two verses and call me in the morning. I'm Tabitha Westbrook, and I'm a licensed trauma therapist, but I'm not your trauma therapist. I'm an expert in domestic abuse and coercive control and how complex trauma impacts our health and well-being. Our focus here is knowledge and healing. Trauma doesn't have to eat your lunch forever. There is hope. Now, let's get going. Welcome to this week's episode of Hey Tabby. I am so excited to be here with someone I hold in very high regard. I have been under her teaching. I have listened to her heart and her thought, and I'm just really excited to get a chance to introduce you to her if you don't know her and to chat with her. Her name is Rachel Clinton Chen, and she has a master of divinity. She is a formative voice in the movement toward healing from spiritual abuse. And you guys know we care about that here so much. As a trauma care practitioner and pastoral leader, she weaves together theology, psychology, and story to accompany individuals and communities toward a kind of wholeness and resilient faith that tells the truth and pursues repair. Oh, yes. She serves as a lead instructor for the Allender Center at the Seattle School and is the co-host of the Allender Center podcast with Dr. Dan Allender. Rachel is a stormborn woman of the Oklahoma Pains and received a Bachelor of Arts and Religion from Oklahoma Baptist University. She holds her Masters of Divinity from the Seattle School of Theology and Psychology, and she recently had the honor of being named by the Sojourners as one of nine Christian women shaping the church in 2024. That is a huge honor. Rachel's devoted to addressing the harm of abuse, especially spiritual abuse, at the intersection of trauma, healing, embodiment, and spiritual formation. She leads a story workshop for spiritual abuse and healing and recently developed the Allender Center's Spiritual Abuse and Healing online course, inviting survivors of spiritual abuse to journey together toward healing and reclamation. Rachel is a contemplative, charismatic, and unapologetic Jesus follower, surrendered to the do justice, love mercy, walk humbly kind of life. She's a tea drinker, an avid sports fan, and a karaoke aficionado, as one should be. She lives in Philadelphia with her husband, Reverend Dr. Michael S. Chen, two beloved stepsons, Jameson and Silas, and her beloved daughter, Evie Rachel. Welcome. I'm so excited to have you here.

SPEAKER_00 3:22

Aw thank you for having me. And I'm just so looking forward to being in conversation with you.

SPEAKER_02 3:28

Yes. I I think your bio is one of the most embodied bios I have ever read. And I love it so much. I think that is like it just it it paints this gentle invitational picture. And I think that that is phenomenal. So amen to that.

SPEAKER_00 3:48

Thank you. Right, as you know, writing a bio is actually really hard. And it's been through many iterations. And I struggle with it because I have to take myself, you have to take yourself seriously when you write a bio, which is sometimes for me really hard to do. Like in the sense of like you have to like talk about what you do in a way that honors the work you've done. But I'm also like, I'm really just a human. Yes. So they kind of I have to be brave when people read my bio. So thank you for saying it's embodied. That means a lot.

Storms As A Life Metaphor

SPEAKER_02 4:28

Yes. I think my favorite line is a stormborn woman because that says so much in just two words. And I think that it encapsulates the like the difficulty and the beauty of entering into this world. Like it just says to me so much about who you are and the deep thoughts. Like I didn't have to know you were comp contemplative till we, you know, before we got to the contemplative through those words, which I think are so helpful for people. Because I don't think we think about how we came into this world.

SPEAKER_00 5:07

Yeah. No, not often. And that word for me, yeah, you're right. I'm not typically known for being poetic. I'm definitely more of a prose person. My husband is very poetic. So, like, even like our wedding ceremony was hilarious. His vows were like two minutes, mine were like 15. Ever. Stormborne is a word that, yeah, for me captures both a very literal, I grew up on the plains of Oklahoma, and it is just a storm borne in every sense of the word, like geographical location. Um, it's a convergence zone of lot, and that's where you get storms. It's a convergence zone. But um, but it also for me, yeah, I think captured so well some of the energy of my home and what it was like to like learn to navigate a world where there just were a lot of storms and to need to become a storm watcher, um, both literally and metaphorically speaking. So yeah.

SPEAKER_01 6:04

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 6:05

Dude, there's some depth right there. Holy cow! Like, I am thinking about that. So I'm sitting in a place that is pretty stormy, and I just got a text from my son saying, like, hey, mom, you might want to check the weather because I am in my van today. And he's like, they're talking about baseball size tail for your location. You might want to just have a heads up on that. And I think about that, right? That convergence, that storminess, that, you know, all of those things. And and that is so shaping, particularly for women in Christianity and in the church. Like oftentimes there are storms. We may not name them as such, but they are what they are. And being a storm watcher, that says to me, right. So there's there's the there are two words I love. One is discernment and one is hypervigilance. And they feel the same in the body. And hypervigilance can also be discernment when you have seen harm. So if you're watching the sky essentially, and looking at the storms, you're gonna notice the cloud patterns, you're gonna notice how things come together, and there's gonna be something in you that goes, This might not be where I want to stay. Like I might want to move or I need to do something different or get undercover or whatever. And so I think that's such an interesting analogy for all of life.

SPEAKER_00 7:28

Absolutely. And I'm just gonna say as a side note, if you see green clouds out there that look like uh like cotton candy on the bottom, you need to get on move on.

SPEAKER_02 7:37

Yep, do not stay there. And if the tornado, if the tornado doesn't look like it's moving, that means it's headed straight at you, and you definitely should get undercover.

SPEAKER_00 7:47

Oh my goodness. But uh, yeah, as a metaphor for life for sure. Um, I mean, we're in a very stormy season in our country right now that is certainly connected to the church and to theological and spiritual imagination. And even no matter where you locate yourself in that storm, we feel the like kind of fever pitch of the way a storm builds and just how destructive or how fragmenting it can be. So absolutely, I think it my guess is a lot of people know that feeling, even if they didn't grow up in stormy areas. They know that feeling of like watching something build and knowing that you need to know the nuances of it to stay safe. Um, yeah. Yeah.

How Rachel Named Spiritual Abuse

SPEAKER_02 10:09

For sure. So tell me, you know, I've known who you were for a while through your work through the Allender Center. And I want to say it's maybe the last three years I've heard you talk more about spiritual abuse. So tell me how you got there. I mean, we all know how we all get those kinds of places, but like, tell me how it became a public ministry, like, you know, your experiences and then how did we get to having a course on it?

SPEAKER_00 10:39

Yeah, it's a great question. And one that I'm like, yeah, if you had told me even a decade ago, you're gonna be talking a lot about spiritual abuse. I would have been like, what? Like, first of all, I get it, like spiritual abuse, but like me, why? Um, you know, it for me, it really started. I was before I became the co-host on the podcast, I would be a regular guest with Dan, mostly because I was available and in the building. And at the time, we were just recording on like a tiny little recording device and then giving it to the team, like we weren't in a platform like this. And he asked me to join him in a podcast on spiritual abuse. And I remember thinking, sure, like I feel like I probably have something to contribute to that. I would have described myself as someone who loved working with, in some ways, like doing trauma healing work with people who would say they've been harmed by bad shepherds or because of their abuse, maybe had been felt like they were cut off from God. Like they're just, I'm a pastor by orientation. It's just who I am. Again, we can talk about I grew up in this other Baptist tradition, so that wasn't allowed. And I was not someone who would have said that's what I wanted to be growing up. It's just all of my gifts are shepherding gifts, like they just are. And so I loved shepherding people who needed to know that they could still have access to a good shepherd. Um, I would have said, Oh, yeah, I probably have experienced some abuse in a church setting. I grew up in fundamentalism. But I would have even said, I have clergy abuse, you know, but like spiritual abuse just felt like, I don't know what this is. We get into the conversation. I'm talking about being a teenager set up in relationship with one of my youth leaders. I'm thinking about the impact of that particular church we are a part of was very fundamentalist. It was probably the most extreme fundamentalism I had been exposed to. It was a Southern Baptist church that honestly did not feel Southern Baptist in polity or practice. Um, like it had an elder board. And if you know anything about Southern Baptist polity, like there's not like it, there's just it just functions differently. Um, and it was like one of those lightning strike moments, you know, where, and it's funny to be someone doing story work, immersed in trauma and abuse work, and you have kind of an aha moment of like, oh my God, like I care about these things not just because I'm a pastor, but because this is my story. Like, this is I've survived spiritual abuse. How have I survived spiritual? How did I come out of this with uh the kind of grace to have not only a faith that feels much more complex but intact, but also an entire education path that kept opening doors and windows for me to be able to ask hard questions and to like deconstruct, so to speak, some of the fundamentalism in a way that I could actually like lead into a more life-giving faith. And so there was that was 2018. And I mean, you would laugh. I laugh looking now. So, like in my end of program, I had to do like an integrative project. And what did yours? And it had to kind of be like some of your heart's deepest theological questions converging with your vocational hopes. One of those, like very, I don't know, um, idealistic questions that someone like me was tortured over. Because I'm like, oh my God, I gotta like do my life's work in this 25-page paper. But I wrote about atonement, how atonement theories collide with domestic violence and can be problematic when they are like how we determine what it means to like follow after God into love. And, you know, so just looking back, I can see like, oh, very clearly, I was in these waters of like where spiritual abuse is really harming our attachment to God and really disordering our what I would call like spiritual imagination. Certainly, both those things could feel like they're outside of our body, but they're so deeply, deeply embodied. Um, and so really I felt this kind of like clarity in some ways, like this vocational clarity that I wanted to help give language and find my conversation partners to have playmates around a very particular type of harm that can feel like elusive, or the way I think about it, like it can feel like trying to define it can feel like water going through a colander. And yet, if you start to name the impact of it, it's so abundantly explicitly clear. Um, and so that's how we got to, you know, I wanted to create something like an online course. I did not want to write a book because I'm just very much wrestling with writing in general. Um, and I wanted to play with playmates, you know. So it was kind of like I wanted to co-create something. And I feel like with spiritual abuse, it's really important to hear from a multitude of voices and perspectives. And so we thought, let's create this course. And and we we had sense this was before before Christian nationalism was going to take main stage in our in our experience of seeing kind of what I think are like really the foundations of any form of spiritual abuse, at least in Christianity, that fusion with power, right? Because spiritual abuse is so much about a misuse of power and distortion of the truth and like utilizing fear and weaponizing shame. And so we tried to make it really evergreen in the sense that it wasn't going to get into particularities, but would help give people a framework to feel less insane and to actually understand grooming and gaslighting and again the weaponization of violent things to kind of control and coerce and violate.

Power Misuse And Ministry Coverups

SPEAKER_02 16:55

So yeah, absolutely. And I think we don't there's a fear in my estimation, just in my observation in the work that I do, of naming it because it's almost like you're speaking against God, which is one of the worst underpinnings of spiritual abuse, is you know, the men and women who are the abusers in this case are speaking as if they are speaking for God. And so if you love the Lord and you love the church, it can feel really tricky to start naming harmful systems and harmful theology and things that are actually outside the word of God, to be honest. I know I've had this conversation with a number of people of just like, well, do you hate the church? And the my answer to that is I absolutely don't. I love the church. I think that's why it bothers me.

SPEAKER_01 17:45

Right.

SPEAKER_02 17:45

Because I want it to be the place it's meant to be. I want it to be safe. And if I don't call out problematic power, then I don't feel like I'm being a good Berean and seeing if these things are so, like Paul talked about in the New Testament.

SPEAKER_00 18:01

Well, and spiritual abuse is not new, it's not a new phenomenon. It might be a new language for naming something because we have this kind of growing body of like understanding the impact of abuse and understanding trauma and and how it shapes us. But this is what the prophets are addressing all throughout the Hebrew scriptures, the Old Testament, when they're talking about the priests and the and bad shepherds, and talking about the leaders and of the people of God exploiting, of abusing power, of like, you know, being greedy, of withholding care from the vulnerable. So it's it's not really something, it's like a tale as old as time. Um, we just happen to be in a moment where we're witnessing, actually think, more like apocalyptic, meaning like unveiling revelation of where some of this has, like where the Christian church, especially in the US, has kind of married itself to imperial power. And we think we can kind of wield imperial power towards our, towards like goodness, but like that kind of worldly power that is built on the exploitation of people is going to corrupt. And so it's not surprising to me that we're seeing pastor after pastor, denomination after denomination, reckoning with abuse of people and like systems and structures that are being exposed. I mean, how many like very famous pastors and like ministry leaders have we seen be exposed as sexual predators or as people who exploited the women and children in their midst? And yeah, it's very disturbing, it's very disheartening, it's very agonizing and horrific. And yet, if we actually understood kind of some of what's in the water, it would be like, yeah, the system is setting itself up toward this kind of harm. So when you, you know, it's like when I'm working with folks who have known really profound harm by maybe a spiritual leader or a certain ministry, and what they're told when out of their good faith and believing that ministry wants to become better, wants to grow in wholeness and repair, when they're told you can't, you need to forgive. And we basically need to sweep this under the rug because you'll harm the ministry. It's like, oh yeah, like we don't actually believe our gospel story. We're much more concerned with covering things up, protecting powerful people, and like really letting fear lead the day. And I think that that's really tragic because the most vulnerable people, then it's like what Jesus said, like, woe to you who heap heavy burdens on already burdened people and do nothing to lift them. Like the the most harsh words Jesus has for any group of people are certainly towards spiritual leaders who abuse power. Yes, I take that very seriously, like very seriously, you know, like that brings a certain kind of humility. It should, a kind of fear and trembling that we need to take the because I don't think power is intrinsically in and of itself evil. It's what we do with it and how we use it to dehumanize others. So I mean, the Holy Spirit is like filling us with power. Like power can be a really good, beautiful thing when it's leveraged towards being Christ-like. Yes.

Why Lament Matters For Healing

SPEAKER_02 22:00

Absolutely. And I think too, not only is there the problem of fear in the body of Christ, you know, fear of what if all these people start sinning and just are given over to licentiousness. And, you know, those are things I've heard pastors say, and I'm like, that's interesting, because if you're indulged by the Holy Spirit being changed from glory to glory to be like God, then that's less of a concern. So discipleship becomes really important. But there's also a lack of grief, right? There's what do you do when someone that you loved and served with for 20 years is shown to be a sexual predator? That happened very recently in a story that I know about from a church in North Carolina. And it's very disorienting. And so if you're on the elder border, if you're, you know, in the leadership construct with that, like I can see the temptation to just shove it under the rug because of what's happening in you, you know, and it's like, well, this isn't representative of the ministry. It is representative sometimes of the system that people don't realize is at play. But like I think not being able to enter into grief and then have the introspection of that grief can also be part of the issue. So fear of losing what you have, especially when it's vocational for you, and the inability to grieve and lament well.

SPEAKER_00 23:20

Yeah, well, and that's you're right on because grief and lament you are rarely present in fundamentalist systems, whether that fundamentalism is on the right or the left, right? Like, because there's not room for it. Grief opens us up to vulnerability and it opens us up to honor the harm and to let the full weight of the harm be given expression. It opens us up to transformation and a deeper kind of, I would say, collective repentance of like, how is it that we got here? It's a lot easier to scapegoat people, to scapegoat survivors, to scapegoat, even a system than to actually enter with honor the heartache and and the anger. You know, lament is such a marriage of grief and anger, protest and sorrow of just naming like this is not what we're meant for. This is not how and who we're meant to be. And it makes me think of I guess Andre Henry. He's kind of a I would say like a more justice oriented person in some of the circles I listen to, but he always says it doesn't have to be this way. And that phrase like it doesn't have to be this way. Yeah, I I so few of us have experiences where like lament and grief has been a space made available to us in the wake of relational loss, in the wake of yeah, perpetration of harm of the loss of mentors and heroes and people that we looked up to and the loss of relationship that comes when what this brings to a community of people. So yeah, I think lament is a huge and it's you know I say this to people a lot. I've heard Dan say this a lot. Like lamentation lament grief even rage at times is actually so present in our biblical text as like appropriate expressions to bring to God and to bring collectively in community. But I think when when we have created an image of God where our job is to make God look good, therefore can't ever be sad or greed because that would be somehow expressing that like God failed or God's a disappointment and instead we really rob ourselves and other people of opportunities for comfort and again for like a kind of change that we're also meant for. And that God is certainly big enough to handle and understands and I think even joins us in. Yes.

SPEAKER_02 26:03

I think if we look at scripture as as kind of the plumb line and the benchmark we see him not shy away from the hard and from the messy and from the mistakes of humankind and the effects of sin on the world. Like he's he's right there with all of it, you know? And when we push away from that, we're actually pushing away from the goodness of God. You know, I think of the Psalms of ascent as you know the Israelites were coming back into the land and and the lament the people don't realize a lot of times unless they've listened to this podcast or listened to you that a lot of the Psalms are psalms of lament and that you know that is intentional. We I mean we all can go yes there's an entire book called Lamentations you should go read it but also the Psalms the things that we turn to often when our hearts are dregulated and struggling and all of that that's because they're such an honest expression. And one of my favorite psalms this is going to trip some people out is Psalm 88 it doesn't have a happy ending. And I love that we have that example because they that psalmist never got to end things are going to be fine. They just got to it's terrible and they and I don't like it. And some days that is our reality and that we have a God that gave us that gift to point back to and to say yes yes this is a reality like I think that is a space in the church we need to embrace more of I was at a conference last year was it last year it might have been two years ago I can't remember anymore. It's all time is a construct. Yeah it is but but it was for church hurt and one of the things they did was they had the survivors of the International House of Prayer from Kansas City and Mike Bickle which is a story that you know probably many here have heard a lot about if you haven't you can go Google it but the survivors were on stage and they invited the participants or about 500 people there. Again it's a conference about church hurt the stories in that room were profound. And they just said you know how many of you were overlooked by your church in your moments of harm and worked hurt and so many hands were up in the room and how many of you still feel like you've been overlooked and there were so many hands and they invited the crowd the group to pray over each other and to lay hands on if those people were comfortable those who had felt just so marginalized. And what happened in that room I my makeup did not survive I'll tell you that there were so many tears and the wails I heard like just the absolute wailing of people who were able to get out all of this pain that they had been holding and to have people around them to love on them to pray with them to be with them to turn their faces toward them. And we know how important that is that's part of the hallmark of story work is turning your face towards someone who had their face you know who who was turned away from in their moments of harm and you know and and what happened in that room was just a breaking open but such a healing river of tears. And I remember saying to a friend of mine I was there with like this is church. This is what it's supposed to look like sometimes like this is the most honest expression of worship I have ever seen. And I think that I wished that pastors and elders and deacons and people who maybe haven't had that experience could have been there and have that because I feel like you can't sit in the room with people who've been harmed and really sit with their pain and walk away the same unless you're a sociopath. And I don't believe most pastors are th sociopaths. I think a lot are trying to do the right thing. That's right. And so I I just I would hope that the churches would invite grief in when there's been harm.

SPEAKER_00 29:54

Oh I'm just still struck by that image and I can feel in my body just the the power of you know it's like I think it's Gabor Mate who says like trauma's not necessarily what happens to us. It's what's left in the absence of an empathetic witness and just thinking about how often sometimes that wound of the church's failure to intervene to honor to create safety to make repair is an even more painful wound than the initial abuse that happened within the walls or within a like a relationship. So it's like spiritual abuse is often like a double wound. And just how powerful it would be to have empathetic witnesses who don't say your tears are dangerous because they expose or your tears are unwelcome because you're being gaslit and told you're dramatic or you're a liar or you just want to harm the ministry. That's just so powerful. And what we do here I mean blessed are those who mourn for they will be comforted like you know the God of all comfort will comfort you my colleague and friend Mary Ellen Owen always talks about like you know God the tear collector she talks about I I'm not gonna remember exactly where it is it might be Ezekiel but the the wailing women you know that would the that had an actual vocation of leading of embodying the grief for the community so that they could join in and actually give expression to the agony and the ache and that is a really holy moment.

SPEAKER_02 31:46

And it didn't take people under even though there was wailing yeah it it was so I think reparative for so many people and you know I was just struck by that God is a tear collector because I've heard that spoken so many times in churches but it's like God is a tear collector as long as you're in your house by yourself quiet like a closet crying exactly right you're like not allowed to have tears anywhere else and and what a disservice to the body of Christ to not make these spaces available. You know one of my own profound stories in the last several years we did a lot of recovery and help with Hurricane Helene in Western North Carolina. And I was knee deep in all of it especially the first seven days because of just my vocation and where God put my feet where he told me to go. You know so even though I couldn't be there physically I was doing a lot of telehealth a lot of like middle of the night calls from first responders who had seen some things you know and I just remember holding all of that in my body and my church does this service called encounter which is prayer and worship and I was not okay. Like I walked in there and I almost didn't go and I was just like I just need to be in a place where I can worship and I was literally coming unglued. I could feel that fraying at the edges of burnout and knowing that I was not in a great space and if I wanted to be able to help people I needed help. And when they you know after some of the worship they kind of released you to go pray with people and I made a beeline for a particular elder and he opened up his arms to me and he said and he's uh from Louisiana he goes Mama what's wrong and just took me into his arms and I collapsed and he ended up just holding me and praying over me for the rest of the service and just beautifully praying over me. And I think about what if I hadn't had that space you know I'm grateful that I did but I also think about how many people don't have that space because of harm that has been done to them and what a travesty and what a what a miss that that we are as the body like that we could come around like Jesus talks about you know I want to gather you all under my wings I want you to be close to my bosom like that we're not doing that as the big sea church, right? There are lots of little churches doing lots of great stuff truly and even some big churches doing great stuff right so I don't want to you know say by any means with a broad brush but the overall tenor that we tend to see is pretty harmful in this season of life.

Rebuilding Trust In Self And God

Disentanglement Beyond Deconstruction

SPEAKER_00 34:27

Yeah and I I think your instincts that we've created a system that really actually does not allow people to have integrity and by integrity I just mean wholeness. So a lot has to be left at the door because we don't actually believe God can hold that much. We haven't created systems that can hold complexity we don't have the resources and so we're drawn to this like we're the strong man, right? Like the the bravado, the charisma, the I've got this, I know the way and I'm gonna get us through I mean I've heard so many people talk about like use this language of um I think it's like VUCA time we're in VUCA time. Have you heard that I have not heard that volatile okay volatile it's like VUCA I think it's a Sierra I forget what the U is chaotic and I I'm not gonna I can't remember the letters I'll have to look it up and send it to you. But it it feels you're like yes I feel that in my body like that we are in a time of pretty great upheaval in kind of all facets of life and yeah so we it makes sense why why we're drawn to people and systems that have a sense of certainty and you know a bravado of like we're gonna make it through um vulnerability and a kind of wisdom that says of course we're gonna make it through it may not be triumphant. We're not used to that in the West we're used to the like you know we're gonna be on top and we're gonna prevail and we can just wield our power. So yeah I do think there's a little bit of like an epidemic of leaders and systems that don't have space for complexity can't flex. And there are many that can and I too love the church and there are also many marginalized groups who have for a long time had faith expressions that have had to grow that kind of resilience because they've always lived in some ways under the shadow of empire. And so I do find myself in this season like turning to the wanting longing to be discipled by the leaders and the people who know what it is to navigate pain, heartache, loss, oppression a Jesus who is still pulling all things together to be made new, but who is maybe not doing that in a way that feels as like triumphant and bravado and you know all encompassing kind of like might that we want. And I actually think that's where we get closer to like the early church who had to watch Jesus be crucified who saw in some ways a moment of their movement coming to a stark and like just I can't an agonizing defeat and then to see it be reborn but not in the way that they maybe had most long for to see like a political overthrow and like a an earthly king established. And so yeah I I do think we have had a lot of disorder even in our understanding of like the Christian story and what it means for God to be with us. And so we are gonna we are going to need those places and those resources where we can collapse into someone's arms and weep and be prayed over so that we can get back up and go back out and be available to offer the care and the connection. And I do think the spirit is doing a work to expose harmful people bad shepherds um and to like you know my hope would be that people get a taste of like you do because for me a spiritual abuse what's most insidious about it is that it really harms our attachment to God. Yes and it creates such profound distrust of ourselves to perceive well to discern you know to sense danger because we thought we were safe or we were really compelled to belong to a community and we couldn't see the warning signs. We longed for care and someone offered it extravagantly and we let our guard down. And so there's there can be such a distrust of ourselves and our capacity to discern therefore like how can we even trust God if we can't trust ourselves to perceive right and so I just have a deep longing for people to get to slow down and get that kind of care of like you you do you have perceived accurately you were in the presence of things that were working to override that you have histories of attachment in your earliest memories that have probably participated in setting you up to be vulnerable to spiritually abusive harm. And so to me that's so much of the work when we start to wake up to our experiences of spiritual abuse and I think especially as women right because you can't be in like patriarchal waters where misogyny is present and where that misogyny is present from the pulpit and from the leadership structures and from what's what roles women can participate in, how marriages are understood. And this is so much your work like you can't be in those waters and not experience spiritually abusive harm where there's confusion about who God is and who we are and what's safe and what's not. And so the healing process gets to take its time to take seriously the particularities of the wounds and the stories that need an empathetic witness, the grief that needs a soft place to land. And I'm just a firm believer and I know you are too that healing is possible that healing is available and it's not always as linear as we want it to be I wish it was never linear. I always wish I could be like here's step A and here's step B. It doesn't really work like that. Sometimes it looks like a moment of showing up at a conference and not knowing that a well of heartache is going to open up for you that you desperately needed relief from and release from and that you'll be held and cared for and some part of you knows and returns to a kind of rest that then allows you to step into deeper healing work. There is a mystery to it and I absolutely believe there is a grace to it.

SPEAKER_02 41:25

Absolutely 100% I think you know this is probably key and I'm why I don't like the term deconstruction. I'm not a fan not because I don't think people need to disentangle some things but I like disentanglement better because deconstruction feels linear to me right you take the Legos off and then you build with new Legos. And that is not how this works it's I'm gonna pull on this thread oh God oh god oh god oh god you know and you're you're pulling out these threads that got woven into the story got woven into your belief system that aren't actually in the Bible. They sounded spiritual they were weaponized they, you know, sometimes are covered in poison and barbed wire and yet they're not in scripture. They're not the heart of God they're not what he speaks in his word at all. And and so you have to disentangle by pulling each little thread and it is a process. And also it is a little bit like underwater basket weaving in reverse. It's a lot it's really hard and and it upends your sense of identity which I think is one of the core woundings in spiritual abuse is if my identity is supposed to be in Christ and the Christ that was given to me on a platter in this spiritually abusive environment isn't really Christ, then who am I? And you end up standing there feeling naked, exposed confused upside down while you work to put the pieces back together and move in the new true threads and and that's it's it's deep work. It's hard work it's painful work it's good work. I think we both would agree to that yeah but it's it's a tough thing and I think like if we have too clean of it well like just reject this and accept this then you're in the same you're in the same place it's like and it's it's the same kind of very um binaries that are actually pretty false.

SPEAKER_00 43:14

It's the same if you just believe and practice the right things then you can belong you can be good you'll know you're and and of course we're gonna sometimes swing to like another version of fundamentalism that feels like we know how to find our footing. So you're absolutely right uh and I love disentanglement as like a better word I I agree with you like I've never liked deconstruction because I'm also like I'm not I don't want to tear everything apart. There's a lot I actually want to hold on to and it's been very there for me even in in my story even in some of the most horrible places there were still really good things being given to me that I don't want to just throw everything out. And so and that's and I know that's not everybody's story so it doesn't have to be prescriptive but I'm so with you on the you're you're disentangling something and it can feel so disorienting. And that sense of like rediscovering or maybe sometimes discovering for the first time your sense of identity and personhood that God like deeply delights in with your idiosyncrasies and the things that make you like wildly you can feel so empowering and so delightful to like discover and rediscover and yeah and like establishing a sense of attachment with spiritual practices that feel life giving. And sometimes that does mean setting aside certain things for a season because it's like we're trying you know to force ourselves to do something that actually our body is saying that doesn't feel safe. That doesn't feel safe I don't know if I can trust this it's too familiar from a place of pain. And that's why I think this work is so embodied. And I know for myself when I started having freedom to express emotions like a full range of emotions and realize God could survive not only could God survive my strong emotions but God actually created me with a capacity to be an a deeply robustly and sometimes extremely emotional person um that that's a gift and not a detriment. And so yeah there's a lot more you know I just love your I love your use of metaphors. Like I think you are so um I just can't get enough of the metaphors that you bring because they help me like understand something and like locate myself in something. So I'm like Jebany more you want to share because I love them so much.

SPEAKER_02 45:57

Yeah they're so good. It's such a like it's a tender place you know to disentangle and to look at that identity piece. And I think that as you are finding your identity that Be terrifying because it is going and pressing against your maybe family of origin rules.

SPEAKER_01 46:19

Yeah. Yes.

SPEAKER_02 46:20

And you know, I think it was in my very first NFTC one, it was like the first weekend. That weekend, man, I ended up on the floor at the end of that weekend wailing. And I am not a woman given to wails. I am more now, but like at that time, I really wasn't. And I was like, holy Toledo, what is happening? And what triggered that was my group naming me as pastoral. And everything in me, from all of the ways I had been raised, was like, nope, nope, nope, nope, nope, nope, nope, nope. Can't, no, no, you know, and and they were like, but you have a shepherding heart. And I was like, I'm not allowed, you can't say that I'm a girl. And I had to reckon with that and go, wait, wait, wait, you know, and that is actually just in the years since I've been able to embrace that there is a shepherding heart. And I even went back to in grad school, we had to do a seminar that was led by Dr. Diane Langberg, who was like the patron saint of all of the things. I mean, I hope to be like her when I grow up, not gonna lie, she's wonderful. But she was talking about how being a counselor was a shepherding position. You know, it had a pastoral heart to it. And I remember resonating with that and then shutting it down because I was like, I'm not allowed to feel that. And so then when that was in return named in my group, it was so disorienting at first because I was like, I'm breaking rules. Oh no, like I don't want God to be mad at me because I'm not theologizing correctly. And I had to wrestle with that. I did take that one into therapy. Um, you know, I had to really wrestle with like this is a truism about me. I am a truth teller, I am going to speak, I love the word of God, I love Jesus. And there is that heart there. And and I had to reckon with it and go, I I do have that aspect to me, and and to become more comfortable with it. And and I've become more comfortable with it over the years. But like at first, that stuff's terrifying, you know, and and if I had been to be clear, if I had been on the like an if I felt like I was unbiblical, I would have even refined that, right? Like I think there's still discernment, even when things are named of us, and as we're figuring out our identity, like that is work to be done for people. So I don't want people to think like, oh, I just accept everything everyone says. Yes. Um, by any means, I think that especially when you're you know learning how to heal from trauma, you still want some of that binary space inside. Absolutely. I want to paint some shades of gray for our listeners. Yeah. But it is such a interesting space to be in at first.

SPEAKER_01 48:53

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 48:53

Well, and I I'm just struck by I still really tender towards you because I can relate to someone's naming a truth that's actually exposing some of the spiritual abuse, whether it was witting or unwitting that you've been in. That because you were a girl, the gifts that you've probably been exhibiting your whole entire life were not mirrored back to you or named accurately because they were threatening a certain theological frame. And in fact, what's true of a lot of us is that we're we are um almost punished when those gifts exhibit or kind of corrected to the right path of where those gifts can be used or what they really mean. And I I could relate to you in that if someone, even in college, had even I was a biblical studies major, by the way, had said you're a pastor, I would have rebuked them and been so terrified of them. One, because it would have meant I would be single for the rest of my life for sure, because no man's gonna want to be with an abomination. And two, like I just didn't, I had internalized that I would be an abomination if those things were true of me. And so that fear of being cast out or rejected or not getting to belong, like again, those are all signs of, and so even to get to the grief of like someone's naming something that actually like is where I feel the most myself, and they're saying it's good. And the grief that comes from not having that had that experience until like well into adulthood is like you can't even get there until you can get some comfort from the terror of like, yeah, am I gonna lose God? Is God gonna be disappointed in me? Is God gonna cast me out? Are my people gonna be disgusted with me? Are they gonna cast me out over like something that is actually like we just need more and more and more good shepherds? Right. You know, like when you really think about it, it's kind of like, wait, so we're stopping people from offering like these really good gifts. And I get it, like that there's lots of different theological frames and systems that hold particular views around who's allowed to do that and who's not. I just I want to echo that I absolutely experience you as having a very shepherding pastoral presence. And I'm so grateful that even though that maybe wasn't a gift nurtured in you explicitly or in fullness, that the grace of God led you on a path to keep giving you the skills and tools and resources and communities, and that the work you do today you are your love for the church, that you still love the church. Like to me, these things are just so incredibly stunning and actually help me believe in God more. And so I'm just grateful for you. And I'm grateful that you suffered. I'm not grateful that you suffered, but I'm grateful that you had the courage to let your heart suffer some of the agony of being named in a true way, and that you had the wisdom to wrestle with it and discern if it was true. So you didn't just take it on.

SPEAKER_02 52:22

Yeah. Yeah, absolutely. And I think that's the work of healing in so many ways, right? And then it does, you know, when we lean into story, right? And I had to reckon with that and look at it in my own life and then reckon with spiritual abuse that I've experienced just in different places. You know, I was able to go back to the little girl who at eight in her dad's church taught Sunday school. Why someone let an eight-year-old teach Sunday school, I do not know at this time, but it was the 80s. We were feral, whatever. Um, but I remember being overjoyed by the flannel graph. Gosh, it was so good. Yeah. Despite the sanitized Bible stories that they were. But, you know, you know what you know at eight. And doing the story of Joseph. And, you know, and just being overjoyed at teaching. And I was able to bless that little girl's delight in teaching her peers about the Bible. And whereas, you know, there was a period in my life I would have vilified her. How dare you? What makes you think you should and not honoring the gifts that God gave me? And I think that is part of that reclamation, you know. And and what I would invite our listeners into is, you know, it's so easy to be just angry. And I think anger has a place, it is a very powerful emotion. It is motivating. When my clients who are in coercively controlling spaces get mad, I'm like, hallelujah! Because so many people have been told, well, you're not allowed to be mad. And I'm like, there's a whole verse that says be angry and do not sin. So like, let's do that. And, you know, I think that, you know, anger is definitely a piece of it, but it's not where we want to land and live. You know, there's so much more. And anger is often sitting on top of those more vulnerable spaces of sorrow and longings and all of those things. And so I would just invite our listeners, if you found like every time you hear the word church or God or anything, you're just real pissed, that like, you know, invite yourself to look at the longing that break all of the things that are underneath what I will call the cap of anger that has been protecting you from those vulnerable spaces.

SPEAKER_00 54:23

Yeah, and and that you because God is a God of love, like you have choice. You know, there's no demand as you look, that you you get to have a lot of choice. But I agree with you, like there's law means and heartache and and real goodness that's wrapped up entangled um with our stories, and we get to we get to do that untangling work, and it doesn't mean then we have to go back or be susceptible to harm.

Spiritual Abuse Course And Grounding

SPEAKER_02 54:55

Right, right. They're not they're not mutually exclusive, ironically, right? You can protect yourself, have wisdom and discernment, and enter into places and also leave places if you're like, this is not what I thought you were. You can do all of those things, and you don't have to stay in any sort of rigidity, which I think is part of the healing process. I think the more that I heal and the older I get, the less certain of things, certain things that I am, then the more flexible I become. Yes, absolutely. Yeah. Cosign. So tell us as we land this plane about the online course. Tell me, yeah, tell us about that and and all of that work and how people can find it. And of course, we'll have it in the show notes as well.

SPEAKER_00 55:37

Yeah. Yeah. So we created it's a it's a four-lesson online course, but it is probably around nine hours of like there's grounding exercises for like practices of like honoring your nervous system again, because anytime we get close to trauma, our bodies are activated, our nervous systems are activated. We talk about the nature of spiritual abuse, we talk about the impact of spiritual abuse, we talk about the setup of spiritual abuse. So we talk about family of origin and attachment, we talk about some of the cultural context that we're in, um, and more like larger kind of spiritually abusive structures and how they've been embedded in our Christian imagination. And then we talk about healing from spiritual abuse. And I invited clinicians to be a part of this, Dan's a part of it. I invited spiritual directors to be a part of it. And then there are a couple of deep dives with each lesson where we just go a little bit deeper. So maybe we're looking at narcissism, maybe we're looking at um PTSD and complex PTSD. Um, maybe we're doing some practices of spiritual formation or spiritual imagination that could be really generative if you're healing from spiritual abuse. And then we also provided a pretty robust resource guide, which I need to make sure your work gets added to that and is available to people. Um, just has books and podcasts and practitioners. We link the NFTC directory. Um, so you can find this on the Allender Center website. It's literally called the Spiritual Abuse and Healing Online Course. It just has a very clear name. Um, we wanted to get people language. There's some uh workbook associated with it that's more like reflection questions to help you do some deeper work. And eventually we hope to create like a group guide for people that would maybe want to do like a more of a process group, not so much a story group, but like a process group where you could start to share and ask questions together. I don't know. I'm really proud of the work we did. I think it's like pretty comprehensive. And so if that's something that would be a resource to you or helpful to you, it is available on the Allen or Center website. And it's asynchronous. So once you get the course, you have access to the course and you can move at your own pace and utilize the resources. You know, I always tell people, take what you want, leave what you don't. Andi Culber always says that, and I love it. So it's like if you want to do one of the sections of a lesson and move on, great. You don't want to do the practices, you don't have to. So you just want to do the grounding practices. I think we made that available to you. So yeah.

SPEAKER_02 58:21

I I will say I will strongly encourage and invite people to do the grounding practices. If you haven't developed a grounding practice of your own and and you are reckoning with overcoming harm and healing, grounding is really important. You know, our bodies do get activated and we need to give them that space. And it can feel so trivial sometimes, I think, for people. Like I think sometimes for people, it's like, I mean, I don't really need that. I can just like I just need the data, I need the information. And it's like your your body is crying out for something more there. Um, and and the things that when you are able to ground and you're able to allow your body and nervous system to settle well is so good. And it expands your window of tolerance or your capacity for stuff, and you're able to like have more space to reckon with those things and not be undone and taken out by them, right? The goal of healing is to go, this was sad, I lament it, and I am stronger, I have healed, I am healing, all of those things, and we need that expansion space to be able to do it. So I always invite people, I love grounding personally.

SPEAKER_00 59:36

Well, and you're generous with them in your book, which I also loved because I do think people just need more and more examples and like scripts and imagination for what that could look like. Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 59:47

Yes. And it really does become like muscle memory. Like if you run marathons, I don't run marathons. I will run from something that's chasing me, maybe otherwise I'm just gonna be like, I'm going to heaven, we're fine. But like you're building that muscle memory. And there are certain ones that I do so frequently, particularly paced breathing, that's probably the easiest one because I do it with so many people. That the minute I even think about it, including now my body starts to regulate, I can feel a settling. And so, your body, as soon as you start the practice, when you learn that practice, your body goes, Oh, we know what to do. And it just goes. And it's so delightful and helpful. And so I really invite folks, please take advantage of those. Please, A, go take that course. It's worth your time, it's worth your investment. And and I invite you, even if you just try one, you know, try the grounding and and see what it's like for you, especially if you've never allowed yourself that space.

SPEAKER_01 1:00:43

It is such a gift to your body. Agreed. I can't do enough. I'm still practicing. I'm still blowing those muscles. That's right.

Final Takeaways And Where To Find Help

SPEAKER_02 1:00:53

It's practice, not perfection, right? Rachel, thank you for being with us today and for sharing your wisdom and for having what I think is such an important conversation. We will have all of your information down in the show notes so people can find this course and find all of the places that you are, not stalkery weird, but in the good ways of finding the information you have out online.

SPEAKER_00 1:01:15

I'm just talking. I've so enjoyed um getting to know you more through some of these podcast conversations we've been able to have and joining us on the Alder Center podcast. And um, just so grateful for you and your presence in the world and your good labor in the world. And I actually take great comfort and encouragement knowing um that I have a colleague like you out there doing this work. So anytime, always glad to partner with you and be in conversation. So thank you.

SPEAKER_02 1:01:42

I appreciate that so much. Well, thank you guys for listening to this week's Hey Tabby. Please make sure you like and subscribe. Share this episode with a friend. I know your friends that need it. And we will see you here next time. Thanks for joining me for today's episode of Hey Tabby. If you're looking for a resource that I mentioned in the show and you want to check out the show notes, head on over to tabithawestbrook.com forward slash hey tabby. That's H-E-Y-T-A-C-I, and you can grab it there. I look forward to seeing you next time.