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Post by Vyckie D. Garrison on Nov 25, 2009 10:22:41 GMT -5
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Post by hopewell on Nov 25, 2009 10:56:18 GMT -5
Oh, I know that feeling!!! Even as an adult I've visited Churches and Christian Bookstores [and keep in mind I'm a willing Christian!!] where it was as though everyone "knew" I wasn't "good enough" to join their fellowship. I'm stunned though that you could "know" this at 7--I don't doubt you, just amazes me that it was transmitted so strongly and that your already sensitive brain brought more into it from your own life. I have never understood why we have to dress "this way" or wear our hair "that way" to be "real" Christians! They Christ I stilll love wouldn't have cared! Legalism, man-made [and women demoting] rules change everything, don't they? Very good post. I hope there will be more of your story.
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Post by arietty on Nov 26, 2009 17:41:50 GMT -5
You can really see how the church your parents took you to was homogeneous and how easy it was to be an outsider. I can remember a few church experiences like that but for the most part the places I went to were fairly diverse. I am looking fwd to reading the rest of your story!
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Post by Sierra on Nov 26, 2009 18:10:10 GMT -5
Thanks, hopewell and arietty. I am glad this post resonated with you in some ways. To this day I sometimes wonder if that feeling was a product of the church, my family, or just some defect in my own mind.
As I got older, I began to feel the inverse when I talked to people outside the church - I was too dumb, sheltered and naive. I may write a post about innocence and how my ideas of it changed. Being 'pure' caused me so much agony, as it seemed like people often ascribed to me ulterior motives I didn't even understand - I was too sheltered to know what they were afraid of...
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becky
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Post by becky on Nov 26, 2009 21:43:08 GMT -5
I have been largely a lurker here since the boards first started, but this post really resonated with me. I remember very clearly being sure at around 7 or 8 that I was sinful, and that God was perfect, and that I deserved Hell. I even remember sitting in the bathroom thinking that it would just be better for everyone if I weren't around with my sinfulness, threatening to contaminate everything, but that I couldn't just kill myself/die b/c that would mean hell! I don't think anybody had a clue b/c I was a really smart, know-the-answers, Sunday School star-chart champ. *rolls eyes* But that feeling of not being valid, of somehow fundamentally being not worthwhile, because of some arbitrary "godly" standard - yeah, I get that. I think a big part of the problem was that my parents were working through their own stuff and were pretty emotionally detached, so I didn't feel like they thought I was very worthwhile, and then there was this God who loved me, but was going to throw me into hell because I wasn't perfect, but then he loved Jesus, because he was perfect, and Jesus got me off the hook, but I still wasn't really very good and was going to keep doing the things that made God want to throw me into hell in the first place. That's a surefire recipe for confidence and self-acceptance right there!
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Post by amyrose on Nov 26, 2009 21:58:11 GMT -5
I can't imagine having this experience of knowing you don't fit and are considered not good enough as a child. I had that experience as a young adult in my 20s and that was difficult enough.
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Post by sarahsmom on Nov 26, 2009 23:28:58 GMT -5
I'm so sorry you felt that way at such a young age. It really makes me sad. A lot of people (home schooling christians) don't let their kids play and be friends with others kids for fear of them being badly influenced. Years back, I discouraged friendships between my children and others based on music choices, clothing, no public school or neighborhood kid friends, etc. I tried to keep my kids isolated at home from the world and worldly influences, it backfired though.
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Post by krwordgazer on Nov 27, 2009 17:55:48 GMT -5
Not much to add, Sierra, except continuing to feel so sad for how the little girl you once were, suffered.
I sure know what it's like to feel like you don't fit in with the other kids, and that there's really something wrong with you-- that feeling of being deep-down unworthy.
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Post by Sierra on Nov 28, 2009 15:30:54 GMT -5
Becky, welcome! I'm glad my post meant something to you. I've known some other 'star' Christian kids who felt these doubts, too, although I wasn't lucky enough to avoid being pegged as a 'bad kid' by the adults in my life. I have been in exactly your quandary about feeling like the sinner who is about to corrupt everyone else... amazing all the life-and-death thinking that goes on in the bathroom, eh? I used to sit and stare at myself in the mirror and try to see whether or not I was saved somehow. My church didn't believe in the Trinity so you had to get to grips with the fact that Jesus was simultaneously condemning you and then taking your place but warning you never to do it again unless you wanted to be responsible for killing him... Sounds like an abusive man, frankly. "I punish you because I love you and it hurts me when you do stupid things, so stop doing them so I won't have to punish you..." Ugh, I need to go nurse my brain after writing that... Thank you all for your sympathy, too. It is nice to know others understand these feelings.
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Deleted
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Post by Deleted on Nov 30, 2009 19:51:41 GMT -5
I've known some other 'star' Christian kids who felt these doubts, too, although I wasn't lucky enough to avoid being pegged as a 'bad kid' by the adults in my life. The more I think about it, the more I think that the system is inherently set up to create those "good kids" and "bad kids" and to set them against each other, and it's unhealthy for all involved. My siblings and I were never trying to be the "good kids", but we kind of got stuck in that role because my parents ended up in charge of the local private school for homeschoolers and as a result ended up as the go-to people for anybody who was considering homeschooling anywhere in our area and since my parents were supposed to be the experts they figured we must be the model homeschool children. It was horribly unfair for everyone involved, there was no way for other kids to ever live up to the ridiculously idealized image that people had of us--not when we couldn't live up to that image ourselves, while at the same time (while I can't speak for my other siblings, I know it's true for me), I felt pressure to live up to the image that other people had of me. I half wanted to rebel, but at the same time I felt like I couldn't even do that without walking into another stereotype--that of the sheltered homeschooler who gets a tiny bit of freedom and goes hog wild overboard, and if there was one thing I hated more than the pedestal that other homeschoolers put me on, it was the fear that I would even remotely be seen by people outside the homeschooling world as a stereotypical homeschooler. The more I think about it, the more I realize that's a problem inherent in the system. It's a system that takes the "good kids", puts them up on idealized pedestals, and then uses them to pressure the other kids to stay in line. It's all about control and creating unattainable goals that everyone is still pressured to meet and once you're within that system there's no way to opt out of it. If you're a "good kid" and you try to opt out, you just become a "bad kid" and if you're a "bad kid" you have to either strive to become one of the good kids or else you become viewed as an even worse kid.
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