As I’ve mentioned here before, I like to believe that Dave Hasz and the rest of the Honor Academy staff have good intentions. Unfortunately, their sincerity does not negate the damage they have done. The book Soul Repair has this to say about spiritual abusers:
Spiritual abusers usually are not conscious of what they are doing. Few who accept leadership positions in a Christian community are thinking, I’m looking forward to manipulating people so that they get their value from how I tell them to behave rather than from Christ. Most spiritual abusers have good intentions. They see their actions as an expression of concern for the well-being of others. Few would be able to recognize, let alone articulate, they they are putting their faith in something they are doing rather than in God, and that they are encouraging others to do the same.
Anytime we are in a position of spiritual leadership or influence and we move away from grace, we are in danger of becoming abusive. We need to regularly ask ourselves several questions:
– Do I need to rely on anything other than God’s love to be okay in my relationship with God?
– Would if feel catastrophic if I made a mistake?
– Am I unwilling to give up control over other people’s behavior?
– Do I feel compelled to pretend that I don’t struggle or have problems?
– Am I judgmental towards others, negatively assessing their spiritual standing compared to my own?
– Do I have a need to “get it absolutely right” in my relationship with God?
If we answer yes to any of these questions, we may be suffering from the destructive dynamic of abusive spirituality.
Stay tuned for one more post today.
3 comments:
this is a great post, and i’m surprised no one has commented on this already. it’s hugely important to extend grace and forgiveness to those who have hurt us, whether it was intentional or not…
but i also like how you point out the potential we as individuals also have to be spiritual abusers. in my honest moments, i would have to admit that i could answer “yes” to most of those questions at one point or another.
Ditto. This post is enormously important. IMHO it helps us to move through our own issues with a lesser chance of repeating the behaviors that wind up hurting others.
I’m late to the party but thank you for this…. excellent, excellent post. Being an abuser is a ridiculous amount of pressure on someone. Good to have a list of specific questions like this.