On a Difficult Anniversary

It’s been a hard day.

It happens to be the day before Adrienne’s birthday, the anniversary of that abusive childbirth,  the hardest thing that’s ever happened to me. Adrienne’s birthday is a happy day but the day before is my severely triggered one. And Adrienne is older and wants me to respect her privacy instead of writing a whole post about her, so that’s all the birthday news you’re going to get right now. I’m still allowed to talk about me, though.

I’ve been doing some research for a new book lately. Part of the research involved listening to a recording of the Charismatic priest and cult leader Michael Scanlan, who we now know may have sexually abused someone as well as covering up several now famous cases of sexual abuse on campus. In the recording he was praying in tongues. My tiny part in his story was put on blast by a Trad influencer last month, which is how I found out just how bad he may have been. It feels really awkward that several minutes of that influencer’s video are about how Scanlan groomed me with some severe boundary violations and inappropriate touch, but I was so brainwashed I didn’t feel groomed, which is NOT an important part of the story. But the memory of how it felt to find out, combined with the trauma anniversary, while listening to Scanlan’s voice, started the shudders.

I am not strong. I wish I was. I don’t have courage, I’m just a loudmouth who doubles down instead of backing off. Sometimes that looks like a virtue, but it really isn’t one. So, the past few days I’ve been a mess.

I mentioned it was hard to get through the research on my private Facebook page.

And I woke up this morning to find that someone who I thought was a friend had decided to chide me for shuddering, in the very weirdest way possible:

“for God’s sake, Mary! Behave! Pray with him! Almost every Father of the Church was tainted by antisemitism. If you condemn people wholesale because of the evil in their lives, no one is left. No one! You have to sift all things and hold fast to what is right even as you condemn what is wrong! Scanlan brought people to prayer! When he prays, pray!”

“For God’s sake, Mary, behave!”

I’m not even going to touch the “antisemitism” comment because doing so would take a whole other post. I have no idea why that was the comparison he came up with.

No, this person didn’t know about the sexual abuse allegations, but he’d certainly heard about everything Scanlan is already known to have done. And, more importantly, he knew that I was suffering. But his answer was to yell at me, in print, and suggest that I pray along with a forty-five-year-old recording of an evil man babbling gibberish.

And so, I’ve been angry and hurt and having little flashbacks.

I’ve been feeling as though God doesn’t exist all day. That’s not common for me anymore. I went through an agnostic stage a few years ago and came out of it more convinced than ever that God is real, and what’s more that God is so much greater than I’d previously known. I have even come to the conclusion that God doesn’t hate me and hasn’t singled me out for hell. That took awhile. And I feel like I’ve had a major setback.

So, this is where I stand right now, thirteen years out from the 30-hour period where both the best and the worst things that ever happened to me took place. I’ll never be your standard Catholic author, because I insist on talking about the hard and dark things in Catholicism. But according to my catechism, I’ll never not be Catholic either, because the Seal is indelible. So I’m really struggling. But here I am. And I still believe, most of the time. But today I don’t feel it.

Here’s what I’m going to say, to any of my readers who have survived the Charismatic Renewal or another cult or high-control religious movement: don’t behave.

I’m serious Don’t behave. You can be a good person, an ethical and moral person, and even a saint, but don’t behave. Just stop being have, forever and ever. Do good things instead. Leave the cult. Treat yourself to the self-care you were denied. Do things just to nurture yourself. Grow a garden or get a manicure or go backpacking. Cut your hair or grow it out. Say forbidden words. Watch R-rated movies to see if you like them. Study topics that you were forbidden to learn about. God forbid, study actual theology instead of the mishmash you were fed. Tell God exactly how you feel and see if God answers. Learn to have compassion and love for the people you thought were the enemy. Tell the truth when you were ordered not to.  Believe in gray areas and questions without simple answers. I can’t always feel Him, but I do believe that God is real, and waiting for us outside the cult.

That’s all I have for you tonight.