Verses VS Platitudes for Ineffective Responses

To those who don't know what happened, I blogged about it http://linzarcher.blogspot.com/.../10/bad-anniversaries.html This is a heavily religious post and I normally prefer to avoid those these days, but one too many Bible verses thrown at me, and I just couldn't take it anymore.

This started with a post on my Facebook earlier this week, and ironically I got responses that were similar to what I was just complaining about. After asserting that this approach was ineffective, I got more of it, because forcing the issue makes it right (sarcasm). Books 30 years old obviously hold all the answers because they couldn't have made any important discoveries in mental science in the past 30 years! (I'm dripping the sarcasm now) But I'm in for a penny, so I thought I'd blog and be in for a pound. Keep in mind that I'm upset at the practice of platitudes and verses used as some mental bandaid on wounds that need stitches, more than the religion behind it.

I've heard every platitude and Bible verse in conjunction with what happened, but God gives people free will, even the evil people. If you wish to respond, please be a human with independent thought, don't throw other people's words at me. It only makes you feel better about yourself. It doesn't actually help. It doesn't express empathy. It doesn't fix things.

It does lead to Just World Fallacy. It is a cop out to not think or connect with another human. It expresses judgement, detachment, and a sense of superiority. I've got nothing wrong with the word of God and if I want it, I'll read the Bible and go to the source, or pray and talk to the divine myself. I don't need someone else to dictate it to me.

The monster was very fond of using Bible verses to control people. You don't have to love someone to do that, you just have to want to control them. He was a registered Baptist minister, son of a minister, and leader of a wiccan coven... though I didn't discover that till AFTER we got married. So to the jerks who say I shouldn't have gotten divorced, you're right, I should have stoned him.

The way many (not all) Christians treated me after everything that happened was enough to make me not want to be one anymore, but instead, I just became my own version. I prefer actions to words. They mean much more. And I'm very tired of people telling me what to do and think and feel, especially when they've never been where I've been. Hate to say it, but males have been the worst about this. They want to fix it, when the fix actually requires empathy.  Their attempts to fix without empathy in these matters more often than not break things worse.

Many are still stuck in the mentality that trapped me with the ex in the first place. I wanted to help him and I believed that all people were inherently good. So they are stuck on his salvation, but I have to go with Ayn Rand on this "Pity for the guilty is treason to the innocent."  

Psychopaths are not curable. They have no guilt, which is the main proponent of people making a choice to not be evil. They are a small sect of humanity and their brains literally do not function like a normal person's. I'm sure that functional human beings can, but if you have not had experience dealing with a psychopath, then you don't realize that you can't apply these things, like you can't expect certain things of people born without ears, or legs.

I don't have a problem with Christianity as much as the fact that many churches pump out narcissists [lack of empathy, over devaluation or idealization (inability to see mid-ranges), magical thinking, need for narcissistic supply e.i. other people's perceptions of them as "holy", inability to recognize boundaries, need to "teach" others because they think they are better than others] and codependents [ Are a corrupted form of "do unto others" They do to you what they want done to them. Their acts of kindness are for control. "People who are codependent often take on the role of martyr; they constantly put others' needs before their own and in doing so forget to take care of themselves.] like a factory, and their conditioned responses are often unhealthy ones. 

I believe you can be a Christian and be emotionally healthy. I believe you can have faith and still be logical about it. I believe that respecting other people and their boundaries is part of loving them, and to do otherwise is not a display of love.

My beliefs are valid and personal and not for community moulding. My mind, my body, my heart, and my soul are mine, and therefore my decision who to give them to, is nobody else's business. I refuse to be treated like property of any human or institution, which means that my life is not up for others to tell me how to live it. I am not perfect, but I have learned from my experiences, and a lot of what I have learned is that the church as a whole has accepted unhealthy doctrine, and that those without wisdom or experience are the first to offer someone else's words.

God gave us a brain to use it, to learn, and that God's laws are written on the hearts of humans in the form of conscience, and that those that defy them to do despicable acts are more lacking in empathy than religion, so I cannot abide by teachings that result in lack of empathy, which is the very antithesis of learning to love.

Beliefs in general don't make you a good or bad person, though I find many people think that they do. Actions are what define people. I've seen many a hypocrite (Greek word for actor) present a public face and be a monster in private. From boyfriends to bosses, I've been disappointed repeatedly when their actions and their words were out of sync. I've seen pagans who had worse "holier than thou" airs than the Christians they insisted on telling how to be good Christians (while they did some horrific stuff). Then again I know many non-Christians who've read more of the Bible and about the Bible than the majority of Christians I know. It doesn't matter what symbol/power you attach your identity to, it's who you are, and if who you are cannot offer something helpful from inside you, then you probably should not offer it at all.

At the end of the day, if you have not been through a situation like someone else, then perhaps it's time to be quiet and listen. Before you can hand out information of any kind, you have to understand a situation, and unless you have a degree in psychology or have been there yourself, the best way to do that is to listen.  It's not to assume that the victim did something wrong to end up in the sights of a psychopath.  Ted Bundy avidly preyed on the kinder impulses in people to get his victims.  He wore a cast and would get women to feel sorry for him and carry things back to his car where he would beat them over head with the cast and throw them inside. 

This is a choice made by an evil person, and no amount of platitudes and Bible verses are going to undo the event. If that's how you deal with things, fine, go read your Bible and pray. However if you want to help, try listening without thinking about what you want to say.  Put yourself in their shoes, and imagine the circumstances and emotions involved. Empathy begins when you stop thinking about changing the other person and start seeing them as a person instead of a broken thing to be fixed.