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Originally Posted by Trapped
Welcome ExChurchKid! (How was that username not already taken??) Glad to see another fellow church kid on this forum.
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Just to tie this back to what you are - a church kid - real quick (and again, I'm short on time, sorry), but I wanted to add one thing in case it seemed like I was focusing on the new college students rather than on another equally important group, the church kids. Websites that expose the teachings would serve the church kids, both in and out, just as much as it would the new college recruits, because it's the teachings that enslave and entrap. And it's the teachings that are the psychological binds that tie so many deflated and downtrodden church-kid-adults and keep them judged, shamed, controlled, and dependent, just like you described feeling.
The sheer volume of layers of chains and padlocks that the local church deftly wraps around and closes tightly around its members takes years to unwind and unshackle. I feel like I can write circles around a few of the more major doctrines of error the local church holds to, and yet I still find myself operating according to those same doctrines of error in my daily thought life and action life more often than I'd like to admit. More websites about the erroneous and unbiblical teachings are a critical part of the unchaining process, at least the way I see it, because it 1) says that there are people who speak up when the church life atmosphere is designed to be so opposite to that, and 2) allows for that first crack in the armor that there are people who know "the ministry" and had the same experience growing up as the ones reading the site, and yet see genuine issues with it. For me, it was one crack in the armor - the error of claiming "we are not a denomination" when what we did was so much worse (hyperfocusing on a person-wise) than what we despised the denominations for doing. Once that crack was allowed to exist, I realized that absolutely everything else was up for questioning. And once you can question things, then they all fall apart pretty quickly.
Congratulations, by the way, on becoming free and independent!! [insert confetti emoji here] I totally get what you mean about feeling like it is a unique experience that not many people will get. It's true. Especially once you leave, you don't "fit" with the people still in, and you feel like a weirdo trying to explain to others what your previous life was like and its effects. It's a bit isolating, unfortunately, because there are usually so many things you are trying to sort out and yet may have really no one to talk to about it! You are of course welcome to post here, and there are counselors out there who understand what "abusive churches" are (which is what the local churches are), but it's a rare counselor who has the necessary gamut of skills, training, and personal life experiences who can handle the range of issues that a former church kid ends up having to grapple with. But it's still worth looking for, as far as I'm concerned.
I also am right there with you on feeling abnormal for "not experiencing the Lord, or feeling Him in me", etc. But guess what? I came to find out decades later as an adult that those same church kids I grew up with who I looked at thinking THEY were "experiencing" the Lord when I wasn't myself, are now struggling and tripping up and faltering over the local church just like me. So much of it for church kids was outward appearance while a whole storyline of other thoughts, feelings, opinions, and emotions was going on inside. And like is so typical in abusive churches, no one could or would talk about the truth of what they were really thinking or going through.
The other side is, how can anyone "enjoy" or want to "experience" the condemning, threatening, oppressing "god" of the local church? No wonder church kids struggle so much in that area!! It's not the real God!
I'm also there with you when it comes to "normal fun thing vs ministry/Bible/God". The local church is all about denying yourself when God isn't asking you to deny yourself. The truth is we are supposed to deny ourselves when it's relative to obedience to God, but not just for the sake of denying ourselves any fun when God isn't asking us to. I still have a hard time with "frivolous fun" (games, sports, hobbies, etc) because it's been so hardwired into me that getting any pleasure or enjoyment out of anything is wrong. We were cheated, I'll just say that.
But God takes what others have abused, and renews them instead.
As I said in my previous post, hope you'll post more.
Trapped