Definitions Related to Spiritual Abuse

DEFINITIONS

Abuse:  “Abuse is fundamentally a mentality. It is a mindset of entitlement. The abuser sees himself as entitled. He is the center of the world, and he demands that his victim make him the center of her world. His goal is power and control over others. For him, power and control are his natural right, and he feels quite justified in using whatever means are necessary to obtain that power and control. The abuser is not hampered in these efforts by the pangs of a healthy conscience and indeed often lacks a conscience.” definition from A Cry for Justice blog.

The “Inner Circle”:  This concept is discussed here.  People in the inner circle feed the pastor’s ego and will go to great lengths to defend and protect him.  They have a strong bond and most likely get preferential treatment or some kind of emotional reward for feeding the ego.  The pattern is they will report any kind of suspicious activity to the leader, any dissension in the group, anyone who may not be fully on board.

Commenter Lyida Thomas describes her “inner circle” experience.

No-talk rule:  In abusive spiritual systems, people’s lives are controlled from the outside in by rules, spoken and unspoken. Unspoken rules are those that govern unhealthy churches or families but are not said out loud. Because they are not said out loud, you don’t find out that they’re there until you break them.

The most powerful of all unspoken rules in the abusive system is what we have already termed the “can’t talk” rule. The “can’t talk” [rule] has this thinking behind it: “The real problem cannot be exposed because then it would have to be dealt with and things would have to change; so it must be protected behind walls of silence (neglect) or by assault (legalistic attack). If you speak about the problem, you are the problem. (The Subtle Power of Spiritual Abuse By David Johnson and Jeff Vanvonderen (Bethany House, 1991, 2005))

This is an excellent article on the no-talk rule by labeling it “gossip” and twisting the meaning of Matthew 18:  Rethinking Matthew 18  – Part 2  “Gossip – Control”

Spiritual Abuse:  Spiritual abuse is a spiritual role-reversal where a shepherd, instead of clinging to and emulating the Great Shepherd by shepherding God’s people (Acts 20; 1 Peter 5; 1 Timothy 3; Ephesians 4), subtly demands that members exist to meet the shepherd’s needs (James 4:1-4). Rather than relating as a servant leader, the pastor “pulls rank” and “lords it over others” (Matthew 20:20-28; 1 Peter 5:1-6), not for the benefit of the flock, but for the benefit of the pastor. Rather than speaking the truth in love and rather than ministering grace and truth (Ephesians 4:11-16, 29; Colossians 4:3-6; Titus 2:10-12), the spiritually abusive pastor intimidates, judges, condemns, shames, and blames the sheep without regard for the spiritual wellbeing of the sheep (Jeremiah 23:1-4; Matthew 23:1-39).  Definition from Bob Kellemen, Executive Director of the Biblical Counseling Coalition

PTSD:

Elephant in the Room

Elitism:  A common trait in spiritually abusive churches is elitism.   If we are so special, and all others churches are inferior, who wants to attend an inferior church?  Elitism is a manipulation tactic to keep people at the church.  And it works powerfully because we become convinced that no other church will measure up.