Q. How could I have been so wrong? A. It’s easier than you think

   If you stand forlorn and disillusioned come May 22, you won't be the first to feel that way after trusting a spiritual leader. Though many followers of Bible answer man, Harold Camping, will be "crying mightily" and asking themselves what went wrong, many victims of spiritual abuse have asked that same question -- and  some continue to ask themselves the same question on a regular basis. 

Some spiritual abusers purposely deceive the flock for gain or power. Others unintentionally abuse, but whether intentionally or not, religious authorities who exhibit spiritually abusive traits create plenty of damage.

  After a few days (or weeks or months, in some cases) many Campingites or former Campingites, will wonder how they could have been so blind to their teacher's faults, or how they could have been stupid enough to believe him, or so gullible. They will not understand how easy it is to be taken in. They will be in very good company. Many people, emerging from spiritually abusive churches and groups, ask the same thing. How could this have happened to ME?

It’s a lot easier to fall under the spell of an errant religious leader than many people realize. It doesn’t seem to matter if you're highly educated or not, whether you are wealthy or poor, whether you have a healthy amount of skepticism or not. It doesn’t matter whether you have just a smattering of Bible knowledge, or whether you consider yourself quite the scripture expert. 

  Cult-like leaders – and especially those who seem to believe in their own special calling – can do amazing things to people’s minds, sometimes unknowingly.

  What makes these religious figures so authoritative, and how could you have fallen for it all?

 Certain factors work together in combination to bring about dependence on authoritative voices:

1. Elitism: If your Bible teacher constantly casts scorn or derision on other religious groups, churches or beliefs, he makes his followers feel special. He points out faults of Church A, then B, then C. Before long, no one is quite as enlightened as your special group.

   If Church A is worldly because of a certain practice or doctrine, then simply by not being a part of Church A, you find yourself up a notch on the spiritual ladder. YOU have escaped error or sin by not being part of Church A. Then repeat with B, C, D...

   This is how elitism works. The leader criticizes other Christians not like his followers. When such criticized Christians respond to the negativity, the leader characterizes the response as persecution. At the same time, he steps up the criticism of groups outside his authority. 

  This does two things: 1. It makes followers know that to avoid errors like those in Church A, B or C, they need to keep to the group and listen more closely to the leader. 2. He also makes it hard for followers to leave. After members have spent so long looking down at folks outside the group, and inflating the “specialness” of the group, it is hard for them to leave and join a group they’ve criticized for so long.

   Cults and spiritually abusive groups inflate their own sense of uniqueness and calling. AND they put down others outside the group frequently.

   If you’ve found yourself following your leader in criticism of outside groups, know this: It’s hard -- once you’ve started -- to back up and go a different direction. In the most cult-like groups, almost no one outside your little circle is considered authentic. You can’t just instantly erase months or years of your own critical attitudes toward outside groups. To leave the group, it means you have to realize that your criticism, though sometimes just, was sometimes not just. That’s hard to own up to. To keep from feeling uncomfortable over your negative views of others, you held on tighter to your leader and absorbed more of his negativity and disdainful views than you otherwise would have.

2. Authoritarianism: Your leader not only exaggerated the claims of the group as a whole, he exaggerated his own importance to the group. Some leaders can actually put on a humble facade, all the while stressing their own importance and uniqueness. Though some leaders come right out and demand subservience (so that you show God how humble you are, through serving them) others are more subtle. They just want you to admire and adore. By establishing themselves as the ultimate authority on spiritual things, they puff themselves up and receive an emotional boost. What followers do when they follow, or give to, or compliment such leaders is to provide the narcissist with what is called “narcissistic supply.” When you become a source of narcissistic supply to a leader, he makes you feel very important, very special. Later, when you start harboring doubts, it’s hard to just walk away. If you do, suddenly your position as chief supplier of flattery is in danger. Your own sense of purpose fades and that’s uncomfortable.

  3. Mind control: Manipulative spiritual leaders use mind control tactics. Some may even do this unknowingly.

“Trust bandit” is what Lalich and Tobias call these leaders. They take something very essential from you. In the book Captive Hearts, Captive Minds, the authors point out that “even after leaving the group or relationship, many former devotees carry a burden of guilt and shame while they continue to regard their former leader as paternal, all‑good, and godlike,” according to one reviewer.  The power of manipulation reaches far and wide.

   In a chapter called the Authoritarian Power Dynamic, the authors list some traits you will find among abusive, manipulative leaders:       

 * the tendency to hierarchy

 * the drive for power (and wealth)

 * hostility, hatred, prejudice

 * superficial judgments of people and events

 * a one‑sided scale of values favoring the one in power

 * interpreting kindness as weakness

 * the tendency to use people and see others as inferior

 * a sadistic‑masochistic tendency

 * incapability of being ultimately satisfied

 * paranoia                              

   4. Black and white thinking: When these leaders speak with such convincing authority, with a voice that sounds unwavering and sure, it is hard for many not to believe what they say. They don’t seem to hesitate at all. In a world where there is so much uncertainty and ambivalence, it is refreshing, sometimes, to find a voice that seems so sure and convincing. Unfortunately, certitude comes with a price.

  With spiritually abusive leaders, “many disputable matters are classified as either ‘black’ or ‘white.’ No allowance is made for ‘middle ground’ in these areas. This is sometimes also referred to as ‘polarized’ thinking, because nearly every issue is interpreted as having only two possible answers, both of which are polar opposites of each other. Spiritually abusive groups leave very little room in between the two extremes, thus crowding out both personal freedom and the operation of God's Spirit in the life of the individual. “ See Rest Ministries chapter on black and white thinking.

  People in a spiritually abusive system become dependent on their leader’s reasoning skills, or assurances or authoritative voice. Without it, they feel lost. It’s not because they are stupid or unable to think on their own; it’s because that, first attracted to the calm and forceful assurance of the voice, they eventually became dependent on it, like on a drug.

5. Group-think reinforces the deception: In a chapter called Group Leveraging, one writer looks at mistakes made by the Kennedy administration over the Bay of Pigs incident. He says that Kennedy afterwards asked, “How could we have been so stupid?” but says that stupidity is not the explanation. Group-think was. It’s easy after you’ve gone a wrong direction to ask how you could have been so stupid, but at the time, if you look closely at what was going on, you’ll see that group leveraging was in all likelihood, going on.

Here are some traits of group-think that Rest Ministries quotes from a 1971 Psychology Today article:

"Groupthink" happens when ‑‑

1. The group shares an illusion of invulnerability;

2. The group engages in collective rationalization to discount dissonant information;

3. The group comes to believe in the inherent morality of what it wants to do;

4. The group develops stereotypes of other groups and of dissenters which protects it from accurate analysis;

5. The group puts direct pressure on dissenters in order to silence them;

6. Group members begin to censor their own thought, especially doubts they may have about the wisdom of proposed courses of action;

7. The group comes to believe in its unanimity because of lack of dissent and the belief that "silence means consent;"

8. Some members of the group come to function in the role of "mindguards" ‑‑ watchmen who "protect" the leaders from dissenting views by actively discouraging such dissenters from expressing their disagreement.

These are complicated dynamics, but very powerful ones. It may be hard for those never under the spell of such leaders to understand, but the tricks and deceits these leaders use -- in some cases even without realizing what they are doing -- are very powerful, and almost anyone can become a victim under the right circumstances.

So what do you do when you find you’ve been deceived by a religious narcissist or errant leader? Start by finding other such believers. Tell your story. Tell how you broke away from the power over your mind. Though you may have been told not to “gossip,” it is not gossip to tell your own story and is often very helpful and informative to share experiences with likeminded victims after the trauma of spiritual abuse.

Red Flags

No one ever wakes up one day and says, “Hey, you know? I think I’ll shame and abuse the flock today,” or "I think I'll become a cult leader." Instead, gradual changes take place, usually involving the lure of power that slowly takes hold.

If you study spiritual abuse, you can get a feel for how this happens: Despite differing manifestations of abuse in churches, there are common denominators. Several sources cited on this site point out the following traits and show just how it is a church can move from a healthy body to a dangerous one.

ELITISM

One common finding in cults and spiritually abusive groups is something called “elitism.” It’s a feeling that your vision for the church is superior to that of others. Though most churches  and leaders, feel that they are on the right path, that their doctrines or practices are what God wants, that alone isn’t elitism. Elitism happens when you look at other churches or individuals and believe that your vision or your practices are among the very few that really please God. It is comparative. It is a superiority complex. This initial pride and puffing up – that can begin so very subtly -- ends up justifying any abusive behavior that follows.
Information control
Another common denominator in cults and abusive groups is something called milieu control. It is an attempt to control the environment of members, and especially the information members are exposed to. This may start out as an innocent desire not to have heretical teachings invade the body. But this control becomes deadly in abusive groups. Before long, only those things approved by church leaders, and only material that portrays the church or leaders in a good light are encouraged. Information is censored. Everything concerning the church must go through the leader to make sure it is "appropriate," "healthy" or “not divisive.” Material brought in from outside is frowned on and sometimes actively condemned.
In the worst cases, such material is simply not allowed.
This discouraging or forbidding of outside sources can lead to tight control of information and eventually isolation from society at large, as much information is deemed unholy or worldly and a danger.
Anything the leadership wants you to believe is allowed. Anything that doesn't support the leader's position or perspective is discouraged or banned. If it is something harmful to the image of the church, no matter how accurate or useful, it is kept from members. In some cults, only certain translations of the Bible are allowed. In others, only “correct” interpretations of scripture are tolerated. In some groups any information not originating from the headquarters is deemed unsafe.

When you hear pastors or leaders complaining about "murmuring" or "gossip" in an abusive church, it can sometimes be nothing more than fear that reliable information unfavorable to the leadership is leaking out. Some leaders will actually use the pulpit to denounce the free flow of information, but they will call it something negative and preach against it.
How does this start? How does this control over others’ lives and minds begin?
With a desire to control. It may perhaps at first be only a healthy desire to keep doctrine pure – but control over information and thoughts escalates and gets out of hand.
Sometimes it begins as a shortcut to keep the hassles from members to a minimum. Innocent beginnings, but they can lead to tragic endings.

Image, image, image

Milieu Control is strongly related to another red flag: Image Consciousness. Abusive churches are concerned about image. Sometimes, image is everything. This church has a vision superior to other churches. To preserve that lofty status, anything negative must be quashed immediately, even if it is true. If a leader is caught in sin, the sin is quickly swept under the rug. If many members have left, no one is allowed to talk about it. The church “represents Christ to the community” and you can’t let the public know that the church has a problem or people will think Christ does. This is COMMON practice in abusive churches and is close to idolatry, equating the church, or church leaders, to Christ himself.

Shame, flattery and manipulation

Image Consciousness, in many abusive churches, leads to harsh treatment and manipulation of members. To keep negative information from leaking out of the body, members are sometimes shamed or spoken against -- sometimes from the pulpit. Ministries are whisked away from those who begin to ask questions, and ministries are used as rewards to “loyal” members who know how to keep quiet about the misdeeds of leaders, or who prove useful through slavish work or flattery of leaders. And in abusive groups, flattery goes both ways. Leaders know how to flatter selectively. They flatter those they can use. But they also shame. They will use flattery and shame very deftly to keep the image of the church polished and gleaming and to keep in total control.

Authoritarianism: I'm in control; You shut up

Another red flag is authoritarianism, the concentration of power in the hands of a few or sometimes even one person. That power can start out used well. The maxim “power corrupts; absolute power corrupts absolutely” is especially true in churches. It corrupts leaders in different ways.

Two kinds of corruption

Some are lured by the financial aspects of power and begin to lavish on themselves gifts and luxuries. How does this happen? Possibly, these once godly leaders have sacrificed much over the course of their lives while watching other Christians live luxuriant lives. When the church begins to do well, they see this as a sign that it’s “their turn now,” that they deserve some blessings because they have served so long and so hard for very little. Soon, that feeling of dessert takes over and they feel entitled to more and more. Eventually some may even feel they deserve other men’s wives or multiple wives.

More dangerous, though, than leaders who fall to hedonistic ways are those who believe that because their vision for the church is unique, superior and direct from God that God’s mind and their mind are becoming fused. They soon begin to see their own actions as God’s. Anyone who opposes them is opposing God. When this happens, watch out! They won’t phrase it that way. They may not even realize what they are doing. They feel they have a special place as God’s best spokesperson. Because they are so special, they will steamroll over anyone in their way. Because they are anointed, they soon feel they have a role in rooting out imperfections among lesser Christians, and they can do it with gusto. 
Excellence, or legalism?

These leaders can become more than just haughty; they can become harsh and demanding. They look down on others around them and puff themselves up, all the while stressing the need for humility. They begin to practice a perfectionism that kills. It won’t be called perfectionism. It might be called “striving for excellence” or “pursuing a holy life” or “giving God His due.” It becomes legalism and it drains the life out of individuals and churches, as members try harder and harder to meet standards that become out-of-reach. While members are whipping themselves for failing to perform, the preaching will be on grace. While members are burdened and shackled to legalistic aims, the sermons will be on freedom. But members are not feeling free or forgiven. They are loaded down with guilt and work and feelings of failure.

Calling concern "divisiveness"

Another red flag is a false call to unity. When authoritarian pastors want to quell dissent, they label even legitimate questions “divisive.” You are interfering with the unity of the brethren if you raise issues of concern. This tactic ensures a lockstep, zombie-like following and cements the cult leader or abusive pastor into his place at the top. Who wants to be divisive? Who wants to cause trouble? Who wants to be spreading heresy or harboring a critical spirit or injecting division? (These are common phrases used against those expressing concerns about abusive leadership, and they serve as giant, fluttering red flags.) Most humble, sincere Christians concerned about wayward leadership will be cowed by such tactics. The abuses of the leader will continue unchecked.

When people slink out

The final red flag in this short overview is the telltale indication of trouble signaled by people leaving a congregation. If spiritual abuse is taking place, you might not catch on right away. People in manipulative groups will have been warned – subtly or otherwise – not to talk about church problems. They will be called weak or gossipers or immature if they mention why someone left. Those who leave also may suffer residual effects of controlling mechanisms in the church and say little about why they left.

If you notice an exodus of people from a congregation, it’s a sign to dig further and check for other signs of spiritual abuse.

These are just some of the roots of spiritual sickness to watch for in your congregation, but they seem the most common.

Image Consciousness

One sign of spiritual abuse, according to David Henke of Watchman Ministries, is image consciousness. (Item no. 2 on his list)

When I first saw this item on the checklist, I thought, well our group isn't image conscious. We don't advertise, we keep a low profile, we don't dress up or have new, flashy ministries.

So, at first, when I saw this item, I thought it was one of the few you couldn't check off concerning our group. Then I looked at it again and saw that Henke isn't talking about group image so much as individual image. Suddenly, the red flags popped up.

Our group, on an individual basis, was extremely image conscious. I would not want to park anywhere near a casino for fear the pastor might draw the wrong conclusion should he drive by, or anyone in the church, or anyone who knew me, for that matter.

I was afraid to buy wine vinegar at the grocery store for the same reason. It looks like a bottle of wine. (Though I didn't and don't believe alcohol was wrong, I do not drink for reasons other than religion.) How could I bring down the name of Christ by looking like a hypocrite?

I was constantly thinking, What would the pastor or his wife think of me if they saw me doing this or that? What if I had too many items in my shopping cart and I looked extravagant? What if my clothes look too expensive? Am I being Christlike by serving roast when others can only afford Mac N Cheese?

In short, image was everything. Or at least it was a much bigger deal than I realized until I was out of the group. It wasn't Christ's expectations; it was the pastor's, and the idea that since I was representing Christ to the world, I had to be perfect. Trying to avoid all appearances of evil is a full-time job.

I am pretty much free from this now. I park in front of bars and casinos if convenient. I don't detour around the liquor aisle. I don't pay attention much to what I'm wearing. I am free!

Here's what Henke has to say on the subject:
Jesus was not "image conscious." He was willing to associate with wine drinkers, cheating tax collectors and even prostitutes. He accused the legalistic Pharisees of "teaching for doctrine the commandments of men" (Matthew 15:9) and likened their showy, hypocritical outward rightousness to "whited sepulchres, which indeed appear beautiful outwardly, but are within full of dead men's bones, and of all uncleanness" (Matthew 23:27).

Neither was He paranoid. His ministry was conspicuously open to the public. When He was on trial (John 18) He was asked about His teachings and His reply was, "Why askest thou me?" Jesus pointed out that He always taught in public, and never in secret, so why not ask His disciples. He had nothing to hide.

Jesus did not fear to criticize the religious leaders or their faulty doctrines (e.g. Matthew 15:1-9; 23:1-39, etc.). And when confronted with criticism or with treacherous questions designed to discredit Him, His response was never to simply demand silence or only positive recognition from His accusers. Rather, He gave answers - scriptural and reasonable answers - to their objections (e.g. Luke 7:36-47; Matthew 19:3-9).

Exploring elitism

One common sign of an abusive church is a sense of elitism. Just what IS elitism? It's a feeling that your group is special, better, far superior than other churches or groups. Most churches feel that they are on the right path, that their particular doctrines are right. That's not elitism. It might be a kind of pride to look out for, but it's not elitism to feel that you are doing what you think is right.

Elitism goes beyond just thinking that your doctrines or practices are correct. It's a hyperactive puffing up about it. Your group thinks not only that it is on the right path, but that almost no one else is.

Elitism is a sense of a special mission or a special equipping for a mission. We have better gifts or use our gifts in special ways. We care more about lost souls than others around us. We are more committed to saving souls, or helping the poor, or supporting missions, or being true to scripture, than almost anyone else. We are IT!

Extreme groups begin to think they are the only manifestation of Christ's work on earth, or at least in their area.

There are a couple of ways elitism is expressed. One is that the leaders come right out and say it. The pastor or leaders might preach that the group has a special call or a unique mission. This will be a repeated theme in abusive churches. It tends to isolate. If you are so special, God's own favorite children, why would you even want to hang out with the "unspecial"?

It also takes subtler forms. The pastor might not focus much on your special calling. He might instead spend time cutting down other groups, focusing on their perceived weaknesses and problems. If he does this enough, you get the idea. Church X doesn't really stress scripture (unspoken lesson: WE DO!); Church Y doesn't really preach salvation (unspoken lesson: WE REALLY CARE); Church Z doesn't live out the gospel (unspoken lesson: WE LIVE THE GOSPEL).

What elitism does is unify church members. They get the message. THEY don't want to be like the worldly groups out there that don't care about lost souls or the poor or missions or the scripture. They want to make sure they are among the chosen few. To do this, they will hunker down, they will keep to the group, they will make sure the leadership knows they are loyal and true and not heathen like those other groups outside.

When things get messy and they are tempted to leave, elitism is a powerful handcuff. Members have spent so much time looking down on other groups and playing up their own gifts, that to leave means they have to reverse their thinking, and that's very hard to do. Suddenly, they are thinking about no longer being part of God's special group, and also about joining up with groups they - along with the church leadership - have looked down on for so long. That's a hard reversal to stomach.

Besides bragging about gifts and callings, and besides castigating other "inferior" churches, another sign of elitism is when the pastor or leaders won't meet with other community pastors. They will not join ministerial alliances or Christian groups in a community. They are too good for those lukewarm Christians. They are far above them and will not deign to rub shoulders with them. While many elitist pastors do meet with such groups either just for show or because it lends credibility to the group, the very hard core elitists will not. If your pastor won't meet with other pastors unless they are of the same denomination, it is a big, bright, red flag that he is an elitist and possibly abusive.
Elitism can be blatant or subtle, but it's a common trait of abusive churches.

To see an example of classic elitism, go HERE to see how a Harold Camping defender attacks critics using elitist language.