Abused children often don't realize they are abused. It's the only world they know. I was brought up in a Baptist pastor's house. Our church only held "communion" (eating the flesh and drinking the blood) once a month and I don't remember EVER questioning it until I was well into late adolescence or early adulthood. Then it hit me: RITUAL CANNIBALISM or THEOPHAGY. Egad ....
Sometimes abused children will realize it when they see how other parents treat their kids. At least, I did. I noticed how other parents didn’t force their kids to study or even do well.
OH YOU WANT TO GO HERE? "Our church only held "communion" (eating the flesh and drinking the blood) once a month"
I don't know if I have the sufficient words or thoughts for this, though this idea has been brewing and simmering under the surface for many decades, since as a child I recognized I lived in a body that shed blood on a monthly basis. "Blood of Christ, shed for you," and then we'd put that in our mouths. A man, bleeding, to give us eternal life and salvation. The blatant absurdity and co-optation - and everyone obediently going along with it.
At some point, I became an observer in church, the male-only figures, and the only one in human form was the bleeder. No. Women are bleeders. We bleed to give life. There is no life without the blood of women. To flip this into violence and shame and bloodthirst. Again, losing all words here. It's a massive clusterfuck. Clearly stolen. Purposefully. Strategically. To destroy the way we think about ourselves as humans. To destroy our self-concepts.
I will keep turning this over in my mind. Like I said, it's been simmering, though I don't think I've ever expressed it. I can still feel young self seated in the wooden church pews, committing all mental sins, disobeying every message. Not believing.
Yeah ... "It is from the Bible that man has learned cruelty, rapine, and murder; for the belief in a cruel God makes a cruel man."
"A Letter: Being an Answer to a Friend, on the publication of The Age of Reason" (12 May 1797), published in an 1852 edition of The Age of Reason, p. 205
Thanks for your comment, Ms. McFly. Always on-point. :)
So true. That’s why we have such a bloodthirsty society.
Abused children often don't realize they are abused. It's the only world they know. I was brought up in a Baptist pastor's house. Our church only held "communion" (eating the flesh and drinking the blood) once a month and I don't remember EVER questioning it until I was well into late adolescence or early adulthood. Then it hit me: RITUAL CANNIBALISM or THEOPHAGY. Egad ....
Thanks for commenting, Frances.
Sometimes abused children will realize it when they see how other parents treat their kids. At least, I did. I noticed how other parents didn’t force their kids to study or even do well.
To their credit, they produced ... or helped produce ... a FINE scholar.
It came too late, alas.
OH YOU WANT TO GO HERE? "Our church only held "communion" (eating the flesh and drinking the blood) once a month"
I don't know if I have the sufficient words or thoughts for this, though this idea has been brewing and simmering under the surface for many decades, since as a child I recognized I lived in a body that shed blood on a monthly basis. "Blood of Christ, shed for you," and then we'd put that in our mouths. A man, bleeding, to give us eternal life and salvation. The blatant absurdity and co-optation - and everyone obediently going along with it.
At some point, I became an observer in church, the male-only figures, and the only one in human form was the bleeder. No. Women are bleeders. We bleed to give life. There is no life without the blood of women. To flip this into violence and shame and bloodthirst. Again, losing all words here. It's a massive clusterfuck. Clearly stolen. Purposefully. Strategically. To destroy the way we think about ourselves as humans. To destroy our self-concepts.
I will keep turning this over in my mind. Like I said, it's been simmering, though I don't think I've ever expressed it. I can still feel young self seated in the wooden church pews, committing all mental sins, disobeying every message. Not believing.
Yeah ... "It is from the Bible that man has learned cruelty, rapine, and murder; for the belief in a cruel God makes a cruel man."
"A Letter: Being an Answer to a Friend, on the publication of The Age of Reason" (12 May 1797), published in an 1852 edition of The Age of Reason, p. 205
Thanks for your comment, Ms. McFly. Always on-point. :)