survivors

Be like Cathy

/ Yvonne Aburrow / Leave a comment

When I was 14 or 15 years old and still a Christian, a boy who was older than me (17, I think) told me that God wanted me to be his girlfriend. I didn’t reciprocate but I was worried enough about it that I asked an older female friend, Cathy, what she thought. Luckily for me, she said that if God wanted me to be in a relationship with him, I would feel the same way about it. Thank you, Cathy. 

And thankfully the boy accepted that the answer was no.

The girl in this story (Sarah Carr) didn’t have a Cathy. She finally got justice after nearly 25 years.

The pastor who was betrothed to a child — Friendly Atheist

She has also started a group to help people in the same situation:

the Reclamation Collective, a non-profit group that creates space for those “harmed within religious and spiritual spaces.”

Sarah Carr

A disturbing history

/ Yvonne Aburrow / Leave a comment

This is a very disturbing read about institutional abuse by crypto Nazis and very conservative Catholics in Austria in the late 1940s to the late 1980s. Very similar to the treatment of Indigenous children in residential schools, and of Irish single mothers in Magdalen Laundries. 

What does this kind of history tell us? That “respectable” people can get away with all sorts of unpleasant behaviour merely by being plausible sounding and having academic credentials.

Continue reading →

LGBTQ+ religious trauma

/ Yvonne Aburrow / 1 Comment

Religious trauma still haunts millions of LGBTQ Americans. Some mental health experts are advocating for religious trauma to be considered an official disorder in the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders.

Religious trauma occurs when an individual’s religious upbringing has lasting adverse effects on their physical, mental or emotional well-being, according to the Religious Trauma Institute. Symptoms can include guilt, shame, loss of trust and loss of meaning in life. …

Experts say LGBTQ people — who represent more than 7% of the U.S. population, according to a 2023 Gallup poll — experience religious trauma at disproportionate rates and in unique ways. Very little research has been done in this field, but a 2022 study found that LGBTQ people who experience certain forms of religious trauma are at increased risk for suicidality, substance abuse, homelessness, anxiety and depression.

— Spencer Macnaughton (2024), “Religious trauma still haunts millions of LGBTQ Americans,” NBC News.

Religious trauma workbook

/ Yvonne Aburrow / Leave a comment

I’m excited to see that Gillian Jenkinson’s book is out! Gillian Jenkinson is a therapist with extensive experience in helping people break free of harmful beliefs dinned into them by cults. I quoted her work in Changing Paths (my book) and I’ve been looking forward to her book coming out.

It’s also very reasonably priced, presumably to make it accessible to those who need it.

Continue reading →

The exclusive Plymouth Brethren

/ Yvonne Aburrow / Leave a comment

This blog post was originally written in 2006 and posted on my old blog Nemeton. Some friends had asked why I tended to make statements about the awfulness of Christianity.

Don’t be fooled by the cranky exterior of the Exclusive Brethren. They’re the religious equivalent of Vogons.

I know because I was brought up in them till the age of 9. For those who don’t know me, no, this does not make me sad and repressed. (Aleister Crowley was brought up in the Exclusive Brethren also – it’s why he was so vehemently anti-Christian and outrageously hedonistic).

Continue reading →

Leaving the Mormons

/ Yvonne Aburrow / Leave a comment

An in-depth resource on leaving the Mormons: Recovering Agency: Lifting the veil of Mormon mind control.

Luna Lindsey Corbden was born into the LDS Church and left the faith in 2001, at age 26. They live in Washington State and write about topics of interest, including psychology, mind control, culture, and autism. They also write science fiction and fantasy. When they’re not busy traveling to improbable worlds, or thinking hard about this improbable world, they’re probably snuggled with their cat and an iPad.

Escape from Scientology

/ Yvonne Aburrow / Leave a comment

TW: Scientology, religious trauma. ‘At 52, I abandoned everything, every friend, every family member’: the top official who escaped Scientology (The Guardian)

When he was certain that he wasn’t being followed, he caught the tube to the National Portrait Gallery, where he sat on the grass outside and let his heart rate slow to its regular beat. “I went OK, now what? What am I going to do? For the first time that I could remember, I wasn’t answerable to anyone.”

‘At 52, I abandoned everything, every friend, every family member’: the top official who escaped Scientology (The Guardian)