"Born Free, But Still They Hate Me"

Sheldon's note: Part of this blog post may not make sense unless you have read Monday's post, "You Can Check Out Anytime You Like, But You Can Never Leave"  first. If you haven't, please precede to read it first before continuing.

The resignation letter I sent by certified mail after my disastrous meeting with "Pastor Jones" Monday was apparently received. I got a card in the mail from him Saturday that just reeked of the passive aggressiveness he has shown lately in my attempts to leave. Here's the text of the card:

I am writing to inform you that we removed your name from our membership list by your request. I shared with the congregation Wednesday about your decision, and we are committed to loving you and praying for your restoration to Christ's church. I would still welcome you to come and ask me questions. My door is open to you.

 Talk about a healthy dose of good old fashioned fundamentalist shaming and passive aggressiveness. A fellow blogger (and former fundamentalist) on Facebook told me that they're practically telling me in fundie speak between the lines that I'm on the road to hell. This about sums up the way I feel about that:

Tweet courtesy of the Tweet of God parody account on Twitter

I am also highly suspicious of what he means by sharing with the congregation about my decision. I don't trust him, and some of the details I had told him, and explicitly told him was to remain in that office (why did I do that?), I wouldn't doubt that he has probably at least told my parents, if not the congregation itself.

He doubted what I said from the beginning about how my parents were, and "Jason", my former Sunday School teacher, who is the only person from this church standing behind me so far, has said that my mom probably ran to him and spilled all kind of her lies about me, and fundie parents always stick together, even when one of their own is in the wrong.

There's no better examples of than the powerful fundamentalist homeschooling group HSLDA, which defended parents who forced their children to live in cages, and called the father a "hero". They circle the wagons, defend each other, right or wrong. (Especially the baby boomer parents in that culture)

I was surprised by the way Pastor Jones reacted, trying to make excuses for them, trying to manipulate me into putting them back in my life by using the old "honor your mother and father" line, but I guess I shouldn't have expected any better reactions to abuse victims from a pastor in the Southern Baptist denomination.

 They're the same denomination that had one of it's top leaders fire a man for marrying a divorced woman, even though it was public knowledge that this woman had left her first husband because he tried to kill her. Nothing has ever been done so far by the Southern Baptist Convention to punish or reprimand Mr. Patterson for this.