Part 13 - Birds of a Feather

My father and I in Cape Town

When I first started writing this blog, I thought it would be great to have my story all in one place. I could just send the link if I needed someone to know about this part of me and I could remember the order of certain events years down the road. I didn’t think I would need to keep adding to my story of abuse after writing the installments 1-10, but the more I unravel and dig through my history, the more I see abusive organizations and individuals that I need to process. I wrote about my parents first because their abuse affected me more than any other abuse, but along the way, I unknowingly suffered from constant institutional abuse. Any abusive institutions my parents chose for our family were chosen because they reflected our family. We were not drawn in and changed as gradual brainwashing occurred. Instead, we very easily jumped into the deep end and my father would always quickly gain access to leadership wherever we went because he chose places that were exactly like him. Even where minor (very, very minor) theological differences were present, the spiritual competitions and lack of boundaries made us all feel right at home. This was very true of our church in South Africa.

Healthy churches exist everywhere. It’s something I’ve been astonished to learn as an adult, actually! I always saw the other churches in the States as less-than because I was trained to think that way, but when we arrived in South Africa, my parents’ church selection confused even me! It felt odd, but I chalked all the uncomfortable moments up to cultural differences. I could see that other churches in town seemed more vibrant, though, and a visit to another youth group had me longing for that type of community.

To this day, I have no clue how my parents found this church. It’s tiny and meets in a garage. There’s no sign out front and no church website. My introduction to the church was a Girl’s Retreat in the gorgeous green mountains, within two weeks of arriving in the country. I noticed right away that the pastor’s wife would get within inches of my face as she spoke to me, hugging me in a very matronly way, and I felt like she would be hurt if I told her to respect my space. I could see that she treated everybody this way and it was a new culture so I went along with it. Multiple times, she forced me and my sister to sing for everyone. By forced, I mean insisting over and over until I gave in. She had huge problems when people said no to her, asking until it became clear that it was a demand—all done with a smile. Sometimes during the retreat, the pastor’s wife discovered that me, my sister, and one other girl on the retreat had no problems with contemporary Christian music, so she concluded the retreat by having us all watch a ridiculous and inaccurate movie called, “What’s Wrong With Christian Rock?” I had no idea it was such a big deal to her before then, because the very songs we were singing in our songbooks were contemporary Christian music. We only lacked the instruments. From that point on, I began to hide myself and my opinions out of fear of being called out.

By the time I came home from the retreat, my parents were set on their decision to stick around, and within a month, my dad was preaching on Sundays. They loved him. I consider this a great example of how, in the fundamentalist mindset, it barely matters what you believe—it matters how you believe it. The pastor’s wife once told me, “There are no gray areas,” and I think my dad would agree. He at least behaves like he does. Unlike the rest of the church, my dad was secretly a staunch Calvinist who loved Christian rock and smoked an occasional cigar. It makes sense as I think about their similarities. The church leadership and my dad were both appalled that people would sin differently than they did. They both shamed people who disagreed. They were both male worshippers. They both made me feel like I couldn’t be me and had to be them. I could go on, but you see my point. They got along fantastically, since my dad wasn’t necessarily open about his true beliefs or behavior.

The pastor at this church obsessed over two things—“dying to self” (a phrase that he used so frequently and in a way that eventually made me feel like I wasn’t a person anymore) and tobacco. I remember him sharing from the pulpit on a regular basis about a new convert’s battle with giving up cigarettes, asking us all to pray as he shared specific weekly instances about the man’s failures. Once, during a sermon, he turned to me and asked, “Savannah, is it ok for a Christian to work for a tobacco company?” I’d been doing quite well at flying under their radar, but I felt flustered as I chose between honesty and feeling safe. I care as much about smoking as I do about fast food—both are terrible for you. Where are all the sermons railing against the evils of McDonald’s?  I don’t get angry at the McDonald’s employee working for minimum wage. With ALL those thoughts running through my head, I didn’t answer fast enough. Shocked, the pastor turned to my father and exclaimed, “Allen? Is it ok for a Christian to work for a tobacco company?” My dad paused long enough to take a deep breath, pursed his lips, and answered,

“It would be hard.”

“Absolutely not! Absolutely not!” the pastor indignantly cried, launching into a rant that I barely remember as my mind worked through what had just happened.

In Tugela Ferry

As I reflect back on my years in South Africa, this is the time that I feel like I became a robot that cried a lot.  My parents had just made the biggest move of our family’s life, one that was obviously not in my best interest, and justified it by saying that God wanted them to treat me that way for the sake of the greater good. I was very lonely for months, I couldn’t be myself in church, and I lost myself in John Piper sermons about giving up what you want now so that you could get rewards in Heaven. Really. I was listening to John Piper on an almost daily basis and I kept thinking that if I could just get through this life making every sacrifice I could possibly make and bending myself into submission, I would eventually find sweet, sweet relief when I died. I don’t know that person anymore. She finally had her behavior, if not her will, totally in obedience to the idea of being a missionary for the rest of her life in a remote location, not because it was her gifting to be away from modern conveniences, but because she thought that sacrificing her desires meant God would be pleased.

It was through this church that I first heard of New Tribes Mission, an organization that deserves its very own blog post! When I was barely 18, I packed up and left my parent’s home in South Africa to attend New Tribes Bible Institute in Waukesha, Wisconsin.

With the exception of a few friendships, I wasn’t very sad to leave the atmosphere of “my” South African church behind.