I, Yevette, use god language and theological questions to reflect on my lived experience as a child victim of sexual and domestic abuse who grew up in the church - unseen and unprotected by an omnipotent, omniscient, and omnipresent god. I deliberately use masculine pronouns, he/him, in my writings so that I can stay in the tension of interrogating this male-god, the cultural impact of Christian doctrine, and the interpretive power the religious community has had on me as a survivor of childhood abuse and adult sexual exploitation.

This morning as I mindlessly meandered through my morning routine with a seasoned and grateful heart, I found myself smiling, joyfully singing along with a traditional Christian hymn that popped up on my inspirational playlist, but then without notice, a sad and familiar feeling arose in my body like a fever – a slow and sinister fever rising in all my bodies: mental, emotional, physical and cosmic. Tragically but instinctively, my joyful smile faded. My eyes moistened. Deep ontological questions tightened my chest and shortened my breath. Memories of feeling unseen, unloved, and unprotected collapsed on me without permission and I rushed to grab my laptop, to feel, to write, to weep, and to purge – again.

This hymn declared that god was faithful, that he loved me, and that he could not change and he could not fail, but as a child victim growing up in the church, I knew that he had failed me, and so had his leaders, my community, and my parents. The hymn went on like a storm front awakening an old injury, poking my wounded inner child with the same lies, the same threads of false hope. As a child, I had waited on this god while suffering quietly; silenced by the church and a culture that does not protect its children. This morning, as that hymn played, I felt like god was telling me to forsake my inherent power and quietly go back to my victimization, to the corner of my darkened bedroom, and wait for him to see me, love me, and protect me, but then I remembered he never did.

I saw a podcast today that brought me to tears. There was an adult weeping, respectfully confronting his father for never showing up during his childhood.  He shared how excited he would be when his mother would tell him, “Shane, your dad will be here to get you Friday,” and how brutally painful it was to hold that promise in his chest while preparing and packing, only to sit on the curb until his stomach growled and he had watched the sun go down. The clip brought me to tears because it is how I felt waiting on god as a child victim. I wonder how many adult child victims are weeping before god the way this man wept before his biological father.

To be rejected by a parent is brutal.
To be rejected by god is cruel.

I often think of the child staring out of a window, any window, with a thread-worn, one-eyed bunny in hand, their confused and wondering eyes laden with tears, searching the intersection of the street and then the city's horizon. I often think of me. Every evening, especially on Sundays, when the sun and moon changed shifts, my heart would sink into despair, into questioning. I waited. I didn't know how to process why my heavenly father never showed up. My little heart couldn't keep pace with an ancient grief I should not have known. I remember. I remember waiting and questioning my worth. I remember waiting and questioning why I was undeserving of a safe love - a good love.

It is detrimental to indoctrinate child victims with stories of a god who will bend the rules of nature or the hearts of man to deliver them when we know that is not the truth. God has not changed the terrain; our culture, within this realm of existence, creates new perpetrators and new victims every day. It is imperative that we teach children to self-advocate, even against concepts of god that disempower them. We teach children that their power resides in he who may eventually pull up to the curb at dusk rather than teaching our children how powerful they are in knowing and protecting themselves. It is detrimental to teach children to wait for an external power to speak for them when they have been given a voice.

We must stop placing safety or power outside of the child's concept of self. I waited on this god, breath held, indiscretions covered, and I waited for the answers for why my dad didn't want me and neither did my god.

My “window” was my heart.

My “window” was this ever expanding void of rejection and abandonment being etched in me every time I was left to be violated and then forced to worship him who could not or would not deliver me. I was an innocent child begging god to show up as he did in the divine narrative I was being forced to know, understand, believe and recite. I was so confused, much like a child questioning why they are undeserving of basic parental care and love because even good but broken biological fathers showed up for their children, didn’t they? Why didn’t god see me, love me, protect me, and deliver me?

As I was singing this hymn, the residue of my childhood victimization resurfaced, and I was reminded that I was singing a painful lie: the memories of Sunday nights when I really believed my week’s devotion had changed the heart of god and he would protect me, but he didn’t. I still believed even when the house was quiet and my door opened, my sleep disrupted and my body molested - I still believed. I was a child being violated and beaten while being forced to quietly absorb my trauma, hold the blame, raise my hands, surrender, and sing of the faithfulness of god.

I was told to worship the one entity, the one being, the one god who had the power to protect the innocent but never did. At six, under the physical weight of men and grieving the purpose of my existence and god’s absence, I was being told to venerate a deity who did not show up while being blamed for the symptoms of the trauma he allowed. I waited quietly – learning how to be a victim before god, man and community. 

As a child victim of sexual and domestic violence, I never got the answers and while I was holding secrets, washing soiled gowns and covering bruises, I was shifted from this divine parental conversation of unconditional love, cosmic justice, and parental presence to being indicted by god for being sinful and being unworthy of his love without a guarantor. I don't remember my specific age, but our lessons were less about god's promises and more about my sinful nature. Imagine a child, an abused child like me, standing and weeping at a window for years and then one day that absentee parent arrives. Unable to see through my tears, I run outside to embrace him, but his stoic posture unbends my smile and he telepathically brings my hands down into a posture of confession and surrender. He is not running towards me. He is not kneeling to scoop me up and swing me around while he apologizes for his absence. No, he blames me, tells me of his suffering and then calls me unclean.

I was still a child victim waiting on god to fulfill his promises when I was handed a subpoena that required me to accept cosmic blame for the decisions of others. I still had dried semen on my body while being blamed for the conditions of my existence. How could I be indicted by my creator, my father? What biological parent sees their child in this light, with this lens? How had my prayers gone from innocent pleas and petitions to justifying why I even existed? How had my trauma been overlooked, but god had not been held accountable? How had his promises been presented, but accountability had not?

How did we, do we get here theologically? Imagine your own questions around unresolved, unacknowledged trauma and how long it took for you to reconcile the myth of this god’s power and the truth around the complexities of your existence, the pains of your reality and god’s absence. Theodicy is a complex question because we have created a narrative about the nature of god that is often contrary to the reality of the world we live in. An adult may be able to declare Romans 8:28, “We know that all things work together for good for those who love God, who are called according to his purpose,” but can a child victim? Imagine trying to navigate these same complex and contradictory narratives as a child victim of sexual and domestic abuse. Think of your favorite childhood hymns. Think of the scripturally-based promises and prayers that you recited that went unanswered while adults, oblivious to your abuses, chastise you for not remembering.

As a child victim of sexual and domestic violence who went on to become an adult victim of sexual exploitation, I assert that the root of my victimization mindset, my adult sexual exploitation began here, at the root of this cosmic parental wound.  As a child victim – learning the nuisance of being, boundaries, and belonging, I was being taught to displace my own sense of intuition, understanding, or agency and trust in a being outside of myself who never showed up for me while living in a culture, community, and church that often protects the pedophile and silences the victim.