Hell Week - Part III

We found a sitter for our children and headed over to the Wilson's home at the appointed time. We stopped at the end of their street by the park to pray that things would go well. I particularly prayed that I would not fly off the handle and would remain calm and level-headed. The Lord graciously helped me to do just that and I thank Him for it as it is probably not normal for me!

Derrick texted my dh that they were in the backyard. We entered the side gate and found their entire family eating outside. We had a seat and waited until they were done and the children had been ushered inside.

I got the very distinct feeling right off the bat that things weren't going to go well. I could see the outcome of this meeting well in advance, before even a word had been spoken.

I could try to recount the entire conversation ver batim but I think that would just take too long. I will try to accurately write down what was said in as brief a manner as possible. It had to have been at least two hours long, although I didn't look at my phone to tell the time.

During this meeting, Derrick kept looking at his phone as though he weren't even really that interested in what was going on. It was pretty distracting. The whole time, I noticed that Derrick had a sort of vapid, disconnected look in his eyes. It were almost as if he had become emotionless or had shifted into "business mode." This was very difficult as the subject matter was so painful for us and we didn't seem to be getting any kind of emotional connection back from him.

We had been advised by a friend that perhaps it would be best to start off with the idea that we know that we had done some injury to them so perhaps we should address that first. I said, "It appears that we are hurt and that we have hurt you and we would like to talk about how we have hurt you."

This was met with immediate responses by both of them.

"No. No. We're not hurt. We are confused, but we're not hurt."

(This is, in my opinion, a tactic of disconnecting from people and placing yourself in a safer, superior position. It's a form of, "I am not susceptible to you" or "I am in charge here." But again, I digress.)

Unforgiveness

From there, we moved right into talking about what was going on with my feeling unforgiveness toward Russell Ann.

I tried to explain that I was working through a process of forgiveness. I explained that I had realized that I needed to talk to them and was trying to reconnect when the email from Janna got forwarded. I tried to explain that I was, indeed, working on forgiveness and was making progress.

At this point, Russell Ann began to talk to me about how there is a certain "period of grace" that God gives us for forgiveness. A time when His mercy rests on us as we work through things. But, just as in the Bible, that time expires and then (and this is her quote): "things come back to bite us in the butt like this." Besides the fact that there certainly is no timeline for forgiveness and that God himself stayed angry with the Israelite for many years, I look back and find this language to be very punitive.

Disobedience and Marriage

Derrick then brought up the point that Frank (as revealed in their meeting the day before) had been trying to get me to talk to Russell Ann and that I had refused. This is where things started to get bad. Derrick told me that I was "disobedient" and "rebellious" for not listening to my husband.

Russell Ann quickly followed up with, "Well, maybe not disobedient but not submissive."

Then Derrick looked at my husband and began to tell him that he (and these are direct quotes) "Has no authority in his home" because he could not get me to obey him.

He told me that my “sin” of disobedience to Frank was like unto a practicing homosexual who goes to church and then prays for God’s blessing. “God cannot hear your prayers. He cannot bless you.”

I was repeatedly told that I was in rebellion and disobedience.

While we were discussing obedience and submission, Derrick made the statement that men have to "frame reality" for their wives. Wives are too emotional to think for themselves and men have to help them see things correctly. You may want to re-read that. I assure you that is a commonly held belief among the leadership as I have seen it many times on people's facebook pages, etc.

Then, as he began discussing my previous notes I'd written on facebook (more on that later), he said that to my dh, "I don't trust you. Because you came into my office and said that you didn't think that these facebook notes were appropriate and now you're saying something different. I can never trust you again."

In fact, at one point, he said something close to, "You'll never be trustworthy!"

I interrupted and said, "No. We're not going to say that." I was very upset at the way that Derrick was treating my husband who had looked up to him as a father figure for years and admired him as much as anyone else in the world. It was very hard to listen to him accusing him and attacking and just berating him. :o(

Divisiveness

From there, we moved into a discussion about all the "trouble" that I was causing at the church. Not we, mind you. I. Cathy.

Here we discuss another couple, we'll call them Bob and Jessie. Derrick said this: "I was talking to Bob about a marriage issue they’re currently having (now adamantly): which I will not discuss here. I started asking him questions and it finally got down to the fact that around a year ago Bob and Jessie were talking about something that Cathy had said to her and Bob told Jessie that she was not to take counsel from Cathy anymore. So, Cathy, at the bottom of their marriage problems was…you.” Imagine being told that you were "at the bottom" of someone else's marriage problems.

Derrick never said what it was that I had said to Jessie that was upsetting so it could have been “submit and shut up” or it could have been “bash him in the head with a baseball bat.” I really did have and do have no idea.


He specifically said that this incident has taken place about a year prior. This is a convenient time frame since I had already told him that my issues with Russell Ann had started about a year prior. In truth, however, this incident happened three years prior as I later found out. Again, truth was overlooked to suit a purpose. It wouldn't have been as derogatory if he had said, "The problem was three years ago but everything seems to have been fine since them between you all and there really don't seem to be any problems."


When I asked him why he didn’t encourage Bob to come and talk to me or Frank he said that “Bob wasn’t offended. He didn't have an offense.” I responded that I felt that this was unbiblical and that, in fact, that Bob had caused some disunity, not me.

I was emphatically told that, no, it was me who had caused disunity. When I asked if this wasn’t a problem with Bob walking in brotherly love, I was told that it wasn’t about Bob. That Bob wasn’t on “trial.” Apparently, I was, though. And that is exactly how I was feeling. Under fire and attacked.

I was told that the bible commands me to go and get things worked out immediately (according to Matthew 18:15-22) but when I asked why this same principle wasn't being applied to those who were "accusing" me, there was no response.

Next Derrick repeatedly told me that I had caused confusion and disunity in the church but I was never told WHO said WHAT exactly. There just seemed to be some nebulous allegations.

Derrick told us that Tommy had come to him and reported that he was counseling several women who were expressing confusion about marriage paradigms. He said that when he sat down with Tommy to talk about it, Tommy told him that every one of these women had been speaking to me and that I was the cause of confusion. I believe his exact words were, again, "There is only one person that all of these problems have in common. And that's you, Cathy." This was, as it turns out, a complete and utter lie. But I'll get to that later.

Women Counselors

We were also talked to about an incident that we had with Manny and Karly. Remember them? The couple who had also struggled with anger issues? One night, we had all been in our kitchen discussing marriage relationships. Of course, I had listened to what Manny had to say about my anger. Then we started talking about his issue with co-dependence, I believe. Karly, my husband, and myself were all in agreement that he had an issue with this but I was the most outspoken. Probably because I felt an affinity with him because of the anger issue and I'm naturally outspoken.

At any rate, this is what Derrick had to say about that. "I spoke with Manny and he says that you tried to counsel him. He says that you were very FORCEFUL in trying to counsel him. That is not acceptable. Women do NOT counsel men."

At this point, my dh broke in and said, "Now wait a minute. I was there in the room. We were all talking as a group. Are you saying that's not ok?"

"Absolutely not. Women are not to counsel men. Even if their husbands are there."

Biblically, this is ridiculous and I could go into all the examples of women counseling men (Deborah being a noted one) but I won't do that here. It was clear that the male-authority paradigm was tantamount.

Facebook

We were also told that “lots of people” were calling the church asking about my facebook posts. Now, in case you're wondering about my facebook notes, here is a brief rundown.

One had to do with how I didn't want to be the kind of woman whose main character quality was "submissive." I wanted to be bold, an adventurer, like Deborah.

The second had to do with how I was sick of religious Christians who act as though there is one, black-and-white Biblical solution to any problem and try to force-feed their version of truth to others.

At this point, Russell Ann did something that I consider very demeaning and wish that I had prevented. She insisted (after my repeated protestations) on getting a computer and looking at my facebook notes. She read them aloud to everyone and proceeded to chastise me for how angry I sounded. She then lectured me on how she had recently been to a woman's conference where the speaker was a very strong woman but was also submissive and not "angry" sounding.

Then, Russell Ann made a statement that shocks me to this day and really tells me that something is, indeed, very wrong. She looked at me and said, "I reread the story of Deborah this morning just to make sure I wasn't missing something and I saw that Deborah was VERY submissive."

I think I blinked. Wow. I still do not know how to process this. Deborah was the leader of an entire nation and the general of the entire army came to her and basically bowed down to her and begged for her help. She even ridiculed him for asking for a woman's help. Her husband is only mentioned by name once. Their relationship is never discussed at all. Indeed, all we know about Deborah is that she was a national leader, a judge, a prophetess, men submitted to her, and that she won a war and then sang about how awesome the women were. To say that she is "submissive" is incomprehensible to me. Still.

More Divisiveness

At any rate, we went on to talk about these "divisive" actions that I had taken. Derrick wanted to know exactly what I had against Russell Ann that I was not forgiving her for. I explained that the year prior when I was told, "Christian wives don't leave there husbands," that there was a real break-down.

Russell Ann sort of gently poo-pooed me saying that I should have know that is not what she meant.

I gently reminded her that she had once advised me that if other people are misconstruing our words, we really need to evaluate how we are coming across. That we cannot dismiss the interpretation of others. She seemed to almost accept that, which I thought was nice. She stated that we had had a relationship that was part friend, part mentor. I agreed with her on that and told her that I had since realized that I had been looking for someone to mother me and that, in reality, no one was going to do that. I should not have looked to her to mother me because that was God's job now.

Dysfunctional?

During this entire meeting, Derrick repeatedly told us that we were dysfunctional. Even pointing his finger in my dh's face once as he said it. He told me that I am a "hurt person who is projecting hurt onto those around me and causing confusion in the church." (In retrospect, I think this was probably supposed to be a little more stinging but we had spent the entire previous year talking about how dysfunctional we have been so it really wasn't much of an insult.)

We repeatedly tried to assure him that, in fact, we were more functional now than ever and were getting a good deal of help. We were summarily argued with. He was emphatic that we were NOT functional.

At this point I said, "But Derrick, everyone is dysfunctional."

"No."

"No? Everyone is not dysfunctional?"

"No."

I replied, "I'm sorry but you know that we all have a sin nature. We will always have a sin nature. Are you saying that we don't all have a sin nature?"

The remarkable happened. For the first time during this whole conversation, a veil lifted off of Derrick's eyes. For a split second I thought that he was actually looking at me as though I were a real person. I suppose that being confronted with this obvious truth might have given him pause. I had a glimmer of hope that perhaps reason who prevail. And then it was gone. He just went on talking about how we were dysfunctional and broken and hurting and hurting others.

Mutual Submission

At some point during this discussion, my dh was trying to explain that we believe in the concept of mutual submission.

We insisted that we had tried their marriage paradigm and that it did not work for us. Immediately they responded, "No. You misapplied the paradigm." We rebutted, "No. It didn't work for us. We applied it just as you suggested." They were still insistent that we must have been making some kind of error since it didn't "work."

At this point, seeing that my husband was under more attack from Derrick about our marriage, I said something like this, "Now wait a minute. He has been a leader at Victory Weekend and has been taught this paradigm by you. Don't you think that some of this responsibility for the "misapplication" of the paradigm can be shared by the church?" This was not a favorable idea. (In fact, not once during the entire meeting did Derrick or Russell Ann take any ownership that they themselves or the church or ANYONE had played a part in any of this but us.)

We kept trying to explain that we felt our new belief was best for our marriage, that it was totally biblical, and that we were MUCH healthier since we'd instituted it.

This was met with a very strong negative reaction. Almost an aversion, I would say. There was an immediate, "No. No." and a moving back away from the table on the part of Derrick.

I tried to point out that many solid Christians believe in this concept. This was met with, "That may be. But that is not how we operate at Milestone." Upon further trying to explain what we believe, I pointed out that surely we don't all have to believe the same thing to go to the same church.

Russell Ann replied that among the marriages on staff, there were many varied personalities and people. That no two marriages look exactly alike. That there was room for some variation. But she emphatically stated that there was NEVER that much variation. That all the marriages had a male-authority basis and that no other paradigm was acceptable in leadership.

E-mail

Then there was a segue into the email that I had sent Jeff the previous year. I had printed it out and handed it to them, highlighting the part that had to do with confusion on women's roles. I told them that I wanted them to know that I had tried to figure this out and wasn't inactive on the topic. I also let them know that the email was never answered.

At this point Derrick said something very strange. He sort of jumped on my dh and said, "Why does your wife need to send an email to another man to get these questions answered?" Now for one thing, this is strange because the email was to my pastor and was specifically about women's roles in the church. Something my husband clearly doesn't answer about because he's not in charge there.

Two, he had already established that I was to "submit to" my husband in all things. Now he is saying that not EVEN THE PASTORS should have more of a say in our marriage than my husband. My husband has already told him that he believed that mutual submission was best for our marriage. So, the big question is: If my husband decides upon mutual submission, am I not rebelling against him if I refuse this idea?

Why does he, a pastor, have any problem with this decision of ours if he believes that I am to look only to my husband for guidance? Why is he spending any time arguing with us about this at all? The answer is, of course, that this was all just a desperate attempt to latch onto something to accuse us with when there really was nothing there.

What We Tell Women

During this long conversation, there were several emphatic statements that Milestone does not "simply teach women to submit, pray, and read their Bibles." I found it very strange that the man sitting there telling me that I am "disobedient" and "rebellious" for not obeying my husband was trying to convince us that there is no bias against women in the church. If the situation hadn't been so dire, I would have found it funny. It was so incredibly ironic.

Earlier in the conversation, I was grilled about to whom I had communicated that the church taught women to "submit, pray, and read their Bibles."

I replied that I didn't think that I had communicated that to anyone except in the email to Janna. I stated that I had pointed out that I felt differently than some of the staff women about marriage but I was careful not to be outright attacking of their beliefs. (In retrospect, I believe that I may have come across that way to one woman: Karly. This was probably more because she expressed to me that the old "submit" system wasn't working for her. I was probably pretty clear that I felt she needed to seek help outside the church and learn to draw boundaries.)

Unity

At this point, Russell Ann told me that I was wrong and causing division because I was "differentiating" between what I believed and what the leadership believed. It is very important to understand their definition of "unity." Unity means thinking the same way as they do on certain issues. There is no room for disagreement, though it be biblically based and well-thought out. Even if a majority of respected Christians believe the opposing view. This is one major red-flag of a controlling church and of spiritual abuse. In fact, unity is NOT thinking alike. It is learning to walk together even when you disagree on these issues.

Boundaries

Another interesting note that is that at one point, Derrick said to me, "Cathy you seem to talk a lot about 'boundaries.' You seem to focus a lot on 'boundaries.'" I replied that yes, that is correct. I just find this odd because although my dh had taken the time a year prior to make sure that we were on the same page as our leadership on this issue and that Derrick had assured him that we were, it was obvious that that was not true. "Boundaries" is not an idea that is accepted at Milestone, particularly for women.

Celebrate Recovery

Another odd note was that at one point, Derrick started questioning us about our CR group. Only he referred to it in this manner: "This Celebrate Recovery group that is 'supposedly' out of Rick Warren's church." I was taken aback by the immaturity of this statement. It was as though he thought we were making up the origins of our group.

I simply replied that CR was, indeed, out of Saddleback Church in California and that it was written on the cover of every one of their books. What this says to me is that the idea that a well-respected pastor such as Rick Warren would sanction something that teaches people that they are "broken and dysfunctional" for life is a concept foreign to Milestone leadership. But I will talk about this in a later post.

Names, We Want Names

Late in the evening, the Wilsons wanted to know where I was getting this idea that Milestone was biased against women. I really wanted to just point to the very conversation we were having but instead replied that I wasn't going to do to anyone else what was being done to me. I was having slanderous accusations brought before me with absolutely no evidence and no one there to verify the truth. I was being told that I was not following proper biblical protocol for restoring relationships and yet the fact that this was not being done for me either seemed to be completely overlooked.

Coldness

Now, having no real basis for "divisiveness" as we had answered and explained every accusation, this was the final result: "Look, here's the bottom line. You guys have different beliefs on marriage than we do. You need to find a church that agrees with you."

I looked across the table at Derrick as he paused. I allowed myself, for the first time that night, to get emotional just a bit. My eyes teared up. I said to him, "Derrick, this is our family that we are talking about. Our family. How can you be so cold and clinical?"

His reply: "I don't know any other way to be."

My heart just dropped.

Ultimatums

He proceeded to say, "If you guys want to stay at Milestone, this is what you have to agree to: You can't tell anyone the name of your counselor. You can't tell anyone what books on marriage you are reading. You can't tell anyone what groups you are going to outside of the church. And if anyone asks you for marital help you must refer them to the leadership. You are not to refer anyone anywhere else or give any advice. You guys are broken and dysfunctional and have no business advising anyone on marriage."

My husband spoke up. This was a deal-breaker for him. "We cannot agree to do that. We cannot agree to not tell people where we're getting help."

Conclusion

How the conversation ended was by my dh saying that we would take a month off and think about what we wanted to do. He asked Derrick what we should tell people. Derrick was emphatic that we NOT tell anyone anything. He told us not to call anyone or talk to anyone about it at all. (Why we agreed to is beyond me. Of course, why we sat and listened to any of this is beyond me at this point.)

Also, Derrick did say, "If you want, you can go talk to Pastor Jeff but I can tell you that we're on the same page." (After meeting with some other people who had been pushed out of the church, we determined that this was probably true and was only confirmed later, which you'll see in the next post.)

As we were walking out I asked Derrick if he had happened to record our conversation because he kept placing his iphone in the middle of the table in a particular fashion. He replied that he had not. At that point, I was beginning to wish that I had!