Vyckie Garrison reviews a Quiverfull classic, Me? Obey him?
I am no less rational than my (ex)husband. He also is gifted with a strong intuition and emotional intelligence. Convinced as we were that I was more susceptible to Satanic deception, our family was deprived of my reasonable input in decision making. My intelligence was squelched, my intuition was distrusted and my feelings were denied. My husband developed an artificially inflated sense of his own powers of logic. I can’t count how many times he said to me, “What you are saying sounds reasonable, but how do I know that Satan is not using you to deceive me?” I had no good defense. According to the Scriptures, we had every reason to believe that I was indeed being used to lead my husband astray.
What a horrible, sad, tragic way to live. How heart-breaking that Vyckie was convinced that she was susceptible to Satanic deception.
But it gets even more so.
When a concerned friend reported our family to Child Protective Services, my ex-husband lost custody of the children due to his abuse. The social worker told me that I was guilty of “failure to protect.” The only thing that prevented me from having my parental rights terminated and my children placed in foster care was my willingness to submit to a full psychological evaluation, undergo individual and family counseling, and cooperate with random unannounced home visits by Social Services.
My older children rightfully blame me for not protecting them against their father’s abuse. Even though they know that I was influenced by books such as “Me? Obey Him?” to believe that it was God’s will to submit to the abuse, my children cannot be fooled into thinking that I was not really responsible for their suffering. I have apologized for my neglect. Most of my children have forgiven me — still, the damage is done and some things can’t (and shouldn’t) be forgotten.
Tantum religio potuit suadere malorum. (That was about a parent abusing a child too. Iphigenia.)
Obligatory tangential humour:
“Most Greek scholars that I’ve talked to seem unaware that Iphigenia ever was in Brooklyn”
Before taking her to that job in the Crimea, Artemis dropped her off in Brighton Beach to learn the language. Not much of a job, but she fared better than Jephtha’s daughter, showing you which old-time religion to prefer if you must have one.
Vyckie Garrison says:
I suspect I’m not the only person who raised their eyebrows at that. Presumably VG thinks she’s rational yet she swallowed the QF/P stuff before, and her emotionally intelligent (ex)husband was/is a manipulative QF/P monster. If that is rational and emotionally intelligent behavior, I’m a sea cucumber.
Why do so many ex-QF/P victims seem unable to make the break properly? They have come to see that QF/P is evil nonsense, but they still want to operate inside a delusional Christian structure and justify their new and softer ideas in the same ludicrous way as the old nasty ideas, by referencing bits of their holy books. Helloooo!!! it’s all rubbish!!
If devout Christianity makes people evil as QF/P does to its men, and or miserable as it does to its women, and the appropriate god doesn’t intervene, or even bother to make his wishes clearer (like perhaps in a new edition or erratum to their holy books, surely it’s time for an update?), isn’t that fairly solid indication that it’s not just QF/P that is vile nonsense, but the whole of their religious construct? Nobody answers the QF/P victim’s prayers because nobody is listening.
Ex-QF/Pers need to come to the realisation that their god’s wishes don’t matter because their god doesn’t exist, and it’s time to make a new life based on gently loving one’s family and friends.
I agree with Sammi.
I also disliked the comments by people who claimed “Well…what the Bible REALLY means is this.”