I'm truly not trying to be rehtorically cute or flippant here.

I see ALL people as being religious. Yes...I see ALL people as being religious.

I think back to HiSkool and College and Grad Skool and discussions of "politics." The definitive mantra then and now (academically) was "if you abstain from politics, you are actually being political." I agree!

Similarly, I'll proclaim: "if you abstain from religion, you are in fact 'religious.'"

All the athiests...ooops...a labeled belief or practice.....All the athiests I've aver met have a foundation and doctrine (huh! A "doctrine") with which they justify their lack-of-belief. "Lack of belief of what?" Ok...God n stuff.

Earthies, satanists, witches, and numerologists all maintain a rationale, do they not? They base their beliefs and lack of beliefs on certain truths they determine as truths.

So if I have distain for "religion," what religion exactly and based upon what.

My maintenance of being non-religious would have to have about a paragraph of justification doctrine that explains exactly what I mean and why...even if I refuse to tell anyone, or offer to anyone my rationale for hating religion, I will still have an internal paragraph or two of doctrine...thus, I have a religion.

One of the coldest and most undeniable truths of CSA is the terrible ALONENESS of the victim.

When a boy is abused sexually, the introduction of sexualized subjects and violations cause trauma that isolates him.

Boys who are coerced or forced into sex with older males often assume fault. (THEY are not at fault) They further invent assumptions to make sense of the situation. these assumptions adoped as truth by a shattered boy become as rigid as concrete and iron as that boy becomes a man. The assumption (often wrong) goes untalked about, unchallenged, and becomes FACT. Going back into one's own history and challenging these very assumptions and adopting a more healthy point of view is often one of the Goals of Healing and Therapy.

Having said that, a very very common assumption is that God is unavailable because the boy is bad or dirty or somehow unworthy. The outlook of the boy is that he is at fault and caused the abuse himself and further that religeon won't save him or benefit him because he is/was flawed.

To survive abuse is to join the fraternity of the ISOLATED children, the NEGLECTED boys who were ABANDONED and IGNORED by all those living and yes, even GOD (though the assumption may be inccorect).

For a survivor to reconnect with God the survivor must attain a new paradigm, a new attitude, a new awareness of God. This was my challenge...the God who abandoned me along with the rest of the human race wasn't going to move toward me or apologize or do anything different, so how was I to move toward him? How was I to accomplish that? ONLY through changing of myself.

I use music, I use prayer, I brook absolutely no judgment or opinions from others about all of this. (Yes it is that private, I am that afraid, and it is a VERY BIG DEAL) I allow myself to trust that God was no more at fault than I was. I slowly and surely retrace the steps to the altar that I turned my back on so long ago. I submit to a relationship with God by allowing myself to accept it.

That entire post above is dead-on to my understanding and belief of the dynamic that builds and controls the sexually abused child. It just took a guy who can articulate a complex idea into a clear picture. Well done.

When I packed my bag for issolationville (imposed and/or chosen) at age-8, I took with me: My favorite stuffed animals, hoping they would re-emerge as real friends to me. My thumb, because sucking it still served to comfort me. My forest, as it was a world built not by humans, but by God and only God, and I was safe there. And I packed God into my bag, as I somehow knew that he had not left me, did not like what was happening to me, and when it all killed me, maybe he's take me home. But I'm so glad I packed-up God as i had NO ONE else to talk to about even the tiniest detail of my heart, body, mind, fears and tears. I had no one to cry with...no one to cry to...except him.

Time went on. My choices for the survival-bag were tested.

The animals never woke-up again.

Sucking my thumb only got me humiliated and chastised by the dentist, parents, relatives, sisters, friends...It seems it was a major societal sin, a character-flaw, baby-ish, "queer," and a fully valid reason to hurl rocks at me.

My God-built forest proved to be true. That is, the forest was not a lie to the boy. It remained a kind, loving sanctuary with beauty and comfort. It will always be a sacred and genuinely magical sanctuary. If God has built a cathedral, it is the forest. I hope that I'm there when i die, and not some horrific hospital.

God proved to be so much more than what I believed when I took him along with me. To explain all he was and is and will forever be...dang....I'd have to write a book.

Robbie,

Thanks. You are erudite and well spoken, I have recieved much from you.

Geoff

Your postings made me realize that I believe in God, but not in religion. I know that may sounds strange, or at least it does to me. But my inability to trust impacts my ability to feel connected to any organized religion. It seems that I am continually disappointed by the actions of these organizations and their leadership/agents.

In a similar vein as you Robbie, I find that I feel the closest to God and have greatest sense of comfort and safety when I am on the water in my boat. It is both a therapeutic and religious experience for me.

Dan

*

The phonies in three churches that showed me the door when I was crawling face-down and reaching up for help...ain't holy and int no Christians as far as I'm concerned.

In the way-back, Jesus touched the untouchables when NO ONE else would. Lepers...very untouchable as well. I felt like such a leper. They made me feel like said leper.

Of course, I'll never let a hypocrite go unidentified as such. Could be why they no longer send Christmas cards.

I hope everyone angry or feeling reject by/with/at God can someday realize that NO man is qualified to judge us.

I occasionally will stop-by to poke at them to see if they are true yet. Its actually kind of fun to hold that mirror to their face and let them see and smell a hypocrite all up-close n such.

I have said in other places, and I will say here. There is no stronger, tougher, braver individual than he a member of the broken boy's fraternity. Broken boys who become shattered frozen victims who later become something new, something miraculous.... From the crucible of denial and pain are born a strength inconceivable by lesser men, a strength of character, a man whose mettle has been tested by rites of passage not of this world.

To say that NO man is qualified to judge us is understatement. They can't BECOME US, because no events, no training, no trial by fire can reproduce the circumstances by which we were formed.

True, the experience burned us, the process by which I became made of obsidian glass and volcanic rock was almost impossible to survive, and brought a whole new set of circumstances into my day to day battle for that which other men take for granted, sanity, self love, confidence, pride and so on. But it has made me HARD, I am empathetic, but I SEE TRUTH. My maleness is not based on congratulatory boasts from one father to another at a football game, my maleness is proven in fire, survived suicide, is unthreatened by my gay orientation and witnesses now how gays can and are CHANGING THE WORLD. My maleness can reach other suffering men in a way they can only WISH they could. I AM STRENGTH by it's very definition.

And.......you weak men who know not of this strength....you say I am not loved by GOD?

What the hell do you know about it?

God spoke to me, his resounding words, that still echo in my head more than a year later...."I AM NOT WHO THEY SAY I AM".


From one survivor to all others.....I LOVE YOU AS GOD LOVES ME.......COMPLETELY AND HONESTLY.

Geoff