If you were in a cult, would you want to know?

And if you did find out that you were, what would you do with that information?

I was taught to identify cults growing up. We were even trained on how to try to pull people out of them using reason and logic along with Scripture.

We looked at examples like Jonestown, David Koresh, and other religious examples. We looked at what perceived benefits the groups offered to their followers: community and belonging, security (everyone is out to get us but we will protect you), and a sense of superiority (only we know the truth). But those came at a great cost for those followers.

And if you had the courage to leave, you were shunned or worse. Fear often brought you right back.

In adulthood, I’ve watched documentaries about cults like Shiny, Happy People, Scientology and the Aftermath, and Waco. I’ve watched sitcoms about them, like The Unbreakable Kimmy Schmidt.

In each of these, it seemed so obvious from the outside that the followers were in a cult, but it was also obvious that those trapped within had no idea.

I think for most it’s a slow fade, one they don’t even notice. Each step took them further from reality until it was too late to bring most of them back. But some of us were born into it, don’t know anything different, and once we see the similarities, we cannot unsee them.

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I’ve been struggling for many years now and finally feel like I may be able to describe why.

I’m the type of person who generally believes what I am told (fact-checking as necessary) if the person has proven themselves to be respectable and knowledgeable and if it makes sense with what I know to be true. Innocent until proven guilty. But once I realize they have said something false, it is extremely challenging for me to trust them again.

I grew up in one denomination of Christianity and believed what I was told because I had no reason to question it. No reason to think that those in authority could be manipulating us or bending the truth. I was told we were the only ones with the truth. And I believed them.

I grew up in one political party with little exposure to others. The negative and derogatory way in which the other parties were discussed convinced me that we were the only ones who were right, and the others must be not only wrong, but evil. It seemed obvious. So I believed them.

This denomination and political party fused together as I grew up, making it the only acceptable option if we were Christians, creating a dangerous situation.

One might even say cult-like.

I never wanted to be in a cult and I thought for sure I was too smart to be. I’d never allow myself to be controlled like that. I’d never allow someone to tell me what to think. But now, I can’t unsee the reality of my past.

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Beware of false prophets who come disguised as harmless sheep but are really vicious wolves. 
You can identify them by their fruit, that is, by the way they act.
Can you pick grapes from thornbushes, or figs from thistles? 
A good tree produces good fruit, and a bad tree produces bad fruit.
 A good tree can’t produce bad fruit, and a bad tree can’t produce good fruit. 
So every tree that does not produce good fruit is chopped down and thrown into the fire.  
Yes, just as you can identify a tree by its fruit, so you can identify people by their actions.

– Jesus, Sermon on the Mount
Matthew 7:15-20

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I know I may lose some of you at this point because no one wants to believe they are in a cult or even cult-adjacent. Certainly not me.

But I think we’re in a moment where we must consider this reality.

Rev. Ben Cremer wrote this recently and it immediately resonated:

God did not give us a spirit of fear.

So when someone tries to do whatever they can to make you fearful of other people, like immigrants, women, the poor, or really anyone not like you, yet claims to be standing for God, that’s when you know they are taking God’s name in vain.

God did not give us a spirit of fear.

So when someone tries to convince you to demonize and dehumanize your political opponents, encouraging you to just write them off as evil, demonic, or reduce their humanity, that’s when you can be sure that fear has overtaken them and they want you to join them in that fear.

God did not give us a spirit of fear.

As the election draws closer, the political rhetoric is going to continue to intensify and become more vitriolic. The way we speak about others, including those we don’t agree with, can have really devastating consequences. All acts of political violence begin with dehumanizing language.

So as followers of Jesus, we must do our best to remember that God didn’t give us a spirit of fear and perfect love drives out fear.

Work towards your conviction and stay true to your conscience, but don’t allow fear to cause you to see other human beings as less than human beings. We really do need each other and the only way forward is to work together.

Let love have the last word in all your words, thoughts, and deeds.

You may say, but it’s not about fear. And I know you may think that, but I’d encourage you to recognize that the root of so much of this is fear. It took me a long time to see it, but now I cannot unsee it.

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Joshua Harris wrote about the danger and cult-like nature of political parties recently and that added to the growing evidence I have found that partisanship is cult-adjacent (if not cult-like) today.

I’d even venture to say that some of white American evangelicalism is, too.

It hurts to type those words because it’s a community I was part of and fully engaged in for over thirty years.

And now I don’t recognize it.

The same people telling the truth about what it meant to live as a Christian according to their interpretation of the Bible are the same people living it out in the completely opposite way. The fruit doesn’t match the tree from which it came.

The same leaders telling us how to live like Jesus are telling us to vote for someone who acts nothing like Him.

The same people who don’t trust the government and claim to want maximum freedom are using the government and legislation to control the personal lives of its citizens.

The same people encouraging us to read the Bible, to keep learning what it means to be a Christian are pushing politics that look nothing like the values of the Bible.

Love your neighbor as yourself.
Care for the orphans, widows, strangers (immigrants).
Whatever is good, true, think about these things.
Fruit of the spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, gentleness, self-control.
Do not bear false witness against your neighbor.

Watching people abandon principles to gain power is maddening.

The hypocrisy is deafening.

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What I see today grieves my heart because it proves that I was in a cult/cult-like environment.

Two, actually: my evangelical denomination and my political party.

Both tried to control me through fear.

Both tried to tell me they were the only ones with the truth (and to only get my information from them).

Both told me the only way to live was their way. That any other way was going to destroy me or our country.

Both discouraged me from learning about other ideas, other ways of thinking and operating.

Both claimed to be teaching freedom but actually want to control the personal lives of their followers.

Both taught us to “other” people who are different from us.

When people can no longer tell the difference between Christians and bullies, that’s when we know the Christians are following someone opposite from Jesus. – Ben Cremer

But it was all in the name of “protection” so that makes it okay, right?

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The level of betrayal I have felt since 2015 cannot be described. The amount of gaslighting I have endured…the cognitive dissonance. It’s truly unbelievable.

Watching my former denomination and political party abandon reason and civility, proclaiming “faith over fear” in the middle of a global pandemic, and its followers believing conspiracy theories instead of protecting the vulnerable.

Being unfriended and even blocked on social media because I have never supported Trump’s candidacy has been quite the experience…and one that often happens in cults. Experiencing such vitriol in comments from those who claim to follow Jesus whenever I shared anything that wasn’t pro-Trump…

It’s all been too much.

As I have continued to try to live like Jesus, I see those around me openly supporting a political candidate and party that increasingly looks nothing like Jesus. And maybe it never did, but we were told it was the only Christian option, and we believed them.

I’m so exhausted by the kind of Christianity that claims to stand for truth while spreading misinformation.
That claims to love God while demonizing fellow human beings.
That praises bullies while punching down to the vulnerable.
All while demanding that everyone must believe it is following Jesus rather than worshiping power.
I’m so tired of the kind of Christianity that claims to follow Jesus who said “love your neighbor” all while advocating politics that proclaim “hate your enemies.”
Jesus accomplished the final victory over our greatest enemy on the cross. Because of this, those who follow him are now set free to see the world as being full of neighbors to be loved rather than full of enemies to be conquered.
Why? Because it was out of love that Jesus came to the world and it was through love that Jesus saved the world. It wasn’t saved through hate and control.
Jesus’ new command he gave his disciples was to “love one another.” That means that the greatest heresy of the Christian faith isn’t unbelief, but cruelty and hatred.
Jesus said that his disciples would be known by their love for others. So if we claim to follow Jesus and are known by our hostility and hatred towards others, we are actively taking Jesus’ name in vain.
If the fruit of our theology and our politics produces misinformation, demonization, and further marginalization of the vulnerable, we can call it whatever we want, but it has nothing to do with Jesus.
May the love of Jesus be our reputation and may we always oppose the use of Jesus as a mascot for the politics of hate.

Rev. Ben Cremer

The number of evangelicals who openly promote dangerous conspiracy theories, deny science, dismiss character flaws because they think their candidate will fix everything.

And this isn’t new. The KKK membership rolls were filled with Christians and it was actually also anti-Catholic.

Many Christians enslaved people without guilt and even used the Bible to justify it.

It’s far too easy to use faith as a way to justify unholy things.

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So what helped me get out of this mindset?

• Traveling to other countries with different religions to see how lovely humans are and how similar we are.
• Befriending people who believe and think differently than me and stopped dismissing new ideas.
• Acknowledging that I don’t belong to a club that exclusively possesses the truth.
• Learning the history of the marriage between the Republican Party and evangelicalism (hint: it was always about power and racism).
• Realizing that problems don’t get solved by fighting and retribution but by conversation and a commitment to growth.
• Learning how things work and appreciating the expertise people bring to the table.
• Humility. Something that is preached but rarely practiced.
• Choosing to love first.
• Recognizing that my role in this world isn’t to control how people live or think.

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I’m not sure which is worse: that a political party began using God to gain power, or that a religion allowed it to happen.

But, either way, we’re in a serious situation that has no end in sight because of how challenging it is to bring people out of cults, or to get them to stop believing misinformation.

All I can do is continue to share how I found my freedom, how dangerous partisanship is, and why we must choose principle over party and power, always.

I don’t have it all figured out. In fact, I still feel like it’s all a tangled ball of yarn in my mind. But this recognition that political parties are cult-like has helped to unwind some strands and bring me more peace because I can see the chaos I left behind.

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In some ways, I can see the draw. It’s certainly easier to not have to become an expert in the Constitution, democracy, sociology, etc. It’s also easier to let someone tell you what the Bible says and means instead of learning the ancient languages and context and how it has historically been understood.

Being in a cult or political party is certainly easier than continually learning and growing.

I also believe that people with good (or even decent) intentions can unintentionally create bad situations.

And that is where we are today.

I don’t think people knowingly embraced Christian Nationalism, or wanted to control or even hate their neighbors. I think by being convinced that their way was the only way they were enabled to openly hate and treat others like outsiders, ignoring the words of Jesus that were inconvenient.

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If this resonates with you, please don’t stop reevaluating what you’ve been told to believe by your political party. Please be willing to look at those in office with fresh and critical eyes, and be willing to call out injustice and wrongdoing when you see it. It matters now more than ever.