I am a Potter fan. I admit it wholeheartedly. First chance I get I am bee-lining to Universal Studios for the ultimate Potter experience.If you are not a Potter fan, please allow me a moment to tell you why I am.
Reading the Potter books aided me in escaping the horrid reality. Tapping the wall in Diagon Alley opened a door away from the existence of the cult. The wall always slammed solidly shut, never admitting my abuser.
I often wished I could go to platform at King's Cross Station and waltz through the barrier leaving forever the pain wracked experience of church.
Because the Bible was used as a tool of abuse, a tool to gain my unwilling cooperation, I couldn't find comfort in it. My abuser was too apt at twisting what God said into what she wanted.
Someday I hope to find comfort in God's message once more. Till then the closest I come to cracking the cover is reading books like Donald Miller's Searching For God Knows What and following Jon Acuff's blog "Stuff Christians Like".
I'd like to hear how you survived. Have a favorite book, movie, poem, song? Please share it with the Mr. Linky in the left sidebar. Know of a good post where someone else talks how they coped? Please link it. Don't forget to leave a comment and post a link on your own blog so your readers can share as well.
I guess you could say this is my out-of-the-cult version of testifying...funny thought that! I imagine standing up in my old church telling how Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire kept me sane during the pastor's latest three hour rant...maybe I should do that someday...hmm....
5 comments:
Linked to my post about feeling like Dobby...Thank God for authors who provide us with a door out of reality...Thanks, J.K.!
I found the Harry Potter books to be a good source of metaphor for our lives ex-cult also. We loved the films, as our kids watch them avidly. A lot of christians told us that the Harry Potter stuff was evil and wrong for Christians, but in many ways, we found Harry's predicament to be similar to ours. He came from an abusive family and went to a place where even as a full blood wizard, he was still bullied and picked on.
The Order of the Phoenix was powerfully metaphorical. Professor Dolores Umbridge would make a great cult leader. We feel sometimes like the Potter underground because we write stuff which is considered subersive by those still in the cult.
I agree with your comments about how reading the Harry Potter seris is a good way to escape. When i was in BCF i often wondered why i was not able to read the books. I was a kid when i left an am now a teenager. Since i left i have read all the books and seen all the movies.
@ Meg and Burnie...Love the remark about Dolores Umbridge! So true! I was hooked the moment I cracked open a Potter book...which funnily enough was in the cult-leader's house. One of her "family" members had been given the book and because they were "special" and allowed to do whatever that person got to keep it. Boy! was I glad! I secretly read the entire book in two days!
@ Jason Bourne...Thanks for commenting! I viewed your site and liked it very much. I watched the first Bourne movie while still in the cult and the song at the end of the movie by "Moby" resonated the most w/me...especially the line "I stood in line for this?!?!"
Keep up the good work!
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