• You don’t have to take everything personally. Just like you always wished *your* parents wouldn’t take it so personally when *you* did things differently.

• Just because I feel that I’ve seen the light regarding ATI and Bill Gothard, and don’t agree with the choices you made for us/your family doesn’t mean I hate you or don’t love you.

• I would like to know why you trusted Bill Gothard, speakers at conferences, and leaders at Training Centers so blindly with your young teenage daughter, and why you never questioned anything or put anything up against what the Bible actually says. I don’t understand why everything Bill says is golden no matter what respected Christians and their own children tell you. I am really confused on where this loyalty came from. You are very smart and wise people.

• I am my own person, and I am trustworthy with my own life.

• I wish that you could understand that while our family didn’t always drink the “Kool-aid,” the experiences I had in the Training Center’s were enough for me to have more serious wounds than you *think* or *feel* that I have. Mom, you are more understanding… but Dad, I’m tired of having defend my personal feelings regarding this subject every time it comes up. I just need you to LISTEN!!

• I cannot live my life according to your plans and dreams for “the perfect family.” I have to live my own. It is possible to disagree with you and still love you. Having my own opinion is not rejecting you.

• Why did my choosing a Godly man that would do anything for me, break  your hearts? Why don’t you understand that weddings tear me up? Why, 12 years later, do I still wait for an apology or an ounce of regret?

• I wish when I talk with you that you wouldn’t try to sugar-coat everything bad that happened to me while in ATI. Stop making excuses and just say you were wrong; and don’t tell me about all the “good” that came out of it! You didn’t go through the same crap as me at a Training Center, so stop pretending it didn’t happen!!!!

• Please just say, “I’m sorry. I messed up, and I love you.”

•  You are extremely emotionally-controlling and create codependency in people….I know you don’t see it. That is why I have to create this space between us. You’ve used your words like swords, pounding me with Scripture and religious idealism when I just needed understanding and freedom. I’m not sure how to have a relationship with you that is built on respect.

• What upsets me most about my upbringing isn’t the stupid doctrines and rules we had to follow. It isn’t the fact that you got us into that mess. It’s the fact that, even now, you refuse to say you’re sorry, that you were wrong, and that it hurt us. It’s always someone else’s fault, never yours, or else it never happened at all. You want to forget about everything awful and broken without ever going back to fix it. You are offended that I am working through this stuff on my own, and that I blame you for so much of it.But as a parent, I really don’t understand. If my child came to me and said that something we used to do really caused her pain and affected her life negatively, I would never blame her for that or tell her not to talk about it, and would be the first to own up and apologize for my part in it. You always treated me like your child, a child that would never grow up until you said I could. But I grew up in spite of you. What did you think would happen? You taught me my whole life to never take anyone’s word on any subject, but to study and discern for myself what the truth is. When I did just that and decided you were wrong, you freaked out. But what did you expect? So now I’m working through all the crap that you say never happened and certainly wasn’t your fault. Fine. You don’t want to be a part of my healing journey. Just don’t try to stop me, discourage me, or get in my way. You say you want a better relationship….but a healthy relationship is one where the truth is freely spoken, fault is freely admitted, and you won’t speak it and won’t allow me to, therefore we cannot have the relationship you want. What you really want is for everything ugly to be ignored and stuffed, and pretend that it never happened. But I stopped pretending a long time ago. I’m actually not very good at it anymore. When I write or speak with passion about the pain, healing, and emotions I feel, please don’t get offended. Mourn with me, laugh with me, hurt with me, heal with me. I won’t pretend things weren’t said or done, and brokenness never occurred. Speaking the truth about my past has been the most freeing and healing thing I’ve ever experienced. You can go with me there, or you can get out of the way. You choose. The one thing you cannot do is belittle, invalidate, or stop me. The more I speak out, the more freedom I give others to speak out, and the more truth is allowed to set hearts free. I will never regret that.Here’s the other thing: I can look back on so many painful things and realize they made me who I am. I can now say that while I wince to remember some things, I do not regret them (well, most of them… there’s a few I can’t say that about). I like who I’ve become. I’m at peace with who I am. I know that everything–good, bad, and ugly–made me this person. So I don’t have bitterness toward you or anyone else, and very little resentment is left. I’ve come to see that everything–life AND death, rejoicing AND mourning, building up AND tearing down–are all beautiful in their time, and all a part of a life well-lived. But that didn’t happen overnight. It’s taken me 10 years to get here and I’m still discovering issues that need to be worked through and fought out, and come to grips with. Sometimes the pain, anger and brokenness just has to pour out and fill pages before it can be released. Please don’t discourage me in that. This is my journey, my life, and it has to be done my way. As a parent now myself, I appreciate even more the sacrifices you made for us. I still love you, no matter what. I’m still here, waiting for you to get past your fear of admitting you were wrong, waiting to work toward trust restored, waiting to have a real, sincere, open relationship where I can be myself without fear of rejection or retribution, knowing I will be accepted and that who I am is good enough. A relationship where you don’t have to be perfect either–just honest and real. It’s okay to admit mistakes. I won’t hate you. I already know most of them. And I love you anyway.

• I am tired of every time I bring something up you “spiritualize” it with–“What man meant for evil, God meant for good.” Can’t you just listen to my hurts without trying to do this to me? It makes me not want to share my heart with you because you have shown that you dismiss my feelings as if it didn’t matter with putting a “spiritual band-aid” over it all! Just say, “I am sorry that happened,” and admit that it was a cult!

• You always told me, “When you have children of your own, you will understand.” A year ago, I became a mother. A million hopes and dreams are wrapped up in this child. I know some of them will be realized, some won’t. I know that he is his own individual person, and he will choose his own path. I know that someday he will leave me…and that’s what he is supposed to do. I will pour my energy and resources into helping him become the self-sufficient adult he needs to be. And I know he will then have a choice as to whether he will still be friends with me. I hope to make that choice easy for him. And no, I don’t understand. I want my child to find his own relationship with God, I want him to know that it is okay to fail. Not to be controlled by an external measure of right and wrong, but to be propelled by a real, inner love for God, which doesn’t necessarily manifest itself the way I think it should on the outside. I want my son to know that my approval of him is not based on his performance, but on a love that will never let him go. I am a mother, and I don’t understand.

• Mom, thanks for trying to think of ways you might have damaged me, and for wanting to apologize now. But please, could you stop following the formula that says if you make it right, your daughter will be fixed now? I wish I could call you and tell you how I struggle, but if I do, you will blame yourself, lose sleep, tell your friends, send me Scripture, and wait for me to be fixed. Why can’t you just hear me, understand me, relate to me, and offer practical, real-world advice? Dad, I know you regret the lies you bought into on our behalf. I know you feel foolish and duped. But please, stop getting that stunned, fearful look on your face when I tell you that I’m raising my kids differently. Let me tell you that I’m learning new things without obsessing over the idea that you might have failed. That I am too different. My rejection of the “Basic Principles” is not a rejection of you or of God. It is a journey toward true freedom in Christ, lightness of spirit, and a peaceful home. Please realize that I am all grown up now. I am you, thirty-odd years ago, with three small kids and a desire to bring them up in the way that they should go. Your way was different from your parents, and my way is different from yours. But our intent is the same, and I understand your journey. Don’t feel judged by me. I know your friends judge you for the way your kids turned out. And I know you’ve decided it doesn’t matter, that you love us and are proud of us for asking questions, and stepping out as respectfully as we knew how. But I know that you are still living there, in that bubble of fundamentalists, being judged by them. I ache for you. If you left them and could worship God with true grace and freedom, maybe I could talk to you about the real stuff I need help with. You are so wise and you have so much experience, but you are shackled by your environment, by your guilt, and by distance. Your kids have left the bondage, but we haven’t left you; and we need you in a new role that you have, but have maybe not fully considered. We don’t need leadership, we need bolstering. We don’t need your authority, we need your wisdom. We need your forgiveness, and grace, and patience, and humor, and experience. We have so much potential, you and your children, and now your grandchildren.

• The fact that I am re-examining the teachings I was brought up with is NOT intended as a criticism of you personally. I love you. Whether you were right or wrong. So can we get past the personal stuff and just examine these teachings in a detached, UN-emotional way, just trying to see what the Bible says? Or if you don’t want to, can you at least not get hurt when I try to? Seriously, I love you, but this is not about you. This is about ME and MY spiritual journey. Just like you had to examine Catholicism because that’s what you were raised with, and then came to the conclusion that it wasn’t biblical, and tried to share that with your parents…were you doing that to rebel or to hurt them? Or because you didn’t want them trapped in an un-biblical system? I think it’s pretty obvious it was the latter. Can you give me the same kind of kindness and openness you wish they would have shown?

• I wish you could one day love me enough to realize I’m a person, not a possession. Love me enough to want to see me happy–and try to help me achieve that. I was a kid who should have been nurtured. A teen, who should have been encouraged. A young adult, who wanted to do great things but had all that thrown right back in my face. I wish you could understand what you did to my ability to trust. I gave you every bit of trust I had, believing that you would help me achieve my dreams. I then learned to hold every hope close to my heart because of seeing every one of those dreams re-worked to match yours. They were no longer mine. You tried to hand me your dreams disguised as my own and encouraged me to live them out as far as they would take me…well as far as the string you tied to me would let me go with them anyway. Setting out on my own, I had no ability to trust either myself or others. I had an immense fear that any decision I made on my own would ruin my life and any future I hoped to have. At the same time, I didn’t know who really had my best interest at heart. Who was really “good-hearted”–because you weren’t, and that’s all I knew in life. If I could get you to understand one thing about my journey away from your world to this point, I’d want you to understand somehow that trust is precious and earned, not demanded. It grows as you see a person treat you and others with dignity and respect. You earn trust by lending support to those you care about–not by demanding everything in them. You raised us to know right from wrong and taught us practical Christianity; you should have trusted us to use that training while we still had your support to lean on–before you pushed us so far that we had to leave.

• I do not believe God ever intended for us to place people in the place of authority over the Holy Spirit! I believe ATI is incredibly imbalanced in this aspect of its teachings. This imbalance is what places ATI on the exact same level as a cult. God would be very disappointed…. and shame on you. You have harmed Jesus’ little ones.

• Just because your children are asking questions that you wouldn’t, and making choices that you wouldn’t, doesn’t mean that they are rejecting God or that you are a failure.

• You took part of my childhood away. Kids are supposed to learn to deal with stress and discipline so they are able to take on the challenges of adulthood, but you went so far as to take fun and enjoyment out of life in the pursuit of creating the perfect children. Even fun things were shadowed by your displeasure of everything.

• I don’t blame you. I TRULY BELIEVE you were doing what you thought was best for our family! I am NOT bitter. But I so wish you could swallow your pride long enough to realize that this program caused serious damage in my life. Stop telling me how much money you forked-out for me to have these bad experiences, and just say “I’m sorry you were hurt.”

• My rejection of Gothardism is not a rejection of you, nor a reflection on you as parents.

• This is a journey. It can’t be dealt with in just a few months and put behind me forever; it will take years. There are triggers that gradually bring new issues to light. Reprogramming takes time. ATI gave me a distorted view of the Christian life and a God that I could never please or love. By His true, unmerited grace, I am gradually learning who God really is. It’s probably hard for you to admit that I was raised in a culture that actually stunted my Christian faith, but I still firmly believe that, despite all the good things you learned in ATI/IBLP, it’s not worth all the baggage I came away with. And, yes, I do believe that God works all things for good, but that doesn’t mean that the past decisions were the right ones. I don’t blame you (we all make mistakes and that’s okay), but I need you to listen, believe me, understand as best you can, and love me exactly where I am.

• Now that I’m a parent myself, I understand the pull both to do everything you can to protect your kids as well as the fear that other people are judging you for the negative things your children do. But I wish you could understand how your zeal to protect both me and your reputation came at such a high price–one that I’m still paying to this day. I was hurt very deeply by my experiences in ATI, and then even more so when you dismissed my pain by simply assuming I was bitter or rebellious. Don’t worry though–these experiences have led me to a place of intimacy with Jesus that you always hoped for. I’m just sorry that you can’t see it because it doesn’t fit your paradigm of what that’s supposed to look like.

• Please care more about me as a person, and my children as people, than about being right.

Love,

Your Children