Hey everyone, I am not sure how to start this post or if there is any good way to ease into what I want to talk about. For the people who know me, it is no secret that for 95% of my schooling, I was Christian Homeschooled. While I am incredibly grateful for the people I met, some of the teachers I had, and the flexibility it allowed in terms of courses, sports, and working, it was there where I first learned what shame felt like.
This is hard to talk about not only because anxiety, insecurity, and shame seemed to coalesce into a character trait called perfectionism, (that still tears at me to this day) but because I hate to talk negatively about Christian communities. I do believe it is not always like this, and I don’t want what I say about self professing Christians to be the reason someone decides not to know Jesus. Unfortunately, the grief in my heart surrounding how Christian Homeschool communities treat children is a burden that I have to set down, and this is how I do that.
Let’s start when I was in 7th grade. It was then that I was painfully aware of how adults viewed me at 12 years old. You see, my parents were younger and my family and I are non denominational Christains. This meant I did in fact wear shorts. I was allowed to watch Spongebob. I was allowed to have friends and interact with the opposite sex. I was allowed to wear two piece bathing suits (mind you they always covered everything they needed to cover and I was not a scandalous child in a string bikini, think more nike sports bra/tankini and bottoms). I listened to secular music (obviously not explicit lol). I was allowed to dye my hair whatever color I wanted. I was allowed to wear age appropriate makeup. You might be thinking, “Well duh, none of that is bad,” and at 12 (and now) I thought the same. It was upon entering the Christian homeschool community that I found out those are “bad”, they are “sins” and I was treated as a wayward sinner at 12. I can vividly recall glares I received from mothers who volunteered as teachers as I wore dress code appropriate shorts with a flannel over it. I still have memories that resurface of boys calling me a “hoe”, of mothers telling my mom that I was texting their child too much and their child was “going places”, of mothers telling their children to steer clear of me because the way I dyed my hair and dressed in jeans and tshirts meant I was too much of a “free spirit”, which I can only interpret now as a Christian way to say I was worldly. These things my seem insignificant, but as a kid who loved going to church, who tithed the money I made from acting jobs, who worshiped and prayed with tears in her eyes, I felt so much shame and embarrassment. I didn’t know what I was doing wrong to make people perceive me that way.
Now you may be thinking, “Well Nya, that was 10 years ago. Surely it was just a small group of self righteous individuals who have gone on and the homeschool communities look different now.” I wish I could say you are right, but that isn’t the case. There seems to be a deep rooted pride and pharisee like behavior that circulates the rented churches that hold Christian homeschool co-op classes. Adults that make themselves judge and jury for the salvation of the children that walk the halls. I know this because my sister is a senior this year. She tells me her experience as well as the experiences of her friends. What I have heard has led me to believe kids would almost be better off going to public schools, because hurtful experiences with those that claim to follow Jesus not only turn you away from that people group, but from the Lord as well.
For example, most recently I was told that a student screenshotted another student’s personal Instagram and shared it with admin at the school. The content that was shared was not sexual or indecent. It did not promote drugs or alcohol. It wasn’t filled with hate speech or obscenity. It was simply a homecoming photo of a senior at that school who is in a same sex relationship and has been for over 2 years. It was upon admin discovering that, that they told them they had two choices: break up or be kicked out of the program. Their decision was effectively obey or be exiled. While you may believe that is well within their right, let me pose another scenario to you.
There is a boy who attended the school, who wore an ankle monitor, showed up to class every week high, and was caught making out with his girlfriend multiple times on school property. He was never asked to leave or kicked out, only asked to stop.
Here it is. Judge and jury. One sentenced to excommunication and another one pardoned. One shown consequences and another mercy.
James 2 talks about the dangers of partiality. While the author describes the treatment of a rich man and a poor man, the idea is the same. “But if you show favoritism, you sin and are convicted by the law as lawbreakers” (James 2:9). The Christian Homeschool community is guilty of having favorite sins. Children’s sin being ranked as redeemable or unrecoverable, by adults in leadership, which I believe is a sin also in itself. These two scenarios are just 2 of many failures of adults that claim to want kids to know the Lord and grow in their education as well as their relationship with God.
I have but one thing to say to those adults, “Speak and act as those who are going to be judged by the law that gives freedom, because judgment without mercy will be shown to anyone who has not been merciful. Mercy triumphs over judgment” (James 2:12-13).
And to the students that may read this, entrust yourself to Him who judges justly (1 Peter 2:23).
Trust me, I am trying to wrap this up lol, but I say all of this to say the community teaches condemnation. These kids are experiencing an odd form of persecution by those put in authority to teach them, and because of this the kids do not learn to be holy as God is holy. No. They learn to circumvent the punishment by doing what they want in the dark. They discover how to operate in secret, which later on in life makes them susceptible to the deception of the enemy. Inadvertently they are taught that if it can’t be seen, it can’t be viewed as sin. Later on in life that is certain to translate to their relationship with the Lord.
Now you say, “Nya, how do they fix it?” And I say, the teachers and administrators need to be vetted as if they were going to be the pastor of a church. Held to the standard of a preacher in the pulpit. There needs to be prayer against pride and judgment within the community. There needs to be a revival, an awakening that reveals to said adults that exile breeds contempt for the church and for our Savior himself. An awakening that says no sin is more excusable than another.
I can go on and on, but as a 22 year old who grew up this way, I can say that I have had to wrestle with God more than I would like to admit. That things like this have caused me to turn away from the church at certain points in my life. That the shame that festered since 12 years old came to a head at 19 years old, and I grew tired of never being enough for the people that were supposed to encourage me daily, so that my heart would not be hardened (Heb. 3:13).
I am grieved to the point of tears, and I am begging the Christian Homeschool community to ask God to search their hearts, repent, and do better for the sheep in your care.
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