Part 2: Recognizing Common Patterns of Spiritual Abuse and Their Impact
A gentle note for readers:
In this post, I discuss specific forms of spiritual abuse that often occur in churches and other faith communities. While the content is non-graphic, some readers may find certain parts emotionally triggering. Please read at your own pace and take care of yourself.
The Impact of Spiritual Abuse
Like other forms of abuse, spiritual abuse can be subtle and difficult to recognize. It is often woven into everyday church life, like sermons, biblical counseling sessions, conversations about prayer requests, and unspoken expectations about obedience, loyalty, and belonging.
Spiritual abuse is particularly devastating, impacting our sense of identity, our spiritual life and community, and our connection to God. Religious leaders tend to reframe spiritual abuse as love, shepherding, and/or discipleship. Individuals internalize the harm, often blaming themselves and labeling the pain as holiness or divine discipline. Symptoms like anxiety, depression, dissociation, negative self-image, guilt, and shame are generally not recognized as trauma from spiritual abuse until much later, usually after the person has left the community where they experienced harm and started to listen to voices outside of that world.
Below are some common (and often overlooked) forms of spiritual abuse. The patterns frequently overlap, and most survivors will recognize their experiences in more than one category. This list is not exhaustive, so if you believe you are a survivor of spiritual abuse, trust your instincts even if you can’t find your specific experience below.
Using God to Override Personal Boundaries
Faith is used to coerce people into doing things they never freely chose. This can include pressuring a woman to forgive, reconcile with, and/or submit to an abusive husband, urging congregants to give beyond their means, or convincing people they must sacrifice excessive time volunteering to prove faithfulness to God.
When people resist or say no, they are often shamed or spiritually corrected.
Impact:
Many survivors have great difficulty setting boundaries, especially with authority figures or when faith or spirituality are involved.
Spiritualizing Abuse or Suffering
Even when abuse is recognized, it is often framed as God-ordained suffering, intended to refine the individual’s faith and build character. Responsibility is placed on the person being harmed, who is encouraged to endure quietly and trust God’s plan.
This framing shifts attention away from the abuser and onto the perceived spiritual failure of the victim.
Impact:
Survivors often internalize shame and learn to equate suffering with virtue.
Maintaining Control Through Fear
Hell, curses, or God’s judgment are used to prevent people from questioning church leaders. Doubts, mental health challenges, disabilities, and trauma responses are labeled as sinful or even demonic. Critical thinking that leads to any disagreement with the pastor or the church is framed as rebellion against God.
Impact:
Fear-based control often results in chronic anxiety and hypervigilance.
Shaming Disguised as Accountability
Confidential information is shared publicly through sermons or prayer meetings, or privately among church staff. Even if the person is not named when information is shared publicly, it is always clear to the victim and everyone close to them who the leader is referring to.
Survivors who speak up are labeled bitter, divisive, unforgiving, or unstable.
Impact:
Shaming teaches people that vulnerability is dangerous and silence is safer.
Silencing Dissent Through Scripture
Scripture is weaponized to shut down conversations about church abuse or wrongdoing. People are discouraged from “gossiping,” which prevents open and honest dialogue about real issues. Whistleblowers are shunned, which discourages others from coming forward. Scripture-based phrases like “the heart is deceitful” are used to make people believe they can’t trust their own intuition or perception of events. Submission to pastoral authority is painted as a command from God (don’t touch God’s anointed) and used to suppress resistance.
Impact:
Survivors learn to distrust their instincts and prioritize institutional protection over truth and care for survivors.
Unquestionable Authority and Lack of Accountability
Church members are taught that their leaders speak for God and have special access to God’s will. Problems with leadership are equated with a lack of trust in God. There is no accountability, true transparency, or protection for church congregants. The church does not disclose financial reports, board members, or other information. Reports of abuse are swept under the rug, and the church either refuses to investigate claims against leaders or keeps investigations internal and hidden. Third-party investigations are almost never utilized by abusive churches. When cover-ups fail, soft confessions are used to garner support and compassion for the abuser, blame the victim, and minimize the harm that was done.
Impact:
Without accountability, abuse continues, and congregants remain unprotected.
Gaslighting in the Name of Faith
The church rejects claims of abuse, either from church leaders or in domestic relationships. Abuse is labeled as too strong a word, survivors are made to question their reality, and harm is minimized through the use of sin-leveling (“all have sinned…”), grace, and restoration. The focus is always on restoring the abuser and never on healing and protecting the victim(s). Trauma responses are reframed as sin, a lack of trust, or even mental illness.
Impact:
Gaslighting creates deep confusion and self-doubt, often long after leaving the church.
Conditional Belonging
While most churches preach unconditional love and belonging, in abusive churches, both are tied to strict compliance. Attempts to address problems, theological disagreements, and healthy boundaries are punished. In cases like these, love is withdrawn, people are labeled backsliders, deceived, or even dangerous.
Impact:
Love becomes something to earn, reinforcing fear of abandonment.
The following section addresses clergy sexual abuse and grooming. While not graphic, it names dynamics that may feel especially heavy for some readers. Please take care and read at your own pace.
Clergy Sexual Abuse and Grooming as Spiritual Abuse
Clergy sexual abuse, of both minors and adults, is one of the most devastating forms of spiritual abuse. The initial harm comes through grooming, which is a gradual process that exploits trust, authority, and vulnerability.
Even without physical contact, grooming causes real and lasting harm.
Understanding Grooming
According to Dr. Pierre Diamond:
“Grooming is a process used by perpetrators to build trust and establish emotional connections with their victims, with the ultimate goal of sexual abuse. In the context of the church, where trust and authority are central, grooming can be particularly insidious.”
Grooming typically follows these patterns:[i]
Establishing Trust: Perpetrators often seek to gain the trust of both the victim and the community. They may present themselves as caring, trustworthy individuals, often holding positions of authority within the church.
Emotional Manipulation: Groomers use tactics such as flattery, gifts, and special attention to manipulate their victims emotionally. They may exploit vulnerabilities, such as feelings of loneliness or low self-esteem, to create a sense of dependence.
Testing Boundaries: Groomers gradually push boundaries, testing what the victim is willing to tolerate. This can start with seemingly innocent behaviors and escalate over time to more overtly abusive actions.
Isolation: Perpetrators often seek to isolate their victims from friends, family, and other sources of support. They may use religious or spiritual beliefs to justify this isolation, making the victim feel that their relationship with the perpetrator is special or ordained by God.
Secrecy: Groomers rely on secrecy to maintain control over their victims. They may explicitly or implicitly threaten the victim with harm or shame if they disclose the abuse.
Each of these steps erodes safety and self-trust. Because clergy hold spiritual authority, the manipulation carries extra weight, making it harder to recognize or resist.
Clergy Sexual Abuse of Minors
When the person being groomed is a child or teenager, there is no ambiguity: minors cannot consent to sexualized relationships, regardless of the situation.
Beyond grooming, clergy sexual abuse of minors may include sexualized spiritual guidance, inappropriate touch framed as care or prayer, sexualized text messages, enforced secrecy, blame placed on the child or teenager, and institutions prioritizing reputation over safety. Even if the abuse never progresses past the grooming stage, children and teens are taught to ignore discomfort and carry shame that does not belong to them.
Adult Clergy Sexual Abuse
Adult clergy sexual abuse occurs when a religious leader uses their spiritual authority to sexualize a relationship with an adult in their care. When a pastoral or other spiritual relationship is exploited, trust is betrayed, and the adult is manipulated into believing they consented.
Grooming of adults involves building trust, creating dependency, and using spiritual influence to normalize boundary violations. Because of the power imbalance, when a spiritual leader engages in conduct like this, it is abuse, not an affair.
Adult clergy sexual abuse causes profound emotional, spiritual, and physical harm. Many survivors do not recognize the abuse at first, and churches and other institutions often respond in ways that cause more trauma.[ii]
If You’re Questioning Whether What You Experienced Counts
Abuse is not always visible, nor does it require physical contact to be real. Sometimes, it is woven quietly into words, expectations, or the slow erosion of trust – in oneself, in the church, and even in God. Grooming is intentional, not a simple misunderstanding. If you have ever found yourself confused, frozen, complying even when you don’t want to, or only realizing much later what really happened, know that these are deeply human responses to trauma, not signs of consent.
If someone used their spiritual authority to gradually test and push past your boundaries, to create dependency, or to teach you to question your own instincts, please know that the weight of responsibility is not yours to carry.
If you are starting to wonder if what happened to you really matters, or whether it counts as abuse, I hope you can accept this gentle assurance: your experience matters. You do not have to prove your pain to anyone for it to be real. You are allowed to name what hurt you, to grieve what was lost, and to step away from what no longer feels safe. There is no timeline for healing and no perfect way to move forward. Just take the next small step that feels bearable for you in this moment.
Soon, we will journey into a discussion about the effects trauma has on our bodies and how gentle, embodied care can begin to loosen the hold trauma has on our nervous systems. For now, simply recognizing harm is a brave and tender beginning and a simple way you can honor your own belonging.
[i] The information in this section was adopted from Recognizing-Grooming-in-the-Church-Tip-Sheet_Pierre-Diamond.pdf
[ii] For more information on adult clergy sexual abuse, see Adult Clergy Sexual Abuse: Holding Institutions Accountable; The Stages of Grooming in Adult Clergy Sexual Exploitation; and Clergy Sexual Misconduct Definitions
This post is part of the After the Storm series on religious trauma and spiritual abuse.
If you’re joining mid-series:
Part 1 explores religious trauma and its lasting impact.
Part 2 (this post) names common patterns of spiritual abuse and how they often hide in faith communities.
Part 3 (coming soon) will explore how trauma lives in the body and how gentle, embodied care can support healing.
A note on support:
This series is offered for education, reflection, and solidarity. It is not a substitute for therapy or professional mental health care. If these topics bring up distress, you deserve support that meets you where you are.
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