Thread by @AWWritesStories

One of the problems that comes along with videos like the one making the rounds right now, where an #Adventist pastor takes it upon himself to say the quiet, shadowy, dirty parts of the Adventist Church out loud… (1/15)

Is that inevitably, one of the biggest, loudest (and I suppose I should add well meaning though it doesn’t feel that way) responses is something along the lines of… (2/15)

“I’m an Adventist and he /his beliefs don’t represent me!” “I’m an Adventist and I disagree with him! What he said is vile!” “That pastor doesn’t speak for the official church, here’s a 28-point lecture on what the church officially believes!” (3/15)

And you know what? GOOD FOR YOU if that man and his heinous, venomous contempt for women and women’s bodily autonomy and personhood doesn’t align with your beliefs and doesn’t represent the church you know. I’m happy for you. Truly. (4/15)

But here’s the thing. His beliefs represent the ONLY Adventist Church I’ve ever known. (5/15)

My grandfather was a rapist. He was also a popular, well-respected church elder. And everyone in that tiny town in the Michigan Conference knew him as both. They knew what he was. And they did nothing. (6/15)

They did nothing but lift him up while grinding his victims to dust under their shiny church shoes. They did nothing as his abuse became a cycle, became generational, as it so often does. (7/15)

When he died, there was standing room only at his funeral. Maybe a handful of people were there to celebrate and make sure he was dead. That’s certainly why I attended. But most were there to mourn the passing of a “great, godly man.” (8/15)

THIS is the church I know. This is the ONLY church I’ve ever known. (9/15)

I married one of those “great, godly men.” And I got to watch my entire community embrace him when I finally found the courage to leave. I got to hear church members say I was sinning by divorcing him, say I should’ve tried harder, prayed harder, been more patient. (10/15)

A year after the divorce, I got to see my pastor—the pastor I’ve been listening to since I was a baby—baptize my ex-husband in the same baptismal I was baptized in years before. (11/15)

I got to hear my ex-husband perform special music and give a testimony and I got to hear my pastor preach about numbers. The numbers of baptisms god was going to lead him to perform that year. This was January and my ex was just the first, the pastor said. (12/15)

My ex-husband’s name next to a number in a dusty record book was more important than my personhood.

THIS is the church I know. This is the ONLY church I’ve ever known. (13/15)

I’m still technically a member of that church. But I can’t step foot through the doors without having a panic attack.

So, I’m very happy for you if you know and have known a different version of the Seventh-day Adventist Church. (14/15)

THIS is the church I know. This is the ONLY church I’ve ever known.

And don’t think for a second I’m alone in that. If you think that, then you haven’t been paying attention.

This is the church I know. This is it. And there is no god in Adventism that I want to know.

(15/15)

This is the video for those who haven’t seen it:

https://twitter.com/sethjpierce/status/1462842511320391683