My Relationship With God Is An Not Abusive One

Many critics of Christianity claim that the God of the Bible is abusive. It's easy to understand why they say that. Bible Passages like the ten plagues on the Egyptians and snakes biting the Israelites in the desert make God seem like a being who inflicts physical harm on people if they don't obey Him and give Him sufficient affection. And when a Christian refutes the claim "God Is Abusive" and responds by saying God lets His children be punished because He's a loving father, critics may accuse the Christian of having developed Stockholm Syndrome. While I am by no means an expert on Stockholm syndrome and abusive relationships, I am fairly knowledgeable about those things.

 
I wrote a whole entry in my Diary of A Fangirl about why Disney's Beauty and the Beast does not romanticize Stockholm Syndrome. And that's because there is no Stockholm Syndrome in that movie in the first place. If I can explain why there is no romanticization of Stockholm Syndrome in a classic Disney film, I'm confident I can make a strong case for why God is not an abuser.

 
First, I'm going to share something with you about myself: I have religious OCD. People like me often have a faulty image of God. Their image is the abusive, vindictive, and domineering significant other that critics of Christianity describe my God to be. Deep down, I know that my God is loving and merciful.

 
I am not excessively afraid of sinning because God is going to supposedly abuse me. I am excessively afraid of sinning because of the tendencies of a mental disorder. I can assure you that God did not create me this way in His ordained will.  

Even though He didn't want me to be like this, He allowed me to be created with this disorder.
Let's look at the telltale signs of an abusive relationship and whether or not my relationship with my God matches those signs

1) Jealousy and possessiveness

 
True, my God doesn't like it when I or any of His other children love something or someone more than Him. Loving something or someone more than Him is called idolatry.

 
But due to my scrupulosity, I am a million miles away from committing the sin of idolatry. So I don't have to worry about jealousy or possessiveness from my God.

Even when I do enjoy earthly things, God isn't jealous. He's joyous.

2) Isolation

 
I am Catholic, not Amish. Even within the Catholic faith, many men and women live in covers, monasteries, and abbeys away from the outside world. They pledge themselves to God, giving up earthly romantic relationships and privately owned possessions for a deeper, personal, exclusive relationship with God.

 
But I am not called to that life. I live in the outside world as a single lay woman for now. I'm constantly engaging in regular relationships with those who do not share my faith as well as those who do. The Bible is filled with God-loving people who engage in regular relationships with people who do not share their religious beliefs.

 
The Old Testament prohibition to not mingle with pagans was so the Israelites would not engage in immoral pagan practices like sacrificing their children to pagan deities.

3) Threats and coercion, doling out punishments that include physical harm, genocide, and violence

God threatens eternal suffering in Hell for those who break his commandments
But by the same token, every decent government on Earth threatens life imprisonment for serious crimes like murder.

Also, whether or not a person ends up in Hell is their choice. Try looking at it as God as a lover is powerless when His beloved children choose Hell because He respects our free will and He will not violate our free will instead of God sends to people to infinite suffering in Hell for the finite crime of rejecting Him or not believing in Him.

The latter is a strawman of what the Bible actually teaches. The former is God respecting our choice and showing mercy. If a person decides to reject God, He is showing them mercy by respecting their choice. He won't force them to be with Him because He knows they would be miserable.
God doled out punishments like the ten plagues on the Egyptians and snakes biting the Israelites in the desert.

 
By the same token, loving human parents give their children a punishment or a consequence when their children are disobedient

4) Intimidation

 
5) Emotional Abuse

As a person with ADHD, one of the things I struggle with is extreme sensitivity to criticism. It doesn't matter if the criticism is real or perceived. So by the same token, I probably would not take emotional abuse well. I am very outspoken when I receive criticism or when I think I have received criticism so the abusive person would get an earful from me if I perceived that he or she has been mistreating me. Fortunately, I have never perceived any abuse from God so he has not gotten an earful from me.

 
6) Telling people how good He is while ignoring His faults

This is connected to things like the so-called "divinely mandated genocides" and the permission of slavery issue

7) Blame, denying, & minimizing

8) Economic abuse

Again, due to my ADHD and my extreme sensitivity to criticism, I would not be able to stay silent about another person mistreating me. The abusive person would get an earful from me. And as I stated before, I have detected no abuse from God so he has not gotten an earful from me.

 
7) Using children

8) Male privilege

He's God, not James Bond. Don't even get me started on the verse in the New Testament in which St. Paul says women should be quiet in church. God the Father chose a woman to be the mother of His Son. A woman is honored and respected within the Catholic faith because of her role as the mother of Jesus Christ. That same woman is honored and respected in the Catholic Church because of her virtue. That's not male privilege.

 
9) Overly worried about pleasing Him

This is due to my scrupulosity, not because of Him and His high standards.

10) Putting me down or making me feel small to control me

He never does this. He doesn't call me a wretched little human or a worthless sinner. He doesn't make me feel small to control me. Sometimes, He reminds that I am small compared to Him so I recognize that I need His help and guidance.

 
He says, "You're My beloved daughter, with whom I am well pleased. You're inherently good and beautiful, even when you sin." 

11) Codopendency

12) Controlling & dominating

13) Hypocritical & high expectations

I find it highly insensitive when critics of my religion claim that my relationship with my God is an abusive one and suggest that I should terminate my relationship with God. I won't buy statements like "I want to help you" from critics of Christianity who claim I'm in abusive relationship with God. All the arguments they make supporting that claim are nothing more than an absurd caricature of my actual relationship with God.