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On September 27, 2022, CNN released an article discussing the potentially negative psychological consequences of believing that "Righteous Christians [will] ascend into heaven, while the rest are left behind to suffer." Known as "rapture anxiety," one of many possible symptoms related to religious trauma, the issue of certain religious teachings causing mental health issues is increasingly entering the public spotlight. Not surprisingly, evangelical reactions to the CNN article were stereotypically impulsive, defensive and unempathetic to sufferers. I met with Darren Slade, President of GCRR, to hear his uncensored thoughts about these reactions. You can read our dialogue below:
[Susan] Dr. Slade, are you aware of the reactions to the CNN story and reactions to you personally?
[Darren] Oh yeah. I'm sure there's some reactions I'm not aware of, but I think I read most of them.
[Susan] So let's start with The Christian Post's coverage of the article first, which seems to call into question the validity of religious trauma research in general. It opens by saying, quote "[the CNN article] depicts the eschatological doctrine of the imminent return of Jesus Christ for His Church as a 'chronic problem'" and then goes on to label “exvangelicals” as "former Evangelical Christians who have since turned to unbelief." What do you make of these statements?
[Darren] Well firstly, it would be inaccurate to say that "exvangelicals" have turned to unbelief, but that type of "it's my way or the highway" mentality is pretty common among these Christians groupings. The truth of the matter is that many exvangelicals are still Christian, they just don't buy into the despotic worldview of evangelicals anymore. . . .
Come to think of it, they also mischaracterize the situation as an attack on general eschatological beliefs about Christ's return, which is not true, either. The writer equivocates . . . Dispensationalist beliefs about the rapture with an imminent return of Christ as though the Second Coming necessarily means the rapture. Again, it's a standard tactic to pop up straw men so as to make it seem like CNN was attacking all Christians everywhere who believe Jesus will return one day. But that's not what the CNN article suggests.
[Susan] How do you respond to author, Ian Giatti, who seems to imply that religious trauma is a fabricated thing? He quotes the GCRR's website as stating, "the academic study of religious trauma remains in its infancy" and "there is no actual empirical data to support what we have seen and experienced in the tens of thousands."
[Darren] Well, unfortunately Mr. Giatti is not much of a journalist since even his own article says he had to rush writing the piece without hearing back from GCRR first. This means there was no actual investigation or research done on his part. He had a knee-jerk reaction . . . an urge simply to reject new information. This is why the article has no real content of its own. It just quotes and quote and quotes from the original CNN article and then basically says "nuh-uh!" at the end.
[Susan] But even the GCRR website admits that there is no empirical data to support your claims about religious trauma.
[Darren] Not really, and that's why The Christian Post is not a credible source of information. The GCRR website does not say there are no empirical studies. Mr. Ian deliberately stopped quoting our website once it no longer fit his narrative. Read what it actually says,
"Sadly, this means that there has been no empirical data to support what we have seen and experienced . . . Until now. GCRR has already begun to correct this gap of knowledge by. . ." blah, blah blah ". . .we're about to release the latest empirical data from the world's very first, most exhaustive sociological study on religious trauma."
We have the empirical data, and he would know this fact had he investigated the subject matter before going to press.
[Susan] Is that really a fair criticism of his reaction to the CNN piece? He did go to the GCRR website and he did reach out to you directly, didn't he?
[Darren] Yes and no. I did receive an email from him, but his article posted online within a very short time after I received his email. I think it's fair to say that he had no intention of publishing a response from us because it wouldn't go well for his narrative. He sent that email just so he could say he reached out to us.
But there's a lot more going on here than Giatti not doing his due diligence in reporting. It's been my experience that evangelicals and fundamentalists from every religious tradition routinely misunderstand how research works and how sociological data is incrementally released to the public. Because he hasn't personally seen the data—and probably wouldn't know how to interpret it even if he found it—then that somehow must mean the data doesn't exist and everything is made-up. . . .
But it's quite common for universities and research institutes to have been gathering data for years and for people like me to discuss the results of that data prior to a public release of the details.
[Susan] So why hasn't GCRR released the sociological data yet?
[Darren] It's just a matter of timing, that's all. Nothing crazy. SHERM Journal releases twice a year, in the Summer and then in the Winter. The data was already scheduled to release this coming Winter. We're just waiting for the upcoming issue to come out. CNN just so happened to have interviewed me prior to the scheduled release date.
[Susan] The Christian Post article goes on to quote Todd Hampson who says "trauma" is an extreme word and that Jesus' teachings are being taken out of context. The article then goes on to ask whether it's even possible for something like the "blessed hope" of the rapture could cause people trauma.
[Darren] Well, of course it can. And it does! That's a fact. Hell, ask the hundreds of therapists and clinicians who connect with us regularly. They'll tell you the stories about what some of these doctrines, including the rapture, have done to people's mental health.
Forgive me for being so blunt, but I know Todd's work. He's a cartoonist, an illustrator. He's neither a biblical scholar nor a trained clinician. He's an enthusiastic apologist. That's it. Todd is hardly qualified to give an informed opinion on the matter.
[Susan] And what about Todd's claim that the rapture is found in early church teachings?
[Darren] Yikes. Todd isn't an historian, either. I wrote a blog post about the origins of rapture beliefs, so I won't go into detail about the true, cultish origins of Dispensationalism. Hell, I'm looking at the [Christian Post] article now. Notice what Todd actually says:
Todd points " to early Church documents showing all Christians were awaiting what they believed was the imminent return of the Lord."
That's not the same thing as the early church teaching the rapture. Of course they thought Jesus would return in their lifetime! But they sure as hell didn't believe people would suddenly start floating buck-ass naked into the stratosphere to go meet a white-skinned Jesus in the clouds. That's just stupid.
[Susan] What of the claim that end-time teachings like the rapture have done more good than bad?
[Darren] I'd say, "Prove it." Don't just make assertions because that's what you personally want to believe. Prove that it's done more good with actual evidence. Until then, I'll show you the data showing that it hasn't. Even if the rapture were taught in the Bible, this obsession with a macabre view of the end-times is far from mentally healthy. Many of these Christians literally fantasize about millions of people floating into the sky while billions of human beings undergo extreme torture and abuse all because they didn't accept their Americanized version of a sky-daddy. Many literally rejoice at the thought of seeing women and children brutally tortured because it fulfills a morbid sense of divine justice.
I mean, just from a psychological perspective alone, we know that reading violent passages from the Bible results in increased violence, hostility and a lack of empathy for others. From a more practical perspective, obsessing over the end-times—as prophecy pundits do—distracts people from trying to make this planet a better place to live. If humanity could get its act together, we could work toward ending war, ending poverty, disease, racism. We would focus on social justice and equality. But instead, rapture-enthusiasts believe that the worse the planet gets, the quicker Jesus will come back to rescue them on his cloud chariot. They want to escape this planet, not fix it. Again, I wrote about this in that one blog post.
[Susan] I want to bring up the Faithwire article by Billy Hallowell. He interviewed Jeff Kinley, who is described as an "end times author and expert."
[Darren] By "expert" I'm sure they mean a prophecy pundit who thinks the Bible is literally predicting the end of the world. That's kind of like saying you're an expert in Santa Clause. I mean, there are scholars who study eschatology, sure, but how can you be an expert in what amounts to an overactive imagination? The only thing that prophecy pundits are “experts” in is what’s called “agnomancy.” But you'll have to look that one up.
[Susan] Well, the article quotes Kinley as saying, "You’re making up this whole idea of the fact that people all over the place are just so filled with anxiety about the rapture, which I’ve rarely encountered."
[Darren] Yeah, of course you've rarely encountered it! Ignoring the problem and denying the counterevidence is what they do best, and their dwindling membership numbers across the globe reveals just how fed-up people are with their brand of religion.
[Susan] So why haven’t a lot of pastors or "experts” heard about religious trauma and rapture anxiety?
[Darren] Because when somebody is suffering from religious trauma, these “experts” are literally the last people on earth that a trauma sufferer would want to be vulnerable with and talk to. This of course makes perfect sense. These same “experts” are often the ones contributing to or directly causing the trauma in the first place. Evangelicals and fundamentalists have consistently shown contempt for anyone who shines a light on the abuse perpetrated by Christians. Their flippant and imperious attitude toward victims is well-documented. But a general lack of engagement with current scholarship—in addition to the cognitive dissonance that plagues their lifestyle—prevents most ardent believers from being self-aware enough to acknowledge the pain and trauma they cause others.
Just because they're clueless about the subject does not therefore mean that religious trauma doesn’t exist. It just means that they’re rigidly unaware, like they are with most academic scholarship.
It's really the same thing as asking the tobacco companies if smoking is bad for you. They didn't interview or talk with an actual expert in trauma studies or practicing clinicians who deal with this stuff day in and day out. They went to people who make a living off of peddling end-times nonsense, who have no credentials or training in the subject matter at all.
[Susan] So Hallowell also says that "those who embrace a pre-tribulation escape aren’t necessarily living in fear; many of them see the event as a hopeful occasion." How do you respond?
[Darren] He knows this for a fact, does he? Is it because he doesn't suffer from this type of trauma or doesn't attend church with people who do? Again, he's not a specialist or expert in the field. All he has to do is read the hundreds of messages and forum posts we get from people who are in real pain because of this stuff.
[Susan] Hallowell asks if it's possible whether religious trauma is actually the result of people rejecting Christianity. Is that possible?
[Darren] What is "possible" is not the same thing as what is probable and credible. Notice that he doesn't seriously consider the possibility that people like him are actually part of the problem. It's much easier to just blame the victim. The truth of the matter is that there’s a mass exodus of people leaving evangelicalism, and it isn’t because their churches have been a citadel of good mental health. Quite the opposite, in fact.
[Susan] Is this just another case of woke culture being hyper-sensitive to minor things?
[Darren] Ha! The people who know me personally know that I'm far from "woke." I'm no more a fan of fundamentalist woke mobs than I am of secular fascists or religious zealots. I'm an academic, and I go where the research points. And as a tauma survivor myself, I can tell you that religious trauma exists and it's not being blown out of proportion. Tens of millions of people are being affected by it all over the world.
Instead of automatically dismissing the warning signs, these Christian journalists should come talk to the actual experts about it. Stop relying on fiction authors for your information. Do the hard work and take the steps necessary to educate yourself on the causes, manifestations and treatment options for religious trauma. That's why we created the religious trauma certification program in the first place, to educate people. Until then, their beliefs will continue hurting people and their churches will continue closing at alarming rates.