Toxic faith is a destructive and dangerous involvement in a religion that allows the religion, not a relationship with God, to control a person’s life. People broken by various experiences, people from dysfunctional families, people with unrealistic expectations, and people out for their own gain or comfort seem especially prone to it. It is a defective faith with an incomplete or tainted view of God. It is abusive and manipulative and can become addictive. It becomes so central to a person’s life that family and friends become insignificant compared with the need to uphold the false beliefs.
Those with toxic faith use it to avoid reality and responsibility. It often results in perfectionism; people are driven to perform and work in an attempt to earn their way to heaven or at least to gain favor with God. Like other addictions, it causes great damage, but the addicted continue to pursue it.
Toxic faith has nothing to do with God and everything to do with men and women who want to concoct a god or faith that serves self rather than honors God. In short, toxic faith is an excuse. It is an excuse for an abusive husband to mistreat his wife because he believes God would want her to submit to him as if he were God. It is an excuse to put off dealing with the pain in life. It is an excuse to wait for God to do what he wants you to do. It provides a distraction through compulsive “churchaholism” or religious ritual.
Toxic faith is also a counterfeit for the spiritual growth that can occur through a genuine relationship with God. The toxic faithful find a replacement for God. How they look becomes more important than who God is. Acts of religion replace steps of growth. A facade is substituted for a heart longing to know God. The facade forms a barrier between the believer and God, leaving the believer to survive with only a destructive addiction to religion.
Plenty of people are susceptible to religious addiction. Their brokenness, misery, and conflict leave them open to becoming hooked on working hard to win God’s favor or believing any doctrine that promises to make life easier. They develop toxic-faith practices that become every bit as addictive as heroin. Out of a desire to delay or deny pain, they develop their own toxic beliefs. There are many variations of religious addicts.
Common Characteristics of Religious Addicts
As strange as it may seem, the child who grew up with a rigid parent (or parents) enters adulthood attracted to those who serve up any form of rigidity. One might think that, once freed from the rigidity, the adult child would avoid it. Instead the individual is often drawn to it, which makes the person highly susceptible to an addictive religious system or to follow a toxic-faith leader. Why is this so? One explanation is that human beings are creatures of habit; we are comfortable with what we know. Or perhaps people are drawn toward a rigid system because they have a hidden desire to fix it, to loosen themselves up and free themselves to enjoy life—something they were unable to achieve with their parents.
One boy grew up in a very rigid family in which it was difficult for him to express who he was or what he wanted. His father communicated with directives, offering no reasons for his demands, just expecting compliance. The boy rebelled forcefully. He became a heavy drug user and at age eighteen quit school and moved in with several other drug addicts. Eventually his addiction put him out of work, and he found himself at the bottom with no hope.
When a cult follower befriended him, he responded. He felt love and support and a genuine offer for help. Inside the cult he was confronted with a controlling leader who dictated every decision of the group. He had found home. He had come full circle, back to a variation of his original situation. He became a faithful follower, unwilling to question the validity of the group, its rules, or the demands it placed on him.
A deep wound from a major disappointment lies in the background of most religious addicts. It might have been the early loss of a parent or a parental divorce. It could have been their own divorce or abandonment in later life. The loss and the disappointment cause a tremendous fear of yet another abandonment. Addicts become attracted to and attached to any group that promises acceptance without risk. Often the group promises instant relief or gratification. Feeling the pain from their disappointment, religious addicts want relief, especially if it does not require effort on their part.
I worked with a vulnerable woman who was devastated by the loss of her parents and her own nasty divorce. Somehow she felt she could have done something different to prevent the tragedies. Seeking relief, she began a dating spree that included frequent sexual intercourse. In addition to her grief over the loss of her parents and her divorce, she began to believe God was going to punish her for having sex outside of marriage. She was filled with guilt. She knew God didn’t want her to have sex with everyone she dated, but she succumbed frequently. She was convinced that God was going to punish her by giving her the AIDS virus.
She became obsessed with God’s wrath and the idea of his swooping down on her to wipe her out. Each month she would have another AIDS test—but she didn’t change her behavior or use precautions in her sexual relationships. She went on trying to say no, giving in, and then waiting for God to deliver the death sentence. Her disappointments with death and divorce led her to abandon God for quick sexual relief from her pain. Her chosen source of “relief,” however, only increased her pain.
We all know that peer pressure helps to destroy many young people. But we seem to forget it is just as powerful among adults. If people do not value themselves or have their own beliefs, they will fall victim to the pressures to conform. They cross over a line from rational to irrational belief. Distrusting their ability to discern truth from manipulation, they go along with the group consensus, even if it invalidates everything they have been taught.
Persons with low self-worth feel alienated and isolated. They want to belong and be accepted. Toxic-faith leaders know this. They can pick out wounded followers who are looking for someone to make them feel important. Under the guise of ministry they cater to people’s weaknesses until those people believe they are receiving genuine caring. Thus, the religious group gets new members, potentially forever.
This “care con game” is similar to one of the oldest money tricks among scam artists. First they ask you to trust them with a little money. When you do so, you get a large return. Maybe they tell you to give them one dollar, and in a few days or weeks they give you ten dollars back. Now convinced of a real return on your money, you increase your investment to one hundred dollars … and the thieves are never heard from again.
Toxic-faith practitioners seek out those with low self-worth and minimal boundaries. They ask them to trust just a little. With that first step of trust, the targets are flooded with affirmation and love. Every need is met. Childhood trauma is soon forgotten in the euphoria prompted by so much affection. The ones being manipulated then place greater trust in the leader, sometimes selling all of their possessions to belong to the group. At this stage they often reinforce their radical decision by making justifications for their behavior.
Even when they notice exploitation, the new followers don’t turn away, because they continue to reinforce their decisions. They feel bad about themselves already, and admitting they had been duped would seem devastating. Their minds block out the reality of the toxic beliefs, and they become faithful followers under an exploitative leader.
If they had felt self-worthy in the beginning, they would have discerned the unhealthiness of the group and refused to be part of it. But their addiction moves them to believe the unbelievable if it will provide at least a moment of relief. They don’t see the exploitation—or at least, they refuse to acknowledge it—because their low self-worth has allowed them to be exploited all their lives. It seems almost normal.
Childhood abuse, whether sexual, physical, or emotional, often leads to further victimization in adulthood. The abused feel detached and unloved. They function with a continual feeling of loss. Often they go to great extremes to fill the void left by abusive parents. Their faith is almost always poisoned by these early incidents. Some forsake God, blaming him for the abuse. Others believe in God but consider him to be detached and uncaring about individuals in pain. Still others replace God with a human being.
Attention from an adult friend, especially a father replacement, can set off a craving for more attention and a vulnerability to be victimized again. Seeking a savior, the adult child of abuse repeats being the victim. When the “savior” turns out to be yet another victimizer, the act is so horrifying and degrading that there is often a complete break with reality. The victim blindly complies with the victimizer as the poisonous faith continues to grow.
Susceptible people have something in common with those who are not susceptible: They all hurt. All of us are hurting people; we all struggle with pain and disappointment. Religious addicts, however, believe they are the only ones who hurt. They think no one else cares or has to endure their kind of pain. When a practitioner of toxic faith arrives with what appears to be a heart of gold and a simple plan for an easy life, the followers are quick to sign up.
No religious addict professes a cookie-cutter faith. Such toxic faith has many variations—some Christian, some atheistic, and some affiliated with other world religions. The following are the most common ways it is manifested:
Forms and Variations of Toxic Faith
Compulsive religious addicts are driven by guilt and a desire to earn favor from God. They work hard in hopes of a day when God will look down on their efforts and change reality for them. They hope he will see their hard work and decide to relieve their pain or magically make life easier for them. They have an “earn as you go” mentality that places their future in the hands of their ability to achieve, accomplish, and sacrifice.
Years ago my wife and I visited Thailand, where we observed Buddhists practicing their faith. We saw hundreds of temples and thousands of worshipers. I was overwhelmed by their dedication to their gods, those they said were alive and those who had died. I watched as they bought gold filament and pressed it into a Buddha statue to the point of causing pain to their own bodies.
These worshipers sought relief through their religious activity. We were often confronted with requests to do something for Buddha. They wanted us to buy a bird and set it free. They asked us to give money to restore the temples. We were also invited to buy lotus blossoms. All of those things, we were told, would bring us “good luck.” They constantly suggested new ways for us to please Buddha and obtain favor with him. A person just couldn’t do enough in that land where faith was replaced by hard work.
Sadly, it is not much different here in the United States. Many feel compelled to serve on every church committee or represent the church on every possible community council. The family comes in second to the flurry of activity surrounding the church. Underlying this frenzy of activity is the belief that work will gain favor. But another dynamic is also at work, and like every other addiction, it involves running from pain. If these people can stay busy enough, they will not have to resolve their pain. So they work hard and run fast to stay one step ahead of the hurt. But the pain already has incapacitated them. It has driven them to work and drive and try harder to please God.
Some people with toxic faith are lazy. Laziness is their most common form of self-defeating behavior. Their faith dumps responsibility for everything that happens on God. Rather than work to heal a marriage, for example, they want God to fix it instantly. Rather than make an appointment with a counselor, they pray for a miracle, asking God to do for them what God probably wants them to do for themselves. It is inconvenient to go to a marriage counselor; it is expensive, too. So rather than do the responsible thing, the lazy believe that if they just pray, God will take care of their marriage. Certainly marriage counseling is a painful growth process. And yet God may want these lazy believers to go through it.
Two girls were on their way to school—behind schedule once again. The moment for the bell to ring grew closer and closer. This pair had been late several times, and they knew there would be grave consequences if they repeated the offense. One girl suggested they crawl down in the nearest ditch to pray to God that they would not be late. The other little girl made the more realistic suggestion: They should pray and run.
Thousands of religious addicts have crawled down into the ditches of unreality. They have retreated into a lazy world where they want everything worked out for them in a magical, mysterious way. They want a servant god; they don’t want to serve God. They want a god drug that will wipe out consequences and quickly ease all hurts.
That view of God is toxic and addictive. It is irresponsible and leaves believers stagnant, full of false hope and unrealistic expectations. I think God might be watching, hoping such believers will crawl out of the ditches and continue to grow through facing their difficulties one at a time.
I believe my grandmother gave her money because she thought it was a way to give back to God some of what he had given to her. Others do not possess similar motives. They give out of a belief that the more they give, the more they will get. Their giving is more like a materialistic investment than a spiritual act of worship. Such believers hope their affluence will increase as they give more to a ministry.
Of course, God does promise to bless his people for faithful stewardship—but that blessing is not necessarily in the form of cold, hard cash. I don’t know of many people who give 35 to 40 percent of their money, like my grandmother did. So, if anyone would be rewarded materially, she would be a likely candidate. But though she never had to struggle, she grew no wealthier after ten years of sacrificial giving. The hope of wealth was never her motive, and material wealth was not her reward.
I have heard some fund-raisers ask people to “claim” their material blessings. Supporters are told to claim the Rolls Royce they want, to trust God to provide it, to give money to secure it, and it will come. Some charlatans arrange for the unsuspecting to receive the automobile they “claimed.” These hucksters go out and buy a car, deliver it, and then write up the “miracle” in a newsletter to inform all the other faithful (whose automobiles have not yet arrived). They are told that if they have more faith and give more money, they will receive the material possessions they want. With this “proof” before them, the duped shell out more money, hoping God will give them what they believe they deserve.
God cannot be bribed or bought, but the actions of many individuals appear to be attempts to do just that. Their money might be better spent in Las Vegas where luck, not God, is the rewarder of money. This form of religious addict has more in common with a compulsive gambler than with a faithful follower of God.
Self-obsession leads to the practice of toxic faith, religious addiction, and all other addictions. Poisoned by their constant focus on their own needs, hurts, and desire for relief, the self-obsessed have little room left for worshiping God or meeting the needs of others. It is no wonder that people living in such a selfish state have sky-high expectations of God.
Yet Christ is quoted as telling Peter to show his love by feeding his sheep (i.e., meeting the needs of others). The self-obsessed are not interested in feeding anyone else’s sheep or helping others in any way. They concentrate on how others can meet their needs, especially how God can relieve them of their burdens.
Of course, God does relieve burdens. He does bless. He meets needs in miraculous ways. He brings babies to infertile couples. At times he will heal or reverse a terminal disease. Evidences of divine intervention abound; we call them miracles. But the reason they are called miracles is that they rarely happen. To have faith in God because he is bound to perform miracles is to have faith in miracles more than in God. True faith in God is not focused only on what God can miraculously do or provide; it is focused on what the individual can do for God. Additionally, the individual must make an effort to care for those God loves, his sheep, one’s neighbors.
In a discussion with a psychiatrist friend on how faith can become self-serving, he described another friend’s habits, the qualities of a person after God’s heart. He said the man’s motivation for everything he did was to please God and serve him. He worked with people not to make money but to serve God. He was dedicated to the needs of others and derived joy from meeting those needs. This selfless man had a faith that went beyond his own needs and self-obsession.
It is a rare faith. More often today people proclaim faith in God as long as that faith will increase the bottom line and make life better. There is no greater sin than self-obsession, and no greater poison of faith.
Religious addicts are extremely intolerant of varying opinions or expressions of faith. Either walk their way or be out of step. Rather than accept other believers, their rigidity rejects them. They routinely judge others and find the negative in everyone else’s life. From a position of superiority, they put down others for what they believe and how they manifest their faith. They want to control the lives of others, especially what they believe.
One gentleman, a member of a conservative group, was fearful that his sons would veer into a more liberal faith or that they would end up with no faith at all. He believed that one of the most beautiful pictures to God was of a family going to church together. He took his family to church twice every Sunday and also on Wednesday nights. If the church doors were open, he walked through them with his family.
His oldest son had some friends who attended another church on the edge of town. He developed good friends there and liked it much better than his father’s church. He asked to leave his parents’ church to attend the one on the edge of town. Now, it was not a strange religion or cult; both churches were part of the same denomination. But the father couldn’t handle it. He told his son he had to stop going to the other church. He wanted the entire family to attend church together, and nothing would stand in the way of achieving that goal. He was intolerant of his son’s expressions of faith and of the other church and its members. His demands caused a deep split between him and his son. It was not their first problem, but it was the biggest. Tremendous bitterness and resentment grew from it and destroyed their ability to relate to each other.
This kind of intolerance is common among those with toxic faith. They will sacrifice relationships with family and friends to uphold a standard or ideal of their own faith. As long as they believe they are doing what God would have them do, they won’t hesitate to push their ideas on others and judge them as less faithful and less in touch with the way things should be done. Certain they are upholding God’s standards, they control others by demeaning their beliefs and practice of faith. They create a fake faith and a legalistic caricature of what faith is. Their children, resisting this intolerance, flee from their parents’ faith and often never again seek a relationship with God.
The practice of faith can provide tremendous relief from the pain and frustrations of life. When a person trusts in God, he or she no longer feels overwhelmed with problems or burdened from believing all problems must be resolved alone. This is a natural result of placing faith in a God who promises that his burden is light. But there is another kind of relief, an emotional frenzy that becomes an addiction and robs the individual of real faith.
I was on a Christian talk show and afterward had the pleasure of going to lunch with the staff. They related stories of the variations of faith and the strange incidents that develop when faith becomes unbalanced.
One story particularly intrigued me. The program had sponsored a tour to Israel, and about five hundred people signed up to visit the Holy Land. A woman traveling with the group had felt led to become a nun. Unable to find an order to accept her, she established her own order of one and wore the attire of a traditional nun. Each time she visited a site, she worked herself into a frenzy, chanted loudly, then passed out, claiming to be slain in the Spirit. Although most people on the tour were charismatic Christians, they were not impressed with her performance. Each time they approached a monument, they stood back and waited for the show to begin.
The development of her own order of one was the woman’s first major leap from reality. Her repeated frenzies were further steps of escape. She was addicted to the self-manufactured highs supposed to be religious experiences.
Many other gradations of such extreme religious intoxication exist. Often the toxic faithful become so enthralled with the religious experience that they reduce God to secondary importance.
Anyone who has ever been to a church camp knows what it is like to have a religious high, commonly called a mountaintop experience. When the kids leave camp, they are warned that the wonderful emotions they feel will go away. An eventual “downer” experience will come when the emotions of the mountaintop wear away. The kids must learn to adjust to reality where everyone is not as supportive and loving as the kids and staff at camp.
Yet some people cannot or will not handle the downs after a marvelous spiritual experience. Rather than deal with reality, they manufacture a pseudoreligious experience or a spiritual frenzy. The adrenaline rush energizes and stimulates them, alters their mood, and provides relief from real pain. The hysteria is repeated anytime they need to escape or feel differently. These “instant religious experience” practitioners might as well take a drink, swallow a pill, or inject a drug. The intent is not to worship God but to alter their perception of reality. They are religious junkies, obsessed with mood alteration and a quick fix to face life.
These variations of toxic faith and religious addiction never bring people closer to God. In fact, they form barriers between individuals and God, which allow the deceived to stay busy and active in every way except for a true worship experience. With barriers to God and others in place, the toxic faithful are left with many more painful feelings to compound the original pain at the core of their toxic faith.
Every addiction ultimately destroys intimacy with family, friends, and God. The addicted loathe placing themselves in a vulnerable position of trust with another. Toxic faith is no different. Those with toxic faith cannot or will not trust God. Faith has been eroded, and as individuals place distance between themselves and God, the chasm formed is filled with compulsion, activity, addiction, manipulation, control, and extreme effort. The work is never done and the heart is never at rest. Faith has become toxic.
One paradox of toxic faith sets it apart from any other compulsion or addiction: the issue of moderation.
In alcohol consumption, the goal is abstinence or moderation. When a person moves beyond moderation, evidence of addiction mounts as the level of consumption increases. Eating works the same way. Compulsive overeaters must learn to eat less and find fulfillment in less consumption.
Faith is not this way. True faith, real and pure faith, cannot be practiced in moderation. One cannot trust God too much or seek God too much. Persons whose faith has grown to encompass every aspect of life are spiritual giants to be modeled. On the other hand, a little faith—a faith that knows only a bit about God—is a form of toxic faith. It pays a small tribute to God instead of developing a strong relationship with God. As poisonous as these varieties of toxic faith are, they are minimal compared to the most toxic faith: no faith at all.
Once faith is poisoned, it is a complex process to detoxify the individual and restore a pure faith. Identifying the toxic elements is the beginning of hope. To see toxic beliefs and practices for what they are can allow men and women to plunge deeply into true faith and to know and serve God, rather than to walk on the deadly fringes.
Herein lies the most formidable challenge: to look within oneself and find the toxic elements of faith and remove them. Some people are so self-obsessed, so sold on faith in themselves, that it is difficult for them to break through denial and see what is sick at their core and how that sickness has damaged their relationships, including the one with God.
Yet it is not impossible to break through the denial and clean up faith. Individuals willing to take a second look at God and faith and why they have messed up the relationship so badly are in for a painful experience. But be assured, this pain is less than that experienced in continuing to use God rather than relate to God! It is less painful than realizing one is afraid and continuing to live with that knowledge. By making the effort to detoxify faith, one will go through some difficult times before finding what God designed for a relationship with himself. But in the end, a relationship based on pure faith leads to complete contentment and joy.