I have strong feelings about church hurt, spiritual abuse, toxic faith communities, hate masquerading as love, and churches spewing faulty theology. It grinds my gears, to say the least. Whenever I see a new documentary that seeks to expose these things in churches, I find myself drawn to them, and I never have to look far because it seems like every few months there’s a new series, podcast, or book that highlights spiritual abuse. I first got sucked in when Christianity Today highlighted “The Rise and Fall of Mars Hill.” From there, it was like an onslaught of information from other sources. From “The Way Down” to “The Secrets of Hillsong” to “Shiny Happy People,” the litany of spiritual abuse tales never seemed to end. To be completely honest with you, I think there’s a large population of people who don’t know how to process these documentaries or podcasts, and I get that. It’s so much easier to see these stories and to think, “That would never happen here” or that these are isolated incidents in megachurches. It’s easier to attempt to put distance between ourselves and these stories than to realize these same scenarios are playing out in churches down the road from us every week.