Why Did This Feel So Familiar?
I’ve watched Death of a Pastor’s Wife twice now — once by myself and once with my husband, who did not grow up in the evangelical church. Interestingly, while I kept thinking, “wow, this feels familiar,” my husband kept saying, “wow, what is wrong with them?”—much like how we both responded to The Rise and Fall of Mars Hill.
Part of me wanted to turn off the TV and go about my life, but the other part of me couldn’t let it go without writing about it. Because many of you in this space are feeling that same déjà vu as I am, and we need a place to process it, darn it!
The question I keep coming back to is this: Why does this feel all too familiar to me?
For those of you who have experienced spiritual abuse and the religious trauma that accompanies it, the teachings, journal entries, weaponized scripture, and gaslighting probably felt all too familiar to you. And, if you’ve experienced church hurt from someone in pastoral leadership, the lack of accountability, failure to accept responsibility, lack of repentance, and complete lack of authenticity probably hit a little too close to home as well.
I found myself in a weird push-and-pull as I watched. While I was horrified by what happened to Mica Miller, I wasn’t shocked by how it happened. Frankly, I find that disturbing as well. I realized that my evangelical muscle memory had me recognizing the patterns, teachings, and toxicity before the documentary ever explained them.
If you’re struggling to put words to your reactions to this documentary, I understand. I had to stop and write down all my thoughts so I could start to make sense of them and begin to process the thoughts and feelings it stirred up in me.
Whether you’ve been away from these tables for years or are in the process of walking away right now, it can be good to remember the reasons why you left the table in the first place. After the dust of the horrifying details of Mica Miller’s tragedy settled for me, I spent some time reflecting on and remembering the red flags present in the documentary but also in the churches I grew up in.
And I think there are two parts to what felt so familiar. First, there are the dangerous teachings many of us absorbed as individuals. Then, there are the patterns those teachings create and protect inside our churches.
Because theology doesn’t stay theoretical. What we believe eventually shapes what we are willing to tolerate.
The Teachings That Should Make Us Uncomfortable
1. Imbalance of gender responsibility in marriage
The repeated teaching that it is the woman’s job to meet her husband’s needs so he doesn’t cheat on her, and the focus on making sure he feels respected so his heart doesn’t harden, made me feel like I was sitting right back in the pews of my childhood.
My husband, who did not grow up with this teaching, was appalled, as we all should be. Teaching girls and women that they are responsible for managing the behavior, faithfulness, anger, emotional health, or spiritual condition of boys and men is dangerous and false.
And this teaching goes far beyond infidelity. If he cheats, we wonder whether she met his needs. If he is angry, we wonder whether she respected him enough. If the marriage is struggling, we ask what she could do differently.
Somehow, responsibility for his behavior keeps falling back onto her shoulders.
2. Marriage must be preserved at all costs because God hates divorce
There was actually a moment where someone was reading a text message that was sent to Mica, and I shuddered because I received a text worded almost identically when I was going through my divorce. Then, I shuddered again when they played the video Mica had recorded where she was talking about why God hates divorce and how God also hates abuse because I remember saying those same things almost verbatim.
When marriage is prioritized over the safety and health of those in the marriage, we have to take a step back and question the teaching.
Marriage can be something we value deeply without making the preservation of the marriage more important than the people inside of it.
3. I just have to do more and be better for God to work things out for me
Every time an excerpt from Mica’s journal was read, I found my heart breaking a little more. Each one of her entries showed a woman who had learned that if she was loyal, if she tried harder, if she prayed more, if she did more, God would work all things out for her.
This is one of those well-intentioned but extremely dangerous theological teachings. While it is not inherently bad to want to grow, when we shift our perspective so far that we believe we will be rewarded for doing more and punished for not doing enough, we have missed the point entirely.
We begin to understand God’s love as conditional on our performance, but we also lose sight of our accountability to others because we blame our own failure to do enough for the ways they have failed us.
Performance theology doesn’t just make me responsible for fixing myself. It can eventually make me feel responsible for fixing what someone else is doing to me.
Then, though, there are the patterns of behavior we see emerge in these churches.
What Those Teachings Create
1. Protect the church at all costs
One theme that runs throughout Mica’s story is her desire to remain silent to protect the church. It seemed as if her fear was that speaking the truth aloud would cause irrevocable damage to the church.
The irony of this belief is that it isn’t the exposure of the truth that damages the church. It’s the harm the truth exposes. Keeping the truth quiet isn’t protecting the church; it’s simply allowing the rot festering below the surface to continue to grow out of control.
Somehow, in these systems, the person exposing the harm can become a greater threat to the church than the person who caused it in the first place.
The church needs to be protected from the rot itself. It never needs to be protected from exposing the truth.
2. Ignoring the fruit of the charismatic leader
Cults of personality are real and prevalent in our churches. Charismatic leaders draw people to them, and, in turn, they draw people into churches. Consequently, people start to slowly follow leaders instead of Christ. When we follow a man, we tend to overlook his shortcomings. It becomes easy to ignore the rot of his fruit and focus on the big parts of his personality.
Charisma becomes confused with character. Church growth becomes evidence of God’s blessing. Good preaching becomes evidence of spiritual maturity. A large following becomes evidence that a leader must be doing something right.
But none of those things tell us what kind of person someone is when he doesn’t get his way, when someone challenges him, or when his sin is exposed.
And when we aren’t allowed to question the fruit, Matthew 7 becomes null and void, replaced by excuses like: “Everyone makes mistakes.” No one is perfect. Don’t judge. You don’t know the whole story. Give him grace.
Sound familiar?
I would go one step further here, though. I would encourage each and every one of us to watch the fruit when the sin is exposed. What happens when a leader’s sins are exposed? Does he repent? Does he confess? Does he seek repair? Or does he minimize, shift blame, point the finger elsewhere, attack the people telling the truth, and demand grace without taking responsibility?
That’s the fruit we can’t ignore.
Because, yes, we are all imperfect. We all fail. We all sin. But what happens after the sin is exposed says everything about the individual's fruit.
3. Accountability exists until we actually need to hold someone accountable
Churches love accountability. In theory.
We see it with small groups, prayer partners, accountability partners, elders, and church boards. It sounds great when we talk about accountability for everyone else, but it isn’t so great when the person who actually needs to be held accountable is the person in leadership.
All of a sudden, accountability becomes a lack of grace and forgiveness. It becomes judgment, bitterness, unforgiveness, and rebellion. We are labeled with a spirit of divisiveness. We are told we need to extend grace without ever bringing confession, repentance, or repair into the conversation.
If accountability only flows downward, it isn’t accountability at all. It’s simply control.
And that is how leaders become untouchable.
Not necessarily because everyone around them believes they are perfect, but because the systems around them ensure their behavior never truly costs them power. People may confront them. People may disagree with them. People may even leave the church because of them. But if no one has the ability to say, “You cannot lead anymore,” then we have to question whether meaningful accountability ever existed at all.
If, like me, you shut off the TV and have been wrestling with why this all feels too familiar, I think the answer is simply complicated. It’s not simply that you’ve known of churches where people behaved badly; it’s that you know the complicated theology that allows them to do so. You know the theology, the rules, and the reflex to protect the church. But you also know what happens when people speak out against and stand up to them.
While I am still horrified by the tragedy Mica Miller lived through, the documentary reminded me why we cannot stop talking about the systems that allow this abuse to flourish. I can’t help but think that if we can identify the patterns in these systems, we can begin to dismantle them and stop others from rebuilding them.
Because dismantling the old system doesn’t accomplish much if we turn around and build the same thing with a different leader, a different name, and a nicer lobby.
Next week, I want to talk about the theology itself. For some of us, the theology we were handed did more than fail to protect vulnerable people. It actually trained us to ignore our own internal warning signs and the giant waving red flags in front of us.
Reflection Questions
Were there teachings you once accepted as normal that you now recognize as unhealthy or dangerous? What changed your perspective?
Have you ever seen a church protect its reputation, leadership, or institution at the expense of telling the truth? What did that cost the people involved?
When you think about the “fruit” of a leader, what do you believe matters most—especially after that leader has been confronted with harm or wrongdoing?
What would meaningful accountability for church leadership actually look like to you? What would need to be different from the systems you have seen before?
I write in two spaces. A Seat at the Table is where I explore faith, healing, and making room for honesty after it’s been made complicated. Ink & Intention is for writers who want to show up with clarity, discernment, and integrity—especially online.
I’m also the author of Breathing Again and several guided journals, and I work with writers who want thoughtful, grounded support as they find their voice and shape what comes next.
If you’re a writer looking for thoughtful encouragement, practical strategy, and honest conversations about the writing life, you’re also welcome to join us inside The Visible Author Facebook Community.
If something here resonated, you’re welcome to explore more at your own pace. You can find everything in one place at KristenNeighbarger.com.
