The Way Home P.1
“Sometimes, on the path of life where we grope our way forwards or, alternatively forge ahead without giving it much thought, we see a treacherous fork appear before us, forcing us to make a choice on which our whole future depends. Left or right? How can we know where happiness lies, where misfortune lurks? Our sole consolation will be to think that our choice was illusory, as it had been pre-determined since time immemorial.” – Banine, Parisian Days.
I’ve kept a diary since I was eight years old. Back then, the world felt so vast and indifferent to me, and I often found myself lost in my own world. So, I wrote. Obsessively. Writing became my sanctuary, the place where I could unravel the tangled threads of my inner world. I truly believed, with a child's unwavering faith, that some higher force—God, the Universe, whatever—cared deeply for me, that they would swoop in and rescue me from the life I was stuck in. Writing was my prayer, my quiet plea for salvation.
Those early journals were my refuge from the chaos of untreated mental health struggles, a fractured family life, and the constant sense that I had no control over anything. This blog is (partly) a collection of those thoughts, a reflection of the ten years I spent deeply entrenched in a charismatic church in Perth, WA.
Fast forward 20 years, I left the church bubble and the marriage I was coerced into at 22.I was 28, divorced, living back at my mother’s house, my world in shambles. Everything I had built my life around was gone in an instant. And who could I blame? I was the one who left the church, so did I really have any right to friendship, belonging, or community? I was the one who left my husband in the dead of night—could I expect empathy, or even understanding? I had wrecked the foundation of my life, let everyone down, including God. In that moment, I believed I had become His greatest disappointment.
This story is mine. It’s coloured by my own memories, tinted through the lenses of my personal experiences. It’s not a diatribe against the church or an attack on faith. Honestly, I think organised religion is quite adept at digging its own grave. I wrote this first and foremost for my own closure, but more importantly, to shed light on the harm organised religions can inflict on vulnerable souls with fragile minds. I wanted to start this conversation in Australia, with an Australian voice, from an Australian experience. The time for silence has passed.
As I lay in the ashes of the life I built and tore down with my own hands, I knew one thing for certain: that life wasn’t for me anymore. Yes, I was terrified. I had no idea what was next, but there was no going back—what was behind me had crumbled into nothing. All I knew was that I had to find my way back home.
My early years were a collision of pain and contradictions. My mum came out, I shuffled between two homes, and my dad oscillated between zealous Christianity and drug binges. I remember my Christian nana telling me that my mum was destined for hell unless she repented of her “sins.” Who tells a five-year-old such things? My sister and I clung to each other for survival. Mum had her partner. Dad had his drugs. And I, in the deepest corners of my mind, had Jesus.
Looking back, it makes perfect sense why I would find solace in an unseen figure who promised unconditional love, who whispered of safety beneath the shadow of his wings. What child, starved of consistent love and security, wouldn’t gravitate toward that? Jesus was my knight in shining armour, my refuge. He was going to pull me out of the abyss.
The church wasn’t entirely a dark place. It brought good things into my life, but it also left scars, deep ones, that I’m still trying to heal. The church, in its inaction and passivity, inflicted as much damage as any active harm. It continues to turn a blind eye to the struggles of the marginalised—LGBTQ+ people, refugees, the poor, the elderly, the outsiders. How ironic, given that these are the very people Christ called “the least of these,” the ones the church is meant to love most.
For a long time, my entire life was wrapped up in the church—my identity, my community, even my livelihood. But eventually, I couldn’t feast at the table knowing that so many people I cared about weren’t welcome there.
Week after week, 2,500 seats were filled with middle-class, conservative families. The lights, the rock band, the smoke machines—all of it was designed to keep the machine running. The $8-million auditorium renovations weren’t funded by the homeless or the refugees we claimed to care about. No matter how much Jesus talked about the poor, helping them didn’t make fiscal sense. The hypocrisy infuriated me. In the corporate world, at least businesses are honest about their intentions. But in the church, we masked it all under the guise of compassion, all while enjoying generous tax breaks. I couldn’t pretend anymore.
It was beautiful and awful at the same time. There were moments where I felt whole, like I had found the key to true contentment. But the cost of that contentment was too high. The price was my true self. I had to silence my voice, bury my dreams, let my authentic self wither. But she didn’t die—she just slipped into a deep sleep. My twenties were lost in that slumber.
I learned how to thrive in the church by letting myself disappear. But something stubborn within me refused to die completely. She stayed hidden, waiting.
This is her story. This is my story.
To be continued…
