Editing Religious trauma syndrome (section)

== How RTS develops ==

=== Membership ===
RTS begins in toxic religious environments centered around two basic narratives: "You are not okay" and "You are not safe."<ref name="Winell BABCP 2">{{Cite web
|title=Understanding Religious Trauma Syndrome (part 2): Trauma from Religion
|last=Winell
|first=Marlene
|publisher=British Association for Behavioural and Cognitive Psychotherapies
|url=https://legacy.babcp.com/Review/RTS-Trauma-from-Religion.aspx
|access-date=2020-10-26
|url-status=dead
}}</ref> These ideas are often enforced by [[theology]] such as the doctrines of [[original sin]] and [[hell]].<ref name="Winell BABCP 2" />

The development of RTS can be compared to the development of [[Complex post-traumatic stress disorder|complex PTSD]] (C-PTSD), defined as a psychological disorder that can develop in response to prolonged, repeated experience of interpersonal trauma in a context in which the individual has little or no chance of escape. Symptoms of RTS are a natural response to the perceived existence of a [[violence|violent]], [[Omnipotence|all-powerful]] [[God]] who finds humans inherently defective, along with regular exposure to religious leaders who use the threat of [[damnation|eternal death]], [[Redemption (theology)|unredeemable life]], [[demon possession]] and many other frightening ideas to control religious devotion and the [[deference|submission]] of group members.<ref name="Stone" />

Members of the [[LGBTQIA+]] community are at particular risk of RTS and C-PTSD as they attempt, over an extended period of time, to alter their [[sexual orientation]] and [[gender identity]] to fit the expectations of [[Authoritarian personality|authoritarian]] religious communities. The process of attempting to alter one's orientation can create [[emotionally abusive]] thought patterns that are prone to exacerbate the C-PTSD-like symptoms of RTS. Chronically living in fear of eternal damnation and lifelong separation from loved ones and religious communities if they fail to comply with sexual identity restrictions can induce long-term symptoms of RTS.<ref name=":3">{{Citation|last1=Yates|first1=Jennifer|title=The Religious Locations of LGBTQ+ Survivors: Survivors of Christian Nonsexual Spiritual Abuse|date=2019|url=https://www.jstor.org/stable/j.ctvwrm4c3.18|work=Navigating Religious Difference in Spiritual Care and Counseling|volume=2|pages=251–280|editor-last=Snodgrass|editor-first=Jill L.|series=Essays in Honor of Kathleen J. Greider|publisher=Claremont Press|isbn=978-1-946230-32-4|access-date=2020-10-26|last2=Snodgrass|first2=Jill L.|jstor=j.ctvwrm4c3.18}}</ref><ref>{{Cite news|last=Schiffman|first=Richard|date=2019-02-05|title=When Religion Leads to Trauma (Published 2019)|language=en-US|work=The New York Times|url=https://www.nytimes.com/2019/02/05/well/mind/religion-trauma-lgbt-gay-depression-anxiety.html|access-date=2020-10-26|issn=0362-4331}}</ref>

=== Leaving ===
Leaving a controlling religious community, while often experienced as liberating and exciting, can be experienced as a major traumatic event. Religious communities often serve as the foundation for individuals' lives, providing social support, a coherent worldview, a sense of meaning and purpose, and social and emotional satisfaction. Leaving behind all those resources goes beyond a significant loss; it calls on the individual to completely reconstruct their reality, often while newly isolated from the help and support of family and friends who stay in the religion.<ref name="Winell BABCP 1" /><ref name="Moyers">{{Cite web
|title=Psychological Issues of Former Fundamentalists
|last=Moyers
|first=Jim
|url=https://www.jimmoyers.com/spirituality/issuesexfund.html
|access-date=2020-10-26
|website=www.jimmoyers.com
|archive-date=2021-11-30
|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20211130182602/https://www.jimmoyers.com/spirituality/issuesexfund.html
|url-status=dead
}}</ref><ref>{{Cite book
|last=Newberg, Andrew.
|title=Neurotheology: how science can enlighten us about spirituality.
|date=2020
|publisher=Columbia University Press
|isbn=978-0-231-17905-8
|location=New York
|oclc=1145902629}}</ref>

In addition, when violent or threatening theology, such as a belief in hell, [[divine punishment]], demons, and an [[Us vs. them|evil "outside world"]], have been incorporated into the basic structure of an individual's [[worldview]], the threats of engaging the outside world instead of remaining in the safe bubble of the controlling religious community can induce further anxiety.<ref name="Stone" /><ref name=":3" /><ref name="Moyers" />

As individuals identify the harm they are experiencing in authoritarian religious settings, their concerns may be minimized by the religious group itself, but they can also be compounded by society's investment in positive views of religion.<ref name="Winell BABCP 1" /> Institutional betrayal, first at the hands of beloved religious communities, second at the hands of a world that upholds the utility of religion rather than the experiences of religious abuse survivors, can make symptoms of RTS worse.<ref name="Winell BABCP 1" /> People leaving religion can experience extreme hostility from their former co-religionists.<ref>{{Cite news|title=The Health Effects of Leaving Religion: How a loss of faith can manifest itself in the mind and body|url=https://www.theatlantic.com/health/archive/2014/09/the-health-effects-of-leaving-religion/379651/|last=Fortenbury|first=Jon|date=2014-09-28|access-date=2022-01-08|work=[[The Atlantic]]}}</ref>