Christianity or Jesus? Naming the Distortion
I’ve been sitting with something raw lately. Someone I’ve known for 20 years told me that my worship — my sincere devotion to God — made her uncomfortable. She turned my offering of love into something dark, something “occult” she needed to distance herself from.
I was flabbergasted. She went on to tell me about her new relationship with Jesus. But what I’ve witnessed has nothing to do with the Jesus I know — it’s pure distortion. A God of wrath instead of love. A gospel of obedience and fear instead of freedom and mercy. Misquoting Jesus while giving testimony soaked in Paul, or worse, in cultural superiority disguised as scripture.
And that’s when I realized her new relationship with Jesus was really a Bible-driven, fear-based lens — one that has a need to condemn what it can’t understand, including the very practices that once held her when she was in need.
Let’s be honest: Christianity today is often not about Jesus’ teachings at all. It’s tangled up in the authority of the Bible instead of the voice of Christ. When the church fathers codified scripture, they edited, cut, and reshaped the story to protect their authority. This is not opinion. It’s fact. And in the process, the radical truth Jesus carried — love, freedom, oneness — was shuffled into the background.
What took center stage instead was fear, control, and superiority.
The Jesus I know never called love “occult.” He never told anyone to worship a book above the living presence of Spirit. He didn’t divide humanity into insiders and outsiders, saved and damned. He taught love. He taught oneness. He taught freedom.
Naming the Tension
Here’s the tension between us:
The very path that once held her and called her into truth is the one she now condemns.
When she was spinning with a lot of distortion and no real direction, it was yoga — and the ashram — that provided her with stability and refuge. But it also refused to let her hide. When her eating disorder took over, she was told plainly: this is not what the ashram is for. She was told she needed professional help, that she couldn’t use spiritual practice as a cover to avoid the real work of addressing this life threatening condition.
That boundary was love. That honesty was grace. That was God moving through a different doorway.
Her decision to now call this “occult” is not only ignorant of what the occult really is — it also erases her own history, the very place that saved her life, because the system she’s in demands it.
This is the cruelty of distortion:
It recasts truth-tellers as deceivers.
It calls the voice of love a voice of evil.
It forces you to deny the place where God met you in order to defend a system built on fear.
Jesus’ Teachings vs. Christianity’s Doctrines
God’s Nature
Jesus taught: God is love. God’s sun shines on the just and unjust. (Matthew 5:45–48)
Christianity: God is wrathful, jealous, punishing. Salvation required to escape God’s anger.
Authority
Jesus taught: “The kingdom of God is within you.” (Luke 17:21)
Christianity: Sola Scriptura — the Bible is the final authority in all matters of life and faith.
Love & Inclusion
Jesus: Ate with sinners, welcomed the marginalized, elevated women and the poor.
Christianity: Draws exclusionary boundaries — “believers vs. unbelievers,” saved vs. damned.
Salvation
Jesus taught: Forgiveness and healing through love, mercy, and transformation of the heart.
Christianity: Substitutionary atonement — Jesus died to pay for sins so if you’re a believer you can escape hell.
Fear vs. Freedom
Jesus taught: “Do not be afraid.” (Repeated often)
Christianity: Fear of eternal hell, fear of sin, fear of losing salvation.
Violence vs. Peace
Jesus taught: “Blessed are the peacemakers.” “Put away your sword.”
Christianity: Holy wars, crusades, colonial missions, Christian nationalism.
Relationship to Law
Jesus taught: Love fulfills the law. Spirit over letter.
Christianity: Literal interpretation of scripture, rigid moral codes, purity culture.
Spiritual Access
Jesus taught: Direct relationship with the Father, no mediator needed.
Christianity: Institutional gatekeepers — priests, pastors, church authorities.
Oneness of God
Jesus: Prayed “that they may all be one” (John 17:21).
Christianity: Superiority of “our God” over others; rejection of other faiths as false.
People Are Leaving the Church
This isn’t just my story. It’s happening everywhere.
Nearly three in ten U.S. adults now identify as “nones” — religiously unaffiliated. That’s more than Catholics or Evangelical Protestants.
For every one person who converts to Christianity, six raised in it leave.
Younger generations are leading the way, refusing to carry traditions that don’t line up with their lived experience of God as Love.
And many don’t just leave casually. They leave wounded.
Religious Trauma Syndrome (RTS)
There’s even a name now for the deep wounds caused by fear-based, authoritarian religion: Religious Trauma Syndrome (RTS).
It shows up as anxiety, guilt, depression, fear of hell, loss of identity, and difficulty trusting one’s own inner guidance. People who walk away often feel stripped of community and safety.
That’s not Jesus. That’s distortion.
Other Reasons People Are Leaving
Social Issues & Politics → Evangelical alignment with political power (Trumpism, culture wars) has turned many away, especially those who see it as the opposite of Christ’s ethic.
Theological Tensions → Biblical contradictions, the problem of suffering, and doctrines like eternal hell are pushing many to rethink or leave.
Institutional Disillusionment → Scandals, hypocrisy, money-driven churches, and abuse coverups deepen the mistrust.
Fear vs. Love
What masquerades as “faith” in many churches today is actually fear. Fear of hell. Fear of sin. Fear of being wrong. Fear of losing control. Fear of people who think differently.
And when fear sits in the driver’s seat, love gets shoved to the side.
But Jesus never used fear as a weapon. He used love as the medicine. He walked into the homes of people society despised. He touched lepers. He dignified women. He looked at power structures and said: you’ve heard it said one way, but I’m telling you, love fulfills the law.
Superiority vs. Oneness
Here’s another piece: the idea that “our God is better.” That is not God. That is empire.
When religion teaches that one group has exclusive access to truth or salvation, it divides. It wounds. It breeds violence. It is the opposite of what Jesus prayed for — that we might all be one.
God is not better. God is One. God is Love.
Why This Matters
This isn’t about nitpicking theology. It’s about life and death, freedom and captivity, healing and harm.
Because distortion doesn’t just hurt one person at a time — it’s shaped history. Wars, inquisitions, slavery, colonization, witch hunts, the silencing of women, the abuse of children, entire cultures decimated — all in the name of God. Hitler himself claimed to be carrying out God’s word. That’s how dangerous distortion is when fear, supremacy, and scripture are weaponized together.
And here’s the other piece: at the core of nearly every spiritual tradition are universal truths — love, compassion, service, humility, the oneness of creation. These truths don’t belong to one religion, one book, or one people. They belong to humanity.
When we let Christianity twist those truths into fear and superiority, it doesn’t just betray Jesus — it betrays the universal ground of Love that underlies all paths.
The Invitation
You want to use the Bible as the authority? Then let’s look at what Jesus actually said:
“Love your enemies… that you may be children of your Father in heaven. He causes his sun to rise on the evil and the good.” (Matthew 5:44–45) → God is universal love.
“Be merciful, just as your Father is merciful.” (Luke 6:36) → God is mercy, not wrath.
“The kingdom of God is within you.” (Luke 17:21) → God is present, not distant.
“God is Spirit, and those who worship him must worship in spirit and in truth.” (John 4:24) → God is living presence, not confined to a book.
“That they may all be one, just as you, Father, are in me, and I in you.” (John 17:21) → God is oneness, not superiority.
And again and again: “Do not be afraid.” → Fear is not God’s way.
This is the God Jesus revealed:
Love. Mercy. Spirit. Presence. Oneness. Freedom.
So maybe the real question is this:
Do you follow the teachings of Christ?
Or do you give authority to a book that contradicts itself — a book edited, revised, and stripped of the teachings it didn’t like?
Stop settling for fear when love is waiting.
Because the moment we remember what Jesus actually taught, the distortion crumbles.
And what remains is simple, radical, and true:
God is Love. God is One.