Why Pastor’s Kids Are Messed Up

Everyone has their own share of hang-ups and complexities, but there’s a certain uniqueness to the experiences of pastor’s kids that often sets them apart. Call it fate, coincidence, or a touch of divine irony, but it seems that many of us who grew up as pastor’s kids — including me — carry a distinct flavor of “messed up.”

If I ran a support group for the grown-up kids of pastors, there would be plenty of potential attendees. So many of the pastor’s kids I know, have walked away from their faith completely, or otherwise carry the scars of being in the spotlight of their father’s ‘special’ calling. It’s as if we’ve had a front-row seat to the complexities and contradictions of church life, and it has left an indelible mark on our faith, or what is left of it.

Growing up as a pastor’s kid, I often felt the weight of expectation and the unspoken pressure to be the epitome of virtue and piety. Whether it was the scrutinizing eyes of the congregation or the internal struggle to reconcile my own doubts and questions, the journey of faith became a turbulent dance of seeking authenticity amidst the shadows of the pulpit. It was a delicate balance between finding our own spiritual identity and navigating the complexities of our father’s role as a spiritual leader.

But I was not the model son that perhaps my father wanted me to be. In church, I was pretty darn naughty. I would lie on the floor and read books because, well… the church service didn’t really interest me much. I’m sure the church ladies judged my Mom for not making me sit up straight in my seat and pay attention to the sermon. But, I guess my Dad’s preaching was not all that interesting.

However, I do remember my father telling his flock that they should always put God first, above all others. And, while this might seem like a harmless or even virtuous sentiment, I realize now that this was problematic for me as a child.

The Divine Tug of War

Every boy longs for the affection and affirmation of their Dad. Every boy inherently longs to be the apple of his father’s eye. Every boy wants to believe he holds a special place in his father’s heart.

But, what if that special place in your father’s heart is occupied by another? And what if that other is none other than God? How do you compete with God? How could I ever measure up to the divine figure who held my father’s unwavering loyalty and reverence?

Was I just being petty and jealous?

Or did my father’s dedication actually establish God as a rival in my formative years? Not only was I competing with God for the heart of my father, but I was also constantly being asked to love that God with all my heart and soul. It created a paradox within me — an internal conflict between my desire for my father’s attention and the expectations of my faith. How could I love the one who seemingly stole my father’s attention from me? How could I love my rival?

As an eight-year-old, I’m sure I didn’t think about it this way. Only in retrospect can I see the potential ramifications of what might have been. Inadvertently, the foundations of my faith were intertwined with feelings of insecurity, longing, and even a sense of rivalry.

Please God to please Dad

And so I did what you might expect a young man with juvenile emotions and a juvenile faith to do. I acted out. I sought attention in any way I could, hoping to divert my father’s focus from God, even if just for a fleeting moment. I made mischief during church services, causing a ruckus that would surely turn heads and draw my father’s gaze away from the pulpit.

The results were mixed.

Dad sure was steadfast in his religious practice, and, as a pastor, he threw himself wholeheartedly into the work. I remember seeing him praying and doing his devotions every morning in his study. His commitment to God was unwavering, inspiring, and intimidating.

Somewhere along the way, I realized that competing with God for my father’s attention was futile.

I changed tack.

I made the decision to become equally pious. Moreso, in fact! Perhaps, in some strange way, I believed that if I couldn’t get Dad to love me more than God, then perhaps I could get God to love me more than Dad. I would get God to give me what I wanted from Dad.

How messed up is that?

Plus, I suppose if I did enough wonderful “god stuff,” perhaps that would get Dad’s attention. I immersed myself in performance-based religion — ticking off the checkboxes of rituals, rules, and obligations. And, as I grew up, I threw myself into ministry as well. I became the coordinator of the kids’ ministry at my church at the tender age of fifteen. As an adult, I would become a full-blown pastor, myself.

And so, I began to pass the curse to the next generation.

Giving up the game

Of course, these are not revelations that I had as a child, or even as a young man. As a child, I just wanted Daddy to love me, and I sensed his split loyalty. As a young man, for many years, I failed to see the foundation of sand on which my faith had been built.

I carried with me the lingering effects of my childhood experiences, the wounds of feeling overlooked and unimportant, and was completely oblivious to their presence. I sought solace and validation in external measures of religious devotion, blindly following the path of performance-based faith.

And it may have continued for much longer, had God not intervened.

When I finally burned out on religion, completely exhausted with the sheer level of effort and energy required to keep pleasing God and everyone else all the time, I collapsed in a heap of disillusionment and weariness. In that moment of brokenness, God’s grace met me in the most unexpected way.

It was my Father who became my greatest defender, and an incredible source of comfort and strength. In the midst of my despair, my earthly father, the now-retired-and-old pastor — the one whose attention I had always longed for — reached out to me with open arms and a heart full of compassion. He embraced me not as a competitor to God, but as a beloved son in need of help.

And he didn’t care that my faith had fallen apart.

He showed me that the love of my rival, God, was available to us both in equal measure.

Embracing Grace and Forgiveness

I want to be clear: This is not some kind of “happily-ever-after” story. It took real brokenness and pain and descending into the dark places of my innermost motivations and desires to find healing. And it is still a work in progress. But it was and is a journey that I really had to take, in order to recognize the importance of extending grace and forgiveness to both myself and my father.

Perhaps in this blog post, I did not paint my father in a very good light. However, I want to assure you that he was an excellent Father. Still is. (Yes, I know you are reading, Dad!)

He didn’t set out to establish a divine rivalry where I would have to compete with God for his affection, affirmation, or attention. He was merely doing what he believed was right. He was trying hard himself to please God — walking the thin line between church and family life. And maybe — just maybe — he was trying to appease his own sense of longing for acceptance and connection with God.

This is the great tragedy of fundamentalist belief systems. Despite being told that we are unconditionally loved by God, we are still presented with a message that says the opposite. “Be good! Do the right thing! Keep his commandments! Trust and obey!” And if we do all that, maybe God will love us — until our next mistake.

But, I am convinced that we can never become spiritually mature until we come to a place of full acceptance of the fact that we are God’s beloved sons and daughters with absolutely no requirement to do anything in particular to earn God’s love. That’s what grace is.

Whenever we fail to recognize our inherent divine belovedness and try to earn it through religion instead, we usually damage ourselves and those in our nearest vicinity. When we go looking for God’s approval — which is something we already have — we can become like a person who pulls everything out of the cupboards overturns all the mattresses, and throws everything around the house, just to find the keys that have been in their pocket all along. We make a giant mess of our household and end up looking a bit foolish as well.

Moving past the pastor baggage

But there is hope. In the midst of my mess, I found grace. I discovered that God’s love is not based on our performance or our ability to measure up to religious standards. It is a love that embraces us in our brokenness, forgives our shortcomings, and offers us a fresh start.

I am learning to let go of the rivalry, and the need to compete with God or anyone else for love and affirmation. Little by little I have embraced the truth that God’s love is unconditional and abundant. I have realized that I didn’t have to earn it or prove myself worthy of it. I simply had to accept it and allow it to transform me from the inside out.

To all the pastor’s kids out there who have felt the burden of expectations, who had to fight for their father’s attention and affection, and who have struggled to find their own faith amidst the complexities of their upbringing, know that you are not alone.

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This post was previously published on Backyard Church.

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