Hope Restored

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  • Abigail’s Story – Confessions from The Wandering Soul

    By Abigail Degnan When I think back to where my journey of deconstruction and reconstruction began, one memory stands out. At sixteen years old – four years before I became an intern at a biblical counseling crisis center that would religiously abuse me – I asked my brother to meet with me for lunch at…

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  • Purity Culture Kept Me in an Abusive Relationship

    By Rachel Longshore  Purity Culture Purity culture begins and ends by projecting the idea that a person’s worth is directly connected to their sexual purity. According to Julianna Strati, “Purity culture taught young people, especially young women, to avoid sexual ‘scandal.’ Many people were told that their value was tied to their virginity. This pressured…

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  • Elayna’s Story: A Journey to Deconstruction

    By Elayna Baranova When I was 2, I was adopted along with another kid from Russia. My adoptive parents were really focused on image and optics, and so that was trained into us at an early age. Unfortunately, they were also abusive. My father was sexually abusive to me, and my mom was emotionally and…

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