A common experience among codependent adults is to have been raised by parents who use shame and guilt to get their children to do what they want them to do. Instead of critiquing the behavior of the child (“I am disappointed in what you did. What you did was wrong, inappropriate.”), parents shame the child himself (“YOU are bad! You are no good! You don’t deserve my love!”).

Shamed persons learn to see themselves as unworthy, inadequate, undeserving, not because of what they did but because of who they are. Later, the child internalizes those voices, and they become a part of her internal dialogue, her own self-shaming messengers. The voices of shame-inducing parents are no longer needed. They have been incorporated into the child’s psyche and can be extricated only when replaced with self-affirming messages. What we say about ourselves matters. If we have been trained to tell ourselves that we are unworthy and unlovable, we can recover only by changing the message.

The language of prayers and the rituals in some worship services, especially those of liturgical churches, can have the effect of increasing one’s sense of personal shame. Here are some examples from The Episcopal Church. Services of Holy Eucharist in The Episcopal Church are celebrated according a book of prayers used by Episcopal churches throughout the country. In Rite I, Prayer 1 (the most conservative of the six alternatives), the priest confesses on behalf of the congregation, “… we are unworthy … to offer thee any sacrifice.” (The Book of Common Prayer, Page 336) Later, in what is called The Prayer of Humble Access (said immediately before receiving communion), the congregation joins the priest in admitting that “we are not worthy so much as to gather up the crumbs under thy Table.” (Page 337). The Proper Preface for Advent intones that “we may without shame or fear rejoice to behold his appearing”.(Page 345) Why should we be shameful and fearful at the prospect of Jesus returning in power and triumph?

Shame-based language can also be found in some of the collects for special days and hymns. For instance, the collect read at the beginning of the service for Ash Wednesday acknowledges “our wretchedness”. (Page 264) In the collect for the Tuesday in Holy Week the priest, on behalf of the congregation, prays that “we may gladly suffer shame and loss for the sake of your Son our Savior Jesus Christ”. (Page 220). In some hymns we refer to ourselves as “wretches” and “worms”.

Granted, these ancient prayers and hymns mostly derive from the thirteenth century and were influenced by the theology of John Calvin and the Christology of the time they were first written, but they continue to influence how present day Christians understand themselves. And The Episcopal Church is certainly not the only religious institution to use shaming language in its prayers, songs, or from the pulpit. The shaming of church members is a time honored technique of all Christian denominations. A central tenet of John Calvin’s theology is “the utter depravity of man”. Augustine’s doctrine of Original Sin doomed millions of Christians to self-deprecation and shame. The assumption that there is something inherently wrong with human beings, something dark and evil that exists even at birth and that can only be “fixed” by obedience to God, heaps coals on shame-based fires first ignited by parents in shamed-based homes.

So – why haven’t shame-inducing prayers, hymns and sermons been removed from prayer books like the Episcopal Book of Common Prayer? I offer 3 possible reasons:

1. Shamed parishioners, like shame-based children, are more easily controlled by church leaders.
Children shamed as children by authority figures like parents and teachers will respond submissively
to religious authority figures as well.
2. All institutions have sadistic tendencies, including the church.
3. The influence of the theology of Original Sin is pervasive.