Stockholm syndrome, or capture-bonding, is a psychological phenomenon in which hostages express empathy and sympathy and have positive feelings toward their captors, sometimes to the point of defending and identifying with them. Has institutional Christianity become this?

“Faced by someone promising to do them harm if they didn’t do as they say, most people would at least regard such a person as the enemy. Institutional Christianity, however, embraces this “person” as God. They praise and adore him, and even worship this God who has promised them eternal suffering if they don’t do as he says. They bow their heads in thanks, praising him for giving them a way out of the trap he has set for them.

Some expressions of religion bring Stockholm Syndrome to mind.

In the case of religion, God is the one in control of all things good or bad, including all human beings that he created. God is presented as perfect, righteous and holy, while human beings are characterized as bad, sinful, unworthy, disgusting, and deserving of God’s condemnation, punishment, and wrath. This feeds the belief that every second without punishment is an act of love from God.

This comparison plays out further in the notion that one either does as God says or they suffer the consequences. What hangs in the balance is God’s blessing, and ultimately which afterlife one gets, Heaven or Hell. Heaven is for those who do as God says, and Hell for those who don’t comply.

Wanting to avoid Hell and garner a place in heaven, Christians abide by God’s demands, which include admitting your worthlessness, signing off on a particular theology about God, and following the commands and expectations of God, depending on the particular denomination or church.

So in essence, you have an agent, God, who has set up a hostage situation (denial of blessing, and impending doom) and the conditions by which one can escape (upholding certain beliefs, obeying God, following the prescribed religious program).

Faced by someone promising to do them harm if they didn’t do as they say, most people would at least regard such a person as the enemy. Christians, however, embrace this “person” as God. They praise and adore him, and even worship this God who has promised them eternal suffering if they don’t do as he says. They bow their heads in thanks, praising him for giving them a way out of the trap he has set for them. They even defend his honor and greatness: none greater or better, or more loving than this God. Never mind that he admittedly created evil, threatens, is jealous and possessive, misogynistic, and very controlling. This God, so we are told, is the highest form of righteousness.

This is exactly how hostages turn from a logical hatred of their captor to having “empathy and positive feelings towards their captor, sometimes to the point of defending them.”

And what other reason is there to have empathy and positive feelings, even love, towards this captor-God other than he promises no eternal suffering if one does as he says? In such cases, religion fosters a “traumatic psychological bonding” with God, which becomes a codified program that seeks to create Stockholm Syndrome in others. It is even presenting it as a desirable condition.

Your true Self knows that the above explanation of God is absurd.
Despite what you might have been told, God is not a captor, and you are not a hostage. God is Love, and you are the beloved.
There is NO fear in Love.
Not some, none.”

– Jim Palmer, Notes from (Over) the Edge