by someone who has lived it, endured it, and refuses to stay silent about it
Bullying in the fundamental church does not always shout. Sometimes it dresses itself in suits, hides behind pulpits, and calls itself “defending the faith.” That façade makes the wounds deeper, because the people causing them believe their actions are righteous. I have been on the receiving end of that harm, and the experience has forced me to confront a truth many are afraid to say aloud: when power is abused, when conscience is coerced, and when threats replace conversations, the behavior is not discipline. It is bullying.
The first form of bullying I witnessed came from leaders who demanded allegiance to their own personal theories—ideas like no tongues speaking, no wine drinking, Verbal Plenary Preservation, KJV-Onlyism, and the claim that the Textus Receptus is perfect in every letter. These are not minor differences of opinion; they are elevated to dogma by a small circle of men who insist that their interpretations are the only faithful ones. Disagreement is treated not as an intellectual difference but as moral rebellion. When pastors or students do not subscribe to these doctrines, leaders threaten to withdraw financial support, positions, or ministry opportunities. That is coercion. If a belief must be maintained through fear, it is not conviction—it is control.
Refusing to accept these teachings is not disobedience. It is the right of every Christian, and especially every pastor or scholar, to examine evidence, seek truth, and follow conscience. The church has a long history of debate on textual issues, and responsible Christians have reached different conclusions for centuries. To act as though one narrow view represents the entire Christian tradition is intellectually dishonest and historically inaccurate. Calling such forced conformity “church dignity” does not sanitize it.
Another layer of bullying appears in how pastors and teachers are treated when they dissent. I watched capable, sincere leaders slowly pushed out of churches and Bible colleges because they could no longer pretend to believe what a few powerful voices demanded. Some left under pressure; others were driven out openly. The common thread was misery—men and women doing ministry with constant anxiety because any hint of disagreement could cost their livelihood. When leadership uses its authority to punish honest theological exploration, it destroys the very learning environment a Bible college is supposed to foster.
What happened to Bible college students might be the clearest example of all. Students failed final exams not because their work lacked scholarship, but because their conclusions did not align with the “right” doctrines. Theses were rejected not for poor argumentation but for showing independent thought. Some students reached graduation only to find they would not receive certification because they had not bowed to the preferred textual theory. Years of work, sacrifice, and ministry training were erased at a stroke. This is not education. It is indoctrination enforced through intimidation.
When fundamentalist leaders defend these actions by calling them Christian discipline or protecting the church’s testimony, they misunderstand what both of those terms actually mean. Christian discipline is restorative, patient, and aimed at guiding someone back to spiritual health. What we experienced was punitive, coercive, and designed to silence. Church dignity is upheld by integrity, humility, and truth—not by using authority to suppress honest disagreement. Protecting the church should never require harming the people God has entrusted to it.
What makes this bullying so painful is that it hides behind holiness. The perpetrators are convinced they are champions of purity. But purity built on fear is not righteousness. Unity built on intimidation is not fellowship. And orthodoxy enforced at the expense of human dignity is not a mark of faithfulness—it is a sign that fear, not truth, is steering the ship.
I write this as someone who has walked through this fire. I write it because the silence surrounding these abuses is suffocating. Many who have been harmed still doubt their own experience, told repeatedly that what they endured was “discipline” or “defense of the faith.” It was not. Naming the harm is the first step toward healing and toward building a church that does not confuse certainty with Christlikeness.
The church and bible college should be a place where questions are not punished, where scholarship is not policed by fear, and where authority is not used to crush those who seek truth in good conscience. Confronting these patterns is not an attack on the church and bible college—it is an attempt to save it from the very behavior that drives people away in silence.
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