Photo by Pei Hsin Hsein on Unsplash
The child is small enough
to still believe adults
about almost everything.
About vegetables.
About thunderstorms.
About God.
You were born human.
So when they are told
they were born sinful,
born broken,
born deserving punishment,
they do not hear theology.
They hear identity.
The words settle deep
before critical thinking arrives.
Deep enough
that years later
they will still apologize excessively,
still fear disappointing people,
still wonder secretly
whether love must always be earned
through self-erasure.
The child sits in Sunday school
coloring pictures of Noah’s ark
while absorbing terrifying mathematics:
that perfection belongs to God,
failure belongs to humans,
and hell waits eagerly
for mistakes.
Meanwhile,
the child still cries over scraped knees.
Still sleeps with stuffed animals.
Still believes
their goldfish might get lonely.
And somehow adults call this child
depraved by nature.
There are ways
religion enters the body
before language can defend itself.
A child learns to monitor thoughts.
To fear questions.
To confess normal human impulses
as evidence of corruption.
They begin splitting themselves early:
good child / bad child
holy thoughts / dangerous thoughts
acceptable self / secret self
And if the child is queer,
or neurodivergent,
or simply tender-hearted enough
to notice contradictions,
the shame grows roots.
Because children cannot distinguish easily between
“I sometimes do harmful things”
and
“I am fundamentally harmful.”
One invites accountability.
The other breeds terror.
Still,
children remain miraculous anyway.
They keep laughing loudly.
Keep collecting rocks in pockets.
Keep drawing suns too large for the page.
Keep trusting love
despite everything adults place upon them.
And perhaps holiness
was never supposed to begin
with self-hatred.
Perhaps no child
should have to spend adulthood
recovering from the belief
that their existence itself
required apology.
Perhaps the sacred
looks less like fear
and more like this:
telling the child gently,
You were never born disgusting.
Never born unworthy.
Never a problem
God regretted creating.
You were born human.
Capable of harm, yes.
But also kindness.
Wonder.
Joy.
Tenderness.
And no theology
worthy of a child
should require them
to despise themselves first
in order to feel loved.
