My conversation today is with a friend that I’ve come to know and love over the last few years here at Nampa College Church. Debra Peck is a thoughtful and deeply devoted Christian woman who discovered a few years ago that for years she had been suffering from a disorder known as Religious Scrupulosity. This realization not only began for Debra a journey toward wholeness, but it also set her out to discover more about the disorder itself.
As you will hear in our conversation, Religious Scrupulosity is a type of Obsessive Compulsive Disorder that often hides in plain sight in churches, Sunday schools, and within religious families. Pastors and religious leaders often fail to recognize the problem, and in the process often make things worse for those who are struggling with it.
Debra’s research and her own personal journey led her to write a new book, The Hijacked Conscience: An Informed and Compassionate Response to Religious Scrupulosity. It is a very important book for pastors and church leaders, but it is also an important book for those who though deeply committed to faith find that faith feels more like a heavy burden than a source of freedom and joy. I think you’ll find this conversation enlightening – especially if you grew up in more conservative branches of Christian faith.