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Most of us were taught that faith lives in the mind.Belief. Doctrine. Theology.
But long before Christianity told you what to think, it told you how to move.How to dress.How to sit.How to desire.How to discipline your body into obedience.
This piece isn’t about taking anyone’s faith away.It’s about telling the truth of how faith was used, and what it cost our bodies.
I didn’t realize how much faith lived in my body until I left home…
Growing up Irish Catholic, my body learned reverence before it learned choice.Knees on hard pews.Hands folded just so.Eyes lowered.Silence as virtue.
Church wasn’t loud. It wasn’t expressive. It wasn’t joyful.It was controlled.
Years later, I walked into a Black church in the South and felt the shock hit my nervous system first.Movement.Music.Bodies alive with spirit.
My first thought wasn’t curiosity.It was judgment.
That moment cracked something open for me, not because one expression was “right” and the other “wrong,” but because I realized how thoroughly my body had been trained to equate control with holiness.
That’s when it clicked: (years later)
Christianity didn’t just shape belief. It trained bodies.
Why This Piece, Why Now
This essay lives in the Season of Self, the winter work of slowing down, taking inventory, and tracing what lives in us that we didn’t consciously choose.
It also continues my ongoing arc through Decolonizing Faith, a series that asks hard questions about what we inherited, what we internalized, and what we were never told.
This is not an anti-faith essay.It is an anti-propaganda one.
Because propaganda works by flattening history, stripping context, and severing body from story.And Christianity (as it was weaponized through empire) did exactly that.
This work is about unflattening.Returning faith to its political, material, and embodied realities.And letting people decide freely what they want to carry forward.
Before We Go Any Further…
I want to pause.
During the live recording of Let’s Have the Conversation, Ariana shared that she had written a poem that mirrored our conversation and I asked for her permission to share it here because it captures (better than any analysis) the lived experience of what it means to have your body trained, surveilled, and disciplined long before you ever had language for it.
This episode ran longer than some of the others, intentionally. The Season of Self asks us not to rush. It asks us to let what needs to surface… surface. And sometimes that looks like silence, tears, poetry, and truth arriving sideways instead of neatly on time.
What follows is Ariana’s poem.
Please read it slowly.Let it land where it lands.
Family Resemblance
Mirrors have alwayshaunted me.
Your voicehas become my ownas I look at myreflection.
I have always avoidedthem when possible,but I can’t help butglance as I rid myselfof traveling germs.
“Stand up straighter.You look like ahumpback whale,”we tell me.
I comply to this demandas I always have.
“Comb your rat’s nestthis instant,”I hear as I rearrangemy wild curls.
We continue to pickme apart as I standat the airport restroom mirror,a layer of fingerprints,softening the tearsthat well upin the corners of my eyes
fine lines creeping in,making me lookmore like you each day.
“Those shorts arevery unbecoming on yoursoft thighs,”we remind me.
I notice the fleshy flapthat moves as I grabfor a paper towel.
I know we don’t like it.I should have wornlong sleeves.
I turn back,determined to findone quality we wouldlike in my reflection.
My smile iswarm and inviting,I can camouflagepain entirely.
My teeth are straightand a human shade of white.
There’s somethingwe don’t hate.
Before I turn,I hear our voiceremind me tonever wear this shirt again.
It always catches on thelittle roll just above my waist.
I quickly glance awaybefore it overwhelms.
On my therapists advice,where we talkabout you often,I try to find one morething we don’t hate.
I have grown strong and sturdy,just as you commanded.
I “stay under controlin all circumstance,”just as you demanded.
I am turning to leavewhen I glimpse youin the mirror.
I imagine it is your ghostback for one last punchto my confidence.
And that’s when I realizeit wasn’t a spiritbut a family resemblance.
I know now why youtore me apart.
Perhaps you saw Youin me too.
Somatic Pause — Letting the Body Catch Up
Before we move on, take a moment.
You don’t need to analyze what you just read.You don’t need to make meaning yet.
If it feels accessible, notice your body right now.
* Where did that poem land?
* Was there a tightening, a softening, a holding of breath?
* Did your shoulders rise, your jaw clench, your chest grow heavy?
If you’re able, place one hand somewhere that feels grounding—your chest, your belly, your thighs.Let your body know you are here with it, not to correct it.
Nothing needs to be fixed.Nothing needs to be explained.
This is what it sounds like when supremacy culture moves through generations—when discipline, shame, and survival get mistaken for love. And it’s also what it sounds like when awareness begins to interrupt the pattern.
Take one slow breath in.And a longer breath out.
When you’re ready, we’ll continue.
🔒 Paywall BreakThe next section moves from witnessing into analysis—from personal inheritance into the system that made this inheritance feel inevitable. We’ll name how Christianity, once aligned with empire, became a technology for bodily control—and how supremacy culture learned to live inside us.
Paid subscribers receive the full essay, including:
* a historical and embodied unpacking of Christianity as bodily governance
* the specific supremacy culture pillars at work
* reframes that return dignity to the body
* and practices for reclaiming agency in the Season of Self
If there is a financial barrier, equity scholarships are always available atScholarships@DesireeBStephens.com
When you’re ready, you’re invited to cross the threshold.
