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    Post-Traumatic Church Syndrome: A Memoir of Humor and Healing
    Post-Traumatic Church Syndrome: A Memoir of Humor and Healing
    Post-Traumatic Church Syndrome: A Memoir of Humor and Healing
    Audiobook10 hours

    Post-Traumatic Church Syndrome: A Memoir of Humor and Healing

    Written by Reba Riley

    Narrated by Reba Riley

    4/5

    ()

    About this audiobook

    Written with humor and personality, this debut memoir recounts a woman’s spiritual quest of experiencing thirty religions before her thirtieth birthday. Post-Traumatic Church Syndrome is for questioners, doubters, misfits, and seekers of all faiths, and tackles the universal struggle to heal what life has broken.

    On her twenty-ninth birthday, while guests were arriving downstairs, Reba Riley was supposedly upstairs getting dressed. In actuality, she was slumped on the floor sobbing about everything from the meaning of life to the pile of dirty laundry on the floor.

    Life without God was crashing in on her. And she was sick and tired of feeling sick and tired. She uttered a desperate prayer, and then the idea came to her—thirty by thirty. And thus she embarked on a year-long quest to experience thirty religions by her thirtieth birthday. During her spiritual sojourn, Riley:

    -Was interrogated about her sex life by Amish grandmothers

    -Disco danced in a Buddhist temple

    -Fasted for thirty days without food—or wine

    -Washed her lady parts in a mosque bathroom

    -Was audited by Scientologists

    -Learned to meditate with an urban monk

    -Snuck into a Yom Kippur service with a fake grandpa in tow

    -And finally discovered she didn’t have to choose a religion to choose God

    In a debut memoir that is funny and earnest, Riley invites questioners, doubters, misfits, and curious believers to participate in the universal search to heal what life has broken. Post-Traumatic Church Syndrome takes you by the hand and reminds you that sometimes you first have to be lost in order to be found.
    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherSimon & Schuster Audio
    Release dateAug 18, 2015
    ISBN9781442393585
    Post-Traumatic Church Syndrome: A Memoir of Humor and Healing
    Author

    Reba Riley

    Reba Riley is an author, speaker, former Evangelical Poster Child, and lover of all things sparkly. She lives in Cincinnati, Ohio, where she plans to write more books...once she recovers from Post-Traumatic Memoir Syndrome. She blogs about spiritual health and healing for Patheos.com.

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    Reviews for Post-Traumatic Church Syndrome

    4/5

    21 ratings6 reviews

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    • 3/5
      I received this book free from goodread's FirstReads.

      Firstly; this will get a 3.5 on LibraryThing, but since Goodreads doesn't do .5's; its a 3 on here.

      It was interesting, and a good memoir, and the idea seemed like a good idea. NOW.... it wasn't so much a 30 religions by 30.... more or less a "all Christian sects plus the major mainstream non-Christian religions." Buddhism is touched on, Native American spiritualism, Islam, Judaism, Scientology, but like Kabbalah gets white-washed through because she met a rabbi who didn't want to interact. Sikhism is mentioned but just that - a mention. A shame that some religions get glossed over.

      Her road to spirituality ends long before the 30 project really completes - which is through a church online (which really; how different of a 'religion' is that? more or less just a different aspect/form of religion than one is typically use to).

      The writing is good, but it's very typical to that of modern memoirs where it reads more like fiction rather than that of its subject - autobiography/memoir/non-fiction. She even states the caveat at the very end that can really be said for all modern memoirs (but doesn't get mentioned) in that events get reordered, altered slightly, names/places changed [to preserve privacy, etc.], so it gets the better feel fictionally/naratively/typical story-wise, with events slightly reordered or made to fit better. I found her journey interesting, but not the soul-deep for us the readers as it was for her. We're given snippets of her pre-memoir, of her life pre-start-of-the-book, and we're given a few ideas of why she has "PTCS" [Post-Traumatic Church Syndrome]. But its never given the explanation or the detail it deserves considering that is the name of the memoir, and the entire cause of the 'project'. We're not given to truly understand Reba as much as I believe she thinks she comes across, especially the aspects of her soul-searching. Its shown, it's told, but its not 'gone over' in that weird sense where its even hard for me now to describe it. There's definitely no ambiguity or reading for the readers, its "here and here" and we're not given much of the religions other than her quick snips of it, with no research or reasoning to it, and nothing for us to cling to the religions. Which fall more to the wayside and act more as a vehicle for each mini-event (each chapter) that coincides with her life/sickness/spiritual happenings.

      All in all its a fun memoir that took me a bit longer than expected to read as I didn't get into it as fully as I expected - especially coming from someone who had actually had similar ideas of doing this long before hearing about this memoir (I've thought about going through all the different religions myself, or traveling to religious sites and experiencing, deeply the religions). Its a good tiny scratch of the surface that just doesn't delve deep enough for what I was thinking it could/hoping it would (not a total knock on the book, more or less just that the book didn't line up with my expectations/wants).

      1 person found this helpful

    • 2/5
      I listened to about four hours of this book and had to turn it off. Having experienced post-traumatic Christian syndrome myself, I thought it would be an interesting read. But after four hours, I conclude that it is only disingenuous fluff. You can even tell where she clumsily blends in fiction to try to spice it up, to add mystery. It feels like Reba investigated other religions as a stunt, purely as material for a blog or book deal. She posts her experiences online as she goes, in order to garner feedback for the book. She interviews people from different religions, FOR THE BOOK. I never got the feeling that her journey was anything other than a stunt. Not a spiritual read.

      1 person found this helpful

    • 5/5
      This was just what I needed in my journey of faith
    • 1/5
      could not finish this memoir. her casual colonizer vibes were too much.
    • 5/5
      I loved this book the author is funny and relatable. A must read for anyone trying to deal with spiritual baggage.
    • 4/5
      Sick of Christianish slang and lack of stickiness of a personal faith in evangelical churches, Reba Riley took her 29th year to overcome her Post-Traumatic Church Syndrome (or Post-Traumatic Religion Syndrome) by visiting 30 religions and Christian denominations before her 30th birthday. Of course her parents were worried, though her husband let her go. The result, Post-Traumatic Church Syndrome: a memoir of humor and healing, is both fun to read, gives a personal peek into churches and religious settings most of you haven't been to, and keeps the reader engaged until the end. Will Reba reclaim her original faith, come out as atheist, enriched or disillusioned?Buddhist meditation class: "Mr. Hotness, by contrast, dropped right off into meditative la-la land. I know because I watched him furtively. (Reba Riley, the peeping tom-ette of Intro to Buddhism tranquility meditation.) At some point the practice meditation finished and the lesson began, but I missed most of it because I was busy chastising myself forgetting to wear deodorant." But also interrogation about Reba's sex life by Amish women, visits to the Kingdom Hall of Jehovah Witnesses, being identified as The Christian in a Wicca meeting where blessings are given by pentagram drawings on your head. Riley went to the Mormons (Latter Day Saints), visited a Jewish Yom Kippur celebration, participated with Muslim women in a service in mosque, and tried 30 days of fasting.She was introduced to inclusive types of blended religions by an Urban Monk, initially perceived as representative of the Greek Orthodox Church. Will Hinduism, Quakers, televangelist, preachers on the radio or audio CD bring healing? "Church need not be entertaining to be beneficial, the pastor said through the radio. Bummer, I deadpanned. I came for the fireworks display." Or "I like that author Rob Bell's open-for-doubts, maybe-we-got-some-things-wrong, I-don't-have-all-the-answers brand of Christianity. His book Love Wins makes it almost something I could live with. In fact, I would very much like to buy him a drink."Does God end up as a giant disco ball? Can He be known through all religions? "What if the only phrase, the only origin of the world, was a quietly whispered I AM? The affirmation of Divine Existence, of all Creation, of God, us, the whole Universe...the whole Godiverse..." Or will a Church of Scientology audit do the trick? Get lost to get found again. start, Post-Traumatic Church Syndrome reminds us that sometimes we have to get lost to get found. Questions for a small group or reading group are included.