The last of those churches my parents imposed upon me was the most deliterious. I made the mistake, at the age of 15 or 16, of going to the pastor's office in the middle of the day, in the middle of a work week for help. After his series of sermons on spiritual gifts, I went to him to explain how I believed my spiritual gift was that I am an empath. I explained how I often get a sense of what others are feeling and wanted direction on how to use this gift in God's service.

He told me I was being tempted by witchcraft and was so urgently disturbed by it that he called in a couple of his staff. They put their hands on my shoulders – I don't know if it was their intent, but it effectively kept me from leaving – he annointed me with oil and they started to "pray the devil" out of me.

I spent over a decade afraid of myself, of this gift, suppressing it in myself to the point of pain – because, it physically hurts to suppress that sense. when the emotions are despairing, there's a need, a hunger to reach whomever it is whose emotions you feel. That kind pain is like holding back tears or that gut trembling weakness of anxiety. The need to reach out to someone in pain is God's love in us, I believe. And, that fundamentalist dogma made me fight against that instinct to love.

Thankfully, my instinct to love and a friend in college who wouldn't let me lost to the darkness, helped me find my way back to the God who is love, who I instinctively always knew.