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My Helping Caused More Harm – with Anna Kitko · True Comfort

• Teasi Cannon (00:01) Hi, I'm TC and I want to welcome you to true comfort where it's our desire to live out 2nd Corinthians chapter 1 verses 3 and 4 which assure us that we have a God who comforts us in all our afflictions and encourage us to comfort others with the comfort that we've received. And I also want to welcome my guest and friend Anna Kitko. Anna, thank you so much for being here today. Anna Kitko (00:25) My very great privilege. I looked forward to this for a while. As soon as I saw the invitation, I was like, yes, this is fantastic. Teasi Cannon (00:30) ⁓ well, I'm thrilled to have you. I'm so excited for listeners to hear from you today. And I'm going to go ahead and just read a little bit of your bio because honestly, people, you need to look her up and read her long bio because it is. Fascinating. It is so unique. So Anna holds a Master of Arts in Biblical Studies from Reformed Theological Seminary. She's under supervision for her license as a clinical pastoral therapist and is a Master of Science in the Psychology of Coercive Control from the University of Salford, Manchester in the UK. Her areas of specialty include Christian apologetics, neurochemistry, cults, and new religions, PTSD and dissociative disorders in religious environments and practical theology in culturally taboo subjects. She speaks internationally on the intersection of psychology and theology as well as the anatomy of persuasion. I mean, so I guess listeners you can see what I mean. This is a unique ⁓ field of study and also I just want to add on a personal note, Anna and I both work with Be Emboldened, which is a nonprofit that helps to educate and minister in the field of religious abuse in high control cults, also just church hurt situations, anything on that spectrum. And I have had the privilege of meeting her in person, speaking with her, seeing her heart. She is such an authentic, caring person, not just clinically, professionally, every time I've been with you in person, you just exude care and peace. are such a and also joy, which I find fascinating considering your field of study because these are really dark places and you have chosen to go headlong into them for the sake of the body of Christ and the education of non-believers. So I guess I would love for you to share just a little bit about what got you interested in this and maybe even a little bit of what keeps you motivated to keep on this path of study. Anna Kitko (02:46) Yeah, yeah, I can't because I can't stop. That's what so after you hear my story, you'll understand why. But ⁓ I'm also excited to be speaking alongside you think where the book ends for the Living Out Freedom Conference and that'll be really fun. And your audience actually gets a preview a little bit today, because that's part of my story and why Naomi asked me to speak on a subject that I'm talking about. We're doing history, lots of history. So that's exciting. ⁓ What got me started? Teasi Cannon (02:49) Ha ha ha! yes, we are. Yeah. Awesome. Perfect. Yeah. Anna Kitko (03:14) was a great deal of trauma, much like most of us in this field I've noticed. All of my colleagues at Salford, every single student and every single professor had been through a spiritually abusive environment. And that's how they got started in the field. And I found that fascinating considering, yeah, well, even from like a political cult perspective all the way to religious cults. ⁓ And most of my colleagues had walked away from whatever faith background they had been in. ⁓ Teasi Cannon (03:16) Hmm Hmm. So sad. Yeah, it's sad. Mm-hmm Anna Kitko (03:44) Whereas in my story, that did not happen. And it easily could have, but it didn't. And that's part of why I do what I do. And I do all those eccentric topics is because I have a very low threshold for repetitive information. If you can get it from another apologist, then you don't need me to tell you. I can just send you to them. So I try to do niche subjects that I feel like my people need. And that's part of all of that weird eccentricity is because I'm trying to synthesize a bunch of information they might not have access to otherwise. Teasi Cannon (03:58) Mmm. Right. Yeah. Anna Kitko (04:13) So I was raised by two Christian missionaries who were part of the charismatic movement but came from traditions that are not deeply charismatic at all and got PTSD from that experience and so had lived in other countries and ⁓ loved each other immensely and did medical missions and then ended up going into the clinical field. Teasi Cannon (04:20) Mm. Anna Kitko (04:34) And so I was raised in this environment where everything was heavy theology, heavy church history, heavy comparison of theology. My father taught ⁓ history of the church and ⁓ intro to religion. And ⁓ my mother was an, is an apologist at heart, even though we never used that term growing up. She was like, you ask questions all the time and you don't trust anybody. Yeah. So she just, it just, I grew up in this environment. So I took it for granted. Teasi Cannon (04:58) Wow. Yeah. Anna Kitko (05:03) a great deal didn't know what I had. I basically I inherited this treasure trove of information. And yeah, and they are ⁓ very eclectic human beings. And we lived lots of different fun places just because they wanted to travel and be fun. My father's a lighthouse keeper in St. Augustine. And so I was I was on an island in the Atlantic, which is a small environment that will matter later in the story. ⁓ But my my tradition that I grew up in almost exclusively was Lutheran. Teasi Cannon (05:08) Wow, yes you did. Anna Kitko (05:32) Um, but historical Lutheran, deeply serious, um, confirmation classes, theology every weekend, that sort of thing. Um, but Lutheran and we don't, the Lutherans don't talk to a whole lot of people. We have a tendency to stay in our pews, you know, keep to ourselves. Um, and so I was in school in a program that was a pilot program for Cambridge. It was their first program in the U S so that, um, the kids who graduated from the program were attending Cambridge just in, Teasi Cannon (05:38) Wow. Okay. Anna Kitko (06:00) a US location. So I went to school year round. ⁓ And I was graduating with a Cambridge degree as opposed to a high school diploma. And I was in with a bunch of really neat, interesting human beings, one of whom was my, I'm just gonna say pseudo boyfriend, because it was like unofficial. You know those days when you're like 15 and like, it totally is official. Everybody knows you're together, but you don't say it out loud. And he was a child was witness. He's not allowed to date. Teasi Cannon (06:03) Okay. Yeah. Mm-hmm. Yeah. Wow. Anna Kitko (06:28) outside of the Joe's witnesses. So it was critical that that stay unofficial as well in that in that regard. But I didn't know a whole lot about this group. And it was just like I knew there were some oddities, but I loved him to pieces. And I was like, it's fine. I'll just check it out. He gave me a New World Translation and I opened it up and I was immediately like. Something's off. Yeah, something just off. I didn't know anything else. And through the course of between basically 15 years old, Teasi Cannon (06:32) Mm-hmm. Yeah. Anna Kitko (06:58) all the way to, I would say, 19, somewhere in 19. So we went all the way through high school together and then into college. We went to university together as well. I embarked in what I now know is this apologetics, spiritual abuse, trauma journey, where everything from demonic influence to being labeled a demon by the Jehovah's Witnesses, to being blacklisted, to arguing with. So they have different rank. Teasi Cannon (07:05) Mmm. Anna Kitko (07:26) in the hierarchy and it got to a point where they were sending in overseers to my house twice a week to argue with me in Greek. And if you as you know with me, like if I get attached to something, I like, no, we're going to figure this out. And this was at, you know, this is early 2000s. So iTunes was brand new and iTunes University was free. So I was attending Yale Greek classes to study, to get ready to take on the Jehovah's Witnesses who are coming to my house. ⁓ Teasi Cannon (07:31) Wow. wow. Hmm. Anna Kitko (07:56) Yeah, it was ⁓ for me, it was very intense, but it was also this like, you know, you're 15 and you love this person and you're helping him, you know, break out of his apartment and run around and you're noticing he's being abused and like, what is going on? And you're getting you're getting introduced to the world of spiritual abuse, which is bonkers when you describe it to anybody else. ⁓ And even to the point where I end up going to a police station just to see what could be done, because they had shipped him off to ⁓ the Tennessee, Kentucky border to get him away from me. Teasi Cannon (08:08) Mm. Yeah. Yeah. Wow. Anna Kitko (08:25) ⁓ Yeah, for a month. And we were in this program. He couldn't disappear for a month. You know, that's crazy. And he came back and it was clear that something really bad had happened. I don't know. So I even went to a police station. They're like, you're crazy, kid. Go away. So like I faced this moment of like, no one believes me. No one can see what's going on. And I'm a teenager. What am I going to possibly do? By the time I went to university, I was I had a full ride scholarship to become a brain surgeon. Teasi Cannon (08:31) Yeah. Yeah, gosh. Mm. Anna Kitko (08:55) That's how Florida works. If you're a valedictorian of your school, you get to pick whatever school you want to go to and they'll give you a full ride. So I was going to be a brain surgeon. That's what I wanted to do. And I was going to do medical missions. I was really into neuroscience. That's the neuroscience background. Pre-med kid and ⁓ I got to campus. I had been hired as a, I had to pay my way for rent. So I got hired by the Lutherans to be a campus minister to the University of Florida. And ⁓ Teasi Cannon (08:59) Okay, wow. Anna Kitko (09:21) That's what I was paying my bills. And I walked onto Plaza of the Americas, if anybody knows Gainesville, and basically every iteration of Christian destructive cult was represented on the quad. And I was there in my alb and I just like the Lord and I met. And it was like, there's nobody here to help these people. And here they are being recruited. And I, we, I prayed, ⁓ I walked into the registrar's office. Teasi Cannon (09:34) Wow. ⁓ Mm-hmm Anna Kitko (09:50) and I gave up my scholarship and I picked up a second degree so that I could graduate with a philosophy and a religion degree simultaneously ⁓ and go straight into seminary because the only way I could think to figure out how to start something, anything that could help these people ⁓ would be go get the credentialing to face off, like be somebody that's not just somebody who has an opinion but like has a pedigree. ⁓ Teasi Cannon (10:14) Mm-hmm. Right. Mm-hmm. Anna Kitko (10:20) to be able to respond or debate or something. And that began my career in apologetics. had already had a little bit of an online, what back then would have been a little bit of an online following on an underground for the Jehovah's Witnesses. So people who had lost family members or who had been disfellowshipped and were still getting access to the different studies so that they could give them to the apologist faster so that we knew what to prepare for by the time the debate came up. Teasi Cannon (10:35) Mmm. that's nice. Yeah. Anna Kitko (10:48) Yep, we then started, me and a couple other apologists in training, ⁓ studied with Nabil Qureshi for a weekend when he was still alive and started the first Muslim Christian debate forum on campus. It was mic'd, it was public and it was in ⁓ the student union. They don't do that anymore. This is back, this is back in the day. So it was the Muslim Student Association versus us and we would debate the Trinity. We would do whatever needed to happen. ⁓ Teasi Cannon (10:54) Yeah. Mm. Yeah. Anna Kitko (11:15) That went on, I went to seminary, Reformed Theological Seminary, and got to study with some of most incredible minds in Reformed theology. ⁓ Got to join multiple groups. Again, you know I'm eclectic, so I don't fit in anywhere perfectly. They tolerated the Lutheran in their midst. I'm a continuationist, so they tolerated that part of me. There are a lot of us out there that tend toward that side. ⁓ And had a lot of fun, but there was still this real breakdown even in seminary, which was they didn't. Teasi Cannon (11:31) Yes. Hmm. Anna Kitko (11:45) Nobody really understood the clinical side of this and the post-traumatic stress disorder side of this and how a nervous system is suppressed under coercive control. It's a lot because it cuts your nervous system is comprised of three factors. And when you're under coercive control, it shuts down two of them. You can't feel sensation anymore and you can't emote. You can cognate. So you can do all the thought stuff, which is what the cult wants to control and uses it to control you. Don't touch your feelings. Teasi Cannon (11:49) Mm-hmm. Yeah. Yeah. Anna Kitko (12:14) Right, they're gonna pull from Jeremiah and say, you can't trust anything, so your feelings are basically superfluous, will tell you what to think, and that's what you're gonna do. Comply, and you'll get along just fine. So it's exactly the same as a POW camp. As far as your nervous system is responding, yeah. But my theologians and my other apologists had no idea. They just were like, no, you just, you you offer information, and if they reject the information, they're lost. And I'm like, that's not how this works. Teasi Cannon (12:21) Wow. Yeah. So crazy. Yeah. Mm-hmm. Wow. Anna Kitko (12:41) Like brainwashing is real. It's not like you see on television, but you can turn off your nervous system. And they were like, no. And then we'd start getting into psychology and they're like, you can't do that. Like psychology is evil. And it's like, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, revelation exists. The Christians in the history of the church are the ones who make all of the medical advancements because we know that natural revelation is something we can consistently test your brain. Teasi Cannon (12:45) Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. Yeah. Yeah. Right. Anna Kitko (13:08) as feature of your body, just like in any other part of your physiology can get sick and regularly does. And I had been a counseling student at RTS. I was like, we know that even our referral protocol for counselors in the New Thetix School, which is just the school that says we don't really need to use medicine, we can just use theology to treat mental health. We know that that's actually their exceptions to that rule. And when we meet those exceptions, Teasi Cannon (13:30) Mm-hmm. Anna Kitko (13:36) like profound mental illness, schizophrenia, things along those lines, we refer them to clinicians. That's the protocol. So we already recognize that this is an important thing to understand. Who is bridging this gap? And there wasn't anywhere to go. So I picked up a second master's degree from the University of Salford with a group of clinicians who did the opposite. They did not do apologetics. They did not do theology. Teasi Cannon (13:41) Mm-hmm. Yeah. Mm-hmm. Right. Anna Kitko (14:02) They only did clinical studies of how to shut down. What does brainwashing do? How does it work? ⁓ In order to understand what happened to them and to take care of their people, because it's a complex form of PTSD that you're treating now, it's not classic. And so with those two backgrounds, my goal is to unite them so that we can have a new field of study where we can synthesize for the people who have been spiritually abused, a place where they are safe, they're understood, they're not looked at like they're crazy. Teasi Cannon (14:02) Mm-hmm. Yeah. Well. Yeah. Anna Kitko (14:31) And ⁓ they can then be ⁓ treated and served and welcomed home. And they don't have to flee. And they can know that it's OK if they never darken a church door again. That's not what saves us anyway. And that's not what makes you a good Christian. And they won't be vulnerable to the next cult that tries to come in and take over and use them. So that's basically my story. What we ended up doing with that is long. And you've been in my office here. Teasi Cannon (14:44) Mm-hmm. Right. Yeah. Yeah. Anna Kitko (14:59) ⁓ The title we've chosen for me is Anchorite, which is a very old title. It's a 12th century title in the church for the person who dedicates themselves just to healing theologically and talking to God on behalf of the individual. So we thought that was the most appropriate thing for me since there really isn't a title for what I do. Teasi Cannon (15:00) Yeah. Yeah, wow, it's a lot to just even synthesize, but I think it is so obviously needed. And as we see more and more stories, more exposure, which is hard to see, like no one wants to see abuse in the church. No one wants to know how often it occurs. But at the same time, God loves his church and course corrections are necessary And I love that your heart is ultimately that people would not lose their path to the real remedy. And I love that you have gone into this journey with so much. You've been in all different arenas here and you're synthesizing it and the body of Christ needs it. is, I mean, is there anyone else yet? I mean, I wanna move on into your story too, but I'm just curious, are you seeing anyone else join you? Yeah, you said you're pretty much the only one still, or do you see more and more people trying to have this intersection in their education? Anna Kitko (16:18) I think so. So like I'm looking at doing PhD work with a gentleman at the University of Aberdeen who also is interested in the study, the academic study that psychology and theology can be intersected because we've known even in psychology, ⁓ there are things that we can't explain that we all just, the Christians all just laugh and go, yeah, that's the spirit. Like for example, dissociation, which is that you can separate from yourself and turn around and investigate your own brain. Teasi Cannon (16:47) Mm-hmm. Anna Kitko (16:48) If we're only neurons and we're only synapses, you shouldn't be able to do that. Scientifically, there's an other inside of us that can investigate. We go, duh, right? We know what that is. But even in the clinical work, they just go, we don't know what to call it, but there's an other. we're just, know, so like, it's fun because I can really be real in both. Teasi Cannon (16:53) Yeah. Mm-hmm. Yeah. Yeah. Anna Kitko (17:15) both fields and everybody kind of relaxes. You don't have to posture with all the politics. So yeah, that's what I prefer. Teasi Cannon (17:18) That's so great. Well, God has obviously uniquely wired and equipped you and ⁓ with your journey, with your parents, just the influence and the education you had even before you started your post high school educating and things. And I love seeing the sovereignty, the providential knitting together of all of those pieces. so as we move into the next section in the heart of the conversation. to remind listeners, what I am doing is inviting a Christian apologist, someone who has intentionally studied why we believe what we believe as Christians, but asking them to come in and kind of open their heart to share with us a part of their own Christian journey where they've experienced heartbreak or maybe a continuing battle with a lie or an ongoing just personal struggle and then share personally how God comforts them or reassures them or the biblical worldview, how that brings them peace and comfort. Then also how their study of objectively verifiable evidence substantiates their hope that they know that God's promises are not empty. And so the goal is for all of us to know we're not alone in experiencing hard things in the Christian life that Jesus actually promised that we would experience tribulation even sometimes that we would be hated and because he was but that we do have a God who loves us who is real and his promises are not empty. I also just like to share that these conversations are not pre-scripted And so sometimes we do tackle subjects that are very tender and even tragic. So just kind of keep that in mind as you listen. But Anna, I'd love to just let you take it from here on just sharing a little bit more, like going a little even more personal in. your life in your heart and how God meets you there. Anna Kitko (19:19) So where my mind immediately goes to baby apologists, Anna, who didn't even know what apologetics was, but was actively doing that, you would see like gumption and just in drive and just optimism about success because you know, your rhetoric is really excellent. You know, your, I mean, I was, I was Anna. Teasi Cannon (19:38) Mm. Anna Kitko (19:43) great valedictorian of Cambridge in the U.S. Like I could do anything. And I had formed basically an idol that I couldn't see, which was effectively, God has always been wonderful and just and incredible to me. I have this incredible inheritance. I stand on the shoulders of giants. In my family, the women generations back have college degrees, which is unheard of. Right, so I have all of this incredible. Teasi Cannon (19:44) Hahaha Yeah. Mm-hmm. Anna Kitko (20:12) gifting I showed up on the planet with a high IQ that I didn't earn you know and I just I was God was gonna do this for me God was gonna save my boyfriend and it was more I was never like telling God what to do but in my headspace God was gonna perform for me and that moment when I utterly failed which I did by the way my story is built on complete and total failure part of the reason why I Teasi Cannon (20:22) Mm-hmm. Mm. Anna Kitko (20:41) have so much success in my career is simply because I'm teaching people what not to do. And they're like, thank you. That was so helpful. You're welcome. I did all of the wrong things. I could not have been worse. ⁓ that's the coercive control does not, you cannot reason with it. And here I was just pumping every possible tool I could into this and beating my head against a wall and ⁓ Teasi Cannon (20:53) Hmm. Anna Kitko (21:10) fulfilling in the cult groups, ⁓ persecution complex that I was demon, I was literally making it worse for everyone in my approach, terrible. ⁓ But in God's mercy, right, he writes straight with crooked lines. And all of that failure walked me through my own idolatry. It walked me through basically everything I needed. Teasi Cannon (21:18) Mmm. Mmm. Hmm. Anna Kitko (21:36) to know what then to pursue theoretically, to have an idea of where to go and what to do with my time, to be successful, to help other people, ⁓ and to use me as an example of what not to do. So we switched theology for me. So my training wasn't cataphatic. It wasn't all this positive, like, ⁓ here's what you go and do. It's ⁓ apophatic, right? It's don't behave like Anna. This is your class, right? Teasi Cannon (22:02) Yeah. ⁓ Anna Kitko (22:05) And in that place, like crushing, terrible place where I was like, Lord, are you even there? How could you possibly not help me? Like, how could this be going so badly? ⁓ I learned proximity to Christ. So through suffering, closer to God, right? Sovereignty, but not in the way you would... Teasi Cannon (22:14) Hmm. Anna Kitko (22:29) honest that not in the way you would actually like it not in the way the presbyterians would teach it right not just like well God's sovereign you just have to deal with it like not like that sovereignty that says I have a plan that you can't see and I'm preparing you for a job that doesn't exist yet which how could you possibly plan for that right I know that now but back then I absolutely did not I just felt totally abandoned Teasi Cannon (22:34) Yeah. Right. Anna Kitko (22:56) And through all of that, you have this really wonderful moment, and that's suffering got me closer to Jesus. And sin got turned to gold, which is what God does. It's wonderful. Teasi Cannon (23:11) Yeah, yeah. So when you say that you were suffering and just wondering, are you their God? how long did that last and what did that look like in your daily life? Anna Kitko (23:31) Yeah, about five years I was there and it was like every day. I wasn't sleeping. ⁓ My hair was falling out at one point. ⁓ I developed ⁓ an eating disorder of sorts. It's kind of odd, but it definitely, now that I've done enough psych stuff, I know like, girl, you had an eating disorder. ⁓ I had, ⁓ at one point I was crying blood because I was praying so hard. Yeah, like it was like it was on another level. Like God and I were right there, but it was a total failure the whole time from my metric. Like I had placed this metric of analysis that success would be that these people who I love, who I'm trying to get out, would get out. ⁓ And none of them did. They went further in and further away from me, even to the point where ⁓ they had to be physically separated by the cult. Like they couldn't even see me. So now I've made it worse. Like before they had freedom, now they're locked in their apartment. So it was that place. But all of those metrics that I was placing on God were ones that I had designed. He hadn't. And all of that education that I had at the time ended up becoming the framework by which like when people ask, how did you do this? I didn't. Teasi Cannon (24:29) Mm. Mm. Anna Kitko (24:54) I just took everything I learned and refused to repeat it because I didn't want to hurt anybody. Teasi Cannon (25:01) I can imagine how devastating that was, but were you struggling with any guilt or shame as you were seeing these people going into more and more captivity on as, know, in your mind as a result of your efforts to help them? Did you struggle with some of that too? Anna Kitko (25:16) Yeah. Absolutely and like at one point I had even because this was like early 2000. So this is what I meant peak Hill song time period and Not Bethel yet, but like we it was starting to play into new NAR Right, and I didn't grow up with any of that But I was now in Florida right across from a megachurch where I was going with my friends to youth group And so there are there are a lot of messages about really having enough faith Teasi Cannon (25:36) Mm-hmm. Anna Kitko (25:48) And that was never explained. And I had not dabbled in that field at all. And I was like, that makes sense. You have these like really beautiful songs that are being written. And I'm just like, that's it. I don't have enough faith. I'm not walking out a pious enough life, which is what fed the guilt, which is what fed the asceticism, which is what fed the disorders. Right. So I'm going to suffer more to know that I'm doing the things to please God so he'll perform for me. Teasi Cannon (26:00) Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. Right. Yes. Yep. Yeah, and so you're basically experiencing the fruit of a works-based faith, but not thinking you are, not thinking you are at all. Anna Kitko (26:25) Yep. Yes. But wrapped in apologetics. No, no. Yeah. And wrapped in apologetics and immersed in all the beauty and the wonder and the the black and white reasoning that is very that is very ⁓ healthy in some cases and really not healthy in other applications of scripture. You know, I was surrounded by. Teasi Cannon (26:42) Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. Anna Kitko (26:48) tons of people telling me what I needed to do, other people just being like, absolutely not. And like, where do you go and what do you do with that? ⁓ Pouring into the scriptures in a way that was more like treasure hunting, right? You're not really gleaning out of the scriptures what you need to be nourished. You're like heading in to weaponize it. So all of these massive mistakes, ⁓ Deeply human, ⁓ but mistakes nonetheless. I experienced Teasi Cannon (27:02) Right. Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. Yeah. Anna Kitko (27:18) I'm pretty sure I ran the gambit. I'm guilty of all of them. Teasi Cannon (27:22) Yeah. Anna Kitko (27:24) ⁓ and it was just crushing, totally crushing. Teasi Cannon (27:26) Mm. Do you still battle with any remnant lies from that? do you know, sometimes I know in my own life, I can look back on the beginning moments of lies that I started to believe about. You know, I don't know how this is happening in the metaphysical world. I don't know exactly how these lies are implanted into our souls, but at vulnerable times in life or broken times. They have, it happens. You probably know more about how what's going on in the, neuroscience aspect of that, but they're like imprinted on us. These lies about our identity, about our worth, about our, you know, like you are battling obviously so much failure, so much guilt and shame there. Do you have any remnant lies that still you battle, but you maybe you're getting better at it, but it still pops up if something triggers that feeling or that type of response from. your academic work or you know. Anna Kitko (28:29) ⁓ Yeah, the thing that haunts me is how blind I was to all of it. So how can you know what you're blind to? And so it's like, it's a paranoia of sorts. It's like a theological paranoia. in my, I meditate and pray in the mornings ⁓ over all my patients for the day. And my first prayer, and it has been this way since I was 15, ⁓ Teasi Cannon (28:40) Yes. ⁓ Anna Kitko (28:56) Basically when I started figuring this out, which was like, could seriously misstep. I don't know what that means. I ended up doing it anyway, but I knew that, which is part of that positive feedback loop of, my gosh. ⁓ My prayer is always, Lord protect them from me. Teasi Cannon (28:59) Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. Yeah. Wow. Yeah, and what is that called? There's a word for that when the doctor causes the harm. Yeah, I heard that in one of the talks. I listened to one of your talks and I was like, wow, that is so... Anna Kitko (29:19) Iotrogenic, yeah. Teasi Cannon (29:27) important for us even as believers, even in any type of ministry situation, is to be prayerful that God will help us to walk in the humility that it requires to not wound other people, which is as a victim, as someone who's been wounded, like, gosh, the worst thing you can discover is that you've hurt others. But at the same time, God gives us a pathway forward and that's what's so beautiful about the biblical worldview is okay, when I find out that I've wounded someone, I have a path of repentance that I can walk. And you know, there's a journey, maybe trust issues that are there, but you're not stuck. Anna Kitko (29:54) Yeah. Yeah. Teasi Cannon (30:05) in this place of woe is me, I am filth. we all blow it. We're all gonna inadvertently hurt people. We're not perfect. I mean, I remember once someone shared with me a time when I had hurt them, but it was just that I had made a facial expression. that they thought was directed to them, but I was really just confused, but it looked like I was disgusted. And so even something as simple as that, that we don't realize we're doing, it still wounded this person's heart. And it was wonderful and beautiful to be able to have the opportunity to bring truth into the situation, even the truth of what I was walking, what was going on with my face, but also understand we have this beautiful path of forgiveness and repentance available to us in Christianity. Anna Kitko (30:23) Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Teasi Cannon (30:49) Christianity and you know the biblical worldview but I'm curious. This is kind of something you just mentioned But what do you tell people who are worried that they might be deceived? Because this is a big topic. we all have blind spots and When you look at Colts when I look back at my own life, the times when I felt 100 % sure I was in the right lane or believing the right thing, but looking back, I can see I was deceived. Are there any practices or other than prayer, obviously we can pray, God, please help us to see what would you recommend to people to help them to just guard against or prepare for deception in our own lives? Anna Kitko (31:37) Yeah, I would go this is and this is just me talking about like where because I tend to accidentally develop idols that I don't see and getting better at it. Thank praise God. But like it still happens on the regular. And so number one, I say that out loud and I say it out loud to myself regularly. But number two, I check whether or not my confidence is anchored in the gospel or if it's anchored in something else. So like we're apologists, right? Teasi Cannon (31:45) Mm-hmm. ⁓ Yeah. Right. Anna Kitko (32:03) And we're teaching manuscript evidence for the scriptures and we're teaching the trustworthiness of them and they are trustworthy. Like by every metric of analysis. ⁓ But here's the critical component. Let's say we're going to be just overboard on the deception idea, right? And we're gonna say somehow we're deceived here and our metric for trustworthiness is just bonkers and we don't even know. Where am I anchored? Teasi Cannon (32:09) Mm-hmm. Right. Mm-hmm. Anna Kitko (32:30) I'm not anchored to the trustworthiness of the scriptures. I'm anchored to Christ and what he's done. And that story, like my confidence is there. have my pointing because I have a painting of the gospel in my office. ⁓ But I'm there. My confidence is not in my intellectual prowess to tell you about the manuscript percentages of the 250,000 plus manuscripts that I've held in my hand. Teasi Cannon (32:36) Mm. Right. Mm-hmm. Anna Kitko (32:57) that I can analyze in Greek. It's not in, my confidence isn't in that. It's just in Jesus. And once you're really truly anchored there, now go. Because he's gonna keep you in line. That's my recommendation. I don't know if it's gonna work for everybody else, but I know I need it. Because I, man, I will anchor to anything else and then be like, that didn't work. no, do I know anything? Teasi Cannon (33:02) Right. Right. I love that and what my mind is thinking is how do we know anything about who Jesus really is and what we can trust, what we can anchor our trust into, because you know there's a lot of Jesuses out there as far as people make a Jesus that they like. Anna Kitko (33:38) Mm-hmm. Teasi Cannon (33:39) So there is a component of needing to have this confidence that the Bible we're reading is reliable and trustworthy, but there is that distinction that this trustworthy book that we're reading, these eyewitness accounts, these historical. testimonies of God's working in human history are reliable, but our trust isn't there. and it's such a, it's like this fine line of distinction where, yeah. Anna Kitko (34:04) It is. And that's what we're doing right now. It is. Because as apologists, we know the objective truth claims. We know that they're objectively true. We have moved past that now. We're in a different realm. We're in the realm of the everyday, ⁓ my gosh, walking out the sanctification process. How do we do that? So I am not rejecting anything that is orthodox and what we teach on the regular. Teasi Cannon (34:14) Mm-hmm. Right, right. Anna Kitko (34:29) It's the promise that Yahweh has made to every human being for all of time that his Messiah really did come and it's him. And it's that promise. So it's not that our confidence is not in here and what we feel in here and how well we can parse out our arguments. And it's not in here and how we feel in any warm, toasty way, although he does that regularly. Teasi Cannon (34:31) Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. Yeah. Right. Mm-hmm. Anna Kitko (34:59) It's in this promise that encapsulates all of it and is separate from us. And while we're in that unsteady place of living out life past our ⁓ proclamation of faith and our baptism, whenever that was and all those things, since we're over in this realm now, you can hold that promise intention and remember it, your insecurity and how you feel is just in you and it should be in you, because you are insecure. Teasi Cannon (35:04) Right. Right. Mm-hmm. Anna Kitko (35:28) It's in Christ who is completely separate from you and his promise is not contingent on you at all. Teasi Cannon (35:33) Right. I mean, it's such a beauty and also a mystery, but the privilege and the security that comes from having a hope that is transcendent and yet a God who loves us enough. to give us objectively verifiable things because we live in a material world. Right now on this part of the journey, we are in this part of the story where we have the, you know, we're in the unfolding of the redemption. We're not at the fully redeemed part of the story yet, but we are being redeemed. Anna Kitko (35:58) Yeah. Teasi Cannon (36:13) It's just, you think about even if someone sent you a love letter or you are getting to know someone through letters, you'd never actually gotten to physically touch the person yet. It's not the letters that you're anchoring your hope into or your love into. It's the person. Anna Kitko (36:29) Right. Right. Teasi Cannon (36:33) And I know that's probably a simple, a really oversimplified analogy of what you're saying and what we're talking about, but that is a way to kind of really think about it, that this isn't some weird way to describe our relationship with Jesus. It's the way it would be with anybody, that if all we had was, but we have, like you mentioned, natural revelation. Romans tells us that all creation itself speaks of God's. Anna Kitko (36:39) No, no, it's beautiful. Yeah. Teasi Cannon (36:57) parts of God's character, there's enough to know that there is something transcendent, there's a transcendent creator, there is this beautiful mind and purpose and intentionality behind all of creation, including ourselves. when you bring it down into daily life and you're just waking up feeling like, my gosh, I just ruined a bunch of people's lives and I'm such a failure and I just, ⁓ we need it. It is a joy in my own life and I know for you as well to be able to open a book and read these promises and derive specific, tangible hope and comfort and truth in the moments when we need it. So it's just, I don't know, I'm probably rambling. Anna Kitko (37:42) It's all of it. you can't really answer the question except with the beautiful sentence that you put together that you were worried that it was oversimplified. Like, no, there are layers to it. We learn and relearn that principle at every moment in our sanctification process. And it means something deeper with every iteration, though we can only summarize it. Teasi Cannon (37:54) Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. Anna Kitko (38:06) with a sentence that sounds like, that's all I can say. Like, well, yeah, that's scripture. God designed it that way. And that's the beauty of transcendence is you are always being conformed. It is a new iteration every moment. Further up and further in as C.S. Lewis. Teasi Cannon (38:18) Right. Right. It is. Yeah, and it's exciting I want to continue to be changed. And I love that God promises that he's going to complete the work that he completes the work he's begun in us. And some of that we we can recognize other parts of it. It's just a beautiful working of what his spirit is doing in us. And ⁓ yeah, I just. Anna Kitko (38:43) and that he's delighted to be alive and active personally in our lives. He can be surprising, you know, and that we get to have joy in that knowledge, just like waking up and living out life with your favorite person. Yeah. Teasi Cannon (39:00) Right. What are some of your favorite, truths that you cling to for yourself personally that bring you joy, that bring you hope. What are some of your favorites? Anna Kitko (39:05) Yes. So I'm teaching Job, for example, and I love the book of Job, which is already sounds like what is wrong with this person. But there's a moment in Job that where he says, even though I die, still I trust him. And it's that on one level, it can be like, wow, that's naive, given what you've experienced. Teasi Cannon (39:21) Hmm. Anna Kitko (39:29) Right? That's one level of analysis. On another one, it's, okay, he's really understood sovereignty. Right? That's another layer. But the layer that I always see there is more of like a, I've seen all of the things that he has done positively, and I have no reason to expect that what is happening now won't also be that. And so there's this paradox of joy in suffering. Teasi Cannon (39:52) Mm. Anna Kitko (39:58) that shows up all the way through church history and to belong to enter that throng is just immense. Teasi Cannon (40:09) Yeah, it's the fellowship of suffering. I always think of that like the fellowship of the ring or any fellowship. It's usually something you wanna be a part of and an honor to be a part of and there's some type of qualifications that aren't always easy to be, to make you a part of a fellowship, but to be a part of the fellowship of Christ's sufferings. I don't even know if we're gonna understand the beauty of that fully, the sight of heaven, but to get glimpses of the beauty of it, which is what it sounds like you're saying. Yeah. Anna Kitko (40:35) I do. Yeah. Yes. And just because it's just there's no words for it. Then the profound impact it has on you, you almost can't speak. And if you think about it this way, and this is here's your here's your preview, TC's audience for the Living Out Freedom Conference. ⁓ Think about it this way. This is something I've been really working on for a while when it comes to spiritual abuse. And why why would God permit such a thing, especially in the amounts that we're experiencing it? Teasi Cannon (40:44) Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. Anna Kitko (41:06) ⁓ It's everywhere constantly all the time. ⁓ The metaphor we're given by the Lord himself to understand his church is a body. We should expect to be able to look at physiology and anatomy and derive some comfort and understanding from his metaphor. And I find it really compelling. And this is just Anna talking. This hasn't been like peer reviewed or anything, but I find it really compelling that Teasi Cannon (41:24) Hmm. All right. Anna Kitko (41:34) your body will die if it doesn't get distressed. Did you know that? You cannot form an immune system to any outside variables, to viruses or bacteria. Without actively exposing the body to distress, you will die. So kids who are bubbled in a hospital setting, they have to be slowly given little doses of distress so that they can build that immune system themselves. Teasi Cannon (41:39) Wow. No. Mmm. Anna Kitko (42:04) to be able to go out and thrive. And I wonder, given that we're all different parts of the body, if God isn't designing in those of us who have been through spiritual abuse, the immune system of the body of Christ. Because are we not inoculated to seeing things nobody else sees? And can we not identify it before anybody else knows that there's a problem? And isn't that not? Teasi Cannon (42:24) Right. Anna Kitko (42:30) the white blood cells job and does not the white blood cells change shape and derive antibodies from that distress? And isn't that all of our stories? Teasi Cannon (42:38) Mm. Yeah, wow, I'm just blown away. I've also thought about like the body analogy of just autoimmune disease. know, when the church has gone awry, parts of it and all of, I feel that as spiritual abuse as well. But my daughter and I were just having a conversation yesterday because my newest grandson is going to be three, is three, three weeks old today as we're recording. But we were thinking about that first moment of birth when a baby comes out of the womb that. that first breath is painful. bringing in air and fluid coming in and out at the same time, how that might be painful and that bright light and all the distress, like I'm thinking of distress and how God created even that first moment, maybe not in the same way you were discussing with viruses and things like that, but there is the first moment of life is distressful. Anna Kitko (43:26) That's great. And you look for it as a physician, you worry if the baby's not crying. Yeah. Teasi Cannon (43:36) Right. And how beautiful even in that distress, that initial distress that God is doing something so purposeful to bring breath into our lungs, to get us to be able to flourish as we grow. And I think of muscles. You can't grow muscle strength without tearing them down first. So there's just... Anna Kitko (43:54) right. Breaking bones help grow back stronger than they were before so that you can handle that impact again, so you can develop the ability to fight more effectively. And Christ himself in his glorified body maintains the wounds, which implies that distress is a part of holiness. Teasi Cannon (44:03) Right. Right. That is that I can't wait to get to heaven. I've got my list of things that I want more information about, know, theological questions. Why were the holes still there? You know, things like that. I can't wait to ask that also. Who wrote Hebrews? ⁓ That's okay. Did you really? Okay. Well, great. Yeah, it's Anna Kitko (44:21) Me too. Me too. Yeah. It was Luke. Oh, I'm telling you, I wrote a whole paper about this. I'm solving it for you today. Yeah, no, it's a huge debate. All the all of the medical terminology in acts shows up in Hebrews. Mm hmm. So there are like, yeah, hypex ligamina are like words that appear one time. You have you have the equivalent. I forget the word for it, but it's the equivalent of hypex ligamina for each author. And Luke's hypex ligamina show up all the way through Hebrews. Teasi Cannon (44:39) Really? Okay, I've never noticed that. Mm-hmm That's so interesting because it seems like a ⁓ Jewish author, but Luke is considered a Gentile from what I've studied, but that's really fascinating. Anna Kitko (45:02) Mm-hmm. Teasi Cannon (45:05) You've said so many things. I'm wondering just briefly when you do lean into your apologetics training, what is your favorite? line of evidence that really is what pops into your mind first or that, know, when your reminding yourself, I'm not a fool. This whole endeavor, this whole journey is not a fool's errand. Is there one Anna Kitko (45:25) I do, but it's real strange. I'm the only person I know of that has it. It's backwards, but it makes sense if you know my background. It's follow the ancient paths from Joshua. ⁓ And the reason why that matters is because when I'm faced with this immense question and somebody asked me, and you know we do these community events where I have to just answer the questions ⁓ and I have to prepare based on the questions that have come in and I'm like totally lost. And I'm like, you can't Google this. Teasi Cannon (45:34) Okay. Mm-hmm. Right. Anna Kitko (45:54) Right? It's not a regular apologetics question. ⁓ Follow the ancient paths has been my metric for knowing where to start. And it has, he has honored me every single time and given me this huge sigh of relief with just being like, ⁓ that's where I start. That's where I teach. That's it. There it is in scripture. This this esoteric scripture that we haven't studied in ages. Right? ⁓ That's like, ⁓ that's exactly what I needed. Teasi Cannon (45:54) Right, right. Anna Kitko (46:23) Thank you, Lord. You really are listening. You know? Teasi Cannon (46:26) So when you say the ancient paths, what do you mean by that? Just for listeners, like what, and me, exactly what you're thinking when you say follow the ancient paths. Anna Kitko (46:32) Yep. The oldest teachings for the people of Yahweh specifically, go back and start to there. Find an anchor point in the old stuff and then move out your argument from there toward Christ. Because you know that's where it's going to end up. But to actually form your argument and make it systematic and to know you. Teasi Cannon (46:41) Mm-hmm. and you're talking about scripture or even extra biblical writings of early church fathers, anything. Anna Kitko (47:02) Making sure your scriptures are always, they have to be non-contradictory and you're not pulling out of, you're not cherry picking anything. So holding that intention and then bringing in all of the ancient extra biblical evidence to help understand what was going on for context. Yes, start with the old stuff. Teasi Cannon (47:07) Mm-hmm. Right. And that helps you when you do that, that is the thing that helps remind you you're on solid ground. That's great. Anna Kitko (47:25) Yes, because you suddenly realize, my gosh, modernity doesn't, hasn't experienced anything new. And my gosh, King Solomon is right, there is nothing new under the sun. And actually, it's pretty arrogant of the new people who showed up on the planet to think we've got it all figured out and they actually know a lot of stuff and can really help. Yeah. Teasi Cannon (47:33) right. Mm-hmm. Right. Yeah, no, that's great. I love hearing unique answers to that question because for me, it's always God exists and the resurrection occurred. know, those are the two anchors for me. But I love hearing unique lines of evidence that where people lean into because it reminds me of more. There's just so many. That's the beauty of this faith we have is it is substantiated. Anna Kitko (48:13) Yeah. Teasi Cannon (48:14) God hasn't left us out here to just flounder with a blind faith. I think that is such a gift of love and that's one of my main points and just even wanting to have these conversations is just showing that God loves us so much to meet us in so many different places in so many different ways but not leaving us on our own in our pain also having come into our story in Jesus. experiencing every pain, every trauma, every rejection, every betrayal, and yet dying on the cross, experiencing his flesh ripped off his body, and yet having this joy before him, this transcendent joy that is available to us as well. I think it is the true remedy. And that's what we're all trying to encourage people with to share with broken people. There are a lot of counterfeit comforts out there in the world. There are a lot of people claiming to have solutions for us, encouraging even us to be our own hero, which I find incredibly invalid and hopeless. Who wants to be their own hero? Honestly, like that is so anticlimactic. If you even use a fairy tale analogy, like no one's coming for me. Anna Kitko (49:21) Right. Yes. That's correct. That's correct. Teasi Cannon (49:29) It's me. ⁓ that's so disappointing. I don't know, but I get, you know, the idea of not disparaging or hating yourself, but at the same point, that's really anticlimactic. as we kind of wrap up, is there anything, any final words of encouragement that you would want to share with listeners who are, Anna Kitko (49:31) no! Teasi Cannon (49:50) experiencing a long period of heartbreak or battling lies, what would you want to share with people? Anna Kitko (49:57) I, in a nutshell, expect him to surprise you. He has a habit of doing that. ⁓ and I'll share this story as a close. was, and I have permission to share this. ⁓ no details, but, I see people healed in my office all the time and it is not me doing it. And I'm not saying that to be humble. I am genuinely shocked sometimes at the rapidity. Teasi Cannon (50:02) Hmm. Hmm. Anna Kitko (50:24) and the incredible stories that come out of these people's ⁓ spiritual abuse healing journey. And so in this particular case, very, very difficult ⁓ cult. They involved gothard material. ⁓ And so this person, I was treating an eating disorder. Teasi Cannon (50:39) Yeah. Anna Kitko (50:45) ⁓ And this is one of those eating disorders that we couldn't find anything to go with it. It did have physiological symptoms. So like was it gluten? We were interpreting it as gluten, but we could never prove and that's a pretty easy allergy to prove and it wasn't there. And then there was this other element to like lactose intolerance, but that also didn't fit because all of the enzymes were present to not be lactose intolerant. But here we are. Teasi Cannon (51:00) Mm-hmm. Right. Anna Kitko (51:12) And so it's just like, what is this? I'm so tired of dealing with this. And so we did, I said, let's assume it's trauma induced. Your body's remembering something. It won't do any harm. Let's just see what happens. And we opted for a thing called EMDR, which is the bilateral stimulation of the brain. And here we are doing a routine EMDR on lactose and gluten. And. Teasi Cannon (51:15) Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. Anna Kitko (51:39) my client jumped out of her seat about midway through and opened her eyes and she was like, are you? Cause I like, use the vibrating tappers so you can keep your eyes closed. ⁓ She goes, are you doing that? And I was like, do you need me to stop? Cause I was imagining like the tappers were bothering her and she's like, and I just, what? And she's like, Jesus is here. And I was like, then talk to him. And I just, did nothing. I was silent. I controlled the bilateral stimulation of her brain while she had a private meeting with Jesus. I'm an apologist. So of course I'm like, okay, you know, like I know she's not on anything. We're not doing hallucinogenic anything. And I was like, got told fast and the old fast and test, right? Go eat some gluten and lactose. Teasi Cannon (52:04) Yeah. Wow. Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. Right. Mm-hmm. Anna Kitko (52:29) She sent me a picture of the pizza that she was eating and she's fine. Teasi Cannon (52:32) That's amazing. That is so amazing. Yeah, well, we... Anna Kitko (52:36) Yeah, I can't make this. I didn't do anything. I'm just some privileged to watch. Teasi Cannon (52:40) Right. I think that's a good encouragement and reminder not to limit what I mean be guarded be wise test everything but remember that God does heal. He does heal. Yeah he sees you he heals right no and Anna Kitko (52:51) Yes. Yes, and he sees you. You're not crazy. Teasi Cannon (53:00) And sometimes our healing is in leaps and bounds and sometimes it is one inch at a time. But that is really encouraging just to expect him to surprise us. Anna Kitko (53:09) Yeah, nobody was looking for that. Teasi Cannon (53:11) So thank you, Anna. Thank you so much for, I mean, I feel like we've just had massive education as well as encouragement, And I want, so I want to encourage listeners too. I will put in the show notes how to find you, how to find your ministry. She's got several talks on YouTube. If you enjoyed this, there's much more to find and ⁓ also information on. ⁓ Anna Kitko (53:12) course. Teasi Cannon (53:34) where to find being boldened as well since we mentioned that I'll put that in the show notes. And also I'm gonna list some things for people who are interested in getting started studying apologetics and I have an exciting discount code that someone just offered So you can check that out in the show notes. And if you have been encouraged today, feel seen, feel hope. Anna Kitko (53:36) Great. Yep. Teasi Cannon (53:56) Or if you know someone who needs that, would love it if you would consider sharing this. Also leaving a review because I'm told, that the more reviews, the more people will find this comfort, which is what we are wanting to offer And I do hope that you will subscribe so that you don't miss a single moment of true comfort. Thank you so much for being here. Thank you, Anna. Anna Kitko (54:18) Absolutely, my very great privilege.