ABSTRACT
This chapter looks at how spiritual abuse can emerge if concepts of faithfulness and disobedience are dichotomised and adhered to with warped rigidity. It explains the conceptual possibilities that have materialised through Jacques Derrida's work for the formulation of church praxis as a congregated outworking of Christian faith. The chapter shows that church practice has adopted certain traits of positivism under the influence of post-Enlightenment modernity which prove less than beneficial to its functioning, hence a deconstructive exercise upon the dichotomies that have arisen through the traits may prove useful. It also explains 'grounded theory' as methodology, semi-structured interview as field method, and Derrida's ideas on death and difference as part of its theoretical framework. Derrida observed that 'Christianity is the only mad religion; which is perhaps, the explanation for its survival — it deconstructs itself and survives by deconstructing itself'.
