Perry hints to an altruistic mindset, as well, telling Vogue: “I think you have to stand for something, and if you’re not standing for anything, you’re really just serving yourself, period, end of story.” At this point, she was referring to her political activism during last year’s election. Perry unabashedly supported Hillary Clinton, and the defeat left Perry “disheartened” and stirred up “a lot of trauma” from the past. The election of Donald Trump reminded Perry of the “misogyny and sexism” present in her childhood. “I have an issue with suppressive males and not being seen as equal. I felt like a little kid again being faced with a scary, controlling guy.”
While the election brought up childhood “trauma” and it’s highly unlikely Perry will darken the door of a church anytime soon, the artist does still have a relationship with her parents and goes to a therapist.
Katy Perry and Why You Need to Give Your Preacher’s Kid Choices
In light of Perry and the trauma she feels she has to overcome, I can’t help but wonder what we can be doing to encourage preacher’s kids to experience healthy development in the context of behind-the-scenes church life.
My own father is a preacher’s kid and although he still believes in God, is a little jaded when it comes to church. However, I didn’t pick up on that when I was a child. Looking back, he didn’t let his jadedness influence his kids. Our household was an open one; we were free to express opinions and encouraged to think for ourselves. And while I knew about my parents’ political convictions and moral guidelines by the time I was a teenager, they weren’t spoon fed to me as a kid. I had to gather them from the behaviors I witnessed in my parents. While my experience wasn’t perfect, my parents demonstrated their faith, and thereby instilled it in me, largely by example. They were the same people at home that they were in church. In the end, I chose faith. In fact, I decided I wanted to be a missionary by the time I had completed my education at a very secular, somewhat hostile-to-Christianity college.
