What do I do when the people supposed to support my faith have let me down?

There's a particular kind of loneliness that comes when the people who are supposed to shepherd you instead diminish you. They know exactly where your vulnerability is because you trusted them with it. That betrayal cuts differently than others—it doesn't just hurt your feelings, it questions everything you believed about safety and belonging. Rabia al-Adawiyya loved with such purity that she didn't need institutional validation or anyone's permission to experience the divine. She's not telling you to do that alone forever. She's showing you what becomes possible when your love—for faith, for community, for yourself—isn't held hostage by someone else's judgment. The work now is triage and then renewal. First: name what happened clearly. Not excuse it, not minimize it, not explain it away. A leader who abused their position, a community that chose comfort over your safety, a system that valued reputation over truth. That's what it was. Then: decide what you want to keep and what you're willing to leave behind. You don't have to reject your entire faith because certain people failed it. But you might need time away. You might need to be angry. You might need to find one person—just one—who believes you. Start there. Belonging will come again, but on different terms: yours.