A literal murderer is judging me because I’m queer
Trigger warning
TLDR: My ex brother in law who murdered his wife and is serving life in prison recently contacted me after years of no contact. Instead of taking accountability, he focused on condemning my same-sex marriage and criticizing my past marriage to his brother, framing my life as sinful while minimizing the impact of his own actions with “we’re all sinners” rhetoric. How would you handle this?
I’m looking for outside perspectives on a really emotionally complicated situation involving restorative justice, religion, accountability, and boundaries.
Years ago, my ex brother in law murdered his wife after she told him she planned to leave him and take the children back to her home country. He is now serving life in prison.
At the time, my entire life changed because of what happened. My then husband and I uprooted our lives, my education, finances, and future plans because we believed we would be raising his children. Ultimately the girls went to their mother’s side of the family instead, but the entire situation deeply impacted both sides of the family for years.
Recently, after many years of no contact, he reached out to me. At first I thought maybe he wanted to apologize or ask how I was doing. Instead, the conversation quickly became centered around his Christian testimony and his beliefs about sexuality. He even shared that he slept with both men and women and his now fiancée, a “reformed” sex worker/lesbian emboldened him to be honest about this story.
For context: I’m a lesbian and now married to a woman. (That situation actually caused me to question my religion and realize I was not straight.) He began talking about how God “delivered” him from same sex encounters in his past, how he believes same sex relationships are outside of “God’s design,” and that people who live outside that design have “accepted lies.” He repeatedly framed this as loving concern for my soul.
I pushed back and explained that this felt deeply judgmental and painful, especially because I have a history of religious trauma and because I found it incredibly difficult to receive moral/spiritual guidance from someone whose actions caused such catastrophic harm.
At first, he apologized and seemed more reflective. But then the conversation shifted again and he started criticizing my former marriage to his brother (who has since passed away). He accused me of “psychologically torturing” him, said I dishonored my marriage vows, questioned whether I ever intended to keep those vows, and framed my choices as selfish and pleasure-seeking.
The thing is: that marriage was deeply complicated and included a lot of coercive religious dynamics. My ex read my journals, shared private things with pastors, refused to sign divorce papers, and pressured me into what was essentially conversion therapy disguised as Christian couples counseling because I was struggling with my sexuality.
What’s really messing with me psychologically is that every time I try to talk about the impact his actions had on my life, he pivots into “we are all sinners” territory and starts morally evaluating my life too. It feels less like accountability and more like he’s trying to equalize everything into mutual brokenness.
He keeps saying he’s “not judging” me while simultaneously telling me I have no peace because I’m “in rebellion against God.” I am trying to live my values and approach things with respect and empathy. I have stopped responding because it’s not worth my energy. I just feel so angry and I want to lash out and say all the mean things to him. I see a therapist and I’m okay. I guess I’m just looking to hear other’s thoughts and opinions.
What would you do? What would you say? I’m sitting here wishing I could send him glitter dicks.