domestic abuse

Jim Wallis 5-30-2018

THIS SPRING, more than 2,500 Southern Baptist women published a letter denouncing the misogyny and apparent toleration of domestic abuse exhibited by Paige Patterson, then head of Southwestern Baptist Theological Seminary and one of the Southern Baptist Convention’s most influential leaders.

These women are speaking truth to power at a critical time, affirming that “the Bible’s elevated view of womanhood,” as they put it, is completely incompatible with Patterson having counseled a woman who was being physically abused by her husband to keep quiet and pray for her husband, and with Patterson’s sexually objectifying comments about a 16-year-old girl. (In late May, Patterson was removed from his position as president of the seminary.)

The letter was a real risk for the signers in a religious world as conservative as the SBC, but it quickly opened up a needed conversation in the denomination and beyond.

We should be grateful for and inspired by the courageous witness of women in the church and broader society who are saying #MeToo and demanding accountability for predatory behavior and the pervasive sexism that creates an environment where sexual harassment and assault too often thrive. Too few men have demonstrated sufficient commitment to end domestic and sexual violence and dismantle the patriarchal system that undergirds them. Changes in both personal attitudes and structures are needed. Men in our churches, as in broader society, too seldom speak up on these issues.

A few years ago, Sojourners commissioned a poll of clergy across the country. We found that 65 percent of pastors speak once a year or less about sexual and domestic violence; 1 out of 10 pastors never address this topic. These distressing facts correlate with another of our findings: 74 percent of pastors underestimate how prevalent sexual and domestic violence is in their own congregations.

Image via Roger Netwon/Youth Today 

It’s not just the Dreamers who stand to lose if there are no new legislative protections put in place: It could have hefty economic consequences for states like North Carolina. Patrick McHugh, economic analyst for the progressive research and advocacy organization North Carolina Justice Center, said the Cato Institute (a libertarian think tank) predicted that ending DACA could cost North Carolina $7.8 billion in the next decade alone.

Faith communities can play a powerful role in preventing violence and supporting survivors, but collectively we’re falling short. Two-thirds (65 percent) of pastors say they speak once a year or less about sexual and domestic violence, with 1 in 10 never addressing it at all. This failure has a deep and lasting impact.

Image via RNS/Screenshot from Vimeo

As the seminary said in announcing the award, Keller “is widely known as an innovative theologian and church leader, well-published author, and catalyst for urban mission in major cities around the world.”

But Keller is also a leader in the Presbyterian Church in America, or PCA, which is the more conservative wing of U.S. Presbyterianism and does not permit the ordination of women or LGBTQ people.

“If you take one city alone, like Dallas — without including the surrounding areas — in any given month anywhere from 639 to 1199 people are turned away from emergency services because we don’t have enough funding now,” Sim said.

“Imagine how much worse it would be if we lose funding from VAWA in the future. Right now we still can’t do enough and that is with VAWA funding. Our crisis partner support will be impacted severely and I fear we would see shelters close.”

Phil Haslanger 10-18-2016

It is not just in the courtroom where women are not always believed. If you have been following the news over the last few weeks, you have seen and heard and read about so many vivid and horrifying examples, whether it be sexual assault or domestic violence.

Let’s try to put aside the political ramifications of all this. The feelings and emotions that have been unleashed reach far beyond any single candidate. They get to the core of our lives — how we treat one another, how we stand up for those who are under assault, how we live as men and women in our society.

Ryan Hammill 6-27-2016

The 6-2 ruling in Voisine v. U.S. upholds a federal law that prohibits any person convicted of a “misdemeanor crime of domestic violence” from owning a firearm. 

The case was brought by two men convicted of misdemeanor assault under state law and later charged with federal crimes for possessing firearms. The plaintiffs, Stephen Voisine and William Armstrong, argued that their crimes did not count under federal statute because their crimes were reckless, not intentional or knowing.

QR Blog Editor 1-29-2015

After the high-profile domestic violence cases of Ray Rice and Adrian Peterson, the NFL is speaking out with a new Super Bowl Ad. The commercial features a woman pretending to order a pizza in a call to a 911 operator as the camera rolls over shots of a disheveled home. The operator eventually comes to understand that the woman is trying to ask for help without alerting her abuser.

The NFL created the ad in partnership with No More, an umbrella organization that connects groups working to end domestic violence and sexual assault.

John W. Kinney 1-06-2015

RECENTLY, several highly publicized events of domestic violence have reminded us of the epidemic proportions of relational abuse. While the focus has been on athletes, abuse has taken place from the halls of Congress to the pulpits of churches. We have also experienced, particularly from church leaders, a vocal outcry against such abuse.

This outcry, however, remains superficial, shallow, and disingenuous if we are not willing to challenge some of our dominant theological assumptions that provide the conceptual framework for the maintenance of this abuse.

Many of the early church fathers affirmed the subservient and secondary status of women and even encouraged the “control” and “forceful instruction” of women in order to maintain conformance to what they saw as God’s “relational design.” Even today, some promise to affirm women only as long as they stay in their “God-ordained place.” In other words, women can expect “favor” only when they remain defined by and conformed to a “divinely” decreed order and hierarchy.

Tragically, this hierarchy is established by the curse and the culture—not the creation and certainly not the Christ. When the curse and the culture establish our doctrine, we embrace “snakeology,” not theology. This snakeology distorts the character of God, relationships, authentic manhood, and authentic womanhood.

L.Y. Marlow 10-01-2014
Praying woman, EML / Shutterstock.com

Praying woman, EML / Shutterstock.com

Our shoulders touched slightly like links in a chain, kneeling around a small twin bed, our heads bowed, eyes closed: “ Our Father who art in heaven,” we mimicked, as mama kneeling at the foot of the bed, led us in prayer.

I was four, the second to the youngest child, and the other three were stair steps ahead of me. Hanging on to mama’s every word, we acted as though we didn’t take notice of the sorrow in her voice, the cries that lingered outside her bedroom door just hours ago.

Soon, she would lay in a Philadelphia hospital bed with stitches from the top of her chest down to her navel, and be told to kiss her five babies goodbye because my father had beaten her so badly that he burst both her lungs.

Decades later, I would sit across from her taking notes for Color Me Butterfly, as she told me the story:

I lay there listening to that doctor tell me that I wouldn’t make it through the night, she mused, her face drawn into the memory. I prayed, listened as God spoke to me, told me that I couldn’t let nary a soul touch me—not the doctor, the nurse, not even my own mother and chi’ren. He was gonna see to it that I walked out of that hospital, but I had to trust Him.

Now, as I think back on that day my mother stared into the abyss, as though she could still see the stitches that cinched her chest, I thank God that she was a praying woman.

Joey Longley 7-30-2014

Across the country, dangerous people with records of domestic violence, stalking, and aggression have no legal restriction keeping them from obtaining guns. Today, the Senate Judiciary Committee held a hearing to explore the intersection of domestic violence and gun violence. The hearing discussed major loopholes in the landmark Violence Against Women Act (VAWA), which successfully prohibited some convicted domestic abusers from gaining access to firearms. Yet even with the prohibitions in VAWA, abusers who don’t share a home with their intimate partner and abusers convicted of misdemeanor stalking charges are free to keep the weapons they have and to purchase new weapons.

“I am here today to speak for my sister Zina. I speak for Zina and her entire family because Zina is not here to speak for herself.”

Elvin Daniel, and NRA member and gun owner, lost his sister to domestic violence with a firearm and testified today in support of Sen. Amy Klobuchar’s (D-Minn.) S. 1290: Protecting Domestic Violence and Stalking Victims Act of 2013.

The tragic loss of Zina’s life is not an isolated incident. A study about the relationship between domestic violence and gun violence released by the Center for American Progress highlights how deadly this major loophole can be for thousands of women. The statistics are stunning:

  • While 2.5 percent of men who are murdered are killed by a female intimate partner, 34 percent of women who are murdered are killed by a male intimate partner.
  • Of all the women killed by male intimate partners from 2001-2012, 55 percent are killed with a firearm.
  • More women (6,410) in the United States have been killed by a significant other with a firearm from 2001-2012 than U.S. troops have died in the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan.
Janelle Tupper 11-12-2013
Photo: Artem Furman/Shutterstock

Pastors are encouraged to speak out against sexual violence on Speak Out Sunday, Nov. 24 Artem Furman/Shutterstock

In the United States, more than 1 in 3 women (and 1 in 4 men) havereportedly experienced sexual assault, physical violence or stalking by an intimate partner during their lifetime.

These are not numbers that disappears when you walk in to a church. Christian women are subject to sexual and gender-based violence, too – but when is the last time you heard about this issue in a church?

Talking about the pain and fear of intimate partner abuse can seem daunting, but there are resources to help faith communities get started. On Sunday, Nov. 24, faith communities have an opportunity to speak out against sexual and gender-based violence in the aptly named Speak Out Sunday

Duane Shank 5-10-2012

For those of us whose mothers have gone to be with God, Mother’s Day is a poignant reminder of loss. It’s a day of prayer, reflection and thanksgiving for our mothers, for the love and nurture we received from them. And it can also still be a day of gift-giving, now in their memory rather than to them.

Some years ago I met the founder of what has become one of my favorite ministries. Bridge of Hope is a national ministry, now with affiliates it serves in seven states. Its model of service is to develop a partnership between a church-based mentoring group, professional staff, and a homeless or at-risk single mother and her children. The goal is to empower women to achieve housing, financial stability through employment, friendship and support, personal growth and wholeness. It’s an inspiring example of how the combination of loving, nurturing support coupled with material assistance can change lives.  

Fraidy Reiss 4-24-2012
RNS photo by Jerry McCrea/The Star-Ledger

Fraidy Reiss of Westfield. RNS photo by Jerry McCrea/The Star-Ledger

Where I come from, girls are married off as teenagers to men they barely know and are expected to spend their lives caring for their husband and children. They are required to cover their hair and nearly every inch of their skin, and to remain behind a curtain at parties and religious events.

Where I come from, if a woman wants to feel her hair blow in the wind or wear jeans or attend college, the courts have the authority to take her children away from her.

Where I come from, you might be surprised to learn, is the United States. Specifically, New York and then New Jersey, in the Orthodox Jewish community.