Some violence in the home isn’t so easily addressed
One can barely imagine the scenario.
A person attacked and wounded by their spouse with a weapon is told to ‘go back home and pray’ by someone in a pastoral role in a church. Or a couple, where coercive control was taking place – including imprisonment in the home alongside frequent violence – are counselled together1 by people from their church. But sadly, these are real cases, in real churches, with real people.
Christian books
Recent books written by Christians on the topic of domestic abuse have aimed to equip churches to handle abusive situations well. They even tackle the difficult area of managing a time of temporary (or even permanent) separation for the couple and the need for this to be handled carefully.2 Much of the advice will help people think through how to support those who have experienced some degree of abuse in their marriages.
But most of the situations quoted in the books involve couples, one or both of whom have committed some kind of abuse, with repentance following swiftly, or a one-off act where, given direction, the act isn’t repeated. And this is where the books’ weaknesses lie.
These books are aimed at the person who during marriage counselling readily admits to having done something unpleasant, or even abusive. Given this writer’s own experience of supporting people with marital problems, and others who have suffered serious and sustained domestic violence and abuse (with all it’s control, sexual violence and systematic destruction of the abused by the perpetrator), it seems that the reality of what an intransigent abuser is like has not been sufficiently explored.
Keeping quiet and blame-shifting
The intransigent abuser would not be opening up to a church member about the level of abuse they inflict on their husband or wife. He, or she, fears lack of control. They are more likely to blame their partner for why they attack / imprison / rape / humiliate them. Or they will feign sorrow just to get the well-meaning prayer partner off their back. As soon as the abused spouse says ‘we need help’, they are unlikely to leave that home unscathed2. The intransigent abuser is one who could be imprisoned for their acts of abuse.
Anecdotal evidence of probation officers says that these are the probationers who refuse to ‘own’ their actions, and even after jail still insist that the spouse ‘caused’ the violence that jailed the perpetrator. Spouse abusers may suffer from a borderline personality disorder, and research says that this and other related traits could be the reason behind why abuse takes place.3 Maybe deeply embedded sin is the cause. Either way, the intransigent abuser is generally beyond the help of regular church-based support systems.
Other resources needed
Many people who have dysfunctional marriages will be helped by the advice in these books. But what the profoundly abused need is the law, a solicitor, a safe house and friends and family who are willing to have their own reputations tested to save the abused person. Books about abuse often include ambiguous statements about how many people are released from abuse – is that both victim and perpetrator being released? The person being abused will be helped by prayer support. But the intransigent abuser will hide behind a veneer of religiosity and even use well meaning help to continue their deadly hold over their victim.
Raising awareness
This is not to disparage the vital place of prayer for the abuser and reliance upon the Lord in these circumstances. But awareness is needed as to the deeply sinful paths some are walking, which endangers the life of the vulnerable to whom they are married.
Those who have been involved in saving the life of a victim of abuse know that reliance upon God is needed more than ever in these circumstances. But some abusers have handed themselves over to sin to such an extent that, without knowledge of the depth of danger the spouse has been exposed to by the manipulative actions of an abuser, death will likely be the outcome.4
Exaggeration?
Using the books, the thinking might run: If the abuse doesn’t end, then perhaps the person is exaggerating the extent of their abuse. If it doesn’t end, maybe they are to blame for it; well, not to blame exactly, but maybe they aren’t ‘working at this’ enough. Perhaps they are even the perpetrator of the abuse. They really are causing a problem here.
Again, this isn’t formulated for the benefit of the en reader. This is an actual path of thinking taken by ‘pastoral’ people in real cases. The outcome? The abuse continues, the perpetrator has no real motivation to repent, as the line of questioning ‘equalises’ the abuse – it’s tit for tat; takes two to tango; we only have their word for it – and the abused person is crushed even more. It’s as if the paramedic turns up, opens the medical kit, looks at the severed limb gushing blood and says ‘Stop fussing, here’s a plaster’.
That can be the experience of someone trying to get help for abuse in a church where people think they know what they are doing and then, endorsed by the books, go on to make further mistakes. (It’s all too common for this to happen to men, who have to overcome the double problem of being seen as not really ‘a man’ for getting abused, and then as ‘probably the perpetrator’ anyway.)
More complex
Books suggest that getting the victim to confront their own sin during this time is worthwhile. This is good advice when neither party is an ‘intransigent abuser’. But at a time of crises in serious abuse situations there is almost nothing worse to say than this. It will close the ears of the abused and contribute to them switching off from the gospel of grace. Christians known to this writer who have experienced such treatment in their time of crisis have gained no comfort from this approach. As an outsider, one can look at a situation and quite easily note ‘if only they didn’t do x then y wouldn’t happen’. This works if it’s a ‘normal’ marriage support session. But serious domestic abuse is much more complicated.
Unconditional love
The vulnerable victim is likely to feel that blame is being shifted onto them for the abuse. The victim already has a poor view of themselves, having been battered mentally and physically. If saving the soul is at the heart of the advice to deal with the sin of the victim – which it is – then talking about the grace, love and perfection of Jesus is going to be more helpful for the person suffering so deeply at the hands of someone else’s sinful actions. They need unconditional love unpacked for them, to hear that ‘no-one should treat a child created by God like this; you are loved lavishly’.
Knowing a husband who had his leaving-the-top-off-the-toothpaste ‘sin’ equated during counselling with his wife assaulting him with a knife, it’s not hard to see why more nuanced help is required that goes beyond ‘we are all sinners’. Therefore a large ‘health warning’ is needed across any advice that involves confronting victims with their sin.
Stand by me
There is plenty of time for addressing sin when the waters are less clouded by the confusion and pain that abuse produces. The act of standing by that person lovingly will have won you their ear forever, especially when you’ve rescued them from probable death.4 This isn’t about leaving sin out of things: the perpetrator needs to be confronted by their sin. Churches back off from doing this effectively, as they are often manipulated by the abuser too. This is about life-saving on earth and eternally. This will be achieved best by revealing Jesus’ overwhelming love, offered to the victim in the first instance.
That’s what they crave; that’s why they’ve stayed and allowed themselves to be continually mistreated. The Christian walking with them can show them where to find real love.
If you are looking for more advice in trying to understand domestic abuse, see www.hiddenhurt.co.uk/ responding_to_domestic_violence.html
FOOTNOTES
1. Help! Someone I love has been abused. And Walking with Domestic Abuse Sufferers; page 51 states that separate counselling is needed
2. https://www.refuge.org.uk/get-help-now/support-for-women/planning-to-leave/
3. https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/27255770 and similar research
4. One women dies every three days and one man every 12 days at the hands of a partner or former partner in the UK http://www.domesticviolencelon-don.nhs.uk/1-what-is-domestic-violence-/25-domestic-abuse-against-men.html or www.mensadviceline. org.uk
