The truth is that you know a victim of abuse. It might be your mother, sister, aunt, friend, or a teenager in your church youth group. The chances are she hasn’t felt safe enough to reveal the terrible pain she has suffered in the privacy of her relationship. Domestic abuse is easy to hide, but can be challenging to identify. In this post I go through how the Bible informs our understanding of domestic abuse.
Surviving Domestic Abuse: My Story
I thought my dreams were about to come true when I [finally] got married. I left my family, friends, and my job as a pastor in Canada to move to the U.S. for love. I had waited a long time to meet a guy I could partner with in ministry. My American husband had wooed me with his discourse of our shared theological studies, passion for church work, and a vision of us as a happily married couple in ministry together. Babies would complete the picture of our Christian nuclear family. After our vows, I was shocked to immediately find myself in a different kind of nuclear situation: domestic violence.
Why We Need to Talk about Domestic Violence
October is Domestic Violence Awareness Month and I hadn’t intended to write about it. Aside from helping a friend through a horrible situation years ago, I haven’t had any experience with this, so didn’t think there was much I could say. But I was compelled to write for these reasons: