I’m not going to comment directly on the video. Rather, I think it is worthwhile to give my answer to the question asked. What does a woman who is abused do? (Note also that I’m aware there are men who are abused, but the question was not framed in that way.)
My answer is simple: Get out of there and report it. But especially get out of there. Don’t give a physical abuser the opportunity to do more damage.
I am an egalitarian as I have stated on this blog any number of times, yet I won’t criticize complementarian philosophy as natural leading to abuse, as some have done. I treat this issue as a non-essential. Complementarianism is not abuse.
Violent abuse, on the other hand, is a crime and not just something to be dealt with in connection with the church. It remains a crime irrespective of the theological positions of the abuser. I think we’ve had enough cases of church cover-ups. I also cannot see any way in which abusing one’s spouse or one’s children can be justified, or that one ought to endure it. It should be reported.
Many women in such a situation would not feel comfortable taking their case before the church, especially with a husband who might be in a position of authority, or where the church leadership is all male. In such cases again, I would always emphasize getting out of reach of the abuser first, then reporting it either to the authorities or to someone trustworthy who will, in turn, report it to the authorities.
For me the key theological issue here is that abuse violates the divine mandate for marriage. For some it seems to be easy to hear “wives submit to your husbands” (Eph. 5:22) without also hearing “be subject one to another” (Eph. 5:21) and “love your wives as Christ loved the church” (Eph. 5:25). How was that again? “As Christ loved the church and gave himself up for her.”
That’s the New Testament idea of having authority.
But if four years of college undo 18 years of parenting and religious affiliation, perhaps the faith community’s tenuous hold is the problem, not the particular place outside its bubble where that hold evaporates. Consider the believers we’ve seen in history. With all the persecution that Judaism and Christianity have survived over the centuries, an argument that sites America’s Top 310 Colleges as a first order adversary is hard to credit…. (Source: The Atlantic: Why College Students and Losing Their Religion)
I agree. We tend to blame society for the fact that our young people tend to leave the church around college age. I suspect we’d like to believe that because it means we’re not to blame. We’ve done our best, but it’s just the society. What can we do?
Well, we could try living our faith and inviting our kids to live it with us, rather than trying to work in just the right amount of indoctrination. We could try examining the kinds of ideas they’ll hear about in college, rather than repeating cliches and working our way through bland, unchallenging curriculum. (Can anyone say, “Bring your Bibles?”)
One of my pet peeves is the way “literal” is used in discussing biblical interpretation. The problem is not just that the word has changed meaning; rather, it is now scattered all over the map. “Literal” comes to mean anything from “seriously” to “severely out of context” much more often than it means “literal as opposed to figurative.” Even “literal as opposed to figurative” leaves something to be desired since without a knowledge of just which way something is to be taken, either literally or figuratively, one often can’t tell what is meant.
For example, if I say I don’t take Genesis 1 literally, just what do I mean? For me, Genesis is not narrative history. Having said that, there are many things it could be, and it happens that I take Genesis 1:1-2:4a to be liturgy. There are figurative elements in liturgy, but it is a more specific label.
In any case, in studying Philippians, I came across this note in the Orthodox Study Bible regarding the Greek word leitourgia in 2:17: “Service is literally ‘liturgy.’ …” I hate to beat up on the Orthodox Study Bible so much, especially considering that at the same time as I use it, I’m becoming more and more delighted with the eastern church fathers.
But “service” is not literally “liturgy” nor is leitougia literally “liturgy.” “Liturgy” is merely one gloss one might use, expressing a certain portion of the semantic range of the Greek word. One might say the the word translated “service” is the one from which we derive the English word “liturgy,” though that doesn’t really mean much regarding the meaning of this passage.
So again I will maintain that “literal” is one of the most misused words in biblical interpretation. I’ve suggested before that if I could take one phrase away from conservatives it would be “the Bible clearly teaches.” If I could take one phrase away from liberals it would be “we don’t take that literally.” Neither one advances the discussion.
The Fifth Column has a post titled On Burning Books (HT: Divine Ripples), referring specifically to the recent burning of a Qur’an. He concludes that:
It may not be prudent, it may not be useful, but it is a stand worthy of respect.
I disagree. Book burning is either the petulant reaction of fearful people looking for control, but lacking convincing arguments, or a way to gain undeserved attention.
The article cites a really bad reason why one might respect book burning: Church councils did it through the years. Wow! Lots of church people gathering together and doing something stupid! Who would have ever imagined it? It just proves that Christians are no more immune from stupidity and control issues than any other group of people.
Here’s a quote:
And it wasn’t just the Koran that burned. During the Middle Ages, the Talmud was frequently targeted for the fire by Church authorities precisely because of the numerous blasphemies concerning Christ and the Blessed Virgin that it contains. Throughout Europe, the book was formally put on trial and censored or burnt, in much the same way Terry Jones tried and burnt the Koran.
And this is somehow an example of a good idea?
I want to make clear her that I’m talking about we should do, what’s a good idea, and not what should be legal. I would never burn the American flag, even in protest, but I firmly believe it should be legal to do so. I would never burn a copy of the Qur’an, but I believe the action should be legal. Lots of stupid things are and should be legal. I do not believe the burning of the Qur’an justifies violent actions in response, just as I do not believe that any insult to Christianity, such as burning a Bible, would justify a violent response from Christians.
Now to be fair, the article does question both the prudence and effectiveness of the tactic. But nonetheless the author concludes that there is something here to be respected.
Our problem with Islam is not that we don’t get to say enough nasty things about Muslims, or that we can’t respond to Islam. We can and do respond respectfully on many occasions. But when someone burns a copy of the Qur’an it sends another message, not one of respectful disagreement, but one of hatred. It does nothing to stop even one act of terrorism. It does nothing to convince any radical Muslim that he is wrong, nor any Muslim, of course. It is the adult equivalent of a child’s temper tantrum.
I’m reminded of a time many years ago when I was in a group of young men. One person got angry at another and started swinging his arms in a sort of suggestion he was going to punch the other one out. He kept saying, “Hold me back! Hold me back!” But he never actually approached the other guy, who would doubtless have won any fight between them. Nobody tried to hold him back either, because we knew he was going to be ineffective. The one difference between this event and that one is that the purported target exercised restraint.
We don’t need to take our cues from the radicals. We don’t need to become like them. They are not concerned about who they kill. We should be. They are not making distinctions between one American and another. We should recognize distinctions in their camp. We should not let terrorism make us less than we are.
I fear, however, that it has already happened to some extent.
Via Dispatches I found this story about a lawsuit against the Grossmont Union High School District. The suit alleges that the school forbade the student to bring his Bible to school or to preach. The district tells a different story, claiming the student was very disruptive.
I mention this story for a couple of reasons. The first is our tendency to jump to conclusions. My first response, I must confess, is to think the school is in the wrong, not because of freedom of religion (though I think that’s applicable) but because of freedom of speech. I understand that there are limits–substantial limits–to speech as a student in school, but I tend to think administrators overdo that point. Nonetheless, the more I think about this case, the less certain that becomes. It will be interesting to see what comes out in court, and just who is jumping to conclusions. If the facts were completely as alleged by the plaintiff it would be a slam dunk for them–which makes me wonder.
My second point is that we should, at the same time we teach our children their faith, teach them good behavior and courteous, open, and friendly ways of sharing it. This both provides a witness in their lives as they treat other people with respect, including not forcing religion on them, and it is also just more effective witnessing. We gain nothing through rudeness. I don’t know the facts of this case, just the allegations. But there are genuine cases in which Christians young and old diminish or even pervert their witness through the means they use to carry it out.
Please remember that I do not say this as a way of claiming that this young man did wrong. We don’t yet know precisely what happened. That is what a trial is for.
John Meunier cites comments by Mark Cuban, owner or the Mavericks, who says he doesn’t need the new media because he can reach their readers just as well himself. I would note in passing, though it’s not the topic of this blog, that I think Cuban is optimistic about his ability to reach people directly. I get my sports information via the internet, and I almost never do so through the team’s web site or official channels. But that’s something time will test.
Meunier’s application to the church is interesting, however, and matches with some things I’ve read recently and also heard in discussions at church, i.e. in the physical building we call church. The general idea is that because people can make connections now via social media, they need the church less. I have no doubt that for certain definitions of “church” and “need” this is true. People who attended church for the purpose of social or business networking no longer need the church as much in that particular way.
So if your church exists for the purpose of providing social networking, then your church indeed is obsolete, or is rapidly becoming obsolete. Even someone like me, past middle age, can contact my business associates, friends, and family via social media and text. In fact, I do almost all my business networking online. That doesn’t mean I don’t ever want to physically meet people. In fact, I like to meet them whenever possible. But I have had design work done by people I never physically met. I regularly publish authors I have never met. I sell to people I have never met in physical space.
The problem here is with the definition of church. We use “church” to refer to the building, to the congregation that meets there, to denominations, and to the church universal. Our physical building is diminishing in importance. Not becoming useless (or obsolete), mind you, but diminishing in its role. The local congregation, in the sense of those located in one physical place, is diminishing in importance, as we have it now. But there is no reason in all of this to suggest that the church, as the body of Christ in the world, is diminishing in importance. Unless, of course, we’ve made church equivalent to one of those other things.
Social media is regularly decried as a means of keeping people apart. But people are using it to get together. People complain about how the easy access to one another via cell phones, on Twitter, on Facebook, and in so many other ways diminishes more personal contact. But for me, and I know for many others, all of those are means of keeping in better touch with people I care about. In addition, they make it possible for me to find out about, and care about, people I might never have met otherwise.
The building was never the church in the first place, at least in the biblical sense. Yes, we use the word that way, and I’m not complaining about the way language changes. We just need to be aware of which definition of “church” we’re using. Social media means the building is less important, because it gives us other ways of connecting.
Now if your church, in the sense of local congregation, existed largely as a social network, it’s going to be obsolete as well. It just isn’t as efficient at social networking any more. If that was all your church was, there’s no reason to mourn its passing. But if your congregation was a gather of people filled with the Holy Spirit and empowered to do ministry (see 1 Corinthians 12-14 and don’t skip chapter 13), then three things may happen.
First, you can expand your congregation and connect it to other congregations more efficiently. There might be a congregation in some other part of the world that needs to connect to your gifts in order to serve where they are. You can connect with them via social media, and both be more effective.
Second, you can more efficiently get your congregation aware of, and working together on the things you are called to do. You can arrange rapid responses to disasters. You can discuss the Sunday School lesson on your Facebook wall. You can tweet about the church service if it excites you and thus reach people who couldn’t, or wouldn’t (and probably won’t) enter your building.
Third, remember all those buildings? As they became less useful as places for the membership to gather, you can convert them for use in other ministries, or if you find no new use for them, sell them, and use the money to accomplish the church’s mission. I personally think church campuses are the most underutilized class of real estate around. What good is that sanctuary to anyone during the week?
Speaking of which, and only slightly off topic, what is it with all these closed and locked gyms (or family life centers, or whatever you call them)? I’m guessing that if the church was willing to go to work you could have young people using those facilities for fun and learning. Many of them wouldn’t be church members? Their parents aren’t paying tithe to support the building? Good! Learn as a church to give in mission. There’s a risk in having kids off the street in your facility? They might tear it up? Good! It all belongs to Jesus anyhow, and he can handle it.
I was deeply troubled a few years back when attending a meeting of Christians called to pray for our city (Pensacola, FL). One pastor who was asked to pray for our political leaders offered a prayer that was more of a Republican agenda of things he hoped God would accomplish through our government. I was profoundly troubled by that prayer, especially in an interdenominational setting, but I would be concerned anywhere.
Now let me be clear here. I do see my vote as a moral issue, i.e., I should advocate for things I regard as morally right. I should pray about the way I act in the public square. Further, I have no problem with praying for those in government.
What I have a problem with is combining prayer and my political advocacy. There are things I believe should be done about our budget. These result from my best understanding of how one should implement good government. I have prayed about them and will continue to do so. But I don’t ask God in prayer to do things my way, and I try never to use my prayer life or my fasting as a way to influence others in their decision making.
To a certain extent I see this as running afoul of the early verses of Matthew 6. But being well aware of the Sermon on the Mount, I must also ask if I’m being too critical.
