How Long Oh Lord?
My heart has been heavy lately. Like many of you the news cycle keeps me on an emotional rollercoaster from potential nuclear war to moon joy and everywhere in between. Yesterday I had the gut-wrenching privilege of bearing witness to a very large group of women who have been abused. Trigger warning if this is your story, and you don’t feel up for it you may want to stop reading here.
This article linked below came out on CNN nearly a month ago but it’s just now making some traction on social media. It is a shockingly dark article exposing men in online group chats, now coined “rape academy” where they share ideas and encourage each other to drug and assault their wives with some posting videos and photos, not only of the act but how others can implement it. It was an article so dark it took me a while to get through it, as I had to take some emotional breaks. It’s heavy, vast, and very dark.
In February the site had 62.7 million visits, by March the website had over 80 million hits, nearly double the population of Canada. 38% of those visits coming from America. If you are reading this and you are male, my biggest plea is for you to witness it, stand up for women, and protect them, believe them. In the online discourse I have seen men immediately flex things like, “Well it’s not all men” and correcting women, “It’s not 62 million men, just 62 million hits on the website.” When women read that they immediately hear, “this makes me uncomfortable, and my comfort is more important than your experience.” For many women, she wasn’t talking to you personally, but congratulations, you just made yourself unsafe because you made it all about you and your discomfort. She knows it’s not all men, but she is confessing her vulnerability and your first move should not be to protect yourself.
It is the fruit of a culture that has a high value on hierarchy, excuses similar behaviors in its highest leaders, and emphasizes ancient Roman values over values of the Kingdom of God.
If you are reading this, you are likely a professing Christian, or at least live in and around those circles. I wish I could tell you things are different among our churches, but my lived experience says they are not. I have watched male leaders protect abusers at nearly every church I have previously been a part of. Their power deemed more important than the abused woman standing before them. Statistically, there is very little difference between the abuse of women who attend church, and those that do not. The biggest variance being that churches often have higher rates of women not reporting, victim blaming, and the institution tending to protect the perpetrator (and in my experience, sometimes those perpetrators are in leadership at the church.)
If you are like me sometimes you hear of abuse and your knee jerk reaction is somewhat disbelief. “Wow, but I know him, and he’s always been a great guy.” I can look back on times in my life that this was my first reaction. Sadly, I’ve heard too many stories to be surprised much anymore. These abusers are often married men, leaders in their churches, communities and often well-liked by other guys.
Women want to be believed, they want brothers who will stand up with them and call it out to protect them. This is the sibling relationship Paul speaks of in the New Testament. Sometimes your translation in English may say “brothers” but most often this is referencing the Greek word, adelphoi, which translates to siblings, as in brothers and sisters in Christ. So once again, brothers, we are asking you to witness, be a safe space, believe us, stand up for us.
I am reminded of a dear friend from college who showed me what it meant to have this sibling relationship. I had been asked on a date as a freshmen by and upperclassmen at my small Christian university. I was flattered as the guys weren’t exactly lined up to date me. I said yes and we planned the date for a week later after Thanksgiving.
My memory is fuzzy, but over the break, I got a phone call from a dear male friend named Aaron, who called to gently warn me about this guy’s behavior. He basically let me know that it would be unsafe for me to be anywhere near him alone and that I should call it off. I took him seriously and canceled the date. My potential date was not very happy, but I felt I did the right thing. Later, I watched this potential date punch out the glass in the student center in a moment of rage and I knew in an instant that could have been my face, my body or worse. I can’t tell you how grateful I am to this day for that friend, Aaron, having the courage to speak up about my well-being. Brothers, this is what the women in your life want. In that moment Aaron considered me more important than ruining his friendship with this guy. He saw me as a sister in need of protection.
I’m teaching at our church this week on Ephesians 5 and the dreaded “wives submit” passage. Because of seminary, I’ve come to see it differently than it was previously presented to me. It’s not a Roman hierarchy that Paul lays down, rather it’s a passage about how we all submit to each other in reverence for Christ. What this passage is not about, is abuse. Paul is not saying, as one terrible prominent pastor said, “to endure his abuse for a night.” Nope, that is not it. Paul is speaking about mutual submission here and abusing your wife looks nothing like the weighty unconditional love Paul asks for of the husbands. Submitting to each other sometimes means protection, and it always means placing other’s needs before your own.
If you are a woman and the church has used Scripture and the protection of male church leaders against you, I am so very sorry. This is not Jesus and it’s not what he is calling our churches to look like. If you are finding yourself in an abusive relationship please find a safe friend and protect yourself. I’m here if you need a friend. A theology that asks women to stay in an abusive relationship is not what Jesus came to establish. He lifted the lowly, gave agency to those that did not expect it. You are not less than a man, that’s Aristotle, not Jesus.
If you are a man and you are reading this, I beg of you, witness the stories, not matter how horrific; listen to women, believe women, have the courage to stand up to your brothers when they mistreat women. If you are thinking, “well I don’t know any woman who has been raped or assaulted.” Consider the sobering truth that you may not be a safe person for a woman to share that information with. Learn how to listen, speak up, advocate even if it’s uncomfortable. Be willing to spend your relational capital for the sake of a woman. If you can’t be an ally for women in the boy’s locker room, you are not a true ally. We women are tired, and many of us are angry to the point of rage. Rather than letting that rage frighten you, or feel threatening, step into that rage with your sisters. In the end, as MLK famously said, “we will remember not the words of our enemies but the silence of our friends.”
If you are a man and you find yourself on the side of being an abuser, please get some professional help. If you are in church leadership, step down indefinitely.
Men join us in fighting for justice for women, even in our churches, especially in our churches. That is a far better picture of the kingdom of God.
