What does it mean to be an abuse survivor and a Christian?

I’ve had good cause to wonder about this.

I am a survivor of emotional abuse. During the brief relationship I had with a young Christian man who went to my church, I was emotionally and mentally assaulted on an almost daily basis and told that I was bringing it on myself with my “crazy” behavior. By the time our relationship ended, I didn’t know down from up anymore. My entire sense of self was nearly obliterated by means of his chronic degradations. My entire reality was destabilized by him telling me that most of what I believed or experienced was wrong. What was worse, because he had endeavored to keep our relationship a “secret”, very few people knew we had even been together, let alone what he had done. I didn’t even understand the reality of what had been done to me until months later, and I had to resort to therapy in order to deal with the post traumatic stress disorder and hypervigilance that was interfering with my behavior every day. To make matters worse, going back to that church was not an option for me at the time. I felt at the time (and I still do) that it is not safe for me to be where he is, and opening myself up to the ridicule, blame, and disbelief that I felt I would experience from him and members of my church by exposing his abuse is simply not something I can face. I cannot even live in the same town right now; I live elsewhere.

I have been lucky enough to find a church family that affirms me where I am now. Therapy helps me to regain power over myself; as I do so, my need for vengeance against him diminishes. Forgiveness remains an open question, one I am amenable to in the future, but is simply not possible now. Kindly meant remarks such as “God doesn’t give you more than you can handle” and “Well, why didn’t you leave him?” serve to fuel my rage. God sure as hell didn’t give this to me. Furthermore, blaming the victim for being unable to understand or combat the violence that was inflicted on her or him remains counterproductive at best, outright cruel at worst.

I wonder what it means to be the body of Christ when abuse has happened within it. What was done to me was justified by him with crude moralistic weapons. It was compounded when certain people I trusted treated me like I must have done something to deserve it. Neither of these has anything to do with Jesus or his teachings; quite the opposite, in fact. Yet I find time after time that Christians, including people that I cared for and trusted in my church community, still hold these anti-Christian attitudes. Hence my fear, which in one sense is unfounded (for maybe I am not giving them enough credit) and in another sense is very much based in reality. I’ve seen what happens to women who accuse famous men of rape in the media. I’d rather not have something similar play out in my own life.

What does it mean to be a woman in the church? What does it mean to be silent about violence perpetrated within the church? There is no doubt in my mind that Christ is by my side, weeping tears with me, gently bringing every new healing into creation, holding me up when I feel I cannot go on. I am not so trustful of his followers. Something about having the most fragile parts of you violated makes you wary of trusting people again. My own mother could barely believe that this happened to me. In the early days of understanding, trying to sort through what had really happened, one of my classmates said, “It could happen to anyone. You’re not alone.” I am not alone. What does that mean for me? What does that mean for the church?

What does reconciliation mean?

I don’t know the answers to these questions. I know that my Creator came to destroy a system that is so firmly entrenched that even today, with all our so-called progress, survivors are afraid to speak up. I know that it is only in Christ that I will be healed and become whole again.

Angie Muresan reflects on celebrating IWD in Romania– “When I was a child, every March 8 dawned fresh and glistening. In our country it was a national holiday, a celebration of being a woman, a mother, a wife, a colleague. Children at school worked on crafts and wrote letters to their mothers. Men brought flowers and chocolates for the females in their lives. Mothers sent children to school with bouquets of spring flowers for the female teachers, and after saying, “I kiss your hand,” the obligatory child to female adult greeting, we would give them the flowers.”

And she is hosting a book giveaway in honor of the day, so stop by her site!

Kathy Escobar writes on the power of being wanted – “there’s a strong and powerful undercurrent in the patriarchical, hierarchical systems that have permeated the church that says to women “we don’t really want you.” well, actually we do, but we want you “if you will play by our power rules” or to “do the grunt work that needs to get done, take care of the kids & keep the world spinning round at church & at home.” but we don’t really want all of you–your powerful, creative, beautiful gifts & powerful, wise, nurturing voice side-by-side us as equals together.”

Sonja Andrews takes on Women’s History Month – “But there is something about the idea of having the dominant population “allow” a month for women’s history or african-american history or whatever history that is vaguely unsettling. Because if the culturally dominant population is still in a position to allow this, then they are also in a position to take it back. Which means … they still hold all the power.”

Julie Clawson writes on why we need IWD – “But the fact remains, if women truly were treated as equals, valued for our contributions, respected for our ideas, and not assumed to be inferior or incapable in any way, then there would not need to be a day to bring attention to the achievements of women.”

And I have to add, Nicholas Kristof’s New York Times article today on three proven steps to advance the world’s women as a informative must read.

One of the first signs of spring in my hometown corner of the world was a trip to my grandfather’s sugar shack, usually with my cousins. It was a crude little dirt-floored structure nestled at the edge of a stand of sugar maples. At one end of the shack, a huge metal vat the size of a bathtub filled half of the shack. Underneath the vat, and of a similar size, was a wood burning stove with a curvy little stovepipe that rose from behind the vat and escaped through a hole in the slanted aluminum roof. Bright winter sunlight broke through a thousand tiny cracks in the walls, and on every available stud inside, nails held ladles, spoons, nets and filters. Two folding chairs and a small homemade table were the only other furnishings. It wasn’t especially colorful or comfortable inside the shack, but I remember it with a smile. Maybe it was the smell. For 2-3 weeks every spring, a sweet, woodsy aroma of smoke, syrup, moisture and the earthy outdoors combined with the barn-like smell of my grandfather’s coveralls. I can almost taste the hope of spring as I type.

The syrup making ritual involved checking sap buckets daily, collecting it in 50 gallon size containers that would then be dumped into the vat in the sugar shack- 43 gallons of sap yields just 1 gallon of sticky, sweet syrup, so this was truly a labor of love. Mixing, testing, stirring, feeding the fire that raged below the vat, skimming the syrup with a net to remove impurities that were distilled to the surface, day and night, batch after batch, waiting for the exact moment of perfection- too long and it would burn, too short and the flavor was weak.

For my part, I was involved as a tourist, but for my grandfather and uncles, it was laborious. The end product? Clear glass quart jars of syrupy, caramel-colored goodness would file into my grandmother’s mudroom weeks later.

Today, during this same season of the year, I am involved in an entirely different ritual of purification.

With my prayer, “Cleanse my heart Lord. Purify me from impurities.”
I imagine, “Turn up the heat in the old wood stove. Load on the firewood Lord.”

With the common practice of giving up something for Lent, I imagine the excesses of my life being distilled at a rumbling boil, escaping through the curvy stovepipe of my spirit into the vastness above.

With the difficult work of self-reflection and prayer, I imagine the physical labor of my family members, toting heavy buckets of sap, standing or sitting around a steaming vat day and night, chopping and feeding logs to a ferocious fire for days on end.

And the end result of both processes? A beautiful sweetness that can only be produced through a process- a process of bringing what I have to the sugar shack, stoking the fires of reflection hot, releasing that which is impure (allowing another to skim off the really nasty stuff), and looking forward to the hope of a sweeter, closer relationship with my Maker.

As I allow Him, God is happy to illuminate the clouds of my watery self being released toward Him. He accepts it, releases me from the burden of carrying it, and I anticipate the closeness of knowing Him in all of His flavorful goodness as the days of Lent progress.

This post originally appeared at Erin’s blog Five Crisps: One Mama’s Musings on Her Three Boys and Life.

In Memory of Tyna Webb

I have a healing place. A place I can turn to when I need to be silent. Or need space. A place where I can pray and think. I find comfort in the familiarity of the place- the sea, the birds, the beach, the coffee shop. Within the familiarity there is mystery, an element of surprise. Sometimes the waves are wild, dangerous- although usually they lap gently around your feet. Sometimes the distant mountains are clear, beautiful; sometimes obscured by mist and smog. At times the gently rippling surface is smashed by the wondrous crash of a breaching whale, a waving fluke, or the graceful arcs of a pod of silvery dolphins. Sometimes the shore is littered with wilting bluebottles, decomposing kelp, spiky fish. Sometimes the tide is so high, the wind so fierce that there is no shore to speak of. At times the gull’s cry fills the air forming a symphony with children’s happy laughter, but mostly the South Easter masks all other sounds.

So many full and wonderful memories are associated with my healing place. Memories of my babies eating the sand and feeling the water for the first time. Of swimming alone with my husband whilst the rain pelted down. Memories of happy fish and chip meals, countless cups of coffee, silent walks. Of exploring rock pools, finding star fish, feeding sea anemones, spotting seals. Of my dad building sandcastles with my children. And there are the memories of tears and arguments shouted into the wind.

There is something safe about that place. Safe so that I can always go there when my heart and mind are full. Safe knowing that I can unburden myself into the wind and the waves, the gulls and the sandy beaches. My healing place is a tangible expression of my experience with God. Predictably unpredictable, calm and rough, clear and murky, melodious and discordant. Full of life and yet with the potential to cause death. Consistent in its inconsistency, this is what draws me, calls me. It is this knowledge that beckons me to cool my toes, splash my knees or immerse my entire body in its cleansing depths.

Last night we went for a swim there. The children were a delight. Rebekah twirled and floated in her armbands, Talitha body surfed cautiously in the little waves and Mike rolled around unashamedly in the shallows with Emma. I floated around between them, my heart full, peaceful, safe. My healing place a magnificent reflection of a facet of my God.

This morning my healing place saw death. An elderly lady was taken by a great white shark. All that remained was her swimming cap floating in a pool of red. And a dozen traumatised swimming companions.
Oh Lord, how can this be? Why is it that just when I feel safe with You, feel like I understand something of Yourself, You plunge me into darkness? My healing place is tainted with blood now, Lord. My image of You is once again fragmented and shattered. And just when I had placed the pieces together again.

Consistent in Your inconsistency. Source of life, Creator of death. Understood and completely beyond comprehension. Oh Lord, have mercy on me. I don not understand You, sometimes I don’t even like You. But somehow You seem to be so intimately woven into what makes up the fibre of my being that, try as I may, I cannot walk away from You. I feel like I have plumbed some unfathomably deep well where the water is quenching and life giving, cool and refreshing, calm and clear. But also rough and impenetrably black. Help me to trust You Lord. Help me to love You. And in Your mercy protect the fragile shreds of my faith.

Holly lives in Fish Hoek, Cape Town with her husband of 17 years and her three wonderful (mostly) daughters. She is a full time mom and wife and a part time student and counsellor.

Sometimes we are surprised at where we find signs of life. Sometimes the life around us is so abundant it is hard not to miss, but other times one has to look deep to see the life hanging-on beneath the surface. It’s the same when we start looking for the stirrings of life in regard to faith. Sometimes it is easy to see and celebrate. Sometimes it is only found in the deep roots trying to survive a drought. Sometimes it comes burdened with pain and sorrow. And sometimes it can be found in the most unlikely of places. But faith is alive all around us.

Over the next few months here at Emerging Women we will be pointing out where we see this life amidst us. In addition to regular postings on women’s issues and emerging church topics, we will be hosting a series on “Signs of Life.” Women will be writing on where they see life around them – newly emerging, flourishing, or struggling, this life will be celebrated. I encourage everyone to take time to acknowledge where this life is found. And if you woud like to contribute your own post to this series, please send it to emergingwomen (at) gmail (dot) com.

Let’s celebrate the signs of life around us.

Remember – the root word of humble and human is the same: humus: earth. We are dust. We are created; it is God who made us and not we ourselves.
– Madeleine L’Engle, Walking on Water

As I inhaled and exhaled in concert with the Ashtanga Yoga poses I attempted, I felt it. Felt it toe-tip to scalp. Felt it in my bones and in my soul. It reminded me of the mist that fell on us and the Yountville appellation each morning we spent in Napa. It was a refreshing. A re-birthing. A glimpse of wholeness.

Breathe.

Since Jude rocked our world back in July, important things like exercise, slowness, and breathing have gotten lost in the cracks and crevices of parenthood. Of course, proper priority says that raising a child is the most important thing we can do with our time and energy. But wisdom would also add that you can’t raise a child well if you are unwell. And as I leaned back in child’s pose, the fibers of carpet tickling the tip of my nose, I knew what I had to do.

Breathe.

Science tells us that when we breathe, we eliminate 70% of the toxins in our body. And I haven’t been breathing. I suppose that’s why I’ve felt like a cesspool in so many areas of my life. Scattered. Weary. Tired. Unbalanced. Frustrated. Harried. Hurried. Torn. Undone. Disconnected. Fragmented. Gross.

Breathe.

As I rose from Mrtasana, also known as Corpse Pose, I felt alive. Although this pose’s name literally means “death,” the instructor on my yoga video explains that this is the most restorative and important pose in yoga. That something must die so that we can truly live.

Breathe.

After rising quietly from my final pose, I looked at the calendar. February 17. Ash Wednesday. First day of the Lenten season. I marked the day with the wispy writing: Breathe. This year, for Lent, I will breathe.

I continued breathing as I picked up our bonus room. And, as I did, I heard something new as the rhythm of my breath accompanied a deeper rhythm. This year, rather than giving something up for Lent, I would take something in, knowing full well that this would still require a giving up, a kind of dying. Dying to tasks that stroke my need for perfection. Dying to distractions that overstimulate. Dying to loves that poison any hope of peace.

Receive.

Breathe.

Talitha koum. Rise up, little girl.

And along with each breath, a prayer that I would experience God’s nearness so deeply that his very breath would be mine.

Then the LORD God formed man of dust from the ground, and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life; and man became a living being. [Genesis 2:7]

Krista Finch is a wife, mom and author seeking wholeness in the tension of a malfunctioning world. In her recent book, As Is, and on her site KristaFinch.com, she digs into the mundane majesty of life here and now.

I hear constantly that men should be the provider. What people usually mean by that is they expect men to work hard at their jobs to make enough money so the rest of the family is fed, clothed, and happy.

When Eric and I decided to get married, out of respect he spoke to both my parents before the proposal. They asked him how he planned to provide for me and eventually for children. At the time, I was struggling with serious health issues, so part of their question was a sincere inquiry into his willingness to be the sole income-earner in the case that my health prevented me from working. He, of course, was and would be willing to do that if the need arose.

But I loved his answer. He told them that we would provide for each other. Provision would extend beyond financial concerns. He committed to providing inspiration and care and support to me, just as I would provide that to him.

He has said several times since we got married that he is glad he doesn’t have the burden of “provider” in the traditional sense. He is glad he didn’t sacrifice a job he loves and is gifted at in order to make more money. He is glad he isn’t the spiritual provider in the sense that all spiritual decisions and knowledge are left to him. He is glad that he is connected to me (and later to our children) emotionally, not in a distant provider/protector sense.

Our commitment to provide for each other allows us to trust God to be our ultimate provider of Life and guidance. Christ is the head of our marriage, not one of us.

Lauran Kerr-Heraly is a graduate student at the University of Houston where she also teaches Women’s Studies. She shares a hyphenated name and a blog with her husband. Follow her writing at http://thehyphenhouse.blogspot.com (where this post originally appeared) and www.thisordinaryday.com.

I kept thinking about the incarnation as I lay on the cement floor in St. Mark’s Cathedral this evening during Compline prayer. I was between Stephanie and Jen, two of my best friends since childhood. Throughout our friendships they have been constant pillars in my spiritual life. Each of us comes from her own unique Christian upbringing, and even as we all spent our undergraduate years with the Jesuits, we still hold many differences in faith. Yet they have always been embodiments of Christ to me. Real Love in Flesh and Blood. Truth speakers in some of the most trying of circumstances.

According to Roman Catholic doctrine, one of the major reasons women cannot be ordained priests is the fact that Christ became human in the form of a man. The priest, who represents Jesus in the consecration of the Eucharist, must therefore be male in order to adequately reflect Christ’s embodiment. I’ve acquired plenty of strong theological arguments to dismiss the institution’s logic on this matter, but tonight I didn’t need any intellectual assertions to support by belief that Christ’s embodiment was not merely male. No. There next to me, on my right and on my left, Jesus lay in Flesh and Blood. Skin and Bones. Jen and Steph.

The Incarnation I witness every day is often female, just as it is often male. And it is always a Mystery.

Jessica Coblentz is a graduate student at Harvard Divinity School. Follow her writing on the Web at www.jessicacoblentz.com.

During our first week, we played this song by Cary Cooper, “Pretty Girls,” that really gets at the pain unhealthy cultural expectations and gender roles can cause us. I thought I’d share it here.

Pretty Girls

You…never like…your ugly duckling
You never like me…without my…lipstick on
You…never like…my recollections where your memories
Where you memories are…tread upon

You…never come…right out and tell me
The scenic route has…always…been your way
But I’ve…been riding shotgun with you long enough to know
Long enough to know what you mean when you say

Pretty girls…have pretty voices
Pretty girls…preserve their youth
Pretty girls…know all their choices
Pretty girls…don’t tell the truth

You…can teach a girl…to curtsy
Set a table…like her great grandmother did
You…can dress her up…in velvet
Neglect to tell her…all…the secrets you hid

And love…love is not…the question
Cause if you wanted…you could love someone to death
Love…them straight into…the closet…afraid to draw
Afraid to draw…afraid to draw a breath

Pretty girls…have pretty voices
Pretty girls…preserve their youth
Pretty girls…know all their choices
Pretty girls…don’t tell the truth

Pretty girls…have pretty voices
Pretty girls…preserve their youth
Pretty girls…know all their choices
Pretty girls…don’t tell the truth

Clay Shirky’s recent blog post A Rant About Women has been getting it’s fair share of attention – mostly of the angry and upset variety. In the rant, he asserts that women don’t have the high-paying jobs and positions of power that men do basically because we don’t sell ourselves well enough. He sees male students all the time pompously asserting themselves and even lying in order to get where they want in life. Women just don’t act like arrogant bastards, and so therefore we are still underrepresented in the professional world. He suggests, we need to just be more like men in our self-promotion. He writes-

And it looks to me like women in general, and the women whose educations I am responsible for in particular, are often lousy at those kinds of behaviors, even when the situation calls for it. They aren’t just bad at behaving like arrogant self-aggrandizing jerks. They are bad at behaving like self-promoting narcissists, anti-social obsessives, or pompous blowhards, even a little bit, even temporarily, even when it would be in their best interests to do so. Whatever bad things you can say about those behaviors, you can’t say they are underrepresented among people who have changed the world.

Now this is asking women to behave more like men, but so what? We ask people to cross gender lines all the time. We’re in the middle of a generations-long project to encourage men to be better listeners and more sensitive partners, to take more account of others’ feelings and to let out our own feelings more. Similarly, I see colleges spending time and effort teaching women strategies for self-defense, including direct physical aggression. I sometimes wonder what would happen, though, if my college spent as much effort teaching women self-advancement as self-defense.

* * *

Some of the reason these strategies succeed is because we live in a world where women are discriminated against. However, even in an ideal future, self-promotion will be a skill that produces disproportionate rewards, and if skill at self-promotion remains disproportionately male, those rewards will as well. This isn’t because of oppression, it’s because of freedom.

So on one hand, I understand his point. Research has shown that often women make less than men simply because women don’t ask for raises as often as men do. We don’t put ourselves out there in risky ways, making ourselves look good no matter who it may hurt. But as a Christian I have a hard time with his suggestion that if women just became selfish jerks like men, we would be all good. Yes, we have the freedom to play that game and yes, it may actually get us more power and money, but we’d have to sell our soul in the process. I don’t want to play a bitchier meaner game in order to compete, I want to change the game itself. I would rather live in a world where being an arrogant bastard wasn’t a virtue. Sure, that might sound naive and idealistic, but it also sounds much more in line with my faith. If I want to be like Jesus, I can’t play the game “me first, screw whoever gets in my way.”

So I wonder if the professors and consultants who are putting their time and energy into helping women be able to play just as dirty as the men in a broken system would instead put effort into building a new system what difference that would make? What would it take for that to start to happen? What changes need to be made at fundamental levels to shift the way this entire game gets played? What would a system even look like where caring for the other instead of “every man for himself” was the central tenet?

Julie Clawson is a mother, writer, and speaker. She is the author of Everyday Justice: The Global Impact of Our Daily Choices (IVP, 2009). In addition to moderating the Emerging Women blog, she also writes at julieclawson.com.