power & control in dating and marriage relationships

When one person in a relationship repeatedly scares, hurts or puts down the other person, it is abuse. The Power & Control Wheel lists examples of each form of abuse. Remember, abuse is much more than slapping or grabbing someone.

(click on the image for a larger view at Catholic Social Services of Washtenaw County, Alternatives to Domestic Aggression)

A relationship full of control is really out of control.

click here for resources for survivors of domestic violence

john piper on ‘does a woman submit to abuse?’

i try to stay out of the culture wars within our faith, truly i do, although i admit i’m not always successful. but! this makes me livid because it is condoning domestic abuse and i will speak out on it and so should you.

john piper says, and i quote,

“If it’s [the abuse] not requiring her to sin but simply hurting her, then I think she endures verbal abuse for a season, and she endures perhaps being smacked one night, and then she seeks help from the church.”

i know i’m preaching to the choir here but this is wrong on so many counts. what piper doesn’t realize is a woman could be killed from enduring one night of being smacked. we need to stand against this sort of “teaching”. there is nothing of God in it. also, verbal abuse is just as wrong as well and women are NOT to submit to it. the power of life and death is in the tongue. as my former pastor, a complementarian, said in a sermon once: if a man ever hits you you call 911 and you call on God!