Category: violence
Tylenol Christianity: Offering Hope and Healing, Instead of Easy Answers and Trite Advice
Sometimes, I feel like the church has a hard time lingering in places of pain. Abuse. Homosexuality. Bullying. Singleness. Disability. Abortion. Illness. Addiction. Grief. We tend to skim right over these topics, offering quick, carefully-crafted statements about our stance on the issue. ...
Oppressors, Activists, and Spiritual Stinginess: St. Paul’s Guide to Praying Better Prayers
"And I am praying that you will put into action the generosity that comes from your faith as you understand and experience all the good things we have in Christ." -Philemon 1:6 I was reading Philemon this weekend, and many things ...
Boyfriends, Bad Ideas, and the Bella-Katniss Continuum: Jenny’s Message on Identity in Christ
I was SO blessed to be able to speak at my beloved Mission Covenant Church last Sunday! The topic was how cohabitation hurts women and children, but we focused on the why--WHY do women get involved in relationships they know ...
Patriarchy, Pop Culture, and Pornography, Part 2
(Continued from Part 1) What it comes down to is that in many ways, society ascribes value to women based on how attractive they are to men. (This is only exacerbated by women’s idolatrous tendency to base their identity on who ...
(I know, I know--another inflammatory title. But if you're not feeling a bit inflamed by the end of this post, I don't know what's wrong with you.) Wading through statistics makes me cranky. My inner journalist, latent as she may be, ...
Okay, yes, inflammatory title. But I read something last night that made my stomach knot up into a ball Contrary to public perception, research shows that the most likely physical abuser of a young child will be that child's mother, not ...
Toxic Christianity: When Our Public Face Poisons Faith
If there's one thing that leaves me completely aghast, it's Christians hurting one another and using religion to justify their behavior, or citing it as the reason that they didn't step in to defend the hurting, vulnerable party. It's the child ...
Melody Harrison Hanson wrote a beautiful, brave post on her blog today about her experience growing up with a father who "was in ministry and was a generous, gracious, loving, God-fearing man," but who was also abusive. In fact, he ...
The Girl Who Cried Wolf, and Other Myths
You can’t go online lately without hearing about hearing about Herman Cain and the allegations of sexual harassment haunting his campaign. Those posts inevitably make me wince—not the articles themselves, but the comments crowded beneath them like protestors punching hand-scrawled ...
“It’s more dangerous to be a woman than to be a soldier…”
The PBS documentary "Women, War & Peace" will be starting tonight. I never watch television, but I will be watching this. Check your local listings to see what time it will be on in your area. Watch the full episode. See ...
Liberia, the Nobel Peace Prize, and Me
On Friday, three women were awarded the Nobel Peace Prize for their commitment to women’s rights. Two of those women, President Ellen Johnson-Sirleaf and Leymah Gbowee, were from Liberia, the country I called home for most of my elementary school ...
Why Are 200 Million Girls Missing?
"It appears that more girls have been killed in the last 50 years, precisely because they were girls, than men were killed in all the wars of the twentieth century. More girls are killed in this routine 'gendercide' in any ...
Domestic Violence and Sexual Assault: Why the Church Needs to Get Involved
October is Domestic Violence Awareness Month, and we're kicking it off tomorrow with our first AVA (Advocates for Victims of Abuse) informational meeting in the Twin Ports. In true Covenant-style (Evangelical Covenant Church, for those of you who don't happen ...
“Courageous” or Controlling? Leadership vs. Dominance in Christian Homes
On Friday, September 30th, "Courageous" will be released in theaters throughout the United States. On Saturday, Oct. 1, I will be meeting with a group of women and men to tackle the epidemic of domestic violence in Christian homes. I can't help but ...
Is It Controversial That I’m Not Down With Killing People?
Less than an hour ago, Georgia executed Troy Davis, even though 7 out of the 9 eyewitnesses recanted or changed their testimony regarding his guilt. Amnesty International, which has been protesting the case vehemently, was so overwhelmed with traffic that ...
Making Church Safe for Victims of Domestic Violence
A couple months ago, I wrote an article for The Covenant Companion about AVA (Advocates for Victims of Abuse), and the epidemic of domestic violence within the church. Writing this article broke my heart, and made me determined to do ...
