Being a writer allows you to enter into worlds that you question. I'm fascinated by what leads a woman into abusive situations. What keeps her there? When Mary Winkler killed her pastor husband, I was mesmerized. What would lead a woman to do this? Was she crazy? Was he abusive? Did she just snap? What made her snap? Those questions are what leads an author to a story idea. For one thing, if he was abusive and he was raised by his parents, that's who is raising her kids now, and that scares the daylights out of me. If she was abused, her action of killing did not stop the abuse -- it only perpetuated it. But seriously...a divorce would have kept him from being a pastor. Not his abuse, but definitely the divorce. What is it with the church that they can't get off divorce as the ugliest sin? Sheesh, you can have four abortions, sleep with every man in Texas before you're married and it's all you and God's little secret -- but get a divorce and the church is going to tell you girl about your sin.

What bothers me most about Mary Winkler's story is not that it happened, but that the church is always so quick to deny abuse. Would the church have listened to her? Would they have told her she was crazy and needed to submit more? Doing the research for the Trophy Wives' Club, the stories of abuse in the church are everywhere. Why do we deny that this exists? And if the man truly is the head of the household, why do we hold the women responsible when the marriage breaks up? Is it because the women generally stay in the church?

Could we be doing more in the church to take this matter seriously? How can we take the stigma away from divorce and slap it on abuse? Abuse is shameful. Women are ashamed to admit it. Abusers tell them they're lucky to have the life they have. Where does the truth lie?

If Christians are abusing those they've vowed to love, the truth is not in them. That is why this situation needs to be addressed. If we have not love for our fellow man/woman, we are but clanging gongs and the truth is not in us.

So if I head to murder in my stories, you'll know why now. This is not a new concept unfortunately. Sin is nothing new. "Tess of the D'Ubervilles" by Thomas Hardy. The church was quick to blame the victim of a rape and let her child bear the brunt of her "sins". Copyright 1891. So much for evolution. Kristin

Labels: church abuse