Domestic violence often happens where outsiders cannot see it. Behind the appearance of an ordinary marriage or family life, someone may be living with threats, humiliation, intimidation, coercion or physical violence while saying nothing about what is happening at home.
The scale of the problem is enormous. According to the World Health Organization’s latest global estimates, nearly one in three women aged 15 and older have experienced physical or sexual violence by an intimate partner or sexual violence by someone else during their lifetime. In the previous 12 months alone, an estimated 316 million women aged 15 and older experienced physical or sexual violence by an intimate partner.
Domestic violence is not limited to a particular income, educational level, culture or religious background. Nor does it always begin with physical assault. Abuse can include emotional and psychological abuse, sexual coercion, financial control, threats, isolation, monitoring and other controlling behaviors.
Whatever form it takes, one principle must remain clear: the person being abused is not responsible for the abusive behavior of the person harming them.
Why Is It So Difficult to Speak About Abuse?
People remain in abusive relationships for many reasons, and those reasons are often far more complicated than outsiders realize.
Fear may be a major factor. A woman may fear what her partner will do if she tries to leave or tells someone what is happening. She may depend on him financially, worry about her children, have nowhere safe to go, or fear that family and friends will not believe her. Shame, religious beliefs, immigration concerns, and social expectations may create additional barriers.
Some women may still love their partners and hope desperately that things will change.
Others may not initially recognize what they are experiencing as abuse, particularly when the relationship has gradually shifted from affection to criticism, isolation, and control.
This is one reason telling someone to “just leave” is rarely enough. A person experiencing abuse needs to be heard, believed, and helped to consider her options and safety without being blamed for the situation.
Abuse Is About Power and Control
Domestic violence can take many forms. Physical assault may be the most visible, but it is not the only kind of abuse.
An abusive partner may control money, monitor phone calls, isolate someone from friends and relatives, use threats, destroy belongings, humiliate a partner, restrict access to transportation or healthcare, or use sexual coercion. Some abusive relationships involve several of these behaviors at the same time.
The abuse may also appear to follow a pattern. Tension and intimidation can build before an abusive incident occurs. Afterward, the abusive partner may apologize, promise to change, become affectionate, or offer gifts. Those periods of apparent remorse can make the person being harmed hope that the abuse is finally over.
But apologies are not the same as lasting change, and responsibility for changing abusive behavior belongs to the person engaging in it.
Faith Should Never Be Used to Excuse Abuse
For Christians, this deserves particular attention.
A woman should not be told that enduring abuse is evidence of greater faith, that submitting more completely will stop her husband’s violence, or that protecting herself and her children represents a failure of her marriage vows.
Prayer can provide comfort, strength, and spiritual support. A compassionate church community can also become an important source of practical assistance. But spiritual counsel should never replace necessary safety measures, medical attention, or professional help.
Scripture should not be used to make someone feel responsible for another person’s violence.
Churches have an opportunity to become places where someone experiencing abuse can speak without being shamed, blamed, or immediately pressured into preserving the appearance of a marriage at any cost.
Children Are Affected Too
Children do not have to be physically assaulted themselves to be harmed by domestic violence.
Growing up around violence, intimidation and fear can affect a child’s emotional wellbeing and sense of security. WHO identifies violence against women as a serious public-health and human-rights problem with consequences extending to children, families and communities.
Protecting children therefore matters when considering how to respond to an abusive home.
If You Are Experiencing Domestic Violence
Recognizing abuse can be frightening, particularly when you are uncertain about what will happen next. You do not have to make every decision at once.
Consider telling someone you trust what is happening. Depending on your circumstances, that person might be a family member, friend, healthcare professional, domestic-violence advocate, counselor, or trusted faith leader who understands abuse and will not blame you for it.
A personalized safety plan can also help you think through what you may need if circumstances become dangerous. This can include identification and important documents, medication, money, keys, emergency telephone numbers, children’s records, and information about somewhere safe to go. The National Domestic Violence Hotline emphasizes that safety plans should reflect the individual’s particular circumstances rather than assuming the same approach is appropriate for everyone.
If there is immediate danger, contact emergency services where you live.
In the United States, the National Domestic Violence Hotline provides confidential assistance and safety-planning resources.
How Friends and Family Can Help
When someone tells you she is being abused, one of the most important things you can do is listen without judgment.
Believe her. Avoid asking what she did to provoke the abuse or why she has not already left. Do not make the decisions for her. Instead, help her understand that she has options and support her as she determines what is safest.
Practical assistance may matter tremendously. That could mean helping her locate a domestic-violence organization or shelter, accompanying her when she seeks medical or legal assistance, helping with transportation or childcare, safely storing important documents, or simply remaining available when she needs someone trustworthy.
Most importantly, resist the temptation to blame the person being harmed.
Breaking the Silence
Domestic violence thrives when violence is minimized, hidden, or treated merely as a private marital disagreement. It isn’t.
Every person deserves to live without being threatened, controlled, humiliated, or assaulted by someone who claims to love them.
For Christians, compassion should mean more than telling someone in danger to pray harder or endure longer. It should mean listening carefully, refusing to excuse abuse, helping people find appropriate support, and taking their safety seriously.
Breaking the silence may be frightening. But no one should have to endure abuse simply to preserve the appearance of a peaceful home. No victim should ever be made responsible for the violence someone else chooses to commit.
Eva Bell is a doctor of Medicine and also a freelance writer of articles, short stories, and children’s stories. Published in Indian magazines and newspapers, anthologies, and also on the web. Author of two novels, one non-fiction book, and two children’s books. Special interests: travel and Women’s Issues – http://www.evabell.net.
