Legalism

Reflections on what went wrong

October 7, 2010
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by Jo @ Woman Reclaimed

We’re rapidly approaching the anniversary of when I lost my life as I knew it. I’m finally to a point where I feel strong enough to boldly face where we went, what went wrong and what we messed up so very badly. We fell down the rabbit hole of Patriarchal matrimony. We didn’t necessarily mean to do so. Certainly, we never thought we were down so far as we truly were. We thought we didn’t fully believe in wife-only submission. We thought we never believed that the wife’s salvation is based upon the Husband’s favor. In more ways than I ever understood until the journey of this last year, we did fall into the trap.


Just in case anyone is wondering what my opinion on Patriarchal marriage is now, let me make it VERY clear what my opinion is and why.

Patriarchal marriage is dangerous. First, there is NO accountability to the husband. If the husband is ungodly or inappropriate, then you are to wait for God to deal with him. So basically, a husband can tell his wife to do ANYTHING he wants. The potential to abuse this authority with NO consequences is massive and scary. Only a very few men would not become abusive in some manner or another. There is no safety for a wife if her husband becomes abusive. There is no real accountability for men.

Patriarchal leaders are very open that a wife should never, ever concern herself with what accountability or oversight might exist for a husband, because that would be dishonoring his godhead in her life to do so.

Time Heals All Wounds ~ Part 10: It’s in the Lord’s Hands

September 30, 2010
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All beautiful the march of days, as seasons come and go; The Hand that shaped the rose hath wrought the crystal of the snow

by Shelly Cruz

I walked over to the phone, and dialed Cecilia’s number. My first thought was that it would possibly be disconnected, but who knows, maybe they finally moved. Cecilia always talked about how the time would come, and their house would be demolished, and then they would have to move. They were living rent-free in an old farmhouse. Someone had blessed them years ago with a property. They had to care for it, and in return they could live there for free, but once the owner passed away, they’d have to move.

They were even given a 15-passenger van as a blessing too! Regardless of their ways, the Lord always saw fit to bless them, in abundance, too. Oftentimes, I wonder why all the big families always get so many blessings? If being Quiverfull, is an Old Testament mandate, why does it seem like extra-large families always get extra-large blessings?

I have seen this in church many times, the family with the 8+ kids, receive box loads of children’s clothing for their children. They get free food dropped to their doorsteps, their mortgage paid for them, or they get a blessing of not having any mortgage at all. Do people feel sorry for them, or are they really the “chosen ones”? I know I should not be questioning these things, but sometimes I do. It seems, to me, like the most legalistic people I know are the ones who get enormous blessings.

Anyway, the phone rang three times, and then someone picked up, ”Hello, whom may you wish to correspond with please?”

Justice is No Lady: Chapter 2 ~ First Prison Break

September 27, 2010
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Warning: This story series contains descriptions of physical abuse.

by Defendant Rising

1993 was a rough year. It was the year that Nate was fired from his engineering job in Tazewell, Virginia, and first started thinking about studying the law. It was the year when we went to a conference and met a pastor who advocated corporal punishment for wives, and Nate took to his teachings like a duck to water. It was the year I had Jack, who was conceived a few months after Daniel’s birth. Most notably, 1993 marked my first attempt at a separation from Nate.

Daniel had been born at home. Nate and I were part of the Christian separatist movement of the late ’80s and early ’90s, rooted in the belief that liberals and “secular humanists” would destroy the moral fiber of America. Christian separatists— right-wing religious splinter groups including white supremacists, Y2K survivalists, secessionists, reconstructionists, and so on—believed that the upstanding patriotic Christian Americans needed to separate themselves and create a fortress of Christian homes where the true leaders of tomorrow would be raised.

We were associated with the Quiverfull movement too, which meant that we rejected birth control so that we could physically produce a lot of the leaders of tomorrow: God’s Army. Home birth, home schooling, even home church were big trends. Anything that kept the faithful tucked away in their righteous enclaves and away from the godless masses. Whole communities sprang up where Christian right-wingers could turn on (Rush Limbaugh and G. Gordon Liddy), tune out (the liberal media establishment—many of us even tossed out our television sets), and drop out of mainstream American life.

We were the counter-counterculture. We were fanatics. We were darned proud of it. Quiverfull, in particular, was a philosophy that any married couple in the Christian Right could buy right into. It was so easy: Exercise Dominion! Please Jesus! Take over America! Using Tools You Probably Have Around the House!

The 49 Character Qualities of Ruth #22: Gathering Evidence

September 24, 2010
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by RazingRuth

I was taken back to the station. Officer Barney* and Officer Crouch* (*obviously pseudonyms) spoke to me very little on the way to the station, but the questions they did ask were sympathetic. They wanted to make sure I knew what I was doing – as a minor (technically), I was a runaway. It didn’t matter that I was several weeks shy of 18, I was a minor. They made sure I understood that there was a very good chance I would be sent home with my parents anyway. I understood. I had just come too far to turn back now.

We got to the station and they led me into a room. I’d only been in there a few minutes when Officer Barney came in with the attorney the Kline’s had found for me. Attorney Dana* said she’d called protective services and pulled some strings but that, unless I could prove the engagement and that it was against my will, I would likely have to go home to my parents. I’d have to emancipate myself if I couldn’t prove their was abuse and that process was likely to take longer than my turning 18. Proving the engagement was pretty easy. I had a ring. When I got to the Kline’s, I’d taken it off my finger and tossed it into my bag. Since my possessions were taken from me when we entered the station, the ring was retrieved and catalogued as “evidence”. Then there was my journal. The journal I kept could be used as evidence. The problem was that I had left it behind. The only way to get it would be through my parents and you can imagine how asking for it might not work out. We decided to call my brother and see if he could get to our house and get it under the auspices of getting me some “modest clothing”. It worked. We got my journal.

Daughter of the Patriarchy: “Why do you look that cow in the face?”

September 20, 2010
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By Sierra

Courtship took my church by storm in the 1990s. While I never read I Kissed Dating Goodbye, I was given a number of books about marriage and intimacy and taught explicitly that dating was preparation for divorce. Having never dated, I was not in a position to protest. I listened patiently to the story of the couple in my church who had married without so much as holding hands. They were the happiest couple after Eamon and Pearl, so clearly they’d done something right. I learned that smitten young Message couples would walk around holding each end of a shared stick, in order to express their affection without risking finger-to-finger contact. I thought to myself that it sounded a bit contrived.

I was sure, however, that the first man to touch me would take away something of my purity: a commodity I was given at birth and must guard throughout my life. I was spiritually dressed in a sparkling white wedding gown, which I must constantly defend against the oil of someone else’s hands. Kissing was out of the question. Branham taught that there were “sex glands” in the lips of men and women, and that the two sets should never meet except for marital procreation. But it wasn’t just physical contact to be avoided: broken hearts came, too, from loosely guarded emotions. I must never say the words, “I love you,” to anyone until I was engaged. True love could only happen to the pure.

And so it was with dread that I, at age 15, received and read an email from my friend Karl. I’d known him online for a couple of years – we had joined a message board and discussed our shared love of Japanese anime there. He had been left hanging when I purged my life of secular influences – indeed, I had also purged my life of him, along with the anime and my other very close friends. But on a whim I had logged into AIM, we’d talked, and he’d got my email address. He wrote to me about a dream he’d had where everything was right and beautiful, where I’d come back from my strange and sudden disappearance and told him that it was all okay, now I could finally be with him. He said he loved me. I stared at the email in helpless frustration. There was nothing I could do. I couldn’t date! Especially not an unbeliever. With my cheeks burning in the shame of hypocrisy, I clattered out a terrified reply. “It’s not me you need,” I wrote through gritted teeth and tears. “It’s Jesus.” I never felt like such a liar.

Feeling sure that God would bless my efforts to fully commit myself to Him, I deliberately cast Karl out of my mind and immersed myself in a mythology of my own making: a story running from the time I entered the Message to the present. I rejected the name I’d used online, telling myself all that was “Sierra” was sinful and rebellious. “I will not be Sierra again,” I wrote in my journal furiously. I would rededicate my life to Christ, and revert to my childhood nickname, Tara. And onto the set of my little drama waltzed Sven.

The 49 Character Qualities of Ruth #21: The First Night

September 15, 2010
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by RazingRuth

It’s hard to explain what those first few minutes were like, as I made my way across the field to the neighbors’. I had a million emotions – fear, anger, sadness, grief, excitement, and uncertainty, just to name a few. At any moment, I expected the sliding door to open and the back yard lights to go on. I expected one of the boys, or – worse- my father, to hop on the ATV we kept in the yard.

Looking back every step, though – all I saw was a quiet house. No one had noticed my leaving, even though I was sharing a room at this point. In hindsight, I’ve always wondered if my sisters had slept through my feverish gathering (maybe they thought I was gathering clothes for a late night load of laundry?) or if they knew I was leaving and knew I was unhappy? Either way, they didn’t stop me or raise any alarm.

My neighbors were shocked to see me standing on their porch. Mr. and Mrs. Kline* (pseudonym) had had their doubts about my family for years. They’d called protective services one day after watching my dad dole out a punishment to my brother. Protective services did nothing – deeming the incident to be within the scope of parental discipline, but the Kline’s intervention made a deep impression on me. I knew someone was watching our family.

The 49 Character Qualities of Ruth #20: Betrothed

September 13, 2010
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by RazingRuth

So, there I was, pre-engaged. Betrothed. I refused to say “engaged” because that would suggest I was a party to the act. Nothing could be farther from the truth. When I should’ve been praying to ask God to make my heart right with these decisions being made for me, I was asking God to get me out and show me a way to avoid it all.

My goal was to graduate high school. When I told my mother that, she made sure my home school curriculum was first priority – just to get it out of the way and give me less of an excuse. When I told my mom I didn’t like the boy ‘that way’ – she thought she’d help me by having me spend time with his family. When that didn’t work – I was sent away. I was sent to work in the offices of the movement. During that time, all ties were cut for me. I was only allowed to get one letter a week from my “betrothed” and one phone call from my parents. Both of these were pre-read and listened to. I was kept, doing church related tasks, busy for three months.

When I had been beated down (emotionally and spiritually), I was allowed to go home. The very next day, my dad invited Adam to come help with a project we were doing. He was bringing another brother as a chaperone. I knew the question was coming and the question was going to be the catalyst to change in my life.

The 49 Character Qualities of Ruth #19: You are 16, going on 17

September 10, 2010
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by RazingRuth

I spent close to, or maybe a little over a year, trying to dodge Adam’s calls. We weren’t officially “courting”, so I didn’t see why I had to speak with him any more than I was allowed to speak to other male “friends of the family” that called. Unfortunately, my father had decided that we should get to know each other better and that was the end of that discussion.

Adam was a very pushy guy. Many of his questions seemed inappropriate, even if they would’ve been asked in a normal dating situation. He would ask the standards:

  • How many children do you want?
  • Will you pledge to allowing the Lord to open and close your womb?
  • How do you feel about debt?
  • Would you be willing to sacrifice and go without in order to start OUR lives out with no debt?
  • Would you allow me my patriarchal authority or would you insist on an equal partnership (said like it was bad thing)?