When people talk about "defending traditional marriage," what do they really mean?
Daylight Atheism > The Religious Right Vision of Marriage
As Exhibit A, I present this utterly horrifying article from No Greater Joy Ministries, a religious-right group. The article, by Michael and Debi Pearl, concerns how good Christian wives should deal with emotionally and physically abusive husbands, and all the cheerful imagery of smiling children on the masthead can't change the pure, unfettered evil it contains. If you think I'm exaggerating, just wait.
The Pearls' argument is that divorce is forbidden by the Bible, no exceptions. Therefore, if a Christian woman is in an abusive relationship, it is her God-ordained responsibility to stay with her husband, to obey his every desire, and bear his abuse without complaint or protest.
It's hard to decide which part of this is the most obscene, but there's no shortage of candidates. First, there's this, the eternal refrain of battered wives everywhere: "If I try even harder to please him, eventually he'll change!"
One day you will wake up, turn your head to smile good morning to your husband, and see the tears of thanksgiving glistening in his eyes as he tells you one more time how much he loves you and how proud he is to have you as his wife.
...This happened because day by day, minute by minute, you chose to believe God's Word and honor him even though your flesh wanted to scream in anger and defeat. And in that moment of weakness, when you bowed beneath the load, God reached down and gently reminded you to keep on because some day your children will "arise and call you blessed; your husband also, and he praiseth you. Many daughters have done virtuously, but thou excellest them all."
This promised carrot comes with a stick, a none-too-subtle threat to the woman: if you divorce your husband, God will condemn your children to eternal torture.
There is no promise in Scripture to spare your children if you leave your lost husband. I could give you a list of hundreds of godly Christians that chose to leave their unbelieving spouses and then married a believing spouse, had decent marriages, but lost their children to the world and bitterness. I have sat and listened to many say, "We sinned; our children suffered, and we lost them to the world. They hate us. My divorce was wrong. Oh if only..."
