Popular Christian divorce sermons are worded to make divorce look frivolous and “worldly” and to make Christian divorcees appear to be immature, superficial quitters. Most give the impression that marital abuse is not a problem in our churches by either trivializing issues or ignoring abuse completely. And many sermons contain incorrect information about abuse, gender, and the outcomes of children of divorce. Valerie Hobbs, Ph.D., senior lecturer and linguist at University of Sheffield, UK, studied Christian divorce sermons to analyze how they described divorce and divorcees.
TOPICS:
1:10 – Divorce sermon overview.
2:19 – Dr. Hobbs discusses how her work has been misused recently, ironically, to support the opposite of her conclusion.
2:40 – Sermons are a key site of authority in churches.
3:25 – Dr. Hobbs’s religious background
4:00 – Her membership in Presbyterian Church PCA, Orthodox Presbyterian Church, etc.
4:30 – Her academic career
5:00 – Religious language conveys who are insiders and outsiders
6:30 – Churches often marginalize divorcees. Abuse victims are encouraged to stay married at all cost; divorcees as stigmatized outsiders.
7:10 – Involvement with Ecclesiastical Court Trials
7:45 – New book on Religious Language (release date: 2021)
8:00 – Religious language can be used to control and manipulate, as well as doing good things.
8:21 – Dr. Hobbs’s education
10:50 – Victims of abuse/betrayal or other trauma need to tell their stories.
11:15 – People need to be heard and believed
11:45 – If victims are unable to tell their story, their body holds onto it.
12:30 – Listening allows the victim to release the story and not hold onto it anymore.
13:00 – The importance of hearing stories.
13:30 – Christian language and messages about violence.
14:45 – Sermons that minimize people’s trauma in marriage.
16:00 – Baskerville: Many evangelical Christian divorcees have stopped attending churches that stigmatize them from the pulpit and treat their kids as “broken.”
17:40 – Factual errors in divorce sermons.
20:30 – Sermon examples
24:10 – Quote from a sermon from a permanence-view pastor: Only death breaks the bond. Not murder, incest, extreme violence.
25:00 – When the pastor uses stigmatizing language, he doesn’t have to fear that someone will report marital abuse and ask him to get involved.
28:35 – Message in sermons: We Christians don’t divorce. That’s what Hollywood does.
30:00 – Of the most popular sermons, only one talked about marital violence and the need for divorce.
37:45 – 7 points pastors should know. #domesticviolenceawareness #dvam #dvam2020
44:20 – What is your message to married people in destructive marriages.
44:40 – Listen to the feeling of discomfort; God has equipped you with the ability to sense danger. God is love. That is what he wants. Love prohibits and condemns any kind of abuse. Being in a state of anxiety around someone you love should be a warning sign. If there’s tension in the home and you don’t feel safe, that’s a warning. The home was meant to feel like a nest.
48:10 – You don’t have to prove you’re perfect to the world. Jesus already did that. You don’t have to earn God’s love by staying in a destructive marriage.
CONTACT: Valerie Hobbs, Ph.D. – Twitter @vhobbs5 www.drvhobbs.com
ABOUT
Gretchen Baskerville is a Christian divorce recovery leader and researcher. For more than 20 years, she has worked with Christian women and men going through difficult, life-saving divorces, listening with compassion to those who have suffered from domestic violence, betrayal, infidelity, and emotional abuse. She helps heartbroken people find hope, courage, and healing.
Her book, “The Life-Saving Divorce” is about the one-half of U.S. divorces that are for very serious reasons. What’s a Life-Saving Divorce? A Life-Saving Divorce is a divorce for the serious reasons: a pattern of chronic emotional abuse, infidelity, domestic violence, sexual immorality, criminality, neglect, substance abuse, etc.
How to Get the Book, “The Life-Saving Divorce: Hope for People Leaving Destructive Relationships”
Paperback Book/Kindle via Amazon: https://amzn.to/3CCBsnr As an Amazon Associate I earn from qualifying purchases.
For the 27 Myths of Divorce in Sermons see Ch.3 in “The Life-Saving Divorce.”
Follow Gretchen Baskerville:
Subscribe to Gretchen’s You Tube channel: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCRgt…
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Twitter: https://twitter.com/GGBaskerville
Other helpful links
Good Sermons about Abuse and Divorce: http://lifesavingdivorce.com/pastors-…
Does Malachi 2:16 say “God Hates Divorce?” http://www.LifeSavingDivorce.com/myth18
The Truth About Kids and Divorce: http://lifesavingdivorce.com/abuse-is…
50 Most Popular Blog Posts: http://lifesavingdivorce.com/popular/
Life-Saving Divorce Email Signup: http://www.LifeSavingDivorce.com/courage
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