Answering Their Cries

Answering Their Cries:

Child Abuse and the Violence of War

February 5, 2006

The Rev. Penny Rather

The Unitarian Universalist Fellowship of Laramie

As our country approaches the beginning of our fourth year at war in Iraq, I am reminded of the service that was held at Jefferson Unitarian Church, where I was the ministerial intern, the night after our initial invasion in March of 2003. A dozen or so people gathered that snowy Thursday evening to meditate and pray together and to share our feelings about war in general and about this war in particular.

One couple brought their infant daughter with them, and I was drawn in by her playfulness and joy. My children are grown now, and I am always enchanted by babies, but this encounter was different – more poignant than most. I saw in this child the bliss and peacefulness borne of trust in her world. And I was glad for the innocence that she represented to me in the midst of my discouragement and great sadness about the state of our world that day.

Now perhaps I was reading so much into this child’s smiles and gurgles because I needed to. But, knowing her parents, I was confident that her trust in her world was well placed. She is loved and well cared for and lives in a place of bounty and relative peace, surrounded by a caring community.

Yes, I needed to see trust and hope in this child, because my heart was full of sadness for the children of Iraq. And for the children of the world who have lived their entire lives as refugees or surrounded by war or the threat of war. And for the children of this country who are growing up amidst violence – whether it be the violence of war that comes to them through television or violence in their homes – in the very place where they should be safe and protected.

We heard earlier, in the words of Martin Luther King, Jr., that “violence begets violence; hate begets hate; and toughness begets a greater toughness.” If we are ever to build a world that is free from the violence of war, we must raise our children in homes that are free from the violence of abuse.

Next weekend this congregation will partner with the Albany County SAFE Project for our 21^st Chocolate Fiesta. I am grateful that this community has an agency whose mission is “to advocate for victims of family violence, sexual assault and incest, and to create social change to end violence,” and I am proud that this congregation is uniting with SAFE through the Chocolate Fiesta this year. But what I really wish is that there was not need for such an organization; that it could be put out of business for lack of clients.

If that is ever to happen, children need to learn, not by what we say, but by what they experience – at home and on the world stage – that they can trust the world around them; that violence is not the way to resolve conflict or express frustration; that the strong and powerful will take care of the weak and powerless instead of exploiting or dominating them. As I see the war in Iraq head into its fourth year, and I need to find some antidote for the grief and pessimism I feel, I dream of a world where violence is no longer acceptable – in our homes, our schools, our cities, or our world.

I know that is an ambitious dream, and one I will probably not see realized in this lifetime. But I believe we can begin to make that dream come true by, among other things, working to heal the wounds of the survivors of past child abuse and to eradicate child abuse in the future. And I believe that our Unitarian Universalist values can help us find the strength and the ways to carry out that work. Whether we choose to address the issue of child abuse through work with individuals and families; or by addressing social, legal, or political systems; or through spiritual practice; or in any other way, we can make a difference. A difference that will not only improve the lives of countless children, but can expand to build a culture of non-violence.

Rebecca Parker wrote that “violence is illuminated by insistent exposure. Steady witnesses end the hidden life of violence by bringing it to public attention.” We can’t stop child abuse until we acknowledge it and talk about it. But we don’t want to talk about it. And that is not surprising. It is painful.

Sometimes it is tempting to ignore behavior bordering on physical or emotional abuse by thinking that we have to respect the private choices of parents. And sexual abuse of children is a dirty little secret that we would like to think it only happens to other people. We deceive ourselves into thinking that it is rare. It is not.

We deceive ourselves into thinking that we can keep our children safe by teaching them not to take rides with strangers. But most perpetrators are known to their victims. They are parents and teachers, coaches and clergy, baby-sitters and neighbors. They are men and women. They are more often straight than gay. Sexual abuse is not about sex. It is about power and domination and oppression.

And if it is not easy for society in general to talk about it, imagine what it is like for the children. Most abused children won’t tell us what is happening in a straightforward way. They can’t. Their lives depend on the very adults who have betrayed them. Their abusers may have threatened them or convinced them that they deserve the abuse. Or told them that if they tell, something bad will happen to them or to someone else. My father told me that I had to keep our little “secret” because if my mother found out she would be too hurt.

And it is not much easier for adult survivors to tell what happened to them. I first publicly told my story of years of sexual abuse by both my parents when I was a panelist at a Unitarian Universalist women’s conference. What more supportive environment could you imagine? But it was still excruciating. I remember making a list of all the reasons not to tell my story - I felt ashamed, I didn’t want to make people uncomfortable, perhaps no one would believe me, perhaps it would get back to my family and they would be hurt, maybe people would think I was making excuses for my own shortcomings, maybe it wasn’t really all that bad – the list was long. The list of reasons to tell my story was quite short. But it was ultimately more compelling.

I had to tell it for myself; it helped my own healing.

I had to tell it for the anonymous survivors in the audience. In the hours following that panel discussion a half dozen women came up to me, several of them with tears in their eyes, and began their healing journeys with the words “I’ve never told anyone this before. . . ” On other occasions when I have spoken there have also been men who began their healing by telling me their stories. It is interesting to me that Rebecca Parker moderated that panel, and it was eight years later when her story of abuse and redemption was published in Proverbs of Ashes.

And I had to tell it for the children. Because when adult survivors refuse to let bygones be bygones, refuse to keep blaming themselves, refuse to keep silent, the rest of society can learn to hear what abused children are telling us in their own ways. It takes just one teacher to see a child’s habitual truancy not as delinquency but as a cry for help. It takes just one youth minister or Sunday School teacher to recognize the implications of a sexually precocious grade schooler. It takes just one pediatrician to follow up on a toddler’s chronic bladder infections or a baby’s unexplained bruises.

The anguish of child abuse and the violence of war are related in a number of ways. When I was diagnosed with PTSD, or Post Traumatic Stress Disorder, I began reading everything I could about this syndrome. I discovered that the two populations most affected by PTSD are war veterans and survivors of childhood sexual abuse. These two populations also share a legacy of violence that is reflected in depression, addictions, low self esteem, chronic physical illness, and suicide. The violence that soldiers experience in war harms their souls as surely as the violence endured by abused children damages theirs.

Vietnam veteran Claude Thomas writes about his war experience, saying that in order to carry out his duty to kill he “learned to dehumanize the enemy, and in the process, [he] became dehumanized” (Kotler 98). Many a Vietnam vet has been unable to shed the pain of war and has carried war’s violence back into their civilian life.

In reflecting on the 1991 Gulf War, Vietnamese Buddhist monk Thich Nhat Hanh writes, “One and a half million soldiers were practicing violence, hatred, and fear, and the American public supported them to do so. They thought that this war was somehow quick, clean, and moral. They saw only bridges and buildings being destroyed, but the real casualties were the souls of men and women who came home after practicing violence for so many months. . . After one or two weeks, the war welled up from within their deepest consciousness, and their families and the whole of society will have to endure their pain for a long time” (Love in Action 79)

In Proverbs of Ashes, Rebecca Parker says that, as difficult it was for people in her church to talk about and hear about child abuse, there were even deeper silences around men’s experiences in war. When their stories did begin to surface, one Vietnam veteran sought her counsel because flashbacks were driving him to hit his children without even knowing what he was doing. Another relieved his conscience shortly before he died by telling her his story from the Korean War.

Violence among nations is linked to violence in the home, and both are linked to violence in the heart. As I grieve for the people of Iraq, and for the warriors on both sides, I try to find some way to respond to this war that will not just make me feel better, but might actually help to heal the suffering of individuals and nations or help break the cycle of violence that takes its toll among children and soldiers alike.

Shedding light on the violence of war and of child abuse by fearlessly telling our own stories is one way that survivors can help others heal. And by bearing witness in love to the suffering of child abuse and the suffering of war, we can all participate in the deliverance of our world from these twin tragedies.

You don’t have to have personal experience with abuse to have an impact. There are many ways that anyone can contribute to ending violence in the home. Let me just describe four – political advocacy, direct involvement with abuse prevention programs, religious community, and personal spiritual growth.

First, we can advocate and work for institutional changes that address the causes and remedies of child abuse. The grandparents of Tanner Dowling, a baby boy who died at his parents’ hands in Boulder County a few years ago, had alerted social services of their concern for his safety. But the caseworkers had such heavy case loads that he slipped through the cracks and paid for the inadequate funding of child protective services with his life.

We can write to our lawmakers and appeal for increased funding for prevention and treatment of child abuse; for the training of investigators who know how to question children so that their stories hold up in court – and so that the occasional false accusation, that can devastate an innocent person , is detected.

Every legislative season, the Wyoming Coalition against Domestic Violence and Sexual Assault, located in Laramie, is working hard to implement and revise laws that will protect child and adult victims of domestic violence and sexual assault. Contact your legislators and the WCADVSA; find out what is happening and advocate for the victims of violence.

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Secondly, as part of a Unitarian Universalist religious community we can make an impact in a number of ways. I think that the more responsible adults in a child’s life, the better. Make connections with some of our children and youth. Volunteer to help out in their religious education classes from time to time.

In her Chalice Lighting this morning, Lisa told us how children are taught non-violence in their Sunday School classes. We teach UU children to think for themselves; to respect others, but question authority. Now, it might be annoying sometimes, when they learn that lesson too well. Sometimes independent children can be a little rowdy or impertinent. But when we set limits without demanding absolute unquestioned obedience, we raise children who can say “No” to anyone, even an adult, who tries to persuade them to do something that they know in their hearts to be inappropriate.

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Thirdly, there are many ways to affirm and promote the inherent worth and dignity of every person and justice, equity, and compassion in human relations through direct involvement with abuse prevention programs. Here in Laramie, Cathedral Home for Children and the Laramie Youth Crisis Center work with troubled and at-risk youth, and they both offer opportunities to volunteer. Parents should find out what education is provided about domestic violence in their children’s schools. The SAFE project can provide resources and presentations for almost any audience. Perhaps a PTA meeting could be organized to address this issue.

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And finally, since both the violence of war and the violence of child abuse are accompanied by violence in the heart, participation in some sort of spiritual practice is another thing we can each do to work for a peaceful world. It takes the strength and determination of a compassionate heart to break the cycle of violence that perpetuates both child abuse and warfare; to name and mourn the effects of violence; to nurture the “healing love [that] touches the hidden wounds of violence, lances the places of stored trauma, [and] restores glimpses of soul.” We can develop such a compassionate heart through spiritual disciplines and in religious community.

I reject any theology that claims that tragedies happen for a purpose – whether that is couched as God’s will or karma – but I do believe that it is possible to transform the suffering born of child abuse or war into the development of compassion and the quest for justice. Martin Luther King tells us that “at the center of nonviolence lies the principle of love,” and Rebecca Parker writes that salvation requires steady witness, and mourning, and love. No matter what our theology of salvation, we must seek a salve to heal the wounds of violence.

God does not will the violation of innocent children. But God will be with them and help them make meaning out of their suffering by transforming their anguish into compassion and a quest for justice. No child has ever done anything to karmically deserve the horror of sexual violation or of their village being bombed. But the suffering rent by their oppression can lead them to feel the suffering of others and work for its cessation.

Our children are the future of our world and its hope and promise. If the adult survivors of war and abuse will tell their stories, and if the rest of us will hear, and if we all will listen to the children and demand justice for them, we can stop child abuse. We can begin to make violence unacceptable as a way to settle disputes. We can answer the cries of the children of war and the children of abuse. We can save one child. And then another. And another. And because we are not separate from them, their salvation is our salvation.

May it be so.

Readings

The first reading is from Martin Luther King, Jr. on race relations and the Vietnam War.

“At the center of nonviolence lies the principle of love. . . . We have learned through the grim realities of life and history that hate and violence solve nothing. They only serve to push us deeper and deeper into the mire. Violence begets violence; hate begets hate; and toughness begets a greater toughness.”

“It is not enough to say, ‘We must not wage war.’ It is necessary to love peace and sacrifice for it. We must concentrate not merely on the eradication of war but on the affirmation of peace. . . . We must see that peace represents a sweeter music, a cosmic melody that is far superior to the discords of war. Somehow we must transform the dynamics of the world power struggle from the nuclear arms race, which no one can win, to a creative contest to harness man’s genius for the purpose of making peace and prosperity a reality for all the nations of the world. In short, we must shift the arms race into a ‘peace race.’ If we have the will and determination to mount such a peace effort, we will unlock hitherto tightly sealed doors of hope and bring new light into the dark chambers of pessimism.”

Our second reading is from Rebecca Parker, President of Starr King School for the ministry, on childhood sexual abuse.

“To know the presence of God endures through violence is to know life holds more than its destruction. The power of life is strong. Salvation is sometimes possible.

Salvation begins with the courage of witnesses whose gaze is steady. Steady witnesses neither flee in horror to hide their eyes, nor console with sweet words, “It isn’t all that bad. Something good is intended by this.” Violence is illuminated by insistent exposure. Steady witnesses end the hidden life of violence by bringing it to public attention. They help to restore souls fragmented by violence. They accompany the journey to healing.

Salvation requires love. Fainthearted love, idealized love, impatient love cannot walk in the valley of the shadow of death. Healing love touches the hidden wounds of violence, lances the places of stored trauma, restores glimpses of soul. . . .

Salvation also requires mourning. We must cross the raging rivers of grief to rest before the still waters of blessing. . . .The light of sorrow illuminates where life has been diminished . . Mourning deepens reverence for what is precious.”