Category Archives: Physical Abuse

February 15, 2015 · 1:00 am

Healing from Abuse

Child abuse – whether physical, emotional, or sexual abuse or neglect – is likely to have permanent consequences. The wounds of abuse are grievous, inflicted when we are most vulnerable.

The extent to which we heal varies from one victim to the next, as does the rate at which healing takes place. This makes perfect sense. Victims are violated at various ages, for varying lengths of time, in countless evil ways. They have unique internal resources, and varying degrees of external support (sometimes none).

All these are factors in recovery. We must not, therefore, gauge our progress by that of others.

The “Inner Child”

Experts often refer to the wounded “inner child”. This is not to suggest that victims develop multiple personalities, though some may. It is an abbreviated means of saying we remain sensitive to issues relating to abuse, and – at an emotional level, at least – retain a strong recollection of the trauma inflicted on us.

Misplaced “Coping” Strategies

Unable to defend themselves against abuse, some children adopt desperate strategies in the effort to cope with it. These childhood strategies may continue into adulthood, becoming a hindrance where they once served a legitimate purpose.

Dissociation is one such strategy. The child, in effect, imagines himself or herself elsewhere while the abuse is taking place. This is the “out of body” experience. Dissociation may later be triggered by events which recall (or mimic) the abuse. Though meant to be protective in nature, dissociation can produce serious gaps in a victim’s memory. Continue reading →

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February 8, 2015 · 1:00 am

Innocence

I cannot claim to have written this piece, but I wish I had.  (Anyone able to identify the author is asked, please, to let me know.)

The torment sexually abused children endure – the pain they carry for a lifetime – raises the eternal question of why God would permit evil to flourish.

Abuse can only be understood (if at all) against the backdrop of Christ’s own suffering.

As with Pharaoh’s murder of Jewish infants at the time of Moses’ birth, and the massacre of the innocents by Herod the Great following Jesus’ birth, the horrors inflicted on children by sexual predators are inexcusable.

Yet the image of children so violated may be as close to a likeness of Christ on the cross as can be had in this fallen world.

Lamb of God

Few among us would not give his/her life for the life of a child, if called on to do so. We would not hesitate. These little lambs are precious to us.

So, too, with Christ. The sinless Paschal lamb offered Himself as the Lamb of God for the atonement of our sins. Recall that John the Baptist exclaimed, “Behold the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world,” when he saw Jesus (John 1: 29).

This sacrifice by Christ was accomplished from a love so great we can barely conceive of it.

Suffering Servant

Christ is, also, described as the Suffering Servant in scripture (Isaiah 52: 13 – 53: 12).

Jesus took on a human nature in willing obedience to the Father. He was pierced and wounded on earth; His status as Lord was not grasped. Yet, the revulsion at His disfigured appearance will be replaced with great wonder. Nations will bow down before Him in adoration. Broken, He will be exalted.

Abused children differ in that they are incapable of consenting to their abuse. No one can argue that a crucified God does not understand their suffering. Why then would He allow it? This is the heart of the matter.

Battlefield

There has long been a war under way between good and evil, with the earth its venue. In reality, that war was won by Jesus’ death and resurrection. However, spiritual battles continue daily.

The adversary has the “advantage” of using even the most horrific means to accomplish his ends, to turn us from God and inflict pain upon Him. Our suffering does just that, i.e. grieve God as we are grieved when our own children suffer.

This is the context in which abuse takes place. Harm inflicted on the most vulnerable among us is a cunning weapon by the adversary against God.

But good triumphs over evil, as love is stronger than hate. At the end of time – a point which only God can determine – evil will be defeated and the scales of justice finally balanced. Like the martyrs under the altar (Revelation 6: 9-11), we wait anxiously for that day.

Sanctification

Meanwhile, we are conformed by God to the image of Christ. Archbishop Fulton J. Sheen had this to say about the sanctification process by which this takes place:

“Sanctity, then, is not giving up the world. It is exchanging the world [for something better]. It is a continuation…of the Incarnation in which Christ said to man: ‘…You give Me your time, I will give you My eternity… You give Me your slavery, I will give you My Freedom. You give Me your death, I will give you My Life. You give Me your nothingness, I will give you My All.’ And the consoling thought throughout this whole transforming process is that it does not require much time to make us saints; it requires only much love.”

Day by day, mile by mile, we follow in the Lord’s footsteps – each carrying the particular burden we have been allotted. At times, we stagger forward only by the Lord’s strength. Ours is spent.

It is love – God’s love for us, and ours for Him – which supports this impossible endeavor, and achieves this impossible goal. Not threat, not fear.

The adversary has lost, defeated by a holy God… and the weakest among us.

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January 25, 2015 · 1:00 am

Topsy Turvy

“Amnon and Tamar” (16th-17th Century), Source https://s-media-cache-ak0.pinimg.com/736x/10/4a/27/104a2757ef7c899d98a8f3cc230ae9b4.jpg (PD-Art, Old-100)

“Topsy turvy
Wake me
I’ve had enough
Topsy turvy
Don’t know
Which way is up
Or down
Tears on the ground”

– “Topsy Turvy” by Family Force 5

Child abuse victims are often scapegoated for the disharmony within their families.

The narrative fabricated is that child victims are troublemakers, “bad seeds”.  According to this distorted view, victims are by nature disobedient and rebellious, trying the patience of their loving families. They deliberately prompt family arguments, and “deserve” to be punished for the hurt they cause.

Outrageous as it may seem, the needs of child victims – for food, shelter, and comfort – are seen as an unreasonable burden in dysfunctional families. Victims are viewed as provoking the abuser to act as s/he does. In the case of sexual abuse, child victims are seen as “tempting” the adult, therefore, responsible for the abuse.

This is all a fiction – a false explanation for the dysfunction which allowed the abuse to occur, in the first place. It is, in effect, the rationalization of the abuser.

Any negative emotions the abuser may experience, in connection with his/her moral transgression, are projected onto the victim. The Bible story of the rape of Tamar by her brother Amnon illustrates this.

“But she [Tamar] answered him, ‘No, my brother, do not force me…Do not do this disgraceful thing!’…However, he would not heed her voice; and being stronger than she, he forced her and lay with her. Then Amnon hated her exceedingly…” (2 Samuel 13: 12, 14-15).

Other members of the family may buy into the narrative, in self-defense. That does not, however, give it validity.

In a topsy turvy way, the very opposite of the distorted family narrative is true. Continue reading →

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January 18, 2015 · 1:00 am

Murder in the Family

Many news stories in December were overshadowed by the ongoing Ferguson controversy, the SONY hacking, and a terrorist siege in Sydney which left fatalities. Two, however, warrant our attention.

In Pennsylvania, Bradley Stone killed his ex-wife Nicole and five of her relatives before turning a knife on himself [1]. Victims included Nicole’s mother, grandmother, sister, brother-in-law, and a 14 y.o. niece. A 17 y.o. nephew is recovering from his wounds. Thankfully, the two Stone daughters were spared.

According to the prosecutor, Stone’s attack was clearly pre-meditated. It has been attributed to a custody dispute. Since Stone was a veteran and briefly on tour in Iraq during 2008, there was speculation that Post Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD) might have played a role. The Marines who served with Stone dispute this.

In Australia, a suburban mother (also, wielding a knife) killed seven of her own children and a niece – all youngsters between the ages of 18 months and 15 years [2]. A 20 y.o. sibling found the children. The woman unsuccessfully attempted suicide. She is now under arrest. Continue reading →

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January 11, 2015 · 1:00 am

No Longer Helpless

  • In Georgia, a 13 y.o. boy missing for four years has been reunited with his mother. The boy had been held captive in a false “wall” by his father and stepmother. The pair have been charged with obstruction of justice, false imprisonment, and cruelty to children [1].
  • An even more sinister masquerade played out in Texas. There 17 y.o. Ricardo Javid Lubo enrolled in the sixth grade, apparently to recruit potential victims for purposes of child pornography [2]. The blood runs cold at the thought.

The Humane Society advocates against cruelty to animals.  Gandhi said, “The greatness of a nation can be judged by the way its animals are treated.” Both Islam and Judaism emphasize the proper treatment of animals.

While I do not necessarily disagree, I would contend that the essential measure of a nation lies in how that nation treats its children.

The well-being of children is wholly dependent on the quality of care the adults around them provide. Those cruel toward animals are likely to be cruel toward human beings, as well. Like animals, children are helpless to defend themselves – their only response a muffled cry in the hall.

Children can be harmed with little effort.  They can be slapped, scalded, sexually assaulted, struck, and shaken to death.  Children can be starved for love and attention, as well as for bread.  Their souls may be withered by a word or glance; permanently scarred by a single unwanted touch.

We, however, are no longer children. While we may once have been abused, we now have the strength to reclaim our lives. And we have the power to oppose child abuse, wherever we may encounter it.

The congressman who paws interns, the priest who sodomizes altar boys, the teacher who seduces students, and the boyfriend who uses his partner’s children as a punching bag are now on notice.

Their behavior is under scrutiny. Their secret will out. There will be consequences.

That cry in the hall will no longer go unnoticed. We are no longer helpless. We are no longer alone.  And we will no longer be silenced.

—
[1] NBC News, Crime & Courts, “Boy Missing for 4 Years Found in ‘False Wall’ in Georgia Home: Police” by Elisha Fieldstadt, 11/29/14, http://www.nbcnews.com/news/crime-courts/boy-missing-four-years-found-false-wall-georgia-home-police-n258121.

[2] NBCDFW.com, “Child Porn Suspect Enrolled as a Sixth Grader” by Bianca Castro and Johnny Archer, 11/21/14, http://www.nbcdfw.com/news/local/Two-Men-Arrested-for-Child-Pornography-283391581.html?partner=xfinity1.

FOR MORE OF MY ARTICLES ON POVERTY, POLITICS, AND MATTERS OF CONSCIENCE CHECK OUT MY BLOG A LAWYER’S PRAYERS AT: http://www.alawyersprayers.com

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December 21, 2014 · 1:00 am

The Book of Job

For years, I was an atheist, unwilling to believe in or do homage to a God who would allow suffering by the innocent.

My view was a direct result of the abuse I had endured, and the suffering of all kinds I saw around me. I could not reconcile a good and just God with the many injustices in the world.  Faith was a fool’s game.

The Bible’s Book of Job, in particular, revealed the merciless nature of God. So I thought. A devout man is caused to lose his property, his children, and his health. All to demonstrate that his faith in God is not a response to good fortune alone.

I saw the God who would allow this as sadistic. I viewed the Book of Job as an obscenity, and rejected the propositions it put forward. For a long while, I preferred to rage.

When I found the law as a profession, it felt as if a sword had been placed into my hand.

But the Book of Job is a profound study in suffering. It makes the point that God is God. We are merely His creation, dearly though He loves us.

In the end, I came to recognize that we cannot substitute our sense of justice for God’s. We do not have His perspective. We cannot see the end from the beginning.

Christians do not always know why suffering takes place. Ours is a broken world, not the paradise we might wish.

Christians do, however, know the true character of God. He truly is holy, good, just, and merciful. He and only He is the God who suffered as we suffer, even dying for our sakes. Amid the severest of trials, He somehow sustains us. And we have His promise that He will use all things somehow for good.

That promise cannot be applied simplistically. No Christian would contend that good can come to a child from sexual molestation, torture, or neglect. Continue reading →

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December 14, 2014 · 1:00 am

Venom

“…[The] poison [of the wicked] is like the poison of a serpent…” (Ps. 58: 4).

The toxin that venomous snakes inject into their victims can cause pain, tissue necrosis, respiratory paralysis, and kidney failure, ultimately resulting in death.

In an effort to shield loved ones from the abuse to which we were subjected, many of us swallowed the venom our abusers spewed.

Powerless, we submitted to their violation of us or neglect of our basic needs, and accepted their lies about us – that we were worthless, that we were undeserving of love, that we were responsible for their violation and neglect of us.

As children, we suffered in silence. Often, as adults, we maintain that silence, wrongly believing the details of our abuse too off-putting or too shameful to share with others.

But until it is spat out, that venom continues to wreak havoc with us. It causes incalculable pain, destroys hope, and interferes with our capacity to breath in cleansing truth, ultimately resulting in a kind of spiritual death. Continue reading →

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November 23, 2014 · 1:00 am

Cubs

ISIS is recruiting and training child soldiers it proudly calls “Cubs of the Islamic State” [1].

The recruitment and use of children as soldiers is a war crime, though not without precedent. Children – often forcibly conscripted – have acted as soldiers in India, Chad, the Democratic Republic of the Congo, Uganda, Sierra Leone, Thailand, and Myanmar [2].

In Sierra Leone, boys between the ages of 7 and 14 served in the Small Boys Unit. Some 10,000 are thought to have taken part, in that nation’s civil war from 1991-2002 [3]. These children were involved in rape, mutilation, sexual slavery, murder, and other forms of human rights abuses.

Over 30,000 children have taken part in the decades long conflict in Uganda, a substantial number of these actually abducted [4]. Young girls are subject to sexual violence, or required to serve as “wives” of the rebels and have their children.

And now ISIS.

Boys are taught how to use AK-47s and mercilessly behead captives. An Iraqi security official was quoted by NBC News as saying, “They use dolls to teach them how to behead people, then they make them watch a beheading, and sometimes they force them to carry the heads in order to cast the fear away from their hearts.”

Some children are used by ISIS as suicide bombers; others, as human shields. They are, also, indoctrinated in Shariah law. “It’s being done for the same reasons that Hitler had the Hitler Youth,” stated Charlie Winter of the Quilliam Foundation.

Brainwashing these children is a long-term strategy to assure ISIS’ continued existence. “They have to get used to hearing the sounds of explosions and machine guns and missiles and artillery and aircraft,” Abu Dujana explained. “They should get used to seeing blood,” the ISIS fighter said.

Americans can expect to see more blood, as well.

—
[1] NBC News, “ISIS Trains Child Soldiers at Camps for ‘Cubs of the Islamic State’ ” by Cassandra Vinograd, Ghazi Balkiz and Ammar Cheikh Omar, 11/7/14, http://www.nbcnews.com/storyline/isis-terror/isis-trains-child-soldiers-camps-cubs-islamic-state-n241821.

[2] Child Soldiers International, http://www.child-soldiers.org/.

[3] Human Rights Watch, “Sierra Leone Rebels Forcefully Recruit Child Soldiers”, 6/1/00, http://www.hrw.org/news/2000/05/31/sierra-leone-rebels-forcefully-recruit-child-soldiers.

[4] UN.org, Ten Stories the World Should Hear More About, “Uganda: Child Soldiers at Centre of Mounting Humanitarian Crisis”, http://www.un.org/events/tenstories/06/story.asp?storyID=100.

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November 16, 2014 · 1:00 am

Frozen

The Disney animated film “Frozen” has become enormously popular. Rather than telling yet another tale of how a girl finds her prince, the film tells the story of two sisters whose love for each other saves them and their world.

Child abuse victims, too, run the risk of being frozen.

It is not difficult to find stories about abuse in the news. Incest. Child pornography and exploitation. A child tortured to death. A group of children held captive; handicapped children tormented. Systemic abuse with the collusion of law enforcement or the church. The rare monetary judgment against a predator, more often than not unenforceable for lack of funds. Take your pick.

No Disney villain can compete.

The children robbed of their innocence and peace of mind – sometimes their lives – deserve to have their stories told. But as survivors we cannot focus exclusively on this darkness or we will succumb to it. Isolated, immobilized by despair. Frozen.

There is hope in the world. There are those who consider these violations among the worst harm human beings can inflict. There is love waiting to be found. Reach out for your share.

Darkness cannot withstand Light.  It was to conquer darkness that Jesus Christ came into our world.

“In him was life, and that life was the light of all mankind. The light shines in the darkness, and the darkness has not overcome it” (John 1: 4-5 NIV).

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November 9, 2014 · 1:00 am

American Horror Story

WARNING:  Graphic Images

A three year old boy was beaten to death by his mother and her boyfriend this week. Prosecutors have called his death an American horror story.

Scotty McMillan was tortured for three days by Jillian Tait and Gary Fellenbaum [1]. The child was hung by his feet, and struck with a whip. He was tied to a chair, punched, and beaten with a metal rod. His head was put through a wall.

The nurses who ultimately saw the little boy’s wounds wept. Scotty was gone by then.

We can discuss statistics. The rate of physical abuse is up. Three quarters of the most seriously abused children seen in hospitals in 2009 were on Medicaid, suggesting that poverty is a major stressor on families [2].

We can discuss failures by the system. Scotty’s six year old brother, also regularly abused, attended school. Despite a legal duty to report suspected abuse, no teacher or school counselor contacted authorities.

We can discuss spirituality and moral responsibility. Surely, this was a violation of the laws of God and man. Any mother’s natural instinct would have been to protect her children, rather than inflict harm on them.

We may never know what led Tait and Fellenbaum to act in this inhuman manner. Were they once abused themselves or witnesses to abuse? Were they psychopaths without empathy or sadists excited by the pain of their victims? Whatever the answer, nothing excuses their actions.

Ultimately, the rest of us must remain vigilant for the signs of abuse in children, even those not our own. We may be their only hope.

A list of 10 frequent signs of child abuse can be found at the Safe Horizon website http://www.safehorizon.org/page/10-signs-of-child-abuse-58.html.
—
[1] NBC 10, “Mom, Boyfriend Beat Boy, 3, to Death inside Chester County Home: Prosecutors” by Dan Stamm, 11/6/14, http://www.nbcphiladelphia.com/news/local/Chester-County-Child-Abuse-Murder-281806151.html.

[2] CBS News, “Serious Injuries from Child Abuse on Rise, Especially in Infants” by Ryan Jaslow, 10/1/12, http://www.cbsnews.com/news/serious-injuries-from-child-abuse-on-rise-especially-in-infants/

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