The Bizarre World of Domestic Discipline

Sometimes in a relationship someone forgets to do something. Or lets the other person down. It may be something as trivial as burning the toast. I remember one time, early on in our marriage after some random event saying to Mrs. W., “Oh, oh! I’ll have to give you a spanking.”

I said this rather playfully, since probably in my mind it conjured up something sexual; something kinky. Mrs. W. was not amused. Down other branches of her family tree there is some history of abuse. After using this line on one or two more occasions, I learned to drop the suggestion of corporal punishment. And for the record, we’re not into the kinky stuff, and nobody has ever dressed up in black in the bedroom.

But wife-spanking as a disciplinary action is more common than you might think.

Enter the website Learning Domestic Discipline, a collection of resources dedicated to help you “Learn the DD Lifestyle.”

To begin with, egalitarians need not apply. This is for hardcore complementarians, though I suggest I’m only using that word because in our Evangelical milieu the one is considered the opposite of the other. The blog approach is friendly enough, but the situation described is much more authoritarian, with the husband described as the HoH or “head of household,” and submissive wife described as… the wife.

To best understand this, you need to go to some of the earliest posts on the blog, go to the archives and scroll back to Spring, 2011. (Clicking the image at the top of this article takes you to one specific article on spanking positions. One in May, 2011 discusses whether this should be over or under clothing.)

Again, the earlier articles spell out the lifestyle most clearly, such as one in June, 2011 which tries to clarify the difference between spanking and abuse or BDSM. Anyone who has been a victim of domestic violence — who is probably cringing as they read this — would want to read that article and see if they feel it checks out.

An ‘About’ page makes clear that everything being discussed is fully consentual, and I trust that both partners would see it that way. (The issue of consent was at the center of one of Canada’s biggest news stories late in 2014.) In many ultra-conservative or fundamentalist setting, the role of the husband as HoH is given to be granted by divine authority, and the blogosphere is filled with horror stories of women who suffered all manner of abuse before breaking free.

In the case of Clint and Chelsea, who co-write the LDD blog, it seems to be working for them. They conduct retreats — next one is September, 2015 — and I’m not sure if you bring your own ‘equipment’ or if it is provided. (I’m not saying that tongue-in-cheek, I would think you need to know before you pack.)

More recently, the blog takes a Q&A approach, and unless they’re making up all the questions, they do have an army of followers. Still, these questions are all concerned with the how of DD practice, the why is taken as a given. You pretty much have to have bought in before you start reading. But one column dealt with why the woman would want to go along with this.  Reason #1: “It make women feel more loved.”

I know I may get pushback from DD advocates here, but longtime readers of this blog may find all of this eerily similar to some articles we did about the child discipline advocated by Michael Perl and Debi Pearl in To Train Up a Child and other resources, such as this one, or this one. I can easily see how a situation like this could be, for lack of a better word, abused; or how Clint and Chelsea’s blog and website could be used to justify a host of activities that they are careful not to condone.

I should also say that nowhere on the blog did I see specific references to the spiritual authority of the HoH. This in no way overtly purports to be a Christian resource, though obviously we’re discussing it here because of the way it would suit the purposes of many fundamentalist groups. Any temptation to quote scripture verses here or discuss church contexts seems to be carefully avoided.

But of course we can’t end there.  There is in fact, CDD or Christian Domestic Discipline. One 2013 article goes so far as to describe it as a “new Christian trend sweeping America.” Huffington Post called it “Spanking in the name of the Lord.”

I’m also presenting this relatively without comment. It’s one of the those internet curiosities that proves the “different strokes for different folks” adage. Quite literally as it turns out.

 

 

 

 

Missing Link in Story of Pastor Advocating Beating Effiminate Boys

Maybe I’m not the only one to make this connection, but I haven’t run across it online so far.

Last week one of the top religious stories concerned Pastor Sean Harris of Berean Baptist Church in Fayetteville who suggested that if your boy is acting girly, he needs corporal punishment.  You can watch a 2-minute video of the original statement at SFL. 

“Dads, the second you see your son dropping the limp wrist, you walk right over there and crack that wrist….Give him a good punch…”

At the same site is a link to a sermon audio where the pastor — after the news story had gone viral — issued a retraction.  You can access that audio here.

But there’s a couple of dots in this story that I haven’t seen people connecting.  One reader sent me a link to the original story at The Advocate, an LGBT news site.  (I asked him how he ended up there, and he assured me I don’t have anything to worry about.)  When I clicked the link, they had already done this follow up story about the retraction, but had added a new picture.

And that’s when the lights went on:

Yes, “No Greater Joy,” which just happens to be the same name of the organization of Michael and Debi Pearl, who just happen to be somewhat renown for their advocacy of rather severe corporal punishment for children who misbehave.

You can read about that at When Child Discipline Goes Too Far here at Thinking Out Loud, and later, Petition Launched to Stop Sales of To Train up a Child.   If you want to go outside this blog, there’s this story, and this story,

Now, in fairness, the t-shirt is actually connected to a retreat that took place at Sean’s church, Berean Baptist.  And it is a scripture reference to III John 1:4.  But why would you choose that name?  It has been somewhat tarnished, unless you just happen to be onside with the Pearl’s parenting doctrine. Possible answers:

1. Just a coincidence
2. Someone has read the Pearl’s materials and the name stuck either consciously or sub-consciously
3. There’s more than a direct connection

For those of us who know the Pearl’s story all too well, answers 2 and 3 become rather problematic, don’t you think? 

Petition Launched to Stop Sale of “To Train up a Child”

The human rights organization change.org is currently hosting a petition requesting that Amazon.com stop selling the book To Train Up A Child by Michael and Debi Pearl because of the book’s association with cases where children who were victims of severe corporal punishment later died.

The petition reads:

Currently there are several books available to buy on Amazon that advocate, endorse and advise on parenting methods that involve the physical abuse of children. Examples of titles include To Train Up A Child, by Michael and Debi Pearl; Shepherding a Child’s Heart by Tedd Tripp; and Don’t Make Me Count to Three by Ginger Plowman.

Such books, and other like them, promote behavior which is abusive of children. All of the above books advocate the use of a rod and other implements on children under one.

Such behavior is abusive to children, and it is also ‘offensive’, which is contrary to your Content Guidelines.

It may well also be illegal, as it seems to go far beyond the ‘reasonable chastisement’ currently sanctioned by law in the UK. Not only is beating on a regular basis with a rod likely to leave a mark, which is illegal, it is also likely to amount to inhuman or degrading treatment, which is a breach of human rights.

We wish Amazon to urgently review their decision to stock any book or other product which advises the physical abuse of children.

We’ve covered Michael and Debi Pearl in various Wednesday Link Lists here (use the search bar, upper right) and in this article: When Child Discipline Goes Too Far.

You can sign the petition by clicking here.

You may also read a just published New York Times article about the petition.

Christian booksellers: You should also read this article concerning potential 3rd-party liability if you sell this book.  (This story also contains a link to a recent CNN news clip about another child death.)

The Face of Corporal Punishment

Five million YouTube hits and counting — and that doesn’t take into account that you have to log in to watch the video.

A couple of generations back, the seven-minute video of Judge Adams beating his teenage daughter might not have seemed out of place to a cohort of parents who used corporal punishment, or a cohort of children who endured it.  But we didn’t have video file sharing back then, and you can’t mix and match things from different eras.

Corpus Cristi’s KRIS-TV has the best summary of events that have unfolded in this story over the past few days.

But the blog, Bene Diction Blogs On probably has the best overall analysis, along with a rare personal glimpse into Bene’s own story.

However, our visit to Bene’s blog doesn’t end there.  He uses the story of Judge Adams as a springboard to introduce a new FREE resource that delves into the teaching and writing of Michael and Debi Pearl, strong advocates of extreme corporal punishment of misbehaving children. 

We’ve covered the Pearls here in a piece titled, When Child Discipline Goes Too Far.  You can see the link to the free resource at Bene’s blog here.

Wednesday Link List

Here in the frozen north, Thanksgiving has already come and gone, but that didn’t stop temperatures from reaching 30 degrees Celsius on the weekend (mid 80s Fahrenheit) for three straight days which made link-catching less appealing than suntanning.

• For you worship-leader types, here’s one of the most comprehensive articles you’ll see on the “worship wars” discussed entirely in terms of church architecture.
  
• Just nine more days to another Harold Camping end-of-life-as-we-know-it date.
  
• If you don’t know what I mean when I say, “Stethoscope Video” then you haven’t seen it.  Take 2 1/2 minutes and enjoy.
• It’s official: Mitt Romney tells Dallas Pastor Robert Jeffress that he thinks that Baptists are a cult.  …Okay, not really, but maybe he should have.  Here’s the original story,  a response from Robert Mouw, and a sample of comments; all from CNN.
• You’ll want to read the comments to find more links to get the full 411 on this story, but the blogger Tulip Girl has a blog post implying that another child death may be linked to the controversial book, To Train Up A Child by Michael and Debi Pearl.
  
• No, what follows is not a typo: Is it possible to hate Jesus but love Christianity?  David Paul Dorr looks at that here and here [part two link to follow!]
  
• Are you “crazy busy” all the time?  Pete Wilson hints you may need to invest in the concept of sabbath.
  
• This isn’t new, but… here’s one of those church video clips from Igniter media that uses a Facebook theme; naturally, this one’s titled Follow.
  
• Canadian Anglican Pastor Leonard Griffith is now 90 and just keeps on going.
  
• More from James MacDonald on the decision to invite T. D. Jakes to a forthcoming seminar, aka The Elephant Room controversy.
  
• Hey kids!  Wanna learn Biblical Hebrew in just three easy lessons?  Well, you can’t.  But maybe 40 moderately challenging lessons from Charles Grebe at Briercrest College and Seminary. Learn more about Charles at AnimatedHebrew.com starting with the Hebrew alphabet. Shalom!
  
• The Christian Broadcasting Network (CBN) celebrated a 50-year anniversary earlier this month.
  
• In a culture focused on the excitement of church planting, we never think about the sadness of church closings that are constantly taking place at the same time.
  
• Natalie Grant adds “actor” to her list of accomplishments with a feature role in the movie Decision.
  
• From Internet Monk writer Jeff Dunn

There is a story told of an old woman who claimed she and God talked on a regular basis. Her bishop was doubtful of her claims to hear from God. After all, he prayed on a regular basis, but the Lord never spoke back to him. So he decided to put this woman to the test in order to reveal her for either a misguided soul or a fraud. He went to her and said, “The next time you are talking with God, ask him to tell you what my most grievous sin was.” The woman agreed to do so.

A week later the bishop returned and asked, “Did you ask God to reveal to you my worst sin?”

“Yes,” said the woman. “I did ask him.”

“Well,” said the bishop, “what did he say?”

The woman said simply, “He says he forgets.”

Wednesday Link List

• Was going to link the above video, but decided it really needed to be here on its own.
  
• Kathy Escobar gets invited to speak at a graduation by someone who wants to inspire the students by pushing the envelope; but then, when word is out that a woman pastor has been asked to speak, she gets un-invited.
  
• It turns out Bethany Hamilton’s family had a tough fight with the film directors to keep the faith element visible in the movie Soul Surfer.  But the CNN article notes that removing the faith element would have killed the film entirely.
  
• Rick Kirkpatrick launched a new site Worship Mythbusters which introduces an audio podcast — there are six so far — for worship leaders (and others) which runs about a half hour.  (We listened to episode three.)
  
• “He did not consider equality with God something to be grasped…”  Most of us know this passage in Philippians well, and have assumed it to be an early church hymn, but Gordon Fee suggests it doesn’t fit an established pattern.
  
• Mark Batterson figured the next phase for D.C.’s National Community Church would involve 3 to 4 years.  Then God said, “How about 3 to 4 weeks?”  The church is purchasing an existing church building on a Capitol Hill main street.
  
• XXXChurch founder Craig Gross reminds us again what we’ve been hearing for a few years now: Addiction to adult content online is increasingly a problem for women.
  
• Darrell at Stuff Fundies Like reviews last Friday night’s 20/20 program at ABC Television dealing with the IFB Church, or Independent Fundamentalist Baptists.  Speaking of which…
  
• A young girl was allegedly removed from a Mennonite home where parents were following the book Train Up A Child by Michael and Debi Pearl, but because this child didn’t die, it didn’t get media attention.
  
• David Fitch argues for a different type of church leader, with a half dozen descriptions of what that leader is, and what he or she isn’t.
  
• My goodness!  There really is a typo in the climactic final line of Rob Bell’s Love Wins. Guess it happens to the best of them, right?
  
• Bob Glenn acknowledges the WWJD type of thinking is harmful as it reduces Christian living to a slogan.
• It’s time again for Kent Shaffer’s list of the top 200 Christian blogs.  And once again, I am quite sure, this blog was # 201!!
  
• Rachel Held Evans quotes her own book with a disturbing suggestion that in advancing apologetics, we created a monster.
  
• If you remember the humor and satire blog, Tom in the Box, you might want to know that it has somewhat resurfaced as The Heretic Mug Collection.
  
• And Jason Boyett has mellowed out a little at his new home at Beliefnet. Check out his series of interviews on different types of “conversion” experiences.
  
• On February 25th, Jim Lehmer decided that social media is about to collapse, and he hasn’t blogged since.  Obviously getting ready for what he calls, “the great un-friending.’
  
• Is it just me or does pastor Steven Furtick’s blog render completely differently in Firefox than it does in Chrome?
  
• To wrap up this week… If you’re the parent of a tween, you already know who Rebecca Black is, and the song that what follows below is a well-done parody of… (I think they actually improved the song!)
  

Wednesday Link List

Another mid-week pause to look at some reading I did this week.

• Our upper and lower comic selections this week are some Christian themes found at the daily newspaper comic, Pardon My Planet.  (Click the individual images…)
  
• Here’s a controversial youth ministry concept:  Killing off the youth group as a separate entity within the larger church.   Links to video.
  
• In the wake of the whole Glenn Beck thing, Parchment and Pen dusts off the classic question, Are Mormons Christians?
• Even back in Augustine’s day, the church wrestled with the issue of celebrity conversions, and you may be surprised by his conclusion.
• Here’s a trade review (for bookstore people) of a little 300-word title for kids and parents titled Our Home is Like a Little Church, a local-church publishing project that got picked up for national distribution.
  
• If you found late-night TV Bible teacher Gene Scott quirky, you’re gonna see a similarity in these video clips from corporal punishment advocate Mike Pearl.
• Another HT to Zach at Vitamin Z:  What constitutes “regular” church attendance?   This is a real issue both for families and for church leaders.    Here’s a comment from a pastor at one of Mark Driscoll’s satellite campuses.
• Speaking of Mr. D., here’s a sometimes heated 12-minute discussion between him, Mark Dever and James MacDonald on the whole wisdom of multi-site churches.
• Zac Hicks looks at the lack of spiritual warfare themes in modern worship in a piece on Why the Devil Hates “A Mighty Fortress is our God.”
• Pete Wilson introduces Stephanie, who is willing to step out and share her story in a five-minute video, highlighting how so many of us have a need for approval.
  
• On the occasion of the 25th Anniversary of RZIM, Ravi Zacharias appoints Rick Pease as the new president of the apologetics ministry organization.   Link opens direct to an mp3 file of their radio broadcast.
  
• Yes, as a matter of fact some people have updated Bishop Eddie Long’s Wikipedia page.
  
• Was it atheists and agnostics or Evangelicals who scored the highest on the ABC News response to the Pew Forum religious knowledge test?  Watch the video or read the story.
  

When Child Discipline Goes Too Far

OROVILLE [California]— A Paradise couple accused of killing their 7-year-old adopted daughter waived their preliminary hearing this week and will proceed to trial.

Kevin and Elizabeth Schatz each face two life terms in prison on charges of murder, torture and child abuse for the Feb. 6 death of Lydia Schatz, and severely beating her 11-year-old sister, which landed her in the hospital.

Both girls reportedly had whip-like marks, allegedly from being beaten for hours with a quarter-inch plumbing supply line.

The girls were both adopted from an African orphanage about three years ago, along with an infant girl. They joined the Schatz family, which included six biological children.

According to authorities, the Schatzes followed child training and disciplinary methods espoused by Michael and Debi Pearl. Kevin and Elizabeth Schatz both retained attorneys and pleaded not guilty to all charges in March.

They will be back in court June 24 for further arraignment and the setting of their trial date.

Both defendants are being held in the Butte County Jail on bail of $2 million each.

I wouldn’t normally have interest in this news story, but for the fact that just a few weeks ago, as a bookseller, I took an order for four different titles authored by Debi Pearl or Michael and Debi Pearl.    When some random web surfing took me to their site, I got concerned and did a Google news search and Google blogs search.

So what caused this child’s death?  Going back in the same news source, The Chico [CA] Enterprise-Record, we find more backstory two days earlier.

Seven-year-old adopted daughter Lydia died of blunt force trauma in February. According to authorities, she was beaten for several hours with a quarter-inch plumbing supply line as her parents took turns holding her down and using the instrument. The blows reportedly cause Rhabdomyolysis, which is a breakdown of muscle tissue which fatally damaged her vital organs. The 11-year-old was allegedly beaten in a similar manner the previous night.

According to Butte County District Attorney Mike Ramsey, the parents appeared to be following the methods of Michael and Debi Pearl, founders of a controversial fundamentalist religious group, No Greater Joy Ministries.

They also wrote a controversial parenting book To Train Up a Child. In their literature, the Pearls encourage parents to use a quarter-inch plumbing supply line (or other items like rulers, paddles or tree branches) as a “rod” to “train up” their children. Though they tell parents not to injure their children, they also encourage constant “switching” or “licks” for not only disobedience but also for things like spilling nuts or being foolish. Additional “licks” are recommended when the child cries out.

According to local authorities, Lydia’s “biblical chastisement” leading to her death may have been for mispronouncing a word during a home-school reading lesson…

Think about it.   A girl from Liberia not getting the pronunciation of a word correctly.   The punishment fit the crime?

I am astounded this story, from the last week in May, did not breakout nationally.

Do a regular Google search, and you find people online gushing about how wonderful and helpful the book, To Train Up a Child has been.   But look further and you find a history of stories like the one above.   Here’s a web post from 2006.   The writer’s post includes many other links — I haven’t checked each one — but I’m going to re-post it with all of them:

You may (or may not) have seen the call to boycott Homeschool Blogger/The Old Schoolhouse because of their ongoing, outspoken support for Michael and Debi Pearl’s materials, specifically their extra-biblical parenting teachings. This attention is a result of a little boy who died at the hands of his mother. The mother had sought guidance from the Pearls’ materials.

For quick reference, here are some articles that may illustrate the grave concerns people have about what Michael and Debi Pearl teach.

Here at TulipGirl:
On the Pearls and Parenting
Pearls Po-Russki
Biblical Relationships or Behaviourism
Children, Good and Grown
Offsite:
Authoritarianism and Isolationism Among Us
The Pearls: The Basics, On Original Sin
To Train Up A Child Review
Avoiding Millstones

That blog post was triggered by this story (its first link) which describes the death of a 4-year old “several years” before the above 2006 post.   This has been going on for a long time.

I know this post is getting long here, so I’ll hold back on the dozens and dozens of other bloggers who have expressed concern, and want to alert their readers to awareness of this particular couple and their books.  (I enjoy online research, and wish I had another hour to give to this because I know there are more stories lurking out there.)  I limited my search to older posts and found a somewhat hyperbolic sample from the appropriately named blog, Homemade Fireworks:

To Train Up A Child is ironic because it is a book on how to raise children written by people who probably shouldnt be allowed to live in a country that has children in it. In that respect, this book is a lot like that 300-pound fat guy at your gym with the tube socks and sweatband who tries to give you tips on how to do your crunches.

To Train Up A Child was written by Michael and Debi Pearl. The book’s forward tells us they have 6 children, but fails to mention whether any of them have lived past the age of three. Since this book has no less than three chapters with the word “rod” in the title, plus one with the word “whip,” I’m going to guess “none.”

But I really think this blogger, Jack at New Covenant Living,  raises a greater issue, and as I tried to cut and paste some of it for quotation, couldn’t find anything to leave out:

Regarding the writing and speaking ministries of Mike & Debi Pearl, whose advice about beating children with quarter-inch plumber’s tubing have been connected with the recent beating death of 7-year-old Lydia Schatz: What qualifies these people to be regarded as teaching authorities on anything, within the Body of Christ?

As a pastor, this tragedy touches on an area that I feel is almost never addressed: formal ministry qualifications. We American Christians disdain such concerns.

But the Bible doesn’t support our disdain. Deacons are supposed to be examined prior to being recognized. We’re warned not to lay hands on anyone suddenly, and thereby share in culpability for their ministry sins committed later. Elders are supposed to be proven, then ordained by the laying-on of hands, as Timothy was. The NT teaches that there is a process through which one must pass before you should be recognized. And if you fail the process, then you should not be recognized, as Paul says about any prophets who disregarded his apostolic authority (1 Corinthians 14:38).

But in American evangelicalism, any Tom, Dick, or Harry with access to a computer or Xulon Press can declare himself a teacher with authority, and build a following, regardless of how under-qualified he is. Men launch parachurch foundations, with politically incestuous boards comprised of family members and best buddies. Women start traveling around, putting on seminars without ever having been tested as to their soundness in the faith. In my opinion, a Christian woman speaker ought to meet certain moral criteria, and be required to pass some sort of basic theological examination, no less than a pastor.

We American Christians need to ask, when we read a new book or website, “Who is this person? Where does he come from? Where did she go to school? Have they ever been examined, commissioned, or ordained? To whom is he or she accountable? What are his or her qualifications to teach or preach the Word of God to anyone?” But we never ask those questions, do we? Why? Because we’re ignorant of the New Testament’s teachings about church, pastoral authority, and leadership qualifications. We’re not interested in that subject. It’s boring. Who cares about church government? Not us. Or we ignore these rules, and claim to be directly inspired by the Holy Spirit. Why? Because then no one (supposedly) has the right to question what we do, or how we do it.

Update: The Blog, Bene Diction Blogs On picks up the story of Michael and Debi Pearl and No Greater Joy ministries, with a few additions.