Last week, Liberal America published an article asking whether Christian fundamentalist views promote and justify domestic violence. Georgia’s Religious Freedom Bill goes a step further: it could?legalize violence against both women and children as a religious right.
Georgia’s Republican Rep. Sam Teasley and Sen. Josh McKoon reintroduced this unpopular bill earlier this week despite both businesses’ and religious leaders’ disapproval of it last year. The bill would allow businesses to discriminate in hiring or serving those who do not adhere to their religious beliefs and would allow for the refusal to enforce any law that goes against the religious belief of the person breaking that law. It would also allow police whose religious beliefs support domestic violence or child abuse to refuse to intervene when called to a scene where abuse is present, and could serve as a way for abusers to avoid punishment if their religion supports the abuse.
In Georgia, back in 2003, 8-year-old Josef Smith died after his parents beat him and locked him in a closet to pray. The couple’s church backed their actions and assisted them in their appeal. The couple was sentenced to life plus 30 years. The bill proposed by Teasley and McKoon would have set the couple free.
In February of 2013, Travis and Winona Rossiter were arrested after their 12-year-old daughter, Syble, died of complications from diabetes because the Rossiter’s religious beliefs did not allow for medical treatment. The couple was sentenced to 10 years in prison. The Rossiter’s were from Oregon, but had the same incident happened in Georgia, the bill proposed by Teasley and McKoon would have not only set them free, but allowed them to practice the same form of neglect on their other two minor children.
Jocelyn Anderson writes of?her experience with domestic violence in her 2007 book, “Women Submit! Christians and Domestic Violence” and of the role that fundamentalist Christian beliefs play in keeping women trapped with an abuser. Anderson describes?an incident of being held hostage by her husband, an associate pastor in the couple’s Southern Baptist church, with a fractured skull that nearly killed her.
Although another?pastor helped Anderson escape the violent relationship, she explains that many victims who seek help from their church community do not have the same experience. Often, Anderson says, the women are encouraged to seek counseling from religious leaders with no training or understanding of domestic violence who tell the victims that divorce is not an option and that they simply need to “submit better.” This bill would support these beliefs and give victims of domestic violence even fewer means of support.
Even religious leaders in Georgia see the detriment of passing this bill. In a letter penned by the Georgia?faith leaders last year, they stated:
“We oppose this proposed legislation. First, it would put an individual’s religious beliefs ahead of the common good. Second, it could unleash a wave of costly lawsuits that will add burdens to both the courts and taxpayers alike. Third, it is unnecessary because our freedom of religion is already guaranteed and protected by the U.S. Constitution and Georgia’s State Constitution. Fourth, a state (Religious Freedom Restoration Act) could legalize discrimination by allowing businesses to refuse to serve customers based on religious objections.”
While New York City Pastor?Stephen Kim’s?warnings that a woman’s refusal to submit to her husband’s demands could send her to hell and that men need to assert their dominance over their wives are infuriating, a husband’s legal right to violently force that submission from his wife and children is simply terrifying.
