social workin' | Pugs Not Drugs

I realized my camera was in my purse the other day so I snapped some photos of my office. I wish I had a before picture of this space…pink walls + hunter green carpet = 1988 threw up in my work space. I spruced it up last fall and now it is a much more pleasant place to be. I need to hang some photos on the back wall and get another lamp since I refuse to work under the fluorescent lighting.

when I acquired the office there were 4 of these shelves in an L shape in the corner. I had the ones above my desk removed and it made the room feel much bigger. I left these 2 up so I could display some things.

my inexpensive art

the very important source of non-headache inducing light, a lamp from walmart. Also loving this fun little calendar I bought on etsy.

and my chair, that is looking kind of sad now that I brought the pillow home to use on my bed. Will have to replace it soon. Mirror is from World Market, as is the slipcover. I scored the chair on clearance at Homegoods.

so there you go, my tiny office that fits me plus about 1.5 other people 🙂

Recently I was sent a link to a video of the much loved Christian writer John Piper, addressing the issue of domestic violence, submission, and the church. I was very unhappy with his response, first, the fact that he laughed when the question was asked (although perhaps he was just uncomfortable), and also his answer, which seems completely out of touch with what domestic violence actually is and looks like. You can read the transcript for yourself here. The parts I found most disturbing:

So if this man, for example, is calling her to engage in abusive acts willingly (group sex or something really weird, bizarre, harmful, that clearly would be sin), then the way she submits—I really think this is possible, though it’s kind of paradoxical—is that she’s not going to go there. I’m saying, “No, she’s not going to do what Jesus would disapprove even though the husband is asking her to do it.”

She’s going to say, however, something like, “Honey, I want so much to follow you as my leader. God calls me to do that, and I would love to do that. It would be sweet to me if I could enjoy your leadership. But if you ask me to do this, require this of me, then I can’t go there.”

If it’s not requiring her to sin but simply hurting her, then I think she endures verbal abuse for a season, and she endures perhaps being smacked one night, and then she seeks help from the church.

I decided to click around online and see what else I could find on the subject, and was happy when I found this short blurb from Chuck Colson, another beloved Christian writer. He seems to understand the seriousness of this issue, and the way the church has failed to help these women. One statistic in the article was especially shocking to me:

George sites a survey in which nearly 6,000 pastors were asked how they would counsel women who came to them for help with domestic violence. Twenty-six percent would counsel them the same way Marleen’s pastor did: to continue to “submit” to her husband, no matter what. Twenty-five percent told wives the abuse was their own fault—for failing to submit in the first place. Astonishingly, 50 percent said women should be willing to “tolerate some level of violence” because it is better than divorce.

Holy cow…the last line is particularly upsetting to me, however, I do not ascribe to the “divorce is one of the seven deadly sins” camp. It reinforces to me that the church is not a safe place for many women suffering abuse from their husbands.