Where is a Samaritan When You Need One? Let's Review
Carie Charlesworth taught school at Holy Trinity Catholic school in San Diego for the past 14 years. Because she is a battered woman with four children, she has been fired. Clearly the problem here is Mr. Charlesworth who has a history of violence, restraining orders and is currently incarcerated. But the consequences of his violence have now been exacerbated for his victim by her employer, a faith-based school.
Watch this story on video. Then I will break it down for you.
Carie Charlesworth taught school at Holy Trinity Catholic school in San Diego for the past 14 years. Because she is a battered woman with four children, she has been fired. Clearly the problem here is Mr. Charlesworth who has a history of violence, restraining orders and is currently incarcerated. But the consequences of his violence have now been exacerbated for his victim by her employer, a faith-based school.
The letters from the school to Carie and to parents outline their concerns that she is a liability or, to more accurately describe her, she is a victim.
I understand the school’s and the parents’ concerns for the threat that Mr. Charlesworth represents to the school. The danger he represents is real. But he is the problem, not Carie. Focusing on her and penalizing her for being a victim does nothing but embolden men like Charlesworth and communicate that they can continue to use violence to try to control their partners and children with impunity. And it communicates to battered women to not come forward and ask for help because they will likely lose their jobs.
Our task as a community is to find ways to protect her and her kids, to prevent him from harming anyone else, and to insure that she is safe in her workplace and in her home.
It would be bad enough if Carie had been fired from a public school or a bank or a restaurant for being a battered woman. But the fact that a faith-based school would cast her aside and feel no responsibility for standing by her in this crisis is unconscionable. In their letter, they assured her that “we will continue to pray for you and your family.” Please. Prayer is not enough her. Just when she needed the support of her employer and her faith community the most, they have pulled the rug from under her. They took the easy way out because of fear. It isn’t easy to stand by someone; it takes effort and resources. But courage is what helps us to act even when we are afraid.
Which brings me to the need for a Samaritan. You may recall the parable that Jesus told in Luke 10:29-37. A victim of violence lying by the side of the road; the priest and Levite, community leaders, see him and pass by probably because they were afraid that the assailant might still be around and a danger to them; he was a “liability” in their eyes; a Samaritan, a marginalized person, came upon the victim and “had compassion.” He stopped, attended to the victim’s wounds, took him to a safe place, and paid the bill. “Which of these three was a neighbor to the victim?” “The one who showed him mercy.”
Why is this lesson so difficult? It seems abundantly clear what the right thing is. Yet I regularly hear stories of churches abandoning and/or punishing victims of sexual or domestic violence, playing the priest and Levite over and over.
What could have happened if the church and school had been faithful to their own teachings and played the Samaritan? When Carie went to the principal and disclosed her situation, warning the principal that her husband might show up at school, the principal could have first, reassured her of the school’s support of her as a valued staff member and second, organized a meeting with law enforcement and staff to make a safety plan to insure that the school would be secure and to find out what law enforcement was doing to protect Carie and her kids. San Diego has an abundance of resources for battered women and their kids. They could do this.
Until communities pull together, make hard choices, stand in solidarity with battered women and their kids and hold abusers accountable, abusers will continue to threaten and coerce family members, friends, employers, neighbors, etc. Holy Trinity School has not addressed this problem; they have only made it worse and passed it along. They had a choice and they made the wrong one.
Rev. Dr. Marie M. Fortune
FaithTrust Institute
www.faithtrustinstitute.org
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Carie