Abstract
The complex and multifaceted emotion of anger is a prevalently observed and appropriate response from those recovering from the trauma of sexual violence. However, despite the prevalence, anger has traditionally been perceived and rendered as a negative emotion or maladaptive symptom which needs to be denied, suppressed, or avoided. Hindrances to a timely and healthy communication of anger can lead to debilitating effects on the well-being of the survivors complicating the already treacherous journey of their recovery. Historically, women are subjected to more socially limiting constraints to suppress anger and this constrictive pressure is equally, if not more acutely, experienced by Christian women from the traditional theological rendering of the emotion. This is unfortunate, as church communities can be an especially powerful healing resource for Christian women survivors in their arduous journey of recovery. In this article, I will first examine the role of anger in the recovery from sexual trauma before turning to focus on the theological understanding of the emotion. Having clarified the theological understanding by reflecting on how anger has been portrayed and understood within the biblical texts, I will then explore how faith communities can become more hospitable and faithful places in supporting those struggling along the complex and challenging journey towards hope and healing.
Anger is found to be a primary corresponding response commonly observed amongst a range of other distressing emotions for survivors of sexual trauma including helplessness, fear, loss, and shame. 1 Post-traumatic anger may be manifested directly towards the perpetrators, the events, or those around the survivors, or indirectly through diverting or internalising the emotion. 2 The challenges accompanying this commensurate emotional response for the survivors can include feeling uncertain, guilty, fearful, or pressure to suppress anger and its expression. 3 In this article, I will first examine the role of anger in the recovery from sexual trauma before turning to focus on the theological understanding of the emotion. Having clarified the theological understanding by reflecting on how anger has been portrayed and understood within the biblical texts, I will then explore how faith communities can become more hospitable and faithful places in supporting those struggling along the complex and challenging journey towards hope and healing.
Despite the prevalence of anger in these instances, this emotional response is traditionally conceptualised negatively within medical, especially PTSD literature, as a maladaptive coping strategy hindering recovery and should be avoided. 4 However, the role of anger especially in the context of sexual trauma has received some recent attention highlighting the adaptive functions of this emotional response in the recovery for survivors. 5 For example, by reframing the clinical conceptualisation of anger within the understanding of social functionalist theories, 6 the response of anger in the aftermath of sexual violence is conceived to be a moral emotion instigated by the perceived violation of one's rights and social contracts, having sustained wounding from the intentional harm caused by others. 7 From this broadened conceptualisation, anger is no longer limited to be a negative emotion and a maladaptive symptom to be avoided or suppressed but is reframed as potentially constructive and instrumental in recovery, reflecting healing for survivors as they recognise and validate their rights to possess and develop the skills to express anger. 8 A healthy expression of anger can motivate and empower the survivors in reinstituting a sense of self-efficacy by actions to reclaim their boundaries and to re-attribute appropriate responsibilities on their perpetrators. 9 However, these potentially positive social and psychological effects can be deterred when anger expressions are blocked or made inaccessible to survivors, resulting in further deleterious impacts on their well-being. Without a healthy outlet, repressed anger may be chronically internalised leading to debilitating effects on their psychological well-being including extreme guilt or self-deprecating behaviours. 10
One salient factor impacting anger expression can be found along the gender divide with a growing body of literature demonstrating women's greater likelihood compared to men for anger suppression and its corresponding link to a variety of health detriments including depression. 11 Under the pervasive and deeply entrenched patriarchal social influence, anger has been rendered a male prerogative and a natural feature of masculinity, while women who openly communicate their anger are often seen to be behaving unacceptably and their reputation discredited or invalidated. 12 This attitude which gravely hinders women's ability to recognise and express anger continually robs women survivors of the creative and healing power of anger as they seek recovery from sexual violence. 13 Unfortunately, these hampering and discriminatory attitudes towards women are equally observed within the patriarchal ecclesiastical hierarchy of the traditional institutional church where women are subjected to a range of gender-oppressive treatments sustained by androcentric theologies diminishing their audibility and visibility, including their ability to voice out anger. 14
Having underlined the significance of anger and with the importance of the role this emotion plays in sexual violence trauma and recovery in mind, in the following sections, I will first turn to theologically reflect on the notion of anger before focusing specifically on the expression of anger in the context of Christian women on their journeys of healing from sexual trauma.
Biblical Perspectives on Anger
The complex and multifaceted concept of anger is not alien to Scriptures and biblical literature, yet this topic remains a theological conundrum and the source of some pernicious misapprehensions dominating Christian culture. 15 Historically, Christian tradition has responded to this universal phenomenon with fear and avoidance similarly with the topic of sexuality. 16 Many believers hold onto the perception solemnised by Gregory the Great in the sixth century that anger is one of the Seven Deadly Sins, symptomatic to our carnal nature and incompatible with Christian faith. 17 Guided by this understanding and fearful of the destructive consequences from anger, Christian teachings implicitly and explicitly place great emphasis to deny, suppress, or to excise angry feelings. 18 This confusion surrounding anger is not surprising as not only is this topic rarely addressed in church settings, but an overview of scriptural texts quickly reveals that it is almost universally portrayed negatively when applied to humans. 19
Far more attention has been granted by theologians and scholars to examine God's righteous and just divine anger and distinguishing it from the sinful, self-serving human anger. 20 In the New Testament, Jesus exemplified righteous divine anger in his confrontation of the Pharisees (Matt 23:13–29) and the Temple merchants (John 2:13–17), while God's all-consuming divine wrath is illustrated in the many examples described in the Old Testament (e.g., Deut 29; Num 16; 1 Chr 27). 21 Even though there may be an inherent contradiction in using Jesus, who is both fully human and God, in any neat distinctions between divine and human expressions of anger, all in all, God's divine anger is depicted as holy, constructive for human salvation, and an effective means to typify God's power, while anger on the human plane is depicted as unholy, indulgent, and destructive to God's kingship on earth. 22
Christian Understanding of Anger Expression
Naturally, the overall sentiment of ambivalence within the Christian understanding of anger plays a significant role in shaping how believers identify, value, and deem as appropriate in the communication of angry experiences. An example of a biblical text which has played a key part in shaping the moral-theological vision of Christian understanding of anger and its expression can be found in Ephesians 4:26a, where the apostle Paul stated, “In your anger do not sin.” 23 Amongst the moral exhortations which aimed to consolidate the believers’ distinctive identity within the Epistle to the Ephesians were instructions concerning conduct to promote unity and integrity of the Christian community. Particularly, in order to live a life worthy of their calling (Eph 4:1) as members of the church and to preserve the spiritual maturity and oneness of Christian society, the apostle urged the readers to “put away” anger and other similarly negatively characterised emotions for the sake of the church. 24 Furthermore, by positioning anger in juxtaposition with sin (Eph 4:26a), the emotion was singled out to be bequeathed with noteworthy penalising attention and seen in the same light to be characteristic of sinful behaviours provoking divine retribution. 25 Accordingly, anger, seen as a dangerous emotional disposition necessitating suppression or be expunged from faithful living in ways which resemble the command that it be “put away” (Eph 4:31) for the peace and unity of the church.
But perhaps not. A number of scholars such as Stephen C. Barton have argued for this logic in Ephesians to be reconsidered and have sought to demonstrate the erroneous traditional interpretation of passages such as Eph 4:26, rendering anger as sinful and idolatrous. For Barton, the rationale in Ephesians was not that all anger is destructive and synonymous with sin, but critical attention must be given to undisciplined anger which has the potential to endanger the unity of Christian communities. He argued that the primary motivation in the directive in Ephesians was not a matter of extirpation of the emotion but rather to controlling anger and emotions generally. 26 Similarly, other scholars worked to re-evaluate the indiscriminate correlation and acceptance of anger as sinful by examining other related biblical passages. For example, Victor Hamilton explored the Old Testament passage which contained the first mention of human anger in Gen 4:3–7. In the traditional interpretation of this passage, Cain's anger was the principal causative factor resulting in the disastrous tragedy of the murder of Abel. However, Hamilton questioned the fullness of this understanding in this text and argued that human anger is inappropriate only when it is allowed to dominate the person. 27 Instead of an uncritical assessment and treatment of all experiences of anger, the suitable response is to be on guard of the risks in being consumed by the volatile emotion which could then result in sinful behaviours. 28 Similarly in the New Testament, scholars have worked to conclude on a more nuanced assessment of anger and have proposed that Jesus’ view and teaching in the Sermon on the Mount (Matt 5:2–7:27) concerning anger was not an all-encompassing understanding and condemnation of anger, but the object of condemnation referred to a specific form of the anger characterised by malice and unjust hatred which demeans others. 29 Furthermore, beyond shifting our prescriptive understanding and misconstrued rendering of anger as determinately peace-destroying and sinful, others have expanded the exploration of anger to see the potential of this emotion as a tool against sin. For example, Daniel Wallace concluded that the imperatives found in Eph 4:26 should not be understood as a treatise on the dangers necessitating expurgation of anger but a simple command to “be angry and do not sin.” 30 For Wallace, not only is anger not interpreted as uncritically destructive and sinful, but the form of anger being referred to in the passage is in fact a mode of “righteous indignation,” valuably constructive and commanded to be used a tool in the battle against sin. 31
Now that we have expanded our theological lens on anger and proposed that it should not be uncritically rendered as destructive or perceived to be synonymous as sin, in the following section, I seek to piggyback on the noteworthy arguments mentioned to take a further step in exploring the possibility of how a transformed understanding of anger and its expression can pave a way for the church towards a more faithful realignment in becoming a more hospitable and safe space for survivors on their complex journey recovering from trauma.
The Role of Anger as Faithful Response in the Context of Sexual Trauma Recovery
Thus far we have seen that anger is a common and understandable response from those recovering from the trauma of sexual violence, and hindrances to a timely and healthy communication of anger can be detrimental to the survivors’ healing process. Historically, women are subjected to more socially limiting constraints to suppress anger and this constrictive pressure is equally, if not more acutely, experienced by Christian women from the traditional theological rendering of the emotion. This is unfortunate, as churches can be an especially powerful healing resource for Christian women survivors as communities of faith in their arduous journey of recovery. Sadly, this is not always the case. In fact, the prevalently held attitude of the church on anger and its expression critically impacts its capacity in fulfilling its vision to be an intimate communion of saints, embodying Christ's presence to participate in God's work for healing, reconciliation, redemption, and salvation in the world. 32 Surrounded by deeply held misconceptions related to anger experiences and expressions, as well as a history of marginalisation, many Christian women trauma survivors find churches to be profoundly problematic in their recovery journeys. 33 Far from experiencing the church as a place resembling “an agent of reconciliation … with practices of building community, fighting injustice and resisting oppression, while also offering care, hospitality and service,” 34 many have reported being further harmed and re-traumatised in their post-traumatic survival. 35
Although anger is an inevitable and understandable response, and as argued, an integral and constructive tool not only in the healing process but also in the fulfilment of the church's calling, undeniably some expressions of anger are less desirable. However, it is equally imperative to acknowledge and to grant space for the positive and healing potential of this human emotion and its role to fuel the much-needed transformative pursuit of justice and progress especially in the context of women in their post-traumatic survival from sexual violence. As Audre Lorde asserted, “anger expressed and translated into action in the service of our vision and our future is a liberating and strengthening act of clarification.” 36 I wonder how we can harness the potential from this inevitable and “well-stocked arsenal of anger” 37 to reflect the vision of “righteous indignation” in Eph 4:26, and to turn it into a valuably constructive tool in the battle against sin aligned with and supportive of the church's Kingdom vision and calling. 38
So far, we have seen that a lot of productive work has been accomplished to correct and develop our previously held misconceptions of anger and to have distinguished destructive anger, characterised by its undisciplined nature, from “virtuous indignation” 39 in the more disciplined or controlled mode of anger as potentially faithful tool to fight against sin. Following the work of these scholars who have fruitfully challenged the theological understanding of anger to arrive at an expanded, albeit conditional, understanding and acceptance of anger, I initially wondered if the proposed form and acceptance of disciplined anger is one sufficient possibility for the church to foster a more hospitable and faithful space for trauma survivors. However, upon further reflection, especially with the recipients in mind, I am reluctant to hastily settle on this proposal. Some of the questions which have since emerged are: How might this proposed mode of permitted anger—one which is distinctly marked by the outcomes from efforts required to first process, package, and control the emotion to become adequately “disciplined” before it is deemed acceptable—be passably pastorally sensitive and appropriate? Is it truly feasible in the complex reality of the trauma processes, and indeed theologically faithful, to expect and demand from those in their most acutely vulnerable and disorientated states to behave a certain way before they are considered for care? Is the reason and decision to discourage and dismiss anger, no matter how apt, able to stand on moral, political, and theological grounds? Could such reasoning become a convenient stance which offers the relevant agents and institutions, including the church, an expedient excuse to avoid facing, and be compelled to address, the deeply uncomfortable and confronting emotion, as well as the issues which had previously been hidden from view with those under their care? Is the unity of the church a sufficient reason to dismiss, delay, or deny support and care in this context?
Undeniably, certain communications of and responses to experiences of anger, for example anger which is corrosive, sabotaging, retributive, and deeply malignant, are not always immediately constructive for fostering healing and furthering of justice. However, it is paramount to remember that the human emotion of anger, as explicated above, is not sinful and cannot be relegated to be so and used as an excuse to dismiss those, especially trauma survivors, who are struggling at this stage of their experiences whereby unbridled and unprocessed anger may be part of their intense despair, hopelessness, and powerlessness. Every individual has a deserved place to be cared for by the church, and the commensurate experience and expression of anger for survivors of sexual violence cannot preclude their access to ecclesial attention. 40 As Brittney Cooper suggested, anger can be in a state of disarray, especially for those who do not have access to the opportunities and resources for the necessary work in processing their experiences, including their anger. 41 Exclusion from qualifying for the care or attention of the church based on the communicative mode of the trauma survivors is profoundly inappropriate and misaligned. After all, was Christ not always moving towards the vulnerable and wounded, modelling One who never breaks a bruised reed, nor snuffs out a smouldering wick (Isa 42:3)?
As mentioned earlier, there is an inequitable access for women to an open expression of anger, even justified anger, and there is more at stake for women generally to display anger. This is more so in the case of women victims of sexual trauma whose rage may have resulted from experiencing first-hand the pervasive and normalised attitude towards sexual violence, from the anger towards their perpetrators, or from not being believed, and having to revisit the trauma repeatedly as attempts for their accusation and plea to be finally heard. In openly displaying their justified anger, these women are already showing immense courage in refusing to temper or suppress their emotions for the sake of conforming to the unjust norms of societal expectations, a condition which has been termed by Amia Scrinivasan as “affective injustice.” 42 I am mindful that the notion of a more disciplined or controlled anger, even though theologically sound, without careful qualification especially in the context of survivors’ complex recovery journeys, can be problematic. Worse still, I am concerned that such a proposal would be to misapprehend an additional burden for the women victims to bear, or be utilised as another oppressive tool preventing survivors from accessing rightful and timely support in their faith communities. I was reminded of and resonate with Jennifer Baldwin's stance that, “If the god of a theological frame causes further injury or impedes the resiliency of survivors in the midst of post-traumatic response and process, then that god is not God for me.” 43 How would demanding and expecting victims, who may lack the necessary resources, to first replace their justified experiences and expressions of rightful rage with more conciliatory representations before accessing care be a more faithful proposal? Would this not further estrange and add to the trauma of survivors and, worse still, provide oppressors and other social agents, including the church, to rationalise having to face and deal with the disaffecting social and ecclesiastical structures and norms in perpetuating the existing “sacred silencing”? 44 After all, violence is not simply the function of the relationship between the victim and the perpetrator, but the magnitude of harm is pivotally hinged on other related factors including the reactions of the bystanders. 45
Since I have defended that all anger should have a place in the treacherous process of post-traumatic remaking for sexual trauma survivors, how then can the church make room for all experiences of anger and become a more faithful bystander? There are of course many ways in which Christian communities can support the wounded, but perhaps one possibility in enacting support can be found by the commitment to remain with and hold space for all manifestations of the experiences to unfold, including the potentially disruptive and challenging confrontation with anger in the practice of bearing witness. As a community charged to bring hope to the broken-hearted, we are not called to draw back from those who are struggling and wounded but to model on how to respond well. 46 Part of the endeavour to be a deeply caring community for those hurting, especially for those whose who have been unjustly violated sexually and for whom justice has not been done, would require there be room for their stories to be told and acknowledged, including their justified anger to be voiced in the midst. Feminist trauma theologians have drawn attention to the integral role in having a supportive community to bear witness with the survivors to their trauma recovery. 47 Colloquially, the term “witness” refers to a person's capacity to testify or bear witness to an event. 48 Witnessing has also been defined as a social process which serves to bring attention to certain aspects of social realities or events which were kept previously hidden from public view or disavowed. 49 One valuable example of how witnessing can be practised within communities to create a more supportive environment of solidarity with those in need recovering from violence and violation can be found in the Witnessing Model developed by Kaethe Weingarten (2000). 50 Within this model, each of the four positions describes a different level of the effectiveness and competence of the witnessing individual in relation to the event, which is further determined by the witness’ sense of awareness and empowerment. When this term is used theologically, and specifically in the context of trauma, the witness entails additional layers of meaning to include testifying to one's faith, as well as extending to the person's willingness and ability to be present with the suffering of others. In other words, collectively, the church, with its “graced capacity” 51 as the ecclesial Body of Christ, has the potential to be a “witnessing community” 52 with the ability and promise to actively engage with, hold space, and remain with those navigating the realities of the traumatic experience, including difficult emotions such as anger. Amongst the motivations of the practice of bearing witness with the aim to support those recovering from sexual violence is the desire to (re)instil a sense of hope in the midst of the brokenness and pain with the other, and to shift the pronoun from “you” to “we” in practices of solidarity. 53 “Doing hope” 54 through the act of bearing witness requires a shared sense of not being alone in facing the enormity of the hope-shattering reality in the aftermath especially as the survivors’ understandable experiences of anger have habitually rendered them “the new lepers” of communities, marginalised and shunned from receiving timely care. 55 It is common for survivors of sexual violence to report experiencing deep desolation in their perception of having been abandoned by God, especially if there is insufficient support accessible to them, including their faith communities. 56 It is, therefore, critical that churches continue to seek out ways to create safe spaces to embrace survivors and their needs at any stages of their recovery process. Perhaps one possible movement towards this goal can be attained through training programs with a framework similar to the one proposed within the Witnessing Model mentioned to enhance the awareness and knowledge of congregants and church leaders on the multifaceted nature of trauma, including the varied experiences and expressions of anger in their recovery journeys. Having understood that the inevitable and apt experiences of anger in the post-traumatic realities of those wounded by sexual violence, and to have seen the critical healing potential which can be found in a community's abiding commitment to hold space and remain with those suffering, the practice of bearing witness can be a promising starting place for the church to become a more hospitable haven for those in need.
Concluding Thoughts
As Judith Herman asserted, “no one can face trauma alone.” 57 This article joins scholars and theologians who have gone before me and have continued to pave the way in initiating the conversation with, and invitation to, faith communities to cease denying and avoiding the reality that trauma and abuse are as prevalent within the church as “out there.” 58 Faith communities which cannot hold space for the experiences of others, including the emotion of anger of those with traumatic wounding, are unconceivably distressing and incomplete by definition. 59 The church's omission to face, be sufficiently informed by, and address trauma processes not only threatens to perpetuate the conditions enabling trauma to flourish, further harming those suffering, but also undermines its vocational calling to be faithful agents in witnessing and embodying the gospel. 60 One first step in transforming and strengthening the churches’ response and competence in becoming safe communities in supporting survivors of trauma to create meaning from the fragmentating experience of sexual violence is through a renewed understanding and acceptance of anger and its expressions. In addition to attending to the voices, including the angry expressions and lament with those in the midst of trauma, the church is charged to bear witness with the traumatised at the sites of scars and pain.
