Redemptive Divorce by Mark Gaither is marketed on Amazon with this blurb:
A graceful, biblical way to reclaim sanity for the home and dignity for the suffering spouse in a dysfunctional or dangerous marriage.
Thousands of conscientious believers wanting to honor the sacred vows they took before God suffer in dysfunctional, even dangerous marriages. Each and every day they must choose between the lesser of two evils: divorce without sound biblical support or a life of perpetual, unrelenting misery. Somewhere between the secular disregard for the commands of Christ and the sacred unwillingness to deal with real problems of people, there is a way.
The redemptive divorce process is designed to honor the sacredness of the union while offering practical relief for the suffering partner and tough love for the offending spouse. In some cases, it might even be the catalyst for the restoration and rebuilding of the marriage. Practical, provocative, and utterly unique, Redemptive Divorce includes a helpful guide with worksheets for implementation.
Mark Gaither happens to be Charles (Chuck) Swindoll’s son-in-law, and Swindoll wrote the foreword for the book. Writing here about his own divorce and remarriage, Mark said he implemented the ‘redemptive divorce’ method when his first wife left him for another man, but in the end he had to accept that the marriage was over.
When I read Redemptive Divorce soon after it came out in 2008, it worried me because I knew that in cases of abuse it wasn’t safe to apply the method which Gaither was teaching. So I emailed Mark Gaither to express my concerns. He replied graciously, saying that he agreed with my concerns and he wished he’d been more aware of that before publishing his book.
The first half of Redemptive Divorce explains the theory and biblical principles of disciplinary divorce. That section could be useful for anyone, including victims of domestic abuse. The second half of the book explains the methodology — how to apply the principles when a marriage is on the rocks by utilizing the American divorce system in a way which invites a sinning spouse to repentance and genuine reconciliation, while recognizing that if the sinner refuses to repent, the divorcing spouse will not be guilty for proceeding with the divorce.
I’ll give him credit that in the final chapter of the book he says, “Redemptive divorce is not a remedy for domestic violence.” But mentioning that in the final chapter isn’t good enough, particularly since many of his readers would be victims of abuse given Amazon’s blurb which says the book is for “the suffering spouse in a dysfunctional or dangerous marriage.”
Gaither should not have allowed the wording of that blurb. And he should have stated at the beginning of the book that “redemptive divorce is not a remedy for domestic violence and abuse.” Furthermore, he ought to have a very prominent warning on his website so that readers will know not to apply his methodology in cases of spousal abuse. He has no such warning, either on his homepage or on his page about Redemptive Divorce.
If the proactive spouse using redemptive divorce methodology were a victim of abuse, the method would further endanger her if she had not yet escaped from living with the abuser and managed to firmly barricade herself against post-separation abuse. And as we know, it is very hard to leave an abuser, let alone securely barricade oneself against all post-separation abuse, especially where there are children of the marriage. Any access the abuser has to the victim and any communications she makes to him are going to be re-shaped into bullets by him and fired back at her. Mark gave no guidance on how to adapt his method in abuse scenarios so as to optimize the victim’s safety. And when I wrote to him in 2008 with my feedback, he agreed with me.
Gaither told me that he recognizes that his methodology is okay for victims of adultery or simple desertion but is not suitable for abuse.
So I have to ask now, all these years later — Was Mark lying when he told me in 2008 that he agreed with my concerns? Or does he agree with me but simply not care enough about protecting the abused to put a warning on his site? I think he has shown rank neglect for the safety of abuse victims.
The redemptive divorce method focuses on giving clear notice to the offending spouse that their behavior is sundering the marriage. The method is designed to encourage the offending spouse to repent and it implicitly leaves open the door to reconciliation for quite some time. This leads me to another concern about the book, which one of our readers raised with me.
As we know, abusers typically make a superficial show of repentance. The tough proactive stance Gaither suggests could be used by an abuser to further harm a victim in the divorce process. An abuser could take the role of the proactive spouse using the Redemptive Divorce method and portray himself as the righteous Christian who is inviting his wife to repent and reconcile. Most churches would side with the abuser because they love the word ‘redemption’ and they’re too naive to detect the difference between fake repentance and genuine reformation. Abracadabra! —the abuser can use Gaither’s book as another weapon in his arsenal to manipulate bystanders into blaming the victim for not repenting and for not being willing to reconcile the marriage.
But I’ll say again, as we say so often on this blog: the abused spouse does not need to repent for ‘her part in the marriage breakdown’ because she did not cause the marriage breakdown. (As with anything we write on this blog, reverse the genders if you need to.)
Mark Gaither also makes the classic error of sin-levelling and mutualizing the blame for marriage breakdown.
In Redemptive Divorce, when discussing a case of marital separation due to the husband’s drug addiction and adultery and (by the wife’s report) where husband has “now broken his habit for good and given his life to Christ,” Mark recommends they remain separated for a while to give the wife time to heal in safety, and give time for the husband to address whatever personal issues led to his sin, and “the couple can allow trust to rebuild slowly and responsibly.” But Mark also says, “She must also discover and own her contribution to the breakdown of the marriage.” (p89) That, as we know, is unjustly mutualizing the blame for the marriage breakdown.
And in another place [link] he writes:
Obviously, every troubled marriage has two sides, even when the fault weighs heavier on one side than the other.
Perhaps he has projected his own experience onto every other divorcee. In this post written August 17 2010 for Covenant Eyes, he describes and reflects on the breakdown of his first marriage:
… in marriage, there is no such thing as an “innocent” victim. No one is perfect. We all sin. We all fail. We all do things—small and great—that do harm to our relationships. Sooner or later, if we are to recover from the devastation of marital betrayal, we must turn our eyes away from the sins of our partner and take a painful look at our own.
Essentially, I had to admit that, from the beginning, I chose a woman incapable of normal intimacy because I didn’t want genuine intimacy myself. That way I could tell myself I wanted intimacy without actually having to endure the risks that necessarily come with it.. …
Among my many faults and flaws, I discovered a man unwilling to be wrong. Consequently, I didn’t make it easy for anyone—including my spouse—to be honest about their grievances and disappointments in me. I made it easier for her to bury her pain rather than express it openly and honestly with me. Resentments, like poison, cannot remain inside or they’ll kill the soul. While her sinful choices were her responsibility, I didn’t provide a healthy outlet for her frustrations. My reluctance to hear and accept responsibility for my faults made obedience more difficult for my non-confrontational partner. I didn’t make her sin, but I did make sin an easier choice.
Mark Gaither used an abused woman’s story to elicit donations to his ‘ministry’
Mark wrote in August 9, 2009 that he and his second wife Charissa were setting up Redemptive Heart Ministries Inc., and were applying for tax exempt status. In that post they shared a letter which a woman, Charlene, had written to them in which she said:
I left my marriage of 20 years to a pastor/shepherd husband who verbally, emotionally, mentally, sexually, psychologically, and spiritually abused me and our 5 children throughout our marriage. I reached my breaking point late last year and left. I homeschooled for 15 years so did not work outside home for past 20 years, and therefore have almost no means to support myself, much less pay for legal help.
…. Where does a wife in my situation go when the church, extended family, friends, etc. won’t believe her story and will not offer help because the pastor/shepherd is such a wolf in sheep’s clothing—charming, warm, outwardly loving, does all the right things outside the home, but inside the home, a monster. This is spiritual warfare at a level most people can’t even imagine.
On top of all we’ve been through, it is especially unfair to be relegated to the welfare system to support myself and my children. The majority of churches I’ve emailed for help say that I have to be a tithing member [in order to receive help]. I don’t have a car to get to job interviews, counseling appointments, etc. Where can I go for help? Is there such an organization or ministry that has tangible resources for families like mine?
I feel isolated and rejected, and I need help.
I have little doubt that Charlene’s story was true. And it seems to me that Mark used Charlene’s story to try to get donations for his fledgling Redemptive Heart Ministries Inc.
Then — whatdya know — two days later, on August 11, Mark published another post [link] reporting that
Once Charlene decided to break away from her abusive husband, she began a healing process under the guidance of her divorce recovery group.
This study at a local church became a catalyst for deeper healing, which helped me [Charlene] to humble myself and go to my husband and apologize for how I had participated in the destruction of our marriage. Something broke inside of both of us through this process. I had been rejected since birth. He had been abandoned by an absentee father at an early age. Amazing that we had these issues staring us in the face for so many years after conversion. We needed healing. I took a strong stand for myself—a cry for help—that became God’s intervention . . . for both of us. We are different people as a result of this journey of healing.”
Charlene and her husband are now in the process of reconciling and restoring their marriage. Not merely “getting back together,” but building again on a whole new foundation. They have long way to go and a lot of work to do. Rebuilding trust is a difficult, sometimes perilous journey, and they are not assured of success. Regardless, their separation gave them an opportunity to turn hopelessness into a bright, hopeful future.
And — you guessed it — at the end of that article Mark asked for $ donations again. Mark clearly didn’t have any idea about how men like Charlene’s husband do not change. How they are reprobate. How they can masquerade brokenness and emotional repentance like Oscar-winning actors while their hearts remain as hard as flint and as wily as foxes. Mark used Charlene’s story to leverage his ‘ministry’. He was so clueless about the dynamics of abuse that he took her belief in her husband’s repentance at face value. I feel for all the women like Charlene who have been buoyed up with false hopes by people like Mark Gaither.
According to Mark Gaither, doing ‘what is right’ means not divorcing the unrepentant porn-using spouse.
In Mark Gaither’s article Living with an Unrepentant, Porn-Abusing Husband: Advice to Weary Wives of Addicts (Feb 2010) he responds to the letter from a woman whose husband had promised to give up porn but had not followed through with his promise. The woman had asked Gaither whether she should stay in the marriage or leave. Gaither says:
It’s not an easy question to answer. I address the issue from a theological standpoint in the article, “Is Pornography Scriptural Grounds for Divorce?” [dead link]—concluding that divorce is not the biblically sound response. So, my short answer to her question is, “stay in the marriage.” However, if you are a woman stuck in this situation, I do not recommend remaining passive. While the Bible does not counsel divorce, the marriage is far from okay. Viewing pornography is not the same as adultery—at least not technically. Regardless, women suffer the same humiliation and endure the same feelings of betrayal. (See also, “Is Porn the Same as Adultery?”) Consequently, you cannot simply pretend the marriage is intact, despite what your husband claims or what well-meaning advisers tell you.
While it’s not your place to change your husband or try to rouse his dead conscience, you can continue to allow the consequences of your husband’s sin to fall upon him. However, this can be a delicate matter and it must be handled with wisdom. Otherwise, you can cause more harm than good. Your husband ultimately answers to God, so you cannot—and must not—become his Holy Spirit. Nor can you become a means of behavior modification. “Tough love” does not try to control or coerce another person; it merely rejects sin and declares how we will respond to future wrongdoing. Instead, you must shift your focus away from any hope of his changing and decide how you are going to coexist under the same roof while he persists in his sin.
Needless to say, we have put Redemptive Divorce on our Hall of Blind Guides.
***
A Cry For Justice 
What / Who is this MAN trying to protect by saying that??? himself?????
So, [he claims that] looking at a woman is not technically adultery (it is LUST), watching porn is not technically having sex (even if the people in the video ARE, even if the viewer is FANTASIZING about having sex). […]
Based on my own failed marriage experience, I have come to view my ex’s “adultery and simple desertion” as a form of emotional and psychological abuse; just one among all his other forms of abuse against me and our four sons. I don’t see adultery and simple desertion as being separate from abusiveness. Any thoughts welcome. 🙂
Hi lama, “adultery and simple desertion” are forms of emotional and psychological abuse. Adultery HURTS the innocent partner. Simple desertion (leaving the marriage when the other spouse has not done anything that breaks the covenant) definitely HURTS the innocent partner.
Having said that, an abusive spouse, i.e., a spouse who engages in a pattern of coercive control and intimidation to maintain power over his or her partner, is in many ways worse than a simple adulterer or a simple deserter. The abuser generally is more malicious, more covertly malignant, more evil than the person who only commits adultery or deserts without having the marks of an abuser. For the definition of an abuser, see our sidebar on this blog.
[In my experience] living with a porn addict and an abuser brought in evil spirits [i.e. the abuser’s conduct brought evil spirits into the home]. … I could write a book about how porn affects the wife and the breakdown of the wife’s soul and emotional well being. The after shocks of abuse still wreck havoc in my daily activities. And its been almost two years since i divorced my abusive spouse.
Breaking free from abuse has been a difficult journey. I choose every day not to look back. Breaking all contact with his ongoing control. My hope is the chains will break loose. The spirit tie will eventually be cleansed by trusting in my salvation in Christ. The refuge and protector of my soul.
Comments no pastor or counselor should ever make to a woman facing a porn using / addicted spouse:
–You need to stay in the marriage.
–The result of your sin is no different than his. All sin separates us from God.
–Let’s see where you have been at fault in this relationship.
–In order for him to heal, you need to show him you trust him.
–His use of porn has no bearing on how he views you.
–Porn addiction is a disease.
–All men struggle with this at some time. It is common to men.
–Learn how to spice things up in the bedroom.
–A little tolerance will help you to see things his way.
Also, replacing the words: sin, destructive, unacceptable, breech of trust etc. with the words: difficulty, problem, struggle, misunderstanding etc. is simply a game for the weak and “compassionate” minister who does not want to face what the problem really is and chooses to leave the wife (or perhaps no one in particular) standing holding the responsibility.
Porn so often goes hand in hand with sexual abuse, “gentelmens’ clubs”, and affairs and, if the man is not already participating in those other sins, porn is often the gateway to it.
Very well said.
‘Mistake’ or ‘poor choices’ are some other buzz words they love to use to minimise the seriousness of sin.
Pornography has also been shown to increase abusive behaviour towards the innocent spouse. I’m sure many of us can testify to the correlation. Any ‘teacher’ or ‘pastor’ that tries to lessen the evil of that sin is a false teacher in my book and has some kind of agenda. I don’t think it’s a stretch to say we can be highly suspect they are often protecting their own sin in this area. I don’t apologise for being suspicious of that anymore in these cases, I’ve experienced it to be true one time too many.
It angers me when he says pornogrpahy use is not the same as adultery. Jesus said that looking upon a woman with lust in your heart is adultery, so how is looking at unclothed people engaging in the physical act, while commiting your own physical act unto yourself at the same time, not adultery??? This is nothing but an attempt at sin minimising on his part. Pornography use IS ADULTERY!
It amazes me in this day and age, when there has long been nothing new under the sun, that these supposed Christian leaders still churn out these books with some supposed new doctrine or teaching that is THE answer to your problems. They are just making merchandise out of the people, and it is extra dispicable when it is preying upon vunerable people in painful situations desperate for help.
After learning how he claimed that pornogrpahy is not adultery, I have no reason to hear or read anything else he writes. As soon as someone starts minimising sin, alarm bells go off for me.
Absolutely agree………..this is adultery!! However, I know many of these spouses would deny that, due to not actually having a physical relationship with the online person.
I am so thankful for this site that weekly reaffirms my decision to end the abuse and insanity I was living in for 31 years and to go forth into a new life without shame!
I also now see my ex’s porn-viewing as abusive.
This is from the outside so I don’t know if others agree, but extensive porn use as I’ve seen described seems almost like desertion to me.
I think people minimize it because they are (again) afraid that people are going to get ‘frivolously’ divorced because they find a playboy or something. I doubt that has ever happened.
My question is did he mean obedience to the him, as the husband, or to God?!?! UGH! HUGE BIG RED FLAG!!!!!
Hi dear sister, welcome to the blog.
I changed your screen name to #anon# as a precaution because it looked like you had given your real name. If you want us to change it to something else, just email TWBTC (The Woman Behind The Curtain) —twbtc.acfj@gmail.com — she will be happy to assist. 🙂
You are right to notice the potential ambiguity in that sentence of Mark Gaither’s. We can’t be sure how he meant it to be understood. But the fact that his language is ambiguous and he didn’t seem to realise that, shows how incautious and blithe he is about domestic abuse. Cindy Burrell is right: Mark Gaither is “yet another half-baked Christian marriage expert”.
It seems you are new to the blog. Please check out our New Users’ Info page as it gives tips for how to guard your safety while commenting on the blog.
And after reading the New Users’ Info page, you might like to look at our FAQs.
Yikes. I felt truly sickened by what I read from Mark’s writings. There is way too much wrong to even comment, so I am grateful for the clarification you offered, Pastor Jeff. The most offensive part is that you went far beyond due diligence and seemingly succeeded in enlightening Mark – providing him with the WHOLE truth – yet he has not revised his written work to reflect that vital, validating, life-giving understanding. Mark’s failure on that score is disappointing at best, and grossly irresponsible and self-serving at worst.
Thank you for shining a light on yet another half-baked Christian marriage expert.
UPDATE Sept 2021: I have come to believe that Jeff Crippen does not practise what he preaches. He vilely persecuted an abuse victim and spiritually abused many other people in the Tillamook congregation. Go here to read the evidence. Jeff has not gone to the people that he spiritually and emotionally abused. He has not apologised to them, let alone asked for their forgiveness.
***
Hi Cindy, this post was actually written by me, not Jeff.
Oiy, dare I say that Jesus says porn is adultery.
Jesus also says that Moses allowed men to divorce wives to basically save them from their hard hearts. I would venture to say that these two statements are correlated. Porn equals hardened heart. Wife should be allowed to escape from this adultrous man.
It is my experience that men don’t fully comprehend the devastation that porn causes to a wife’s heart. A man is not equipped to counsel her on this.
Hi Anewanon, I don’t believe that Jesus said that Moses allowed men to divorce wives to basically save women from men’s hard hearts.
I believe that this is what Jesus meant: Moses gave the law in Deuteronomy 24:1-4 to RESTRAIN men from a horrible thing they were doing, namely the man DIVORCED his wife and then REMARRIED her after she’d married another man and her second marriage had terminated for whatever reason.
The hardness of heart in the first man was that he was treating divorce and remarriage as if he were a pimp in control of a prostitute — passing the woman over to be with another man, and then taking her back. I explain this in my book.
The idea that the word Redemptive causes churches to side with abusers is really concerning to me. I so agree with this. I know a minister (I respect very much) who believes that we have to try and redeem or heal abusers, because that is a “Biblical worldview”. But there are so many indicators in the Words of Christ and the apostles and even in the prophets that people with abusive tendencies don’t change and we should have nothing to do with them. Would it be wrong to say that the “Biblical Worldview” concerning abusers, narcissists etc. is to send them away form the church and offer them no shelter. Leave them to themselves and if God would ever break through with a genuine conversion then that is His business?
this book sums up what most seem to agree about anyway.. it’s shining a light on the whole problem with the church and abusers and they refuse to wake up, protect women and understand an abuser’s mind.. In my viewpoint, this book is just rehashing it all..
Hello from a long-time lurker, first-time poster who just can’t keep quiet about this one.
I have no tolerance for anyone who takes a soft stand against porn, none. Gaither may not think his stand is soft, but that’s because he’s genuinely clueless about [the] depth of evil in the porn industry.
A young relative of mine, who is developmentally delayed, was trafficked across the country to a porn / prostitution ring by her own mother. It was only by the grace of God, in response to the intercession of a few powerful prayer warriors, that she was able to escape before they got her to her final destination. The other girls she was traveling with weren’t so fortunate.
That’s why Gaither’s advice, “don’t shame your husband” for looking at porn, just about drives me over the edge. People who use porn are vicariously participating in (and in some cases funding) the sexual abuse of women who are tricked or forced into porn and prostitution against their will. These women end up trapped and terrified. They’re de facto slaves in “the land of the free.” And yes, this happens right here in the US, where I live, not just in “seedy third-world countries”. If the husband feels shame when he’s confronted, that’s not his wife’s fault. The burden is not on her to lessen or avoid his shame. Shame is appropriate for a man who neither knows nor cares that the girl performing the stunts on the screen is slowly dying inside, not just because she’s being intimately violated every day but because she believes that she’ll never see her family and loved ones again. If, God forbid, Mark Gaither had a daughter who fell victim to traffickers, would he still care about shaming the men who fuel the demand for new faces, new bodies, and kinkier acts on their screens?
(For the record, I’m not saying that every woman in porn is forced. I’m saying that porn creates a demand for novelty that far exceeds the number of women who would participate voluntarily.)
By the way, my relative is safe now, but she still has nightmares about this experience and other forms of abuse she suffered at the hands of her mother. Therapy and medication don’t seem to help much. The abuse started too early, ran too deep, and lasted too long. I pray that one day she lets Christ into her heart so that she can know His perfect love and healing.
Thank you SO much, Anonymous Grandma! I wholeheartedly agree with you.
And I’m very encouraged to know you’ve been following our blog for so long. It is wonderful to know that you and those prayer warriors helped get that young woman safe from the porn-industry mincer.
Last Sunday Ps Sam Powell preached a sermon titled Flee Fornication using 1 Cor 6:12-20. He shows that Scripture clearly teaches that fornication is a heart issue. It’s not about the length of the skirt; it’s not an addiction. It’s a heart issue that can only be dealt with at the cross of Jesus Christ. Excellent sermon! I encourage you to take the time to listen to the audio provided at sermonaudio.com
Here are a couple of quotes by Ps Powell:
Ps Powell’s sermon, Flee Fornication, is part two of a 2-part sermon series on 1 Cor 6:12-20. For a complete understanding of foundational principles of this text I suggest you also listen to part 1.
I Belong to Jesus
Thank you so much Barbara for this book highlight…….it’s why I can’t read them anymore…my soul hurts thinking of people who belong to Jesus having to endure these lies, and then when and if they do wake up, it is years later….so many wasted years.
From Mark:
How about this instead, Mark? — “If your husband [has seared his] conscience, none of this applies. He is a man as described in 2 Tim 3 (and elsewhere) as God tells us in His word, we are to have nothing to do with such people. Please start to pray for protection as we will be praying for you too, and then start looking up ways to keep yourself and loved ones safe. We are working on getting ministries up and running that teach God’s children how to identify such abusers before getting married to them and having children with them as these relationships are extremely unholy and soul destroying for both the saved and the unsaved alike. We hope to have churches set up to keep out the evil ones and love and teach and reach those who have a heart to love. Our ministry is dedicated to teaching the truth about these [malicious & devious] individuals as described throughout the Bible, so that we can TRULY be God’s light in the world, because He has vividly and accurately described them for us in His word. We want these churches to be known for keeping out abusers and helping and building up those with a conscience. This is all biblical what we are witnessing and it’s far too long in coming.”
From Mark:
Here’s what I hear Mark telling her: “I forbid you to discern…I forbid you to come to the truth of the matter or reach a reasonable conclusion. I won’t let you do anything but stand there with your hands tied behind your back. But I fully expect you to keep right on having sex with this abuser, worshiping him and taking care of the children without a word of complaint. Are you without sin? You are not to point out any truth to him or to listen or believe any yourself. We don’t want women to think they have any hope of escape or any hope at all. Men are men and as such are gods in their home, you are to shut up and don’t ask for any more help. My first wife left me when I was a perfect husband so I will punish all women forever…under the guise of giving a crap about them. After all, there is no screening for ministry, any old abuser can become a pastor…it’s not even hard. If one seminary throws us out for abuse or porn addiction, there are plenty more that will welcome us in with open arms. Do you hear me now? Do you get it? I don’t care about you, my agenda is to abuse.”
When my psychopathic son was seeing one psychiatrist and this son was absolutely out of control, his advice was similar to Mark’s which was to let him run wild. Do whatever he wanted…..I’m completely serious about this…..even though at our son’s age WE would have been accountable in court for his actions. This was SO MANY YEARS AGO but I remember it like it was yesterday. I had zero frame of reference at the time to absorb this way of thinking. (It was still several years before I knew about psychopathy.) Just do whatever you want to while every other person is held accountable? Oh YES, and this is what they are trying to do here…..keep the few with consciences toeing the line while those poor innocent humans who have [a completely seared] conscience, shouldn’t be held accountable at all.
Again I ask, can’t we set aside some place for these truly evil people to go so they can live out their days in absolute debauchery? A “Funland” for the truly evil? People who are adults who have no conscience, to be set free from societal rules and the societal protection that comes with it, and let them run free? They could be tested to ensure that they don’t have a functioning conscience, then agree to sterilization, and then let them live within this community with others like themselves, having sex, raping each other, doing drugs etc. and simply be what they are? And the rest of us would be educated about them and protected from them? Has this not occurred to anyone else?
The Bible is chock full of abusers and how God’s children are nothing like them. Over and over, Old and New Testament alike describe evil people. Yet somehow, in this generation we have managed to “change” everything! WE (humans) have ‘cured’ evil with psychotherapy. WE (humans) have mastered evil behavior with medication. WE (humans) refuse to acknowledge that GOD Himself told us behaviors to look for to help us discern and identify abusers but instead we have the misguided, deluded and ignorant forcing us to bow down to it. End times indeed.
I swear I almost passed out when I read that she [Charlene] went back and apologized to HIM [her abusive husband, and how Mark Gaither appears to have used Charlene’s story to leverage his ‘ministry’ — text in brackets added by ACFJ Eds to clarify what Dani seems to be referring to].
And how DARE Mark call himself a pastor and say that porn “isn’t the same as adultery”…?! What planet is this guy from?