Should a man take his body, which is part of Christ, and join it to a prostitute? Never! – I Corinthians 6:15b, NLT
When someone is a cheater, they are also an abuser. You cannot have one without the other.
Soul rape is abusive.
I am astounded by how cheating and adultery are too often treated as less than abuse.
The husband with a cheating wife is told to fight for her. Little attention is paid to how she is actively abusing him by her remorseless infidelity.
A pastor tells a faithful wife to buy sexier underwear when she learns about the husband’s infidelity. This same pastor would insist on a separation if she thought the same husband had hit his wife.
It is obnoxious. It is wrong. It is harmful to faithful spouses.
Cheating is not benign behavior. This is NOT a morally neutral behavior.
It involves deception and lies. First and foremost, cheating is an abuse of trust. The sacred marriage vows that provide safety for both parties is unilaterally broken by one. Plus, cheating often puts the unsuspecting spouse at risk for STDs and usually involves so level of financial abuse–e.g. hidden spending of marital assets.
And the oneness of marriage means the cheater is forcing the third party upon the faithful spouse’s soul.
For anyone who has experienced being cheated on, they can tell you the pain is excruciating. In fact, some of us would probably prefer a punch in the face to having our spouse commit adultery.
At least with the punch, (most) religious people would “get” why we needed to get away from the person who would punch us again given a chance.
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*A version of this post ran previously.
