Abuse in the Parsonage, Part 1: A Secret Past
by Dr. Pamela Maize Harris | 8 April 2025 |
What follows is a true story, though names have been changed to protect the identity of those involved.
Sylvia and her husband, Sam, arrived at the state line of their new conference pastorate. They pulled over to document the moment. It felt almost like a pregnant pause, an act of placing the past in the past.
And Sylvia and Sam had an ugly past.
Things had started out happily enough. They’d had a short, whirlwind courtship. The timing for marriage seemed right for both. They’d worked as pastor and wife in another conference in another state. Sylvia felt like they were a team in those first years together, working hand in hand as partners doing the Lord’s work.
You would recognize their home and lives: haystacks on Sabbath, childhoods with ingathering and Mission Spotlight at Sabbath School, the Adventist Book Center, GLOW tracts left at gas stations.
Now, at the state line of their new conference, Sylvia twisted her simple gold wedding band, and hoped to God that good things lay ahead for them after their terrible past.
There was a circling hawk high above that seemed to them as a sign for good things ahead. They moved into the future with hope.
The forgiven past
What brought them to this new place?
Sam had been moved from two previous pastorates. His domestic violence against Sylvia had been documented in sixteen police reports. Sylvia learned later that she wasn’t the first of Sam’s loved ones to receive that treatment.
The first incident happened with Sam and Sylvia after several years of marriage. One Sunday afternoon while they were both working at the church, Sylvia suggested an outdoor Sabbath service because COVID-19 was ramping up.
The suggestion triggered him. He flew into a 45-minute rage. Sylvia ran to the women’s restroom to escape his wrath. He came barging in, throwing anything he could find: glasses, shoes, and more at Sylvia. He cursed, mocked, screamed at, intimidated, and hurt her. He cornered her against the wall where he held Sylvia, pounding her body repeatedly against it. He put his hand on the back of her hand while forcibly making her hand hit her left cheek with his hand behind it, making her “hit” herself repeatedly. He claimed that he hadn’t actually “hit” her himself. The beating left purple scars on her cheek and a black eye.
He kicked her ankles repeatedly. When Sylvia screamed that it hurt, he pointed to her stomach and threatened to kick her there, all the while pushing and banging her into the wall, screaming at her. This was the first of many beatings at Sam’s hand. Police reports graphically document this. Five cases include recordings Sylvia was able to make as the brutal beatings were in progress.
She went through sixteen bouts of physical battery—too many to record every encounter because she was pinned, unable to reach her phone.
That first beating lasted about 45 minutes. As time went on, though, the abuse and rage became louder, longer, and far more intense, lasting up to four hours at a time. The bouts of terror included:
- Yelling for most of the assault
- Intimidating body language and gestures threatening injury
- Throwing objects and bashing items
- Kicking in doors and walls
- Kicking that included attempts at Sylvia’s face
- Throwing just-cooked oatmeal patties onto the floor
- Putting holes in the patio screen door
- Breaking a glass curio case shelf and the glass items on it
- Crossing his eyes with angry, crazed expressions
During one incident the next-door neighbor knocked on the door for a well-check after hearing Sam’s screaming.
The fourth incident went on most of an afternoon. Sam broke the television, pictures, and continued his frightening and threatening attempts to batter Sylvia.
Sylvia texted Sam:
“…You have been violent and abusive. I can’t live that way. You have also belittled, mocked, [and] shown complete contempt. Our vows were to honor, respect and cherish. I am afraid of you.”
Sam texted back: “I’m angry so violence it is…. [I] didn’t keep my vows…. Breaking things fixes me. I’ve destroyed the house…. Just stocked up on weapons…. We are ready to use them.”
Sylvia left immediately for a domestic violence center. While there she received referrals, client advocacy, care management and preparation, and a safety plan. And—importantly—documentation that something terrible had happened.
Things get worse
After about two weeks Sylvia returned home. Sam had been assigned by the conference to a new pastorate. They left an apartment with walls destroyed by Sam’s outrage. No deposit returned, for sure.
In their new pastorate, the violence began almost immediately. The first incident included throwing objects at Sylvia, forcing her to constantly shield herself and her work computer. Sam kicked doors and walls, threw and broke her chair, chased her screaming and throwing objects to intimidate her, and made threatening gestures at her.
Several minutes into one rampage, Sam yelled, “I can’t be a pastor!” Then later, “I don’t want to break stuff. I can’t keep it all inside. There’s no solution.”
Fleeing, Sylvia drove to a nearby hotel to spend the night.
The next morning, Sam texted: “Come home.”
“For what?” Sylvia replied.
“So you can scream and scream at me for 30 hours straight? Your tantrums last until you scare me to death. These long rages are not the sign of a healthy brain. Not. Not. Not. Then when I do take you back like I have, you don’t have the kindness to be humbled by it, you just blame and shame me. I need love and looking after, not a crazy man.”
Sam replied: “I’d like for you to come home. I’d like to help you. No pressure. No forcing. You’ll be safe here. Don’t do anything crazy. I’ll be good and kind.” And, “I don’t want any photos or recordings going anywhere.”
Sylvia replied: “You call your rages ‘talking.’ Talking where I can do nothing to keep myself safe or keep from your destruction. Safe from your accusations.”
She continued:
“You don’t ever change. You just get worse, and you push me down more and more, and just get louder and louder and more destructive. You aren’t going to quit until I am paralyzed, dead, or gone. Every episode gets longer and longer, shorter between, and with more terrible lows. It’s never enough for you. You just can’t seem to hurt me enough. There is no depth for the rage you inflict and you call it ‘talking.’ I am supposed to listen [to] 30+ hours of raging in which you go on about every conceivable, ridiculous, made-up grievance. And the lapses between your rages get shorter and shorter.”
When Sylvia texted that he would be responsible for his vandalism, he texted, “OK, Sylvia.”
She continued texting:
“All the stuff you broke, too. And the wall you crashed in our apartment. I have the photos.… You don’t crave love. If you do, you crave control first. I reach out again and again and I am pushed away. You belittle me, mock me, refuse to accept boundaries, abuse me, hit me…. I told my family how you hit me, and that makes you feel bad. Well, how do you think it makes me feel to be hit? The blood vessels on my left cheek still have to be covered with makeup from when you pushed my face against the bathroom wall at church. The more I think about it, the angrier I get. So help me, you so much as throw at me or hit me, I will make these tapes of your violent episodes available to your elders, the police, and your family.”
Sam (as often happens with domestic abuse) accused the victim:
“If you genuinely don’t feel safe based on what might happen, I can’t live like that. I’m not being mean or manipulative. There is something going on that I seem to be taking the brunt of. However, as a husband I need to support you through whatever it is. It is driving me crazy sometimes… Something is not right and it isn’t all me.”
Sylvia responded:
“You can’t hit me or verbally abuse me. Those are the rules. When I say I need you to stop—I need you to stop. I would like to come back, as it’s cold in the car. But I can’t take your abuse anymore. I will sleep in another room if needed, or until I find a place to rent. If there is abuse, I will call the police and your [church] elders.”
He responded, “I won’t give up if you won’t.”
Three months later…
After another raging bout Sam texted that he needed to resign and come clean from the secrets he carried into his ministry work. “I’m faking it” and “have anger issues,” he admitted, and said he knew he was causing her pain. He suggested he take the pictures of the damage he’d done to doors and walls with him to therapy. He texted Sylvia,
“To heal, I need to come clean, and to come clean, I need to resign my job…. I need out of this pastor thing. Maybe just for a sabbatical or something. Perhaps it’s just burnout. But I feel I’m not allowed to be burned out.”
And a few minutes later:
“I try and always think about how I’m going to hold this all together under this unbearable set of circumstances…. Well, then I guess you are safe away from me. And I’ll just keep trying.”
Sylvia moves out
By this time, Sylvia had moved in with a family member several hours away from Sam. She stayed with her family during the week, but returned to be with Sam on the weekends, so that church members wouldn’t suspect.
But even those short stays became unsafe. Once, when she was home with Sam for the weekend, they had been to the grocery store. In a bout of terror he began throwing groceries at her as she shelved and placed them in the refrigerator. He kicked her legs and shins. He threw peanut butter into her hair. As she reached for the bagged food items, he forced her to the ground where she couldn’t move. She was terrified. He screamed at her, holding her down so that she couldn’t get up.
Sam pulled back the hand with his wedding ring—that circle of promise—and it caught her eye with the ring. Blood pooled behind her eye, which turned a wicked black. Sylvia broke free and ran to the bedroom, where he chased her and pushed her against a wall, placing his hands around her throat. She somehow got loose, grabbed her keys and purse and ran to the car, yelling for her little dog, Winston. A terrified Winston ran to the car, where the little dog lay at her feet near the pedals, quivering. She locked the car as Sam sprang out the door and flung himself on the hood, refusing to remove himself until she began driving, when he finally jumped off.
Several months later, fearing for her safety, Sylvia moved to another state to live with family. The two then separated for the next year and a half, at first part time, then full time.
Next: Starting over—new place, new promises—and a battered women’s shelter.
Pamela Maize Harris is retired from teaching journalism at Southern Adventist University. She writes investigative reports for Adventist Today.
