For the love of money is the root of all evil: which while some coveted after, they have erred from the faith, and pierced themselves through with many sorrows.
-I Timothy 6:10, KJV
A popular Christian curriculum for people going through divorce would regularly try to dissuade people from divorcing by pointing out the financial cost of divorce.
I find this scare tactic especially awful for faithful spouses. It is just making it more difficult for them to take the hard, necessary action.
Such scare tactics actually enables ongoing abuse by Cheaters as faithful spouses might be fearful of ending the abusive situation due to how scary divorce looks. Why is enabling abuse–as cheating is abuse–acceptable from the “pulpit” or other place of church leadership?!
More importantly, motivation out of fear is not a godly motivation (see 2 Timothy 1:7).
Yes, divorces are costly.
This is a fact. What is missed in these scare tactics are the costs of staying in an abusive relationship. That is what staying with an unrepentant cheater is–namely, abusive.
I still believe divorce is a real, godly mercy (see Mt 19:9).
Like a costly surgery, divorce can be the gateway to life from a dangerous situation–namely, an attachment to a destructive person. The cost is not the point. If you have to amputate, you amputate. You do what you have to do to save life!
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*A version of this post ran previously.
