Years ago, I was challenged at the end of a talk to make a response to St. Peter’s insistence that women are the “weaker vessel” (1 Pet. 3:7).  The questioner clearly saw this as implying some kind of female inferiority that was incompatible with the gender egalitarianism I was expounding.

This week the issue came up again in a very different context. St. Peter wasn’t mentioned, but the underlying ambiguity was evident enough. A report published by the University of Bristol and the National Society for the Protection of Cruelty to Children (NSPCC) surveyed 1,300 youngsters aged between 13 and 17 and found that 90% of the girls had been in an intimate relationship. One third of the girls had suffered sexual abuse in the relationship, with 17% saying they were forced to have sex.  A quarter of the girls reported violence at the hands of their boyfriends, and one in 16 said they had been raped. Experiences from some of the boys in the survey also indicated the presence of violence, although in much smaller proportion, with one in 17 saying they had been pressured into having sex.  In the words of one commentator, the report showed “immense peer pressure” among teenagers to behave in certain ways, resulting in “disrespectful or violent relationships with girls often bearing the brunt.”

The findings have produced some stunned responses, even from those who commissioned the research. Professor David Berridge was shocked to find exploitation and violence in relationships starting so young and described the rate of violence as “appalling.” Diane Sutton, head of NSPCC policy and public research, was shocked that “so many young people view violence or abuse in relationships as normal.”

And indeed, shocking it is. That such abuse should be identified as intimacy is a denial of human value. Yet this is not a problem that originates with teenagers but is often handed down by those who are older. The two groups of girls who were found to be particularly at risk were those with older boyfriends and those who had already experienced violence from adults within their family. The witness of domestic violence toward a mother was also a factor. It seems part of a societal legacy of relational dysfunction and disrespect, which all too quickly creates a pervasive culture of abuse.  Perhaps we should not be so surprised when this is mirrored in the experiences of teenage intimacy. 

So how should we respond as Christians? It goes without saying that we need both to teach and to model something better—relationships that are committed, faithful, respectful, safe, and noncoercive. Clearly, we should actively pursue the fruits of the Spirit in our own marriages and friendships. The very least the church could do is to open a new window on love joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control “against which there is no law.”

But we might also need to revisit that statement by St. Peter. Within his culture the woman was indeed the “weaker vessel”; not spiritually, but within the structures of patriarchal society. Today also, women might still be said to be “weaker”—not in any sense of inferiority or inadequacy, but in the cultural sense of economic and physical vulnerability. Yet women’s sexual vulnerability is no justification for discrimination or stereotyping, even less for abuse. There should be no incompatibility between promoting an egalitarian society that celebrates difference and acknowledging that girls have always been in need of protection. The two go together. The problem comes when male power and gender violence are accepted as normal, and we fail to censure those who are predatory and abusive. St. Peter had a better idea, and we would do well to acknowledge it: that men should live considerately in relationships and “bestow honor” on women.  

This article originally appeared in the Church Times (September 2009) and is reproduced here by permission.