Rosie Aiello and her daughter, Sunny, “trapped in an emotionally, mentally, and financially abusive relationship for nearly 25 years, Rosie engineered their escape from the Middle East to save her daughter Sunny and herself from domestic violence. Nearly mentally destroyed and stunned by PTSD, Rosie and Sunny arrived in their home state of California.”1
You can only imagine what abuse looks like in the Middle East where women are repressed and treated no better than chattel with essentially one purpose for even being on this earth. Failure to comply to the sexual or domestic demands of the husband or to produce male heirs can result in inexplicable torture. These women become POWs – Prisoners of Weddings – weddings that were often arranged and forced upon them. The abuse is a part of the culture with the man having total dominance over the woman.
According to Breaking The Cycle, domestic violence and abuse happens a whole lot more than I realized.
- Nearly every 1 in 2 women in the United States will face physical violence from an intimate partner at some point in their lives.
- Almost 40 million women reported being slapped, pushed, or shoved.
- Almost half of all women reported psychological aggression by an intimate partner in their lifetime.
- 1 in 4 men in the United States has endured severe physical violence from an intimate partner.2
Rosie and Sunny found a way to turn their situation around to help others. They founded The Love Is Kind Network, a means of reaching out with hope and a lifeline to those experiencing abuse. They also established this day as National Love Is Kind Day, a reminder of the principles found in 1 Corinthians 13 that define love.
Today’s date was chosen in recognition of the day Rosie and Sunny gained freedom after an international escape. On June 18, 2022, Sunny died at a young age of heart failure, a result of the previous trauma she had experienced.
Take a moment and reflect on 1 Corinthians 13:4-8.
“Charity suffereth long, and is kind; charity envieth not; charity vaunteth not itself, is not puffed up, (5) Doth not behave itself unseemly, seeketh not her own, is not easily provoked, thinketh no evil; (6) Rejoiceth not in iniquity, but rejoiceth in the truth; (7) Beareth all things, believeth all things, hopeth all things, endureth all things. (8) Charity never faileth: but whether there be prophecies, they shall fail; whether there be tongues, they shall cease; whether there be knowledge, it shall vanish away.”
Charity is that Biblical agape love. It is a love only the child of God can know and experience. It is the “love of God” that is “shed abroad in our hearts by the Holy Ghost which is given unto us” at the moment of salvation. (Romans 5:5)
Reread the verse above and every time you see the word “charity,” substitute the words “God’s love.” “God’s love suffereth long, and is kind; God’s love envieth not…” You get the idea. The love of Christianity is a reflection of the love of God. We know the right way to love others because we see it demonstrated to us by Jesus.
Abusers have no concept of this love. In fact, they do the opposite of each attribute of God’s
love. But it’s not just abusers who are confused about this love. From time to time, we all demonstrate the selfishness that clouds the reflection of God’s love from our lives.
While I cannot attest to the spiritual condition of Rosie and Sunny, I can at least say that they recognized the source of genuine love and that is the love of God. They knew that real love should be kind.
Remember today the truth of 1 John 4:7-8 and treat others with the love of the Lord. “Beloved, let us love one another: for love is of God; and every one that loveth is born of God, and knoweth God. (8) He that loveth not knoweth not God; for God is love.”
1https://nationaldaycalendar.com/celebrations/national-love-is-kind-day-july-27
2https://www.breakthecycle.org/domestic-violence-statistics/
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