May god help you: Faith leaders’ perspectives of intimate partner violence within their communities

Semi-structured interviews were conducted with religious leaders from Jewish, Islamic and Christian faiths on the relationship between religion and intimate partner violence (IPV). They were analyzed using grounded theory, producing a model of this interaction. This paper describes the leaders' perceived relevance of IPV for their congregation and the interventions that leaders used to address this issue. Most of the leaders estimated very low occurrence of IPV within their congregations and, accordingly, rarely discussed this topic in sermons. They identified preventative aspects of their faiths that might reduce marital conflict and violence, however, and described the methods they use to help congregants who do experience intimate partner violence. This article examines these prevention and intervention methods in light of current IPV research and makes available a broad variety of strategies for leaders to consider.