Mark Driscoll, founding pastor of Mars Hill Church in Seattle, recently preached a stirring message about the harms of pornography called “The Porn Path.” This message is a part of a series, “Real Marriage.”
Our friend Crissy (a former porn actress) is interviewed by Pastor Mark and his wife during this message and our friend Bill Struthers (author of Wired for Intimacy) is quoted.
At times throughout this message, there are things that are tough to hear, but that is exactly why you need to listen to it. You can check out a preview of Pastor Mark’s message below and watch/listen to the whole thing, here.
A particularly powerful and disturbing quote from this message is:
“Some of you will say, ‘Well, I don’t contribute money to it.’ But you do, because the advertisers are the ones who pay a fee, and every time you click, you are legitimizing their existence, and you’re participating in a culture of slavery and abuse. And there is no such thing as free porn. The people participating pay and the advertisers pay so that you can enjoy their suffering, shame, and humiliation… Some of what’s made is because of sex trafficking; some of the women who are even in the industry in the US are often held against their will, threatened, beaten, traumatized, because it’s always about the money. And even if you’re not giving your credit card number, by clicking on the site, you are encouraging an advertiser to pay money, so that someone might be assaulted and abused, and you’re complicit in that.”
I recently returned from Thailand where I saw with my own eyes, very young women (likely underage) being trafficked for sexual purposes. I am still processing this trip and hope to write more about it in the near future. But the correlation between pornography and human trafficking is very, very real. We have to wake up and face this very dark reality and the responsibility we have in it.
Face the tough stuff,
Crystal Renaud
DGM Founder
ht: Covenant Eyes
