when I was say between 3 and 5 or so, mom was playing around with some of the local christian churches.  So both of them had some hard core christians who thought it was their moral obligation to confront mom on her sinful behavior.  Which just pissed her off worse.  And often resulted in me taking more savage beatings at her hands.  So a preacher was fired because some of these hard core christians decided this preacher had failed in the mission to confront mom.  And they had.  Instead of stopping the beatings, and making mom realize the error of her ways, I just kept getting my ass violently beat over and over, and over.  Many of these conversations were held in my presence on purpose at the elementary school.  Because Albert Erb, the principle, was himself a hard core christian.  So the preacher was fired in front of me.  And he asked how would he support his wife and kids.  His boss told him the church would pay for him to attend college, and get a degree that would enable him to support his family.  So the preachers wife couldn't handle losing her status as a preachers wife.  My mom learned this thru the grape vine.  She tried to commit suicide once.  And failed.  Then succeeded the second time.  My mom drove the family station wagon by the church  to gawk.  The preacher handed moved out of the house yet.  He saw us, and starts trotting down the street behind us, smiling and waving.  And this was after he had gotten me savagely beat a couple of times.  So I preferred not to be around the dude.  Mom accelerated away from him.
 
The asshole risked my life.  As every time I took a beating, I could have been killed.  This was hardcore child abuse.