For God's Sake, Recovering from Religious Trauma

For God's Sake, Recovering from Religious Trauma

Anna Clark Miller, LPC
Sheldon Press, 5th May 2026
Trade paperback $19.99 • 240 pp • ISBN: 9781399828413

“I feel guilty all the time, even when I'm not doing anything wrong...”

Are you navigating fear, shame, and isolation in the aftermath of harmful experiences in religion? Are you so used to suppressing your own needs and emotions that you don't know how to express them anymore?

For God's Sake: Recovering from Religious Trauma offers language to help you understand what you've experienced, process your hurt and anger, and start healing on your own terms. You'll learn how to turn your self-judgment into 
curiosity, and your shame into self-compassion. Each chapter includes multiple inventories, checklists, and personal reflection prompts to help you connect more deeply with yourself and gain insight into how religious trauma has impacted you.

Grounded in research and counseling experience, Miller takes a religiously neutral approach to healing. She knows from experience that many religious trauma survivors are understandably anxious about perceived hidden agendas, particularly those tied to religion and spirituality. So whether you're looking to leave religion completely or seek a new, healthier relationship with your faith, For God's Sake can help you recover and explore who you are beyond religious trauma.

About the Author

Anna Clark Miller, LPC, is a licensed counselor, author, speaker, and trainer who
specializes in recovery from religious trauma, spiritual abuse, and cults. Her
passion for healing from high-control religion started with her own experiences in
a fundamentalist belief system. She was raised overseas by evangelical missionaries, educated in religious universities, and worked in religious organizations for 10 years before recognizing the signs of religious trauma. After getting a degree in mental counseling, she started her career in trauma recovery with a focus on adverse experiences in high-control religious groups. She facilitates clinical training for therapists and social workers treating religious trauma and speaks at retreats and conferences for survivors.


For publicity and press inquiries, contact: Cassandra Murphy at Cassandra.Murphy@johnmurrays.co.uk

CultNEWS101 Articles: 7/29/2025 (Cult Trauma, Video, Margaret Singer, Swami Rama, White Only)

Cult Trauma, Video, Margaret Singer, Swami Rama, White Only

Coping with Post Cult Trauma (Margaret Singer)

Criminal: The Guru (Podcast)

"In the late 1960s, a yogi named Swami Rama came to the United States. His followers believed he could read their minds, visit them in their dreams, and manipulate reality. Shruti Swamy was one of them."

LAD: Man is trying to establish a 'whites only' town in America in extremely disturbing developments

Their leader wants to foster what he calls 'traditional white American culture'

" ... [A] man in America is trying to establish a 'whites only' community, with thousands of people already donating to show their support.

In case you weren't aware, the US (and too much of the rest of the world) has a problem with racism and xenophobia. You only need to have watched the viral video from Jubilee, which saw one journalist face up against 20 far-right conservatives, with one man losing his job after outing himself as a fascist and quoting a renowned member of the Nazi party."

" ... Return to the Land is described as 'a private membership association (PMA) for individuals and families with traditional views and European ancestry' and has strict rules regarding ethnicity and eligibility.

A recent video from Sky News captured the life of women living in the community - or as many would see it, cult - and it reveals that 'trad wife' role that most have undertaken.

The trad wife aesthetic has gained popularity on TikTok in recent months, with Emmeline Pankhurst probably rolling in her grave at the thought of the women in the community who decide that their only worth is in the home, with $1000 bonuses also given to families when they welcome a new child."

News, Education, Intervention, Recovery

CultMediation.com   

Intervention101.com to help families and friends understand and effectively respond to the complexity of a loved one's cult involvement.

CultRecovery101.com assists group members and their families make the sometimes difficult transition from coercion to renewed individual choice.

CultNEWS101.com news, links, resources about: cults, cultic groups, abusive relationships, movements, religions, political organizations, and related topics.

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The selection of articles for CultNEWS101 does not imply that Patrick Ryan or Joseph Kelly endorse the content. We provide information from multiple perspectives to foster dialogue.

Coping with Post Cult Trauma

Coping with Post Cult Trauma (Margaret Singer)

 https://youtu.be/5kXQ09wPLEo?si=XFYqLXinenSEVAlw

Religious trauma still haunts millions of LGBTQ Americans

Some mental health experts are advocating for religious trauma to be considered an official disorder in the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders.


Spencer Macnaughton
NBC
January 28, 2024


Kellen Swift-Godzisz, 35, said he doesn’t go on dates, struggles with erectile dysfunction and is hesitant to trust people. For more than 20 years, he’s experienced intense bouts of anxiety and depression that have had a “major hold on his life.”

“Imagine being told by everyone you trusted that you’re going to hell because you like men,” Swift-Godzisz, a marketing project manager living in Chicago, told NBC News.

At just 11 years old, Swift-Godzisz recalled, he would sit in his bedroom every night praying or writing letters that said, “Please God, remove my affliction of same-sex attraction,” and would then store each letter in an overflowing shoebox in his closet.

Swift-Godzisz, who grew up in an evangelical Baptist church in rural Michigan, believed Bible verses like Matthew 21:22 — “And whatever you ask in prayer, you will receive, if you have faith” — would help him “pray the gay away.”

As he entered his teens and realized his feelings of same-sex attraction were only intensifying, Swift-Godzisz finally accepted that God would not be answering his prayers. Things went downhill from there, he said.

Swift-Godzisz is among the 1 in 3 adults in the United States who have suffered from religious trauma at some point in their life, according to a 2023 study published in the Socio-Historical Examination of Religion and Ministry Journal. That same study suggests up to 1 in 5 U.S. adults currently suffer from major religious trauma symptoms.

Religious trauma occurs when an individual’s religious upbringing has lasting adverse effects on their physical, mental or emotional well-being, according to the Religious Trauma Institute. Symptoms can include guilt, shame, loss of trust and loss of meaning in life. While religious trauma hasn’t officially been classified as a mental disorder in the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (DSM), there is debate among psychiatrists about whether that should change.


Experts say LGBTQ people — who represent more than 7% of the U.S. population, according to a 2023 Gallup poll — experience religious trauma at disproportionate rates and in unique ways. Very little research has been done in this field, but a 2022 study found that LGBTQ people who experience certain forms of religious trauma are at increased risk for suicidality, substance abuse, homelessness, anxiety and depression. And as political animus toward the LGBTQ community intensifies ahead of the 2024 presidential election, many queer people say their pain is resurfacing.


‘It’s basically a mind rape’
The concept of religious trauma has been around for centuries, and, according to experts, it can have serious consequences that can last a lifetime.


“In its worst manifestations, it’s basically a mind rape,” said Marlene Winell, a psychologist who coined the term “religious trauma syndrome” in 2011. “These doctrines that are taught to you over and over are so damaging and so hideous and so hard to weed out. In many cases, you have been violated, you have been abused or you have been shamed, and the impact is very deep and can be everlasting.”


Dr. Jack Drescher, a clinical professor of psychiatry at Columbia University who specializes in LGBTQ populations, agreed, noting that growing up gay or transgender in a nonaccepting religious environment could have serious mental health consequences.


Evan Jenkins for NBC News
“When you hide or morph your behavior in an effort to conceal your queer identity, you wind up hiding other things about yourself,” he said. “There may be strengths or aspirations you have that you never access because you’re afraid they’re associated with your gender identity. This can affect your self-esteem, it can affect your confidence, and even your capacity to be realistic about what you can do and achieve.”


At 14, when Swift-Godzisz accepted that he could not “pray the gay away,” he confided in his youth pastor, who in turn told his parents and the entire church leadership.


“My mom was hysterical and ashamed and wanted us to pack up and move to a new town,” he said. “My parents very much viewed it as a sin and a choice that I made that we were going to fix.”


For the next three years, Swift-Godzisz said, he was grounded indefinitely. He said his parents controlled the friends he was allowed to hang out with and enrolled him in so-called conversion therapy, a discredited practice that aims to change a person’s sexual orientation. For this type of therapy, Swift-Godzisz said, his parents forced him to speak with various people from the fundamentalist Christian group Focus on the Family, which is widely known for its anti-LGBTQ advocacy.


“They weren’t trying to understand me,” he recalled of his sessions with the Focus on the Family leaders. “All of their advice was just, ‘Practice abstinence,’ or ‘Don’t do that; that’s against God’s wishes.”


While conversion therapy has been made fully or partially illegal for licensed mental health practitioners in 27 states and Washington, D.C., these laws don’t apply to religious leaders.


Swift-Godzisz’s mother, who declined to address her son’s allegations, told NBC News that while she and her son “differ on some things,” she would give her life for him in a moment. “I’m proud of my son, I love him and I’m glad the Lord gave him to me,” she said.


Focus on the Family did not reply to a request for comment.


“The church has been the villain in my life story,” Swift-Godzisz said, adding that he’s been traumatized by his family and religious leaders. “Anything I’d do that’s ‘gay’ was considered a sin.”


Evan Jenkins for NBC News
Now, decades later, Swift-Godzisz said he struggles with severe ADHD and — though he’s never been officially diagnosed — what he described as post-traumatic stress disorder, or “PTSD-like feelings.” He also said growing up queer in an ultrareligious household has led to persistent issues in his romantic life, including erectile dysfunction.


“When you’ve spent decades of your life reinforcing not getting a boner around another guy, and now even though you are ready to do that sort of stuff, your brain still kind of goes like, ‘I don’t know, we’re not supposed to do that,’” he explained.


He also said he avoids romantic relationships altogether.


“Still, to this day, one of my biggest fears is that I’ll get married to a man, have children and get old with him, and on my deathbed I’ll denounce it all because I’m afraid that I might go to hell,” he said. “So I just don’t do it.”


Winell said many of her patients’ trauma response is so active from what they experienced as a child that their brain gets confused about what’s past and what’s present, which causes the fear response to fire up in situations where they are doing something related to their sexuality or gender identity.


“Sometimes there’s a real split between what you think in your head — your intellectual understanding of everything — and your gut-level emotional condition and response to situations,” she explained. “So someone like Swift-Godzisz might be comfortable with his identity but can still have this gut-level fight-or-flight response in the amygdala to all the trauma from the past, and if that happens constantly, that can really screw you up.”


She added that people experiencing this can also develop physical symptoms like digestive problems and headaches.


The effect of familial and community rejection
Religious trauma for LGBTQ people may be particularly intense, because it “goes to the very essence of who the person is,” according to Winell.


“There’s so much condemnation in conservative kinds of churches about being LGBTQ, that the trauma is felt as a direct attack on them,” she said.


LGBTQ people experiencing religious trauma may also be met with instant rejection when they come out or when their queer identity is discovered, she said, noting that they could lose connection with family, friends, church leadership and other forms of community overnight.


“In a biological way, we all want to belong, and we are attached to our parents — we’re dependent on them and need their approval. So if you have their love growing up and then one day, boom, they reject you for something you can’t control, that can create long-lasting anxiety and trauma,” Winell said. “The icing on the cake is that you might simultaneously be losing friends, mentors or entire communities.”


Jamie Long, 40, is among those who quickly lost her support system due to a clash between her LGBTQ identity and her religion.


“Religion has obliterated my life,” she said.


Growing up in Greensboro, Alabama, where her father was the deacon and Sunday school teacher of her Pentecostal church, Long — who was assigned male at birth but now often uses she/her pronouns — remembers feeling different about her gender and sexuality as early as kindergarten. She spent her youth “in hiding,” doing everything to beg God to give her the power to change the feelings she had about her gender and her attraction to men.


“I would pray for hours nonstop,” said Long, who, decades later, is still trying to figure out her gender identity. “Nothing worked. It was terrifying.”


As time went on, it became harder for Long to hide her effeminate behavior. So she came out as a gay man and started hooking up with men on “the down-low,” which she said is omnipresent among men who have sex with men in the Black church.


“The pressure to subscribe to heterosexuality and masculinity is so intense, so there’s this culture in the Black religious community of guys keeping their hookups on ‘the low,’” she added.


As people close to Long started to find out she had come out as gay, the rejection ramped up. Her choir director — whom she described as a prominent figure she looked up to — pulled her aside after a Sunday service and said, “We can’t have a homosexual singing in the choir. I’m going to work with you to get that evil spirit out of you,” Long recalled. Her mom, who had been her “biggest supporter,” broke down in tears and said, “You will burn in hell,” and her brother berated her and called her anti-gay slurs for the duration of a 30-minute drive through Alabama, she recalled.


Long’s brother told NBC News that he “doesn’t remember” that car ride and — using male pronouns for his sibling — said that while he loves Long, he does not respect the path Long has chosen. “I don’t believe in gay; I believe it’s a spirit,” he said. Long’s choir director did not respond to a request for comment.


Now, years after losing most of her support systems because of her LGBTQ identity, Long has been diagnosed with generalized anxiety disorder and major depressive disorder.


“I blame 100% of my identity crisis, of who I am as a queer person, on my religious upbringing,” Long said. “I had to create a mask and suppress my feelings all because of how I was brought up in the church. I was conditioned to believe my life was wrong.”


When religion meets politics
In addition to feeling isolated or rejected by family and community, many LGBTQ Americans say the current political climate is exacerbating their experience with religious trauma.


In 2023, a record-shattering 510 anti-LGBTQ bills were introduced in state legislatures, with more than 80 of them passed into law, according to the American Civil Liberties Union. Transgender people’s access to health care was a key talking point in the Republican presidential primary debates, and, before he was in Congress, recently elected House Speaker Mike Johnson called same-sex marriage a “dark harbinger of chaos” and suggested it could lead to people wedding their pets.


“For me, the religious aspect is almost inextricable from the political aspect,” said Amberlyn Boiter, a business analyst for a software development company, who lives in Spartanburg, South Carolina.


She remembers attending a 1,500-person megachurch just months before she came out as trans where the entire audience applauded after the pastor went on a 10-minute “transphobic rant.”


“I had to go up and play the bass in the church band after that, and I remember hating every second,” Boiter, 36, said.


Shortly after that, she came out to her family and they rejected her, stating that she was “betraying God and in turn she had betrayed them.”


“I think the biggest hurt is seeing our family members choose mythology over a relationship with their own flesh and blood,” she said.


Boiter cited the 20 anti-LGBTQ bills that were introduced in South Carolina’s state legislature in 2023. Some bills would strip trans people of gender-affirming health care, while others would criminalize them if they use public bathrooms that match their gender identity. Many of the bills were backed by Christian legal groups and think tanks like the Alliance Defending Freedom, the Heritage Foundation and the Family Research Council.


“Being able to tie the policy to religious sources, it makes me feel doomed,” Boiter said. “There have been some pretty dark days, some of which have gone into the territory of suicidal ideation, where I’m worrying about whether I am going to have to uproot my wife and my child and move them from a place that I was born and raised.”


Boiter said she has ancestral ties in Spartanburg that go back to the 1780s.


“I have more than once spiraled into a place of thinking, ‘I might not only need to move to a different state, I may need to consider moving to another country.’ When people like Mike Johnson — who I would call a religious fanatic — are elected to higher and higher positions and even federal office, what am I supposed to think? More than a couple of times, I’ve looked at Canada’s refugee policies. I legitimately and truthfully worry that a day may come where my family and I are refugees.”


Swift-Godzisz shares those sentiments.


“I’m keeping the lid on a pot that is ready to boil over,” he said, adding that Johnson’s anti-LGBTQ track record is “one of the scariest things that has happened in my perception of politics.”


Healing from religious trauma
Mental health experts say in order to heal, those suffering from religious trauma should work toward building a new, affirming chapter in their lives.


Dr. Harold G. Koenig, a professor of psychiatry and behavioral sciences at Duke University Medical Center, said building that next chapter may involve cutting off those who hurt you.


“You say, ‘I love you, I forgive you,’ and you take the initiative to move forward. That will help heal you,” he said.


Koenig added that LGBTQ people who have experienced trauma but don’t want to leave religion entirely should consider joining an affirming church where leaders may be able to help with the healing process.


“Christian acceptance of [the LGBTQ] community is growing,” he said. In fact, majorities of every major religious group favor laws that protect LGBTQ people against discrimination, according to the Public Religion Research Institute’s 2022 American Values Survey.


To move forward, Drescher recommends rebuilding self-esteem by forming new relationships. “It’s important to find new communities, new friendships that are affirming and that can help you heal,” he explained.


For those who leave their religion — as Swift-Godzisz, Long and Boiter have all done — it’s “like the rug gets pulled out from under you,” according to Winell.


“Your life needs to be gradually reconstructed,” she said. “It’s a reconstruct of who you think you are and what you believe now. One of those new beliefs is that being LGBTQ is OK.”


In terms of treatment, Winell said she first helps her patients learn to take care of themselves.


“Instead of outsourcing all that care to God, I teach them how to be self-reflective and how to regulate their feelings from their own perspective, rather than from the Bible’s,” she said.


From there, she teaches skills that help with the trauma response, like writing down negative messages you grew up believing and changing them to something that can read as positive and hopeful.


“What used to be, ‘My life is a trial, and then I die and go to hell,’ can change to, ‘My life is an adventure and a journey,’” she said.


She also works with her patients on relaxation by teaching them breathing exercises and body scan meditations, among other techniques. In certain cases, she recommends combining these tools with medication.


A debate among mental health providers
As more LGBTQ people share their experiences with religious trauma, there is debate among mental health experts about how it should be characterized in the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders, the American Psychiatric Association’s reference guide for coding, classifying and diagnosing mental disorders.


In the decades-old manual’s fifth and latest edition, the DSM-5-TR, religious trauma falls under the category “Religious or Spiritual Problem,” as a Z code, not an official mental disorder. Z codes are listed in the back of the DSM and are referred to as “other conditions that may be a focus of clinical attention.” Other examples include various forms of “Child Psychological Abuse,” “Unsheltered Homelessness” and “Victim of Terrorism or Torture.”


Koenig is now working with a group of public health experts and psychiatrists at Harvard University to expand “Religious or Spiritual Problem” as a Z code in the DSM to include “Moral Problems,” such as moral injury.


Moral injury, which is not currently listed in the DSM, may occur when an individual believes they have acted in a way that deeply conflicts with their morals and values, which produces guilt, shame or profound feelings of broken trust. It has been applied to war veterans and, more recently, to health care professionals who did not feel like they were able to provide appropriate care to those suffering during the Covid-19 pandemic.


“For centuries, people have been manipulating and weaponizing religion by condemning LGBTQ individuals,” Koenig said. “Moral injury — particularly for religious LGBTQ people — can create a whole life of shame and guilt. To live with it can result in mental health problems over time, like suicide, depression and anxiety, because that’s what moral injury does, and you can get stuck in it for years and decades.”


Koenig said it’s critical that the combination of “Religious or Spiritual Problem” and “Moral Problem” — which is currently under review by a DSM committee — finds a spot in the manual as a Z code. By adding moral injury, he explained, providers will be able to collect more specific data and prescribe more targeted treatments, such as whether it’s appropriate to recommend pastoral support for those suffering. They’ll also be able to more effectively document which part of the patient’s trauma came from their family’s or community’s religious beliefs and which part came from a separate worldview that being LGBTQ is immoral.


“For religious people who identify as LGBTQ, it’s not just Christianity at play,” he said. “It’s the whole moral fabric of the culture that’s been passed down through generations that has caused this condemnation.”


Getting a new disorder or code added to the DSM involves submitting an extensive proposal to the manual’s steering committee, which is then reviewed and forwarded along to the American Psychiatric Association’s board of trustees for approval.


“Having it as a Z code will validate and stimulate funding support, and then there’ll be more money for research, which will help us learn more about how we can treat folks experiencing moral injuries like religious trauma,” Koenig said.


A further step would be changing “Religious or Spiritual Problem” from a Z code to an official disorder in the DSM. While Koenig is unsure about his stance on this, as the process would be even more rigorous and could take years, Winell said she “definitely thinks it should be in there” as a disorder.


“Right now, most therapists don’t know much about it. They’ll do an intake with a new client and talk about family, schooling, substance abuse, but they won’t touch religion,” she said. “So if it was a real thing in the DSM, it would get covered and the millions of folks who are struggling with it across this country could get better help.”


Winell added that a disorder classification in the DSM would give religious trauma more credibility in the eyes of medical professionals and would give those experiencing this type of trauma the ability to name what they’re going through. She also predicted this would result in more research in the area and religious trauma becoming part of the curriculum in university psychology courses.


Drescher, who was part of the APA committee that in 2013 changed gender identity disorder to gender dysphoria in the DSM in an effort to remove stigma, disagrees with Winell on this matter.


“We don’t need diagnoses to understand what’s going on. … Medicalizing social issues is how homosexuality was originally labeled a mental disorder,” Drescher said, noting that homosexuality wasn’t officially removed from the DSM until 1973. “So the idea that now we’re going to turn anti-LGBTQ ideas into psychiatric diagnoses doesn’t sit well with me.”


This, he added, could enable a future generation to “just flip the switch” and pathologize homosexuality once again.


And while Drescher — who has been practicing psychiatry for over four decades — isn’t optimistic about changing the hearts and minds of today’s anti-LGBTQ church leaders who are “set in their ways,” he is still hopeful about the future.


“Younger religious people don’t think of LGBTQ people as their enemies. They know them as their friends, their neighbors and their fellow congregants,” he said.


“So as the new generation grows up, religious LGBTQ people will be met with greater acceptance rather than being stigmatized and having to hide who they are, and less hiding who you are means you can grow up feeling better about yourself and perhaps experience less anxiety, depression and other mental health struggles.”


If you or someone you know is in crisis, call or text 988 to reach the Suicide and Crisis Lifeline or chat live at 988lifeline.org. You can also visit SpeakingOfSuicide.com/resources for additional support.


Spencer Macnaughton
Spencer Macnaughton is an Emmy-nominated and Gracie Award-winning producer and an adjunct professor at New York University, where he teaches journalism with a focus on LGBTQ issues.


Ohio board stands by disqualification of trans candidate, even though others are allowed to run
A county board in Ohio has refused to reconsider the disqualification of Vanessa Joy, a transgender state House candidate who omitted her former name from circulating petitions.
https://www.nbcnews.com/nbc-out/out-health-and-wellness/millions-lgbtq-americans-religious-trauma-psychiatrists-want-help-rcna135728

ICSA Annual Conference: SECURE - Essential Principles to Understand and Recover from Religious or Spiritual Abuse

ICSA Annual Conference: SECURE - Essential Principles to Understand and Recover from Religious or Spiritual Abuse

Dr. Patrick J. Knapp; Saturday, June 25, 2022; 1:00 PM-1:50 PM

Currently there are at least four major, identifiable perspectives on how people best understand and recover from religious abuse.  These basic theoretical viewpoints are: (a) a thought-reform or mind-control perspective, (b) a deliberative or Conversionist conceptualization, (c) a psychosocial needs-based perspective and finally (d) a dynamic-systems approach.  Both secular and faith-based (Christian) adherents can be variously identified in each of these perspectives.  All these viewpoints have their various strengths and limitations.  Each is helpful to the extent possible, given the limitations of its respective philosophic or theological assumptions.  However, a larger contextual approach may be more helpful to sufficiently understand involvement in and recovery from religiously abusive environments. This presentation will integrate features from various conceptual frameworks and suggests essential principles necessary for recovery from such abuse. 

A fifth perspective SECURE, is introduced and explained. This approach includes the importance of essential recovery principles that are embedded in the concept and practice of the following: finding a Safe haven, derived from attachment theory; acknowledging the essential role and function of Emotion, identified in emotion focused therapy; realizing the benefits of remaining Cognitively focused, found in cognitive behavioral theory;  having Unconditional positive regard, from client center humanistic psychology; having a required Relational support system, as identified in the 12-step plans of recovery; and finally, affirming the need of Education to understand family-systems theory as a unifying and organizing principle to the religious environment. 

Finally, this presentation will summarize research and findings from a recently (August 2019) completed doctoral thesis. This work is now available in book form under the title of Religious Abuse and Recovery: Discovering Essential Principles for Hope and Healing, and easily found on Amazon and other outlets.

Conference Information
Agenda
Conference Registration

Dr. Patrick J. Knapp
Co-director/Life recovery coach
Becoming Free LLC

Patrick J. Knapp, PhD.  Following a 14-year involvement in a high-control abusive Christian sect (1970-1984) Pat completed an MA (Philosophy of Religion) from Denver Seminary (Winter, 2000).  His MA thesis was titled “The Place of Mind Control in the Cult Recovery Process.”  His doctoral studies focused on marriage and family systems and attachment theory at Gordon Conwell with his PhD (Pastoral Psychology) thesis completed at Graduate Theological Foundation “A Survey of Religious Abuse and Recovery.” 

He and his wife (Heidi Knapp) co-direct Becoming Free, LLC (www.BecomingFree.org). This organization facilitates educational support for all those who have been religiously abused. As a life-recovery coach for over 35 years Pat has assisted people to process harmful spiritual experiences for improved insight and emotional healing.  He and his wife (Heidi) provide HIPPA compliant video internet and in-person life coaching and support groups both for former members and friends and family members effected by religious or spiritual abuse.

In 2017 he contributed a chapter on support groups in "Cult Recovery: A Clinician’s Guide to Working with Former Members and Families" (Goldberg, L. et al, 2017).  His most recent book publication is "Understanding Religious Abuse and Recovery: Discovering Essential Principles for Hope and Healing." (Pickwick Publications, 2021). In this book he evaluates various perspectives of religious abuse recovery and introduces a new perspective (SECURE), a synthesis model that incorporates family systems and attachment theory as understood within a Christian worldview.  He also includes in this book: practical recovery strategies, on-going supportive resources and three user-friendly indexes.

Pat and his wife (Heidi) can be reached at becomingfree.org@gmail.com or at 720-227-8695

Religious Abuse and Recovery: Discovering Essential Principles for Hope and Healing

ICSA Annual Conference: After the Teacher: Developing Personal Ethics in the “Real World”

ICSA Annual Conference: After the Teacher: Developing Personal Ethics in the “Real World”
Ponder Abra Goddard, Jia Apple; Saturday, June 25, 2022; 12:00 PM-12:50 PM – online

Although clinical psychology and professional counseling can serve as a profound aid in cult recovery, training in the counseling professions often leaves new clinicians unequipped to handle lasting questions of faith and self-trust in the aftermath of spiritual abuse.

The presentation will begin with a PowerPoint outlining the problem of spiritual abuse and resulting difficulties in establishing a reliable inner compass for ethical decision-making after leaving a cult, a cultic association, or abusive relationship. Following the PowerPoint presentation, the speakers will engage in a personal conversation exploring the topic in a non-hierarchical and reciprocal question and answer format. In a dynamic and co-creative conversation, Jia and Ponder will explore the topic of moral and ethical recovery in the aftermath of spiritual abuse and provide practical guidelines and personal anecdotes for others struggling with making moral and ethical judgements in the process of “real world” living. No solutions will be offered for the question of “how do I trust again” but the question will be addressed in other ways. The final part of the conversation will be directed towards providing useful suggestions to counselors and other involved care workers in their efforts to support cult survivors in developing a balance between strong personal ethics and equally strong self-compassion and forgiveness for human error.

Both presenters come to the subject of spiritual abuse and resulting crisis of faith from professional interest as well as personal experience in joining, living within and eventually leaving abusive religious groups. Ponder Goddard is a PhD student currently working on completing her doctorate in clinical psychology; Jia Apple is a cult survivor and a visual artist who has been writing about her experiences in fiction and non-fiction forms. They live together in New Mexico.

• Conference Information
• Agenda
• Conference Registration

Ponder Abra Goddard
Graduate student, Alliant International University

Ponder Goddard was born into a radical “New Religious Movement” to two spiritual seekers who met in their new spiritual community. When she was very young her parents divorced and one parent remained in the community as a faithful adherent to the teachings and another parent became a “dissident” and decided to leave. Ponder’s sense of ethical and moral dilemma began early, as she learned to exist in radically different moral and historical universes based on each parent’s perspective of this new religion. She is a Ph.D candidate in clinical psychology currently working on finishing her dissertation, focusing on the domination-partnership spectrum in women’s sexual experiences. Ponder has worked in dual-diagnosis treatment centers and high school counseling environments. She has experience in counseling people through sexual trauma, spiritual crisis, and substance abuse issues. She is also an experienced stage actor, children’s entertainer, and solo performer. Ponder lives in New Mexico with her partner Jia and their cats Ethel and Jubilee.

Jia Apple
Artist, Author, Speaker, Olivet Nazarene University

Jia is a lifelong artist specializing in watercolor portraits, oils and graphite realism. Having attended Olivet Nazarene University (ONU), she is otherwise self taught. Jia has a permanent pen and ink show on display at ONU. Jia’s work has been on display in many galleries throughout the years. Jia is a mural artist founding The Young da Vinci’s and having completed several public art murals in southern New Mexico. She continues to teach, write and speak on a variety of topics. Jia is a former cult member of fourteen years devoted to a life of service helping others who are facing the challenges of what it means to survive and thrive through integrity and self forgiveness in today’s world. Jia’s first book, Oft Made to Wonder, a memoir…. “Jia’s powerful memoir takes the reader back to the seventies and the challenges of a young adolescent girl, the eighth born of ten children. Raised by a schizophrenic mother and an angry father, she gives an inside look into the Apple home where the neighbors might hear the sounds of family prayers and then the screams from beatings…all in the same night.” Dennis Apple, M. Div, author Her second book, The Tell, is scheduled for release this May and an excerpt may be seen in the ICSA December, 2021 Journal. Jia’s work can be found at thepictureseer.com, Twitter, Facebook, Instagram, LinkedIn and Etsy.

CultNEWS101 Articles: 3/11/2022 (Turning Point and Spring Joy, South Africa, LGAT, Legal, Golden Dawn, Greece, Documentary, Second and Multi-Generational Adult Former Cult Members, Cult Recovery, Trauma)

Turning Point and Spring Joy, South Africa, LGAT, Legal, Golden Dawn, Greece, Documentary, Second and Multi-Generational Adult Former Cult Members, Cult Recovery, Trauma

Times Live SA: Staff turn to HRC to save them from 'cult-like' course

"Employees of a direct-marketing insurance company in Durban have turned to the South African Human Rights Commission (HRC) to save them from a leadership course in which they say they will be sworn at, belittled  and made to cross-dress and sing nursery rhymes — or face being fired.

Employees of The Unlimited said the Turning Point and Spring Joy course — which costs R25,000 a head — will be held over five days in Gauteng next month. During this time their cellphones will be confiscated and they will be barred from communicating with their families, will have limited bathroom breaks and will have to endure "tough and challenging" role-playing games and activities that run until the early hours of the morning.

But the company, which sells data, sim cards and medical insurance, has defended the mandatory workshops as part of its commitment to "building future leaders".

In a letter to the HRC from about a dozen people who wished to remain anonymous for fear of being fired, employees voiced concern about the course content after hearing about it from colleagues and former colleagues. The employees have asked the commission to investigate the company for ordering them to go on the course or face  dismissal. 

"They are forcing employees to participate in controversial transformational workshops that have nothing to do with workplace skills, and it is either you do it or you get dismissed," staff say in the letter. 'What is making things worse is the fact that these courses have controversial reviews and there are allegations of brainwashing, verbal and physical abuse, sleep deprivation and being like a cult.'"

UpNorth Film: Golden Dawn Girls Norwegian documentary filmmaker Håvard Bustnes examines the rise of far-right nationalist party "Golden Dawn"

The key male members of the far-right political party Golden Dawn are imprisoned accused of carrying out organized criminal activity. To maintain Golden Dawn's position as the fifth largest political party in Greece, their daughters, wives and mothers step up to the task of leading the party through the upcoming elections. As the elections and trial unfold, the Norwegian film crew gets access to secret chambers and witness the family dynamics of one of Europe's most notorious nationalist parties. This documentary exposes the mindset, values and personalities of the people on the front lines of modern nationalism.

This is filmmaker Håvard Bustnes' impression of this disturbing documentary. In recent years, Greece - with its sunny beaches and friendly people has been overshadowed by political ideologies that are close to Nazism. In this documentary, Bustnes leaves the camera running, revealing not only the depraved side of this political party but also revealing an ever-widening gulf between facts and political image-making. While it's frustrating that the women are so inflexible in their views, it illustrates how wearing blinders can derail an entire society.

ICSA Online Event: Second and Multi-Generational Adult Former Cult Member Series (FREE!)

Sunday, March 13th, 2022, 1:00 - 2:15 pm EST: After the Cult: Exploring Healthy Relationships for LGBQA+ Individuals, Presented by Cyndi Matthews and Ashlen Hilliard
Sunday, March 20th, 2022, 1:00 - 2:15 pm EST: The Impact of Yesterday on Today, Presented by Lorna Goldberg and Ck Rardin
Sunday, March 27th, 2022, 1:00 - 2:15 pm EST: Destigmatizing Medical Care Post-Cult, Presented by Eva Mackey and Ck Rardin

ICSA Annual Conference: Cult Recovery and Trauma

Laura Chandler

Friday, June 24th

1:00 PM-1:50 PM

This presentation will be for mental health professionals to recognize the signs and symptoms of a client currently being in a cult or a dangerous group. The presentation will consist of skills that the provider can use in order to help a person that is currently in a cult or is currently experiencing distress from past experience. It is important to note that a cult or a dangerous group may or may not have anything to do with religion. Also, a cult has nothing to do with the type of religion a person or a group of people practice. The signs that someone may be in a dangerous cult is if the person experiences a lot of stress from this group by trying to meet the group's expectations. Is this group very controlling? Does the group tell the individual who they can or can't date or be friends with? Where they can or can't live? Does the individual experience financial distress due to giving the group large sums of money? Is the individual being isolated from friends and family outside of the group? Does the individual spend a lot of time recruiting new members? Does the individual have an unusual fear of the outside world? The presentation will consist of skills that the therapist can utilize with the individual such as CBT that can help the individual to challenge black and white thinking related to the cult. Also, the therapists will learn coping skills to teach to the individual to heal from the trauma such as relaxation skills and positive memories.

Eagles Counseling, LLC

I am a Licensed Professional Counselor in Pennsylvania. I am a Certified Clinical Trauma Professional and Certified Specialist in Anger Management. I graduated from Immaculata University with my Master's Degree in Clinical Mental Health Counseling in 2017. I am the owner and director of Eagles Counseling, LLC. I have been working as a therapist since 2018. Prior to being a therapist, I was working as a mental health case manager at various locations in Pennsylvania from 2007-2018. I am also in recovery from being in a religious cult. I was a member of a religious cult from 2002-2006.

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ICSA Annual Conference: How lessons learned from the SGA community can be applied to the R&R context

ICSA Annual Conference: How lessons learned from the SGA community can be applied to the R&R context

Enryka Christopher

Friday, June 24, 2022

2:00 PM-2:50 PM

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Countries globally face the challenge of developing and implementing programs to support children and families recently repatriated from formerly Islamic State (IS)-controlled territories. These youth face multifaceted challenges of integrating into a society that is culturally, ideologically, and politically different from the one they grew up in, often from birth. “Second Generation Adults” (SGAs)--children raised in cults who now identify as members of the ex-cult community--similarly contend with issues related to integration, including redefining their sense of self, making sense of past ideological indoctrination, and loyalty conflicts. In addition, both SGA and repatriated individuals are known to struggle with mental health issues such as cognitive distortions, post traumatic stress symptoms, and low sense of belonging.

Innovative, grassroots initiatives have formed over the past few years to help the SGA community deconstruct ideology and support one another with adjustment to new ways of living outside of totalitarian systems. Creative therapies, peer support groups, and web-based resources developed by and for the SGA community share common elements with recommended intervention guidelines for repatriated populations. Consequently, these SGA initiatives may provide useful models for rehabilitation and reintegration of children and families from IS-controlled territories.

This paper will showcase interventions and resources created within the SGA community and offer a framework for how these initiatives could be applied to rehabilitation and reintegration efforts with repatriates from IS-controlled territories. First, an environmental scan will identify existing interventions and resources for SGAs, as well as any available evidence describing their effectiveness. Second, intervention guidelines for repatriated populations will be summarized, highlighting themes that parallel interventions and resources that have been developed for the SGA community. Finally, the paper will conclude with a suggested framework for applying lessons learned from work with the SGA community to rehabilitation and reintegration efforts with those from IS-controlled territories.

 

Enryka Christopher

Enryka Christopher is a Clinical Research Specialist at Boston Children's Hospital and Harvard Medical School. She works with the Trauma and Community Resilience Center on several projects related to community-based interventions to prevent and counter targeted violence and terrorism. She also works under the University of Chicago on research of best practices for the reintegration and rehabilitation of children and spouses repatriated from formerly Islamic State-controlled territories. Projects she works on outside of her formal work include those involving mental health within the SGA community. As she herself was born and raised in the Unification Church, Ryka aims to utilize her lived experience of reintegration to apply useful lessons to parallel fields. Her research interests include victims of human trafficking, displaced populations, mental health, population health, humanitarian contexts, trauma, and resilience.

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