Through the Scriptures, Tradition, liturgies, and devotions, people can encounter the living Christ and experience his love, healing, and freedom.
But what happens when the women and men in the Church who are tasked with teaching doctrine, preaching God’s word, or presiding over the sacraments, do so with carelessness or coercion? What harm is done when the place of healing becomes a source of harm?
I’m a professional counselor who previously worked for eight years as the Director of Religious Education at a Catholic parish. I provide counseling for those who have been spiritually abused and create resources for Church leaders to better safeguard their communities against abuse.
Join me for an online workshop focused on recognizing, preventing, and responding to spiritual abuse in the Catholic Church.
This workshop is for:
Individuals trying to better understand their experiences of spiritual abuse in the Church
Clergy and lay leaders interested in safeguarding their communities from spiritual abuse and abuse of conscience
Therapists or spiritual directors working with clients who have been spiritually abused
This workshop will help you:
Recognize and prevent spiritual abuse and abuse of conscience in the Church
Know the symptoms of spiritual abuse, religious trauma, and moral injury
Better understand and respond to abusive systems in the Church
Details:
This is five-part live workshop that will be held virtually. I’m running two workshops with day or evening sessions to accommodate different time zones and work schedules.
Groups will have between 5 and 12 participants and space will be filled on a first come, first serve basis.
Group 1 - Tuesdays*, 8:00-10:00am (EST) | 9/2, 9/9, 9/23, 9/30, 10/7
Group 2 - Thursdays, 7:00-9:00pm (EST) | 9/4, 9/11, 9/25, 10/2, 10/9
*a previous post incorrectly said Wednesdays, sorry for the confusion
Price:
It’s important to me that this workshop is available to anyone who can benefit from it, but it’s also an essential part of my family’s income. Based on my training and the time commitment, this workshop is valued at $400, but I don’t want financial cost to prevent you from registering.
While the full value of the five-part series is $400, you decide what you can pay. Whether it's $10 or more than $400, your contribution is appreciated. Also, even if you can't attend, but you are grateful resources like this exist, you can financially support the workshop. Any amount helps.
How to Pay:
1. Pay $400 with a credit card here: https://buy.stripe.com/fZu8wOaEy48ogpU8XZdIA01
2. Send a custom amount via PayPal (paul@faheycounseling.com) or Venmo (@catholicthirdspace)
With this flexible pricing I'm trying to ensure inclusivity while also supporting my family. I hope it can be an opportunity for solidarity within this community.
I’m looking forward to having you in the workshop!
Feedback from previous workshops
This workshop has been attended by people from across the US, Ireland, Singapore, Austria, the UK, Canada, and beyond! Attendees have included lay ministers, college students, parents, grandparents, religious sisters, catechists, clergy, spiritual directors, artists, farmers, and more.
I have three personal goals for the workshop participants: that all participants will 1) better understand their own experiences of spiritual abuse, 2) feel less isolated, and 3) be more equipped to make their own communities safer. And, based on the feedback I’ve received, the workshop was a huge success!
Several participants gave me permission to share their responses to the final survey:
I asked if the workshop met the participant’s expectation:
The content exceeded expectations.
It helped me feel less lonely…and showed me that there are others like me out there who have suffered spiritual abuse and want to have the tools to recognize and resist abusive agendas.
No one was ever pressured or coerced to unwillingly share what they did or did not want to. There is immense freedom in this! I have the sense that everyone felt this was a very safe space in which to express their experiences, thoughts, hopes, dreams for their own faith journey and where they fit in within the body of Christ, within the Church.
I asked what the most impactful aspect of the workshop was:
Learning more in-depth terminology to put around the circumstances of my abuse and also having a place where I could try to speak objectively about my experience. I have only done that one other time, and I felt safe.
Finally realizing that this is happening inside the church. And that this [does] not mean we have to move away from our faith. And how to recognize it. And how to actively act to try to change the structures that might be contributing for the reproduction of this harm.
We are part of the solution; we are not defeated because of any spiritual abuse we have experienced. I had a very clear sense that everyone was imbued with more hope for themselves, their faith journey and their role within the Church.
The research, especially diagrams you showed. I feel called to share my experiences to empower others and effect change. This will help me formulate my story in a way that makes sense, which has been a struggle for me--it felt overwhelming to think about before.
I asked how the participants plan on applying what they learned from the workshop to their life moving forward:
To continue growing, learning and listening to other's experiences in order to deepen my own faith, but also to be able to point out to someone if they have been or are being spiritually abused, I have a body of terminology and resources now that I feel better equipped to assist others.
In the first place it's probably going to be in parenting that I apply what I learned. It's also given me a language to explain more concretely the problems I've seen in unhealthy religious settings.
This course has helped me realize how much I have been harmed and how I have harmed others unintentionally. The pain is real and it has helped enormously to have a group of people who feel the same way. I don't feel alone. It has also helped me realize this a new awareness of spiritual trauma and abuse and I have to be patient for changes in the church at large.