Restoring the Soul of a Church - Reconciling Congregations Wounded by Clergy Sexual Misconduct (Paperback)

What happens to the sense of community and faith of a Church that finds itself wounded by pastoral sexual abuse? Counselling and other resources are available to victims and abusers, but what about congregations, which are also left with feelings of disbelief, disillusionment and anger? While the focus of this book is the healing of congregations, it first discusses the original problem of sexual misconduct and exploitation. Once this is established, the majority of the text focuses on those neglected "secondary" victims of abuse - the congregation, the wider community, other clergy, the wider Church, the offender's family and the pastor who must take over for an offending pastor. An "intervention model" is offered for each of these six victim groups that can be applied to most situations. Case studies and first-person testimonies appear throughout the work, and serve to demonstrate the very sensitive nature of the problems faced and the practicality of the solutions offered.