COMMENTARY: Rape No Therapy for Trauma of Rape

c. 2003 Religion News Serice (The Rev. Marie M. Fortune is editor of the Journal of Religion and Abuse and founder of the Seattle-based Center for the Prevention of Sexual and Domestic Violence. She is the author of “Is Nothing Sacred? The Story of a Pastor, the Women He Sexually Abused, and the Congregation He […]

c. 2003 Religion News Serice

(The Rev. Marie M. Fortune is editor of the Journal of Religion and Abuse and founder of the Seattle-based Center for the Prevention of Sexual and Domestic Violence. She is the author of “Is Nothing Sacred? The Story of a Pastor, the Women He Sexually Abused, and the Congregation He Nearly Destroyed,” and an ordained pastor in the United Church of Christ.)

(UNDATED) There seems to be some confusion as to the nature of pastoral counseling provided by priests to rape victims.


The Rev. Roman Kramek, a Polish priest serving a parish in New Britain, Conn., told police over the holidays he had sex with a teenage rape victim in her family’s apartment in order to counsel her and show her that sex with men doesn’t have to be bad.

He questioned the victim about the rape and then, ignoring the young woman’s protests, began to touch her breasts and crotch and to have intercourse with her.

So let’s review Counseling With Rape Victims 101 for the benefit of any other clergy out there who may have slept through that section of their seminary training.

1. It is NEVER helpful and indeed is unethical (and in some states, like Connecticut, illegal) for a pastor or counselor to have sex with ANYONE he/she is counseling.

2. It is NEVER helpful to re-enact the sexual assault or incestuous abuse that a victim may have experienced in the past.

3. A rape victim does not need sexual contact from a pastor or counselor “to help her forget the bad experiences that she had when she was sexually assaulted in the past.”

4. What she needs is to know that she has the right to choose if, when and with whom she ever has sex again.


5. She needs to know that there are adult men in her life who respect her bodily integrity and who will not take advantage of her vulnerability.

6. She needs to know it was not her fault, that she is not “damaged goods,” that she is not now a “loose woman” available to anyone who wants her.

7. She probably needs a trusted female counselor or clergyperson.

8. She needs to know that the sexual assault was not God’s will, that it was a sin committed by the rapist.

9. She needs to know that God loves her and stands with her no matter what.

10.She needs her family and her parish to love her and stand with her as well.

11.She needs to know that the men who assaulted her will be held accountable and hopefully will not be able to do this to anyone else in the future.


If she experiences this kind of support from her community, she can find healing and restoration physically, emotionally and spiritually.

Rape is about power and is the use of sex as a weapon. Anytime anyone forces another person to have sex, it is rape. Period. And when a priest who is supposedly trustworthy uses the advantage of his priestly role to force a vulnerable teenage rape victim to have sex, it is rape. Period. One has to wonder what is being taught in seminaries that could allow anyone to assume that sexual contact with girls or boys, teens or adults in the pastoral relationship is acceptable under any circumstances.

DEA END FORTUNE

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