A Public Resource for Families

IS YOUR CHURCH SAFE FOR YOUR FAMILY?

We are families who trusted our church with our children, our marriages, and our faith. We are sharing what we learned so you can make an informed decision.

Know Before You Go Share Your Story
Stories

Families are speaking up

These are the voices of families who have experienced it firsthand. Names are withheld for their protection.

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We were told to trust the process. The process destroyed our family. I wish someone had given us these questions before we walked through those doors.

Anonymous · Oklahoma City, OK · 8 years
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When I raised concerns about how my family was being treated, I was told I was being divisive. Within a month, we were completely isolated from our community.

Redeemer Church · Matt R. · Kansas City, KS · 5 years
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I signed a care team contract without understanding what I was giving up. No licensed professional would ever ask a family to agree to those terms.

Anonymous · Edmond, OK · 3 years
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A judge recognized the church by name within five minutes of testimony and described the pattern of harm she had seen in other cases. That tells you everything.

Court Record · Oklahoma County
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Your identity will never be shared without your explicit consent.

Before You Walk Through Those Doors

Know Before You Go

Six things every family should understand before trusting a church with their children, their marriage, or their faith.

1

Child Safety

Who has access to your children and how were they vetted?

  • 1Does your church run independent background checks on every adult who has access to children, including volunteers, counselors, and ministry leaders? Can you verify this yourself?
  • 2If a leader at your church was asked to leave a previous church or placed on administrative leave for misconduct, would you be told before that person was given authority over your family?
  • 3Who decides whether someone is safe to work with children at your church? Is that decision made independently, or does the senior pastor have the final say?
  • 4Has any person in a counseling or leadership role at your church ever been the subject of a complaint to a state licensing board, a regulatory body, or law enforcement? How would you find out?
  • 5If your child told you something felt wrong about an interaction with a church leader, does your church have a clear, independent reporting process that does not route through the person being accused?
2

Is Pastoral Counseling Safe?

Know the difference between licensed therapy and pastoral counseling. Your sanity and safety is on the line.

  • 1Is the person counseling your family a licensed therapist bound by professional ethics and state oversight, or is it a pastor or volunteer with no clinical training and no accountability outside the church?
  • 2If a counselor affiliated with your church gave your family a diagnosis or clinical recommendation, are they actually qualified to do so? Have you checked their credentials with your state licensing board?
  • 3Has your church ever promoted someone as a counselor or therapist who was later found to be unlicensed or operating outside the scope of their training?
  • 4Does your church have clear guidelines and training for counseling? Does the church have a policy regarding the limitations of biblical counseling vs psychotherapy which requires licensed oversight?
  • 5If the advice you received from a church counselor made things worse for your family, not better, what recourse do you have? Can you file a complaint? Or does the church treat pastoral counseling as beyond accountability?
3

Family Matters

When pastoral care turns to coercive control, it could cost you your children.

  • 1Has a pastor or church counselor ever recommended that a parent be separated from their children for weeks, months, or years as part of a counseling or restoration process?
  • 2Does your church involve itself in custody or visitation decisions between parents? Under what authority? With what training? And whose interests are they actually serving?
  • 3If your family has gone or is going through marital crisis or even divorce, does your church take sides? Are other pastors and members brought in to help alongside the family and if so, are they helping to foster biblical restoration and the wellbeing of both individuals and any children that may be involved? To what extent are they helping positively or negatively influence outcomes?
  • 4Does your church help advocate for the connection of both parents? Are there any cases where pastors and members have knowingly engaged the children to negatively influence the opinion of one parent? Are they helping foster parent-child relationships or have they participated in alienation of one parent in any way?
  • 5If a father texted his teenage son to congratulate him on winning a state championship, would your church consider that an act of love or an act of disobedience? The answer tells you everything you need to know about who your church is actually protecting.
4

Confidentiality

Is it care or is it gossip?

  • 1If you share something deeply personal with your pastor in confidence, who else in the church will know about it? Is there a written confidentiality policy that you have seen and that the church follows?
  • 2Has information shared in a private counseling or pastoral care session at your church ever been repeated to other leaders, staff members, elders, or congregation members without the person's consent?
  • 3If what you confessed in private was later used against you in a custody dispute, a church discipline process, or to influence how other members treat you, would you even know it happened?
  • 4When your church says "we want to care for you," does that mean your story stays between you and your pastor? Or does it mean your story becomes part of an internal file that leadership can access and discuss without your knowledge?
5

Leadership & Governance

Who answers to who and why churches need accountability

  • 1If a member brings a credible concern about a pastor or elder, who investigates? Is it someone independent of the accused, or is it other leaders within the same system who have every reason to protect the institution?
  • 2Has your church ever submitted to an independent, third party review of its leadership practices, financial decisions, or handling of complaints? If not, why not?
  • 3Who serves on your church's board or elder team? Are they independent voices with real authority, or are they handpicked by the senior pastor and expected to support his decisions?
  • 4If multiple families reported the same pattern of harm from the same leader, what would your church actually do? Is there a documented process, or would it be handled behind closed doors by the people closest to the accused?
  • 5There is a principle in Matthew 18 about how to handle allegations and seek reconciliation and repair for broken relationships. When a church responds to serious allegations by hiring an attorney before talking to the people who raised the concerns, that church has chosen to protect itself. Is that the church you want your family in?
6

What Is Spiritual Abuse?

Recognize the signs of coercion, control, and manipulation in a church setting

  • 1Researchers have identified a pattern in which questioning leadership is reframed as rebellion against God. Does your church distinguish between healthy accountability and dissent, or does disagreement with a pastor carry spiritual consequences?
  • 2Many spiritually abusive environments operate through unwritten expectations that members only discover when they violate them. Does your church have transparent, documented standards for how concerns are raised and how disagreements are handled?
  • 3Studies on religious trauma consistently point to the fear of losing community as the primary reason people remain in harmful church environments. If members at your church feel unable to voice concerns without risking their relationships or standing, that pattern deserves examination.
  • 4When a member leaves your church, how does leadership characterize that departure to the congregation? Are terms like "bitter," "divisive," or "not submitted" used to explain why someone left without that person's perspective being heard?
  • 5Psychologists who study institutional abuse have noted that healthy organizations measure themselves by how they treat the most vulnerable among them. If your church measures its health by attendance, revenue, or the reputation of its pastor, it may be prioritizing the institution over the people it was designed to serve.

“I lost my children, my home, and every friend I had. All because I asked a question no one wanted to answer.”

Anonymous · Former member, 6 years

Blog

Resources for families

Child Safety5 min

5 Things Every Parent Should Know About Child Safety at Church

You drop your kids off and assume they are safe. Here is how to actually verify it.
Is Pastoral Counseling Safe?7 min

Counseling vs Therapy: Know the Difference

There is a difference between spiritual guidance and institutional control over your family.
Family Matters5 min

What Is Parental Alienation and How Can a Church Make It Worse?

Your kids used to run to the door when you came home. Now they will not return your calls.
Confidentiality5 min

3 Ways Your Church Could Use Your Confession Against You

You shared something real. Then you discovered it did not stay in confidence.

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You are not alone

If you have experienced or witnessed harmful behavior at your church, your story can help protect other families. Everything shared is confidential unless you choose otherwise.

Share Your Story

This site provides questions and publicly available information for public consideration. It does not make factual allegations. If your church would like to respond to any of these questions, we welcome their transparency. Maintained by a group of concerned families.