Faith-Based Responses

The phenomenon of sexual abuse as committed by persons in fiduciary relationships is widespread among helping professions. This bibliography is oriented to several specific contexts in which this occurs. The first is the religious community, particularly Christian churches, and particularly in the U.S.A. This is the setting of occurrence that I best know and understand. The second context is the role of clergy, a religious vocation and culture to which I belong. While the preponderance of sources cited in this bibliography reflects those two settings, the intent is to be as comprehensive as possible about sexual boundary violations within the religious community. While the bibliography focuses on the position and role of clergy, the concept of sexual boundary violation by one in a religious role is applied here to include other positions that also involve fiduciary trust and power derived from a sanctioning religious community, e.g. a missionary, youth worker, or woman religious.   James Evinger's Bibliography on Clergy Ethics