Donahoe Announces Members of Study Committee on Domestic Abuse and Sexual Assault
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Howie Donahoe, moderator of the 47th General Assembly, has announced the members of the Study Committee on Domestic Abuse and Sexual Assault. The committee will consist of four teaching elders, three ruling elders, and four advisory members.

The committee members are Cal Boroughs, Tim LeCroy, Lloyd Pierson, Shane Waldron, Kelly Dehnert, Bob Goudzwaard, and David Haburchak. The advisory committee members are Diane Langberg, Barbara Shaffer, Darby Strickland, and Anne Marie Goudzwaard.

“The Dallas GA has given this study committee a monumental task. This team will serve us well,” Donahoe said. “And the role and importance of the advisors cannot be overemphasized. We’re grateful for their willingness to participate, and for the wisdom, insight and experience they will bring.”

Boroughs is a teaching elder at St. Elmo Presbyterian Church in Chattanooga, part of Tennessee Valley Presbytery. He has served as moderator for his presbytery and chaired the Pastoral Care Committee. He was also part of the working group that brought to the Assembly the overture for a study committee on domestic abuse and sexual assault.

LeCroy is a teaching elder in Missouri Presbytery and pastor at Grace and Peace Presbyterian Church in St. Louis. He is a visiting instructor of historical theology at Covenant Theological Seminary and has served on the General Assembly as a member of the PCA Administrative Committee, Review of Presbytery Records Committee, and Overtures Committee.

Pierson and Waldron both work with abuse survivors and perpetrators through Refuge Ministries, a domestic abuse ministry that Waldron founded in Kalispell, Montana. Refuge Ministries includes The Refuge, a support program for abuse survivors; Turning Point, a batterers intervention program; and Refuge Kids, a ministry to children in abusive homes. Waldron is now the pastor of Rocky Mountain Presbyterian Church in Westminster, Colorado. He developed the curriculums for Refuge Ministries, which now has branches in Montana, Wyoming, Colorado, and Pennsylvania. Pierson serves as director of Refuge Ministries in Kalispell and pastor of Faith Covenant Church. Both pastors serve in Rocky Mountain Presbytery.

Dehnert, a ruling elder at Covenant Presbytery Church in Lander, Wyoming, wrote his doctoral dissertation on toxic leadership in Christian organizations. He continues to research and teach on leadership in the church and is editor of Pearls and Swine, a site providing information on abusive leadership in the church, Christian organizations, and the home.

As a counselor, Goudzwaard helped develop a domestic abuse online training video for the Institute for Biblical Counseling and Discipleship (IBCD). He serves as director care ministries at Christ Covenant Church — where he is a ruling elder — and director of operations at IBCD. Goudzwaard has a Master of Arts degree in biblical counseling from Reformed Theological Seminary, Charlotte.

Haburchak recently moved to Atlanta from August, where he served for years as a ruling elder at First Presbyterian Church Augusta. He is a doctor of internal medicine and was a professor of medicine at the Medical College of Georgia at Augusta University. He recently authored “Kingdom Work: Redeeming Child Sexual Abuse.”

The committee’s advisory members have a voice on the committee, but no vote.

Langberg attends Calvary Presbyterian Church in Willow Grove, Pennsylvania and has over four decades experience in counseling and teaching about abuse, oppression, and trauma. She has authored or contributed to many books about abuse, including “On the Threshold of Hope: Opening the Door to Healing for Survivors of Sexual Abuse” (1999), “Counseling Survivors of Sexual Abuse” (2003), and “Suffering and the Heart of God: How Trauma Destroys and Christ Restores” (2015).

Shaffer is a psychologist with nearly 40 years of experience, much of which involved working with women and some men who were survivors of sexual and domestic abuse. She is a member of Faith Presbyterian Church in Wilmington, Delaware.

Strickland is a member of Cornerstone Presbyterian Church in Center Valley, Pennsylvania, and an instructor and counselor with the Christian Counseling & Educational Foundation. She teaches Counseling Abusive Marriages and is the author of two booklets: “Domestic Abuse: Recognize, Respond, and Rescue” and “Domestic Abuse: Help for the Sufferer.” She is currently writing a book on how to help victims of marital abuse, due out in 2020 and also worked with a team to develop the curriculum “Becoming a Church that Cares Well for the Abused,” a free web-based training that provides best practices for pastors, ministries, and leaders who minister in the context of abuse. 

Ann Maree Goudzwaard is a member of Christ Covenant Church (CCC) in Matthews, North Carolina where she is the training coordinator for the Shepherdess Ministry. Together with the Director of Women’s Ministry, she developed the CCC policy for domestic abuse. She is a certified biblical counselor and director of communications at the Institute for Biblical Counseling and Discipleship. She was instrumental in the content development of a domestic abuse counseling training observation video (still in editing) for IBCD. Currently, she is in domestic abuse advocacy training (Called to Peace Ministries), as well as developing a church-based domestic abuse advocacy training curriculum as an independent study for her doctoral studies.

As with the Ad Interim Committee on Human Sexuality, this study committee is entirely funding by designated contributions. Checks can be mailed to the PCA Administrative Committee, 1700 North Brown, Suite 105, Lawrenceville, GA, 30043.

Please note “Study Committee: Domestic Violence 2019” in the memo line. Online contributions can be made at  https://www.pcaac.org/get-involved/giving-to-the-pca/

All contributions will be receipted. For questions regarding contributions, call 678-825-1000.

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