Sexual abuse is something that is a very real threat to all of our families, and yet we think this would never happen to our kids. Studies show that 1 in 4 girls and 1 in 6 boys will experience sexual abuse before the age of eighteen. That is a statistic that literally causes my stomach to ache. I can almost taste the vomit in my throat at the idea of any child in this world enduring sexual abuse.
I am no expert on this subject, so I do not ever plan on writing about this extensively, but I am a momma that wants to protect her babies as much as she possibly can, and so I want to let you know about a training that is coming to Austin to help us mommas protect our babies. A few years ago I wrote about how we don’t keep secrets in our house, and that post came about after the Penn State scandal broke. I also had a hard time dealing with the counselor from Kanakuk that was convicted of abusing boys over the years. The Penn State scandal was a national story, but the Kanakuk one was personal for me. I worked at Kanakuk the same summer as this guy did. I would have let him take any of my boys to his house to hang out. I trusted him and would have never thought he would be abusing boys. Both of those incidents received high publicity, but the reality is that this is a threat to our kids too, not just football players and kids at camp.
This Saturday, The Austin Stone Community Church, is hosting a sexual abuse training that is open to anyone in Austin, and I can not recommend it enough. They are partnering with Ministry Safe to help us as parents guard our kids from this abuse happening to them. This training is not meant to help us parents keep our kids out of the world for fear of this, but yet how do we help them be light to a dark world and still protect their hearts, bodies and souls from the evil in the world.
I attended a training with Ministry Safe before that was geared towards child care workers at church and it was by far one of the most eye-opening and resourceful trainings I have ever been apart of for working with kids. I left that training and told John (our children’s pastor) that everyone needs to hear this. All parents need this training. I’m beyond thrilled that this opportunity is now here for all of us parents to be resourced in ways that we can help our families hopefully avoid the tragedy of abuse towards our children.
Tickets to this training are $10 and there’s also limited childcare for a small fee as well. If you can’t afford this training there are scholarships available and please don’t let the lack of funds keep you from this training. If you have any questions or fears, feel free to contact me, or anyone in the KIDS ministry at the Stone. Click HERE to sign up.
Thank you for sharing this! Do you know if this will be available online at a later date?
Thanks!
Chelsea I’m not sure about that one. If you contact someone at the link I listed I know they can help you!