advocacy classes
Become EquippedLed by Dr. Debra Wingfield and Joy Forrest, our year-long advocacy course offers nearly 100 hours of instruction on understanding the dynamics of coercive control through a Biblical lens.
Classes cover prevention, intervention, and healing the trauma women and children experience from abuse.
Note: If you are still in the early stages of healing, these classes may trigger difficult emotions and memories.
Once you complete the advocacy classes, you can apply to become a CTPM-affiliated advocate.
I am currently enrolled in CTPM’s year-long faith-based advocacy training. The training has helped aid in my healing in multiple ways. The courses offered have helped me understand how to help my children heal from the trauma of living in an abusive home. It has also helped me understand many of the lies and unhealthy belief systems I believed that kept me trapped in my marriage for as long as it did. I continue to single parent my children, helping them recover from their trauma while healing from my own. I hope to someday start a CTPM support group in my church or community and become a CTPM-affiliated advocate (in God’s timing), helping other women find the hope and healing that I have found.
This training is the most comprehensive and insightful I have found anywhere, even as a trained professional. They are experts on this topic, and you will learn more from this program on domestic violence and coercive control than I have ever found from another resource — including my own undergraduate and graduate programs as a trained clinical therapist. Dr. Debra Wingfield bases her findings on research from credible resources, and is an expert in this field, as well as Joy Forrest, who has lived the topic. I would highly recommend this training to anyone without reservation.
How we help counselors and people helpers
We have several training videos that may provide guidance and/or clarity in identifying the signs of domesic abuse. In addition, we provide advocacy services to help you and your client find the best and safest path forward. Many counselors and people helpers choose to take our one-year training program to learn all they can about ways to help their clients. We have special breakout sessions at our annual retreats to help sharpen your skills in dealing with complex abuse-related issues. You can access prior retreats and conferences here.
Why we help
Using power and control to diminish others and to promote selfish interests stands in direct opposition to God’s heart for the weak, needy, and oppressed.
Scripture uses the term oppression to describe such behavior and God clearly hates it (Is. 1:17, Ps. 147:7-9 Ex. 22:7). He commanded his people not to “lord it over” others (Mt. 20:25-28,1 Pet. 5:3).
The Bible is filled with passages on God’s heart for the oppressed. In the New Testament, the religious leaders who opposed Jesus and the disciples provide us with clear examples of the abusive mindset—prideful, entitled, self-righteous, and self-promoting. Their agenda was to have more power than Jesus, and they stopped at nothing to get it. The same is true of abusive people. Therefore, we should never underestimate the potential for danger, even if the control has not yet escalated to physical injury. We should also understand the multiple impacts of all forms of abuse.
In 1 Corinthians 13:4-8, we find that these abusive traits are the exact opposite of God’s definition of love in 1 Corinthians 13. We often ask those suffering in destructive relationships to read this passage, because it can also be a great way to help them determine whether their relationships are abusive.
“Give justice to the weak and the fatherless; maintain the right of the afflicted and the destitute. Rescue the weak and the needy; deliver them from the hand of the wicked.” Psalms 82: 3-4 ESV