General Board Policy on Church Discipline APPENDIX VI: DEFINITIONS OF ABUSE 5500-5523

Modified on Fri, 21 Mar at 10:38 AM

Definitions of Abuse

5500. Preamble. The Wesleyan Church is committed to protecting the vulnerable, caring for survivors, and holding those who abuse power accountable. Our commitments come from God, who is a refuge for the abused and never ignores their cry (Psalm 9:9, 12). Our community seeks to embody Jesus’ priority of justice for the vulnerable, especially children.

Abuse is a particularly grievous sin (and often a crime), when someone in a position of power and trust violates or exploits someone who is often powerless to stop it. Abuse is sadly a common reality in this world. As Christians we cannot face abuse if we are in denial about the reality of abuse. Instead, Jesus calls us to be “wise as serpents.” (Matthew 10:16) God rejects leaders who domineer, serve themselves, and abuse power to prey upon the vulnerable. Jesus taught that leaders must use power in ways that serve, heal, bless, and protect (Ezekiel 34, Jeremiah 23, John 10, Mark 10:42-43).

The Wesleyan Church is committed to being educated about abuse and taking responsibility to uphold our policy. All people within our fellowship should experience an environment of safety and justice and one that is free from any form of abuse.

Chapter 1

DEFINITIONS

A. Abuse

5503. In general, abuse occurs when a person holding power and/or trust (e.g. pastor, elder, boss, mentor, supervisor, parent, adult, older child) uses that position to exploit or violate someone who is more vulnerable (e.g. a ch.ild, someone who is sick, elderly, or disabled, student, supervisee, intern, immigrant). Exploitation or violation can take a variety of forms such as emotional, financial, physical, sexual, spiritual.

B. Sexual Abuse

5505. When a person in a place of power and/or trust engages in sexual behavior with a child or an adult under their supervision, authority, mentoring, or spiritual care, including:

Sexual Penetration: Any act or attempted act of vaginal or anal penetration, however slight, by a person's penis, finger, other body part, or an object, and/or any oral-genital contact.

Sexual Contact: Any intentional touching of a person’s breasts, buttocks, groin, genitals, or other intimate part(s). Touching may be over or under clothing and may include making the person touch their own body or another body. This also includes contact with non-sexual areas of the body for the sexual gratification of the perpetrator (such as with certain paraphilic disorders).

Non-Contact Sexual Acts:

Observing a person’s nudity or sexual activity or allowing a person to observe sexual activity.

Recording, photographing, transmitting, showing, viewing, streaming, or distributing intimate or sexual images, audio recordings, or sexual information of person(s).

Exposing one's genitals or inducing a person to expose their own genitals.

A power dynamic (e.g. boss-employee, doctor-patient, teacher-student, pastor-congregant, adult-child) communicating sexual desire or sexually stimulating content toward a person.

A child cannot consent to any sexual behavior with an adult or significantly older child. An adult under the authority, care, or mentorship of a leader cannot consent to sexual activity. Even when both people are adults and the contact is not forcible, any crossing of sexual boundaries within a power structure is not an “affair” or a “relationship” but an egregious abuse of power. Adult sexual abusers often develop an emotional and spiritual connection and then exploit it. While not always recognized as a crime according to provincial or territorial law, this is a serious violation, and The

Wesleyan Church will treat it as such.

C. Clergy Sexual Abuse

5507. Sexual abuse (see above) by a pastor, officer, or other leader holding formal spiritual authority with a person under their spiritual care and/or supervision, whether an adult or a child. It is an abuse of power; whether or not this is criminalized by state or provincial law.

D. Sexual Assault

5509. Sexual contact or behavior that occurs without the consent of the victim. Some forms of sexual assault include:

Penetration of the victim’s body, also known as rape.

Attempted rape.

Forcing a victim to perform sexual acts, such as oral sex or penetration of the perpetrator’s body.

Fondling or unwanted sexual touching.

Consent is words or overt actions indicating a freely given agreement to the sexual act or contact. Silence or the absence of an explicit “no” does not equal consent. Physical submission by the victim - such as “freezing” or “fawning” in fear - does not equal consent. Consent also implies the ability to say no in a mutual relationship: Children, certain vulnerable adults (based on functioning related to factors such as intellectual disabilities, age, mental health, or other vulnerabilities), or those within a power differential (e.g. pastor-congregant, boss-employee, doctor-patient, teacher-student) are often unable to consent to sexual activity. Other circumstances such as intoxication or unconsciousness also render a person unable to give consent to sexual activity. Deception or manipulation of a person also renders that person unable to consent.

E. Sexual Harassment

5511. The legal definition of Sexual Harassment by the US Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (1980) is “Unwelcome sexual advances, requests for sexual favors, and other verbal or physical conduct of a sexual nature constitute sexual harassment when:

submission to such conduct is made either explicitly or implicitly a term or condition of an individual’s employment,

submission to or rejection of such conduct by an individual is used as the basis for employment decisions affecting such individual;

such conduct has the purpose or effect of unreasonably interfering with an individual’s work performance or creating an intimidating, hostile, or offensive working environment.”

Beyond the legal definition, harassment, sexual or otherwise, can also occur in a community, conference, or event when the people involved are not employees of the church.

Sexual harassment is not restricted to what is defined as sexual harassment under the law. The Wesleyan Church considers any unwanted sexualized behavior or sexualized behavior within a power differential to be a serious form of harassment (including unwanted touch or communication, other unwanted sexual attention, or any behavior that objectifies or degrades.)

F. Intimate Partner Violence (Domestic Violence)

5513. A pattern of behavior where a person in, or who has been in, an intimate relationship uses tactics of control, belittling, isolation, fear, stalking, and/or intimidation to dominate, harm, degrade, or otherwise undermine the worth and agency of the other person in the relationship. Intimate partner violence can be physical, verbal, emotional, sexual, social, or financial.

G. Emotional Abuse

5515. When a person holding power and trust uses a pattern of unreasonably controlling and domineering behaviors such as shaming, insulting, degrading, intimidating, threatening, humiliating, and/or domineering. Bullying is a common term for acts that typically constitute emotional abuse.

H. Financial Abuse

5517. The illegal or improper use of a vulnerable person or his/her financial resources for another's profit or advantage. Some examples of financial abuse may include: the taking of money or property; forging a signature; getting a person to sign a deed, will or power of attorney through deception; coercion or undue influence; or illegally or improperly adding names to bank accounts or safety deposit boxes.

I. Physical Abuse

5519. Non-accidental physical injury (ranging from bruises to severe fractures or death) by way of bodily contact (such as slapping, punching, pushing, beating, kicking, shaking or striking with an object) or non-injurious contact with the goal or effect of intimidating, threatening, or controlling.

J. Spiritual Abuse

5521. A form of emotional abuse, meaning a pattern of coercive or domineering behaviors using religion, usually by a person who holds power and trust. Many acts of abuse in a religious environment will have a spiritual dimension. Examples include:

Use of religious ideology, precepts, tradition, or sacred texts to harm.

Compelling a person to engage in religious acts against his or her will.

Abuse that occurs in a religious context or by a religious leader.

Invoking divine authority to manipulate a person into meeting the needs of the abuser.

Using spirituality or spiritual authority to unreasonably dismiss a person’s perspective, agency, or value.

Attempts to use the divine, sacred texts, sacred tradition, theology, or spirituality to put their leadership or decisions beyond questioning or accountability.

Attempts to spiritualize or justify harm using the divine, sacred texts, sacred tradition, theology, or spirituality.

K. Stalking

5523. A pattern of unwanted, fixated and obsessive behavior which is intrusive and causes fear of violence, alarm, or distress. Stalking is a terrifying reality and is now recognized as a crime in all fifty states.

Examples of stalking include (from The Justice Department’s Stalking Victimization Survey):

Making unwanted phone calls/texts or sending unwanted messages or emails.

Following or spying on the victim.

Showing up or waiting at places without a legitimate reason.

Leaving unwanted items, presents, or flowers.

Posting information or spreading false or confidential information about a person or victim on the internet, in a public place, or by word of mouth.

Updated 11/2024