Psychology - Abuse and Recovery

From BBC News UK: A cursory glance at the classified section of the ethnic press reveals a myriad of spiritual healers making some remarkable claims.

Considered 'conduits of God' by some, they claim to be able help return a loved one, cure impotency and infertility, help advance your career and even make you wealthy.

One such spiritualist says he can cast away 'evil influences and bad luck', another will break voodoo and black magic curses and several others offer exorcisms.

Concern has been growing about the impact on children of such ritual practices.

The issue hit the headlines with the grim discovery of a torso of a young boy in the Thames in September 2001.

Police believe the child, later named Adam, had been the victim of a west African-style ritual sacrifice.

How widespread is the problem? Academics estimate only 5% of crimes involving possession or witchcraft are actually reported.

Africans Unite Against Child Abuse (Afruca), a UK charity, is calling for tighter regulation of minority churches and faith organisations.

Continued at "African children 'at risk of ritual abuse'"

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Permanent Link posted by Jarl @ 9:31 AM 0 comments

From the Houston Chronicle: Diana's grandson came to her with his secret on a Thursday evening. School had just started after another humid summer, and she and the 14-year-old, whose parents had their bowling league that night, finished cleaning up the kitchen after dinner. She took a glass of iced tea and her cigarette pack outside for a smoke.

Minutes later, he followed. The boy said he had something to tell her, something that had been bothering him for many months. And that's when things changed.

'He had broke down,' recalled Diana, who asked that her last name be withheld to protect her family's identity. 'And he told me about it.'

Diana won't say exactly what 'it' was. But the Harris County Sheriff's Office detailed the teenager's disclosure in criminal reports this fall. Her grandson, a football player who speaks in ma'ams and sirs, said he had been sexually abused the year before, when he was 13, by a woman nearly 20 years his senior. She was a former neighbor and his mother's close friend in Highlands, the small town just east of Pasadena where his family once lived. The pair had sex at least twice and sexual contact another time, according to the reports.

The teenager had been saving himself for marriage, he later told his grandmother. He worried that God might not forgive what he did.

Police arrested Deborah Joyce Lux, 33, in September and charged her with two felony sexual assaults of children: one in connection with Diana's grandson and a second in connection with another teenager, a then-15-year-old boy from Highlands who also said he had sex with her.

Continued at "Many still don't see women as sex predators"

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Permanent Link posted by Jarl @ 9:55 AM 0 comments