Module 2: Religious Trauma and the Nervous System

INSTRUCTOR: Dr. Laura Anderson, PhD, LMFT

APA CE Credits: 1.5

This program is co-sponsored with Traumastry. Traumastry is approved by the American Psychological Association and NBCC to sponsor continuing education for psychologists. Traumastry maintains responsibility for this program and its content.

Learning Objectives:

• Participants will identify and describe four primary autonomic nervous system responses and analyze their clinical presentation in survivors of high-control religion.
  
• Participants will demonstrate effective use of three body-based interventions to support regulation and embodiment in survivors of high-control religion. 

Program Summary and Justification: 

This program is designed to increase the clinical competency of licensed mental health professionals by analyzing their understanding of nervous system responses in survivors of religious trauma and applying knowledge and practice in clinical settings. This program is designed for psychologists who have already completed foundational training in trauma theory and are seeking advanced skills in somatic assessment and intervention within religious trauma contexts. Grounded in current research on the autonomic nervous system and polyvagal theory, the program offers a dual focus: (1) conceptual education in nervous system survival responses through the lens of religious trauma, and (2) applied training in trauma-informed somatic interventions to support interoception, regulation, and embodiment.

In the first half of the program, participants will identify the four primary nervous system survival states—fight, flight, freeze, and fawn—as they are assessed in individuals emerging from high-control religious environments. These physiological responses, while often misinterpreted as personality traits or resistance, are adaptive strategies developed in response to chronic fear, spiritual coercion, and loss of bodily autonomy (Porges, 2017; Dana, 2020; Anderson, 2023; Maté, 2022). Clinicians will analyze how these survival patterns are shaped by experiences such as rigid authority structures, shame-based teachings, and spiritual bypassing. 

In the second half of the program, participants will apply experiential learning through three body-based interventions adapted for religious trauma recovery. These tools are introduced with attention to therapeutic pacing, consent, and clinical relevance, especially for clients whose bodily cues were pathologized or suppressed in religious settings (Menakem, 2017; Khalsa et al., 2018; Paulus, 2018). These interventions are drawn from established psychological disciplines including clinical neurobiology, trauma psychotherapy, and somatic psychology, and are taught in alignment with ethical standards and evidence-based practice models.

By bridging nervous system science, somatic psychology, and religious trauma theory, this program expands postdoctoral-level knowledge and equips clinicians with both theoretical insight and hands-on tools to better support clients who cannot access healing through cognitive approaches alone (Grabbe & Miller-Karas, 2018; Ogden, 2021; Van der Kolk, 2015).