CLH Talks: Social challenges and self-care following apostasy

CLH are pleased to partner with Faith to Faithless and host guest speakers Dr Savin Bapir-Tardy & Dr Windy A. Grendele for this talk.

As leading academics and psychologists, Dr Bapir-Tardy & Dr Grendele will provide insights and advice on the care and support required for those leaving high-control religions, the social challenges that apostates face, and how to find or refer help.

After a short presentation, there will be ample time for attendees to put questions to our guest speakers.

Our guests speakers will cover:

• What apostasy is
• The stages of apostasy
• The social challenges following apostasy
• Self-care following apostasy

Speakers profiles:
Dr Windy A. Grendele is a senior lecturer at Regent College London. She developed specialist knowledge of several areas of Social Psychology, such as group dynamics, social dominance and coercion and control in a religious environment. During her PhD, Windy explored the lived experiences of people shunned from the Jehovah’s Witnesses community with particular reference to the impact on the individual’s life and the strategies employed to cope with such an event. One important contribution of her research is the Integrated Model of Social Dynamics and Coercive Power Construct.

Dr Savin Bapir-Tardy is a senior lecturer in Psychology at the University of Roehampton and a chartered Counselling Psychologist. Savin’s clinical and research expertise is on traumatic experiences and community-based violence particularly ‘Honour’ Based Violence (HBV), Female Genital Mutilation (FGM) and Forced Marriage (FM).

Moderator: Terri O'Sullivan is the apostate services development officer at Faith to Faithless, a section of Humanists UK. F2F supports people who have left high control religious groups and raises awareness of apostasy issues.

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Reference Articles:
Grendele, W. A., Flax, M. and Bapir-Tardy, S. (2023) Shunning from the Jehovah’s Witness Community; Is it Legal?’, Journal of Law and Religion, 38 (2). https://doi.org/10.1017/jlr.2023.13
Grendele, W. A., Bapir-Tardy, S. and Flax, M. (2023) Experiencing religious shunning: Insights into the journey from being a member to leaving the Jehovah’s Witnesses Community, Pastoral Psychology. https://rdcu.be/dem5d
Grendele, W. A., Flax, M. and Bapir-Tardy, S. (2023) “You're going to go into some really dark, dark places in your mind.” Loss and disillusionment of being shunned from the Jehovah’s Witnesses community and its impact, International Journal of Coercion, Abuse, and Manipulation, 4. doi: 10.54208/10000004/005. https://www.ijcam.org/articles/youre-going-to-go-into-some-dark-dark-places

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Date: Wednesday, 29 November 2023

Time: 7:00pm - 8:30pm GMT

Platform: Zoom - Link will be visible once registered

Suggested donation: £3 per person
If you would prefer to pay online, please click here.

Before and after the talk there will be some time to chat over zoom and meet CLH members and guests.

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Our events are 18+ unless accompanied by a parent or guardian. We encourage dialogue, debate, and sharing of information, but ask people to keep their comments cordial. Any individual's views expressed here do not necessarily reflect the views of the group at large.