Mercy: Choices that Bring Change, New Info

Nancy is trying to spin Mercy's new program. Sean and Cynic have already commented on this program, but I don't think they are yet aware of this new article that has come out in a major Methodist publication. Nancy claims that:

"Well, it’s definitely a biblically-based counseling model. We called it “Choices that Bring Change.” And it relies, first of all, on choice—you may be a victim but you don’t have to stay a victim. So many times people talk about things that get passed down from generation to generation, that become the bad things. But it’s also possible for someone who’s got a tough background to begin a generation of blessing. We try to empower the girls to understand that you do have a choice.
In order to really share a biblically-based counseling model, everything starts out of that personal relationship with Christ and where your heart is. So the girls who come to us know we’re Christian-based.
Another choice that we focus on is choosing to forgive the people who have hurt you—helping people understand what biblical forgiveness really means. It’s not a feeling. And we help them understand what it’s not. It’s not saying that somebody abusing you was okay; it’s not saying that you have to go back and put yourself in that situation again; it’s not saying any of those things.
Another part of our counseling model, we deal with renewing the mind. For example, a girl who has been a prostitute would believe about herself, “I’m dirty; I’m shameful.” “No godly man would ever want me because of my past.” What we help that girl do is renew her mind to what God’s word says, so that she can begin to see herself the way God sees her. So we focus on what we call “replacing lies with the truth.”
Another area is healing life hurts. Anyone that’s got life-controlling issues, particularly young girls who have been sexually abused or raped, there are usually lots of emotional wounds. We believe that Jesus came to heal the brokenhearted. It was never God’s will for them to be abused. A lot of girls think that “this happened to me, so it must’ve been what God wanted for my life,” but of course that’s not the truth.
And then the next thing we deal with is what we call “principles for lifelong success.” It’s designed to get girls ready to go back into society and live their lives. But what we do is encourage the girls, regardless of what background they’re from, that wherever they’re going back to, they need to get involved in a local church family. We teach them about committing to live a life of integrity and obedience according to God’s word, in all different practical areas. We don’t assume these girls know anything. We teach them about balancing checkbooks, budgeting, finance, about a lot of different things that have to do with practical aspects of everyday life."

I for one am suspicious of this "change", since its clear from the subtext of this article that Alcorn is still operating from the pretext of believing in generational curses ("the generation of blessing" and all that). I also think the emphasis on forgiving abusers is bad policy. That should be left up to the individual. I have never been abused, but I had a dear friend who was raped when I was a teenager. I felt tremendous anger about it, and try as I might, I could never forgive the person who hurt my friend. That attempt at forgiveness put me under enormous stress, and I wasn't even the victim, just a friend of the victim. So I definitely don't think victims should feel obligated to forgive their abusers. Also, relating everything back to Christianity is a bad idea. For a person with religious obsessions, for instance, this could make matters worse. While the morality of the program and its aims could certainly legitimately be to glorify God, its methodology should not see this as its primary focus.
I would certainly be happy to believe that Mercy is no longer using the RTF counseling model. But I'm not sure that this model is any different than the one they were using before.