Viva’s Cutting Edge: Trauma-Informed Care
“Safety is not a given—it has to be intentionally created and maintained.” - Ruth Stephens
Trauma-Informed Care Summary
The panel explored trauma-informed care from foundational principles to systemic implementation. Ruth Stevens outlined the core concepts, stressing safety, trust, peer support, and cultural awareness. Julie Cooper reframed service delivery by urging providers to understand clients’ trauma histories and adapt engagement accordingly. Heather McNeil offered practical strategies for integrating trauma-informed principles, including staff training and wellbeing measures to prevent vicarious trauma. Barbara Clark addressed systemic and policy-level enablers, calling for leadership commitment, collaboration, and data-driven evaluation. Together, the panellists underscored that trauma-informed care is an organisation-wide cultural shift, not a checklist, requiring sustained effort and cross-sector cooperation to truly support recovery and resilience.
Why is this such an important topic?
Trauma was defined as resulting from an event, or series of events, or circumstances that is experienced by an individual as physically or emotionally harmful or threatening, and that has lasting adverse effects on an individual's functioning and physical, social, emotional or spiritual well-being. (Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration (SAMHSA))
This session brought together four panellists who discussed the importance of understanding trauma from a Christian perspective and emphasised the need for self-care when working with children who have experienced trauma. The session began with the four presenters answering a key question: Why is this so important?
Ruth Stephens, Join the Dots, UK: “50%, at least, of the children that I'm serving in my ministry are going to have experienced trauma; so that is one big reason to upskill.”
Barbara Clarke, Connect Network, South Africa: “Trauma is a buzzword these days, and I think it's important to understand what it really means, and what it means for us as Christians, and what it means for the Church.”
Heather McNiel, Anchored Hope, UK: “I think we know as followers of Christ that we are broken people, and we occupy a broken world. So I think the trauma-informed perspective really aids us to understand this brokenness more deeply and move towards holistic healing.”
Julie Cooper, Trauma Free World, USA: “It's really equipping the Church to move forward in the next generation in a more healthy and a more positive in a more influential way.”
The session then invited each presenter to share their insights into what trauma is and their work in this critical area.
People need to feel safe
Ruth Stephens from the charity Join the Dots explained about Adverse Childhood Experiences (ACES), such as abuse or household dysfunction (including a family member in prison or with mental health issues), which leads to toxic stress if a child does not have a supportive adult to help them. She noted that, “If one key adult is there in a child's life - present, supportive and understanding to that child - it can make all the difference.” The resulting effects of trauma, particularly pre-language trauma, are all-encompassing, impacting a child’s basic functioning in multiple ways, with trauma potentially leading to substance misuse, chronic illnesses and increased accidents. She shared this quote from Bessel Van der Kolk: “People who have been through trauma experience the world through a different nervous system.” Children who have experienced trauma may be stuck in a state of fear, which prevents them from properly engaging with things around them. People need to feel safe: emotionally, relationally and physically; and when these are missing, “The fulfilment of who we are just won't be possible because those areas at the bottom, those areas of need are not met.” A critical thing to remember is that trauma brings real change in people’s sensory system and that needs to be understood in any response to help them deal with their trauma.
Training in trauma-informed care is critical
Julie Cooper began by sharing her experience of her own interaction with her adopted children, which impacted the creation of Trauma Free World. Her personal experience with one child was significant to her understanding: “We started to realise emotional care isn't the same thing as emotional healing. So we were doing our best to give emotional care as best we could. But healing wasn't coming - and kindness is important, of course, but for kids who've experienced chronic abuse and neglect, they really needed more than our kindness. They needed people who understood trauma.” Trauma-free World provides training to caregivers across multiple fields and is exploring AI to scale trauma-informed care (more from Julie can be found at the end of this summary).
Connect Network: Building trauma-aware organisations
Barbara Clarke discussed Connect Network's trauma-informed care model in South Africa, which includes a two-year process to help organisations become trauma-transforming, starting with self-awareness and emotional regulation. She presented on the multi-layered contexts of trauma, emphasising the importance of understanding individual and societal factors. She noted that “We live in a deeply broken society, and that there are no quick fixes and easy solutions.”
The importance of being ‘trauma-organised’
Heather McNiel explained how we become ‘trauma-organised’ as people respond to the difficult situations they have gone through by preparing themselves – meaning their trauma ‘organises them’ to behave in a certain way. She gave an example of a young boy who may give an appearance of carrying a weapon because of attacks in his neighbourhood. She explained that sometimes people are in a situation where they are telling themselves, “I'm trying to be loving. I'm trying to be caring, or you know, I'm trying to be a good Christian, or a good caregiver or a good pastor. I'm trying to be a Christian leader, and I just feel stuck. I really can't unstuck myself.” She gave some methods to help address trauma, such as calming the body and the nervous system so that we can actually turn our brain back on – the ‘flip the lid’ model. She explained about the need to look for triggers and ask the questions - What's happening with me? What's happening with my body? What's happening with my heart and my mind? Her emphasis was that the experiences we have had become embedded in who we are, not something we put on – and that knowing it’s a journey is essential.
Caring for those with trauma - and the carers
The panellists discussed strategies for supporting individuals with trauma backgrounds, emphasising the importance of creating safe and nurturing environments. They highlighted the need for sensory supports, emotional regulation techniques, and professional help when necessary. A key point was that yes, the trauma changes the brain, but a healing community over time can change the brain too. There was also a strong emphasis on caregivers ensuring they care for themselves, unashamedly recognising their own need for space and support, before they can successfully help others deal with their trauma. Barbara closed the session with this blessing: “Do your own work. Trauma-free begins with me. But remember that we're part of a faith community. We have a faith, tradition - and healing belongs to God. It's not our responsibility. We are just part of the process, and praying for yourself, praying for the people that you work with, asking God for wisdom. We can't do this on our own. We do this together, and we do this with the help of Jesus and the Spirit.”
Beyond Compassion (workshop)
In a follow-up workshop, Julie Cooper delivered a presentation entitled, Beyond Compassion: Three Reasons to Get Training in Trauma-Informed Care. These reasons are:
We can't respond to what we don't understand.
Training gives us a new lens through which we see our children's emotions and behaviour.
Training rewires our reactions.
Noting that “50% of the children alive right now have experienced some kind of abuse, neglect, violence,” Julie underscored the importance of moving from good intentions to informed practice, reminding participants that compassion alone is insufficient when working with trauma survivors. She explained that “when the only tool you have is a hammer, you tend to see every problem as a nail ... children who have experienced chronic trauma require us to put the hammer down; read the manual, find the missing pieces, bring out the glue, and put them back together.”
There is a physiological element at play: a part of the brain responsible for keeping people safe becomes overresponsive when someone feels threatened. “What happens is we start seeing threat (like a ‘lion’) everywhere, even when that threat isn't there, because this is about survival … (I think) I can't trust you. I need to protect myself.” Furthermore, children who have experienced a lack of safety begin to see threats (lions) everywhere, even things that are not threatening at all (kittens): “It's because their brain and their ability to process those threats are on hypervigilance. This is why we prioritise safety and we prioritise connection to a safe adult.”
Julie explained that understanding how children are feeling is essential when we see things like manipulation, triangulation, lying, aggression, violence, and control. “If I haven't grown up in a way where I can trust others can take care of me and meet my needs; if I don't trust others are going to be kind to me and help me survive if I can't count on you; who am I going to count on? I'm going to count on myself.” As we understand children’s feelings are coming from a place of experience, we can help them build safety, always being aware of our own attitudes and behaviours: “And we need to be aware of our reactions because what doesn't get repaired gets repeated.”
This workshop also addressed the role of AI in caring for children, a topic covered in a separate fact sheet.
These sessions were from a Cutting Edge conference in July 2025, organised by Viva, an international charity that inspires, equips and connects networks of churches and community-based organisations to work together to make a bigger, better and longer-lasting impact in the lives of children. For more information about Viva or Cutting Edge, please visit viva.org.