Grace Therapy: Meeting the Challenge of Group Therapy for Male Batterers

Grace Therapy is a relatively new model for male batterers' group therapy, based on the 12-Step program. Grace Therapy attempts to address the marked suspicion of and resistance to treatment that most male batterers display, while offering several principles that work together to enhance the men's affiliation with the group—modularity, immediacy, group and therapist availability, accessibility, acceptance, and mutual help. Grace Therapy considers battering to be a three-leveled phenomenon: physical/behavioral, mental and spiritual. The respective treatment goals range from abstinence from any manifestation of violence, leading up to a self-transformation at the spiritual level that replaces self-centeredness with “God-centeredness,” in which the man becomes non-violent. During the change process, the men learn how to adhere to a letting go Win-Win principle of partnership, based on unconditional giving. A range of case studies and the first-hand testimony of the second author, a recovering male batterer, support the description.