Haffner, has taught at
Yale Divinity School,
Meadville Lombard Theological School, and
Pacific School of Religion, and was an adjunct lecturer/visiting professor at
Union Theological Seminary. Works she has authored include several guides for congregations on sexuality. In 2001, Haffner co-founded the Religious Institute on Sexual Morality, Justice, and Healing with Larry Greenfield. The Religious Institute, Inc. was established as an independent 501(c)(3) nonprofit organization on March 6, 2012. The organization's stated mission is to advocate for sexual health, education, and justice in faith communities and society. Prior to founding the Religious Institute and entering ministry, Haffner was President and Chief Executive Officer of
SIECUS, the Sexuality Information and Education Council of the United States (1988-2000), Director of Information and Education for the Center for Population Options, Director of Community Services and Public Relations, Planned Parenthood of Metropolitan Washington. She has also worked at the Bureau of Community Health Services at the U.S. Public Health Service, and at The Population Institute.
Sexuality education Haffner has been a sexuality educator since the mid-1970s. She was an AASECT certified sexuality educator until she became a full time parish minister. Her contributions to the field of sexuality education include: • Creating the first educators' handbook for
Planned Parenthood in 1981. • Directing the nation's first conference on AIDS and Adolescents in 1986 for the
Center for Population Options. • Co-authoring the first national study on the costs of teenage childbearing with Martha Burt from the
Urban Institute. While at SIECUS, she created the National Guidelines for Comprehensive Sexuality Education, which Haffner co-authored with Dr. William Yarber of
Indiana University, the National Commission on Adolescent Sexual Health and the National Coalition to Support Sexuality Education.
Sexually healthy faith communities Haffner's most recent work in sexuality focused on helping faith communities understand the relationship between
sexuality and religion and creating sexually healthy faith communities. In 1999, she conceived of the project to develop a multifaith progressive statement on sexuality and religion and coordinated the development of the Religious Declaration on Sexual Morality, Justice, and Healing. Written with the input of twenty leading theologians, the Religious Declaration first appeared in
The New York Times on January 25, 2000 endorsed by more than 800 religious leaders. As of January 2016 when she retired from the Religious Institute, more than 9,000 religious leaders from more than 70 denominations had endorsed the Religious Declaration. "Sexuality education is a religious issue," Haffner has publicly stated. "We have a commitment to helping young people develop a moral conscience, including an ability to make healthy decisions. We have a religious commitment to truth telling, which means that people should have full and accurate information, not biased and censored." In collaboration with the
New England Adolescent Research Institute (NEARI), Haffner developed a course entitled
Balancing Acts that is designed to train ministers and other religious professionals in how to keep children and youth safe from sexual abuse. Haffner works frequently with congregations who are struggling with including sex offenders in their congregations, and in this program, she addresses the concerns these faith communities face when discerning how to discern appropriate involvement for these individuals. It suggests the formation of a "limited access agreement" to determine what activities the individual may participate in and suggests rules and guidelines to prevent the occurrence of future abuse. "Every place of worship needs a safe-congregation policy," Haffner said. == Published work ==