Southern Baptists face push for public record of intercourse abusers

A blistering report on the Southern Baptist Convention’s mishandling of intercourse abuse allegations is elevating the prospect that the denomination, for the primary time, will create a publicly accessible database of pastors and other church personnel known to be abusers.

The creation of an “Offender Information System” was one of many key suggestions in a report launched Sunday by Guidepost Options, an unbiased firm contracted by the SBC’s Government Committee after delegates to last year’s national assembly pressed for an investigation by outsiders.

The proposed database is anticipated to be one in all a number of recommendations presented to 1000's of delegates attending this 12 months’s nationwide meeting, scheduled for June 14-15 in Anaheim, California.

“Those recommendations can be open to questions, debate and feedback on the assembly ground,” mentioned SBC President Ed Litton.

He expressed hope that the stunning findings in the Guidepost report will deliver “lasting change” to the SBC, America’s largest Protestant denomination. It has been shedding membership steadily lately, whereas being wracked by internal divisions over race and gender roles.

The Guidepost report mentioned survivors of abuse by SBC clergy repeatedly shared allegations with the Govt Committee, “solely to be met, time and time once more, with resistance, stonewalling, and even outright hostility from some within the EC.”

“Our investigation revealed that, for many years, a couple of senior EC leaders, along with exterior counsel, largely controlled the EC’s response to these reviews of abuse ... and were singularly focused on avoiding liability,” the report said.

The motion for an unbiased investigation was put forward eventually year’s national meeting by the Rev. Grant Gaines, senior pastor of Belle Aire Baptist Church in Murfreesboro, Tennessee.

Reading the Guidepost report, Gaines stated he was struck by repeated examples of a callous disregard for survivors, as well as leaders prioritizing protection of the SBC from legal responsibility over abuse prevention.

“We’re at a fork in the highway,” Gaines stated. “I feel this report provided the knowledge that we would have liked for there to be a groundswell of support to take the proper actions.”

Particularly, Gaines stated he helps the proposal to create a system that alerts communities to known offenders.

“I believe that’s one of many first issues we must always do,” he stated.

Lawyer and author Christa Brown, who says she was sexually abused as a teen by the youth minister at her SBC church, has been pressing the SBC since 2006 to create a publicly accessible database of identified abusers. She was heartened that Guidepost was recommending such a system, however said questions remain about its implementation.

“What is totally vital is that the native church can not function because the default or presumed beginning place for a survivor to try to acquire an investigation of clergy intercourse abuse,” she stated by way of e mail. “If the local church is deemed to be a requisite first cease for survivors to pursue motion, then many survivors’ voices will probably be choked of their throats earlier than sound is ever uttered.”

Among the many Guidepost report’s findings was that the Government Committee stored a secret record of hundreds of SBC-affiliated clergy and other personnel identified as sex abusers. Brown mentioned the committee, at a particular meeting Tuesday, ought to conform to release this checklist.

“I urge you to make public the entirety of your record of pastors & ministers accused of sexual abuse, in whatever type it’s been kept for lo these a few years,” Brown tweeted. “Put up. It. Now.”

The final selections about recommendations to submit to the Anaheim delegates might be made by the SBC’s Sexual Abuse Activity Power, comprising seven members and two advisors. Its work over the previous year has been an emotional journey, mentioned Pastor Bruce Frank, who led the group.

“We saw patterns and things that have been deeply concerning,” he said. “Our fundamental job was to empower Guidepost to do their job, and so they have done a really outstanding job in the last nine months to look at events that occurred over 20 years.”

In the next week or so, the task drive will carry forth formal motions in “precise language,” which shall be made public and offered to the delegates in Anaheim for a vote, said Frank, lead pastor of Biltmore Baptist Church in Arden, North Carolina.

Frank stated the crux of the duty pressure’s recommendations based on Guidepost’s report could be summarized in two phrases – prevention and care.

“Our essential purpose must be preventing sexual abuse,” he mentioned. “And if abuse does happen, how do we look after survivors in a much better pastoral method? How can we better talk to ensure (abusers) don’t go from one church to another?”

His hope is that this report serves as “a catalyst for change.”

“Any one who is fair-minded will take a look at what’s in that report and demand that issues be better,” Frank said. “SBC is an enormous household with 48,000 church buildings. There might be some disagreement on find out how to make issues higher. But I’m assured that we’ll work by way of the difficulties.”

In addition to sex abuse, the agenda for the assembly in Anaheim consists of election of a new SBC president to succeed Litton.

One of the main contenders is Bart Barber, a pastor from Farmersville, Texas, who expressed dismay on the mean-spirited behaviors attributed to some SBC officials within the Guidepost report.

If elected, Barber mentioned in a broadcast interview Monday, “I’m praying that God will give me the wisdom to know what to do.... We’re sailing into uncharted waters.”

“The work’s not performed,” he added. “We’ve gotten the report, but I feel all people in the survivor community that I’ve heard from has mentioned stories are one factor, however we’ll see if this family of churches has the courage and resolve to take motion.”

The intercourse abuse scandal was thrust into the spotlight in 2019 by a landmark report from the Houston Chronicle and San Antonio Categorical-News documenting a whole bunch of instances in Southern Baptist churches, together with a number of during which alleged perpetrators remained in ministry.

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