Eight Missouri ministers accused of sex abuse in Southern Baptist Conference report • Missouri Impartial

The Southern Baptist Conference on Thursday launched a once-secret and prolonged record of accused sex abusers — a number of of whom are within the Midwest — inside the denomination.

The 205-page checklist is a compilation of ministers and other church workers who have been credibly accused of sexual abuse. The listing is described as a “fluid, working doc” that was additionally incomplete however largely pulls information about abusers from revealed information experiences.

The publication of the listing comes after the discharge Sunday of a 300-page report by an impartial investigator that described how leaders of the Southern Baptist denomination for many years have acquired studies of sexual abuse committed by church workers, pastors and others. However those reviews have been largely stored secret and, rather than performing upon and investigating reports of sexual abuse, denomination leaders sought to intimidate and vilify victims and their advocates.

“The entire thing must be seen for what it's,” wrote former Southern Baptist Conference government committee member and common counsel D. August Boto in an inner email that was printed in the report. “It’s a satanic scheme to completely distract us from evangelism.”

The crisis rocking the Southern Baptist denomination this week is comparable in some ways to what the Catholic church continues to face. Leaders in both faiths systematically hid information about sexual misconduct, appeared to indicate extra concern about their own legal liability than the victims and at instances failed to expel accused abusers from positions of authority.

In 2007, Father Thomas Doyle, a Catholic priest credited as one of the first to warn of his own denomination’s clergy sex abuse disaster, wrote a letter to SBC leadership conveying his concern that Southern Baptist leaders have been repeating the failures of the Catholic church in dealing with sex abuse.

Doyle was told, “Southern Baptist leaders actually have no authority over native church buildings,” a response that Doyle considered dismissive, in accordance with the investigative report. 

That same 12 months, at the SBC convention in San Antonio, Oklahoma pastor Wade Burleson made a movement to create a database of Southern Baptist clergy who had been convicted or credibly accused of, or had confessed to sexual abuse. The proposal was meant to “help in stopping any future sexual abuse or harassment.”

The database proposal appeared to go nowhere, based on the report, and witnesses at the conference recalled little about it except to precise their opinion that it could “violate native church autonomy.”

Ultimately, a staffer for the SBC govt committee since 2007 had maintained an inventory of accused ministers and church workers, but it was stored hidden from the public and even SBC govt committee trustees, in response to the report.

Southern Baptist leaders stated publicizing the listing of credibly accused abusers represented “an preliminary, but important, step towards addressing the scourge of sexual abuse and implementing reform in the Conference.”

“Each entry on this record reminds us of the devastation and destruction caused by sexual abuse,” said a joint assertion from Willie McLaurin and Rolland Slade, each SBC executive committee members. “Our prayer is that the survivors of those heinous acts discover hope and healing, and that churches will utilize this checklist proactively to guard and care for essentially the most susceptible amongst us.”

Attorneys for the SBC govt committee researched the listing of accused abusers, taking steps to confirm information it contained. It left unredacted entries about alleged abusers that might be confirmed, while redacting entries where someone was acquitted or did not have a remaining disposition, as well as info that would determine victims.

Missouri males feature prominently on the record. They embrace:

This story comes from the Midwest Newsroom, an investigative journalism collaboration including IPR, KCUR 89.3, Nebraska Public Media News, St. Louis Public Radio and NPR. For extra in-depth news from Iowa, Kansas, Missouri and Nebraska, we invite you to comply with us on Twitter.