An Open Letter: To All the Laity of Adat Shalom Church (a Southern Baptist congregation in Dallas)
“Any story sounds true until someone tells the other side and sets the record straight.” (Proverbs 18: 17)
For the past three months, I’ve become increasingly aware that my soul cannot rest until I’ve completed this personal message to those who occupy the pews of your congregation. My intent is to set the record straight, going far beyond the parts of your church story which you may have heard already—either from online reports, the lengthy letter from your pastor a few weeks ago, or from hearsay.
This
letter will serve to tell “the rest of the story,” as Paul Harvey often
declared on the radio for many years.
Though
I’ve never met any of you personally, I've
come across hundreds of churches in similar situations as yours is right now. My
name is known in certain Southern Baptist circles and far beyond due to the
work I’ve done for over thirty years upon discovering the complex issues of collusion
with abuse in the faith community--a widespread, systemic problem I first learned about while serving as an SBC missionary (1978-88).
You not only have a right to know the whole story, but the right to understand the very complex issues that will be playing out in your congregation for a long, long time. These same issues are playing out in a very public way, on a larger scale, in the executive committees of the SBC and of your own state.
The
Foundation for Trouble
As the daughter,
granddaughter + great-granddaughter of SBC ministers and the wife of another,
now retired, I know it’s not very common to go around checking the criminal
records of new folks in most churches. Not anymore than it is to do the same
check of our new friends or personal acquaintances. We just naturally trust
our judgment.
Many employers check, of
course. Yet, pulpit committees quite commonly make the mistake of relying on
recommendations without doing background checks, even when searching for a new
pastor.
If someone talented
shows up to volunteer their time in Christian service, they are quickly put to
work. Especially in a small church, where well-trained workers are in very short
supply.
“Just grab ‘em!”
someone says, “’fore they change their minds.”
The assumption that
dedication and willingness are all God’s people need reflects the same naivety first
brought to light regarding Catholics almost forty years ago.
By contrast, pioneer
voices like mine, calling for change in evangelical churches, were so ignored
that even a mention of the problem seldom made SBC state papers until 2002.
From national leaders to individuals, most Baptists snoozed right on until a team of Texas journalists took on the SBC in 2019 in a big way!
Twenty-five years ago,
not even female leaders in the SBC had ears to hear what I’ve tried to tell
them as far back as 1995.
As Pastor Rose sees
things, Chad Michael Hutchins had done his time in federal prison by the time
he showed up to join your fellowship about five years ago. Having served 70% of
his ten-year sentence, imposed in federal court for child pornography charges,
his past was his past.
Not exactly. All you
need to do is talk to U. S. Attorney Richard B. Roper, as I did a few weeks
ago. Or to Chad’s federal probation officer, whom I finally tracked down, after
an extensive bureaucratic search, at the suggestion of Roper.
Hutchins is currently
serving a 15-year term of supervised release until at least 2030. This means he
dare not take on a role in the church, where families with children frequently
are present, without talking to his probation officer. He is also required to
register as a sex offender for the rest of his life, even if his record remains
stellar as everyone is hoping.
To be in any place in
the church, teaching, preaching, or even being on the worship team IS a place
of leadership, even if some folks like your pastor do not see it that way. Not
the top leader—no, but most certainly to a young person Chad Hutchins was in a
role that indicated he was a solid man of character and a trustworthy
individual. Why would anyone suspect him to be a registered sex offender?
Talking to the local
sheriff’s office, in addition to the probation officer, should have been the
first thing concerned individuals did along with notifying the Executive
Director of Dallas Baptist Association and also reaching out to those
considered to be the gold standard among experts such as GRACE:
Godly Response to Abuse in the Christian Environment. These are, in fact,
the very first steps I took as soon as a concerned individual who had never
personally met Chad reached out to me.
Chad was often viewed
as the associate pastor by 2019, and treated as such, according to Caera
Thornton, your young worship leader. Of all the people who needed to know,
Thornton should have known before anyone: as worship leader, she was the
supervisor for Hutchins and the entire team!
If Pastor Rose had
done the same when he was alerted last year to the concerns by another pastor,
I would not have been writing this letter. Nor would anyone associated with
Adat have been named by the press.
I was not the first
person to be contacted during the year of patiently waiting and hoping as the
pastor who notified Pastor Rose did, along with the informant's concerned friend who went on to send a confidential report to The Southern
Baptists of Texas Convention (SBTC), with which Adat is affiliated. To this day, there has been no response from the SBTC!
It seems the River of Apathy runs deep and wide.
Not on my watch! That’s what I said as soon as I got the same info as SBTC. Knowing far too much to stay silent, I wasn’t sitting another year, no more than I would have if I’d found this problem in my own church!
Calling Dallas Baptist Association
After a lengthy, congenial conversation with your new Executive Director of the Dallas Baptist Association to discuss our shared concerns about the matter at hand, as well as the more widespread, related issues at the SBC level, I left matters in the executive’s hands as I
waited to see what interventions he and the associational leaders might undertake.
Jespersen had not heard a word about Adat Shalom’s situation. Not surprising. I’ve found men in his position are often among the last to hear—that’s just how well the secrecy seems to work in this Convention, as if it’s a grave sin to talk about “family matters.” Not so when it comes to schools or other public places where adults seem to feel much less guilt or fear about speaking what they know.
He was certainly aware of the growing concerns in the Convention and of the decision messengers had just voted for—to enlist the help of an outside team of investigators to explore the mishandling of cases gaining media attention due to mounting pressure from a multitude of courageous survivors now coming forward to tell their stories.
As I told Jespersen, I do not hold high expectations of any SBC congregation at this point, but I do have high hopes. I understand the limitations of his power compared to bishops in other denominations; but I do know the value in warning people in a spirit of love.
He agreed. Being new, he would make a few calls to determine the best way to proceed in reversing the problem before it got worse.
While I understood full well the precarious position this new executive was in, I left the door open, hoping that he would not meet with opposition to seeing that the issues at Adat Shalom were confronted, and knowing that I would be back to him in a few weeks if I’d not heard from him first.
By contrast, upon learning of the problem, another advocate immediately had an entirely different approach, as many of you may have already discovered. In my own way of “seeing through a glass darkly,” the greatest disadvantage to moving quickly to question or confront a person I expect to be threatened is that it usually comes across as sounding extremely shame-based, driving people into deeper shame and defensiveness, as a result.
On the plus side, it saved me from having to rush through some of the key steps I considered necessary in this case, before being comfortable bringing my findings fully to light.
Seeking the Truth Victorious
A quarter of a century
ago, I tucked away a couple of gems closely related to speaking the truth in
the spirit of Divine Love.
Dr. Marie Fortune of Faith Trust
Institute in Seattle, Washington, a well-known sister
advocate to whom I’ve often turned for guidance, in speaking of her personal
challenges in such prophetic work, has often cautioned: “It’s never simple. And it’s never easy.”
“The
most dangerous of all moral dilemmas: when we are obliged to conceal truth in
order to help the truth to be victorious.” Swedish statesman Doug Hammarskjöld
declared.
Some situations call for swift, drastic action. At others like yours, in the absence of a direct victim in the congregation and with very low risk of there being one (see "Coming Together" below), a little slower tempo laced with diplomacy may be best.
Generally, men do not put much weight in what women have to say in this denomination, especially if the matter is an extremely controversial one. So, finding male voices of advocacy like Jespersen's is always my preference. Yet, only in recent years have such voices been found in this Convention.
Calling in The Civil Servants
Pastor Rose, like many other Baptist pastors, apparently hasn't gotten word that the first action upon being notified of the presence of a sex offender in the congregation should always be to contact civil authorities.
Never mind, I told myself. It's never too late to see what can be accomplished.
Former U. S. Dept. of Justice Attorney Richard B. Roper, listed at the top of the 2008 press release announcing Chad's conviction for child pornography, answered his own phone promptly on my first attempt. Just as quickly, he raised questions as to what information Chad may not have volunteered to his probation officer when he became involved in the congregation in the beginning.
“If
the federal probation officer doesn’t know he’s taken on these roles, he is
likely to be in big trouble,” Roper said.
I soon ran into another hurdle in navigating the layers of bureaucracy to locate Hutchins’s federal supervisor. This took many hours of phone calling, waiting for return calls, discovering I’d called the wrong department or selected the wrong phone option, and starting over. Not having the offender’s inmate number was the greatest barrier.
My
concern extended beyond Adat Shalom, I'd told Roper and again said the same to the assigned when we finally got connected weeks later. If, for any reason, Chad left this
church, he could easily find his way into another SBC congregation incognito, creating a stir at the new church, as well. In the process, the officer had a lot of
questions about recommendations of experts in the community of faith who advise
churches on protecting the flock from potential wolves in sheep’s clothing.
No Help Needed
If only the informant
had done so, everything should have been fine, Rose claimed in speaking with
Caera Thornton this summer when she challenged him on what she’d learned.
Who was that man in
the “ethics department,” I wonder? Considering there is nobody in the
Convention with official authorization to say this. Nor an official ethics
department. If so, I definitely would have contacted them long ago!
There are plenty of
Monday Morning Baptist Quarterbacks sitting in armchairs all over the country,
however, who often speak out of turn with half-baked “wisdom.”
Sadly,
despite what many have been led to believe, there are few, if any,
highly-trained experts within the SBC who are ready to skillfully take on the
complexities of abuse prevention, early intervention, and long-term care that
is required along with ethics to do this work—at least none that I’ve found
yet. There are a growing number who have become much better informed. At this
point, the denomination is only scratching the surface, at best.
The Duty to Inform
“The
church must be fully informed regarding the sex offender’s criminal background,”
declares Simms & Showers, on the best site I've found that speaks in detail about sex offenders and
the church.
This
is the first cardinal rule. Also, the one most often skirted. Who among us
hasn’t heard Romans 3:23 used to teach that “sin is sin,” going on to lecture
us on why we are not qualified to “gossip” about others? Certainly, it’s not
acceptable to bring up past sins, as Chad’s crimes and the secrecy that had been going on a long time.
Secrecy
was certainly not something of “the past” this summer, though. Nor will it be until
a full confession is made to the entire congregation. Once that process occurs, it will be time to go
forward.
A Different Kind of Victimization
For
weeks, Caera suffered in solitude. Her agony peaked as she turned in her
resignation, leaving her church home and spiritual family, effective
immediately. To her, there was no other option after the selected leaders of
which she was a part voted 10 to 5 in support of the pastor’s choices. It was
an act of courage that she’d wrestled with long and hard after prayer and
seeking wise counsel, she tells me.
I
believe her, for I’ve heard the same story many times from other staff members
in the same situation or professional ministers, too discouraged to go on
standing alone among colleagues who circled the wagons of others who had
abandoned their calling to sexually act out, at the expense of members of their own flock! I’ve
lived this painful situation, alongside my husband, as we both lost our careers
in order to keep our integrity many years ago.
Caera
Thornton has been openly blamed, rather than appreciated, for her stand that she was
unable to fully express to the entire congregation.
For
weeks, Caera, at only 33, was facing the same decisions, with the same set of
dynamics my husband and I had faced as career SBC missionaries, back in our
early 40’s. Should she stay, join the secrecy, and hope to find ways to work
for change? Or leave to avoid sacrificing her own integrity? She agonized for
weeks, same as we did under somewhat similar circumstances.
Caera
Thornton did not act as a reactionary trouble-maker, as Pastor Robin Rose
suggested in an email to his flock.
Neither
was she the problem. I am the “problem” if anyone is. The same as I’ve been in
many cases where I raise questions when church leaders decide to protect a sex
offender from exposure at the expense of vulnerable families who have a right
to know.
Caera’s actions in August were precipitated because multiple people, myself included, got involved over this past year—each of us as past or present professionals in ministry, who have long been concerned, each in our own way playing a part to try awakening faith leaders where some form of abuse has been committed by congregational leaders or ordained members of the clergy.
You would think that caution given by leaders of the Dallas Baptist Association, of all people, would have been heeded. It was not. Even when they went back a second time before Caera's story went public. See https://watchkeep.org/2021/08/worship-leader-resigns-from-dallas-sbc-church-over-mishandling-of-sex-offender-in-leadership-role/
As some of you know by now, this
young worship leader, who had been asked to supervise a registered sex offender
without her knowledge, had unknowingly been put in a difficult position years
ago. To continue, doing so in an atmosphere that lacks transparency would have
been a sacrifice of her own integrity. Her hurt was too deep to fully express
at the time of her resignation.
What
a sign of strength she showed! To do less was inconceivable.
Secrecy vs. Confidentiality
The
most misunderstood word I hear in this work is “confidentiality,”
used to justify inappropriate secret-keeping. While there is an important place
for confidentiality, it should never be used to avoid a full accountability of
an offender—whether it is a sexual offender or one who has abused power by
keeping secret a matter that can jeopardize the unity and well-being of those
with much less opportunity to see through the smokescreens.
Confidentiality
is never for the protection of offenders. It is always essential for the
protection of those most vulnerable to betrayal until they have the strength
and information to make their own decisions and are able to move freely in
doing so.
In
the faith community, the opposite of truth is spiritual sickness. It causes us
to deceive ourselves and one another, robbing us of freedom and good will.
Sadly,
as the world is fast learning, Southern Baptist churches and agencies seem to
be one of the safest places for incompetent or unqualified people to hide in
plain sight. The resistance to changing hearts and attitudes has been great at
every level of the SBC—from small, country churches to The Executive Committee
of the SBC, even after the problems in the U. S., as well as on the foreign
mission fields, came to light after Texas journalists made it happen in 2019.
When Secrecy Loses Out
Evidence
of resistance to transparency made national news earlier this week when the Convention’s
EC elected to ignore for the second time the will of the messengers handed to
them at this year’s annual meeting. Deciding instead to keep their
conversations secret about cases of sexual abuse that have come to their
attention rather than have them exposed to the scrutiny of investigators who
are being authorized to dig deeply into matters like the one I am bringing to
your attention with this letter. Yet, by taking such a stand, they were not
only ignoring what survivors have been asking for in recent years, they were
setting a precedence in also ignoring the will of messengers.
That
did not fly, though, as you know if you’ve read as a result!
After
two unacceptable votes, the people stood up and voted with their pocketbooks
along with their strong words calling for an about-face!
If
there is nothing to hide, why is there a need for powerful people to insist on
keeping their own secrets from investigation by waiving attorney-client
privilege, people in 1000 churches and Presidents of all six seminaries
rightfully asked.
Transparency,
which is for the protection of everyone in a self-governing system, where women
and children’s rights and needs should be as important as men’s rights, is a
sign of health.
I have long believed
that, if hearts are in the right place and minds are well-trained, the polity
of a denomination need not really be a great concern. Polity in the SBC has
just become an excuse for passing the buck. The buck should be stopping with every
leader and every congregant who cares to get involved if the issue is one of
integrity. Nobody can afford to say: “That’s somebody else’s problem.”
Secrets dis-empower people, whether they are messengers of the SBC or members of a small congregation.
While
your pastor Robin Rose told you what he believes you need to know, some of you
likely have questions you’ve been afraid to ask. You were left to figure things
out through a very opaque lens. With this letter, I hope your eyes have been
further opened.
A Sign of Spiritual Maturity
It
is unclear if Chad knew of a single one of the attempts to intervene with
Pastor Rose, from the notification in 2020, the phone call to your pastor, made and recorded by another
activist which many of you have now found on line, the TWO visits from DBA
leaders pleading with him to see that Chad be removed from each position he held
at Adat, and the times Caera Thornton urged Robin to do so before he finally
brought the matter for a vote by those considered “in leadership.”
Since
the usual recommendations for ex-cons who were convicted of child pornography
is that they limit their time on the internet in the same way alcoholics are
encouraged to stay out of bars, it is unlikely that Chad would have seen
references to the story in The Washington Post or anywhere else online.
Assuming
that Chad knew nothing of the intense conflict until after Caera turned in her
resignation, effective immediately, following the leadership voting 10 to 5 for
everything to continue as usual, one wonders what he would have done if he’d
been made fully aware of the issues earlier.
He
may have found out first from his probation officer, who I’m certain talked to
him soon after I finally reached her in August. For it was not long after that
Caera Thornton tells me Chad finally realized why she’d left. And when he did,
he immediately resigned from the worship team, saying he did not want to be the
cause of any conflict. Thereby, he seems to have acted with more maturity than
most of the key players in this story.
It’s
impossible to know all that Chad was thinking since 2016 when he showed up in
the sanctuary and soon found himself taking on more and more responsibility.
Did he not realize that it was inappropriate to be a registered sex offender
without anyone in the congregation knowing? Did he believe it wasn’t important
to report his church involvement to his probation officer? Or did someone
neglect to tell him so?
Coming Together
Compared to
most sex offenders, those arrested for child pornography are the least likely
of all sex offenders to directly abuse another person, according to the
expertise that is given on
Consuming child pornography alone is not a risk factor for
committing hands-on sex offenses – at least not for those subjects who had
never committed a hands-on sex offense. …..For those offenders, the prognosis
for hands-on sex offenses with children, as well as for recidivism with child
pornography, is favorable. https://bmcpsychiatry.biomedcentral.com/articles/10.1186/1471-244X-9-43
2011 Washington
University Law Review "Disentangling Child Pornography" negates the commonly-held belief that
the majority of those who possess child pornography have engaged or will engage
in direct offenses with children. The creation of child pornography always
involves the sexual abuse of a child, which is a far more serious crime than
possession. Considering these to be equal offenses is the equivalent of saying
that those who fail a drug test should have the same sentence as those hauling
a car full of drugs across state lines.
In fact, increased
arrests and lengthier prison terms may mislead the public into believing that
prosecutors are succeeding in decreasing child abuse much more than they
actually are.
Though they all lose
their rights to privacy by having their names published and readily available
on the internet. There are many questions raised about the rights of offenders
who wish to be assimilated in church. So far, though some of the larger
churches have programs where teams of trained individuals work together to
closely monitor the activities of offenders at all times on church property,
one of the greatest of legitimate concerns is the trust factor.
Questions like: Since
1 in 4 women and 1 in 8 men have a history of being sexually abused before
their 18th birthday, with a multitude of them still suffering
from easily-triggered post-traumatic stress disorder, is it fair to expect them
to be comfortable occupying the same pew as a registered sex offender?
How do we keep people of all ages safe without letting the congregation
know that sex offenders are attending?
Truth is: we can’t. We
must insist on full accountability for all. This is why more than 1000 SBC
pastors chose last week to weigh in on these same secrecy issues, bringing
money in as a strong, motivating factor.
As
Pastor Rose saw it, Chad Hutchins never abused anyone. This old myth, still
quite common for folks past sixty, couldn’t be further from the truth. To view
pornography that is made without a subject’s consent, even when the subject is
an adult, is an act of voyeurism.
To have
600 images of children being coerced into sexual acts means Chad Hutchins was
obsessed with this illegal industry that is fed from the work of direct child
molesters. Victims often report being haunted for the rest of their lives—not
only from the direct abuse, but knowing that the images continue to circulate without
their consent. Because of this, Hutchins was convicted and
will be required, like anyone in Texas caught in it, to register as a sex
offender for the rest of his life, even if he never commits another crime.
Nobody is trying to destroy Chad Hutchins, as
Pastor Rose has suggested. Nor does anyone wish to harm his recovery or the
ministries at Adat Shalom. In regard to their relationships with the
congregation, however, the secrecy on the part of both Hutchins and Rose, each
in his own way, that is raising serious and legitimate concerns for many, even
if your pastor manages to satisfactorily explain to every member that the
intentions were good.
The Liberating Truth
What will victory look like at Adat Shalom? Only you, as a congregation can decide. Pastor Robin Rose and his closest confidantes seem to have had little desire to help the truth be victorious--not anymore than when he'd received the unwelcome message a year earlier. By
repeatedly refusing to listen to wise counsel, the pastor:
1.
tried to preserve the status quo
2.
made a disreputable “name for himself” and pushed the blame onto
others
3.
greatly harmed Caera Thornton, making her the scapegoat, when she took a
moral stand, clearly on the side of Christian ethics and integrity
4. has continued to withhold vital information from his flock, failing to confess publicly what the congregation has a right to know going forward
5. apparently did not consider that there may be victims in the church who have serious, understandable trust issues for themselves and their families and may choose to quietly leave a congregation if they feel threatened or uncomfortable due to the assimilation of an offender in a worship service.
6. failed to seek the counsel of true experts in the field and failed to do a risk assessment with the probation officer when notified of Chad's status
Unfinished Business
In the Baptist system,
the responsibility of holding leaders responsible has historically belonged to
the entire congregation. Nothing has changed that, messengers declared in June, with their vote to hold sex offenders fully accountable in SBC churches.
However, if the
congregation is kept in the dark, it is impossible for individual congregants
to do this job without deferring to those who are in the loop. In the case at
Adat Shalom, there were less than a handful who were aware until the problem of
secrecy in regard to Chad’s disqualifying circumstances began to surface.
I strongly suspect the
BGCT took the strong stand on sex offenders in the church after learning
specifically about the lack of integrity at Adat Shalom.
Jesus calls us to
shine light into the darkness. It is in the light that the Kingdom of God
operates best.
Collusion, sometimes
referred to as complicity, comes from what I have been referring to for over
twenty-five years as DIM thinking. It consists of DENIAL, IGNORANCE (or the
refusal to become educated), and MINIMIZATION. See takecourage.org for much
more.
While Caera Thornton
is trying to come to grips with much unresolved grief, especially with the
way she has been portrayed by people she felt she could trust. She paid a heavy
price and deserves gratitude from each of you and a sincere apology from those
who refused to listen.
Since Hutchins removed
himself from the stage, where he was in leadership, inherit
with being on the stage time and time again, there’s
nothing more the laity at Adat Shalom need to do. Is that what you think?
Wrong! Not only does
the entire congregation need to be fully informed. It also needs to sort out
its written policies regarding background checks and much more.
In so doing, you need
to take several healthy steps:
1. openly confront the issue of secrecy, condoned
by Chad from the beginning of his arrival and for five years thereafter;
2. let your pastor know that his decision plus
that of the two leaders who elected to keep the same secret for over a year,
until it was brought to the attention of the public, was ethically unacceptable
and calls for apologies;
3. decide what your policies will be about
allowing known sex offenders to attend your church at all now
4. provided the membership votes to continue
allowing Chad and/or other offenders to continue sitting with you in the
sanctuary, despite this not being recommended for churches that are already having
a tough time getting volunteers, decide how these new volunteer monitors,
unrelated to the offender, will be recruited for training by GRACE or an individual they recommend
specific to the
volunteers’ training
5. decide how new members will be fully informed
whenever it comes to the attention of any individual, your pastor included,
that there is a sex offender attending.
Picture This
Eventually, a new
ministry outside the walls of any church may serve to provide a place where men like Chad
could help with leading worship, working hand-in-hand with chaplains—perhaps older
pastors, newly-retired, might consider being trained through a combination of a short-term study, known as CPE (Clinical Pastoral Education) and by prison chaplains to
take on such a role with the growing number of sex offenders being released and
needing a supervised meeting place.
Perhaps the BGCT may
consider leading the way to prepare a welcoming place for these outcasts to
find the love of Jesus without pastors and church leaders being put in the
precarious position that has so often put vulnerable persons, especially the
young ones, at risk.
The Deficit of Services
Pastor Rose was certainly right when he declared that God can change every one of us. Because his area of expertise does not extend to knowing the complex issues of sex offenders, I doubt he realizes that it takes many years for an individual to identify and process the deep-seated issues, even with professional mental health teams. Certainly spiritual growth is essential, whether it takes place within a congregation or through support groups. The question remains as to where this can best occur safely for the protection of all concerned.
Understanding the Resistance
What can be done now?
I believe there can be amazing outcomes from this. Not only awareness, but a
creative new ministry.
I love what the late
John Lewis called “good trouble,” and I am seldom hesitant to “get in the way”
as Lewis encouraged people seeking justice to do. So, if anyone deserves to be
taken on by your pastor, it should be this old seventy-five-year-old woman!
Yet, it may come as a
surprise that I fully agree with him on one point. While I insist that no
registered sex offender should ever be placed in a place of trust, it is safer
to have a person previously convicted of child pornography to attend services
than any other category of sex offender. This still does not qualify him
as exceptional.
Honestly, I cannot
imagine why the Baptist General Convention of Texas (BGCT) allowed for even a “rare exception” in the permanent disqualification of any registered sex offender
from church leadership. My fear is giving wiggle room will complicate matters
immensely. As the old adage goes: “Give ‘em an inch and they’ll take a mile.”
As for keeping vulnerable individuals safe, however, we should always "err" on the side of caution. Making allowance for their attendance must only be undertaken with strictest stipulations, such as not allowing the offender to even come on church property without a person on a team of carefully-trained individuals who can be designated specifically for one-on-one monitoring after meeting the individual at his car, escorting him back, and keeping him in close eye contact if not within arm’s length at all times in between.
If a congregation has small groups meeting in members' homes, it becomes even more precarious. Obviously, there is much to think about if a church elects to assimilate known sex offenders safely.
Sounds awfully strict, you say? It is indeed and for good reason!
A few years ago, my
husband Ron and I were invited to be a part of a press conference near our
home. It was called after two young girls were molested by a young man who had
already served time in prison for sexual assault. Still, this registered sex offender had been allowed to roam the halls of an SBC congregation. He did not connect with
his victims in the church building, however. He used the trust he'd built in
the church to first connect with them online, entering the comfort of their own
home without their parents’ knowledge.
I immediately thought of this church in Lenexa, Kansas, upon learning of the concerns previously expressed for Adat Shalom.
While I knew that I
wanted to write this story at some point, I felt under the circumstances that I
needed to personally give the association an opportunity to intervene with this
elderly pastor and others in the congregation if the leader chose to go
further. If successful, it would serve as one of the exceptional outcomes that have
come to my knowledge in United Methodist circles a couple of times, and I’d
heard through Todd Unzinker, a young SBC leader, that several good outcomes had
occurred due to early intervention by other associations due to the
consciousness-raising done by the ERCL
This case wouldn’t be
ideal, of course, since the pastor had refused to listen to wise counsel
already a year earlier. There’d be no need to “write the church up,”
however—only the story without giving a clue as to the location or name of this
congregation.
In my opinion, associational leaders are in an ideal place to be trained and to see that training on
a local level is provided to all churches. If so equipped, they can
use their position to speak with a good deal of authority, seeing that bases
are covered, including but not limited to reporting to civil authorities,
speaking with parole or probation officers, and reporting unresolved issues to
state officials, and SBC personnel at both the state and national levels.
My prayer is that you
may find a God-given peace about the personal decisions each of you make, going
forward.
Yours in Christ,
Dee Ann Miller
Comments
Post a Comment