Just over five years ago, a hearth broke out in certainly one of the world’s most famous houses of worship, the cathedral of Notre-Dame de Paris. In the times following, officials confirmed that one reason the hearth grew uncontrolled was that the safety team, after hearing the alarm, miscommunicated and responded on the mistaken location. The fire was in an attic, however the team went to the sacristy, positioned in a wholly different constructing. Portions of the cathedral soon burned to the bottom.
It was also just over five years ago that alarms sounded within the Southern Baptist Convention (SBC) when reports emerged detailing a whole lot of cases of sexual abuse in our churches and organizations over a span of a long time. Since then, the eyes of the nation have been on America’s largest Protestant denomination as we’ve grappled with learn how to reply to these revelations and forestall future sexual abuse. This includes an ongoing investigation by the US Department of Justice, which recently filed its first indictment.
As an SBC pastor for greater than 20 years, it saddens me to report that, fairly than fighting our fire with every available resource, efforts to extinguish sexual abuse within the SBC have been hindered by distractions and delays. As messengers gather in Indianapolis for the SBC annual meeting this week, it stays unclear whether addressing our abuse crisis remains to be a priority for the SBC. This concern is magnified by the most recent update from our abuse implementation task force: After two years of painstaking work by faithful volunteers, their tasks weren’t accomplished resulting from several “obstacles and challenges.”
Five years ago, recall, our initial response to the abuse revelations was a unified call to motion. We won’t stop until we get this right, convention and church leaders said. Momentum began to construct toward fighting the hearth through certainly one of the SBC’s biggest strengths: cooperation. New relationships and efforts were forged, and a community of abuse survivors and advocates emerged, who were welcomed and given platforms from which to share their stories within the SBC.
As work was starting in 2020, survivor Susan Codone told CT, “It takes years to alter a culture, often at the least ten years, and the measure of success shall be a major reduction within the cases of sexual abuse in churches together with a much higher variety of churches actively enacting policies and caring for the abused.”
Sadly, five years into the method, the hopeful spirit of cooperation with which we began has all but dissipated. Key SBC leaders have disagreed about what steps needs to be taken and who should direct them. A perceived divide exists between preserving institutions and protecting the vulnerable, partly due to fears of litigation and infighting concerning the transparency of investigations. Millions of dollars pledged by the 2 largest SBC entities for the aim of abuse response and survivor support have yet to be distributed. Some leaders now treat the more vocal abuse survivors like villains fairly than victims—sometimes even working against them—leading to a seemingly irreparable lack of trust. All the while, the hearth continues to burn.
This isn’t to say that no work has been done to deal with abuse within the last five years of SBC life. On the contrary, our convention has made significant efforts to discover potential vulnerabilities and to coach and equip churches to forestall abuse. Multiple task forces and work groups were appointed to deal with abuse at each the national and state levels, and collaborative efforts from these groups have produced materials to assist churches develop the fitting policies and procedures for abuse prevention and response.
I’ve participated personally in these efforts and have seen a lot of our leaders and members commit much of their time and resources to fighting the hearth. I’m especially pleased with the work we’ve done in Oklahoma, which has received an abundance of support from our state convention. I’ve also had the chance to listen to from more abuse survivors than I can count, and I feel the burden of our tremendous responsibility to them.
Nevertheless, the work has been frustrated by several diversions, and abuse prevention and response efforts have been less effective than hoped. According to recently released surveys by Lifeway, the SBC’s own research arm, lower than half of our churches provide training to those that work with children or teenagers on learn how to report sexual abuse. Additionally, lower than 20 percent of churches provide training on caring for abuse survivors. Our work is removed from finished.
As our annual meeting convenes yet again this 12 months, it’s time for us to make a final and actionable commitment to deal with sexual abuse in every certainly one of our greater than 50,000 churches—and I feel there are at the least 3 ways we are able to achieve this. They are the three things to which we committed from the beginning.
First and most significantly, we must always use our unmatched capability for cooperation within the SBC to mobilize each of our international and national entities, seminaries, state conventions, local associations, and the publications of every to coach and equip every church in addressing abuse. We should be sure that one of the best abuse prevention and response curriculum, policies, and procedures are within the hands of pastors and key leaders in every church, in each print and digital formats. We should provide multiple opportunities for state, regional, and native abuse prevention and response training and set high expectations for churches and their participation.
Our SBC structure is built not only to guard the autonomy of local churches but in addition to carry them accountable to our agreed-upon standards for doctrine, practice, and cooperation. We’ve been successful in similar efforts related to other pro-life, pro-family, and pro-human dignity issues. Why would we not apply the identical fervency to guard our youngsters from abuse?
Second, our churches need comprehensive access to the long-awaited Ministry Check database of each convicted and credibly accused abusers as a forum to go looking for known abuse concerns related to any potential applicants for employed or volunteer positions in SBC churches or organizations. (It stays to be seen whether a recently formed independent organization to manage this database will receive official SBC support.) Though some facets of the database have been contested, specifically those related to the category known as “credibly accused,” it’s gone time that we have now this convenient instrument to guard our youngsters and churches from repeat abusers.
Finally, our churches and leaders should reengage with the SBC abuse survivor community and permit their voices to be heard in every decision-making process. Their words may not at all times be as gentle or polished as some might prefer, but why should they be? They’ve been burned in the hearth, and the injustice and trauma of their abuse has yet to be properly addressed. Their input, together with input from those with skilled expertise in areas related to sexual abuse, shall be most dear in choosing the fitting tools for our work.
While the Notre-Dame fire was tragic from a symbolic standpoint, the physical damage itself was ultimately limited. The fire burning within the SBC is of a much more destructive nature due to unspeakable harm done to precious lives. If we proceed to delay our response, we’re communicating a willingness to simply accept the hearth’s damage.
Scripture calls leaders within the church to be “shepherds” of and “examples” for “God’s flock that’s under your care” (1 Pet. 5:2–3), which implies the responsibility to deal with the SBC sexual abuse crisis lies not with the US Department of Justice, the media, or most people. It lies with all of us who lead within the SBC.
As our messengers gather, a full half-decade after we committed to take substantive motion to finish sexual abuse in our churches, we must get this right. If we allow yet one more 12 months to pass without starting to extinguish this fireplace, we must always not be surprised when it consumes us.
Eric Costanzo is lead pastor of South Tulsa Baptist Church in Tulsa and coauthor of Inalienable: How Marginalized Kingdom Voices Can Help Save the American Church.
