Are Baptists Hopeless, Stop Baptist Predators, December 7, 2009

Are Baptists Hopeless?

Stop Baptist Predators
DECEMBER 7, 2009

http://stopbaptistpredators.blogspot.com/2009/12/are-baptists-hopeless.html

UNITED STATES -- Some have criticized me for giving hope where, realistically, there is none.

Some have told me that I should content myself with ministering to the wounded, but that it's hopeless to try to get anyone in Baptist leadership to actually do anything.

First Baptists Church

"Hopeless."

To me, that's like saying you have a cholera epidemic in Baptistland, and all you can do is put washcloths on foreheads.

I just can't accept that.

For me, it only makes sense that people should at least try to find the contaminated wells.

How can we not at least try to spare others?

It's like a preventable disease. Maybe you can't eradicate it, but you can greatly reduce its incidence.

Because most child molesters have more than one victim, the best way for Baptists to prevent clergy sex abuse in the future is to institutionally listen to those who are trying to tell about abuse in the past.

But that doesn't happen in Baptistland.

And more and more, I find myself wondering if those who say Baptists are "hopeless" are right.

Maybe they are.

Maybe the Southern Baptist Convention is simply too protected by its self-designed radicalized autonomous polity. And as long as state and national organizations think they can hide behind their radicalized autonomy to avoid legal responsibility, they see no reason to concern themselves with moral responsibility. Nor do they see any reason to concern themselves with the safety of kids.

Maybe Baptists will never institute any clergy accountability mechanisms like other major faith groups, and maybe clergy-predators will continue to roam among them with no one in leadership doing diddly-squat.

Maybe clergy accountability won't come to this faith group for another 20 years . . . or maybe it will take 200.

Or maybe this denomination will simply die.

Maybe that's reality. And maybe I just can't accept it.

Some Baptist abuse survivors have told me they feel just as powerless now as when they were kids. They muster all their courage and they try to tell about their perpetrators . . . and nothing happens.

It's too late for criminal prosecution; denominational leaders ignore them; lawyers won't take their cases (because Baptist cases usually have more hurdles than Catholic cases); reporters won't write about their perpetrators (because there's no lawsuit or denominational review to report); and without media exposure, the perpetrators simply stay in their pulpits.

I'm sorry.

I can't make Baptist leaders remove perpetrators from pulpits. I can't make them listen compassionately to those who try to report abuse. I can't make them responsibly assess abuse reports. I can't make them keep records on credibly accused clergy. I can't make them warn people in the pews.

In fact, I can't do much at all.

But here's what I know for sure. Whatever else may or may not happen, I cannot and will not join in the nothing-but-platitudes pretend game that this denomination plays.

I will not pretend that clergy sex abuse is no big deal. I will not minimize it. I will not put a pretty gloss on it.

Clergy sex abuse is ugly and awful. And I will tell the truth about it.

Perhaps I cannot do much. But if nothing else, I will bear witness.

I will bear witness to the horror of what this denomination is allowing to happen to kids.

I will bear witness to the horror in how its leaders treat survivors who speak of it.

I will bear witness to the horror in the do-nothing response of this denomination's leaders.