Sovereign Grace Church Group Sued; Abuse Alleged

By Peter Smith
The Courier-Journal
October 19, 2012

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An international church group now based in Louisville allegedly fostered a climate of fear and unquestioning obedience that allowed sexual abuse to persist among members, according to a new lawsuit.

Three plaintiffs filed suit Wednesday in Montgomery County Circuit Court in Maryland alleging that Sovereign Grace Ministries “created a culture in which sexual predators were protected from accountability and victims were silenced.”

The denomination moved its headquarters to Louisville from Montgomery County earlier this year. Less than a month ago, it launched Sunday services at its new congregation, Sovereign Grace Church of Louisville, led by longtime President C.J. Mahaney.

The plaintiffs, using pseudonyms, allege that church elders mishandled the sexual abuse of children at congregations in Maryland and Virginia between the late 1980s and 1990s.

The suit describes the plaintiffs as a Virginia teenager and a Maryland college student, both sexually assaulted by church members as young girls, and a young Maryland woman whose family was allegedly shunned by her church for refusing to seek leniency for her sister’s assailant.

The lawsuit seeks class-action status for what it claims is a wider pool of victims and a continued culture of cover-up.

“Over time, the families realized that they weren’t the only ones,” said Washington attorney Susan Burke, who is representing the plaintiffs.

“There’s a real concern about reaching existing members so that the children do not remain vulnerable,” Burke said.

The lawsuit alleges that sexual-abuse victims as young as 3 were forced to meet with and “forgive” perpetrators who had displayed repentance.

The suit alleges that church leaders “taught members to fear and distrust all secular authorities, and expressly directed members not to contact law enforcement to report sexual assaults.”

Claims in a lawsuit give only one side of a case.

Sovereign Grace Ministries said in a statement that it had not been served with the lawsuit and could not comment on specifics.

It added: “Child abuse in any context is reprehensible and criminal. Sovereign Grace Ministries takes seriously the Biblical commands to pursue the protection and well being of all people, especially the most vulnerable in its midst, little children.”

The denomination includes more than 90 churches, mainly clustered in Atlantic coast states, with about 28,000 members worldwide.

The lawsuit alleges negligence, intentional infliction of emotional distress, conspiracy to obstruct justice, negligent hiring and supervision, and misrepresentation.

In addition to Sovereign Grace, the lawsuit names eight people, including Mahaney, pastor of the new Louisville congregation, which began meeting Sept. 30 at Christian Academy’s English Station campus.

Some of the defendants were elders at the churches involved and were accused in the lawsuit of taking specific actions to cover up sexual abuse.

Others, such as Mahaney, were named because the incidents occurred under their leadership, Burke said.

The lawsuit did not name the congregations involved as defendants — Covenant Life Church in Gaithersburg, Md., and Sovereign Grace Church of Fairfax, Va. — but Burke said the lawsuit holds the denomination responsible for them.

Pastors at both churches said they could not comment on the specifics of the cases. Covenant Life Church Pastor Joshua Harris added in a statement that the church has “labored very hard over the years to protect the safety and well-being of the children we care for, counsel, and instruct.”

Mahaney co-founded Covenant Life out of small groups formed in the 1970s, and it eventually became the base for the denomination. But the move to Louisville came amid growing strains between leaders of Sovereign Grace and Covenant Life since the summer of 2011.

That came as part of a wider upheaval in the denomination.

Mahaney took a leave of absence of several months in 2011 and early 2012 because of accusations of prideful and abusive leadership.

The denomination’s board ultimately found Mahaney fit for ministry and restored him to office.

Earlier this year, a report by the independent conflict-resolution group Ambassadors of Reconciliation said that while many had benefited from involvement in Sovereign Grace churches, others had been hurt by the movement’s focus on correcting members’ sinfulness.

Estranged members saw an “over-emphasis of the teaching about sin without the balance of God’s grace,” leading some to be overly judgmental or despondent, the report said.

The lawsuit takes such complaints to a new level, alleging that an insular and authoritarian church culture prompted members to obey without question pastors’ instructions “in all matters, including methods of parenting, place of residence and employment.”

The suits do not allege abuse by clergy themselves. Rather, it alleges abuse by lay members and in one case a teenager who baby-sat children during small-group meetings.

But the lawsuit alleges church elders consistently interposed themselves into the process, seeking leniency for perpetrators in the courts and ordering victims’ families not to warn others of a perpetrator in their midst.

The lawsuit recounts one case in which a 3-year-old victim, brought into a room to reconcile with her perpetrator, crawled under a chair in terror.

Until this year, Sovereign Grace had no presence in Kentucky or Indiana.

Its move to Louisville has built on growing ties between Sovereign Grace and Southern Baptist Theological Seminary, with which it shares many theological beliefs despite denominational differences.

Mahaney and seminary President Albert Mohler have regularly shared platforms at conferences associated with the New Calvinism — which emphasizes divine power, sinful humanity’s need for a savior in Jesus, tightly disciplined churches and male authority in churches and homes.

Also named as defendants are Larry Tomczak of Tennessee, a Sovereign Grace Ministries co-founder who split with Mahaney in another controversy in the 1990s; John Loftness, chairman of the Sovereign Grace Ministries board; Gary Ricucci, an elder in the Louisville church and formerly at Covenant Life Church; David Hinders and Louis Gallo, elders at the Fairfax church; and Frank Ecelbarger of Florida and Grant Layman of Maryland, identified in the suit as Sovereign Grace employees.