|
|
How Not
to Respond to Grace
By Rod Dreher
American Conservative
February
12, 2014
http://www.theamericanconservative.com/dreher/grace-abwe-sexual-abuse/?utm_source=rss&utm_medium=rss&utm_campaign=grace-abwe-sexual-abuse
The Christian sexual abuse investigating team GRACE,
which was abruptly fired by Bob Jones University on virtually
the eve of its report on allegations against the fundamentalist
college. This is the second time the team, led by Liberty
University law professor Boz Tchividjian, has been dismissed by
a Christian organization that hired it to investigate the
organization. The first time was a year ago, when the
Association of Baptists for World Evangelism (ABWE) did so. Back
then, GRACE responded
to the school’s startling action. Excerpt:
In addition to responding to the alleged investigative
“flaws”, it is important to recount ABWE’s repeated failures to
comply with the contractual obligations to GRACE. These
contractual breaches included repeated objections to providing
requested documents and the failure to provide such documents in
a timely matter, if at all. ABWE further breached the contract
by failing to provide GRACE with access to critical witnesses
associated with your organization. ABWE’s contractual breaches
needlessly delayed this investigation and impaired our ability
to fully evaluate ABWE’s response to the crimes perpetrated by
Donn Ketcham.
When placed in the context of ABWE’s conduct over the
past 20 months, the termination of GRACE strongly suggests ABWE
is unwilling to have itself investigated unless the
investigation is within your control. We pray that is not the
case.
Click on the link above; it takes you to a PDF file of
the GRACE letter, which responds in great detail to ABWE’s
criticism of GRACE.
To my knowledge, GRACE has not put out a statement like
this in response to BJU’s abrupt termination of its contract. But
the ABWE letter, in all its detail, should go far to answer
concerns that GRACE didn’t know what it was doing, and pursued a
particular agenda incommensurate with its mission.
Anybody with even the slightest familiarity with the
Roman Catholic child abuse story knows this script all too well.
Bob Jones University will not get away with this cowardly move —
thank God! I have no idea if the charges against the Christian
school are valid, but their attempt to quash an independent
investigation is a textbook example of institutional cover-up.
Bob Jones is behaving like it has something to hide. Not only
have they made the truth more likely to come out, when it does —
if, that is, it vindicates the accusers — it will further
discredit the BJU administration, which will, in that case, have
been shown to be moral cowards, or worse.
Boz
Tchividjian writes on his blog:
Why do some churches and Christian organizations seem
to struggle with encouraging members to report the suspected
abuse of a child? At the heart of the struggle is a fear that
is rooted in the need to self-protect. It is a fear of losing
the “good reputation” of a ministry, it is a fear of losing
ministry donors, it is the fear of losing congregation members,
it is a fear of losing a ministry altogether. All such “fears”
are usually masked by a rationale that the reporting of such
abuse may “damage the reputation of Christ”. Do you see the
great tragedy? It is a fear fueled by protecting self. This has
nothing to do with Jesus.
The Gospel tells Christians that our identity is in
Christ alone, and that our reputation and all that we possess
belongs to Him. Another way of putting it is that apart from
Christ’s accomplishment, we have no reputation and we possess
nothing. This Gospel-centered perspective gives us great
freedom to confess, confront and expose sin without fear of
earthly consequences. This Gospel-centered perspective
liberates us to sacrifice personal and institutional reputations
if doing so protects and preserves the lives of His little ones.
Isn’t that what God did for us? He sacrificed His reputation,
His supporters, His ministry, and even His very own life in
order to protect and redeem. This Gospel centered perspective
should drive us to expend ourselves in protecting children,
regardless of the consequences to our church, ministry, or our
very own lives.
The next time someone tells you that reporting
suspected abuse of children may “hurt the reputation of Christ”,
tell them to stop protecting themselves. Tell them that the
reputation of Jesus is reflected in how we love and protect
children. Tell them that the reputation of Jesus is only
damaged when we turn away and leave grievous sin alone in the
darkness of silence.
Yes. Yes, yes, yes. Some of you reading this right now
know about abuse within your church or religious organization.
You know that your leaders are manipulating people into
maintaining silence. They are not protecting the church or the
institution, they are not protecting children and the victims,
and they are certainly not protecting Jesus Christ; they are
protecting themselves. Do not trust them to investigate
on their own! Call the authorities. Do it right now.
This is not going to end well for Bob Jones University,
even if the school is innocent, or mostly innocent, of the
accusations against it. The school’s leadership is behaving as if
it has something to hide. We know what’s likely to be the next
act in this drama. We have been there before.
|