People who think that sexual abuse and its systematic cover-up is something that happens only in Roman Catholic Churches ought to read this devastating series in the Fort Worth Star-Telegram, about how the same thing has been happening in a national network of independent fundamental Baptist churches. Let me stress here at the beginning that this is not about churches affiliated with the Southern Baptist Convention; those Baptist churches are thought to be too liberal by the independent fundamentalists.

Excerpts:

At least three other teen girls would accuse Hyles of sexual misconduct, but he never faced charges or even sat for a police interview related to the accusations. When he got in trouble, Hyles was able to simply move on, from one church assignment to the next.

Hyles’ flight to safety has become a well-worn path for ministers in the independent fundamental Baptist movement.

For decades, women and children have faced rampant sexual abuse while worshiping at independent fundamental Baptist churches around the country. The network of churches and schools has often covered up the crimes and helped relocate the offenders, an eight-month Star-Telegram investigation has found.

More than 200 people — current or former church members, across generations — shared their stories of rape, assault, humiliation and fear in churches where male leadership cannot be questioned.

“It’s a philosophy — it’s flawed,” said Stacey Shiflett, an independent fundamental Baptist pastor in Dundalk, Maryland. “The philosophy is you don’t air your dirty laundry in front of everyone. Pastors think if they keep it on the down-low, it won’t impact anyone. And then the other philosophy is it’s wrong to say anything bad about another preacher.”

Even though it’s hard to get much farther on the theological spectrum from Catholicism than an independent fundamental Baptist church, this is exactly what happened in the Catholic Church. Why? Because it’s in human nature, for one, and for another, because the clergy have an extraordinary amount of power (real and symbolic) within the ecclesiology of both churches. More:

Members instinctively go to the pastor first with problems, including those of a criminal nature.

“Any issues, even legal issues, go to the pastor first, not the police. Especially about another member of the church,” said Josh Elliott, a former member of Vineyard’s Oklahoma City church. “The person should go to the pastor, and the pastor will talk to the offender. You don’t report to police because the pastor is the ultimate authority, not the government.”

Stuart Hardy was a youth and music pastor at an independent fundamental Baptist church in Michigan. He witnessed the same authoritarian approach.

“You can’t question your leaders,” Hardy said. “And when you can’t question your leaders, we’ve seen it in politics, you know what happens. It’s not a good thing.”

A case in which an adult woman publicly accused a prominent pastor of having manipulated her at age 16 into giving him oral sex and having an adulterous relationship:

When Giovanelli resigned from Golden State Baptist College after the abuse allegation went viral, the chancellor of the college and the pastor of its affiliated church asked the congregation to pray for the church, the college, and the Giovanelli family.

The pastor, Jack Trieber, dressed in a yellow tie and matching pocket square, reached into his pocket to put on his glasses before reading a statement that “allegations of inappropriate conduct” had been made against Giovanelli.

Trieber took his glasses off. The video posted on the church website ends. Then, say people who were in attendance, he proceeded to praise Giovanelli.

Trieber did not respond to interview requests. Reached by phone, Giovanelli said he had no comment and hung up. He did not respond to specific questions that were sent to him.

Jackson filed a police report. The investigation is ongoing. Still, Giovanelli found a soft landing at Immanuel Baptist Church in Jacksonville, Florida, where he is an associate pastor and head of the church’s book publication arm. He is supported by the pastor, Greg Neal, and his Twitter feed shows him traveling around the country, welcomed at churches.

He might not be guilty of the allegation, but notice how the church network is still allowing a man publicly accused of sexual abuse to minister.

Pastor Stacey Shiflett finally had enough:

For Shiflett, the issue was personal. He’d twice been a victim of attempted sexual misconduct in the church world. Both times, people knew about his would-be abusers’ behavior and did nothing to stop it. One alleged abuser went on to serve as an administrator in a Christian school in a different state, even after Shiflett warned the school’s pastor.

“It’s been the M.O. in fundamentalism for pastors and churches and ministries to just gloss over and sweep under the rug things of absolute epic proportion,” he said in the video. “The reason why I’m so fervent, so passionate about it this morning is because I relived all of those feelings of what it’s like to be abused — and the one that does the abuse is the one that always comes out the other side smelling like a rose and goes down the road to another church so he can do it again to somebody else.”

When he spoke out, other pastors condemned him.

The Star-Telegram series is long, but I encourage you to read the whole thing. 

This past summer, amid new stories of Catholic sex abuse, the Evangelical magazine World cautioned its readers not to make the mistake of thinking that it cannot and does not happen in Protestant churches. Excerpt:

Stories like that display a Roman Catholic problem, right? Look at centralized Catholicism’s opportunity to shuffle priests from one parish to another, few questions asked. Look at the Catholic ban on priestly marriage, and the pressures that creates. Look at homosexuality within the priesthood.

But evangelicals should recognize that clerical sex abuse is widespread, and some evangelical and fundamentalist churches do cover up problems and pass them on to others. Although the decentralized nature of Protestantism makes statistics very hard to find, we’ve particularly found opportunities for abuse and cover-ups in three kinds of situations.

(1) Some congregations have dominating pastors with unchecked authority.

(2) Evangelical culture has a conference and lecture circuit with celebrities and quasi-celebrities who come to cities for weekend workshops and one-night lectures that provide opportunities to sin and go, leaving behind casualties.

(3) Megachurch leaders face the ordinary temptations but also extraordinary pressure to cover up problems, knowing that a sniff of scandal will summon packs of critical reporters.

I would add that all church communities are at risk of condemning the victims for the sake of maintaining the community, and the illusion that all is well. In New York, a couple of Greek Orthodox nuns are protesting the reinstatement of a priest to a parish there after he admitted to unspecified “inappropriate” conduct with women, and a diocesan spiritual court recommended that he not be returned to that parish. More:

Nevertheless, [Bishop] Andonios [Chancellor of the Greek Orthodox Archdiocese] said he decided to reinstate [Father Gerasimos] Makris because parishioners demanded it.

“We were informed that the parishioners felt so strongly that they would protest in front of the Archdiocese for the return of their priest,” he said.

“I would not have returned a clergyman to his former parish after what transpired but out of pastoral sensitivity to the desires of the overwhelming numbers of parishioners who sought his return,” he said.

It could be the case that Bishop Andonios is lying here. But I find it believable (which is not to say that I believe it, if you appreciate the distinction). If you spend any time covering sexual abuse story, any belief that congregations are never complicit in abuse and cover-up goes evaporates quickly. People do not like to be made to confront ugly things. To know is to be responsible. Most of us have seen situations in the workplace, or in our families, in which whistleblowers were despised and cast out for telling the truth about a situation that threatened people within the group.

I’m thinking right now of a case from the early 1990s in which a small-town Louisiana pharmacist who noticed that she was handling an extraordinary number of prescriptions for a rare cancer drug, and spoke out. Her community turned on her, even though she was defending their health; most of the people in the community worked at local chemical plants, and they feared that the pharmacist’s allegations would cost them their jobs. They preferred to remain ignorant of evidence suggesting that something in the air around the plant was giving them cancer. The pharmacist’s priest even told her and her husband to leave the parish, because their presence was causing too much discomfort there.

Human nature is a destructive force. We may read these stories of sexual abuse in churches, and tell ourselves that if something like that happened in our church, we would stand up for what is right. Maybe so. Maybe you would. But if you think most of the people in your church would do that, or stand by those who did, your optimism is unwarranted.

One of the hardest life lessons I ever had to learn is that in the main, people prefer to be deceived. They would rather believe a lie that upholds their comfortable lives than face a truth that challenges it. I guarantee you that most independent fundamentalist Baptists in this country are furious at the Star-Telegram today. I’m not. I thank God for that newspaper and what it has done for His children.