(Southern) Baptists Asked to Crack Down on Abusers

[wakeme2008]

http://www.nytimes.com/aponline/us/AP-Southern-Baptists-Sex-Abuse.html?_r=1&oref=slogin

February 21, 2007
Baptists Asked to Crack Down on Abusers
By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS

Filed at 4:28 p.m. ET

NASHVILLE, Tenn. (AP) -- The victims' advocates who dogged the Roman Catholic Church over sex abuse by its clergy have now turned their attention to the Southern Baptists, accusing America's largest Protestant denomination of also failing to root out molesters.

The Chicago-based Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests has started a campaign to call attention to alleged sex abuse committed by Southern Baptist ministers and concealed by churches
..cut..

''They don't want to see this problem,'' said Christa Brown, a SNAP member from Austin, Texas, who says she was sexually abused as a child by a Southern Baptist minister. ''That's tragic because they're imitating the same mistakes made by Catholic bishops.''

In the past six months SNAP has received reports of about 40 cases of sexual abuse by Southern Baptist ministers -- with some of the incidents dating back many years, Brown said. SNAP leaders hold that abuse is typically underreported because being molested is such a painful experience that victims often wait years before stepping forward.

..more at link...

[Name removed]

1. Deleted sub-thread

Sub-thread removed by moderator. Click here to review the message board rules.

[kdpeters]

2. Proud to grow up in a rural, southern, liberal, feminist Southern Baptist Congregation

We refuse to leave or change. We're pro-women, and now, pro-gay in the middle of rural Georgia -- and we like it that way. We enjoy being radical Southern Baptists and we defiantly defy the label as being reactionary, fundamentalists. We may be the last feminist Southern Baptist congregation in existence, but we defiantly stand up for ourselves until they kick us out -- which hasn't happened yet. Did I mention that my great-grandmother, my grandmother, and my mother are generations of some of the most faithful, active, educated, and uppity feminists in this rural Southern Baptist congregation? :) There's an organized and effective movement of educated women to always see that there are women in leadership positions to ward off any fundamentalists who might consider becoming members. We send them over to the Presbyterians. In our Baptist church, we're all about Jesus' love and how it helps each of us to live a better life. We're not so much the judgemental hellfire and brimstone types.

I haven't yet decided if I'm an "Atheist Christian" or a "Cultural Christian". My values were certainly shaped in the Christian church. I love the cultural holidays and the community of my home. I love singing hymns and the inspirational parts of my cultural heritage -- but I don't believe in the 'truth' of the mythological parts any more than I believe in Aesop's fables -- that nonetheless are instructive stories. I guess that leaves me free to be a 'Cafeteria Christian' because I take only what I find valuable. I enjoy the inspiration and certainly do turn to Christ for guidance as I've found the fables to be extraordinarily inspirational -- I just don't believe in literal truth as much as the metaphorical. Of course, I don't normally tell anyone else how I view my involvement in the church, but then, I consider that my business and between my and my Lord if indeed He does exist at all.

[Nevernose]

3. Well, you SOUND a lot like...

...a Unitarian! :D

I grew up in the rural South, too, and my spiritual path has mirrored yours, apparently, in more ways than one. Fortunately, I now belong to a congregation that not only accepts the fact that I'm a secular humanist who happens to read the Bible (among other things, like Aesop or Freud) for spiritual guidance, but who think that that's perfectly normal behavior!

If you should ever move and need a new spiritual home, check out the Unitarian Universalists. At the very least, they'll make great contacts for social justice work (they were instrumental in the Civil Rights movement, e.g.) and make for interesting conversation.

At any rate, you sound like you've got a great church. If we could all be so lucky! Good luck and God bless...

[kdpeters]

4. I LOVE the UU's, but I'm a sucker for traditions and challenging my own people

I've lived a long time in Atlanta, San Francisco, and LA, but I'm still a native son back home. A big fish in a little pond. I'm moving back in April to help care for my step-father in the last stages of Huntington's. Most important to them is your involvement in your family and community -- and frankly, that's most important to me too. Took me a long time to realize that.

As long as the church I grew up in politely accepts me and my Deaf boyfriend, then that's where I feel at home and that's where I'm most effective in challenging outdated beliefs and stereotypes just by my presence. Most of my rather large extended family has accepted their oldest gay cousin quite easily -- with at least one younger cousin coming out to me before anyone else.

The closest UU congregation would be in Macon, but even so, I don't yet feel unwelcome in the Southern Baptist church that raised me. It might help you to know that we were once affiliated with a local Baptist women's college which would explain all the educated women at our church. Though it's been closed for 20 years, the influence is still quite strong. Growing up gay in a rural Southern Baptist church could have been a LOT worse for me. I never knew people justified homophobia with the Bible until I left for college.

[Az_lefty]

5. It's about time this was identified...

it's very common for pedophiles and such to join very conservative organizations, not because they follow the beliefs but because it gives them cover.

[anotherdrew]

6. sue these bastards and take away their mega churches n/t

[underpants]

7. Will Pastor Ted help with the "crack down"?

Oh that was just too easy