While blissfully living with his
grandparents, a young boy’s existence changes when his parents whisk him away
to a life where he is transformed into a sexually depraved monster. For years, he self medicates with drugs,
alcohol, and pornography to suppress the lurid childhood memories of the
secrets behind closed doors at the rectory.
As a grown man with children, he finally realizes that the degrading
sexual behaviors embedded in his mind as an impressionable child were the cause
of the uncontrollable urges that plagued his life. When he finally encounters a therapist whose
patience and understanding enlightens his psyche, the reconstruction of his
twisted life begins.
The story will help those with addictions of all kinds, not just those abused by religious authority figures. We hope to have our manuscript released as soon as possible to share this amazing story.
Stay tuned one and all.
Helen
| Time ranks SBC rejection of sex-offender database as 'under-reported' story |
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| By Bob Allen | |
| Wednesday, 17 December 2008 | |
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NEW YORK (ABP) -- Time Magazine ranked the Southern Baptist Convention's refusal to establish a database of clergy sex offenders one of the most under-reported news stories in 2008. A ranking of under-reported stories in Time's "Top 10 Everything of 2008" special feature placed
the story at No. 6, behind a mix-up that accidentally sent U.S.
nuclear-warhead fuses to Taiwan, the Congolese civil war, violence in
Sri Lanka, and new guidelines for insurance coverage for mental health
and regulation of food from animals that are genetically altered. "Facing calls to curb child sex abuse within its churches, in June the Southern Baptist Convention -- the largest U.S. religious body after the Catholic Church -- urged local hiring committees to conduct federal background checks but rejected a proposal to create a central database of staff and clergy who have been either convicted of or indicted on charges of molesting minors," the magazine noted. "The SBC decided against such a database in part because its principle of local autonomy means it cannot compel individual churches to report any information. And while the headlines regarding churches and pedophilia remain largely focused on Catholic parishes, the lack of hierarchical structure and systematized record-keeping in most Protestant churches makes it harder not only for church leaders to impose standards, but for interested parties to track allegations of abuse." Christa Brown, Baptist outreach leader for the Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests, agreed the story was under-reported. "It's such an extremely important story," she said. "The largest Protestant denomination in the land -- a denomination that claims 16.2 million members -- refused to even attempt to implement the sorts of proactive measures for routing out predators that other major faith groups have." Brown, a survivor of clergy sex abuse, worked two years to draw attention to the problem of unreported sexual abuse in Southern Baptist churches before seeing denominational leaders recommend against her suggestion of a national database. Last month Brown and SNAP National Director David Clohessy wrote SBC President Johnny Hunt asking for a meeting about establishing a system to report abusive clergy. "As president of the Southern Baptist Convention, you now have the opportunity to show genuine leadership on the issue of clergy sex abuse and cover-ups," the letter said. "This may be one of the greatest leadership challenges in the history of Southern Baptists." The SNAP leaders said Southern Baptists' local-church autonomy makes it all-the-more imperative that congregations have enough information to make responsible decisions about whom they call as ministers. "The only way people in the pews will find out about clergy child molesters is if victims feel safe in reporting them," they said. "And victims are never going to feel safe if they have to report abuse by going to the church of the accused minister." "Telling clergy victims to 'go to the church' is like telling them to go to the den of the wolf who savaged them," the letter said. "It is cruel to the victim and unproductive toward the end of protecting others." -30- Bob AllenBob Allen is senior writer for Associated Baptist Press. |
“'It is most likely that the plaintiff will voluntarily dismiss her law suit [sic] as to the SBC...,' Guenther writes. 'That is what routinely occurs when the SBC is sued in these kinds of cases. If she does not dismiss her suit, I expect the judge will dismiss the SBC on its motion for summary judgment because the SBC was not involved in this matter in any way.'
"Guenther has every reason to be confident. The SBC has never lost a lawsuit of any kind. In the nearly 50 years he’s represented the denomination, Guenther says the SBC has only been sued in sexual abuse cases five times and settled only one of those—not through an admission of guilt, he adds, but because the denomination’s insurance company chose to pay the plaintiff a 'small nuisance value' rather than the attorney fees to try the case.
"Many SBC higher-ups boast about this record with a sense of bravado. Take this comment from Augie Boto, legal counsel for the SBC executive committee, in an interview with Baptist website SBCOutpost: “Though the SBC is named as a party in legal proceedings about twice per year on average...it has not ever had a judgment rendered against it throughout its entire existence (i.e. since 1845). SBC polity is the major reason for its frequent dismissal out of lawsuits on motions for summary judgment.”
June 14, 2007, The Houston Chronicle By ROSE FRENCH NASHVILLE, Tenn. — The three companies that insure the majority of Protestant churches in America say they typically receive upward of 260 reports each year of young people under 18 being sexually abused by clergy, church staff, volunteers or congregation members. The figures released to The Associated Press offer a glimpse into what has long been an extremely difficult phenomenon to pin down — the frequency of sex abuse in Protestant congregations. Religious groups and victims' supporters have been keenly interested in the figure ever since the Roman Catholic sex abuse crisis hit five years ago. The church has revealed that there have been 13,000 credible accusations against Catholic clerics since 1950. Protestant numbers have been harder to come by and are sketchier because the denominations are less centralized than the Catholic church; indeed, many congregations are independent, which makes reporting even more difficult. Some of the only numbers come from three insurance companies — Church Mutual Insurance Co., GuideOne Insurance Co. and Brotherhood Mutual Insurance Co. Together, they insure 165,495 churches and worship centers for liability against child sex abuse and other sexual misconduct, mostly Protestant congregations but a few other faiths as well. They also insure more than 5,500 religious schools, camps and other organizations. The companies represent a large chunk of all U.S. Protestant churches. There are about 224,000 in the U.S., according to the Association of Statisticians of American Religious Bodies, although that number excludes most historically black denominations and some other groups, which account for several thousand congregations. Church Mutual, GuideOne and Brotherhood Mutual each provided statistics on sex abuse claims to The Associated Press, although they did not produce supporting documentation or a way to determine whether the reports were credible. The largest company, Church Mutual, reported an average of about 100 sex abuse cases a year involving minors over the past decade. GuideOne, which has about half the clients of Church Mutual, said it has received an average of 160 reports of sex abuse against minors every year for the past two decades. Brotherhood Mutual said it has received an average of 73 reports of child sex abuse and other sexual misconduct every year for the past 15 years. However, Brotherhood does not specify which victims are younger than 18 so it is impossible to accurately add that to the total cases. Abuse reports don't always mean the accused was guilty, and they don't necessarily result in financial awards or settlements, the companies said. The reports include accusations against clergy, church staff and volunteers. Even with hundreds of cases a year "that's a very small number. That probably doesn't even constitute half," said Gary Schoener, director of the Walk-In Counseling Center in Minneapolis, a consultant on hundreds of Protestant and Catholic clergy misconduct cases. "Sex abuse in any domain, including the church, is reported seldom. We know a small amount actually come forward." Tom Farr, general counsel and senior vice president of claims for GuideOne, based in West Des Moines, Iowa, said most abuse cases are resolved privately in court-ordered mediation. Awards can range from millions of dollars down to paying for counseling for victims, he said. One of the largest settlements to date in Protestant churches involved the case of former Lutheran minister Gerald Patrick Thomas Jr. in Texas, where a jury several years ago awarded the minister's victims nearly $37 million. Separate earlier settlements involving Thomas cost an additional $32 million. When insurance companies first started getting reports of abuse from churches nearly two decades ago, the cases usually involved abuse that happened many years earlier. But over the past several years, the alleged abuse is more recent — which could reflect a greater awareness about reporting abuse, insurance companies said. Insurance officials said the number of sex abuse cases has remained steady over the past two decades, but they also said churches are working harder to prevent child sex abuse by conducting background checks, installing windows in nurseries and play areas and requiring at least two adults in a room with a child. Patrick Moreland, vice president of marketing for Church Mutual, said churches are particularly susceptible to abusers. "By their nature, congregations are the most trusting of organizations, so that makes them attractive targets for predators," he said. "If you're a predator, where do you go? You go to a congregation that will welcome you." A victims' advocacy group has said the Southern Baptists, the nation's largest Protestant denomination, could do more to prevent abuse by creating a list of accused clergy the public and churches could access. "I think they should have a list of credibly reported clergy child abuse," said Christa Brown, a member of the Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests, a group initially created to hold the Catholic church accountable for sex abuse by its clergy. "These are things people are entitled to know," said Brown, who says she was sexually abused as a child by a Southern Baptist minister. "The only way to prevent this crime is to break the code of silence and to have absolute transparency when allegations are raised." At the Southern Baptist Convention's annual meeting in San Antonio this week, the Rev. Wade Burleson of Enid, Okla., proposed a feasibility study into developing a national database of Southern Baptist ministers who have been "credibly accused of, personally confessed to, or legally been convicted of sexual harassment or abuse." A convention committee referred Burleson's motion to the SBC executive committee, which will report back with findings and a recommendation at next year's meeting in Indianapolis. Southern Baptist President Frank Page said leaders are considering several options to help churches protect children against abuse. "We believe that the Scripture teaches that the church should be an autonomous, independent organization," Page said. "We encourage churches to hold accountable at the local level those who may have misused the trust of precious children and youth." Several years ago, the Baptist General Convention of Texas, which represents moderates who have increasingly distanced themselves from the conservative-led Southern Baptists, started a list of accused clergy for churches, but not the public. Under pressure from victim advocates, the Texas group just released the names of some convicted sex offenders who may have been ministers in local congregations. Joe Trull, editor of Christian Ethics Today and retired ethics professor at New Orleans Baptist Theological Seminary, helped the Texas convention create its registry and says there are now about 11 cases involving clergy abuse with minors. But he believes these are just the "tip of the iceberg" because churches don't have to report abuse cases to the registry and aren't likely to. "The problem we're having is that churches just weren't sending the names," Trull said. "In the normal scenario, they just try to keep it secret. We're going to have to be more proactive and let them know if they don't come forward, they're helping to perpetuate this problem." http://www.chron.com/disp/story.mpl/headline/nation/4890603.html |
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