BishopAccountability.org
	Clergy Sex Abuse Is a Top Baptist Story By Christa Brown Stop Baptist Predators January 2, 2010 http://stopbaptistpredators.blogspot.com/2010/01/clergy-sex-abuse-is-top-baptist-story.html Clergy sex abuse was the top Southern Baptist story of the decade on the BaptistLife forum. Bruce Gourley, site administrator, reports that there were 9,373 views of the forum’s discussion on clergy sex abuse in the fall of 2006. That was over 1,800 more views than for any other topic on the forum during the entire decade. Some of you participated in that 2006 discussion on the BaptistLife forum. You shared pieces of your clergy abuse stories and you tried to engage a dialogue with Baptist ministers on the forum. I know it was painful for many of you at the time. The cold callousness of some of the posted responses was very hurtful. The hateful pettiness of some was downright bone-chilling. Yet, for many of us, we made that effort to engage Baptists in a dialogue on clergy sex abuse because we held the vague hope that it might help to open hearts and to eventually bring about change within the denomination. That’s why I’m letting you know about this. You deserve to know. That discussion wound up being the most-viewed discussion of the decade on the BaptistLife forum. This was before the first big Associated Press article on Baptist clergy sex abuse, before the 20/20 show, before the published insurance data and the comparative analysis of it, and before countless other stories made their way into the public light. On the BaptistLife forum, and on many other Baptist blogs as well, many of you were there . . . trying to tell them . . . trying to help them understand. Give yourselves a huge pat on the back for that. The fact that most of these men won’t hear -- and the fact that they sure as heck won’t actually do anything -- is not our shame. It’s theirs. We put ourselves on the line by even talking about something so profoundly painful. They put nothing on the line. In the Associated Baptist Press, clergy sex abuse also made the list of top-10 Baptist news stories for 2009. So . . . the topic continues to garner attention. But of course, what’s needed is action.
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