TEXAS
Associated Baptist Press
By Bob Allen
A Texas Baptist pastor urged his congregation to shine a light on sexual abuse, which he says occurs much more frequently than most people believe, even in churches.
Gary Morgan, pastor of Cowboy Church of Ellis County in Waxahachie, Texas, said in a recent sermon that sexual abuse carries damage beyond the physical and emotional.
“It makes a hole in the soul that can’t be fixed, and I didn’t understand this until just lately,” he said. “Over the last couple of months, maybe the last three or four months, we have just had a run on people who have been either sexually abused or raped, all kind of things like that, and it’s been an eye-opener to me.”
Morgan said in his July 29 sermon that statistics say that one out of every three girls is abused at some point in her lifetime. “Based on my experience, I think for this church, that’s a very optimistic figure,” he said. “I think the numbers are quite a bit higher among us.”
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