ILLINOIS
Slow Church
March 1, 2014 By Christopher Smith
Although I heard awhile back that that this documentary on the sexual abuse of minors at the Jesus People USA (JPUSA) Community in Chicago was in the works, I happened to see this article on the Christianity Today website this afternoon and saw that it was released today. I knew that it would be one that I needed to watch, so I plunked down my ten bucks and downloaded the movie. You see, I have been acquainted with JPUSA for over 20 years; I have visited their community a couple of times and have friends who are members or former members. There was a block of 5 or 6 years — before my wife and I had kids — in which I attended their Cornerstone Music and Arts Festival every July.
No Place to Call Home is a heart-wrenching movie, offering story after story from victims who were sexually abused as children or teenagers while living as part of the JPUSA community (At one point the film offers the statistic that of 120 former members who were contacted in the course of making the film, over half were victims of sexual abuse at JPUSA). Including among the victims who speak out on camera, is the film’s director and producer Jaime Prater. The movie culminates with three stories of victims who name their perpetrator as Johnny Herrin, a member of the community’s — relatively small — leadership council, the son of the community’s founding pastor (who himself was ousted for sexual abuse), and the drummer for JPUSA’s seminal Christian rock group, The Rez Band. How could such a Christian community that had a relatively high profile in evangelical Christianity over the last four decades foster a culture in which sexual abuse was apparently all too common?
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