NEW ORLEANS (LA)
Times Picayune
February 12, 2019
By Tim Morris
So whoever knows the right thing to do and fails to do it, for him it is sin. — James 4:17
One common evil in the sex abuse scandals in the Roman Catholic and Southern Baptist churches is the number of people in authority who chose to cooperate, compromise or remain silent in allowing the wrongdoing to continue.
Just six months after a grand jury report provided horrific details of sexual exploitation and abuse by members of the Catholic clergy and laity in Pennsylvania, the Houston Chronicle and the San Antonio Express-News published a joint investigation Sunday (Feb. 10) documenting similar offenses by pastors, ministers and volunteers within the churches of the Southern Baptist Convention.
As with the Catholic offenses, the worst atrocities are magnified by the church’s indifference to the victims or its protection of the perpetrators.
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A case in point is the story of Debbie Vasquez, who was just 14 when she was first molested by her Southern Baptist pastor in Sanger, Texas, a small town an hour north of Dallas. The abuse went on for years until she became pregnant at age 18.
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