WINSTON SALEM (NC)
Winston Salem Journal
June 18, 2019
Southern Baptists said many of the right things about sexual abuse during their recent Convention, but they didn’t take enough of the right actions.
The Southern Baptist Convention, the largest assembly of Baptists in the world, has been shaken by reports of sexual abuse on the part of clergy and church volunteers. Last year, a woman went public with allegations that her church’s youth pastor sexually assaulted her when she was 17.
Then, earlier this year, two Texas newspapers published detailed accounts of abuse involving 380 church leaders and volunteers and more than 700 victims, over 20 years.
Southern Baptists are facing the same challenge that the Catholic Church, the Boy Scouts and other groups have confronted: What should they do to atone for years of sexual abuse and, possibly, cover-ups of that abuse? And, even more important, what should they do to keep it from happening again?
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