SALT LAKE CITY (UT)
Deseret News
December 4, 2017
By Kelsey Dallas
SALT LAKE CITY — The recent onslaught of sexual assault allegations has left few industries untouched. Hollywood producers, politicians, celebrities, Silicon Valley insiders and journalists have been outed as abusers, prompting a depressing question: Who’s next?
“We’re in a time of reckoning,” said Dan Darling, vice president for communications for the Ethics & Religious Liberty Commission of the Southern Baptist Convention.
This reckoning is playing out in mostly secular settings, but it’s centered on moral and spiritual concerns. Religious leaders have a role to play in ongoing conversations about sex and power, said Charlie Camosy, an associate professor of ethics at Fordham University.
“We’re at this cultural moment where we don’t quite know what to do,” he said. “It would be odd to not have all hands on deck to try to rethink our sexual culture.”
Yet, for the most part, faith has been relegated to a small role in initial efforts to improve professional ethics, serving as a resource in the search for ways to reduce temptation.
Fearing accusations of creating unsafe work environments, some business leaders have proposed limiting one-on-one meetings between men and women, like a famed evangelist before them. The “Billy Graham rule” instructs men to refrain from spending time alone with women to whom they aren’t married, and it’s famously observed by Vice President Mike Pence.
“I think a lot of Christians and people in public leadership support some version of the Billy Graham rule because it’s clear. It provides clarity in situations where the boundaries aren’t always clear,” said Katelyn Beaty, an evangelical Christian writer. However, this clarity often comes at the expense of career advancement opportunities for professional women.
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