UNITED STATES
Christianity Today
My Interview with Boz Tchvidjian (Part 4)
Ed Stetzer
A while back, I spoke at Liberty University convocation. While there, I had the privilege to sit down with my friend, Boz Tchividjian.
Boz is a prosecutor by background, specifically dealing with child sexual abuse cases. He has recently been engaged in advocacy for the protection of victims—first and foremost that there might not be victims. Second, he advocates that those who are victims might be heard and that the perpetrators might ultimately be prosecuted.
Sadly, this is an ongoing challenge in the life of the church. We are certainly all aware of the scandals within the Catholic Church. But increasingly people are asking questions about the Protestant and the Evangelical world. I’ve blogged on such abuse situations on several occasions—see here, here, and here.
For this reason, I felt that an interview with Boz would be worth our time. Here are the other parts of our interview run previously:
Part One | Part Two | Part Three | Part Four
I recognize that I have written frequently on the subject of child protection, and this will just add more, but I think the protection of children is worth dwelling on since this blog is read mostly by pastors and church leaders.
Let me encourage you to check out Boz’ brand new Religion News Service blog. Also, be sure to check out this article from CBN, and this article on how churches can endanger children.
This week, Part Four of our interview only deals with one of the questions I asked him because his response is lengthy and helpful.
ED: You said we need to have protocols for dealing with reporting abuse at the local church level. I think most people know what a “required reporter” is now—they have to report certain things. But it’s more than that. Can you talk to us a little bit about that?
BOZ: I think the number one priority is to be familiar with the law in your particular jurisdiction regarding mandated reporting. Every jurisdiction is different. Every jurisdiction has a mandated reporting law. For example, I believe everyone in Rhode Island is a mandated reporter. So if anybody suspects child abuse and doesn’t report it, they can be prosecuted. In other jurisdictions, only certain types of persons are mandated reporters.
The best advice I can give on this subject is when in doubt, report, regardless of whether or not you are a mandated reporter. Those reporting laws only identify individuals “mandated” to report. They certainly don’t prevent non-mandated reporters from reporting suspected abuse. I believe anyone and everyone should report any suspected abuse of a child.
Note: This is an Abuse Tracker excerpt. Click the title to view the full text of the original article. If the original article is no longer available, see our News Archive.