Why I do this

Sammy Nuckolls

Last fall, Southern Baptist pastor Sammy Nuckolls was convicted on more than a dozen counts of video voyeurism and sentenced to 10 years in prison. Nuckolls used concealed cameras, including pen cameras, to surreptitiously film women showering and in bathrooms. Nuckolls was convicted in Mississippi, but he was also arrested in two counties in Arkansas, and additional allegations were made against him in Virginia and Texas.

Investigators found numerous videos on Nuckolls’ computer and identified 21 victims on the videos they recovered. However, investigators believe Nuckolls made hundreds of such videos over the past 15 years, and so it is likely that hundreds more women and girls may have been victimized. Between 2003 and 2011, Nuckolls worked as a camp pastor for summer youth camps sponsored by the Southern Baptist Convention’s Lifeway Christian Resources.

Just a couple weeks ago, a Texas woman whom I’ll call Connie wrote to me. She describes some of the evidence that came out at Nuckolls’ sentencing hearing, including his use of a spycam pen in the spine of his bible. But what Connie talks about the most is how she was treated by her church. She describes the church-provided counseling as having “a Cesare Borgia quality” – that’s a way of saying it was cunningly cruel – and she says that she and other victims were “curb-stomped” – another powerful metaphor of brutality.

What is obvious is that Connie’s wounds derive not only from the perverse deeds of Sammy Nuckolls but also – and perhaps even more so – from others whom she believes covered up for Nuckolls, who blamed the victims, and who minimized the harm. I’ve heard these kinds of stories too many times, but it’s people like Connie who remind me of why I keep doing this. Thank you, Connie.

Dear Christa,

As a victim of a Southern Baptist sexual predator, traveling youth pastor Sammy Nuckolls, I cannot begin to tell you how important your blog is to those suffering. . . .  Sammy probably taped hundreds of girls as he was the …camp pastor for Lifeway-Centrifuge Camps all over the South and Southeastern U.S. from 2003-2011. He preached to over 100,000 kids ages 11-17 years old during this 8-9 year span of time.

Police investigating the case said that they were 100% sure that Sammy had sold and/or traded his films although they declined to pursue any investigation or effort to remove the tapes from voyeur websites. So for us victims, the devastation continues as we wait for the day someone we know sees our videos.

 

Although not every single church involved -- and there are plenty -- supported Sammy or helped him out in sentencing, I can say that every single church involved ignored, covered up and/or spurned the victims of his many crimes. Every. Single. One. 

That is why your blog is so bloody important . . . . What you write is one of the few things that helps to set against all of this evil and corporate misconduct. We used to go to [a megachurch in Texas] . . . . I cannot tell you what it feels like to have your entire world yanked out from underneath you like a cheap rug, because almost all of our friends and people we thought of as family all go to [the church]. And all we can do now is sit alone in stunned silence.

That is why your work is so very important. You are the voice for all of the rest of us who won't ever be heard. You are the tiny piece of justice for all the rest of us denied. Texas is filing NO charges whatsoever. Sammy and his accomplices .. . are, therefore, not going to face any justice for the horrors of what they did here . . . .

But [this church’s leaders]… told the Fort Worth Star-Telegram and the Dallas Morning News that Sammy only spoke 3 - 6 times total at [this church] and the pastors decided to not notify anyone because they conducted their own investigation and found no wrong-doing. And yes, they knew fully well the number of confirmed victims. We personally attended every Wednesday night youth group . . . and we can document, independently, over two dozen times Sammy was paid to preach to the kids . . . . 

[The church’s] message is simple -- if you ever say anything remotely negative, we will shoot you down using a skilled professional . . . . One of their Executive Senior Pastors called and BLAMED US (since we were at the youth services every Wed night) and tried to make us stay silent citing the guilt we ought to feel for not "seeing any red flags" sooner as if it was our fault. They also continued to bully us even after leaving, calling to tell us that we should not testify in person or in writing against Sammy at his Mississippi sentencing hearing. He actually referred to Sammy's 13 felony sex crime CONVICTIONS as a "goofy situation" but would only admit that Sammy "might have crossed a few lines" (there were 7 weeks in between the convictions and his sentencing hearing . . . so the issue of guilt was not in question at this time.)

Hopefully you can see from this that it is people like you who are the only hope for the many people like us, that anyone might ever be held remotely accountable for their bad actions or at least feel like they can't hide as easily with your flashlight of truth shining in their filthy basements of deceit and cover-ups.

Thank you again, from the bottom of my heart, for what you are doing. I sincerely hope that you will continue this mighty work. May God continue to bless you for doing what others cannot or will not do.

__________________

 

For another view on how churches inflict so much additional harm when their minister is accused of sexual abuse, see this recent story, also out of Texas: "The second-worst church in the world," 5/2/2013 

 

Related post: Contract preachers and accountability avoidance, 11/6/2011

007 "hitman against bad publicity"

Lawrence Swicegood

When I wrote about evangelicals’ “long history of using militaristic metaphors,” readers sent me some more examples. Here’s the one that I just couldn’t resist sharing.

At the Gateway multi-campus megachurch in Texas, their public relations guy is Lawrence Swicegood. To quote my reader, he’s the church’s “hitman against bad publicity.”

With his 007 pose in the church's online staff directory, it looks as though Swicegood might be pointing a gun, but I think it might actually be a journalist’s tape recorder. Whatever it is he’s pointing, presumably that’s his “deadly weapon of choice” in protecting the church against bad publicity. (I imagine the church probably thinks this looks edgy and cool; personally, I think it’s in poor taste – but you can decide for yourself.)

Gateway describes itself as “a Bible-based, evangelistic, Spirit-empowered church.” Much like the Prestonwood Baptist multi-campus megachurch – also in the Dallas/Fort Worth metroplex – Gateway is huge and has enormous financial resources. It’s 2012 financial report shows annual revenues of over $75 million and assets of over $156 million.

People often ask me why there’s not more media coverage of the Prestonwood clergy abuse cover-up scandal. I’ve gotten the same question about many other churches around the country, including many other churches in the Dallas/Fort Worth area.

But look at their resources. A church like Prestonwood has a constant stream of ready revenues from all those tens of thousands of members who think they’re putting their dollars in the offering plate to do God’s work. Meanwhile, a big chunk of those dollars actually get used to hire a paid “hitman against bad publicity” – a guy who’s paid to keep the corporate brand – oops, I mean church brand – clean in the media.

Swicegood used to do media work for the White House. He even played golf with the President (and yes – he makes a point of telling people about it). So, I expect Swicegood is probably one heckuva good spinmeister and I don’t imagine a guy like that gets hired on the cheap.

I think you have to assume that most other megachurches – churches such as Prestonwood -- also have high-powered and highly-paid public relations people. That’s a big part of how churches such as Prestonwood are able to minimize, and sometimes totally squelch, ugly stories like a clergy sex abuse cover-up scandal.

_______________________    

For still another view on the assault metaphors of many prominent evangelicals, consider these comments by Southern Baptist guru Richard Land. With the recent announcement that he would become the new president of Southern Evangelical Seminary, Land proclaimed that his goal was to produce graduates who would be “the green berets and paratroopers of God’s army, and who will be used by him to win tremendous victories….”

 

Related posts:
Boots, biscuits and Prestonwood Baptist, 3/18/2013
People to remember in the Prestonwood/Morrison Heights scandal, 2/9/2013
Baptists should heed mother’s call for accountability, 1/29/2013
Prestonwood saga shows clergy abuse database is overdue, ABP, 8/19/2011

More child sex claims against British Baptist minister Robert Dando

Robert Dando

As reported last Sunday, seven additional men are alleging that they were raped as teenagers by prominent British Baptist minister Robert Dando. The assaults allegedly occurred between 1996 and 2008.

Sources say that the men’s legal action – reportedly the first of its kind against the Baptist church in Britain – could cost the church millions of pounds.

The accused minister, Robert Dando, is currently serving an eight-year prison sentence in Virginia. He was jailed there in 2011 for molesting two boys when Dando was in the U.S. on a missions trip.

In Britain, Dando was the senior minister at Worcester Park Baptist Church in southwest London, and previously at Orchard Baptist Church in Oxfordshire.

The allegations against Dando include “multiple rapes and serious sexual assaults.”

Dando was closely connected to the highest levels of Baptist worldwide leadership. He previously served as executive assistant to the president of the Baptist World Alliance.

One of Dando’s churches was previously involved in another child sex scandal when the leader of the church was convicted of serious sex offenses against a 14-year-old boy. At the time, Dando told the press, “All our youth work is carried out within proper guidelines.” Yet, we now know that Dando, too, was sexually abusing kids.

Dando had plenty of access to kids. His wife was a national vice-president of the Boys’ Brigade, a Christian youth organization with more than 500,000 members in 60 countries. Dando also worked for a children’s charity in India. And he previously worked as a magistrate on a family court panel which dealt with child care and child access proceedings.

It’s terrible to imagine how many kids a wide-ranging pastor like Dando could have sexually traumatized. Baptists ought to be making a broad public outreach effort -- in India, in the U.S., in Britain, and anywhere else he traveled -- to try to minister to those kids, provide them with independent counseling, and help them. But of course, we haven’t seen anything like that. Instead, the Baptist way seems based on simply letting the children suffer and suffer and suffer.

__________________

 

Update: Jailed minister accused of abuse in UK, ABP, 5/1/2013 (naming other churches where Dando worked)

Related posts:

Baptist World Alliance needs common voice on clergy sex abuse, 8/12/2010

He was a Baptist pastor, not a priest, 11/11/2010

Baptist school teacher sentenced on child sex crimes; others prosecuted in cover-up

Terah Rawlings (top left); associate pastor Raymond Knight,
who is Rawlings' father (top right); senior pastor Franklin Knight,
who is Rawlings' uncle (bottom right); school principal Jan Ocvik (bottom left).
(El Paso County Sheriff's Office photo)

“A former teacher who pleaded guilty to sexually assaulting a 15-year-old student at a now-shuttered Baptist school in Colorado Springs will serve 90 days in jail and up to the rest of her life on intensive probation.”

Terah Rawlings, 33, taught at the Hilltop Baptist School, which was operated by Hilltop Baptist Church. The school belonged to the Southern Baptist Association of Christian Schools.

Kudos to the El Paso County sheriff’s office for also prosecuting three other school administrators in connection with a cover-up that involved failing to report the teacher’s crimes. Such “failure to report” prosecutions are rare.

Rawlings’ uncle, Franklin “Wayne” Knight was the senior pastor of Hilltop and formerly the school’s chief executive. He was accused of orchestrating a cover-up to protect Rawlings, and according to The Gazette, he pled guilty to being an accessory to sex abuse.

Rawlings’ father, Raymond “Allen” Knight, was an associate pastor and the school’s athletic director. He has pled guilty to failing to report child abuse.

The school’s former principal, Jan Orcvik, was also charged with failing to report the abuse and sentenced to probation in a plea agreement.

The abuse was allegedly ongoing for about two and a half years, and Rawlings’ conduct was described as an “open secret.” Other students, in their confusion, were left to keep Rawlings’ secret.

Other teachers and church-goers had reported concerns to school authorities and to the pastor. Laurie Sutton and Dustin Sutton, who were a math teacher and basketball coach at the school, claim they were fired in retaliation for reporting the information they had heard about Rawlings’ abuse of the boy. Another teacher, and two other church-goers, are also reported to have raised concerns, but each time, prosecutors say that the concerns were ignored and those who spoke out were discouraged from going forward.

So a young teen boy -- betrayed by church, school, and community – was left to be sexually abused for two-and-a half years.

P.S. to Ed

After I posted my open letter to Ed Stetzer last week, a reader directed me to another one of Ed’s articles about allegations of child sex abuse connected to the Association of Baptists for World Evangelism. Ed’s words are so true – but so hollow -- that I decided to add this postscript.

“Truth must be known. Victims must be acknowledged. Protections must be in place.”

This is mighty fine talk, Ed. But where are the deeds? And again, why is your talk directed at others rather than at your own faith group, the Southern Baptist Convention?

So, Ed, I’m quoting some more of your words right back to you, along with the questions they raise for many of us who were sexually abused by Southern Baptist preachers.

“I think religious institutions, churches, and those that lead them have yet to come to grips with both the seriousness and frequency of this crime,” you say. I agree! But what about you, Ed? Have you come to grips with the seriousness and frequency of this crime in your own faith group – in the Southern Baptist Convention? I haven’t seen any indication that you have.

With respect to the investigation at the Association of Baptists for World Evangelism, you wrote that it was “another reminder of the pain of child abuse, the importance of honest disclosure… and the need for outside help (the police if it is a current crime or a credible investigation if it is a past allegation).”

“Honest disclosure.” Sounds great, Ed. How about working to implement that in your own faith group? But how can your denomination even hope to honestly disclose ministers with credible child sex abuse allegations when your denomination doesn’t even bother with systematic record-keeping on ministers?

I couldn’t agree more about the need for “outside help.” This is why clergy abuse survivors have been asking the Southern Baptist Convention to fund a panel of trained professionals who could responsibly review clergy abuse allegations – i.e., the more-than-90-percent that cannot be criminally prosecuted. For the truth to be known, outsiders are essential for oversight. Churches cannot – cannot – responsibly address abuse allegations against their own clergy, not only because they typically lack the expertise, but because they always lack the objectivity.

Concerning the investigation of abuse within the Association of Baptists for World Evangelism, you state that you “have confidence in the organization doing the investigation, G.R.A.C.E.”

So, Ed, why don’t you call for a G.R.A.C.E. investigation of what happened at Prestonwood? People in the pews deserve to know how it came about that one of the most prominent churches of the Southern Baptist Convention – a church headed by two-term SBC president Jack Graham -- allowed one of their ministers to move on to another church even after he was accused of molesting church-boys. People in the pews deserve to know the extent to which their leaders covered up for the molesting-minister and allowed more kids to be placed at risk.

In connection with the Penn State scandal, you said you were “shocked” that leaders could receive a report of child sex abuse and not report it to the police. But Ed, a “failure to report” allegation is also being made about Prestonwood’s leaders. So call for an investigation! Or are you too afraid that Prestonwood could not withstand the scrutiny that an independent investigation would bring? Are you afraid that Prestonwood would suffer damage similar to what Penn State experienced?

“Protections must be in place,” you say. But, Ed, how do you imagine that people will be protected when Southern Baptists don’t have any system for doing anything at all about clergy-predators even when denominational leaders are specifically told about them? Unlike other major faith groups, Southern Baptists don’t offer even the possibility of a denominational office for hearing clergy abuse allegations, much less for doing anything about them.

Most child molesters have multiple victims, and so one of the best ways to protect against abuse in the future is to institutionally hear the voices of those who are trying to tell about abuse in the past. But Southern Baptists don’t bother. They keep telling abuse survivors to go to the church of the perpetrator – which is sort of like telling wounded sheep to go back to the den of the wolf who savaged them. It doesn’t work.

With respect to the ABWE, you claim that you are “watching this investigation” because “transparency is essential.”

But, Ed, how closely are you “watching?” Have you noticed that the ABWE fired the investigative team of G.R.A.C.E.? Even though the investigation had been ongoing for two years, ABWE fired G.R.A.C.E. just before G.R.A.C.E. was getting ready to release its final report. ABWE hired a new investigative team with a privacy condition so that the results of any report will be released only to ABWE.

So much for transparency, eh?

“Pray with me for those children who have been victimized,” you say. But Ed, I gotta tell you, for people like me who were abused by Baptist clergy, that “pray with me” line sounds like a cop-out. It comes across as little more than a cheap slogan that Southern Baptists use to avoid taking any meaningful action.

Talk, talk, talk, talk, talk.

Ed, is that all you’ve got?

Dear Ed: Speak up!

Ed Stetzer

This is an open letter to Ed Stetzer, who is the president of LifeWay Research, a Baptist pastor, and a professor at Southeastern Baptist Theological Seminary. LifeWay is affiliated with the Southern Baptist Convention, and according to its website, provides data and research for “enlightening today’s churches with relevant insights.”
 

 

 

Dear Ed:

In the midst of all the news about the scandal involving Prestonwood Baptist Church in Texas, I was reminded about how you took to task the Independent Fundamental Baptists for not speaking up about clergy sex abuse. And I keep wondering why you aren’t also taking members of your own Southern Baptist faith group to task.

There have been so many reports about Southern Baptist pastors committing sexual abuse and about Southern Baptist churches involved in clergy abuse cover-ups. In my spare time, I used to try to keep track of Baptist clergy abuse cases, but frankly, it was more than I could handle. And I was only trying to log the ones that had been publicly reported.

Since LifeWay provides research and data on so many other topics relevant to Baptist life, I often wondered why you yourself weren’t keeping track of Baptist clergy sex abuse cases. I imagine that most parents would find it “enlightening” to learn how widespread the problem really is – and how easy it is for clergy predators to simply church-hop their way to new prey.

But for now, I want to ask you about just one case: Prestonwood. Why aren’t you speaking up about what happened at Prestonwood?

Surely you’ve heard about it. With 32,000 members, Prestonwood is the fifth largest church in the Southern Baptist Convention. It’s headed by pastor Jack Graham, a two-term Southern Baptist Convention president. And it’s mired in a clergy sex abuse “cover-up” scandal that just won't let go.

 

The scandal has been in the news for quite a while now, but in case you’ve missed it, let me bring you up to speed with the short version.

A longtime Prestonwood member, Chris Tynes, recently discovered that “a former music minister, John Langworthy, admitted to sexual misconduct with young boys while at Prestonwood” twenty years ago. Prestonwood officials dismissed Langworthy at the time, but they allowed him to simply move on to another Southern Baptist church in Mississippi, where he continued to work with kids. Langworthy was recently convicted of child sex crimes in Mississippi.

There is no indication that Prestonwood officials ever notified the police of Langworthy’s admission, and a woman who was a staff intern at the church says they didn’t. There are questions about whether Prestonwood officials tried to keep things “under wraps.”

Yet, when Tynes started inquiring about all this, Prestonwood officials called the cops on Tynes, labeling him as “a suspicious person, possibly violent.”

Did you get that? The Watchdog blogger summarized it this way: “Prestonwood Baptist doesn’t call the cops on the molester, but they call the cops on the church member who asks questions about the molester.” So, you’re there telling Independent Baptists to speak up, Ed, but in your own denomination, when a Southern Baptist does exactly that, the church calls the cops on him.

Tynes has now created a Facebook page, “People Against Prestonwood’s Silence on Allegations of Sexual Abuse.” And pastor Graham, who refused to comment when this story was first reported in 2011, still maintains that he’s doing the right thing by keeping silent -- “like a lamb” --  and by refusing to answer questions.

So here’s what I don’t understand, Ed. One of the most prominent churches of your own Southern Baptist denomination has done so much that’s so wrong and so dangerous. Yet, you and other Southern Baptist leaders stay silent.

You lose credibility when you take the easy road of pointing a finger at Independent Baptists without also speaking out about your own Southern Baptist abuse scandals.

So, Ed, I’m quoting your own words right back to you: “Speak up!” Your denomination “has had way too many scandals . . . so speak up now.” “Secrecy and circling the wagons breeds this kind of behavior and is destroying children. . . . Your young pastors are leaving and your children are in danger. It is abuse. It must stop. And it must stop now. Speak up.”

And Ed, it’s not only the morally right thing to do, but it would be the smart thing as well. Twenty-somethings will not be satisfied with the Southern Baptist status quo. They are a generation of young people who believe they can make things better, and who feel a responsibility to at least try. When so many other faith groups have begun implementing denominational safeguards against clergy abuse, young people will see the inanity of Southern Baptists’ self-serving denominational do-nothingness and the hypocrisy of Southern Baptists’ charade of powerlessness. Ultimately, they will reject the dysfunctionality of a denomination that refuses to protect its own children.

So Ed, heed your own words. Speak up!

For the love of kids, speak up!

Sincerely,

Christa Brown

___________________

Update: P.S. to Ed, 4/26/2013

And take a look at this 4/10/2013 WatchKeep posting, “Of Questions and Cowards,” including its attached transcript of a phone conversation with what is reported to be a Prestonwood deacon, who asserts that Prestonwood tried to “handle it discreetly, as any church tries to do.”

Related posts on this blog:

Boots, biscuits and Prestonwood Baptist, March 18, 2013
People to remember in the Prestonwood/Morrison Heights scandal, February 9, 2013
Baptists should heed mother’s call for accountability, January 29, 2013

The Christian Right and Child Sex Abuse

Frederick
Clarkson

In a column last Saturday on his widely-read "Talk to Action" blog, Frederick Clarkson asks,

"Can the Southern Baptist Convention and the Catholic Bishops be taken seriously on anything else when they cannot get it together to actively protect children from sex predators -- especially their own clergy?"

Clarkson outlines the differences between the blind-eyed responses of Southern Baptists and Catholics as contrasted against the "many other traditional religious denominations" that actively seek to prevent and address child sex abuse by clergy. Read more.
___________________

Related update: "Blog shines light on abuse in SBC," ABP, April 18, 2013

Pastor's sexual abuse of kid is blamed on "prostate troubles"

Jack Schaap delivering his "Polishing the Shaft" sermon at the church's 2010 Youth Conference. See video of the sermon.

On March 20th, Jack Schaap, the prior pastor of the 15,000 member First Baptist Church in Hammond, Indiana, was sentenced to 12 years in prison for sexual abuse of an underage girl whom he had been counseling.

More than 100 letters of support were sent to the judge before the sentencing hearing. As reported in the Chicago Tribune, the letters attested to Schaap’s “decades of good works” and claimed that “stress and health problems, including prostate troubles” had led him “to stray.”

Schaap’s wife described her husband’s “affair” with the girl as “consensual” and said that her husband was suffering from “a severe case of prostatitis.” She asked that the judge grant leniency in her husband’s sentencing.

And though the pastor still had plenty of supporters, the church was apparently not so supportive of the girl. After the scandal broke, she was expelled from Hammond Baptist High School and her family expelled from the church.

The evidence against Schaap was overwhelming. Prosecutors pointed to nearly 700 text messages, phone calls and letters along with photographs on the pastor’s computer.

“In a statement, the victim wrote that Schaap would text her from the altar during his sermons. In another statement, written as a letter to Schaap, she wrote: ‘When you first kissed me I was shocked. . . When I asked you if it was wrong, you said ‘No.’ You told me that I was sent you from God, I was a gift to you.”

Like so many other clergy perpetrators, this is a pastor who essentially used God as a weapon to sexually abuse a kid.



Nine of the offenders with ties to First Baptist
Church in Hammond, Indiana: from top left:
(first row) A. V. Ballenger, Christopher
Settlemoir, Chester Mulligan; (second row)
William Beith, Jack Schaap, Tedd Butler;
(third row) Joseph Combs, Craig Sisson,
Russell Overla (Chicago Magazine photo)

But lest you start thinking that Schaap was just a rogue “bad apple” sort of Baptist pastor, consider the dreadful history of First Baptist Church of Hammond – a history that was recently detailed in a feature article in Chicago Magazine called “Let Us Prey.” Schaap’s conviction is simply the latest in “a string of assaults and sexual crimes committed by pastors across the country” who all “have one thing in common:” they all have ties to the First Baptist Church in Hammond, Indiana.

“According to dozens of current and former church members, religion experts, and historians . . . plus a review of thousands of pages of court documents,” Schaap is part of what some call “a deeply embedded culture of misogyny and sexual and physical abuse” at the church. “Multiple websites tracking the First Baptist Church of Hammond have identified more than a dozen men with ties to the church – many of whom graduated from its college, Hyles-Anderson, or its annual Pastors’ Schools – who fanned out around the country, preaching at their own churches and racking of a string of arrests and civil lawsuits, including physical abuse of minors, sexual molestation, and rape.”

 

It is a culture that many say is "enabled by cover-ups and cultlike control."

 

"Cultlike." I know it's a word that a lot of people don't like. But really. "Prostate troubles?" How else do you explain the lunacy of people who offer that as an excuse for their pastor's sexual abuse of a kid?

Boots, biscuits and Prestonwood Baptist

In Texas, we’ve got a saying: “You can put your boots in the oven, but that don’t make ‘em biscuits.”

That’s what I keep wanting to tell officials at Prestonwood Baptist Church in Dallas, as I watch them trying to alter the reality of the clergy sex abuse cover-up scandal that’s engulfing them.

When Chris Tynes’ questions were deleted from Prestonwood’s Facebook page, he scheduled an appointment with one of the church’s ministers. As reported by WFAA News in Dallas, Tynes had “discovered that a former music minister admitted to sexual misconduct with young boys while at Prestonwood Baptist Church more than twenty years ago.”

“Sexual misconduct?” You can see from the get-go the sort of minimizing slant that reporter is going to take. We’re talking about a minister who committed sex crimes against children. Some of his crimes are detailed in this court document; they include the molestation, digital penetration, and oral rape of young boys.

Prestonwood officials kept the secret of its minister’s soul-searing conduct for more than twenty years while the minister, John Langworthy, went right on working with kids at another Southern Baptist church. Last January, Langworthy was finally convicted on child sex crimes in Mississippi.

If Prestonwood officials had taken responsible action when they first heard reports about Langworthy’s conduct twenty years ago, a whole lot of kids could have been a whole lot safer.

So, having read multiple news reports about all this – news reports which implicate Prestonwood officials in a long-time cover-up – Tynes was troubled. It looked a lot like the Penn State cover-up. As a member of Prestonwood, he decided to try to get some answers from church officials.

But Tynes’ appointment to talk about it was cancelled, and the minister’s secretary wouldn’t reschedule. Tynes was being stonewalled.

So, on a weekday, he hung out in the mostly-empty church parking lot, sitting on his car. He was hoping to catch the minister when he came back from lunch.

Church security approached, and Tynes was super-polite. (You can see a video and transcript of the encounter here.) They asked Tynes to leave, and he did. Nevertheless, church officials called the cops, and they characterized Tynes as “possibly violent.”

Crazy, eh? That’s how it is in Baptistland.

Prestonwood officials are trying to turn this scandal into a fluffy biscuit hubbub about an odd-ball church-member so as to deflect attention from what it really is – a big stinky old boot scandal about their own twenty-year history of keeping quiet about a minister who molested kids.

Now they’ve dug in their spurs even more and accused Tynes of making “terroristic” threats. Why? Because while he was waiting in that mostly empty parking lot, he twittered to his friends a photo of the minister’s empty spot with the words “my target,” and then in another tweet, he wrote that he had found “my perfect ambush spot.”

Oh my.

You can read Tynes’ explanation here. He took down the postings right away after a friend suggested they might be misinterpreted. And here are my own thoughts on it.

First, Tynes is an ordinary guy. He’s not a trained and paid public spokesperson, like the lawyers and PR people that Prestonwood hires with its endless supply of offering plate dollars from its 32,000 members. And at least Tynes was prompt in offering an explanation. That’s a lot more than I can say for Prestonwood’s senior pastor Jack Graham, whose long silence only raised more questions.

Second, let’s put Tynes’ comments in Southern Baptist context. This is a faith group that has a long history of using militaristic metaphors in its often over-zealous evangelical efforts.

In fact, not too long ago, at one of Southern Baptists’ premier seminaries, the school president, Paige Patterson, “stormed onto the chapel stage” dressed in a military camouflage shirt and stationed as the gunner in a military fast-attack vehicle. (I kid you not – see this for yourself in this photo.) He then fired off a round of blanks from a .50-caliber Browning machine gun. All of this was to illustrate his message about “taking the hill” as they evangelically targeted the households within a one-mile radius of the seminary.

By the standards that Prestonwood is applying to Chris Tynes, that whole seminary should be shut down for making “terroristic” threats against the neighborhood. Heck, they even put their weapons on display.

And for those of us raised in this faith group, we grew up with “Onward Christian Soldiers” from the time we were two. Every summer of my childhood, in Vacation Bible School, I went “forward into battle” and “marching as to war” as we paraded into the church singing that militaristic song. By the standards that Prestonwood is applying to Chris Tynes, I guess the Bible schools should also be shut down as training grounds for “terroristic” activity.

I hope you see the lunacy in this.

But still, I’ve got to hand it to Prestonwood. They’ve sure got some slick spin-meisters. It takes a lot of time in the saddle to be able to spin the story of a mega-church’s clergy child molestation cover-up into a story that boot-stomps the one church member who dares to ask questions.

But Ben Lovvorn, Prestonwood’s director of administration, stuck with the spin-script. “When it comes to protecting our people, we take that very seriously,” he said.

Whoa. We’re talking about a church that, from all appearances, evidence, and news reports, didn’t take the protection of people seriously at all . . . at least not if those people include church kids and their families.

Prestonwood officials can keep trying to cook up some biscuits, but they can’t alter the reality of what’s already in the oven. That stinky old cover-up boot isn’t going away and, so far, it’s getting stinkier with every word they say.
___________________________

Update: "Pastor says let God judge accusers," Associated Baptist Press, 3/19/2013 (This is a great summary. It contextualizes the Prestonwood saga and shows how Southern Baptist officials will publicly rebuke others involved in child sex cover-ups but won't hold their own accountable. ABP is a press service that is independent of the Southern Baptist Convention.)

Megachurch calls cops on member who speaks out

A Southern Baptist megachurch reportedly called the cops on a longtime church member who raised questions about news stories that church leaders had “failed to alert authorities about credible allegations of child molestation” involving a staff minister and had kept quiet while the minister moved on to work with kids in another church.

As the Watchdog blogger succinctly explained it, the church didn’t call the cops on the child molester – a minister who has since been convicted – but did call the cops on the member who asked questions about it.

That’s Baptistland for you.

Jack Graham

The church is Prestonwood Baptist Church in Plano, Texas. With about 32,000 members, it’s one of the largest churches in the Southern Baptist Convention. Its senior pastor, Jack Graham, is a former two-term Southern Baptist Convention president, and he heads a ministerial staff of about 40.

You’d think there would be somebody in the mega-sized-leadership of this mega-sized-church who would do the right thing, wouldn’t you?

You’d be wrong.

So far, they have not only failed to do the right thing – over and over again – but they have affirmatively done the wrong things – over and over again. For two decades, Graham and other Prestonwood church leaders kept the allegations against their former minister under wraps, and in doing so, they allowed many more kids to be placed at risk of sexual predation. And now, they try to bully a member who simply seeks to ask some questions.

The story has been repeatedly reported in the media. Just take a look at that long list of articles at the bottom of today’s story in the Associated Baptist Press (which, incidentally, is a news service that’s independent of the Southern Baptist Convention). It’s also been reported on WFAA TV and CBS News, in the Clarion-Ledger newspaper, and in numerous postings by numerous bloggers, including myself. It’s a story that shows an abdication of institutional responsibility and an abandonment of moral responsibility.  

So why don’t the people in the pews see this? Why don’t they speak up? Why don’t they demand accountability?

That’s always the mystery, isn’t it? Southern Baptists say they care about children, but in a church with 32,000 members, only one man speaks up.

Chris Tynes

That man is Chris Tynes. Remember the name. I think you’ll wind up hearing more from him. He’s polite, but very persistent. He's not one of the silent many. You can follow the continuing developments in this story on the Facebook page that Tynes has started called People Against Prestonwood’s Silence on Allegations of Sexual Abuse. Ever the optimist, I'm hoping that many more will eventually join Tynes in his efforts.

Meanwhile, I’m still remembering the over-the-top editorial that the Dallas Morning News wrote about Jack Graham back in 2008, when another one of Prestonwood’s ministers was arrested on child solicitation charges. The News heaped undue praise onto Graham for the simple fact that he addressed the congregation after the minister’s arrest. But of course, by the time Graham spoke, the story of the arrest was already making headlines, and so Graham didn’t have the possibility of keeping things quiet in that case. Now, since the news about this two-decades-long scandal has finally come to light, we see what happens when the possibility for keeping things quiet does exist.    

“In the end,” wrote the Dallas Morning News editorial, “the real scandal in cases like this comes not from the sins and crimes of sexual offenders. No church will ever be free of that. The truly damaging scandals arise when church leaders mishandle these crises by failing to treat them with the gravity they deserve. Many in church authority have failed their calling and their congregations under similar conditions through defensiveness, dissimulation and deferring hard decisions. Not Jack Graham.”

Yes . . .  Jack Graham.
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Thanks to Patheos.com for linking and quoting this posting under Fred Clark's "Smart people saying smart things" column, March 11, 2013.
Thanks also to Deep Thoughts blogger, Mojoey, for spreading the word about this "unholy scandal" in "Baptist hell."