The Southern Baptist Convention’s Abuse Reform Implementation Task Force disbanded without having implemented much of anything.
The database they purported to “launch” last year — even hyping it as “historic” — remains empty. It holds not a single name of any credibly accused pastor.
Similarly, there has been no permanent funding allocated for abuse reforms.
Christa Brown
After two years of SBC officials touting the task force as proof that the SBC was making “progress” on addressing sexual abuse, the reality turned out to be far different. Abuse reform progress is nearly nonexistent and at best wholly stalled.
One columnist described the task force as having done so little that it was a “non-event.”
At the SBC’s annual meeting in Indianapolis this month, task force chair Josh Wester said they had been given an “impossible task.” Excuses ensued.
Roadblocks … liability concerns … insurance hurdles … political conflict … a lack of funding, and “unnamed difficulties.” There were plenty of excuses to go around, and as a Dallas Morning News editorial said: “Their excuses remain as flimsy as their promises.”
Wester claimed the task force had 100 names it was ready to publish onto the database, and he called out other SBC leaders for obstructing the task force’s work.
However, when asked exactly who had hindered the database — and how — Wester deferred, saying he didn’t want to “compound the problem by going into too much detail.”
So now it’s turned into a “bad guys vs. good guys” narrative. And that seems a tad too facile. It also detracts from the bigger structural problem. And I’m wondering if that may be the point.
“Whether deliberate or inadvertent, SBC folks have effectively narrowed the framing of the discussion on abuse reform.”
Whether deliberate or inadvertent, SBC folks have effectively narrowed the framing of the discussion on abuse reform.
Now the focus is on the “bad guys” who put up roadblocks, and that, if not for them, the “good guy” task force members would have put up 100 names on a database.
But here’s the thing. The 100 names the task force claims it had “vetted” were pastors who had criminal convictions or civil judgments rendered against them. In other words, the justice system already had done the job of “vetting” them and those pastors already were outed by public records.
What happened to the promise of a database that would include pastors who are credibly accused as determined by independent inquiry? This category would be far more numerous than criminal convictions, and it’s what survivors have been urging for nearly 20 years. But it would require institutional action beyond simply looking at public records.
This category — the credibly accused — has now been narrowed right out of the frame.
Even if the “bad guys” hadn’t put up roadblocks, what the task force brags that it was ready to do was still grossly inadequate. It wouldn’t have moved the needle even as far as the Houston Chronicle database from five years ago. And it would have been far less than what they promised in 2022.
But now the focus is on “Who were the bad guys?” instead of the big picture of “Where is the database with credibly accused pastors?”
That’s narrowing the framing for you. It’s a common PR and damage control tactic. (And while we can’t know what goes on in the minds of particular individuals, we do know that the SBC spends heaps of dollars on a crisis management law firm and PR professionals.)
“There’s a similar kind of narrowing going on with discussion of the money.”
There’s a similar kind of narrowing going on with discussion of the money. Now the focus is on the refusal of the SBC’s Send Relief group to release $3 million in funds — as if $3 million were the standard — instead of on the bigger picture of “Why can’t a billion-dollar organization come up with the resources to do this?”
None of this negates the fact that there may indeed have been some “bad guys” who put up roadblocks. I expect there were. But the reality is also more nuanced than that.
At best, what the task force claimed it was prepared to do would have scarcely moved the needle. Meanwhile, for two years, and perhaps unwittingly, task force members and advisers played a role in what amounted to an institutional charade.
They gave credence to an “effort” that wasn’t legitimate from the get-go. The very fact that the task force members were volunteers tells how unseriously the SBC, institutionally, took the problem.
It was obvious from the start that the task force didn’t have the resources to effectively pursue the job. So why didn’t task force members and advisers realize this?
Rather than trailing out hollow promises and platitudes for two years, it would have been far kinder if, long ago, they had all resigned in protest and spoken the truth about how, in the absence of adequate resources, they were given an impossible task.
As it stands, it appears the task force served as little more than a prop for a dog-and-pony show. It was part of a self-serving institutional performance.
Other questions remain as well. For example, if the “bad guys” were so bad and so obstructive, why won’t anyone even say who they were? This failure is not only a narrowing of the framing but also a lack of transparency even as to what’s in the very small frame that remains.
“When the framing is so narrowed, we tend to see only what they want us to see.”
When the framing is so narrowed, we tend to see only what they want us to see. And if we talk only within their narrowed parameters, then we play into their hand.
When the SBC finally does post those 100 names the task force claims it had ready, I’m not going to cheer. The only reason those 100 names may superficially appear meaningful is because SBC leaders have so narrowed the frame.
There should have been at least 1,000 names listed by now.
The problem isn’t the failure of a mere 100 names; nor is it just about “bad guys.” The problem is an entrenched system that holds neither predators nor enablers accountable and that fosters impunity for pastors.
Possibilities for the future in Baptistland don’t look much better. Newly elected SBC President Clint Pressley already has made clear that he is “not in favor” of a database that would list abusive church leaders.
Whether he’s a “bad guy” or a “good guy,” I don’t know. I only know he’s yet another top Southern Baptist official who is unlikely to do anything meaningful toward safeguarding kids and congregants against clergy predators.
Christa Brown, a retired appellate attorney, is the author of a new book called Baptistland: A Memoir of Abuse, Betrayal, and Transformation. Follow her on Twitter @ChristaBrown777.
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