File this under “Things I Never Thought I’d See.”
Last Friday, the official news service of the Southern Baptist Convention published a 2,300-word news story about the tarnished legacy of Paul Pressler.
Paul Pressler (left) and Paige Patterson, architects of the SBC takeover, sit at Cafe duMonde in New Orleans June 9, 1990, comemmorating their meeting at the same spot 20 years earlier to conceive the plan to gain control of the nation’s largest non-Catholic denomination. (Photo by Thom Scott)
For the first time, the BP story acknowledges in detail the allegations against Pressler regarding sexual abuse of boys and young men. That abuse allegedly happened all the time he was leading the campaign for the “conservative resurgence” in the SBC. And for the first time, this article puts on the record some SBC leaders addressing the horror of these revelations.
None of them go as far as they should in acknowledging the worst-kept secret among SBC leaders in the latter part of the 20th century — and Paige Patterson stretches truth into a pretzel to deny knowledge. They all feign ignorance, which I find hard to believe because I was a low-level part of that insider network at the time, and I heard the rumors. Perhaps they are parsing the difference between persistent rumors and documented fact.
The truth is Pressler did not engage in his alleged activities without help. Other people were feeding him young interns, saw him repeatedly at Baptist meetings with young men in tow and didn’t ask questions, heard the stories and didn’t investigate.
Why this matters
Here’s why last Friday’s BP story matters more than you might perceive. One of Pressler’s primary control tactics for his conservative movement was to control the denominational press. He detested the free press that existed in those days among state Baptist papers, SBC agency news staffs and even BP.
The editors of BP became Enemy No. 1 to him, and he managed a campaign to get them out of the way — a shameless pair of firings that left two men and their families wrecked and tarnished. Al Shackleford left his vice president’s job to sack groceries at a local store.
Pressler was a master of abuse in multiple venues.
BP wouldn’t tell the news the way he wanted it, which was slanted to his goals. He wanted a public relations service for the conservative resurgence, not a respected news service. And for 34 years, he got what he wanted. Until last Friday.
I am not a casual observer to these events. I was present the day Al Shackleford and Dan Martin were fired. They were my friends and colleagues and mentors. (Al died 10 years later in a car accident; Dan lives not far from me in a suburb of Dallas.)
I was present that afternoon when Associated Baptist Press — now Baptist News Global — was formed to ensure unfettered flow of free and faithful Baptist news. We still strive to fulfill that role every day.
“I have been a harsh critic of the Pressler era of Baptist Press, so it is fitting that on this day I should offer praise where it is due.”
I have been a harsh critic of the Pressler era of Baptist Press, so it is fitting that on this day I should offer praise where it is due. Bravo to David Roach and whoever at BP made possible this long-overdue article. It is not perfect, but given the system from which it was born, it is astounding nonetheless.
For the SBC’s new service to publicly acknowledge one of its greatest modern heroes was a “dangerous predator who exploited boys based on his power and his false piety” — a quote from the current SBC attorney — is extraordinary.
Pressler’s power
This never could have happened while Pressler still wielded power. That he is now confined to an assisted living facility in Houston is just one indicator of how powerless he currently is. But sadly, the power he once wielded carries on in the storm he unleashed that still brings division to the SBC even today. He definitely got his desired legacy.
It’s important to note here that many people do awful things and have personality flaws and moral failures of all kinds. But there is a difference between those who are abusers and everyone else.
Paul Pressler was and remains an abusive person. He not only abused the church boys and young interns committed to his care, he abused an entire denomination and hundreds of faithful clergy and denominational leaders along the way. There is no other single person who has done more damage to more Southern Baptist leaders and Southern Baptist churches than Paul Pressler. He should not be hailed as a hero.
“He not only abused the church boys and young interns committed to his care, he abused an entire denomination and hundreds of faithful clergy and denominational leaders along the way.”
Story highlights
While the BP story may not offer all some of us would hope, it goes a lot further than we could have imagined. Here are some highlights:
- “Hints of a darker side to Pressler, a former Texas state judge, began to emerge two decades ago. The church where he served as a deacon, Houston’s First Baptist Church, rebuked Pressler for being nude at his home with a young man from the congregation.”
- “Also in 2004, Pressler settled a lawsuit by Duane Rollins that alleged assault by Pressler, according to more recent court filings. In exchange for confidentiality and the destruction of ‘all tapes, affidavits or other written or audible information,’ Pressler agreed to pay $1,500 per month until 2029 – nearly half a million dollars.”
- “Evidence in the (Rollins) case included affidavits by multiple men who claimed Pressler engaged in inappropriate sexual behavior with them.”
- Danny Akin, president of Southeastern Baptist Theological Seminary: “I am grieved beyond measure at the revelations of what the evidence seems to be overwhelmingly clear that he did for many, many years. … What he did can only be called evil, wicked and distasteful in the highest degree.”
- “Jim Guenther, an attorney who represented the SBC and its Executive Committee until his resignation in late 2021, wrote in a 2021 email to a then-EC vice president that all codefendants in the Rollins lawsuit, including the SBC, believed a full investigation into Pressler’s conduct likely ‘would have produced a lot of evidence of the truthfulness of the fundamental allegation by the plaintiff that Pressler had sexually abused him for many years.’”
- “Current SBC attorney Gene Besen echoed Guenther’s assessment, tweeting in January that Pressler is a ‘dangerous predator who exploited boys based on his power and his false piety,’ and adding, ‘The man’s actions are of the devil. That is clear.’”
- Heather Evans, a licensed social worker and adviser to the SBC’s Abuse Reform Implementation Task Force: “Why are there leaders that remain silent and don’t publicly call out the evil of what was done, even though there are ways (Pressler’s) work is celebrated and revered? Why are they silent on this issue? That silence speaks so loudly to survivors. It re-harms survivors, and not just the survivors directly hurt by Pressler, but all survivors in both a watching convention and beyond.”
- Marshall Blalock, pastor of First Baptist Church in Charleston, S.C., and former chairman of the SBC Abuse Reform Implementation Task Force: “Typically, we don’t comment on lawsuits while they’re under adjudication. I understand that. I get that. But we came to a settlement, and no one who has the real information has explained the whole perspective of why we did what we did: why we settled, what was involved, when the information came forward. None of that has been officially presented to people.”
I am reminded of the words Shakespeare placed in the mouth of Marc Antony in the play Julius Caesar:
I come to bury Caesar, not to praise him.
The evil that men do lives after them;
The good is oft interred with their bones.
A fitting epithet for Paul Pressler, who is not dead yet but should be dead to Southern Baptists who care about justice.
Mark Wingfield serves as executive director and publisher of Baptist News Global. He is the author of Honestly: Telling the Truth About the Bible and Ourselves and Why Churches Need to Talk About Sexuality.
Related articles:
Confidential settlement reached in Pressler sexual abuse case
What the SBC should do about its most famous accused sexual abuser | Opinion by Marv Knox
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