Sexual abuse is “the rotten fruit of the Sexual Revolution,” says Jeff Dalrymple, director of the Southern Baptist Convention’s newly created Sexual Abuse Prevention and Response department, which operates under the SBC Executive Committee.
In two Baptist Press columns published May 5 and May 6, Dalrymple set forth his view that abuse is part of “the rotten fruit Western culture has borne over the last several decades” and blamed “the counterculture movements of the 1960s.”
Christa Brown
This is deeply disheartening and undercuts any thought that Dalrymple might make a difference in propelling the SBC toward meaningful action to address its clergy sex abuse crisis.
Framing the SBC’s widespread sexual abuse scandal as stemming from “the Sexual Revolution” is a reach too far. It’s also a tactic of obfuscation that already has been tried and rejected in the Catholic context — and of all people, Dalrymple should have known that.
Clergy sex abuse is a problem of the SBC’s own making
Regardless of one’s view about sex outside of marriage, or about “the Sexual Revolution” of the 1960s, the rape and molestation of kids and congregants by trusted pastors — and the nauseatingly redundant coverups in Southern Baptist churches — are horrific crimes and brutish betrayals. They always have been and still are.
No amount of finger-pointing at “Western culture” will obscure the reality that thousands of lives have been decimated by clergy sex abuse within the SBC and by the faith group’s unrelenting refusal to reckon with that reality.
But Dalrymple says nothing about the SBC’s decades-long complicity in protecting molesters, in refusing to hold abusers accountable and in stonewalling clergy sex abuse survivors. He is so insistent on broadly blaming the abuse crisis on “sexual sin in culture” that it’s as though he doesn’t even see the specific reality of the SBC’s own role or the human cost of the SBC’s recalcitrance.
“It is a cowardly and disingenuous deflection.”
Instead, he shifts blame away and points to “the Sexual Revolution.”
“Look over there! Look over there!”
It is a cowardly and disingenuous deflection.
It’s also a minimization of the gravity of pastoral sexual abuse, and of the incessant blind-eyed enabling of it by so many others within the faith.
And it doesn’t do diddly-squat to address the SBC’s structural issues that have enabled the proliferation of abuse and coverups: the absence of effective accountability systems, the entrenched culture of clergy impunity and the lack of care for clergy sex abuse survivors.
The SBC has an internal problem, but instead of reckoning with the awfulness of what is proliferating within the faith group, Dalrymple points his finger outward and blames “Western culture.”
At best, Dalrymple’s deflection shows a reckless ignorance. Alternatively, it’s a calculated spin. Either way, it certainly doesn’t inspire any confidence in Dalrymple’s ability to deal with the SBC’s clergy sex abuse problem.
Dalrymple’s deflection has been tried before
Years ago, former Pope Benedict tried the same spin for the Catholic Church’s sexual abuse crisis. Like Dalrymple, Benedict blamed the abuse crisis on “the Sexual Revolution of the 1960s.”
Numerous experts criticized Benedict’s explanation, calling it “problematic and damaging,” “deeply flawed,” “profoundly troubling,” “myopic,” “embarrassingly wrong” and “catastrophically irresponsible.”
Yet, apparently having learned nothing at all from the Catholic abuse crisis, a top Southern Baptist official now follows suit, mimics Benedict and makes the same irresponsible explanation. So, Dalrymple merits all the same criticism.
More evangelizing won’t cure the problem
Dalrymple not only blames “the Sexual Revolution,” exactly as Benedict did, but he also offers up a remedy similar to Benedict’s.
Jeff Dalrymple (Baptist Press)
As an answer to the Catholic abuse crisis, Benedict advocated a return to faith, saying the solution was in “obedience and love for our Lord Jesus Christ.”
Similarly, Dalrymple urges Southern Baptists to address the SBC abuse crisis “with the clear hope of the gospel of Jesus Christ.” He even goes so far as to describe the sexual abuse crisis as an “opportunity” for Southern Baptists — an opportunity to evangelize.
Dalrymple calls on Southern Baptists to show people “the goodness of God’s plan,” apparently without the slightest realization that “God’s plan” is precisely the weapon many clergy predators use to rape and molest kids and congregants. The crimes and abuses are facilitated by the power of the pastorate and the mantle of trust that the faith group bestows.
Dalrymple either doesn’t understand these unique dynamics of clergy sex abuse, or he just doesn’t really care.
“’God’s plan’ is precisely the weapon many clergy predators use to rape and molest kids and congregants.”
And while his rhetoric may resonate with evangelicals, in this context, Dalrymple’s words are functioning as a distraction from the SBC’s in-house problem and from the imperative for concrete measures to protect kids and congregants.
Far better than the pabulum of evangelical platitudes would be the implementation of common-sense strategies, such as a system of record-keeping and information-sharing on credibly accused clergy sex abusers so they can’t church-hop to new prey.
Three years ago, SBC annual meeting messengers voted for such a concrete measure when they approved the development of a denominational database. But SBC officials have stalled it ever since.
And how about measures to hold accountable the many pastors who have kept quiet about the abuses of their clergy colleagues? Without accountability for the enablers and cover-uppers, you can be sure the preacher-predators will persist.
Southern Baptists lack moral credibility and expertise
Next month, at the SBC annual meeting in Dallas, Dalrymple will be part of a panel presentation called “Safeguarding the Next Generation.” They’re selling tickets for it — $15 at the door. It’s as though they think they have expertise to offer.
They don’t. Southern Baptists never have gotten their own house in order, so they’re in no position to teach anyone else.
Having refused to implement even “the bare minimum” of abuse reforms — as described by the head of their own task force — and having failed to provide even a modicum of care for vast numbers of survivors sexually abused by Southern Baptist pastors, SBC officials are the very last people anyone should consider for expertise on dealing with abuse.
The expertise they hold is in hubris, because it takes audacity to talk about “safeguarding the next generation” when, for decades, they have refused the measure recommended by survivors, advocates and experts: a denominational database of credibly accused clergy sex abusers.
It also takes a cruel oblivion to the safety of future generations of church kids.
They are the ones who will pay the human cost of the SBC’s obtuse leadership — leadership that still focuses more on safeguarding the institutional image than on safeguarding the people.
Christa Brown, a retired appellate attorney, is the author of Baptistland: A Memoir of Abuse, Betrayal, and Transformation. Follow her on X @ChristaBrown777 and on Bluesky @christabrown.bsky.social.