Eight Missouri ministers accused of sex abuse in Southern Baptist Conference report • Missouri Independent

The Southern Baptist Conference on Thursday launched a once-secret and prolonged record of accused sex abusers — several of whom are in the Midwest — within the denomination.

The 205-page listing is a compilation of ministers and other church staff who've been credibly accused of sexual abuse. The checklist is described as a “fluid, working document” that was additionally incomplete but largely pulls details about abusers from published news experiences.

The publication of the list comes after the discharge Sunday of a 300-page report by an independent investigator that described how leaders of the Southern Baptist denomination for decades have received reports of sexual abuse dedicated by church workers, pastors and others. However those studies had been largely stored secret and, reasonably than acting upon and investigating studies of sexual abuse, denomination leaders sought to intimidate and vilify victims and their advocates.

“The whole thing should be seen for what it is,” wrote former Southern Baptist Conference executive committee member and basic counsel D. August Boto in an internal electronic mail that was published within the report. “It’s a satanic scheme to fully distract us from evangelism.”

The crisis rocking the Southern Baptist denomination this week is similar in some ways to what the Catholic church continues to face. Leaders in both faiths systematically hid details about sexual misconduct, appeared to show more concern about their own legal legal responsibility than the victims and at instances didn't expel accused abusers from positions of authority.

In 2007, Father Thomas Doyle, a Catholic priest credited as one of the first to warn of his personal denomination’s clergy intercourse abuse disaster, wrote a letter to SBC leadership conveying his concern that Southern Baptist leaders had been repeating the failures of the Catholic church in dealing with sex abuse.

Doyle was instructed, “Southern Baptist leaders really have no authority over native churches,” a response that Doyle considered dismissive, according to the investigative report. 

That very same 12 months, on the SBC convention in San Antonio, Oklahoma pastor Wade Burleson made a movement to create a database of Southern Baptist clergy who had been convicted or credibly accused of, or had confessed to sexual abuse. The proposal was meant to “help in stopping any future sexual abuse or harassment.”

The database proposal appeared to go nowhere, in line with the report, and witnesses at the convention recalled little about it except to specific their opinion that it will “violate native church autonomy.”

In the end, a staffer for the SBC govt committee since 2007 had maintained a listing of accused ministers and church employees, nevertheless it was stored hidden from the public and even SBC executive committee trustees, according to the report.

Southern Baptist leaders stated publicizing the record of credibly accused abusers represented “an initial, but important, step in the direction of addressing the scourge of sexual abuse and implementing reform within the Convention.”

“Every entry on this record reminds us of the devastation and destruction caused by sexual abuse,” said a joint statement from Willie McLaurin and Rolland Slade, each SBC govt committee members. “Our prayer is that the survivors of these heinous acts find hope and healing, and that church buildings will make the most of this checklist proactively to protect and care for essentially the most weak among us.”

Attorneys for the SBC government committee researched the checklist of accused abusers, taking steps to confirm information it contained. It left unredacted entries about alleged abusers that might be confirmed, whereas redacting entries where someone was acquitted or didn't have a ultimate disposition, as well as info that might identify victims.

Missouri males characteristic prominently on the list. They embody:

This story comes from the Midwest Newsroom, an investigative journalism collaboration together with IPR, KCUR 89.3, Nebraska Public Media Information, St. Louis Public Radio and NPR. For extra in-depth news from Iowa, Kansas, Missouri and Nebraska, we invite you to follow us on Twitter.