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Southern Baptist Convention vs. Catholic record-keeping about and punishment of clerical sexual predators

Unintentionally, Christa Brown points out how unfair it is of us to allude to Southern Baptist Convention (SBC) clerics as Batholics. Unfair to Catholicism.

As required by canon law, the Catholic Church keeps meticulous records on its clergy. In part because the Catholic Church has dealt with sexual predation by the clergy for hundreds of years, the records are inclusive of such matters.

Whereas the SBC neither keeps such records nor requires that any be kept, as she explains:

Usually, they not only allow the accused ministers to continue in ministry, but they don’t even keep any records about victims’ accusations. It is as though it never happened.

It is as though Baptist leaders believe “no records” means “no abuse.”

It certainly means no action, whereas the modern Catholic abuse and scandal appear to have arisen in part from a departure from early church practice, which required action against clerical predators. For in the early church, there was no tolerance for it, as Brendan Kiley explains:

The first official decree on the subject was written at the Council of Elvira, held around A.D. 305 near Granada, Spain. The precise history is complicated, but the council is traditionally believed to have set down 81 rules for behavior, the 71st of which is: “Those who sexually abuse boys may not commune even when death approaches.” It was the harshest one-strike policy: If you’re caught abusing a child, you are not only laicized, but permanently excommunicated—damned for all time.”

The SBC simply accepts no responsibility for dealing with such transgressions by Southern Baptist clergy. It embraces and defends a hands-off policy which permits clerical predators to move from church to church, unimpeded by denominational record keeping, accumulating victims as they go.

March 6, 2009 - Posted by | Catholic, Churches, History, Law |

3 Comments

  1. Your writer misunderstands the basic difference between Southern Baptists and Catholics. Each Southern Baptist Convention church is completely autonomous. They govern themselves. The Convention holds no authority over the local churches. Each of the 42,000 churches makes its own by-laws, and calls its own ministers. The Southern Baptist Convention neither assigns nor moves any Pastor to any church, ever.
    The issue of sexual misconduct is very grave, and deserves every bit of attention we can muster until we have stopped and punished every abuser. But the comparison you make to the Catholic sex scandal is neither valid, nor factual. Surprising for someone who claims such professional journalistic credential.

    Comment by Rev. Herbert J. Young | March 6, 2009

    • We understand the difference.
      We disagree with your assessment of its meaning, as you might easily have determined by reading from our long list of previous commentary on this issue.
      The Southern Baptist Convention could keep records on clerical sexual predation and has made a scandal of itself by refusing to do so. Specifically, the SBC failure to create a clerical pedophile database was one of Time Magazine’s top underreported stories of 2008.
      Church autonomy is not a reason for the failure to create, maintain and provide to local churches the required records.
      It is a shameful excuse.
      Our comparison of the SBC failure to the Catholic sex scandal is valid, factual and appropriate.

      Comment by baptistplanet | March 6, 2009

  2. I know this maybe somewhat off topic but it’s something that I have wanted to get off my chest about “Southern Baptist.” Both sides of my family are Catholic and my parents raised me and my brother in the Catholic religion. I was born in California, lived there until I was 8 years old, and not once did I feel that my peers thought negative about me for being a Catholic. I was at the age that I didn’t fully know the differences among religions until we moved to South Carolina. My parents were in disbelief that there was only ONE Catholic church in our city and the majority were all Baptist. Once again I didn’t see what the big issue was until I entered the 6th grade. It was the first few days of school when I was sitting at lunch with a group of girls in my class I became friends with. They were all talking about their churches and one of the girls, who proudly proclaimed she was a “Southern Baptist” asked me what church I went to. When she heard me say I went to the Catholic church she looked at me in disgust and asked “Don’t you Catholics worship the devil?” Wow! Can you say ignorance?! It was then that I realized(in my opinion) that “Southern Baptist” can be highly judgmental, especially towards Catholics. I have always questioned myself “How can these Southern Baptist try to portray themselves as wonderful people when I feel as if they judge other religions besides theirs?” This is my OWN opinion on “Southern Baptist” simply because I have come across so many who have made me feel as if my religion is so wrong and terrible.

    Comment by Erin | March 15, 2009


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