To make a horrifically long story short, leaders in the SBC were proven to have repeatedly ignored, blamed, discredited, and shamed victims of sexual violence who have made outcries over the past decades. They even had a list of known offenders who were still active in church leadership. The Guidepost report's conclusion is that the SBC's executive committee was more concerned with protecting the reputation of the SBC than they were with the actual crimes being committed and hidden. This has left untold numbers of victims invalidated and ostracized by their own religious leaders.
I'm heartbroken for a number of reasons but this doesn't just impact me professionally. It's personal. For over 18 years of my life, the Southern Baptist Convention was like my family. My parents were career missionaries, sent by the International Mission Board, an extension of the SBC, to bring the gospel to the people of the Philippines. For my whole childhood, every meal I ate and every house I lived in was paid for by donations from Southern Baptist churches. When we would visit the states every few years, my family made the rounds to dozens of Southern Baptist congregations asking for their continued generosity.
I wish I could say that I'm shocked to discover that the SBC's leadership is so corrupt, but I'm not. I lived through it myself. I doubt that my name is on their list of victims of unreported sexual assault but it should be. In my case, though, no one else silenced me. I did that myself, believing that it was what God wanted.
At eight years old I had already internalized a very profound belief: I didn't matter to God. How could I? He'd "called" my parents to a remote area of the world to spend their lives saving the lost from eternal damnation and my job was to stay out of the way. That's why, when I was molested by a stranger at 8, I didn't even consider telling my parents. I was sure that speaking up would get me in trouble for interfering with God's calling. That is the culture that the Southern Baptist Convention has been cultivating.
Over the years I've shifted the blame for my trauma a thousand times. Was it my fault somehow? Was it my parent's neglect? Was it the mission board's careless policies? Or Christianity in general? Possibly several of the above. But there's one thing I know for sure: No human being should ever, EVER feel the need to silently bear the burden of being sexually assaulted for the sake of the gospel.
It devastates me that I ever believed I was worth so little to God, much less to my church and family. It breaks my heart to know that I wasn't the only one who had to bear that unspeakable trauma in silence. It outrages me that so many people have had their lives destroyed by an organization that claims to be doing God's work.
As people of my generation flee American evangelicalism in droves, it's infuriating to hear shock and confusion from those who are still devout. If you want to know why we're leaving, here it is: The evangelical "good news" is a slap in the face to those who have been traumatized and then silenced in the name of a loving God. I no longer attend church or profess to be a Christian, but if a good God does exist, he is undoubtedly disgusted by what this version of Christianity has become.
As we digest the news of the SBC report (only the latest in an exhausting list of similar scandals) we're bound to look for someone to blame. I pray with all of the faith that I have left that we won't let this horror be dismissed by placating statements about "some individuals" who "are not true representations" of Christian beliefs. When enough high-ranking "individuals" in an organization follow the same horrific path, it's time to stop deflecting or feigning shock. It's time to start showing compassion to those who have been silenced by tearing the offending organization down.
If God is indeed great, he will applaud the fall of corrupt systems; even those that were in his name.
In case you're wondering, yes, I did eventually come forward about what happened. Nearly 20 years after the assault, I finally realized the implications of continuing to hide in shame. I filed an official report but too much time had gone by for any charges to be brought. What matters the most is that I'm no longer holding an innocent eight-year-old girl responsible to sacrifice her safety and emotional wellbeing for the sake of her religion.
I deeply, truly hope that other survivors of sexual assault in religious settings will find the healing and real freedom that I have found. I hope we will finally hold the perpetrators accountable and stop letting this tragedy play out again and again.
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