Eight Missouri ministers accused of intercourse abuse in Southern Baptist Conference report • Missouri Impartial

The Southern Baptist Convention on Thursday released a once-secret and prolonged checklist of accused sex abusers — several of whom are in the Midwest — throughout the denomination.

The 205-page checklist is a compilation of ministers and different church workers who've been credibly accused of sexual abuse. The record is described as a “fluid, working doc” that was additionally incomplete however largely pulls information about abusers from revealed news studies.

The publication of the listing comes after the release Sunday of a 300-page report by an impartial investigator that described how leaders of the Southern Baptist denomination for decades have acquired experiences of sexual abuse dedicated by church staff, pastors and others. But these reviews were largely stored secret and, slightly than acting upon and investigating stories of sexual abuse, denomination leaders sought to intimidate and vilify victims and their advocates.

“The entire thing ought to be seen for what it's,” wrote former Southern Baptist Convention executive committee member and common counsel D. August Boto in an inside e mail that was revealed within the report. “It’s a satanic scheme to fully distract us from evangelism.”

The crisis rocking the Southern Baptist denomination this week is analogous in some ways to what the Catholic church continues to face. Leaders in each faiths systematically hid information about sexual misconduct, appeared to indicate extra concern about their very own legal liability than the victims and at times failed to 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 crisis, wrote a letter to SBC management conveying his concern that Southern Baptist leaders have been repeating the failures of the Catholic church in dealing with intercourse abuse.

Doyle was told, “Southern Baptist leaders actually don't have any authority over local church buildings,” a response that Doyle regarded as dismissive, in keeping with the investigative report. 

That same 12 months, at the SBC conference in San Antonio, Oklahoma pastor Wade Burleson made a motion 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 “assist in stopping any future sexual abuse or harassment.”

The database proposal appeared to go nowhere, according to the report, and witnesses at the conference recalled little about it besides to precise their opinion that it would “violate native church autonomy.”

Ultimately, a staffer for the SBC govt committee since 2007 had maintained an inventory of accused ministers and church employees, but it surely was stored hidden from the public and even SBC executive committee trustees, according to the report.

Southern Baptist leaders said publicizing the checklist of credibly accused abusers represented “an initial, however necessary, step in direction of addressing the scourge of sexual abuse and implementing reform in the Convention.”

“Each entry on this list reminds us of the devastation and destruction led to by sexual abuse,” stated a joint assertion from Willie McLaurin and Rolland Slade, both SBC govt committee members. “Our prayer is that the survivors of these heinous acts discover hope and healing, and that churches will make the most of this checklist proactively to guard and take care of the most weak among us.”

Lawyers for the SBC govt committee researched the listing of accused abusers, taking steps to confirm information it contained. It left unredacted entries about alleged abusers that might be confirmed, while redacting entries the place somebody was acquitted or didn't have a closing disposition, as well as data that would establish victims.

Missouri men function prominently on the record. They include:

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 information from Iowa, Kansas, Missouri and Nebraska, we invite you to follow us on Twitter.