In an effort to help the Southern Baptist Convention Executive Committee rebound from ongoing financial struggles and growing legal expenses, the EC announced on Tuesday (Sept. 17) it was planning to sell its downtown Nashville building. The EC also reported this week during its meeting it had spent more than $12.1 million on sexual abuse investigation-related expenses since 2020.
During the meeting, newly installed EC President and CEO Jeff Iorg also announced on Tuesday it was time for the SBC to “stop talking” about sexual abuse prevention and response and “take an initial step” toward creating a new department dedicated to helping churches confront the issue. The move was in response to messengers this past June in Indianapolis calling for the EC to find a more permanent home for abuse response in the SBC.
‘Stop talking’
“It’s time now to stop talking about what we’re going to do and take an initial step,” Iorg said.
Iorg noted, that EC leadership “ultimately concluded that the next most important step was to create a department in the Executive Committee to get us proactively started on implementing sexual abuse prevention and response across our denomination.”
The Executive Committee will now look to hire a director and additional staff as needed to lead the department and help Southern Baptists prevent abuse in their churches.
While questions still remain on what exactly that next step will look like and who the director will be, Iorg acknowledged it’s a much-needed step forward.
More details
For more headlines related to these latest developments, see list below:
Southern Baptists to sell downtown Nashville building due to costs over SBC abuse inquiry — Tennessean
EC votes to create department dedicated to ongoing sexual abuse response — Baptist Press
SBC may be heading toward settlement with Johnny Hunt, will sell building — Baptist News Global
SBC EC legal expenses surpass $12M in three years — Baptist Press
EDITOR’S NOTE — This report was compiled by Shawn Hendricks, The Baptist Paper.
