To continue conversations addressing sexual abuse within churches, the Southern Baptist Convention Executive Committee sponsored a panel discussion on abuse response and prevention during the SBC annual meeting June 9 in Dallas.
The panel discussion on “Safeguarding the Next Generation” featured Olivia Littleton, Jeff Dalrymple, Lynne Little, Matt Espenshade and moderator Courtney Reissig.
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Littleton is a team supervisor for One More Child, an anti-trafficking group. Dalrymple serves with the SBC Executive Committee as director of abuse prevention and response.
The conversation began with the question: “Why are we still talking about this?”
“I think the worst thing that we can do is hide and act like this doesn’t affect everyone,” Espenshade said. “This affects not just Christian communities, but camps and schools and public institutions. It’s everywhere, and it’s pervasive.”
‘Biblical mandate to continue this conversation’
Little, a Christian educator, said, “Every child is the thumbprint of God.”
“We have a biblical mandate to continue this conversation because the reality is that the statistics are staggering,” she said, “We continue this conversation because we have a continuing aggressive culture towards abuse of our children. There are increased avenues of access to our children. Misconduct is on the rise and yet our safeguards aren’t keeping pace.”
Dalrymple pointed to societal issues.
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“I think also we see the sexualization of our culture and the prevalence of promiscuity and pornography in virtually every aspect of society, and that’s infiltrated the churches. So, our churches need to continue to preach the good news of Jesus Christ, call people to repentance [and] call people to discipleship,” Dalrymple said.
During the discussion, the panel shared the statistic from the Centers for Disease Control that 1 in 7 children are abused and/or neglected.
“One in seven is one too many,” Reissig said. “And Jesus is a good shepherd who goes after the one. He cares about the one.
“And if that’s the one who is abused, our stories and abuse happening in churches in particular tell a story about Christ that is not true. And we don’t want that for our children, and we don’t want that for our Christian witness.”
The conversation also included advice on how to equip yourself and what signs to be aware of as a leader within a Christian community and as a parent.
Topics discussed also included online predator activity through social media, AI, online gaming and explicit acts of extortion.
‘Everybody has a role to play’
The speakers encouraged parents to be more aware of their children’s online activity, as well as to be in consistent conversation with their kids in order to develop their ability to discern.
Espenshade, a Tennessee pastor who served 24 years with the FBI, emphasized the need for governance, training, policy and improved response.
“Everybody has a role to play and everybody has to be educated on what to look for,” Espenshade said. “It comes down to training and mindset. You have to have good governance and good training in letting people know what to look for. You have to have good response plans in place.
“Grooming happens, and they [groomers] are master manipulators … building trust with kids, trying to isolate them from other people, gradually pushing boundaries with those kids so that they start to think about things differently and isolating those from the ones that truly care about them.
“Also, in church particularly, we often mistake someone’s spiritual reputation and think that equals safety … Their position doesn’t equal spiritual integrity.”
As the conversation on equipping continued, Littleton expressed the importance of reporting even if you suspect abuse of a child is taking place rather than expecting someone else to.
“There is no ‘somebody else’ on your team. I never met anyone named ‘somebody else,’” Littleton said.
“So, when you say somebody else is going to make that call … that person is you. And wouldn’t you rather have made the call to report and have been wrong, than to have not made the call and abuse is missed. So, take the chance, report it.
“There are experts that will then take the ball and carry it from here. But we have the first step that we need to report it and pass it on. And hopefully you’re wrong … hopefully there is not abuse, but we’d rather make the call and be wrong than to have missed an opportunity to intervene in a child’s life.”
Other recommendations from the panel included required mandatory training and reporting policies, background checks and proper response to mitigating trauma in the event that abuse takes place.
The SBC also provides resources on sexual abuse prevention through their website as well as resources from GuideStone, Lifeway and associated state conventions.
EDITOR’S NOTE — This story was written by Kendall Lyons and originally published by Baptist Standard.
