Eight years ago, in the fall of 2014, I had the opportunity to correspond with a member of the SBC Executive Committee about the SBC sexual abuse offender database that didn’t exist yet.
His name was Roger Oldham, and he showed up in the 288-page investigative report issued by Guidepost Solutions on Sunday.
That fall of 2014 I was working on the book Tear Down This Wall of Silence: Dealing with Sexual Abuse in Our Churches with Dale Ingraham. As part of my research, I read Christa Brown’s book This Little Light: Beyond a Baptist Preacher Predator and His Gang (in one sitting, I might add).
Here is my review of her book that I posted on Amazon:
Only about 20% of this book focuses on the Baptist Preacher Predator–the youth director who molested and raped Christa and the difficulties that abuse produced in her life.
The other 80% focuses on the Gang–the author’s attempt to find some sort of compassion and concern, first with the local church, then the wider body, and finally the national convention of the Southern Baptists. I was amazed at Christa’s perseverance and appalled at the stone-cold stonewalling she received from the church and the denomination, again and again and again.
I’m ignorant and naïve, but I still can’t understand why people wouldn’t want to do all they can to protect the vulnerable from abuse and show compassion to those who have been abused. I cannot understand it.
I received this book at lunchtime and had finished reading it by a late suppertime. I could not put it down. It was gripping, compelling, and nauseating.
So, since her book was published in 2009 and I was reading it and working on my book in 2014, I wanted to find out what progress had been made in a matter that seemed so clear-cut. Roger Oldham of the Executive Committee was recommended to me, so I wrote to him.
After introductions, I asked:
Has the SBC made any progress in the past five years on this matter? Specifically, have they established a database? Because I’m going to put a footnote in this new book, and I want it to be accurate.
Part of my letter said this:
I can see how experiencing the treatment that Christa described at the hands of leaders of the SBC . . . would have propelled more than one person to a complete loss of faith. Though my own experience and advocacy work is primarily in the area of independent Baptist churches and Bob Jones University, I was sickened to see that the Southern Baptists appeared to be just as bad.
So my hope is that all that terrible stonewalling and lack of care is in the past, and in the past five years some massive strides have been made to love and care for abuse victims and to keep the evil abuse offenders from being able to hurt the people in the Southern Baptist churches.
Roger Oldham did reply, in fact, almost immediately, with some links to articles that didn’t answer my question. We link to the U.S. sex offender database, he said, and we passed the Resolution of 2013 that included such information as how church officials should call law enforcement when there’s abuse in the church.
A resolution is good. Just like pinwheels on the lawn in April are nice.
When he told me they couldn’t have a database because the SBC never interferes in the autonomous local church, I replied,
I wouldn’t think of a database of admitted offenders that are not in backgroundcheck.com as being any sort of operation of authority. I would see it as simply helpful information that a local church could use or not use as they see fit, sort of like the Sunday school or VBS material or the LifeWay connection to backgroundcheck.com that you currently provide.
So why did he then ask to talk on the phone? I wasn’t sure, but when we did I took very careful notes, because I know how it can be with phone calls. . . . Unless they’re recorded, one can deny having said the things one said.
As I made my non-brilliant points, he said more than once, “I’ve never thought about it that way.” I confess I was in eye-roll mode there because I knew these were only things Christa herself had discussed.
For example, I told him the database can be for offenders who for one reason or another won’t be going through the criminal justice system (statute of limitations or some other reason) but (1) have open-and-shut evidence against them (which might necessitate an investigation) or (2) have admitted their offense.
“It’s not that unusual for offenders to admit to their crimes if they think they can get a quick forgiveness and restoration,” I observed. “And one way the SBC can show they really care about this issue beyond just making a ‘resolution’ is to say that you’re willing to name admitted offenders who have fallen through the cracks.”
Then I brought up the matter of how the SBC de-members churches who are “not in friendly cooperation.” (In theory it could be a number of things, but in practice it was only about homosexuality and women preachers.)
“Couldn’t this also apply to an SBC church in which you become aware that a person in that church has sexually assaulted an underage person, even if that crime has never been reported?” I asked.
His replies kept on along the lines of, “You have some really great points. I hadn’t thought about it that way. I’ll think about these things and get back with you.”
But regarding that last one, I added,
“This is not a hypothetical scenario. This is what happened in Christa Brown’s situation and in the cases of several other people she has written about either in her book or on her blog or her other blog, and Bob Allen has written about too (at www.baptistnews.com).”
Then I also asked him if he had ever read Christa’s book—after all, her story created quite a furor in the SBC in the mid-2000s and surely played a major part in the resolution they passed in 2013.
He said no. Roger Oldham, who was on the Executive Committee, had never read the book that so clearly documented abuse in his own denomination.
“Will you read it?” I urged. “It’s a quick and easy read. I finished it in an afternoon.”
Yes, he would read it, he said. He’d read it in the next couple of weeks. And he’d get back with me.
To be honest with you, I rolled my eyes again.
Dale Ingraham, the primary author of Tear Down This Wall of Silence, was very optimistic back in those early days about the SBC “getting it.”
I wasn’t as optimistic. I believed there was a whole lot of institution-protecting going on.
But after the phone call, I wrote to Oldham immediately, synopsizing all we had discussed, saying, “I’ll look forward to hearing from you as to whether you think this is an accurate synopsis.”
I never heard from him again.
So had he said conciliatory things to me on the phone because he knew I was writing a book? Did he purposely intend to never follow up?
That was certainly the sense I got.
At that time, I made the footnote in the book. I went on with working to expose the abuse in the Bob Jones University world.
And here we are, eight years later. The report has come out, and there is Roger Oldham’s name.
Internal communication indicated that he saw Christa Brown, the brave author of This Little Light, as a hindrance to be removed.
And I find, contrary to the ignorance and naivete he so unconvincingly tried to exhibit to me over the phone (combined with flattery about my “great points”), Roger Oldham was keeping his own database of sexual abuse offenders in the Southern Baptist world.
In fact, he had been keeping an informal database since 2009, the very year Christa’s book was published. By the time we talked, he had around 200 on his list.
Yet, the Guidepost Solutions report states, he “never took any action to ensure that the accused ministers were no longer in positions of power at SBC churches.”
There is more, so much more in the 288 pages. These are issues that have been flying right in their faces for decades. But no, the “institution” was more important than the cause of Christ. The “powerful” were more important than the powerless.
Many people have their stories. Mine is a small one.
But I add it to the chorus of those who say, “I bear witness too.”
*****
An earlier version of this story, not naming Roger Oldham, was published in 2018.
***
Go here to download your free Guide, How to Enjoy the Bible Again (when you’re ready) After Spiritual Abuse (without feeling guilty or getting triggered out of your mind). You’ll receive access to both print and audio versions of the Guide (audio read by me). I’m praying it will be helpful.
I am soooo glad I didn’t fly pass, delete or ignore this email. I experienced a number of emotions, thoughts and opinions,, while reading it. The strongest being a sense of advocacy.
How can I help make a difference. How can I help bring about awareness, how can I EDUCATE.
I realize I can do it all but I can certainly contribute. EDUCATION is the focus point of my organization L.A.S.A. Life After Sexual Assault.
I pledge, vow to EDUCATE as many as possible regarding the truth about Sexual-Abuse.
Research has proven 95% of childhood sexual abuse can be prevented via EDUCATION.
As a two-time, childhood sexual assault survivor, I feel this is my life’s calling. Again thank you for sharing.
Thank you so much, Yvonne, and I grieve for what happened to you.
I was in learning mode for about 6 years (2006-2012) before I began speaking at ALL, and even then I was in learning mode. (Ha, truth be told, I still am.) It was in late 2016 – early 2017 that my blog shifted over to an advocacy blog (from a devotional blog), so after I’d been learning for about 10 years. That year, 2017, is when my ministry really began to flourish. (I didn’t start a FB pro page till a year ago, though, because, well, I just resisted doing it, haha.)
I say all that to say, I believe that even (and perhaps especially) when you’ve been through it, getting training is very important. There is so much to learn and so much to understand, about how the brain works and why it works that way, about our relationship with the Lord, about our relationship with others, about sin and righteousness, and more. I’ve seen some people begin speaking out of their woundedness (I don’t know you, so I don’t know if you would do this or not), and they end up hurting others. To others, they can seem as if they are like the abusers they despise.
of course I’m not talking about mistakes–we all make mistakes, and as we grow and mature and learn, we will make fewer of them. I’m speaking more of the groundedness that’s needed to do this work well.
Your points here, laid out in “eye-rolling” obviousness, just make my blood boil! As I read today that Josh Duggar was sentenced to 12.5 years in prison for his heinous crimes, I remain appalled at the perverted church culture he grew up in. I have been on the inside of a church leadership for 35 years and taught in a Christian school for 11 years. I encountered a pervasive patriarchal, even unscriptural culture in both places. My own PTSD is triggered each time I see more evidence that the church is in deep trouble. I believe Holy God has put the church on the threshing floor where wheat is separated from chaff and only the wheat will remain. Thank you for being a “thresher”! God is using you mightily.
My impression is that Roger Oldham was not interested in addressing the ongoing problem of sexual, mental, and physical abuse predators in the SBC.
Many Southern Baptists are ignorant and innocent of the systemic wide problem of sexual abuse and cover up in the SBC. They are shocked beyond our imagination at the 288 page revelations of this committee. We have to pray for them that their pain and their outrage and their denial does not stop the SBC leadership from continuing to address and act on the resolutions they have begun to set in place.
The Bible says that Jesus “will baptize us with His Holy Spirit and with fire”. It also says that “He has laid His axe at the root of the tree.” Go, Lord Jesus! Let our Father be glorified! This is Your work, to bring healing, revival, and Your Gospel back to the church in our country!
Right, that was definitely my impression too–very much so.
And amen.
Thank you for this, Rebecca. It stirs so many thoughts.
About the statement that the SBC keeps hands off to allow local churches to be autonomous, are they not willing to kick a church off its membership rolls for doctrinal drift?
And this is me too!
I’m ignorant and naïve, but I still can’t understand why people wouldn’t want to do all they can to protect the vulnerable from abuse and show compassion to those who have been abused. I cannot understand it.
My church-hurt story is not sexual abuse but of another kind and yet I watched two pastors and two elders circle the wagons and come against me using their biggest weapon, church discipline. They said I was unforgiving toward a person who had hurt me. (I wanted to see repentance a breach of Adams’ three promises of forgiveness.)
But as the situation developed, I came to see that my greatest offense was item #2: I had “become an accuser of my counselors.” I had told my own story of disastrous counseling to someone I trusted, violating apparently some unwritten code.
Their self-protection and self-exaltation comes at a price that is paid by we little insignificant people, God’s beloved lambs. Woe to the shepherds.
So awful, Helen, and I’m so sorry. This story is repeated over and over.
I’ve written about that Jay Adams three-promises-of-forgiveness-that-isn’t-in-the-Bible thing.
And of course, the ignorance and naivete that I claimed in 2014 is no longer the case. Though I long to stay free from caustic cynicism, I do see now that the wickedness and self-protection in church leaders runs very, very deep.
In a state of horror, I found myself saying “Wow” as I read this entire account. But although I was shocked, I wasn’t surprised. As we’ve seen so many times, all too often the priority is to preserve an image of the church and its cronies – however false – over others’ personal safety and truth.
It’s all about protecting that image.
My heart is simply broken for the sexual abuse so rampant in all the churches. It’s so sad. And it makes me feel like the Pharisees, I mean, Christians, know NOTHING about the love of God.
Well, if they know nothing about the love of God, then I would venture to say they’re not Christians. Yes, the situation is definitely a huge spiritual crisis.
Thank you for sharing your experience. Let the truth be told.
Amen