From an interview with Christianity Today:
https://www.christianitytoday.com/ct/2018/january-web-only/rachael-denhollander-larry-nassar-forgiveness-gospel.html
"Yes. Church is one of the least safe places to acknowledge abuse because the way it is counseled is, more often than not, damaging to the victim. There is an abhorrent lack of knowledge for the damage and devastation that sexual assault brings. It is with deep regret that I say the church is one of the worst places to go for help. That’s a hard thing to say, because I am a very conservative evangelical, but that is the truth. There are very, very few who have ever found true help in the church."
She then goes on to explain how her own advocacy on behalf of abuse victims made her into a pariah within her own church.
“The reason I lost my church was not specifically because I spoke up,” she says. “It was because we were advocating for other victims of sexual assault within the evangelical community, crimes which had been perpetrated by people in the church and whose abuse had been enabled, very clearly, by prominent leaders in the evangelical community.”
Denhollander also says that the situation she was dealing with in the [Evangelical] church was “one of the worst, if not the worst, instances of evangelical cover-up of sexual abuse.”
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varialus ago
It doesn't necessarily indicate that the Church has implemented institutional measures that resulted in the failure, but does at least suggest that the church hasn't institutionalized measures to prevent the failure. Another Evangelical leader may have done a much better job, if the failure isn't institutional, which I'm sot saying it isn't, just that individual reports of failings should be taken in measure, acknowledging that it conclusions should be tempered while viewed as isolated incidents.
But having said all that, looking at the bigger picture from my personal perspective it does seem like religious institutions often are ill equipped to help victims of sexual abuse. However, although they often do have that fault, certain churches also have a distinct strength of producing moral hardworking citizens who are faithful to their spouses and who raise many children to follow in their parents footsteps.
3141592653 ago
The Catholic church, at least, has in fact implemented such institutional measures
varialus ago
Edit: This kinda goes off on a tangent toward something indirectly related that I've been thinking about lately.
Yeah, there doesn't seem to be any ideal organizations or paths for people to follow. On the one hand you can give your family a comfortable, pleasant, and fun life, but it will likely lead to low birthrates which would in theory lead your descendants to be overrun by people of less pleasant religions. Or you can but strict, hardworking, and moral, but totally, totally boring and super strict, and have lots of descendants, but who wants to live a super boring and strict life? It might not be so bad if you never knew better, but it'd be hard to choose that if you didn't grow up with it. Theoretically a perfect medium might be possible, but it'd be like walking a tight rope where you don't know whether you made it across until six generations after you're dead.
3141592653 ago
Very interesting
Vindicator ago
This cracked me up. The solution is the virtue of 'Magnanimity"...but it is a virtue and thus not natural. It's something we have to practice.
I think we'll be seeing a turn around soon. It's generally the cost of college education that makes parents pucker up when it comes to generously welcoming the gift of new life. College education is now largely worthless, and new alternatives are already arising. There is light at the end of the tunnel. :-)