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Date: 16.9.18
Text: John 8
Title: Does abuse in the Church prove that Christianity is no better?
Place: Rhema
File: Apologetics3(Rhema)
Preacher: Stephen Taylor
Last year a friend encouraged me to watch the movie Spotlight. Spotlightbegins with a short phrase on a black-and-white screen: “Based on actual events.” And it goes on to tell the story of a group of reporters who work for the Boston Globe newspaper, the spotlight team, who over the course of a couple of years uncover the systematic sexual abuse of more than 1,000 children at the hands of around 249 Boston area priests.
It’s an amazing movie on a horrendous subject. For it highlights not only the abuse, which was heinous, but the cover up, the denials, the moving on of priests, the hush money, the legal gymnastics that survivors needed to jump through. But in this movie eventually some of the perpetrators are brought to justice. And it ends with a list of another 208 cities throughout the world where a similar story could be told. 208 cities! A list that includes the city of Newcastle, Australia.
No this is not a problem in a galaxy far, far away. This is our problem, in our backyard. Which is why surveys have actually shown this is the number 1 problem stopping people from considering a faith in God. How could the Church allow these things to happen?
- The Problem
First let me address the extent of the problem. For the abuse of a child, an innocent and defenceless child has to be one of the worst crimes imaginable, don’t you think? And here we have an institution, the Church that claims to represent a God of love who has not only allowed the weak and the vulnerable to be subject to the worst kind of cruelty and betrayal that you can possibly imagine but did nothing about it when it began to come to light.
No it was actually worse than that, they actively tried to cover it up. They claimed that the victims were telling lies. They moved paedophile priests to other Churches where they just wreaked havoc again & they did that because they were more concerned with the finances and the good name of the Church than confronting the problem and helping the survivors.
It’s shameful. It’s wicked. It’s evil. And because these things have happened in the Church, god’s Church “the name of God is blasphemed among the Gentiles” (Rom 2:24)
But it not just a Church problem it’s a societal problem. Hollywood was rocked last year by the Harvey Weinstein allegations. TV has had Don Burke, Rolf Harris, Jimmy Savile allegations. As has the scouts, school teachers, indigenous communities, government institutions. This is a massive problem for our whole society.
As a society we have let our young people down horribly. But this doesn’t mean the Church
can wipe their hands of their part in all this. In the words of Catholic Bishop Geoffrey Robinson, “Some might say it’s ‘No worse than others’. But that is not a good enough answer. They are priests for God’s sake”.
- An Apology
And so as we deal with thismost important question the Church needs to say, “We are sorry. Deeply sorry.”The Church hasn’t got it right in the past. We didn’t take peoples allegations seriously enough. We were more interested in protecting our Churches good name or our Churches finances.
So if you know of anything that the Church has done to you or others in the past you need to go to the police with that information. And if you can’t go alone then find someone who will go with you because this is not your fault. And you will need people, good people to surround you and be with you as you go through this difficult journey.
Sexual Abuse is a sin, a sexual sin as it violates the Bible’s commands about how we should use our sexuality. But it is also a sin of coveting wanting something that is not yours. It is a sin of deceit because it thrives in secrecy. It is a sin of violence forcing children to do what they don’t want to do. It is also an abuse of power and it has devastating effects on children.
In the long term child sexual abuse may lead to depression, anxiety, drug & alcohol addiction, suicide, poor self esteem and post traumatic stress disorder. But sexual abuse has also been described as a murder of the soul because it makes it difficult to believe in a God of love, in a God who cares for his people, who answers their prayers. So often then there is also a loss of faith, a guilt, a grief, an anger, a sense of shame and an inability to love & trust.
This is not your fault, it was the perpetrators fault &often the Churches fault for not protecting you. We can’t take away what has happened to you but we are determined to not make it worse than it is. We take responsibility for our actions and we want to try and do the right thing, the caring thing, the just thing from here on in.
Or taking the words of one Australian Catholic Bishop who wrote to a survivor after hearing his story from his own lips, “the behaviour of FR … is contrary to everything the Church stands for. I know an apology will not change the past but I am absolutely ashamed that such behaviour was perpetrated against yourself and others by Church personnel. As a Bishop of the Church I declare that there was no excuse for such brutal treatment and I am deeply sorry that it took place… When I left you I felt both humbled and ashamed.”
- Repent
But it is not good enough just to say sorry. The Church needs to repent as well. Sorry might be a good first step but it can’t be our last step. A sign that you are truly sorry is that you will repent and change your ways. And so if the Church is truly sorry it will show its repentance by doing four things.
It will pastorally care for the survivors. The allegations must be listened to by the Church and heard by the Church. It is not up to the Church to determine whether a crime has been committed that is up to the police and the law courts. So the Church doesn’t act as a judge
and jury on itself that doesn’t work but as someone who will pastorally care for the survivor.
Thesurvivors need a safe place to rebuild trust. They need someone to walk with them through the difficult times. They will need money for medical bills, for counselling, for depression, maybe even in place of a job they can no longer get. The Church is to love them
and help them find a way towards the light in the midst of their deep darkness.
Secondly the Church needs to help bring about justice. Now I don’t mean criminal justice once again that is up to the courts but there needs to be disciplinary proceedings against those who are charged with such offenses. For the Church should have a higher level of accountability than just the law. For Church leaders are bound to a higher standard than the Australian law, they must follow the standards of the Bible. So these allegations need to be investigated and if the Bible’s expectations have not been met then discipline needs to be enacted. Removal from office. No access to children. No way to return to active ministry all need to be considered.
Thirdly the Church needs to put in place preventative measures to ensure these things don’t happen again. Which is what most denominations, including my own has done over the last decade or so. Things like creating child protection policies, working with children checks,screening all volunteers, training them in safe practices and providing adequate supervision. We need to make Churches a safe place again for all of our people.
Lastly a repentant Church will emphasise the gospel of the good news of Jesus Christ. For
despite all that the Church has done wrong in the pastit holds in its hands the gospel of the Lord Jesus Christ which is good news for all people.
It is good news for survivors. Psalm 72 reveals God as the one who truly cares for those who have been hurt. “For he will deliver the needy who cry out, the afflicted who have no one to help. He will take pity on the weak and the needy and save the needy from death. He will rescue them from oppression and violence, for precious is their blood in his sight”
Jesus once said “Come to me,all you who are weary and burdened, and I will give you rest.29Take my yoke upon you and learn from me,for I am gentle and humble in heart, and you will find rest for your souls.30For my yoke is easy & my burden is light.” God cares. Jesus cares even if it seems that others don’t care or the Church doesn’t care. As a Church we need to keep pointing to the good news that God does care for the survivors. That Jesus Himself felt the absence of God. That Jesus has gone through so much of what we have gone through. He understands, he cares. He will always find a way to bring us to God.
As well as pointing to the good news that is available also for the perpetrators of these terrible crimes. Pauls says in 1 Corinthians 6:9-11, “Do not be deceived:Neither the sexually immoral nor idolaters nor adulterersnor men who have sex with men10nor thieves nor the greedy nor drunkards nor slanderers nor swindlerswill inherit the kingdom of God.11And that is what some of you were.But you were washed,you were sanctified,you were
justifiedin the name of the Lord Jesus Christ and by the Spirit of our God.”
That is what some of you were, Paul says. But Jesus death on the cross pays for our sin, even
the worst of our sin. And so even the perpetrators of these crimes can be forgiven. But… and it is a massive but, the perpetrator must fully repent.
I think at times the Church has been too quick to forgive in the past. Yale theologian Miroslav Volf, himself famous for having forgiven his brutal interrogators in communist Yugoslavia, says Christian forgiveness is not some teary-eyed sentiment. It’s hard edged & is reliant on honestly facing wrongs & bringing them into the light. “Full reconciliation, cannot take place until the truth has been said and justice done”, he writes.
The perpetrators must still face the civil courts, they will need to pay for their crimes here on earth. But the good news is if they truly repent God can also fully forgive them and over time change them. It is often in our brokenness that God does his work and the one who realises they are a sinner is often broken by that sin.Only then they can find grace given to them from Jesus Christ.
The Church has good news also for the world that we live in. You see it is the gospel that truly understands what is going on in the world. The reason that child sexual abuse is in our Churches, our families, our society is that we live in a selfish world. All of us have sinned and fallen short of the glory of God. All of us have within us a nature that cares more about ourselves than our neighbour and the one who made our neighbour.
James chapter 4 says “What causes quarrels and what causes fights among you? Is it not
this, that your passionsareat war within you?2You desire and do not have, so you murder.
You covet and cannot obtain, so you fight and quarrel.” There are deep and strong urges inside all of us. Left unchecked they lead to violence, hurt and pain for the people around us. None of us are immune to sin. All of us have standards that we break on a regular basis.
And yet through Jesus Christ, God is offering us redemption, renewal and a recreation. It is not available through the Church. It is not available through a priest or a Christian minister, it is available only through Jesus. So what this Church sexual abuse crisis has done is it has shown that the Church is clearly not the way to God, only Jesus is. That the body of Christ will always be far from perfect but Jesus always did what was perfect. That religion can and will be corruptible but a relationship with Jesus is and always will be freeing.The Church can’t just be pointing to itself it must keep pointing people back to Jesus Christ
Let me give you an example. In John 8, we see a woman is dragged before Jesus having been caught in the very act of adultery. She is brought in for condemnation by the leaders of the religious institution of the day. They don’t really care about her but they want to trap Jesus. And so they use a woman as a pawn in the game they are playing to trap and destroy Jesus.
And yet Jesus has this wonderful capacity to be serious about sin and have compassion on the sinner. He firstly tells the mob baying for blood that he who is without sin can cast the first stone. And so one by one they all leave. You see he was telling them that they are all sinners too. That they will one day have to face judgement for what they have done. You see Jesus isn’t soft on sin. He represents a God of just judgement after all.
But when they have all left he asks the woman, is there anyone left to condemn you? No
one she answers. Then neither do I condemn you. Go now and leave your life of sin. Here we see Jesus compassion for the lost. His care for those that no one else seemed to care for. Here in Jesus we see justice and mercy come through. Love the sinner, hate the sin. Tough on those who needed toughness, gentle on those who needed gentleness.
Jesus. That’s who the Church needs to point toward in the midst of all this abuse. Because
Jesus didn’t just talk the talk he was even willing to die for his enemies a horrible death on
the cross. He took our sin seriously by taking our place and receiving the punishment that
should have been ours. Yet as he hangs on the cross after being arrested, flogged, unjustly
and taunted by all and sundry he says “Father forgive them they don’t know what they do.”
There on the cross justice and mercy work beautifully together. Compassion for the lost, condemnation for the proud. Jesus. That is who we are to point toward. That is what the Church should be all about. Or in the words of Dale Kuehne, a professor of political science, pastor and someone who has been abused himself by his Pastor when he was 11 years of age. It is “not going to do any of us any good if we beat up on Jesus when he is our only hope. Jesus is still our hope in the midst of all of this.”
So to end, how would I answer someone who said to me “Do the sexual abuse scandals in the Church show that Christianity is bankrupt”.Well I would say something like this. “Recent events have shown that the Church has not only been the place where people have been sexually abused but it has denied that it has happened & covered it up which has made things worse. Yet what has happened in the Church has happened also in Hollywood, foreign aid, scouts, schools and especially the family. Because the problem is not just the Church it is the human heart. Yet the Church has to put up its hand and say “We are sorry.” There is no excuse. No mitigating circumstances. We did wrong and we now take full responsibility for our actions.
And as part of our repentance the Church needs to do four things, Pastorally care for those who have been abused, Discipline and bring to justice the abusers, Put in place procedures to stop it happening again and preach that the only way forward for us all is through Jesus.
For in the end it is not the Church you need to put your trust in, its Jesus. It is not the
Church but Jesus Himself who gives us hope. For while he was on earth he modelled a hatred
for sin but a love for the sinner. And he was so committed to the justice, pastoral care
and forgiveness that he died on the cross to open the way for all these things to come to us. Yes the Church has let people down but Jesus will never let you down. Come to him, give him a go, put your trust in him & you will find in Him justice & compassion. Grace & forgiveness. You will find that he is the hope of the world and he is also your one and only hope as well.