Southern Baptists vote to fight sexual abuse and elect a leader eager for change

https://www.npr.org/2022/06/15/ [login to see] /southern-baptists-vote-to-fight-sexual-abuse-and-elect-a-leader-eager-for-change
The annual meeting of the Southern Baptist Convention put dissonance on display.

The mass gathering Tuesday and Wednesday in Anaheim, Calif., entailed two days of bickering over hot-button religious topics — ordaining women, denouncing the LGBT movement, applauding abortion bans — interspersed with 15-minute blocks of worship, prayer and preaching.

Repentance was the dominant theme of the spiritual interludes.

There is much to repent for after the bombshell third-party investigation by Guidepost Solutions, authorized at last year's meeting. The report, made public May 22, revealed widespread silencing of abuse victims. The denomination even kept tabs on hundreds of credibly accused ministers but allowed them to move to other churches without sharing that information, the report noted.

"Today we will choose between humility or hubris. We will choose between genuine repentance or continually being passive to our approach to sexual abuse in the Southern Baptist Convention," the Rev. Bruce Frank of North Carolina said Tuesday before a vote on several reforms he described as the "bare minimum" of what needs to be done. Frank led the denomination's Sexual Abuse Task Force, which oversaw the outside investigation.