Ungodly abuse: The lasting torment of the New Tribes missionary kids

The Aritao school was run by a Florida-based group formerly known as New Tribes Mission, one of the largest Christian missionary organizations in the world.

New Tribes missionaries have operated in more than a dozen countries, spreading the gospel in some of the most remote corners of the globe.

Devoting one's life to God in this way requires a particular sacrifice. Missionary parents would often go several weeks in the field without seeing their young children, leaving them in the care of New Tribes boarding schools in places like the Philippines, Senegal and Brazil.

Some of the schools, former students say, employed missionaries who were like wolves in sheep's clothing.

In interviews with NBC News, more than a half-dozen women said they were sexually abused by New Tribes staffers while attending the mission schools in the 1980s and '90s.

Ungodly abuse: The lasting torment of the New Tribes missionary kids

UPDATED::The Silence of the Lambs | New Republic

UPDATE::  Missionary doctor won't face sex assault trial

A former Baptist missionary doctor from Wyoming accused of molesting nearly two dozen girls and women in Bangladesh, along with a girl in Allendale, won't face trial.

An Ottawa County judge ruled that Donn Ketcham, now 87, is incompetent to stand trial because he suffers from dementia.

Prosecutors told 24 Hour News 8 they don't plan to appeal, which means the charge against him will be dismissed.
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Ketcham, who also suffers from Parkinson's disease, was never charged over the allegations in Bangladesh decades ago, in part because his missionary group covered up the alleged crimes.

In his decision filed last week, Ottawa County Circuit Court Judge Jon Hulsing cited Ketcham's age, the fact he suffers from Parkinson's disease and his failing memory.

He is "unable to recall his attorney's name, is unable to identify his medications, is unable to identify the date, has gotten lost when walking, obsesses over certain issues, forgets significant events, and becomes agitated," the judge wrote in his opinion.

A state psychologist testified July 20 that Ketcham was competent to stand trial.

This is an older narrative that fell through the cracks during my recuperation.  While many of the cases and lawsuits primarily deal with the RCC, the story of Donn Ketcham highlights that it is  not "just" a Catholic problem.  Not that I ever believed that it was, as this blog highlights

Donn, the pastor would soon learn, was not really Kim’s uncle. He was Donn Ketcham, the 58-year-old chief doctor at the mission hospital in Bangladesh. His father had co-founded the Baptist denomination that sponsored the missionary group, the Association of Baptists for World Evangelism; its goal was to create a “militant, missionary-minded, Biblically separate haven of Fundamentalism.” Little known outside the world of Christian fundamentalists, ABWE is among the largest missionary groups in the United States, deploying more than 900 Baptists to 70 countries. His father’s legacy made Ketcham a sort of prince within the world of ABWE: the doctor with the “magical name,” as one missionary later put it, much beloved by the family of churches that supported the group. He’d been the undisputed patriarch of the Bangladesh mission for almost three decades.
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Kim’s confusion only grew. “My body likes it,” she thought, “so either I’m a bad person or it’s OK.” The biblical teachings she’d grown up with, in a culture that preached abstinence and the sinfulness of sex, told her it was wrong. But Uncle Donn was a close friend of her parents, and the holiest man she knew. He wouldn’t do anything that’s not right, she thought. Ketcham told her God was using him to help her. If she told her parents, he warned, her entire family would be banished from the mission, “where God wanted them to be.” Kim was old enough to understand the implicit threat: By speaking up, she would be ruining God’s purpose for her family. And the blame would be no one’s but hers.

The Silence of the Lambs | New Republic

The epidemic of denial about sexual abuse in the evangelical church. - The Washington Post

This is more for reference, but a good report.  Many of the cases highlighter on H&C are mentioned. 

Without a centralized theological body, evangelical policies and cultures vary radically, and while some church leaders have worked to prevent abuse and harassment, many have not. The causes are manifold: authoritarian leadership, twisted theology, institutional protection, obliviousness about the problem and, perhaps most shocking, a diminishment of the trauma sexual abuse creates — especially surprising in a church culture that believes strongly in the sanctity of sex. “Sexual abuse is the most underreported thing — both in and outside the church — that exists,” says Boz Tchividjian, a grandson of Billy Graham and a former Florida assistant state attorney. 

The epidemic of denial about sexual abuse in the evangelical church. - The Washington Post

See also::
Report: Protestant Church Insurers Handle 260 Sex Abuse Cases a Year (2007)

Bob Jones University Blamed Victims of Sexual Assaults, Not Abusers, Report Says

3 accuse former Orangewood coach of abuse amid investigation of church and school's past - Orlando Sentinel

Last month, Orangewood hired GRACE, an independent organization that investigates claims of abuse in religious institutions, to conduct the investigation. The allegations, Orangewood Director Allyn Williams said, included “whether Orangewood had knowledge of such allegations and how it responded” at the time of the incidents.

Orangewood Church’s head pastor, Jeff Jakes, also has been accused of harassing and emotionally abusing a former intern in 1998 and is part of the investigation. The church announced he was placed on paid administrative leave Jan. 28 “to avoid any assertion of influence with [the] investigation, and will remain so throughout GRACE’s investigation,” Williams said. Jakes has not been accused of physical or sexual abuse.

Williams did not respond to specific questions about any of the allegations against Manes. He said GRACE asked Orangewood to refrain from commenting on the inquiry until it concludes.

Orangewood announced the GRACE investigation after its Jan. 28 church service. Williams said the probe was expected to take at least 90 days. In a statement, GRACE Executive Director Boz Tchividjian said the organization “cannot put a definitive timetable” on the investigation. When asked, he would not confirm whether Manes is part of the investigation.

3 accuse former Orangewood coach of abuse amid investigation of church and school's past - Orlando Sentinel

ADDENDUM::Sex abuse in Protestant life: Is Rachael Denhollander the tip of a newsworthy iceberg? — GetReligion

As my GetReligion colleague Bobby Ross reported, her speech was notable for many reasons. She talked about God’s forgiveness, tossed in a C.S. Lewis quote near the end, then added that she lost her church over the matter.

That's news. Only Christianity Today really went after what happened and named the organization: Sovereign Grace Ministries, whose flagship church -– Covenant Life Church in Gaithersburg, Md. –- got hit with a sexual abuse lawsuit. Sovereign Grace Ministries issued a rebuttal on Feb. 13.

Sadly, no reporters are pursuing what Denhollander is alleging: That Sovereign Grace Ministries is really the tip of the iceberg and that sexual abuse of the young in Protestant churches may dwarf the horrors exposed, starting 16 years ago, in the U.S. Catholic Church.

Sex abuse in Protestant life: Is Rachael Denhollander the tip of a newsworthy iceberg? — GetReligion

ADDENDUM::Sexual abuse is not just a Catholic problem | Catholic Globe

I have mentioned my issues with Tchivividjian before and find it odd that references is being made to his review as the RCC can "end this all" if one man spoke up. Now granted the author does have a point, not just Catholics, but to hide behind that premise is bogus.  Take a look at the 2000 year-old book that condones children as chattel and a doctrine that represses sexuality and expression first as the commonalities.  It is not just the silence that kills youthful spirit, but the dogma you hold dear.  "One may ask, finally, why the Catholic situation has not received fair treatment in the print and electronic media. The answer: the media themselves, which often seem rather less interested in exposing child abuse at all levels of society than in Catholic-bashing."

The movie “Spotlight” (which I saw last week, and thought remarkably fair – not at all expressive of the familiar media attacks on the Catholic Church) has again opened up discussion about the issue of child abuse in the Catholic Church. The movie portrays the disastrous handling of sex abuse in the Archdiocese of Boston over a number of decades.

“Boz” Tchivividjian (don’t ask me how to pronounce the name) offered an insightful commentary, titled “Spotlight: It’s Not Just a Catholic Problem,” in a Religion News Service blog last week. Tchivividjian, a former child abuse prosecutor, the founder and executive director of ABUSE (Godly Response to Abuse in the Christian Environment), and a professor of law at Liberty University (and I would guess a Baptist) argued that child sex abuse is just as prevalent in the Protestant churches as it is in the Catholic Church.

Regarding the movie “Spotlight,” Tchivividjian writes: “Some may be tempted to watch this film with disgust at the Catholic Church and a sigh of relief for Protestants.

Sexual abuse is not just a Catholic problem | Catholic Globe

ADDENDUM::Stetson graduate prepares churches to protect children | Stetson Today

As I said in an ealier post concerning Tchividjian, "Trying to figure out how he is able to rectify this view in light of where he teaches law? Criminality is suppressed and restoration of the "guilty" party back into leadership is the typical modus operandi of the evangelical crowd as recent headlines have shown (ie. Dino Rizzo and Sam Hinn)."  I still feel that way as he is still with Liberty.

But as a young assistant state attorney handling a variety of criminal cases, Tchividjian couldn’t ignore the horror of those that violated children. When he volunteered to aggressively prosecute all of the 7^th Judicial Circuit’s child sex abuse cases, the state attorney approved and established a sex-crimes unit that handled hundreds of cases, a third of them involving children.

It was the start of a lifelong passion for fighting child sexual abuse.

“As I was prosecuting, you really see the cases up close,” says Tchividjian. “You see the victims, the families, the devastation, but you also deal with the offenders. You see common characteristics and behaviors, and get a comprehensive picture of this offense.”

The issue remained heavy on his heart as he went into private practice in 2001. “What do I do with all of this information that I learned in the trenches?” Tchividjian asked himself.
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“Churches are fearful of damaging their reputations, and it’s easier to buy the redemption narrative from offenders, because that’s what Christianity is all about,” explains Tchividjian. “The real narrative is that offenders are the most deceiving people you’ll ever meet, having abused multiple victims before they are caught.”

Facing sexual abuse is difficult for churches to grasp, so Tchividjian founded GRACE — Godly Response to Abuse in the Christian Environment — to educate Christian organizations on how to prevent and respond to child abuse.

A culture of trust and naïveté can attract perpetrators to church environments. Moreover, many church leaders choose not to believe the allegations of victims and instead side with the offender, further devastating the survivors of abuse.

“We have to shift the cultures of our churches by highly valuing our children and being vigilant about their protection … always receiving up-to-date training, monitoring for these issues, with children’s safety classes for the adults, the parents, and also the kids,” advocates Tchividjian.

Stetson graduate prepares churches to protect children | Stetson Today

Billy Graham’s Grandson: On Chid Sex Abuse, Evangelicals Worse Than Catholics | The New Civil Rights Movement

Trying to figure out how he is able to rectify this view in light of where he teaches law? Criminality is suppressed and restoration of the "guilty" party back into leadership is the typical modus operandi of the evangelical crowd as recent headlines have shown (ie. Dino Rizzo and Sam Hinn),,,

The name Billy Graham is synonymous with America’s evangelical movement, “televangelism,” and the infamous Moral Majority. The Billy Graham Crusades were legendary, and Graham, today, 94-years old, is seen as being the most popular televangelist of all time.

At the Religion Newswriters Association (RNA) conference last week in Austin, Texas, Billy Graham’s grandson dropped a bombshell that should have made a huge impact in the national media, but — perhaps for obvious reasons — was barely reported.

Evangelical Basyle “Boz” Tchividjian (image, left, with Rev. Billy Graham,) is a Liberty University law professor focused on sexual abuse in the church — and a man who just happens to be Billy Graham’s grandson. On Thursday, he told the RNA audience that when comparing sexual abuse in the church, “I think we are worse” than Catholics.

Tchividjian, who is also the executive director of GRACE, Godly Response to Abuse in the Christian Environment, says that the culture of Protestant Evangelical churches makes it harder to report sexual abuse of minors, and makes it harder for those who report the abuse to be believed.

Billy Graham’s Grandson: On Chid Sex Abuse, Evangelicals Worse Than Catholics | The New Civil Rights Movement