sexual abuse by protestant ministers

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Prodigal_Son1 said:
And if you don’t agree with the Pope, he’s wrong?
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Did I say that? I’m human like the Pope. I was referring to sticking up for the victims in the flock rather than false shepherds in the context of the cover up.
 
That is the one thing I like about protestantism. I’ve seen cases where a pastor is having a relationship with a woman (single even; the pastor was single as well) But since he was counseling this woman the relationship was inappropriate.

3 p.m. relationship is discovered

4 p.m. synod called by church council president

4:15 p.m. church council members called for emergency meeting

7 p.m. church council meeting

7:30 p.m. pastor is fired

7:45 p.m. synod called and call placed for new pastor

The pastor was not stripped of his credentials, but the reason for his firing was noted in his file and is shared with any congregation that may call for him. Individual Church councils can decide if they will hire him or not. None of this hiding him and shuffling him around.
 
SugarMagnolia said:
The OP is NOT defending sexual abuse by Catholics. It is a reminder that sexual abuse occurs in other religions as well and should not be considered an exclusively Catholic problem.
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sorry i missed this before. thank you for taking the time to actually read what i wrote.

peace, sugarmagnolia!
 
Lutheranteach said:
That is the one thing I like about protestantism. I’ve seen cases where a pastor is having a relationship with a woman (single even; the pastor was single as well) But since he was counseling this woman the relationship was inappropriate.

3 p.m. relationship is discovered

4 p.m. synod called by church council president

4:15 p.m. church council members called for emergency meeting

7 p.m. church council meeting

7:30 p.m. pastor is fired

7:45 p.m. synod called and call placed for new pastor

The pastor was not stripped of his credentials, but the reason for his firing was noted in his file and is shared with any congregation that may call for him. Individual Church councils can decide if they will hire him or not. None of this hiding him and shuffling him around.
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i believe both our churches have guidelines in place, but as pointed out there are sinners everywhere and these abusers somehow get shuffled around.

*Lutheran abuse cases settled, Texas church involved
Associated Press/April 8, 2004

Marshall – Settling one of the most serious sexual abuse cases to hit a U.S. Protestant denomination, plaintiffs suing the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America and its agencies said Wednesday they had reached agreements with all defendants except the regional synod.

The announcement came just two days after a jury was selected in a civil case brought by 14 victims of former Lutheran minister Gerald Patrick Thomas Jr. and their families. They claimed the Chicago-based denomination, which has 5 million members, should have done more to stop Thomas.

A joint statement by the plaintiffs and the defendants Wednesday said the settlement involved the Evangelical Lutheran Church, the Trinity Lutheran Seminary in Columbus, Ohio, the Southeast Michigan Multi-Synodical Candidacy Committee and the Good Shepherd Lutheran Church in Marshall, where Thomas served as pastor from 1997 to 2001. The settlement is subject to court approval at a hearing Monday.

None of the parties would reveal details of the settlement or how much victims might be paid.

A source close to the case told the Associated Press last week that the sides were nearing agreement on a $40 million settlement, averaging about $2.85 million per plaintiff. However, the settlement amount could not be verified Wednesday.

The trial set to begin next week is expected to proceed, however, against the Dallas-based Northern Texas-Northern Louisiana Synod, which was not a part of the settlement.*

background checks are now standard in the CC and i am sure in the lutheran communities as well, but sadly enough people like this guy thomas somehow made it into various lutheran communities.

i think with the amount of money that has gone out from these cases, the rules are in place as to how to officially handle such situations, but again sadly enough some humans continue to do the wrong thing.

peace.
 
I"ve often wondered what value is there in starting these threads in the first place?

Shouldn’t we be focusing on the positive and not the negative; Every religion has its own personnel issues and deals with it in their own way whether we agree with it or not. I feel that when we question and point fingers, it only polarizes the different faiths among us. Nothing positive is to be gained by it.

The media flogs religion enough as it is; I just don’t think we need to join in.
 
There was an article today in “The Courier Mail” (our main newspaper in this neck of the woods) about teachers under investigation for inappropriate behaviour. As someone commented, a lot of complaints about teachers are purely vexatious, but in Queensland there are 300 teachers under investigation.

news.com.au/national/over-300-teachers-under-investigation-for-inappropriate-behaviour/story-e6frfkvr-1225844532979

Now it doesn’t say whether they’re state, private or Catholic school teachers, but the Catholic Church is not alone in having a problem.

And I’ve heard before the number of charges in Protestant circles exceeds that of the Catholic Church. But it’s harder to get a figure as the researcher needs to go through insurance records, rather than a single centralised body.

Yet for some reason, this fact is not highlighted by the media anywhere near as much as the Catholic Church issue.

To put the media in perspective - on behalf of St. Vincent de Paul Society, I recently gave a bit of help to a family to get relatives out of Africa to Australia. While talking to the family about the seeming number of problems in Africa reported by the media, she pointed out that when they still lived in Africa, all they heard about Australia was the allegedly poor way we treated the aboriginals, to the point where they wondered if they should attempt to migrate or seek asylum.

So while the media here gives an impression of Africa that is almost entirely negative, their media reciprocates about Australia.

In fact, if it weren’t for good old sinners, we wouldn’t have a media. When you think about it, nearly all the news is about the consequences of human sin.
 
Recenltly, a policeman in southern Alabama/Northerwestern Florida (i am not sure which) was arrested and charged with 127 counts of child sexual assalt. Now, I live in Central Alabama. I never once heard or saw it covered in my local media. Had I not been there when he was arrested, I would not know about it. That is our point. 127 cases is as bad as any of the priests were accused of. Likewise, it is illogical that a man can be THAT bad and NO ONE knew about it. Yet, even the state media did not report it at all…
 
jen_fla said:
i think we can all agree that sexual abuse by any human being of any creed is something we must all work towards preventing.

since the news has brainwashed most americans into thinking Catholic priest = child molester i thought some light should be shed on how this problem exists for our protestant friends as well. the second comment i posted shows how the problem is even worse in our secular school systems.

ALL Protestant denominations - 838 Ministers

147 Baptist Ministers

251 “Bible” Church Ministers (fundamentalist/evangelical)

140 Anglican/Episcopalian Ministers

38 Lutheran Ministers

46 Methodist Ministers

19 Presbyterian Ministers

197 various Church Ministers

read cases here
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A few more facts, please.

Can you break this down into decades or time frames of some kind?

Do you have percentages? The percentage of the number of pedophiles per total of ministers in each decade? There are an awful lot of Protestant ministers out there, both in total and the number who were ordained per decade.

Listing this string of numbers is meaningless.
 
WAIT! You forgot to put in Catholic numbers:

462,456,418,746,448,579,475,968,462,654,381,364,648,843 -Catholic Preists

Jk. 😃
 
A couple of considerations
Code: 
1. The vast majority of Catholic priests, of course, are not involved in sexual misconduct.

2. The Boston study, which first initiated this whole matter, investigated Protestant clergy also, and found that sexual exploitation of children was far less.

3. The most serious indictment of the Catholic system has been that pedophiles and such have been protected by the hierarchy and even reassigned to other churches.

4. There also is the sin of asking/forcing/bribing victims to keep silent about their exploitation by a priest. Some even signed statements promising to be silent. In many cases the children were not believed, even by their parents, or they did not tell out of guilt or fear.

5. The worst 'Protestant' offenders, in this area at least, seem to be pastors of self-organized churches, men who have no ties with major denominations, usually with little education, often operating out of storefronts. These are hardly bonafide clergy. In the USA, of course, there must be 300,000 maybe 400,000, Protestant clergy. And what is it? Roughly 50,000 Catholic priests? Someone out there must have the authoratative figures.

6. The Catholic clergy seems to have attracted more men who have sexual problems, which they often seek to hide or solve by becoming priests. They hope that by joining the clergy they can overcome their problem and be truly celibate, which frquently does not happen. The sexual impulse is powerful and too many yield to it in weak moments.

 7. A Protestant clergyman in this area was accused of infidelity with a member of his congregation who had come to him for counseling. He immediately was dropped from the ministry by action of the Bishop. Every year the ministers in the regional organization of that denomination are asked if any charges should be brought against any other clergy. If so the clergy go into executive session and consider such charges. 

 8. The priests I know are faithful to their vows and valiant soldiers for Christ. However, the truth is coming out about abuse which was never rampant but for too long concealed, with too many priests getting away with crimes against children and youth - even protected by their superiors, eager to shield the church from scandal.

God bless all clergy, and may the Lord make them worthy to their high calling. None of them are saints, as they all are human, but the overwhelming majority are men (and women) of dedication and high moral standards.
 
Prodigal_Son1 said:
Your argument is a matter of semantics. In each instance, that you’ve listed, there is a superior.
Because there is a superior does not stop the ‘flock’ from straying, whether it’s the Catholic Church, or a single Church with only one pastor.
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It is all semantics, even between Islam and Christianity its just semantics. However in the Protestant case because no claim of universal authority is made the moral failings of the single leader, as h3e claims he is, to act doesn’t stain Christianity as a whole. The one local church losses members to another local church is the damage. In the same way a bundle of sticks is stronger then a single thick rod.
 
Darron_Steele said:
Hold on here.

Your defense of the inexcusable behavior of Catholic clergy is `Protestants have people who do it too.’ That is no defense: that is deflection.

Here is the difference:
Protestants: in the vast majority of cases, perpetrators end up in handcuffs.
Catholic: perpetrators generally do not end up in handcuffs, but rather have it dealt with, or not, internally and covered up.

If the Vatican would direct that anyone who had molested a kid should be reported to the law, abuse would decrease, and the Catholic Church as an organization would merit being respected on this point. Practicing Catholics are a great contribution to the Lord’s work, but on this one point, the Vatican needs to step up for Catholics.

They do it too' is an excuse adolescents like to pull when they get caught doing something they should not. When I was in school, it did not hold water.’
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**That’s just like you to to twist the meaning of what somebody said as you’ve done on other threads.

JEN FLA was NOT defending the clergy in this post - just a comparison between the crimes in the Catholic Church as opposed to what is going on in Protestant churches. It was also noted that this is a horrible thing - no matter WHO is doing the molesting.

The offenses committed by Catholic Clergy make headlines because of the potential for money that can be won by a large entity as the Catholic Church and it’s perceived “endless wealth” - as opposed to the average small Protestant church.
 
Do protestant ministers lose their salvation by committing sexual abuse?

🤷
 
4Squarebaby said:
It is all semantics, even between Islam and Christianity its just semantics. However in the Protestant case because no claim of universal authority is made the moral failings of the single leader, as h3e claims he is, to act doesn’t stain Christianity as a whole. The one local church losses members to another local church is the damage. In the same way a bundle of sticks is stronger then a single thick rod.
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Oh so, in your opinion, a Catholic priest sins and it stains the whole Church? Don’t you realize how that sounds? A single individual has sinned and the whole Church is now contaminated. How convenient that is for your argument. :rolleyes:
 
Jon_Hus said:
According to Pope Boniface VIII of Unam Sanctam fame, they never had it to begin with.
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According to the following Scriptures - nobody is guaranteed salvation.
It’s a lifelong process and a journey of enduring faith:
***(Rom. 11:22, ****Heb. 10:26-27, ****2 Pet. 2:20-21, ****Matt. 7:21, ****1 Cor. 4:4, ****John 15:1-9, *24:13)
 
gamewell45 said:
I"ve often wondered what value is there in starting these threads in the first place?

Shouldn’t we be focusing on the positive and not the negative; Every religion has its own personnel issues and deals with it in their own way whether we agree with it or not. I feel that when we question and point fingers, it only polarizes the different faiths among us. Nothing positive is to be gained by it.

The media flogs religion enough as it is; I just don’t think we need to join in.
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Well this is a discussion forum, it would be a rather boring discussion if everyone starts threads like “Positives of the Mormon Church” with 200 replies listing all the wonderful aspects of that church. What’s the point? It’s not fun, it’s informative in a propagandaish way. I think a proper balance of positive and negative is the goal. 🙂
 
Roy5 you said:
  1. The Catholic clergy seems to have attracted more men who have sexual problems, which they often seek to hide or solve by becoming priests. They hope that by joining the clergy they can overcome their problem and be truly celibate, which frquently does not happen. The sexual impulse is powerful and too many yield to it in weak moments.
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What kind of sexual problems are you referring to; homosexuality or pedophilia? Homosexuals are not the same as pedophiles and generally have consensual sex with adults like heterosexuals. I wouldn’t group these two together.

No sexual impulse is too powerful to suppress. God wouldn’t make it impossible for us not to sin. 🙂
 
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