Rebuilding trust in the clergy

A Pennsylvania grand jury’s report last week about sexual abuse in the Catholic Church is devastating and heartbreaking. The stories are despicable; even more troubling is the church’s refusal to address problems immediately, its systemic cover-up and its inability to take corrective action to minimize the risk of future abuse.

We struggle any time we discover the horrific and abusive ways in which humans can treat other humans. But it is something else when the source of the mistreatment comes from people, and organizations, in whom there is a higher — indeed a sacred — trust. Many of the episodes happened because people thought they could trust priests and the church. After all, they had been told that priests are representatives of Christ, and the church a sign of God’s Reign.

I wrote an Op-Ed in 2002 titled “Tough love for sexual abusers” when the Catholic sexual-abuse crisis was first coming to public awareness. I emphasized the importance of dealing with the issues systemically, the significance of focusing on care and justice for victims, and the theological significance of avoiding “cheap grace” and trivializing forgiveness.

In retrospect, my piece was naive. I assumed that leaders in the church would move quickly, theologically and administratively to address the problems. They did in some ways, but nowhere near enough. The breadth and details of systemic issues contained in the grand jury report demands a reckoning — now.

I am not Roman Catholic, but I am a Christian. I am also a United Methodist pastor and dean of Duke Divinity School. The grand jury report not only raises important questions for ordained ministry and the church across the traditions, but also damages the credibility and trust of the church and of churches, precisely when people yearn for places and people and institutions worthy of trust.

And it is not as if Protestants are only indirectly culpable. Recent stories about sexual misconduct at Willow Creek Church, and among high-profile leaders in the Southern Baptist Convention, are reminders that betrayals of trust and abuses of power are not the exclusive problems of one sector or tradition.

We Christians have serious repair work to do. We need, first, to hold ourselves to higher levels of accountability than that required by the law. We certainly need to work with legal authorities who are more competent and independent to investigate allegations.

Second, we must corporately and personally embody repentance, humility and prayerful commitment to victims as we come to terms with the damage done by the church. This especially includes our leaders; we must reckon more clearly with the dangerous abuses of power, and articulate more clearly wise uses of power.

Third, we must begin to rebuild trust. This will take time, as one of the great tragedies of any betrayal is how much longer it takes to rebuild trust, than to destroy it. This will require courage, truthfulness and willingness to change.

Fourth, those of us entrusted with educating and forming clergy need to change. We need to pay greater attention to issues of sexual abuse and institutional accountability in our coursework and scholarship; focus more on the character expected of those entrusted with clergy leadership; and identify how to minimize the risks of damage by complex organizations, their leaders and power.

I hope this is a wake-up call for all people of faith, and especially divinity schools and seminaries, to begin the needed repair work. I hope we will prepare women and men to practice humility and embody trust, to nurture organizations capable of preventing abuse whenever possible and immediately addressing it if it does, and to cultivate more faithful witness in all we are and do. The challenges are daunting; the urgency of addressing them is clear. May we rise to the challenges.

L. Gregory Jones is the dean of Duke University’s Divinity School.