Leaders of prominent Presbyterian church neglected teen girls sexually and spiritually abused by youth director

Get Religion - April 5, 2011

A vague Presbyterian sexual-abuse scandal

by tmatt


In this day of tight budgets and a shrinking supply of space in major newspapers, it says something when the editors of the Washington Post devote a giant chunk of A1 turf to a story about a church controversy. This was certainly the case with the recent story that ran under the headline, “Vienna Presbyterian Church seeks forgiveness, redemption in wake of abuse scandal.”

The story is, of course, about sex and, to be specific, sexual abuse of teens by an adult. It is also about the leaders of a wealthy, powerful church in the high-rent Northern Virginia suburbs outside of Washington, D.C., and their struggles to realize the seriousness of the scandal that quietly unfolded in their midst.

I get all of that. However, after reading all 4,000-plus words of this report and cannot figure out why the editors believed that the report needed to be so vague about the role of religion in this crisis and the beliefs of the people involved. In other words, it is a religion story that is hollow when it comes to religion and, in some cases, it ignores major details or gets them wrong. Maybe this was a job for professional religion writers?

I’ll try to keep this as short as possible, but we do need to start with the opening scene:

Pastor Peter James stood before his congregation at Vienna Presbyterian Church … and paused before giving one of the most difficult sermons of his life (.pdf).

Framed by the light coming through the sanctuary’s huge windows, James spoke of sexual abuse by a youth director, of the church’s shortcomings and of the tormenting darkness that has been eating away at the church for nearly six years. A row of young women sat in a back pew as James apologized for just recently learning that their ordeal was “far more devastating and horrific than we had imagined.”

“We failed as leaders to extend the compassion and mercy that you needed,” James said, publicly acknowledging the church’s failings for the first time. “Some of you felt uncared for, neglected and even blamed for this abuse. I am sorry. The church is sorry.”

James’s sermon — and a letter detailing the situation for the congregation’s more than 2,500 members in Northern Virginia’s affluent suburbs — comes as the church reels from the recent discovery that as many as a dozen teenage girls may have suffered sexual, emotional and spiritual abuse at the hands of a youth director who worked there from 2001 to 2005.

This is followed, in news feature form, by the “nut paragraph,” the summary statement of the big idea in this story:

The breadth of the accusations and the nature of them have shocked the relatively staid congregation and laid bare the kind of damage that can result from a combination of secretive predation, blind trust and a desire to move on without a full exploration of what really happened. It is the kind of tragedy that has affected churches across the country, and there’s no formula for how to deal with it. But Vienna Presbyterian leaders hope that shining light on their failings will lead to redemption, education and healing.

Reading on, I found it especially interesting that church elders brought this story to the Washington Post. The second I read that sentence, the first thing that popped into my head was this question: What kind of Presbyterian Church is this? After all, there are a wide variety of Presbyterian flocks in this nation.

As it turns out, the story never really tells us, even though that denominational identity is clear (if one digs) on the church’s website. In the story there are references to the “Presbyterian Church” and its structures, but we never find out that this is a prominent church in the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.), one of the seven sisters of liberal Protestantism. At the same time, this is a large and thriving congregation with prominent youth and children’s ministries. This particular church, in other words, has strange mainline Protestant demographics. Is it a more conservative, semi-evangelical PCUSA congregation? It is interesting to note that this church is an affiliate of the C.S. Lewis Institute, along with some other famous evangelical congregations in its region.

There is another logical reason to ask that question due to the name and background of the youth minister at the heart of this story — Eric DeVries. Here is how he is introduced:

DeVries arrived at Vienna Presbyterian Church in September 2001 after a stint as a residential director at his alma mater in Michigan, Calvin College. He had worked at a church in Alabama and at a Christian summer camp in Pennsylvania, and officials at Vienna Presbyterian said he came with glowing recommendations.

Shortly after his arrival, however, church officials said the staff at a Pennsylvania religious summer camp notified them that DeVries had inappropriate contact with a 14-year-old girl after the previous summer and that he would need counseling to return to the camp. They said they were never aware of any physical abuse, and DeVries said his contacts with the girl were limited to e-mails and text messages meant to boost her self-esteem.

It should be noted that Calvin College is one of the nation’s most prominent Christian institutions and, while it is way to simplistic to refer to this campus as “conservative,” it plays a highly symbolic, Mecca role for members of the conservative Christian Reformed Church. Veterans on the religion beat may also know that the campus includes more than its share of buildings and projects that carry the “DeVries” name. Do a Google search for “Calvin College” and “DeVries” and one gets 180,000 references.

Is this relevant? I have no idea, in large part because we have almost no idea what role religion, faith and beliefs played in this story. Is his “conservative” branding one of the reasons that DeVries was trusted?

There’s a bit more strangeness when the Post brings the local Presbyterian authorities into this matter. Check this out:

G. Wilson Gunn Jr., the general presbyter for the National Capital region — akin to a Catholic bishop — said he was not fully aware of the situation until a few weeks ago. He said that the Presbyterian Church has a solid sexual-abuse policy and teams of people who respond to such situations but that they were not called into action because Vienna Presbyterian appears to have tried to contain the issue within the church.

Gunn said a recent review of sex abuse cases showed that 40 of the 180 churches in his area have had to deal with the issue. He attended Sunday’s sermon and vowed to do whatever is necessary to reverse that trend.

First of all, one must note that this is “the Rev.” G. Wilson Gunn Jr., if one is following the Associated Press Stylebook. And, again, Gunn would be referring to the sexual-abuse policy of the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.), as described in the same style manual. And, as a letter from Gunn to the Post notes, there are 108 churches in this region, not 180. I also highly doubt that any thinking Presbyterian leader would use the word “akin” in a comparison of the role or powers of a general presbyter and a Catholic bishop.

I also hear a kind of strangeness in this reference, when Gunn says that the PCUSA’s sexual-abuse experts “were not called into action because Vienna Presbyterian appears to have tried to contain the issue within the church.” So, what is the state of the relationship between this church and its presbytery?

So, is any of this information is essential to understanding the core issues in this event? I literally do not know.

Still, I think there are mistakes and holes in this report that make we uneasy. After all, sexual misconduct by Protestant youth ministers is — tragically — not that uncommon. Why such in-depth coverage of this story? Are there other issues at play and layers to this particular scandal? I get the big idea of this story and it is valid. However, is there more that we need to know? I sense that there is.

This article was found at:

http://www.getreligion.org/2011/04/about-that-vague-presbyerian-sex-scandal/

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Presbyterian Church commission says minister had sex with minor

bnd.com - Illinois November 13, 2008

by DON BABWIN | Associated Press Writer



CHICAGO -- A Presbyterian minister accused of having sex with a woman when she was a teenager, even tattooing her initials on his buttocks, kept working as a pastor and college administrator after the church's insurance company paid his accuser $150,000.

Rev. Ronald Campbell was removed from the ministry in April - nine months after the insurance payout. But he did not resign from Trinity International University, Trinity Evangelical Divinity School and Trinity Graduate School in Deerfield until this month, shortly after a church commission ruled he sexually abused the woman in the 1980s.

The commission's three-page decision was released to the media Thursday by Survivors Network of Those Abused by Priests, in part to highlight the fact that Campbell remained at Elmwood Park Presbyterian Church long after Julie Hokanson received the settlement.

"Even though they did pay that, Rev. Campbell was still in a position of authority, still in a position where he could abuse more children," Barbara Blaine, SNAP's president, said in a news conference at which Hokanson spoke publicly.

The Associated Press does not normally name victims of sexual abuse, but Hokanson said she wanted to go public in the hope of encouraging others who have been abused by clergy to come forward.

"I wanted to use my name so people would know that I am not ashamed to have been abused by an adult while I was a child," she said. "The shame is not to be mine, it is to be the abuser's."

Executive Presbyter Rev. Robert Reynolds said the church could not remove Campbell until after it conducted its own investigation, which was completed in March. Campbell was removed the next month.

But Blaine said Campbell was removed only after activists, including Hokanson, went to the church on a Sunday and handed out leaflets.

Campbell was allowed to keep working as a director of admissions and financial aid at Trinity International for more than a year after he notified the school about the allegations and after the settlement because, "they were just allegations and they were all from the '80s and he had an exceptionally good record in his career since then," said Gary Cantwell, a school spokesman.

Nevertheless, he said, "After the allegations came to light we asked him to only meet openly with students and their families and not privately with individual students."

Campbell has not been charged criminally. The Presbytery of Chicago said the state's statute of limitations had run out when the woman came forward two years ago.

Campbell's Nov. 3 resignation came a few weeks after The Permanent Judicial Commission of The Presbytery of Chicago of the Presbyterian Church found him guilty of sexual abuse.

The commission also found Campbell guilty of using "force, threat, coercion, intimidation, or misuse of office or position" against the girl.

During the three-day hearing, Hokanson told the church panel that Campbell instigated a sexual relationship with her when he was an associate pastor at a church in River Forest, outside Chicago. She said the relationship lasted for about four years, extending into her freshman year in college.

She testified that Campbell showed her a tattoo on his buttocks that included her initials inside a heart, and that he showed her a gun, which she interpreted that as a threat.

"I definitely felt like I wanted to stay in his good graces," Hokanson said.

The commission also found that Campbell lied about the relationship and the tattoo, though he eventually admitted he had the tattoo. Hokanson said she thinks that helped persuade the panel of Campbell's guilt.

"There would be only one reason I would know that the tattoo was there," said Hokanson, a 37-year-old mother of three now living in Minnesota.

James Betke, Campbell's attorney, said that while his client admitted having the tattoo, he "steadfastly denies" allegations of sexual abuse. He said he did not know what Campbell planned to do now.

Campbell is removed from ordained ministry for at least four years, after which he can apply for reinstatement if he takes steps, including a public confession to the woman, according to a presbytery news release.


This article was found at:

http://www.bnd.com/326/
story/541755.html

In Training to Combat Satan

Washington Post - August 18, 2007

Military-Style Camp Aims to Toughen Teens For Spiritual Warfare

By Kay CampbellReligion News Service


KELSO, Tenn. -- "What's this?" roared Henry Phillips. "There's trash on the floor in here."

Inside the simple block cabin, teenage girls stood at attention at the ends of their bunks, each bed neatly made up with a Bible and study notebook on top of the pillow.


Trash cluttered the entryway to the little cabin; Phillips, "sergeant major" to the campers, had just dumped over the trash can, spilling crumpled paper towels and cups onto the freshly swept floor.

"There's to be no trash in the cabins whatsoever!" Phillips shouted, his voice ragged from a week as drill sergeant at Spiritual Warfare Camp. "And no trash in your hearts. Do you have the message?"

"Yes, sergeant major," the girls answered in chorus, their eyes focused straight ahead as he marched up and down the line.

Inspections at the weeklong camp, designed to toughen bodies and souls, were just one of the rough parts. If you pass the camp general, Pastor Lou Ostrzicki of Bethlehem Baptist Church in Hazel Green, Ala., and forget to salute, you will be on the ground doing push-ups. Make a wrong remark, and you might have a dog biscuit pushed into your mouth.

Unlike North Dakota's Kids on Fire School of Ministry, the subject of the 2006 documentary "Jesus Camp," Spiritual Warfare Camp concentrates on children's spiritual, mental and physical fitness, not on their political actions. The services at Spiritual Warfare Camp are lively, but they don't tip into the charismatic speaking in tongues as did the North Dakota camp, now on hiatus.

Each day at Spiritual Warfare Camp began with a half-hour of physical training and a run, then another half-hour of prayer done while marching.

One squad of boys spent a day wearing diapers over their jeans after the boys whined about push-ups. At this camp, there are no excuses, no whining and no let-up.

What matters in life, Phillips told the kids, is not what happens to you but how you deal with it. Abuse comes because life isn't fair. That's what Satan does to Christians, no matter how hard they try, the camp leaders say.

The kids were met the first day with the command to walk through the pool with their clothes on and then roll in the dirt. The first morning's inspection was like an act of vandalism.

"The first day, we tore everything out of there," Phillips said as he and the camp officers headed to the next cabin. "There's a little bit of edge here."

Phillips explained, "That's what Satan does: He tears up your life."

Phillips knows about disruption. He survived three tours in Vietnam, failed marriages, one child's death and another's drug addiction. Now a middle school history teacher, he is determined to help other kids make better decisions than he did.

One activity turned a trail hike into an exercise in decision-making. A paint-ball course taught campers to work together toward a common goal. They earned each meal by memorizing a Bible verse from a list of Scripture about character, steadfastness and God's love.

The themes at Spiritual Warfare Camp are teamwork, respect for authority and creating the right relationships in life. The cabin squads went everywhere together, lined up behind a leader holding the squad's guidon, or flag. They chanted march cadences, some traditional, some special to the camp: "Alpha squad will always fight. . . . Under God we will unite."

Henry Phillips learned about the camp from Louie Barnett, who established the first camp in Michigan. Phillips's children attended one. Phillips was so impressed that he gave up weeks of summer vacation to help run the camp in Michigan for 14 years. This year, he decided to set up one closer to home.

The camp was held at Crystal Springs Camp, a Cumberland Presbyterian campground in eastern Lincoln County, Tenn. The camp, attended by 48 teens this year, has a capacity of 120. Phillips said he expects it to be full next year, since all of this year's campers have told him that they want to return.

Aaron Ball, 15, of Tullahoma, Tenn., said this year's camp helped keep him on the course he chose last year when he attended the camp in Michigan.

"This camp turned my life around," Ball said. "I did a 180. Before, I thought life was just stupid, and I wondered, 'What's the use of living?' But after camp, I was really on fire for God. Now I know why I'm living."

Kay Campbell writes for the Huntsville Times in Huntsville, Ala.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/08/17/AR2007081701902.html