Ethics

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Beyond Potiphar's wife: Leaked letters yank SBC debates about sexual abuse into the open

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Beyond Potiphar's wife: Leaked letters yank SBC debates about sexual abuse into the open

It's hard to follow warfare inside the Southern Baptist Convention without a working knowledge of biblical symbolism.

Consider this passage in a May 31 letter (.pdf here) from the Rev. Russell Moore to SBC President J.D. Greear, which described key events leading to his recent resignation as head of the denomination's Ethics and Religious Liberty Commission.

"You and I both heard, in closed door meetings, sexual abuse survivors spoken of in terms of 'Potiphar's wife' and other spurious biblical analogies," wrote Moore, in a letter posted at the Baptist Blogger website. "The conversations in these closed door meetings were far worse than anything Southern Baptists knew. … And as you know, this comes on the heels of a track-record of the Executive Committee staff and others referring to victims as 'crazy' and, at least in one case, as worse than the sexual predators themselves."

Who was "Potiphar's wife"? She was known for her efforts to manipulate Joseph during his enslavement in Egypt. The Genesis narrative notes: "Now Joseph was handsome and good-looking. And after a time, his master's wife cast her eyes upon Joseph, and said, 'Lie with me.' " When Joseph refused, the seductress accused him of assault and had him jailed.

It's easy to see how "Potiphar's wife" insults would fit into attempts to discredit Moore and activists who want America's largest Protestant flock to change how its agencies, seminaries and nearly 48,000 autonomous congregations deal with sexual abuse.

Moore's resignation, after years of attacks by critics, has pushed sexual abuse to the top of the agenda at the SBC's June 15-16 national meetings in Nashville -- along with the election of a new president.


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New podcast: Will SBC politicos answer questions about doctrinal clashes in this new war?

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New podcast: Will SBC politicos answer questions about doctrinal clashes in this new war?

Whether they’ll admit it or not, when covering conflicts and controversies many (not all) journalists seem to think that one of their main duties is to help (wink, wink) readers separate the people in white hats from those in black hats, smart people from the not-so-smart people and kind people from mad people.

There are several ways to do this. Reporters can quote calm, articulate people on one side, will seeking the most radical, scary voices on the other. I have, when covering events linked to abortion, seen TV crews rush past women who oppose abortion (including women who have experienced abortions) in order to interview screaming male protesters who are waving (literally) bloody signs.

Journalists can do long, personal interviews with people on one side, while pulling dry, boring quotes from press releases on the other. They can allow one set of activists to define all the crucial terms and questions, while ignoring or distorting the beliefs of activists on the other side.

Journalists also get to choose the labels they pin on the competing armies. That was the subject that loomed over this week’s “Crossroads” podcast (CLICK HERE to tune that in), which focused on the bitter debates surrounding the resignation of Russell Moore as leader of the Southern Baptist Convention’s Ethics and Religious Liberty Commission.

The obvious other news hook: The nation’s largest non-Catholic flock will hold its 2021 national meeting next week (June 15-16) in Nashville. For more background, see this earlier post: “That SBC powderkeg: Clearly, executive committee is bitterly divided on sexual-abuse issues.”

As the old saying goes, “You can’t tell the players without a program.” Well, it’s going to be crucial how journalists label the “players” in this conflict.

For example, here is a crucial section of a new Peter Wehner essay at The Atlantic, which ran under this headline: “The Scandal Rocking the Evangelical World — The sudden departure of Russell Moore is forcing an overdue conversation about the crises of American Christendom.”


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What is valid journalism? America's racial debates spotlight concerns about bias

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What is valid journalism? America's racial debates spotlight concerns about bias

Begin with the "Statement of Core Values" chiseled into stone at the Hussman School of Journalism and Media on the University of North Carolina-Chapel Hill campus. The school declares these values will "help rebuild the bond between the public and the media" -- a desperate need considering the unprecedented popular distrust of news outlets lamented in this earlier GetReligion post.

Read the UNC credo for yourself. But let's summarize key J-school principles at the nation's third-best public university, per the latest Wall Street Journal ranking (behind Michigan and UCLA, edging U-Cal Berkeley).

* "Impartiality," defined as "delivering the news honestly, fairly, objectively, and without personal opinion or bias," the news media's "greatest source of credibility."

* "The pursuit of truth," journalism's "noble goal," though the truth "is not always apparent or known immediately." Thus journalists must not decide in advance what's true but "report as completely and impartially as possible all verifiable facts" so audience members can discern what to think.

* Some journalism presents viewpoints, but to protect this impartiality and credibility the media and their consumers need "a sharp and clear distinction between news and opinion."

Think of it this way. How far should American newspapering drift toward the contrary -- and successful -- business model of cable TV "news"? (Alongside conservative Fox News, the once-centrist CNN moved leftward though its imitation of MSNBC's partisanship and that produces third-place audience ratings).

Walter Hussman Jr., whose name graces this J-school, donated $25 million in 2019 to foster the above credo, which appears daily in Little Rock's Arkansas Democrat-Gazette and other papers owned by his WEHCO Media. This company operates 10 dailies, eight weeklies, seven regional magazines, nine cable TV systems and broadband and digital services, all in six states.

Now his credo is swept into the culture-war convulsions emanating from the nation's troubled racial past and present, Black Lives Matter, "Critical Race Theory," the murder of George Floyd and especially The New York Times Magazine's "1619 Project," launched in 2019 and coming soon to a school near you.


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That SBC powderkeg: Clearly, executive committee is bitterly divided on sexual-abuse issues

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That SBC powderkeg: Clearly, executive committee is bitterly divided on sexual-abuse issues

Several decades ago, early in the media coverage of the Catholic clergy sexual abuse scandals, a veteran Catholic educator gave me some sobering advice.

When dealing with stories about sexual abuse, he stressed, the usual doctrinal and cultural labels do not apply. There wasn’t a “left” or a “right” side of the story because there were people hiding their sins on both sides. When dealing with sexual abuse, most conflicts centered on issues of honesty and integrity and, most of all, a willingness to repent and admit that these sins and crimes were real.

I thought of that the other day when reading the Religion News Service story that started dominos falling in America’s largest non-Catholic flock: “Leaked Russell Moore letter blasts SBC conservatives, sheds light on his resignation.” (I apologize for getting to this story late, due to a week of travels with family, followed by a painful health crisis that has me rather drugged and could return me to an emergency room at any moment.)

Journalists and SBC insiders were not surprised that RNS scribe Bob Smietana was involved in breaking that story, in part because of his years of experience in the Nashville market at The Tennessean, as well as five years with Lifeway Research, an organization linked to Southern Baptist life. This is one of those cases in which a reporter can build on years of experience and contacts in a complex, massive organization and, thus, Smietana has been landing one SBC scoop after another in recent years. It’s crucial that this RNS story was supported by a post featuring the full text of the 4,000-word Moore letter.

The next key story, by Sarah Pulliam Bailey, ran in The Washington Post: “Newly leaked letter claims Southern Baptist leaders 'covered up' sex abuse allegations.” Click here (.pdf file) for a full text of this second Moore letter. It’s packed with material from crucial voices on both sides of this conflict, with most of them speaking on the record. This is another MUST read report.

The ink will be flying fast and furious, I imagine, as combatants prepare for the 2021 national Southern Baptist Convention, which will be held June 15-16 in Nashville, with preliminary gatherings two days earlier.

As Moore stated in the letter posted by RNS, many people will assume that this conflict centers on his highly public opposition to the presidential candidacy of Donald Trump. However, he stressed that he is convinced the main lightning rod was his efforts to fight sexual abuse inside the SBC, along with his bridge-building efforts to Black congregations, a growing and strategic network in the convention.


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Another trial by media: In defense of Mother Teresa and why she is a saint, not a 'cult leader'

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Another trial by media: In defense of Mother Teresa and why she is a saint, not a 'cult leader'

Historical figures are going through another mass-media reckoning. They have been for some time. Some with good reason.

Christopher Columbus? Understandable given what was unleashed by his arrival from Europe.

Thomas Jefferson? A paradox that’s worth examining given his ability to pen the Declaration of Independence and also own slaves. In some cases, there is evidence that he fathered children with them.

Other figures haven’t been so obvious. Following the tragic murder of George Floyd last May, many statues were toppled or removed across the United States, including those of 18th century Spanish priest Junipero Serra, Abraham Lincoln and Mahatma Gandhi. These weren’t so obvious to explain. I’m not sure those who damaged them knew either.

This takes me to the latest reckoning: Mother Teresa, now known as Saint Teresa of Calcutta.

Yes, that Mother Teresa. The diminutive woman who dedicated her life to helping “the poorest of the poor” in India. And the same one who was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize in 1979 and Pope Francis canonized a saint in 2016. Turns out she was a cult leader.

Michelle Goldberg penned an opinion piece in The New York Times, which ran Saturday on its website, under the headline: “Was Mother Teresa a cult leader?”

With a headline like that, is it possible the thesis will be that she wasn’t?


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Religion ghosts in Bill and Melinda Gates split? There are some old questions to ask ...

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Religion ghosts in Bill and Melinda Gates split? There are some old questions to ask ...

I have written quite a few headlines over the past four decades or so and read a kazillion more. Still, I have to admit that a news headline the other day in The Washington Post stopped me in my tracks: “If Bill and Melinda Gates can’t make a marriage work, what hope is there for the rest of us?”

I immediately assumed this was some kind of first-person commentary.

However, it appears that this was a news feature — using the break-up of one of the world’s richest couples as a chance to examine the marital stress caused by COVID-19 lockdowns, life changes for aging Baby Boomers and the resulting need for professional counseling. Here’s the overture:

Just imagine how many hours of couples therapy you can afford when you’re among the world’s richest people. Or the shared sense of purpose you could forge while raising three children and running a $50 billion charitable foundation with your spouse.

Then imagine that it’s not enough to keep you together.

In announcing their decision to divorce, Bill and Melinda Gates cited the work they’d done on their marriage, and a mutual sense of pride in their children and philanthropy. But, they said in identical joint statements shared on Twitter, “we no longer believe we can grow together as a couple in this next phase of our lives.”

Now, for millions of Americans it would be logical to ask another question whenever a couple faces a crisis of this kind. It’s a kind of two-edged sword question that can be carefully worded as follows: Did religions and-or moral issues have anything to do with the break-up of this marriage?

All of the initial coverage that I saw didn’t include any religion/moral information at all. There is a chance that these questions will be asked in the days ahead, now that the Wall Street Journal and other publications have added a rather problematic name to the cast list in this drama — Jeffrey Epstein.

However, I had already opened a digital file folder on this topic because my pre-Internet (think dead tree pulp) files on this couple included a lengthy 1997 Time magazine feature with this headline: “In Search of the Real Bill Gates.” This long-ago article included several details of interest, including at least two of the religious-moral nature. We will take the less famous of these two details first:


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Pandora's box? Wall Street Journal piece on human-animal hybrids needs more than vague ethics

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Pandora's box? Wall Street Journal piece on human-animal hybrids needs more than vague ethics

My $19/month Wall Street Journal subscription is pricey, I admit, but every so often there comes a story that makes the investment worthwhile.

Or at least causes you to do a double take.

Such was Monday’s piece titled “Creation of First Human-Monkey Embryos Causes Concern.”

Excuse me? Do read on:

Imagine pigs with human hearts or mice whose brains have a spark of human intelligence. Scientists are cultivating a flock of such experimental creations, called chimeras, by injecting potent human cells into mice, rats, pigs and cows. They hope the new combinations might one day be used to grow human organs for transplants, study human illnesses or to test new drugs.

In the latest advance, researchers in the U.S. and China announced earlier this month that they made embryos that combined human and monkey cells for the first time. So far, these human-monkey chimeras (pronounced ky-meer-uhs) are no more than bundles of budding cells in a lab dish, but the implications are far-reaching, ethics experts say. The use of primates so closely related to humans raises concerns about unintended consequences, animal welfare and the moral status of hybrid embryos, even if the scientific value of the work may be quite high.

The idea of chimeras brings up images of half-human, half-beast gargoyles.

The bottom line: This story screams for some kind of input from religious leaders and academics. After all, doesn’t the creation of these … things have something to do with the whole concept of what is human or not?


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Vague doctrine at for-profit company? Tennessean nails key issue in new Ramsey lawsuit

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Vague doctrine at for-profit company? Tennessean nails key issue in new Ramsey lawsuit

Get ready for more stories in which religious believers clash with the increasingly woke doctrines proclaimed, and enforced, by the Human Resource personnel in modern corporations.

Can your company fire you for declining to use a colleague’s preferred pronouns? What happens if (a) someone declines to remove a study Bible from his or her desk or (b) some believers refuse to hang LGBTQ+ rainbow solidarity posters in their offices? What if an employee marches in a right-to-life parade? Battles continue, in some workplaces, over crosses, beards, headwear and other religious symbols.

That’s one side of the HR culture wars. Meanwhile, it’s clear — pending the outcome of the Equality Bill debates — that faith-defined nonprofits have the right to create lifestyle and doctrinal covenants for the people who chose to sign them and, thus, work in these ministries.

But what about for-profit companies led by executives who want to maintain faith-friendly images? What are the limits on their policies?

For example, Hobby Lobby won its U.S. Supreme Court case after rejecting the Obamacare requirement that contraceptives be included in employee benefits packages. But what if for-profit company leaders said that, for faith-based reasons, they could investigate and fire employees who USED contraceptives?

This brings us to another fascinating dispute inside the Ramsey Solutions empire. The Tennessean headline asks: “Can you be fired over your sex life? Dave Ramsey thinks so.” Here is the overture:

While a former employee has accused Ramsey Solutions of terminating her because of her pregnancy, the company disputes the claim. Company lawyers said in court filings the employee was fired for premarital sex and so were a dozen other employees.

Former administrative assistant Caitlin O'Connor, who was employed by Ramsey Solutions for over four years and never disciplined, said when she announced she was pregnant in June and requested paperwork for maternity leave, she was terminated for her pregnancy since she isn't legally married to her longtime partner, the baby's father.

Lawyers for Ramsey Solutions, owned by Dave Ramsey — a conservative financial titan who made headlines when he hosted a giant Christmas party during the pandemic and refused to let his employees work from home — said O'Connor wasn't fired because she was pregnant. She was terminated for having premarital sex.


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Returning to Kamp Kanakuk: Is this new expose a work of journalism, theology or both?

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Returning to Kamp Kanakuk: Is this new expose a work of journalism, theology or both?

Readers with long memories will recall that, when the Internet arrived it had an immediate impact on important subjects that rarely received adequate coverage in mainstream media.

Take religion, for example. The lower cost of publishing online led to an explosion of forums, listservs, newsletters, online “radio” channels, podcasts and weblogs. Some failed or evolved into new forms — consider the long and complicated histories of Beliefnet and Patheos — and others became, well, normal.

Now, in the “cancel culture” era, it’s clear that another example of online evolution is affecting serious coverage of religion, as well as other complicated topics.

I am referring to the controversies surrounding Substack and the myriad newsletters and alternative publications thriving there. For a sample of the fea paranoia surrounding Substack, click into this thread from a professor at the UCLA Center for Critical Internet Inquiry or read between the lines of this Washington Post column: “The Substack controversy’s bigger story.” Here is a sample of that:

Substack is a start-up for self-publishing email newsletters: Writers decide how often to write and whether and how much to charge; Substack sends the newsletters and collects any fees. The ease of use has made it popular with journalists. …

Some of the most prolific users are heterodox political writers who had found mainstream publications an increasingly poor fit. A number quickly rose to the top of the Substack leader boards. This attracted the gimlet eye of the cancelers: Other online writers — some of whom had their own Substack newsletters — have leveled accusations of transphobia and other offenses. A nascent boycott aims to pressure Substack into deplatforming the alleged offenders. Reportedly, their campaign is having some effect.

“Heterodox” is an interesting word. It appears, in this context, to define the work of various kinds of conservatives or, even worse, free thinkers (Andrew Sullivan and Bari Weiss, for example) who accuse many “liberals” or “progressives” of turning dangerously illiberal.

This brings me to this weekend’s must-read missive from Nancy and David French, care of The Dispatch, an alternative conservative online publication that is thriving in this new online environment. Here is the dramatic double-decker headline atop this long feature:

‘They Aren’t Who You Think They Are’

The inside story of how Kanakuk — one of America’s largest Christian camps — enabled horrific abuse.


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