Saturday, April 17, 2010

A story of abuse from Canada

Clergy sexual abuse happens in churches all over the world, even in the great white north. Chad Blaine Mossing was a church volunteer working with youth at several churches. He was convicted of 11 counts of sexual assault.

Fifteen of the offences occurred in Mission, with others in Merritt and Oliver, B.C. from around 1998 until August 2007. The investigation was conducted by the Kelowna and Mission RCMP detachments.

All of the victims, except one, were boys.

Two of the abused children reported abuse…

Court documents show that the first two victims reported the incidents to other adults but the behaviour was brushed aside and was not reported to police at that time.

One girl took it to her pastor…

In 2002, Mossing sexually touched a girl, then 13 or 14, when she was part of a group he took on a trip. The following day, the girl confronted Mossing and a pastor, but she was made to feel as if she had over-reacted.

Does this sound familiar? It happens in so many of these cases. Unsupervised access to children in the name of spiritual development is an open door to pedophiles. Add a church culture that blindly trusts Christians as incapable of committing these acts and its the perfect storm for abuse. When Church officials protect adults over children, it’s time to find another church.

At least Mossing will spend a few years in prison.

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BC Pastor · 734 weeks ago

I know we're coming from seriously different places philosophically, but for what it's worth, the BC regional group of churches I'm a part of just the Mossing cases as case studies a recent lengthy program on taking this stuff seriously and creating policies and procedures aimed at preventing abuse. You are right that the idealism of church culture (and to a degree, naivety) is a huge problem. Small churches are also vulnerable because they don't have enough manpower to feel they can be selective when it comes to volunteers and they "everyone knows everyone here. It could never happen here." But I at least in my neck of the Christian woods I'm seeing a significant change of attitude and an awareness that the very nature and values of the church create vulnerabilities.

The keynoter at that seminar works for BC social services and actually worked on this case. Mossing actually worked with several groups, but the speaker's take on the one that blew the case open was that the church had, in fact, taken the allegations seriously and had responded immediately by contacting the appropriate authorities. Immediately as in at the moment it was disclosed by the victim. The victim and accusation was taken seriously and there accused was not given the benefit of the doubt.

Anyway, I'm not commenting to argue atheism or anything. Just to note that, institutionally, churches are more aware and proactive about this stuff than you may realize. Rigorous, regular screening is beginning to be mandated, and people aren't so prone to confuse grace and responsibility.
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Mojoey 107p · 734 weeks ago

BC Pastor - I agree with you. I am finding more and more that churches are getting their act together on this subject. In fact, the trend I see in reporting is that more churches are catching the crime or putting processes in place that let the abused come forward in safety. It's encouraging.

Thanks for your comments.

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