the main American Protestant Church publishes a list of alleged sex offenders

A “initial but important step”. Officials from the main American Protestant Church, the Southern Baptist Convention, published a 205-page document on Thursday, May 26, listing its members who have been accused of sexual violence.

“The list is made public for the first time and is an initial, but important step in the fight against the scourge of sexual violence and the implementation of a reform in the Convention”the Southern Baptist Convention said in a statement.

The publication of this list comes a few days after that of an independent investigation report on the Church. The document concludes that the Southern Baptist Convention has, for years, practiced obstruction and concealment from victims of sexual assault. The document unveiled Thursday, which has existed since 2007, has long remained secret. He was regularly fed by a Church employee. Despite the existence of this list, officials appear to have done nothing to ensure that those named no longer hold important positions, according to the report.

The list includes hundreds of sexual assaults that often led to convictions. In some cases, suspects’ names or other details are obscured. The names of the victims are not listed, but their ages are often given. Some of the reported sexual assaults concern children aged five.

According to the report, the victims of these alleged facts and the people who sought to denounce this sexual violence have come up against for almost twenty years against “resistance, obstruction and even outright hostility” from members of the executive committee.

This scandal, involving nearly 400 pastors, volunteers and educators for two decades and more than 700 victims, was brought to light in 2019 thanks to the investigations of two Texas newspapers, the Houston Chronicle and the San Antonio Express-News.