The SBC’s “Not-So-Hot” Hotline.

Posted on by February 26, 2025avatar

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The Bible tells us to love our neighbors, and also to love our enemies; probably because generally they are the same people. Gilbert K. Chesterton

When doing something means doing “Anything but that.”

Back in the days when the SBC was determined to “Do Something” about reports of sex abuse, I wrote The SBC Hotline Is ‘Expensive’ and Worth It But the Cost Must Eventually Be Disclosed I wrote:

The Roys Report posted SBC President Bart Barber Says Sexual Abuse Hotline Worth the Cost:

Barber said despite the high costs, he believes having the hotline is the right thing to do.

“I think according to God’s economy and according to the way that accountants look at the economy,” he said, “it’s a good investment for Southern Baptist to do everything that we can, even if it costs some money to do it, everything that we can to assist our local churches to prevent abuse and to comfort those and provide support for those who are survivors of abuse.”

How much does this cost? Please don’t ask because they won’t tell you unless they go broke.

I had lots of questions about the costs surrounding this endeavor.

However, will the SBC ever release the exact cost of the project?

I have been in conversation with some folks who have pointed out difficulties in getting exact numbers for anything. Take the North American Mission Board as an example. Are the messenger’s ever told exactly how many church plants have occurred, were houses bought for these church planters, and what happened if the church failed? How many church plants fail? How much do they pay their leaders?

I am digging into the finances of the SBC and am somewhat surprised how little is shared with women like Auntie Harriet, who is willing to use her estate to help the “poor missionaries.” I hope that the SBC will become as transparent with its finances as it is about its failings in sexual abuse. That means telling the messengers exactly how much the hotline cost and how it was conducted. I’m sure other denominations are watching this process, and such transparency will also help them.

In the meantime, I’m waiting patiently, hoping the SBC can figure out how to curb sex abuse in their churches while claiming church autonomy. How it will happen remains to be seen.

The database is as gone as Roger Williams was from the Puritan in-crowd in Massachusetts.

The sex abuse database is no longer their focus. I believe this is due to the financial hot water experienced by the folks who run that “organization.” I think “organization” is a far better word than denomination since the leaders claim they have no control over just about anything a church does, including sexual abuse. Well, to be truthful, there is an area they have control over. They will boot-kick any church that names Mary Lou, who runs the children’s program, as a pastor. But that is neither here nor there. Christianity Today wrote Southern Baptists Abandon Abuse Database.

“At this point, it’s not a focus for us,” Jeff Iorg, head of the Southern Baptist Convention’s Executive Committee, told reporters at a news conference Tuesday during the committee’s annual meeting in Nashville.

The hotline to nowhere…

I have been somewhat tied up in the last two months and am finally returning to normal. I realized I was naive because I assumed the hotline was “unplugged” since its original intent was to give information to the database. I had long been somewhat suspicious of the hotline because no one could tell us how the calls were handled. How was the information handled? Apparently, the hotline has not been unplugged. Christa Brown deals with this in The SBC’s Sexual Abuse Hotline: Who Does It Serve?

Repeatedly, those who developed and promoted the hotline told us that one of its primary purposes was to gather information to assess: “Is this person credibly accused and should they be going on the database.”

Further, the abuse reform task force claimed it was going to hire personnel “to receive and investigate reports of abuse and mishandling abuse” in Southern Baptist churches,

…There are no names at all on the much-touted “historic” SBC database. And now, SBC officials have flat-out admitted that they’re sidelining the development of a database.

Boz Tchividjian weighed in with a question about where the information goes after a person spills their pain on the hotline.

Boz also raised questions about “what it does with the information it collects.”

How are those calls handled?

Christa Brown said:

They said it was “safe” and claimed that survivor information was “protected and confidential.” But that wasn’t accurate, a fact that became all the more obvious when, unsurprisingly, a court ruled that a survivor’s communications to the hotline administrator had to be disclosed.

They also said the hotline would ensure that abuse reports are “properly handled.” But from all appearances, it seems the vast majority of them simply vanish into a dark file somewhere. Is that what they deem “properly handled”?

What is the data?

Christa wrote:

Last week, SBC Executive Committee president Jeff Iorg announced that there had been 674 abuse reports made to the hotline, 59% involving alleged abuse of minors and 41% involving alleged abuse of adults.

Could the SBC be using this hotline to “prove” there is no sex abuse problem? Uh oh!

With the hotline, SBC officials are gathering data to irresponsibly bolster their claim that SBC clergy sex abuse isn’t a widespread problem.

How do we know? Because based on the hotline reports, Iorg asserted that sexual abuse is “not widespread” within the SBC.

Karen Roudkovski immediately saw the problem with Iorg’s statement: He was effectively using the hotline data as though it provided a prevalence rate for clergy sex abuse within the SBC.

Christa’s summary and Jay Mallow’s explanation.

So, to summarize… it appears the Executive Committee decided to sideline the development of a clergy sex abuser database based on their belief that, because the hotline had “only” 674 abuse reports, the problem wasn’t “widespread.”

Jay Mallow explained the reality of what the SBC had done: “It’s a real phenomenon where you make the complaint process difficult or untrustworthy, then point to the lack of complaint as evidence of a lack of a problem.”

My thoughts?

I believe that Christa Bronw is right. My community discussed adding some gates two years ago since traffic increased due to roadwork. Some neighbors opposed the effort and hired a company to prove the neighborhood had little traffic. They did the study during summer vacation when traffic slowed to nothing. The study was flawed from the start.
I plan to discuss the problem that the SBC has with an increase in lawsuits due to sex abuse. They need more money. Why an increase in lawsuits? Could it be they have a problem? It looks like I’m back to square one.

Comments

The SBC’s “Not-So-Hot” Hotline. — 39 Comments

  1. Oh, dee…. there’s more! They’re asking the pew sitters to pay for their lies and incompetency!

    https://baptistnews.com/article/sbc-executive-committee-cant-cover-expenses-seeks-extra-3-million/

    ……cannot meet its financial obligations this year and needs $3 million in “priority funding” from church offerings to cover its legal expenses. ……….

    This request for special funding to help pay the legal expenses of the SBC’s sexual abuse claims is a first in the denomination. To this point, the Executive Committee has burned through $13 million in its own reserves to cover investigations and legal bills.

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  2. Nancy2(aka Kevlar),
    I have noticed in a number of orgs over the years that “leaders” are masters of not taking responsibility for their actions…. Now, not only do they not take responsibility, but they get the peons to pay for the consequences..

    i always like the “I don’t recall” very obvious actions … yet demand/receive outrageous salaries claiming they they are so “effective”.. what a scam..

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  7. Jeffrey Chalmers: BS artist..

    We read about them daily on TWW, a steady string of imposters. They can be found in megachurch pulpits, in the ivory towers of denominations, and even in small-town churches. The American church, in its current condition, ain’t scarin’ the devil much … an ailment which can be cured only through genuine revival and spiritual awakening. Humility, prayer, repentance, and a return to God are what’s needed, but I don’t see much movement in that direction.

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  8. Nancy2(aka Kevlar): needs $3 million in “priority funding” from church offerings to cover its legal expenses. ……….

    This request for special funding to help pay the legal expenses of the SBC’s sexual abuse claims is a first in the denomination.

    Whoa! I like to hear how pastors at SBC’s 47,000 churches approach their congregations with that request! No matter how you spin it, pewsitters will hear “Today, you need to dig a little deeper in your pockets. We are taking up a special offering to help pay for all the sexual abuse that’s been going on in SBC.”

    As an old Southern Baptist yourself, Nancy, remember when “priority funding” meant the support of worldwide evangelism and missions? Yep, the SBC is done … it just hasn’t quit yet.

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  10. Max,

    Combine this with our current “political” situation, evangelicals and fundamentalist have zero credibility in my professional world…. Just yesterday, one my colleagues went off how as long as someone holds up a Bible for a press shot, the person can be “morally bankrupt” do anything since “this person” is divinely appointed…

    Sigh…. Growing up, it was POUNDED into me by my fundamentalist “teachers” how we have to morally pure… but now, it is fine to have ……

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  12. Another good quote from Martin Luther:
    “Why does not the pope, whose wealth today is greater than the wealth of the richest Crassus, build the basilica of St. Peter with his own money rather than with the money of poor believers?”
    So SBC so-called leaders, lead by giving of your own money, selling your own things, doing what it takes as far as you to raise 3 million.

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  14. JJallday: So SBC so-called leaders, lead by giving of your own money, selling your own things, doing what it takes as far as you to raise 3 million.

    SBC’s so-called leaders and their activities are funded by hard-working Southern Baptists across the country via something called the “Cooperative Program.” Each SBC church (there are 47,000) budget a certain percentage of their receipts to the CP; this year, the CP budget is around $200 million to support the operations of the SBC hierarchy. We know that salaries of some of the big boys exceed $500,000 (reckon what the average Southern Baptist makes each year?); perhaps it’s time for a Musk-pencil to sweep through SBC ranks.

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  16. Okay, I freely admit that I’m kinda crazy, but…… From what I could access, I tallied the SBC’s 2024-2025 budget. From what I could find, the total budget is $1,067,107,100. The detailed list is below….. (I couldn’t find a total, so I added and triple checked…. why won’t the give the total?…..hmmmm.)

    The $13,000,000 they have spent on abuse would be 1.2% of the 2024/2025 budget…. 4% of what has been budgeted for Lifeway Christian Resources…….. and they’re begging the pew peons for a measly 3 million (1% of what is budgeted for Lifeway!) ???????

    https://www.bgav.org/blog/recap-of-proceedings-at-sbc-2024-annual-meeting#:~:text=Messengers%20overwhelmingly%20approved%20with%20no%20discussion%20a%20%241.067,includes%20the%20EC%2FSBC%20operating%20budget%20of%20%2410.23%20million.

    Convention operations — $10,235,000

    International Mission Board — $284,000,000

    North American Mission Board — $137,320,000

    Lifeway Christian Resources — $309,500,000

    GuideStone Financial Resources — $127,000,000

    Gateway Seminary — $12,900,000

    Midwestern Seminary — $35,340,000

    New Orleans Seminary — $24,896,500

    Southeastern Seminary — $33,177,000

    Southern Seminary — $53,328,964

    Southwestern Seminary — $35,600,000

    Ethics & Religious Liberty Commission — $3,351,340

    Historical Library and Archives — $507,100

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  19. Gee, after spending some time reading the Bible, you might think that a bunch of “church leaders” would believe that ONE case of sexual abuse within the “church” would be too many…

    Jesus spoke about the lost coin/sheep/son. I assume he didn’t mean that just for a Sunday sermon, but about how we are supposed to live our lives, most especially within “church.”

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  22. Jeffrey Chalmers: I have noticed in a number of orgs over the years that “leaders” are masters of not taking responsibility for their actions…. Now, not only do they not take responsibility, but they get the peons to pay for the consequences..

    About 40 years ago in Computerworld, there was a humor essay that became prophecy.
    It was on company organizations and how the goal for all of them is Absolute Authority and Zero Responsibility.

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  23. Jeffrey Chalmers: Just yesterday, one my colleagues went off how as long as someone holds up a Bible for a press shot, the person can be “morally bankrupt” do anything since “this person” is divinely appointed…

    From a YouTube comment thread about “Rural Cosplay” (Drugstore Cowboy Chic):

    To these folks, you’re always doing something wrong if you try to better yourself in anyway that doesn’t involve The LORD™, sports-related stuff, or becoming a high-ranking businessman overnight. You can get away with the most horrific stuff imaginable and people will look the other way if you involve Jesus somehow.

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  24. Jeffrey Chalmers: Growing up, it was POUNDED into me by my fundamentalist “teachers” how we have to morally pure… but now, it is fine to have ……

    Convenient how Purity has been limited to Pelvic Issues and Pelvie Issues alone, Eh, My Dear Wormwood?
    NOWHERE DO WE CORRUPT SO EFFECTIVELY AS AT THE VERY FOOT OF THE ENEMY’S ALTAR!

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  26. Susan,

    You would think so right? But even after 674 reports, 59% of which relate to minors, 0 names have appeared in the database. Wondering what’s their definition of a ‘credible accusation’ or a ‘widespread problem’. Jesus also said “whatever you do for the least of these you do for me”.

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  27. Susan: after spending some time reading the Bible, you might think that a bunch of “church leaders” would believe that ONE case of sexual abuse within the “church” would be too many

    Indeed. The average SBC church of its 47,000 churches has less than 200 members. Located in rural areas across America, many of them are struggling to keep their doors open as the world changes about them. News such as this doesn’t circulate in those area. But pastors know what’s going on. I guarantee you that they are not in a hurry to have ‘family meetings’ with their congregations to inform them about two very important things happening in SBC life: (1) the alarming level of sex abuse by pastors and other staff, and (2) the proliferation of New Calvinism throughout SBC that is gradually changing traditional beliefs and practices of the denomination (most SBC members are non-Calvinist). The SBC is done; it just hasn’t quit yet.

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  29. Max,

    Interesting to say the least with all these years and years of preoccupation with external evils and enemies coming through the front door, when more often than not, its internal evils and enemies that have entered through the back door and established legitimacy. Sounds all cold war & checkpoint Charlie stuff but nothing new under the sun.

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  32. Max,

    Not that I’m contending with a crisis of faith or anything, but all these ends justifies the means, alternative biblical facts, and shameless justifications for all soughts of unethical behaviour, makes me quite anxious. More so now when I hear it dripping from mainline churches and denominations.
    Count myself fortunate though to have know Godly men & women who faithfully churches and communities and did all things for Jesus sake.

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  33. Ian Docker,

    These are days that believers need to be well-grounded in faith, praying and reading Scripture themselves … to test and try the spirits that have made their way into the institutional church. The level of pulpit deception is at an all-time high … we read about it daily on TWW and elsewhere. We have a “hotline” to Jesus if we would just use it.

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  36. Max: I have yet to hear anyone refer that way to New Calvinists and their movement.

    Oh, but it IS “Real Christ like”.
    All you need is to redefine “Christ like” into its “diabolical meaning”, My Dear Wormwood.
    Nowhere do we corrupt so effectively as at the foot of The Enemy’s altar!

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  38. SBC’s hotline could cover so much wrong with the denomination these days:

    “Press 1 if you are reporting sex abuse by church staff … Press 2 if your new pastor lied to the pastor search committee about his theological leaning … Press 3 if your pastor is preaching things opposed to SBC traditional belief and practice … Press 4 if you believe your hard-earned tithes and offerings are supporting things at the national SBC level you don’t agree with … Press 5 if you want to know how to get out of a membership agreement without getting the spiritual daylights disciplined out of you … Press 6 to report any other hell you are encountering in your church.”

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