By Elliott Nace | Staff Writer
The Diana R. Garland School of Social Work began a new faculty-led research project, the Adult Clergy Sexual Abuse Advocacy and Research Collaborative, in 2023. The collaborative, which features faculty members from both the School of Social Work and from other universities, provides the university and greater academic community with a mix of research on clergy sexual abuse and increased advocacy for survivor awareness and legal reform.
Collaborative Director and Social Work Professor Dr. David Pooler, who conducted prior research into cases of clergy sexual abuse, said an incentive behind the creation of the collaborative was a need for greater incorporation of what has historically been a niche field. He said the lack of action from clerical higher-ups also heightened the need for awareness at the university level.
“[Change] is coming bottom up — from the grassroots — for survivors and allies of survivors who would like to see change within churches as far as prevention around this, and certainly much better responses to survivors when it happens,” he said. “Those wanting to do advocacy work in this area didn’t really have research to go to, so we’ve created a public-facing web page where … some of the findings from research that have been done are posted there.”
Faculty working with the collaborative approach clergy sexual abuse in an interdisciplinary context which benefits from the perspectives of several fields spanning the humanities and social sciences. Dr. Marie Griffith, the John C. Danforth Distinguished Professor in the Humanities at Washington University in St. Louis and an outside faculty affiliate working with the collaborative, has interviewed over 120 people about their experiences within church communities. Of these interviewees, three-quarters of them were survivors of clergy sexual abuse.
Griffith, who has a background in the history of religion and gender in the U.S., has also consulted family members, journalists and lawyers to further gauge the existing cultural and institutional response to the issue.
“What I can lend in part is that perspective, that analysis of how these things came to be — the more historical perspective — and put these in a sort of context for us to understand,” she said. “I’m partly a gender studies scholar too, which I think is really important for studying clergy sexual abuse.”
The #MeToo and subsequent #ChurchToo movements, according to Pooler, brought clergy sexual abuse into the public forum at a time when churches had neglected the issue.
“[Awareness] became less hidden and less stigmatized, although there’s still a lot of issues around it, but there’s now so much more public awareness,” he said. “Churches often protect their own self-interest and their reputation, and sometimes what that ends up meaning is that survivors are not believed — they’re blamed.”
Pooler noted that in the U.S., both the Catholic Church and other Christian denominations often relocate and briefly rehabilitate abusive clergy instead of permanently removing them from their pastoral positions and pursuing legal prosecution.
“Churches don’t have the skill set to investigate these things in-house and then remove an offending pastor from ministry,” he said. “What we know is most of these folks are serial offenders and will continue to reoffend. The reason to make it a crime is so that the courts then become the places that actually hold an abusive minister accountable.”
Griffith said the collaborative’s findings, as well as research on the subject at large, has shown little gender discrimination across several churches with respect to clerical offenders and survivors, who in both cases can be either male or female.
“I want people to understand that there are still stories that are hard to tell, and that sometimes those are the stories we don’t always hear,” she said.
According to Pooler, clergy often have far more interaction with the laity than most other public figures. He said that this endows them with far greater power over their respective congregations and the additional responsibility to refrain from abusing their power.
“Someone’s social life, their sense of service and calling, their sense of meaning and purpose — all of that is connected in a faith community, and a minister is the one who is facilitating all of that,” he said.
According to Griffith, clergy sexual abuse awareness not only has the purpose addressing the needs of survivors, but also the added benefit of motivating public officials to pass new laws and driving clergy to act in accordance with their churches’ teachings.
“I think that this research that we’re doing not only provides better public awareness of abuse and how common, unfortunately, it turns out to be in all institutions — not just religious ones — but there are growing numbers of lawyers [and legal reform],” Griffith said.
Pooler mentioned that currently, only 15 states and the District of Columbia criminalize improper sexual contact between a pastor and someone in their care. Although clergy are not often held to the same standards as other social workers, the collaborative can feasibly advocate for reform, Pooler said.
“That’s an area where a lot of work can be done, where I know that survivors and others that support survivors will go to a lawmaker in their state and say, ‘Hey, would you sponsor a bill to make this a crime?’” he said. “Generally what happens is then pastors are just simply added to the list of other helping professionals, like doctors, nurses, therapists, social workers, professional counselors, etc.”
Griffith said the wide scope and interpersonal focus of the collaborative enables it to operate in each capacity necessary when navigating such a prevalent issue.
“Those of us who are working in this area can sort of strategize together about both prevention and solutions and ways of addressing clergy sexual abuse before it starts, but also once it’s happened,” she said. “’Solutions’ is an awfully big word, but awareness and eventually enough people getting together and performing our laws [will make] it a lot easier for survivors to get justice.”
Pooler said, Baylor’s academic focus through a Christian lens gives him an opportunity to conduct research on clergy sexual abuse that may not be feasible at other institutions.
“I’m close enough to the church because of Baylor’s identity, but yet removed as [part of] a research institution to be able to speak to the church with just enough objectivity and one step removed,” he said. “So I really do think that my sort of proximity and location as a researcher to Baylor is the sweet spot for doing this research.”
