It’s Not Over – Evangelicals, Abuse and a Call for a Gospel-shaped Repentance

Jan 1, 2021 by

by David Ould:

What a year 2020 has been. What seemed like a localised event far far away has spread to affect so many of us. If it’s not hit your church community yet, it can only be a matter of time.

I wish I was talking about covid. But the reality is that there’s been another contagion rippling across our world:

Abuse by evangelicals.

It’s not over – a stream of reports of abuse

The abuse has taken many forms and been revealed by many brave people. Only this last year we’ve heard revelations about Crowded House under Steve Timmis. Then the rapid unveiling of Ravi Zacharias’s behaviour, with RZIM only admitting to likelihood of some of the offences in the last few days.

What is particularly disappointing about these events and others like them (not withstanding, of course, the actual abuse itself) is the cover-ups and denials that they are accompanied with. So, as just one example, RZIM’s American leadership quite clearly initially sought to suppress the allegations rather than investigate them properly causing prominent members of the organisation to break ranks and call for transparency and openness, not just with the specific allegations of sexual assault by Zacharias but other related matters. Where leadership seeks to minimise these events the eventual harm done is even greater. Genuine transparency is always the better option.

Right here in Sydney another incident is unravelling before our eyes.

Read here

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