Child Abuse: The Church’s Best Kept Secret?

While the nation addresses the problem of sexual abuse, Christian victims of incest say the church is lagging behind.

Alice Huskey remembers when she was just three years old, waking up in the morning and finding that her pajama bottoms had been removed. At first she was puzzled. Then she realized that her father had removed them during the night. An incestuous relationship that continued for 10 years had begun.

Huskey’s father wasn’t a convicted felon or even the town drunk. He was a Boy Scout leader and an active member of a fundamentalist church. On Sundays, he sang in the choir. But during the week he lived a private life about which only he and his daughter knew. For 10 years, on the average of twice a week, he coerced his daughter to have sexual relations, including intercourse and oral sex.

“I did not like what he was doing,” Huskey says today. “I felt it was wrong, but I feared him. I was taught to honor, trust, and obey my parents.… When I asked my father why he was doing this to me, his reply was that he was teaching me and this was the right way it was done by people. Trust him, it was okay.”

When Huskey was 13, her mother found out about the incestuous relationship, and the family crumbled. Huskey was placed in a foster home, and her parents were divorced. For the next 25 years she carried in silence the emotional scars of incest. But about two years ago, she became one of a rapidly increasing number of people who are talking about their experiences as abused children and expressing their concern for today’s victims.

Some observers regard child abuse, including incest, as this country’s greatest social problem. Experts cite studies indicating that as many as 25 percent of the country’s female population and 20 percent of the male population are sexually molested by the age of 16. Experts say most of this abuse occurs in the home.

Huskey has reason to believe these statistics apply to the evangelical community as well. She asked all 247 female students at a Christian liberal arts college to respond to a survey. Of the 96 who did, more than half said they had been abused as children. Almost all of these students had been reared in Christian homes.

At Focus on the Family, an organization founded by author James Dobson, all 25 people who work full-time answering letters say they have noticed an increase in the number of incest victims asking for help. “Our mail definitely reflects an increase in child abuse situations,” said correspondence director Claudette Reiser, adding that “the bulk of our mail is from Christians.” Reiser could not give details because of the organization’s commitment to confidentiality.

Sexually abused children typically develop emotional problems and have trouble adjusting socially as they move out into the world. They usually blame themselves for what happened. “The abused person feels fundamentally not okay,” says California therapist Henry Giaretto. “They have an intense, unconscious self-loathing, and some will do anything to sedate it.”

In 1972, Giaretto founded Parents United, today the nation’s largest treatment program for incest victims and their families. The first year he had 26 cases. Last year he had more than 1,000. Observers debate whether the increase is in the actual occurrence or in the reporting of incest. Most say it’s probably both.

Huskey says she remained silent about her experience with incest because “society does not look well on those who have been abused. And I thought I was the only person this had ever happened to.” But when she started telling others about her problem, she began hearing stories that sounded familiar.

One of the most tragic accounts she has heard is that of a young woman named Rebecca. For as long as Rebecca can remember, she was sexually and physically abused by her parents, both of whom continue to be active in their mainline Protestant church. She remembers being prostituted as a child for her parents’ financial gain. She was photographed in various sexual acts, including as a victim of sadism. She still shies away from cameras.

As a junior high school student, Rebecca told her school nurse what was happening, but the nurse simply reported her story to her father. After that, the abuse heightened, and she learned to endure in silence. Rebecca says that until recently, she felt guilty about what had happened to her. “I kept wondering if there was something I could have done that could have made a difference.”

Although the scars on her body remain, Rebecca’s emotional wounds have begun to heal. However, she does not attribute her progress to the church, an institution she says denies that the problem exists. At one point she sought pastoral counseling, but says, “All I got was an expression of disbelief.”

Huskey is writing a book intended in part to convince Christians that the problem does exist. It will be published by InterVarsity Press later this year. She has also formed an organization called Counter Abuse, Inc., which offers seminars and lectures at schools and churches in the Chicago area. Huskey says that at these events, young Christian women regularly come forward, unprompted, to reveal for the first time their history as incest victims.

Incest is but one aspect of child abuse, a problem that society only recently has begun to address. The hard reality of child abuse confronted America with the arrest last May of Virginia McMartin, a 76-year-old woman who seemed an unlikely candidate to be a leader of a child-sex ring. McMartin had operated a prestigious preschool in California. She and several members of her staff were charged with more than 100 counts of various forms of sexual abuse, including rape.

Soon after, Kee McFarlane, a California therapist who has worked with many children from McMartin’s preschool, stunned a congressional audience with her testimony that “we’re dealing with a conspiracy, an organized operation of child predators designed to prevent detection.”

Experts dismiss the “dirty old man” stereotype of the child abuser. They say abusers frequently are respected members of society: teachers, camp counselors, and scout leaders. The popular director of a Minneapolis children’s theater last year pleaded guilty to criminal sexual conduct with three 15-year-old boys. A United Methodist minister in New York whose church operated a day-care center was indicted on 42 counts of rape, sodomy, and sexual abuse of children.

Only a small percentage of sex abusers can be classified as pedophiles, according to Suzanne Danilson, who handles child abuse complaints for the state of Louisiana. “The pedophile has no normal adult sexual relationships,” she says. “They can only deal with children, and they have a certain type of child in mind.”

Danilson says pedophiles are rarely arrested “because they are so slick. They’re very good with children. They take a lot of time enticing them.” She adds that pedophiles “prey on children and teenagers who are having family problems.”

Franciscan priest Bruce Ritter says a high percentage of the children he works with daily have fled parents who abused them. Ritter’s New York City-based Covenant House provides food, clothing, and counseling to youth up to the age of 21. “These children grow up making no connection between sex and concepts like marriage, fidelity, and commitment,” he says.

Ritter cites a burgeoning pornography industry as a major reason for the increase in child abuse. The U.S. Justice Department is studying the relationship between pornography and aberrant sexual behavior. However, Ritter says he is not convinced such a study is necessary. “The most intellectually dishonest thing a person can say is that there is no connection between pornography and sexual abuse.”

Runaway children are prime targets for sex offenders, including those who peddle child pornography. According to Danilson, pedophiles use pornography as a way of breaking down the resistance of their victims. She says children are easily convinced that if something appears in a magazine, it must be okay.

Experts generally distinguish between the pedophile and the “situational” sex abuser. Unlike the pedophile, those in the latter category are not sexually obsessed with children. Rather, they use children as sexual outlets, typically as a surrogate partner in response to a troubled marriage or other personal problems. Many who contend that incest is on the rise cite the breakdown of the family as a major cause.

Most therapists believe the pedophile is untreatable, though the urges can be controlled by drugs. Abusers, they say, can be helped, but they suspect only a small percentage seek it. One reason is that therapists are required by law to report incidents of abuse to legal authorites.

Huskey says that offering “hope and help” to both the abused and the abusers presents Christians with a major opportunity for evangelism. She cites research indicating that sexual abuse is the root cause for violent crimes, including rape and murder. She says Christians should take steps to understand the feelings and motivations of victims before they victimize others.

However, Huskey says talking to abuse victims about God is no easy task. Because they were betrayed by those they trusted most, victims of abuse have trouble trusting anyone, including God. To some women, the word “father” invokes fear, not comfort. Huskey reports that after she invited one woman to allow Jesus to “come into her life,” the woman’s first reaction was fear that Christ would somehow abuse her sexually.

In another instance, such obstacles were overcome. Says Huskey’s friend Rebecca, “After meeting other victims of abuse, and realizing they had the same feelings and patterns of thought, I was comforted. Eventually I was able to see the Scriptures from a different perspective and to realize that to God, I was acceptable.”

A Watchdog Group Says The Irs Is Investigating The National Council Of Churches

A church monitoring group says the Internal Revenue Service (IRS) asked it for information to help determine if the National Council of Churches (NCC) has misused tax-exempt contributions for political purposes.

Penn Kemble, a spokesman for the Washington-based Institute on Religion and Democracy (IRD), said the IRS asked the institute to provide material from its files concerning the NCC’s use of tax-exempt contributions. Although the IRD has been a major critic of the NCC, Kemble said his organization refused to cooperate with the IRS investigation. NCC officials said they were unaware of any IRS investigation of the ecumenical body.

IRS spokesman Steven Mangellazzo said it was against the agency’s policy to “confirm or deny any alleged investigation.” However, he said the IRS would not contact a group such as IRD for information unless a formal investigation was under way. Evidence of partisan political use of tax-exempt contributions by a nonprofit organization could lead to the revocation of the organization’s tax-exempt status, he said.

George Johnson, of the IRS’s Chicago office, reportedly told the IRD that the inquiry was prompted by complaints from church members and clergy. Kemble said that Johnson asked the institute for any material it had concerning the council’s opposition to U.S. policies in Central America. Although the IRD is a leading critic of the council’s involvement in liberal social causes, the institute rejected the request for information.

“In this dispute [between the NCC and its critics], it is not for the government of the United States to judge,” Kemble wrote in a letter to Johnson. “The IRS should stay out.” He also expressed concern that government action against the NCC would hurt the cause of “real reform” in mainline denominations by making “legal and political” martyrs out of church officials.

Possible IRS action against the NCC would not be the first time the agency has investigated the ecumenical council. Between 1970 and 1981, the IRSconducted an audit that failed to prove that the council had misused tax-exempt contributions. Although the IRS refused to explain the grounds for that audit, some observers said they felt it was conducted in response to the NCC’s active opposition to the Vietnam War.

The cost of defending against such government inquiries sparked protests from many religious groups, and helped lead to the passage of the federal Church Audit Procedures Act. The law places some restrictions on the IRS’s ability to audit churches and religious groups.

In his letter to the IRS, Kemble wrote that if the IRS were to challenge the NCC’s tax exemption, “the IRD would almost certainly feel obliged to come to the council’s defense, even though we disagree profoundly with many of the council’s activities and the interpretation of Christian teaching from which such activities flow. Our disagreement with the NCC has a religious basis. We believe it must be resolved with the churches—not by the government.”

Government intervention into church disputes “can only make real church reform difficult,” Kemble wrote. “Some of those who are abusing Christian stewardship will eagerly seize upon any IRS action to claim a kind of legal and political martyrdom for themselves.… Others who are troubled by what their churches are doing may be lulled into passivity by the false expectations that the government could somehow solve the problems of their churches.”

RELIGIOUS NEWS SERVICE

NORTH AMERICAN SCENE

The Unification Church moved its fleet of 81 fishing boats out of Norfolk, Virginia, to avoid paying thousands of dollars in personal property taxes. Last year, the city collected $37,736 in taxes on the boats, trailers, and motors because they were not being used for religious purposes. “When they don’t use it, I tax it,” said revenue commissioner Sam Barfield.

A York, Pennsylvania, abortion clinic has dropped an effort to prevent picketing by antiabortion demonstrators. A spokeswoman for the Hillcrest Women’s Medical Center said they dropped their lawsuit against the protesters because the clinic did not want the suit to be used to get the picketers’ cause before the U.S. Supreme Court.

The U.S. government’s annual survey of drug abuse among high school seniors has shown a small decline in overall drug abuse, but a slight increase in the use of cocaine. The figure for cocaine abuse, 5.8 percent of all the nation’s high school students, has never been higher. Twenty-seven percent of the nation’s high school seniors had used at least one illicit drug within 30 days of the survey. That figure compares with 29 percent last year, and 38 percent in 1979, the peak year.

A recent Gallup Poll suggests that many Catholics would welcome the return of the Latin mass. Fifty-three percent of the respondents said they would attend such a mass if it were convenient to do so. Since the mid-1960s, Roman Catholics have celebrated mass in their own languages, having changed from the traditional Latin mass as a result of decisions made during the Second Vatican Council.

New Jersey education officials have suspended their attempt to end the observance of a moment of silence in three school districts until the U.S. Supreme Court decides on a similar case from Alabama. Schools in Woodbury, Pennsville, and Sayreville start each day with a moment of silence despite a federal judge’s ruling in 1983 that the practice is unconstitutional.

CBN University(CBNU),a graduate-level institution founded in 1978, has received full accreditation by the Southern Association of Colleges and Schools. Accreditation gives the school comparable academic standing and interchangeable course credits with other accredited colleges and universities. With an enrollment of 500, CBNU is part of a 685-acre complex that includes the headquarters of the Christian Broadcasting Network.

Personalia

Former President Jimmy Carter next month will receive the World Methodist Peace Award for 1985 in recognition of his continued commitment to world peace. The first American to receive the award, Carter helped establish the Carter Center of Emory University for the reduction of world conflict. Recently, he has worked with Habitat for Humanity, an organization that provides low-cost housing for the poor.

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