SBC’s Sex Abuse Task Force Pivots Away From Guidepost Amid Pushback
Good news
A month after the SBC’s Abuse Reform Implementation Task Force (ARITF) announced that Guidepost Solutions was chosen to develop a “Ministry Check” website to “establish and maintain a public database of “pastors, denominational workers, ministry employees, and volunteers who have at any time been credibly accused of sexual abuse and who have been or are associated with a cooperating Southern Baptist church or entity,” the task force announced that they’d no longer recommend Guidepost Solutions as the one for the job.
Previously, SBC president Bart Barber released an extended video detailing why Guidepost was the only entity capable of creating the database, but weeks later, that’s no longer the case.
Amid fierce pushback from SBC laypeople and some leaders against using Guidepost, especially after they tweeted out pro-LGBTQ content to celebrate Pride month, ARTIF now says they will “consider alternative pathways (dividing the work among smaller firms which share our values) to establish and maintain the Ministry Check website. The ARITF is presently sourcing and evaluating additional firms to assist with the Ministry Check process who meet our qualifications for the highest professional standards.”
This is good news. We explained in our Guidepost Sex Abuse List how sloppy, deceptive, poorly researched, and almost entirely without merit Guidepost’s efforts have been so far. In particular, we noted that despite the report containing more than 700 entries, over 300 of the entries are against individuals who are either not part of the SBC or whose denomination is unknown.
How ARTIF needs to completely repudiate their notions of what it means to be “credibly accused” and they might have some worth after all.