October 1, 2026
Dr. Johnny Nix is right: the Southern Baptist Convention's response to the abuse crisis damaged trust. The pastor of Pickett’s Mill Baptist Church makes that case with real conviction in a recent Christian Index commentary. Where we part ways is on whose trust was broken, and how it will be rebuilt.
Where We Agree and Disagree
We agree that abuse is evil, abusers should be held accountable, and the accused rightly deserve due process. He is right when he says, “Justice needs facts, due process, and impartiality.” On these principles we stand together. I would add that not everything done in the name of abuse reform has been done well. Many churches still fail to provide the bare minimum of protection. Some survivors still find their cries ignored or see justice come only at great personal cost. Some accused persons may have felt suspicion settle on them before the facts were in.
Nix’s commentary risks leaving the impression that the whole of the reform effort has been unjust and that the accused were its chief casualties. While Nix offers no specific instance of “pastors, leaders, and faithful servants of Christ” being falsely accused, false accusations occur, and each one does real harm. Yet it is also true that where the process may have failed, however inexcusable, it no more discredits the pursuit of justice than a wrongful arrest discredits the rule of law. We must continue to improve the process without abandoning the pursuit of justice for victims and the accused.
The Problem Is Not Behind Us
The problem of sexual abuse is not behind us. At the June 2026 annual meeting in Orlando, SBC Credentials Committee Chairman Jonathan Sams reported that over the past seven years, the committee was asked to inquire into more than 800 churches, and about 75% of that work, more than 600 cases, involved alleged sexual abuse. Recent Lifeway research shows that while 58% of SBC churches now conduct background checks, only about a third have been trained on how to report abuse. We have made progress, but a long way remains before we can claim we protect every child and vulnerable person in our care.
A Story I Know Closely
Numbers like these have faces, and, admittedly, not all have outcomes like this story here. What follows, though, is one case, told in some detail, spanning forty years, multiple churches, and one abuser. It is not the whole story, but it shows the pattern. David Pittman has shared publicly that from the ages of 12 to 15, in the early 1980s, he was raped by a youth minister of an SBC church in Georgia. It took him 20 years to speak of it publicly, well past the statute of limitations for criminal charges. When he did, he says survivors from three other SBC churches in Georgia came forward to say the same man had abused them.
Beginning in 2006, Pittman says he warned SBC churches where this youth minister was serving on staff. In a published interview, the deacon chairman at one church Pittman warned said the youth minister resigned when confronted. The chairman added that he shared with the Georgia Baptist Convention “evidence that the youth minister should be barred from working in churches.” Pittman says he also reported this youth minister to the Georgia Baptist Convention, Southern Baptist presidents, and the SBC Executive Committee. The responses, he says, were silence or that they could not help but would pray for him.
In 2010, the youth minister began serving yet another SBC church. Nearly a decade later, that church’s pastor apologized publicly in the Christian Index: he had terminated the man after Pittman warned him and the man had admitted assaulting Pittman, only to rehire him as music minister a short time later. In 2019, while continuing to serve as music minister at this church, the abuser confessed in writing to me that he had sexually assaulted five boys, Pittman among them, when he was on staff in the 1980s at the church I now serve as lead pastor. He named each boy. He also told me he could not remember if there were more victims at other churches.
That same year, and before the pastor’s public apology, this church was referred to the SBC Executive Committee for allegations that its minister of music had committed sexual abuse. The EC referred the church to the Bylaws Workgroup to inquire as to whether it was in good standing with the SBC. The Workgroup was informed that two more survivors had come forward, beyond Pittman, alleging abuse by this man, that the pastor of the church where he was serving would not say whether he had been warned about the abuse allegations, and that Pittman had documented the abuse publicly. Yet the Workgroup, without speaking with any survivor, declared no further inquiry was warranted.
After that decision, the pastor told his church, in a message streamed online, that the EC’s interim president had called him to apologize that the church was accused of mishandling abuse. The Georgia Baptist Mission Board’s executive director did much the same, later acknowledging in the Christian Index his message had been insensitive to survivors and asking for their forgiveness.
As hard as it may be to believe, this dreadful story does not end here. The church terminated the worship leader, and he found his way into the worship ministry of yet another SBC church, at least the seventh known where he served in student or worship ministries. He eventually returned to the worship ministry of the church that terminated him in 2019. When the local Georgia Baptist-affiliated association learned of it in 2023, association leadership told me they had not previously acted because no one had brought it to their attention. Once they confronted the church, it withdrew from the association, having already withdrawn from the Southern Baptist and Georgia Baptist Conventions. The pastor resigned. The confessed abuser remained.
This story is not a headline. It is the documented record of how certain Southern Baptist leaders responded to credible allegations of abuse, responses that, in my opinion, contributed to an environment in which this abuser was able to move from one SBC church to another. Trust was not broken because leaders were too eager to believe victims. It broke because our structures and processes too often failed to give survivors a just hearing, and, as this case shows, allowed a child sexual abuser to keep serving in ministry roles of SBC churches.
How We Disagree Matters
How we disagree is a substantial part of the challenge. We seem to have lost the ability to differ with one another without questioning one another’s motives or commitment to the Word of God, and the ongoing debate over waiving attorney-client privilege is no exception. Nix suggests that Convention insiders were more concerned with appealing to the world than to the Word when some advocated a limited waiver. But to frame the choice as defending the faith once delivered or supporting the waiver is a false dichotomy. Faithful brothers and sisters, equally committed to the Word, can weigh these matters differently.
The facts of the waiver paint a different picture than his commentary presents. Church messengers, the very ones he rightly says own the Convention, demanded the waiver from the floor at an annual meeting. After vigorous debate, Executive Committee trustees enacted it. We should not celebrate the authority of messengers and churches in one paragraph and lament its exercise in the next when we disagree with their decisions.
Reasons for Hope
There are reasons for hope. On May 11 this year, Georgia’s governor signed into law legislation that will add clergy to its improper sexual contact statute, a bill the Georgia Baptist Mission Board publicly supported and that passed both chambers unanimously. Among those who worked to advance this bill was Hayle Swinson, who has spoken publicly about being victimized by a pastor she trusted. When the church and the law move together to protect the vulnerable, trust is strengthened.
So let me end where Nix and I agree. Trust is a stewardship. It takes years to build, and it can be lost quickly. But it can be rebuilt by telling survivors, in word and in deed, that when they report abuse, they will be heard the first time, not the third, and by giving the accused due process. Justice has to run both ways, and it will take courage to see that it does. Heaven is watching.
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Troy Bush serves as the lead pastor of Rehoboth Baptist Church in Tucker, Georgia. He holds a Ph.D. from the Southern Baptist Theological Seminary and has taught at several seminaries and universities. He previously served with the International Mission Board and the North American Mission Board.
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