#ChurchToo: Not Just for Evangelicals Anymore
Fri 10:00am - 10:50am
Venue: Library
Co-Creators
Many of the predators who've been exposed by #ChurchToo are common Evangelical household names—celebrities, even. So it's easy for progressive Christians to think that they and their faith communities are immune to the sexualized violence that seems so ubiquitous in places like the Southern Baptist Convention. Unfortunately, progressive communities house abusers too, and many of them get away with it for years under the guise of being left-leaning and open-minded. In this session, I'll look at what factors actually contribute to an environment that is friendly to abusers and dangerous for marginalized groups—such as culture of celebrity, failure to reject purity culture fully, failure to adopt and teach sex-positive values, and tolerance of misogyny, among others. My hope for this session is to give progressive people of faith something to walk away with that they can actually do to make their communities better and safer, rather than just sitting around and pointing fingers at Evangelicals, which may make people feel better but doesn't actually do anything for survivors. I hope that people who come will leave feeling motivated, like there is still work to do, because there is. But I also hope that survivors of sexual violence will feel seen and heard and comforted knowing that they will be centered and fought for regardless of the political or theological environment their abuse happened in. I hope to leave time for Q&A at the end as well!