The Southern Baptist Convention is under investigation by the United States Department of Justice. The executive committee of the Nashville-based denomination announced today that the investigation will include multiple Southern Baptist entities.
The executive committee says it plans to “fully and completely” cooperate.
A statement from SBC entity leaders and SBC president @bartbarber on the initiation of an investigation by the @TheJusticeDept. pic.twitter.com/yIopOScCAz
— SBC Executive Committee (@SBCExecComm) August 12, 2022
This disclosure comes from the denomination’s leaders. So far, the DOJ has not released any information publicly and declined WPLN’s request for comment.
“The SBC Executive Committee has received a subpoena from the US Department of Justice,” the SBC’s lawyer wrote in a statement to WPLN. “However, no individuals have been subpoenaed at this point.”
The investigation comes after a third-party report in May found the SBC ignored sexual abuse for decades. Interviews with more than 300 people and a review of documents across two decades showed that senior leaders at the nation’s largest protestant denomination pushed aside the allegations to protect their own reputations and avoid legal liability.
And this week, the SBC named a nine-person task force for reforming how the church will respond to sex abuse in the future.
The SBC’s annual meeting in June focused on responding to the revelations, and by the end, the executive committee picked a new chairman seen as a reformer.
The new executive committee chairman Jared Wellman is an Arlington, Texas, pastor who pushed the leadership panel to drop attorney-client privilege — a decision that ultimately led to a wave of resignations.
Update: This story has been updated to note that the Department of Justice declined to comment on the investigation.
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