Faced with Allegations, Anglicans Want to Change the Trajectory of Abuse Response

Mishandled case in Wheaton has been a wake-up call for the relatively young denomination.

Priests and parishioners in the Anglican Church in North America (ACNA) are expressing grief and anger over sexual abuse allegations against a lay leader in the Diocese of the Upper Midwest and the revelation that its bishop waited two years to notify churches in the diocese about the reports.

Church leaders and advocates in Illinois and beyond see this case as a chance for the 12-year-old denomination to establish better practices for preventing abuse and to care well for survivors.

After admitting he made “regrettable errors” in the process, Bishop Stewart Ruch III requested a leave of absence this month as the diocese investigates whether he and other diocesan leaders mishandled abuse allegations against Mark Rivera, a former lay leader at Christ Our Light Anglican in Big Rock, Illinois, and longtime member and volunteer at Church of the Resurrection in Wheaton, Illinois. Until his leave, Ruch was a pastor at Church of the Resurrection, the diocesan headquarters. Read More

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ACNA's Scandals and Mine

Image Credit: Anglican Diocese of the Upper Midwest

Early in the life of the Anglican Church in North America I concluded that ACNAers were idealistic, naive, and overly defensive. They were not willing to admit that their fledgling denomination had problems that would develop into worse problems over time. When I shared my concerns, I was dismissed as "not a friend of the ACNA." One of the problem areas to which I drew attention was that the ACNA at the diocesan and local level was not implementing adequate safeguards against sexual abuse and sexual abuse perpetrators. There was an attitude that that sort of thing could not happen in the ACNA. "We have godly bishops!" I was told. My response was that bishops were fallible human beings like everyone else and ACNAers were overlooking the need for checks and balances to episcopal authority and lay oversight of the episcopate. Now the chickens are coming home to roost.