Wolves and Shepherds: why we need to talk about abuse in order to welcome young people in our churches

In Titus chapter 2, in the midst of a section of the letter that is all about the importance of living lives of transparent goodness and godliness, Paul gives one of his main reasons that living like this matters ‘so that in everything they may adorn the doctrine of God our Savior’ (Titus 2:10 ESV). The word used for adorn literally means to ‘beautify’, it is the verb kosmeo from which we get our word cosmetics. The good lives of God’s people are supposed to compliment the beauty of the gospel the way that make-up magnifies the beauty of a woman.

And yet over the past few years successive abuse scandals, and the church’s frequent mishandling of them, has made the church and the gospel seem ugly. #MeToo has tragically become #ChurchToo as some shepherds have been exposed as wolves.

There are many implications for this and many important reasons, primarily focusing on the needs of survivors, why the church needs to talk openly about abuse. However, whilst in no sense diminishing that vital conversation, I want to focus on why we need to talk about abuse as part of our witness and particularly if we want to welcome young adults into our churches.

1. The importance of social justice

Millennials and Gen Z are animated on issues of social justice almost like no other generation before. In August 2020 a research report by Forrester noted the way that Gen Z assesses institutions (like government, the police, and the church) as well as brands. Think of the various websites available now that evaluate how ethical brands are on their supply chain, their worker conditions, their waste, and carbon footprint. Think of how scrutinised the police have been around issues of racial justice since Black Lives Matter. Now ask yourself whether you really think that young adults aren’t doing a similar evaluation of the church, of your church? It doesn’t take long to do a quick Google, or search through a few social media posts for young adults to form their opinions about the transparency and trustworthiness of a leader, church, or denomination.

This is not just some PR exercise for the church, this should be an area where we are taking the lead. We serve a God who is passionate about the rights of the vulnerable and who shows that godly leadership is that of self-sacrificial love as shown to us by Jesus Christ. The early church was counter-cultural and compelling in large part because of the way that it cared for the marginalised and the vulnerable in this way. Similarly, if we are serious about beautifying the gospel, we need to be more concerned for transparent lives of godliness than the worldly responses of ‘protecting the name of the church’, which is too often at the expense of survivors.

2. Suspicion and the need for authenticity

Paul Ricoeur dubbed that great triumvirate of late nineteenth and early twentieth-century thought - Marx, Nietzsche, and Freud - ‘the school of suspicion’. They all had in common ways of seeing the world that said that the surface level experiences and narratives are not in fact the way things really are. This narrative of suspicion has really got hold of the West’s young adults and has been reinforced by a wide range of recent scandals, not least in the church. This is almost certainly one of the driving reasons why time and time again ‘authenticity’ is a virtue so highly prized in leaders.

However, authenticity is a very difficult virtue for a culture that is lurching into the twin extremes (occupying political left and right respectively) of cancel culture and the populist ‘strongman’. Cancel culture may call for authenticity but undermines it by eliminating people on the basis of their mistakes. Populism undermines authenticity by championing a thin type of power of a leader who has to project strength and therefore can’t admit to weakness and failures.

The gospel gives us rich resources for our churches and leaders to avoid both these extremes and to be authentic. Why do we think (for example) that David’s Psalm of repentance, admitting his sin with Bathsheba is preserved in Scripture, if it is not to both show that David was justified by faith and that the gospel allows remarkable forgiveness such that sin is never condoned but it can be forgiven and authentically ‘owned’ even in our leaders? Why was Paul so consistently open after his conversion about his sin of persecuting the church? Why does Galatians speak openly about Peter’s sin of drawing back from the Gentiles? In the honour/shame culture of the first century the early church was remarkably open in its leaders repenting, receiving forgiveness and owning their failures.

This is not to say that certain sins might not mean leaders have to step down - David’s sin did have serious consequences for his rule - but surely Scripture is underlining to us that such sin is talked about appropriately openly by God’s community rather than being hushed up and minimised. Is this not time and time again what we hear young adults asking for?

Open up the conversation

Opening up the conversation about abuse will feel very uncomfortable to churches and denominations, particularly those steeped in the received wisdom of the 80s, 90s, and noughties which was about PR teams minimising scandals and maintaining a united front. However, the Chinese walls of those years have been torn down by social media and if we keep trying to rebuild them we’ll only lose the current generation. Ironically if we embrace the very Christian virtues that young adults who don’t know Christ are calling for - a care for the vulnerable and authenticity, then we’ll find more willing listeners to our gospel message and we will start to adorn the gospel again.

Pete's latest book, A Place for God, gives lots of practical and big-picture advice on reaching young adults - as well as being a great read, whatever your age. You'll find it, and some recent and forthcoming titles related to issues of leadership and culture, below. You might also enjoy another blog he's written for us, on Civility and Cancel Culture.