Change: Lori Adams-Brown on Empowering Women & Survivors By Breaking the Silence in the Southern Baptist Convention

Transcript

Podcast Lori Post SBC.mp3

Lori Adams-Brown: 00:06

Welcome to the A World of Difference Podcast.

I'm Lori Adams Brown, and this is a

Lori Adams-Brown: 00:33

podcast for those who are different and wanna make a difference.

Well, it has been a very intense week so far for many of my Southern Baptist listeners and ex Southern Baptist listeners.

or people of all faith communities as you've watched what has gone down here in the United States on the news with the Southern Baptist Convention this in New Orleans.

We're gonna talk about that today.

It's gonna be intense.

Lori Adams-Brown: 00:57

It's gonna be triggering for some of you.

And so this is your trigger warning.

If you have experienced abuse of any kind, Please listen or discretion advised.

As we have watched the events on the SBC Convention, convention this week.

We've seen angry men at microphones.

Lori Adams-Brown: 01:29

We've seen 2 men seeming to try to win over women pastors.

We've seen women pastors be a religious football thrown back and forth.

We've seen women used as pawns as trophies We've seen abuse survivors dismissed and minimized and really just an overall disappointing convention when it comes to abuse.

with a little glimmer of slight aspects of hope, but at the same time, it's been quite intense.

It's been quite disturbing.

Lori Adams-Brown: 02:01

It's caused people, I know, personally, women in particular to just grieve and lament and say, what in the actual world is happening here?

And as I have just My body has kept the score this week.

I don't know how you're feeling, but it has been it's been intense, and I didn't even watch the majority of the SBC.

But the parts that I watch were just were really difficult to see.

We had men who've had abuse credible abuse allegations who are speaking.

Lori Adams-Brown: 02:28

We've had men cover up for men with credible abuse allegations, men who are not at all the kind of male allies, and we do need male allies as women proasters.

as women, it we didn't need these 2 particular ones.

And I I'm just gonna Take some time today to talk about that from my perspective.

I've been on a couple of podcasts recently.

Some of you listened to Hey Gar's voice that came out last week.

Lori Adams-Brown: 03:05

where I spoke about some of this was asked to speak on my experience as a woman pastor in the Southern Baptist Convention.

Having experienced also abuse psychological abuse, emotional, verbal, spiritual, financial abuse at the hands of Andy Wood, who now has been the successor to Rick Warren at Saddlebach Church And I was also on an Instagram live with bodies behind the bus.

And so some of you joined in for that speaking about all those same things.

So a couple some of you may have heard those 2 podcasts.

If not, we'll link both of those in the show notes, Hanger's voice and bodies behind the bus.

Lori Adams-Brown: 03:28

But for our purposes here today with each of you a world of difference different podcast listeners, I know some of you are Southern Baptist and live all around the world.

And some of you are are Christians of all different types, Protestant Catholic.

Some of you are Muslim.

Some of you are Hindu, Buddhist, Muslim.

and some of you don't identify in any kind of faith at all.

Lori Adams-Brown: 04:18

And all of you are invited into this conversation.

because I believe that it takes so many perspectives to help us understand how we can come alongside abuse survivors, how we can come alongside women who've just had who've just experienced what so many of us have experienced where so much misogyny, so much discrimination, so much dismissing of women's voice or just the the absence of them in a conversation about women by and large being led by mostly men.

and just the disappointing nature of seeing a woman posture speak at their microphone and the end result being incredibly heartbreaking.

We've witnessed that this week.

Those of us who've watched or read it in the news.

Lori Adams-Brown: 04:55

And if you haven't, I don't know if I recommend that you watch it or not because it was pretty intense, but you've probably at least seen some of the news articles coming out about it.

So we're gonna tackle this subject today once again.

Please, if you are somebody who's experienced abuse, feel free to pause this podcast and take it in chunks, feel free to just stop it altogether and never ever listen again.

or feel free to just tap, you know, stick your toe in this water and see how it feels.

And if you start to feel your body reacting in ways that are just not okay for you right now.

Lori Adams-Brown: 05:15

You're just you're just not there.

Absolutely no judgment.

You take care of yourself.

And in fact, go do some work on your body that just makes your body feel safe and and comfortable and and wonderful because you deserve that.

But, yeah, we're gonna take some time just to to dig into this very, very difficult conversation today.

Lori Adams-Brown: 05:41

I'm not gonna say hot topic because For me, this has been kind of an ongoing thing for for several years.

Someone has shared with you my perspective.

So Let's get started.

Okay.

So as many of you know, like I said, I worked as a pastor at a Southern Baptist Church for about a year and a half.

Lori Adams-Brown: 06:56

Many of you know my story that I've shared publicly and my husband has as well.

about a year ago, this month, we went on the record and talked about the details of walking through psychological, emotional, verbal, financial, and other types of abuse spiritual abuse from the lead and executive pastor at the church where we worked in California.

And it was a year ago that the Le pastor of that church took over Saddleback Church in Southern California, and it was Saddleback Church this year at the convention that a few months ago had been kicked out or disaffiliated because of having women pastors.

and it came up at the Southern Baptist convention this a few days ago that they would be appealing that.

And so that was that happened on Tuesday this week and today, which is Wednesday, the announcement was made this morning that the Southern Baptist messengers had voted to keep Saddleback out of the Southern Baptist convention because of having women pastors.

Lori Adams-Brown: 08:01

So women pastors have very much been in the news.

Women pastors have been discussed on Twitter.

the Theobros have had their say, women pastors have had their say, and all types of people along the spectrum of what This means theologically and sociologically, people have been saying all kinds of helpful things and some things that might be triggering to some of you who either are women pastors, believe women should be pastors or are still sort of confused or maybe some of you are just very adamantly against that, that that's not something you believe in.

And if that's you, that latter one, I would really invite you into a series I did a couple of years ago here on the podcast called Women in the Church, where I had many different speakers come on and talk about the theology from different vantage points.

And we talked about various aspects of what that theology can look like from all different kinds of scholars and perspectives, authors, women pastors.

Lori Adams-Brown: 08:32

And, you know, people like Doctor Beth Allison Barr who wrote a book, specifically as a Baptist around what's called the making of biblical womanhood.

We also had Kristen Kobaz Du May during that series talking about her book, Jesus and John Wayne, and both of these women are Astorians.

We had Scott McKnight and Laura Behringer talking about a church called Tove during that time.

So lots of different people we had the the Junior project was represented.

And if you're not familiar with the Junior project, I invite you to check that out.

Lori Adams-Brown: 08:50

It's a lot of great resources and even journal articles.

and the Priscilla paper is included in that.

So if that's the space you're in, once again, lots of resources in our women in the church series.

But Let's just talk about sort of recognizing the problem.

You know, within the SBC, there's many types of abuse that have taken place.

Lori Adams-Brown: 09:27

Everything from sexual abuse of adults to sexual abuse of children, boys, and girls.

And there's been all kinds of abuse of power that has taken place psychological abuse, spiritual abuse, emotional, verbal, financial, and even some labor abuse that we're starting to really begin to discuss.

And all of these things are so overwhelming to even comprehend and understand and wrap our minds around.

But I think what's important is that we acknowledge and address the problem and understand the historical context.

And, like, once again, there's been a lot written about it.

Lori Adams-Brown: 10:11

But we really have relied on journalists in the last couple of years and especially, you know, a shout out to Robert Down and of the Houston chronicle who really broke a lot of this story a couple of years ago.

A couple of years ago was more than that.

It was several years ago.

But all this time later, we're still learning from what was written then, and then there's more stories that have come out in terms of abuse.

And the southern Baptist convention, I think that my hope and that of many others was that women pastors, as, obviously, many of you know that I'm very passionate about that topic as I was a woman pastor, but even before I was, just the fact that women can use a pastoral gift, and that's a holy spirit given gift.

Lori Adams-Brown: 11:13

And really women don't need permission from any man, church, or denomination to use a gift that God has given them.

So I'm very passionate about that.

But what has saddened me in this year of the Southern Baptist annual meeting is that that issue that controversy around women pastors overshadowed and was used as a distraction to the very prominent issue that should have been front center, which is abuse.

I'm really just sad and disappointed.

Even kind of angry that the women pastor issue was used, that women, it seems, were used as upon as trophies to be presented, to be thrown back and forth as this religious football in in a convention between different men who were speaking at the microphone or on the stage around this issue, often very emotionally, very angrily, and that this was what is playing in the news.

Lori Adams-Brown: 12:46

This is what the conversation was about instead of abuse.

And even Ironically, the church saddleback that was the most famous and biggest church that was being disaffiliated is led by a man who abused me and many others and has been covered up by NDAs for many, many years.

And so My perspective is having worked at Echo Church and having gone to the you know, many of you know, there was a a sort of what we call a faux investigation last year at Saddlebach Church to make it look like to show to have sort of an image management around the fact that it looked like they were open to hearing stories of abuse by Andy Wood, but it turns out it was all sort of a show and smoke and mirrors this Vanderbloment investigation that was done last June.

But my experience behind the scenes of walking through that as a whistleblower, as a or as one of the few that didn't sign the NDA from Andy Wood that was required of us in order to get severance or medical insurance.

I my perspective behind the scenes is that using this fight for and I put that in quotes, women pastors, has given a lot of limelight, has given a controversy and a stage and an opportunity to speak and make it look as though these men at Saddleback and at Echo Church are for women.

Lori Adams-Brown: 13:36

Whereas behind the scenes, there was abuse from Andy Wood and Felipe Santos of a lot of women and men behind the scenes who continue to be silenced with their NDAs that were given some of them recently and some of them years ago.

So it's it's really important to sort of understand the problem that it complicated.

There's a lot of behind the scenes cover up.

Even the people saying they're against abuse and against cover up publicly on Twitter, Sometimes they're a part of the cover up and it's all a lot of smoke and mirrors.

And so I just think as we look at the Southern Baptist convention, I left being a southern baptist years ago, even, you know, before people like Beth Moore famously left and recently, and then Russell Moore, different people who were sort of prominent in the in the denomination.

Lori Adams-Brown: 14:06

And Southern Baptist have lost, I think it's, like, half a million people since last year.

So there is it's disappointing.

that at a time when the institutional response should have been so prominently focused on abuse this year that it wasn't.

And so, you know, we see the challenges there.

We see that people who stay I I really don't understand why more people aren't talking about abuse prevention, advocating for survivors, human rights.

Lori Adams-Brown: 14:44

The individuals who have worked within the SBC aren't all linking arms to promote change on behalf of these who have been oppressed often by pastors or church leaders and denominational leaders.

In order to shift culture, though, it it would just take so much.

We're talking about power dynamics.

We're talking patriarchal structures, theological interpretations that may or continue to enable abuse to occur.

So we have this fight going on, it seems, between a complimentarian theology of what is hard complimentarian and soft complimentarian.

Lori Adams-Brown: 15:28

instead of what is, you know, even between complementarian and egalitarian.egalitarian meaning that men and women are equal and each of them share gifts.

have the same gifts that Holy Spirit only, you know, gifts everyone not based on gender, but complementarians would be people who believe in what they call male headship.

Headship not being a biblical word, but a concept taken from a few verses here and there.

And some of complementarians would be more soft complementarians, which would allow women to preach.

even be called pastor, but not be a lead pastor and that maybe, you know, even in situations like with Andy Wood, he still sees himself as the head and authority over his wife.

Lori Adams-Brown: 16:23

So it's really trying to deal with abuse in situations like that with these umbrellas with these, if many of you have seen this shiny happy people documentary with Bill Gothard in this kind of cascading umbrella scenario, which is just I don't even understand the physics of it, the science behind needing multiple umbrellas where you have god is the big umbrella, and then you have, like, the path and you have, like, the husband umbrella and then the wife umbrellas under the husband umbrella and the kid umbrellas under the parent the the mom.

it doesn't even make sense.

I mean, rain doesn't need that many umbrellas for us to protect ourselves.

I don't really quite understand it.

But that sort of concept, if you'll watch in that documentary, the shiny happy people on Amazon Prime, you'll see that this book authored movement with this umbrella analogy really infiltrated Southern Baptist in different ways.

Lori Adams-Brown: 17:19

And so there are so many male pastors, even women, who believe in this umbrella authority type thing.

And so it's very difficult for abuse or whistle blowers to be heard for their voices to be heard women in particular or even children who are abused because of this whole umbrella authority structure.

And so when we're talking about shifting the culture, You would have to shift so many of the basic ideas that exist in some of the theology that has gone back for, you know, a couple of decades already.

Creating safer spaces would mean exploring best practices for prevention for training, for reporting mechanisms, for things like taking your church staff to visit a police station and understand how you would report.

It would be things like understanding what it's like for women in domestic violence centers, what they can learn from people who have experienced that.

Lori Adams-Brown: 18:21

It would mean having people in the survivor community who aren't wounded wounders, but who are wounded healers who could come alongside and speak into the things that are developed in ways that don't retramatize these survivors at the at the same time.

And that's been one of the trickier parts of what has gone on.

And then when we think about healing and restoration, I think about so many people who have left as survivors, people who have just been friends with some of these abuse survivors out of the Center Baptist convention.

And there's just a huge need right now for support systems, for resources, counseling services, and you know, the hope that some of these survivors have for accountability for the perpetrators of their abuse and hoping that the SBC would take steps to facilitate their the healing process for survivors and steps for holding perpetrators and churches accountable.

And yet, we see again and again that this system is is just not working.

Lori Adams-Brown: 18:50

And so, like I said, so many people are leaving.

But even as they leave, where are they going?

And so that's a that's a huge need right now.

And I'm just so grateful there's a lot of people in this a community that has left that has been a very sacred space for me as a survivor, but I've also been able to hear stories of other survivors and their abuse.

And I just wanna say if you know someone who has walked through abuse of any kind.

Lori Adams-Brown: 19:44

whether it's financial abuse by their husband and the church took the husband's side and gaslit the wife, or it's somebody who's walked through sexual abuse as a child in a church, or it's somebody who has been dealing with spiritual abuse by their pastor 1 on 1.

Any of these situations and more require a lot of trauma therapy and healing.

So if you are somebody who has a friend that's walked through this, I just wanna encourage you to reach out to them because after this week, at what a lot of people have observed in the news or even if people watched the convention in New Orleans online or certainly if they were there in person.

Some people are just I just I'm seeing this over and over again.

In my community, it's been very difficult for people's nervous systems for their minds, their bodies.

Lori Adams-Brown: 20:23

And I'm just hoping some people can be given a gift card for, like, a massage or a spa day or that people are if you have a swimming pool at your house or a hot tub that you would just invite somebody to come over and float in your pool or sit in the hot tub.

Some of this work around trauma.

really requires survivors to do a lot of what we call body work, this somatic work that we have to do even if your abuse was not physical or sexual, the body still keeps the score.

And so DBT therapy, EMDR therapy.

All these things that can help our bodies and our brains are are so important.

Lori Adams-Brown: 21:26

And I know that many of you want to come around survivors and help make a difference.

And one of the best ways that you can do that is just to let them tell their story over and over again at as many times as it takes.

We my husband and I had people in our lives and still do that allow us to keep talking about aspects of it because we don't often remember the traumatic memory all at once, especially if it's, like, complex trauma, and it was many incidences over and over, like, for months or years at a time.

And one of the things I really wished that would have happened at the Southern Baptist convention this year was that it was centered more around women's voices.

Because Evelyn hard complementarians, theologically wouldn't be able to make a strong case that outside of a church at just a convention that a woman couldn't be centered to speak at a microphone or on the stage And we did have women that spoke in microphones in the audience where people can come up and speak.

Lori Adams-Brown: 21:48

But when you look at just the list of speakers on the website, pretty much all of them are men.

You can just scroll down and you'll just see man after man after man.

And then I think the first woman I noticed on there was just like on the worship team.

And so even if you are an a person who holds to this very hard complementarianism, this was not a church.

This was a convention.

Lori Adams-Brown: 22:19

Women can if you don't believe women can preach or be pastors, they can still speak.

And if you're one of those who interprets for Timothy 212 that women or the verse about being women being quiet in church.

Does that mean you don't believe women can sing in the microphone or that babies could cry in the nursery if they're girls?

I mean, some of this gets really kind of extreme.

And so if whatever the lid is people think believe is they're on women, I didn't even see the southern baptist reaching that lid.

Lori Adams-Brown: 22:38

It's like all the way up women should be in all of the spaces as far up to that lid as they could be and they still weren't.

It was largely by far centered around men.

And historically, it it has been, especially over the last few years.

No.

I don't say any of this to say that there aren't men allies because there are, and there are some great ones out there.

Lori Adams-Brown: 23:04

I know many of you many of you are wonderful men who are coming alongside women.

I think that the important thing to say is the male allies that women needed in the Santa Barbara's convention this year were not Rick Warren or Andy Wood.

They weren't people who have abused and covered it up.

And and men have been abused in this other world too.

And and many of them have NDAs.

Lori Adams-Brown: 23:23

I know from my own experience at Echo Church, many of the ones who have NDAs are men.

But women don't need men to speak for them.

We have our own voice, our god given voice, and we can speak for ourselves.

And we don't really need mail permission.

We don't need a church's permission or denominations permission.

Lori Adams-Brown: 24:05

And The Holy Spirit has gifted men and women based on not gender, but the Holy Spirit gifts, different gifts to different image bearers of god, and that includes women, that includes men, and there's nowhere in the scripture that it says anywhere, that any of that is based on gender.

And so, you know, I I just get I'm it was a bit confusing in the beginning.

Why I I was wondering what is the thinking behind having men with abuse allegations speaking on behalf of women pastors?

And I was really curious about that.

And as I thought about that, it made sense that institutions protect themselves.

Lori Adams-Brown: 24:53

And image management is so effective when the image being portrayed, is that of a do gooder?

who's standing for women, fighting for women, and any whistle blowers that are women are so easily discredited behind a man who is seen as fighting for women, fighting the southern bow convention on behalf of women who would suspect ever that that man had actually abused a woman ever.

And this southern Baptist convention, this denomination is an institution of people that apparently has been allowing this sort of thing to happen.

And when good people do nothing as silent bystanders, then we see the flywheel of abuse cover up, repeat, just continue.

really, this whole system falls apart if people stop being silent as bystanders.

Lori Adams-Brown: 25:22

That when you see something, you say something, When someone bullies someone else, you stand up to the bullies.

Silent by standards are the system the of people that keeps this going.

And one of the things we saw was that women were being used as pawns, as trophies.

Women used to further a male megachurch pastor's desire to fight in the limelight.

And I just don't understand why we didn't ask him to step aside and let the women speak.

Lori Adams-Brown: 25:48

I mean, where are the women from Saddleback that have been famously ordained?

And why aren't we hearing their voices?

Why were there all these videos by Rick Warren being sent out in the weeks ahead of time.

What do the women have to say?

abuse, it shouldn't be hidden because if it's hidden and covered up by silent bystanders, by church boards, by other staff in churches by a denomination.

Lori Adams-Brown: 26:22

Survivors voices get silenced, and we don't get to find out how we can make this better, how we can help them survive how we can come alongside the oppressed and minister to them and help them heal.

And it puts women and men in churches like Echo church and Saddleback church and the entire SBC at risk when we hide the abuse.

And power itself can be abused.

I think one of the main conversations we're not having and that we should have in churches, especially from what I'm seeing in southern baptist world, is that power it exists.

Power Dynamics exist.

Lori Adams-Brown: 27:02

And a a pastor, a lead pastor has enormous power over a staff, and over people that are in positions of staff that are way lower than him and the hierarchy.

And when you are a lead and executive pastor and you invite a woman pastor in who's not even your direct report.

And you mob her in your office, that is an abuse of power, and power can be misused.

And powering over, we we're seeing this over and over again in this hierarchy, this structure, this just shouldn't be this way.

And in grandiosity, it really tempts leaders to misuse their staff and volunteers to build an empire.

Lori Adams-Brown: 27:46

And power by fear can be used to build mega churches and to keep trophy women pastors silent content basically to not make any major decisions and never question any big decisions publicly.

And the silencing that, you know, we are seeing happen in some of these churches at the church, for example, under the leadership of Andy would had the role that if you gossip, you'll get fired.

It was a way of silencing the narrative.

And for him to control the narrative, So when somebody was run off and started to whistle blow, he would have his own narrative that he could share.

And if there had been no sharing of that on staff, from the the person who was abused and fired and was trying to whistle blow, it's so easy to discredit that person.

Lori Adams-Brown: 28:06

and say, you know, they're gossiping.

They're trying to tear the church down.

They're evil, and we're gonna return evil with good by being silent and saying silent and saying nothing.

These are all things that happen after I left Echo Church and things that were said about about me as a way of slandering me.

And there's this whole toned policing of women that happens.

Lori Adams-Brown: 28:45

I mean, it was so strange to watch people like Al Moller and being so emotional and passionate and at times angry at the microphone speaking a couple of times.

And Rick Warren, the same, just this very intense and angry and, like, passion and emotional speaking where we and then we hear of stories of so many women being toned police that, oh, well, you had a tone.

You can't talk to men that way.

And NDAs that are a part of this tyranny that is this flywheel of abuse of abuse cover up, repeat, just on and on and on.

Without the silent bystanders though, this whole system would collapse.

Lori Adams-Brown: 29:40

And so I just continue to say, either speak up and say something and stand up for abuse survivors or tell about your abuse yourself if that's something you are capable of and you have people around you that can support you.

But if you just either speak up or walk away, this this whole system of abuse would collapse.

There's just so much faulty thinking.

And I think some of the reason we were hearing from Rick Warren's videos a couple weeks ago about the reasons that many are leaving the SBC is is in my perspective and the perspective of many others, It's because of this rampant abuse that is not being dealt with with abusers being re platform to disabuse again and again.

It's also people are leaving because of the rampant discrimination of women, the lack of respect for women's basic human rights.

Lori Adams-Brown: 30:28

And If the Southern Baptist convention had been holding pastors like Andy Wood and Rick Warren accountable, I think this would have been very different.

We would have seen a very different Annual Meeting in New Orleans of the Southern Baptist this year, if women are truly free to use their god given gifts according to those actually have pastoral gifts and teaching gifts and leadership gifts, this would be so different.

Andy Wood and Rick Warren really have no business being seen heroes of women pastors in the movement in the SBC.

And I've seen a bit of that lately in some of my egalitarian spaces.

Being very excited that Rick Warren has apologize and changed his theology, but at the same time, Rick is not creating safe environment where he is elevating the voices of women and listening to survivors.

Lori Adams-Brown: 31:07

And he also has not address the issues of abuse around Andy Wood, his successor that he brought in, and all of the at least twenty stories of a of people who spoke to the, once again, in quotes, so investigation by Vander Gloman last summer.

But these 2 men, Andy Wood and Rick Horne have no business see being seen as heroes of women pastors.

They are dangerous.

Andy Wood in particular, and He Andy has bullied intimidated belittled silence and gaslit many women behind closed doors in his office, and he's not above reproach.

And he should be removed from his position.

Lori Adams-Brown: 31:49

He's not safe.

He's hurting both himself and many others.

And then Rick Warren having covered up the abuse stories from Echo Church that came to him through the Vander Bloman situation last year.

Anybody who's gonna cover that kind of thing up and call what is clearly abuse from stories that are way, way, way worse than mine even, call it conflict in a way of minimizing it is also not safe.

And so I would just say inviting a woman to a table made by men, for men where toxic masculinity reigns And the in woman invited woman is basically tone police and given no authority to make decisions.

Lori Adams-Brown: 32:31

maybe even ask an innocent curious question and is perceived as a threat by these lead male pastors who see themselves as the authority who should be unquestioned -- and then she might even be peppered with questions abrasively in multiple closed door meetings like I was.

and, you know, situations like for me being mobbed and fired in retaliation for calling out abuse and offered an NDA tied to severance and medical insurance.

That is not And I repeat, that is not the kind of environment we want to invite women pastors into.

So I do not recommend any woman who wants to be a pastor.

would try to do so in the southern Baptist convention at this point.

Lori Adams-Brown: 33:30

It has become clear what this is all about, that this is a male centric denomination with male centric platforms where women are not invited in ways that they can be fully themselves, whereas psychologically safe, and where their voices are fully welcomed in all their fullness.

whatever tone they may use.

And even if they're angry or emotional or impassioned about an issue like Alamo or Eric Warren wear this week, So I just want to give a strong warning to any woman can considering being a a woman pastor or if you know someone who is, that the SBC is absolutely not a safe place.

And particularly, Andy Wood and Rick Horan, even though Saddleback is no longer as as southern Baptist Church that that is also not a place that I would consider to be safe for any woman on staff.

But if the Southern Broward convention wants to survive, They really need women to be centered.

Lori Adams-Brown: 33:56

I don't know that they're gonna take that step, but that would be it would be crucial for that the survival of the SBC.

They would need to consider a woman president.

They would need tables made by women from for women with their terms.

and they need to pay for therapy and legal bills of the abuse survivors.

They need to listen to scholars, like doctor Basil Barr who is a Baptist and has studied Baptist his industry in-depth.

Lori Adams-Brown: 34:38

And doctor Kristen Kobaz Doumet, who has studied the White evangelical Church in the United States and written a book Jesus and John Wayne, and d tells many of the things that have gone on in southern Baptist history as well.

Doctor Diane Langberg, an ex expert on abuse in the church who's written multiple books and an on trauma, the gold standard, and world renowned.

And they would need women who can come in and help diagnose the problem of abuse and systemic sexism.

really, the the whole convention would need to take a plan and approach and systemic strategy to be anti sexist.

They needed anti racism strategy, and they needed anti sexism strategy.

Lori Adams-Brown: 34:59

And the issue of women pastors is not gonna be solved.

buy a saddleback.

Even though they're out of the SBC now, they're still somewhat adjacent.

It's not gonna be solved by celebrity pastors who've abused women and men and covered it up.

What we don't need right now is a faux egalitarianism, and that's what I experienced working at Echo Church under the leadership of Andy Wood.

Lori Adams-Brown: 35:53

I thought he was an egalitarian because I was the second woman pastor brought in and they made a really huge deal about having the first woman pastor hired.

or given that job right before me.

But it turns out behind the scenes, behind the curtain, I realized Andy really was.

a soft complimentarian and saw himself as the authority as the man and that male leadership was more preferred and he was the head of his household than that type of thing.

So very much a faux egalitarianism, and that was really dangerous for me and many other women in their stories that you know, one other woman, whistleblower, came out before me, but many of the women have either NDAs or have reasons in their life, either career reasons or just the basic power by fear that still rules and reigns or just trying to heal and move on with their lives.

Lori Adams-Brown: 36:22

All reasons why they haven't spoken out at this point.

But the phoey egalitarianism was particularly dangerous.

for women.

And that's, you know, because some of it is just more smoke and mirrors on a stage that is already a smoke filled stage.

I really just I get sad when I think about the Southern Baptist at this point because priesthood of the believer is such a a core theology that came out of the Protestant Reformation.

Lori Adams-Brown: 36:51

It's been a core Baptist theology.

And yet, we have seen over the past you know, a couple of decades how men have basically been seen as priests in their own homes.

But the belief that I was taught as a Baptist is that every believer, every follower of Jesus, is a priest that we don't need a priest.

This was what the reformers fought so famously for.

And yet, we're seeing men basically be priests of their own homes.

Lori Adams-Brown: 37:10

And that just shouldn't be.

because women don't need a priest.

They just should be able to go directly to Jesus and not had to go through their husbands.

And it just makes me sad that it's come to this point.

You know, I know firsthand what it's like to work as a woman pastor in the southern Baptist convention I get asked this question quite a bit.

Lori Adams-Brown: 37:32

What was that like?

And I I think after the this week, I'm probably gonna get asked it quite a bit more.

because of everything that's gone down, and it's all over the news.

Women pastor's in the SBC.

But having worked with Andy Wood, as a lead pastor at a mega church working with him as a pastor one of the pastors on staff.

Lori Adams-Brown: 38:24

it was not at all what it seemed on the outside.

And Andy Woodstaff at this mega church in Silicon Valley Before he went to Saddleback, there were many, many stories of abuse that still exist.

Multiple credible stories of abuse that were shared with Saddleback.

And I just I just call on a saddleback and Echo church to do the the things that my husband and I asked in the beginning when we were fired for calling out abuse And that is to get Grace Ministries to come in as a 3rd party organization that investigates churches in the wake of an image threatening event of abuse allegations of this nature.

And they are not a hiring agency like Vanderbilt.

Lori Adams-Brown: 38:58

They're a third party, and this is what they do.

They were started with the influence of doctor Diane Lambert, like I said, gold standard, worldwide expert on abuse in the church and a boss division who's famously done a lot of work as a liar with abuse survivors and SBC as well and other churches.

Grace Ministries is what we recommended Echo Church get to come in and investigate this.

We asked Saddleback to do the same for Echo Church.

And now I feel like Grace needs to go into both Saddleback and Echo Church to find out what in the world has gone on.

Lori Adams-Brown: 39:32

and how we can move forward in a healthier way.

It's really unacceptable that it has been this long.

And so many have been asking for this, and neither echo church or nor saddleback church has brought in grace ministries.

They need a thorough months long deep investigation that specializes in this in order to get to the truth and help everyone move forward.

we've seen more than 1 pastor in Southern Baptist World have unethical behavior, including abuse, and cover it up and discredit the abuse survivors.

Lori Adams-Brown: 40:10

If you have not seen the movie women talking, I know a lot of us talk about that.

And it's a great movie that helps to reimagine what a future could look like where women can speak and they can speak about their abuse and how to find a way forward.

And I highly recommend that movie if you have not seen it.

So I guess in conclusion to all of this, I would say if you are somebody who is a spiritual authority figure or you are close to someone who is a spiritual authority figure, and you have a red flag that something's wrong, please do not condone this.

If you see something, say something.

Lori Adams-Brown: 40:35

You are not alone, and your voice matters, and you can speak out.

I ask still for Echo Church to release the NDAs.

We have over 1600 signatures on our petition to do so.

I call in Felipe Santos, the lead pastor of Echo Church to release the NDAs.

I call on Saddleback Church, Andy Wood, to put pressure on Philippe Bay and Echo Church to release the NDAs.

Lori Adams-Brown: 41:16

and I call on Rick Warren to urge both of these guys to do the right thing and release these NDAs.

Saddleback is no longer a part of the southern Baptist convention.

But Echo Church still is.

Therefore, I call on southern Baptist to put pressure on Echo Church and to demand that they release the NDAs or that you will dis fellowship from them because I don't think the southern Baptist convention should condone even the existence of NDAs.

We saw earlier this year with the National Labor Relations Board here in the United States made it no longer legal for businesses and other organizations to give NDAs tied to severance.

Lori Adams-Brown: 41:48

to their employees in ways that would make it where they could not share what had happened at that church at that organization after they're gone.

it seems as though that there is an exception for churches, unfortunately, and I do hope that that changes.

And it may, coming in the future, and that is our hope because absolutely no church should be giving NDAs for any reason.

And therefore, I call on the Southern Baptist convention to ask all churches in the denomination to ban NDAs and hope and that would include at this moment, Echo Church.

which is still affiliated.

Lori Adams-Brown: 42:01

I also call on Saddleback Church to remove Andy Wood from leadership.

He's not above reproach.

He's abused many and covered it up.

and he is not a hero for women.

He is someone who needs to get help.

Lori Adams-Brown: 42:29

And I and my husband recommended that he get intensive sling with Diane Lambert.

I think that she's actually retired now.

So I would recommend doctor Chuck De Groat who's also got a a specialty in narcissism actually in churches as his area of expertise.

But certainly, he understands that shoes around abuse by pastors.

And this is for Andy's own good, and it's for the church's good.

Lori Adams-Brown: 43:10

Because when we enable someone who has abused over and over again, we essentially become complicit in that abuse.

And there are too many lives too many souls, too many families that have been just obliterated with nuclear bombs that have been thrown into their lives.

And if you've ever walked through trauma, you ever walked through any type of abuse, especially this type of abuse where happens in a faith community and it's one's job or in the case of our family, both of the parents' jobs We lost our church.

We lost our jobs.

We lost our friends all in one fell swoop.

Lori Adams-Brown: 43:51

And this has happened on more than one occasion under the leadership of Andy Wood.

And so because of that because of all of the many people's lives that he has single handedly just bulldozed over without anyone stopping him.

People who do that to others or are addicted of to anything of any kind.

They don't stop until they get help.

And so when we enable somebody who's addicted to power, and we give them more power and zero accountability, we don't see things go well.

Lori Adams-Brown: 44:05

And so I'm just calling on all of us to to raise our voices to not condone this.

You are not alone.

Your voice matters.

You can speak out, and you can be a part of the solution of coming together to make a difference.

and do the right thing.

Lori Adams-Brown: 44:58

So that is my appeal to you whether you're a part of the Synchronoss convention used to be a part of the Synchronoss convention or are just any type of community and you want to see this get better.

You can make a difference.

And I firmly believe that it is through seeing the darkness that has gone on by shining a light and opening the windows and letting the sunshine come in to be the best disinfectant.

That is we sit and observe that and understand it and sit in that suffering and the pain and lament it and expose it that through that process of just truth and transparency, that we will come through the other side with hope and our voices together and our brains together coming around this problem to solve it.

It is something so huge that no one could single handedly fix all of this.

Lori Adams-Brown: 45:40

but I don't believe we should throw up our arms and say there's nothing we can do.

I just refuse to believe that, but I do believe that as we come together with our voices, with our gifts, with our our passions around this particular issue that we will see something come out of it that we don't even know what it looks like.

We can't even imagine what that outcome is, but that we know we don't want this and that we work together to find a better way and to stop excusing and and minimizing and throwing our hands up in the air and saying there's nothing we can do.

I firmly believe that listeners in this community can be a part of making this change.

And I wanna hear from you.

Lori Adams-Brown: 45:49

I wanna hear your perspective.

What are your ideas?

What are your what are you imagining?

What are some calls to action?

that you're thinking through.

Lori Adams-Brown: 46:16

Are you emailing Felipe Santos and saying, please release the NDAs.

His email address is fsantos echo Dot Church.

Are you emailing Saddleback and asking them to put pressure on Echo Church to release the NDAs?

Are you asking them to remove Andy from leadership to get him the counseling that he needs to step down for several years in order to get the help that he needs?

Are you make taking steps to center around women.

Lori Adams-Brown: 46:39

I wanna hear it all.

And I wanna hear your creative ideas and your your dreams and your imagination around it.

And as we share those ideas together, I would really invite you to come into our patreon community.

We'll do something really special there around that this over the next week.

But also just find me on Twitter.

Lori Adams-Brown: 47:06

I'm Lori ADBR on Twitter and just tag me on there and say, hey.

This is what I'm thinking.

I really want this podcast to be a space where we can talk about these ideas and come together because I do believe that the more perspectives we have around this problem, the more likely we're gonna be able to solve it.

So reach out to me on Twitter come join our Patreon community.

Let us know how you're implementing these calls to action.

Lori Adams-Brown: 47:38

And if this has been a hard week for you like it's been for many of us, I hope that you go float in a pool somewhere, enjoy a hot tub.

Have a cup of, you know, hot tea or hot cocoa next to a warm fireplace.

just do something nice that makes your body feel safe and that regulates your auto auto autonomic nervous system.

It's been kind of an onslaught this week.

So take care of yourselves, take care of your bodies, and reach out to a survivor if you know one and just say, How can I help?

Lori Adams-Brown: 47:59

Or could I listen to your story again and just empathize with them and say, I believe you.

And it takes so much courage to share.

and help them know that they can share it as many times as they need to because you're gonna be there for them.

That is one of the most special ways you can make a difference in this community, and I know that many of you already do.

Thank you for being who you are.

Lori Adams-Brown: 47:59

I appreciate each of you as listeners.

and keep making a difference wherever you are.