Garments of 13 sexually abused children were exhibited last month at a convention of “Plain” churches, which include Amish, Mennonite and Brethren communities.
As reported by the Associated Press, the display included dresses and head coverings for four- and five-year-olds, and even a onesie,
Investigative reporting about the Amish, Southern Baptists and the Catholic Church all describe communities that rally around perpetrators while shaming and shunning victims.
Common denominators are a patriarchic structure, autocratic leaders who disdain governmental limits on their authority, secrecy, and intense pressure to conform:
Their leaders’ message to internal critics is that if you go outside the community for help you will be expelled from it.
It can’t have been easy for the church members who organized this exhibit. They stood with courage to say that the needs of children sometimes outweigh the interests of communities.
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