Once upon a time in the Friendly Forest there lived a lamb who loved to graze and frolic. One day, a tiger came to the forest and said to the animals, “I would like to live among you.” They were delighted. For they had no tiger in their woods. The lamb, however, had some apprehensions, which, being a lamb, she sheepishly expressed to her friends.
The tiger followed its nature and began to harass the lamb, to the point where some animals wondered what the lamb was doing to contribute to the tiger's aggressiveness. “Don't be so sheepish,” they said. “Speak up to the tiger.”
To which one uncouth animal remarked: “How ridiculous! If you want a lamb and a tiger to live in the same forest, you cage the tiger!”
Rabbi Ed Friedman's fable is a wry observation on how society so often makes the vulnerable responsible for protecting themselves from the powerful. And it is precisely this imbalance in church and other settings that screening processes aim to address. Screening involves rating jobs according to risk. It is an assessment of power differentials in relationships.
Like many other caregivers, ministers face vulnerability in their job. But when assessed in the wider context of the community in which they minister, they also wield profound power. That power creates an imbalance in pastoral relationships, just as it does for lawyers and physicians. Add that to the inequality between adults and youth, as in the Robert Fourney sex misconduct cases, and the power differential can be disabling.
Part of the sad story surrounding Dr. Fourney, the recently deposed Toronto minister, is that he and some of his supporters mistakenly think he was the vulnerable one in these pastoral relationships that have come back to haunt him.
While Dr. Fourney will need the support of his friends, supporting a lie will help no one.
Dr. Fourney accepts the salient facts in one complaint, although he admits no wrongdoing. He disputes the others cases entirely. His defence rests on suggesting his accusers exhibit false memory syndrome — fictional memories suggested by psychotherapy.
Since none of the complaints were tried in criminal court and church proceedings were in camera, the public can't judge this.
However, more than 80 per cent of the large East Toronto presbytery was unconvinced by this line of thinking, as was the smaller investigative committee that included people experienced in dealing with these matters. Wrongful accusations of sexual assault, for whatever reason, are made in about six per cent of cases in Canada, according to police statistics.
Two criminal charges didn't make it to trial because witnesses declined to testify. This is unsurprising: the stigma is enough, the remembering tortuous. Moreover, if complainants see the accused is publicly disciplined, as Dr. Fourney has been, they may feel no need to relive what they would rather forget.
As for Dr. Fourney, he waived his right to a church trial and has filed neither a wrongful dismissal suit against the presbytery nor slander suits against the complainants.
All this shows just how important it is for the church community to wrestle with the complex question of vulnerability in ministries and it reveals why screening programs are becoming more common in society.
And the church must not forget this has been most painful for the complainants. It was their vulnerability that was exploited in the first place and they made themselves vulnerable again in testifying before the church.
Others too will feel violated and wounded by these events, especially two congregations where Dr. Fourney ministered: St. Andrew's, Windsor, Ont. and Glenview, Toronto. It was during the time he was in Windsor that the accusations arose, while Glenview only knew a successful and progressive ministry.
It will be important for those congregations to remember that because a minister has done wrong, even great wrong, does not invalidate what he did right. The sacraments administered and the pastoral care he gave were all acts of God's grace and nothing can diminish that.
Every minister, every human, is a sinner. But the Spirit works in all of us despite that. May the Spirit work this summer to bring healing to the church.
