Read Part One HERE
Here is my second post on abuse in one of the Southern Baptist Churches in the US.
Chad Foster, a former firefighter from Missouri, arrived in Texas soon after his divorce and with his 30th birthday fast approaching. He described himself as a fairly new Christian with a history of hard drinking.
He was hired and later ordained as a youth pastor by Houston's Second Baptist Church, one of the largest Southern Baptist congregations in the country.
"When I took the job," Foster later said, "I didn't know anything about it." Foster preached abstinence and urged teens to sign contracts to save themselves for marriage. But he soon targeted underage girls at the church's Cypress campus for intimate text messages and physical contact. His brief career as a youth pastor ended with guilty pleas to three counts of sexual assault of a child and two of online solicitation of a minor.
A 16-year-old girl with whom he illegally had sex testified at his sentencing. "I thought I really loved him," she said. "He's not the person I knew. I feel like he's a sick person. I think he's going to do it again if he's on probation. I have no doubt in my mind that he will."
There are many others like Foster. Scores of Southern Baptist youth pastors across the country, many with little oversight or formal training, used their church positions to groom and sexually abuse children in their flocks, an investigation by the Houston Chronicle and San Antonio Express-News reveals.
Read Part Four HERE
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