Katherine Archer on California Senate Bill 894

Author(s): Katherine Archer and Scott Douglas Jacobsen

Publication (Outlet/Website): Bishop Accountability

Publication Date (yyyy/mm/dd): 2024/06/02

Katherine Archer is involved in Californian legislative efforts to criminalize clergy-based exploitation of adults. What is her work, now?

Katherine Archer has been involved in California legislative efforts to criminalize clergy exploitation of adults. Her primary interest is in trauma occurring in church settings, where one should expect to find more support for healing. She has been involved in nonprofit work with dual-diagnosis adults experiencing homelessness, human trafficking, and youth experiencing foster care. Currently, Archer is completing studies towards a Master of Theological Studies at Antiochian House of Studies. She is co-founder of Prosopon Healing, a resource center for Orthodox Christian victims/survivors of clergy abuse, and is involved in research efforts to better understand the impact of clergy-perpetrated abuse on those victimized by religious institutions. 

The series on the Eastern Orthodox Church amounts to a formal project into the clergy-related abuse in it. These publications provide a free, open-source electronically available resource for interested parties to begin some of the first contemporary research into abuse within Orthodoxy along the lines of the Roman Catholic Church clergy-related abuse scandals happening for decades.

Scott Douglas Jacobsen: The issue of clergy abuse is a complicated one. Not in its violation of a person’s dignity and human rights, but in its style, mode of operation, means of keeping a secrecy. Naturally, the Roman Catholic Church, as statistically the largest Christian church in the world, it will garner both the most abuse cases in total and the most airtime, as, again, statistically, taking the odds, we should expect the worst cases to come out of the Roman Catholic Church too – given its size. Now, with the United States, I, recently, returned from a nationwide wide “W” trip from Montreal to New York, New York to Bost, Boston to D.C., D.C. to Charleston (S.C.), Charleston (S.C.) to D.C., D.C. to Atlanta (G.A.), Atlanta (G.A.) to New Orleans, New Orleans to Illinois, Illinois to Los Angeles, Los Angeles to San Diego, San Diego to Los Angeles to Santa Ana to Irvine back to Los Angeles, Los Angeles to Seattle, and then all the way back to Vancouver. Since I am back, and very marginally rested and recovered from the exhaustion of constant travel, I have some time to write some questions for our lovely guest, today, Katherine Archer, who is based out of California, United States. So, the Eastern Orthodox Church has its own issues with the abuse of the young, indeed, and other adult populations. Let’s paint a general picture before the activist portion, what is the key picture of the abuse happening in the Eastern Orthodox Church based on research conducted so far?

Katherine Archer: First off, thank you for your willingness to have this conversation. I think first and foremost the media database that we have been working on clearly points to the fact that abuse is happening in the Orthodox churches.  We have to name that these abuses are occurring and cannot say that it does not happen or has not happened within Orthodox churches. This seems overly obvious to state, but it does need to be stated. We can’t say that clergy abuse is a problem that occurs only when celibacy is a requirement of the priesthood. Orthodox clergy are married and yet our database documents that we still have cases of abuse. This is to be expected because clergy abuse is really about power and control rather than the constraints of celibacy being too much. A correct Orthodox understanding of the priesthood is that the priest is a shepherd, and that there is only one true priesthood, that of Christ. Yet not everyone will approach the priesthood with this humble mindset, and some people who have narcissistic tendencies will be drawn toward the priesthood for the wrong reasons. I think we need to understand this now in the same way that St. Gregory spoke of it in his Pastoral Rule. Some priests will abuse their power. Our database points to the fact that this is true. There are priests who have done some horrific things and wounded the members of their flock. We have documentation of both child victims, many adolescents, as well as adults, both male and female adults being abused by priests. 

Jacobsen: How far back does your database span?

Archer: Right now the media cases go back to 1987, but we are in the early preliminary research stages. There is a book that we found that documents allegations of child sexual abuse within an Eastern Orthodox community of San Francisco in 1887 involving a bishop, and we will dive into that and see what the media reported then…so 1887 may be our earliest cases. However, our primary focus right now is about 71 media cases since 2002, documenting well over 300 alleged victims. 

Jacobsen: What are the jurisdictions studied, to date, and their differences from the analysis of the data collation?

Archer: We have gathered media stories that tell of clergy abuse within every Orthodox jurisdiction. In the United States, we have the greatest number of cases of alleged abuse that are being reported to the media occurring within the Greek Orthodox Archdiocese. This kind of thing is difficult because what we believe is that these media reports are just the tip of the iceberg and that there are wounded people who have never publicly come forward, perhaps never filed a police report or a civil lawsuit, so the media reports themselves are inadequate for understanding the issue.   

Jacobsen: What is the #ChurchToo movements history and current form?

Archer: Church Too developed in 2017. I think we are still seeing most of the #ChurchToo conversation centered around the Protestant churches, and I think this is due to the fact that we have more resistance to this conversation within Orthodoxy. If I am viewed as standing over here pointing my finger at someone’s sin and just copiously taking notes on someone else’s failures, most Orthodox Christians will not want to listen to me at all or to the conversation. Within Orthodoxy we have much more resistance to what is viewed as creating drama or even scandal, or detracting from one’s own spiritual life. So, we have to be very careful in this conversation. 

Rather than focus on errant priests, which no one wants to do, I was brought into this research myself out of concern for the members of the body of Christ who have been wounded by clergy. If one member of the body suffers, all suffer. Clergy abuse should never be happening. Our churches should be a place of safety and healing. For clergy abuse victims, the wound is so deep and painful and the trauma is compounded when people say that clergy abuse is not happening within the Orthodox churches or when we don’t want to educate ourselves as laity and understand the complex dynamics that go into abuse—of both children and adults. It might not always look like what we think, but there can be psychological coercion and other things happening, leading to sexual exploitation. 

At the heart, clergy abuse takes place within a relationship which itself is the vehicle or mechanism of the abuse. Most people are not adequately educated about the relationship of trust being used as the means to sexually exploit another person and as a result, most laity simply do not understand and will often side with the priest against the victim. It seems as laity we do not want to talk about this and our silence enables abuse to happen and to continue. Are our Orthodox priests all 100% doing the work of ministry, no one is ever offending and our seminaries are turning out clergy who are never involved in misconduct? 

All the misconduct cases are lies? No person with critical-thinking skills would try to say that and yet this seems to be where the conversations go when we attempt to raise this issue within Orthodox circles. Our database of cases of abusive priests is quite large and the reality is that these things are occurring, and that victims are being sidelined and their stories of trauma and abuse not taken seriously in most of these cases. In fact, often victims are flat out blamed and from other research I’ve conducted, the suicide rate of clergy abuse victims is just astoundingly high compared to the general population. That should give people pause. What struck me in one of the cases I read was the surrounding non-Orthodox community could believe the victim and expressed shock, sadness and disgust for the priest’s actions. This is something people just can’t often do when abuse occurs within our churches. It immediately devolves into a conversation about whether the accusation is true or exiling the wounded truth-teller. The fact is, statistically, people are telling the truth when they report clergy abuse and they don’t always even know enough to use the word abuse. I think that how we need to approach this as Orthodox Christians is with great love for these victims and in humility, that maybe we don’t have abuse dynamics all figured out. This is the Orthodox way—love and humility. I have heard of priests conducting abuse “investigations” and I am left wondering when and where they took forensic interviewing and how their priestly vocation enables such double abuse of a victim already severely traumatized. 

Where is the humility there? There is extensive training needed to conduct a proper abuse investigation. Our priests and church administrations should not be conducting internal investigations. We need to be getting this right. I think #ChurchToo has shifted into where we are seeing people leave churches or completely deconstructing their faith and primarily this is due to the hypocrisy found especially in these abuse cases and so-called “investigations” that are taking place internally and really damaging survivors. So, we have to be open and transparent and note that clergy abuse is happening and then figure out not just how to prevent it, but also how to have conversations where we aren’t vilifying the people wanting to discuss it. There is a real problem if a conversation about a topic is completely and always off-limits. And maybe control over investigations needs to be relinquished and just as we would call a plumber in our churches for a leak, we call a professional organization that handles investigations in a trauma-informed way and not try to take that on and cause additional trauma for victims and their families.

Jacobsen: How have these movements informed the activism, the theology, and the, essentially, humanitarian work for you?

Archer: Honestly, rather than follow a movement, I seek to be a Christ-follower and I am always trying to use discernment. I think Christ would be listening to the voices of those wounded within our churches. Listening to the #ChurchToo voices and reading the news stories, I have been struck by the tremendous courage of the voices coming forward when it is very hard to do so, especially if one has been abused as an adult, which is less understood. There are compelling reasons to stay silent. I think the most courageous voice that I initially read was Lori Anne Thompson, who was abused by Ravi Zacharias as an adult. She was groomed. She came forward at great personal cost. One of the men who worked for Ravi Zacharias did not believe her and I recently listened to him come forward, admit his mistake, and publicly apologize to her. Within the Orthodox churches, I have not seen what could be described as a positive outcome to a case of clergy abuse, either child or adult, and a victim coming forward. Instead, I have heard of suicides and people being ostracized from their communities and incredible amounts of suffering. I think this all serves to continue to silence people who are hurting within the Orthodox churches who may have experienced harm by a priest.  Why would we want to continue to silence these hurting members of the flock? 

Jacobsen: As noted in the press release, there is work to call on the “government to criminalize adult clergy sexual abuse in alignment with the Southern Baptist Convention’s 2022 resolution. However, a recent bill in CA to criminalize adult clergy sexual abuse, similar to laws in 13 states and D.C., failed to leave the Public Safety committee under questionable circumstances, and survivors are calling on Governor Gavin Newsom to investigate.” What have been the failures, now, towards criminalizing adult clergy sexual abuse?

Archer: There is a failure of understanding. The bill did not move out of committee in California because of the use of the word “consent”, with a real failure to understand the dynamics present between a clergyperson and parishioner and the fact that true consent is never possible. The clergyperson holds too much power. Within the Orthodox churches, we have an understanding of spiritual fatherhood, the priest hears confession and not in a confessional—a priest hears the confession standing right there beside the person. There is a real intimacy and trust there where if a priest chooses to abuse the trust of his spiritual child and sexualize a spiritual relationship, it really is closer to incest. I believe many faith traditions are similar in this dynamic where it is a huge violation of trust like a parent and child. So honestly, maybe there is a lack of awareness of cultural dynamics or religious understanding. The priest is not one’s accountant. 

The relationship is deeper, requiring the same degree of trust like a therapist even if the priest isn’t conducting therapy. We would never presume that there is consent if a therapist chose to exploit a client and moreover, there are guidelines and professional boards that oversee that kind of thing and unequivocally will name it as abuse. With clergy abuse of adults, there just needs to be more education because it is mislabeled as an “affair” and when clergy respond in an uneducated way, mislabeling it, it causes deep secondary trauma for a victim. There is a lot of research about the power differential between priest and parishioner and the fact that exploitation is never an “affair”. Legislation that criminalizes clergy exploitation of adults is important because often those who have been exploited have a lot of confusion over what occurred and how they were groomed to be exploited by another person and it can take many years to untangle it. If a criminal statute exists, it is much clearer. The way I see this is very similar to human trafficking. In many cases, trafficking victims have been exploited within a relationship and have difficulty naming it as abuse and recognizing the exploitation. It is very similar. Our lawmakers need to understand this complexity.

Jacobsen: On April 16, 2024, California Senate Bill 894 (SB 894), or “Sexual Exploitation by a Member of Clergy” was presented. What happened?

Archer: The bill was presented, but we were told prior to the hearing that the issue had already been decided. We attended the hearing anyway and we decided that Dr. Nedelescu would speak, since as a neuroscientist she could speak about the harm done in these cases from a neurobiological perspective. Dorothy Small was already slated to speak. About 23 letters of support were submitted prior to the hearing, but they were omitted from the bill analysis and I’m unsure if they were read. I’m certain the letters would have been educational for lawmakers had they been read. This is an issue that may require some more work from legislators to understand the issue of consent and to be sensitive to the dynamics of clergy abuse. It took awhile for the dynamics of human trafficking to be understood and clergy abuse is similar.  

Jacobsen: What happens to support letters about bills like this?

Archer: In California, support letters can be uploaded to a Legislative Portal and in theory those letters would be read and in Maine they even made them available to the public. However, with SB 894 at least 23 letters went “missing” from the Legislative Portal. They were never acknowledged in the bill analysis. We went back and asked the letter authors and found that all were submitted by April 9th, the date the hearing was originally scheduled for. There is no accountability for including these letters of support in a bill analysis and they simply disappeared. Who knows where those letters went. We certainly haven’t been given an answer. However, they were letters of support, some of them by survivors of clergy abuse, and they should have been handled better and acknowledged in the bill analysis at the very least. People wrote in telling their own personal stories and reasons for supporting the bill and those letters were not acknowledged.   

Jacobsen: Before and after the proceedings, there may be hostility to bills like SB894. During hearings, there can be, obviously, dismissive, even contempt-ridden, behaviour. How do these indicate the lack of a fair hearing or provide reasonable grounds to claim a fair hearing did not happen?

Archer: I think really these things are decided prior to the hearing, and from what we gathered, people have it all decided and then align their votes with each other, which is unfortunate and it doesn’t seem like a true democratic process where information is presented and discussed. The committee members have the opportunity to ask additional questions, but no one did. Senator Dave Min even spoke out about the way that the bill had been handled and all he had done to try to work with the committee members. The letters should have been read. And honestly, a vote should have been taken so advocates could know who stood where. 

Jacobsen: How can people get involved, volunteer skills and time, or finances, to your work?

Archer: Dr. Nedelescu and I co-founded Prosopon Healing as a resource website about clergy abuse for Orthodox clergy and survivors. We have been collaborating with other researchers and laborers in this movement and we are interested in speaking to and working with anyone who wants to move the conversation forward, with love.

Jacobsen: Thank you for the opportunity and your time, Katherine.

Archer: Thank you!

Further Internal Resources (Chronological, yyyy/mm/dd):

Historical Articles

Crimes of the Eastern Orthodox Church 1: Adam Metropoulos (2024/01/11)

Crimes of the Eastern Orthodox Church 2: Domestic Violence (2024/01/12)

Crimes of the Eastern Orthodox Church 3: Finances (2024/01/16)

Crimes of the Eastern Orthodox Church 4: Sex Abuse (2024/01/17)

Interviews

Dr. Hermina Nedelescu on Clergy-Perpetrated Sexual Abuse (2024/06/02)

Katherine Archer on California Senate Bill 894

License

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