A Pentecostal church’s child protection policy was based on a biblical reference which could be interpreted as “don’t get caught”, an inquiry has heard.
The training manual for workers at the Queensland church where a 13-year-old boy was sexually abused by the youth pastor for two years advised “the bible says to avoid the appearance of evil”.
The manual said the child abuse policy was formed on the basis that the enemy would try to destroy the ministry of the Lord and “shuts down opportunity for anyone to falsely accuse you ... Satan is the enemy of the brethren ... leave no door open for him”.
Chris Peterson, who took over as senior pastor at the church in 2006 – a year before a former youth pastor, Jonathan Baldwin, was charged and later jailed for child sexual abuse – said in hindsight the policy read as if it was saying “don’t get caught”.
Peterson was giving evidence to a royal commission into institutional responses to child sexual abuse hearing into how his church and the umbrella body for Pentecostal churches – Australian Christian Churches – responded to the Baldwin case.
Baldwin was jailed in 2009 for eight years, with a four-year non-parole period, for indecent treatment of a child under 16 and for one count of sodomy.
Counsel assisting the commission, Simeon Beckett, asked why the manual referred to “the appearance of evil” instead of simply evil.
Peterson said the manual was prepared by two church volunteers – one of whom was a teacher in training – and neither had had specific training in child protection.
“I don’t think they viewed the document with that critical analysis,” he told the hearing on Thursday.
He also said that during his six years at the church he could not remember any specific child protection training but he had faith the people running the youth program were competent.
Beckett asked if the document was saying “Don’t get caught.”
“I see it, I hear it … Obviously its intent is genuine; the legal analysis may not have been very insightful,” Peterson said.
“Evil is what we’re really trying to avoid, not just the appearance, but evil,” he added.
Peterson said he would have applied a state policy of mandatory reporting of child abuse to police when it was introduced in Queensland.
He also told Beckett there was no written policy on mandatory reporting circulated to church workers.
On Wednesday the father of the boy abused by Baldwin told the commission the Pentecostal movement shunned his son, who was still suffering the effects of the abuse.
Peterson said Baldwin had left the church by the time he took over but he had offered pastoral and spiritual help to the boy’s parents when the offences became known.