“A church’s response to an allegation of abuse begins with a call to Child Protective Services.”

A church's response to an allegation of abuse is not an immediate call to CPS or the police, but rather a quick appraisal of whether the allegations are in fact likely to be criminal. If it's sexual contact, it almost certainly is, but there are many in this country who would argue that any corporal punishment, even spanking, constitutes abuse.

The reason I say this is that a hasty report to CPS can turn a person's life upside down and cost him (her) thousands of dollars in legal and counseling fees to "prove innocence." There has been a necessary correction from the time when I was a child, when police departments would overlook child abuse, child sexual abuse, and other serious allegations--I can give some examples and names.

On the flip side, I can also name names of people who have been through the wringer by this process by well-meaning but misled people who more or less assume the accusation is the conviction. There is an ugly reality of what appears to be an over-correction here, one that seems to insert narratives into peoples' cases which are not really there, and one that seems to tread rather heavily on the presumption of innocence. A good example is the Wenatchee child abuse furor of 1994 and 1995.