| 2007-01-12 |
| Clergy sexual misconduct: What's being done to rein in abuse? |
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| By Eugene L. Meyer and Richard Greenberg, Jewish Telegraphic Agency |
Even as the Catholic Church has been rocked by a massive pedophiliascandal in recent years, the Jewish community also has been buffeted byhigh-profile cases of sexual impropriety involving rabbis and otherauthority figures.
How extensive is the problem of clergy sex abuse in the Jewishcommunity? It depends on which criteria are used as a yardstick. Onepossible gauge is the volume of abuse complaints adjudicated by theethics panels of the major religious denominations.Judging by the tiny caseload, the problem appears to be negligible --unless, of course, wrongdoing by rabbis and other clergymen isunderreported, as some observers maintain.
Rabbi Richard Hirsh, executive vice president of theReconstructionist Rabbinical Association, counted three or fourinvestigations into rabbinic sexual misconduct since the 300-memberorganization adopted a new code of ethics in 1999. Hirsh would identifyneither the transgressions nor the transgressors. The code is againbeing revised.
"We're not allowed to discuss any details," he explained,although in one instance, he added, the association's ethics committeemerely admonished the accused rabbi to "be careful next time."
Rabbi Joel Meyers, executive vice president of theConservative movement's 1,600-member Rabbinical Assembly (RA), said inthe 17 years he has held his current post, only three rabbis have beenasked to leave the RA or left on their own due to "inappropriatebehavior" of a sexual nature. Last year, one rabbi was expelled. Inaddition, the RA insisted that "several" other rabbis found to haveengaged in "seductive behavior" should undergo therapy.
Rabbi Basil Herring, executive vice president of theRabbinical Council of America (RCA), a primarily Modern Orthodoxyorganization, said the RCA has ruled on so few sexual misconductcomplaints over the past 10 years that the number is not statisticallysignificant.
The Union for Reform Judaism, which has 900 membercongregations, sees no "particular need" to keep records on the numbersor dispositions of sexual misconduct cases, according to its president,Rabbi Eric Yoffie.
"I don't happen to believe there's any evidence of an epidemicof rabbinic sexual abuse," Yoffie said. "If you are asking, am I awareof there being some significant numbers of people, my answer is no. Wehave to keep it in perspective."
Yet the Awareness Center, a Baltimore-based Jewishclearinghouse of clergy sex abuse information, lists on its Web sitescores of Jewish clergy who are alleged to be sexual predators. Some ofthem have been convicted of crimes, but some have not even beencharged.
Although authoritative statistics quantifying the problemappear to be nonexistent, some experts estimate that "between 18 and 39percent of Jewish clergy are involved in sexual harassment, sexualexploitation and/or sexual misconduct -- the same percentage asnon-Jewish clergy," according to the 2002 book, "Sex, Lies, and Rabbis:Breaking a Sacred Trust," written by psychotherapist Charlotte RolnickSchwab.
"All denominations are involved," Schwab wrote. In her book,she said quantitative data were drawn in part from a conversation withthe Rev. Marie Fortune, director of the FaithTrust Institute, aSeattle-based nonprofit organization that fights sexual and domesticviolence.
Schwab in her book added: "The large number of cases alone ... in my files bears out this estimate."
Contacted later, Fortune said: "To my knowledge, there are nodefinitive statistics in any of our faith groups that quantify theproblem, and what we have instead are anecdotes and, in some places,numbers of complaints brought in that particular jurisdiction."
Fortune said her "best guess, based on anecdote andexperience," is that 10-15 percent of all clergy have been involved insome form of sexual impropriety.
Offenders include, for example, Orthodox youth leader RabbiBaruch Lanner, a former regional director of the National Conference ofSynagogue Youth, who is serving a seven-year prison sentence forabusing teenage girls while he was principal of a New Jersey yeshiva.That scandal set off a storm in the Orthodox world, stemming fromallegations that rabbinic leaders and others had long been negligent insupervising Lanner.
More recently, David Kaye, a prominent 56-year-old Conservative rabbifrom Maryland, was ensnared in a nationally televised pedophile stingoperation. Kaye, the former vice president for programs of Panim: TheInstitute for Jewish Leadership and Values, was sentenced Dec. 1 to 61/2 years in prison for trying to solicit sex last year from someoneposing on the Internet as a 13-year-old boy, a case that was featuredon the network television show, "Dateline NBC."
Virtually all denominations, except segments of ultra-Orthodoxy, nowhave formal codes on the books that outline unacceptable clergybehavior and mandate precisely how complaints of sexual impropriety areto be investigated and adjudicated by in-house ethics panels.
The system, according to critics, suffers from an institutional fear oflawsuits and excessive secrecy -- both byproducts of an ethicalquandary faced by decisionmakers. They must balance an individual'sright to privacy against the obligation to protect the public from apotential sexual predator.
One symbol of that ethical push-pull is the Awareness Center, aprivate, 5-year-old Jewish organization devoted to protecting thepublic from abusers. It has been both criticized and praised for itspolicy of identifying rabbis and other sexual predators on its Website, even if they have not been tried in court.
Perhaps the most serious impediment to controlling clergyabuse is what Chicago psychologist and psychoanalyst Vivian Skolnickcalls "the plague of silence" -- the continuing reluctance of victimsto report transgressions.
"People are afraid of being ostracized if they come forward," saidDavid Framowitz, 49, who has alleged in a recently filed federallawsuit that he was abused decades ago by a Brooklyn rabbi.
Like most of the observers, anti-abuse activist and author DrorahSetel, a rabbi at a Reform congregation in Niagara Falls, N.Y., laudedthe denominational rule makers for taking steps to undo decades ofinaction and denial -- but she faulted their specific policies,nonetheless.
"They are really well-intentioned, but they just don't understand theprocess and the issues involved in sex abuse cases," said Setel, whohas written extensively on the topic of clergy sexual misconduct.
The notion of image-conscious, liability-minded and oftenmale-dominated rabbinic ethics boards policing their own members, sheadded, is like "the fox guarding the henhouse."
Secrecy vs. Privacy
Although Judaism's get-tough policies may have their flaws, conclusiveproof of their effectiveness -- or ineffectiveness -- is elusive. Onereason is that the pool of sex abuse complaints that have beenprocessed by ethics panels over the past several years is minuscule.
It is an open question, however, whether the low volume of casesindicates that the problem of sexual misdeeds among rabbis and otherJewish clergy is minimal, as some claim, or is simply underreported, asSkolnick and several others contend.
In addition, the administrative proceedings aimed at meting out justiceare typically cloaked in what critics call excessive secrecy andadvocates of the system maintain is an environment of prudent andcompassionate privacy. The denominational hearings are generally closedto the public, and in some cases, public access to the results of thosehearings is severely limited.
Proponents of this approach say it is warranted to avoid unnecessarilytainting the reputation of the accused, while sparing the accuseradditional shame and embarrassment.
"It's not easy for someone to institute an ethics complaint; it'sfrightening," said Rabbi Rosalind Gold, chair of the ethics committeeof the Reform movement's Central Conference of American Rabbis (CCAR)."There are repercussions in the community, and people are not stupidabout that."
Victims are typically traumatized by the fear of being ostracized ifthey publicly challenge a respected, and often charismatic, communalauthority figure, such as a rabbi, according to Skolnick and others.
The fear is not always illusory. As this JTA investigationdemonstrates, victims are sometimes shunned and even harassed by fellowcongregants. Consequently, other victims fail to report transgressions.
Despite encouraging inroads in the area of reporting sexual abuse, thereticence of victims to come forward continues to be a major problemacross all denominations. However, anecdotal evidence suggests thatunderreporting may be more prevalent in the ultra-Orthodox community --the type of neighborhood where denial runs rampant regarding clergysexual misconduct, according to Framowitz.
"Growing up in that frum world, it was thought that things like thiscouldn't be; it was too much of a black mark on the community,"explained Framowitz, who was raised in part in the Flatbush and BoroughPark neighborhoods of Brooklyn, which are described in his lawsuit as"tight-knit Orthodox Jewish" communities.
Framowitz, who now lives in Israel, said that even his parents did notinitially believe that he had been repeatedly sexually abused.
"For several years," he said, "nobody protected me."
Framowitz's mother, Naomi, explained her response in the context of thetime: "I was too naive to understand that such a thing could happen. Ilived in my own little world. At that time, it wasn't spoken about likeit is today."
The denominational policies all address a vast range of prohibiteddeeds, from criminal acts such as rape and child molestation tosexually charged conduct that is exploitive but not necessarilycriminal. That includes sexual harassment, adultery and other forms ofseductive or coercive behavior grouped under the broad heading of"boundary violations."
In many instances, boundary violations are an outgrowth of pastoralcounseling that rabbis and other clergymen are often called on toprovide for congregants who, for example, are grieving, undergoingreligious conversion or experiencing personal problems, such as maritalcrises. Explicitly banning even sexually suggestive behavior, most ofthe denominational guidelines recognize that the inherent powerimbalance between clergyman and congregant makes otherwise consensualsexual contact unacceptable.
The codes of professional conduct promulgated by both the Conservativeand Reconstructionist movements go as far as to warn of possiblepitfalls that may arise when an unmarried rabbi dates a congregant.Some regulations aim to foster gender balance among those whoinvestigate or rule on sex abuse cases -- an important consideration inthese matters, according to several sources. Other provisions aregeared to raising the level of expertise and independence amongdenominational investigators and adjudicators.
For example, the Modern Orthodox Rabbinical Council of Americaspecifies that whoever initially assesses complaints not be an RCAmember, that the organization's fact-finding team include one mentalhealth professional and that all members of that team "have appropriatetraining in the area of sexual abuse."
The CCAR guidelines, meanwhile, require that its three-memberfact-gathering team include a lay person in addition to two rabbis.
A key provision of the denominational codes focuses on sexualpredators who escape apprehension by relocating to another institutionor community, where they repeat their conduct, an issue that gainedprominence during the child-molestation scandal in the Catholic Church.
In the case of the church, pedophile priests were aided by superiorswho routinely shuttled them from one parish to another, where theycontinually had access to children.
"This is an area of great concern in the Jewish community as well,"said Alison Iser, director of the Jewish Program at the FaithTrustInstitute. "The Jewish community has viewed with disdain that sort ofbehavior elsewhere, and as a result, has felt a sort of smugness thatit was not happening here."
Whether segments of the Jewish community do in fact have a"Catholic-priest problem" is debatable. And yet Yosef Blau, a ModernOrthodox rabbi, focused on a similar concern in the July 2003 issue ofNefesh News, the journal of the International Network of OrthodoxMental Health Professionals.
"Even when the pattern of abuse is clear," Blau wrote, referring to thesituation in the Orthodox community, "the question remains how toeffectively deal with the abuser in a way that at least limits hisability to move elsewhere and continue to abuse new people."
If progress has been made on that front, it is in part because ofdenominational regulations that govern how much background informationabout a clergyman is to be divulged to interested parties, includingprospective employers. The guidelines generally place a premium onconfidentiality, but they vary in terms of how much discretion movementofficials have to release personnel information.
Declaring that "confidentiality is crucial," theReconstructionist Rabbinical Association guidelines -- which predateBlau's article by nearly four years and are now being revised -- saythe chair of the association's ethics panel may only disclose that amember is under investigation, the investigation "has been resolved butis confidential" or that the member has been suspended or expelled.
"No other details are to be revealed." Hirsh, executive director of theassociation, elaborated: "In the abstract, the default position wouldbe that the more serious the violation, the more imperative it is todisclose as much information as possible."
News of a rabbi's expulsion from the RCA, the Modern Orthodoxorganization, must be disseminated throughout the RCA, and the rabbi'scurrent employer must also be notified. Beyond that, though, RCAofficials shall determine "who else, if anyone," is to be informed thatsuch an action took place. The RCA's Herring said that policy enablesofficials to consider relevant factors, such as the seriousness of theoffense, as well as possible complications posed by pending lawsuits.
The CCAR, the Reform movement's rabbinic arm, mandates that aprospective employer be provided with a fairly detailed report ofdisciplinary action taken against a CCAR member. But "after an extendedperiod of time," a single noncriminal infraction doesn't have to bereported at all.
Attorney Anne Underwood, who helped write the CCAR's code, noted thatbefore the decision is made to withhold information, it must first bereviewed by several senior CCAR officials in conjunction with theorganization's legal counsel.
"I don't like secrecy," Underwood added, "but there is a differencebetween secrecy and privacy, and this provision honors that."
If you act on a false accusation, you're killing a guy and hisfamily; the responsibility is awesome," said Rabbi Abraham Twerski,medical director emeritus of the Gateway Rehabilitation Center inPittsburgh. "Plus, you can be sued for defamation of character. And boydoes that ever hamper the system."
Concern over litigation "causes people to get very frightened," addedDavid Pelcovitz, a suburban New York psychologist who has treated manyvictims of sexual abuse. "It certainly tests the limits of theiridealism."
Some victims' advocates are transparency absolutists, insisting on fulldisclosure of virtually all details of sex abuse cases involvingreligious authority figures that have been ruled on by denominationalethics panels. They feel that such information should be released notonly to prospective employers but to the public at large to protect themaximum number of people.
"There has been so much secrecy for so long that victims are rightfullydistrustful," said rabbinic activist Setel of Niagara Falls. "They havea desire to overcompensate, and I can totally understand that."
Responding to those who advocate maximum transparency, Meyers of theConservative movement's Rabbinical Assembly (RA), said: "They're notcrazy, and they're not wrong. It's a dilemma we struggle with. Thequestion is how high up do you put that billboard?"
The underlying issue, added Meyers, who said the RA has not beeninfluenced by fear of lawsuits, is "what do you do in these cases torestore equilibrium between the rabbi, the victim and the community?That is really the Jewish challenge."
Due in part to concerns over civil liability, the RCA generally limitsthe public release of details regarding sex abuse cases, even thosethat have resulted in a rabbi's expulsion from the organization, saidHerring.
"The threat of liability hangs over you," he added. "The chill factoris significant." The RCA guidelines, however, do have an emergencyclause that recommends informing a wide range of individuals, includingneighbors and civil authorities, if a rabbi might pose an immediatedanger to "alleged or potential victims."
Sources within the other movements said that regardless of officialpolicy, an expansive disclosure stance would likely apply in similarcircumstances. The ethics panel of the Reform movement's CCAR does notordinarily publicize its findings, even in expulsion cases, accordingto Gold of its ethics committee.
"I don't know for sure why," she said. "I'm not sure that question hasever been discussed as that question. It's not a desire to keep thingssecret. It might be an interesting thing to discuss."
Commenting on the transparency issue, Minneapolis psychologist GarySchoener, whose office has consulted on hundreds of clergy sex abusecases, both Jewish and non-Jewish, said there is such a thing as"hurtful honesty" that can needlessly trash the perpetrator -- whomight be a good risk for recovery -- while inadvertently exposing theidentity of the victim. Otherwise, Schoener added, full disclosure isalways the best policy when responding to inquiries from would-beemployers.
Due in part to extensive First Amendment protections enjoyed byreligious organizations, the keepers of clergy personnel records have"lots of leeway" in terms of what information they can release withoutbeing successfully sued, Schoener said. Simple morality and commonsense are usually effective decision-making guides in these situations,he said.
"Let's say you're hiring a rabbi," Schoener explained, "and he had donesomething wrong, and somebody later finds out about his history. Howwould the congregation feel if he goes out and does it again?
"The issue here is knowing the truth. It does set everyone free. Theprospective employer should know both the good and the bad," he said."There should be an accurate description of the full person, includinghis recovery plan and how it is being monitored.
"The idea is to know exactly what kind of situation we're dealing with."
