Christian group Ethnos360 accused of failing to protect girl
from abuse, years after ‘significant child safety training’
Warning: This story contains graphic descriptions of abuse.
A Christian organization long plagued by allegations of child sex abuse is now facing a lawsuit that accuses the group of failing to protect a girl from one of her peers at its missionary training center.
Ethnos360, a religious nonprofit group based in Sanford, Florida, that was formerly known as New Tribes Mission, sends missionaries and their families to far-flung corners of the world. In 2019, multiple women told NBC News that they had been sexually abused decades earlier by their “dorm dads” — missionaries tasked with caring for children at New Tribes Mission’s overseas boarding schools while their parents served in the field.
The group issued a public apology to the abuse survivors following the NBC News report and said that it had “incorporated significant child safety training” after an independent party commissioned by New Tribes Mission shared recommendations in 2010 amid abuse allegations.
But Monday’s lawsuit alleges that six years after those recommendations were issued, a girl was repeatedly sexually abused by another child on Ethnos360’s missionary training property in Missouri. The lawsuit was filed in Florida’s 18th Judicial Circuit Court and obtained first by NBC News.
“Ethnos360 has had a history of child sexual abuse within their community, at different locations across the globe. They certainly have been educated about this issue,” said the attorney who filed the suit, Boz Tchividjian, a former sex crimes prosecutor and the grandson of evangelist Billy Graham. Tchividjian was the founder and former executive director of Godly Response to Abuse in the Christian Environment, or GRACE, the group hired to make the 2010 recommendations to New Tribes Mission, but now is no longer part of GRACE.
There is more on this story on NBC News at:
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‘Raped 50 times’: A UK woman’s shocking story of child sex abuse at Osho ashrams
A 54-year-old woman has shared her harrowing experience of being raised in the notorious cult of Indian mystic Rajneesh, popularly known as Osho. Prem Sargam detailed the rampant sexual abuse she endured from the age of six to 12 in three ashrams
 "‘Raped 50 times’: A UK woman’s shocking story of child sex abuse at Osho ashrams")
Please continue reading this story on FirstPost at:
The so-called spiritual movement
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Pastor's daughter speaks out after being 'sexually abused by him for years'
A pastor's daughter thought she had escaped a childhood of sexual abuse by moving out and getting married only to see her father break into her house and sodomize her weeks after she had a baby.
Bertheophilus 'Judge' Bailey, a respected minister at St Andrew Christian Church in Tulsa began abusing Harmony Oates when she was in sixth grade, court documents claim.
He told his daughter he was her 'boyfriend' and that the little girl would unleash a 'total catastrophe to the whole kingdom of God' if she ever revealed what he was doing to her.
But he was arrested on Wednesday and charged with rape, child sexual abuse, incest, forcible sodomy and burglary, after the 22-year-old decided she had spent too long 'in the shadows'.
'He left me broken, shattered, a shell of the person I could have been,' she wrote on Facebook. 'And yet, I refuse to let him define me.'
Harmony Oates at church with Pastor Bertheophilus 'Judge' Bailey on Father's day 2022
Bailey, 45, was arrested on Wednesday and is being held on a $500,000 bond charged with rape, child sexual abuse, incest, forcible sodomy and burglary
Bailey, 45, had seen felony charges of lewd molestation against him dropped by the time he turned his attention to his daughter in 2012.
And in 2013 he admitted a separate charge of child abuse by injury against another of his children.
'He would pray over me at first but he would do a lot of touching while he was praying,' Oates told kjrh.com.
'I knew how to set a boundary but when he's your father and when he's a pastor and when he has this authority and he has a record, it's like you say no, but what does your no mean?'
The assaults escalated and Bailey began raping his daughter after she turned 16 as she struggled to reconcile the public image of a loving father with the man who was abusing her.
'The thing is when I was a kid I separated my dad from who he was, I had to, that's the only way I survived,' she said.
'I would call him my best friend only to hide the reality of what I was living.'
And she claims that her father refused to release his hold over her even after she escaped the family home.
'In 2021 after (she) moved out, got married, and had a baby, the defendant came into her residence unannounced, pushed her to the floor and forcibly orally sodomized her,' the probable cause affidavit reads.
'After that incident, the defendant began coming to (her) residence and looking in her windows.'
Oates said her father began abusing her when she was a sixth grade student
She claims he warned her that she would unleash a 'total catastrophe to the whole kingdom of God' if she ever revealed what he was doing to her
The University of Oklahoma graduate describes himself as a 'community servant' and a 'men's recovery counselor' on his LinkedIn profile
He was employed as a senior pastor at St Andrew's in northern Tulsa in 2018
Oates began confiding first in her husband, then an older brother and finally in her mother Aricca before they confronted Bailey.
In a series of text messages included in the affidavit the pastor admitted his guilt, telling his accusers 'I am an adulterer. I am a child molester. I am a rapist'.
In one he admitted watching incest porn videos, adding that 'seeds of sin grow'.
In other words, 'Sin is Progressive'!
He allegedly told them he felt justified in having sex with his daughter because 'it was what people do'.
Bailey also allegedly admitted abusing his daughter in conversations with his therapist and sent his wife an email exchange in which the counsellor warned him he had a legal duty to report the abuse to police.
'In the email chain the defendant tells the therapist he understands his legal duty to report child abuse but that he felt tricked and thought he was safe to disclose in therapy,' the affidavit notes.
Bailey, who describes himself as a 'community servant' and a 'men's recovery counselor' on his LinkedIn profile, is a University of Oklahoma graduate who has been a senior pastor at St Andrew's since 2018.
Funny, no mention of being a servant of God.
His daughter went to police in August 2023, and on September 17 she announced that she was ready to press charges.
'For too long, I suffered in silence, afraid of the repercussions of speaking out against someone with such influence and power,' she wrote on Facebook.
'The damage he has done is immeasurable. It has poisoned my relationships, poisoned my mind,' she added.
'It has filled me with doubts, with fears, with a sense of worthlessness that I struggle to overcome.
'As a victim of sexual and mental abuse at the hands of Pastor Bailey for over a decade, I feel compelled to warn others about his predatory behavior.
'Despite his status as a respected member of the community, it is essential to shed light on his actions to prevent further harm to unsuspecting individuals.'
The following day, the rest of her family issued a statement offering her their full support.
'You are a strong, intelligent and a talented young woman,' they wrote.
'No one should ever have their trust and safety violated in such a horrific way, especially by their own father.
'We are all so deeply sorry this happened to you.'
Oates and her mother Arrica went to the police after confronting Bailey about ther abuse
Oates confided originally in her husband Malachi with whom she has a young daughter
'Coming out of the darkness makes you a survivor,' she told kjrh.com. 'That's what I would say. 'It feels like I'm not in the shadows anymore.'
Bailey resigned from St Andrew's on September 21 and has been held in Tulsa County Jail on a $500,000 bond since his arrest on Wednesday.
Another alleged victim of Bailey has since come forward as Oates prepares to face her father in court.
'Think of a 13-year-old girl confused about who her true love is because her dad is saying 'I'm your boyfriend',' she said.
'I'm learning on trusting God more and I know he has me and every other victim.
'He has been guiding me through this whole journey, and I know he will come for me like a father, even though my dad did not.
'Coming out of the darkness makes you a survivor. That's what I would say.
'It feels like I'm not in the shadows anymore.'
Indeed, you are 'In the Light', keep walking in the Light.
Former Bishop of Broome pleads not guilty to more than
20 sex offences against Indigenous youth
The former Bishop of Broome who has been accused of alleged historical sex offences against Indigenous youth and children across the Kimberley has pleaded not guilty.
The 74-year-old former Catholic bishop is facing 28 charges in total, including three counts of a person in authority indecently dealing with a child, 16 counts of unlawful and indecent assault, and two counts of sexual penetration without consent.
It is alleged at least some of the offences took place in Broome, Kununurra, and Kalumburu between 2008 and 2016.
The West Australian reported Mr Saunders' lawyer, Seamus Rafferty, indicated to the court that the former bishop would enter a plea to the remaining six charges - all counts of inadequately storing firearms and being unlicensed to possess a firearm or ammunition - next year.
Two new counts of unlawful and indecent assault were added by police in April.
In 2023 a leaked 200-page report from the Vatican found it was likely Mr Saunders sexually assaulted four Indigenous youths and may have groomed 67 others.
It also claimed he used significant amounts of church funding to bring alcohol into dry communities and alleged other offences.
Mr Saunders has always denied any wrongdoings.
He has become the highest-ranking member of the church to be accused of sex crimes since the acquittal of Cardinal George Pell by the High Court in 2020.
Mr Saunders will next appear at the Broome District Court on January 28 for a trial listing hearing.
His bail conditions have been extended until then.
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