“To be clear, Turning Point’s leadership had no awareness of these alleged abuses during Luke’s time of service nor had any knowledge of allegations of previous misconduct in other churches prior to serving at Turning Point,” Turning Point said. “We are devastated by these allegations and feel enormous grief for anyone who is a potential victim.”
Turning Point added that it has “detailed written guidelines and operating procedures that specifically address the highest expectations of integrity for our pastors in our care for people.”
“What we have learned is devastating and reinforces our determination to secure all ministries, church environments, and pastoral relationships so that they are without any issue of concern,” Turning Point said.
While the leaders of Lakeside Baptist said that the church has measures in place to prevent and report sexual abuse, they believe the SBC’s long promised but hotly debated “Ministry Check” website could have prevented the church from hiring Cunningham in the first place.
SBC delegates, called messengers, overwhelming voted to establish a database of pastors, denominational leaders, ministry employees, and volunteers who have been credibly accused of sexual abuse during the denomination’s 2022 meeting.
Since that time, Southern Baptists have debated what constitutes “credibly accused,” which has stalled the process. Funding has also been an issue for the SBC’s Abuse Reform Implementation Task Force (ARITF), the volunteer group responsible for overseeing the site’s creation.
The ARITF dissolved at the conclusion of this year’s SBC annual meeting. The “Ministry Check” website still has not been launched, and responsibility for completing the task has been given to the SBC’s Executive Committee.
“Lakeside Baptist Church stands firmly against clerical sexual abuse,” Lakeside Baptist said. “We believe that, if the Southern Baptist Convention had a working database for offenders, we would likely have never been exposed to Mr. Cunningham.”
“We plan to do everything possible to encourage national leaders to exercise their spiritual responsibility, identify perpetrators in the churches, and stop this from happening again,” the church continued. “Until then, we plan to re-evaluate and institute our own even more rigorous processes.”
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Cunningham is being held on a $200,000 bond.
ChurchLeaders has reached out to Lakeside Baptist Church and Turning Point Community Church and will update this article in the event of a reply.
