Sometimes, you just have to face a difficult fact.

Child sexual abuse is pervasive in Bermuda and often takes place within church communities, where people usually try to keep it hushed up. I have several clients who, as adults, are trying to deal with the wreckage that has caused.

This includes great difficulty dealing with their churches and their relationships with God Himself. When you think about it, why should Bermuda be any different from other places, since child sexual abuse is not limited by geopolitical boundary?

When children have been abused sexually, no one does anyone a service by erring on the side of secrecy. The best thing is to get it out into the light and fresh air.

Healing comes by cleaning the infection and providing no cover where it might fester in the concealed safety of superficial action. In many churches the problem includes multiple generations and cases of abuse that have not been handled well.

That kind of thing infects a church. It's a cancer growing in the bowel that only becomes visible when it kills.

It makes no sense to tell such a victim to read his Bible and pray about it, but not to go to the doctor.

In the same way, a sex offender in the church needs the forgiveness and support of his brothers and sisters AND the clinical treatment that can help him understand and deal with his psychophysical patterns of arousal and offending. The best thing a church might do if they intend to face this problem is to insist on hard accountability.

Forgive, yes, but verify. Get nosy. Don't be afraid to get dirty with it.

Unfortunately, most people are in over their heads on this subject from the very beginning.

Understanding takes information and consultation with people of competence. The Association for the Treatment of Sexual Abusers (www.atsa.com) is an international group providing standards for those who work in this field, and they would provide a helpful starting place for church leaders in need of resources.

Here are some basic facts to consider.

Juvenile sex offenders for the most part do not have a set pattern of offending; they tend to commit crimes of convenience that often involve family members, but adult offenders display a set pattern which includes a familiar cycle.

Juvenile sex offenders respond to treatment much better than adults, but with both the risk of re-offending goes up dramatically without treatment. The cycle of offence includes periods of deviant arousal coupled with the intentional grooming of victims and various forms of coercion or even force.

Those at most risk for re-offending have some characteristics in common, and one of them is the degree of force they utilise to get what they want. In completing an accurate and helpful evaluation of such adult offenders, there is a very precise process to establish what kind of deviant arousal a man experiences and to uncover what he would otherwise keep secret.

If any person were to systematically groom and offend a child over a period of several years, and especially if he were to use coercive intimidation and force to effect the behaviour, that would indicate sophistication in offending.

Such a person should complete a Sex Offender Specific Evaluation, which is an involved procedure that includes polygraph, and psychophysical testing, a complete psychological evaluation, and extensive interviewing.

Without such an evaluation, adult sex offenders tend to slip away, which leaves them undetected, untreated, and an extreme risk for re-offending.

In a Christian man I cannot think of a more destructive situation, because he would be sick, ill with a disease sure to lead him into failure and relapse, then despair of his own sin, let alone all the grief for other people in the families and communities against which he might offend.

It is precisely because churches have not understood all this that the terrible results that periodically rock major church organisations have taken place.

Dr. Philip Brownell, M.Div., Psy.D., is a psychologist at Ashton Associates (295-0999). E-mails can be sent to crossroadsg-gej.org