4 Women Report Child Sex Abuse At Madison Church

Four women say that men in the Calvary Gospel Church in Madison sexually assaulted, groomed and manipulated them when they were children — and that the church did nothing to put a stop to it.

In an investigation published by the Cap Times called “Stolen Childhoods,” one of the women told reporter Katelyn Ferral that at age 14, the man who raped her would then make her kneel and recite a psalm about being forgiven for adultery.

Speaking with WPR’s “All Things Considered,” Ferral said the women and others who had been in the church reported “a culture of manipulation and real fear from its senior leadership — some of whom are still in place there. Also a real impetus on evangelizing others. That played a role in a lot of the fear that women had in coming forward and not wanting to expose or sully the name of this church. They were told, really, that if they out church members, people aren’t going to want to come to church, and if they’re not going to want to come to church, they’re going to go to hell.”

The women reported being groomed by a group of men who, as Ferral explained, “were actively involved in the church, they served in a variety of ministries. One of the women I highlighted, her alleged abuser was her Sunday school teacher. These were people who were known and believed to be selfless, service-oriented men of God, so when (the women) did end up reporting what was going on, they felt it was often they who were thrown under the bus.”

Some were forced to go before the entire church for public confession. A church member told Ferral a story about her teenage daughter.

“They brought her in front of the congregation and had her confess her sin of having sex outside the marriage,” Ferral said. “Then the pastor at the time was told to shun her.”

Ferral said she reached out to current church leadership, some of whom were also in leadership at the time the women say they were assaulted. The leaders issued a written statement in which Ferral said “they did not exactly deny the allegations, but did emphasize some of the protocols that they have been putting in place to prevent this type of abuse, and then declined to comment further when I had some follow-up questions.”

Her story didn’t name the men involved, because there have been no charges filed. But, she said, she contacted them too.

“I reached out to one alleged perpetrator who multiple times did not respond,” she said. “I did quote another alleged perpetrator in the story, and he denied those allegations as well.”

The Cap Times report was published the same day that some of the women took part in a news conference announcing two bills aimed at stopping child sexual abuse.

“The women have spoken to police about this,” Ferral explained. “Debbie McNulty made a police report in 2017. She’s nearly 50 years old now, the abuse occurred when she was around 9 or 10, and she was told that the statute of limitations to prosecute that case criminally had passed.”

Ferral said the women have shown interest in a civil suit, but “my understanding is that they would be precluded from that, because victims of childhood sexual abuse need to bring a case forward by the time they reach 35, and most of these women now are beyond that — one is 31. But that’s another issue that some lawmakers want to abolish completely. They want to say that, for civil cases, there should be no time limit.”

A second bill introduced by the same lawmakers would eliminate an exemption for clergy in reporting sex abuse. Current law does not require that they report such information if it’s disclosed in a private conversation.

Whatever happens at the Capitol with those proposals, Ferral said the women still struggle with what happened to them at the church, and struggle with blaming themselves for it.

One told her while looking back at pictures of herself from that time that she hated the person she saw.

“It was heartbreaking,” Ferral said. “She outlined in our interview a lot of things where she has some residual anger, she really wants justice, there’s been ways she’s been able to hyper-compartmentalize your life … it really strikes you.”