The cost of coming forward: 1 survivor's life after #MeToo (2025)

It’s been a year and a half since Megan Lively revealed she was raped in 2003 by a fellow student at Southeastern Baptist Theological Seminary — and that Paige Patterson, then president of the seminary, counseled her not to go to the police.

The Associated Press

Her message to more than 50 male pastors sitting in a conference room during the annual meeting of the Baptist State Convention of North Carolina earlier this month was both tremulous and full of conviction: When a woman comes forward alleging abuse, listen to her. Don’t try to fix it. Be more like Jesus.

In September, she spoke at the Caring Well conference, in which the denomination invited abuse survivors to tell their stories. In the new year, she plans to speak at half a dozen other SBC-affiliated venues. But after the dozens of reports of sexual abuse in the church, she also wants to help her denomination do the right thing. In this, she has become a reluctant speaker.The daughter of a Realtor and a psychologist, Lively grew up in Wilson, an old tobacco town about 40 miles east of Raleigh, the state capital. Her family attended Grace Baptist, and like them, she loved church.

But he wasn’t quite done. In 2000, Patterson and his wife led the SBC to revise its doctoral statement to codify traditional gender roles. The revised statement now includes a sentence declaring that “a wife is to submit herself graciously to the servant leadership of her husband,” and another that declares the office of pastor is limited to men.

The following morning, she reported a nonconsensual sex act to a campus student office. She was immediately called and questioned by Paige Patterson. She recalls him asking for the precise details and then suggesting she was at fault for inviting a male student to her room. She was asked to forgive her assailant and advised not to report it to the police.Southeastern placed Lively on probation; she can’t remember why. It may have been for allowing the male student to her room.

“In a religious system, survivors often lack the vocabulary to name as a crime,” said Susan Codone, a professor in the School of Engineering at Mercer University who experienced sexual abuse as a teen. “You don’t have the words to say ‘This was rape. This was sexual abuse.’ Without the words, you tend to put your own words on it: ‘It was my fault. It was a sin I committed.’”

With word was getting out about her story, Lively decided she didn’t want to remain anonymous anymore.

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