WOMANSDAYMAGAZINE APRIL 2020 55
KEEP THE
AN ONLINE MOVEMENT CALLED #CHURCHTOO IS
LEADING THE CHARGE TO HOLD RELIGIOUS
INSTITUTIONS RESPONSIBLE FOR SEXUAL ABUSE
BEHIND THEIR DOORS. KATIE TROUT SHARES HER
STORY TO HELP OTHER SURVIVORS COME FORWARD.
K
atie Trout practically
grew up at Calvary Church,
an evangelical megachurch in
Charlotte, NC. As a kid, she
spent at least two days a week
there, attending Sunday services and taking
part in Wednesday night activities. But as she
got older, she felt lonely, lost in the throngs
of young people who regularly hung out on the
sprawling campus.
In 2000, when she was 15, she got to
know Joseph,* a popular and charismatic
35-year-old church employee who acted in the
church’s drama group and volunteered with
the children’s ministry. Katie worked with
Joseph behind the scenes as a stage manager
for church productions. “I joined that group
hoping to get plugged in somewhere at church,”
Katie says now. “It started off with me really
just wanting a friend.”
On Wednesday nights, Katie and Joseph
would sit together at church and talk. She
told him about school, her friends, and hersoftball games. He would complain about his
job and his marriage. One evening, he offered
to give her a piggyback ride. The request
seemed odd at the time, considering that she
was a teenager, but they were friends and
she just wanted to fit in. Today she recognizes
interactions like these as “grooming”—a term
used to describe the subtle ways abusers build
trust with victims in order to exploit them.
Soon Joseph began to make lewd comments,
and his touch grew increasingly invasive.
He cornered Katie in church stairwells and
elevators and in his car. She was ashamed
and afraid to reveal the situation to anyone,
especially her parents and church leaders. “I was
a good girl growing up, and then this happened,”
she says. “Coming from an ultraconservative
family, I was terrified to speak up.”
Years passed, and Katie says the abuse
continued, even as she started college in
another town. One weekend in 2004, she
returned home to see a church production at
Calvary. While she was there, she alleges,HA
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BY TIFFANY STANLEY ✚ PHOTOGRAPHED BY STACEY VAN BERKEL