THE Seventh-day Adventist Church in Jamaica is adamant that it has sufficient checks and balances in place to ensure that people of questionable character are kept away from the children in its care.

The church is preparing to host Pathfinder Camporee 2023 which will see approximately 15,000 people, many of them minors, participating in a what is expected to be a life-changing experience at the Trelawny Multipurpose Stadium in April.

Several adults will serve as master guides and volunteers at the camporee, and with the country still reeling from the disclosure that American educator Carl Robanske was allowed full access to Jamaican children housed at transitional facility The Father’s House, in St James, despite admitting inappropriate contact with a child in the US, there is even more focus now on adults who are allowed access to the island’s children.

Details of Robankse’s contact with the children, even after the Child Protection and Family Services Agency (CPFSA) became aware of his transgressions with an American child believed to be no older than 15 years old, were revealed last week in a report from the Office of the Children’s Advocate (OCA) following an almost two-year-long probe.

But responding to questions at this week’s Jamaica Observer Monday Exchange, president of the Seventh-day Adventist Church in Jamaica Pastor Everett Brown said the organisation has checks and balances to ensure that it is not in a situation similar to the CPFSA.

“We are very serious when it comes to the protection of our children, and before the [OCA] report we have been exposing our pastors, we have been exposing our workers, and we have been talking to our members about the seriousness of this and that we should vet all persons who are engaging with young people to verify their status,” said Brown.

“Where we find any reasonable doubt, we don’t engage them. We do not support persons who are who are flagged to work with young people,” added Brown.

He told Observer editors and reporters that for the camporee, which will be staged from April 4-8, the church is going to be doing what it has always done to ensure that people with questionable character do not find themselves close to the camp.

“That’s our position, and we would encourage all persons who are engaging with young people to do the due diligence so that these persons are not exposed to our young people,” added Brown who rejected a claim that the church has been silent since the release of the troubling OCA report last Tuesday.

“We have not been silent in regards to sharing. As a matter of fact [we have gone] beyond sharing to insist that we do the due diligence and do not allow persons who have had an issue to work with our children, so we have been doing that. And, of course, we don’t have all the information [regarding Robanske], “argued Brown.

He was supported by youth ministries director for the Jamaica Union Conference of Seventh-day Adventists Pastor Dane Fletcher who told the Monday Exchange that the church has established protocols to keep the children safe from predators.

“In other words, we are not having a knee-jerk reaction to the [OCA] report. This only serves to encourage us to strengthen what we do in order to protect our children,” said Fletcher as he pointed out that children could be scarred for a lifetime if they were molested in a church setting.

“When a youngster would come into our space, they see the Church as a place of safety, as a place where they will feel protected of their innocence so this is of critical importance to us,” said Fletcher.

The comments of the two pastors were endorsed by Nigel Coke, communications, public affairs and religious liberty director for the Jamaica Union Conference of Seventh-day Adventists, who quipped, “And I tell you, too, we are not going to hide anybody.”