Metro Voice News Celebrating Faith, Family & Community
The former editor of “Christianity Today” once criticized the character of former President Donald Trump. Now the magazine said it failed to hold Mark Galli and former advertising director Olatokunbo Olawoye accountable for sexual harassment for more than a decade.
That harassment included “demeaning, inappropriate and offensive behavior,” according to a report from news editor Daniel Silliman. He reported finding a dozen firsthand accounts of harassment.
“Women at CT were touched at work in ways that made them uncomfortable,” the report said. “They heard men with authority over their careers make comments about the sexual desirability of their bodies. And in at least two cases, they heard department heads hint at openness to an affair.”
Eight women alleged that Galli touched them inappropriately, including one former employee who said Galli caressed her bare shoulder during an event in the early 2000s, while another said Galli’s hand got “stuck under her bra” when he rubbed her back.
According to the report, Galli was reprimanded in 2019 after three women in three days reported to human resources that he had inappropriately touched them, allegedly hugging a woman from behind, grabbing another woman by the shoulders and shaking her and putting a hand on another woman’s bottom.
In 2019, not long before he retired, Galli called for Trump to be removed from office, saying Trump’s character flaws made him unfit for the presidency. The editorial caused a national uproar among evangelical Christians. Galli then left the magazine in early 2020 and since has converted to Catholicism.
Dan Darling, an evangelical author and director of the Land Center for Cultural Engagement at Southwestern Baptist Theological Seminary, said the magazine’s account showed how badly Christian institutions have handled issues of sexual harassment. “A lot of our institutions did not have good policies,” he said.
The report was sad, he said, but also a step forward for Christian groups. He hopes that other ministries will learn from “Christianity Today’s” example and adopt better policies. “We need these protections in place,” he said.
–Alan Goforth | Metro Voice
