Church elders face scrutiny as abuse spans generations

Across the Old Apostolic Lutheran Church, prosecutors and survivors say leaders and members have handled child sexual abuse inside the church for years—often steering victims away from police—while elders from Sweden are scheduled to visit U.S. congregations t

When Moorcroft police drove up a long dirt road last summer to an Old Apostolic Lutheran Church building at the edge of town, they weren’t looking for rumors. They were looking for records—because several children had said the man sitting near their families during Sunday services had abused them.

His name was Charles Massie, brother of Clint Massie. Clint Massie, who pleaded guilty to child abuse in Duluth, Minnesota, had already put the OALC’s internal handling of allegations under a harsh spotlight months earlier.

In Wyoming, prosecutors said the alleged abuse didn’t stay hidden. Over more than 10 years. court documents describe Charles Massie sexually abusing at least seven girls. with some abuse occurring at his house and some at his businesses where young girls worked part time. Investigators also alleged that the vast majority of the incidents happened at church.

They tallied 832 incidents where Massie allegedly sat near the girls’ parents and fondled their genitals and breasts. One victim told police she was 5 or 6 when Massie abused her, and said he “raped me with his fingers.”

Wyoming has charged Charles Massie with nine counts of sexual abuse and sexual battery. He is being held in jail in Nebraska, where prosecutors also have charged him in connection with sexual assaults. Massie has pleaded not guilty in both states and could not be reached for comment.

Inside the church, prosecutors say, the pattern was not just what happened—it was what didn’t.

DaNece Day. the prosecuting attorney for Crook County in Wyoming whose office has charged two OALC members in the past two years. said there was “no support” for victims and that the church did nothing to punish Charles Massie. “There are no consequences for him,” Day said. “He’s allowed to sit in church with them every Sunday. even after they’ve come forward and said. ‘This man has been hurting us.’”.

The charges say families already knew, but police were not told. Investigators learned that one family had learned about the abuse three years earlier. Another, prosecutors allege, had told their preacher, David Lindberg, about the abuse in 2024—yet no one called law enforcement. Charles Massie would later turn himself in, but not for another year.

Lindberg disputed that characterization. “All I can say is, when I first heard about it, he came to me and he had a problem, so I told him he needs to go get therapy and turn himself in to the police,” Lindberg said. Lindberg said Massie did turn himself in.

Lindberg referred questions to a church spokesperson, Troy Massie—relative of Charles and Clint Massie. In written responses. Troy Massie said the church told Charles to stop attending services after he confessed to Lindberg. though he could listen on the phone. Troy Massie also wrote, “We continue to improve our efforts as needed to protect all children.”.

Across the country, prosecutors and survivors describe the same conflict: a faith doctrine that emphasizes forgiveness and—critics say—discourages speaking openly about wrongdoing, even when the victim wants police.

Old Apostolic Lutheran Church congregations, a Scandinavian-rooted revivalist faith, have been forced to deal with child sex abuse in places ranging from Wyoming to Minnesota to Washington state. In many of the cases described by prosecutors and survivors, allegations were not reported to police.

In Minnesota, a man from the same faith admitted he began entering the bedrooms of his daughter and son at night around the time each turned 12. He and his siblings grew up in the church, were sexually abused themselves, and then repeated the abuse with his own children.

In Washington state, preachers knew a member of their congregation had sexually abused several young boys. Instead of reporting him to police. the preachers allowed him to ask for forgiveness. according to a family member. and he continued to sexually abuse children. He was later found guilty of raping the 9-year-old son of a church member and was sentenced to life in prison.

Survivors say the church’s rituals place the burden on victims rather than perpetrators—sometimes trapping families in a long cycle that can last through mothers, daughters, and granddaughters.

“There are no consequences for him,” Day said in Wyoming. In the courtroom, the doctrine itself can sound like a wall between victim and accountability.

At sentencing in Minnesota, a judge commented on that cyclical nature in 2023. The case involved a man from an OALC family who turned himself in to police after repeatedly abusing his son and daughter. The judge said she found it “almost incomprehensible” that the adults in his life didn’t know about the abuse he and his siblings had suffered as children.

“All I can see are the ripples of consequences for you and all of your siblings, who were abused or abusers, and then for your children,” the judge said.

The church’s doctrine of forgiveness is central to why survivors and prosecutors say allegations have been handled inside congregations instead of the criminal justice system. Current and former members say the belief works like this: sins are forgiven by fellow church members. and once forgiven. those who speak about wrongdoing—including victims—can be accused of harboring an unforgiving heart.

Sexual abuse survivors say the result is a culture where allegations are resolved outside of law enforcement, and victims must bear their pain alone or risk going to hell.

Victims also describe pressure to keep quiet in concrete, daily moments.

In Minnesota. police records describe a woman telling a young girl that her abuse—beginning when she was around 5 or 6 years old—was not a big deal and she “needed to get over it.” In Washington state. a police report notes a woman told law enforcement that her preacher discouraged her from contacting authorities after her daughter said she’d been raped by three men from church. saying it was for “spiritual reasons.”.

One woman who said she was told not to speak about her abuse put it simply: “We’re always told that what the preachers tell us, that’s coming from God,” she explained. “Who’s going to argue with that?”

The faith’s internal structure is part of the problem prosecutors describe: large, multigenerational family networks connect congregations spread across the U.S. and Canada, often hundreds of miles apart. That means church members can move between communities while legal consequences lag behind.

Last fall. ProPublica and the Minnesota Star Tribune reported that preachers in Minnesota had known for years about allegations that a man named Clint Massie sexually abused young girls in the congregation. Instead of reporting it to police. church leaders urged some victims to take part in sessions where victims and Massie were brought face-to-face and encouraged to forgive the abuse.

Now, new reporting by those same organizations is being used by victims and advocates to argue that the abuse and the failure to report allegations are persistent and national.

Some current and former OALC members say Sweden’s church elders—seen as the “mother congregation” of the faith—must intervene. Elders from Sweden. who don’t have authority over the American church but wield influence. are scheduled to visit U.S. congregations this summer and meet with members. Victims and advocates hope their presence will force reform.

In a statement. representatives from the Swedish church said the cases are isolated incidents and they didn’t “observe any pattern” among the tens of thousands of members in 34 OALC congregations in the U.S. and Canada. They said sexual abuse should be reported to authorities and that it was possible “some matters have been handled improperly or without sufficient knowledge.” They also acknowledged that church guidelines “are being reviewed with the American missionary pastors in order to ensure compliance.”.

Representatives of the OALC in the U.S. and Canada. in an email. said they “do not perceive there to be a general pattern of behavior. ” describing sexual abuse as a serious and persistent problem across society. They acknowledged that bringing a victim to face their abuser. as a pastor for the OALC did with Massie. can be traumatic. They defended the church’s doctrine of forgiveness. saying it was not a means to conceal wrongdoing or to shield offenders from legal consequences. and that no one is coerced to forgive or to ask for forgiveness. They added that if teachings had been misapplied or misunderstood, it “does not reflect an error in our doctrine.”.

But in families where survivors say the abuse stretches across generations, that dispute lands differently.

Lorie Peldo. for example. said she was sexually abused for eight years by her older brother starting when she was only 2. She said that a quarter century later—after memories resurfaced during therapy—her mother told her she had known about the abuse. Peldo said that. on the advice of her preacher in Battle Ground. Washington. her parents didn’t report the crimes to police. instead taking her brother to a doctor.

Peldo said she confronted her brother, who told her it haunted him his entire life. She said she tried to forgive him. but “the weight of what he’d done did not lift.” She later said she tried to commit suicide and ended up in a psychiatric hospital. She said her brother later died, and her parents are also deceased.

Peldo’s account continues into the next generation. On a church road trip. Clint Massie—sentenced for child abuse in Duluth. Minnesota. last year—sexually abused Peldo’s daughter. Tonya. when she was 11 and he was a teenager. according to Tonya Peldo’s statements to law enforcement. Peldo said her case was included in the police file involving Massie. but it wasn’t charged criminally “because the statute of limitations had run out. ” according to a prosecutor. Massie has not responded to repeated requests for comment.

Tonya Peldo told the St. Louis County Sheriff’s Office in Duluth that she didn’t see Massie again until some two decades later after she moved to the city and recognized him passing out candy to kids at the church.

She said she told the pastors about what he’d done and that one of the preachers told her to ask Massie for forgiveness. “I was like, ‘No. No!’” Tonya Peldo said in an interview. She said it was more than a decade before Massie was charged with sexual abuse crimes.

In 2019, Tonya said her daughter was also sexually abused—making her the third generation of Peldo girls to be victims. She said her daughter was 14 when a 25-year-old relative. Blake Nelson. bought her a pack of cigarettes and invited her into his trailer in Clark County. Washington. to teach her how to give a massage. according to court records.

Nelson pleaded guilty to charges of communication with a minor for immoral purposes and fourth-degree assault. At sentencing. Tonya told the judge how church leaders had tried to keep her daughter from reporting the abuse to police. Nelson’s own lawyer. Michele Michalek. said the pastors repeatedly called her law office to insist the case should be handled internally. “They think that law enforcement shouldn’t be involved,” Michalek said.

In Washington state, the consequences have also been followed by years of conflict inside the church.

In southwestern Washington in 2017, a jury convicted Carsie Tikka of raping a 9-year-old boy. A woman who said she was a member of the church at the time said years before he was charged. Tikka assaulted her stepchildren and leaders did nothing to stop him. Instead, Tikka asked her family for forgiveness.

After Tikka was convicted. a court-ordered psychiatrist wrote in a report that Tikka had “a history of offending 29 males. ” an allegation Tikka denied in court. At sentencing, Tikka said his conscience was clean. He said he had already “received the testimony of sins forgiven” by one of God’s disciples.

“You clearly by your statement here are not remorseful,” the judge remarked before sentencing him to life in prison without parole. “You put the blame on everyone else.”

Then, in words that survivors say capture the church’s central divide between spiritual absolution and secular justice, Tikka told the judge: “My sins have been forgiven,” and added, “Have yours?”

There is another reason Swedish elders’ scheduled visit matters now. Even outside the courtroom, families describe a doctrine that can make confession feel like the only option—because silence isn’t just a choice, it’s framed as spiritual survival.

One abuse victim described anxiety whenever she turned on her car radio, fearing that if she listened to a pop song and died in a crash before asking forgiveness, she could go to hell.

In Moorcroft, Wyoming, the next step is still playing out in court. Charles Massie has pleaded not guilty in both states, and prosecutors are trying to translate what victims said happened during services into charges and evidence.

Still, what comes after the verdict—or if the case drags—may depend on whether elders from Sweden can persuade congregations to do what Day and other prosecutors say is missing: pick up the phone and contact law enforcement.

That is what one mother in Washington state argues she did—she said it was her, not the church, who set up therapy after weeks of efforts to get help through church channels.

Her 15-year-old daughter revealed in May 2025 that her father had been abusing her for years, according to court records. The mother said she told her preacher about the abuse. Authorities did not learn of the allegations until August. when her daughter saw a therapist after weeks of the mother trying to get help through church channels. That visit led to an investigation by Washington child protection authorities, which substantiated the complaint.

Prosecutors in Minnesota charged the father with criminal sexual conduct, but he hasn’t been charged in Washington. The father asked the court for a public defender and has not yet entered a plea. He did not respond to voice and text messages seeking comment.

Asked why church officials did not immediately contact law enforcement. a church spokesperson declined to answer. saying the case was “complex” and in authorities’ hands. He said. in general. spiritual advisers need to use counselors and other professionals “to determine if there is a reasonable cause to report as dictated by law.”.

But the mother said she set up the therapy session. “Their job is to pick up the phone and say, ‘Hi, I’ve got some confusing, conflicting information but I’m concerned for the safety of this person,’” she said. “They don’t have to be investigators, all they need to do is tell somebody.”

When she said she plans to raise the church’s failure to notify police with elders during their visit this summer, she also made clear what reform advocates are fighting against: her decision to remain inside the church. “Because I want to go to heaven,” she said.

The story of what forgiveness means in the OALC stretches back long before today’s prosecutions. A photo in a newspaper from 1951 shows Eija Marttinen as a little girl arriving in Nova Scotia from Finland with 14 family members and suitcases. just before her father started Canada’s first Old Apostolic Lutheran Church.

Now 84 and living in Sault Ste. Marie. Ontario. Marttinen said in an interview that at age 9 she had a secret: she said her older brother sexually assaulted her starting when she was 5. and that another brother soon began abusing her too. Both brothers are now dead. She said she kept silent for most of her life. fearing she would be forced to forgive and still live with stigma if she came forward.

Marttinen said she only told her own daughter about the extent of the abuse in recent months after reading the ProPublica and Star Tribune stories.

“They can do whatever they want and you have to forgive them. That’s not right. But you go along because you were brought up in it,” she said. “I wish I wasn’t.”

For advocates watching elders from Sweden arrive this summer, the hope is simple: that influence can shift from controlling what victims say to confronting what police need to investigate.

In courtrooms across Wyoming, Minnesota and Washington, prosecutors and judges are already drawing the same line—between spiritual absolution and the consequences of leaving abuse unreported.

And for survivors, the clock doesn’t stop. In one Minnesota file. Tonya Peldo says her daughter was abused in 2019. and in another life—her own—statute of limitations and years of silence became part of the damage. In Wyoming, Charles Massie remains in jail in Nebraska while the alleged 832 incidents tied to church service are litigated.

The question now is whether a visit framed as guidance and reform will be enough to change the most important decision victims say was never theirs: whether their leaders picked up the phone when they learned enough to act.

Old Apostolic Lutheran Church OALC child sexual abuse DaNece Day Crook County Moorcroft Charles Massie Clint Massie Minnesota Washington state Sweden elders forgiveness doctrine