This month it was announced through his publicist that actor David Duchovny had entered rehab for sex addiction. Specifically it was disclosed that he struggled with internet pornography. The good news for Duchovny is that now that he is on the road to recovery, and as such he is in a better position than the estimated 37 percent of pastors who said in a 2001 Leadership Journal survey that pornography was a struggle for them. Even if that number seems high, Focus on the Family reports that 25% of their clergy support calls are from pastors who are addicted to pornography.

There have been a variety of studies that talk about why clergy especially seem to be easy targets for the allure of pornography. One thing that most agree on is that clergy isolation compounds the problem. Pastors with a pornography addiction have nowhere to turn for help. This lack of support seems to be built into the structure of the major North American Lutheran Churches. When Bishops and District Presidents, the ones who are in a position to help clergy in trouble, are the same ones who mete out church discipline, clergy can be left with the choice of getting help for their problem or keeping their livelihood. The media-circus of scandals involving Roman Catholic clergy over the last few years have only served to poison the atmosphere for reaching out to clergy who genuinely need help, and creating a climate hostile to open confession and absolution where such help is possible. While clergy with other type of addictions – notably alcoholism – have been able to return to pastoral ministry, an admission of a sex-related addiction or indiscretion is to wear a scarlet letter from which there is apparently no cleansing.

Tragically, this is precisely the attitude that fosters the continued addiction. There is nowhere for the addict to attain accountability within the church structure, and so the addiction is buried further and further from sight. Addictions left untreated usually get worse and more destructive.

For all of the criticism that can be leveled at the Roman Catholic Church for the way that they handled the sexual abuse scandal, one area where I think they have done a better job than Lutheranism is in understanding that clergy are fallible people who are sinners in need of healing just like the parishioners they serve, and they have erred on the side of grace and reconciliation. Clergy sometimes need counseling to address life problems, and sometimes face addictions that are not simple character defects – they are addictions in need of treatment. While maintaining high moral standards for their clergy, they have also put their theology of forgiveness and restoration into practice. Trying to find a balance between protecting the church and believing in the possibility of forgiveness, healing, and restoration, however, is no easy thing.

Institutional Lutheranism’s approach of handling sex-related indiscretions from a strictly legal perspective may ultimately protect the church from lawsuits and its parishioners from habitual offenders. But a zero tolerance policy denies struggling clergy the help that they need, and has the potential to allow clergy with a “gateway” problem like pornography to fester into full-fledged problems of abuse. When that happens, zero-tolerance becomes a short-sighted solution with no winners.