Stephen Collins is addressing his dark past. The 7th Heaven actor, 67, sat down for an interview with Katie Couric to discuss his history of sexual abuse.
An early look at the segment, which will air on 20/20 on Friday, Dec. 19, shows Collins reflecting on his faults and his growth.
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“I had put that stuff behind me,” Collins said of the multiple times he sexually abused young girls. The actor’s abusive history was brought to light this past October, when a recording surfaced of Collins admitting to molesting young girls and exposing himself to them in a therapy session with his estranged wife Faye Grant.
“In 1973, there were two occasions when I exposed myself to this young woman,” he admitted to Couric. “Several months later, she came to visit and stay with us, with my first wife and me. My wife had gone to sleep, and she and I were watching TV alone together… I knew that something unthinkably wrong had just happened that I couldn’t take back.”
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“I’m a flawed person,” Collins continued. “In the church, it’s actually one of the things I love about the church… it’s really one of the main things about the Christian faith, is you know, Christ said in so many ways, ‘Bring me that… which about you is broken, bring it,’ and most people are broken in some way.”
The news of Collins’ transgressions came as a shock to many fans, who knew the actor best for his role as doting father and moral churchman Reverend Camden on the late ‘90s and early ‘00s family show 7th Heaven.
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“Most people get to, or have to, or choose to hide it,” Collins added. “This came out. I didn’t choose this to come out. I didn’t want to have to deal with these things publicly… I had dealt with them very, very strongly, and committedly, in my private life, but I think, I’m a human being with flaws and I’ve done everything I can to address it.”
Watch part of Collins’ interview with Couric in the video above.
