“Evil is a mystery, a scandal and it will always be so.” ―
Josh Duggar now allegedly caught with child pornography
Today, this made the rounds on social media: Josh Duggar formally charged with receiving and possessing child porn, pleads not guilty.
Joshua Duggar, 33, is charged by indictment with receiving and possessing child pornography.
According to court documents, Duggar allegedly used the internet to download child sexual abuse material. Duggar allegedly possessed this material, some of which depicts the sexual abuse of children under the age of 12.
…The star of the former reality show, “19 Kids and Counting,” was taken into custody by U.S. Marshals on Thursday afternoon and booked into the Washington County Detention Center — he was placed on a federal hold with no bail.
Jacob Denollandere posted this resource on Twitter.
USA Today reported ‘19 Kids and Counting’ star Josh Duggar arrested, indicted on child pornography charges.
The former reality star’s attorneys have requested a detention hearing to allow Duggar out on bond, which will be held virtually May 5, Robbins added.
…According to a press release from the United States Attorney’s Office, Duggar could face up to 20 years in prison and fines up to $250,000 on each count.
“Duggar allegedly possessed this material, some of which depicts the sexual abuse of children,” the press release said.
The case is being prosecuted in part by national initiative Project Safe Childhood, a program started in 2006 by the Department of Justice to protect children from sexual exploitation and abuse.
Then there is the obligatory *we love Josh* from the Jim Bob and Michelle patriarchy.
Duggar’s parents Jim Bob and Michelle Duggar released a joint statement on their family website Friday afternoon following the news of their eldest son’s indictment.
“The accusations brought against Joshua today are very serious. It is our prayer that the truth, no matter what it is, will come to light, and that this will all be resolved in a timely manner,” they wrote. “We love Josh and Anna and continue to pray for their family.”
A history of the scandals involving Josh Duggar.
Here is a list Josh Duggar’s Lawsuits, Scandals, and Controversies Over the Years
- News broke in May 2015 that Josh had molested five girls between 2002 and 2003.
In addition to TLC canceling 19 Kids and Counting, the eldest Duggar sibling stepped down from his job at the Family Research Council.- June 2015: Sisters Among Josh’s Molestation Victims
Jessa and Jill confirmed they were among their brother’s molestation victims. Jim Bob recalled Josh confessing his actions and noted “safeguards” were subsequently put in place. Jill went on to explain the precautions taken: “Locks on the doors. … You know, everybody’s in bed. Girls in the girls’ room. Boys in the boys’ room —- August 2015: Ashley Madison Scandal: As the fallout from the child molestation allegations continued, Josh admitted he cheated on Anna after his Ashley Madison account was revealed in August 2015. Josh subsequently sought treatment
- January 2016: Danica Dillon Lawsuit
Josh made headlines in late 2015 after a porn star named Danica Dillon alleged that he paid to have sex with her and subsequently “assaulted her to the point of causing her physical and emotional injuries- 2019: Real Estate Lawsuit: Josh and his company, ALB Investments, were sued by a man named Carl Echols for allegedly purchasing a five-acre property illegally.
It appears that Josh Duggar has had some form of paraphilia for much of his life and needs intensive psychiatric care.
It is highly unusual for a teen boy to molest his sisters. It is even more unusual for the parents to *solve this* by having the girls lock the door to their room. To make matters worse, the parents encouraged Anna to marry Josh. I wonder if they thought she might cure his problem. She didn’t and she learned that Josh cheated on her. Still, the parents encouraged Anna to stick with Josh and to keep pumping out the babies.
Now it appears that Josh allegedly has been caught accessing child pornography, showing pictures of children under 12 years old. Imagine a man getting his jollies by watching little children being raped? Such a man is possibly a pedophile which is a paraphilia, something I discuss regularly. Here is the best paper from the NIH: Paraphilias: definition, diagnosis and treatment
Does anyone care about Duggar’s kids and wife or are they to be sacrificed to the patriarchy?
It appears that the Duggars felt prayers, a submissive wife, and locked doors could cure their son who is plagued by serious sexual difficulties. This has gone on since Josh has been a teen. He is now a mature man and is allegedly viewing child porn (He denies it according to his lawyer who was quick on the scene.) Duggar is in deep trouble. If he is released on bail, he most likely will not be allowed home with his children which is a darn smart idea. He could get up to 20 (times 2) years in prison for his crime. Oftentimes, such sentences run concurrently. That would give his kids time to grow up.
However, we should be aware that Duggar may well have a paraphilia which can be a lifelong problem. Such a problem also demands the input of expert psychiatrists, not unskilled biblical counselors. Without expert help, we can be sure we will be hearing more about scandals involving Duggar.
We should also be concerned for the welfare of Duggar’s children as well as the extended Duggar family which involves many, many children. He molested his sisters. Can you imagine what he could do to his nieces and nephews?
TWW has been covering the Duggars since 2009. Josh has been in trouble since 2002. It appears we are going to eyewitnesses to the utter foolishness and failure of their ability to cope with real-life problems. Does anyone remember Michelle and Jim Bob consulting doctors to see if she could keep having babies beyond normal cessations of such abilities? Michelle Duggar Consults Fertility Doctor About Having a 20th Child at Age 47. They appeared to want more babies to surpass some record so they could make more inane TV shows. Michelle was a carnival freak show and her husband was on board. After all, it got them their fancy house.
Now, they appear to be pushing Anna to keep having more babies while her husband indulges his apparent paraphilias. What an awful family. I’m so glad that one of them got away. Jill Duggar Says She Hasn’t Been to Parents Jim Bob and Michelle’s House in ‘a Couple Years’. I only hope that someone can help Anna and her kids get away from Josh. (Run, Anna, Run!)
PS Is Josh smirking in his mug shot?.
I heard the news early this morning via radio. I’m sure Anna will be pressured to remain a faithful wife. Why she should be faithful to her faithless husband is a mystery that only makes sense in the twisted world of the Duggars and their bizarre ideas of Christianity. Praying for truth to be known and for Anna’s strength to do what is truly best for her children.
Thanks for the historical update. I hope his children, his wife, and society are protected from this man for a long time.
Also, you may want to correct his last name from “Harris” under the list of his past scandals :))
I would just like to point out that Duggar is a MARRIED MAN.
He is also a father. He has a child or two by his wife.
I’ve seen I don’t know how many married Christians maintain this illusion, since I was a a kid, that single adults are the ones out there having nooky all over the place (no, not all of us are), and that being married (or being a parent) supposedly keeps a guy (or woman) from molesting children or from fornicating.
In light of these news stories that keep coming out about married people who “spouse swap” or look at child abuse imagery, or other such terrible things,
I think it should be very clear by now (at least based on these anecdotes) that not every person’s character (who gets married) improves, is sterling, or that marriage somehow prevents married people from engaging in sexual sin or sexual abuse.
It’s not celibacy or singleness that causes people to molest children or to sexually sin.
But so many Christians and other types of “marriage-pushers” keep on insisting otherwise.
Absolutely true, Daisy! Marriage is no cure for sins or other deep issues.
Josh and Anna Duggar are expecting their seventh child. I know that leaving a marriage, especially with many children, is a far more difficult option than it appears on the surface. It would probably mean leaving just about everything she knows and all the people she knows. I pray for her to have all the many kinds of support she would need if she determines that’s her wisest option for herself and her children.
Two things:
1. For a clan that projects really loving children (and counting), they sure hate children. Other people’s children (porn) and their own (he violated his younger sisters, which they covered up). This is pure evil against children. The biggest family ever that has absolutely no family values. Record breaking, maybe not the record they wanted to break.
2. Noted in all of their publicity, they are centered on themselves, the adults in their story, never on the children, and the child victims in particular (child porn is violation).
The Duggar Seniors are frighteningly degenerate. They hung out Josh and siblings to dry from an early age. John Piper and Long Senior do the same with their “restorations” and the former even calls it “hedonism” (and Ortberg is similar). Why do media moguls / gullible denominational backwaters fall for these Savile or Jackson types? I think there is money in broody mawkishness got out of hand.
Ortberg III (who hasn’t been given his own identity) only needed to be told, a few years back, give the kids into their parents’ space, and keep your eyes out of everybody’s space, simple as that. Ortberg II laid him open to what occurred after. Nobody needs to gratify daddy by earning their daddy’s titillation / “hedonism” for falling in with his whims. Especially when that “church” has stagily exempted itself from having responsible procedures. Preachers’ kids should be told not to volunteer.
I’m part of a Christian divorce group called The Life Saving Divorce. You’d be amazed how many women there are who discover that their ‘Christian’ husband – Pastor/Missionary/Elder etc- is a paedophile who views child porn or abuses children, including their own. Absolutely horrific. I wish there was some way to let Anna know that there are other women out there who have had to face this themselves & have rebuilt their lives & kept their children safe.
Ava Aaronson,
I completely agree with this. I was just reading yesterday a thread about these huge quiverfull families & one young woman talked of taking her younger sibling out of an event because he was crying (she was on child care duty as usual) only to be faced with a Duggar girl or two, plus others obviously all in same position, exhaustedly dealing with younger siblings & keeping them quiet.
She said she knows so many young women like her who were the defacto parents to their siblings, & whose actual parents did very little of the parenting of their final 7+ children because they expected their older girls, aged 10 & over, to do most of it. A total travesty of the picture of a happy family, with exhausted older children taking care of little children.
Not just that, but it is likely she is not very well educated and does not have much in terms of means to support herself. The Gothard system teaches that women have no need for education and jobs. Even if she does separate herself out, she may not be able to find a lawyer that will be able to get her reasonable alimony and child support, even though I’m sure Duggar has the means.
I get the impression they hate female children, while male children are pampered and spoiled. women are basically seen as slaves with no purpose except to serve men.
“A history of the scandals involving Josh Harris”
Dee, I think you got your Joshs mixed up.
Tree,
Anna’s brother, Daniel (?), and two of her sisters offered to help her leave Josh after the first scandal (molesting his sisters) but she stayed. Here’s hoping the koolaid has worn off and she leaves this time around. I’m sure her brother and sisters will be willing once again to help.
… become the young mothers as the real biological mother keeps having more children.
Very strange family life as the real parents obsess over numbers – never enough, but they can’t parent the ones they have.
The arrangement of the older siblings having power over unparented younger siblings facilitated or provided the opportunity for the older son to violate his younger siblings.
Parents who dump their kids on coaches, camps, church, neighbors, relatives, siblings, or whomever, entertain a high risk life style. Parents who care (but may need help, like single parents or various circumstances) always have an eagle eye and elephant ears for what’s going on with each of their children.
As already mentioned, these people (those in charge) don’t love children. They may love numbers and notoriety, though.
You need to correct this paragraph heading “A history of the scandals involving Josh Harris”. It should be Josh Duggar not Josh Harris. Otherwise thank you.
Just wanted to point out that one of your bolded subheadings refers to Josh Harris—I’m sure it’s just a typo, but it needs fixing.
Seems to me that Jim Bob should bear the financial responsibility for Anna and her seven. He bears blame for some of this.personally i hope it gets this family off the air….or are they already off??? On what planet do you shelter your children from worldly influence by making them television stars????
Mistake…A history of the scandals involving Josh Harris.?
It should be noted that there are two charges against Duggar and that the penalties are up to $250,000 and 20 years per charge. So I believe the post needs to be corrected as he is facing up to not 20 years but actually 40 if convicted on both charges.
This is a celebrity case so I expect the D.A. to press hard for for the fullest penalties allowed by law. There will be a lot of press following this case and this is what D.A. tend to do with that much spotlight. Considering the circumstances, the longer the sentence the likely the better for everyone else.
AL,
Thank you all. I have been writing for far too long about way too many people. It is like my fingers are on automatic. I appreciate everyone’s help.
Mr. Jesperson,
You are correct! Thank you.
Mr. Jesperson,
Well, I wasn’t totally wrong. Here is the quote from above.
“According to a press release from the United States Attorney’s Office, Duggar could face up to 20 years in prison and fines up to $250,000 on each count.”
Sometimes I consider writing just two posts a week. It certainly would be easier. Yesterday, I was tied up with things for my mother and other obligations. So I didn’t get going on this post until 8 PM. I am quite tired at that time due to my psoriatic arthritis. Yet this was an important story that I was thinking about all day. So, it was worth it.
I realize how much info is out there. I want to continue writing a minimum of three stories a week. But I’ll need your help if I make some mistakes like calling Josh Duggar, Josh Harris. I have. written about these guys for many years. So my fingers were on automatic last night.
Love you all.
Daisy,
Duggar has a paraphilia. No amount of sex with Anna will cure him. The. best we can hope for is jail time, and an expert psychiatrist helping him to control his urges.
Ava Aaronson,
Even their program was a lie. Did you know that there are two kitchens in the house? They only showed the one that was perfectly clean. It was a TV set. They also redid scenes when the kids acted up. It was all a lie.
I agree with you. They didn’t care about the children. They only cared about what the children could bring them. The more, the merrier or is it the more the more $$.
You are correct. They refused to deal with Josh’s serious problem. They just made sure doors were locked! Seriously? They wanted the show to go on and that is what we got. *A show.* while a young teen man was dying inside and his siblings were at risk.
Michael in UK,
See the last comment. That was a response to you.
There is this dangerous belief within certain segments of the Christian populations that getting married will solve their urges. They are not interested in sex with women, The women are merely their *beard* so they can hide behind it. It is very scarey. I am so sorry for these women. Often they blame themselves.
If I were her, I would be terribly worried about my own kids being around him, also. I hope she escapes.
dee,
I don’t know about you Dee, but could you marry, let alone have sex with, a man you knew was a paedophile? I just don’t know where they find these women, I have to assume they don’t know before they get married. But those that do? Like that case you’ve written about where the husband then went on to molest his own child & wasn’t allowed to be alone with his baby anymore? Do women like that have no maternal instincts AT ALL?
Honest to God, if I found out a man I was married to abused children I’d be hard pushed not to murder him & feel I was doing the world a service.
Even in the most prooftexting of contexts, the mind reels on how allowing someone else like a likely unwitting wife into the situation with someone in the territory of 1 Cor. 5 activity “not even among the pagans“ could be spun. The expelling part from yourselves recommended at the end of 1 Cor. 5 associated with his activities certainly doesn’t appear to have been on display.
Try 6 kids and another on the way!
(Uhm, how much child support money is that in Arkansas?) Oops, I guess it might be a bit difficult for inmates to pay child support. But, I don’t think it matters anyway. My money is on Anna toughing it out in a hopeless marriage.
I suppose that might be allowed, despite the substantial amount of dues we have to pay to receive this insight as well as all of the sabbaticals and dog-washing stations we have to fund. (In other words, absolutely no need to explain anything.)
Your money is on Anna being a Proper Winsome Submissive CHRISTIAN Widdle Wifey.
(As the Mormons would put it, “Stay Sweet… Stay Sweet… Stay Sweet…”)
Winsome and Sweet and CHRISTIAN – He could beat her bloody and she’d come crawling back to him. “What is Thy Will, My Lord Husband? How might I better Submit?”
That is NOT a Wife (except in Christianese).
That is NOT a lifetime Companion (except in Christianese).
THAT is a completely-broken domestic animal With Benefits (nudge nudge wink wink know what I mean know what I mean…).
Why would any woman in their right mind WANT to be Christian?
If her family of origin has any decency at all, they will encourage and support her in every single way. I have never watched the shows, and mainly know this family through the more responsible blogs and news stories. Based on that limited understanding, it seems that Jim Bob has tremendous power over the family. It’s time for someone to stand up to him and refuse to sit down.
That is just the Christianese version of “getting laid will fix all your problems”.
Sums it up.
An act. A show. A paycheck. Rinse, repeat. Reality shows are like knock-offs bought cheap from street vendors. Fake.
The eldest son has definitely been living a lie. Lies breed lies. The lying life.
Life is neither an act nor a show. And God is never fooled. We, likewise, should be neither fools nor fooled.
The answer for those born & bred in such a system? Get out. Fast. And create a real life for yourself. Like those who left Short Creek. Coming of age, there is choice. Thank God for choice.
Nothing is as Artificial as a Reality Show.
(Even Furry Art and My Little Pony fanfic can be more in touch with Reality than a Reality Show.)
Ugh! I honestly don’t know what to say except I feel sick over this. It brings back so many similar instances of male abusers being protected by church and/or family. I flashed back to when I met a former housemate in Kohl’s after the revelations came out about Covenant Life Church. One of the revelations was a former housemate had married a man who was jailed for abusing his step daughter. She went on to have daughters with him. The family had been in a small group with other families and they were never informed about his offenses. When the truth came out, the other families were asked to leave the group so they could minister to him and his wife. (Cue vomiting noises in the aisle of Kohl’s).
The Duggar’s threw their kids and grandkids under the bus to protect their evil son. I feel for Anna, who never knew anything different so who knows if she’ll ever get the strength to leave. And also Jill, who is trying to get healthy and has been treated like dirt.
Little Josh, Heir of House Duggar, is a SHORT EYES.
And has been ever since his teens, when his first scandal was hushed up by Daddy’s influence.
Not if Daddy’s Friend in High Places (Mike Huckabee, CHRISTIAN) “fixes” things…
Has the Conspiracy/”PERSECUTION!!!!!!!!!” card been played yet?
Like Oral Roberts, Jim Bob comes across as a third-rate Tywin Lannister.
That is not a Wife.
That is not a lifetime Companion.
That is breeding stock for the Stud Bull.
In Gifts of the Jews, Thomas Cahill makes a point that ha-Torah was given to Uplift a certain upright bipedal primate into Transcending the Animal. Like Aslan in Chronicles of Narnai: Magician’s Nephew uplifting beasts into Talking Beasts of Narnia.
THAT is obvious to this old-school Furry Fan, but CHRISTIANS have to do the opposite and Return to the Animal. Like those Talking Beasts in Chronicles of Narnia: The Last Battle who lose their Uplifing and return to being beasts in the Last Judgment scene. Just before they pass into Aslan’s shadow to His left and vanish forever.
All they need is a working Womb and Slot (and Looooong… Waaaaavy… Haaaaair…)?
(Yes, this is hitting the language barrier, but there is NO nice way to say it. If you sugarcoat the language, the Reality of what has happened loses its impact.)
Not to me.
Fear of Eternal Hell/being spewed out of Christ’s mouth on The Last Day can be quite the motivator.
i.e. GAWD Holds the Biggest Whip of all So STAY IN LINE!
What kind of God is that?
I have so many feelings about this situation.
Anna is expecting their seventh child. I believe that due to her upbringing and the family she married into, she is essentially a cult member. It seems to me that she has lived with coercive control all her life, and it will be extremely difficult or her to leave without some kind of outside intervention. I believe her brother has offered her support, as he has also distanced himself from his family and their brand of religion.
I fear that Josh has already harmed one of his children. I have never wanted to be wrong about something more than this. But his oldest daughter certainly is a similar age to the two sisters we know of, when he molested them. Part of me hopes CPS will get involved and support her to get away from this environment.
I can’t remember if WW has covered the FLDS, but it seems to me that there are similarities between Anna’s situation, and that of people like Carolyn Jessop. If anything Anna is worse off because she has no formal education. Supporting a family financially will be very daunting.
I can’t even imagine my parents allowing me to marry a man like Josh Duggar. They knew before the marriage that he had molested his sisters. I hesitate to use the word allow, but i think it’s appropriate given this group’s emphasis on patriarchy, on being a godly daughter, and the large influence that parents have in a courtship. They have talked freely on the show about how young people do not date or spend any time alone with the opposite sex, how holding hands is only allowed after engagement, and how they save not only sex but even kissing for marriage.
My heart is breaking.
ishy,
Exactly, she doesn’t even have a high school level education as far as I can tell from the show. Her family seemed to share a similar approach to the Duggars, who used IBLP materials, which are fundamentalist, creationist and historically revisionist. Certainly no college, and no vocational skills training. Her family appeared in the early episodes of the show, and it seemed that they were also extremely isolated, both physically and mentally. They lived in a sort of trailer compound, with little interaction with the outside world beyond church and grocery shopping.
By now she is aware of living a lie. She has a duty to safeguard herself and her children, right here on planet Earth.
Yes, it’s easy for me to talk. I’m not in her situation. But she is famous. Any number of people would help her out, even if her parents and siblings decided to shun her. Most mothers in such circumstances would not have much of a support network.
Headless Unicorn Guy,
Exactly.
Her parents knew before the marriage that Josh had molested his sisters. They let her go through with it.
The Duggars knew, and either sought Anna as a wife for Josh, or allowed the marriage, despite knowing that he was a child molester.
My ex was not a paedophile, but I experienced the same attitude from my church. Submit, because you’re a woman. “Lean not on your own understanding” – your judgment is not to be trusted. If you don’t forgive him, Jesus won’t forgive you, and you’ll go to hell. You can express pain but only for a limited time. After 12 years of domestic abuse I was supposed to get over it in 3 months, and I was judged for still being afraid of my ex. If you don’t get back together with him and work things out, you’re bitter, angry, you’ve hardened your heart towards the Lord. You can no longer serve in ministry. A church elder who I previously considered a friend, wrote to me to tell me that God hates divorce, and that he had a revelation of chaos in my future if I continued with this course of action. God won’t use you if you defy him like this. Children need a father – really? Even one who beats them? One who denies their special needs diagnosis and leaves them in the care of people who defend child molesters?
I can think of so many reasons why Anna would be afraid or feel unable to leave. I just hope that she screws her courage to the sticking post, and allows this to be a wakeup call. She does not have to be a martyr to a criminal husband. Her children need her protection.
A lower-case god …….
The kind of god that takes free choice away from females, en masse, and places their lives ….their souls, even….. in the hands of mortal men. The kind of god that relinquishes the Great White Throne, as well as the Bema Seat, over to mortal men to pass judgements on the females ………..
The same kind of god some ancient pagans worshipped……. the same kind of god that tooooooooo many so-called “Christians” worship.
JDV,
🙂
Absolutely not. It would make me feel sick to my stomach. However, I didn ‘t grow up in a cult which seems to think that a wife can prevent pedophilia. They are stupid.
I am so sorry for what you endured-at the hands of your husband and the church. Slowly, some churches are beginning to come around. Unfortunately, many are not. Have you ever told your story? Or is it all too much?
Michael in UK,
Clarifying: in my 4.27 I was mentioning qualities and principles, in whatever varying quantifications from one personality to another, as I expect most of you understood.
Nancy2(aka Kevlar),
Great to see your name here today! Hope you are doing well.
I had the same thought a when I saw her name…. 🙂
My heart goes out to the victims first of all, but also in a way to the Duggars, Anna and her family, and even in one way to Josh.
First, as parent of an adopted son who had been abused, and who acted out inappropriately although not at Josh’s level of offense, my heart goes out to the Duggars. First of all, you do not stop loving a child just because they are a criminal. You may have to detach, distance, disown, or whatever to be safe but you still love them. Forever. And if you carried and gave birth to that child, how can you ever not love them? We found that if the offender was under age 18 there were not a lot of treatment options for those that act out sexually. On round one I believe they did what they honestly could arrange and believed would be effective. The other rounds he was an adult, and I disagree with their handling of the situation. He needed tough love, and did not get it. This time maybe he will.
As for Anna, I believe I read that she did not know he had molested. Her father did, but only told her he was “overly curious” as a teen, or some such nonsense. So I give her a pass until she knew the truth. When Josh was outed re Ashley Madison she chose to stand by him, based on her belief and her father’s teaching that “even King David sinned sexually and yet was a man after God’s own heart.” I cannot imagine a father basically warning a sinned against daughter to remain in the marriage or else. I am glad her siblings have fled the nonsense, but fear she could be so in love with the fame and fortune of being a Duggar. It is possible she loves the camera a little too much, but I cannot know if that is true or not. I pray this time she can find a way to flee Josh that does not mean running to Jim Bob or to her own father.
I believe the courts may make sure he is not around children. This being a celebrity case their hand may be forced to do the right thing.
My heart is saddened for all the family: for the ones guilty of collusion, that they are so deluded or so caught up in sin themselves, either way is sad. For the ones who have not done wrong, who are kids and their spouses and kids who just love the gang and want a more normal life, this is hugely embarrassing. They may have done no wrong but their every move is going to be scrutinized and criticized no matter what.
And then there is Josh. On one level, as a perp, he rightly deserves all the wrath and punishment he gets. Assuming he is guilty, of course. On another level, if he suffers from a mental disorder he actually may not be able to control his behavior. In that case he should be incarcerated or in a secure facility for life. My heart goes out if that is the case to any human being suffering any illness, be it mental or psychological or physical, etc. I would surely hate to be so afflicted, and suffer the loneliness and hatred of the world. That would be a sad situation to be in for sure.
There is no good in this situation that I can see. I believe we are commanded to judge the actions of all involved, but also commanded not to judge their souls. That belongs to God alone.
So I would hope, assuming Josh truly has reoffended, that this time he is locked up securely. Personally I would see this as locked up for life, but the law doesn’t. So I hope he is kept away from children forevermore. Any and all children. And the internet. And receives some really good counselling/treatment. And I hope, as a Lutheran, his coffee cup has both saint and sinner on it. That is to say, that he has repented before God and received true forgiveness.
And I hope maybe others caught up in the ultra conservative, ultra anti-science, ultra fundamentalist world will look at the results and run, and run fast.
Friend,
researcher,
Thanks!
Yup, I’m back ……. I had a shoulder injury (my car is a stick shift, uhg), and I had to do physical therapy for an old injury as soon as my shoulder was better. Kids out of in-person schooling due to COVID —- I’ve been tutoring some math students via email and telephone —- what a pain!
My attitude has not been good for a while.
However, physical therapy gets two thumbs up from me! The exercises the therapist taught me has relieved some constant pain which, in turn, has given me more energy. Bwaaah haha ha!
And don’t go picking’ on me about my age – it’s not the years, it’s the wear and tear!
Good examples. Hope. The women who escaped from Short Creek are bold, amazing women. With little to no initial outside support. They literally escaped from the cage of their community. A beautiful new life is possible.
One of these courageous women testified against her abuser in Court, intentionally wearing bright red, against the dress code of the cult. She LOVES her new life, which she started from scratch and never looked back.
A difference is the Short Creek young women (teens) were born into the cult then fled, even after arranged marriages. Ms. Duggar joined the Duggar family, though maybe raised similarly, and gives no indication of leaving, even during indiscretions and evils of her husband. She may have drunk the Kool-aide, unlike the Short Creek women.
Ms. Duggar, as mentioned, is famous so help is available. It’s on her to make good decisions on behalf of her children, or they will come of age and have to escape from her, their mother, too.
Nancy2(aka Kevlar),
Heyyyyy Nancy, good seein’ you back!
Duggar will never see the joint.
He’s too valuable a property (possible cable tv reboot).
18 months tops in a minimum security country club with 12 mos. community service upon exit, along with psychiatric ‘counseling’ and ‘therapy’.
Maybe I’ll be proven wrong, but that’s how I see it right now.
Liz,
“Lean not on your own understanding”…
++++++++++
good grief, how dangerous. anything can be justified.
quote this verse with the caution you would normally reserve for “Please castrate me.”
Muff Potter,
Hi ya, Muff!
What a beautiful, compassionate, yet clear-eyed reflection.
That smirk was the first thing I noticed.
Nancy2(aka Kevlar),
Glad you’re doing better! Physical therapy is the greatest thing.
Very dangerous.
When the verse itself is Hueyed (helicoptered) out of its surrounding background (context), it can be used like you say, to justify just about anything imaginable.
I am very sad to hear about Josh, and hoped his charges would be financial. This mess started with Gothard. A now 86 year old man has dumped his 15 year old religiously sexual fantasy on the the World. JD may be genetically a Duggar, but he is Gothard’s spiritual grandson, the fruit of his mind. By their fruit you will know them.
This links to probably the best IFBC related description I’ve ever heard. The segment actually mentions J.Frank Norris, but applies directly to the Gothard/Duggar sexual fiasco. @40:10 43:15. It parallels my belief that the personal thoughts of a celebrity leader, become tangible objects and people in his legacy. Josh Duggar’s arrest is Gothard’s tangible fruit.
https://youtu.be/6fspa_5IJEA
Nathan Priddis,
Interesting listen. The mega personalities of a cult of personality produce that personality. Ya think? Yeah.
Re: JD, fruit – yes. Choice – yes.
We choose our cult engagements, even as we are raised in a cult and come of age to choose to go or stay. The Short Creek escapees prove choice. Unfortunately, most stay, even contrary to their own personal interests.
1. “communes” / secular loose livers: That you may have sex and have it more abundantly
JP II / mutant schelerism / “body theology” / cliquey orientation to the “other” cold shouldering the “other other”: The answer to bad sex is “better” sex
name it and claim it (usurpers of God): pray and don’t consult
wouldn’t be seen dead copying those filthy fundagelicals: consult and don’t pray
2. It wasn’t me that put these people in a goldfish bowl so here goes: I expect there are ultra sad degradations among the uncles, great uncles, cousins, on all sides of this feral bunch of clans. If we know, we should not doubt God’s wish that we pray AS WELL as administer whatever wholesome procedures of ALL kinds.
Never forget the utterly destructive effect on morale of billions of people from WW I, WW II, many other wars and strange occurrences, and ordinary disasters. Who knows the actual 2016 result didn’t put some actual bad plans (which we might not know about) off their stroke for four or even more years? Why not regard current realities as opportunity: that’s how Jesus would look at it. We ought NOT to be buying into the dominionist fallacy EITHER way. (I think US 2020 bears more resemblance to UK 2016.)
3. I developed choice over 28 years. The presented context for proposed religious arrangements is highly ambiguous in the “Alice” world.
4. Whatever about Calvin himself, Calvinism was commonly touted as suiting those of a delicate conscience, similarly to Jansenism and Jesuitry, and similarly mechanised / mechanical like those too.
However a misinterpretation regarding so called “assurance” led to an entrenched and deliberate neglect of conscience being promulgated from high places to the lower ones wishing to be seen to emulate them.
Thus a collision of factors added to which the less educated (because of dyslexia shaming in families and schools) are told by “spiritual authority” to have sour grapes.
If we are inarticulate before this, we should mutter whatever simple set prayers we happen to remember, under our breaths, and God will know “who it is for”.
We HAVE to pool inferences open-endedly which is how we will become part of God’s providence for those around us and they for us (that is why the five fold belongs to us ALL, contrary to Selwyn Hughes).
5. I’ve lived with specific learning differences – helped in them only the last third of my span – and am single as yet because it was drummed into me by “spiritual authority” once I am married the good person will make specific “demands” and I will have to make specific “demands”.
Because of circumstances arising in WW I, my forebears personally converged in the denomination through which my major cult infiltrated. I sometimes think I’m God’s “mystery customer”. The purpose of my life is that there was one more person who SAW. Nobody knows the trouble God sees EXCEPT what is our grave privilege AND the grave privilege of those less lucky in religious instruction than we are AND of those who have been free of it. We can stop crowing about the fact that we are not crowing. We need oceans of tears.
And the fallacies of the fundamentalists continue to be adopted by those who protest against them, from R Dawkins to respectable middle of the road religious types alike.
insert * after “other other” and add at end of section 1:
{ * Holy Trinity is about space for the Other Other }
thank you & God bless
The comments above are wide ranging, compassionate, and contain many deep insights. I hope this small thought will measure up: the principals in this tragedy, because of their affiliation with a cult, live in an alternate universe. Paraphilia is incurable, of course, and probably not even responsive to psychiatric treatment. The only reason Josh Duggar has been exposed, and now charged, is that his behavior escaped the event horizon that conceals what goes on inside his alternate universe . (twice, counting the show’s cancellation). Civil society, which in America has only crude tools, will remove him from society and not incidentally his own children. But that ‘solution’ will do him no good whatsoever, unless and until the society he is released into has miraculously become a better place.
I am very sad to hear about Josh……… but for the sake of his wife, his children his sisters, and the children who were abused for his gratification. I hope Josh gets what he’s got coming, with no leniency or sympathy!
d4v1d,
“Civil society, which in America has only crude tools, will remove him from society and not incidentally his own children. But that ‘solution’ will do him no good whatsoever, unless and until the society he is released into has miraculously become a better place.”
+++++++++++++++++++++++
thank you for the comment.
sometimes i’m slow – “the society he is released into…” — he’ll be removed from society, and then released into a society.
what society do you see him being released into? (are we talking potentially prison?) and what are the things about it that need to miraculously become better?
(your comment was so well-spoken in general, i want to understand what i’m missing, here)
d4v1d,
I don’t know what to say about a church culture (cult) that on the one hand is very moralistic and legalistic (I imagine that there are minute rules for everything) and yet it excuses extreme, unnatural sins and crimes. There is something worse than just hypocrisy going on.
This is explainable without resorting to Spiritual Warfare(TM) – “DEMONS! DEMONS! DEEEEMONS!”.
(Which Charismatics and NAR Spiitual Warrior Fanboys pick as their first choice.)
When someone runs from and hides their Dark Side, it can fester and mutate in the darkness of Denial, growing darker and kinkier and more Unnatrual and obsessive. Until one day it all boils over.
X-Treme Moralism and Legalism (to the point of OCD) can also grow out of this, as an attempt to keep that Dark Side in check – In Secret. (Must Keep Up Appearances; Must Stay Respectable(TM).) Secret attempt at Self-Medication and Self-Treatment, like becoming a psychiatrist because you’re Closet Crazy and trying to treat/cure yourself without showing it.
And the X-Treme Moralism/Legalism/Piety just adds pressure to the pressure cooker. In an environment like that, you can’t afford to let your Angel of Light Mask slip, even for an instant. It’s not only chickens who turn on defectives and peck them to death in the barnyard. (“Holy, Holy, Holy…”)
Type Examples: Adolf Hitler and L Ron Hubbard.
Whose Cults of Personality were deliberately created by them and whose Public Personae (“Der Fuehrer” and “Bridge to Total Freedom”) were originally artificial roles. Until those artificial personalities took them over and their original personalities (“Wolf” and “Elron”) ceased t exist.
Like that Twilight Zone episode where they wear masks so long the masks became their faces.
See my comment two comments up.
And WEAPONIZED.
(Anyone remember that song from the Eighties, Pat Benatar’s “Stop Using Sex as a Weapon”?)
And then the Comeback Trail, maybe greased by some convenient Private Revelations and Testimony, ending in Triumphal Return. “THE VOICE OF A GOD, NOT OF A MAN! THE VOICE OF A GOD, NOT OF A MAN!”
Just before these same CHRISTIANS(TM) denounce my church’s PAGAN(TM) Canonization and Veneration of Saints.
“Up on Cripple Creek, she sends me;
If I spring a leak, she mends me;
I don’t have to speak, she defends me;
A drunkard’s dream if I ever did see one…”
— The Band, “Up on Cripple Creek”, 1969
I can.
But then I’ve watched “Game of Thrones”.
Like Camille (Mrs Bill) Cosby?
linda,
“I believe we are commanded to judge the actions of all involved, but also commanded not to judge their souls. That belongs to God alone.”
++++++++++++++
your comment is really beautiful, Linda. so honest, sincere. what an awesome mom you are.
re: the excerpt above, actions are deliberately chosen by a person.
sometimes there are mitigating factors, but i’m referring to when there are not.
if actions are deliberately chosen by a person, then we are judging not only the actions but the person who willed them to happen by their own hand, (or voice, or inaction…) — by their own doing (or not-doing).
so…what is the difference between that and a person’s soul?
.
.
(i ask because i’m disgusted with christian culture’s fixation on “not judging” — therefore ‘let’s pretend the abusive, corrupt and criminal things christian leaders and other ‘highly favored ones’ do didn’t really happen. we are only permitted to say and feel good and positive things about such a person’.
…this turns christians into passive, compliant, complacent morons who live in some kind of fantasy-land where consequences don’t exist and hypocrisy grows on trees.
where they do not hold their favored ones accountable, while simultaneously excoriating the evil worldly world. yes, such christians are very liberal dishing out the judgement for sexual minorities, political foes, etc., if not anyone on the worldly outside)
Nathan Priddis,
I agree… That youtube link is excellent…. What was said parallels my experiences, and adds thing I did not know..
They won’t.
Once you Take The Mark (on forehead AND right hand), there is no turning back.
Why am I thinking of Sansa Stark and Ramsey Snow/Bolton?
Because your story Afflicts the Respectable, Righteous, and Comfortable.
As Rich Buhler used to put it, “A lot of Pretending going on there”.
Your very presence made them UNcomfortable, and that could not be allowed to happen.
So the chickens peck the Defective to death in the barnyard. Beware Thou of The Mutant.
Just the wrinkle is they hijack Jesus Christ to be their Weapon.
Nathan Priddis,
I find it interesting how Bill Gothard, and Institute’s of Basic Life Principles, IBLP, gets linked in all of this mess. I remember in the late 1970’s the HUGE pressure at my Evangelical Free Church to attend the intense seminars IBLP….. implying you are a “bad Christian”, for not attending, and paying you $$$…. sigh… now we are seeing just one example of the “ fruits”..
i was pretty upset when I saw all the bad stuff coming out about IBLP 6 or 7 years ago…. just another example of corruption…
The pride of showing the world how to raise children & live an ideal Christian family life, that is all FAKE and LIES
Enough already:
-Pride is the deadliest sin.
-Who is the Father of Lies? Who are they following?
-Faking a Christian testimony, IOW taking the Lord’s Name in vain – broadcast to the world! For profit! (As the lecturer on Nathan Pridis’ youtube link states, they follow their leaders who also FAKE Christianity, taking God’s name in vain, for profit!)
d4v1d,
Great comment.
Anna might be purely a victim here, or she might be both victim and villain. I do not know.
Regardless, she stands as a BARRIER between the world and her six children.
That is very convenient for Josh, Jim Bob, Michelle, and everybody else.
While people are immobilized with fear for Anna’s safety and wellbeing, nobody needs to take the next step and get help for the little ones.
Figuratively:
Forehead = thought
Right hand = deed, actions
IOW, no Jason Bourne implanted chip needed; just christo-fascist play-the-music-bow-to-the-idol leaders
Add to the list of christo-fascist commanders, controllers, cults & colleges:
Piper & his Bethlehem/Desiring
Wilson & his Kirk/Andrews
Behold the photo op, what they present; subvert the underbelly of truth, what goes on relationally among these people. There’s a story behind every picture perfect staged cosplay of xianity. (A woman who worked for Beth Moore’s Oklahoma event, experienced & wrote of the underbelly & lies.)
also In the News:
https://www.brnow.org/news/stanleyville-church-grieving-in-wake-of-pastors-arrest/
“T. Elliott Welch, pastor at First Baptist Church in Stanleyville, was arrested April 27…Law enforcement officers searched Welch’s residence in Tobaccoville…Welch was taken into custody on the church’s property.”
T. Elliott Welch’s blog:
https://tewelch.blogspot.com/2012/04/our-sole-mission.html
T. Elliott Welch on Twitter:
https://twitter.com/tewelch/status/1160356613393387521
@tomascol · @FoundersMin · Aug 10, 2019 By What Standard?…Find out how you can contribute and sign up for updates on the Cinedoc
@tewelch Replying to @tomascol Keep up the great work. Praying and thankful for y’all.
https://twitter.com/tewelch/status/1175529931041886208
@LawyerGregLove · Sep 20, 2019 The Baptist State Convention of North Carolina ( @NCbaptist ) knows how to fill a room! Over 150 ministry leaders attending the @MinistrySafe training today at Pleasant Garden Baptist Church (@PG_Baptist). We expect another 150 for Saturday event.
T. Elliott Welch @tewelch Replying to @LawyerGregLove @MinistrySafe and @ncbaptist Eye opening and impactful presentation. Talking with my team and we will be in contact with Ministry Safe. Thank you for this ministry.
and this happened Friday:
James Welch (apparently no relation to T. Elliott Welch)
https://www.floridabulldog.org/2021/05/first-baptist-church-implodes-over-challenge-to-pastor/
“On Friday night First Baptist trustees, seemingly under the control of Lead Pastor James Welch, released an email that expelled from membership — much like Catholic excommunication — an entire dissident faction, an estimated 200 churchgoers. The group has been pressing for dialog about finances, the future of the property-rich institution and Welch’s controversial, top-down management style. He took control of the church in early 2019.”
Yes, this guy “loves 9Marks”:
https://twitter.com/jamesrwelchjr/status/11790855885
Jerome,
It looks like this situation deserves investigating….. “excommunicating” 200 members in one action is not typical “Baptist” thing…
Quite.
https://www.npr.org/2021/03/27/981803154/why-nearly-all-mass-shooters-are-men
“researchers say that men, more than women, tend to externalize their problems and look for others to blame”
There are various tellings of Gothard’s bio, mostly deleted online. Here, in my narrative, is critical information to a forensic reconstruction of not only Gothardism, but portions of postwar Evangelicalism itself.
-The setting. It’s possibly late Spring 1946. Gothard is a flop in elementary school. He is not normal and has obvious learning disabilities. I would not rule out high functioning autism.
Gothard will later call this event a “rhema”. I call it an evil spirit lied to him seventy four years ago. The spirit knows BG’s brain works by repetitious hearing and reciting. BG doesn’t actually have the capacity to ponder the repetitious data. He will not know there is a slight translation difference in the two text cited.
BG comes to believe that God is the Amighty pot of gold, at the end of the rainbow. BG in time, will have a few things he wants from God.
-My observations.
1. Evil spirits where involved from day one of Gothardism.
2. Dispite the focus on the Bible, doctrinal errors and a false understanding of God are structural to Gothardism. It is not repairable. It is anathema. Heresy is common word thrown about the Church, usually with the user lacking it’s definition. Gothardism is actual heresy, due to it’s schizmatic nature.
At this point, the sexual component of Gothardism is still future. It will emerge fully by the time he is fifteen. Because it formed prior to adulthood, it is forever juvenile. It remains timeless, as BG and his followers age. This explains the sexual proclivities toward youth by older men. Their bodies may have aged, but the doctrine is ageless. A sixty year old man, is not really separated by age from a fourteen year old, other then by outward and superficial appearances.
Josh Duggar is thirty three and was brought up in Gothardism from birth.
https://web.archive.org/web/20020806081633/http://billgothard.com/aboutme/chapter1.php
Nathan Priddis,
And, as I mentioned above, is some circles, Gothardism was POUNDED into pew peons… I can still remember church members being all emotional about IBLP…. that was over 45 years ago…. sigh….
I had odd home, school, work and family situations as a boy.
I did see it in churches, but only rarely if I was visiting a church or something. Gothardism from the pulpit is something largely outside my experience.
For me it came in school and school materials over a period of years. It was like being in a smoke filled building. Suffocating and disorienting. At some point tracing back through the timeline, I was too young to differentiate Gothard from pre-existing Fundamentalism, or even what Fundamentalism was. I just called it school. Maybe that was before the fire broke out in the school building.
(My apologies if I unintentionally trigger someone with my comment…)
Serious question (and I usually only paraphrase the Bible because most of the time I do not remember exactly where to find what I think I remember): Might people in the phrase “nobody needs to take the next step and get help for the little ones” be like the hurtful people in Matthew 18:6 – But whoever hurts one of these little ones who believe in me, it would be better for him if a millstone were hung about his neck and that he were drowned in the depth of the sea.
(Perhaps a difficult to answer because one cannot always tell if the child(ren) is (are) a believer(s)….)
OT:
Thank you, Dee, for not having one of those pop-up (dialogue) boxes that appear in the middle of the screen when one comes to read the TWW blog.
Yikes! That’s right in my neck of the woods! :O
As noted, there are varied experiences w/the BG community sweep. What we’ve seen:
Everyone, whole families, attend the fad Conference. Yawn. Move on.
Except:
Pedos & predators of every variety who use it to biblically back their evil ways. No need to hide any more.
Life-style challenged (drug/alcohol abuse, promiscuity, felonies) who used it to rehab to weird lifestyles like Duggar’s. No TV, no college espec. for girls, Disney is evil, Harry Potter is the devil, science is knowledge that puffs up with pride so evil, etc.
There’s more: no Rock n’ Roll, the devil’s music; interesting wardrobe choices – what they deem “holy” to wear for boys/men and girls/women; dating or not & the whole courtship deal; women don’t lead & don’t talk with men other than their husband; financial directives; gender directives. Etc. It’s a whole lifestyle with rules for everything; minutia of rules about good & evil.
We’ve never seen (purely anecdotal here) average people adopt these practices from BG. There are always specific lifestyle challenges they were addressing, as mentioned in my above comment.
Since we identify as Christian but do not adopt these practices, we figured it was something these families felt they needed to do, and we respected it. However, for example, our children didn’t like inviting their children over to play since all they wanted to do was watch television (not allowed in their homes). Boring, our kids thought, as they’d rather play together.
Sorry if this is TMI, but just want to give a shout-out to the journey w/JC as a transformed life. That’s why the story (Dee’s, yours, mine) is so interesting. Unique, faithfully moving forward, no gimmicks, no TV broadcasting, no fame, no celebs, no cults, no personalities, no “look”. Just trying to figure it out in fellowship with God & each other, moving in the right direction, sometimes slowly and even a bit messy, but looking back, transformed. Better today than yesterday, thank God. Nothing primetime worthy, just better. Ever grateful.
Ava Aaronson,
That is “the problem”….. slowly moving through life, dealing its problems, trying to live a live Christ says we should….. hard work….. not exciting, but can be satisfying…
there is no “quick fix”, or conference material that you can sale for this true reality to come quick and easy…. in fact, preachers saying this won’t bring in the crowds….or $$$
I find the same thing happening in education…. we teachers are supposed to make hard things fun, exciting!!!
Which, to me, is a lie…. Calculus is not Fun, and I do not know how to make it, and I do not think it can be made fun…. the best I can do is show the students the satisfaction of solving the problem, and as a engineer, how I can use to solve important problems…. I personally get allot of satisfaction out it, but it is NOT FUN…. sking is fun, driving a convertible on a warm evening is fun, or you can add your own “fun”..
Having loved maths from age 7 (blessed to use Cuisenaire at age 7 – 8, and chant the times tables WHILE looking AT them at age 9), I got a nasty teacher at age 15 who wouldn’t explain why dy over dx doesn’t cancel out to y over x (I didn’t understand I should have made myself known as a complainer). Every book I now look at on calculus bears zero resemblance or overlap to his lesson (but is equally impenetrable).
I need – every child and adult needs – multi sensory and multi dimensional overlapping accounts and demonstrations, and mentoring in same, in all subjects. (I was always staring and prodding – sadly I didn’t have much chemistry – but I have been blessed to always be in proximity with words. A coach told me to get back to the spatial thinking of my infancy and I was gradually attracted through many subjects to what I call “big logic”.)
This is just what mystifiers in religion deprive us of too, including the overview of how things are going to quietly get turned on their heads. “The left hand shall not understand what the right hand is doing.” I’m glad I’ve never ski’ed – my 28 year “ride” was a slippery slope.
Let’s not forget that Josh Duggar’s used car lot was investigated by Homeland Security in 2019, and computer equipment was seized.
https://www.foxnews.com/entertainment/josh-duggar-employment-homeland-security-family-denies
The Duggar parents were aware of this and yet released a public statement where they lied to their followers, calling the investigation “fake news”. Josh, Anna, and their children moved into a converted warehouse on Jim Bob and Michelle Duggar’s property, where Josh has continued to have access to many siblings, nieces, and nephews in the Duggar family for the past TWO YEARS while this investigation was continuing.
clarification to my cmt re Pope Leo et al (with pugs): I do NOT mean manipulative dominionist jockeying, only invisible benefit without closed expectations, the kind of old-fashioned prayers the fundamentalists have taught us to believe never existed. Even “prayer” got made ersatz and TM-ed.
In groups that focus on abuse, especially of children, this verse is often presented as a warning to predators… and perhaps it is.
But most of us probably assume that Jesus loves all children, whether or not they know who he is and love him back. The context suggests that Jesus is telling the disciples to stop vying for prestige. He calls for adults to have childlike faith before talking about literal children. I think the passage tells people not to stand between Jesus and others, namely children. There are many ways to deter belief; abuse is one of them.
At that time the disciples came to Jesus and asked, ‘Who is the greatest in the kingdom of heaven?’ He called a child, whom he put among them, and said, ‘Truly I tell you, unless you change and become like children, you will never enter the kingdom of heaven. Whoever becomes humble like this child is the greatest in the kingdom of heaven. Whoever welcomes one such child in my name welcomes me.
‘If any of you put a stumbling-block before one of these little ones who believe in me, it would be better for you if a great millstone were fastened around your neck and you were drowned in the depth of the sea. Woe to the world because of stumbling-blocks! Occasions for stumbling are bound to come, but woe to the one by whom the stumbling-block comes!
—Matthew 18:1-7
If Nathan Priddis’ linked speaker (above) is correct about how these leaders produce their fruit…
Wonder if the Feds checked the Mainframe & Server at Duggar HQ – re: the Dad’s or Head of Household’s activities… where it all began. Something might be a click off at the base of operations or control central, high command. The LE officer the dad used to coach the teen son, is now incarcerated for … child porn??? Cult culture.
“Fake News(TM)”…
I wonder where they got that term…
“All emotional” as in “My LORD and My God!!!!!”?
But spread your legs on demand for the ManaGAWD or his male spawn.
So deception is what they are really teaching their children. Actions teach.
“Tobaccoville, NC”.
That sounds like the name of a setting for The Hills Have Eyes, 2000 Maniacs, or other “Hillbilly Horror” grindhouse flicks.
Don’t be so quick to blame “evil spirits”.
Human Evil can get pretty Dark all by its lonesome.
“Nothing’s worse than a monster who thinks he’s right with God.”
— Captain Mal Reynolds, Free Trader Serenity, Firefly
But there is, Captain.
A monster who KNOWS He’s Right With God.
When Got Hard got famous on this and other spiritual abuse blogs, didn’t somebody say that Got Hard’s sexual development seemed arrested at early puberty?
Anyone else heard about the idea that you’re sexually attracted to those the same physical age as your emotional/personality development age?
I don’t know the source of this reference, but I vaguely remember seeing a short movie clip on YouTube where an apparent ehebephile was ogling passing high school girls saying “I keep getting older… They stay the same age.”
AKA The Pious Piper and the Jerk with his Kirk trying to pull a Rejneeshpuram on Moscow, Idaho.
LOL, it’s sooooo North Carolina, though. For decades the biggest employer in these parts was R.J. Reynolds. (I am retired from the other big employer, HanesBrands.)
Tobaccoville is literally just down the road apiece from my home. OK… several roads apiece. But quite nearby.
“Deleted” as in “as of now, It Never Existed – doubleplusmemhole”?
After 40+ years in various fandome (SF, gaming, comics, proto-anime, Furry…) arround Compulsive Creatives I have encountered a LOT of high-functioning autistics. Fandoms seem to attract them, give them refuge from the outside world and the company of others of their kind.
I show a couple Asperger’s characteristics myself (though I really wish I’d retained the Hyperfocus ability). One of my writing partners (the self-educated son of a steelworker) definitely shows the indicators of high-functioning autism. Guy’s the hottest raw writing talent I’ve come across in decades of fandoms, yet he’s seriously inhibited by the side effects coupled with damage from an abusive upbringing.
High-functioning Autism plus abusive upbringing is one of the most soul-killing combinations I can imagine. And American Christianity (without any modifiers) seems to go out of its way to push that combination as far as they can.
Gothard will later call this event a “rhema”.
What is a “rhema”. When I punched it into a search engine, the first thing that came up was Kenneth Hagin’s Ministry (which immediately sounded alarms in my head).
Can’t these guys speak plainly instead of hiding behind Theological Jargon and/or Biblical Buzzwords? I don’t think those two Rabbis from Nazaerth and Tarsus bloviated Theological Theo-Babble. No matter how Christians have re-translated them into Theo-Babble.
As per the Haginites, a prophet idea (word) from God to an individual about something.
Like, “I got a rhema word to do street evangelism tonight, so here I am on the street corner,” or even “I got a rhema word to go to McDo’s so I’m here eating Big Macs.”
So God tells an individual something, and these folks call it a rhema word, message.
That’s the FLDS (polygamists) and their saying is “Keep Sweet.” The regular Mormons don’t say that kind of stuff.
I disagree. These are federal charges, not state charges. The feds have a very high conviction rate because they don’t waste their time on cases they can’t prove. And possession of child porn is not something that can be wiggled around. Also, the feds have mandatory sentencing guidelines.
I do not think that Josh Duggar is going away for a year somewhere. If he’s convicted, the feds are going to lock him up for a very long time.
No they can’t, because then they’d give up their aura of authority through mysticism which amounts to nothing more than plain old-fashioned gnosticism.
Keep em’ guessing, keep em’ in the dark and fed poo-poo, like good little mushrooms.
Headless Unicorn Guy,
Rhema…is an extremely common word, but mot really used by those in the pew. It is Greek and occurs70 times in the NT. But when it’s use became common I don’t know. Certainty by the 1970’s. It lends itself to Pentacostalism readily, but it’s used far and wide.
Fundamentalist are normally hostile, to very hostile towards Pentacostals. But Fundamentalist can use the word. Regardless of the semantics of using Rhema, recieved words are normal historically. Not occasional…but normal.
Spirits..
Yes people hear, converse and physically interact with spirits. You must have wondered where people get new doctrines? They’re told them. It’s normal.
There are three things, and three only that are not forgivable. These three have no connections to the usual church teachings. They are:
-Blasphemy of the Spirit
-Accepting a mark of the Beast
-Receiving any doctrine or teaching from a spirit. Only the latter is called anathema. And an entire book (Galatians) warns against those receiving.
Welcome to the world of Independent Fundamentalist Baptists.
I attended a church where we ended up with a ton of Gothard followers joining all at once. Unfortunately it was about the time the church wanted to start a Christian school.
The good news is the Gothard followers, for the most part, left.
The bad news is now the church is part of 9Marks and Founders. So talk about going from bad to worse …
And at the church I once attended, the Gothard families has to have their OWN SEPARATE SUNDAY SCHOOL CLASS. Because Heaven forbid the children/youth of the other families “wrongly influence” theirs. I sensed a church split coming and bailed out.
Education is another part of the BG agenda. So homeschooling.
This isn’t the only reason parents homeschool, but BG insists that their homeschooling program is the right way to educate children.
Depends on the pew.
Bite your tongue math heathen. I found it a lot of fun. And many others do also.
But I will agree about convertibles. 🙂
But then there is opera, which some of my friends consider so beautiful, which just drives me nuts.
Dee’s husband has made the statement that I totally agree with:
“We are all wonderfully and uniquely made.”
I think you understand what I’m trying to get at. Yes, he is likely to be imprisoned – but when he’s released, will society at large have developed the capability to protect others and (and himself for himself)? To advance or correct his broken emotional and cognitive scaffolding? Because his church isn’t capable of doing that – unless he joins the rare one that can.
OT, but I just learned of this: https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-9523485/Eight-women-claim-sexually-assaulted-raped-children-Virginia-summer-camp.html
Edgar Cayce (1877-1945) was a well-known psychic whose teachings mix traditional Christianity (Cayce was raised in the Disciples of Christ) with esoteric / New Age ones such as reincarnation. The ARE (Association for Research and Enlightenment) is dedicated to promoting him. It is headquartered in Virginia Beach, while the ARE Camp (which has its own leadership) is on the other side of Virginia, in a place called Rural Retreat.
NC Now,
…. I was wondering if there were any math purist out there!
The drive is especially good on a windy mountain road in a roadster
Muff Potter,
Unfortunately, you are correct…
As an academic, I see the same kind of behavior by some faculty in the humanities…. they like to throw around words and phrases that only the “in” know what they mean….. I find it VERY annoying…. as a scientist/engineer, there is a whole, distinct vocabulary in my different sub-fields that I could speak if I wanted to…. but I try to use more common words when I speak/write to more general audiences….. because I want YOU to understand what I am saying….. these clowns want just the opposite.. which is gnosticism..
Mark R,
Yup… whenever a preacher, or church, focuses on particular sins…. look out….
Nathan Priddis,
Pentecostal (charismatic) and non-pentecostal (charismatic), are not a dichotomy. The dichotomy is i) those who either ration OR deny, versus ii) those who don’t. Rationing = denying, denying = rationing; Jesus, James and Isaiah speak about this a lot.
To enslave like beasts, as Macarthur-Piper-Warren-Hagin and their copycats including some RC do, is to blaspheme the HS in you and me (Ascension unifies Resurrection and Pentecost). Gen 14 has something to say about enslavement, so does Jonah, and when Daniel begs for the lives of the soothsayers.
HS brings us into all truth, and He’ll help us see our way. Providence isn’t going to be convenient. Galatians warns the recipients against imposing perilous things on those in their care as a power grab.
Eternal subjection of the Son = of women = of all church people. Around “hedonistic” “body theology” cliqueyness freaks, there is no good spirit in whatever they do or don’t do (unlike a God-given calling to laity).
Scripture words are not things. They like all texts allude, and when we have intersecting allusions then we get meaning. Fundamentalism = reifying (by logic, only God Himself can do that).
Holy Trinity is about room for the other other, for widows and orphans. The norm is you & me trading HS gifts to each other’s profit (the only crown), not bigwigs like Bill Johnson and the New Apostolics hogging them to their elite.
The Kingdom has got nothing to do with dominionism. Those who stop someone entering, will be asked about it. ALL Scriptures have MANY fulfilments. The fundies and the big shouts have even stolen prayer from Christians; our very way of life; including prayer about the past of our nations.
researcher,
I’ll take the compliment!!
Catholic Gate-Crasher,
A “perp walk” on church grounds!
Jeffrey Chalmers,
“there is a whole, distinct vocabulary in my different sub-fields that I could speak if I wanted to…. but I try to use more common words when I speak/write to more general audiences….. because I want YOU to understand what I am saying….. these clowns want just the opposite.. which is gnosticism..”
++++++++++++++
…or simply to overcompensate for other shortcomings with big, important-sounding words.
(sort of self-defeating — i mean, we see right though it)
So a church in the neighborhood may indicate predators in proximity to prey. Community beware. (see @RobDownenChron ‘s database)
Other professional communities nay have hidden predators, but they also practice & support & enforce mandatory reporting to weed out the criminals. The church, given @RobDownenChron ‘s database, is not there yet. Quite the opposite, churches refuse to maintain such a database with transparency to warn – for safety, caution, care. Opaque. Safe house for predation.
Duggars & their criminal activities (including the parents here) are also a part of this opaqueness of criminal activity, providing a safe haven for predation. What a place to be in raising children! Their own children are a combination of predators & victims. Again, this is neither respecting nor loving children. They do not – love children. Their children are their a$$ets for their entertainment bu$ine$$. To keep the rating$ going, they had to keep having more kid$. Freak show.
This puts some blame on the authorities for not investigating at any reasonable speed. I get there was a pandemic that made everything crazy, but it took them two years to act on the information they got in that raid, which is two more years Josh had to prey on the children around him.
A local man married a woman who ran an in-home day care. He got a job driving a bus for a private school. A few years later, he was arrested for groping one of his little bus passengers.
Parents of the day care kids instantly withdrew all their children, and the wife had to shut down her day care.
And then the sympathy: “Oh, that’s so sad. She had no idea what he was doing, and now her business is ruined, even though it had nothing to do with him.”
It is more likely that the man wooed and married her because she was trusting, and she could provide him with access to children.
I have no idea what’s going on in the household of Josh and Anna, or in the Duggar universe, but the naive trust and hermetically sealed world present a gigantic problem.
Courts and social workers need to intervene, even though that will confirm every bit of Quiverfull fearmongering.
Yeah, that is the good news. We had gaggles of Gothardites come and go at various times. None stayed, as our church was found wanting. Every church would be found wanting, which is why most of them seem to house church.
The bad side of this, and why it will produce problems is that it increases isolation. In my non-gothardite church, even though the average family size is large, there is a bit of pressure to use the church school, or some other christian school. We also have Sunday school (anathema to the Gothard crowd) and youth groups. This gets our youth in contact with many adults, and avoids the isolation that is the hallmark of Gothardite groups.
Just think, that mass of children were in the house almost all of the time, with only the mother for supervision, which she parceled out to the older children. Without an effective school and church, it was a train wreck waiting for a place to happen. If they lived on a working farm, after school and chores, (Under the supervision of Dad or Mom as the case may be) the young men would have much less idea time to get into mischief.
No TV is not the problem. The problem is the isolated patriarchal structure of Gothardism, with the distorted social structure that results.
All of the isolation is self-imposed, and based on bad PR about other groups.
This is everywhere in Christianity (and in other religions and groups too). “My church is too awful for me to keep attending. I really wish I could find a good one, but all the other churches in town are Not For Me.”
Back in the old days, objections to those other churches might have been: 1) no bans on gambling; 2) permits alcohol consumption; 3) is/isn’t Catholic; 4) women are allowed to wear makeup; they have shocking! ideas! about! Communion!!!!!!!
If I were looking for a church today, I’d take my time, look around at several different traditions, and try to gauge the health of each congregation. Then investigate the teachings. Few people agree with every single teaching of their tradition. Health might be hard to gauge, but asking questions about opportunities to participate will reveal a lot. (Is there are written membership document, how can my spouse and I participate, tell me about Sunday school…)
That reminds me of what is called the “Gish Gallop” – you probably have heard of it. That is named after a “creation science” advocate who would speak quickly and use a lot of technical words, some legitimate scientific terms that he misapplied and some technical-sounding pseudo-scientific terms. It would overwhelm the laymam audience with legitimate-sounding phrases as the speaker jumped from one point to another. It was the opposite of a teacher using sound arguments to take a listener from point a to point b.
Friend,
Thank you, Friend, for taking the time to write your thoughtful reply to me. 🙂
Matthew 18:6 is so often used as a prooftext, and rarely is the verse properly explained in context. (It is only more recently when someone described an actual millstone in the time of Jesus that I thought about the actual millstone to which Jesus might have been referring, although I have seen actual millstones.)
It is difficult for me to explain how you clarified my misunderstanding, as I suspect some of my misunderstanding stemmed from being high-functioning Asperger’s.
Mostly, I just wanted to let you know I had read your thoughtful reply to me, and to say thank you for your answer to my question, even if I can’t explain very well how your reply to me added clarity to my understanding of Matthew 18:1-7.
Eeeessshhhhh. And I wasted all of my talent explaining mathematical theorems and formulas in plain, simple English!
Jacob,
yup
As far as I am concerned, the YEC apologists are fraudsters/con-artists..
Nancy2(aka Kevlar),
There’s a difference between using technical terminology appropriately and overwhelming a listener with technical-sounding jargon just to obfuscate.
Worse. BG teaches it is the ONLY BIBLICAL way to do so. That’s why I sensed the split coming: the pastor (who actually thought BG had a lot of good points) wanted the school (and ultimately it did open) but the tension between the BG followers and the non-followers got too much. I know of one couple who left and there were probably several others.
researcher,
🙂 I’m no expert, but I’m glad it helped.
You wasted nothing Nancy!
You did what was necessary to clarify, and I have no doubt you did it well.
Like Jacob said, there’s a big difference between Math and a pile of horse poo-poo with no hope of brilliance.
Muslin, fka Dee Holmes,
I must defer Muslin, you have far more knowledge about this kind of thing than I.
Muff Potter,
A lot of my students would have zoned out for the year if I had talked too fast and used just big words, let alone made up jibberish. Even some simple algebraic theorems are worded in such a fashion that many of my students could not have understood well enough too apply. I don’t believe in making students meet me at my level (as one board member suggested, strongly). I believe in doing my best to meet them at their level, and then bring them up.
I did give them occasional quizzes on mathematical terminology, though……. real words I knew they would be seeing on national exams and ACTs, no matter what a college student majors in, a certain number of hours in math are required —- college algebra is the lowest level class that counts towards those hours! And, I had to make sure they recognized the theorems in their proper forms!
Yikes!
Nancy2(aka Kevlar),
Colleges can also require courses in quantitative reasoning, which seems to blend algebra, geometry, graphing, and real life. Courses are numbered in the 130s and 150s in a couple of college catalogs I checked.
Religion seems to be part of Quantitative Reasoning, too. Or at least the Miracle of Compound Interest. 😉
Headless Unicorn Guy,
Saw that doc … Wild Country.
You are right. It’s like that.
It’s the difference between a Technical Language and a Mystery Language.
A Technical language includes a lot of unique terms and words and jargon having to do with its discipline.
A Mystery Language is a Speshul Sekrit Code and tribal recognition codes understood only by the Illuminati of The Inner Ring.
The most important part of a Gish Gallop is SPEED.
Keep moving FAST, keep hitting HARD. Keep Jumping Around like a ricocheting Superball.
Throw out a thousand FACTS(TM) in the time it takes the enemy to defend against and rebut one. (“SCRIPTURE! SCRIPTURE! SCRIPTURE! SCRIPTURE! SCRIPTURE!”)
Note that it is named after a YEC Apologist.
For some weird reason, reading the term Gish Gallop often makes me think of Lillian Gish (of silent movie fame) when I read it. (Maybe those who intentionally Gish Gallop should take a lesson from the old movies and stay silent. 🙂 )
Headless Unicorn Guy,
i don’t remember that one. i didn’t know there were any others after Hit Me With Your Best Shot.
i think they played that at the End Of The Year Dance, the only dance us 6th graders got to go to, with all the big 7th and 8th graders. what a night. an 8th grader asked me to dance to YMCA. just amazing.
BTW, on my FB page a Calvinist friend has just been telling me that *his* Perfectly Pure Denomination (PCA) would never permit a Bad Person to even *join,* let alone remain as a member. Apparently the elders interview all prospective members — interrogating them in minute, intrusive detail — so they can weed out the “tares” ahead of time.
It doesn’t seem to occur to my naive friend that (a) Bad People *lie*; and (b) elders aren’t mind readers, so they probably wouldn’t pick up on the fact that Bad People are lying to them.
I cited the case of this Stanleyville pastor, along with a case I was personally familiar with, involving a PCA Pillar of the Church with an unrepented porn addiction and a propensity for verbally abusing his wife (and physically abusing his son).
My Calvinist friend retorted that any “good reformed church” wouldn’t allow such bad apples to join. So, by definition, I guess, the churches I had cited must not have been “*good* reformed churches.”
Of course, that would be apparent *only* in retrospect. So, um….
Plus, I still can’t figure out how those “good” elders in those “good” churches could prevent prospective members from LYING to them and thereby gaining admission to membership. I guess mind-reading ability really *must* be a Reformed Elder Charism or something.
My head hurts.
“No True Scotsman” Fallacy.
There was also “Hell is for Children” which got denounced to the Pit of Hell by James Dobson. If he’d listened to the song for five seconds he would have known it was about child abuse. (Maybe that hit too close to the Dobson home?)
Thanks, HUG. Nailed it. No wonder my head hurts.
Details keep coming out about Josh Duggar.
The articles are saying that Duggar created a partition in his computer’s hard drive so that the “Covenant Eyes” software his church / wife insisted he use would not be able to monitor the dirty stuff he was downloading.
More reportage (via Fox News):
“Investigator said alleged images found on Duggar’s computer was ‘top five of the worst I’ve ever had to examine'”
….. According to Faulkner, the file is a series of videos that Faulkner said allegedly includes inappropriate videos and images of children ranging from 18-months to 12 years old and is in the “top five of the worst I’ve ever had to examine.”
…to seize the [Duggar’s] computers which had allegedly downloaded, viewed and deleted child pornography of children with ages ranging from 5-10 years of age.
…HSI Faulkner said the software [“Covenant Eyes”] was installed before Homeland Security began their investigation into Duggar and that the program cannot be monitored by a Linux Partition.
…A partial password that included the birth year of Duggar was also found to be used for the Linux partition, which was used to remain undetected by the Covenant Eyes program and disallows monitoring and reporting.
– – – –
Source:
https://www.foxnews.com/entertainment/josh-duggar-granted-jail-release-bail-trial-federal-child-pornography-case
Friend,
You said:
“It is more likely that the man wooed and married her because she was trusting, and she could provide him with access to children.
I have no idea what’s going on in the household of Josh and Anna, or in the Duggar universe, but the naive trust and hermetically sealed world present a gigantic problem.”
—-
That reminds me. In one of the Josh Duggar articles I read this evening, the investigators said the on one of the very computers that Duggar used to download child abuse imagery,
his desktop photo was of his wife Anna and their children (just a normal family photo of them).
Lord have mercy.
Daisy,
Please God , let those around him not let him get away with the ‘oh I stumbled & wasn’t looking to Christ, but now I am’ defence AGAIN. That is partly how he ended up being able to do this, & to create his own family full of potential victims.
This is way way into the most criminal & depraved territory there is, & his children are not safe from him.
There’s reason for the smirk.
He’s out on bail.
Wonder if the judge was CHRISTIAN(TM)?
Re Josh Duggar: if this judge is elected I sure hope the next election triggers a new face behind the bench. He should not be out. Period, comma, and quotation mark. Unlimited visits with his kids monitored by his codependent spouse Anna????
I may literally throw up. I feel like his kids have just been tossed to the wolves.
And oddly enough, this isn’t fair to Josh either. If he truly cannot stop himself from this insanity, which I suspect, he should not be sent out to “resist temptation.” Good grief this is like releasing a person on their 4th dui who has killed with his vehicle driving while drunk to the local bar and grill, to be supervised by the waitress.
BeakerN,
I can’t believe that the judge allowed Josh to have unlimited visits with his children as long as Anna was present. I’m afraid this judge doesn’t understand the husband/wife pecking order in the religious environment they are in. I wouldn’t trust Anna to be able to keep her children safe. There should be no visits with his children, or at least an outside, trained observer should be present.
Neither would I, but she has more power than anyone else in the family to protect the children. Anna actually has legal standing. Grandparents and pastors do not.
All she needs to do is ask for help, and it will come to her and the little ones.
Nathan Priddis, When I first heard of this my mind immediately went to Gothard. He has a lot to answer for. I hope he genuinely repents before he dies. Gothardism is from the pit of hell.
I have to disagree here. In this case, the state should not let him be around his children or any children (at church either) without outside supervision. Anna in too entrenched in the cult of Patriarchy. She will still view Josh as her head and head of the family.
I grew up in a household with an abusive parent and a parent who let it happen, although our situation was less severe. I tend to look at this as a (former) child abandoned by people who knew.
You might be right about Anna’s reality, but she really does have legal power here. Her brother spoke openly about encouraging her to leave after the Ashley Madison revelations. Josh apparently had some software on his computer to make it harder for him to use it for bad activities. His arrest most certainly turned things upside down and forced the family to think and talk about the implications. She’s not in the dark. She can ask for help.
Yes, but she tends to lean to the Duggar family. I don’t trust them to do what’s best for Anna and the children. They have warped views of what’s best.
In the words of an article when the news got out that Josh was into incest at 14:
“MORE CHRISTIAN FAMILY VALUES”
And overheard on the 480 bus at this time:
“Bla bla bla Duggars bla bla bla they’re CHRISTIANS bla bla bla Guess it’s OK to do your sisters as long as you’re not gay…”
But she won’t.
“Stay Sweet… Stay Sweet… Stay Sweet…”
“What is Thy will, My Lord Husband? How might I better Submit?”
so my take on this is this man is clearly a very sick wicked individual. He has chosen to do everything he is doing and has done. He clearly has no desire to change nor should anyone force it since it isn’t going to do a bit of good! Personally I don’t have any compassion for him or those who allowed him to abuse or support him in any way. His wife’s only concern once she was aware of his proclivity towards children should be the safety and protection of her own children and therefore she should be fighting like hell to ensure they are protected regardless of the family. She has plenty of support from outsiders who clearly have the children’s safety in mind more so over the family. so I have no doubt resources are more available to her more quickly than most people. Just my opinion. Personally if they dropped him in a hole somewhere I could care less. as long as he is free to roam someone’s child he comes across will always be in danger around him.
shauna,
Amen.
shauna,
Josh Duggar is a monster. He has sinned repeatedly and shown no remorse. I have no compassion for him. All the compassion should be reserved for his victims.
The God of this world, the destroyer, the liar and father of lies.
Josh Duggar has become truly creepy looking, what he is is written on his face.
I suspect this is only the tip of the iceberg of what is wrong in that family.
I agree with you but I would caution against imputing your own feelings and values to others without good evidence that they do, indeed, share them. Some people have only a very shallow version of love, some people are narcissists who love only themselves, some people love fame and fortune above all. You will know them by their fruits.