Tears
It matters enormously if I alienate anyone from the truth. C. S. Lewis
I want to thank Eric Bonetti at Anglican Watch for helping me understand court documents and for assisting me with posting court documents.
I am using this post, along with the court documents, to convince the church that pedophilia, et al., are egregious sins, and the abuser is forever banned from the pulpit. There is a problem when they come to church. Churches must also always put the children first. There is a lot of information, and it is here to educate the church. Anyone may request these documents if they wish to read the unredacted letters from these young girls. We decided to protect them. Never, ever forget that most pedophiles reoffend.
This pastor confessed and repented, and they were restored to the pulpit. Case closed!
Today, I spoke with a friend in the child safety business. I am downright frustrated with the greater evangelical church’s dangerous naivety when it comes to those who abuse children. As my readers know, I am a committed Christian, so suggestions that I don’t know my Bible can be proven to be uninformed.
The Lutheran church has helped me better understand the role of sin in our lives. Few Christians will deny that we all struggle with sin. In my church, we confess our sins weekly before receiving communion. Yet some folks seem to believe that there is no possibility of egregious sin when an individual claims to be a Christian. So, the complex problem, sin, and crime of pedophilia is now “wiped away because Jesus saves.” And if Jesus saves, who are we to question a grown man who has assaulted a teen girl?
- We claim people have “repented” because they told us so.
- We believe that pastors like Robert Morris are walking in purity because they told us so.
- We claim to “know” our pastor based on watching him in a 1-hour church service.
- We cannot believe that our pastor would “lie” to us.
- There is no “problem” that Jesus won’t overcome because He permanently cures us, always.
- There is no way that a serious sinner would be in the pulpit because I would know it. I’m a pretty good judge of character.
- There is no way that a person could give excellent sermons if they weren’t the “real deal.”
- “My Jesus heals pedophiles, and I believe it.” (Told to Dee about 5 years ago.)
- “I would leave my kids with a convicted sex offender because they’ve found Jesus.”
- “What do you mean that my pastor, who was saved from his pedophilia, might still be dangerous? He repented.”
- “What do you mean that pedophiles and those with other paraphilias are likely to reoffend?”
- “Why do you keep talking about paraphilias? I’ve never heard of those, so they can’t be important. Jesus saves, you know.”
I am here to speak uncomfortable truths to uninformed church people.
Pedophilia is one form of a paraphilia.
According to the Merck Manual:
Pedophilic disorder is characterized by recurring, intense sexually arousing fantasies, urges, or behavior involving children (usually 13 years old or younger).
But what if the person is interested in older kids?
Pedophilia” refers to sexual attraction to pre-pubescent children. “Hebephilia” refers to sexual attraction to post-pubescent minors age 11-14 . “Ephebephilia” is sexual interest to those in later adolescence, approximately 15–19 years old.
However, the use of the term “pedophilia” is often used to encompass those below the age of consent, even though it can be confusing.
So what is a paraphilia, and why does it matter, especially to Christians who believe that it is just “one more sin that Jesus wipes away?’
The Merck Manual states
The unconventional sexual arousal patterns in paraphilias are considered pathologic disorders only when both of the following apply:
They are intense and persistent.
They cause significant distress or impairment in social, occupational, or other important areas of functioning, or they harm or have the potential to harm others (eg, children, nonconsenting adults).
People with a paraphilic disorder may have an impaired or a nonexistent capacity for affectionate, reciprocal emotional and sexual intimacy with a consenting partner. Other aspects of personal and emotional adjustment may be impaired as well.
The article goes on to describe many paraphilias. For the sake of this article, I’m focusing on what many people call pedophilia.
They will likely reoffend.
I wrote about this here. Please read the entire post. This problem must be dealt with carefully. It is not normal for a man to have a sexual interest in a minor teen who cannot consent. That is why this is both a crime and a deeper problem. Why won’t the elders address this elephant in the room? It is possible that Logan is still struggling with this problem. Everyone should be aware that if he has this problem, he will likely re-offend. At the minimum, how does the church keep him away from teens?
What is a paraphilia? Isn’t it just another sin?
I have used this blog to expose pedophiles in the broader Protestant church. However, my goal in writing has little to do with exposing “one more pedophile.” There always seems to be more than one more pedophile. I have hoped that the reader will understand the complicated topic of paraphilias. Comprehending the difficulties inherent in such behavior is essential to protecting you and your family.
Here is a link at the National Institutes of Health: Paraphilia by Kristy A. Fisher and Raman Marwaha that explains this.
Paraphilias are persistent and recurrent sexual interests, urges, fantasies, or behaviors of marked intensity involving objects, activities, or even situations that are atypical in nature. Although not innately pathological, a paraphilic disorder can evolve if paraphilia invokes harm, distress, or functional impairment on the lives of the affected individual or others.
…The DSM-5 diagnostic criteria for paraphilia states explicitly that the patient must have experienced intense and recurrent sexual arousal from deviant fantasies for at least six months and must have acted on these impulses. A paraphilia becomes a pathology, or a paraphilic disorder, only when this behavior causes significant distress and impairment of functioning to the individual or if the paraphilia involves personal harm or risk of harm to others
…However, due to the patient’s reluctance to seek treatment or the legal obligation to obtain treatment, psychiatrists are often forced to exceed the call of duty to the patient to reduce distress but rather focus efforts on protection against potential victimization.
Those with paraphilia are often reluctant to seek treatment. Even when they do, the counselor must focus on preventing harm to another victim.
Read the section called Prognosis. It appears that those with paraphilias are likely to reoffend.
Despite the psychological and pharmacological interventions designed to manage paraphilias and paraphilic disorders; an ultimate treatment or change has yet to be established. Existing interventions merely allow for increased voluntary control through self-management skills over sexual arousal and reduction in sexual drive, with the best-yielded prognosis only from those individuals who are actually motivated to change.[2] Those who do participate in either therapy alone or, ideally, the combined management of psychological and medicinal intervention show improvement with a marked reduction in the intensity and frequency of deviant sexual arousal and resultant behaviors.[18] However, the literature suggests that most sexual offenders are likely to re-offend.[2]
Takeaway point: Literature suggests that most sexual offenders will reoffend.
So what is the Christian response to pedophiles, etc?
Protect the children at all costs.
They may reoffend. They are still with their obsession. Always keep this in mind. Therefore, they must never, ever be around children.
But they want to come to church!
Many will want to come to church because it is a hunting ground. There are usually lots of kids and trusting adults who are clueless about pedophilia.
First, protect the kids! For some, that might mean the offender cannot attend the church. Others might appoint a full-time person to be with the offender while he is on campus.
If a church really cares, it will set up a separate worship service for a small group with no children present. It is extra work, but does the church wish to protect the kids or decrease their workload?
But it’s not fair to the pedophile and his family.
So, is protecting the children NOT the priority? The pedophile is more important? Remember, the person who caused his family to suffer is the pedophile. It’s wonderful that the church wants to help, but it will involve lots of work by the folks who want to support the family.
But Jesus saved him.
Maybe He did. At the same time, the pedophile might want to come to your church for his purposes and is quite pleased that you believe that Jesus saved him. You don’t know for sure, but that’s the rub.
Why Don Logan and his court documents?
- Some elders hid his arrest and imprisonment for ten years. They did not put the children of the church first. They did not “trust” the membership to understand Logan’s background.
- The elders did not appear to investigate what happened.
- The elders thought they knew better. As you will see, they didn’t.
- Don Logan had the opportunity to tell the whole truth about his arrest. He didn’t tell it to the elders. He had ten years and didn’t tell the members anything about his time in prison.
- Did he lie to the elders?
- The membership was not trained to understand the problems of a grown man interested in a 14-year-old teen. I wondered if Logan could have a paraphilia.I think I guessed closer to the truth.
- The church has been deeply wounded by this action by Logan and the elders.
What do the documents provided appear to say?
We redacted a fair number of letters in which the victims were named. He was imprisoned for the one incident with the 14-year-old girl. The prosecutor likely decided not to have the other girls testify to their injuries due to their age. Due to their young age, 12-14, we do not feel it is advisable to post their testimony. We left a snippet of some of the letters to get an idea. Logan then had a plea deal. Many people wrote letters in favor of Logan, which is not unusual. A person with a paraphilia is apt to have many people who claim he is safe because he chooses his victims carefully. Paul Pressler did the same thing.
If you want to see all of the letters, you can request the entire documents with those desperately sad letters. Remember, these letters with allegations were allowed to be included in the court documents.
- After the arrest, Logan appeared to seek our unsupervised visits with adolescent girls.
- One noted that he appeared to fit the profile of a predator, calling him cunning and patient. People are drawn to and like him, but this is dangerous because he was a minister. (He was a pastor at the time of this arrest.)
- At the time, the elders in his church appeared to be secretive, and folks were not told what he did.
- One girl claimed he wanted to marry her.
- We redacted a letter by a young girl who claims he hurt her.
- He told one girl he wanted to take her into the woods and rape her.
- There were claims that he was writing girls in Ohio from prison.
- His former church, Geneva Church of Christ, wanted to see him restored to the pastorate because he was a “gifted minister of the Gospel.” They believed he should be forgiven like King David and Paul, showing a lack of understanding of what forgiveness in those contexts means from a historical and theological point of view. However, they did not believe he should be restored to the ministry at that time. The church asked that he not be imprisoned because “He is gentle and nonaggressive.” I sure hope that the church has changed leadership. A man who goes after a teen is not gentle is aggressive and is a danger. Geneva Church of Christ-seriously?
- Logan has a certificate that claims he overcame addictive behavior. I wonder what that might be.
- He also took a parenting class. He probably met others who had children. I wonder if they stayed in touch?
- There were a number of letters from prison officials who supported his attempt to have his sentence reduced since he was a good boy in prison.
- Remember, he was already a pastor, so he taught Bible study classes in prison. Many prisoners claim to have done those studies and had experiences with Jesus as they try to get out of jail early.
- Some letters claimed that he was a model inmate, causing no difficulties, which is why prison is a good place for a pedophile. There are no children there so maybe they behave.
In other words, what is noted in this document appears to be different from what the elders claimed. They presented this as a one-time incident. I believed that this was doubtful. From what I’ve been told, they finally received these documents and decided to dump Logan. They will now be meeting in small groups with church members where they will present their latest thoughts. The elders should resign and new elders elected. It appears they waited 10 years to send away the court documents in order to discover that they may have supported a more than 1x predator (is there a 1x predator out there?), or he appeared to be at least a liar, as their pastor. This is shepherding?
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to dee and all the daughters and sons of stan,keep up the good work.
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Haven’t read it all, but wth, the sheriff thinks Logan deserves respect?
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Went through the documents.
Pedophiles have their fan club(s). So they can have unsupervised free access to their targets in a target rich environment as a pastor in a church. Camouflage for the Dark Side: criminality attacking the most vulnerable.
Wasn’t Larry Nassar such a great guy? And Harvard embraced Jeffrey Epstein. Harvey Weinstein was applauded, awarded, and kissed by Hollywood’s most glamorous ladies at the Oscars. Bill Cosby was America’s Dad. Jimmy Savile was honored by the Queen for his benevolence to the disabled. Jerry Sandusky rescued boys, so he could violate them.
Re: predators. Shall we award Oscars for those who masquerade their predation best, fool the most people, and manage to then violate the most children?
The ruse is highly skilled, and finely developed among pedophiles, as they slyly smile their duping grin, right into the camera or from the pulpit on Sunday morning. How we love, adore, trust, and vouch for our Dear Leader “real deal” pastors as we sacrifice children into their clutches. Not many predators, but the hidden ones are deadly with numerous victims, doing enormous damage. Not new, Christa Brown has been warning us for DECADES.
Church, wake up, wise up, grow up, rise up.
Profiler Roy Hazelwood published his predator research a looong time ago, and he has long gone to Eternity. Way past time for churches to get a clue. Andrew Denney UTC is publishing research now, specific to Protestant Clergy Pedophiles. This should be required reading for everyone who supports clergy, especially Board Members, but ALL donors. Know what you are paying for. A registered sex offender? In his Poster Boy Polite Company Evangelical persona hiding his Dark Side Vampire Claws and Fangs Diaries?
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Having read the blacked out pages, I confirm that the girls’ testimonies have an audience rating of MA. At one point the interviewer read from a letter that the perp sent to the victim after the incident. It was absolutely vile.
I went to the 9 am service this Sunday. An elder escorted me to the back row and rebuked me for attacking the church. I asked him if he had read the case file. He said yes, but the girl admitted to lying in her testimony, and she and her family have reconciled with Don. I asked him “which girl” and he said he didn’t remember. I asked him “who told him this, Don?” He said, “Yes, Don.”
I share this just to show how convincing Don Logan is. That the person who wrote that vile letter could be concurrently so beloved at Geneva Christian Church is quite revealing.
He admits to being an accomplished actor. He has pretended to be something he is not, a pastor, for over 35 years.
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i read much of the content of the letters in support of Don Logan. aside from magical thinking & child-like faith, it all struck me as incredibly self-centered.
ie, “I don’t mean to be insensitive but…”
“I don’t really know what he did exactly, but….”
“…Don is good for me” “Don is good for my daughter” “Don is good for our church.”
wonder if any of these letter-writing folks have read or will read these documents, and what they think now.
i think a thesis is needed on re-thinking child-like faith.
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I believe that the entire “pedophiles in Church” situation should make one rethink his or her theology.
I was an altar boy in the Catholic Church. I was not abused but many of my peers were.
Christians believe in an active, loving, powerful, and personal Jesus.
Exactly where is Jesus in all this?
I believe that all of the victims prayed to Jesus when the abuse started and as it continued. They prayed intensely, relentlessly, and with the most pure and innocent faith and free will. And yet, I have found little evidence of such prayers being answered, either in the short term or a lifetime of shame and suffering.
I also believe that some of the abusers prayed with faith and sincerity. Their prayers for remission of their urges were apparently never answered. And yet these were men of god who gave themselves over to be the very image of Christ on earth. As their prayers remained unanswered, they sank completely into a life of monstrous deception.
To recap: Men (mostly) who are anointed in the Spirit to be the image of Christ on earth instead prey on faithful innocent children—all of whom are praying for the violations to stop. Apparently Jesus in those moments—in every moment—says and does little or nothing. I know this from the testimonies of my peers.
If readers know of more hopeful testimony, I welcome it. I see this blog as a genuine annd powerful expression of the love of Jesus. And yet, blogging is a non-Biblical and thoroughly human invention.
In my long life, I have come to love Jesus. I am comforted and healed in His Spirit. My heresy includes this: I think Jesus / God is real but imperfect, and is flawed and broken in his love. We need him and he needs us. We forgive him and he forgives us, imperfectly. Jesus is both human and super-human, just like us. Jesus can save, but only in communion with humanity.
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This is the core of the truth of the matter. How many more pastor predator actors are there, and who are they?
The grand performance stages of the megas with magnificent sound and lighting, fog machines and Hollywood production, doesn’t help. But snake oil salesmen pulpiteers were among us back in the small town small church days, too. This is not new. Reference: victims finding their voices and being heard, half a century later.
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I wept when I read the letter from the mother who could not allow her daughter to go camping because all she could think of was Don Logan telling her daughter he wanted to take her in the woods and rape her (page 15)
Let that sink in
A PASTOR told a CHILD he wanted to RAPE her in the woods.
And this child was not the same victim he was convicted of abusing.
And by abusing, I mean digital penetration (affidavit provided on p. 91)
And all the letters of support from little girls…
These court documents are a case study in the predatory grooming process of children, parents, and church communities.
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Exactly why I wrote “Legal Grounds” (by Ava Aaronson). It’s on Amazon, the kindle quite inexpensive, but there’s a paperback, too.
There are those who testify to God’s intervention, God’s deliverance, God’s recovery. None of this involves “restoration” with a predator. Build a wall and never look back.
As noted in the book intro, all names are redacted and this is a novel, a compilation, as victims’ privacy was already violently violated in the attacks by predators.
Wade Burleson put in his recent review on Amazon as “superb.”
Anyway, yes, God intervenes, cleanly and clearly.
The predators are slimey, surly, greasy, slippery, actors. Their targets see this. Their groomed supporters are high on a social drug of being in with the predator pastor, with self-interest as #1. As elastigirl notes:
God is pure love, care, and dignity, having nothing to do with the social scene that violates children, especially when it calls itself “church.”
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Absolutely. By a highly skilled actor predator pastor. He’s a predator of the worst kind, violating children while posing as a “pastor.”
Anointed by the Holy Spirit? Never. Anointed and appointed as an agent of the Evil One, plain and simple. Doesn’t get worse. Might as well be in cahoots with the gods of the Old Testament, putting their children on the pagan god altars.
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I sent the following email to the Executive Pastor of Eternal Church this Sunday afternoon. I have not heard back.
Chad,
I visited Eternal this morning hoping to speak with my (elder) friend (______) and to make myself available to the elders and staff of the church. While sitting in the back row worshipping, I was accosted by Bill _____, who said he knew that I was attending to “cause a disruption.” He himself asked me to come back after I visited last week. I asked him politely to stop pestering me. He said that he couldn’t worship knowing I was there. I moved a few chairs down and was singing. After the music ended, it was he, not me, that was causing a disruption, repeatedly whispering loudly that I needed to leave. He then brought the police over, and I quietly exited the back of the church.
I know that this is a tempestuous time in your church. But the focus does NOT need to be on me or Julie Sale. It needs to be on the perpetrators of this attack on God’s church: Don Logan, the sinning leadership of Eternal Church, and the various ministries who somehow restored Logan to ministry.
Your brother in Christ,
Dale Rudiger
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Dee wrote: “Logan has a certificate that claims he overcame addictive behavior. I wonder what that might be.”
This makes no sense — and anyone with a casual understanding of relapses in addiction should know this makes no sense. He may have completed an addiction treatment program, but that can’t predict future behavior/relapse.
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Dale Rudiger,
When the mob hails Barabbas, they get the murderer, and they are sticking with their guy. This is not the first time “God’s People” are grossly wrong. They executed Jesus, the Son of God, as they were duped by their religious leaders, back in the day. Nothing new here, just another toxic combo of predator + religious leaders + mob, all in the clutch of the Evil One.
Faithful people, beware and be aware. Protect yourself and your family from the evil nonsense. God does not suffer fools. We have free will to choose whom we shall serve and live the consequences of our choices.
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It doesn’t. Certificates and letters of support galore. The play acting, the ruse, the defense, the argument. Cover and camou. All to certify a child predator as “safe” to pastor with free access to a target rich environment. Working hard, working the system, to get what he wants.
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I just bought it, looks great.
I accept your testimony, that some testify to Gods intervention and deliverance. I see that myself. I also observe that deliverance seems stochastic.
In my experience (anecdotally) among altar boys, there are few boys and few priests — approaching zero—who prayed and received help in the moment more or less, or in the direct aftermath. There have indeed been welcome waves of justice in the Catholic Church. I frankly see these as human interventions in a largely secular context.
Prayers are largely ineffective.
So, call the police.
The hard question is, Where was God in the sacristy during the abuse when prayers from both parties were thick in the air? Where was god in the years of suicidal ideation and futile prayers for help? The poor soul is often accused of insincere faith, when the opposite is true, at least for a while.
I’ll get off my soapbox now, I don’t want to distract from the welcome work of this fine blog.
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Heavens! He didn’t let the weight of that question slow him down for a moment, did he?
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Did the police intend to escort you out at his direction? If my church had uniformed officers could I request them to remove the lady behind me who sings more off-key the louder she gets?
Are these off-duty officers? From which police force? I suppose they were not briefed on Don Logan’s history while they’ve been used to “protect” the church?
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Poppy,
Yes, the police were directed by him to escort me from the church. He is not on staff or an elder. He apparently knows Don Logan from time together in Guatemala, so he has been extensively groomed as well. There were three officers who escorted this dangerous 67 year old from the building. I spoke with the lead officer, explaining that I had done nothing to warrant eviction. He responded that he understood, and that there was a lot of controversy at the church.
I assume that he was directed to sit with me by someone in leadership.
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Remember, at the time of his offence, “Pastor” was not a pastor at all … a true pastor would not harm a little one, a true pastor would not betray the trust of those entrusted to him, a true pastor would not forsake his promises to God when he assumed that sacred role. Once his sin/crime was revealed and dealt with by church and state, a truly repentant believer would never seek the office of pastor … he would realize that child sexual abuse is a permanent disqualifier from ministry … he would pursue other avenues of employment rather than put himself back in a church leadership position where his presence and sincerity would be questioned. These are things that both and “pastor” and church should know and do.
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Amen!
There is an element to Christian watchblogs that those reading TWW today should know. This is more than good work for some … for some, it is more than being a participant in an exchange about the topic at hand … for some, it is a calling to be a “watchman” in the Body of Christ (I consider Dee and Todd to be serving the Lord in this capacity). Through years of exercising this call, they have sharpened their discernment and wisdom. They stand on a wall overlooking the city, they see the enemy through the smoke, they shout to inform and warn. Their mission is to protect the inhabitants of the city. The inhabitants can’t see the enemy – they are in the city, the walls around it keep them from seeing his approach. The watchmen see and hear for them, until they, too, realize the danger.
“On your walls, I have set watchmen; all the day and all the night they shall never be silent.” (Isaiah 62:6)
For those who realize they are called to this role, Scripture provides an admonition:
“If the watchman sees the sword coming and does not blow the trumpet, so that the people are not warned, and the sword comes and takes any one of them, that person is taken away, but his blood I will require at the watchman’s hand.” (Ezekiel 33:6).
So, watchmen know they ‘must’ shout – they are called to.
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Is the sheriff a member of Logan’s church?
“TOUCH NOT MINE ANOINTED!”
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I do not think that any of the abusers are in church to be pastors. They are predators using the cover of the cloth to harm children to fulfill their evil sexual predilections.
The second problem is that we have clueless people in church leadership who don’t understand that pedophiles use the church.
Some members and leaders enjoy simplistic views of the Gospel. Jesus saves. That’s it.
There are those who feel their job is to “protect the image of the church” as opposed to doing the right thing and letting Jesus protect His church.
We live in a fallen world. Children have been abused from the beginning of time. Due to my daughter’s childhood brain tumor, I watched little kids dying of horrific cancers.
I am a fan of NT Wright. He says that the goal of our salvation is not to “get to heaven when we die” but to live out the faith and transform the world in the here and now.
We take our love for our Lord and proceed to transform this sad, sick world. That is why I continue with what I do even when I get discouraged and tired.
We each have a place in that transformation and need to focus on what that is. We got this world because we wanted to pursue our free will. Predators are a result.
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Dale Rudiger,
I would like to speak with you about what happened with you. dee@thewartburgwatch.com
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Oh no. I would be the first one they would drag out.
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Could police be the answer to prayer?
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Susan,
I believe that his addiction was sexual, but it could also be alcohol or substance abuse. The rate of such abuse is relatively high in pedophiles, etc. I was a bit tongue-in-cheek. The church leaders, including Hollowell, who spoke with me, believed that Logan was no longer addicted to anything. he was a great teacher.
They were so uninformed they didn’t imagine he wasn’t telling them the truth. I’m sure some still believe that.
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In my humble, but accurate, opinion, NT Wright was wright! Transformation is a process. It takes blood, sweat and tears (not to mention humility, prayer, repentance, seeking God) to genuinely live out faith; it takes time to be transformed and to transform.
I heard a political candidate (name and affiliation concealed) say this:
“I don’t believe in transformative moments, as transformation is harder than a moment. I’ve seen far too many people awash in a genuine desire to change only to lose their mettle when they realized just how difficult change actually is.”
Dee, God will carry you when you are discouraged and tired … you are on the same road with Him.
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The devil quoted Scripture in Matthew 4. Jesus didn’t fall for it.
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To which my dear wife adds:
“Let us not grow weary or become discouraged in doing good, for at the proper time we will reap, if we do not give in.” (Galatians 6:9 AMP)
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Crickets….not a single Fort Mill pastor has publicly spoken up about a sex offender pastor in their network and the cover up of this felony by Eternal elders.
Dee talked to Nate Siemon from Lifepointe Church and the Fort Mill network leader of ForCharlotte in her first blog post about Logan. Where is his public rebuke of Logan’s abuse?
Where is ForCharlotte’s public statement about a sex offender pastor in their network?
Where is Forest Hill’s statement? How about Tega Cay Baptist? Elevation? How about Lakeshore and Good Shepherd? Where is Derwin Gray of Transformation on the other side of town?
Come on, pastors! Be pastors!
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Yes I believe so.
I was a grand jurist in a federal courtroom investigating a predator priest. The victim in this case committed suicide before the trial.
The cops in this case arrived about 15 years too late. The aging priest received a light sentence because of the suicide and accompanying obliterations.
Another way of phrasing my concern is this:
Does Jesus intervene directly, ever?
Such as the small miracle of allowing the demonically blocked voice of the boy to command “Stop! No! This is wrong!”
Because common sense Christianity says that God sometimes intervenes directly.
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I was a member and a victim of childhood sa and I attended a meeting where I asked if they did a criminal background check before hiring Don they said they called a couple of churches. They did not do a criminal background check on him. They took his word!!! Now, 50 years later I am once again reliving my pain. I’m furious with their negligence.
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From the court documents:
“He was in a position of trust with the victim and her family. He had been their minister, was a friend of the family and was someone that the victim looked up to for guidance and support.”
Sounds like the same thing that church members are saying today. The problem with deception is that you don’t know you are deceived because you are deceived. Genuine or counterfeit? It’s not worth the risk to find out.
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Lay low, stay quiet, this will all blow over, the watchblogs will move on to deal with some other bad-boy church leader … then we can continue business as usual … no need to say anything, repent, change, seek God or anything like that.
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I would be the next one for clapping out of beat, so thankfully it will stay rhetorical!
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And pastors/staff can move on to one of the other churches in town… and repeat.
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Known in church leadership circles as “kick the can down the road.”
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In her mind, I’m sure she thinks she is making a joyful noise unto the Lord! 🙂
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Now you know why all these dudebro pastors and elders try to get in tight with LEOs and detectives and the like. To help them deal with troublemakers and bury/sandbag any attempts to uncover crimes. I am sure they said, “We are just following orders.” Of course, their cadre of hired goons whether LEO or private won’t be able do much against someone REALLY determined and REALLY skilled to seek out retributive justice, it just means more targets. Think Mr. Clark from “Without Remorse” or Jason Bourne. Beware the fury of the patient man.
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Dale Rudiger,
Dale, I suggest that you look into Jimmey Hinton’s web site (jimmyhinton.org). He has a lot of resources for church leaders. Jimmy reported his own father to the police. His father, a minister, had been abusing kids for decades and is now serving a life sentence in prison. Jimmy wrote a blog post in January of this year on whether abusers feel remorse when confronted – https://jimmyhinton.org/do-abusers-feel-remorse-when-confronted/ In the post he describes working with one church where they wanted to confront the abuser. He warned them what the abuser would say- abusers expect to be confronted, they welcome it, they rehearse their responses and think of every angle. Unfortunately, the church fell into the abusers trap and wanted to extend compassion to the abuser. One quote he gives from his own father is as follows: “If you think you’ll be able to tell when we are lying you’re only fooling yourself. We can look you in the eye and tell you anything and get you to believe it. Lying is what we do.”
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Only if they are actually competent and not BFFs of the abusive dudebro pastor or elder. Like the police chief who had a “talking to” with Josh Dugger when he molested his sisters. That police chief was buddies with Jim Bob Dugger and Mike Huckabee. That LEO later when to prison for child porn. By the way, this is reason why pastors and elders of churches try to get in tight with law enforcement. What better way to avoid/delay/stonewall investigations if you have some buddies who are SUPPOSED to enforce the law and investigate crimes and criminal complaints. The idea that they are supposedly”ministering” to them and providing spiritual help due the challenges of their job is a crock of s**t.
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Susan,
Anyone familiar with addiction disorders, whether substance, eating, sex, or any other such disorder knows that a person is never cured. Persons with such disorders are in and always will be in recovery. They live one day at a time and if they are serious about their recovery know that they must be very mindful of the people, places, and things that stoke the passions of their disorder. Thus, there is no true counselor or health care provider who would pronounce some one “cured.” Such a statement would be laughable if were not so dangerous to the addictive person and the people around them.
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It’s really quite simple and off the top of the head, it could one of the following.
1) They don’t really believe it for whatever reasons and are brain-addled as Logan’s cult followers in the church.
2) If they said something, no doubt it provide an opportunity for exposure of their own crimes/abuses/sins by their victims. The victims could then call them out on the pot calling the kettle black, hypocrites, etc.
3) They know Logan’s dirt and he knows theirs. So a case of Mutually Assured Destruction (if I go down, you go down with me).
At this point I and many, many others are willing to give a God-hating pagan atheist more benefit of the doubt than any Christian (especially a Christian leader).
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I do not think that any of the abusers are in church to be pastors. They are predators using the cover of the cloth to harm children to fulfill their evil sexual predilections.
dee,
I agree.
And elders like those at Eternal Church have no business being in leadership positions.
I don’t know whether they are absolute idiots, or if they are just in it for the money, the power, and the popularity from riding on the coattails of a false prophet/criminal who happens to be ‘a gifted speaker’.
But, Don Logan is an abuser and a convicted felon. He hid those facts for as long as he could. When the elders learned of those facts they fell in line behind him, hid those facts from the public and the church members. If Don Logan has any victims at that church, the elders are as much to blame as Logan is.
They have all intentionally been living a lie and hiding the truth.
Would they have kept Logan on if they had discovered he had served a prison term for criminal embezzlement from his former church?
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“ONE OF US! ONE OF US!
GOOBLE! GOBBLE! ONE OF US!”
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And start the plans for the Triumphant Return with Standing Ovation.
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Like the story of Don Juan in Hell.
(Don Juan was a legendary womanizer with a body count of over a thousand.)
In the story, the Devil agrees to let Don Juan out of Hell if he can remember the name of a single one of his thousand conquests. And he couldn’t name a single one.
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Given that these MenaGAWD are always awarding themselves and each other fake Doctorate after fake Doctorate, way should we believe these other pieces of paper are for real?
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Poppy and Dee,
Singing? Oh, no, no, no. I’ve probably got you both beat.
Not only can I NOT carry a tune…. several years ago, an illness damaged my vocal cords. I can speak normally but when I try to sing……
……..Can you imagine a mule braying out the alto parts of “In the Sweet Forever”?
But, I do believe that the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit are tone deaf by choice.
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Trusting churchgoers just won’t believe that there are men who go into the ministry for that purpose … who prepare for the ministry with other another mission in mind than to fulfill the Great Commission. Predators look for habitats where they can sneak up on prey without their detection. Wolves in shepherd’s clothing are trusted by the sheep.
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I was once in a rural church that participated in a “5th Sunday Sing” with other area churches. Every month that had a “5th Sunday”, folks would bring their corporate talents to one of the churches for an extended period of worship, playing various instruments and singing unto the Lord. One Sunday, an old saint who was crippled by a stroke on his right side moved slowly to the front, raised a harmonica to his mouth with his left hand, and with tears streaming down his face proceeded to play “Amazing Grace.” It was an awkward rendition of missed notes, but brought many tears to the gathering of believers … I’m sure the Father, Son & Holy Spirit received his offering as a sweet sweet sound. It certainly was the best “Amazing Grace” I ever heard before or since.
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Max,
You just describe the church world I was raised in and lived in…….
That world started going the way of the dodo bird 20 years ago.
I miss it.
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Max,
A professor of mine called it “the dance of the lemons.”
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and sustained because too many churchgoers drink the lemonade, without questioning what’s in it
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Max,
Lemonade flavored Kool -Aid!
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This says it all. I saw this with a colleague overseas who was brilliant at deflecting and getting everyone to believe and stand behind him. Even when first hand witnesses came forward with credible testimony the leaders in my org gave the guy a pass after counseling because “everyone deserves a second chance.” Of course he reoffend. It took five years to get anyone to believe what was really going on. The guy resigned the same day he was finally confronted and presumably found another org to join. His supporting church refused to believe what the field leaders told them because this guy was such a great liar and actor. We do well to check people’s backgrounds ourselves and not believe everything they tell us.
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Ain’t that the truth!
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“There is no way that a person could give excellent sermons if they weren’t the “real deal.””
“I know he’s on a sex offender registry, but he sure can preach!”
What’s wrong with this picture?!
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Pastors are to be above reproach. NOT guilty of vile sins the Lord says not to even EAT with people who profess Christ but commit egregious sins! And this bastard wants an AUDIENCE???? Oh Lord what FOOLS!
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Sandy,
“Because common sense Christianity says that God sometimes intervenes directly.”
+++++++++++++++++
no disagreement.
although I’m wondering what is God intervening indirectly as opposed to God intervening directly.
can you rephrase your thoughts on “intervenes directly”?
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Max,
“What’s wrong with this picture?!”
++++++++++++++
christian culture dispensing stupid pills
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It’s simple. He’s a liar and doesn’t believe or understand the Gospel at all.
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I am trying to inhabit the persona of altar boy in these thought experiments.
If I am the altar boy, in the moment of abuse, I just want it to stop.
I sense the horror and damage minute by minute.
Intervening directly or immediately might be me finding the courage and voice to say stop, as if from the spirit within.
It might be that the predator hears that small insistent voice inside that says “this is wrong, back off.”
Or my mom or dad sensing danger and confronting the predator, even against their obedient mindset.
Intervening indirectly is the predator coming to trial 20 years later.
Intervening directly is the emergence of systemic reform that prevents abuse.
And this blog.
These are good things, but they seem secular even when pursued by Christians.
To my way of thinking, a type of Jesus that does not rather quickly respond at least somewhat miraculously to the prayers of children serving at the altar of God and being viciously abused is not the type of Jesus presented by modern Christianity.
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This should say “Intervening indirectly is the emergence of systemic reform that prevents abuse.”
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We must teach children that they have authority over their body. They also have to know how to and that they are allowed to say no. “No” in every degree of the word. In so many christian paradigms the teachings for children is real dangerous: submit to authority, trust the authority, don’t question the authority, obey the authority, be small, be silent. Yikes!! This is known grooming manipulation tactics.
An incredible young survivor, rescued after years of abuse and exploitation, said something I will never forget… she said, “I did’t know I could say no.”
It absolutely broke my heart for life.
“Sexual abuse and purity culture are alike
in that they teach that your body
belongs to someone else.”
-brave survivor of church abuse
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Can one be a pagan & an atheist?
pagan
noun
also Pagan /ˈpeɪgən/
plural pagans
[count]
1
: a person who worships many gods or goddesses or the earth or nature : a person whose religion is paganism
2
old-fashioned + often offensive : a person who is not religious or whose religion is not Christianity, Judaism, or Islam
Anyhow, there’s three people in the room….the abuser, the abused and ostensibly God.
One would think that the master of the universe (not He-man), who has been documented to do amazing things could send a talking wombat or just a strong feeling of unease or anything but doesn’t.
Why that doesn’t happen, I don’t know. And no one else does either. But it’s up to all of us to seek justice here on earth.
At least one of the criminals who hung with Jesus (and not in the “Hanging With Mr. Cooper way) repented. Apparently did not pass go and went straight to paradise. But still paid for his crime here on earth.
Finding Jesus (or finding Nemo for that matter) is not a get out of jail card.
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“Build a wall and never look back.”
This is VERY, VERY GOOD advice. EXCELLENT advice.
Even if you choose to forgive an abuser, that DOESN’T mean that you have to have any sort of relationship with the abuser.
Forgiving an abuser certainly DOESN’T mean that God wants you to restore the relationship with the abuser.
If the abuser claims to be sorry and asks to re-establish the relationship, TOO BAD.
The abuser should have thought about that BEFORE they abused you.
As a victim, you are under ABSOLUTELY NO obligation whatsoever to have ANY contact whatsoever with an abuser, regardless of who they are.
God does NOT want you to feel obligated to restore your relationship with an abuser.
God does NOT want you to feel obligated to ever even TALK to the abuser ever again.
God wants you to be FREE. You have ALREADY suffered ENOUGH.
God does NOT want you to be under the abuser’s yoke, REGARDLESS of whether the abuser claims to be a changed person.
You have no way of knowing whether the abuser’s claim to be sorry is true, or whether the abuser is LYING and trying to MANIPULATE you.
Even if the abuser is genuinely sorry, you have ABSOLUTELY NO obligation to restore the relationship, or even speak to the abuser EVER again.
If the abuser is actually sorry, he would understand this. Trying to pressure the victim into restoring a relationship is NOT the behavior of someone who is genuinely sorry.
Putting pressure on the victim to restore the relationship is the behavior of a MANIPULATE PREDATOR who is NOT sorry, and is trying to GASLIGHT and MANIPULATE the victim, so the predator can CONTINUE to ABUSE and MANIPULATE the victim.
The most likely outcome of restoring the relationship with the abuser, is that you will be abused AGAIN, and certainly you will be gaslighted by the abuser who will attempt to convince you that “it was no big deal, why are you making a big deal out of it?”
Jesus does NOT want victims to be re-victimized. Therefore, Jesus does NOT want victims to feel obligated to restore their relationship with the abuser.
Anyone who claims that forgiveness means restoring your relationship with the abuser, is a MANIPULATOR trying to GASLIGHT you and cause you further HARM.
As Ava said, even if you choose to forgive the abuser, the best approach is to BUILD A WALL between yourself and the abuser, and NEVER look back.
The best approach is to PERMANENTLY REMOVE the abuser from your life.
That is the ONLY WAY to be sure that you will not be re-victimized.
DON’T let the abuser manipulate you into restoring the relationship with apologies, claims that he is sick/dying and wants to reconcile, etc.
Trying to pressure the victim into restoring the relationship is NOT the behavior of an abuser who is genuinely sorry. It’s the behavior of a MANIPULATIVE PREDATOR who wants to CONTINUE to abuse you.
DON’T let the abuser manipulate or gaslight you.
If you are a victim, you do NOT owe the abuser ANYTHING.
Let me say that again: you do NOT owe the abuser ANYTHING.
If the abuser wanted to have a relationship with you, he should have thought about that BEFORE he abused you.
Now it’s TOO LATE.
DON’T let the abuser manipulate or gaslight you into restoring the relationship.
BUILD A WALL between yourself and the abuser, and NEVER look back.
Don’t even contact the abuser ever again.
I was sexually abused for years by my biological father, who tried to gaslight me into believing “it was no big deal.”
My biological mother knew about the abuse, but didn’t care.
Both of my biological parents are narcissistic manipulative psychopaths.
As soon as I became an adult and legally independent, I CUT THEM OUT of my life.
the devil tried to manipulate and gaslight me into believing that I had to maintain a relationship with my evil biological parents.
But Jesus Christ, in His Mercy, told my heart that He wants me to DRAW A LINE under that part of my life, and BE FREE.
I couldn’t control what happened to me as a child, but I certainly CAN decide how to live my life as an adult.
Jesus told my heart that He wants me to BE FREE to have a HAPPY LIFE as an adult, and NOT be yoked to my abuser biological parents.
Jesus told my heart that He wants me to live the life I WANT to have as an adult, and not feel obligated to have any relationship WHATSOEVER with my abuser parents.
So I BUILT A WALL and DREW A LINE under the early part of my life, and I moved on and I have NEVER looked back, and I NEVER will.
I haven’t spoken to my evil abusive biological parents in almost 20 years, and I NEVER will, for the rest of my life.
Jesus showed me that He wants me to be FREE to live a FREE AND HAPPY LIFE as an adult, which means NEVER having any contact WHATSOEVER with my abuser parents EVER AGAIN.
That part of my life is DONE, OVER, FINISHED.
I will NEVER even talk to my abuser parents again. Not even an email or a letter. My abuser parents don’t know my phone number or address or where I live, or even my email. In fact, I have no idea whether they are even still alive, and I don’t care.
While I have decided to forgive them and let God deal with them, that forgiveness is contingent on my abuser parents STAYING OUT of my life, and me NEVER having to see them again or ever talk to them ever again.
I never even told my abuser parents that I forgave them.
My decision to forgive my abusers is between me and God. That’s it.
Jesus showed me that I had NO obligation to even inform my abuser parents that I had forgiven them.
I sent my abuser parents a legally phrased letter telling them to NEVER contact me again. I included language to preempt any fake “we just wanted to check if he is alright” excuses for them to try to re-establish contact. I made it totally clear in the letter that I will NEVER speak to them again, under any circumstances.
And almost 20 years later, I NEVER have.
I BUILT A WALL, and I have NEVER looked back, and I NEVER will.
Now I am FREE to live my OWN LIFE, rather than the oppressed life my abuser parents tried to subjugate me under.
So, for any victims of abuse (sexual, physical, emotional, mental, psychological, any sort of abuse) who are reading this:
As Ava said, BUILD THAT WALL between you and the abuser, and DO NOT let the abuser cross that wall.
Let me say that again: DO NOT let the abuser cross that wall and re-enter your life.
CUT the abuser OUT OF YOUR LIFE, and NEVER let the abuser back in.
DO NOT let the abuser or anyone else (including well-meaning but stupid idiot “Christians” who don’t understand what forgiveness means) GASLIGHT you into restoring your relationship with the abuser.
Let me say that again for emphasis: DO NOT let ANYONE manipulate or gaslight you into believing that forgiveness means restoring your relationship with the abuser. DO NOT let ANYONE convince you that forgiveness means letting the abuser be part of your life. DO NOT let ANYONE convince you that you have to even contact the abuser to tell the abuser that you have forgiven the abuser.
DO NOT let anyone gaslight or manipulate you.
If you are a victim of abuse, you have SUFFERED ENOUGH.
As Ava said, BUILD A WALL between yourself and the abuser, and NEVER let the abuser re-enter your life in ANY way.
NEVER look back. Move on with your life, and BE FREE and LIVE the life that YOU want, the life that YOU always DREAMED of having.
When Jesus Christ died on The Cross to save us, Jesus said “it is finished.”
Jesus wants the part of your life where you were abused to be OVER, DONE, FINISHED!
That part of your life is FINISHED! You are FREE NOW!
You are FREE to LIVE the life you always wanted, without the abuser in your life.
DON’T let the abuser drag you back to a life of being abused, mistreated, manipulated, and gaslighted.
Jesus bled and died so YOU can be FREE.
So BUILD A WALL between yourself and the abuser, and NEVER let the abuser cross it and re-enter your life, under ANY circumstances.
That part of your life is DONE, OVER, FINISHED!
DRAW A LINE under that part of your life and NEVER look back!
Move forward with the Freedom In Christ that Jesus died to give you.
Move forward and LIVE a life of FREEDOM and HAPPINESS, the life that YOU want to live.
I’m sorry that this post is so long, but I thought that it might help other people who have been abused, who are being manipulated and gaslighted into falsely believing that forgiveness means restoring a relationship with the abuser.
DON’T let anyone manipulate or gaslight you!!!!
I hope this post, the advice in it, and my sharing of my own story is helpful to someone reading this.
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Yes, excellent, thanks for sharing and God bless you.
No one should be “restoring” a relationship with their rapist. This is not vengeance; it is Common Sense. Especially if the rapist is related to the victim.
Survivors need to be safe, stay away from the predator, and never look back. (Report the offender to LE and protect yourself.) Predators cross a line. Their fault, their problem, their loss. They can be forgiven but never allowed another opportunity.
(Request: asking TWW community for intercessory prayer tonight. Without mentioning specifics, as God’s Holy Spirit leads you. Thx. God bless. I’ll update on results, answers.)
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Yes.
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Excellent observation. Now that you mention it, same here.
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Dale Rudiger,
Thx for all your work on this.
In the end, church is private property. Whoever is in charge, is in charge. Another reason to be careful about church. Whose kingdom is it, any particular church? The question.
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Precisely. Very well said.
By the way, I saw your request for prayer! I am praying that The Lord Jesus and The Holy Spirit will bless you and help you!
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I have commented before on my experiences in a forensic mental health nurse working in a unit with a number of patients with paraphilia and sexual offences including rape of elderly females. Despite extensive treatment, all still posed an ongoing risk. You can email me and I will be more than willing to share my clinical experience. The first priority must be to protect the vulnerable, whom these predators will target.
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I attended the re-opening of an SBC church just last Sunday. They do not have Sunday School for kids at this time because there is no one who has been cleared by authorities to supervise Sunday School for the kids. There is an older lady who has begun the process but it’s going to take some time.
Do NOT tell me the SBC isn’t taking seriously the protection of their children.
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There is no connection between those two beliefs. Addicts can perform excellently in a variety of fields.
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Top priority. God’s people, I believe, uphold and live this priority, just like Jesus. Anything less is simply not church.
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Thank you so much. God bless and keep praying.
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Ava Aaronson,
Ava, I just saw your prayer request. I prayed for you just now.
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There is a misperception among churchgoers that the ability to preach/teach must mean that a church leader is anointed and being used by God. With a touch of charisma, a gift of gab, and a working knowledge of the Bible, anyone (anyone!) can deceive the hearer into believing this.
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Another local media outlet has picked up the story:
https://www.heraldonline.com/news/local/article290113039.html
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senecagriggs,
Let’s not get too excited about anecdotal experiences. What does the big picture tell us? I see problems
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Nancy2(aka Kevlar),
We should form a small chorus…
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Absolutely. Pedophiles are often charismatic. They have to be in order to attract their victims. So many believe that they are weird men wearing black trench coats and hanging around a park where kids play. They are far more cunning than that.
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Dale Rudiger,
I am so glad that the church is getting some attention at this time. Those church elders need to pull on their big boy pants and do the right thing. Most of them need to be educated, and not one of them took the time to be educated in 10 years.
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But we can make an educated guess based on human experience with prayer and godly intervention.
Which is that God is present while conspicuously lacking the “omni” properties typically ascribed to God. God is not all-powerful, not all-seeing, not even all good, or all loving. These omni properties are the residue of Greek philosophy imported into Western theology. These properties are absent in the Old Testament. They are a human invention.
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Or to put it another way, the sample size (1) is much too small to make that conclusion. If that one church does the right thing, it does not prove there have been systemic improvements in the whole organization.
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Sex offender registries are Fleshly, preaching is Spiritual, the two are completely sepearate, and the mere Physical cannot taint the Spiritual.
Just like the Manichees young Augustine was mixed up with – so Spiritual they have ceased to be human.
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That trope is no different that the devil being a being dressed in red, with horns, a pitchfork and a goatee. Or a villain being a guy with a monocle and twirling his mustache. More like disguising as a being of light.
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Including pointing fingers at and casting suspicion on those who are Different as a decoy.
“Beware Thou of the Mutant.”
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Ever heard of a HIgh-Functioning Alcoholic?
Completely normal as long as they keep their blood alcohol level topped off?
And if you adjust the dosage right, you can be thoroughly-trashed on opiates and still be able to function.
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Which has been eclipsed by Selling That Fire Insurance (with complementary Rapture Boarding Pass).
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With that bitter-almond tang!
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Don’t forget the Stadium Seats to watch it all burn down on earth…
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Ah yes, Jim Jones Guyana Punch.
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They don’t care what’s wrong with the picture, they only care about the picture.
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As someone who wrote one of those letters that I just read in the court, docs, believe me I want to vomit. He is a very manipulative man. He had many of us fooled for years. Pamela is not my real name because I’m honestly too embarrassed to have my name out there as someone that was so fooled. The entire situation back then has just caused trauma for any of us that cared for him. And to read the documents and find out even more has been devastating. My prayers are for his children because this has to be horrible for them to go through.
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senecagriggs,
One church doing it right does not clear the rest of the SBC, silly Seneca.
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I’m so sorry you have been traumatized again. The church was wrong in not doing a criminal background check and taking his word for it.
His children will be hurt for sure.
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He has fooled so many. He must be a consummate liar to be believed even by my friend who is an elder at Eternal Church AFTER he read the unredacted case files.
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This may be way too simple but what about better safe than sorry? Have they thought of that? Something along the lines of “we believe you have repented and mean not to do it again, but we cannot take that chance especially since children are involved.” A truly repentant adult, I believe, would understand this and humbly (like how leaders are suppose to be humble per the Bible) go into another line of work.
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Pamela,
There is such shame associated with the idea of being “fooled” when in reality, you were not fooled – you were manipulated. You were a trusting, loving person who was manipulated by a person who thinks and behaves in ways unfathomable to a normal person. You and your congregation were manipulated, groomed, triangulated, etc for the purpose of Don getting what he wanted for himself. Essentially, you, like the little girls in the court documents, were acting against your will by writing your letter – you never wanted to write a letter to support a predator. You never wanted a predator to be a pastor in your church. You were lied to and manipulated by someone who was using you and others, like a puppet master, to do his will and not yours. Thank you for your courage in writing your post. You are brave.
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Amen and Amen.
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JJallday,
This!!! He should have never been a pastor in the church.
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Grace,
Thank you for posting your very wise words.
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Grace,
This is one of the most beautiful comments I have ever read at TWW. I have forwarded it to a staff member and my elder friend at Eternal Church.
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2 Cor. 2:17: “…we do not peddle the word of God for profit. On the contrary, in Christ we speak before God with sincerity, as those sent from God.”
Don received what he wanted as a peddler of the gospel: access to young girls, acclaim, status, and a paycheck. The ministry attracts narcissists who are in it for the wrong motive: to get rather than to give.
No empathy for others, no love for others, just clanging cymbals.
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I’ve known some. Pornography addicts function, too.
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And for “pedophiles,” you could also substitute a variety of other types of abusers.
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Exactly.
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Cynthia W.,
Yes. Many, many predatory pastors are not attracted to children. But, the predatory behavior is similar. And hearts, minds, bodies, and souls are decimated
The church needs to be aware of all types of clergy abuse: spiritual abuse, adult clergy sexual abuse, physical & psychological abuse, the list goes on.
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Thank you for the grace, Grace. If nothing else, finally seeing those documents and what was said…what he pleaded guilty to, was enough to make me not question anymore. There was always doubt because he was good at convincing you that he wasn’t guilty. That YOU knew the real him. I see him clearly now. And as hard as it has been, it’s also been freeing. I am a Christian. I certainly believe in loving people and hoping they heal. can start to let that part of my life go now. Those girls that he took advantage of…those are the victims. Not him! I can pray for him and at the same time want justice done. I can forgive him but still want him to pay for everyone he hurt, not just one girl. He manipulated not only young girls but young women. We ignore red flags very often in our early years of adulthood. Because we WANT to believe the things being said to us.
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People of any age can be blind to red flags – especially when abuse of spiritual authority is occurring. Education and sharing stories help to enlighten people who are being or will be harmed by clergy.
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Pamela,
“I’m honestly too embarrassed to have my name out there as someone that was so fooled.”
++++++++++
i’m very sorry for how these circumstances are impacting you.
the betrayal of being manipulated and tricked by someone who does so by playing the God card, the forgiveness/redeemed card, and the biblical card is deeply painful.
it’s encouraging you to be vulnerable and to trust with your cosmic beliefs (almost as deep and vulnerable as one’s sexuality), and then using it against you for selfish gain.
it’s egregious with a side of unethicalimmoral, covered with corrupt sauce, with lots of nefarious sprinkles.
i’d say it’s worse than childbirth.
so much irony in my silly religion.
i find much of christian culture to be self-serving in a sanctimonious costume.
and i find much of church culture to be extremely manipulative. not even the best pastors know how manipulative they are. it’s woven in to so-called christian leadership, which they emulate and have been trained on.
call me disgusted dolores.
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That makes the new testament a Hellenic add on. And negates the ministry of Jesus.
“God loves cars, and god loves sex
God loves liquor, and cigarettes
He’s a fool for the rush just like the rest of us
‘Cause God is scared of his own death
And he dabbles in drugs on the weekends
Sometimes on a Sunday
When the choir’s done singing
And the kids ain’t watching
And the angels need a reason to pray
Well, I bet it gets lonely in heaven
I bet that God gets lost too
Well, I bet it gets lonely in heaven
I bet that God sings the blues
God loves Audrey Hepburn
And he loves Marilyn Monroe
For all those scenes in all those movies
That no one really knows
And he seduces himself with his own eyes in the mirror
On the top floor of the Marriott
It’s times like that when God really needs a friend
Sometimes the devil’s all he’s got”
– the Glorious Sons, Sometimes on a Sunday
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Ava, thanks for writing this. I read it last year, and it’s a page turner, although a hard read because of the subject matter—but any Wartburg Watcher can handle it. I very much recommend it.
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Ronald Reagan, one of the great heroes of evangelicals, said, “Trust, but verify.”
Oh, he was talking about nuclear weapons accords with the Soviet Union, but hey, almost as important as this.
Can a habitual sex offender of small children repent and be forgiven? Of course; with God all things are possible. Is repentance likely in most, or at least many cases? Maybe; and we can’t know one way or the other. Because we can’t know, we have to prevent these guys from getting near kids in the church. If the offenders are serious about rehabilitation (not to mention repentance), they will comply. Let them be escorted by a deacon, elder, or appointed adult when not in the sanctuary. And this is for their own benefit as well, to prevent false accusations such as, “I saw him looking at my daughter while he was near the nursery.” Don’t let him into that situation, for his sake and for the church’s.
I have an old friend, still in prison for production of child pornography (taking photos of his students in compromising poses, and yes, that qualifies as production, though he never meant it for distrubution or profit). After his arrest in 2011, he was out on bail for a while, separated from his wife and small children, with an electronic ankle bracelet, etc.; and while awaiting sentencing (he pleaded guilty to the greater charge of production, a federal crime with 15-year minimum, with the lesser crime of possession, a state charge, dropped), he enrolled in a Christian counseling program meant to “cure” him of sexual desire for young girls.
I should add here that he was not a pastor, but a kindergarten teacher, and considered one of the best. He taught two of my three girls. That is, he was considered one of the best until his mug shot appeared on the front pages.
At his sentencing, the director of the pedophilia counseling program testified that my friend had passed with flying colors and was cured, with little chance of recidivism. My friend, in his prepared speech to the judge, expressed repentance and asked for forgiveness from the children and families he had hurt, from his own family, church and community, and from God. But then, he was of course coached by his attorney.
However, over the years (now 13 of them) in his letters he has never once expressed that remorse that he testified to in court; rather, it’s more like, “let’s move on, I’ll be out soon and reunited with friends and family,” or “we need to get beyond the hurt and misunderstandings of a distant past.” Comparing notes with his (recently divorced) ex-wife, he seems delusional, as if all is going to be rosy, peachy and normal when he is released to a halfway house later this year.
Is repentance possible? Of course. Can there be a recurrance after repentance? Probably, or perhaps that would indicate no true repentance. Either way, this man will never be allowed to teach children again, and his sex offender status will follow him into every job and housing situation for a very long time. If the law (deep state nasty liberals, those) can insist upon this much, churches can and must do the same. It’s a matter of discipline, something conservative evangelical churches talk way too much about and don’t practice when it comes to child sex abuse.
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Sandy, I appreciate your anguish about theological contradictions that come later in your comment. But to comment on your quote above, when my friend was arrested for production of child porn (see above) one of the most powerful rethinkings I was confronted with was (and still is), “What am I capable of?”
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Thanks, Ted, for your encouragement. There’s a sequel, not out yet. Very difficult topic but so important.
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Good point. Absolutely.
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Thanks so much for praying! God answered. A workman left out equipment (work being done on our house) that I tripped over, flying across the room, injuring a knee. God answered and intervened. Healed. Thanks be to God and God bless you a hundredfold for praying.
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I agree, it’s sound wizdum.
Why can’t there be more smart and real-life-practical-procedures in this thing we call ‘church’?
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I agree. And not just clergy, because abusive people can be found at any level of an organization. Although it seems as though, in some churches, everyone except the cleaning service is a “pastor.”
There are good abuse prevention programs out there. Most of them seem to be for youth protection, but the principles are similar for adults. A problem in churches – a difference from large corporations – is that, if you recognize abuse, there’s really nobody to tell about it who can do anything other than tell you to quit.
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When churches are run by predators and/or predator dudebro enabler supporters, there really is nowhere to go, within the church.
Attorneys seem to all testify that when a church predator case goes to Court, the church ALWAYS sides with the predator, NOT the victim.
So you are right, regarding predators in churches, there is nowhere to go in church.
So here we are at TWW. Yesterday, I needed prayer, so Max and Commenter23 prayed. God answered and healed. God be praised. Thank God for TWW. No building, no collection plate, no pastors, no committees, no rituals, no face-to-face even, no entertainment. Just God and God’s people coming together to tell the truth as we know and see it. Prayer. Bible. Testimony. Faithful people. And God shows up. Don’t know about you, but I want to go where God is. That’s all. That’s church. That’s the communion of the Saints, where God and God’s people are.
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Because those are all of The World,(TM) The Flesh(TM), and The Devil(TM), NOT The Spirit(TM).
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That, and because we’re ‘church’, that $hit ain’t sposeta’ happen in our circles.
So we’ll just get a back-hoe and dig ourselves in deeper.
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Dale, have you seen the article Don wrote in March of 1998 (while in jail) that was published in the Lafayette Journal & Courier? It’s the one the GED teacher references in the case file due to the controversy it caused. If not, it’s available in the J&C’s archive (March 2, 1998).
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Ava Aaronson,
Well said.
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Ava Aaronson,
Praise God, Ava! I, too, have experienced the touch of Jehovah Rophe (The Lord Who Heals) in response to the prayers of those who interceded for me.
Tell those workers to be more careful where they leave their tools! 🙂
As you pray, I have a request. My son-in-law lost his job unexpectedly. Please pray that he finds new employment soon.
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guest,
Are we talking about his Op-ed on President Clinton? This looks like a classic example of projection.
“Criticism and Judgment. A toxic person may excessively criticize and judge others to cover up feelings of inadequacy. By projecting their self-doubt onto someone else, they create a smokescreen that hides and distracts from their shortcomings.”
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guest,
The J&C archive is behind a paywall.
Can you or anybody give us a summary?
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Which makes it VERY easy for fakes to get inside the perimeter.
And once inside…
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Magical Thinking and Child-like Faith IS incredibly self-centered.
You’re supposed to grow out of that self-centeredness as you grow up, but a Gospel of Personal Salvation and Only Personal Salvation is also incredibly self-centered and can arrest your development.
Another sign of arrested development is “toddler-level morality”, i.e. Avoid Punishment and nothing else.
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Though not a drinking man myself, I used to collect recopies for Drinks to Serve to People you Don’t Like.
In the aftermath of Jonestown, there actually was an Improbable Drink recipe called Guyana Punch; Kool-Aid made with vodka (or Everclear) instead of water and flavored with a couple shots of almond bitters.
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Headless Unicorn Guy,
President Clinton’s
approval reflects our
own bad behavior
President Clinton’s job is not in
peril. In fact, his job approval rat-
ing is as high as it has ever been
during his term in office, jumping
from 58 percent to 69 percent in al-
most every national poll after the
Monica Lewinsky charges sur-
faced.
Let that sink in for a minute.
Politicians, pollsters and psy-
chologists are scurrying for an-
swers. Why has he become more
popular, admired and supported af-
ter allegations of cheating on the
fort la the ubridanonestinica
Several answers have been given.
Some experts have offered that
it is an example of a nation rally-
ing around a man who has been
unjustly targeted by “right-wing”
factions with false allegations. But
this explanation rings hollow when
every major poll shows that, in
ual relationship with Ms. Lewin-
sky. We also believe that there
have been other women sexually
involved in his life, and, indeed, he
has admitted to at least one extra-
marital affair.
So what gives?
in Snee ora th hevdene red tton:
first presidential campaign, “It’s
the economy stupid.” In other
words, as long as it doesn’t affect
our wallets, we will overlook presi-
dental indiscretions.
But this is not a jaded view of
the American public, it doesn’t re-
flect history. President Nixon be-
gan losing support during the Wa-
tergate scandal while the economy
was holding strong. President Rea-
gan’s job-approval rating plummet-
ed from 63 percent to 47 percent
when news of the Iran-Contra deal
became public. This was during an
American boom.
So what gives?
I’m not a political or social ex-
pert, but I do think the obvious an-
swer has been overlooked for obvi-
ous reasons. It has always been
true of the human nature that we
are most likely to overlook and for-
give the vices in others that we are
practicing in our own lives.
Let that sink in for a minute.
We don’t talk about it, but we do
it. We rent the R- and X-rated
movies. We buy the pornographic
magazines. We have extramarital
affairs. All the while, our children
are being raised listening to sexu-
ally explicit music and watching
“soft-porn” MTV.
So an overwhelming majority of
Americans are willing to not only
overlook our president’s sexual for-
ays, but to support him more vigor-
ously. After all, we wouldn’t want
our own sexual lives to come under
similar scrutinv. The obvious rea-
son for overlooking this obvious an-
swer is because, like the vice itself,
we don’t want to admit or talk
about such things.
So with a half-smile, and a wink,
we cast a supportive vote for Presi-
dent Clinton. To not do so would be –
to cast a negative vote on the sexu-
al impurity in our own lives. And
that’s something we would rather
not face.
Don Logan
Frankfort
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HUG,
Of course the difference between Jim Jones and TFG is that TFG would charge for the Kool-Aid (and his followers happily chug away).
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Enabled by a touch of charisma, a gift of gab, and a working knowledge of the Bible, they are in pulpits across America. We read about them daily on TWW. It’s tough for the average churchgoer to detect the counterfeit.
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The more I sit here and think about it, those parents at Eternal Church need to be talking with their kids…anyone that was under the age of 18 in the last 10 years. They need to really question those children as to whether or not, he did anything inappropriate around them. Even if it was just remarks he made because, let’s be honest, those remarks are him preparing something more. Or even talk to the young women in their 20s. His attraction is for females much younger than him and 20s would fit that category as well. Being a married man, that’s just as inappropriate.
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Headless Unicorn Guy,
Basically while in jail (before prison) he wrote an opinion article saying no one cared about Bill Clinton/Monica Lewinsky scandal because of sexual sin in their own lives.
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Headless Unicorn Guy,
“a Gospel of Personal Salvation and Only Personal Salvation is also incredibly self-centered and can arrest your development.”
++++++++++++++
i observe christians caring more about being ‘biblical’ and theologically right than they care about their fellow human being.
i observe christians prioritizing their own sinlessness & pleasing God over and above how the impact of their theology destroys others (not them).
principle over people. (often meaningless, weird, boring and dumb principle)
i just can’t abide it.
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Prayed yesterday, today, and will keep praying until further notice. God bless. Praying your son-in-law will hear God’s voice, see God’s guidance and follow God’s lead with humility and courage. God always has a plan for his people.
Deuteronomy 31.8 God goes before you. He will be with you. He will never leave you nor abandon you. Do not fear. Do not worry.
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Ava Aaronson,
Thank you, Ava. It is comforting to know that you are praying.
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Just like the Communists of the last century.
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Sounds like another example of Christsianese tunnel vision on Pelvic Issues — the OTHER guys’ Pelvic Issues.
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I just found an article that shows Don Logan on staff at Grace Community Church in Noblesville, IN at the time of his wedding in April, 2001. He was “Senior Director of Connecting.” But his probation required that any employment be approved by his probation officer and the court. I see no such approval in the court documents. He was released from probation in April 2002.
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Wow. It looks like the various churches were Logan worked simply did not care to do their homework or fell for him hook, line, and sinker. And if they discovered his record, they allowed him to walk away, kicking the can down the road (Not my problem anymore).
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“Indiana Probation Violation Consequences
Indiana Code 35-38-2-3(h) explicitly states that if a person has been found to have violated a condition of their probation at any time before termination of the period, and the petition to revoke is filed within the probationary period, the court may impose one or more of the following Indiana probation violation consequences:
Continue the person on probation, with or without modifying or enlarging the conditions
Extend the person’s probationary period for not more than one year beyond the original probationary period
Order execution of all or part of the sentence that was suspended at the time of initial sentencing.”
I think that if Logan violated his parole by working at a church, he would have gone back to prison.
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Dale Rudiger,
Where was this article? Could you post the link please?
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Marriage announcement, August 13, 2001. The Sentinel, Carlisle, PA. Page 25.
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I posted it on my Facebook page.
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I also have contacted the lead pastor at the time, Dave Rodriguez. He officiated at their wedding. I asked him about how he got back in ministry and if the church was following the probation guidelines that any contact with minors must be supervised by an adult who knows of the conviction. I have yet to hear back.
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Elastigirl, your post reminded me of something the famous pastor Aiden W Tozier’s wife said.
After Aiden Tozier passed away, his wife re-married to a man named Leonard.
She later stated: “Aiden loved Jesus, but Leonard loves me.”
Was Tozier so focused on studying Scripture and building his ministry that he neglected to care for his own wife?
Truly the above quote is heartbreaking.
Tozier is remembered as a renowned pastor and theologian, but it seems that he failed to show his own wife that he loved her.
I keep his wife’s quote in my mind, to remind myself always to focus on the Big Picture of Jesus’ Will, rather than worrying about the minutia of Scripture. Jesus prefers that we follow the Big Picture of His Teachings, rather than becoming pedantic Scripture experts.
I keep that quote “Aiden loves Jesus, but Leonard loves me” in my mind, so that I remember what really matters.
Of course we should love Jesus, but if we love Jesus, we show Him Love by emulating Jesus and following His Teachings, following the Big Picture, by loving and caring about others, especially the most vulnerable such as children.
When we stand before God to be judged, Jesus will want to know whether we loved, cared for, showed compassion and helped others.
Jesus isn’t going to be standing at the gates of Heaven giving people a pop quiz on Scriptural knowledge.
As Jesus taught His disciples, being a kind-hearted and caring and loving and generous person is far more important than being an expert on Scripture.
The pharisees were experts on Scripture, and Jesus condemned them.
In my opinion, a lot of modern Christians have become pharisaical and legalistic (often without even realizing it). As you pointed out, there is a tendency in modern Christianity to prioritize being “biblically” correct and to become bogged down in following every single thing the Bible says, instead of focusing on the big picture of following Jesus’ Teachings.
For example, many churches (especially the Neo-Calvinist variety) are very meticulous about following everything that the Bible says. So meticulous in fact, that every sentence of their church constitution is footnoted with Biblical citations. The church wants to show everyone how meticulous they are in crafting a constitution that is based on Scripture. They also want to show everyone how well-versed in Scripture their leaders who wrote the church constitution are.
They are extremely meticulous when it comes to finding a passage from Scripture to support everything they do. You get the sense that they can hardly make a cup of coffee without needing to quote a verse from the Bible to support it.
But these churches are often so narrowly focused on following to the letter what it says in the Bible, that they miss the Big Picture of what Jesus taught and the Big Picture of the example that Jesus set for us.
Churches that pompously quote Paul to forbid women from reading Bible verses out loud in church, are often the same churches that tolerate and cover up horrific crimes against women and children.
The same churches that have conniptions at the idea of a female pastor, often think nothing of brushing under the rug serious crimes committed by male members.
These churches have become so legalistic and rigid that following Scripture and being able to recite Scripture to justify everything they do, has essentially become an idol to them.
What Jesus says in Matthew 15:8 completely applies to these modern pharisee churches, which sanctimoniously cite a Bible verse for every sentence in their constitution, while committing spiritual abuse, covering up child abuse, pressuring abused women to stay with evil husbands, and all sorts of other horrific things that Jesus would NEVER endorse.
To use Jesus’ Words from Matthew 15:8, these sanctimonious legalistic hypocritical modern pharisees honor God with their lips, but their hearts are far from God.
Of course, Jesus Himself taught AGAINST the practice of being so focused on the law that we ignore the Big Picture of how God wants us to behave.
Time and time again, Jesus reminded His Disciples that being kind and caring and loving and compassionate is much, much more important than following the letter of the law.
Jesus healed on the Sabbath. He hung out with sinners. He ate without washing his hands.
Jesus taught His disciples to focus on the Big Picture, rather than worrying about following the rigid rules and constraints of the law.
I hope the above post is halfway comprehensible. I haven’t slept for 29 hours, so if anything in this post doesn’t make sense, or if there are grammatical/spelling errors, I apologize.
Below I have pasted Matthew 15:1-16. The things Jesus says in that passage are just as appropriate to the legalistic, overbearing, authoritarian and hypocritical “Christian” leaders of today.
Matthew 15:1-16:
“That Which Defiles
15 Then some Pharisees and teachers of the law came to Jesus from Jerusalem and asked, 2 “Why do your disciples break the tradition of the elders? They don’t wash their hands before they eat!”
3 Jesus replied, “And why do you break the command of God for the sake of your tradition? 4 For God said, ‘Honor your father and mother’[a] and ‘Anyone who curses their father or mother is to be put to death.’[b] 5 But you say that if anyone declares that what might have been used to help their father or mother is ‘devoted to God,’ 6 they are not to ‘honor their father or mother’ with it. Thus you nullify the word of God for the sake of your tradition. 7 You hypocrites! Isaiah was right when he prophesied about you:
8 “‘These people honor me with their lips,
but their hearts are far from me.
9 They worship me in vain;
their teachings are merely human rules.’[c]”
10 Jesus called the crowd to him and said, “Listen and understand. 11 What goes into someone’s mouth does not defile them, but what comes out of their mouth, that is what defiles them.”
12 Then the disciples came to him and asked, “Do you know that the Pharisees were offended when they heard this?”
13 He replied, “Every plant that my heavenly Father has not planted will be pulled up by the roots. 14 Leave them; they are blind guides.[d] If the blind lead the blind, both will fall into a pit.”
15 Peter said, “Explain the parable to us.”
16 “Are you still so dull?” Jesus asked them. 17 “Don’t you see that whatever enters the mouth goes into the stomach and then out of the body? 18 But the things that come out of a person’s mouth come from the heart, and these defile them. 19 For out of the heart come evil thoughts—murder, adultery, sexual immorality, theft, false testimony, slander. 20 These are what defile a person; but eating with unwashed hands does not defile them.””
-Matthew 15:1-16
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I just looked back at the summary of the case on the Indiana website. There was a letter from Grace Community Church in August, 2001, so apparently they made the court aware of the hiring. It was not in the case file I obtained.
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Praying….
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Religion, any religion can strip you of your humanity if you let it.
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researcher,
Thanks Researcher. I sincerely appreciate your prayers.
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The above quote reminds me of so many things:
“Only one life, and that is past; Only what’s done for Christ will last” — That only God and what is of God is the only thing that’s important, not you, your life, and those around you.
i.e. “If God is of Supreme Importance, nothing else can be allowed to have ANY Importance.”
A phone-in to Rich Buhler’s radio talk show in the Eighties, where the caller was having serious problems trying to set priorities in her(?) life. Her list had started out with “JESUS” at the top and ended up with “JESUS”, “JESUS”, “JESUS”, “JESUS” all the way down and she(?) was going crazy — “WHAT DO I DO?”.
Rich’s answer was that “Jesus is not at the top of the list; Jesus is the reason for the list.”
And a CCM romantic song I heard in the Eighties (female vocalist, don’t know who, with a country/western beat) assuring the love of her life that
“You’ll always be Number Two —
Because JESUS is Number One in my life,
So second place will have to do;
I’m looking to be spending all of my life
In love with the two of you!”
(First time I heard it, it brought back bad memories of High School Hell, my first taste of being a complete loser in the dating game (courtesy of Hypergamy towards the Football Quarterback Alpha Males). Reinforced by “What I’m Like” and “What I’m Looking For” on Chritian dating service profiles (with Jesus instead of the Varsity Quarterback). And just last week I came across a comment to a YouTube video that said it all in two sentences: “Experienced divorce lawyer here. If you are not her First Choice, Do Not Marry Her.”)
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Look at the Taliban and their total dedication to their Scriptures.
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Long long ago in a downtown Los Angeles far far away, there was a Church of the Open Door with a large “JESUS SAVES” rooftop sign visible all over downtown.
The pre-Internet Meme that went with it was “JESUS SAVES – MOSES INVESTS”.
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Yesterday, 7/21/24, Eternal elder, Steve Park, read an apology statement that made NO mention of Logan’s victims. None. Zero.
This lack of acknowledgment, grief, or heartbreak over the lifelong trauma caused by Logan indicates a total disregard for and ongoing minimization of the severity of his criminal sexual abuse and sends a very clear message to anyone who experienced SA in their past that this church doesn’t care about them and is not safe. Instead, this church leadership only shows concern for the perpetrator of SA.
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Yes. They “have a plan in place” to assure the healing and well being of the sex offender felon, who is welcome to stay on as a member. They have no plans in place to hold the “pastor-pretender” to account for lying. They have no plans in place to be accountable via a qualified third party investigation. They have no plans in place to repent for their treatment of the whistleblower. They actually believe there was only one victim, the 14 year old SA victim.
Indeed, they have multiplied the number of victims. Every member or attender who has suffered abuse in the past has been re-victimized. Every faithful contributing member of the congregation has been victimized by Pastor Don and other leaders.
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Yeah, they’ve already scheduled his Standing Ovation!
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Today, Pastor Jacob Collins told the congregation that if they left the church family they were being hard hearted and unbiblical. Wow. The spiritual abuse and manipulative continues even after Don Logan is gone.