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“If you have integrity, nothing else matters. If you don’t have integrity, nothing else matters.”  Alan K. Simpson

I have been hopeful that the SBC, as well as other denominations and churches, are getting the problem of sexual abuse in the church. The SBC has deeply disappointed me, time and time again, and that has led me to find a home in the Lutheran (LCMS) church. Matt Queen’s story is the same old, same old. I don’t expect anything different from the denomination leaders.

Matt Queen started as a “favored son” of the SBC.

Benjamin Cole wrote an excellent post: Matt Queen, we hardly knew ye.

Paige Patterson mentored Matt Queen, and I wonder if that foreshadowed what happened to this favored one, given Patterson’s checkered past in dealing with the victims of sexual and domestic abuse.

Matt Queen, on the other hand, finished his master of divinity degree and Ph.D. work at Southeastern Seminary and accepted an appointment as a professor of evangelism in Fort Worth under his mentor, patron and then-president Paige Patterson.

…In 2018, when Patterson was fired and a number of administrative changes were made, Queen stayed on at Southwestern. By October 2022, he was named the seminary’s interim provost under appointment by Patterson’s replacement, once-removed, and the school’s current president, David Dockery. That appointment took effect in January 2023.

So what happened? Heath Woolman, Chief of Staff, told Matt Queen and Terri Stoval (a female professor who brought the case to their attention) to make the report of a sexual assault on campus “go away.”

Back to the BNG post

Within three short weeks of Dockery’s announcement, the seminary’s long-tenured female professor, Terri Stovall, brought to campus police a student report of sexual assault. Incidentally, the campus police chief at the time, Kevin Collins, previously held the same job under R. Albert Mohler Jr., at Southern Seminary in Louisville, Ky. What Collins did with the report is uncertain, but we now know it took nearly three months for an arrest to happen. That delay, coupled with the entire chronology of events, has abuse survivors, seminary leaders and reporters still scratching their heads.

Yet according to reports by seminary officials, a hurried meeting about the arrest was convened by then-Chief of Staff Heath Woolman, who along with Stovall and Queen huddled after chapel in the final week of January 2023. At that meeting, Stovall alleges and now Queen confirms, Woolman told the group to make the matter “go away.”

What did he do? It appears he lied about a reported sexual abuse situation after being asked to produce all relevant documents.

The Christian Post wrote Pastor Matthew Queen charged with obstructing DOJ, FBI investigation of SBC.

“As alleged, Matthew Queen attempted to interfere with a federal grand jury investigation by creating false notes in an attempt to corroborate his own lies,” said U.S. Attorney for the Southern District of New York Damian Williams in a statement Tuesday.

…In October 2022, the Justice Department issued a grand jury subpoena to the seminary, requiring the production of all documents in the seminary’s possession related to allegations of sexual abuse against anyone employed by or associated with the seminary, among other things.

In November 2022, the DOJ noted that a seminary employee identified as Employee-1, received a report alleging that a current seminary student committed sexual abuse. The employee notified campus police and no further action was taken. The allegation was not reported to the U.S. Attorney’s Office

…Employee-1 reportedly documented the allegation in January 2023, along with the seminary’s failed response.

…On Jan. 26, 2023, Employee-1 then met with Queen and another executive staff member of the seminary identified as Employee-2, prosecutors say.

“During that meeting, and in QUEEN’s presence, Employee-2 directed Employee-1, in sum and substance, to destroy the document,” the Justice Department’s statement contends.

In May 2023, the U.S. Attorney’s Office and the FBI interviewed Queen, who “falsely stated that he had not heard Employee-2 direct Employee-1 to destroy the document.”

He then appeared to falsify a document after the FBI interview and then denied he ever heard

According to the Christian Post:

Three days after his interview with investigators, Queen told another seminary employee, identified as Employee-3, that he found a notebook in his office with contemporaneous notes of the Jan. 26, 2023, meeting.

…Three days after his interview with investigators, Queen told another seminary employee, identified as Employee-3, that he found a notebook in his office with contemporaneous notes of the Jan. 26, 2023, meeting.

…The notes falsely stated that during the January 26, 2023, meeting, Employee-2, and Employee-1 merely discussed providing the Document to a different department at the Seminary and omitted the fact that Employee-2 had directed Employee-1 to destroy the Document

Queen, who first pled “not guilty,” changed his mind and pled guilty.

Things did not go well for Queen, who first pled “not guilty” while claiming his integrity. This is when I got mad.

According to the Christian Post in Pastor, former SBC seminary prof. charged in DOJ investigation says he is ‘not guilty.’

 …Matthew Queen says he is not guilty as he faces one count of records falsification.

“I fully cooperated with this investigation and have pleaded not guilty to the charge against me. As a Christian, a (former) seminary professor, and now a pastor, my integrity is everything to me and I will cling to that integrity and seek to be vindicated by God and man,” Queen, 49, said in a statement to The Tennessean.

Then he changed his mind and proved his integrity doesn’t mean squat.

Bob Smietana wrote that Matt Queen, SBC Pastor And Former Seminary Professor, Pleads Guilty to Lying to FBI.

On or about June 21, 2023, MATTHEW QUEEN, the defendant, testified under oath that on January 26, 2023, he had in fact heard Employee-2 instruct Employee-I to make the Document ‘go away,’” according to a court filing.

On Wednesday, the U.S. attorney for the Southern District of New York filed court documents charging Queen with falsification of records and providing false information to law enforcement. Queen changed his plea as part of an arrangement with federal officials.

“I understand that if my plea is accepted, my sentencing will take place before the United States District Judge who is assigned, or who is to be assigned,” Queen said in a court filing.

Queen has been removed from his seminary position and has become a pastor of Friendly Avenue Baptist Church, which is 1 1/2 hours away from me.

Queen was quietly removed from his interim appointment as provost within days of his grand jury appearance. He had his teaching load cancelled. Yet he remained on the seminary’s website as a professor of evangelism until early 2024. Whether he stayed on the seminary payroll that entire time is not a matter of public record.

In February 2024, Queen accepted the pastorate of Friendly Avenue Baptist Church in Greensboro, N.C., a position he held for a few months leading up to his indictment in a United States District Court.

Queen is still the pastor of Friendly Avenue Baptist Church despite the indictment.

Wut?? I would advise all victims of sexual abuse to avoid this church since we know the “integrity” of Pastor Queen. The Christian Post wrote Despite pleading guilty to felony, Pastor Matthew Queen hasn’t resigned, church reveals.

The revelation was made Sunday near the end of the church’s service by chairman of the deacon board, Darin Humbard.

…“Dr. Matthew Queen appeared in court … and admitted to committing a serious crime by pleading guilty to a felony charge of making false statement to the government. Sentencing is scheduled for February 2025, though this date may be subject to change,” Humbard said.

“We stand firmly against any behavior that undermines trust and integrity. Dr Queen remains on administrative leave and will not attend worship service as our leadership assesses his status and relationship with Friendly Avenue Baptist Church,” he added.

Curiously, today (10/25/24), the church website does not list any staff, which is standard on all church websites. So, Queen appears to be hanging on to his pastorate. He probably needs the money.

Two final thoughts

Terri Stovall is the hero in this story.

From Baptist News Global:

Stunned by what she’d heard and scrupulously determined to abide by the seminary’s written policies and comply with a federal subpoena, Stovall made contemporaneous notes and provided them to seminary leaders. In early February, wanting to get to the bottom of things, Dockery brought in all affected and involved seminary employees for a fact-finding meeting. What happened in that meeting is a matter of legally privileged and confidential employment records.

For her part, Stovall maintains throughout it all that she’d heard the order to destroy evidence, sought to inform her supervisors as required by seminary policy, and refuted persistent accusations by Woolman, Queen and others that she was either misremembering events or outright lying. All the while, Queen and Woolman continued serving under Dockery’s appointment.

The SBC Executive Committee has to sell its office building due to legal expenses: They deserve this sting.

From Bob Smietana in The Rioys Report: The SBC Will Sell Nashville Headquarters to Defray Abuse-Related Legal Costs.

The Executive Committee’s building, at 901 Commerce St. in downtown Nashville, was originally built for $8 million in the 1980s, on land donated by Lifeway, the SBC’s publishing arm, according to Baptist Press, an official SBC publication. The property also houses the SBC’s Ethics and Religious Liberty Commission and a library and historical archive. The building was appraised for $31.7 million in 2021, according to The Tennessean newspaper.

I don’t believe that the SBC will do anything to prevent sex abuse or the coverup of sex abuse. Caveat Emptor.