The Black Collar Crime Series relies on public news stories and publicly available information for its content. If any incorrect information is found, please contact Bruce Gerencser. Nothing in this post should be construed as an accusation of guilt. Those accused of crimes are innocent until proven guilty.
Several female members of Kitty Hawk United Methodist Church in Kitty Hawk, North Carolina, have accused their pastor, Jonathan Mills, of sexually harassing them.
The North Carolina Conference of the United Methodist Church has confirmed that four women have made sexual harassment complaints about Pastor Jonathan Mills of Kitty Hawk Methodist.
Conference communications director Derek Leek says Pastor Mills is suspended for up to 90 days as part of the complaint process, effective December 19.
Kitty Hawk police say no one has filed any criminal complaints against Mills.
Mills has been pastor at Kitty Hawk United Methodist since July of 2016.
It’s unclear how many of the women who have complained are Kitty Hawk Methodist members, but Leek says he believes they do attend church there.
Church officials say the Bishop’s office in Raleigh is handling the investigation of the claims of sexual harassment, and is working toward “a just resolution with healing and accountability.”
Leek says they are currently trying to determine the nature of the alleged behavior and whether the allegations can be substantiated.
When we tried to reach Reverend Mills by his church email and phone to get his response to the claims, we got this response instead from the North Carolina Conference:
“Due to the complaint process, Reverend Mills is not allowed to talk to anyone at this time. This creates a time of safety for the complainants, for Reverend Mills and the church.”
The Black Collar Crime Series relies on public news stories and publicly available information for its content. If any incorrect information is found, please contact Bruce Gerencser. Nothing in this post should be construed as an accusation of guilt. Those accused of crimes are innocent until proven guilty.
Heather Cook, the associate pastor at College Church of Seventh-day Adventists in Lancaster, Massachusetts, has been accused by parents of skinny dipping with their children while on a church camping trip. The fallout from the nude bathing resulted in conflict between Cook and church member Randall Gifford, leading to Cook requesting a restraining order against Gifford.
An incident of outdoor nude bathing during a camping trip between chaperones and students from religious private school and church may have actually been skinny dipping between a pastor and students.
A state Department of Children and Families investigation launched earlier this year after a concerned parent reported the incident to the principal of South Lancaster Academy, a Seventh-day Adventist school in Lancaster, MassLive reported earlier this month.
Fallout from the incident led to Heather Cook, the associate pastor at the College Church of Seventh-day Adventists in Lancaster, seeking a restraining order against a congregation member after that member spoke to her about the apparent skinny dipping incident.
Cook allegedly took off her clothes and went into a public body of water in Maine with the female students, some of whom were minors, during an annual “senior survival” trip held by South Lancaster Academy.
“There was a field trip involved with minor children where the pastor disrobed and went skinny dipping with them,” attorney Danielle Thomason, counsel for Randall Gifford, the congregation member, said at Clinton District Court on Tuesday. “Parents were outraged. Some parents weren’t, some parents were.”
The hearing was the first time the incident at the senior survival trip was publicly referred to as skinny dipping.
“She has been accused of inappropriate sexual misconduct with students at the school on a trip in Maine,” Thomason said, according to audio of the hearing.
The Southern New England Conference, which oversees South Lancaster Academy as well as other schools and churches in the area, stated earlier this month that there was a “nude bathing” incident on the trip.
Cook filed an affidavit asking for a restraining order against Gifford, a longtime member of the congregation.
In her affidavit, Cook wrote that Gifford met with her and two other parties on Nov. 27 to “reconcile perceived misunderstandings.” However, Cook claimed that Gifford then threatened her.
“During the course of the meeting, Randy stated he was the most powerful man in town and could ‘make me disappear,'” Cook wrote. “He also claimed connections to the government and said he ‘would be watching me in ways I couldn’t imagine.’ He also stated he could destroy me and take everything I had.”
….
An investigation into the incident by DCF has been completed. Findings by the agency are not public.
“Your honor, there has been an investigation, which is now closed,” Cook told the judge. “It went to the DA’s office in Maine and all criminal charges were dropped. There was absolutely nothing found.
“The DCF investigation is also closed,” she added. “This is purely a harassment order. This has nothing to do with what happened in Maine.”
The Maine trip took place in September. A parent reported concerns about the trip to South Lancaster Academy Principal Jeffrey Lambert in October.
While Cook acknowledged that something did happen in Maine, she did not use the term “skinny dipping” or make any specific statements about the incident during her testimony.
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Two chaperones went on the trip in Maine. The conference identified one as a female church employee, who was placed on paid administrative leave and asked not to participate in any church activities. That leave was later lifted.
The other chaperone was just identified as a female chaperone.
Both chaperones have stated the nude bathing was for hygienic reasons, a letter previously released by Lambert read.
….
Senior Pastor Luis Garcia, who was with Cook and Gifford during the Nov. 27 meeting, was called to testify regarding the restraining order.
In recounting the meeting in which Cook claims Gifford threatened her, Garcia said Cook became emotional at one point in the meeting.
“Tears were even shed as Mrs. Cook was expressing how terrible she felt about the whole situation with the camping trip in Maine,” Garcia testified.
He told the court that the meeting was civil and seemed like it was leading to a resolution.
Thomason asked Garcia if he meant that Cook “felt awful about the incident in Maine.”
“No,” he said, clarifying that she “felt awful about how everything has developed and transpired since then.”
Garcia said that some church members have asked him about the trip in Maine, but he could not disclose details of those conversations because they were confidential exchanges with a pastor.
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Thomason also brought up some nude photos that Cook reportedly “liked” using her Instagram account, saying that Gifford felt it was inappropriate for girls in the congregation to see that material through Cook and the social media platform.
“Everything that’s going on here again surrounds the controversy with what some feel is inappropriate behavior of the youth pastor and this is what my client has stated,” Thomason said. She told the judge that there were two parents in the courtroom whose children were “deeply affected by the stripping in Maine.”
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Earlier this month, a teacher was placed on paid administrative leave from South Lancaster Academy after multiple former students contacted the principal alleging inappropriate behavior by the teacher during their time as students.
Scott Fellows will remain on leave until Worcester County District Attorney’s office investigates further and decides on a legal course of action, Dennis, of the Southern New England Conference, wrote in a letter dated Dec. 20.
Fellows, the chairman of the school’s English department, also went on the senior survival trip in Maine.
“In regard to Scott Fellows, our initial review of allegations did not reveal any connection to Senior Survival,” Dennis said Friday. “The police and District Attorney are conducting the investigation and we await their report.”
….. Heather is an associate pastor at the Atlantic Union College Church in South Lancaster, Massachusetts. She has spent seven years in ministry, two as the youth pastor at the Connecticut Valley Church, two as an ethics and religion teacher at Hong Kong Adventist College, and three in her present position. Heather holds a BA in theology from Southern Adventist University in Collegedale, Tennessee. She says, “I love people, creating, travel, running, pushing myself, and my babies.” Married to Dustan Cook, physical education teacher at South Lancaster Academy, Heather has twin girls …. **** and ****.
Cardinal Bernard Law died on Wednesday at the age of eighty-six. At the very moment Law breathed his last breath, I believe I heard countless Catholic sex abuse victims and their relatives say, with one voice, good riddance. May you rot in hell. Alas, as this story will show, Law not only escaped hell, it is likely he escaped purgatory too.
Law was Archbishop emeritus of Boston and an American cardinal of the Roman Catholic Church. Law is best known for having extensive knowledge of sex abuse perpetrated by priests and doing nothing about it. Worse yet, Law often moved sexual predators to new parishes where they continued to rape and assault children in the name of God. According to Wikipedia:
One priest alone was alleged to have raped or molested 130 children over decades, while Law and other local officials moved him among churches rather than going to the authorities.
Law resigned as Archbishop of Boston in 2002, only to be appointed two years later by pedophile-sympathetic Pope John Paul II to a cushy position as Archpriest of the Basilica di Santa Maria Maggiore in Rome.
At no time did Law admit that his behavior was sinful or criminal. In a statement made after his resignation, Law asked for prayer and forgiveness, acknowledging that he had shortcomings and made mistakes. Shortcomings and mistakes? How about owning destroying the lives of hundreds and hundreds of Catholic children and their families? How about telling the Pope you that can no longer in good conscience be a priest, and that you intend to spend the remaining days of your life atoning for your support of men who raped and molested their way through numerous Catholic parishes?
Pope Francis is generally considered a great guy, a man who understands the people and sincerely desires to help the poor and afflicted. Pope Francis damaged his good-guy reputation this week by allowing Law to have a funeral befitting a Cardinal in St. Peter’s Basilica. Nothing was said about Law’s abhorrent behavior and his complicity in decades of criminal sexual abuse. Instead, Law’s many “good” deeds were memorialized, reminding anyone who was paying attention that Pope Francis and the Catholic Church still don’t get it when it comes to sexual abuse. Even the choice of Italian Cardinal Angelo Sodano to conduct Law’s funeral Mass reeks of stupefying indifference towards victims of sexual abuse. Sodano, according to John Allen, Jr, writing for The Crux:
Sodano . . . has a checkered history when it comes to the Church’s abuse scandals. Among other things, Sodano was a principal patron of the late Mexican Father Marcial Maciel Degollado, founder of the Legion of Christ, whose own pattern of sexual abuse and misconduct was eventually acknowledged by his own order after a Vatican finding of guilt.
Emma Green of The Atlantic says it best when she writes:
Even in death, he [Law] was given a ceremonious exit: a funeral mass at St. Peter’s Basilica, attended by a coterie of cardinals and complete with a blessing from Pope Francis. The Church has taken steps to move past its legacy of clergy sex abuse over the last decade, but it still betrays moments of ambivalence like this, caught between the moral imperative to eliminate abuse and its reticence about sacrificing decorum or showing disloyalty to powerful clerics.
Moments of ambivalence indeed — a poignant reminder that Pope Francis and the Church still, to this day, do not understand how the massive Catholic sex abuse scandal is viewed by the public, nor, it seems, do they understand how memorializing a pedophile enabler such as Law rips open the psychological scars of countless sex abuse victims.
Here’s what Pope Francis should have done. Standing before the world, the Pope should have, one last time, exposed Law’s behavior, asking his victims to forgive the Church for its crass indifference towards their plight; and, in a gesture of contrition, ordered Law’s body to be buried among the heathen. In doing so, Pope Francis would be saying to pedophile priests and their enablers that sexual abuse is a mortal sin worthy of banishment on this side of the grave and hell on the other.
Jesus said in Mathew 18:5,6:
And whoso shall receive one such little child in my name receiveth me. But whoso shall offend one of these little ones which believe in me, it were better for him that a millstone were hanged about his neck, and that he were drowned in the depth of the sea.
Instead of a millstone around his neck, Law received the praise and blessings of the Pope and his fellow Cardinals. In giving Law such magnanimous send-off, these “godly” men, once again, showed that when it comes to sexual abuse they simply don’t get it.
About Bruce Gerencser
Bruce Gerencser, 60, lives in rural Northwest Ohio with his wife of 39 years. He and his wife have six grown children and eleven grandchildren. Bruce pastored Evangelical churches for twenty-five years in Ohio, Texas, and Michigan. Bruce left the ministry in 2005, and in 2008 he left Christianity. Bruce is now a humanist and an atheist. For more information about Bruce, please read the About page.
Bruce is a local photography business owner, operating Defiance County Photo out of his home. If you live in Northwest Ohio and would like to hire Bruce, please email him.
Thank you for reading this post. Please share your thoughts in the comment section. If you are a first-time commenter, please read the commenting policy before wowing readers with your words. All first-time comments are moderated. If you would like to contact Bruce directly, please use the contact form to do so.
Donations are always appreciated. Donations on a monthly basis can be made through Patreon. One-time donations can be made through PayPal.
The Black Collar Crime Series relies on public news stories and publicly available information for its content. If any incorrect information is found, please contact Bruce Gerencser. Nothing in this post should be construed as an accusation of guilt. Those accused of crimes are innocent until proven guilty.
A group of Catholic sex abuse victims and their survivors are suing the bankrupt Diocese of Great Falls-Billings in Montana for $70 million.
Representatives of sex abuse victims and their survivors are suing a bankrupt Roman Catholic diocese in Montana in an effort to ensure more than $70 million in assets are available for those abused by church officials.
The Diocese of Great Falls-Billings entered bankruptcy protection in March as part of settlements involving more than 400 people in sex abuse lawsuits. Church officials said at the time the diocese and its insurers would contribute to a fund to compensate victims and set aside additional money for those who had yet to come forward.
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A committee of unsecured creditors representing eight sex abuse survivors sued the diocese in U.S. Bankruptcy Court this week, aiming to reach a negotiated settlement. California attorney James Stang, who represents the committee, said the complaint was “part of the process,” the Billings Gazette reported.
U.S. Catholic leaders have been grappling with a clergy sexual abuse crisis that exploded in 2002 following reporting by The Boston Globe. Nationwide, the church has paid several billion dollars in settlements since 1950. More than 6,500 clergy members have been accused of abuse and hundreds have been removed from church work.
In the Montana bankruptcy case, the church says the disputed assets are held in trust for its parishes and therefore unavailable for creditors. The creditors argue the property is part of the church’s estate and should be available for victims.
Stang has represented unsecured creditors in 11 other Catholic church bankruptcies since 2004, including the Diocese of Helena’s bankruptcy. He said every case has resulted in a negotiated resolution.
Bishop Michael Warfel said in a statement that the creditors’ lawsuit was an “unfortunate and unnecessary distraction” to the church’s efforts to resolve victims’ claims.
Two sexual abuse lawsuits were filed against the Diocese of Great Falls-Billings, including one in which a woman in her 60s said she was molested and raped by the Rev. Emmett Hoffman while she was a student at the St. Labre Parish and School between 1955 and 1962. Hoffman died in 2013.
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The Diocese of Helena filed for bankruptcy in early 2014 to settle about 360 claims of abuse and sexual abuse by priests, nuns and lay workers who served in the diocese.
That settlement, negotiated before the bankruptcy filing, created a $21 million fund for victims named in the lawsuit and any others that might come forward.
The Diocese of Great Falls-Billings has a comprehensive Child Protection Policy. I found it to be interesting reading. One can only hope that this policy is strictly enforced.
The Black Collar Crime Series relies on public news stories and publicly available information for its content. If any incorrect information is found, please contact Bruce Gerencser. Nothing in this post should be construed as an accusation of guilt. Those accused of crimes are innocent until proven guilty.
James Csaszar, parish priest at Church of the Resurrection in New Albany, Ohio and former priest at St. Rose of Lima Parish in New Lexington, Ohio, jumped from a Chicago hotel Wednesday, plunging to his death. Csaszar was under investigation for “questionable communications with a minor and possible misuse of church funds.”
A Catholic diocese in Ohio says a parish priest under investigation for “questionable” communications with a minor and possible misuse of church funds killed himself.
The Catholic Diocese of Columbus said in a statement Thursday that the Rev. James Csaszar killed himself Wednesday in Chicago. Csaszar was pastor of Church of the Resurrection in the Columbus suburb of New Albany.
The diocese’s statement says Csaszar was placed on administrative leave last month when officials learned of “excessive and questionable” text and phone communications with a minor and possible misuse of funds while pastor at St. Rose of Lima Parish in New Lexington.
The Ohio Bureau of Criminal Investigation began looking into Csaszar after the diocese learned of the allegations and contacted police in New Lexington, roughly 55 miles (89 kilometers) southeast of Columbus.
The Chicago Tribune adds:
A man who killed himself by jumping off a downtown Chicago hotel on Wednesday was a Catholic priest under investigation in Ohio in connection with “questionable” communications with a minor and misuse of church funds, according to authorities.
A man identified by authorities as James Csaszar was a priest who was pastor of Church of the Resurrection in the Columbus suburb of New Albany, according to a statement from the Catholic Diocese of Columbus. Csaszar, 44, died after suffering multiple injuries after jumping from 221 N. Columbus Drive — the Aqua Hotel — and his death was a suicide, the Cook County medical examiner’s office determined Thursday following an autopsy.
It is with deep shock and sadness that we have learned of the death of Father James Csaszar, pastor of the Church of the Resurrection in New Albany, who took his own life yesterday in Chicago.
On November 7, Father Csaszar was placed on an administrative leave by the Diocese of Columbus after diocesan officials were made aware of excessive and questionable text and telephone communications with a minor and potential misuse of church funds while serving as pastor of St. Rose Parish, New Lexington. Following a diocesan review of the matter, the New Lexington Police were contacted and all information was turned over to them and the Ohio Bureau of Criminal Investigation for their review; an investigation was being conducted at the time of Father Csaszar’s death.
We are reminded throughout sacred scripture that God our Father is loving, merciful, compassionate and forgiving. We also know that in his years of priestly ministry Fr. Csaszar did many good things for the people that he served in his parish assignments. And so we ask that everyone pray for Father Csaszar, his family, friends, and parishioners during this most difficult time.
An April 10, 2018 Channel 10 news report states:
Father James Csaszar, who was a member of the Church of the Resurrection in New Albany, took his life on December 20, 2017. He was 44-years old.
Father Csaszar was under investigation at the time by the New Lexington, Ohio Police Department regarding stolen funds at the St. Rose Parish in New Lexington as well as inappropriate conversations with a minor child.
According to a statement released Wednesday from the Diocese, the investigation into Father Csaszar is concluded and the following was substantiated:
*Inappropriate communication had taken place between the minor child over a period of time.
*The minor stated that while texting conversations with Father Csaszar became “weird” and at times minor felt bullied and blackmailed by him, no inappropriate physical contact had taken place.
*Father Csaszar stated in one text messages that he was in possession of a nude photo of a minor.
According to the letter sent to members of the Church of the Resurrection, Father Csaszar was approached by Reverend Frederick Campbell, Bishop of Columbus about the allegations regarding the minor child.
“He admitted wrongdoing…including possession of a nude photo of a minor that was sent to him by an allegedly unknown person or persons. Father Csazar never reported the photo to the minor’s parents, law enforcement or the Diocese,” according to the Bishop.
After that conversation, the church says they placed Father Csaszar on leave of absence until the police investigation was completed.
The Diocese says it fully cooperated with police.
The investigation also found “financial irregularities” at the Perry County Consortium of the Parishes. It was never determined how much money was missing, according to police.
I am not suggesting that the reality of death isn’t painful, but just because something is painful doesn’t mean it can be avoided, or even that it should be. I believe the promise of eternal life is a coping mechanism, and I don’t like it. Pascal’s famous wager posits that if there is even one chance in a million that God exists, you should bet your life on it, but to me those are terrible odds. Indeed, it may well be that the greatest mistake in this world is to live as if you have endless time…when in fact you don’t.
What would Evangelical Christianity be without the belief that humans are eternal beings that will either dwell in Heaven (God’s Kingdom) or Hell (Lake of Fire)? Evangelicals give up a lot of living in order to earn a room in Heaven’s Trump Tower. I say “earn,” because despite talk of grace, Evangelicals know that gaining a golden ticket requires work and effort on their part. There are sins that must be confessed and forsaken, and Christians who wallow in the cesspool of the “world” likely will end up in Hell with Adolph Hitler, Barack Obama, and Bruce Gerencser. Thus, Evangelicals religiously attend church, pray, read their Bibles, witness, give tithes and offerings, buy Christian literature, listen to Christian radio, watch Christian TV, support Evangelical political candidates, and fight against abortion, homosexuality, and same-sex marriage. These same Evangelicals try their damnedest to follow the sexual mores of the Bible. From the moment they awake in the morning until they fall asleep at night, Evangelicals focus their minds on God, Jesus, the Bible, Christianity, and making sure that the evil agenda of Satan and the Antichrist is defeated. (I am aware of the fact that not all Evangelicals are zealots; that many of them are nominal, in-name-only Christians, but millions of Americans are committed followers of the Evangelical God. It is these people who are the focus of this post.)
Those of us who spent much of our lives living and breathing Evangelical beliefs and practices often find ourselves lamenting the time wasted serving a mythical deity. I was fifty years old before I saw the “light” and divorced myself from Jesus. From the age of fifteen to the age of fifty — thirty-five years — I devoted my life to Jesus and did all I could possibly do to live according to the teachings of the Bible — failing miserably, by the way. None of my six children played sports or enjoyed many of the things “normal” children do because their Dad demanded that they, too, devote their lives to Jesus. My children, for the most part, were either educated in unaccredited private Fundamentalist schools or home schooled. Rarely were they given the opportunity to do something that was not connected to either school or church. My oldest son attended over three thousand church services and heard virtually every sermon I preached. The same could be said for Polly and the rest of my children. We lived and breathed God, the Bible, and the church. To what end? What did we gain from such a life? So much wasted time. Hours, days, and years squandered with no hope of a do-over or a second chance. Lost time is just that — lost. All the weeping and wailing in the world doesn’t change the fact that the time wasted in service of a myth is forever lost.
Ephesians 6:16 says, Redeeming the time, because the days are evil. James 4:14 states, Whereas ye know not what shall be on the morrow. For what is your life? It is even a vapour, that appeareth for a little time, and then vanisheth away. And Proverbs 27:1 says, Boast not thyself of to morrow; for thou knowest not what a day may bring forth. For Evangelicals, these verses are reminders of the brevity of life and the importance of serving God while they have the opportunity. Amos 4:12 speaks of preparing to meet God. Evangelicals believe that this life is preparation for the life to come; that the pain, suffering, heartache, and loss faced in the here and now is meant to keep them from becoming attached to the world. 1 John 2:15-19 states:
Love not the world, neither the things that are in the world. If any man love the world, the love of the Father is not in him. For all that is in the world, the lust of the flesh, and the lust of the eyes, and the pride of life, is not of the Father, but is of the world. And the world passeth away, and the lust thereof: but he that doeth the will of God abideth for ever. Little children, it is the last time: and as ye have heard that antichrist shall come, even now are there many antichrists; whereby we know that it is the last time. They went out from us, but they were not of us; for if they had been of us, they would no doubt have continued with us: but they went out, that they might be made manifest that they were not all of us.
Evangelicals are implored to not love the world with its pride and lusts. Someday, according to the Bible, Jesus is going to return to earth and destroy the heavens and the earth, making all things new. Knowing this to be “true,” Evangelicals forsake the world, knowing that, in the end, they will be glad they did. And for those Christians who love the world and its fleshly desires? Their behaviors reveal that they aren’t True Christians®.
Evangelicals know that life is short. Psalm 90:10 says, The days of our years are threescore years and ten (seventy); and if by reason of strength they be fourscore (eighty) years, yet is their strength labour and sorrow; for it is soon cut off, and we fly away. All too soon, death will come knocking on their doors, thus it is crucial to live life in such a way that when Jesus calls their number he will say to them, well done thou good and faithful servant…enter into the joy of the Lord (Matthew 25:23).
It is too bad that Christians don’t live their lives according to Solomon’s book of wisdom, Ecclesiastes. Solomon reminds people of the brevity of life, and the best any of us can do is eat, drink, and be merry, for tomorrow we die. And therein lies the point of the Bart Campolo quote at the beginning of this post. This life is the only one we will ever have. This is it. No re-dos. No second chances. No reincarnations. No coming back as ghosts or angels. Every breath, every heartbeat brings us one moment closer to death. I am sixty years old. If I live to age seventy, this means my life is six-sevenths gone. If I live to eighty, three-fourths of my life is in the rear-view mirror. I currently take drugs that prolong my life. Without them, I would have already gone up in the smoke of the local crematorium.
There are moments in the night when pain keeps me from sleeping, and I lie in bed listening to the tick-tock of the clock on the nearby nightstand. Tick-tock, tick-tock, two seconds of life is gone. Sixty tick-tocks and a minute is gone. Thirty-six-hundred tick-tocks and another hour of my life is dissipated into the night. Someday, sooner and not later, readers of this blog will be greeted with a post from my wife or one of my children. It will say that on such-and-such a date at such-and-such time, Bruce Gerencser drew his last breath. Cause of death? Life.
Knowing this to be true, I refuse to spend my time chasing ghosts, goblins, and gods. I refuse to offload the present in the hope that I might receive some sort of divine payoff from a mythical deity. Life is meant to be lived in the here and now, with no promise of tomorrow. Yes, it is okay to plan for the future, but not at the expense of enjoying the present. Campolo says belief in eternal life is harmful because it is, above all things, a lie; a lie based solely on some words written in an ancient religious text thousands of years ago. Believing this lie causes people to miss out on all that life has to offer. Believing this lie changes relationship dynamics, pitting believers and unbelievers against each other. If Heaven and Hell are real places, then it stands to reason that Evangelical concern for non-Christian family, friends, and neighbors is warranted. However, there is, based on all we know about the universe, no Heaven or Hell. The only heaven and hell any of us will ever know is that which is lived in this life. That’s why I want, with what little time I have left, to live and raise a little hell, and make earth as heavenly as I possibly can.
Let me conclude this post with the advice I give to new readers on my ABOUT page:
You have one life. There is no heaven or hell. There is no afterlife. You have one life, it’s yours, and what you do with it is what matters most. Love and forgive those who matter to you and ignore those who add nothing to your life. Life is too short to spend time trying to make nice with those who will never make nice with you. Determine who are the people in your life that matter and give your time and devotion to them. Live each and every day to its fullest. You never know when death might come calling. Don’t waste time trying to be a jack of all trades, master of none. Find one or two things you like to do and do them well. Too many people spend way too much time doing things they will never be good at.
Here’s the conclusion of the matter. It’s your life and you best get to living it. Some day, sooner than you think, it will be over. Don’t let your dying days be ones of regret over what might have been.
About Bruce Gerencser
Bruce Gerencser, 60, lives in rural Northwest Ohio with his wife of 39 years. He and his wife have six grown children and eleven grandchildren. Bruce pastored Evangelical churches for twenty-five years in Ohio, Texas, and Michigan. Bruce left the ministry in 2005, and in 2008 he left Christianity. Bruce is now a humanist and an atheist. For more information about Bruce, please read the About page.
Bruce is a local photography business owner, operating Defiance County Photo out of his home. If you live in Northwest Ohio and would like to hire Bruce, please email him.
Thank you for reading this post. Please share your thoughts in the comment section. If you are a first-time commenter, please read the commenting policy before wowing readers with your words. All first-time comments are moderated. If you would like to contact Bruce directly, please use the contact form to do so.
Donations are always appreciated. Donations on a monthly basis can be made through Patreon. One-time donations can be made through PayPal.
The Black Collar Crime Series relies on public news stories and publicly available information for its content. If any incorrect information is found, please contact Bruce Gerencser. Nothing in this post should be construed as an accusation of guilt. Those accused of crimes are innocent until proven guilty.
Six Virginia Mormon families have filed a civil lawsuit against the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (LDS), alleging the church knew “one of their members was abusing children and actively covered up the abuse that continued for years.”
A group of families are suing the LDS church, alleging it covered up child sex abuse by another member in West Virginia.
A total of six families with nine children filed the lawsuit against The Corporation of the First Presidency of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints according to court documents — available at the end of the story.
The families allege LDS leaders knew one of their members was abusing children and actively covered up the abuse that continued for years. The case is scheduled to go to trial in January.
“My church family preached to me about forgiveness — that I needed to forgive him,” Helen said. “How do you forgive something like that?”
The abuse allegedly took place over the course of two months in 2008.
According to documents, in January 2012 the children told their parents what Jensen had done to them five years before.
She didn’t contact law enforcement immediately when she discovered the abuse.
“That is something that does eat at me. It is something that I wish that if I could go back and change, I would have done it differently,” Helen said. “I felt if i couldn’t even get these people that are supposed to have my family’s best interest, why would a jury believe what happened?”
In 2012, the abuser, Michael Jensen, was indicted for abusing other children and she contacted law enforcement. She said one of her sons testified at the trial but the court proceedings were not about his abuse.
According to court documents, Jensen was on trial for abusing two children in 2007. The papers say the boys, 3 and 4-years-old at the time, were forced to perform oral sex on Jensen while he was their babysitter. In 2013 Jensen was sentenced for up to 75 years in prison after he was convicted beyond a reasonable doubt for abusing the two boys.
The appellants’ brief states:
The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day (sic) Saints knew that it had a sex offender in its midst as early as December 2004-January 2005, when Michael Jensen was charged in Provo, Utah, with felony sexual abuse of two girls and pled guilty to two sex offenses in the presence of his parents (who became Church leaders) and a Church bishop in Provo.
Is says that instead of warning others about Jensen, even as his predations began to mount, local church leaders “covered up, minimized and denied” his abuse and “dangerous proclivities; sponsored false explanations when evidence of abuse surfaced; touted him as a trustworthy and exceptional member of the Church community.”
Attorneys in the civil case contend local church leaders discussed the allegations of Jensen’s abuse as early as 2007 and no one reported them to law enforcement. The layers also claim LDS church leaders in Utah knew Jensen was convicted of other sex crimes in Utah in 2004.
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The legal papers state that between April 2007 and August 2012, after moving from Provo, Jensen sexually abused nine children.
Helen said she doesn’t want to forgive, she wants justice.
“And this is the only way I know how to do it,” she said. “The only way for [my son’s] voice to be heard and my voice to be heard and to force them to change their policies so that this doesn’t happen again.”
Religious people often seem to be unhealthily fixated on sex and have a desire to interfere with how everybody else does it! This prompts lots of questions that need answering: Why is virginity so highly prized?
Why is celibacy considered to be ‘pure’?
Why is masturbation considered to be shameful?
Why is homosexuality abhorred?
Why are women treated like second-class citizens?
Why do we have marriage?
Why is infidelity (adultery) unacceptable?
Why is divorce considered to be unacceptable?
What has any of this got to do with ‘god’ and his Earthly agents?
This is going to take more than one article to analyze and there’s little real evidence available to help us answer these questions so, unusually for this blog, what follows will be mostly reasonable speculation. Let’s start with virginity…
There is a very good biological reason to prefer having sex with a virgin, it is this: minimal risk of infection by a sexually transmitted disease. The opposite of virginity, promiscuity, is great for spreading pathogens via the sexual fluids. Historically, the clients of prostitutes could be observed falling ill with the same symptoms, so this undeniable correspondence is likely to have given rise to, in the minds of those who knew nothing about microbial infection, the idea of ‘virginal purity’ or ‘cleanliness’. Similarly, celibacy also safeguards against venereal diseases and could be considered to be another way of achieving a ‘clean’ state, at the cost of not parenting. By corollary, sexual acts came to be thought of as ‘unclean’ and, because everyone was ignorant of the fact that these diseases have to be transmitted, that included masturbation; it became tarred with the ‘dirty’ brush even though you can’t catch a disease from yourself!
Sex coming to be regarded as shameful in this way was a gift for the assorted clergy because their modus operandi consists of first destroying the self-esteem of prospective followers and subsequently offering them forgiveness and salvation, in the form of an ‘afterlife’, in return for donations (payment). Of course, there is no evidence for the promised reward (or the threatened alternative of punishment in ‘hell’), but it was wonderful for preachers to have a ready-made guilt button to press any time they wanted to make their flock subservient! There’s a seemingly obvious connection from ‘clean’ sex to ‘godliness’ and virtue, and it gives a preacher a perennial topic to rant about.
One of the reasons for the decline of religiosity in Western countries over the last fifty years may be because the availability of condoms for preventing contagion and effective antibiotic cures for contracted STDs have taken this weapon away from the priests and pastors. With nothing to fear, the guilt goes away and the message of shame loses its teeth. One of the things that the clergy traditionally told us we needed saving from turned out to have been a paper tiger, so people came to reasonably wonder whether all the other pulpit monsters are fake too!
In the minds of dogmatic seekers of purity, homosexuality adds another level of disgust on top of heterosexual unions. Being a minority practice it’s an easy target for the self-righteous and we all love a scapegoat. Homosexuals have been held responsible for all the disasters of society including drought, war, plague, famine, hurricane, earthquake, volcanic eruption, tsunami and flood. How they are supposed to have caused those events is a question that is not even asked. Recently, a preacher in Phoenix, Arizona [IFB pastor Steven Anderson] laid the blame for AIDs at the feet of gay men and advocated that they should all be killed before Christmas! This is not fake news – there is video evidence, see here.
Yet, the most homophobic preachers are constantly being exposed in flagrante with young boys and the outbreak of priestly pedophilia has changed the face of, once fervently Catholic, Eire (S. Ireland) to such an extent they have elected an openly gay Prime Minister!
Is the sexual fixation of theists finally turning into their nemesis?
Warning! Lyrics may contain offensive, vulgar language.
This is the one hundred and fifty-ninth installment in the Songs of Sacrilege series. This is a series that I would like readers to help me with. If you know of a song that is irreverent towards religion, makes fun of religion, pokes fun at sincerely held religious beliefs, or challenges the firmly held religious beliefs of others, please send me an email.
Today’s Songs of Sacrilege is Cigarettes & Saints by The Wonder Years.
Twice a week I pass by the church that held your funeral
And the pastor’s words come pouring down like rain
How he called you a sinner and said now you walk with Jesus
So the drugs that took your life aren’t gonna cause you any pain
I don’t think he even knew your name
And I refuse to kneel and pray
I won’t remember you that way
I lit you a candle in every cathedral across Europe
And I hope you know you’re still my patron saint
I tried to forgive, but I can’t forget the cigar in his fist
I know that they were heartsick, but I need someone to blame
And I know how they blamed me
I know what you’d say
You’d tell me it was your fault
I should put all my arrows away
I’m sure there ain’t a heaven
But that don’t mean I don’t like to picture you there
I’ll bet you’re bumming cigarettes off saints
And I’m sure you’re still singing
But I’ll bet that you’re still just a bit out of key
That crooked smile pushing words across your teeth
Cause you were heat lightning
Yeah, you were a storm that never rolled in
You were the northern lights in a southern town
A caustic fleeting thing
I’ll bury your memories in the garden
And watch them grow with the flowers in spring
I’ll keep you with me
These wolves in their suits and ties
Saying, “Kid, you can trust me”
Charming southern drawl, sunken eyes
Buying good will in hotel lobbies
Buy fistfuls of pills to make sure you don’t hurt no more
You don’t gotta feel anything
Got their fangs in our veins
Got their voice in our head
Got our arms in their grips
No, we can’t shake free
This goddamn machine, hungry and heartless
My whole generation got lost in the margin
We put our faith in you and you turned a profit
Now we’re drowning here under the waves
(We’re no saviors if we can’t save our brothers)
Drowning out under the waves
(We’re no saviors if we can’t save our brothers)
Drowning out, drowning out
You can’t have my friends
You can’t have my brothers
You can’t have my friends
You can’t have my brothers
You can’t have my friends
You can’t have my brothers
You can’t have me
No, you can’t have me
Warning! Lyrics may contain offensive, vulgar language.
This is the one hundred and fifty-eighth installment in the Songs of Sacrilege series. This is a series that I would like readers to help me with. If you know of a song that is irreverent towards religion, makes fun of religion, pokes fun at sincerely held religious beliefs, or challenges the firmly held religious beliefs of others, please send me an email.
Today’s Songs of Sacrilege is I Won’t Say the Lord’s Prayer by The Wonder Years.
[Verse 1]
It’s a series of bars, thrift stores and churches lining the streets
While women with gold crosses push kids into half-formed beliefs
If Lot was righteous, I think I’d rather not be
We lean on fences built from out-dated morality
It’s a gang mentality
It’s a dangerous thing
They don’t ask you to think
Just to repeat after me
And assume you’re too careless to look at it critically
You’ll stop progress if it contradicts what you’re told to believe
[Refrain]
I refuse to spend life on my knees
[Verse 2]
These billboards that flaunt these scare tactics
Make me think you’re only good if you’re afraid of being punished
Every single Sunday, church bells wake me up
But it’s never enough to pull me out of bed
[Verse 3]
The church on Main Street has got its doors painted red
And I guess it’s so the Angel of Death passes over it
On its way to get gas
The church over on Broad Street has got a neon sign that says Jesus Save Me
And I guess it’s so God can see from where he is in the cheap seats
[Refrain]
I refuse to spend life on my knees
[Chorus]
And I won’t let somebody else make my decisions for me
If we’re all just Christians or Lions
Then I think I’d rather be on the side with sharper teeth
I don’t need saving
