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.
Jeffrey Graton, a counselor affiliated with The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, was arrested Monday on sexual abuse allegations.
The Daily Herald reports:
A second counselor in a bishopric in The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints was arrested Monday after reportedly sexually abusing a girl multiple times.
Jeffrey Graton, 40, of American Fork, was arrested on suspicion of three counts of forcible sexual abuse, a second-degree felony.
Police responded Sunday to a call at the 300th block of 620 South in American Fork Sunday night on a welfare check after an LDS bishop called to have police check on Graton, a second counselor in an LDS bishopric.
Graton reportedly had left his home with a gun and wasn’t answering his phone after it was reported he had inappropriately touched a girl several years ago, according to a police report. Graton was found and gave the rifle to an LDS leader.
The abuse reportedly happened 10 times.
Graton reportedly told police he had touched the girl’s chest and thighs, both under and over clothing, while giving her a massage in two occasions two and a half years ago. He also admitted to grabbing the girl’s hand and using it to touch his genitals.
Tim Bunting is a Fundamentalist Bible teacher at the West Harlem Church of Christ in New York. Earlier this year, Bunting wrote a post for the Downtown Demure website titled, An Open Letter About Modesty From a Brother in Christ. Here’s an excerpt from Bunting’s letter:
Okay, before I begin, I get it. You’re tired of talking about modesty. You’ve put forth some effort to conform to all these different standards being thrown at you, but no one ever seems to be satisfied. I know what you must be thinking. “Don’t they know modesty is a hassle? I’m just trying to look fashionable and attractive. People at church continue to stress the importance of modesty while the boys give more attention to the girls in more revealing clothing. Not to mention the fact that no one seems to have any standards of modesty for them anyways.” All this confusion, legalism, hypocrisy, and double standards is just about enough to make you stop caring about modesty all together. What’s the point anymore?
Well let me tell you, I’m tired of talking about modesty as well. I understand. However, we have to keep talking about it as long as it continues to be a challenge in this sexually saturated society.
Keep in mind that immodesty gets so much attention because it’s a visible sin. As saints trying to please God, we can’t ignore sin (I Corinthians 5:2, 12). As long as immodesty is around us, we will continue to have to deal with it. “But aren’t there much deeper problems to worry about? Isn’t immodesty just a physical external thing?”, you might ask. Yes! I concur completely. However, even though immodesty is external, the way we choose to present ourselves is directly connected to our hearts and has great significance on our souls. My hope in this letter is to get to the heart of the matter. I want to thank you for all efforts you’ve already made to be modest. I want to clarify some misconceptions about modesty, and I want to remind you of the real reason you should be concerned about modesty.
…
But why does God care about modesty? God cares about modesty because He is a holy God who calls us to be holy as well (I Peter 1:16). Sexual perversion is unholy, and it’s [sic] participants are unholy (I Cor 6:15-20). Sexual perversion includes any sexual activity outside of a marriage relationship (Hebrews 13:4). That includes lust (looking, thinking, desiring sexual things outside of a marriage) (Matthew 5:27-28). We are also told that anyone who is a stumbling block to others is also held accountable (Matthew 18:6-7). This principle is used to condemn the man for divorcing his wife and tempting her to commit adultery (Mathew 5:31-32). So if there is someone lusting after a person who has presented herself in a sexually appealing way, both parties are guilty of sin, whatever side of the equation they may be. Proverbs also illustrates that one who draws others into sexual sin is condemned along with the one drawn into sexual sin (Proverbs 2:16-19, 5:3-6, 6:24-29, 7:6-23). God wants you to be modest, because God wants you to be holy, pure, and free from sin. God wants you to be these things because this is how He can have a relationship with you, and if you want to have a relationship with Him, then you should care about modesty as well (Psalm 15:1-2).
….
Still, I know what you might be thinking: “If a guy wants to lust, I can’t control that! No matter what I wear, some creep can think sinful thoughts about me. So why am I held responsible for that?” Those are fair questions. Allow me to clarify something. Lust is a choice. Lusting is the choice to indulge yourself with sexual thoughts. God can demand a man to abstain from lust because, regardless of what any person might be wearing, we can choose to not indulge in sexual thoughts. Sexual attraction, however, is not a choice. A man will be attracted to sexual things because God made him that way (He made women that way too). However, a man needs to be led by the Spirit, and not by his fleshly desires (Romans 8:13). A man will be attracted to the many sexual images that surround him on a daily basis, but he must choose to not indulge in lusting over them.
Let me provide an analogy. Imagine you see something cute. A puppy or kitten. A newborn baby. Or perhaps newborn baby taking a nap with a puppy and a kitten.
What happens? You swell up with warmth, and an involuntary “awwwwww” escapes your mouth. Why? Because that’s what happens when you see something cute. You didn’t decide for that puppy or kitten or baby to be cute. They inherently are. You couldn’t stop thinking it’s cute even if you wanted to. Imagine if that warm fuzzy feeling of cuteness is sin. Imagine you are sinning every time you squeal in adoration over something adorable. What could you do about that? How could you stop? You can’t help but think it’s cute. That’s not even a conscious decision. You’d have to look away. You’d have to stop going to pet stores. You’d have to avoid new couples at church with their newborn babies. Cuteness is all around, but you have to make sure you don’t lust after it.
This is kind of what it’s like to be a guy. We didn’t decide for you to be so appealing. God did. God made both sexes to be that way. And it’s a blessing that he did! However, it’s a blessing that can only be enjoyed in marriage. So, a man’s responsibility is to not lust over the things he is sexually attracted to by keeping them from his eye sight. Your concern is to make sure you aren’t one of those sexually appealing things his eyes have to avoid. Here’s the conclusion: you aren’t in sin because someone is lusting over you. You can’t control that. You are in sin if you are presenting yourself in a sexually appealing way. You can control that.
….
Let me summarize Bunting’s “loving” letter to Christian women:
No one seems to have any standards of modesty these days. What those standards should be, Bunting does not say. I will assume then, that Bunting’s standard of modesty is his personal opinions and that of his church. The Bible say little to nothing about modesty other than to say women should wear modest apparel. The Bible does not define what is modest/immodest, so Christians make up the rules as they go. What is considered modest or proper attire is culturally driven, often changing from generation to generation.
Immodesty is a visual sin. In other words, women who violate Bunting’s dress code are sinning against God. This means that no immodestly dressed woman is a Christian. That’s right…follow my logic here. Christians say that people who habitually sin against God and do not repent are not followers of Jesus. A woman who regularly dresses immodestly is habitually sinning against God and no habitual sinner will inherit the kingdom of God. Imagine a conversation in Hell one day between a man and a woman. The man asks the woman, why are you here? She replies, cleavage. The man responds, me too.
Immodestly dressed women are responsible for the lust of men. In other words, women are culpable for how men think.
Women dressing modestly leads to holiness, purity, and freedom from sin. Evidently, in churches that follow Bunting’s dress code, men don’t lust and they never fuck anyone they are not married to.
Sexual attraction is not a choice. Men are wired by God to want what they see, and to fuck their way indiscriminately through the fair maidens of the church. The only way to keep these horn dogs in their place is for women to dress in ways that don’t lead to lust or boners.
Women are like puppies. When people see cute puppies they say “AWWWWW.” And when men see immodestly dressed puppies, err I mean women, they do the sexual version of “AWWWWW“– whatever the hell THAT is. Make sense? Didn’t make any sense to me either.
Women are sinning against God if they present themselves in sexually appealing ways.
I know, nothing new here. Bunting is just one of a countless horde of Christian preachers who think God has given them the duty and responsibility to police how women dress. Bunting tries his best to not blame women for what he calls male lust, but he ends up talking out of both sides of his mouth. If how a woman dresses can cause a man to lust, then she is responsible for the man’s lust. This is a classic case of laying blame on someone else for one’s own actions.
Bunting says that he plans to keep preaching the gospel of modesty until women heed his words and put their breasts and legs under the cover of oversized feed sacks. And I plan to continue to preaching the gospel of freedom and personal responsibility. Both men and women are responsible for their sexual behavior. Men, in particular, need to learn how to responsibly handle sexual desire. It is normal and healthy to see an attractive woman and sexually desire her. In my gospel, such thoughts are normal. Not in Bunting’s. Desiring any woman sexually besides your wife is a big sin against God, the very God who supposedly wired men to sexually desire women (and for gays, men). Makes perfect sense, right? For weak, pathetic Christian men who are driven to Pornhub by seeing too much cleavage on Sister Sue, the answer is for women to dress modestly. However, wouldn’t it be better if men grew up and owned their sexuality? Wouldn’t it be better if Christian men learned that it is never right to leer at or sexually harass women, and it is most certainly not permissible to touch women without being invited to do so.
According to my gospel, personal responsibility and accountability are paramount. Both men and women are responsible for their own sexual behavior. Christian morality cripples people, making others or outside forces responsible for bad sexual behavior. If church women would just dress modestly, men would be able to sit through the sermon without engaging in lustful thinking. And if women outside of the church would dress as Muslim women do, why Christian men would be able to go through the day with their only stirring being the Holy Spirit. What a wonderful world, one without sexual want, need, and desire; a world where sexual intercourse only takes place within the bonds of marriage and only in the missionary position. Of course, such a world, thanks be to Eros, does not exist. Sexual attraction is here to stay, regardless of how women dress. Clothing, as past human history shows, is not a barrier that protects people from wanting or desiring others sexually. All any of us can do is act decently and respectfully towards others.
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.
Ernest Williams, a retired Presbyterian minister, blames the current spate of sexual harassment allegations on baby boomers. According to Williams, the free-love generation threw Christian morality to the wind, leading to all sorts of sexual perversion and misbehavior. Ironically, Williams is a Trump supporter. Evidently, helping to elect a pussy-grabbing, serial sexual predator to the highest office in the land is okay, but using coarse language, viewing pornography, and fucking contrary to the Intercourse Rulebook® — the Bible — is not. Williams is the textbook example of a hypocrite. Williams, as many of his ilk do, pines for a return to the glory days of the 1950s; days when women knew their place, gays were deep in the closet, and Christianity and its moral prohibitions ruled the land.
We’ve been battered for weeks now with allegations of sexual misconduct by U.S. Senate candidate Roy Moore in Alabama, and Rep. John Conyers of Michigan.
Add to those the smell of scandal surrounding a growing number of Hollywood personalities.
The media are talking about a “cultural shift” in the public’s attitude toward sexual morality.
Shock is being professed that leaders in the worlds of politics and entertainment are seeing the ends of their careers over the abuse of women in the workplace.
Of course, we recognize that such hanky-panky has been going on as far back as we can research.
…
The other reason is that the “cultural shift” which the media are just now discovering happened in the 1960s and ’70s.
It was in the ’60s that I became a seminary student, and saw some of the changes occurring on the campus of a top-rung Ivy League university (Princeton).
I was not naive. I had been in the army, and was familiar with the sexual immorality which was flaunted by my fellow barracks-mates, and by the underground pornographic material which they mysteriously found somewhere despite its illegality.
But something new was happening.
This kind of immorality had been confined to the businesses that had constantly to keep a low profile and to bribe the authorities in order to operate.
But now it became open, visible and eventually mainstream.
When the movie, “Deep Throat” created a stir about 1970, it did not appear in an XXX-rated shack in a back alley, but in a first-run theater on Chestnut Street in Philadelphia.
From that point, Hollywood increasingly purveyed the world-view of a whole new generation of producers whose heroes were people like Helen Gurley Brown and Hugh Hefner with their zeal for unrestricted sex-play.
There was an openly declared purpose to change our society and create a cultural shift.
Walk into a college classroom, or even your local middle school, and listen carefully, and you’ll see how successful they were.
The old norms of what was naughty and what was nice are gone.
The cultural shift took place some 50 years ago, and it blew away the cultural expectations for decency in language and sexual behavior that had been considered normal, even though some had always flouted them.
What the big mainstream media, whose professionals are part of the changed culture, have not realized is that there has always been about half the population who did not make the shift back then, and have continued to stand for traditional American values.
They are outraged to see obscene words, if not printed, then clearly indicated with initials and asterisks, on their TV screens.
They are outraged to see their elected officials engaging in conduct that they do not want as examples for their children and grandchildren.
They are outraged to see a man refusing to stand for the national anthem, or to be urged to do their “holiday shopping.”
And they are tired of being regarded as uneducated hicks who are hopelessly out of the times and out of the culture which for the elite has become normal.
These elite just couldn’t believe it when Donald Trump was elected U.S. president on a platform that seemed to them to appeal only to a few remaining and aging survivors of the old order.
The “cultural shift” they see now is not a shift at all for the Trump voters.
It is just the ongoing American tradition and people are thankful to the God in whom they still believe that they finally have someone in the White House who understands and shares their love of America.
It is those reared by the culture of the ’60s who consider “making love instead of war” to be normal, who can’t understand what is going on.
They see the rotten fruit of their culture in these celebrities, and not knowing that it was produced by the rotten tree of the sexual revolution, wonder where it came from.
….
There ya have it, baby boomers. Yet another cultural malady is that is your fault.
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.
Robert Kalton, a British church choir director, was convicted of sexually abusing boys and sentenced to nine years in prison. Kalton previously spent six years in prison for similar crimes.
A former church choirmaster has been jailed for sexually abusing three boys in the 1970s and 1980s.
Robert Kalton, 82, sexually assaulted the children while he was working at a church in Leicestershire and Wiltshire, Leicestershire Police said.
He had moved to live in Portugal after the attacks and was arrested in 2013.
Kalton, of no fixed address, was found guilty of 15 child sex abuse offences at Leicester Crown Court and sentenced to nine years in prison.
He was also put on the sex offenders register for life.
Police said the victims were sexually abused at a church in Melton Mowbray and Trowbridge.
Officers received a report four years ago from a boy who claimed he had been sexually abuse by Kalton when he was 11 and 12 years old.
An investigation found two other victims were abused when they had attended choir practice.
Kalton was found guilty of four counts of gross indecency with a boy under 16 and 11 counts of indecent assault on a male.
Det Con Steve Winterton said: “These awful crimes took place when the victims were young boys.
“They have lived with what happened to them for many years and no doubt the crimes committed on them have affected them ever since.
“All the victims have shown immense courage throughout the investigation and legal proceedings and it’s their perseverance which has resulted in the conviction.”
Former choirmaster and organist Robert Kalton was extradited from his home in Portugal earlier this year to face charges relating to his abuse of young boys during the seventies and eighties.
He was sentenced at Leicester Crown Court on Friday after admitting to 15 counts of indecency with a child and indecent assault on a male.
The court heard that Kalton’s crimes were committed against two victims when he was living in Thorpe Arnold, near Melton, and a third young boy when he previously lived in Trowbridge, Wiltshire.
Richard Thatcher, prosecuting, said: “They were all boys at the time of the offences when this defendant was a choirmaster.”
He said Kalton seemed to “pay more attention to the boys” and was “very tactile with them” whilst not encouraging girls to join the choir.
Mr Thatcher said that the defendant used the victims’ “keenness to learn” to draw them to his home, which one described as being “like a boys club”.
Kalton also relied on his reputation as a gifted teacher and their parents’ naivety to engineer time alone with the boys and would “groom” them with praise to win their confidence.
The court heard that in each case “congratulatory hugs and kisses” would often lead to intimate touching and sexual activity, however, he added that this did not involve intercourse.
….
In 1988, the defendant was convicted of a serious sexual offence on a boy and was sentenced to six years in prison.
Mr Thatcher said: “These matters, however, did not come to light at the time, the complainants indicating that they would have lied at the time to avoid the embarrassment of revealing what had happened to them.”
When you hear somebody say somebody hits like a girl How does that hit you? Is that such a bad thing? When you hear a song that they play saying you run the world Do you believe it? Will you live to see it?
Sister, shoulder, daughter, lover Healer, broken halo, mother Nature, fire, suit of armor Soul survivor, holy water Secret keeper, fortune teller Virgin Mary, scarlet letter Technicolor, river wild Baby girl, woman child Female
When somebody laughs and implies that she asked for it Just ’cause she was wearin’ a skirt Oh, is that how that works? When somebody talks about how it was Adam first Does that make Eve second best Or did He save the best for last?
Sister, shoulder, daughter, lover Healer, broken halo, mother Nature, fire, suit of armor Soul survivor, holy water Secret keeper, fortune teller Virgin Mary, scarlet letter Technicolor, river wild Baby girl, woman child Female Yeah, female
She’s the heart of life She’s the dreamer’s dream She’s the hands of time She’s the queen of kings
Sister, shoulder, daughter, lover Healer, broken halo, mother Nature, fire, suit of armor Soul survivor, holy water Secret keeper, fortune teller Virgin Mary, scarlet letter Technicolor, river wild Baby girl, woman child Female Mhm, female
Bruce Gerencser, 67, lives in rural Northwest Ohio with his wife of 46 years. He and his wife have six grown children and sixteen 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.
Your comments are welcome and appreciated. All first-time comments are moderated. Please read the commenting rules before commenting.
Warning! Lyrics may contain offensive, vulgar language.
This is the one hundred and fifty-seventh 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 Like it Heavy by Halestorm.
[Verse 1]
Some like beautiful, perfect, and pretty
I see the good in the bad and the ugly
I need the volume one louder than ten
Put the pedal to the metal, needle into the red
If the windows ain’t shaking
Making my heart race
If I can’t feel it in my chest
I’m in the wrong damn place
Got a demon in my soul
And a voice in my head
Saying go, go, go
I can sleep when I’m dead
There’s a sonic revelation bringing me to my knees
And there’s a man down below that needs my sympathy
I got a ringing in my ears getting ready to burst
Screaming hallelujah mother fucker take me to church
[Chorus]
I like it louder than the boom of a big bass drum
I need it harder than the sound of guitar grunge
I like to crank it up, make it thump, and evil to the core
Headbanging in the pit and throwing my horns
And just like old school Sabbath, Zeppelin, and Lemmy
I need to drop it down low and make it heavy
I like it heavy
Who-o-o-oa
I like it heavy
Who-o-o-oa
[Verse 2]
I ride the lightning, roll with the thunder
Going down, down, down with my sisters and brothers
I fell in love with the darkest parts
Standing on the side of the wild at heart
I plucked a feather off a crow so I could fly
Since I was 13 years old I’ve had my fist to the sky
[Chorus]
I like it louder than the boom of a big bass drum
I need it harder than the sound of guitar grunge
I like to crank it up, make it thump, and evil to the core
Headbanging in the pit and throwing my horns
And just like old school Sabbath, Zeppelin, and Lemmy
I need to drop it down low and make it heavy
I like it heavy
Who-o-o-oa
I like it heavy
Who-o-o-oa
[Bridge]
I like it, it like it, I like it heavy
I like it, it like it, I like it heavy
I like it, it like it, I like it heavy
I like it, it like it, I like it heavy
Some like beautiful perfect and pretty
I see the good in the bad and the ugly
I like it heavy
Who-o-o-oa
I like it heavy
Who-o-o-oa
I like it, it like it, I like it heavy
I like it, it like it, I like it heavy
I like it, it like it, I like it heavy
I like it, it like it, I like it heavy
[Verse 3]
Take me home tonight I, do anything with you
Buy a bottle of whiskey, we’ll get matching tattoos
Tell me that you love me, oh let me drive your car
We can sit to morning light, just countin’ every stars
Cause if there’s a Hell, I’ll meet you there
And if there’s a Heaven, they’re serving beer
And if you’re an angel then, I must be high
Oh if there’s a church, it’s rock ‘n roll
If there’s a devil, I sold my soul
And it’s alright whatever we do tonight
Cause if there’s a God dammit she won’t mind
If there’s a God, baby she won’t mind
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.
Sogyal Rinpoche, a renowned Tibetan Buddhist teacher, stands accused of psychologically and sexually abusing numerous students and devotees.
David Leser, a reporter for The Sydney Morning Herald writes:
On a late September evening this year, a group of leading Australian business figures gathered in a Sydney boardroom to discuss a series of allegations that had scandalised the Buddhist world, and shaken their own to the core. The meeting was called by David White, chairman of business strategy advisers Port Jackson and Partners; Ian Buchanan, former lead partner with management consultants Booz Allen Hamilton; Diane Grady, non-executive director of Macquarie Bank and chair of Ascham School; and Gordon Cairns, chairman of Origin Energy and Woolworths.
What these four had in common was a long-standing involvement in Practical Wisdom, a series of business retreats held in Sydney over the past 15 years with Sogyal Rinpoche, the Tibetan Buddhist teacher and author of the 1992 international bestseller The Tibetan Book of Living and Dying.
These retreats were now up for review, as Rinpoche stood accused by eight of his former senior students of decades of physical, psychological and sexual abuse.
“There is such a deep sadness over what has happened,” Buchanan tells Good Weekend. “Whatever the facts turn out to be post investigation, this will inevitably be a tragedy. That this should come from an organisation that has done so much good, and from an individual who has done so much good, is very sad.”
….
But on July 14 this year, Rinpoche’s world came crashing down, and soon thereafter the faith of thousands of his devotees and admirers. That was the day he received a 12-page letter from the eight former senior students accusing him of years of violent and abusive behaviour.
“This letter is our request to you to stop your unethical and immoral behaviour,” they wrote. “Your public face is one of wisdom, kindness, humour, warmth and compassion, but your private behaviour, the way you conduct yourself behind the scenes, is deeply disturbing and unsettling.”
The letter then laid out in spectacular and shocking detail the nature of the Tibetan master’s alleged abuse: “We have received directly from you, and witnessed others receiving, many different forms of physical abuse. You have punched and kicked us, pulled hair, torn ears, as well as hit us and others with various objects such as your back-scratcher, wooden hangers, phones, cups and many other objects that happened to be close at hand.”
“Your physical abuse – which constitutes a crime under the laws of the lands where you have done these acts – have left monks, nuns and lay students of yours with bloody injuries and permanent scars. This is not second-hand information; we have experienced and witnessed your behaviour for years.”
Among the letter’s co-authors: his Australian IT expert Ngawang Sangye, and his personal assistant, an Australian artist turned Buddhist nun known as Drolma, who fled Rigpa – the organisation Rinpoche founded – in 2010 after what she claims was nearly eight years of abuse.
“His behaviour was often wildly unpredictable and irrational,” Drolma tells Good Weekend in a Skype interview from London, where she now lives. “If anything went wrong and his anxiety got the better of him, he would take it out on me. One of those times he grabbed me by the ear and it was torn all the way along the back. There was blood pouring down my neck.”
According to his accusers, the mistreatment went far beyond the physical. “Your emotional and psychological abuse has been perhaps more damaging than the physical scars you have left on us,” they wrote. “You have threatened us and others, saying if we do not follow you absolutely, we will die ‘spitting up blood’. You have told us that our loved ones are at risk of ill-health, or have died, because we displeased you in some way.”
Then came a range of alleged eye-popping sexual misdeeds. “You use your role as a teacher to gain access to young women, and to coerce, intimidate and manipulate them into giving you sexual favours.”
“Some of us have been subjected to sexual harassment in the form of being told to strip, to show you our genitals (both men and women), to give you oral sex, being groped, asked to give you photos of our genitals, to have sex in your bed with our partners, and to describe to you our sexual relations with our partners.”
“You have for decades, and continue to have, sexual relationships with a number of your student attendants, some who are married. You have told us to lie on your behalf, to hide your sexual relationships from your other girlfriends. Publicly you claim that your relationships are ordinary, consensual and proper because you are not a monk. You deny any wrongdoing and have claimed on occasion that you were seduced.”
….
In Sogyal Rinpoche’s case, the “channels in his body” were less than subtle, according to British journalist Mary Finnigan, who was to spend nearly two decades trying to expose him. “I’m one of the people who launched Sogyal on his career as a teacher in London in 1973, when he was very young and very inexperienced,” she told a Canadian documentary team in 2011. “There was just this continuous stream of seductions. He didn’t even hide it in those days. He was absolutely flagrantly promiscuous. He would pick girls up – usually vulnerable, needy – and entertain them for a short while and then dump them.”
One of those young women, American Victoria Barlow, first met Rinpoche in New York in 1976 after grappling for years with her own childhood sexual abuse. Rinpoche was visiting Chogyam Trungpa Rinpoche, the pioneer of Tibetan Buddhism in the US, and Barlow wanted Sogyal Rinpoche’s advice on the dharma, or Buddhist teachings.
“He opened the apartment door without a shirt, holding a bottle of beer,” Barlow recalls now in a written response to Good Weekend. “I [had] just turned 22 and I arrived in an almost floor-length dark brown tent dress that I had made a few months before in Calcutta.
“I thanked him for taking the time to see me and was in the process of asking him my question when he reached over and touched my cheek. He said, ‘I think we have a special connection.'”
“My face flushed. I had just been touched by a lama. This was such a blessing … but as I spoke, he reached toward me and literally mashed my face with his face. He was literally slobbering all over me.
“He roughly put his hand up my long dress, groped my privates, unzipped himself and lay on top of me, literally grunting for the minute or two until he released. Immediately, he got up, said he had things to do, that he was getting ready to travel across America.”
Barlow was mortified, but still willing to believe that – in the spirit of “Crazy Wisdom” – Rinpoche had just transmitted a powerful “source of enlightenment”.
In the following months, she received several calls from him, including one from Trungpa’s spiritual centre in Boulder, Colorado, where Rinpoche “spoke with amazement about how Trungpa had girls lined up outside his door like a rock star and that he wanted that, too. I thought he was joking and only later realised that was his actual aspiration, to have a conveyor belt of groupies.”
Despite growing doubts, Barlow allowed her spiritual mentor to convince her to fly to Berkeley, California to receive teachings from another Buddhist master. She was invited to stay with an American couple, both Tibetan Buddhist students who showed her a room with two beds. “They said, ‘That’s Sogyal’s bed next to yours. He told [us] to put you in here.’ I felt a combination of shock, shame, humiliation, defeat and anger.”
“Within a minute of his arriving in the room, Sogyal said he’d had a fight with his girlfriend in London. He made it apparent that he wanted sex with me, so that made me just some lay he’d arranged to use in Berkeley.” Barlow concluded then that Rinpoche was a “charlatan”; that she needed to get away as soon as possible. “Eight weeks later,” she says, “I miscarried his child.”
….
Over the 15 years that Buchanan and Cairns helped convene the “Practical Wisdom” retreats, there was nothing in Rinpoche’s behaviour to suggest scandal. Yes, there had often been questions about his inner circle of beautiful young women, and how it was that a teacher of loving-kindness could so often publicly humiliate his senior students. But never a hint of physical or sexual abuse.
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.
Convicted rapist Michael Mercado believes God wanted him to marry his victim. Mercado, however, was already married. Mercado’s crime was reported to church officials. It is unclear whether they reported Mercado’s behavior to law enforcement.
Johnathan Hogan, a reporter for the Idaho State Journal, writes:
When Michael Mercado’s ex-wife caught him having sex with a minor, he told her it was God’s will that he take this woman as his second wife.
District Judge Joel Tingey wasn’t buying that defense Monday when he sentenced Mercado, 48, to five to 20 years in prison for sexually abusing a minor.
“I considered a rider program. As with probation, I think that minimizes the damage done,” Tingey said.
Mercado of Idaho Falls was arrested in June after the relationship was discovered. He was charged with sexual battery committed by lewd or lascivious acts on a minor child 16 to 17 years of age. The charge was amended to rape where the victim is 16 or 17 years of age.
During Mercado’s sentencing, the ex-wife read a victim impact statement to Tingey about how her former husband’s actions had affected her.
She said Mercado had tried to guilt-trip her for reporting him, and when she spoke to a church leader about the abuse, told her to call him back and deny her earlier statements. She said Mercado said they should stay together, and that the abuse would stop if she didn’t report it.
“After this, I don’t know what part of my relationship was real,” Mercado’s ex-wife said. “I used to think the worst thing that could happen in a marriage was to have my husband cheat on me, but I was wrong, so very wrong.”
The woman said she was disgusted by the harm he had done to the victim, and said she did not feel safe with her ex-husband free.
“At this time, I would ask the court to extend the full wrath of the law to Mr. Mercado,” she said.
The victim of Mercado’s abuse agreed.
“I know that he can get life in prison, and that’s what I want,” the victim, now 18, said in her victim-impact statement.
She said she met Mercado when she was 13, and he said he wanted to get to know her better. He told the victim he had prayed, and God told him they should marry.
Mercado proposed to the then 17-year-old girl in May, and said he had even looked up how much time he may face in prison if caught. The victim said she typically went along with what Mercado wanted for fear of how he would react if she said no.
“He also brainwashed me to think it was OK to rape me,” the victim said.
John Thomas, Mercado’s defense attorney, acknowledged the unusual nature of the case, but said his client’s actions would not have been a child sex abuse crime if he waited six months.
…
He argued, however, that his client needed treatment for sex addiction, pointing out that Mercado had four marriages that failed because of cheating. Thomas also said his client has no criminal history.
“I just don’t think this is a prison case,” Thomas said. “I certainly don’t think it’s a life-in-prison case.”
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.
Catholic priest James Talbot was indicted earlier this month on charges of gross sexual assault. Talbot previously spent six years in prison after pleading guilty to raping two high school students.
Dennis Hoey, a reporter for the Press Herald, writes:
A former Jesuit priest who taught and coached at Cheverus High School for nearly two decades before being fired in 1998 is scheduled to be arraigned in Portland on charges he sexually assaulted a minor in Freeport nearly 20 years ago.
A grand jury indictment dated Nov. 9 and obtained by the Press Herald on Tuesday identifies the priest as 80-year-old James Francis Talbot of Dittmer, Missouri.
The indictment charges Talbot with gross sexual assault, a Class A offense, and with unlawful sexual contact, a Class C offense.
The indictment alleges that Talbot engaged in a sexual act with a minor and subjected the minor, who was 8 or 9 years old at the time, to sexual contact on or between May 1, 1997, and June 14, 1998.
The indictment said the alleged crimes took place in Freeport, but offered no information about a specific location, Talbot’s relationship to the minor, or why Talbot was in Freeport. It also was not clear why the charges are being brought now or whether this is the first time Talbot has been charged in Maine.
According to Maine statute of limitations, a prosecution for incest, unlawful sexual contact, sexual abuse of a minor, rape or gross sexual assault may be commenced at any time if the victim was not 16 at the time of the alleged crime.
The Boston Globe reported in October 2005 that Talbot pleaded guilty to raping and sexually assaulting two Boston College High School students in the 1970s and was sentenced to five to seven years in prison. Prosecutors said the assaults took place during wrestling practices.
When Talbot was accused of molesting the Boston College high students in 2002, the president of Cheverus said the school was unaware of the incidents in Boston when Talbot was hired in 1980.
“It was absolutely not known,” the Rev. John Keegan told the Press Herald in March 2002. “I was superior of the community and I would have heard. But there were no hints at all.”
Talbot served six years before he was released in 2011. He was ordered by the court to live out of state in a secure, monitored treatment facility.
….
Talbot was targeted in the Boston Globe’s Spotlight investigation into abuses that had occurred within the Catholic Church. The Globe’s investigation resulted in the movie “Spotlight” that told the story of how the newspaper uncovered the sex abuse scandal in the Boston church.
In a March 2002 Spotlight article, the reporting team said that Talbot coached wrestling at Boston College High School and that he engaged in a “bizarre habit” of wrestling with students who were in various stages of undress, including wearing only athletic supporters. He was transferred to Cheverus High School in 1980.
The Globe reported that Michael S. Doherty of Freeport filed a lawsuit against Talbot in 1997 for molesting him while he was a student at Cheverus. The case was settled out of court for an undisclosed amount, the Globe reported. No criminal charges were filed because the alleged abuse fell outside the statute of limitations at that time.
As the Black Collar Crime series has shown, Evangelical pastors can and do commit all sorts of crimes, including — in the case of Missouri-Synod Lutheran pastor Christopher Gattis — murder. Gattis stands accused of murdering his wife, stepdaughter, and the stepdaughter’s boyfriend on Thanksgiving Day.
Gattis worked for and was a member of a church that believes “the Bible to be the inspired and inerrant Word of God and the only revelation on both beliefs and practice.” Lutherans believe people must persevere until the end to be saved (as do Calvinists). The difference between Lutherans and Calvinists, according to Douglas Sweeney, chair of the church history and history of Christian thought department and director of the Jonathan Edwards Center at Trinity Evangelical Divinity School, is that Lutherans believe:
….the elect will certainly persevere in faith. God is not impotent to carry out his decrees respecting salvation. But not everyone who is born again is among God’s elect. It is possible for regenerated people to apostatize. So perseverance is largely a matter of walking in step with the Spirit, persevering, and encouraging other people to do the same.
According to Sweeney, Martin Luther believed that there were sins that could result in people losing their faith. Luther wrote:
“it is necessary to know and teach that when holy people—aside from the fact that they still have and feel original sin and also daily repent of it and struggle against it—somehow fall into a public sin (such as David, who fell into adultery, murder, and blasphemy against god), at that point faith and the Spirit have departed.” Luther, Smalcald Articles (1537), 3.3
None of us can know Christopher Gattis’ “heart.” For the purpose of this post, I am going to assume that he was a good Missouri-Synod Christian who loved Jesus, and the moment he committed the very public sin of homicide, the Spirit of God took flight from his soul and Gattis is now a sinner in need of conversion.
Using murderous, adulterous David as an example, Luther believed that when King David publicly sinned against God, faith and the Holy Spirit departed. Gattis, much like David, had a record of misconduct. In 2010 he was accused of public intoxication, and in 2012 he was charged with assault and battery. Kevin Defford, his victim in the assault, said the following to the NBC-12:
“He was on edge that day, was my thinking,” says Kevin Defford, who is the victim in the 2012 case.
Defford was delivering samples of a newspaper with his son and tossed one onto Christopher Gattis’ driveway.
“On the way up, he had come from his driveway and was standing in the middle of the road,” said Defford.
He says Christopher Gattis threw the paper at his face and started yelling, even going as far as to pull out a box cutter.
“The fact that he pulled the box cutter, it had me thinking about my son at that point, and that’s why the police were called,” says Defford. “But again, it seemed like he was on edge that day when I met him.”
Christopher Gattis was found guilty, but the charge was dismissed once Christopher Gattis paid restitution. Now knowing this man is connected to a triple murder has Defford shaken.
“Now it makes me wonder a little more um, what might have been,” he said.
It seems that Gattis has had several bouts of faithlessness. The good news is that if Gattis repents — telling God, my bad, Jesus. I promise never to kill anyone again — he can, once again, become a man after God’s own heart. No sin — no matter how perverse, vile, disgusting, or evil — is beyond the forgiving power of the miraculous blood of Jesus. For Gattis, restoration is but a prayer away.
Or is it?
Evangelicals love to talk about how bad they were before they became new creations in Christ Jesus. As anyone who has sat through a Baptist testimony time can attest, wild claims of depravity are quite common. The greater the sin, the greater the grace needed to save sinners from their sins. Over the course of the fifty years I spent in the Christian church, I never heard believers minimize their sinfulness. Oh no, the bigger the sinner, the better. This is why the history of Evangelicalism is filled with stories about people who were once witches, Satanists, and mob hit men before J-e-s-u-s saved them. Such people regale congregations with stories of murder, sexual abuse, demonic possession, sacrificing infants to Satan, and all sorts of perversion. Yet, Jesus somehow, some way, reached down into their wretched souls and saved them. (Of course, many of these wild testimonies are lies straight from the mythical pit of hell.)
Murderers present a real conundrum for Evangelicals. They know that David was a murderer, yet God forgave him, and he was considered not only a man after God’s own heart, but also a relative of Jesus. Evangelicals read and hear stories about murderers whose lives were transformed by the mighty working power of the triune God. This must mean, then, that murderers can be saved too, that even killing your family or strafing innocent men, women and children with weaponized drones is within the purview of Jesus, the savior of humankind. But, is it really? What does the Bible say on the matter?
Revelation 21:8 states:
But the fearful, and unbelieving, and the abominable, and murderers, and whoremongers, and sorcerers, and idolaters, and all liars, shall have their part in the lake which burneth with fire and brimstone: which is the second death.
Revelation 22:14,15 adds:
Blessed are they that do his commandments, that they may have right to the tree of life, and may enter in through the gates into the city. For without are dogs, and sorcerers, and whoremongers, and murderers, and idolaters, and whosoever loveth and maketh a lie. [OMG! all dogs go to hell!]
The writer of First John said:
Whosoever hateth his brother is a murderer: and ye know that no murderer hath eternal life abiding in him. (1 John 3:15)
Speaking of reprobates — those beyond the grace of God — the Apostle Paul said:
For this cause God gave them up unto vile affections: for even their women did change the natural use into that which is against nature: And likewise also the men, leaving the natural use of the woman, burned in their lust one toward another; men with men working that which is unseemly, and receiving in themselves that recompence of their error which was meet. And even as they did not like to retain God in their knowledge, God gave them over to a reprobate mind, to do those things which are not convenient; Being filled with all unrighteousness, fornication, wickedness, covetousness, maliciousness; full of envy, murder, debate, deceit, malignity; whisperers, Backbiters, haters of God, despiteful, proud, boasters, inventors of evil things, disobedient to parents, Without understanding, covenantbreakers, without natural affection, implacable, unmerciful: Who knowing the judgment of God, that they which commit such things are worthy of death, not only do the same, but have pleasure in them that do them. (Romans 1:26-32)
Paul emphatically states in Galatians 5:19-21 that murderers shall not inherit the Kingdom of God:
Now the works of the flesh are manifest, which are these; Adultery, fornication, uncleanness, lasciviousness, Idolatry, witchcraft, hatred, variance, emulations, wrath, strife, seditions, heresies, Envyings, murders, drunkenness, revellings, and such like: of the which I tell you before, as I have also told you in time past, that they which do such things shall not inherit the kingdom of God.
Did Christopher Gattis, by murdering his family, cross a line of no return? Has his nonrefundable ticket for the Lake of Fire been punched? Or, is there still hope for Gattis; that if he really, really, really says he is s-o-r-r-y that God will say to him, aw shucks, Chris, I forgive you. The Bible is incoherent on this matter, as it is with virtually every other theological, cultural, and social issue Christians say the Bible addresses. God said it, and that settles it, right?
Of course, there is no God, so flesh-and-blood humans are left with the unenviable task of trying to figure out why Gattis picked up a gun and murdered those closest to him. Was he mentally ill? Was he under the influence of drugs or alcohol? Did he shoot them in a fit of rage? If so, what caused him to be so angry? So many questions, and regardless of the answers, Gattis, if convicted, should spend the rest of his life in prison (and I know some readers think this is a death-penalty-worthy crime).
I grieve for those left behind in the wake of Gattis homicidal rage. And for those who attempt to paper over this tragedy with God, prayer, and faith? Child, please. Stop excusing bad behavior with nonsensical theological arguments and clichés. What’s next? — God needed more good angels so he used Christopher Gattis to send his family to heaven; that God always works things out according to his purpose and plan? Enough, already. (Please read Sutherland Springs Massacre: God Answered the Victims Prayers by Allowing Them to be Murdered.)
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.
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The Black Collar Crime Series relies on public news stories and publicly available information for its content. If any incorrect information is found, 
What follows is a video of the Keith Urban singing Female. The song fits well with the current national discussion about women and sexual harassment.
Warning! Lyrics may contain offensive, vulgar language.
The Black Collar Crime Series relies on public news stories and publicly available information for its content. If any incorrect information is found, 
