David Tee/Derrick Thomas Thiessen is the tall man in the back
I know some of you are tired of me mentioning Dr. David Tee (whose real name is Derrick Thomas Thiessen) on this site. I’m sick of mentioning him too. However, I can’t and won’t ignore his defense of clerics who commit sex crimes. I’ve met thousands of Christians over the years. I’ve never known a Christian with such callous disregard for the pain, suffering, and heartache of others. Whether out of some sort of misguided understanding of justice and forgiveness or a need to cover up past misconduct in his own life, Thiessen refuses to accept how offensive (and immoral) his words really are.
What follows is an excerpt from Thiessen’s latest post, @MeChurch 3, and my response to it. Please see @Me Church 2, and @MeChurch to read Thiessen’s other defenses of Evangelical preachers who molest children. All spelling, grammar, punctuation, and irrationality in the original.
How many people have had their lives and careers, not to mention their faith, ruined because Christians and others demand their pound of flesh far above what God demands? In this specific case, we can understand these moves better if Mr. Morris had not repented and lived a life that continually practiced this sin.
Mr. Morris is Evangelical megachurch pastor Robert Morris, who recently resigned after he was exposed for sexually assaulting a twelve-year-old church girl in the 1980s. The abuse continued for several years. Morris admitted assaulting the girl, acknowledging that his church knew about his crime — and yes, he committed a crime — at the time it happened. Morris briefly stepped away from preaching, then returned to the pulpit as if nothing happened. Ain’t God good, right? (Please see What Are We to Make of an Evangelical Preacher Who Defends a Pastor Who Sexually Assaulted a Twelve-Year-Old Girl?)
Morris committed a crime — a felony sex crime. What the Bible says doesn’t matter. Thiessen thinks he has intimate knowledge of God’s thoughts, but he doesn’t. And what God “thinks” on the matter doesn’t matter either. We are a nation of laws, and those laws consider Morris’ actions a crime. The only reason he is not in jail is that he can no longer be prosecuted for what he did almost 40 years ago.
Thiessen can’t possibly know if this was a one-off or whether Morris “repented” — as if repentance wipes his slate clean. Thiessen thinks saying “my bad” to God is a get-out-of-jail-free card.
But he had dealt with it, he took his spiritual punishment and paid the price for his actions. No more should be required of him. God promises to forget our sins when we honestly repent and turn from our wicked ways.
How does Thiessen know Morris “dealt with it” — “it” being sexually assaulting a church girl for several years? He demands evidence from me for all sorts of things, but when it comes to Morris molesting a young girl, Thiessen takes his word for it. Why is that?
Christians are not better than God and they should do the same thing when the person has truly repented. Keep in mind that we do not know the exact nature of his repentance or experience with God at that time. We are not judging that part of this story as we do not know what God did at that time.
Thiessen says he is not judging Morris, but he most certainly is. He has judged him forgiven. Based on what, exactly? That he said he repented? Child, please.
What we are discussing is the attitude of those Christians and others who think they need to do more than God to make a person pay for the sins they have committed. People outside of those involved do not have the criminal or spiritual authority to demand more than those who have jurisdiction put in place.
People often forget their place and think they can add more to punishment or make the crime more severe than it is for whatever reason they may use to justify their vigilante and kangaroo court justice.
If God has forgiven his sin with that young girl, then no one has the right to hold it over the person’s head forever. Nor do they have the right to add more punishment or destroy the man’s life.
No one is adding more punishment to Morris’ life or trying to destroy him. He did that to himself. What his victim demands is accountability. What people like me demand is that men like Morris are never allowed around children again; that he never pastors a church again. He has forfeited the right to be a pastor.
This brings us to the second possible alternative title of this piece. Is this what it all boils down to? Is a man’s or woman’s life reduced to one sin or crime that will not be forgiven or forgotten by the people?
One sin or crime? Morris committed multiple sins and crimes, and it remains to be seen if other victims come forward. Sadly, Thiessen makes no distinction between filching a grape at the grocery and sexually assaulting a young girl. Both are sins that God can and will forgive if the sinner confesses his sin and repents. Awesome, right? No matter what you do, forgiveness is but a prayer away.
If they have spent 10, 20, or 40 years of excellent service for God or humanity, is that all lost because someone does not like an ancient sin that was dealt with at the time? When did one sin or a previous sinful life overrule what took place after repentance?
Ancient sin? How ancient is Morris’ crime (not a sin or mistake, a CRIME) in the mind of his victim? Thiessen seems clueless to the fact that sexual abuse leaves lifelong scars, often requiring extensive therapy to come to terms with. Note what Thiessen says here: sex crimes committed ten years ago are ancient history. Truth be told, he likely thinks that crimes committed immediately before the act of repentance are “ancient” crimes too.
What good is Christ’s redemption if Christians and others ignore the redemption and faithful life and refuse to restore someone who committed a sin? If anyone takes the attitude ‘God forgives but I won’t’ they are committing a sin just like the person they won’t forgive.
Pay careful attention to what Thiessen is doing. He is blaming the victim. She needs to forgive Morris and move on. He demands sexual abuse victims forgive their abusers, even if they don’t want to. And if they don’t, they are every bit as much of a sinner as their abusers. In other words, in Thiessen’s mind, refusing to forgive is the same in God’s book as sexually abusing children.
OMG, how dare we trample underfoot Jesus’ blood, demanding that sexual predators be held accountable for their crimes. Give me a pair of waders. I plan to keep on stomping on Jesus’ magical blood if it means abuse victims are seen and heard, and their abusers are held accountable for their crimes.
If they want forgiveness then they need to forgive those they refuse to. The Bible says if one wants forgiveness from God they must forgive others who wronged them. We are not speaking out of personal ideology here.
The victim in question does not want forgiveness. Forgiveness is cheap, a bandaid over a gaping wound. What victims generally want is justice and accountability.
God has covered sins and forgiveness throughout the Bible. We must adhere to those words if we want to be an example to others and make an impact for Christ. Jesus said to forgive 7 x 70 and so far we have not seen 1 x 1 for people like Mr. Morris or Mr. Ravi Zacharias.
What we have seen is exacting a pound of flesh for a sin that did not affect anyone who is canceling Mr. Morris. Justice is not up to the victim to decide. God has already determined what is justice and it is best that we learn what it is and implement it properly if we want to truly restore sinning Christians to the church body.
Actually, in a secular society, it is the legal system that determines just punishment, not God, the church, or the Bible. Morris would be in jail now if it weren’t for the expiring statute of limitations.
In our view, a dealt-with sin is no match for a restored, redeemed life that obeys God’s word correctly. Despite what unbelievers want or say, the sin, once dealt with, should be forgotten. Coming back 40+ years later is not a Christian act. It is not biblical teaching and Christians must abide by God’s instructions correctly.
In other words, one aw-shit doesn’t cancel out ten atta-boys. Thiessen desperately wants to think that doing good cancels out sexual misconduct; that if a serial rapist asks Jesus to forgive him, all his victims should forgive him too.
Now I need to go take a shower.
Bruce Gerencser, 67, lives in rural Northwest Ohio with his wife of 46 years. He and his wife have six grown children and thirteen 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.
We read BG’s response to our black collar crime series article. .He is lucky that we are not litigious in nature and do not strike back at those who not only distort what we have said but libel and slander us.
But he says things the way he does because he is a first-class narcissist who needs to be seen as the victim 100% of the time. If he wasn’t that way his posts would be written vastly different than they are being written.
He just doesn’t get it. No one needs his black collar crime series. Everyone that needs to know already knows about what some pastors do. There is no need to pile on and add misery to those who are already miserable.
Of course, if you read that series, you will find that BG does not present one legitimate solution to the problem. Instead, he spends his time attacking us as we are providing the framework for a solution to ministers going and gone bad.
We would prefer that those men not join the ministry until they allow Jesus to heal them of their problems. But since they do not postpone their answer to their calling, we must deal with the problem within the church.
The secular world does not have a solution for the problems these men face and instead of embarrassing and humiliating pastors, they should just remain silent trusting that church officials will be led by God to handle the problems correctly.
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They [rapist, predator, abusive preachers] have sinned and come short of the glory of God, just like the rest of us. Christ is there for them as he is for all of us. We are no better even if we did not commit such worldly sins as the bible tells.
Those men are no worse than any one of us and deserve a second chance. Where would any of us be if we were not given 2nd, 3rd, or 14 chances by God?
As you may have noticed we are not saying much about BG and his black collar crime series as that rant is not worth discussing. The author of those words doesn’t speak the truth and offers no legitimate reason for it to exist.
We have said the worst we are going to say about the owner of that website and series. As all he can do is distort, libel, and slander. It is not worth getting into a war of words over.
But since it does exist, that series does provide us with a starting point to provide direction for those Christians who may have condemned and judged those men or do not know what ministry they should do.
We should not judge nor condemn those men because that is not our duty. We are not better than them and we do need to find a way to solve their problems BEFORE they get themselves into trouble.
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We have not changed one word of what we said in the article on the black collar series. That series is a useless effort that does not help anyone.
According to Thiessen, if a preacher commits a sex crime, he is not disqualified from serving in the ministry; that God forgives them (how does he know this?) and we should too. And therein is the fundamental problem: unconditional forgiveness. No matter what a person does, God forgives him. All he needs to do, according to 1 John 1:9, is repent and ask for forgiveness. Rape a child? Repent and ask for forgiveness. Sexually assault a teenager? Repent and ask for forgiveness. Molest children? Repent and ask for forgiveness. Manipulate a woman who is under your care so she will have sex with you? Repent and ask for forgiveness. No matter how heinous the crime, all an offending preacher needs to do is shoot a prayer up to Jesus and he will immediately wipe your sin slate clean. Awesome, right? No matter what a preacher does — even two, three, or fourteen times, according to Thiessen — forgiveness is but a prayer away.
I know several Evangelical preachers who refuse to run background checks on workers in their churches. Why? Whatever these workers might have done — including sexually molesting and assaulting children — is in the past, covered by the blood of Jesus and buried in the deepest sea to be never remembered again. If God has forgiven them, so should their fellow church members.
How hard can it be to say to prospective clerics: if you commit a sex crime, you are no longer fit to serve as a pastor — period? If you are a registered sex offender, you are no longer fit to serve as a pastor — period. Sexually molesting and abusing children, sexually assaulting teenagers, and taking sexual advantage of church women (or men) should be immediately, and forever, disqualifying. That it is not in many corners of the Evangelical world is troubling, to say the least.
Sexual predators cannot be “cured.” We can have a long discussion about pedophilia, but the fact remains that predators typically re-offend; that children are NOT safe around them. Some predators should be locked up without the possibility of parole. Others should have strict limitations put on them, including forbidding them from having contact with children and other vulnerable people. Next to the finality of murder, sex crimes leave some of the deepest, most long-lasting scars on victims/survivors. Doubt me? Scores of victims/survivors read this blog. Ask them how being sexually violated has affected their lives. Untold harm, heartache, and loss, yet the Derrick Thiessens of the world ignore the harm caused by predators, choosing instead to “forgive” offenders and send them back into the ministry so they can “prey” again.
Bruce Gerencser, 67, lives in rural Northwest Ohio with his wife of 46 years. He and his wife have six grown children and thirteen 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.
Dr. David Tee, who is neither a doctor nor a Tee, continues to support preachers who rape, molest, and abuse children, saying that their crimes are mere “problems”; weaknesses that they can overcome through Jesus and the power of prayer. Tee, whose real name is Derrick Thomas Thiessen, continues to impugn my character, suggesting that I hate God and Christians; that I’m just piling on those poor preachers who are down. Thiessen thinks I am trying to make God look bad. According to him, the purpose of the Black Collar Crime Series is to harm Christianity and Christians.
There is a website [The Life and Times of Bruce Gerencser], BG’s [Bruce Gerencser] to be more specific, that likes to post the names, images, and crimes of those Christian pastors who have not been able to conquer their problems [rapes, molestations, assaults]. For the most part, it is a useless list as it does not expose anyone of any secret crime they have committed.
It is just a reposting of actual news stories for whatever reason BG may have. We have labeled it as hatred for God and Christians in the past and it is simply piling on those who are down. It is an uncalled for list as it serves no purpose but to harm Christians and Christianity.
He tries to make God look bad through the fallen ministers who are paying for their crimes. However, no matter the bad reason BG has for posting these images and crimes, Christians can turn it into good.
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Being a pastor is a hard profession to be in as evil will attack the minister through a variety of means. Ministers need prayer to remain strong, resist temptation, and remain in the faith. They are totally human and do have weaknesses they have not conquered.
Just because God calls them to the ministry does it mean they are impervious to temptation, perfect, or even properly spiritual. These lists prove that point. When these men and sometimes women fail, don’t get a superiority complex because all Christians fail in some way at some point [most Christians don’t rape, molest, or assault children].
The Black Collar Crime series is in its seventh year, having published over one thousand reports of clergy and church leader criminal misconduct. Most of the reports are about Evangelical pastors, evangelists, youth directors, and other church leaders who committed sex crimes. Using Google Alerts, I receive an immediate notice any time a news story about clerical malfeasance is posted on the Internet. These stories must receive wide circulation. Victims need to know that people are standing with them as they bring to light what God’s servants have done in secret.
I realize that these reports are often dark and depressing, but the only way to dispel darkness is to turn on the lights. Clergy who prey on congregants — especially children — must be exposed, prosecuted, convicted, and sent to prison. By leveraging this blog’s readership numbers and publishing these reports, I am serving notice to law enforcement, prosecutors, and judges: we are paying attention, and if you fail to provide justice for victims, we will hold you accountable.
Sometimes, these seemingly untouchable predators are brought to justice, but not before the public puts pressure on law enforcement and prosecutors, forcing them to act. The sordid story of abuse at Restoration Youth Academy is a case in point. Decades of abuse reports were filed with local law enforcement, yet nothing was done. Yes, they finally acted and the perpetrators are now in prison, but what do we say to the hundreds of children and teenagers who were ritually abused before prosecutors got around to doing their job?
I am sure that this series will bring criticism from Evangelical zealots, reminding me that accused/charged clerics are innocent until proven guilty. While they are correct, all I am doing is sharing that which is widely reported in the news. In the sixteen years I’ve been writing about clergy misconduct, I can count on one hand the number of pastors/priests/religious leaders who were falsely accused — less than five, out of hundreds and hundreds of cases. The reason for so few false accusations is that no person in his or her right mind would mendaciously accuse a pastor of sexual misconduct. The social and personal cost is simply too high for someone to falsely accuse a religious leader of criminal conduct.
Secondary reasons for this series have to do with exposing the lie that Evangelicalism is immune to scandal and criminal behavior. I remember when the Catholic sex scandal came to light. With great glee and satisfaction, Evangelical preachers railed against predator priests and the Catholic Church who covered up their crimes. Now, of course, we know — with the recent Independent Fundamentalist Baptist (IFB) and Southern Baptist sex scandals — that Evangelicalism is just as rotten, having its own problems with sexual abuse and subsequent cover-ups. Evangelicals love to take the high moral ground, giving the perception that their shit doesn’t stink. Well, now we know better. Not only does Evangelicalism have a sexual abuse problem, it also has a big problem with pastors who can’t keep their pants zipped up. (Please see Is Clergy Sexual Infidelity Rare?)
I receive threats from people defending their religious heroes. Threats of legal action are common, even though all I am doing is republishing stories publicly reported by news agencies. A pastor featured in one of my reports contacted me and said that reporters had it all wrong. As I do with everyone who asserts they are being falsely accused, I told this preacher that he could give his version of the facts, sign his name to it, and I would gladly add it to the post. Usually, this puts an end to any further protestations. Most often, the accused want to bully me into taking down my post. In this preacher’s case, he provided me his version of events and I gladly added it to my post. After adding the information, I decided to investigate this pastor further. I found more information about his past indiscretions and crimes. I dutifully added them to the post. I have not heard anything further from the good pastor.
I am not immune from making mistakes, so if you spot a factual error in one of the stories, please let me know and I will gladly correct it. If you come across a story that you would like me to add to this series, please use the contact form to email me. Please keep in mind that I need links to actual news reports in order to add them to this series.
I primarily use Google Alerts for Black Collar Crime reports. I also rely on readers to alert me to new stories or updates of previous reports. I am one man with a limited amount of time each day to slog through the brackish Evangelical swamp, so I don’t see every report or know the outcome of every case I’ve featured in the Black Collar Crime Series. Keep in mind that I require EVIDENCE for me to update a story. Not gossip or personal opinion. Actual evidence such as reputable news stories (with links). Just because a reader or drive-by commenter says something doesn’t make it so. I appreciate your understanding.
I realize that nothing I say in this post will change the minds of preachers such as Dr. David Tee, whose real name is Derrick Thomas Thiessen. Thiessen has a sketchy background. He has been accused of abandoning his family, including an infant child, failing to pay child support, and fleeing to South Korea/Philippines to avoid being held accountable for his behavior.
Thiessen has been a vocal critic of me personally and of the Black Collar Crimes Series. Thiessen is known for defending clerics who commit sex crimes. Just this week he wrote two more posts defending Ravi Zacharias. He has also defended men such as Bill Cosby and Bill Gothard. Thiessen goes to great lengths to defend his support of offending preachers, but I find his defenses lacking in every way. Thiessen repeatedly rejects the substantial work done by law enforcement in investigating, prosecuting, and convicting pastors who commit sex crimes. Why? This is the judgment of the “world,” not God. Of course, God is unavailable for comment. All we have are our legal processes, albeit imperfect, they are the best we have to hold clergy and churches accountable.
Thiessen frequently blames victims for what happened to them. Thiessen is not alone in this approach to women (sometimes men) and children who have been sexually violated and taken advantage of by so-called men of God. Again, Thiessen claims that victims are following the ways of the “world” instead of God. Of course, God’s ways in Thiessen’s mind are his peculiar interpretation of the Protestant Christian Bible.
He [Bruce Gerencser] is right in one thing, we do not like his black collar series but not for the reasons he thinks. We [Derrick Thiessen] do not like it for many reasons and two of them are, it is not being fair or just. That owner [Bruce Gerencser] ignores all the unbelievers and atheists who are caught, tried, and convicted for the same crimes.
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[Speaking of being fair and just] Christians have to do both to be able to make an impact for Christ. But this is not the end of the hypocrisy and injustice carried out by the owners of the BG [The Life and Times of Bruce Gerencser] and MM [Meerkat Musings] websites, as well as other unbelieving websites.
There have been other similar stories about drag shows in schools, and so on. Yet not one peep from either owner about how bad, immoral, or wrong these actions are. Instead, they would rather target Christians as that is the group of people, as well as Christ, that they hate.
This is another reason God told us to never follow in the counsel of the ungodly. They do not have fairness or just behavior in their thinking. Look at all the CRT, equity, BLM re-education going on today. None of those and anything similar is of God nor are they just and fair.
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Another reason we do not like the black collar series over at that website [The Life and Times of Bruce Gerencser] is that it is unneeded. It does nothing constructive for society nor does it help redeem those men who failed in their Christian lives, if they were Christians at all.
All it does, as we said earlier, is influence others to hate Christ, pastors, and the church, and turning people to hate is wrong. It is not fair to those men highlighted and the series does not have people being just or fair towards them. In fact, it helps stoke the misguided guilty-until-proven-innocent mentality that many unbelievers endorse.
It is also redundant as the local papers will carry the same stories and his series is just wasting everyone’s time. When the Christian sees those stories they need to ask God how to reach those men so that Christ can redeem them.
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{we would link to the article we talked about but it is so filled with lies and eisegetical comments that it is nothing but trash [which I can’t rebut] }
I have explained my motivations for writing the Black Collar Crime Series several times. He knows exactly why I do what I do, so I can only conclude that Thiessen is a liar and his goal is to impugn my character and impair my coverage of clergy sex crimes.
Let’s suppose I operated a site whose mission was to cover the Cincinnati Reds. Every day I published news stories about the Reds and individual players on the team. One day, a man named Deirere TeeDee sent me an email, complaining about me not writing any posts about the NHL, particularly me not covering the Detroit Red Wings. Duh, I replied, I write about the Reds, and Major League Baseball, not the National Hockey League and the Detroit Red Wings. Your complaint has no merit.
Yet, this is exactly what Thiessen has done with his complaint about me not covering atheists and other unbelievers who commit sex crimes. He knows that this site focuses on four things:
Helping people who have questions and doubts about Christianity
Helping people who have left Christianity
Telling the story about my journey from Evangelical Christian to atheist
Critiquing Evangelical Christianity
I have been blogging since 2007 — sixteen years. I have stayed true to these four focus points, rarely veering off the path to talk about politics, sports, food, and travel. Why Thiessen cannot understand why I write the Black Collar Crime Series is beyond me. I know that all sorts of people commit sex crimes, but my focus is on Evangelical preachers who commit such crimes. This is NOT a sex crime blog. If it was, I would cover unbelievers and believers alike. And even if I did, it would still be true that the vast majority of people who commit sex crimes are Christian or religious. Why? Because most Americans are Christians.
I have repeatedly explained to Thiessen why the Black Collar Crime Series is needed. I assume, at this point, he is being obtuse. Most of the stories I write require numerous news stories to tell the complete story. They also require research on my part to find out what sect the offender was a part of and their background and beliefs. Sometimes, these reports take a lot of time to put together. Other times, a Google search quickly gives me everything I need to write the story.
These reports are based on news reports, court records, social media, and other verifiable sources. I rarely interject my personal opinion. My goal is to provide a one-stop website for people looking for information about a particular preacher/church and their crimes. Blog traffic numbers suggest that this is exactly what is happening.
It is not uncommon for news sites to either delete stories about clergy sex crimes or put them behind paywalls. That’s why it is important for me to make these stories available to the public free of charge. The public has a right to know what is going on in Evangelical churches. Surely it is important to cover criminal behavior by clerics. Surely it is important to say to victims that I hear you and I will make your story known far and wide. The bigger question, then, is this: why do Derrick Thiessen and other Christians of his ilk want to muzzle me and keep these stories from being known?
One answer to the questions above is that the Thiessens of the world don’t care about the victims of clergy sex crimes. I suspect many of them believe that the victimized women (and men) and children and not victims at all. Thus, they view sexual predators as the real victims; that the “world” is out to get them. Thiessen admits as much when he says “When the Christian sees those stories [about rape, sexual assault, child molestation, along with theft, fraud, and murder] they need to ask God how to reach those men so that Christ can redeem them.” Remember, Thiessen has called sex crimes “mistakes.” He has yet to write one positive post about the victims of clergy sexual misconduct. All that Thiessen cares about are the poor preachers who rape, assault, misuse, and abuse vulnerable people. In his mind, these preachers just made “mistakes.” If they will just shoot a 1 John 1:9 (If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just to forgive us our sins, and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness) prayer to Heaven, Jesus will forgive them and cleanse them from all unrighteousness. With that, the offending preachers are forgiven and should get right back on the ministry horse. Thiessen seems oblivious to the fact that most pedophiles are incurable; that Jesus himself can’t fix them. He seems to be oblivious to the fact that preachers caught committing sex crimes, particularly child pornography, have likely been doing so for years. When a 60-something-year-old preacher is arrested for sexually assaulting a child, it is likely that he has committed this crime before. Most clergy sex crimes go unreported/unprosecuted (as is the case in the general population). What I cover with the Black Collar Crime Series is but a fraction of the crimes committed by Christian clergy. I read sites such as Ministry Watch, The Roys Report, Bishop Accountability, Baptist Accountability, and the Black Collar Crime listings published monthly for members by the Freedom From Religion Foundation. I am astounded by how many stories about clergy sex crimes I actually miss.
It’s clear to all who are willing to see that Evangelicalism has a clergy sex crime problem of epic proportions. These reports are not a few bad apples. The sex scandal roiling through the Southern Baptist Convention certainly proves that the proverbial barrel is littered with rotten, stinking apples.
Note: As of today, I have published almost 1,000 Black Collar Crime posts. I am sitting on over 1,000 more stories that await publication. I wish I could do more in this regard, but I can’t due to my health. I do what I can, but I want every victim/survivor to know that I see them, hear them, and will do all I can to make sure their story is not forgotten.
Bruce Gerencser, 67, lives in rural Northwest Ohio with his wife of 46 years. He and his wife have six grown children and thirteen 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.
Six years ago, I posted the first story in the Black Collar Crime Series. Focused primarily on clergy sexual misconduct, the sheer level of reports puts to rest the notion that such crimes are committed by a “few bad apples.” Numerous times a day, I receive notices from Google Alerts, notifying me that a new report of alleged clergy crime has been posted to the Internet. I look at every notification, choosing to only publish the stories that are publicly reported by reputable news sites. I am often contacted by victims who are looking to expose their abusers. I do what I can to help them, but if there are no public news reports or other information that can corroborate their stories, I am unable to do anything for them. Believe me, I WANT to help them, but it would be legally reckless of me to post a story without sufficient evidence. I generally also only publish reports about clerics from the United States — mostly Protestant, Evangelical, Southern Baptist, and Independent Fundamentalist Baptist (IFB). While I post stories featuring Catholic priests from time to time, I usually leave such reporting to others. The same could be said of widespread clergy sexual misconduct in Africa. The point I am trying to make here is this: the 1,000+ published reports in the Black Collar Crime Series are just the tip of the iceberg. As of today, I am also sitting on over 1,000 clergy sexual misconduct stories I have not published due to lack of sufficient evidence or a shortage of time to do so.
Not only are there more than just a “few bad apples” preying on church members, when you add to the total the number of pastors and other religious leaders who have consensual sexual relations with congregants, it is clear for all to see that so-called “men of God” are hardly the pillars of moral virtue they claim to be. In 2015, I wrote a post titled, Is Clergy Infidelity Rare? Here’s an excerpt from the post.
In October 2013, Doug Phillips, president of the now-defunct Vision Forum Ministries confessed to church leaders that he had an inappropriate sexual relationship with a woman who is not his wife. Defenders of Phillips took to their blogs, websites, Twitter, and Facebook to do damage control on the behalf of Phillips and the patriarchal movement. One such defender is Independent Baptist pastor Voddie Baucham, a man who is widely viewed as the African-American version of Doug Phillips.
Dennis, You ask, “How many times do we see this in Christian leadership?” The answer may surprise you, but it is actually quite rare. There are hundreds of thousands of churches in America. We hear of these types of things on a national basis when they happen to high profile people. However, considering the number of people in Christian leadership, the numbers are quite small. As to your other point, most men who go through something like this never recover. Of course, there are exceptions. Moreover, there are some circles wherein things like this, and much worse, are merely swept under the rug. However, in circles where leadership is taken seriously, it is very difficult for a man to come back from things like this. People have long memories, and tend to be rather unforgiving. (emphasis mine)
Baucham repeats the oft-told lie that clergy sexual misconduct is quite rare. I have heard this line more times than I can count. It is an attempt to prop up the notion that clergy are more moral and ethical than most people; that they are pillars of virtue and morality. Such claims are patently false.
Of the one thousand fifty (1,050 or 100%) pastors we surveyed, every one of them had a close associate or seminary buddy who had left the ministry because of burnout, conflict in their church, or from a moral failure.
Three hundred ninety-nine (399 or 38%) of pastors said they were divorced or currently in a divorce process.
Three hundred fifteen (315 or 30%) said they had either been in an ongoing affair or a one-time sexual encounter with a parishioner.
So much for clergy sexual infidelity being rare.
Numerous studies have been conducted concerning sexual infidelity among married people. The percentage varies widely, but it is safe to say that between ten and twenty percent of married people have been sexually unfaithful to their spouse. The percentage is higher for men than it is women.
We know that men of the cloth are not morally or ethically superior. In the United States and Canada, there are approximately 600,000 clergy. According to the Hartford Institute for Religion and Research, this total includes active clergy and “retired clergy, chaplains in hospitals, prisons and the military, denominational executives, and ordained faculty at divinity schools and seminaries.” This number does not include clergy who are affiliated with independent churches. If between ten and twenty percent of married people commit adultery, and clergy are no different morally from non-clergy, then this means that between 60,000 and 120,000 clergy have committed adultery. Again, so much for clergy sexual infidelity being rare.
Keep in mind, this is only the number of CONSENSUAL sexual relationships.
Most people in the United States profess to be Christians. Taught to think that their churches are safe havens and their pastors have only their best interests at heart, many of them have a hard time believing and accepting that bad things happen, and far too often the perpetrators are pastors, deacons, elders, youth leaders, worship leaders, Sunday school teachers, church janitors, evangelists, missionaries, bus drivers, Christian school teachers, and principals. Wherever Christians have authority over others, you will find sexual misconduct — both legal and criminal.
What makes churches and clergy so dangerous is that congregants trust pastors. It’s the world they need to worry about, or so church leaders tell them anyway. Led to believe that Christians — thanks to salvation and the Holy Ghost — are above the fray and oh-so-humbly morally superior, church members naively trust those who have “God-given” authority over them. Even after their pastors and other church leaders have been exposed as sexual predators, many congregants refuse to believe that the men and women they looked up to abused others. You who read the Black Collar Crime Series regularly know that it is not uncommon to have congregants comment, defending their pastor or suggesting that the police or district attorney are out to get their preacher.
Sadly, it is not uncommon for church members to blame victims instead of putting the blame where it belongs: on their ministers, youth pastors, and other church leaders. Even after church leaders are found guilty in criminal court, congregants will often line up to testify at sentencing hearings; letting courts know that their pastors are good men who made a momentary mistake (never mind the fact that most pastors convicted of sex crimes are repeat or habitual offenders). Worse yet, on way too many occasions, once incarcerated clerics are released from prison, they find their way back to churches looking for pastors, or they start new churches — hiding from their new congregations their criminal past. One of the reasons I continue to publish Black Collar Crime stories is that this blog becomes a database of sorts for people doing their due diligence before accepting as fact the “testimony” of prospective pastors.
And to churches who hire registered sex offenders, knowing what they did at their previous churches? Don’t be surprised when your new God-fearing pastor treats your church as a hunting ground. Get your head out of your ass and protect the children, teens, and vulnerable adults in your churches. “But, Bruce, as Christians, we are supposed to forgive and forget. It’s forgetting I have a problem with. Forgetting what clergy have done in the past invites and encourages new abuse and harm. A few years ago, a family member who is an IFB pastor, mentioned in a positive light the “ministry” David Hyles has to “fallen” preachers. (Please see Disgraced IFB Preacher David Hyles Helping Fallen Pastors Get Back on Their Horses and Is All Forgiven for David Hyles? and David Hyles Says My Bad, Jesus, and UPDATED: Serial Adulterer David Hyles Has Been Restored.) I thought, ARE YOU FUCKING KIDDING ME! But, when you believe in 1 John 1:9 Christianity (If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just to forgive us our sins, and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness), it is easy to dismiss past bad behavior as being “under the blood” and “buried in the depths of the sea of God’s forgetfulness.” No matter what Christians do — including rape, murder, and fraud — wiping their slates clean is but a prayer away. (Note: I later talked to the family member. He genuinely didn’t know about David Hyles’ past. He was a child in the 1980s when the Biblical Evangelist published its expose on Jack and David Hyles. I guess I am officially an old man.)
Years ago, a former colleague of mine in the ministry, told me that at his church they believed in forgiveness, and that’s why they didn’t run criminal background checks on church workers. “Bruce,” this pastor said, “when a person gets saved, their past ‘sins’ are forgiven and remembered no more. If God doesn’t remember their sins, neither should we.” In his naive, Bible-sotted mind, once a person is really, really, really “saved,” there’s no reason to not “trust” them, even if, in the past, he or she was a murderer, rapist, serial adulterer, or child molester. “Either our sins are under the blood, or they are not, Brother,” this preacher told me. Many years ago, I warned him that one of his daughters was in a sexual relationship with a teen boy in my church. He told me, “Oh, they would never do that!” Right, two horny kids, all alone on a back-country road? What were they doing, studying the Bible and praying? A month or so later, he came home early from his church’s midweek prayer meeting, only to find his daughter and her boyfriend naked and having sex on the living room floor. Sadly, in far too many churches, trusted church leaders are assaulting and abusing congregants, and everyone around them is saying, “oh, they would never do that.” As the Black Collar Crime series makes clear, such thinking is not only naive, it’s dangerous. Throw in pastors who psychologically manipulate congregants and use those who trust them as a means to an end, and I can safely say that churches are some of the most dangerous places in the United States; that parents who “trust” church leaders with their children and teenagers risk their charges being misused, abused, and assaulted.
No, I am not saying all church leaders are bad people, but I am saying a large enough percentage of them are — more than a few bad apples, to be sure — that wisdom and prudence demand keeping children right by your side when attending houses of worship. Better safe than sorry, I say. (Dear Evangelical Church Leaders: It’s Time to Get Rid of Your Youth Pastors and Youth Departments) Suppose you went to the local grocery with your children to buy some groceries. Suppose there were 200 shoppers in the store, and ten of them were child molesters or registered sex offenders. Knowing this, would you let your children wander through the store unattended? Of course not. Why, then, should churches and preachers be treated any differently?
Let me leave you with one poignant thought: countless Christians have prayed for God to deliver them from the hands of their abusers, and without exception, God ignored their prayers. If left up to “God,” predator church leaders will, with impunity, cause untold harm. It is up to us to put a stop to clergy sexual misconduct. All I can do is write about the subject. But if you are a church-going Christian, you have the responsibility and duty to make sure children, teens, and vulnerable adults are safe when attending church, school, or church events. Doing nothing is no longer an option.
Bruce Gerencser, 67, lives in rural Northwest Ohio with his wife of 46 years. He and his wife have six grown children and thirteen 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.
We are seeing countless episodes of clergy members who are having sexual relations with their (church members) in a spiritual setting; I mean, right in the church, right in the confessional. And we think that there are a lot of these clergy members who have quite honestly taken advantage of people and taken advantage of their authority or power.
It’s a very powerful thing if you are an individual who has represented yourself as sort of the conduit to heaven, you know for salvation…well then you have a lot of influence over another person’s life. You know, we see cases all the time of a clergy member saying, you know, ‘Do what I say or else you’re not going to go to heaven.’ And that’s a type of power, a type of authority that we just don’t think that anybody should have to be able to exploit for a sexual purpose.
If attorneys have a sexual relationship with a client that they represent, they lose their law license for that, you know? Same thing with a doctor. So why should it be any different for members of the clergy?
We don’t think that it is a First Amendment issue, and we’d be willing to go to court on that if we had to. But I think that there are just certain positions of authority that should not be exploited for sexual purposes, and this is one of them.
I’m not afraid and I won’t apologize for wanting to ensure that any institution around the state understands that if they have been engaged or aiding and abetting in the coverup child sexual abuse, absolutely if there are charges that can be brought, we are happy to entertain those charges and to file them. But we’re hopeful that through the process of this investigation, when we find out more about what has happened in the past, we’ll be able to prevent that from happening in the future.
The egomaniacal and rapacious drives of a molester who blots out all sense of right and wrong, brutally disregarding the pain he is causing children, have often found a parallel in churches bent on protecting themselves at the expense of thousands of victims. That disregard is a malignancy in the church . . .
If religion or any institution depends on the sexual exploitation or subordination of children or women, then it is better that such institutions should cease to exist. If it is a question of the survival of the institution of the church versus the survival and safety of children, then our allegiance clearly must be with children.
It should be clear to everyone by now that Evangelicalism has a huge problem with sexual abuse and sexual misconduct. Hopefully, the Black Collar Crime series has forever shut the mouths of those who self-righteously claim that Evangelicals don’t have the same sort of sexual abuse problem as the Catholics do. I hope, anyway — but way too many Christian zealots are oblivious to their flies being unzipped. Bob Gray, Sr, the retired pastor of Longview Baptist Temple in Longview, Texas, loved to rail against the Catholics over their sexual abuse scandal. Gray, Sr, blindly believed that Independent Fundamentalist Baptist (IFB) churches didn’t have such problems. Evidently, in the mind of Gray, Sr, IFB doctrine is a condom of sorts that protects preachers, evangelists, missionaries, youth pastors, and deacons from committing sex crimes. Of course, we now know that the condom has a hole in it, and IFB leaders are just as likely to molest children, assault teenagers, and sexually manipulate congregants as are Roman Catholic priests. Gray, Sr, knows this, but he ignores it, choosing instead to protect serial adulterer David Hyles and fellate a blow-up doll of accused adulterer Jack Hyles. Countless sex scandals have rocked the Hyles wing of the IFB church movement, yet little is said publicly by men such as Gray, Sr. Wouldn’t it be great if IFB newspaper The Sword of the Lord ran a regular Black Collar Crime column? You know, calling sin, sin, as IFB preachers are wont to do. It should be thoroughly embarrassing to Evangelicals that an atheist’s blog and the Freedom From Religion Foundation’s monthly newsletter do more good in this regard than The Sword of the Lord, Christianity Today, and CHARISMA Magazine combined.
Recently, Marja asked:
Thank you for your diligence with this [Black Collar Crime] series. You have collected so many examples of black collar crime it’s stunning. Did you have any inkling of this while you were a pastor? Do you think there is something uniquely Christian about this, as it were, or do you think this is a dynamic that is prominent in any community in which you have strong patriarchalism tied to imperatives of religious obedience?
The Internet has fundamentally and forever changed how the public hears of and responds to allegations of sexual abuse, sexual assault, sexual harassment, and other sex-related crimes. The same can be said for offending pastors, evangelists, missionaries, professors, and traveling singers. Before the Internet, a preacher could commit all sorts of crimes, and, if not caught red-handed or reported to the police, he could escape punishment. Why? First, many parishioners simply refused to believe that THEIR pastor could ever do such things! This kind of thinking remains a problem to this day. I have posted more than a few stories about offending pastors that have attracted people heaven-bent on protecting their pastor. They will demand I take the post down, saying their pastor couldn’t have committed the crimes he is accused of. I try to remind them of the fact that, according to the Bible, King David was a “man after God’s own heart,” yet he had a sexual affair with Bathsheba and later had her husband murdered. Rarely does this work — these preacher-worshipers refuse to see the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth.
Second, before the Internet, a God-loving, sin-hating predator could quietly leave one church and move on to fresh hunting grounds. His old church was glad he was gone, end of story. A good example of this is the sordid story of David Hyles. David was the youth pastor at First Baptist Church in Hammond, Indiana. His father, Jack, was the pastor. At the time, First Baptist was the largest church in the United States. David was accused of having sex with teen girls and adult members. When his behavior reached a level where it could not be ignored, David was shipped off by his father to Garland, Texas to pastor Miller Road Baptist Church. The elder Hyles said nothing to people at Miller Road — a church he himself once pastored — leaving them in the dark about his son’s sexual proclivities. And, as sure as the sun comes up in the morning, David Hyles returned to his predatory ways, fucking his way through the church.
Third, IFB preachers/church leaders were taught to protect their church’s “testimony” at all costs. “There are souls in need of saving,” the thinking went. “If people find out about what our pastor/deacon/youth pastor/bus driver/school principal did, why they might not want to come to our church!” I know of countless scandals that were swept under the rug, all in the name of protecting the church’s reputation. Victims were often disbelieved and, far too often, blamed for what happened to them. Sometimes, church leaders would withhold from congregants allegations against their pastors. I know of one church which has had three sex scandals over the past twenty-five years, yet the pastor and church board have never given congregants a full accounting of what happened. The pastor, from the pulpit, encouraged people to “trust” him, that he was taking care of matters. This resulted, of course, in one man committing crimes TWICE at the same church over the course of two decades. So much for taking care of things. Fortunately, the second offense landed the offender in prison.
Fourth, it was hard to get to local law enforcement and prosecutors to take seriously allegations of criminal sexual misconduct against clergymen. Pastors were often viewed as pillars of their communities, men of virtue, character, and moral integrity. Sadly, some legal authorities who should have known better, believed that clergymen were above the fray; that it was impossible for such “godly” men to commit such crimes. Case in point is the late Mack Ford. Ford operated IFB boys’ and girls’ homes — detention centers — in Louisiana. He was repeatedly accused of criminal behavior, yet he astoundingly escaped prosecution. (Please see Sexual Abuse in the Name of God: New Bethany Home for Girls.) Countless children were harmed by Ford and people employed by him, yet local authorities refused to investigate or prosecute.
These four things, and others, provided cover for clergy sexual misconduct — and other crimes too. Over the years, I would hear whispers about this preacher or that preacher, or hear that Pastor so-and-so suddenly resigned from his church in Ohio and moved in the night to Florida. Such men were accused of everything from molesting children to running off with their secretary, yet I know of only two men who were arrested, prosecuted, and served time in prison for criminal behavior. Sadly, far too many offending preachers had a “Get Out of Jail Free” card.
While I don’t think such behaviors are uniquely a “Christian” problem, I believe that certain Evangelical beliefs and practices make such things more likely. First, Evangelicals are known for preaching against sex — any and all sex except for married, one man/one woman, monogamous, missionary-position sex. Puritanical views on sex breed sexual dysfunction and deviancy. It has been my observation that the louder some preachers preach against certain sexual sins, the more likely it is that they are doing the very things they preach against. One such preacher I know spent years having sex with his secretary every Saturday in his office. Bus workers would gather on Saturdays to visit their routes and canvass for new riders. After everyone left the building, the pastor and his lover would hit the carpet. Imagine this! Prior to having adulterous sex, this pastor would lead workers in prayer and give them a short devotional from the Bible. And then on Sundays, he would rain Holy Hell down on the heads of congregants, warning them that God hates sexual sin. (All pastors are hypocrites, but this man took the cake.)
Bob Gray, pastor of Trinity Baptist Church in Jacksonville, Florida, still clutching his King James Bible as he leaves jail
Second, Evangelical pastors wield great power — authoritarian and patriarchal in nature — over their congregations. Most churches are pastored by one man. In some Evangelical circles, pastors have total control over their churches, deciding everything from who can/can’t be a member to how the money is spent. (There are, by the way, Biblical proof texts supporting this kind of “rule,” but I’ll leave that to another day.) Suffice it to say that way too many churches are controlled and lorded over by their pastors. Now, this in and of itself doesn’t necessarily lead to criminal behavior, but some authoritarian pastors, drunk with power, do cross moral boundaries and commit crimes. It is not uncommon for Fundamentalist churches to be pastored by narcissistic men or sociopaths. Take for example the other Bob Gray — the former pastor of Trinity Baptist Church in Jacksonville, Florida. This Gray molested children and preyed on women for fifty years. His church was one the largest in the United States in the 1970s and 1980s. I considered him to be one the best pulpiteers I ever heard. I loved to hear him preach. (I vividly remember a sermon he preached on being filled with the Holy Spirit.) Gray was not found out and arrested until near the end of his life. He died awaiting trial for sex crimes. Gray ruled his church with a rod of iron. I have no doubt that there were whispers about “Bro. Gray” over the years, yet out of fear or not wanting to cause a scandal, people said nothing. Authoritarianism will do that, silencing people who see and know that their pastors are perverts or abusers.
Thanks to the Internet and to countless victims unwilling to be silenced, it is now much harder for Evangelical preachers to escape punishment for their crimes. With great courage, victimized men and women share their stories, even when the statute of limitations precludes their abusers from being prosecuted. Light dispels darkness, and as long as I am among the living, I intend to write about clergy sexual misconduct, publish first-person stories about clergy abuse, and publish Black Collar Crime posts. The Evangelical sex scandal is in its infancy. I have published over 500 Black Collar Crime stories. This, I am certain, is just the tip of the proverbial iceberg.
About Bruce Gerencser
Bruce Gerencser, 61, lives in rural Northwest Ohio with his wife of 40 years. He and his wife have six grown children and twelve 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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