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Tag: Evangelicalism

Black Collar Crime: Evangelical Youth Pastor Jared Thomas Stands Accused of Giving Teens Alcohol

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jared thomas

Jared Thomas, youth pastor at First Baptist Church in Ridge Manor, Florida, stands accused of giving teens alcohol and inappropriately touching a girl.

WFTS reports:

A Hernando County youth pastor is in trouble for giving alcohol to minors.

The church’s website says that Jared Thomas, has been the youth pastor here at the First Baptist Church in Ridge Manor since 2012. Though police reports say back on September 5th, he wasn’t acting very pastor-like.

The police report shows that after a high school volleyball match on September 5th, Thomas took his daughters to hang out with friends.

The report says Thomas stayed at the home and gave the girls alcohol and became very drunk himself. It goes on to say that he touched a girl inappropriately and was making obscene comments to that girl, then began chasing her. It also says he broke a window in the home after the girl locked him out.

“She was scared.” said Jason Sager. Sager says the girl was a player on the youth basketball team that Thomas coaches. Sager and his wife mentor the girl and says she texted him that night.

He said, “She was frightened, as she should be. There was an adult giving chase to her in a vehicle.”

Deputies arrested Thomas Sunday night.

Sager has now stepped in to coach the youth basketball team. “I’m a Christian myself and I do believe that judgment is up to God, but I do believe that Mr. Thomas needs to do a little soul searching.”

We reached out to the church and to Jared Thomas trying to get a statement about these charges but did not get a response.

Thomas’ bio on First Baptist’s website states:

Jared Thomas has been the Youth Pastor of Ridge Manor First Baptist Church since November of 2012. He is leading the Ridge Manor Student Ministry called UTURN Student Ministries with a focus on the passage of scripture Acts 1:9 Turn to God, give up sin and you will be forgiven. While being passionate about making disciples and seeing people reach their maximum potential in who they are in Jesus Christ, Pastor Jared and his Wife Josie came up with the ministry motto: “Changing Course and Making Turns in the Right Direction”.

Jared was ordained into the gospel ministry by FBC of Ridge Manor and has taken on a more involved role at the Church assisting with Pastoral Care. Having grown up in the Church he has served in Ministry in some way shape or form his whole life.

Prior to arriving in Ridge Manor, he had served in a few different local ministries in the Tampa Bay area for many years; working in Student Ministry, Music Ministry and Recreation Ministry. Jared and his Wife Josie are also Nationally Recognized Recording Artist Known as “Beyond Skillz”.

Black Collar Crime: Evangelical Pastor David Diehl Pleads Guilty to Sex Crime Charges

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pastor david diehl

Last November, David Diehl, pastor of Church on Fire in Grand Rapids, Michigan, was arrested and charged with ” child sexually abusive activity and using a computer to commit a crime.”

MLive reports:

A pastor pleaded guilty to accosting a child for immoral purposes for an online conversation with an undercover officer posing as a man willing to prostitute his young daughters.

David Robert Diehl, 40, of Kentwood, was to stand trial Monday, Oct. 9, facing up to 20 years in prison if convicted of child sexually abusive activity and using a computer to commit a crime.

He instead pleaded guilty to a four-year felony.

He will be sentenced Jan. 11 by Kent County Circuit Judge Dennis Leiber.

Diehl told investigators he worked full-time in a funeral home and was a pastor at Church on Fire in Grand Rapids.

State police detective Matthew McLanin had put a notice on Craigslist warning about a fictitious man named “Daddy Dave,” who was trying to prostitute his young daughters.

Diehl emailed the investigator for the phone number of the man. The detective sent his own number.

Police said Diehl admitted to texting “Daddy Dave” about his 11-year-old daughter and the possibility of meeting her for sex.

“Diehl admitted there was a strong possibility he would have met with Daddy Dave for the purpose of having sex with the 11-year-old girl if there was zero chance of Diehl being arrested by police or having to go to jail,” McLanin wrote in court documents.

Defense attorney Matthew Borgula has acknowledged that his client’s conversation with the investigator was “disgusting.” But Borgula said Diehl didn’t commit a crime, he only considered it.

Christians Say the Darnedest Things: Franklin Graham Thinks Unbelievers Hate the Religious Right. He’s Right, We Do!

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franklin graham
Comic by Keven Siers
As always, Fundamentalist Franklin Graham is clueless as to WHY unbelievers hate and despise the religious right. Look in the mirror Franklin. YOU are to blame.

America has flaunted its sexual immorality to the world. We’ve neglected many of the poor and suffering and are guilty of much injustice, pride and self-indulgence. We are broken spiritually, adrift morally and divided politically and racially—following whichever direction the bankrupt culture seems to drive us.

Sadly, the voices of hate have grown increasingly loud and insulting, and it was my prayer then and now that God would silence these voices like he shut the mouths of the lions when Daniel was hurled into the den.

While those hateful voices have been raised on both sides of the political aisle, we must realize that ultimately what is transpiring in our nation is an increasing hatred of God, His Word and His ways.

In my lifetime, I have never seen such blatant and incessant animosity toward Christ and His followers. We should not be surprised, because the Scripture tells us that if they hated the Lord Jesus Christ, they surely would despise those who worship and serve Him.

….

So let’s be clear. While believers should never raise voices of hate against anyone, the real object of hate in our nation (that has been so blessed by God) is none other than God Himself. What has been historically called good and righteous is now called evil, and what was evil is now called good. The Bible says, “Woe to those who call evil good, and good evil, who put darkness for light and light for darkness” (Isaiah 5:20).

In what I can only describe as unbelievable, the Southern Poverty Law Center in Mongtomery, Ala., has labeled a number of Christian organizations—such as the Family Research Council led by my friend Tony Perkins, and D. James Kennedy Ministries-—hate organizations simply because they hold to the teachings of the Bible on key social issues like same-sex marriage. Powerful contributors to the SPLC include Apple President Tim Cook and financial services giant J.P. Morgan. The leftist-progressive media frequently reference the SPLC in their reporting.

….

We need to pray for those who hate the Gospel, those who hate the Name of Jesus, those who hate His followers—that they will come out of their self-imposed darkness and into the light of God’s forgiveness through faith and repentance in Christ, who gave Himself for our sins.

The love of Jesus is the supreme antidote against the hate of our culture. It is the love that saved us from our iniquities and will save whomever will call on His Name.

— Franklin Graham, Decision Magazine, From Franklin Graham: Hate What God Hates, October 3, 2017

Black Collar Crime: Evangelical Youth Pastor Samuel Sutter Sentenced to Ten Years in Prison for Sexual Abuse

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samuel sutter

Samuel Sutter, youth pastor at Openwater Church in Odessa, Florida was sentenced last week to ten years in prison for sexually abusing a church teenager.

The Tampa Bay Times reports:

Everything had been worked out.

The former pastor had already admitted to sexually abusing one of his teenage congregants. He had agreed to serve 10 years in prison. He said nothing as he waited Thursday for a judge to pronounce the sentence.

But the girl’s mother couldn’t stay silent.

“He used God as a weapon,” she told the judge. “Fear as a weapon. Her own beliefs as a weapon.”

When the sexual encounters started, Samuel Sutter was a 25-year-old married pastor at Openwater Church in Odessa.

The girl was 15.

Sutter’s responsibilities included ministering to the church members in middle school, high school and college, and that was how the two met.

They had chatted on the phone and on Twitter. Over time, they started getting together outside church, at coffee shops and malls. The sex began in the fall of 2015.

“He shoved her face into bare, sweaty mattresses, so the evidence wouldn’t be on the sheets when his wife came home,” the mother said in court. “He obsessively reviewed every social media account she had, every text on her phone, every email, every photo …”

The mother spoke of Sutter overpowering the girl, putting his hands on her neck. She spoke of him forcing her to take morning-after pills to prevent her from becoming pregnant. She spoke of him threatening to leave her, if she didn’t do what he wanted, to pursue one of her friends.

In the spring of 2016, the mother noticed her daughter was acting anxious, more stressed than usual. She managed to get into her daughter’s phone, where she found text messages which indicated the two were sexually involved.

Hillsborough sheriff’s detectives investigated and later arrested Sutter. They said most of the sex acts happened at Sutter’s home, but some occurred in the women’s bathroom at the church on Race Track Road in northwest Hillsborough County.

“He chipped away her self worth, her self-esteem, her sense of balance, her trust, her faith in her family, her God and her self,” the mother said. “He continued to take, until all that was left was a shell of a girl who was so fearful and anxious and full of self-loathing that she felt the only way out may be to take her own life.”

Since the abuse ended, the mother said her daughter can’t eat certain foods or listen to the Christian music she once enjoyed. She has nightmares and panic attacks. She fears becoming close to anyone.

“Her precious gift of first love should have nothing to do with an adult, married youth minister …” she said. “This man hurt a child. He’s a dangerous predator, and unforgivable.”

Sutter could have faced up to 35 years in prison.

He pleaded guilty to three charges: lewd and lascivious battery, unlawful sexual activity with a minor, and use of a computer or device to solicit illegal acts.

In addition to prison, Sutter was sentenced to 25 years of probation. He will have to register as a sex offender for life.

Black Collar Crime: A Brief Example of Why You Should Never Trust Evangelical Churches to Protect Your Children

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theron mcdaniel

Sexual abuse is widespread in Evangelical churches. For every case reported and prosecuted, numerous others go unreported. Recently, Theron McDaniel, a bus mechanic, pleaded guilty to two counts of sexually abusing a teen girl. He was sentenced to twenty-six years in prison. Astoundingly, the children’s pastor and a church volunteer from Open Door Church in Burleson, Texas — the church home of McDaniel and his family — asked the judge to give McDaniel probation. Why? They believed he was not at risk to abuse anyone again. Really? I mean REALLY? How can these spokesmen for God KNOW McDaniel is not at risk to re-offend? Jesus? McDaniel got saved or told God he was really, really, really sorry? Or perhaps he cried crocodile tears, asked God and the girl to forgive him, and promised that he would never, ever, cross-his-heart-hope-to-die do it again.

Let this story be yet another example of why parents should NEVER entrust the care of their children to Evangelical pastors, church leaders, teachers, or nursery attendants. The risk is too high — with Evangelical theology turning smart people into trusting, forgiving, blind sheep who always see the “good” in people. Unfortunately, as the Black Collar Crime Series reveals, parents put their children at risk if they believe that Pastor so-and-so and the loving people at First Evangelical Church of Anywhere would never harm their children. They can, they might, and sadly, they, at times, will.

Here’s the Weatherford Democrat news story about McDaniel, his crimes, and those who think the convicted sexual abuser is an a-okay dude:

A 48-year-old Weatherford man was sentenced to consecutive 13-year prison sentences for two cases of sexual assault of a child in a trial that concluded in Parker County district court Thursday.

Earlier this month, Theron Scott McDaniel pled guilty to sexually abusing a 15-year-old girl and elected to have 43rd District Court Judge Craig Towson assess his punishment.

During the trial, victim impact testimony showed that, as a result of the abuse, the victim suffered from post-traumatic stress disorder, nightmares, anxiety, depression and low self esteem, according to Assistant District Attorney Jeff Swain, who prosecuted the case. According to testimony, the abuse occurred better than a dozen times over the course of about a year-and-a-half.

“The abuse in this case has had a profound impact on our victim,” Swain said. “With all that Mr. McDaniel put her through, she and I were both grateful that Judge Towson assessed stacked sentences that will keep him in prison for a long time.”

McDaniel testified that he had sex with the victim 13 times and apologized to her from the witness stand. He told Towson that while he may deserve a prison sentence for what he did, he was asking for probation so that he might continue to work and support his wife and three daughters.

Several defense witnesses from Cowtown Bus Charters in Fort Worth testified that McDaniel worked for them as a bus mechanic, was an excellent employee who would be difficult to replace, and requested that the judge give him a probated sentence. The Children’s Pastor and a church volunteer from Open Door Church in Burleson testified that they did not feel that McDaniel was a risk to sexually re-offend and that they also requested that he receive probation.

“The earliest that Mr. McDaniel could be released on parole would be in 13 years,” Swain said.

Theron McDaniel was employed by Cowtown Bus Charters. They too, worried about who would replace McDaniel, asked the judge to grant him probation. Evidently, motor repairs come before protecting children from people who deign to harm them.

Here’s McDaniel’s Cowtown bio:

I have been with Cowtown since 2009 as a mechanic. I have 30 years [sic] experience as an auto/diesel mechanic, mostly in the transportation and heavy, off-road equipment fields. I am currently the Head Mechanic at Cowtown. I have 4 daughters. I am active in Life Group Ministries and like bass fishing. My favorite vacation spots are Monument Lake, Rockwall, & Colorado.

Black Collar Crime: Evangelical Pastor David Farren Sentenced to Fifteen Years for Sexually Abusing Two Teens

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david farren

If you are not familiar with David Farren, please read, The David Farren Case: Why I Post Reports of Clergy Sexual Misconduct on Facebook.

David Farren, former youth pastor at Anchor Church, Trinity Church, Heritage Baptist Church, and Faith Baptist Church — all located in Texarkana, Texas — was charged in 2016 with sexually assaulting two teen girls. At the time, the Texarkana Gazette reported:

A youth pastor at Anchor Church in Texarkana was arrested Wednesday on three counts of sexual assault involving a teen girl. David Farren, 41, allegedly assaulted the girl when she was 16 and 17, Deputy Prosecuting Attorney Connie Mitchell said. The girl was allegedly a member of the youth group Farren headed. Miller County jail records show Farren was booked at 4:15 p.m. Wednesday. He is expected to appear before a Miller County judge Thursday for an initial appearance, at which time bail will be set. First degree sexual assault is a class A felony in Arkansas. Each of the three counts Farren is charged with is punishable by six to thirty years in prison.

….

When I publicized Farren’s crimes and arrest on Facebook, his supporters came out of the woodwork, defending him from all accusations of misconduct. Today, Farren was sentenced to fifteen years in prison for his crimes. TXK Today reports:

A Texarkana pastor was sentenced to 15 years in prison Tuesday morning for sexually abusing two teen girls who were members of youth ministry groups he led at several local churches.

David Wayne Farren, 42, appeared with Texarkana attorney Jason Horton for a plea and sentencing hearing before Miller County Circuit Judge Carlton Jones. Farren pleaded guilty to seven counts of first-degree sexual assault, one count of second-degree sexual abuse and a misdemeanor count of violating mandatory reporting requirements. Farren pleaded no-contest to one count of second-degree sexual assault as well.

As part of a plea bargain, Jones sentenced Farren to 15 years for each of the nine felony counts of sexual abuse, to run concurrently, and to four days in the county jail with credit for four days served on the misdemeanor. At the end of the hearing, Farren was led from the courtroom to the jail.

Deputy Prosecuting Attorney Connie Mitchell said Farren confessed to eight of the nine felonies during an interview with Texarkana, Ark., Police Dept. investigators last year. According to a probable cause affidavit, the victim listed in eight of the felony counts first met with TAPD detectives in July 2016 when she was 20. That victim told investigators she was motivated to come forward because she worried Farren was grooming another girl. At the time of his arrest, Farren was serving as lead pastor of Anchor Church in Texarkana.

The victim told investigators she first met Farren while in middle school at Trinity Christian School and while Farren was youth minister at Trinity Church and later youth minister at Heritage Baptist Church in Texarkana. The girl said she confided in Farren in 2013 that she had been sexually abused by someone else in her past. Members of the clergy, teachers and medical personnel are required by law to report allegations of child physical or sexual abuse to a national child abuse hotline, but Farren did not.

The girl said she was babysitting Farren’s children the first time he touched her sexually as she was lying on a couch under a blanket, and that he had intercourse with her on her 17th birthday in 2013. She said she and Farren had sex in his home in Texarkana, Ark., more than 20 times and that he would have sex with her in his garage if his wife was at home. She said Farren claimed he did not divorce his wife because it would be a sin. The victim reported that the abuse stopped in August 2013. The victim mentioned that when Farren began taking an intense interest in her, another girl with whom he had been “close” had left for college.

The other girl was interviewed by TAPD detectives in August 2016 after Farren’s first arrest. She told detectives Farren began touching her sexually after her father died when she was about 15 and Farren was her youth minister at Faith Baptist Church in Texarkana. The second victim to be interviewed by police is named in one of the second-degree sexual assault counts. She said she cut off contact with Farren after he made a phone call to her while she was in her college dorm room. The girl said Farren’s sexual conversation with her led her to “realize how he had control over her.”

Farren will be required to register as a sex offender upon his release from prison and will be required to pay a fee for the registration as well as a fee for having his DNA included in state and national databases. He must serve 70 percent of his sentence before he becomes eligible for parole.

 

 

Freethought Music

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I want to make readers aware of a site called Freethought Music: A Website for Atheist and Humanist Musicians, Composers, and Leaders. If you are interested in freethought music — I know I am — you will find this website helpful.

Video Link

Video Link

I want to say THANKS to Paul Heffron and Jerry Rauser for making me aware of the Freethought Music site.

Songs of Sacrilege: He is by Ghost

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ghost

Warning! Lyrics may contain offensive, vulgar language.

This is the one hundred and fifty-second 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 Song of Sacrilege is He is by Ghost.

Video Link

Lyrics

We’re standing here by the abyss
And the world is in flames
Two star crossed lovers reaching out
To the beast with many names

He is
He’s the shining and the light without whom I cannot see
And He is Insurrection
He is spite
He’s the force that made me be
He is
Nostro Dispater
Nostr’Alma Mater
He is

We are hiding here inside a dream
And all our doubts are now destroyed
The guidance of the morning star
Will lead the way into the void

He is
He’s the shining in the light without whom I cannot see
And He is Insurrection
He is spite
He’s the force that made me be
He is
Nostro Dispater
Nostr’Alma Mater
He is

He is
He’s the shining and the light without whom I cannot seeAnd He is Insurrection

And He is Insurrection
He is spite
He’s the force that made me be
He is
He’s the shining in the light without whom I cannot see
And He is
The disobedience that holds us together
He is
Nostro Dispater
Nostr’Alma Mater
And we are falling over the precipice

Songs of Sacrilege: Reality Asylum by Crass

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crass

Warning! Lyrics may contain offensive, vulgar language.

This is the one hundred and fifty-first 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 Song of Sacrilege is Reality Asylum by Crass.

Video Link

Lyrics

I am no feeble Christ, not me.
He hangs in glib delight upon his cross. Upon his cross.
Above my body. Lowly me.
Christ forgive, forgive. Holy he, he holy, he holy.
Shit he forgives. Forgive, forgive. I, I, Me, I.
I vomit for you, Jesu. Christi-Christus.
Puke upon your papal throne.
Wrapped you are in the bloody shroud of churlish suicide.
Wrapped I am in the bloody cloud of hellish genocide.
Petulant child.
I have suffered for you, where you have never known me.
I too must die. Will you be shadowed in the arrogance of my death?
Your valley truth? What lights pass those pious heights?
What passing bells for these in their trucks?
For you Lord, you are the flag-bearer of these nations,
one against the other, that die in the mud.
No piety, no deity. Is that your forgiveness?
Saint, martyr, goat, billy. Forgive?
Shit he forgives.
He hangs upon his cross in self-righteous judgment,
hangs in crucified delight, nailed to the extent of his vision.
His cross, his manhood, his violence, guilt, sin.
He would nail my body upon his cross,
as if I might have waited for him in the garden,
as if I might have perfumed his body, washed those bloody feet?
This woman that he seeks, suicide visionary, death reveller,
rape, rapist, grave-digger, earth-mover, life-fucker. Jesu.
You scooped the pits of Auschwitz.
The soil of Treblinka is rich in your guilt,
the sorrow of your tradition,
your stupid humility is the crown of thorn we all must wear.
For you? Ha. Master? Master of gore.
Enigma.
Stigma.
Stigmata.
Errata.
Eraser.
The cross is the mast of our oppression.
You fly their vain flag. You carry it.
Wear it on your back Lord. Your back.
Enola is your gaiety.
Suffer little children, suffer in that horror.
Hiro-horror, horror-hiro, hiro-shima, shima-hiro,
hiro-shima, hiro-shima, Hiroshima, Hiroshima.
The bodies are your delight.
The incandescent flame is the spirit of it.
They come to you Jesu, to you.
The nails are the only trinity.
Hold them in your corpsey gracelessness.
The image that I have had to suffer.
These nails at my temple.
The cross is the virgin body of womanhood that you defile.
In your guilt, you turn your back, nailed to that body.
Lamearse Jesus calls me sister! There are no words for my contempt!
Every woman is a cross in his filthy theology!
He turns his back on me in his fear.
His vain delight is the pain I bear.
Alone he hangs, his choice, his choice.
Alone, alone, his voice, his voice.
He shares nothing, this Christ; sterile, impotent, fuck-love prophet of death.
He is the ultimate pornography. He! He!
Hear us, Jesus!
You sigh alone in your cock fear!
You lie alone in your cunt fear!
You cry alone in your woman fear!
You die alone in your man fear!
Alone Jesu, alone, in your cock fear, cunt fear, woman fear, man fear.
Alone in you fear, alone in your fear, alone in your fear.
Your fear, your fear, your fear, your fear, your fear, your fear, your fear,
Warfare, warfare, warfare, warfare, warfare!

JESUS DIED FOR HIS OWN SINS. NOT MINE.

A Social Media Discussion Between an Evangelical and an Atheist

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pascals wager

What follows is a discussion between an atheist friend of mine and an Evangelical. I no longer engage in such discussions on social media, choosing to focus on my blog, but the following discussion reminds me of the interactions I once had with Christian zealots on Facebook and Twitter. In just but a few comments, the Evangelical trots out an interesting version of Pascal’s Wager, threats of judgment and hell, with a zesty seasoning of “you are angry and bitter” to round out the discussion.

Enjoy!

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social media discussion atheist christian (8)

 

Bruce Gerencser, 68, lives in rural Northwest Ohio with his wife of 47 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.

You can email Bruce via the Contact Form.