Carly Gelsinger – Unfundamentalist

Willow Creek Community Church, a Chicago-area megachurch, is scrambling under the light of the recent allegations of sexual misconduct against its lead pastor, Bill Hybels. Last night, Hybels announced that he was resigning from Willow Creek due to the controversy, although he continues to claim that the allegations against him are false.

The Hybels are a well-connected and influential evangelical family and their supporters have rallied around them. Both the church itself and Hybels’s daughter Shauna Niequest have posted publicly in social media spaces, receiving thousands of comments in support of the Hybels family. This is understandably a difficult time for Bill Hybels’s wife and children and anyone else who has been influenced by him, and their feelings matter. But what matters more is a fair investigation into the disturbing patterns of behavior and cover-ups Hybels is being accused of.

The responses from churchgoers and fans of Hybels’s books and ministry are beyond problematic. They are everything that is wrong with evangelical culture and the reason these things are allowed to happen in secrecy for so long. They demonstrate blind support of their leaders and disregard for logic or facts, with a generous side of victim blaming. Here are some of my favorites:

“Willow Creek changed my life therefore these accusations must be lies.”
You can be grateful for the way a church or pastor has shaped you and still be open to the possibility he may be a… [Read more…] about 9 Responses to the Willow Creek Accusations That Reveal Everything Wrong with Evangelicalism

Sexual assault thrives in the evangelical church, but why?

The sexual assault confession of Texas evangelical megachurch pastor Andy Savage is just the latest in a disturbing trend we’ve seen over the last decade.

It’s time to face the music. Evangelical pastors sexually abuse.

I realize this issue isn’t unique to evangelicalism, or religion (hello, Catholic Church circa 2002) or humans in general. There are abusive schoolteachers, parents, bosses, Hollywood directors, and strangers in parks. But there is a unique microclimate within evangelicalism that fosters the growth of abusers while silencing their victims. Whether they do this explicitly (as in Savage’s victim, who was told by the senior pastor to “not tell another soul”) or implicit in the theology and lifestyle in the congregation, the effect is the same. Victims of sexual abuse in evangelical churches often stay quiet. I grew up in the evangelical church, and while it never happened to me personally, it absolutely could have. This is why:

Pastors are elevated
There is a verse in the Bible that says “touch not the Lord’s anointed,” which in my church was interpreted to mean “don’t disrespect the pastor.” This kind of respect is given by title, not necessarily earned. Pastors are often seen as an elevated spiritual human, and while they’ll refute this at the pulpit (“I’m a sinner just like you!”) some pastors secretly enjoy the elevated status they receive from their job. This is… [Read more…] about How Evangelicalism Fosters Sexual Abuse