Pastors Misbehaving

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March 2008
- Televangelist's Husband Admits Attacking Her
  
  Atlanta Journal-Constitution | Mar 12, 08 2:40 AM CDT
  
  (Newser) - The husband of Pentecostal televangelist Juanita Bynum pleaded guilty yesterday to assaulting her and was sentenced to three years probation. Thomas W. Weeks III, the founder of Global Destiny churches, admitted grabbing Bynum, throwing her down and kicking her in the parking lot of an Atlanta hotel in August, the Atlanta Journal-Constitution reports. Weeks apologized to his wife in court. More »
December 2007
- Priests Brawl With Brooms at Church of the Nativity
  
  Times (UK) | Dec 29, 07 6:58 AM CST
  
  (Newser) - A holiday cleanup at the church built over the grotto in Bethlehem where Christians believe Jesus was born turned ugly Thursday, as Greek Orthodox and Armenian priests came to blows, the Times of London reports. Robed priests pummeled each other with brooms and stones in the Church of the Nativity for an hour before police broke up the melee. More »
- Navy Chaplain With HIV Gets Jail in Forcible Sodomy Case
  
  Associated Press | Dec 6, 07 2:43 PM CST
  
  (Newser) - An HIV-positive US Navy chaplain pleaded guilty today to several charges of forcible sodomy and an aggravated assault charge for not disclosing his HIV status to one man, the AP reports. Lt. Cmdr. John Thomas Matthew Lee, 42, was sentenced to two years; without the plea bargain, the charges could have carried a life sentence. More »
- Senator Attacks Free-Spending Megachurches
  
  NPR | Dec 5, 07 3:34 PM CST
  
  (Newser) - Sen. Charles Grassley thinks big-spending pastors of so-called “megachurches” might be abusing their tax-exempt status, NPR reports. Ministers in these stadium-sized churches preach a gospel of wealth, and practice what they preach—driving Rolls Royces, flying in private jets, living in mansions. “Maybe that's not illegal,” the Iowa Republican says, “but it may raise questions about whether it's the right expenditure of money.” More »
- NY Diocese's Coloring Book Warns of Abuse
  
  Newsweek | Dec 5, 07 9:06 AM CST
  
  (Newser) - A coloring book handed out by the Catholic Church to kids in New York warns them not to be alone with an adult in a room with the door shut, Newsweek reports. It doesn't specifically name priests as a risk, but it does depict an angel warning an altar boy not to "be alone in a closed room with an adult." A man with his back turned—possibly a priest—is smiling at the child. More »
November 2007
- Sex Scandal Roils Atlanta Megachurch
  
  Associated Press | Nov 22, 07 3:59 PM CST
  
  (Newser) - Revelations was the theme of the day for a scandal-plagued Atlanta church as its archbishop had to admit that his "nephew" is really his son. And worse, he’d lied about it under oath, AP reports. A court-ordered DNA test showed Archbishop Earl Paulk fathered D.E. Paulk. Both work at the Cathedral of the Holy Spirit at Chapel Hill Harvester Church. More »
- Jeffs Gets Two Terms on Rape Charges
  
  Salt Lake Tribune | Nov 20, 07 5:45 PM CST
  
  (Newser) - Polygamous sect leader Warren Jeffs received consecutive five-year-to-life terms today for two counts of accomplice to rape, the Salt Lake Tribune reports. A Utah judge also made him pay $18,500 on each count of forcing an underage girl to marry in 2001 at the Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints, where Jeffs is considered a prophet, CNN reports. More »
- Jesuits Settle Sex Suit for $50M
  
  Seattle Times | Nov 19, 07 3:55 AM CST
  
  (Newser) - The Jesuits have agreed to pay $50 million to some 110 people living in remote Alaskan villages who claim they were sexually molested as children by 15 priests, brothers or men working for the Jesuits, reports the Seattle Times . Details of the settlements are still being negotiated, according to attorneys and a Jesuit spokesman. The victims were reportedly molested over a 20-year period from the ages of 5-16. More »
- Pope to Shun Boston on US Visit
  
  Time | Nov 14, 07 7:52 AM CST
  
  (Newser) - For his much-anticipated inaugural trip to the US this spring Pope Benedict XVI plans to visit the White House, the United Nations, the site of the World Trade Center—but not Boston, where the Church sex abuse scandal first erupted. The omission of Boston from the papal tour has infuriated victims of priest sexual abuse, reports Time. More »
- Lawmaker Probes TV Preachers
  
  Associated Press | Nov 7, 07 8:18 AM CST
  
  (Newser) - A top Republican lawmaker is probing six televangelists who have put their opulent lifestyles on display, the AP reports. Rolls Royces, private jets, and a $30,000 table are among the luxuries that sparked Sen. Chuck Grassley's inquiry, he said yesterday. "I don't want to conclude that there's a problem, but people who donated should have their money spent as intended and in adherence with the tax code." More »
- Pull Over, Father
  
  Der Spiegel | Nov 3, 07 5:08 PM CDT
  
  (Newser) - Irish priests are carping about a government proposal to lower the legal blood alcohol limit for drivers from .08 to .05, fearing that communion wine may make them legally drunk. “I don't like to use the word wine, as it is Christ's blood,” says one priest, “but it still has all the characteristics of wine when in the blood stream.” Non-alcoholic vino is no option, he adds, for it requires case-by-case church approval. More »
- Anti-Gay Church Ordered to Pay Dead Marine's Family $11M
  
  CNN | Nov 1, 07 2:00 AM CDT
  
  (Newser) - A fundamentalist Kansas church has been ordered to pay $11 million to the father of a Marine killed in Iraq after a jury decided that anti-gay church protesters violated the family's privacy. Members of Westboro Baptist Church routinely wave anti-gay posters at soldiers' funerals because they claim the war is punishment for the nation's tolerance of gays. More »
October 2007
- Oral Roberts U President Takes Leave of Absence
  
  Associated Press | Oct 17, 07 10:44 PM CDT
  
  (Newser) - Richard Roberts, the Oral Roberts University president who is accused of misuse of university funds and illegal involvement in a political campaign, requested and received an indefinite leave of absence from the university's Board of Regents today. The board said a senior pastor will temporarily take over the president's duties, with help from 89-year-old Oral Roberts, who is technically still the school's chancellor but had left day-to-day operations to his 58-year-old son. More »
- Gay Vatican Priest Outed on TV; Ousted by Holy See
  
  Associated Press | Oct 14, 07 6:55 AM CDT
  
  (Newser) - The Vatican yesterday suspended a senior official caught on hidden camera making advances to a man and saying that he didn't believe he was sinning by being involved with gays. Italian television showed the priest with his face distorted, but Vatican officials recognized the office where he was filmed. The suspended priest, Monsignor Tomasso Stenico, works for the Vatican's Congregation for Clergy, which aims to ensure proper conduct by priests. More »
- Priest Gets Life for 'Dirty War' Crimes
  
  BBC | Oct 10, 07 9:03 AM CDT
  
  (Newser) - A former Roman Catholic priest who delivered dozens of Argentines to the former military junta was sentenced to life in prison yesterday. Christian von Wernich, 69, passed his parishioners’ confessions to police during the so-called "Dirty War," leading to 7 murders, 42 abductions and 31 cases of torture, according to the BBC. Survivors say he watched torture sessions, absolving police of blame. More »
- Laity, Clergy Asked to Defray Sex Abuse Costs
  
  Los Angeles Times | Oct 8, 07 12:00 PM CDT
  
  (Newser) - The San Diego Diocese is turning over every stone to pay its $198.1 million settlement to sexual abuse victims, asking both priests and parishioners to chip in. Clerics are apparently willing—many will donate a month’s salary—but parishioner responses are far less positive, the LA Times reports. One says: "The Vatican can sell a painting or two." More »
September 2007
- Catholic Leader: Condoms in Africa Carry HIV
  
  BBC | Sep 27, 07 12:19 PM CDT
  
  (Newser) - Catholic opposition to condom use as an AIDS preventive in Africa took a bizarre turn yesterday when a respected archbishop in Mozambique charged that condoms imported from Europe had been deliberately infected with HIV. Maputo Archbishop Francisco Chimoio made his comments at an Independence Day celebration and reiterated them to the BBC. More »
- 6 Ark. Nuns Excommunicated
  
  Associated Press | Sep 27, 07 11:32 AM CDT
  
  (Newser) - Six Arkansas nuns have been booted from the Catholic Church for refusing to renounce the Army of Mary, a sect the Vatican deems heretical for its founder’s claim to be the reincarnation of the virgin. “We know we are doing the right thing,” said an 82-year-old nun. “We pray that the church will open their eyes before it is too late.” More »
- German Cardinal Uses Nazi Term to Describe Art
  
  BBC | Sep 15, 07 4:21 PM CDT
  
  (Newser) - Germans are in an uproar after an archbishop labeled some modern art “degenerate,” the same word Nazis used to persecute artists. A spokesman for Cardinal Joachim Meisner said the archbishop didn’t intend to acknowledge “old ideologies,” but the BBC says the term was precisely scripted because it has only one connotation in Germany, where the Nazi legacy is still taboo. More »
- Polygamist Boss Ordered Girl to 'Surrender' to Husband
  
  Associated Press | Sep 14, 07 4:05 AM CDT
  
  (Newser) - Polygamist Warren Jeffs was accused yesterday of ordering a 14-year-old girl to surrender to her older cousin in an arranged marriage. That amounts to rape as an accomplice, prosecutors charged in the first day of Jeffs' trial. Church members consider their leader “God on Earth" who could only be disobeyed at peril of their souls, testified the young woman, now 21. More »