Kruse Kronicle

Looking Haggard, Ted Steps Aside

—

by

mwkruse
in ,

From Ben Witherington: Looking Haggard, Ted Steps Aside

In a scenario reminiscent of the Jim Bakker scandal decades ago, Ted Haggard, pastor of a 14,000 member Evangelical Church in Colorado Springs and one of the heads of the National Association of Evangelicals who has led the charge in the state by state organizing against gay marriage, has at least for now stepped aside from pastoring his church. Why? Because Mike Jones of Denver says that the 50 year old pastor, married with five children, has been having same sex sexual relations and doing metamphetamines with him for three years! The acting pastor, Ross Parsley told KKTV-TV that Haggard had confessed to him that some of the allegations were true. It remains to be seen which ones.

Here is the link to the story on MSNBC–http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/15536263/.

Before we ask– has the world gone mad, it might be good to reflect for a minute on the leadership climate in the rarified air of big time Evangelical mega-churches. of course it will vary from church to church, but there are a few things in common with most of these churches which needs to be rethought:

1) most of these large churches are not part of denominations which have a connectional enough system to hold the individual church leadership accountable through peer leaders in other churches….

2) The culture of patriarchal Evangelical leadership involves a lot of power and isolation at the top. Too often it involves a cult of personality kind of scenario, with the "pastor-superstar" model, and the pastor put way up on a pedestal– from which he is almost bound to fall. …

3) One of the unspoken realities that needs to be dealt with especially in high pressure large churches is male menopause. Yes, you heard me right, male meonpause. Men, beginning in their late 40s and continuing on into there mid to late 50s also go through a change of life. …

…..

I do not know how much of this applies to Ted Haggard. What I do know is this– I have seen many good ministries destroyed due to lack of proper accountability and lack of good marital relationships, and lack of spiritual formation of the leader himself. …

Comments

2 responses to “Looking Haggard, Ted Steps Aside”

  1. islandpreacha Avatar
    islandpreacha

    Certainly a sad fall and reflects poorly on the entire Church.
    As you reflect it would benefit all churches (I’m pcusa) to have in place better systems of accountability. However, I think you are perhaps off regarding our connectional nature as an antidote to such incidents.
    “1) most of these large churches are not part of denominations which have a connectional enough system to hold the individual church leadership accountable through peer leaders in other churches….”
    In theory it is and it should be. But my experience in practice is that by the time the COM or other pastors are stepping in it is way to late. Pastor Lance at fullcourtpresby blog has written some about new ways we might network and kingdom build together with a more realistic connectionalism. Some pcusa (or other connectional/denominational) pastors will have strong and effective accountablity partners. Some big-steeple evangelical nondenoms will too. but it is likely that these effective accountability relationships will come from grassroots than from institutional structures.
    Anyhoo, my 2 cents!

    Reply
  2. Michael Kruse Avatar
    Michael Kruse

    Thanks. Actually the observations are Witherington’s not mine. I too share some of your concerns about supposing a “connectional accountability.” I got caught in the middle of a PCUSA congregational meldown four years ago and because of several beginning miscalcs by the COM it made things much worse than it had to be. I don’t see our present connectionalism being very proactive with problems like these.

    Reply

Leave a Reply

Discover more from Kruse Kronicle

Subscribe now to keep reading and get access to the full archive.

Continue reading