Doug Wilson recently met with members of his congregation — heads of household (HOH), specifically — to discuss the Sitler and Greenfield/Wight cases. He pulled his information, he stated in his introduction, from “elder minutes, from the HOH minutes, and occasionally letters.”
Based on the records from this meeting, we know precisely what Doug told people and can hold him accountable for his words. So let’s fact-check the statements that Doug Wilson has made to his congregation. I encourage you to go back to your own notes of the meeting, if you have them, and compare them to the public records and other links I’ll be posting here.
Steven Sitler Case
- The information spin: In the Steven Sitler case, Doug waited months before informing his congregation about what Sitler (who was not then in jail) had been up to. Doug doesn’t deny this, but in the meeting he claimed that talking about this is “misleading.” He specifies: “there are a number of things that have been out on the internet that have been misleading. One of them is um, one of the arguments of the things that’s alleged is that we took many, many months before we communicated with the HOH about this, but you have to remember that this was a small town event, public, a very public event — nobody needed to be told what had happened, the basic facts of the case.” So, why is saying he waited to inform the congregation “misleading”? Apparently, because Doug didn’t think his congregation needed to be informed that a serial pedophile had access to his congregation. Which is the whole point of what “the internet” finds problematic about this. As for the implication that people knew about it anyway — that’s a pretty weird argument given the church-wide directive not to gossip about situations like this, because the church will tell you what you need to know.
- The “victims were all OK” spin: Doug stated repeatedly in the meeting that he is concerned for Sitler’s victims and did his due diligence there, but he appears to have left Sitler’s victims and their families out of his calculations about bringing Sitler back into the congregation. Doug states: “After the State of Idaho gave permission for him to worship on Sunday morning, the elders considered it, we had a HOH meeting where we communicated that prospect, that possibility to the HOH, got feedback from that, and decided to do that.” In actuality, at least one of the families obtained a No Contact order against Sitler coinciding with Silter’s release into the congregation, which prevented him (very rightly) from being around his abuse victims, including during church. I say this based on the No Contact orders listed under Sitler’s name in the Idaho Repository (note: again, rightly, the victims are not named in the Idaho Repository; you can look up the Sitler case and find these orders listed under his name). There are three such orders, dated December 13, 2005; May 4, 2006; and a year later on May 4, 2007.
- The parole violations lie: Doug Wilson claimed that Sitler did not violate his parole at any time. His words: “From the time he was released to the time of his wedding, he was free of any probation violations. And from the time of the wedding until the present, the same.” This is flat-out false (or, at the very least, highly misleading). Sitler was arrested for voyeurism a few weeks after being released, and has had two (alleged) probation violations since then.
- The “back to prison” spin: Doug expounded on this by stating “Steven was sentenced to life, uh, a lifetime sentence, which means that when he is out on probation, if there were a probation violation for example, he could go back to prison for life.” As we’ve seen, there have been probation violations or at least potential violations, and Steven has not gone back to prison. Now, in theory, Doug is correct that Steven could go back to prison, but the probation violations would have to be pretty extreme. It’s not just any violation.
- The “no kids” spin/lack of due diligence/lie: Doug stated that when the Sitlers got married, “I know that initially the plan was to not have children.” Now, this is a very weird thing to “know,” given that the state of Idaho publicly recorded the opposite at the time. An officer told the court that Steven had stated he did intend to have children, based in large part on his religious beliefs. I find it ludicrous that the officer would know this ten days before the wedding and Doug Wilson would not. Particularly since this is the same hearing Doug referred to in order to justify the fact that the judge signed off on the Sitler wedding. Now, Doug could have been referring to the fact that the woman who married Steven had stated she was going to be on birth control until she was done with college (maybe that’s what Doug meant by “initially”). But if Doug knew this, he’d also have to know the next item uttered in the hearing, which was that they’d try to have kids after that. Additionally, Doug was present when someone else, as part of the wedding ceremony, prayed that the Silters’ union would be fruitful and bear children.
- The “marriage is all good” spin: Doug stated in the meeting that the judge thought that Steven getting married was a “good idea,” and that the church agreed. That’s pretty strong language based on the actual dialogue of the court records. In the court recording, Judge Stegner does say “an age-appropriate relationship with a member of the opposite sex for Mr. Sitler is one of the best things that can happen to him and to society.” However, he expresses ambivalence elsewhere and stresses that there’s not much he can do to stop the wedding, given how soon it is. For example, he states, “I think it’s a reasonable restriction that he not reside with his wife and child, in the future, if in fact they have children,” which would make for a strange Father-centric Christian marriage, no? Additionally, Doug totally skips over the part where the Idaho Department of Corrections advised against the marriage — again, based on the fact that Sitler had stated he intended to have children.
- The total lack of understanding of what abuse victims need and how healing works: Doug’s descriptions of the victims of these crimes is a bit weird — on two levels. Firstly, it’s weird that he appears to think that the victim’s problems have “largely just ceased, or at least apparently ceased” once the perp is apprehended. Secondly, it’s weird how he words this — he uses double negatives and double-speak to the point that it seems like he’s arguing opposite things. He says, “when you have a molestation or a problem like this and the offender is caught, the victim’s family’s problems have largely just ceased, or at least apparently ceased. We found out what the problem was. Now I know that’s not true, but in terms of the — the offender’s problems have just started. So, um, I’m — let’s just make up another imaginary situation not like this at all where someone offends some grievously, and then they get caught and it’s criminal, I’m going to be getting ten times more phone calls from the offender needing help, who’s in trouble, who knows he’s in trouble and wants pastoral help, and the people who just got delivered from this problem are going to say, ‘well I need to forgive,’ and that’s true, but for victims, there’s often times, things that need to be processed, so I’m not saying no help is needed, but it’s not on fire the way it is with someone going to court and who might be facing penitentiary time.” Clear as mud, right? This sort of prevaricating is exactly the kind of thing you should be avoiding when you’re ministering to sex abuse victims. There was nothing in the records that suggested a clear and reasonable plan of action for how to minister to abuse victims, either — aside from Doug suggesting his wife would be the counselor he recommended for women. And when you add Doug’s words about victims of sexual assault from his latest blog post, things look really bad: “One in four women are sexually assaulted on college campuses because feminists feel like statistics are necessarily validated by how dire they are. One in three women, regardless of the actual number of assaults, would feel even truer… we released The Free Speech Apocalypse at exactly the right time. If you watch that most excellent film, you can see victims actually painting their own bruises on. At least nobody said ow ow ow while they were doing it. Victim make-up for made-up victims.” Translation: don’t pay attention to women who say they’ve been sexually assaulted, because some are sure to be lying. Instead, pay to watch a film I star in, where I continue to make fun of these women.
Jamin Wight/Greenfield family case
- The “parent approved relationship” spin: What is Doug’s basis for claiming there was a “parent approved relationship”? The main thing he referred to in the meeting is what Jamin told him. Remember: Jamin, among his other crimes, has committed perjury. Doug stated, “[Natalie’s mom] and Gary knew about it, um, Jamin knew about it, Jamin has confirmed to me recently that — I asked him that question, did Natalie know about it. According to Jamin, he said yes, she knew — she knew all about it. She knew she was in a relationship with him, but did she know that this was a parent approved relationship? Jamin would say yes. I think Natalie would say, from this distance, no.” Later on, in a bizarre twist, Doug states, “it would be disingenuous for me to apologize for having trusted [Jamin] when I didn’t.” Yes, Doug, you did and you do, or you wouldn’t be using his quotes as evidence (Jamin said he knew there was a relationship; therefore there was a relationship). Doug additionally states that “we have documents from the time that clearly show they were in that courtship… [but] I couldn’t prove right now that [Natalie] knew about it.” That’s pretty weird… a “courtship” where one party in the courtship might not know it’s a courtship. Is this even possible? I submit that it isn’t, unless by “courtship” you mean something way more nebulous than the way the word is used 99% of the time… So what are these “documents” that Doug keeps referring to that “prove” this so-called “relationship” that Natalie might or might not have known about? Few in his congregation appear to know, because Doug refuses to answer questions about them. He claims he’s doing this to protect “the Greenfields,” but absolutely none of the Greenfields feel protected by the way Doug has handled this. Doug’s slandering all of them and refusing to man up and say exactly why. And let it be noted that Doug was certainly willing to quote letters by and about the Greenfields aloud in the meeting. So here’s the thing: the only documents I know about that “prove” what Doug is claiming are authored by Jamin. You can even see the outline of this in Doug’s assertion to the HOH that the courtship was real because the Greenfields didn’t deny the allegations at the time. Well, as far as I can tell, Gary’s refusal to even entertain such an absurd claim, and refusing to let his family near the church’s spreading of these lies, is a pretty strong denial. Not to mention, they’re denying it now, when it’s publicly being tossed at them. So, my guess is, given all of these details, the only “proof” Doug has of a “parent-approved relationship” is what Jamin wrote down. Yeah, the same guy who committed perjury. And I’m guessing that’s the real reason Doug refuses to talk about it in detail.
- The “abuse” spin: Doug claims Gary Greenfield was abusing his family, and while the abuse was different than what Jamin did, it was still “every bit as bad” as what Jamin did. Doug mentions a number of things that Gary was supposedly doing to abuse his family. What Doug mainly talked about in the meeting, tellingly enough, was how Gary wanted his family to leave the church and move away from Moscow. He mentioned that Natalie wrote a letter to Gary saying no, she didn’t want to move. He also claimed that Gary blamed Natalie for what Jamin did to her. This is either a misunderstanding or a deliberate spin of the facts — Gary at one point did go off on a tirade blaming Natalie, but it was not for her abuse, and it was not for the breakup of the family — it was specifically (if this is the incident Doug is referring to) for medication-induced health problems, caused by a dangerous lack of oversight (on the doctor’s part) when combining sleeping pills and other meds, which Natalie was on in an attempt to deal with her PTSD from the abuse. Natalie actually discussed this with me before this HoH meeting even happened. Natalie does not remember what she specifically wrote to Doug ten years ago that would “prove” what he’s claiming, but she does remember the events with her father, and she knows her father as well as herself much more fully after taking the time to sort through some of this stuff.
- The “weaponized apology” lie: Doug claims that he can’t apologize because his apologies get “weaponized.” He stated, “I wrote [Natalie], emailed her and apologized; and the next morning the attack blogs had quotes from that letter.” I confirmed with Natalie, but no blog whatsoever published quotes from the email Doug is referring to — the next morning or any morning thereafter. Natalie didn’t share this email with many people, and it’s true that the people who read it were disgusted by how self-servingly the “apology” was worded. Nonetheless, they didn’t publish it. As far as I know, the only thing remotely pertaining to this has to do with things I’ve published on my own blog. I once wrote an obviously-faux quote from Doug stating “I sneezed in Natalie’s direction once, and she didn’t take this as a sincere apology, so what are you going to do?” Is Doug really arguing that this is a direct quote from the letter he sent Natalie? That would be hilarious. Or maybe he’s thinking of where I quote the coercive letter he wrote to her after his “apology” — although I waited weeks before publishing quotes from this. If anyone can point me in the direction of other blogs that quote Natalie’s letters to Doug, I would greatly appreciate it, because I’m committed to being as accurate as possible here.
- The sex offender lie: Doug claimed that Jamin was legally labeled as a sex offender: “He was labeled, I think for a short time, so he got sentenced and was labeled as a sex offender for a certain period of time and I forget how long that was. But then that label was dropped. So, but he was labeled that for a time.” In reality, Jamin was never labeled a sex offender, not even for a second. Had Jamin been convicted of his original charge, he would have been a sex offender. However, because he plead guilty to a lesser charge (thanks at least in part to a last-minute judge DQ), he escaped the sex offender label.
Why is Doug Wilson commenting authoritatively on stuff he clearly knows nothing about? Because this, you see, is my real beef with him. He’s unqualified to handle abuse cases and legal cases, and he sincerely appears to believe that he is — and/or that his equally-unqualified wife is. This total lack of understanding and expertise has severely injured many people in his congregation, and it will continue to until Doug can step back and admit what he doesn’t know — and the way he’s mislead people based on what he doesn’t know.
Now for the real test. How will Doug react to being informed that he spread misinformation at a HOH meeting? Will he brush any factual errors aside with “well, I forgot, big deal”? Will he claim that I’m making his quotes here up, or taking them out of context? Will he accuse me of slander? Will he use his elders to caution anyone who brings these things up to him, “well, she’s on a crusade to slander us, so you can’t believe anything she said; if you agree with her about anything, even factual things, then you’re an enemy of the church”? Will he insist him lying to his congregation is nobody’s business? That the only legitimate way to bring up concerns is through his panel of hand-selected elders under the specific church rules he himself made up?
Here’s the thing, which I’ve mentioned before: I’m not out to slander Doug, and everything I publish on my blog has to pass the litmus test of whether I could prove it in a court of law. Because I’m putting my name on this. I’m hanging myself out there for potential retaliation, and given the number of people I’ve talked to who are scared of Doug retaliating if they speak up, it seems like a legitimate concern. I know I need to have my ducks in a row. I do not always reveal my sources or discuss how I know things, or even, in some cases where I’m deliberately vague, what exactly I’m referring to. I need to keep my sources safe. And I need to keep myself safe. And the only way I can do that for sure is by telling the truth.
And, unlike Doug, I welcome constructive criticism if something I’ve written is factually inaccurate, even a little bit. So please contact me if that’s the case.
Botkin Creative 
You’ll have to pardon me if I find all of this to be absolutely hilarious and comical, albeit for entirely all of the wrong reasons. I’m laughing myself into a catatonic stupor over here at the sheer insanity and zaniness of it all. Doug Wilson is like one of those old villains from a Scooby-Doo cartoon. I can’t even.
Well, when one considers that these Head of Household meetings only include males, I’d say that’s silencing quite a few members of the CREC from having a voice in this whole process. Very convenient for DW.
For these special meetings, they invited all CC and TRC members including wives. But at Tuesday’s TRC meeting, according to former members the Roise’s on FB, former members were unwelcome. Another couple who reportedly have intimate knowledge of the Wight situation tried to attend and were asked to leave because they’re no longer “family”. (Or, from my cynical POV, because of things they might have said.)
I have heard that at least this specific HOH meeting including women as well. In general, it is mostly the husbands who attend these meetings though.
I have no context, and am only here because my oldest son tweeted it out. I have some interest because I am the son of a molester, and used to have sex offenders as a sub-specialty of mine at the psychiatric hospital I work at. The general story fits a pattern I have seen before, of the offender being able to gather more support and protection – from churches, law enforcement, and mental health providers – than the victims. It is part of their survival set, their-imitation-of-humanity skills. It’s discouraging.
@ Darlene – As for excluding women, whenever you see one group being even partially excluded, others rapidly follow. When someone says of a patient “Oh, she doesn’t work well with men,” we quickly find that she doesn’t work all that well with women either. There seems to be some of that here. Women were not entirely excluded but were not fully in-cluded either. Looking around, we see that others were excluded as well.
Eventually, the circle grows very small.
Katie wrote: ” And, unlike Doug, I welcome constructive criticism if something I’ve written is factually inaccurate, even a little bit. So please contact me if that’s the case.”
This pretty much says it all. Because Doug has God on his side, even if he is misunderstood or wrong, he is still covered and technically right because he is the pastor and his theology has teeth. As Jesus surely would, he allows abusers free access to his congregation and he seems to relate to them much more agreeably than he manages with those abused by those perpetrators.
What seems especially sad to me, is that his sheep know him and continue along with barely a baaa of concern. When they do, his theology with teeth clamps down hard, fast and hard. I grew up in a fundy Baptist home and I learned to shut up and not reveal because reveling meant punishment. Doug’s church fold sound like I was as that kid. Of course in his church, only the heads of households get to speak and be included… that is another special message from God to Doug, I expect.
It is indefensible that while Wilson and Christ Church are supposedly being investigated for any wrongdoing, negligence or misjustice that Wilson is free to influence and spread his twisted version of the events to his congregation (who may be speaking to the investigators) not once, but two times so far. If the inquiry was in any way honest about its intentions Wilson would have been asked to refrain from comment on the situation until it was over.
So far the only honest part about the inquiry is that they’ve already let us know that we won’t like what they determine.
Well, Cicero, it seems Wilson fancies using his blog as a means for his defense, albeit in a most ambiguous manner. Except that those who are on to him know what he’s doing over there at Blog and Mablog. It’s truly a narcissistic sight to behold.
Darlene, Yes. His narcissism is on clear and obvious display over there. It’s weird to read it and think that some don’t see it.
Case in point, his very latest entry.
Katie wrote: ‘He stated, “I wrote [Natalie], emailed her and apologized; and the next morning the attack blogs had quotes from that letter.”’
Maybe he read a comment on Wartburg Watch where I excerpted a non-apology from the Blog and Mablog comment thread, and conflated this with his email (which I’ve not read or heard about except here). I made some sport of Wilson thinking he’s the one being abused (as a skunk and a scoundrel).
The context was Natalie’s blog post about the letter Wilson wrote her dad 10 years back.
Douglas Wilson 09/11/5 to Natalie Greenfield
“Since all along my refusal to speak about this has been in order to respect your family’s privacy, I am happy to continue to honor you all in this way. I can say that there is an answer, and that in my mind, it is a compelling one. But I care enough about you, and your mom, to continue to be abused as a skunk and a scoundrel — I would rather that continue than to violate a trust. If you are curious about what I could possibly say, I would be very happy to get together with you and explain it. I would not withhold anything from you, in other words. You can ask me anything you want. I am very sorry about the sins that were committed against you, and I wish you well. God bless.”
Notice the carefully worded “the sins that were committed”.
By whom? Which sins?
I have screen shots of the whole deleted conversation if you like, including Gary Greenfield’s comments and Wilson’s veiled threat in response.
Error– my excerpt is from 09/11/15, NOT 5. And to clarify, it’s possible WILSON conflated my comment about his comment with being about his private email (of which I had no knowledge).
Thanks for sharing that, Dave. Either way, you didn’t publish the email he wrote to Natalie “apologizing,” but you’re right, that might be where he thought he read that.
On second thought, he probably is talking about you, and exaggerating to “attack blogs” plural– in this from your Sept 28th article, “Now, Doug has recently indicated privately to Natalie that he was sorry about one thing — not finding a way around Natalie’s Dad to meet with her during the aftermath of her abuse (translation: it’s your Dad’s fault that you didn’t get the care from the church that you needed).”
I didn’t post my comments until Oct 1st and 2nd, which would not be the next morning. Plus he would have had to find mine amidst long comment threads, whereas I’ve a feeling he reads everything you write immediately.
Doug– since you’re likely reading, why not clear this up for us yourself?
You’re right, that is probably what he was referring to. His email was by far the least-sincere sounding apology email I’ve ever read, and it echoed what he’s said elsewhere more publicly, but, nonetheless, it would have seemed catty to directly quote it. Not so sure about that now that he’s accused Natalie and “attack blogs” of doing so, as potentially people should know exactly how silly it is that he called that email an apology. But I’m not going to be the one to do that.
You seem like an alright guy, Dave.
I consider that a great compliment, coming from you!
Did anyone really expect anything different from Doug Wilson?
I didn’t think so.
I’m sure it doesn’t bother him that people oppose him.
But I’m sure it irks the ever-living-daylights out of him that there are people who are in the position and have the resources to utterly expose him for the fraud that he is.
All I can say is, it’s about time.
Oh, and thank you Katie for stepping up to the plate, along with the others, and contributing to this needful work
Yeah, DW is willing to be a skunk and a scoundrel…believe that one and I’ll tell you another. If that’s the case, why all the spin on his blog to defend himself over and over again?
Katie translating one of Doug’s tirades: “Translation: don’t pay attention to women who say they’ve been sexually assaulted, because some are sure to be lying. Instead, pay to watch a film I star in, where I continue to make fun of these women.”
This really is at the heart of Doug’s gospel. It’s good news for him because he gets to be judge, jury, and insulter of all the women who don’t fit in with his version of the gospel.
But it’s bad news* for these women who don’t fit in, who have found themselves in abusive situations. There is no salvation or healing. And there sure as heck isn’t any mercy or justice.
Doug Wilson is worse than the unrighteous judge in the Bible. Because that judge was at least worn down by the pleas of the widow woman.
But not Doug. Oh, no. No widow or abused woman of any sort is going to wear him down. No siree bob. He will continue his relentless accusations, minimizations, and persecutions against these women in his misguided religious zeal.
*I’ve called his kind of gospel a “sucks to be you” gospel where women are concerned. Because that really is what he has made it.
Apparently, Judge DW believes the criminals should be rewarded and the victims should be punished ~ at least when the criminals are males and the victims are children and/or females.
Been thinking about this.
What it looks like to me is that Doug thinks men, by virtue of being male, are not the criminals. However If they do something wrong against a female of any age on a criminal level, it is forgivable and worthy of being covered. They are given a pass.
Women, if they don’t keep everything perfect and in check are automatically the greatest sinner in any equation involving a man, patriarch, future patriarch.
So by virtue of being female, women are automatically the criminals in the world of patriarchy, like the woman thrown at the feet of Jesus. There was a man involved in that woman’s adultery. But his sin was not brought to Jesus, only the woman’s.
This is what Doug is doing to women. This is the world Doug wants women to submit to. He claims it is God’s will. But really it is his own. He wants to be a patriarch. But he is really a Pharisee.
i call it “the more you care [about doing it ‘biblically’ as a woman] the more screwed you are”. When i gave up caring if i might be violating some fine line of submission….it got a whole lot better.
Cicero wondered in the previous post comments if I am a CREC member. I am but I think I have fallen into some weird world where up is down and wrong is right, no is yes, and bad is good, where a pretend investigation pretends to happen so wrong can still be seen as right.
What part of Randy Booth presiding over an investigation of Douglas Wilson- [Presiding Minister of CREC who posts the most godawful spewing of hatred (see any post) on his “private” though linked to his church website and no one ever reels the guy in] seems wise? And tra la la, so it goes.
These links are worth your time.
http://dougsplotch.net/crec.htm
http://moscowid.net/2015/11/12/on-a-conflict-of-interest/
And why post all this publicly? Isn’t that unseemly? Shouldn’t we give the investigation a chance to play itself out? Church stuff on the internet?
My simple answer is: FULL DISCLOSURE
We should all be aware of all the facts before- not after- a decsion has been reached. And if only half the story is coming from the leadership (and add to that that the investigation is in-house) the other half needs to come from places like this. Kbotkin’s facts, because that is what they are-facts, are verifiable and she invites you to question her. See, full disclosure. That’s a breath of fresh air right there.
Would this mess ever have been dealt with except for the internet? No. When you have leadership coddling pedophiles and throwing the victims under the bus and then “inviting” long fast friends to come see if you did anything, anything at all wrong, well, it’s time for the internet.
Thank you for clarifying and yes that is exactly the case. If we agitators kept our mouths shut and didn’t question their behavior there wouldn’t even be a sham inquiry. At the very least they have been forced into taking actions to defend their precious (more precious than human life and dignity) reputations and plainly reveal their corruption in doing so. They say the internet is not the place for this because they don’t want it discussed, at all. They want everyone to be in the dark and to not question what goes on behind closed doors. This is a threat to their self-created position of being the wise patriarchal stand-in for God, the spiritual authority. That is why we should never shut up about this until the truth is free.
Cicero said:
“It is indefensible that while Wilson and Christ Church are supposedly being investigated for any wrongdoing, negligence or misjustice that Wilson is free to influence and spread his twisted version of the events to his congregation (who may be speaking to the investigators) not once, but two times so far. If the inquiry was in any way honest about its intentions Wilson would have been asked to refrain from comment on the situation until it was over.”
from the CREC statement:
“Pastor Douglas Wilson is the current Presiding Minister of the CREC Council, and he has recused himself in this matter.”
Yeah, I’m surprised they didn’t make any such request of Wilson. I would think such a semi-public statement to the church would have been more appropriate after the conclusion of the investigation, whatever the outcome. Anything he says on these cases will end up on the internet, whether on his own blog or otherwise. Maybe there was such a ruckus behind the scenes within CC that Doug and/or the elders felt that some kind of preliminary statement had to be made, but if so, it was apparently a rather detailed one.
One more thing—Katie said:
“Natalie does not remember what she specifically wrote to Doug ten years ago that would “prove” what he’s claiming, but she does remember the events with her father, and she knows her father as well as herself much more fully after taking the time to sort through some of this stuff.”
If Doug still has possession of such a document and believes it to be incriminating for Natalie, will he restrict it to the eyes of the investigative committee? For a guy who believes he is innocent of any wrongdoing, who is willing to be considered a skunk and a scoundrel, he sure seems willing to participate in the “trial by internet” as some have called it. Between that and the HOH meetings, I wonder if he’s causing heartburn for any of the involved presiding ministers.
Along the lines of DW having proof from Natalie’s letters or some other documents, there is an aspect to this that needs to be addressed. Let me say that having once been a committed member of a Christian cult, what I said and did there parroted the party line. In order to survive in that environment, I had to say things that reflected fidelity to the pastor and the group mindset that prevailed. It was a matter of self- preservation while living in a partisanship that thrived. Those who departed from the group think tank were openly ridiculed and shunned. Peer pressure is a force meant to keep folks in line. All this to say that what a person says while still under the influence of controlling church leadership does not necessarily reflect the reality of what was actually occurring at the time. I said some pretty dumb things back when I was a member of that Christian cult, which I only was able to recognize after I left and the spell was broken.
I have been thinking that very thing, Darlene.
Part of the whole make-up of an abusive system is the fear of leaving it for the unknown. This is true in a marriage and it is true in an institution. It is the reason it sometimes takes years or decades for an abused person to leave the abuse or speak up. Sometimes awful seems better than an unknown; a person gets used to the abuse and making it on her own seems scarier than putting up with the abuse.
And then add to that the fear that you will be judged for keeping silent for so long or worse yet accused of being at least 1% complicit and further judged and abused by a system you hoped would help you out. Well, that’d take a pretty strong woman speak up.
So a husband or a church ought to be careful in the extreme about trotting out the women who have not left as proof of the wonderfulness that is them. It might just be the known seems less scary than starting over on her own. Even knowing things were not handled well at all.
Trinity Church Moscow pastor has said, “We do not believe that airing these grievances on the internet and sharing grievances with unrelated third parties is helpful, protects victims, or actually works toward accomplishing true justice.”
I believe the sexual abuse of children would happily have been buried forever and ever in a reckless and injudicious manner. Except for the internet.
Because, just exactly when was the leadership going to take these sexual abuse cases up as a concern? Except for the internet.
Peace, Peace, when there is no peace.
God bless the internet.
Katie…if you have the strength will you address Jezehellsbells? I’m just left shaking my head and needing to get the taste of his ugly blog out of my mouth.
Natalie has defied DW, and he has essentially embarked on a scorched earth policy to destroy her (and her father); his minions are unleashed in the comments section. It’s a hot mess over there.
Katie, your formidable intellect in service to calm and reason in this situation is a balm and inspiration all at once. And commenters, your insightful responses are also deeply appreciated.
I “third” that request!
Katie, you’re to be commended for exposing a man who I consider to be a sociopath, pathological liar and spiritual abuser. Unfortunately this rabbit hole goes deeper still. It’s just been exposed that Doug Wilson’s good friend and fellow spiritual abuser RC Sproul Jr was also deeply involved with Steven Sitler, or rather Steven Sitler was deeply involved with children under Sproul’s charge. Sproul knew of it but didn’t lift a finger to see justice done on behalf of the victims. There’s even speculation that Wilson arranged a payoff from the wealthy Sitler family to buy Sproul’s silence. https://rc-sproul-jr.blogspot.com/2020/02/rc-sproul-jr-steven-sitler-pedophile-coverup.html