The following news stories all took place in the last week. Every day, there are new stories about preachers who don’t practice what they preach. I am sure some Christian will be sure to remind me that these men of God were outliers and do not represent Christianity as a whole. However, are we not reaching a point with Evangelical/Charismatic/Fundamentalist Christianity where we start comparing them to the rotting soul of the Roman Catholic church? What number do we need to reach before we say that these kind of stories are no longer the exception to the rule; that the Evangelical/Charismatic/Fundamentalist church has a huge problem with criminal preachers?
Sunday Akintayo, a Lagos, Nigeria pastor, was arrested and charged with molesting a seven-year-old girl and infecting her with an STD:
A 51-year-old man, Sunday Akintayo who pastors the Mile 12 branch of Cherubim and Seraphim Church, Ajelogo, Lagos, has been arrested and charged to court over sexually assaulting a 7-year-old girl.
Pastor Akintayo was accused of dipping his fingers into the minor’s private part and molested her. He was also said to have infected her with staph – a sexually transmitted disease.
According to detectives from the Criminal Investigation Department of Railway Command of the Nigeria Police the accused was alleged to have shaved the little girl’s eyebrows.
The girl has since been admitted at the intensive care unit the hospital where she was tested by a doctor who certified she had staph…
Jeff Beltz, a pastor at Hydesville Community Church, Hydesville, California for 20 years, was arrested for thumping his wife in the church parking lot:
Men’s Ministry Pastor Jeff Beltz has been arrested for Belting his wife in the parking lot of the Hydesville Community Church. Police arrested Pastor Jeff Beltz on one count of inflicting corporal injury on a spouse. Police report that the Men’s Ministry Pastor punched his wife in the face only moments after walking out of the sanctuary.
Beltz was arrested in the church parking lot after allegedly striking his wife in the face with an open hand, according to Lt. Steve Knight of the Humboldt County Sheriff’s Office. The officer at the scene reported that the alleged blow was strong enough to break the woman’s glasses.
Officers received a call concerning the confrontation in the church parking lot at around 2 p.m., Knight said. Beltz was booked into custody shortly after 4 p.m. on $50,000 bail. He bailed out that evening…
In 2013, a former pastor of Hydesville Community Church was arrested and charged with child molestation.
Leonard “Sonny” Layman, children’s pastor at Spring Creek Church of the Nazarene, was arrested and accused of a sex crime with a child:
A children’s pastor with a Rockingham County church has been arrested and accused of a sex crime involving a child.
A member of the congregation from the Spring Creek Church of the Nazarene tells WHSV that an announcement was made Sunday regarding the arrest of the church’s children’s pastor.
The Rockingham County Sheriff’s Office confirmed that Leonard “Sonny” Layman was arrested over the weekend for a sexual crime involving a child. We’re also told he is in jail without bond and waiting for a first court appearance Monday morning.
Ibigbemi Ajayi, a Ilorin, Nigeria pastor, and his son, were arrested and charged with attempted murder and culpable homicide:
An Ilorin-based cleric, Ibigbemi Ajayi, 70, and his 17-year-old son, Joel, have been arraigned before an Ilorin Magistrate’s Court for attempted murder and culpable homicide.
The suspects were charged with criminal conspiracy, causing grievous hurt and attempt to commit culpable homicide contrary to sections 97, 271, 248 and 229 of the Penal Code Law.
According to the police first information report (FIR), the charges preferred against the accused followed a petition written by one lawyer, Pastor Ayoade John of No. 16, Sulu Gambari Road, Ilorin, alleging that the cleric engaged him and his wife as Bible Study teachers on Saturdays and Sundays at a church without being paid.
The FIR stated that, “On June 1, 2014 at about 20:00 hours, you, Prophet Ibigbemi Ajayi and your son Joel Ajayi, criminally conspired and went to the room of the petitioner to beat him with criminal charm and his right hand swelled, simply because he answered a phone call while you are speaking with him. On June 13, 2014 at about 20:00 hours, the petitioner met you for settlement when you, Ibigbemi Ajayi and Joel Ajayi, conspired together and beat him up with a stick and he sustained [a] fracture on his right hand and also shot at him, causing him to sustain injuries on his stomach as a result of slight touch of the pellet. You hereby committed the above offences.”
The accused, however, pleaded not guilty to the charges, but the police prosecutor, Yusuf Nasri, opposed their bail application, stating that the police have “overwhelming evidences” against them..
Kong Hee, pastor of Singapore’s City Harvest Church has been accused of using $50 million of church funds to advance his wife’s music career:
In a case eerily familiar to the Ephren Taylor – Bishop Eddie Long Scam, Singapore Mega Church Pastor Kong Hee is accused of using $50 Million in church funds to promote his wife’s music career. Unlike in the United States where Pastors are allow to freely fleece their congregations – Pastors in Singapore are held accountable by the Government for how they reinvest Jesus Cash. It was government prosecutors who charged Pastor Kong Hee with the largest White Collar Crime committed by a non-profit official. Go Singapore Go!
Known professionally as Sun Ho, his 41-year-old wife has put out several Mandarin and English pop albums and songs, including a 2007 collaboration with pop star Wyclef Jean called ‘China Wine’.
She founded the megachurch with her husband in 1989 and moved to LA in 2009 to launch her English-language singing career.
But her husband’s arrest last year on charges of fraud and criminal breach of trust shattered her dreams of having a U.S. pop career, though she has not been charged with any crime.
As Confirmed by Bloomberg.com
City Harvest Church founder Kong Hee didn’t dishonestly gain from using the church’s money or conspire to use sham bond deals to promote his wife’s music career, his lawyer said in a Singapore state court today.
“There is no wrongful gain in this case,” Kong’s lawyer Edwin Tong said. Church members had voted in favor of using funds to acquire bonds in two companies to fund Ho Yeow Sun’s pop albums and broaden the church’s reach, he said.
Kong and five others are accused by prosecutors of misusing $50.6 million ($40.5 million) of the church’s funds and devising sham bond investments to finance Ho’s career in the largest graft case involving a Singapore charity. The church has said it stands by the six, who are defending charges against them in a trial which started in May 2013.
The pastor in 2001 decided to use pop songs to reach the young who tune in to Viacom Inc’s MTV music channel.
“We’re going to engage the world of MTV and through it engage the world in Jesus Christ,” Kong testified. “The members were very, very supportive.”
Singapore’s white-collar crime agency and the charities’ commissioner began probing the church in 2010. Kong and four others were arrested and charged in 2012 after the regulator of charities found financial irregularities. City Harvest, which has more than 18,000 members, was registered as a charity in 1993, a year after it was founded…
A video of former youth pastor, registered sex offender, Dale Hoffert, reveals he has access to the children of Highway Holiness Church in Oklahoma City, Oklahoma:
…Tanya Cotton says she is still shocked that the Highway of Holiness Church, located at 2800 S.W. 38th Street, allowed registered sex offender, 29-year-old Dale Hoffert Junior, to attend the Children’s Crusade event last week.
“I was upset. I was sick to my stomach,” said Cotton. “You should send your kids to church and feel safe about it.”
After the services, Cotton watched the videos on her 10-year-old son’s cell phone when she saw Hoffert in one of the videos, participating in the service. She recognized him immediately, because he used to be the youth pastor at the church.
“His past is not good with children,” she said. “Do not be tempting him with our kids.”
Hoffert was convicted on charges of forcible oral sodomy in 2007. The victim was not a member of the church. Court records show he served time in prison until he got out earlier this year on a suspended sentence.
“They sentenced him. He paid his debt to society,” said Highway of Holiness Church Pastor John Steiger. “We’re a church that believes that God can change people.”
Following church services on Sunday, Pastor Steiger confirmed Hoffert did attend the youth event but says the kids were never in danger.
“It all happened in this sanctuary,” said Steiger. “There was 25 adults in this same room, and he was never left alone with any of them.”
Pastor Steiger says Hoffert will never be a church leader over the children but will always be welcome inside his house of God.
“A church is a hospital for the soul. We help lost souls” said Steiger. “We’ve done what a church is supposed to do, help a lost soul change their ways.”…
Other Posts That Might Interest You
Christian Naivety: I Hope He is Innocent
Sexual Abuse: Dear Pastor, Here’s What NOT to Do
This Week in Christian Abuse, Perversion, and Extremism
The Devil Made Man Molest and Rape Kenyan Orphans
If You Didn’t See it, it Didn’t Happen, There is no Evidence, There is no Proof
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