Hypocrite windbag Rev. Ted Haggard has left his "spiritual restoration program"

[Bluebear]

DENVER - The evangelist forced out of his job after being caught up in a sex scandal involving a male prostitute has left a "spiritual restoration program" and no longer has any ties to the megachurch he founded, the congregation's new pastor said Sunday.

Under a severance deal that Ted Haggard reached with the church in 2006, he agreed to leave Colorado Springs and not talk about the scandal publicly. The deal expired at the end of 2007. New pastor Brady Boyd said Haggard was now free to live where he wanted and has returned to Colorado Springs.

"They have moved back and they live in the original house that they lived in for many years," Boyd said of Haggard and his wife, Gayle.

Haggard answered the telephone at his Colorado Springs telephone number on Sunday and confirmed he was in the city but said he couldn't talk to reporters.

He was fired in 2006 as pastor of the 14,000-member church he established, after a former male prostitute alleged they had a cash-for-sex relationship. The man also said he saw Haggard use methamphetamine.

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20080623/ap_on_re_us/disgraced_pastor

[gratuitous]

1. I suppose being left alone is punishment enough

But there is probably some congregation somewhere, desperate for "leadership," that will give Pastor Ted another chance. I wonder what sort of referral his last church will give him?

[hyphenate]

2. Okay

I need some help here--perhaps I'm just too thick.

We've seen so many of these two-faced religious wrong-winged bastards caught in a wide variety of scandals, but mostly with a prostitute, embezzling, lying through their teeth, or some other "sin" for which they would never get away if they just happened to be progressive or reasonable.

So why is it that the REAL idiots who worship them can't get it through their small brains that everything these assholes say is a lie? How is it that they can still "look up" to these crooks and worse, and yet condemn the same thing if it happens to someone on our side of the fence?

I'm not really that thick, and yes, I have some theories about the whole list of reasons why, but I still find it puzzling to some degree, because there HAS to be SOME native intelligence in these followers. I mean, my best friend had become a fundie even though she had her master's and was a frickin teacher, for chrissake, until I finally told her what a nutcase she had become. The thought of others like her teaching our kids, in public schools, mind you, is one I would sincerely like to never think again, but there are too many out there, and that's very disturbing.

But the Jimmy Swaggarts, Jim Bakkers, Ted Haggards, Jerry Falwells, Oral Roberts, and Pat Robertsons of the world seem to be immune to the same ideals they expect from the rest of us. The "do as I say, not as I do" cavalier attitude is enough to make most of us deathly ill from the sheer hypocrisy of it all.

[Missy Vixen]

5. You're not thick. They're ignoring it.

>So why is it that the REAL idiots who worship them can't get it through their small brains that everything these assholes say is a lie? How is it that they can still "look up" to these crooks and worse, and yet condemn the same thing if it happens to someone on our side of the fence?<

We have some friends that we dearly love, but we can't discuss politics or religion with them. At all. They finally left Overlake Christian Church in Redmond, WA. We wanted to ask why, but it was shortly after yet another scandal had broken out there. If you're interested in the one we tried to talk with them about, feel free to start with the following. http://seattlepi.nwsource.com/archives/1998/9805180079.asp We asked them how they could continue attending the church when the police had done a complete investigation of the initial restroom incident and subsequent accusations of several other men Rev. Moorehead had been involved with, and they could not answer.

I am a former fundamentalist. The only way I could stay in my church was to ignore what was going on around me, and there was plenty. Someone I knew watched one of the more prominent men in our church pick up a hooker in broad daylight in front of the first guy's business. Another board member was exposed as having had a twenty-year extramarital affair. Rinse, lather and repeat. The only way these folks can stay is to ignore and deny. When they finally have to admit to themselves what's really happening, they have to leave.

IMHO, YMMV.
Julie

[hyphenate]

6. I hope you aren't offended with my

jibes against fundies. I still carry wounds from the past with the fundies I've known, and I have come to cringe at the thought of some of these people in the secular world: my ex-friend used to say "secular" as though it was a swear, and get all puffed up when trying to convince me that she was right and I was wrong. However, that is a foregone conclusion at this point, even though it still bothers me.

There was this one woman I knew online whose husband was in seminary. I don't know what denomination they were, but the couple went to the church where the husband was going to be assigned afterward, and the priest or pastor (or whatever the highest minister would be) was telling them all kinds of things that he said he couldn't tell anyone on the "outside" because it was the equivalent of the "secret handshake" some groups use. But since the husband was now going to be an insider, it was different.

The one main thing he told them is that they could never tell the truth. That it was all about the money, and that the purpose of the church was to pull in people and get their donations, and because they needed to "fill all the seats" they had to tell the congregation what they wanted to hear. It didn't matter how far-out something was, if it would elicit an approval from the audience, then it could be said. The minister pretty much told them that they shouldn't question anything too much or think too deeply of a subject, just skim over the bad parts and make the people happy to be returning to the church every week, where for just that little while, they could feel superior to everyone else "out there."

The woman said her husband quit not long after that, feeling that they had wasted so much time invested in lies, and that the calling he had had was to something non-existent.

But it definitely gets you thinking about what some of these preachers, priests, ministers and what have you are doing--if they believe what they say every week, or if the money really is all that counts. I'd suspect there are more who believe in the latter than the former.

[Missy Vixen]

13. hyphenate, not at all

I've been out of the church for almost twenty years, but this kind of stuff (the praying away the gay, etcetera,) still makes me flinch.

>if they believe what they say every week, or if the money really is all that counts.<

The people that actually live their faith aren't the ones clamoring for attention. They're going about their business and don't feel the need to make sure everyone knows how Godly they are.

I'm with you on the money thing. Our former church is in the middle of a VERY expen$ive building program. Again. I'm wondering how much pressure there is on parishioners to foot the bills for this.

Julie

[old mark]

15. Of course, it's all about the money...

...they are selling bullshit they don't believe in themselves, and the payoff is the important part, that and the hookers and drugs, I guess.

mark

[SoCalDem]

3. Amazing how he "got caught up in" it all.. He had nothing to do with any of it

just happened to be in the wrong place at the wrong time & got caught up in it..

How Republican of him

[Joe Bacon]

14. I bet Pastor Ted is cruising Adam 4 Adam right now!

After watching Jesus Camp, I was shocked at seeing Haggard in action. He was Paul Lynde on steroids!

[Missy Vixen]

4. Of course he did. He couldn't pray away the gay.

We left our former church due to many reasons, one of which was their attitudes towards gay people. Ironically enough, our former pastor would not countenance any criticism of the former pastor of Overlake Christian Church of Redmond, WA, who was arrested for propositioning a male police officer in the men's restroom of a rest stop several years ago.

I guess it depends who you are, huh? :mad:

In the meantime, if there is anyone in this mess that deserves the good thoughts we could send, it's the Haggards' children. They didn't ask for this.

Julie

[Tommytoons]

9. Religious Tolerance?

:+ I remember this quote from years of being involved with the Catholic Church, oh by the way, it isn't a quote the Church ever taught, "It's not because the Christian way has been tried and found wanting, its that the Christian way has never really been tried."

I think the reason why folks still go to church and believe is because THEY believe, and one crucial part of their faith is to forgive one another as they have been forgiven. Its not that they like the scandals, they believe that people should be forgiven their wrong doing. Simple yes, but at the same time very profound.

[Missy Vixen]

11. You know, I'm all about the "religious tolerance".

I'm not about religious leadership who shame and condemn others to hell on earth because they're born gay. Ted Haggard was actively doing so, as were many of his evangelical friends. If he decided to be truthful about himself and his life, I'd support him. He won't. He and his friends will continue making others' lives hard because of their insistence that it's possible to pray away something we are born with -- our sexual orientation.

See the late Tammy Faye Bakker Messner as an example. She spent the last twenty years of her life making amends for the attitudes she was taught in the Assembly of God church. I very much admired her and her faith, which was authentic and compassionate.

Julie

[Liberal_in_LA]

7. 'Severance deal'? Sounds like he got a payout to go away.

[Vickers]

8. Purraze Jay-zuss, he's oh-fish-shully a HETERO-SEKSHUL!

Wonders never seize!

:P

[tom_paine]

10. Time for more gay hookers and meth! I am sure haggard learned the ONLY

lessons Bushies ever learn on the rare occasionas they get busted for their hypocrisy and malfeasance.

DONT. GET. CAUGHT.

I have no doubt Haggard will go back to his lifestyle...sooner rather than later. He's just going to have to be even more on the down-low about it.

In fact, it wouldn't surprise me if gay men started disappearing from near his hometown within the next five years. Dead men tell no tales, after all.

[a la izquierda]

12. Has anyone seen "Jesus Camp"?

Haggard is on there. Every time my husband and I watch it, we just break out into fits of laughter because of the irony. I'm not going to give it away; if you haven't seen it, you really need to. It's beyond disturbing, but the Haggard part is very funny.

[Joe Bacon]

16. He is Paul Lynde on crack!

It is just amazing to see that closet queen shake his ass from side to side. One gets the impression that he is auditioning to replace the leatherman in the Village People!

[a la izquierda]

17. My husband got a kick out of that. N/T