On Blogging

I was no blogger, neither was I a blogger’s son. I’m a stiff, and the discipline of writing is very difficult for me. I used to shoot for posts of 600 words and they usually ended up about 750–800 words, taking me about an hour to write. Now I shoot for 600 words and end up with 2,000, but it takes me about 90 minutes (sometimes longer) per 600 words, which I spread over a couple-days’ period. It takes me longer because I really am trying to limit the word count. Currently, I have two posts queued up, each almost 3,000 words, and I don’t know how to shrink them.

That said, there’s still a massive HIGH over Moscow and the Kult elders cannot explain it.

Thank you.

Weather Update

There’s a huge HIGH over Moscow and the Kult leaders can’t figure it out.



Thank you.

Another Stacked Committee

Today we need to examine the committee deployed by the CREC to nullify the RPCGA’s Declaratory Judgment that deposed from office the Saint Peter Four — Laurence Windam, Wayne Hayes [Hays?], Jay Barfield, and R.C. Sproul, Jr. — and then attempted to legitimize their so-called ministry, at least as far as it concerns the CREC.

To refresh your memory, on December 15, 2005, when reality finally dawned on the Saint Peter Four that the RPCGA might actually sanction them, they dropped a note to the RPCGA Moderator, Dr. Kenneth Talbot, stating,

It appears that at least three of our four elders cannot stay in the denomination. Given that reality, we would likely look for a denomination where we can not only believe in paedocommunion, but be free to practice it. If we as a church do so, we cannot then have one elder who cannot serve the sacrament. We don’t want to go, but we can’t change our convictions. The particular hardship is this. We especially don’t want to leave with a cloud over our heads. Could you either, having let us go, hear the complaints against us, and issue a ruling, or barring that, could you forward all those complaints to where we end up? We have had much to repent of these past few weeks. We have done so. We are sorry in turn that our failures have caused trouble for you and the presbytery.

I call this “dropping a note” because these words, more than any others, demonstrate the Saint Peter Four’s complete ignorance of the magnitude of their sins, which is no surprise. Men seldom repent of abusing the flock apart from divine intervention of the Damascus Road variety. The same principle applies to criminals; they seldom turn over new leaves to become model citizens unless God gives them new hearts. In this case, these men confessed to rampant abuse of their ordained authority; they confessed to at least one felony, perhaps two if you count the perjury; and they confessed to multiple violations of the RPCGA BCO, which constitutes “covenant breaking.” And despite these facts, RC Jr casually states on behalf of he and his fellow sots, “We especially don’t want to leave with a cloud over our heads.”

Please read that again: “We especially don’t want to leave with a cloud over our heads.” Let’s see, they committed multiple egregious and grotesque crimes against the Lord Jesus Christ and against His sheep, and the only thing on their mind was withdrawing from the RPCGA without having a cloud over their heads. They actually called it a “hardship.” These men were so detached from reality that they acted as though they were negotiating a settlement. Clearly they had no grasp of their sin or of the gravity of the situation, which accounts for their expectation — “the expectation of the wicked.” It also accounts for their sense of privilege and entitlement. Notice how they acted as though they deserved to remain in the ministry, just in another denomination where they could serve communion to infants. “We confessed, we repented; now cut us loose so that we may practice paedocommunion and commit felonies elsewhere.” Whatever else is true, this is not the posture of a broken spirit and these are not the words of a contrite heart. But it’s consistent with their pattern of sin and it explains the immediate appeal that rose between them and the CREC. Thieves prefer the company of thieves — beats lawful accountability any day.

So the CREC appointed a “pastoral commission” to duly nullify the RPCGA’s Declaratory Judgment and welcome the Saint Peter Four into their thieving fraternity, which brings us to the composition of the committee — the men whom the CREC appointed to duly nullify the RPCGA’s Declaratory Judgment against the Saint Peter Four. And the first thing that we should note about this committee is that the CREC failed to appoint any representatives from the RPCGA, which would be the most obvious pool of men to select a body of commissioners from because . . . well . . . because the RPCGA happened to be the denomination that was the most familiar with the facts of the case. The second thing that we should notice about this commission is that the CREC neglected to appoint any representatives from the Associate Reformed Presbyterian Church, which is the denomination that the Saint Peter Four defrauded in an identity-theft scam to commit tax fraud. (I also noticed that the CREC didn’t appoint anyone from the federal government to the commission, probably because it would have resulted in an indictment.) And finally we have to notice that the CREC was remiss in appointing to this commission any representatives from the families that were abused by the Saint Peter Four. Call me a cynic, but everything in me says that these oversights were not accidents.

Nevertheless, these facts establish who wasn’t on the commission, but they don’t tell us who was on the commission. According to the “Report from the CREC Pastoral Commission for Saint Peter Presbyterian Church,” however, we see that the CREC sat five men to serve on this commission, and taking them in order of their appearance, we see —

1. Randy Booth
   Randy Booth holds the office of Moderator of the CREC and he chaired the “Pastoral Commission,” which means that he was the principal nonentity whose strings the Fearless Leader tugged to accomplish the deed. The other commissioners simply had to nod their heads. But despite his nonentity status, Booth has the most unique qualification to hold any office in the CREC because he’s the only man on record whom another church officially identified as a “wolf in sheep’s clothing.” Don’t let the collar fool you — he’s lupine to the bone. But Booth has another unique qualification for this position that we’ve never explored, he wrote a book titled Children of Promise, published by P&R. I’m pretty sure he wrote it before his teenage son began selling mushrooms and marijuana to the students at Logos School and NSA, as well as violating the daughter of a certain Kult elder. But if it’s any consolation, at least they were all children of promise in a covenantal sort of way.



2. Patch Blakey
   Patch Blakey is a ruling elder at Trinity Reformed Church, Moscow, ID, which means that he reports for Kult duty about thirty minutes after Christ Church meets and about 100 yards from Christ Church’s meeting place. It’s a long story, but the Kult doesn’t plant a church in Moscow in order to meet the needs of the community; they do it to circumvent a potential Kult split. Nevertheless, Blakey was uniquely qualified to serve on the Saint Peter Four pastoral commission for two reasons: First, he was one of the Kult elders who helped stage the April Fools’ Day joke of 1999 — he countenanced the whole thing — and, second, one of his teenagers intimately participated in Randy Booth’s aforementioned drug ring. These two events — the April Fools’ Day joke and the drug ring — took place during the same year and I’m sure that Blakey has convinced himself that there is no causal connection between his illegal activities and his teenager’s illegal activities. After all, recreational drug abuse is commonplace in all covenantal homes, isn’t it?



3. Virgil Hurt
   Virgil Hurt, pastor of Providence Church, Lynchburg, VA, was uniquely qualified to sit on this pastoral commission for four reasons: First, he obtained his religious training at Wilson’s Greyfriars Hall, where like a good clone he wrote a paper on the all-important subject of marijuana. Second, he was the Kult deacon who used his office as manager of Kinkos to stonewall the police after the Kult’s April Fools’ Day joke turned into a criminal investigation. Third, the RPCGA named him in the Declaratory Judgment; at best he was a witness and at worst he was an accomplice to the Saint Peter Four breaking covenant with their presbytery. And fourth, this guy’s really dumber than a box of hair, take a peek at his blog.



4. Gene Liechty
   Gene Liechty is pastor of Christ Church, Carey, North Carolina, where you’ll notice that the church website states,
   
   

   Although this is Gene Liechty’s first pastorate, he is well on his way to being a model pastor. . . Mr. Liechty studied theology at Greyfriar’s Hall in Moscow, Idaho. . . Before entering the ministry, he worked as a marketing professional in a wide variety of fields.

   
   This brief bio conceals as much as it discloses. First, note that he attended Greyfriars, which means that he can bob his head up and down better than most monkey boys and make it look solemn: “Yes, Doug, I agree wholeheartedly.” But then notice the clever copy: When it says, “he is well on his way to being a model pastor,” it really means that he was (is?) a professional model; and when it says, “Before entering the ministry, he worked as a marketing professional in a wide variety of fields,” it really means that he was a professional model. You should look for him the next time you see a Fruit of the Loom ad. (This is not a fabrication; to be fair, however, he’s a great looking guy — even better looking than my dashing avatar!) But Liechty’s unique qualification to serve on the CREC’s pastoral commission was the unflagging loyalty he showed to the Fearless Leader when he refused to distance himself from the Kult after the public discovered that his church-associated school used Wilson’s & Wilkins’ trashy little booklet Southern Slavery As It Was to indoctrinate children. Generally speaking, most normal people have a problem when adults deliberately teach falsehoods to children so that they can grow up to admire the Fearless Leader, but not in the CREC or the ACCS. Liechty didn’t have a problem with it either; love for the truth didn’t compel him to break ranks with the Kult, so he’s a natural choice to serve on any committee appointed to arrive at a predetermined decision.



5. Dennis Tuuri
   No CREC committee is complete unless Dennis Tuuri is present to guarantee that abusive ministers have fair representation, which appears to be a primary means employed by the CREC in order to achieve growth. Of course, Tuuri is the renegade who fled from the PCA rather than answer charges for “abuse of the flock.” Interestingly, his ministerial credentials bear a remarkable similarity to the Fearless Leader’s. You will recall that Wilson described his act of self-will as an “irregular ordination”; similarly he described Tuuri’s ordination as “irregular,” which leads me to believe Tuuri has less credentials than Wilson, if that’s possible.

These are the men who composed the CREC’s so-called “pastoral commission”: one (1) wolf and one (1) brown-nosing toady — both with tainted households and equally tainted values; two (2) illegitimate Greyfriars — one a misdemeanant, the other a loyal airhead; and one (1) irregularly ordained yet abusive minister. I kid you not.

For the record, I am advancing an ad hominem argument, but it’s not fallacious. First Timothy 3:1–7 requires elders to be “above reproach,” along with other specific obligations such as ruling their households well, having children in submission with all reverence. Most of these men, however, couldn’t meet the basic requirements for church membership in a legitimate (“law-abiding”) church, let alone the high standards for leadership. Indeed, any church foolish enough to bring them in would have to initiate disciplinary proceedings against them the moment they administered their membership vows. They are no less rebels against the kingdom of God than the Saint Peter Four whom they were appointed to refrock.

In the end, Wilson hand-picked this commission to accomplish his will and there’s no way he would leave this job to anyone he had not already corrupted. Therefore, every one of the five commissioners was an insider. Every one of them sat under his tutelage to one extent or another, learning to call evil good and good evil. All of them were as dirty as the Fearless Leader. And this gang of misfits and thugs successfully achieved his decree, which was to nullify the RPCGA’s Declaratory Judgment and bring the Saint Peter Four into the CREC so that they could resume persecuting God’s saints with impunity and break covenant at will.

But it won’t end well for these rebels because Scripture pronounces a woe on them (Isa. 5:20), and though the Fearless Leader may be able to blow off a Declaratory Judgment written by man so that his fellow hoodlums can wreak havoc in the Church, he cannot invalidate the Word of God, for the Lord Jesus Christ declares, “the Scripture cannot be broken.”

Thank you.

A Thousand More Words

A quick follow-up post to the previous 1000 words: I’ve already noted that during the summer 2003, serial paedophile Steven Sitler attended the Highlands Study Center and preyed on the lambs of RC Jr’s flock, and I noted that Sitler kept a photo archive of his victims on the worldwide web that he concealed from the authorities. I call these facts to your attention because Sitler took this photograph of RC Jr’s basement during his stay in Virginia.

I count six cases and one six pack of Corona, two sixers of Heineken, two sixers of Samuel Adams, two sixers of Ice, a sixer of Molson Ale, three sixers I can’t distinguish, and multiple empties. Now, I am not a teetotaler, but this strikes me as a bit much. Excessive or not, RC’s basement stash left a strong enough impression on 18-year-old Steven Sitler that he documented it on film. Sitler titled the pic “Bird_214,” but as far as I’m concerned it gives new meaning to The Basement Tapes.


Thank you.

Another New Website

Here’s a new website for you to peruse; it’s called Saint Peter Four, in honor of the four confessed and deposed felons of Saint Peter Presbyterian Church, and it contains all of the primary documents regarding this scandal, set in chronological order.

Thank you.

1,000 Words

U P D A T E: archive.org has a real slow connection rate that tends to time out. If you don’t connect the first time, hit refresh and you’ll connect the second (I just checked it).

We’ve been preparing another fully documented anonymous attack blog to furnish the pertinent documentation regarding the St. Peter Four and came across this jpeg at archive.org. Someone from RC’s gang named the photo “RCBooze.jpg”; it’s dated May 27, 2002, which is roughly one year before serial pedophile Steven Sitler arrived in Virginia to prey; and it appears that they uploaded it to the Highlands Study Center website sometime in the middle of November 2006.

If a picture’s worth a thousand words, this one says it all.

Thank you.

“Let Them Alone”

This is a follow-up to Patrick Poole’s post “R.C. Sproul, Jr.: Scandalizing the Body of Christ” and it’s more groundwork for a post I’m drafting. I hope you find it helpful.

Everyone recalls how, for about a year or so, Doug Wilson endeavored with all his might to disrupt the PCA’s disciplinary process as it applied to Steven “Machen” Wilkins. Whether raging confident about a “stacked committee” or stirring up strife over a “strong presumption of guilt” or breathing out threats and slaughter when it appeared inevitable that Steve Wilkins would face trial — Beelzeblog established Solomon’s words — “A fool lays open his folly.”

Of course, none of these canards really meant anything to Wilson. He certainly didn’t believe them and it’s not as though he tried to raise honest concerns in an honorable way. Not at all. It was obvious from the beginning that he wanted to knock the process off balance because he knew, as everyone else knew, that neither Wilkins nor any other Federal Visionists could harmonize their theology with Westminster. So he blew the first thing that came to his head and prosecuted the point, however absurd, until he could create more handles by blowing harder. And he creates these handles — these talking points — to give his disciples — those “dumb” folks who will follow him to the ends of the Earth and beyond — something to grasp. Just think of it as doug-opiate for the masses.

At this point I hear all the monkey boys in the land of DUMB screech from their cyber trees — “See, you’re slandering again; you don’t know he doesn’t believe these things! Of course he believes it or else he wouldn’t say it!” But in objecting to the obvious they only prove John Piper’s observation. I honestly cannot understand why no one thought to ask the Fearless Leader why the leaders of the Kult ever put someone on trial. Hello. They put folks on trial in the Kult because they established a strong presumption of guilt, at least by their standard. Well, that’ not true. They put folks on trial in the Kult so that they can point to the show trial to justify the public execution. Trials in the Kult are mere formalities — table dressing for the execution, but that’s grist for another post. Obviously they impute a strong presumption of guilt to the accused before they try them — why else would they try them? You don’t think they hold trials because they presume innocence on the part of the accused, do you? And they certainly don’t have to worry about stacking the jury — the Fearless Leader has already told the elders how to vote, and unfortunately no witnesses are present to do their imitation of John Madden with his Xs and Os and all. They declare the accused guilty of crimes against whatever after an unfair and partial trial (think Jezebel setting up Naboth) and duly execute him before a multitude of witnesses.

Consequently we know that Dougzilla threw monkey clumps and banana peels at the PCA strictly for entertainment purposes. The big gorilla was having fun at the PCA’s expense while simultaneously giving his disciples something to believe — no matter how ridiculous or implausible. And the whole point of this exercise was to run interference for Wilkins (who vowed to uphold the PCA’s form of government) by creating doubt and confusion. Mark that: in the end Wilson’s primary objective was to defend Wilkins by discrediting the PCA. For him, Sin covers a multitude of scoundrels and in the end Wilkins landed in the CREC without a hitch.

Anyone who can think critically knows this is true, but Wilson and the CREC have furnished us with a test case to establish these facts another way: Enter RC Sproul Jr and his three elders — the St. Peter Four. Those of you unfamiliar with the nuts and bolts of this case should read Patrick Poole’s brilliant post “R.C. Sproul, Jr.: Scandalizing the Body of Christ” so that you may begin to comprehend the staggering enormity of these men’s sin.

On January 26, 2006, the RPCGA issued a Declaratory Judgment against the St. Peter Four for a catalog of crimes against the Lord Jesus Christ that is as long as it is shocking. There are not words in the human tongue strong enough to condemn these thugs for the unconscionably wicked, deceitful, and abusive measures they exacted against God’s saints and even now I am at a complete loss to describe it. This may explain why the Declaratory Judgment concludes, stating:

In view of the request made by Dr. R.C. Sproul Jr. and given the authority of this office by the Elders of Westminster Presbytery, the following ruling is hereby issued. Considering the pattern of behavior noted above, the Session of St. Peter Presbyterian Church has proven to be irresponsible in their duties as ministers of the Gospel. They have proven they are not men under authority of this denomination because they are continually acting outside of the Book of Church Order. Their actions, in matters of writing, teaching, articles on their web site, and practice, in each of the issues above demonstrate that they have no interest in preserving the peace, purity, and unity of the Church and its order, which includes conforming all their actions to the requirements thereof. Therefore, in order to protect the Church of Jesus Christ from any further damage and humiliation (WCF 20:4), the Moderator hereby declares the following declaration by the authority vested in this office and the expressed support of the Elders of Westminster Presbytery to carryout their will in these matters.

Judicial Action: Deposition from Office
The Moderator, by the authority of the Elders of Westminster Presbytery, herein deposes from the office of Elder, Dr. R.C. Sproul Jr., Mr. Laurence Windham, Mr. Wayne Hayes and Mr. Jay Barfield and dismisses them to the general membership of Westminster Presbytery. They are to be held for trial pending additional charges, both public and personal, that are currently being investigated. The consistent pattern of actions taken by these men are duplicitous in nature, and demonstrate that they willingly and knowingly act in an arbitrary fashion in violation of their vows of ordination and in violation of our denomination’s Book of Church Order. Most importantly, their actions manifest that they lack the qualification for the ministry (1 Timothy 3:1–7). It would be unwise to allow these men to continue to hold an office for which they are not qualified. They have no interest to govern themselves appropriately within this presbyterian system of government that they vowed to submit and conform to its rules and regulations with conduct becoming ministers of Jesus Christ. (Declaratory Judgment, 10, 11)

Sobering words. No, more than that. An indictment this damning that the respondents substantiated with unqualified confessions should move everyone to cover their mouths in dread. Face it: the RPCGA had no choice but to pull the trigger on these brute beasts, and if the St. Peter Four had had any spiritual life in them they would have fallen on their faces in fear and trembling. They would have repented in sackcloth and ashes, pleading for forgiveness from everyone they abused and making restitution to them, as true servants, for the rest of their lives. This veritable Rolodex of offenses — which they freely owned as the fruit of their ministry — should not make a man consider his call to the ministry — it should make him consider his relationship to God. (Yes, you must be born again to see the kingdom of God.) After all, a minister cannot be a wolf and a sheep at the same time and true Christians don’t earn livings persecuting the brethren.

Enter Beelzeblog and the CREC. The laundry list of felonies and misdemeanors in the RPCGA’s Declaratory Judgment is kid’s play for the CREC — it’s the stuff of April Fools’ Day jokes. Therefore, less than a month after (much sooner if you have any street smarts) the RPCGA deposed the St. Peter Four, the CREC set in motion the wheels of ecclesiastical corruption to refrock these defrocked degenerates. Never mind the words “in order to protect the Church of Jesus Christ from any further damage and humiliation.” The Fearless Leader knew they were a perfect fit for the CREC when he read, “They have no interest to govern themselves appropriately within this presbyterian system of government that they vowed to submit and conform to its rules and regulations with conduct becoming ministers of Jesus Christ.” Crooks, knaves, fools — all of them.

But there’s one particularly aggravating circumstance in the CREC’s handling of the St. Peter Four when compared with their handling of Steve Wilkins that you need to see. When the CREC positioned itself to abrogate the RPCGA’s Declaratory Judgment and refrock the St. Peter Four, they (Wilson) had Sister Randy Booth issue a public statement calling on everyone to butt out of the whitewashing process:

The RPCGA has deposed the former session of St. Peter from office and has also released both the St. Peter congregation and her former session from RPCGA membership without censure. . . . The RPCGA has not precluded the possibility that some or all of the St. Peter session might be reinstated to office in the future, provided they go through the normal credentialing process. That is not to say that reinstatement is a forgone conclusion, only that the judgment of the RPCGA does not necessarily call for their permanent exclusion from office. . . . Some of these matters have been treated in an anti-ecclesiastical way via web sites on the worldwide web. There is definitely false and misleading information that is being advanced at some of these sites, including false information pertaining to the nature and make-up of the CREC Commission. Self-appointed arbiters of justice do not contribute to a godly resolution of anything and we hereby call upon them to recuse themselves from such public discourse, to immediately remove any material related to these matters from the web, and to pray for all those affected by these matters. (“RE: Saint Peter Presbyterian Church in Bristol, TN,”)

These guys really know how to pile the baloney. Stack it high, baby — high and tight. Look at their super-sanctimonious posturing. Such equitable language, such righteous indignation, such holy zeal for the truth — O let all the Earth keep silent, the CREC hath spoken. The only problem is that while this band of rogues in the CREC had absolutely no authority to sit in judgment of the RPCGA’s Declaratory Judgment, let alone reinstate the St. Peter Four, they demanded the very courtesy of the entire Christian church that they refused to show to the PCA in the Wilkins’ case. And don’t forget that the PCA actually had standing over Wilkins. Oh, I know, the PCA deserved it. After all, the Fearless Leader decreed it. Doug said it. I believe it. That settles it. But this does not remove the stain of hypocrisy from their actions. Rather, it reveals it.

Douglas Wilson taunted and harassed the PCA with obnoxious tirades and petulant tantrums while that communion pursued peace and purity in decency and order. And when the PCA’s disciplinary process finally isolated that rancid scoundrel Steve Wilkins for trial, Wilson and the CREC snatched him from the jaws of accountability under cover of night. But the point is that their MO was just the opposite with the St. Peter Four. In that instance they blew off the Declaratory Judgment as if the devastating facts against those hoodlums carried no weight and stared down anyone who dared question their actions. In fact, they preempted criticism with a blanket condemnation of all objections in advance. But where were the preemptory denouncements in the Wilkins’ case? Where were Randy Booth and his fellow CREC confederates when Beelzeblog relentlessly attacked the PCA for the last year? I didn’t hear any of them say,

Some of these matters have been treated in an anti-ecclesiastical way via web sites on the worldwide web. There is definitely false and misleading information that is being advanced at some of these sites, including false information pertaining to the nature and make-up of the CREC Commission. Self-appointed arbiters of justice do not contribute to a godly resolution of anything and we hereby call upon them to recuse themselves from such public discourse, to immediately remove any material related to these matters from the web, and to pray for all those affected by these matters.

I didn’t see any of them posture in their long flowing robes or flash a collar like a badge. All I heard were the Fearless Leader’s cheerleaders shout hurrah as they waved their pom-poms on the sidelines.

Pharisaical hypocrites — all of them — they say one thing while they do another. They’re dissemblers of the worst order, using pious spin when they refrocked the St. Peter Four and equally pious spin when they attacked the PCA — except they spun it the other way, turning their high and holy standard upside down.

The CREC confederates are like toilets at a rest stop; their porcelain appears pure and white on the outside. To be sure, some of them even have scent bars. But when you lift the cover, look out. The raw-sewage version of Big Foot jumps at you. IT’S ALIVE! You can flush and plunge all day long but he won’t go away. In fact, he keeps growing because an endless supply of waste — starting with Randy Booth and all the other CREC dignitaries — feeds him from the depths. His only purpose in life is to rot, fester, and stink up the joint, world without end, unless, that is, you call his flaming hypocrisy good fruit. And there’s no getting rid of him because the CREC confederates love to have it so.

The CREC deserves RC Sproul Jr and his three pet reptiles for the same reason they deserve Steve Wilkins, Burke Shade, Randy Booth, and all the other rebels against the kingdom of God that Douglas Wilson has gathered unto himself. But this doesn’t mean the Christian church deserves them. No, there’s no reason the Church should receive back the filth it cast out. In fact, we have every reason and all the incentive you could imagine to obey the command of our Lord regarding these Pharisees: “Let them alone” (Matt. 15:14).

Thank you.

Freshly Squeezed

Alright. I admit it. A couple of weeks ago when I wrote that Mark Horne has the IQ of a banana peel, I stole the line from Mike Ditka.

Back in the ’80s, when the Chicago Bears were coached by Iron Mike Ditka, they enjoyed a competitive rivalry with the Washington Redskins, who shored their defensive line with a player named Dexter Manly, a man gifted with exceptional football skills but limited education. The two men occasionally bantered in the media and one time Dexter made some rather aggressive comments about his bad intentions for Chicago’s QB. When the press asked Ditka for a response, he quipped “Dexter Manly has the IQ of a grapefruit.” And when Dexter heard about it, he replied, “Which kind — fresh or squeezed?” And he was serious. Of course, anyone with an IQ greater than Dexter’s realized that, unbeknownst to him, he made Ditka’s point better than Iron Mike himself.

So I lifted the line from Ditka with attribution. I wouldn’t say my offense rises to the level of Steven “Machen” Wilkins’ serial plagiarizing; heck, Ditka didn’t even put it in print, forcing me to recreate the paragraph above from memory. But you get the point.

This brings me back to Mark Horne. He honored April Fools’ Day by posting a comment on Green Baggins that dropped my jaw. The context of the quote was his response to Pastor Lane’s latest installment in his ongoing review of A Faith That Is Never Alone. (By the way, I think the biggest public loser in the Federal Vision controversy is P. Andrew Sandlin. First, the CREC confederates ratified the Fearless Leader’s usurpation of his church’s leadership, then a year later he edited a book that he dedicated to Norm Shepherd (page 3) where Lane caught Shepherd in a Wilson-faced lie. Even worse, no one associated with the book, which appears to be about a grand total of 9 souls plus or minus 3, corrected Lane — they let the lie stand. Sandlin is a talented writer who oftentimes has insightful contributions and I’m sorry to see him continually get shafted by the FV clowns. But I digress.)

The point of my Iron Mike anecdote was to illustrate that some people won’t ever get it, even when it stares them in the face. Mark Horne, for example, blew an incoherent three-point rant at Pastor Lane, which concluded:

Plainly, if your comments are regarded as intelligent criticism, then we have a whole subculture in the PCA who are theologically incompetent and given to making railing accusations against those who are more intelligent and faithful than they are. Pretty tragic.

And suddenly Mark Horne makes Dexter Manly look like genius — fresh or squeezed. He blows as often as the Fearless Leader but with neither the deceptive flair nor the cunning deceit (yes, Mark, I was redundant on purpose). He just blows, like a foghorn sounding for ears to pierce, unaware that his barge has already shipwrecked and his soul is in imminent peril.

Ironically, Horne got it right, however, as usual he misapplied his conclusion. In the words of one critic: “Self-awareness level: Minus zero.” Or as Horne said, “Pretty tragic.”

Thank you.

“Ruthlessness gene” discovered

Two things struck me from this article entitled “Ruthlessness gene” discovered:

1. The headline promised more than the article delivered. Obviously this kind of article doesn’t purport to present all of the circumstances of the test nor all of the findings. Nevertheless, they didn’t discover a “ruthless” gene; they observed behavioral tendencies within 200 students who played a modified version of Monopoly and they found that 18% of the so-called “dictators” kept all their money, which amounted to 50 shekels or 14 bucks. Researchers did not indicate if those 18% were hungry for pizza that night. Regardless, and modern science notwithstanding, dictators — those psychopathic beasts — remain “without excuse.”


2. The second thing that struck me was that they cropped the image to fit the web frame. As you can see below, we remedied this horrible injustice to the memory of two of the most sadistic dictators in modern history.

Thank you.

R.C. Sproul, Jr.: Scandalizing the Body of Christ

I’ve been working on a rather large post for almost a week now and as it continued to grow, it occurred to me that my fully documented anonymous attack blog has not addressed the RPCGA’s defrocking of RC Sproul Jr and the St. Peter Four, which is important because I reference it in the post I’m drafting. I can’t imagine that anyone in the Reformed world hasn’t heard about this scandal, but I can imagine that not everyone has benefited from Patrick Poole’s keen analysis or from examining the primary documents.

So I asked Patrick for permission to republish this essay that he originally published on Existential Space but deleted after he Kut His Losses on the Kirk Kult. (Please note that Patrick Poole feels safer writing exposés of Islamic terrorists than he does analyzing the Fearless Leader’s brazen hypocrisy; if you do the math this means that in Patrick’s estimation, Wilson’s thugs are much more sinister than the jihadists living in his hometown. I’m sure this is because Wilson loves God so much.) Nevertheless, Patrick may have deleted his blog post, but not before I saved it. After all, I am an information hog.

Anyway, Patrick gave me permission to republish this and I urge you to read it keeping one thing in the back of your head: Douglas Wilson said, “I have known Mr. Poole to act with integrity in the past.”

Sunday, February 05, 2006
R.C. Sproul, Jr.: Scandalizing the Body of Christ

Warning: If you’re not interested in presbyterian polity or keeping up with evangelical church news, come back later.

Preface: There are MANY who are saying that I don’t have the right to publish this article. Some are already writing thinly veiled screeds directing divine judgment at anyone having the audacity to make reasoned judgments from the well-established facts at issue here. “Touching the anointed of the Lord” kind of stuff. Even the Moscow Mullah, the Pasha of the Palouse, Doug Wilson himself publicly commented AFTER the RPCGA’s recent action to shout down any discussion about his friend R.C.’s defrocking. (Gee, Douggie, why can you publicly comment and none of us are allowed to do the same?) Some have also said that ecclesiastical charges should be issued against anyone making the following statements (a position rife with irony, as you will see as you continue to read). At least one individual was bragging earlier this week about having another blog closed down in retaliation for publishing the truth about this ongoing matter (which, thankfully, has reappeared). That’s the poisonous atmosphere that has been intentionally created in the wake of this situation. However, the stakes in this matter are not limited to discussing minuscule points of dogma or isolated to a Reformed micro-denomination. At this point, much is already a matter of public record, with all sides having their say. Thus far, at least to my knowledge, none of those self-appointed Reformed “superstars” who are aware of this situation have been willing to say anything publicly about it, presumably hedging their bets on how this whole affair plays out. Someone has to say, “We must stop this madness, or else it will kill us all.” It is a shame to the Church that it has to be left to someone as insignificant and unqualified in all senses as me to say it, but there it is.

As some observers are aware, on January 26th the Westminster Presbytery of the Reformed Presbyterian Church General Assembly (RPCGA) defrocked R.C. Sproul, Jr. and the entire session of St. Peter Presbyterian Church for a laundry list of violations not in dispute by either the presbytery or the defrocked men. Additional disputed charges are to be brought up for trial by the presbytery.

As you can read in the Moderator’s Declaratory Judgment (approved unanimously by the Westminster Presbytery), chief among the reasons for this action are abusive and unauthorized actions taken against members of the congregation, including refusing to allow the family to leave the church over doctrinal disputes, suspending them from the sacraments without trial, and ordering the entire congregation to “shun” the entire family (though only the husband and father was named in the session’s censure). R.C. and the session members all agreed that these actions took place and offered their “apologies” (which fell along the lines of “I’m so sorry your actions made be beat you. . .”). Additionally, several current and former church members gave written evidence to the same effect, including an apology letter sent to the targeted family from Rick Saenz, R.C.’s longtime and former personal assistant, admitting to not speaking out against the outrageous actions at the time they were occurring. St. Peter member (now former) Peter Kershaw should be applauded as well for being the first to denounce the treatment of the Austin family. You can read the entire documentary and evidentiary trail here.

These former church leaders have also admitted to illegally using the tax EID of another denomination as cover for the church and the Highlands Study Center, a violation of state and federal laws. Evidence has been given that this was deliberate and done at the direct instruction of R.C. himself. In light of this, the doctrinal differences between these former church leaders and the RPCGA noted in the Declaratory Judgment seem slight in comparison.

Again, this is all thus far undisputed and a matter of public record, with the written testimony of multiple witnesses and the confessions of the defrocked men themselves as witnesses against their abusive and illegal conduct.

All of the proceeding is not the cause of scandal to the body of Christ. This is biblical church discipline in process, and nothing unusual in that regard. If these men had shown repentance, it wouldn’t be right for me or anyone outside. What is scandalous is the behavior of these men subsequent to their defrocking. At this moment, there is a note posted on the website of St. Peter Presbyterian Church/Highlands Study Center that reads (UPDATE — the following quote has been removed from their website):

As many of you have read, Dr. Sproul Jr., along with the entire session of Saint Peter Presbyterian Church, has heard from the moderator of the Westminster Presbytery of the Reformed Presbyterian Church, General Assembly, that they have been deposed from their offices as elders in the church. This action was taken without a trial, indeed without even a conversation. We disagree with the action taken, and are considering our options as to how to respond. What we will not do is take shots against our accusers over the internet, and would encourage you not to do so, either. Please be patient, and please pray for the peace and purity of the church.

Now this is patently Clintonesque. They say that they won’t “take shots against our accusers over the internet.” Where is this posted? That’s right: on the Internet. And what do they say? “We’ve been wronged by these ecclesiastical fascists who didn’t even give us a trial!” Aren’t we all glad that they are refusing to say anything in their defense, especially over the Internet?

Now for the truth:

At this time, these men have been defrocked on the basis of their own testimony of their actions, confirmed by multiple witnesses. When a man pleads guilty, there is no trial. For those accusations that are disputed, and thus, still pending, a trial is being arranged by the presbytery.

They would have you believe that they are being railroaded by an out-of-control moderator (as evidenced by the attack on Westminster Presbytery Moderator Ken Talbot this week on WorldMagBlog [posts #37 and #38] by one of R.C.’s friends, David Zuniga), but in fact this action was approved in accordance with the RPCGA’s Book of Church Order, which as a member of their presbytery these men have submitted to. The Declaratory Judgment cites the relevant BCO language that allows for summary judgment when the facts are not in dispute.

It is also important to note that the entire Westminster Presbytery approved this action, and approved it unanimously. This is not the decision of a lone moderator.

The claim that this action was taken “without even a conversation” is entirely false. Ken Talbot examined this matter for almost two months, and the Declaratory Judgment even cites conversations between R.C. and the presbytery on this matter.

Another fact is that the Declaratory Judgment cites a December 15th email from R.C. to Ken Talbot asking for swift resolution of this matter:

It appears that at least three of our four elders cannot stay in the denomination. . . The particular hardship is this. We especially don’t want to leave with a cloud over our heads. Could you either, having let us go, hear the complaints against us, and issue a ruling, or barring that, could you forward all those complaints to where we end up? We have had much to repent of these past few weeks. We have done so. We are sorry in turn that our failures have caused trouble for you and the presbytery. (page 10)

The moral of the story? Be careful what you wish for.

The quote taken from R.C.’s email is quite telling. By this time, the investigation was in full swing, and it was only at this point that the “St. Peter Four” decided that they couldn’t stick around the RPCGA on the basis of their “convictions” of practicing paedo-communion — a practice strictly banned by the RPCGA since 1997. But when an investigation is launched on matters much more serious than their views on the Lord’s Supper, these cowards suddenly develop “convictions”? Remember that these men took vows before God and their fellow elders in presbytery to be in submission to the system and the judgments of the RPCGA. But using the canard of “convictions,” R.C. has asked that they either be tried only after they are allowed to leave the denomination, making any judgment by the RPCGA meaningless (because they will no longer have any jurisdiction), or allow some other as-yet unspecified denomination to examine the evidence (meaning that they might have to Catch R.c. Evacuating Christianity). But one thing is clear — they don’t want the RPCGA, the only authorized authority, doing the trial. How’s that for accountability? Maybe Doug Wilson will blog on that topic this week.

He thinks that having taken oaths and vows before God and men that he can leave the denomination without so much as a “by your leave”? Aren’t these the same Federal Vision “men without chests” who endlessly proclaim “the covenant, the covenant, the covenant of the Lord are these” over every minute detail of theology and beat anyone over the head who doesn’t agree with their interpretation of it? Covenants and vows apparently now mean nothing to R.C. and his Gang. This is pathetic in and of itself, but it gets worse.

Does anyone else but me see the sickening irony that R.C. is demanding for himself what he was ugly reluctant to give to others? The Austin family, who was the subject of malicious persecution by the ordained leaders of St. Peter, were refused when they requested to leave the church for their disagreements over paedo-communion and other doctrinal issues. What did R.C. and the Gang use as justification for their refusal to let the Austin family leave? Their membership vows. Another family states (cited in the Declaratory Judgment, p. 3):

Because of this we became more determined than ever to leave the church. R.C. and Laurence became just as determined that they were not going to let us go. They told us we had taken a vow to the Elders to stay in the church, and we could not leave unless they released us. They told us that we would never be able to join another reformed church if we were not in good standing with St. Peter and we would need their release for that to happen. (emphasis added)

From the documentary evidence available thus far, we can see that this refusal to let families leave the church was part of an abusive pattern. Furthermore, R.C. and the Gang made all members take vows beyond what was allowed by their denomination (point 5, pg. 7 of the Declaratory Judgment).

But that’s still not fully viewing how scandalous this affair truly is. One of the things at issue in the Austin’s de facto excommunication was that it was done without any trial whatsoever. At least Westminster Presbytery is willing to let these men go to trial for the matters that are in dispute, they having admitted to the substance of the charges laid out in the presbytery’s Declaratory Judgment. That notwithstanding, R.C. and the Gang are still complaining that they were not given a trial before they were defrocked. But when the shoe was on the other foot, they felt completely justified in acting without due process against the Austin family and others in violation of denominational rules.

At this point, if you still feel any pity for these reprobates, remember that the RPCGA is acting in accordance with their Book of Church Order, which the former leaders of St. Peter agreed to live by when they entered the RPCGA. No one put a gun to their head to make them join this denomination, and their rules were not treated as some kind of Masonic secret; their BCO is published on their website. Those who live by presbyterian polity can die by presbyterian polity.

As of this date, the previous statement that the church was part of the RPCGA has now been removed from the church’s website, making clear that these men are on the run. And they are looking for a safe haven. Time will tell where they might land, but at least one commentator, Tim Bayly, has provided this week a “hypothetical scenario” in which R.C. and the Gang could justifiably (sic) discuss moving their credentials to the CREC, where Douggie Wilson and his gang of drug dealers and illegal casino operators reside.

The scandal still keeps coming. R.C. has said that he is going to devote his time to the Highlands Study Center, which has historically been a ministry of St. Peter Presbyterian Church (even sharing the illegally obtained tax EID number). However, R.C. incorporated Highlands with the state of Virginia on January 10th (in the midst of the presbytery investigation), effectively stealing the ministry from the Church that he is not even a member of (ordained elders are members of the presbytery, not of the church they minister to). Whereas the St. Peter/Highlands website used to read that Highlands was “an integrated ministry of St. Peter Presbyterian Church,” that is no longer the case. It has been pilfered by R.C. and the Gang.

Make no mistake: these men are spiritual outlaws. No matter how much they want to hide behind their recently acquired “convictions” about the perils of presbyterian polity, they are autonomous religious renegades, and ought to be considered as such. Any ministry that planned to feature R.C. or any of his Gang as speakers at their events should withdraw the initiation immediately, and anyone previously invited to speak at future Highlands Study Center conferences should now decline to speak. Is this what I expect will happen? Not likely. These squibs are going to look for safe harbor, and my bet is that they’ll get it. Some wannabe Reformed micro-denomination would be glad to add R.C.’s name to their roster, regardless of the stench he drags behind him. Certainly there can be restoration with demonstrated repentance, and Lord willing, that will eventually occur. These men could even be restored to ministry at some future date. But as Westminster Presbytery has made clear, these men are currently unqualified and unfit to shepherd any flock:

The consistent pattern of actions taken by these men are duplicitous in nature, and demonstrate that they willingly and knowingly act in an arbitrary fashion in violation of their vows of ordination and in violation of our denomination’s Book of Church Order. Most importantly, their actions manifest that they lack the qualification for the ministry (1 Timothy 3:1–7). It would be unwise to allow these men to continue to hold an office for which they are not qualified. They have no interest to govern themselves appropriately within this presbyterian system of government that they vowed to submit and conform to its rules and regulations with conduct becoming ministers of Jesus Christ. (Declaratory Judgment, p. 11)

No one should be under any illusions. R.C. and his Gang of Thugs will try to paint this as nothing more than a difference over doctrine. They are “suffering servants” for the cause of paedo-communion (what a pathetic hill to die on!). But this is one of the clearest cases of spiritual abuse and reckless leadership the evangelical world has seen in a while (excepting Certain Reformed Evangelical Cults in Idaho). These men are in fact unqualified and unfit for office (and at this point, membership) in any church, and should be regarded and treated as such. The Westminster Presbytery should be applauded for the lawful defrocking of these petty tyrants. Their decisive removal from office in the face of overwhelming evidence is presbyterian polity at its best. Other Reformed denominations have had similar cases where they have refused to act. And the presbytery is lucky to have a man like Ken Talbot (who is both a theologian/churchman and an attorney) to oversee this matter. In light of the present conduct of R.C. and the Gang, hopefully further sanctions will be forthcoming. R.C. and the Gang are a direct threat to the purity of the body of Christ. Their mockery of the Reformed ecclesiology that they have publicly preached, but perverted in order to lord over others, will hopefully be put to an end. May this scandal be disassociated with the name of Christ.

POSTED BY PATRICK POOLE AT 11:01 AM

As I said, Patrick is an excellent analyst. Here are three other essays that he gave me permission to republish in the past; they are outstanding:

• “The Mendacious Mullah of Moscow”
• “Wilsonistas Gone Wild! ! ! !”
• “Kutting My Losses on the Kirk Kult”

Thank you

Above the Law

“Let every soul be subject to the governing authorities. For there is no authority except from God, and the authorities that exist are appointed by God. Therefore whoever resists the authority resists the ordinance of God, and those who resist will bring judgment on themselves. For rulers are not a terror to good works, but to evil. Do you want to be unafraid of the authority? Do what is good, and you will have praise from the same. For he is God’s minister to you for good. But if you do evil, be afraid; for he does not bear the sword in vain; for he is God’s minister, an avenger to execute wrath on him who practices evil. Therefore you must be subject, not only because of wrath but also for conscience’ sake. For because of this you also pay taxes, for they are God’s ministers attending continually to this very thing. Render therefore to all their due: taxes to whom taxes are due, customs to whom customs, fear to whom fear, honor to whom honor.” — Romans 13:1–7

Yesterday we saw the Fearless Leader quote Romans 13 to suggest that the Kult had cooperated with the police during their investigation of his April Fools’ Day prank, which they did not. Today, I have a question: If the Fearless Leader really wanted to obey Romans 13, why would he instruct a toady to steal a letterhead from the University of Idaho?

That’s a fair question when you think about it, but it raises another question: Why would the Great Protector instruct anyone to steal anything? Isn’t there a commandment prohibiting theft?

The only answer to these questions that I can surmise is that Doug Wilson sees himself as above the law — God’s and man’s — which probably accounts for his gloating in Credenda Agenda. I know, I know, it was a prank. I’m sure that justifies it some minds. Besides, everyone loves a good boob joke, don’t they? They sure worked ’em in on the whole “stacked committee” thing.

Regardless, these considerations raise another question: Does the Fearless Leader see himself above the law at all times? or does he see himself above the law on one specially designated day per year — the one they named in his honor?

I suspect the answer to this question is self-evident, but for those of you who have to think twice about it, take a tip from me: Think Al Capone.

Thank you.

PS: Doug Jones’ “humorless” defense is laughable. They’re all a bunch of nutjobs.

April Fool

“The folly of fools is deceit.” — Proverbs 14:8

I would be remiss if I let this day pass without noting its high spiritual import to the fool-mongers of the Kult. Indeed, April Fools’ Day stands head and shoulders above all the other days on the Kult calendar. As one person said, in terms of significance, it’s like their Day of Atonement. It probably carries as much weight to them calendar-wise as baptism does sacrament-wise, if that makes sense. However, since I don’t have much time, I will limit myself to documenting two of the more notorious April Fools’ Days in Kult lore.

The first and probably most offensive April Fools’ Day that I want to call to your attention was April 1, 1999, when the Kult leadership executed an incredibly well-devised prank to fool the entire Palouse, including all of the University of Idaho, into believing that the University was holding a lecture series on toplessness, which would be delivered by topless feminist scholars.

Here’s how the Fearless Leader told the story in Credenda Agenda:

By the time you receive this, our local police will probably have forgotten all about it, so a little bragging is now safe, and perhaps it is even in order. But first some background. Our local city council, through a series of ridiculous circumstances, decided to quit restricting female toplessness. The noble senior editor of this journal, encouraged by some winks and nudges from me, not that he needed any, made up a flyer which announced a topless and proud lecture series by topless feminist scholars. The titles of the talks were the typical postmodern hoohah — “Topless Shadows: A Personal Narrative,” “Destabilizing the Topless/Bottomless Duality,” “Breasts as Embodied Intuitions,” you get the drift. Some of our stalwart young Christian men, majoring in Christian culture and skylarking, papered the university with these flyers, and the next morning a bunch of them were faxed all over campus. Now you know that we live in sad days, days when satire is increasingly difficult, and almost impossible. The radio station announced the lectures all day, an instructor out of the women’s center announced the lectures to a class, and the English department (listed on the flyer as sponsor) called the announced location to find out if they were in fact going on.

Well, some authorities at the University of Idaho went sideways, and had the cops out looking for the culprits. When they demanded to see the film from the security cameras at Kinko’s (whence the faxes had been sent), our noble editor contacted the established authorities (Rom. 13), who told him it wasn’t funny. He responded that on the contrary it was, and the next day gave out a press release on how the university was trying to repress the true, the good and the lovely.

Needless to say, lots of people showed up for the non-event, and all this happened on April 1. All in all, it was a bad day for the tight-lipped fundamentalists of the left. (Credenda Agenda, Volume 11 number 3)

Please make careful note of the dougspeak in this narrative: “Some of our stalwart young Christian men, majoring in Christian culture and skylarking, papered the university with these flyers, and the next morning a bunch of them were faxed all over campus.” This really means that a member of the Kult stole a UI letterhead from the Vice President of the University of Idaho so that someone from the Kult could forge a memo announcing the topless lecture series. We know this from the police report, which you can read here on dougsplotch. Moreover, the “stalwart young Christian men, majoring in Christian culture and skylarking” were NSA students, which should remove all doubt about the corrupting influence of Doug Wilson.

You should also notice the way he describes the police investigation, how he leaves the false impression that the Kult cooperated with the police pursuant to Romans 13, which was not the case. The manager of Kinkos was a deacon in the Kult (now he’s a CREC pastor) and he stonewalled the police, refusing to let them see the surveillance tapes. No one that I know knows anything about the “press release on how the university was trying to repress the true, the good and the lovely.” The Lewiston Morning Trib (below), however, reported a press release that threatened a subpoena if Kinkos didn’t cooperate. If you read between the lines, that’s when the Kult leaders stopped laughing and began wetting their pants, which the Fearless Leader doesn’t mention either.

All in all, it was another bad day for the gospel, sponsored, of course, by those irresponsible fatheads of Christ Church, Moscow.



The second April Fools’ Day of Kult lore that I want to call to your attention was April 1, 2005, which was exactly 20 days after Douglas Wilson discovered that a serial pedophile had ravaged the lambs of his flock for the past 18 months. This fact alone should have been cause to lay off the fool’s play and take life a little more seriously. Not so for the Fearless Leader. Life is one big lying joke to him. Here is his blog post from that day:

Big News Topic: Current Events
Now that the papers are all signed, and my attorney says that there is nothing that can be done about it, I suppose this would be a good time to announce that through the generous help of a third party my wife and I have bought the Moscow Food Coop. For me to have been involved in the negotiations publicly would have been obviously counterproductive, but now that the deal is done, I think there is no longer any sense in being coy. At the same time, despite local politics, I want to assure all the regular Food Coop customers that there is absolutely no intention of selling the Coop’s new downtown location to Christ Church, or of diminishing in any way the quality of service that our customers have come to expect.

To understand this, you have to know that Wilson covets all the downtown property in Moscow and the Moscow Food Coop sits smack dab in the middle of downtown, like a hub. Wilson has coveted it for years. Moreover, you can’t go in the Coop without rubbing shoulders with a hippie, which is the exact opposite crowd that attends the Kult. I think it’s safe to say that Wilson despises them as much or more than anyone in the PCA. So he makes this stupid announcement on his blog, knowing that many of the locals keep tabs on him. He was making fun of the climate of fear that he cultivated, which is not funny if he’s after your property.

Local freelance reporter and Coop board member (I think) Bill London posted this to Vision 2020 in response to Wilson:

Doug Wilson, that funny guy, is at it again.

His April Fools joke this year is posted at his website (www.dougwils.com) today (see below). He claims in this post to have purchased the Moscow Food Co-op. The Co-op is owned by its 3,500 members, not some shadowy multinational corporation he guided to a corporate takeover. Doug is not a Co-op member, so he doesn’t even own a tiny portion of the Co-op. It’s just his attempt at “funny.”

I would like to remind Doug that there are two kinds of funny. Funny as in “hah, hah, good joke” and funny as in quite peculiar. He’s sliding well into the peculiar category with this one.

BL

“Funny as in quite peculiar”: Bill nailed it. Think about it: At that time Douglas Wilson had no idea how many lambs Steven Sitler had raped (and he still does not know this), but he had time to play a practical joke on the community. At that time Wilson had not notified his flock of predation (and he still has not warned his flock of predation), but he had time to for foolishness. And presumably, at that time Wilson had not yet completed his six counseling sessions with the serial pedophile whereby he declared him repentant and ready to return to society. But Wilson knew the community didn’t trust him and was suspicious of his land grabbing, so he played off that fear as a joke.

Frankly, Bill London understated it (as is his style). This April Fools’ Day joke was “peculiar” before anyone knew about Steven Sitler, simply because it constituted yet more antagonism from a professed gospel minister against the community. Now that we know about Steven Sitler’s horrifying crimes and Wilson’s unconscionable dereliction of duty, this joke is downright sick.

He may think it funny, just as he got a hoot out of his “topless and proud” gag. But I know this much: none of the victims laughed that day, if they kept abreast of the bilge from Blog and Mablog. No, I’m certain that none of those families in Moscow, Colville, or Virginia yucked it up with the Fearless Leader — “Happy April Fools’ Day, Pastor! By the way, when you get a minute from your busy blogging schedule, can you please tell me what to do about my two-year-old daughter?” And I know God was not pleased either.

But I take comfort knowing that the Lord has not precluded fools from reaping what they sow, which means that one day the Fearless Leader shall face a harvest of unprecedented proportions, because Scripture says,

Because you disdained all my counsel,
And would have none of my rebuke,
I also will laugh at your calamity;
I will mock when your terror comes,
When your terror comes like a storm,
And your destruction comes like a whirlwind,
When distress and anguish come upon you.

Then they will call on me, but I will not answer;
They will seek me diligently, but they will not find me.
Because they hated knowledge
And did not choose the fear of the LORD,

They would have none of my counsel
And despised my every rebuke.
Therefore they shall eat the fruit of their own way,
And be filled to the full with their own fancies. — Proverbs 1:24–31

Thank you.