You’ve encountered stories like this before, unfortunately…
Men who lead religious congregations who, on the sly, act like total creeps and don’t walk the walk.
And the guy you’re going to read about is really something else!
Are y’all ready for this?
Check out what happened!
Dishonest Hypocritical Pastor Loses It All.
“I used to be very religious.
At the end of that period in my life, I became involved with a new church that was pastored by a charismatic young pastor who seemingly had everything going for him.
There was a big problem.
But he was greedy. Too greedy. As the saying goes: “pigs get fat, hogs get slaughtered.” Pastor Hog got slaughtered.
My wife and I were looking for a church.
An old friend invited us to a new church that was energetic and full of friends.
We started attending regularly and eventually became involved with the leadership of the church.
After a while, I started to become uneasy around the pastor.
The way he communicated with people just rubbed me the wrong way.
I slowly realized that he was a manipulator and compulsive liar.
Quick with an overzealous compliment but slow to explain himself when issues arose.
It started with little things like lifting sermons wholesale from the internet without doing any personal research.
Then a habit of, when the small church couldn’t afford to pay a full time salary, being fired from every entry-level part time job he started with no good explanation as to why.
This guy was sketchy.
Soon, the sermons demanding church members give more money became frequent.
He then refused to find part time work.
This, all despite the fact that he lived in a much nicer home than any of the church members (gifted to him from a church member in a previous church) and seemed to live a very comfortable life.
My wife and I eventually took over the church accounting.
We were appalled by the frivolous spending and mounting credit card debt, accruing at insane interest rates.
I started to pore over the credit card statements, some going back a couple years.
It was insanity.
Credit card cash withdrawals, clearly personal expenses charged to the church.
$200 for a massage on Christmas Eve?
Why is he putting his wife’s last minute Christmas gifts on the church card?
Uh oh…
And then one day I fired up the church computer and a messenger app popped up.
Two clicks and I was confronted with messages to women in which he propositioned them to come meet him in his super legitimate business office in a shiny high rise (a tiny office he recently decided to lease on the church dime (the church was in between buildings at the time) to come sit on his you know what.
I confronted him about the messages and he fessed up, admitting he sent the messages, had never done it before, and it was a mere lapse in discretion.
He said he would cut it out. No big deal.
I believed him and didn’t tell anyone.
A few months later, a young unmarried musician in the church became pregnant.
He made a huge spectacle about it and kicked her out.
Turns out, in his opinion, we couldn’t have the blight of sin on display at his church.
Wait, what?
Things were going from bad to worse.
The petty lies turned into more elaborate lies, mostly about how church money was spent but also what he was doing with all his time.
Things were out of hand.
I sat down with him and his wife to go through the credit card statements line by line to work out which charges the church would pay.
I mean, “we can’t pay for a Christmas massage for your wife.”
Wife: “What? He didn’t get me any massage. We can’t afford that.”
Again, one Sunday morning, I fired up the church computer and noticed that all the internet history had been wiped.
I became suspicious and, after a discussion with a couple church leaders, began to monitor traffic on the computer (which was church property.
He, being an employee of the church, the church had the right to monitor the computer).
Wow!
Within a matter of days it became apparent that he was cruising the net for hookers.
To his credit, it seemed he was looking for older discount hookers.
He had a church provided cell phone and I had access to the account. A quick check confirmed a pattern.
Hits on a hooker ad, a phone call to the corresponding number.
One minute call.
Another ad, another number, another minute, repeated until a call lasted more than a couple minutes and then no more calls for a day or two.
In the course of 7 days, there were 4 distinct episodes following the same pattern.
Looking at the past phone records, I was able to work out that he had been doing it for years.
During and right after the time when I caught him pretending to be a totally legitimate successful business man on messaging apps.
He lied right to my face, played contritious, and I swallowed it whole. I felt like a total fool.
I checked up on him during work hours.
He wasn’t in the church office (now at a church building).
He wasn’t home with his wife.
She said he was at the church. Nope.
This was really ugly.
Guilt a bunch of people who look up to you into giving you more money while spending all kinds of money banging hookers?
Kick out some hapless pregnant teenager because of impropriety while banging hookers with your prodigious business ****?
Pay for a Christmas rub and tug at a 20% compounding interest rate?
Unforgivable.
I brought together all the records I could get my hands on and organized them.
Excel spreadsheets with times and phone numbers.
Printouts of the ads complete with full color pictures.
Lists of suspicious credit card charges. Color coordinated and collated.
It was an unimpeachable record that the slipperiest liar would not be able to explain away.
I contacted the church leaders and shared what I’d found. We called a meeting and confronted him.
He immediately went into damage control.
He resigned on the spot and begged us not to tell his wife or anyone else.
Sorry, dude!
No way. I sent my masterpiece to his wife and walked her through it.
Anytime he fed her a lie, I set her straight with raw data.
She kicked him out, filed for divorce, and left the state.
Church disbanded.
He disappeared and eventually filed for bankruptcy.
I haven’t been to church since.
I still google his name from time to time.
After a couple years I got a hit about him working at low levels in some church.
Every time I would check, he was at a different church.
I’ve been tempted to dust off my folder of destruction but I figure he’s been through enough.”
Take a look at how readers reacted.
This reader asked a good question…
Another individual was impressed.
This Reddit user offered some advice.
Another Reddit user had a lot to say.
And this person didn’t hold back.
Do as I say, not as I do…
Or something like that…
If you liked this post, check out this story about an employee who got revenge on a co-worker who kept grading their work suspiciously low.