[ :eek: WE LOVE THIS STORY. THIS GUY AND HIS CHURCH PREACH THE EVILS OF SAME-SEX MARRIAGE BUT SAME-SEX SEX, OH WELL, THAT’S ANOTHER THING :rolleyes: . kk]
By Colleen Slevin
COLORADO SPRINGS, Colorado Nov 5 AP - Describing himself as a deceiver and liar'' who had given in to his dark side, one of America's top evangelical leaders today confessed to sexual immorality in a letter read from the pulpit of the megachurch he founded. The Reverend Ted Haggard, the disgraced former president of the National Evangelical Association (NEA), which represents 30 million evangelical Christians, apologised and said because of pride, I began deceiving those I love the most because I didn’t want to hurt or disappoint them’’. The fact is I am guilty of sexual immorality. And I take responsibility for the entire problem. I am a deceiver and a liar. There's a part of my life that is so repulsive and dark that I have been warring against it for all of my adult life,'' he said. Haggard, 50, resigned last week as NEA president, where he held sway in Washington and condemned homosexuality, after a man claimed to have had drug-fuelled homosexual trysts with him. He also placed himself on administrative leave from the 14,000-member New Life Church, which he founded in the 1980s. Its independent Overseer Board sacked him yesterday. The letter was read to the New Life Church by another clergyman, the Rev Larry Stockstill, senior pastor of Bethany World Prayer Centre in Baker, Louisiana, and a member of the board that fired him. Neither Haggard nor his wife, Gayle, attended. In his letter, Haggard said the accusations made against me are not all true but enough of them are that I was appropriately removed from his church leadership position.’’
He did not give details on which accusations were true. Haggard had acknowledged on Friday that he paid Mike Jones of Denver for a massage and for methamphetamine, but said he did not have sex with him and did not take the drug.
The Overseer Board, made up clergy from various churches, used stronger language. Our investigation and Pastor Haggard's public statements have proven without a doubt that he has committed sexually immoral conduct,'' the board said in a statement. At the New Life church, youngsters were sent from the room before elders began discussing the church crisis. Worshippers are always challenged by crisis. And when tragedy and crisis strikes it is at that moment that you truly decide if you are a worshipper of the most high God. And today as the worship pastor of this church I am very proud of you,’’ said the Rev Ross Parsley, who has replaced Haggard.
Ryan Price and his fiancee, Karen Geyer, were impressed. It seemed genuine - from the heart. It's unfortunate but it happens,'' said Geyer. He’s reaching out and asking for forgiveness,’’ said Price.
Jones, who said he is gay, said he was upset when he discovered who Haggard was and that New Life opposed same-sex marriage - a key issue in Colorado, with a pair of issues on Tuesday’s ballot. I am sad for him and his family. I know this is a tough day for him also,'' he said in a telephone interview today. I wish him well. I wish his family well. My intent was never to destroy his family. My intent was to expose a hypocrite.’’
The scandal has disappointed Christian conservatives, whom President George W Bush and other Republicans are courting heavily in the run-up to Tuesday’s election.
Many were already disheartened with the president and the Republican-controlled Congress over their failure to deliver big gains on social issues even before the congressional page scandal involving former Representative Mark Foley.
Haggard, who had been NEA president since 2003, has participated in conference calls with White House staffers and lobbied Congress last year on Supreme Court nominees.
Move over Jimmy Swaggert.
Of course, when you think of it, he’s “hoist on his own petard” because, aside from lying, it’s only in the bigoted community he fostered that being gay can be considered “immoral”.
I love the Republican Party’s (a wholly owned subsidiary of Halliburton Inc.) reaction. Talk about rats and ships.
While this guy was getting serviced literally, the Reps were sucking him figuratively, as the head of the Evangelical Conference, to get votes. Today Karl Rove (turdblossom to his friend George) says: “It’s not a problem cause most peole have never heard of him anyway!”
The other amazing thing about an election is how things just manage to find their way into the news. Notice how Haggard came out in response to the idiotic comments by Kerry and then the trial verdict on Saddam to counter Haggard. Is there enough time for anything else to hit?
Haggard will claim he has become a Born-again Christian
Claim all his sins are in the past
Renouces meth & homosexuality
His wife welcomes him back in open arms
Pictures all over CNN
All is good again
Meanwhile Dem’s annouce that due to the terms of the coaltition Saddam cannot be hung and therefore the sentence is irrelevant and the most he is liable for is life in prison … claim Bush messed up again.
The US Military release a statement in support of Cheney and Rumsfeld
What ballot boxes??- it’s all electronic so you can’t check. Advanced polls have already released reports of people’s votes being switched from Dem to Rep- just like the last two times.
They need observers from Haiti to come up and certify fairness!!
Something needs to be done about bringing democracy and regime change to the US. Saddam is looking like just another guy who got screwed by the Christian right (read:there’s the tenuous connection to the original topic of this thread)
Exaclty! This could be the biggest affront to US democracy ever. There is absolutely no paper trail so you cannot tell me that at some point in the future people will not figure out ways to get into the system to ‘change votes’ in favor of a particular candidate. Perhaps even in this election if a political group has the will and the means to influence it.
They at least should have a paper trail to ‘back up’ what the electronic voting says took place. Otherwise we might as well all just vote online or text in our vote as many times possible a la American Idol. There is no accountablilty or way to prove what actually happened. All because people were too stupid to fill out a paper ballot correctly. Ridiculous.
It already happenig. Votes have been switched from Dem to Rep by the Rep machines already!
It wasn’t that people were stupid with the paper. The paper was lined up in such a way sa to guarantee problems in democratic parts of Florida- not to worry, now Florida has eliminated the paper trail so Brother Jeb won’t almost screw up the fix like he did in 2000!
How does one perform a reliable recount (in close results like in Virginia) if the voting has been electronic? A paper-and-pen technology seems to be far superior so far.
I think there’s an even bigger problem with voting in U.S. than voting technology thou. The whole winner-takes-all system is seriously flawed.
I guess a big problem there is the sheer number of things on a ballot, making the count tough. The parties push for hot-button issues that they think will encourage their side to turn out. BTW, if I’m right about the Reps juicing the machines, how bad do you really think the route was if everything was counted.
Maybe there was so much crap stirred up after the last election in 2004 that they were scared (or monitored) off.
If you’re about to rig votes, then you should be damn sure you’re not loosing the elections. If you know for sure you’re going to loose… don’t even bother risking the shit hitting the fan. Perhaps I’m wrong, but I think many states had the option where the electorate could choose between electronic or paper. Sure, the number of issues on a ballot is a problem, that’s why personal elections should be an own entity. Issues can, but doesn’t have to, be voted on during the same time, but then on a different ballot.
The voting system should be proportional and not as the current moronic one; the democratic problems in the current one are far too many. With a proportional system many more parties would play a role; any rigging would have much lesser consequences; and the votes would actually be representative (the most important thing I think).
It appears…The best way to fix U.S. election is to follow the legal route actually. It’s called redistricting (done every ten years). It basically means that a voting district is redrawn every then year. The catch is this: The redraw is often done according to party structures; because incumbent politicians can influence “political consultants” (who draw the districts) in how they draw the districts; in political science that’s called incumbent protection policy. Basically it means that the incumbent politician, with lobbyists, can asks the drawer to draw such a district where the politician cannot loose (i.e. in California the price was approximately 20.000 a piece). Hence, the Center of Voting Democracy can predict the outcome of an election without even having to know who the runners are, months in advance, and they are usually 99% correct. Whoooooa!
what a duplicitous shyster.