{"id":1462,"date":"2015-06-22T14:46:38","date_gmt":"2015-06-22T18:46:38","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.bobfelton.com\/?p=1462"},"modified":"2015-06-22T14:46:38","modified_gmt":"2015-06-22T18:46:38","slug":"so-long-pastortullian","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/www.bobfelton.com\/?p=1462","title":{"rendered":"So long, @PastorTullian"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>This seems to be a day for departures: a reader points me toward news that Tullian Tchividjian, pastor of Coral Ridge Presbyterian, has <a href=\"http:\/\/www.washingtonpost.com\/news\/acts-of-faith\/wp\/2015\/06\/21\/billy-grahams-grandson-steps-down-from-florida-megachurch-after-admitting-an-affair\/\" target=\"_blank\">resigned his pastorate<\/a> due to an extramarital affair.<\/p>\n<blockquote>\n<p>I resigned from my position at Coral Ridge Presbyterian Church today due to ongoing marital issues. As many of you know, I returned from a trip a few months back and discovered that my wife was having an affair. Heartbroken and devastated, I informed our church leadership and requested a sabbatical to focus exclusively on my marriage and family. As her affair continued, we separated. Sadly and embarrassingly, I subsequently sought comfort in a friend and developed an inappropriate relationship myself. Last week I was approached by our church leaders and they asked me about my own affair. I admitted to it and it was decided that the best course of action would be for me to resign.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p>Some thoughts, in no particular order:<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>\n<p>To mention his wife&#8217;s indiscretion at all, especially as a device for explaining his own &#8230; ummm, not a very gentlemanly thing to do; it suggests the vanity, or character failure, or plain-vanilla immaturity, that may have helped her decide the grass is greener elsewhere.  He should have left her out of it, taken his lumps, and departed.<\/p>\n<li>\n<p>Cheating pastors are common as dirt; I have seen estimates which place the incidence of it in the 50% neighborhood.  We would do ourselves a lot of good, and probably them, too, if they weren&#8217;t installed on pedestals.  There are of course exceptions but, as a class, clergy are neither well-educated nor reflective men.<\/p>\n<li>\n<p>But every cult needs a cult leader, somebody to herd the insecure and childish people who are drawn toward &#8220;you&#8217;re no damn good, so just do as you&#8217;re told.&#8221;<\/p>\n<li>\n<p>Pastor Tullian was a regular star of the &#8220;<a href=\"http:\/\/www.bobfelton.com\/?s=%40pastortullian\" target=\"_blank\">Dismal theology tweet for the day<\/a>&#8221; series, regularly reminding his fans that they are no damn good.  Pardon me if I wonder &#8212; not for the first time &#8212; if these clowns who bear down hard on Original Sin are, in fact, projecting.<\/ul>\n<p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>This seems to be a day for departures: a reader points me toward news that Tullian Tchividjian, pastor of Coral Ridge Presbyterian, has resigned his pastorate due to an extramarital affair. I resigned from my position at Coral Ridge Presbyterian &hellip; <a href=\"http:\/\/www.bobfelton.com\/?p=1462\">Continue reading <span class=\"meta-nav\">&rarr;<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[3],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.bobfelton.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1462"}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.bobfelton.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.bobfelton.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.bobfelton.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.bobfelton.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=1462"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"http:\/\/www.bobfelton.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1462\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1466,"href":"http:\/\/www.bobfelton.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1462\/revisions\/1466"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.bobfelton.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=1462"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.bobfelton.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=1462"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.bobfelton.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=1462"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}