Bloomington goes to bat for IRPC: Part 4

There are more points to go, and perhaps a summary:

7. Lawsuits and the threats of lawsuits among believers 

I think this is ironic because Bloomington initially claims that lawsuits are immoral:

We affirm the command that a believer should not take another believer to court, especially if they are members of the same church body. 

Then, however, they have to defend their buddy boy Jared for threatening a lawsuit:

Consider, for example: What about threatening a lawsuit where one does not actually intend to follow through with the action threatened?

Okay, so Jared would be immoral if he went before a secular court to litigate a matter, but if he's just threatening to go to a secular court, well, that's probably okay. Huh?

Now this is hard, because I think Paul's purpose in 1 Cor. 6:1-7 is less to make the command of no lawsuits between believers (isn't it interesting how Evangelicals like to turn everything into a command?) and more to point out that the Corinthian church has fallen to a point where there is no person who can be trusted to judge cases rightly. I think this is the case in the GLG, where the presbytery is split over whether enabling abusers, denying the existence of victims and turning the ninth commandment into "thou shalt hide the truth or you're going to get disciplined" is the way the church should operate.

Jared's threatened lawsuit was to claim privacy rights over the church proceedings, because the two Lafayette churches were able to attend. The question that is intriguing, is that, when one joins an organization, they are agreeing to cede certain rights. If the RPCNA Constitution says that trials are public, then being a member of the RPCNA means that you agree to your trial being public. Let's say that I decide to be on the show Big Brother. I will have to sign an agreement that says that I agree to living in a house that has cameras installed everywhere, including my bedroom. I can't subsequently sue because they recorded and aired something I was upset about. I waived my right to privacy. So, when I become a member of the church, I agree that the process of church discipline can involve private information being made public.

I don't think Jared's threats were legitimate in the first place. I can pay a lawyer to write pretty much anything to anyone. Lawyers are going to put in the appropriate asterisk phrases that say - these are the words and thoughts of the client I represent, not my legal opinion. If I want to sue my neighbor for using alien mind-wiping technology on me... I can find a lawyer who will take my money, knowing I will lose, and file that lawsuit.

Back to Paul's argument:

1. The parties are assumed to be believers. Believers love each other and want justice. So, the fact that there is a trial suggests that one or the other believer may not be a believer. Paul says nothing about believers taking unbelievers to court.

2. The church should have people who are wise and judge justly. Paul is implying that cases between believers going to secular courts means that there is no wise, just judge in Corinth.

3. Paul's argument here is not a command against taking fellow members to civil court, but how suspicious it is that two believers can't agree what is just, and they can't find a righteous judge in the church (which certainly had men appointed elders).

8. Internet-based communication platforms and the Ninth Commandment

If you haven't gotten the feeling yet that Bloomington has demonic influence, this point might get you there.

The IRPC case reminds us that the impatience to bring all before the public eye tends to short-circuit pastoral care and a spirit of charity.

So, apparently, the highest goal of the church is not justice, not grieving with those who grieve, but pastoral care. It makes sense, because there is no such thing as a victim, therefore, there is no need for justice, and victims need to immediately jump from being wronged to forgiving. So, I wonder how many milliseconds I have from the point that the fist contacts my face before I need to forgive someone for hitting me. Does the fist even have to break my nose?

So, in Bloomington, "Pastoral Care" means the abusers continue to abuse, the victims accept abuse with no desire for justice and all of this is hidden from public view because the demons would be sad if the light of Jesus shone on their process. The nature of the IRPC matter was that a member (not sure if communicant, but at least baptized) sexually molested and raped a number of children. Bloomington argues, in the name of "Pastoral Care" that the children should patiently wait for the courts of the church to repeatedly suppress their victimhood and continue to make sure that their abuser enjoys all that the church has to offer, while continuing to deny them any sort of protection from their abuser.

Bloomington is proposing a demonic system, where abusers continue to abuse with impunity, are afforded all the benefits of church membership, while victims are ignored, suppressed, blamed and even disciplined for their lack of love and forgiveness. This is called "Pastoral Care".

The enemy of Bloomington's "DemonicPastoral Care" is the light. It's no surprise that the fanbois of Jared and IRPC want to suppress the light of truth in this matter, because they are not responding in any sort of godly way.

For everyone who does evil hates the Light, and does not come to the Light for fear that his deeds will be exposed. But he who practices the truth comes to the Light, so that his deeds may be manifested as having been wrought in God. (John 3:20-21)

These verses specifically are talking about the light of Jesus, but Jesus is saying a general truth. People who are doing good have no fear of public exposure. It is those who are knowingly doing evil that are afraid that people will discover their wickedness. "Pastoral Care" is being used as a smoke screen for people who are covering up evil by hiding from the light.

Does Samuel want to hide from the light of public scrutiny?

"Here I am; bear witness against me before the Lord and His anointed. Whose ox have I taken, or whose donkey have I taken, or whom have I defrauded? Whom have I oppressed, or from whose hand have I taken a bribe to blind my eyes with it? I will restore it to you.”  They said, “You have not defrauded us or oppressed us or taken anything from any man’s hand.” (1 Sam.12:3-4)

 What about the Pharisees?

Then Jesus said to the chief priests and officers of the temple and elders who had come against Him, “Have you come out with swords and clubs as you would against a robber? While I was with you daily in the temple, you did not lay hands on Me; but this hour and the power of darkness are yours.”(Luke 22:52-53)

Bloomington continues: 

The authors of this site make much of the virtue of truth but forget the corresponding duty of love; rather, they weaponize truth against love.

Echoing Stephen Rhoda, Bloomington now defines "love" as the primary requirement in disseminating truth. Jesus fails this test easily. He says, "Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites!" How unloving of Jesus to call out those offering pastoral care! Jesus is simply slanderous (by Rhoda's definition).

So, now Bloomington wants to weaponize church discipline for their desire to cover up sin. If you speak the truth, you must do it on our terms, or it is not loving. By what standard is something judged loving or not. It's easy. Let's look at the Manring case. If Manring questions the qualifications of candidates because of public documents they've signed, he's unloving, because the session doesn't want that information to be known. If the session subsequently sends a letter to the congregation rebuking Manring, that is loving. So, loving is "the image the session wants to portray" and unloving is "what the session doesn't want exposed". Convenient. 

It can be argued that the sole reason this whole issue wasn't covered up was the fact that it was reported to the IndyStar, and sites like PeacePurityProgress are helpful to expose the evil deeds of those who want to cover up their sins.

For example, the image Rhoda (and presumably Bloomington) want to portray of Keith Magill as someone whose "reputation" ought to be "protected". What exactly is the reputation of Magill that must be protected? Is it the person who criminally covered up child sexual abuse at Southside? Is it the person who repeatedly defended his coverup at IRPC? Is it the person who didn't like the terms of his Synod censure and walked out of the RPCNA? No, of course not. Magill's reputation that must be protected is that of a loving, wise saint and spiritually gifted leader, but that reputation is out of sync with what he has done. Magill has repeatedly covered up sexual abuse. That doesn't sound "saintly" at all. The only thing that is preventing Rhoda and Bloomington from their whitewashing of history is the fact that Magill's sinful actions are available for the public to read.

So, who is being loving? Those who want to promote the lie that Keith Magill has done nothing deserving of censure, or those who want to promote the truth that Keith Magill was involved in gross sin and negligence against rape victims?

I believe Synod ought to commend the PeacePurityProgress website for standing up for the truth despite the children of Satan trying to promote lies and falsehood.

This website is the equivalent of hiring a town crier, or constructing billboards along the interstate, to rehearse, in perpetuity, the past sins of a brother in Christ.

The Bible says:

Now when evening came David arose from his bed and walked around on the roof of the king’s house, and from the roof he saw a woman bathing; and the woman was very beautiful in appearance. So David sent and inquired about the woman. And one said, “Is this not Bathsheba, the daughter of Eliam, the wife of Uriah the Hittite?” David sent messengers and took her, and when she came to him, he lay with her; and when she had purified herself from her uncleanness, she returned to her house. The woman conceived; and she sent and told David, and said, “I am pregnant.”

So, what exactly is the problem? We "rehearse, in perpetuity, the past sins of a brother in Christ", namely David, a man after God's own heart. We don't call out the Word for rehearsing past sins. We see these past sins as examples that we can, with God's help, avoid. When the report of the commission that reviewed the Space Shuttle Challenger disaster was published, it named names, and those names may be rehearsed. Certainly, those responsible didn't want their reputations exposed to public scrutiny, but it was their actions that caused the deaths of the astronauts. So, part of the purpose of publishing the report was in rehearsing the failures, so that they would not be repeated, but another part of the purpose is to remind decision-makers and leaders that their wrong actions will potentially be exposed to public scrutiny. We as citizens are safer on both accounts, first that we know the physical causes of the explosion and how to better design safety-critical systems, but also that those responsible for disasters will be exposed. Bloomington is proposing the opposite. First, we hide documentation of how the system conspired to deny justice to the victims, so we will repeat the same evil process over and over without correction, and second, we hide the actions of those who contributed to the coverup, such that those who want to repeat the process know that they have the protection of the church systems.

So far, this Bloomington letter reads like a manual of how we protect evil men doing evil in the church, how we prevent anyone from calling attention to the evil to prevent its recurrence, and, if it fails, how we make sure these evil men get to walk away with their reputations unscathed and their livelihoods intact.