"And if your hand or your foot causes you to sin, cut it off and throw it away. It is better for you to enter life crippled or lame than with two hands or two feet to be thrown into the eternal fire. 9 And if your eye causes you to sin, tear it out and throw it away. It is better for you to enter life with one eye than with two eyes to be thrown into the hell[c] of fire."
Here are some recent comments that have been left in the blog regarding this issue.
"I just learned of this tonight from a very reliable person. It is an example of the sexual sickness that is covered up in the LLC.
There is a man in Cokato who is a deviant person. Example: He has killed puppies and forced his children and nieces and nephews to watch. I heard this from someone who was force do watch this as a child. About five years ago this man was caught by his wife molesting a child who was under one year old. She wanted to kick him out for good as did her family who supported her 100%.
One minister A, in Minneapolis, and another minister B, in Minneapolis got involved. The man asked for forgiveness and was contrite to them. The family wasn't buying it because they knew of his years long track record, and were at the end of their rope. They told the ministers as much. The ministers passive aggressively attempted to change the families mind and told them that it would be wrong to go to the law or kick the man out of the house. This got to the point where minister B was yelling at the family in a conference call, "Don't you believe in miracles? in forgiveness? He is a changed man." minister A continued to chase down one of the family members, who is very well respected in Minneapolis, for several years to try and get him to change his mind. Everyone I know holds this family and their very evident faith in the highest regard, but the ministers could care less when it comes to the potential damaging reputation of the church.
I know that minister A knows of many sexual crimes of a family in Northern MN, but he never does anything about them besides forgive and forget. Two of the family members in this family , including the patriarch, have had charges filed against them which were later dropped because the police couldn't get cooperation from the victims when it came time to testify in court. Why? The sins are forgiven and its wrong to dig them back up again. Who preaches this to the people in these awful situations? Ministers.
I have done much sleuthing on this issue and I have many victim stories I could share. I saw the case file of a case in another state where the victim was molested over several years by the relative. Right in the case file its says that the victim told two people, who then talked to the perpetrator who asked for his sins to be forgiven and they were. She told a third person, who I happen to know has a backbone of steel, who immediately called the cops and told those who told him shouldn't do it and just "forgive" to take a hike. The victim was fortunate to have someone who cared about her enough to do the right thing.
I think its time for people to start sharing what they know, even if its stuff back from many years ago. The culture of forgive and forget needs to change for these crimes in a major way."
"I have a family member who was sexually assaulted at a youth get together in a park as a young teen. Luckily he was able to get out of the situation before things went to far. The guy who assaulted him was in his twenties. He told someone, they called the cops (who were incompetent), then
two ministers found out about it from the perpetrator's family and proceeded to put immense pressure on my family member and the person who called the cops not to press charges, so nothing ever became of it. Of course, there was no forgiveness either because the perpetrator was
from a prominent family. The guy who did it is married with kids now. I've heard he's done similar things to other males."
"A couple years ago, when I still belonged to the church, I was sexually assaulted by another believer on the way to Haps. I brought it up to a best friend, and it was reported to the police and so on. My best friends, parents, and the minister that we talked to took the side of the assaultant, and told me that I was to blame for leading him on. They defended him, and I went through many mental health problems because I truley thought that they were right- I was to blame for what had happened to me. The man that did this still belongs to the church and no one has done anything. He was not put into jail, and nothing at all has happened to him. He walks free. I know now that it wasn't my fault and I couldn't have done anything to stop him, but some of the people that knew about it still think of me as being at fault rather than him. How does this make sense?"
May the victims find peace and may perpetrators repent from their dark and sinful ways.
May the victims find peace and may perpetrators repent from their dark and sinful ways.
