Bill Hybels (Willow Creek) Accused of Sexual Misconduct

[molecule]

Looks like there are additional allegations that have brought an apology from the Willow Creek board.. A former president of Zondervan (major evangelistic publishing company) has said that Hybels made sexually inappropriate comments to her.
https://www.christianitytoday.com/news/2018/april/bill-hybels-willow-creek-promises-investigation-allegations.html

[livinginthelight]

Unless the elder board does some serious soul-searching and rectifying their practices, they are going to come out of this looking very bad. They averted their eyes to a lot of his attitudes and activities. It was their responsibility to question him when he started stepping outside of the lines and instead they covered for him.

I'm glad more women are stepping forward. I am sure there are even more than these.

 

 

[Briefly]

8 minutes ago, livinginthelight said:

Unless the elder board does some serious soul-searching and rectifying their practices, they are going to come out of this looking very bad. They averted their eyes to a lot of his attitudes and activities. It was their responsibility to question him when he started stepping outside of the lines and instead they covered for him.

I'm glad more women are stepping forward. I am sure there are even more than these.

 

 

There probably are a lot more, it's rare that it's just one.

[molecule]

Yup, where there is a lot of smoke, it usually turns out that there's a fire somewhere.

[SilverBeach]

Hybels needs to apologize, not the elder board. The board should resign too. I'm not surprised at all, this is #metoo Willow Creek edition. And their self-serving "investigation" won't mean crap, no more than their prior investigations did.. 

[stylites]

From that link:

Quote

That meant a number of one-on-one meetings: often at his beach home in Michigan, on his yacht, on his jet,

 

He has a jet and a yacht? I guess it’s natural once you start emulating the CEOs you have over to speak at your leadership conference.

[SilverBeach]

7 hours ago, stylites said:

From that link:

 

He has a jet and a yacht? I guess it’s natural once you start emulating the CEOs you have over to speak at your leadership conference.

Yeah, how many poor/hungry/homeless people could be helped by just the operating costs of that jet, let alone the purchase price? Nothing like materialistic Christianity. Commercial marketing and advertising tactics are used also. Ugh.

[SilverBeach]

Breaking news...just saw on the 10:00 news that Willow Creek elders have admitted that at least some of the allegations against Hybels are true! So much for their sham investigation that exonerated him of all wrongdoing. 

[Briefly]

Wonder how many more bricks are going to fall out of the wall they built around themselves with their sham investigation?

[livinginthelight]

http://www.dailyherald.com/news/20180509/willow-creek-elders-we-are-sorry--some-of-bill-hybels-choices-were-inappropriate

We're getting there. But "We're sorry.  Some of his choices were inappropriate" is a long way from " We repent of shielding a sexual predator."

[apple1]

@livinginthelight My thoughts exactly.

 

"at least some of Bill's choices were inappropriate."

"We do not believe the stories were all lies or that all the people were colluding against him."

"had too much emphasis on defending Bill and cast some of the women in an unfair and negative light."

"We are grieved that this situation is difficult for so many people."

 

This all smack of "I'm sorry you..." whatever.

 

While I never cared for Jimmy Swaggart and do not excuse Swaggart in any way - I would far rather hear Swaggart-esque "I have sinned." Not a fan of this excuse-making.

[Briefly]

On 5/10/2018 at 10:23 AM, apple1 said:

@livinginthelight My thoughts exactly.

 

"at least some of Bill's choices were inappropriate."

"We do not believe the stories were all lies or that all the people were colluding against him."

 

"had too much emphasis on defending Bill and cast some of the women in an unfair and negative light."

 

"We are grieved that this situation is difficult for so many people."

 

This all smack of "I'm sorry you..." whatever.

 

While I never cared for Jimmy Swaggart and do not excuse Swaggart in any way - I would far rather hear Swaggart-esque "I have sinned." Not a fan of this excuse-making.

True, I have never been a Swaggart fan. But at least he did admit that he had sinned.

[Grimalkin]

6 hours ago, Briefly said:

True, I have never been a Swaggart fan. But at least he did admit that he had sinned.

  Bill Hybels is so bad we prefer Swaggert over him! 

[Jencendiary]

On 4/23/2018 at 9:02 AM, SilverBeach said:

Yeah, how many poor/hungry/homeless people could be helped by just the operating costs of that jet, let alone the purchase price? Nothing like materialistic Christianity. Commercial marketing and advertising tactics are used also. Ugh.

Jesus doesn't want his chosen flying commercial with the heathens and the poors. 

12 minutes ago, Grimalkin said:

  Bill Hybels is so bad we prefer Swaggert over him! 

The lowest bar of all low bars.

[Briefly]

On 4/23/2018 at 9:02 AM, SilverBeach said:

Yeah, how many poor/hungry/homeless people could be helped by just the operating costs of that jet, let alone the purchase price? Nothing like materialistic Christianity. Commercial marketing and advertising tactics are used also. Ugh.

We often ask ourselves that same question about a lot of mega churches and mega evangelists. I don't care what a particular person does with their own money, but when it is a faith based group and they spend money like that when they could be feeding people?  There is no excuse.

[feministxtian]

28 minutes ago, Briefly said:

We often ask ourselves that same question about a lot of mega churches and mega evangelists. I don't care what a particular person does with their own money, but when it is a faith based group and they spend money like that when they could be feeding people?  There is no excuse.

That pisses me off too...There are 2 "megachurches" in town here that could be utilizing their facilities all week long offering classes, childcare, what have you...but they don't. The church we go to has a school (K-12) and even though the tuition is pretty modest compared to other schools (and what I paid in years past), they have students there on scholarship (I know someone who's son is on scholarship). They also don't deny a child who wants to go to camp and find a way to pay for it. They also do quite a bit within the community, We're a smaller church, don't have the big fancy buildings, the fancy auditorium or anything like that. Our weekend service attendance is under 1000 people. 

[livinginthelight]

Vonda Dyer's response to the recent non-apology. Go Vonda!

 

https://www.christianpost.com/news/vonda-dyer-bill-hybels-accuser-who-was-called-a-liar-rejects-willow-creek-apology-223890/

[Pecansforeveryone]

On 5/10/2018 at 11:23 AM, apple1 said:

@livinginthelight My thoughts exactly.

 

"at least some of Bill's choices were inappropriate."

"We do not believe the stories were all lies or that all the people were colluding against him."

 

"had too much emphasis on defending Bill and cast some of the women in an unfair and negative light."

 

"We are grieved that this situation is difficult for so many people."

 

This all smack of "I'm sorry you..." whatever.

 

While I never cared for Jimmy Swaggart and do not excuse Swaggart in any way - I would far rather hear Swaggart-esque "I have sinned." Not a fan of this excuse-making.

The SNL skit with Phil Hartman as Jimmy Swaggart and Jim Baker tearfully confessing is comedy gold. 

[Grimalkin]

On 5/16/2018 at 5:55 PM, livinginthelight said:

Vonda Dyer's response to the recent non-apology. Go Vonda!

 

https://www.christianpost.com/news/vonda-dyer-bill-hybels-accuser-who-was-called-a-liar-rejects-willow-creek-apology-223890/

      I cannot imagine the kind of pain Vonda expierienced being betrayed by her church like that. If those people really believe in Jesus how can they look at themselves in the mirror.

[Briefly]

19 hours ago, Grimalkin said:

      I cannot imagine the kind of pain Vonda expierienced being betrayed by her church like that. If those people really believe in Jesus how can they look at themselves in the mirror.

Because they would only see what they want to see.  Not the truth.

[stylites]

On 11/05/2018 at 7:10 PM, Briefly said:

True, I have never been a Swaggart fan. But at least he did admit that he had sinned.

Though he then got out and more or less reconstituted the ministry around the same levels of hucksterism 

[livinginthelight]

The issue is not going away. Thank goodness. The pushback to the "conciliation effort" by the elders is becoming more widespread. The article also discloses that 12 years ago, the church received consultation because Bill was bullying staff members. The elders - to whom the pastor is supposedly accountable - recommended Bill take time off. He refused. And the elder responsibilities were restructured in a manner that stripped them of more power.

http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/ct-met-willow-creek-reconciliation-20180524-story.html

and here is Nancy Ortberg's blog: https://www.nancylortberg.com/

They need to just say it openly: He lied, we covered for him.

The truth MUST come out for there to be healing. "Conciliation" efforts at this juncture are like putting a bandage on a pus-filled wound.

[Palimpsest]

2 hours ago, livinginthelight said:

The pushback to the "conciliation effort" by the elders is becoming more widespread. The article also discloses that 12 years ago, the church received consultation because Bill was bullying staff members. The elders - to whom the pastor is supposedly accountable - recommended Bill take time off. He refused. And the elder responsibilities were restructured in a manner that stripped them of more power.

And they have hired the group, Crossroads Resolution Group LLC, run by the guy who failed to recommend more than have the Bill the bully take time off then.

Crossroads Resolution Group LLC sounds familiar.  I'm trying to remember other church abuse cases they've been involved in reconciling.  Or rather attempting to make the accusers shut up.

@apple1, does CRG sound familiar to you too?

[apple1]

4 hours ago, Palimpsest said:

And they have hired the group, Crossroads Resolution Group LLC, run by the guy who failed to recommend more than have the Bill the bully take time off then.

Crossroads Resolution Group LLC sounds familiar.  I'm trying to remember other church abuse cases they've been involved in reconciling.  Or rather attempting to make the accusers shut up.

@apple1, does CRG sound familiar to you too?

While it seems like it should, I can't find anything specific that I can connect with other groups I know anything about.

However - The red flags are sure popping up in my head about this. It seems like "conciliation" is a bit of inappropriate "Christianese" designed to get people to give up their legal rights for redress of grievances in any legal way.

[livinginthelight]

The elders have posted their final update of the initial 45 day investigation. Sadly, it's more of the same. "Inappropriate choices" "not all were lying"  yada yada yada.

They acknowledge that most women didn't participate in the investigation. Well, duh. The agency doing the investigation wasn't trustworthy. But did WC listen to the women and get someone entirely independent? No. Of course not.

I'm sickened. But I can't say I'm really surprised.

I know for a fact that other women are considering coming forward. I pray they do.

WC has done many good things. But this is evil and reflects an evil structure. Christ is not served by this coverup.

https://www.willowcreek.org/en/elder-update-four