Central Indiana Presbytery (PCA) proves it’s unsafe at any speed by threatening fellow blogger Dee Parsons

The Central Indiana Presbytery (PCA) has just tried to implicitly threaten fellow blogger Dee Parsons at The Wartburg Watch over her coverage of allegations of misconduct involving pastor Dan Herron, formerly of Hope Presbyterian Church. That was a profoundly stupid move that reflects a lack of common sense and Christian thinking. And it has now officially backfired.

At issue is the handling of the Presbytery of allegations of abuse by Herron involving two women.

We won’t bore readers with details, but the upshot is that the Presbytery sat on the women’s complaints for 18 months (fast, by Episcopal standards) and then basically told them to pound sand.

Now, the Presbytery says Herron has been cleared of wrongdoing by the Presbytery. Indeed, the whole thing smells suspiciously like the PCA’s handling the pedophile at Covenant Presbyterian Nashville (who happened to be Mike Huckabee’s speechwriter). And, by some strange coincidence, the PCA dealt with the pedophile a bit too slowly—by the time it did anything, the statute of limitations had passed.

How convenient.

Now, almost four years after Dee first covered the Herron allegations, the Central Indiana Presbytery has sent Dee a letter insinuating she’ll be sued if she doesn’t “alter” her coverage. A copy of the letter is included in the article hyperlinked at the top of this post, and in PDF below.

In response, Dee has reported on the less-than-Christian behavior of Pastor Bob O’Bannon of New LIfe Presbyterian and the Presbytery. We agree with her assessment in its entirety and are prepared to go a step further: There is nothing defamatory in her original post or her follow-on post.

As to the bit in the letter about criminal charges, there is nothing even arguably criminal involved. That argument was tried by the Liam Goligher’s attorney with us, and it won’t fly.

Further, we encourage anyone who receives such a letter to report the attorney(s) involved to the relevant attorney disciplinary board(s). As certain high-profile attorneys have recently learned the hard way, truth matters, and you can’t make arguments entirely unsupported by the law and facts.

Meanwhile, Dee, being a whole lot nicer than folks here, is taking down the original post. But we like her post a lot, and so we are republishing and, if she wishes, taking ownership of the content. It’s below, in PDF.

In other words, come and get us, O’Bannon. And while you’re at it, we expressly forbid use of our email to send legal notices, so knock yourself out. And we sent a heads-up to you, so you know damned well what we’re up to. 

Meanwhile, the chuckleheads at the Presbytery might want to read up on the so-called Streisand effect. The phenomenon takes its name from Barbara Streisand, who attempted via legal counsel to suppress photos of her Malibu, California, oceanside digs due to security concerns. Unfortunately, her efforts backfired, and the otherwise innocuous images of a rather over-the-top heap suddenly became matters of enormous public interest.

In other words, think before you threaten, because you may just go from the fire to the frying pan.

As to prospective PCA members, this is the only denomination we’ve seen that gives the Episcopal Church a run for its money when it comes to dragging abuse victims through hell, kicking them out the other side, then siding with the perpetrator, all while bloviating about the church’s lofty clergy disciplinary goals. In other words, the abusive handling of complaints often is worse than the original abuse. And both denominations like to find excuses, procedural issues, or just make up rules as they go on these matters.

And yes, that includes our Roman sisters and brothers.

Keep the PCA’s track record in mind if you are looking for a new church home.