Ron,

I actually had a pastor friend who burned his church to the ground in Burlingame, California. He was gay, hiding it, and pastoring in a denomination that doesn't accept that as a valid expression of Biblical Christianity. Guess the contrary winds in his soul blowing in different directions finally got to him. Gassed the building just as they were finishing a major remodeling project, and burned it. Had a breakdown of some kind. Lost his marriage and ministry. Might have been locked up for a while. I've lost track of him. We sat in classes together for six years.

I had known of his struggles. He was a regular visitor in the room I shared with another gay student my junior year in college. (I am, and always have been a flaming, monogamist heterosexual. I was engaged to the woman I married at the time.) My reaction to my roommate's sexual direction let this pastor know his secret was safe with me. While I didn't agree with his choices, I would not do anything to harm him or expose him. Now I wonder what more I might have done to help him.

Gripping imagery. Paul Simon wrote an early song called "A Church is Burning".

I missed why this preacher torched his place of worship. Did he go crazy? Did he fall into sexual exploitation of some of his younger parishioners and burn himself as a kind of self-inflicted punishment--or was burned by others in revenge? Preachers who sin horribly are such interesting villians. They even show up in the Bible. Always good for a shudder... (Check out the final three chapters of Judges, for instance. In fact, the last two major stories in that book involve "cracked and creepy clergy".) Hope never to provide a living example of such personally.

Keep writing.

Skip




[This message has been edited by Skip Johnson (edited 10-14-2002).]