Matt Chandler, a Seattle native, was a Southern Baptist megachurch pastor in Texas (bio here).
The history of the Southern Baptist denomination is rooted in support of slavery; in modern times, it’s an evangelical religion whose specific beliefs and preaching somewhat varies among member churches. It’s experiencing steadily declining membership, but remains the largest Protestant group in the U.S. (details here).
So Chandler had leeway in what he preached. Raw Story described him (here) as “an anti-Choice pastor who once called rape victims ‘worse than Hitler,'” (see details here), and noted, “His church also ‘disciplined’ a female church member for wanting to divorce her husband after she discovered he was watching adult videos sexually exploiting children.”
Then he was caught messaging a woman on Instagram. It broke into the open when the woman’s friend confronted him in the church lobby. Chandler, who’s married with kids (photo below), initially didn’t think he did anything wrong. But the elders, after reviewing the messages, thought otherwise and hired a law firm to look into his other social media activities. (See Christianity Today story here.) Then he was fired.
I’m curious what was in those messages. Anyway, the preacher who called rape victims who get abortions “murderers” wasn’t sacked for that. It was the old “inappropriate relationship” story that brought him down.
Mathew 7:3-5:
“3 Why do you see the speck that is in your brother’s eye, but do not notice the log that is in your own eye? 4 Or how can you say to your brother, ‘Let me take the speck out of your eye,’ when there is the log in your own eye? 5 You hypocrite, first take the log out of your own eye, and then you will see clearly to take the speck out of your brother’s eye.”
Amen.
