Mark Coultan, New York
November 7, 2006
Truth hurts: the congregation of the New Life Church responds to a letter read out to them from Pastor Ted Haggard, in which he confessed that he was guilty of sexual immorality.
FIRST it was: "I never meet this man." Then it was: "I bought drugs off him but I never used them, and I never had sex with him." But by Sunday, it was time for confession.
Ted Haggard, former head of the 30 million-member National Association of Evangelicals — the man with President George Bush's ear — finally told all: he was a hypocrite and a liar. The overseers of the New Life Church in Colorado, which he founded, sacked him for "sexually immoral conduct".
It was the most spectacular downfall of an evangelical leader since the Reverend Jim Bakker was embroiled in a sex and accounting scandal in 1987.
In a letter read out to the Sunday congregation at the New Life Church in Colorado Springs, Pastor Haggard said: "I am guilty of sexual immorality, and I take responsibility for the entire problem. I am a deceiver and a liar."
He said he wanted to clarify "my heart's condition" after telling reporters a series of stories since male prostitute Mike Jones alleged that the pastor had been paying him for sex every month for the past three years. Mr Jones also alleged that Pastor Haggard used methamphetamine to heighten the sexual experience.
The prostitute said he went public to expose the churchman's hypocrisy because of his support for measures to ban same-sex marriages.
In Pastor Haggard's letter to his parishioners, he said: "There is a part of my life that is so repulsive and dark that I've been warring against it all of my adult life. For extended periods of time, I would enjoy victory and rejoice in freedom. Then, from time to time, the dirt that I thought was gone would resurface, and I would find myself thinking thoughts and experiencing desires that were contrary to everything I believe and teach."
He said he had sought help, but it had not been effective.
"The public person I was wasn't a lie, it was just incomplete. When I stopped communicating about my problems, the darkness increased and finally dominated me."
Not all the accusations levelled against him were true, he said, "but enough of them are true that I have been appropriately and lovingly removed from ministry".
He asked the congregation to forgive his accuser, saying: "He is revealing the deception and sensuality that was in my life. Those sins, and others, need to be dealt with harshly. So, forgive him and, actually, thank God for him."
He said that he loved his wife.
"What I did should never reflect in a negative way on her relationship with me. The problem was not with her, my (five) children, or any of you. It was created 100 per cent by me."
His wife Gayle also wrote a letter to the women of the congregation, saying: "I know your hearts are broken; mine is as well." She said she still loved her husband.
