Focus on the Family Members Practice Infidelity or Homosexuality and Get Divorced and Remarry – links to exposes
(Some of these stories date from the year 2000.)
Edit. April 2016. Preface and Clarification.
I am right wing myself and do not hate “the family,” nor am I opposed to traditional values or marriage.
Since I have started this blog, I have collected newer examples, ones that date up to March and April 2016, of other pro-family, Christian, or right wing persons or groups that have been caught in extra-marital affairs, or sexually abusing children – including, but not limited to, the Duggar family, whose son Josh was in the media for having sexually molested his sisters and a babysitter.
Here’s one example:
(Link): Pro Family Values Republican Hastert in Trouble Over Sexually Abusing Children (story date: April 2016) – I even criticize certain liberal views about sexuality in the midst of criticizing right wingers in that post.
You can look further examples up on my blog using the “search” box on the right hand side of the page to find newer examples; some of them might be linked to at the bottom of this post under “Related Posts”.
I was told in a Tweet by a reader that sharing “older” stories (some of the news items in this post date from the year 2,000) is not “helpful”.
I am absolutely dumbfounded by this. This is a person who usually seems to understand how the extreme focus on stereotypical, pro-family values that Christian gender complementarians champion are very alienating to women who never marry, who cannot have children, or who are divorced.
One reason of several I feature such stories on my blog – news stories of pro-family Christians who are caught having affairs and so on – is to show how hypocritical these groups are – the same group who marginalize anyone who is not married by the time they are 25 years old with three children.
These pro-family Christians make more out of the “nuclear family” than the God of the Bible ever did, which harms women who never marry, women who divorce, women who are infertile – women who do not or cannot meet the “gender complementarian” or “traditional family values” rules and roles some Christians heavily promote.
Understand I’ve had traditional values my entire life, and I am still pretty right wing on most subjects. But I’m not going to excuse the hypocrisy of other right wingers on any of this.
The age of these stories is irrelevant to a degree.
It doesn’t matter if some of the pro-family values men (or women) mentioned in this blog post were caught in adultery last week, ten years ago, or 50 years ago.
If anything, it shows that these pro-family types have been full of bunk consistently for a long time, all the more reason to question their views on some issues.
Christians who promote “Family” and “Family Values” often do so at the expense of women (and men) who cannot or do not meet such standards, and it’s been an on-going pattern for decades now, so it’s actually helpful to see older material that reveals this (see also (Link): Americans Are Nostalgic for a Family Life That Never Existed by S. Coontz) .
A lot of the organizations promoting “Family Values” revere the 1950s, American decade. They are stuck in the past. So there again, I don’t think the age of the articles below are entirely pertinent, or is a mark against what I’m trying to demonstrate: Christians usually make an idol out of marriage and family, which excludes single adults, the divorced, widows, and the infertile.
What hypocrites. And they continue to aid in the marginalization of adult singles and adult childfree, and they keep on worshipping parenthood and the nuclear family.
By the way, if Christian groups spent more time doing what the Bible says they are to do – such as, policing their own rather than those outside the church ((Link): 1 Corinthians 5:12), AND spent their time pointing outsiders to Jesus (who was never, ever a hypocrite), instead of complaining and griping about homosexuality, abortion, and feminism, and other social issues, then when one of their own is caught in an extra-martial affair, or whatever other kind of sin, there would not be as much damage done to Christianity.
You can also see in posts such as this, which contain numerous examples of married Christian men screwing teen girls or having affairs with grown women, that they run around claiming to support sexual purity but in practice actually do not.
This also goes to show, once more, that being married, contrary to what most Christians believe, does not make a person more ethical, sexually pure, or responsible than being un-married.
Christian fable: if you stay a virgin until you marry, the sex will be great. -If that is true, we would not see so many middle aged married Christian men screwing their 25 year old secretaries or visiting prostitutes, now would we?
This link is from Democratic Underground, a site whose members I am usually not in agreement with (I am right wing):
(Link): “Focus on the Family,” glass houses, a Philanderer and an “Ex-Gay” Gay – Democratic Underground
Focus on Family shows ‘repentance’
Trout, who has been married for 31 years, declined to discuss details of the extramarital relationship, but said that the woman was not a Focus on the Family employee and that the relationship was over.
The ministry has declined to discuss the factors behind Trout’s resignation, citing legal and privacy concerns.
Trout, 53, is best known as the on-air partner of the founder and leader of the ministry, James Dobson. Dobson is a key figure in the conservative Christian movement and earlier this year criticized George W. Bush, claiming the Republican presidential candidate was sacrificing conservative values to appeal to a broader base.
Mike Trout abruptly quit last week. In an interview Monday with The Gazette, he admitted to an “inappropriate relationship with a woman other than his wife and had no choice but to resign from a ministry that stresses the sanctity of marriage.”
COLORADO SPRINGS, Colo. (AP) — A top official and radio announcer for Focus on the Family said he has resigned from the conservative Christian group because he had an extramarital affair.
Focus on the Family official resigns, admits extramarital affair
October 17, 2000
Web posted at: 4:05 PM EDT (2005 GMT)
A Philanderer:
Associated Press
COLORADO SPRINGS — Focus on the Family’s 1,350 employees prayed, joined hands and circled the ministry’s offices to show “corporate repentance and confession” after recent embarrassing revelations about two of its leaders.
“Satan has thrown just about everything in his arsenal at us in the last several weeks as you know,” Focus on the Family President James Dobson told the staff in a recorded message Friday. “I am certain those who hate our cause are doing everything they can to undermine and to discredit it.”
The $116 million Colorado Springs Christian ministry is going through tough times. Mike Trout, a senior vice president and well-known radio show co-host, resigned Oct. 11 after admitting to an extramarital relationship.
A Focus division chief, John Paulk, was allowed to keep his job after visiting a gay bar in September and lying about it. Paulk, an avowed former homosexual, has been pulled from the speaker list of Saturday’s “Love Won Out” conference, which teaches that homosexuality is a lifestyle choice that can be overcome through prayer and therapy.
As a result of the Trout and Paulk incidents, the ministry has become the target of jokes on The Tonight Show With Jay Leno and Politically Incorrect.
[original story source]:
http://www.rockypreps.com/news/1105focu5.shtml
(Link): Here We Go Again
Posted Nov. 11, 2000, 12:00 a.m. by Lynn Vincent
Issue: “Here we go again,” Nov. 11, 2000
The recent revelation of Focus on the Family radio host Mike Trout’s marital infidelity has pundits pelting conservatives-and Christianity-again. Have two decades of clay-footed “celebrity conservatives” shattered the credibility of the “family values” movement? And can tough-minded actions restore some of it?
Bill Maher, talk-television’s answer to Nero, recently fed another Christian to his panelist-lions.
On Oct. 24, an aging Boy George, minor starlet Karen Duffy, and others batted the Mike Trout story around the studio-coliseum on Mr. Maher’s late-night show Politically Incorrect. Mr. Trout, longtime co-host of Focus on the Family’s flagship radio broadcast, last month resigned from the Colorado Springs-based ministry.
A few days later he admitted to an “inappropriate relationship” with a woman not his wife.
“How come so many of these people who are supposedly the ‘family people’ get caught?” Mr. Maher carped as a knowing titter rippled through the studio audience. “I mean, Jimmy Swaggart, Jim Bakker, Henry Hyde, Strom Thurmond … they get caught. Why? Why?”
PromiseVision vice president Bill Horn, the panel’s token conservative that evening, gamely offered a defense: “Because people make mistakes and people are human … [Mike Trout] made a mistake and he was man enough to resign….”
Mr. Maher abruptly cut him off: “It’s because they’re ‘pervs’ to begin with and they try to cover it up by becoming Christians [and] Republicans. Those are 12-step programs for these people!”
Ugly, yes. But though he arrived at wrong conclusions, Mr. Maher was grappling in his own caustically comic way with a serious problem: the chain of hypocrisy among those who publicly preach family values, but privately poach in other people’s families.
The chain hamstrings innocent clergy, damages trusting laity, and, worst of all, tarnishes the image of Christ in the eyes of nonbelievers.
In a media-saturated culture that emphasizes sins among Christians and conservatives, incidents of saying one thing and doing another overwhelm for many Americans any good impressions that might be created.
…How big is the problem among church ministers? According to a national study of 4,000 active pastors over a 10-year period conducted by counselors at First Evangelical Free Church of Fullerton, Calif., and completed in 1998, one in five pastors admits to indulging in “sexually inappropriate” behavior with someone who was not his wife since the time he first became involved with some local ministry.
That period may span many decades and many definitions of “inappropriate,” but ministers such as Chuck Smith, senior pastor of Calvary Chapel of Costa Mesa, Calif., say they have seen an increase in moral failure among Christians in public ministry. Mr. Smith’s own ministry exploded during the late 1960s Jesus movement, eventually spinning off 800 affiliated churches, dozens of parachurch groups, and numerous radio outreaches.
…Charles Ballard, president and founder of the Initiative for Responsible Fatherhood, remembers leading an abstinence workshop with a group of inner-city fathers who were struggling to walk a straight moral path: “Questions were raised in the group, which was mostly teenagers. The questions were along the lines of ‘How about this guy Swaggart? He has a wife, he has a family and here he’s out here [having sex with other women].'” Mr. Ballard concludes, “It’s the believer who preaches one thing and lives another that most hurts the cause of Christ.”
San Diego youth pastor and Bethel Seminary graduate Rich West, 29, says he labors under the yoke of an increasing public cynicism toward Christianity. “I think the culture has been inoculated by us and our moral failures,” he said. “I believe that people now expect that pastors and clergy will fall morally … it’s just so common that it’s expected.”
— end excerpts —
Though I totally disagree with this comment, that appeared in the above article:
-
- Part of that wall is built by prayer: “Lead me not into temptation” should be on the lips of every leader with admiring followers. Part should consist of basic precautions: the Billy Graham rule for leaders-don’t be behind closed, windowless doors with a member of the opposite sex-needs faithful following.
Part should be accountability procedures, preferably within a local church, where men report to each other the early stages of restlessness and thus corral it in time.
— end excerpts —
That excerpt above assumes that people are incapable of sexual self control, so married people avoid singles, and singles become isolated as a result.
This is sometimes referred to as the Billy Graham Rule, which I have blogged about several times over on my blog, such as (Link): here and (Link): here – and many others (search for the term “Billy Graham Rule” on my blog to find more posts about it.)
(Link): Mike Trout Says Emotional Affair Forced His Resignation from Focus on the Family
- Ted Olsen [ posted 10/1/2000 12:00AM ]
Mike Trout says he resigned from focus because of extramarital relationship
Mike Trout, co-host of “Focus on the Family” with Dr. James Dobson for the last 15 years, says the reason he abruptly resigned from the organization was because of an “emotional” relationship with another married woman.
“I’m greatly saddened,” Trout told The (Colorado Springs) Gazette. “I didn’t work at Focus on the Family for 19 years because of the paycheck or the benefits or the positive environment. I worked at Focus on the Family because I believed in what we were doing. I know that might sound strange, because I violated it.”
The relationship, he says, is over, was “not a long-term thing,” and was not with another Focus employee. Trout told Dobson, and is now telling others, about the relationship and resigned immediately, he says, because “If I hadn’t shared the truth, it would have eventually come out.”
(Link): Subject: Tom Papania and Focus on the Family
Excerpts
- 5) FYI – Ryan Dobson information – Dr. Dobson obviously has his own reason for not wanted to talk about Ryan’s divorce.
It is a very sensitive subject for the whole family. Again, the staff on the phones do not have any information about this, probably most don’t even know that he has been previously married.
You can write to Focus if you have a question and they will pass it on to the Correspondence department. I will save you the time and give you the answer. Ryan Dobson was divorced from Cezanne in 2001. Ryan was totally opposed to the dissolution of the marriage and there were no biblical grounds to justify it (No adultery involved.) Ryan has just recently remarried.
By the way, just because I work at Focus on the Family doesn’t mean that I agree with everything that goes on here (probably no employee agrees 100%). Nevertheless, I have a very high regard for Dr. Dobson and this ministry.
God Bless You
Andy
Hope this clears a few things up for you.
[reply]
If Ryan Dobson wants to be a public leader at a FAMILY ministry why is he allowed to keep issues like his marriage, divorce, and re-marriage a secret? Clearly, he has learned much from his father (about secrecy).
There is much more I could write. But I think this covers the main points. Please write again.
Sincerely,
Brian Karjala
[concluding thoughts]
As for Mike Trout, former co-host of Jim Dobson’s radio program… he gives the introduction and closing remarks on the Focus on the Family “From Mafia To Ministry” Tom Papania tape originally broadcasted over radio stations in Dec. of ’96.
Some years later Trout resigned from his VP position at Focus after he was lured and swallowed up by an extra-marital affair which he publicly confessed to.
Expect more scandals to come…
(Link): Testimony of Former Focus on the Family Employees and the Public
The Corruption of Focus on the Family
“What we’ve got here is a failure to communicate!” (Cool Hand Luke)
Update: In response to webpages like this one Focus on the Family has been forced to address the Ryan Dobson divorce:
“You’ll be interested to know that the Dobsons have addressed this situation openly in response to any inquiries that are made. That said, it might be helpful to explain that Ryan and his former wife, Cezanne, divorced in the summer of 2001.
“Obviously, we must not invade the young people’s privacy except to say that Ryan was completely opposed to the dissolution of the marriage and that the biblical grounds that have permitted him to remarry are consistent with the scriptural understanding of abandonment.”
Many people coming to this website think the Dobson divorce is the big story. It does highlight the secrecy of the Dobsons and raises questions about Ryan’s behavior but it’s actually a minor issue compared with the Tom Papania story.
(Some have speculated that Cezanne may be a black woman and wonder why there was never a public photo posted of her. Ryan has posted photos of his second wife, Laura.)
The bigger story is that Focus on the Family’s most popular selling radio broadcast in its history is fraudulent along with the subsequent ongoing cover-up.
Papania continues to exploit people and harass those who expose his fraud.
And if Focus on the Family is responsible for recruiting the lawyer now representing Papania in an attempt to silence me then we are dealing with a callous evil that the public needs to know about. (In the past Papania has stated in his newsletters that the lawyer, a Dobson supporter, sought him out to freely represent him for the purpose of trying to eliminate websites like this one.)
(Link): Focus on Family exec admits affair, resigns
This has a long list of sexual sins by Mike Trout, Jimmy Swaggert, and other conservative, hetero Christians who worship family, who were caught having affairs, using porn or prostitutes, etc, then mentions a long list of public Christian personalities who claimed to be against homosexuality but were themselves having homosexual affairs:
Another book excerpt on Google Books mentioning the sexual sins and affairs of married Christian men who publicly bray about the importance of “family values” and marriage (though I assume this book was published ten or more years ago, because today’s social conservatives have LOST the culture war):
(Link): Focus on the Family Official Resigned Over Affair
Mike Trout, an on-air personality for the evangelical radio ministry, has admitted to an ‘inappropriate relationship’
Mike Trout abruptly quit last week. In an interview Monday with The Gazette, he admitted to an “inappropriate relationship with a woman other than his wife and had no choice but to resign from a ministry that stresses the sanctity of marriage.”
Trout, 53, is best known as the on-air partner of the founder and leader of the ministry, James Dobson. Dobson is a key figure in the conservative Christian movement and earlier this year criticized George W. Bush, claiming the Republican presidential candidate was sacrificing conservative values to appeal to a broader base.
Related on this blog:
(Link): Focus on the Family Defends IRS Classification as a ‘Church,’ Says It’s Meant to Protect Donors
(Link): Democrats Pushing Transgenderism In Schools Are Fully Responsible For Bathroom Sexual Assaults
(Link): Former Democrat Mayor Dennis Doyle Arrested for Possession of Child Porn During Term in Office
(Link): Christian, Family Values Vlogger – Austin Null – Caught Sexting (story dates from January 2016)
(Link): Why Not Focus On How Churches Can Help Adult Singles?
(Link): Conservative Christianity Stuck in 1950s Leave it To Beaver-ville
(Link): Focusing on the Family Causes Church Decline
(Link): Focus on the Family having financial problems – aw, too bad (not!)
(Link): Focus on the Family advice columnist perpetuates stereotypes about single women
(Link): Republicans Ditch Family Values As Strategy (article)
(Link): Do You Rate Your Family Too High? (Christians Who Idolize the Family) (article)
(Link): “The Family Sex” Show – Nude Sex Show For Children (as Young as Five) at Theater
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