Reviving an ancient practice, churches are exposing sinners and shunning those who won't repent.

[RedEarth]

On a quiet Sunday morning in June, as worshippers settled into the pews at Allen Baptist Church in southwestern Michigan, Pastor Jason Burrick grabbed his cellphone and dialed 911. When a dispatcher answered, the preacher said a former congregant was in the sanctuary. "And we need to, um, have her out A.S.A.P."

Half an hour later, 71-year-old Karolyn Caskey, a church member for nearly 50 years who had taught Sunday school and regularly donated 10% of her pension, was led out by a state trooper and a county sheriff's officer. One held her purse and Bible. The other put her in handcuffs. (Listen to the 911 call)

The charge was trespassing, but Mrs. Caskey's real offense, in her pastor's view, was spiritual. Several months earlier, when she had questioned his authority, he'd charged her with spreading "a spirit of cancer and discord" and expelled her from the congregation. "I've been shunned," she says.

Her story reflects a growing movement among some conservative Protestant pastors to bring back church discipline, an ancient practice in which suspected sinners are privately confronted and then publicly castigated and excommunicated if they refuse to repent. While many Christians find such practices outdated, pastors in large and small churches across the country are expelling members for offenses ranging from adultery and theft to gossiping, skipping service and criticizing church leaders.

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB120061470848399079.html?mod=hpp_us_leisure

[Ellen Forradalom]

1. Michigan, one of the epicenters of Calvinism in the US

Calvinism is not noted for its emphasis on compassion.

Dirty rotten @#$Q$Ts, kicking her out like that. Outrageous.

[ayeshahaqqiqa]

2. I know about this sort of thing

40 years ago, a cousin of mine was publicly rebuked in her church because she had a baby out of wedlock. Don't recall them rebuking the married pastor who impregnated her, though. He was just quietly shuffled off to another parish where he could seduce another innocent young girl.....

[Solly Mack]

3. "she had questioned his authority"

says it all

[madmom]

4. So finally some good will come out of these fanatical practices,if they

do this to everyone who supposedly "sinned" there will be no one left and organized religion will be done. That would be the best thing to happen to this world.

[Beausoleil]

12. We'll always have lying hypocrites

They would be the only ones left in church.

[madmom]

15. sad but true!

[niyad]

5. I hope she sues the bastard and ends up owning him--and that

lousy church.

can the cops sue for that wasted 911 call?

[NV Whino]

6. George W. Bush, I shun thee.

[Liz7]

7. sounds familiar

A friend of mine and her live-in boyfriend were regular churchgoers. Their pastor refused to marry them because they were "living in sin."

[sandyj999]

8. One More Reason I Wish I Didn't Live Here. n/t

[hedgehog]

9. We had a similar situation up in Watertown, New York

An aging congregation hired a new pastor who brought in a lot of new members, and everything was fine until he stated imposing his views. For example, he told one elderly woman that she could no long teach adult males in Sunday School. It's kind of odd, because I think American Baptists were one of the first groups to have female ministers. She's served her congregation something like 40 years, but the new people now outnumber the original members.

The question of who owns a church is going to be coming up more and more. Is it the congregation that built a church or new members who have changed the policies. For the Episcopalians, it's going to be a fight between individual parishes and their dioceses if the split over church policy grows. Catholics face a similar dilemma over a different issue. Here in the diocese of Syracuse, the bishop is planning on closing half the parishes solely because it's the only solution he sees to the shortage of celibate males who want to be priests.

[FiveGoodMen]

10. "Let him who is without sin cast the first stone" -- Who said that?

[otherlander]

24. Some goddamn commie.

[nichomachus]

11. Just another reason

Just another reason to avoid those hypocritical cesspools they call "churches."

But beware, Pope Eggs Benedict has unleashed "Exorcism Squads" to cure us of our satanism.

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/pages/live/articles/news/worldnews.html?in_article_id=504969&in_page_id=1811

With all this nonsense, it's a wonder they found time to rape hundreds of thousands of children.

[niyad]

14. I thought that article was from the Onion at first.

[elehhhhna]

13. shunning make the baby jesus cry. i'm certain of it.

[katty]

16. The Crucible, back by popular demand-ha! repent!!!

[kimmylavin]

19. That's just what I was thinking! n/t

[bemildred]

17. What an asshole.

I'll bet he likes to yell at children too.

[Lydia Leftcoast]

18. That's the kind of nonsense you get from free-lance fundamentalists

A clergy person in an established denomination couldn't get away with that, because you could appeal to the higher-ups in the church hierarchy, and they'd pin that clergy person's ears back.

[nealmhughes]

21. Exactly, there is no bishop or archdeacon or moderator or any such higher up to keep the Stalinesque

tactics at a minimum.

Oh, for the good old days when one had to stand on a stool wrapped in a white sheet holding one's sin in the hand upon the front steps of the church before public confession! Or even older days when Peter spoke through Leo and willed mass murder in Syria and Palestine!

She ought to pull an Anne Hutchinson on him! Demand a church trial and then show him for what he is: a fraud and charlatan. Of course, Mother Anne ended up in the wilderness of R.I. and then died in an Indian massacre in the Bronx. . .

[SecularNATION]

22. No acccountability

When I see or hear the term "nondenominational", the first thing I think of, is, the Pastor doesn't have to have any theological training whatsoever, nor is he accountable to anyone. Many of those churches are cults of personality.

[Lydia Leftcoast]

26. You've got it right

They treat being "non-denominational" as some kind of virtue, but it almost always means "fundamentalist" and indicates a church in which the minister may have no training, just an obsession, and isn't accountable to anyone, either financially or legally or theologically.

[windoe]

20. The scarlet letter

will be seen on a woman one of these days.

[SecularNATION]

23. Principled lady

I feel sorry for the woman. She tried to do the right thing and didn't allow herself to be intimidated. The ones who are deserving of contempt, are the other members who didn't back her up, at the start. I suppose their motto is "Growth at any cost".

[tom_paine]

25. That's medieval. But then, all Amerika is rocketing backwards to a pre-1776 condition

Plus, if you read the article, it is the same old medieval venality that lies behind it, such as the woman who was shunned for "gossiping" about the crooked pastor skimming some more church $$$$ to buy a bigger house while people are doing really hurting out there.

"Causing discord in the church is an abomination," said one supporter of shunning. Yes, and it allows evil pastors to cover their own deeds just like Bushler does. Trickle-down at work. Now, every crooked or venal church autocrat gets to shut down any criticism of their venality.

It's a beautiful racket. Anyone who asks questions, threaten them with shunning. I expect church corruption is going to go skyrocketing back towards it's medieval levels from this. It is an ugly time to belong to a Bushie Church (which is not to say all of them, not by a long sight)

All the little signs of the approaching Dark Ages are there and they are growing bit by bit. When Crunch Time comes, will we be medievalized enough to do what the Bushies want us to?

I think the odds are very good that is the case.