The Falsehoods of Scott Joseph - Part 1
Not all of these are gaslighting. But some of them are.
After nearly a year of stories being shared, primarily by Leaving the Network and the r/leavingthenetwork subreddit, on Friday, July 8th, 2022, Leaving the Network shared the revelation of Network President Steve Morgan’s arrest in 1987 for Aggravated Criminal Sodomy. On July 10th, a statement was shared in at least one Network church, attributed to the Lead Pastors of the Network. Also on July 10th, Lead Pastor Casey Raymer spoke about it at Vine Church, for a little more than 13 minutes. Neither statement was made public by The Network, but both leaked. It’s been reported that additional churches had “family meetings”. The only other two known mentions were a brief opaque mention of “mobs” in Lead Pastor Nelson Liu’s (Roots Church) sermon on July 10th, and an August sermon by Lead Pastor Scott Joseph of High Rock Church in which he referred to the reddit as a “toxic cesspool of leaches”.
But in December, audio was shared of the July 15th “Family Meeting” at High Rock Church. Lead Pastor Scott Joseph is the primary speaker, and the meeting lasts for just over three hours, totally nearly 30,000 words.
Trigger Warnings
Strong trigger warnings for sexual abuse, spiritual abuse, and gaslighting.
I can’t emphasize this enough. This audio is, to put it bluntly, brutal. Joseph raises his voice in anger repeatedly, while speaking in an authoritative voice throughout. He mentions many people from the reddit or previously in the network repeatedly (and almost always negatively), and makes claims that are false, and in some cases outright lies. Many people, including myself, have said that it dramatically affected their mental health. I have transcribed the whole thing to the best of my ability. If you don’t need to read this, particularly if you’re already out, consider skipping it, or reading in in sessions. If you are in the network, particularly at High Rock - I’d highly recommend reading this to understand the way you’ve been lied to, which are honestly quite easy to see when you just fact check the statements Joseph makes that can be checked.
The Audio
As always, I want to share the audio first. You can find it here, where I have also provided a full best-efforts transcript. Again, if you’re already out of the Network, please consider reading the transcript rather than listening to the audio, as it may be less triggering.
In fact, because of how triggering it is, I’ve done something I’ve never done before: I have not included the audio clips in the analysis below. I’ve included the timestamps, and you can find them in the audio above, but I’m not embedding them again, in part because I want to protect my own mental health and not have to listen to it again and make the specific clips.
“Lies”
I do not use this word lightly. Those of you who have followed this blog will hopefully have observed that I am careful with my language. In fact, in the past, it’s caused some conflict with people who wish I would use stronger language, but I choose not to.
So how am I using “lie” here?
There are three ways that Scott Joseph could have stated a lie:
He knew something was false and he said it was true.
Someone else knew something was false, and told it to Joseph as though it was true, and then Joseph repeated it as though it was true.
Joseph (or someone telling him something) made something up without doing any due diligence to determine if it was true, and it was false. (legally this would be called “reckless disregard for truth”)
I will attempt to make clear in each instance which type of falsehood I am accusing Joseph of. But he is effectively signing his name to everything he’s saying, and therefore shares guilt in it.
“Bearing False Witness”
Bearing False Witness is one of the actions forbidden in the Ten Commandments, specifically the ninth commandment. The Westminster Larger Catechism describes it expansively. Reading this a bit before I left Vista actually helped convict me that I needed to leave, given the behaviors I had seen from the leaders.
Q. 143. Which is the ninth commandment?
A. The ninth commandment is, Thou shalt not bear false witness against thy neighbour.
Q. 144. What are the duties required in the ninth commandment?
A. The duties required in the ninth commandment are,
the preserving and promoting of truth between man and man, and the good name of our neighbor, as well as our own;
appearing and standing for the truth; and
from the heart, sincerely, freely, clearly, and fully, speaking the truth, and only the truth, in matters of judgment and justice, and in all other things whatsoever;
a charitable esteem of our neighbors;
loving, desiring, and rejoicing in their good name;
sorrowing for and covering of their infirmities;
freely acknowledging of their gifts and graces, defending their innocency;
a ready receiving of a good report, and unwillingness to admit of an evil report, concerning them;
discouraging talebearers, flatterers, and slanderers;
love and care of our own good name, and defending it when need requireth;
keeping of lawful promises;
studying and practicing of whatsoever things are true, honest, lovely, and of good report.
Q. 145. What are the sins forbidden in the ninth commandment?
A. The sins forbidden in the ninth commandment are,
all prejudicing the truth, and the good name of our neighbors, as well as our own, especially in public judicature;
giving false evidence, suborning false witnesses, wittingly appearing and pleading for an evil cause, outfacing and overbearing the truth;
passing unjust sentence, calling evil good, and good evil;
rewarding the wicked according to the work of the righteous, and the righteous according to the work of the wicked;
forgery, concealing the truth, undue silence in a just cause, and holding our peace when iniquity calleth for either a reproof from ourselves, or complaint to others;
speaking the truth unseasonably, or maliciously to a wrong end, or perverting it to a wrong meaning, or in doubtful or equivocal expressions, to the prejudice of the truth or justice;
speaking untruth, lying, slandering, backbiting, detracting, talebearing, whispering, scoffing, reviling, rash, harsh, and partial censuring;
misconstructing intentions, words, and actions; flattering, vainglorious boasting, thinking or speaking too highly or too meanly of ourselves or others;
denying the gifts and graces of God;
aggravating smaller faults;
hiding, excusing, or extenuating of sins, when called to a free confession;
unnecessary discovering of infirmities;
raising false rumors, receiving and countenancing evil reports, and stopping our ears against just defense;
evil suspicion;
envying or grieving at the deserved credit of any;
endeavoring or desiring to impair it, rejoicing in their disgrace and infamy;
scornful contempt, fond admiration;
breach of lawful promises;
neglecting such things as are of good report, and practicing, or not avoiding ourselves, or not hindering what we can in others, such things as procure an ill name.
(Hat Tip, The Gospel Coalition)
The Lies
And so we begin. This is not exhaustive, if for no other reason than to be charitable to Scott Joseph and to my own time.
“adversaries” and “out of context”
(Part 1 - 4:55) I feel so fearful about words. Because everything we say, gets taken back by people who have become adversaries against us and take things out of context or twist by their own way of hearing certain things that makes me feel honestly, extremely tentative.Which is not helpful when I want to try to convey things accurately. But I'm trying to be very careful. We are recording this. So you don't need to like, "I'm gonna be slick and record it and steel and share it," in that way. You don't have to do that. If you want it, ask for it, we've got a recording, okay. Other churches in our network that have dealt with this topic have already had their teachings taken and transcribed and posted online for people to comment and tear apart. And so I just anticipate the possibility of that. It's sad, and it makes it hard to speak honestly and clearly and try to bring help. But the truth is, you guys are my audience. And reddit's not my audience. I love you guys. I'm thankful for each of you. And I'm speaking to you. And not to an online mob that has formed against us. But so all that to say, if if you feel in your own conscience, good about recording what I'm saying and posting it online, for the purpose of helping those who have made themselves opponents and you have a clear conscience about doing that, you can do that. I just -makes me sad.
“take things out of context or twist by their own way of hearing”
Let’s start here, because Scott Joseph may try to use the same argument against this very article.
everything we say, gets taken back by people who have become adversaries against us and take things out of context or twist by their own way of hearing certain things
First, let me speak for myself: I have always, always provided full context for every single thing I share. I’ve spent hours transcribing things (more on that in a minute), cleaning up audio quality, and then sharing here. But I never share just clips, I always share the whole thing, even if I don’t think the whole thing is relevant. Those who read my writings know that I err on the side of hyperverbosity, even giving possible “now they might have meant” fairly frequently. I’m always clear that the audio is the authority, the transcript is helpful, and then everything else is my opinion. Take a look at “disclaimers” in one of my MBT write-ups.
To hear Joseph say this when I have spent so many hours trying not to do what he accused me of is incredibly frustrating. And it’ll only get more frustrating as we go on and see Joseph do the thing he’s accusing others of.
For others, I do not recall any significant clip of audio or email/etc. that was shared without context. Teachings shared by LTN are typically shared in their entirety. Documents are only redacted to protect those who have minimal agency (wives of pastors, for example).
Even the actual arrest records of Steve Morgan were shared in full, except with the victim’s name redacted by LTN and myself to preserve his privacy (more on that in a bit).
This is all to say: the goal of the vast majority of people has been to share the truth. I’ve made corrections in the past, and Scott Joseph and The Network are more than capable of providing further information if they believe something’s been misconstrued. Instead, they claim that their silence is noble, while they slander those who speak.
“adversaries”
Joseph refers to those who are critiquing the network as:
“people who have become adversaries against us”
“an online mob that has formed against us”
“those who have made themselves opponents”
Every time you hear “online”, I’d like you to ask yourself: “Would Scott Joseph prefer if the 600+ petitioners for an investigation would show up at High Rock Church one Sunday?”
There’s a propensity these days to dismiss people online who say things we don’t like as “online.” This is an ad hominem attack, in which their words are to be discarded simply because they were said online.
But the internet is where communication happens. 500 years ago, it was the door of the church (maybe) and then a public debate. Not to mention, despite repeated offers (like the one at the end of this letter), Network leaders have refused to engage in any forum at all. If Joseph wants to talk in person, I’ll fly out to him and we can meet in person (moderators needed, and it needs to be in a public location).
But what of “adversaries”, “mob”, and “opponents”? My sense of those words is that they are pejoratives. Again, speaking for myself, I have never thought of myself as an “opponent” of the leaders of the Network, and certainly not those in it. I consider them to be siblings in Christ, and as such they cannot be my adversary. I believe they are in sin - significant sin. And therefore I work to rebuke them. But Christians have no belief whereby rebuking someone means you are their “opponent.”
A “mob” usually also implies a certain mindlessness, a “group think” of some kind. Instead, there are many different opinions expressed (e.g., some are not Christian, and I am a transgender woman, definitely not approved of by some of those who are still conservative evangelical Christians). Our common trait is wanting to spare those in the Network from further harm, and for many of us that includes the leaders themselves.
Scott: I am not your enemy. I am not your adversary. I am your sister in Christ. I’m trying to help you, whether you believe that or not.
“hard to speak honestly”
I just anticipate the possibility of that. It's sad, and it makes it hard to speak honestly and clearly and try to bring help
This is just a very odd statement and I’m not sure what to make of it. Joseph is stating that the possibility that his words may become public makes it “hard to speak honestly and clearly.” I would think that it would be even easier, knowing that any lies will be exposed, but I’m really honestly confused at his words here.
The purpose of Not Overcome
There's another website, Not Overcome, I believe it's called, devoted to a similar purpose of just, just speaking against. (Part 1: ~8:30)
This is false. Here’s what my about page says:
This site is dedicated to shining a light in dark places. 1 John 1:5 says, “The light shines in the darkness, and the darkness has not overcome it.” I hold hope in that promise. Christ’s light will not be overcome. We who have Christ in us will never be defeated.
Many thanks to Kat for coming up with the name, also. Oh, and her countless hours helping me with this site and generally being there for me. She’s a blessing from Jesus.
I wrote my first public letter regarding Vista Church and the Network in December 2021, and have continued assessing the Network’s actions and practices since then.
I mean, I suppose if the Network defines itself as darkness, then I am against it. But I can’t imagine they would define themselves that way, nor would I. But there is darkness - a lack of light, and I aim to turn the lights on and let people see what is there.
The only edit I’m aware of having made to that section recently is the update of my wife’s name to “Kat”. I wrote the “Seeking Truth” section of this post on July 8th, which echoes the above words.
The intentions of those speaking out
I think maybe the best of them, with the best of intentions, maybe think -I'll give them the benefit of the doubt that they're trying to expose what they consider to be abuse.I don't agree with them in their assessment, but I'll give them the benefit of the doubt that their motives are. "We're not trying to destroy churches, but we're trying to expose abuses to help people." And I disagree with the claim, but I can understand and assume a motive that they believe is right.Others however, it's not. There's just no purity in the motives. It's pretty clear that there's that it's fueled by a pretty deep hatredand there's quite a lot of just just intense, awful angry vitriol coming out of some people. That it's not to try to reform or help, you know, shift something that they believe needs to be helped but is really just to destroy and take down. (Part 1: ~9 min)
Here, Scott Joseph does something that, as far as I’m aware, is unique among Network leaders so far. He acknowledges that at least some of those speaking are doing so out of what they believe to be good motives. Here, he accurately states mine: “trying to expose abuses to help people.” That’s a good way of putting it.
But then he moves on to speak harshly about many others. And is it true that there are some like that? Maybe. There have been actors over time who were certainly more “burn it all down.” But I’d argue that this is not the majority, and that those people frequently get push back from others.
But furthermore, I’d argue that someone can be against a particular church, but for the Church. Martin Luther and any reformers (including Steve Morgan!) who came after him and split off from the church they were in were clearly “against” that church. It’s a long tradition in what we call “Protestants.” How can one call themselves “Protestant” and not expect the occasional protest? It’s kind of our thing.
And this is always done because people believe that the institution they are critiquing is failing to follow Christ in some important way.
Now, there are non-Christians who also critique The Network, as is their right. To my knowledge, most of them also have noble goals to spare others from harm.
I cannot speak for everyone, but I read Scott as implying that the latter sentiment is what defines the “online mob.”
“never looked at it”
I've honestly never looked at it, on purpose.Some of you, that maybe -that upsets you that I've not looked at it because you think I'm just ignoring it. I'm not ignoring it. I'm aware of the claims. And the gist of it.I simply don't agree with the claims or believe that they're worth giving mytime and energy toand I also believe that the source is pretty, pretty ugly.And I intentionally don't want to expose myself to all of that. (Part 1: ~9:55)
“never looked at it” is false, and he’ll take it back a bit later (around the 11 minute mark, where he says he looks at things people have shown him).
But look at this: “I simply don’t agree with the claims”. How can one disagree with something they’ve never read? As he’ll make clear later, he doesn’t mean he disagrees, he means his leaders disagree and have told him to disagree. He believes “that the source is pretty, pretty ugly.” But he hasn’t engaged with the source at all. I’ve met amazing people through the community here. Incredible people of high integrity who just want to help, and have given up so much to be able to do so.
“primed the pump”
But a guy named Andrew Lumpe. He posted something this past Friday that was their biggest bombshell accusation, it was like we're building all of these other things up making all of these other and then we're going to, you know, when when the time is right, when we've primed the pump, then we can blow it open with this bombshell accusation.And so that came out this past Friday. (Part 1: ~12 min)
Note, we’re 12 minutes in and Joseph still hasn’t actually said why the “Family Meeting” is happening. And in introducing it, he’s still sowing doubt about the motives and tactics of LTN before he actually says what Steve Morgan did.
But Joseph is painting a picture here that there was some grand plan to lay this all out, and then finally release what Steve Morgan did. That is a lie. And it’s a lie that Scott Joseph should have known was a lie by the time he said it. And even if he didn’t see anyone say it wasn’t that, he clearly didn’t see anyone associated with breaking the story say it was that. Scott is speculating (wrongly) about the motives of others and calling it truth.
In my work here, I’ve been so careful to share facts, not speculation about motives. Sometimes I will say “this might be why”, but I always phrase it that way (if you find me failing to do so, please call me on it).
But Scott Joseph, who hasn’t read LTN or the reddit other than bits people showed him, is ready to categorically state that this is how this happened.
Instead, this is how it happened. Briefly:
Indeed, several people, including myself, knew something about Steve Morgan’s incident with a minor prior to the Network. No one had managed to find corroborating evidence for it, and so it remained unreported.
A family member of Steve Morgan’s victim contacted myself and LTN on Wednesday, July 6, 2022. She was worried because she knew what Morgan had done, and saw that he was a Lead Pastor. Her intent was to make people aware of what Morgan had done.
I obtained the court records based on the information she gave me on Thursday, July 7th, 2022. I shared them with LTN.
On Friday, July 8th, 2022, LTN published their information (and the court documents) and I followed up with information about what I saw at Vista Church.
If I had not known that some involved with LTN (particularly Andrew Lumpe) had prior knowledge on this story, I would have reported it myself. In fact, there’s an alternate universe where no one had ever told me about Steve Morgan’s crime before, and I get the email from the woman, find the court records, and publish them by the end of the day on Thursday, July 7th, 2022, or maybe within a couple days.
The catalyst for this breaking was a concerned family member of Steve Morgan’s victim, and the stories were published within 48 hours of her reaching out, as she wanted.
Furthermore, no one referred to it as a “bombshell” (literally - the word, and “bomb shell” never appear on the reddit) either before or after its reporting. Scott Joseph is the one describing it that way.
“significant distortions”
But there are significant distortions in some of the facts concerning that.That are, I think, designed to make it -I mean, it's, it's, it's, it's a thing that's bad, but to try to make it worse by some of the claims attached to it that aren't true. (Part 1: ~12 mins)
Just remember this as you go through. To my knowledge, I am unaware of a single “significant distortion” that he demonstrates.
Note also, he still hasn’t said what the “accusation” is.
Uncertainty about the victim’s age
So the thing that is true, and that no one is excusing or denying or minimizing is Steve Morgan, when he was a 22 year old man, before Jesus saved him dramatically had sexual contact with a younger man, I'm not positive about the age, the criminal charge that was found and posted online, I believe the charge has to do with someone 16 or younger and so I don't know if it was a 15 year old or 16 year old. I don't know that detail about the identity of the young man. But Steve had had inappropriate sexual contact. Criminal, a criminal offense that he was charged with as a 22 year old, admitted to and went to went to court and went through diversion process. Which I honestly don't know a ton about. I'm certainly not a legal processes scholar, but read the court document. I certainly have read that full page. (part 1: 13:31)
Here, Scott Joseph finally manages to say some of what Morgan did. he describes it as “sexual contact with a younger man” and “inappropriate sexual contact”. Scott Joseph then states that he has read “the court document”, then reiterates, “that full page.”
He says he’s not sure if it was a 15 or 16 year old.
Here’s the court document’s first page, and I’ve highlighted the relevant phrase:
Steve Morgan’s victim was “under sixteen years of age”, which was published in the court documents.
Casey Raymer (Lead Pastor, Vine Church) also expressed doubt at the victim’s age on July 10th, saying:
And basically what happened was, in 1986, when Steve was 22 years old, he engaged in a form of sexual conduct with a minor who was a male. And I am not exactly sure how old the person was 15, 16, 17. I don't know.
These men are lead pastors, speaking to their churches. And later, Scott Joseph will reveal that he has known about this incident for nearly two years. And he fails to know the age of the victim cannot be more than 15.
This was a fact clearly established on the very first page of the court document (the victim’s family member was able to confirm that the victim was in fact 15, and not younger).
“Their anonymity would be protected”
But yes Steve did have that criminal charge against him when he was a 22 year old. And it's bad. It's a, it's it's evil, wicked, horrific, ugly sin.I don't make any attempt to minimize the actual ugliness of the sin and the crime,or the pain inflicted on the other individual who I honestly don't know anything at all about. That's been kept confidential. And you know, that's often the case for victims of that, that their anonymity would be protected.And so I don't know anything about how that affected that young man who's now an older man.This occurred in 1986.
Joseph appears to be implying he could know anything else about the victim. But this is false. The name was not kept confidential by the courts. It was redacted by LTN and myself. In fact, on the night of July 8th, I wrote this on reddit while describing how easy it was to get the court records:
LTN has rightly redacted the victim’s name and witnesses who appear to be related to him in the copy they shared. While anyone can obtain an unredacted copy, I beg people to not publish the victim/family’s names.
“Young Man”
Scott Joseph repeatedly uses the phrase “young man” (see previous quote). I did a poll on Twitter to see how people would refer to a 15 year old male.
It’s hard not to read this as a (perhaps subconscious) effort to make the crime seem less heinous. a “young man” certainly doesn’t sound as bad as “teenage boy”. I can’t say at all that Joseph did it intentionally, but he is breaking convention. WebMD at least refers to them as “boys”.
What Steve Morgan Did
The name of the charge. If you read it online, the name of it will make you horrified.Rightly so. But it might cause you todraw implications about what the actual physical acts were, and how those took place that would not be correct implications to draw about the nature of the actual offense. So when you see the word "sodomy" -"criminal sodomy against a minor"or something like that, I don't remember that exactly.But that sounds bad. And it is. But if you have -if you, if you've tried to activate your imagination, to wonder about the scene of what took place, you might read those words and draw a wrong conclusion about what actually took place.Is not, not to minimize but there are degrees of thingsand you can imagine things that are worse than the thing that was actually committed
To quote Scott Joseph from later on: how do you know? The only word you have to go on is Steve Morgan’s, unless the victim or family have given some other statement.
Joseph gets the name of the charge wrong - again, it’s on the first page of the court record, which he says he read in full. He says “criminal sodomy against a minor.” That’s not right, it’s “Aggravated Criminal Sodomy.” The is the second basic fact on the first page of the court record that Joseph gets wrong.
It is true, sodomy is legally defined as requiring either oral or anal sex. The colloquial refers to the latter, and I believe Joseph is trying to imply that it’s the former. He may also be trying to imply that maybe it wasn’t a violent act or something.
But here’s the thing: literally the only thing myself or Scott Joseph knows is that Steve Morgan was charged with “Aggravated Criminal Sodomy” against a 15-yo boy. Everything else is speculation or repeating things that someone else has said. In Scott Joseph’s case, we know he did not talk to the victim (he said so), so he could only be getting his information from Morgan. And, it’s relatively clear that Morgan had not even made the victim’s age clear. Morgan is an unreliable narrator of this story.
I am not saying that I know what happened. I am saying that Joseph cannot know what did or didn’t happen.
“The main question”
The the major issues are, is an offense like that reason for a lifetime disqualification?That a person who commits an act like that just no matter what happens in their future, they are never qualified for pastoral ministry. I don't believe that, obviously.And I'll describe why. But that's, that's kind of the main question, right?Is how could a man who did that lead in a Christian church? And how is that okay? (Part 1: ~17 min)
I specifically outlined the key issues in a blog post on July 9th. I wrote that the simplest version of the allegation was this:
Allegation:
1. In 1986, Steve Morgan feloniously sodomized a 15-year-old boy.
2. The Network helped keep it hidden.
3. Many were harmed in the process.
And I stand by it. For me, I do think that Morgan’s criminal offense earns a lifetime disqualification from being a pastor. But I respect those who disagree on that, and I wouldn’t spend too much time trying to convince them of it. And on July 10th, I wrote this in a comment on reddit (in response to a post that Joseph references in a few minutes).
Again, I’ll say. Let’s just say for a moment that Steve’s alleged crime is real, but should be fully forgiven.
Ok, so was the apostle Paul’s, and he brought it up himself in two letters (Phil 3:6, 1 Cor 15:9), and his friend Luke brought it up when he wrote the book of Acts (7:58ff, and I think 9:1-2). The network is constantly talking about telling your leaders your entire past, everything. Why is Steve exempt?
And let’s just imagine it’s ok for him to keep it quiet as long as it’s not hurting anything. Ok, but it is hurting people. Andrew Lumpe got shunned (at least to a degree) for trying to tell the truth to people who asked.
That’s it. That’s the part that there is no spin for. Andrew told the truth and got his relationships destroyed (and torrey’s, and their daughter). That’s where this simply crosses a grievous line, and does so in the very recent past. And leaders had to lie or badly mislead people in order to do it.
(Final note: i don’t think it matters if Steve was a Christian when he did this, or to get into the questions around whether the RLDS church he was in was christian. Paul was not Christian when he persecuted the church. But he was transparent about his past anyways.)
For me, the original crime has never been the clearest problem. For me, it is that people were harmed to keep it a secret. The shunning of Andrew Lumpe harmed his relationships and was unjust towards him and them. Or, as Proverbs 16:28 says:
A dishonest man spreads strife, and a whisperer separates close friends.
Luke Williams (with the Vista overseers in attendance) lied about Andrew Lumpe (July 8th) in order to separate close friends. And then 1 John 3:11-15:
For this is the message that you have heard from the beginning, that we should love one another. We should not be like Cain, who was of the evil one and murdered his brother. And why did he murder him? Because his own deeds were evil and his brother’s righteous. Do not be surprised, brothers, that the world hates you. We know that we have passed out of death into life, because we love the brothers. Whoever does not love abides in death. Everyone who hates his brother is a murderer, and you know that no murderer has eternal life abiding in him.
I don’t know how to define hate in a way that doesn’t include Williams’ behavior.
And then we’ve seen the repeated statements, including in this very “Family Meeting” that lie about those who are trying to tell the truth about The Network. It is those sins, which continue to the present day, which I find disqualifying.
It is convenient for Joseph to focus on the original crime. He makes as good a case as anyone can for why it shouldn’t be lifetime disqualifying. And maybe he’s right. I really don’t know. But he fails to engage in talking at all about what lies were spread about Andrew Lumpe and others, including the lies that he himself states in this very talk.
Purposeful Distortions
Some of the confusion that's brought about, and I believe is very purposeful, where there's distortions behind what's written in order to inflame more. (Part 1: ~17:36)
Keep this in mind as we move forward. It’s the context for the next several statements, where Scott Joseph is going to try to prove this statement, presumably because he believes it undermines LTN and others.
Mormon Christian Churuch
One of the things that you'll read is he was a youth pastor at the time it was committed, in a what they call a "Mormon Christian Church."That's deliberate. The choice of words. I've literally never in my life heard anyone use the phrase "Mormon Christian church." (Part 1: ~18 min)
Scott Joseph continues on this track for several minutes, including this after the ~10 min mark:
It was an intentional choice to call it a Christian church, though, the authors of that know that it was not a Christian church, but they want to twist the meaning to convey the idea that he was a pastor, and he was a Christian. And he was most certainly not.
“they call”. “the authors of that”. “they want to twist.”
Here’s the problem. There’s exactly one instance of that phrase on LTN, my site, or the Reddit. You can see it here. No one in the comments agrees with that phrasing, though they do echo that Steve Morgan thought he was a Christian following Jesus at the time.
The phrase was used by one person, out of dozens who have discussed Steve Morgan’s past.
But Scott Joseph finds it and then attributes it to “they” and “the authors”, and then claims to know why “they” did it (“to inflame more”).
Suspicion
If you know anything at all about Steve Morgan. And many of you don't. That's part of what I want to do tonight actually is -Steve doesn't care a lick that you know him, because he couldn't care less about fame, or being recognized. Opponentswill say, "Oh, that's because he was hiding this deep secret. He didn't want anyone tofind out. So he tried to maintain a low profile so nobody would know." That kind of thinking belies an initial distrust and skepticism and suspicion towards the character of the man.That's just not fair to him. And it's not true. It's not true that he is, because of fear of exposure, has been feigning humility, somehow successfully for 30 plus years. Fooling everybody that he's not actually humble. He's just hiding. It's just not true. And it's a -it's an attack on his character through suspicion about who he is.
You know what’s great for reducing suspicion? Transparency. Light. An independent investigation would do the trick. As Amy Fritz talked about on Untangled Faith (when she interviewed a falsely accused pastor), the falsely accused want an investigation, because it can give them the gift of exoneration. Or, also a quote from Fritz, “The truth says examine me.”
But look at what Scott Joseph is doing here. He’s saying that those who infer motives to Steve Morgan show an “initial distrust and skepticism and suspicion towards the character of the man.” Well, Joseph is doing the same. He’s taking phrases from Reddit, or events on LTN, and without ever even talking to the authors, or in some cases even reading what they say or knowing who they are, he is attributing clear motive to them.
Maybe the distrust of Morgan is unfair. But I would say that I for one trusted him implicitly at one point. And only after being presented a mountain of evidence did I come to the conclusion that he is not trustworthy.
It’s not an initial distrust, it’s a distrust that comes from him having broken my trust. And it’s awfully difficult to trust a guy who lives in a $2M mansion with a cattle ranch and tennis courts and a pool who is said to be “humble”. A guy who kicked a guy out of church for making a joke about a donut. Ask yourself: when is the last time Steve Morgan apologized to the church for something? I don’t recall having seen it in my time at Blue Sky Church. How can someone like that be referred to as “humble”?
How do you know?
What people want to do today is re adjudicate 36 years later, and apply different standards and say, “That was not appropriate. He did - he deserved this.” I'd say, "how do you know?" The people saying that don't know the actual facts of the case. And it's, I believe, arrogant, presumptuous. I'm not sure what you word to use here, but lacks an understanding about the nature of authority. (Part 1: 25:33)
Scott Joseph says “how do you know” loud enough that he sounds like he’s yelling.
So, I haven’t seen anyone doing what Joseph is saying. I’ve seen a number of people say, “if that had happened today, he would be sentenced to…” Which is a true statement. The answer to Joseph’s question, if he’d actually asked it instead of yelling it, is this:
We know the crime Steve Morgan committed (Aggravated Criminal Sodomy against a 15yo boy)
We know the penalty for that crime today.
Therefore we know what his penalty would be today.
It’s well known that this country is terrible at dealing with sexual assault. And we were much worse in the ‘80’s. And Christians fought to strengthen laws to protect child sexual assault victims. So it’s not so much people on LTN saying that Steve Morgan got off easy, it’s Christians over the last four decades who have said “that’s not good enough.”
But no one is arguing for some sort of “double jeopardy” in which Morgan should be tried again in court. They’re just stating a fact that the penalty for the same crime today is much stronger.
If anything, it’s remarkable that Steve Morgan faced any penalty at all, especially if this truly was a one-time incident. Here’s an incredibly powerful graph that a man on Twitter shared last week.
“Rot in hell”
When I see, "rot in hell, Steve Morgan." That's on there. I don't know who, I'm not calling out individuals. It's on there. And that's -what kind of heart posts that? I'll leave it at that consider the source.
The comment is here. It does, indeed, say that. Actually, “rot in hell, Steve Morgan. rot in hell.”
There are hundreds of people in the reddit. The post it was on has 299 comments. People were livid to find out what Steve Morgan had done, and find out that the person who ran a church that profoundly harmed them had such a problematic past, and had covered it up, and harmed people to do it. So yeah - people were angry.
Many of us have lost friends, been called demonic, or many other things. So yeah - as a group, people can get a bit upset. Is the tone correct? I don’t like it (and I didn’t upvote that comment - in fact only 10 people did). I also find the theology problematic. If Steve Morgan is truly repentant and trusting in the grace of Christ, he will not rot in hell.
But what Joseph is doing here is classic DARVO: Deny, Attack, Reverse Victim and Offender. He’s saying:
Deny: Steve’s stuff doesn’t matter. He wasn’t saved before. He is now.
Attack: But look at these awful people saying these awful things.
Reverse Victim and Offender: Poor Steve getting told to rot in hell!
It’s classic (specifically, Scott Joseph is “Tone Policing”). Steve Morgan is not the victim here. And neither is Scott Joseph.
By the way, as good a time as any to note: Scott Joseph doesn’t utter a single phrase of compassion for the victim in the entire Family Meeting.
And then, remember - Joseph is going through these to show how people say mean things and take things out of context and twist words. Well, out of 299 comments after the news of Steve’s past came out, this is the one he read. I wonder why?
And finally - I know this is hard for someone like Joseph to understand. The Network is a High Control Group that bears many of the traits of a Mind Control Cult. That means there’s little dissent, and it’s rare that someone says something that the rest of the group doesn’t agree with. But in a group like that which is found on the leavingthenetwork reddit, there’s a huge variety of opinions, and “respect” is pretty much the only rule. So yes, someone can say something like “rot in hell, Steve Morgan”, and someone like me can cringe at it. And that’s ok.
Email to his daughter
Someone emailed his daughter, who I've known since she was six months old. She's 25. "Your dad is a rapist and a child molester." Which is not even true. It's not even accurate to the offense. Or well, at least the rapist part is not.But the ugliness behind that is beyond next level.
This part made me upset. In fact, upset enough that I spoke out about it publicly to say that this kind of behavior was unacceptable.
The rapist part appears to be colloquially true, even if not legally true (sorry to get graphic, but in Kansas at the time, rape required vaginal penetration, which was impossible for a male victim). But most people would consider rape to include any forced sex, regardless of type, and I’m unaware of a definition of “aggravated criminal sodomy” that wouldn’t fall under it.
That said, I completely agree that if someone sent such a harsh email to Steve’s daughter, that’s terrible and should never have happened. On the other hand, unlike many of the claims made on LTN, here, or the reddit, Scott Joseph presents no evidence (specifically, the email). That’s his choice, but especially given the rest of this meeting, it leaves me to wonder how accurate he’s being.
James Chidester
Someone else emailed or texted one of my friends, James Chidester. A good, godly man. I baptized him on his 21st birthday. I've known him a long time. He is a psychologist, he's a professional. He is, in fact the suggestions that he's just Steve's lackey, and he's not actually, are deeply offensive to a person's professional training. And to the people that say that I'd say "How dare you and you don't know anything to make that accusation." But someone emailed or texted, I forget, James saying, "you're gay. And you are -you and Steve have a thing. And you ought to just come out and live your -you know, live your true self. Your soul will be much better off. Just admit it." It's like, no basis in reality. He's married has five kids and happy marriage, and has never struggled in any moment with same-sex attraction at all. And it's just like, it's just so ugly and evil.
This one is much harder. Again, Scott leads with taking offense to “suggestions that he’s just Steve’s lackey.” And he just leads with “How dare you and you don’t know anything to make that accusation.” But… many of the people making accusations that James is too deferential to Steve Morgan actually do know him and have known him for years.
Regardless, if the sender of that message believed that James is gay, I could see them actually sending it in love and care for him, wishing for him that he could be himself. We don’t have the email, so we don’t know the intent, but I don’t see enough to assume it’s “ugly and evil.”
And at least one person says that they had conversations with both Steve Morgan and James Chidester in which they spoke about their sexuality and same-sex attraction.
I am a trans woman who is attracted to women. You won’t find me judging anyone for being gay, straight, bi, pan, or trans. In fact, I wrote this defending the position that these are not condemned in the Bible.
Scott Joseph, on the other hand, sees homosexuality as a bad thing. And so he gets very upset at the suggestion that James and/or Steve are gay, even though the person writing it may have meant no ill will.
Someone says Steve is not an abuser
Scott Joseph: Well, that's how Steve is being treated.And it saddens me.I want to help you guys know, because if you've only read the Reddit, and you don't know, Steve, you would be persuaded that he's a monster.Steve's a monster, he's an abuser. spiritual abuse, child abuse, sexual abuse, he's an abuser.[Name], is he an abuser?
Unknown; Absolutely not.
Scott Joseph: [Name] knows Steve. How's Steve been towards you?
Unknown: I mean, I've known Steve since I was say[inaudible]. And I think one of the things that people have said, like, a friend of mine, saying that people had elevated Steve to be this royal figure. And that was very, like, made me very angry, because I'd never read Steve that way.
And there you have it. Someone Scott pointed to and asks says Steve Morgan is not an abuser of any kind. Done and done.
Ok, so what’s truly important here, and literally every book on spiritual abuse talks about this: the experience of the abused is not universal. If it was, the abuser could not maintain power. Rather, they abuse some, and are wonderful to others. Those the abuser is wonderful towards simply can’t even process that the abuser is abusive to others. This is a form of betrayal blindness, and abusers depend on it.
When Luke Williams began spiritually abusing me more directly, it took a while for me to understand what was happening, because I didn’t think he was capable of it.
Which is all to say: believe survivors enough to get an independent investigation going. That way it’s not the word of some guy Scott Joseph points to, it’s someone who can get into the situation and talk to all relevant parties and figure out what’s going on and how to make repairs as needed.
Scott Joseph would have likely lost his job if he’d come out and said “Steve Morgan should not lead the Network anymore.” And the guy Scott Joseph pointed to likely would have felt very nervous about responding “yes, Steve Morgan is an abuser.” Neither is in a position where speaking their mind wouldn’t come with consequences.
People making things up
I've seen people that used to go to High Rock posting on Reddit fake, like totally made up things about Steve. I'm like, I know you've never met him. Or about James or about Nick Sellers. Like, how are you -where -why do you think you can do that? Like why do? It doesn't make sense to me. (Part 1: 34min)
Examples would be helpful, and fortunately he gives one:
Somebody that used to attend here posted on Reddit. "Five" -this is what they said. Not an exact quote. Maybe it is. It's close. It gets the sense of it."5% of your tithes go directly to Steve Morgan." And they may have added that somebody else said thatadds up to $1.5 million a year from all the network churches. I can't remember if that was in the post or not, but it was in another part of the same things, so you could draw the implication there. "5% of all of your tithes, go directly to Steve Morgan,let that sink in." That's what they wrote. You know what I'd say? How about don't let that sink in, because it's a complete fabrication.No basis in truth whatsoever. It's like me saying, "The cubs traded away all their best players. And yet they're stillin first place, let that sink in." And then you look at the standings, you're like, "wait, but they're in last place." Like, "yeah, but we're not talking about reality, we're just making stuff up." It's not true.
And once again, he borderline yells, “How about don’t let that sink in, because it’s a complete fabrication.”
But there’s a problem - Scott is badly misleading here. He hints at the problem when he says “Not an exact quote”, but then follows with the problematic statement “It gets the sense of it.” Here’s the comment that Scott Joseph is referring to. It reads:
According to the article, the 5% that went directly to Steve’s general fund totaled about $1.5M/yr. The fund has existed for what, a good 20 years? Just let that sink in.
That’s not exactly the quote that Scott said. “went directly to Steve’s general fund” is very different than “went directly to Steve Morgan.” But wait - what article?
The comment is in response to a post that was sharing this article from MinistryWatch. That article includes the following quote:
A former bookkeeper for The Network told MinistryWatch that The Network asks member churches pay 5 percent of their income to The Network, and these contributions add up to about $1.5 million a year.
So… this isn’t someone who used to attend reddit saying it, this is a former bookkeeper in the Network saying this. And in fact, the bylaws of local churches say exactly that about the 5% (and Scott Joseph goes on to confirm it). The only new information that bookkeeper is disclosing is that the amount added up to about $1.5M.
So Scott Joseph here takes a comment out of context and twists it’s wording and meaning to make it look like someone just pulled something out of thin air. When in fact, the only thing that someone might take exception to would be calling it “Steve’s general fund” (italics mine). When it should probably be “the network’s general fund.” But they were citing the article which had the verbiage right, and the point of this comment was the 20 years. And given the degree of control Steve has over the network, I think it’s an interesting semantic question whether or not it’s right to call it “Steve’s general fund.”
Scott Joseph is portraying this as someone making something up to say that Steve Morgan is effectively getting $1.5M/year from the network, when literally no one has made that allegation.
So what I would say is: Don’t let that sink in, because it’s a complete fabrication.
Scott Joseph wraps up his discussion on this with this statement:
And so even if 100% of that went to salaries, which it doesn't, by any stretch of the imagination, it would go to those four people, not all to Steve, but it's not even remotely close to all going towards salary. So it's just a completely ridiculous nonsense, laughable idea based in no reality whatsoever.But you find it on the internet, somebody that used to go here and knows nothing about it claims it.
To review: Scott is wrong about who said it. He’s wrong about what they said. He’s wrong about the implication of what they said. It has tremendous basis in reality, with only one semantic change to “steve’s” general fund, which wasn’t in the article that person was citing and wasn’t the point of what they were saying.
So, any more examples of people making things up, Scott Joseph?
There's tons of stuff like that on there.There's tons of stuff like that. When I've found myself reading things in the last few days in order to be informed of, "what are you guys reading? What are you hearing? What do you what do you know? Or what what's being told to you?" I'm like, "ah, that's not true. That's not true at all. That's not true at all." Tons of stuff like that.
When, when I give time for questions here in a bit, which again, I don't have, I'm kind of winging this, and hoping that I get to everything when weget there. If any of you want to pull up any of those websites, or Reddit and ask about something that's totally fair game. I don't mind that at all. Because when I look at some stuff, and I'm like, "That's so bogus. That's so ridiculously untrue." But I don't know, I can't say all of those different things. So if there's something that you've seen that you want to ask a specific, "Hey, answer this, it says this right here, this person wrote that."Feel free to do that if you'd like to. I don't don't have a problem with that. (Part 1: ~37 min)
So… no. There’s tons of stuff, yet the only example he gives is one where he has to twist the original meaning beyond all recognition.
Once again, this is why I and others choose to publish full context for everything we say, if the context is available. Scott Joseph here chooses to misquote someone and make them out to be a liar when in fact he is the one spreading false information that either he’s been told or he chose to tell. That’s called slander.
“The Network”
Here's one that's come up a few times in my mind, and I haven't said it yet. Even the idea the baseline language description on Leaving the Network website and on the Reddit is constantly intentionally capitalizing "The Network," Ooooooh, like this big boogeyman,"The Network." And then assigning motives, false motives, about why we have an unnamed network. (Part 1: ~39 min)
[Scott goes off on long “rabbit trail” (his phrase, not mine), and comes back to it later]
Those that have left and now hate us call it "The Network" all capitalized on purpose as a kind of dig about, "This is Steve's empire that he's always wanted to build. He's, he's driven by a lust for power. And he's wanted to build this empire of his own making." That is so deeply offensive to me as the exact opposite of reality. And please, please don't talk about the network in a way that sounds like it's a proper name.Unless you leave and hate us and don't want to. Do whatever you want, fine, you can be free to do that. But just, it's not what it is. It's not who we are. It's not what we're doing. (Part 1: ~45 min)
Scott Joseph is not happy about people calling it “The Network”. And he assumes that we’re doing that to make it “this big boogeyman.”
You’ll notice that I still refer to it as “The Network”. I also have an interesting perspective on this. I am a transgender woman, and I would never carry on a friendship with someone who refuses to use my new name, Celeste, for sure once I have it legally changed. I’m a big fan of people getting to decide how they are referred to. So I actually thought a lot about whether to switch this one to respect Scott Joseph’s statement.
First, I do not call it “The Network” out of malice. I do it because I used to talk about “the network” on twitter and people would think I was talking about Acts 29 or some other church planting network. It caused a lot of confusion. So I moved to “The Network”, and these days I frequently use “The Network™️”, which has dramatically improved the likelihood that people will know what network I’m talking about. Sometime’s I’ll use “Steve Morgan’s Network of Churches”.
Which is all to say: I use the name “The Network” to ensure that my communication is clear, not to make it sound scary. In fact, it had never occurred to me that capitalizing it made it sound scary, and I’m pretty sure the entire time I was in The Network, I would have thought it was “The Network”.
One of the quotes I remember from Luke Williams was when I told him that I worried about what would happen if I disagreed with him. He responded “I worry about what happens if I disagree with The Network.” And he absolutely emphasized “The Network” like it was a name.
Furthermore, this comes right after Scott Joseph talked about how all networks, denominations, affiliations, etc have a general fund, and that’s why the 5% is ok. Well, you know what else all networks, denominations, and affiliations have? A name.
Scott is assuming malicious intent here, where at least for some of us, there is none. A few people have floated much more malicious names like “Morganism” or “Morganites”, but they haven’t stuck, quite possibly because people find them to be too harsh.
So here’s what I landed on: When The Network tells me what name they’d like me to call them, I will call them whatever they want. But until then, I will continue to use The Network.
I respect the right of someone to determine their own name. But I don’t agree that someone should be able to just not have a name at all.
Side Note: I’d be fascinated to hear from anyone inside The Network on whether or not they refer to me by my new name or old name at this point. Probably only comes up at Vista, but I don’t know.
“We’re not the mafia”
You, when you fill out a membership form, it's true at the time, you say, I believe that Jesus has called me here. You can at any moment decide, I don't believe that Jesus has called me here. That's okay. You're allowed to do that. We're not the mafia. It's not that tough to get out. And also, we don't hate people that left because they left. How we feel -or I shouldn't say we as if like, I don't mean to be speaking for all of us, collectively, you have your own feelings. You're your own person.
Scott Joseph: “It’s not that tough to get out.”
Me: Try it.
Yes, the actual departure is relatively easy to execute. I did the following:
Wrote a letter.
I gave it to an overseer.
I turned in my key to the trailer, as well as a couple books Luke had loaned me.
I wrote them a check for $810 to pay for three broken stage lights that were at my house, just in case they would say I broke them.
I turned off bill pay so that it wouldn’t send tithe checks anymore.
And I told the small group I was leading at the time that I was leaving.
I offered to serve the following Sunday so that they wouldn’t be short a person - they declined.
But The Network talks regularly about how it’s a “Relational church”, and “not a shopping mall church”. The idea that I’m just physically leaving the building is hardly at all what people mean when they say they’re leaving the church.
I have tried to be as open as I can about what leaving was like for me:
I lost most of my friends overnight. Many of them, including some incredibly close ones who I called family, I have never seen again. Some of them I’ve never even heard from by text.
The friends I did keep took a long time to figure out what to do. I told very few of them what had really happened - the abuse I’d been enduring or the things I knew behind the scenes. I tried to “leave well”, while still being honest.
And yet, Luke still spread falsehoods about me, telling first a close friend, and then a subset of the church that I had called the church “racist and sexist”.
An overseer warned a close friend that talking to me about my public letter might be a bad idea (the overseer had not spoken to me in 8 months).
And we lived in San Luis Obispo, and I still worked for Microsoft in the Seattle area. We had no close friends outside of Vista, because we were 100% committed to Vista. So when we left, I lost everything. Several months later I was struggling a lot with suicidal ideation, and honestly could have easily not made it.
And today, almost two years later, I’m still recovering. I’m better now than I’ve been in a long time, but I’ve effectively had to take a year off from life in order to accomplish that (gender transition has helped greatly, as has finding a great and welcoming and safe Christian community).
A friend told me that he worried that if someone else left The Network, it would take them years to recover. Turns out, that’s a valid fear (Side note: I suspect it’s easier (but still not easy) for people these days because there is so much validation publicly as well as people who already left who would be happy to reconnect). Multiple other people told me they were staying (for a time) because their friends were still there, and no other reason. Network pastors, consider that. Those people you think are staying because they like your church? They may only be staying because of their friends, and might not even like the church other than that. How would you know the difference? You’re hostile to feedback, so no one gives you their honest opinions.
In any case, Scott Joseph: you are being callous and cruel with these comments. Steve Morgan always talked about how it should be hard to leave the church. Now you blame us for saying that it is.
And here’s the thing: all you would have to do to make it much easier is to tell your churches: “DO NOT ghost people who leave. They are still our siblings in Christ and you still love them. Disagreements do not mean a lack of love.” If I had known that I could keep my friends, I would have left a little earlier (honestly not that much earlier).
This one is an example of gaslighting. Scott Joseph is telling a room full of people “of course it’s easy to leave”, while in their gut they know that the process of leaving will be painful at best.