In this episode of Relatable, Allie talks about the tragic story of the missing astronauts, the scandal surrounding megachurch pastor Robert Morris, and why we have to be reminded of hope in the midst of tragedy like that. Plus, we have a lighthearted segment at the end of the episode that you don t want to miss.
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00:11:43.780Several months ago, we talked about longtime pastor of a huge megachurch outside of Dallas, Gateway Church, whose name is Robert Morris, being accused of the routine sexual assault of a child in the 1980s.
00:12:08.640The woman is named Cindy, and she came forward not only with these allegations, but with receipts of trying to confront the Morrises, of trying to tell her story, and routinely being silenced in a variety of ways, including through a non-disclosure agreement.
00:12:27.920And now he has been, Robert Morris, has officially been charged with five counts of lewd or indecent acts with a child.
00:12:37.280Morris formally pleaded not guilty to the charges on Monday and was released on a $50,000 bond.
00:12:46.900And that happened in the state of Oklahoma, where the crimes had originally taken place.
00:12:53.380So a little bit more on the background.
00:12:56.200Last June, 54-year-old Cindy Clemshire reported that she had been sexually abused over multiple years in the 1980s by Morris.
00:13:05.800He was a young, married, traveling evangelist at the time.
00:13:09.540Cindy's parents trusted him, allowed him into their home.
00:13:15.820He would stay there with his wife, and Cindy claimed that he would sneak into his room, or her room, rather, and that he would sexually molest her.
00:13:28.360At the age of 16, after over four years of abuse, so she claims this started when she was just 12, Cindy confided in a close friend who encouraged her to tell her family.
00:13:43.520Her father confronted Morris and said, you know, if you don't get away from us and step down here, we're going to do something else about this.
00:13:51.620Of course, the right response would have been right there to go to local authorities, because at that point, that's outside of just church jurisdiction.
00:14:00.660That is civil authorities' responsibility to punish evil.
00:14:05.180Morris stepped away from the ministry for just two years.
00:14:08.000He eventually wanted to go back to pastoring.
00:14:10.820During this time, Cindy said that she received a call from Debbie Morris, Robert's wife, who told Cindy that she forgave her.
00:14:19.140Now, remember, Cindy, according to her own story, was not asking for forgiveness.
00:14:25.100Debbie Morris, it seems, kind of called her out of the blue just to say, hey, just so you know, we forgive you for this accusation.
00:14:33.540Cindy had been talking about the abuse within her own personal circle, her friends, for years.
00:14:38.780So there are friends who say, yeah, Cindy did tell us about this at the time.
00:14:42.560This isn't just randomly coming up now.
00:14:45.540She actually tried to sue Morris in 2005, but her actions did not generate much attention.
00:14:51.480At the time, she obtained an attorney to file a civil lawsuit against Morris.
00:14:58.020Morris's attorney implied in response to that that they believed it was her fault, Cindy's fault, for being, quote, unquote, flirtatious.
00:15:07.620At that time, they tried to offer her $25,000 to not talk about it.
00:15:15.040She then decided again last June to come forward publicly at the urging of her pastor,
00:15:22.120who was also the friend of the editor of an outlet called the Wartburg Watch.
00:15:29.400So that's who broke this story again in June.
00:15:33.500After the story broke last June 14th, Robert Morris and Gateway Church released statements that minimized Morris's abuse as the sexual sins of a young man who has since repented.
00:15:45.180Neither mentioned that the girl in question was actually a minor.
00:15:48.780They say this was sexual behavior with a young lady.
00:15:53.200This is what they said in the statement.
00:15:55.180No, a 12-year-old is not a young lady.
00:15:57.160That is a child that is being molested.
00:15:59.980It doesn't matter if the person says, oh, well, this person consented.
00:16:04.280A minor cannot consent no matter what they verbally say.
00:16:09.120The elders of Gateway Church said that Pastor Robert has been open and forthright about a moral failure he had over 35 years ago.
00:16:17.740So the inclusion of that phrase over 35 years ago is supposed to imply this was a long time ago.
00:17:03.660He said he inserted his fingers into me, which I understand now is considered a form of rape by instrumentation.
00:17:09.280I was an innocent 12-year-old little girl who knew nothing about sexual behavior.
00:17:14.420I mean, that is just absolutely abhorrent.
00:17:17.540Yes, that is a crime that should put you in jail.
00:17:20.220Obviously, that disqualifies you from ministry forever.
00:17:24.880Particularly when you are in a pastoral position, a professing Christian, when you are molesting a child, you should be nowhere near a pulpit.
00:17:34.600And anyone who says, well, look at the ministry he created and the lives that he reached and all of the people who heard about the good news of Jesus and who were helped by Gateway Church.
00:17:44.240Look, God works despite the evil of man, not because of it.
00:17:49.320That points to God's goodness and God's power.
00:17:52.700If indeed people truly heard the gospel through anything that Robert Morris was saying or building at the time or leading at the time, God is really, really faithful.
00:18:06.020That does not mean that he approves of Robert Morris' behavior, that he has forgotten about it.
00:18:11.280In fact, he says that vengeance is mine, says the Lord, I will repay.
00:18:17.400And I believe that his wrath was kindling towards this act and that this justice, this finding out of Robert Morris is not just justice and faithfulness to Cindy, who I understand is still, you know, still is a Christian.
00:18:34.180Thank the Lord for that, but also truly a grace to Robert Morris.
00:18:40.000Sometimes the most gracious thing that God can do is allow you to be found out for your sin, because that hiding creates a callousness in you, creates a separation between you and God.
00:18:53.580And it is through God's mercy and even his love for the perpetrator of this awful abuse, Robert Morris, that he said, you are no longer going to be in hiding and far from me, but I am going to bring you to a place of total devastation and vulnerability in the hopes that you will truly repent.
00:19:11.840And I don't know if that's where Robert Morris is, but I pray to God that it is.
00:19:15.620I pray for repentance for everyone, for everyone, period.
00:19:21.980Even for someone who committed such an evil act, like the best form of justice in addition to the civil justice is also that he realizes the severity not only of his sin 35 years ago, but the sin of being a fake shepherd, the sin of living a lie.
00:19:39.540Now, thankfully, he did resign from Gateway Church on June 18th after the report was published.
00:19:49.440At the time, the church claimed that Morris had not revealed that it was a little girl, so they made their original statements when everyone, understandably, was up in arms, like really a young lady, sexual sin that happened 35 years ago.
00:20:02.300That's how you guys are handling child molestation.
00:20:05.520They changed course and they said, oh, wait, we didn't know that it was a child's.
00:20:16.800It is reported by the Christian Post that Gateway Church subsequently authorized an independent investigation into the allegations against Morris.
00:20:24.900And last November, the results showed that there were elders and employees at Gateway who did know about Cindy's young age before the report detailing her abuse went public.
00:20:34.840These elders were also removed from the church.
00:20:41.000Gosh, I pray for every single believer that has ever been a part of that church.
00:20:44.340When you trust, no matter what pastor it is, and we talked about a lot of pastors who have failed in different ways recently, that is really rocking for your faith.
00:20:59.420And thank the Lord that Jesus Christ is the same yesterday, today, and forever.
00:21:03.900But you understand how that can be really difficult for someone, especially who may be a new Christian, who looked up to someone as a spiritual mentor.
00:21:11.900And you're thinking, if you don't even get it, how can I get it?
00:21:15.260And of course, we have so much grace, and we preach the gospel over and over again to ourselves and to those people.
00:21:21.180But have compassion for people who are rocked by things like this, because this is really tough.
00:21:29.960So pray for Gateway Church that they would have a leadership and elders and a pastor who believe truly in the gospel, who are living that out in every area of their lives.
00:21:43.020To have integrity means to have your life integrated.
00:21:46.580So all different parts of your life are integrated in the gospel of Christ.
00:21:51.680There's no part over here that is like secret sin that you allow to fester, because that's how Satan creates a foothold.
00:21:57.800And then he's used this to try to shipwreck the faith of people, to try to test people's belief, not in Robert Morris, but in God himself.
00:22:07.300And we know that the gates of hell won't prevail against the church, and we're thankful for that.
00:22:11.360But we've got to pray for this local church, too.
00:22:13.920They would put good leadership in charge, who believe in the gospel, preach the gospel, who believe in the authority of God's word, and live those integrated lives.
00:22:21.560All right, we've got more new information about this in just a second, but we've got quite a few ads to get to today.
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00:23:57.440So, in Oklahoma, he was indicted, Morris was indicted last week on five counts of looter and decent acts with a child by a multi-county grand jury in Oklahoma.
00:24:17.580The Oklahoma Attorney General's Office noted that the statute of limitations is not applicable to the charges against Morris.
00:24:27.900He said Oklahoma, or the Oklahoma Attorney General, said that Oklahoma and other frontier states have a provision in their laws that allows them to pause the statute of limitations.
00:24:38.640So, statute of limitations says, okay, after a certain point, someone can't be charged for a crime that they committed, but it doesn't apply to all crimes.
00:24:47.800So, they're saying when it comes to a crime like this, sexual assault of a child, that statute of limitations does not apply.
00:24:54.980Even though it was 35 years ago, he can obviously still be charged.
00:24:59.820Since Morris was a traveling evangelist who did not reside in Oklahoma when he is alleged to have committed the crimes, Drummond, the attorney general, and his prosecutors argue that there was a pause on the statute of limitations.
00:25:12.200So, that changes what I said just a little bit.
00:25:14.380So, it does have to do with the crime, but it also just has to do with the fact that the statute of limitations doesn't apply here because he was not actually a resident of Oklahoma.
00:25:22.780He was traveling around, and so that changes the policy around the statute of limitations.
00:25:29.560Arrest documents show that Morris was formally booked by the Osage County Sheriff's Office in Oklahoma at 7.57 a.m. last Monday, was released minutes later on bond.
00:25:40.400Morris is set to appear in court on May 9th.
00:25:44.020He faces a possible 100 years maximum in prison if he is convicted on all five counts of lewd or indecent acts with a child, and a judge orders sentences to be served consecutively.
00:25:57.480He could also be sentenced to as little as five years in prison if convicted on all five counts due to the law that was in effect for the crime more than 35 years ago.
00:26:11.100The Oklahoma's Office of the Attorney General told the Christian Post at the time of the abuse, the range of punishment was 1 to 20 years in prison.
00:26:18.640The additional restrictions based on the victim's age were not in effect in the law at the time of Morris' alleged crime.
00:26:27.400So, 1 to 20 years, the reason why the lowest he could be sentenced, the lowest amount of time he could be sentenced to is because there's five counts.
00:26:37.300That would be one year for each count if he is charged with all five.
00:26:40.880So, he could be, I guess, theoretically, if he was found not guilty in all of these, he could spend no time in jail, or he could spend just one year in jail if he is only convicted, found guilty of one of these charges.
00:26:53.140But if he's found guilty of all five, minimum five years, up to 100 years in prison, again, the math works out.
00:27:00.960Because if the maximum 35 years ago was 20 years for these charges, then five times 20 is 100.
00:27:08.320So, I doubt that he will get 100 years in prison, but he does deserve to go to prison.
00:27:16.120Just because something was a long time ago doesn't mean that justice should not be served.
00:27:20.360The government, as instituted by God, we read in Romans 13, is to execute justice against the wrongdoer.
00:27:28.020It's to punish evil and to reward good.
00:27:31.360So, this, again, is under the jurisdiction of the government, not just the local church, and what is being done here is right.
00:27:40.060Gateway Church released this statement after the indictment.
00:27:43.360We are aware of the actions being taken by the legal authorities in Oklahoma, and we are grateful for the work of the justice system in holding abusers accountable for their actions.
00:27:56.500We continue to pray for Cindy Clemeshire and her family, for the members and staff of Gateway Church, and for all of those impacted by this terrible situation.
00:28:04.260Well, that's a much better response than they initially had.
00:28:08.440Cindy Clemeshire shared her story in front of lawmakers at the Texas State Capitol yesterday.
00:28:16.360Clemeshire testified in favor of a Texas bill that would eliminate NDA agreements for survivors of sexual abuse and civil court agreements.
00:28:24.580About 18 years ago, Clemeshire, as we already noted, said Morris offered her a settlement.
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00:42:03.180We do know, as reported by Axios in December, that Daily Wire has said that they are open to buyers.
00:42:16.020Axios asked the Daily Wire about a deal with Fox.
00:42:18.720Boring said that the company isn't actively looking for a buyer, but we're not closed off to an offer.
00:42:24.860It's easy to imagine a strategic partnership with Fox or someone like Fox.
00:42:28.460He said that could be mutually beneficial.
00:42:32.280So we don't know if something like that's going to happen.
00:42:34.360That's kind of been in the talks for a really long time.
00:42:37.140And I think that that's a smart statement by Jeremy Boring because you're always open to lucrative opportunities.
00:42:43.940Of course, everyone's always open to lucrative opportunities, whether it's just an individual employee looking for better employment somewhere else,
00:42:50.900or whether it's the owner of a company who, you know, wants to make money and do things that make sense.
00:44:43.520If you want to try to understand what's really happening right now, I think a good idea would be to go back and to watch her and Jeremy's response after she left the Daily Wire just a couple months ago.
00:44:56.900And now to see this response, and we can put it up, she put this gif of Jimmy Fallon.
00:45:04.240She quote tweeted the Axios report that says that Daily Wire co-CEO Jeremy Boring to step down.
00:45:11.340She posts this, like, I don't know what you would call it, smirk, soft smile, kind of like, I'm happy about this gif from Jimmy Fallon.
00:45:25.860So that tells us right there that her leaving Daily Wire was not as friendly and as smooth as we were told it was at the time, which means that there's a lot more going on behind the scenes.
00:45:42.460Brett also said right under that, genuinely excited to see where Ben and Caleb take the company next.
00:45:48.140And I don't, I have not talked to Brett about this.
00:45:53.720I haven't talked to anyone about this, but I am just looking at this response and saying, okay, obviously she's got beef specifically with Jeremy.
00:46:02.980That's, that's, that's what's going on.
00:46:05.360And it seems to me like she is saying that the shakeup that occurred when she left the contention or the, just the, whatever happened, the discord between her and Jeremy possibly played a role in this.
00:46:22.200And so it seems to me like that is the message that she is communicating and Candace Owens retweeted this.
00:46:32.960Candace Owens has been talking even recently more about the Daily Wire.
00:46:37.520You'll remember that Candace and Ben have very, very, very diverging views on Israel and her friendship with Kanye West, who made some really disturbing comments about Jewish people also caused a divide at the Daily Wire.
00:46:54.940A video was leaked of Ben Shapiro talking badly about Candace Owens.
00:46:59.740And it was just this whole, it was just this whole fight at the time.
00:47:07.120She's been insanely successful in doing that already.
00:47:11.240Brett Cooper has been insanely successful.
00:47:14.040And so I think this gives the impression to people that, okay, these independent creators that are mad at Jeremy Boring, that are mad at some ways at Daily Wire.
00:47:23.220I don't know about Brett, if she's mad at Daily Wire in general, they're doing really well.
00:47:34.480I think Owens and Cooper are doing amazingly well, and they will continue to do amazingly well.
00:47:40.080I also think the Daily Wire will be fine.
00:47:42.540But Candace said she's celebrating the fact that Boring stepped down, saying that Boring stepping down was tremendous news.
00:47:49.960She also pointed to the statements Ben Shapiro and Kaylin Robinson gave to the Daily Wire, adding that if they were excited about this decision, then she could be as well.
00:47:56.880So, again, this is implying that Candace Owens' beef was specifically with Jeremy Boring.
00:48:02.840Now, she also did have public beef with Ben Shapiro.
00:48:05.740So it's not just Jeremy, but it seems like she's got a specific issue with Jeremy, too.
00:48:11.920She points out that there was no new title announced for Jeremy Boring.
00:48:15.400So that indicates to her, she says, that he also might be leaving.
00:48:19.940So that was about all of the kind of like insight and commentary that she gave.
00:48:25.080She did a whole video on this, and she did a video, I think, on the Daily Wire last week, too.
00:48:30.340You can go watch those and see her assessment if you're interested in that.
00:48:37.000This also comes on the heels of yet another Crisis King controversy.
00:48:40.800You'll remember when she left Daily Wire, that was a whole big debate because after she left, after she was fired, she posted Crisis King.
00:48:50.900People thought that this was like a—they interpreted this, some, as a direct attack on Ben Shapiro, who is Jewish, who obviously doesn't believe Crisis King.
00:49:02.280And there was this whole debate about whether it's anti-Semitic to say Crisis King and whether people are using anti-Semitism as a way to silence Christians from using this refrain.
00:49:15.600I talked about this on Glenn's show last week.
00:49:18.480Then Jordan Peterson, he led this report that was recently published that said Christ is King is being—has been co-opted by these anti-Jewish voices in order to attack Jews, and they're using his name in vain.
00:49:38.700Now, this is kind of like an aside from everything I've been talking about, but this is all happening at once.
00:49:43.300And, like, I do think all the context of this matters.
00:49:48.240I mean, my quick take on this is that, yes, there are people who use Crisis King in vain.
00:49:52.700Like, you can see the posts on Acts where people are like, Crisis King, you dirty Jew.
00:49:58.020Like, I think it's pretty safe to say that that person is not a Christian and that they are using it in a way to attack someone who is not Christian,
00:50:08.480to attack a Jewish person that is using the Lord's name in vain.
00:50:13.260Do I think that everyone who uses Crisis King, or even most people who use that refrain, Crisis King, that they are directly attacking Jewish people, that they are being anti-Semitic?
00:50:28.880And it is a refrain that Christians have used, that Christians can use.
00:50:32.740I don't think people should stop themselves, hinder themselves from saying Christ is King just because they're afraid of someone calling them anti-Semitic.
00:50:43.440I think that you should continue to say it, but of course you should never say it in a way that is not simply a humble, sincere declaration of Jesus's lordship and Jesus's royalty.
00:50:56.280It is not a mantra simply to virtue signal or to try to attack someone else.
00:51:03.600Of course, that's true of any Bible verse or any Christian refrain.
00:51:10.300Candace recently talked about this before she even knew that Jeremy Boring was going to step down.
00:51:15.280Of course, people are trying to put the puzzle pieces together and say that this is all kind of like affecting one another.
00:51:23.780People are also pointing out that Jeremy Boring has been kind of like in confrontations with different commentators, including people like Jason Whitlock on X, and maybe that wasn't making the company look good.
00:51:36.180I feel like Jeremy has always kind of just been like very forthright with the things that he says and believes and hasn't been afraid to disagree with people who are even on his political side.
00:51:46.960So I don't really think that that's a part of this decision.
00:51:50.400Again, just my subjective assessment there.
00:51:55.360All in all, I think that everyone's going to be fine.
00:51:58.580I think we'll find out more information about everything that went down over the next few months, but I think everyone's going to be fine.
00:52:05.520I have no doubt that Ben Shapiro at all will be successful.
00:52:21.640I think that it's good for the conservative movement, for Daily Wire to continue to be successful, and for people to have a variety of voices to listen to.
00:52:31.240But yeah, media shakeups, it's interesting.
00:52:34.360I mean, conservative media now, we dominate.
00:52:36.860We dominate informal, non-cable news, and we should want good sound voices to continue to thrive.
00:52:48.560So we'll see what goes down with all this.
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00:54:08.380Would he have been able to do it without Relatable?
00:54:11.220We talked last week about it, so you should go watch that episode.
00:54:16.320But, guys, with, like, 2.5 stars on Amazon and, like, 19 reviews, or, like, 30 reviews, maybe, and never breaking the top 100 on Amazon, he somehow made the New York Times Bestseller List.
00:54:38.780The New York Times Bestseller List is not an objective list based on sales.
00:54:43.580It is a curated list that is, it's editorialized by the people who work in the New York Times, which is why it always is amazing when a conservative book is on there.
00:54:53.220That's why we were shocked that my book went on there.
00:54:55.720But there are some books that even if the editors at the New York Times do not like it and they completely agree with the message, they might put it on there for a variety of reasons.
00:55:04.500Either, like, the sales are just so high that you just can't deny it, or it is starting important conversations, cultural conversations that maybe the New York Times doesn't agree with, but they could see how it's causing buzz.
00:55:20.440And I'm very thankful that my book did sell well and it still is causing a lot of conversation.
00:55:27.280Some people who have actually read it and are giving proper assessments and some people who have not read it and are virtue signaling by giving their knee-jerk reactions.
00:55:36.200But, yeah, it does show you when a book that doesn't seem, by the objective metrics that we can see, to be selling well and still makes the list, you see the bias of a place like the New York Times and, like, the things that they include there.