Seven months ago Brian Houston was ousted from his role as the Global Senior Pastor of Hillsong Church, after facing allegations of sexual impropriety and an addiction to alcohol.
Five months ago he released an apology to everyone that he hurt, interweaving multiple instances promising he will continue to be active in the ministry in some way, repeatedly stressing that the best is yet to come, the final chapters of his life haven’t been written and that God isn’t finished with him yet.
Two months ago, he preached a ‘comeback’ sermon at the multicampus Christian Faith Church in Seattle, WA, repeatedly stressing that God’s plan is to give everyone an amazing legacy, and no matter how many mistakes you make, it’s never too late to choose to have a legacy for your future.
Now, Houston and his wife have announced a special event on November 9th, 2022 that will be streamed across the world.
Billed as An Evening with Bobbie and Brian, the event will be an “evening of connection, fellowship, and enjoying community” where the Houston’s will “preach, and they pray people will be blessed and God will be Glorified” while noting specifically that “Great things start with small beginnings!“
In short, they’re back!
With many within Hillsong convinced that Houston got a raw deal and he and his wife Bobbie making multiple comments on social media decrying the shabby way they were treated, promising that they would soon tell their side of the story, the prospect of the Houston’s starting up a new church ministry is not a matter of ‘if but ‘when.’
Given the popularity and loyalty he still enjoys within the flock, this new endeavor will certainly prove to be a smashing success.
Telling congregants that “this will not necessarily be an inspiration night,” Hillsong Church held a special meeting to discuss the state of their organization and share recommendations from an independent review of their governance structure. It was a move forced by necessity after terminating Brian Houston following a series of scandals hidden from the church and later emerged, including several instances of sexual impropriety concealed from congregants by the board.
Interim Global Senior Pastor Phil Dooley explains that they partnered with former Assistant Commissioner of the ACNC, Murray Baird, to examine the organization’s ins and outs, releasing two separate reviews.
The Board Review
Dr. Steven Crouch, the new chairman of the Global Board, explains, “some of the questions we addressed were, what should the board look like moving forward and who should be on it? How should it operate, especially in terms of relationship with the church’s global senior pastor and health check? Where are we at right now with strategy, risk management, and reporting? Are there areas that we can improve?”
They came up with five recommendations, which were all adopted.
The first two are of note. Right now, Phil and Lucinda Dooley are only the interim pastors, and the recommendation insists that Hillsong appoints someone in the role permanently and as soon as possible, either the Dooleys or someone else.
The second: update the board appointment and renewal process. Previously, because Global Senior Pastor Brian Houston was also the board chairman, he could appoint whoever he wished to join him, including “yes men.” This has now changed, with the Global Senior Pastor no longer able to fill dual roles and therefore have that control.
They pledge to develop a system that will “include more people in the selection and appointment of director” so that members can have the freedom to vote against their boss if needed and “include a greater diversity of gender, age, geography, and racial background” and set term limits. As a result of these changes, six members have either resigned or have been transitioned off the team, leaving only five members left, with a goal of getting back to ten in total.
The Complaint Review
This is an assessment of Hillsong’s process for complaints against their pastors, including a high-level review of the complaint process, to “meet with an interview board members and staff members involved in the complaint handling, to look into conflicts of interest, to review and support the support provided to complainants and respondents, and assess the skills required to undertake the complaint handling process.”
Hillsong asked an outside organization for recommendations to improve the pastor’s code of conduct and establish “fitness for ministry processes to work through complaints against pastors.” They likewise emerged with five recommendations, all which were adopted.
The first: Hillsong says they want to move away from being a “discipline and restoration process for pastors, to actually being an inquiry into the fitness of a person to be credentialed.” They want to have less of a “disciplinary approach” and focus instead on “providing the church with a safe environment. “
The second: “form a new body within the church to handle complaints relating to credential pastors. This new body will have functional independence within the church. This means that no person within our church will be able to influence the outcome of any complaint.” Some of the practices to implement include:
Have a single point of contact. Ensuring notifications to authorities are done when required. Provide support options for the complainant, such as pastoral support, counselling and psychological support. Ensuring investigators clarify the complaint, identify evidence, and witnesses support the complaint. Ensure pastors are invited to respond to the complaint and ensure pastors are provided with procedural fairness. Obtaining a written report from the investigator identifying a range of possible outcomes for pastors when complaints are upheld, including counselling, placing conditions on, or suspending or revoking credentials.
The third: complaints about the Global Senior Pastor should be outsourced to an external and independent investigator rather than handled internally.
The fourth: have an “overall approach to credentialing to a single credentialing body and implement a program of psychological assessment for future candidates for ministry.”
Lastly: develop a program to provide ongoing accountability and support for their credentialed pastors.
Explaining that “In so many ways, our system failed in 2019” Hillsong says that the review highlights a “shift away from language which focuses on a discipline and restoration processes” and instead on “making an assessment of a pastor’s fitness for ministry. That is evaluating whether or not they should be ministering to others.”
Disappointingly, Crouch says that despite all the bad behavior by the board over the last decade, they are not going to investigate members or instances of scandal and error, but rather want to move forward, content that acknowledging their failures ought to be sufficient and put things to rest, but perhaps they will relent and grant it, despite being completely disincentivized from doing so:
As current chair of the board, I want to sincerely apologize to you, the church, Hillsong Church. For us having failed to develop systems that you can trust. We must do better moving forward. And we intend to.
Some of you may have come tonight expecting to hear the details of a forensic review of the past actions of individual board members. We know that our systems were inadequate. We know that in the past, the board makeup had too many executive members who were forced to try and balance the conflict of being both staff member and board member. We know that until changes were made to the constitution earlier this year, only a few had power to control the makeup of the board.
A forensic examination of the individual board members actions will only provide us with evidence of the inadequacy of our systems. That said, it’s my commitment to you that when our new board is in place, I will ask the board to examine all the evidence and consider whether they believe a forensic examination of past board members actions is warranted, if they decided is, I will not stand in their way from commissioning an independent investigation and responding to the findings as they see fit
Nine months ago Hillsong Atlanta officially launched its first service. Joined by rapper Da’ T.R.U.T.H. performing a hip-hop and rap worship set while flanked by Hillsong head honchos Brian and Bobbie Houston who made the trip from Australia for the grand opening, the congregants cheered for their new pastor, Sam Collier, who was being lauded for being the first African- American man to serve as lead pastor of a Hillsong church.
Yesterday, Collier announced that he was resigning from the pastorate in light of the slew of scandals, including the sex scandals that saw Hillsong head honcho Brian Houston likewise resign, explaining:
“My greatest reason for stepping down as Pastor of Hillsong Atlanta is probably not a secret to any of you. With all of the documentaries, scandals, articles, accusations and the church’s subsequent management of these attacks it’s become too difficult to lead and grow a young Church in this environment.
I have no shame in admitting I cried like a baby moments after I informed the Hillsong global pastor of my departure. I truly love the Hillsong family and believe they will get through this storm and come out better than they were before.
In what will sure to be a catastrophic loss for the budding church, Collier said that this week’s coming service will be his last, and then he is launching his own church in three weeks for Easter Sunday, He will likely take almost the entire church with him, all but guaranteeing the shuttering of Hillsong Atlanta.
Collier said he will reveal the details of the new church on Sunday.
Collier has a wild theologcial past, including spending years as Youth Choir Director in a church where the Senior Pastor was the openly pro-choice, openly pro-LGBT, heresy-spewing, Planned-Parenthood-endorsed Democrat Senator, Dr. Raphael Warnock, and then several years at Bishop Eddie Long’s megachurch – a prosperity gospel heretic who preaches wretched blasphemies about name-it-and-claim-it, speaking realities into existence, little god theology, and multiple sex scandals. Later he joined up with Andy Stanley for several years until he was tapped by Hillsong head honcho Brian Houston to lead the new plant, even though Collier has no seminary training and a horrific Christian pedigree.
In light of the announcement, interim Global Senor Pastor Phil Dooley told Collier in a video message: ‘We just want to give you guys our absolute blessing for the next season that you feel to step into…I just want to say from us to you- God bless you.”
Hillsong was founded by Houston and wife Bobbie in 1983 and has grown to over 30 campuses and 150,000 members. Rocked by sex financial scandals in America over the last two years, with Carl Lentz in NYC and later shutting down Hillsong Dallas after it was revealed Pastors Reed and Jess Bogard were spending money like drunken pirates.
All throughout the turmoil, Houston appeared as the apologetic face, expressing his dismay at sadness at the way his organization let people down and promising to do better, being seen as a steady hand that could guide them through though this present crisis.
But then it was revealed that he was embroiled in his own sex scandals, with at least two instances that we we know about. One of these involved sending a staff member flirtatious messages about a decade ago. “It was along the line of, ‘If I was with you, I’d like to kiss and cuddle you,’ words of that nature.” The second one was more recent, and it involved a visibly intoxicated Houston spending almost an hour in a woman’s hotel room alone with her, after a Hillsong conference at Qudos Bank Arena in 2019, with Dooley explaining that Houston violated Hillsong Pastor’s Code of Conduct.
During the meeting with Hillsong pastors and members, Dooley revealed that Houston handed in his letter of resignation at 4:00am this morning, ending nearly 40 years as the face of the church. Dooley reiterated that “we honor them for what they have done” and told members:
“Irrespective of the circumstances around this we can all agree that Brian and Bobbie served God faithfully over many decades and that their ministry has resulted in millions of people across the world being impacted by the power and grace and love of Jesus Christ. We are extremely grateful for all that Brian and Bobbie have given to build His house.
…We acknowledge that change is needed. We have committed to an independent review of our governance structure and processes.”
Furthermore, a letter posted to their website reads:
An audio recording between Hillsong founder Brian Houston and Church executives has leaked, revealing that disgraced Pastor Carl Lentz, who cheated on his wife with model Ranin Karim, had engaged in multiple sexual affairs and committed adultery with many women, and not just with the one that was known, with Brian Houston saying “It was more than one affair, they were significant. And at least some bad moral behavior had gone back historically”
The meeting, which was recorded around November 19, took place between founder Houston, church executives, and top donors. During the meeting, Houston rips Lentz six ways to Sunday, describing him as possessing:
general narcissistic behavior, manipulating, mistreating people, I think sometimes other hurtful things, the breaches of trust… constantly lying.
In fact, Houston describes how Lentz was spiraling and that he likely would have been terminated even before the adulterous affair came about.
[Carl was a] difficult man to have any kind of direct conversation with, because it was always defensive, it would always be put back on the other person, as though they’re the ones with the problem. And so they were not easy meetings, and I was already at the point at the end of summer that I felt like (unintelligible) Carl and Laura’s time in New York was coming to an end.
And then of course what actually happened was Tolu [Hillsong East Coast Chief Operating Officer Tolu Badders] had a conversation with one of the staff members, and that staff member had found a very compromising chain of text messages on Carl’s laptop or computer. And so that person went straight to Tolu. And Tolu, to her credit, the first thing she did was call me. I knew it was an urgent call because it was very late at night, and you know she needed to talk, and we did talk, and then the next day Tolu spoke to John.
In what would have been an extremely difficult thing to do, John and Tolu drove straight across town to talk to Carl and confronted him, and that was the beginning of the process where we’re at the point where we are now…
It was more than one affair, they were significant. And at least some bad moral behavior had gone back historically, but not necessarily those affairs. I can honestly say before God the first time I heard any moral complaint against Carl was when Tolu contacted me, and so if anyone’s wondering whether this was something we knew about, no it’s not.
In the meeting, members also discuss that Lentz will likely be getting a very hefty severance package, though it appears in part to help out Laura and the kids:
We’re working on a severance package which we’re negotiating with them on…
They haven’t accepted that at this point in time.
We are trying to care for them as far as they are letting us care for them. And certainly our heart is to look after the children, to look after [Lentz’s wife] Laura, and even Carl who needs a lot of help.
And the purpose of that is really to get them the help they need, and to help them through this difficult process, to work on their marriage.
We’re doing a lot of stuff behind the scenes, it’s not anything we’re going to promote publicly.
The Lentz’s, however, don’t seem to be hurting for money after recently their home for $1.5 million dollars and moving into a $16,000 a month beachfront home.
This is breaking news and we will update this post accordingly as we transcribe more of the audio to get the most clarity and context possible.
