Infamous Scandals

by Anne Williams

  Isaac Haight and John Lee were excommunited from the Church and in 1874, a grand jury indicted nine men for their part in the massacre. Although most of them were eventually arrested, it was only Lee who stood trial and was executed for his part.

  Family members of the men who masterminded the attack suffered as well, as neighbours ostracised them or put curses on them. The Paiutes also suffered for their part and the massacre left an indelible blot on the history of the region. Although it is obvious today that there were great efforts to cover up the massacre, no one is really sure just how involved the higher Church leaders were in trying to hide the atrocity. Whatever the answer, the discovery of the bones in 1999, complicated an already controversial subject. The discovery has once again stirred up deep emotions in the descendants of both the victims and the villains.

  A reburial of the bodies was attended by hundreds of descendants of the victims and survivors of the Mountain Meadows massacre, as well as descendants of the Mormon militia. There was a definite tension in the air with thoughts of reconciliation, but feelings still run very deep.

  Jack Hyles

  Jack Hyles was a leading figure in the Baptist church, pastoring the First Baptist Church of Hammond in Hammond, Indiana. His literal interpretation of the Bible often put him at odds with his fellow Christians, but that was nothing compared to the scandal that broke about his private life in the late 1980s. For a man who was supposed to stand as a shining example to his followers, his behaviour has been described as ‘a clear violation of the Scriptures’.

  a life in the ministry

  Jack Frasure Hyles was born on 25 September 1926 in Italy, Texas, a rather run-down area south of Dallas. His early years were tough, by his own admission, but by the age of 18 he was drafted into the US army and served as a paratrooper with the 82nd Airborne Division. During World War II he met and married Beverly, and as soon as the war was over he entered the East Texas Baptist University to pursue his dream of entering the ministry. After graduation Hyles started to preach at several small Texas churches, and through his popularity the congregation grew rapidly.

  In 1959 Hyles moved to Hammond, Indiana, and took the position as pastor to the First Baptist Church of Hammond. When he first arrived the church had a congregation of around 700, but several people soon started to leave because they didn’t like the new pastor’s style of preaching. Unperturbed, Hyles soon led the church into an independent status and his congregation gradually escalated to around 20,000.

  In 1972 Jack Hyles founded the Hyles-Anderson College with financial assistance from Russell Anderson, which specialised in the training of Baptist ministers and Christian schoolteachers.

  One of the most notable achievements of Jack Hyles was his church bus ministry. Its purpose was to reach the ‘lost souls’ who weren’t able to get to his church, and soon his buses were penetrating all the surrounding communities. Boys, girls, mums and dads all came to hear Hyles preach as a result of hearing the gospel while riding on his church buses.

  He became known as ‘Brother Hyles’ and received many accolades during his 50 years in the ministry, but he has also been the subject of much controversy and criticism regarding his and his family’s un-Christian behaviour.

  allegations

  In May 1989, Victor Nischik, a former deacon of the First Baptist Church, , made allegations against Hyles. He accused him of being a ‘cult leader’ and claimed that he had been having an affair with his wife, Jennie, for many years. Jennie was Hyles’ assistant. Nischik, who was an accountant for the church, also accused Hyles of questionable financial dealings. He is believed to have given Jennie over $100,000 over 20-years in addition to her own salary.

  Despite Hyles denying all the allegations, Nischik claimed that he had alienated his wife from her family. He also said that even with this knowledge, Hyles continued to keep Jennie in his employ and have close and intimate contact with her in his offices behind locked doors. Nischik also claimed that Hyles took Jennie on long car rides, often staying in hotels overnight without either of their spouses being present.

  Jack Hyles apparently had plenty of opportunities to try and clear his name, and yet he repeatedly refused to meet those who accused him face to face. Hyles’ response to the allegations made by Nischik was to expose the man as being a womaniser and a homosexual who had no right to condemn others.

  As if that scandal wasn’t enough, there was also a lot of moral allegations being spread about the behaviour of Hyles’s son, David. It was claimed that despite the fact that he knew his son was a womaniser, he actually recommended that he be given his own pulpit to preach from at Miller Road Baptist Church, allegedly using his own position to further his son’s ministry. By doing this, he deliberately allowed a man who had problems loose on a congregation, which resulted in the near destruction of the church. It is believed that David became involved with at least 19 women from the congregation.

  David Hyles was also under scrutiny for the death of baby Brent Stevens while in the care of Brenda Stevens and David himself. After his divorce from his first wife, David went to live with Brenda and her child. Rumours were rife that Brenda had posed for pornographic pictures in Adam and Chicago Swingers magazines, allegedly for an advertisement for group sex. After David married Brenda ,Brent, Brenda’s 17-month-old son by a previous marriage, was found battered to death at their home. At the coroner’s inquest, Brenda failed to turn up, while David pleaded the Fifth Amendment. (The Fifth Amendment gives all citizens accused of major crimes the right to have their cases contemplated by a grand jury before being brought to trial.)

  David and Brenda had a son together and called him Jack David Hyles, but Brenda ran him over with the family car when he was just five years old and killed him. She claimed that her son had fallen out of the car and she couldn’t avoid running him over. In June 2003 David Hyles was kicked out of the Pinellas Park Baptist Church in the Florida Keys, this time over a sex scandal involving nine other women. Despite all these problems, David Hyles still continues to make speeches in churches regarding the growth of Sunday Schools and their importance in achieving youth awareness.

  Even with all the scandal surrounding the Hyles family, their followers refused to believe what was being said about them. Robert L. Sumner, a Christian author, Baptist pastor, evangelist and editor of the fundamentalist newspaper called The Biblical Evangelist was vilified when he broke the code of silence and published what he knew about the sordid events. One of the congregation even went as far as to say, ‘If you criticise my preacher I’ll ripe your face off!’ That was the incredible power that Jack Hyles had over his flock.

  another scandal

  In March 1993 the First Baptist Church of Hammond was the subject of yet another scandal. A. V. Ballenger, who was a deacon and one of the bus drivers for the First Baptish Church of Hammond, was accused of molesting a seven-year-old girl in 1991 during a Sunday school class. Possibly the most damaging of these witnesses was Ballenger’s own 17-year-old niece, who said that he had touched her private areas while she lay feigning sleep in a bed at her uncle’s house. She claimed that she would often spend nights at his house as she was the same age as Ballenger’s own daughter. Along with his niece there were three other witnesses when the case was brought to trial, two of whom were women who had claimed to have been fondled by Ballenger. One was a 21-year-old student at Indiana University, who said she had visited Ballenger’s home a number of times when she was much younger, because her own mother and Mrs Ballenger were close friends. Another witness was a 20-year-old woman from the Columbia Center public housing project in Hammond, who told how she used to ride the bus to the First Baptist Sunday School. Ballenger was the bus driver, and on more than one occasion she found herself alone with him on the bus and he would run his hand inside her dress and fondle her private areas. All three of the victims said they had not reported the incidents when they were younger because they were scared what people would think of them and they doubted anyone would be
lieve them anyway.

  Although Ballenger tried to indicate that the witnesses were all ‘crazy’ and didn’t know what they were saying, he was convicted in March 1993 and sentenced to five years in jail.

  Jack Hyles, who of course testified on behalf of Ballenger, defiantly tried to declare the outcome of the trial as null and void, claiming that the courts had no jurisdiction in matters of the church. Ironically, Hyles spoke to the girls’ parents and told them, ‘Deacon Ballenger just likes little girls!’

  sued for negligence

  As if Jack Hyles and his church had not been condemned enough, on 3 October 1997 they were once again the subject of a scandal in Hyles’ church. Hyles and his church were sued by the attorney of a mentally disabled woman and her sister for negligence with respect to sexual assaults that are alleged to have taken place over a six-year period. Hyles was accused of simply standing by while the woman was raped by two or three males. At the time another church member had also watched without taking any action to protect her. Apparently this was not the first time that the matter had been reported to the police, but no criminal charges were filed on either occasion.

  Jack Hyles died on 6 February 2001, aged 74, from complications following heart surgery. Despite all the scandals surrounding his years with the church, he is still remembered fondly and is often referred to as ‘their pope’. He is survived by his wife, their four children, his sister, 11 grandchildren and four great-grandchildren.

  What did Jack Hyles say about his alleged wrong-doings? His response was that sin does not need to be repented of, only forgotten saying, ‘We don’t even have a right to remember our sins.’ [Hebrews 10:17]

  Jimmy Swaggart and Jim Bakker

  In the late 1980s two of the largest figures in TV evangelism were destroyed due to sex scandals. The two men concerned were Jimmy Swaggart and Jim Bakker, both of whom were very popular in the Christian Broadcasting Network which broadcast TV programs with a large, and loyal following.

  jimmy swaggart

  Jimmy Lee Swaggart was born on 15 March 1935 in Louisiana. Swaggart was the cousin of two famous recording artists, Jerry Lee Lewis and Mickey Gilley, and Swaggart himself loved to sing and play the piano. His parents were both Pentecostal evangelists, and from an early age the young Swaggart would preach on street corners and lead congregations in singing. In 1952, when Swaggart was just 17, he married Frances Anderson and they had one son, Donnie, who also became a minister.

  Swaggart became a full-time preacher in 1958, and spent his early years travelling around spreading the word. In 1960 he started to record some of his gospel music, but he also found another easy way of reaching people – through Christian-themed radio stations. By 1969 Swaggart had his own radio programme called The Camp Meeting Hour, which was aired over several different radio stations throughout the Bible Belt in the United States.

  From radio Swaggart advanced to television and, under his established ministry the Assemblies of God, he quickly became the most popular television preacher in the United States. The Jimmy Swaggart Telecast was regularly watched by as many as two million people. In fact, there seemed to be no end to Swaggart’s popularity. In addition to his television broadcasts he had his Jimmy Swaggart Ministry headquarters in Baton Rouge, Louisiana, and 4,000 followers at his Family Worship Center. He also had a printing and mailing production plant, a television production company, a recording studio and his own Bible College. However, Swaggart’s world was soon to crumble beneath his feet, but not before he spilled the beans about a rival evangelist, Marvin Gorman.

  hypocritical behaviour

  In 1986 Swaggart discovered that fellow Assemblies of God minister, Marvin Gorman, was having an affair with one of his congregation. The following year, Swaggart released fire and brimstone on another rival evangelist, Jim Bakker, regarding his misconduct. Swaggart dug the knife even deeper by appearing on the Larry King Show and describing Bakker as a ‘cancer in the body of Christ’.

  Gorman was incensed by Swaggart’s revelations and decided to retaliate. He hired a private detective to follow Swaggart. This paid off when the detective found Swaggart in a motel in Louisiana with a prostitute by the name of Debra Murphree and managed to take photographs of them in an embarrassing situation. Before showing the photographs to the officials from the Assemblies of God, Gorman decided to give Swaggart the chance to come clean. He went to see him and showed him the incriminating photographs, but Swaggart refused to be blackmailed. Gorman went straight to the officials and showed them the evidence, and Swaggart was suspended from broadcasting his television programme for a period of three months.

  The following Sunday, Swaggart appeared before a congregation of 7000 people at Baton Rouge. In a truly dramatic act befitting that of an accomplished actor, he broke down in tears and confessed his ‘moral failure’ without giving details of his indiscretions. ‘I have sinned against you and I beg your forgiveness,’ he sobbed from the pulpit. Of course his confession was even more scandalous since he himself had already denounced the behaviour of his fellow evangelists, knowing full well that he was not exactly ‘squeaky clean’.

  Four days later, Debra Murphree appeared on a television programme in New Orleans, stating that Swaggart was a regular customer, although they never actually engaged in the sexual act. He liked to pay her to take her clothes off while he simply watched.

  Swaggart, who felt he was far too important to heed the ruling of the officials, decided to broadcast his programme as usual. He said, ‘If I do not return to the pulpit this weekend, millions of people will go to hell!’ The officials, believing that he was not fully repentant by disobeying their ruling, immediately defrocked him, removing both his credentials and ministerial licence.

  caught again

  On 11 October 1991 Swaggart was caught in yet another tryst with prostitute Rosemary Garcia. The couple were pulled over by highway police in California for driving down the wrong side of the road. When the police questioned Garcia, she told them that she had been propositioned by Swaggart, who had pulled over to her side of the road.

  ‘He asked me for sex. I mean, that’s why he stopped me. That’s what I do. I’m a prostitute,’ Garcia told them. However, this time instead of being repentant, Swaggart told his congregation quite blatantly, ‘The Lord told me it’s flat none of your business!’

  aftermath

  Directly after the latest scandal, Swaggart’s son, Donnie, told his father’s followers that he would be temporarily stepping down as head of the Jimmy Swaggart Ministries, as he needed time to ‘heal’. Although the ministry’s revenue was greatly reduced following the scandal, Swaggart returned to preaching and he and his son still continue to broadcast to 30 different countries.

  jim bakker

  James Orsen Bakker was born on 2 January 1939 in Muskegon, Michigan. Like, Swaggart, he was a minister with the Assemblies of God with his then-wife, Tammy Faye Bakker. Their career in the Christian Broadcasting Network began in 1966, when the Bakkers joined Pat Robertson, but their audience at the time barely reached into the thousands. However, through their enthusiasm the Bakkers managed to build the show’s popularity and using a variety show format, made The 700 Club one of the most successful and longest-running televised evangelist programmes ever.

  Taking their success with them, the Bakkers left for California in the mid-1970s and soon built a name for themselves with their very popular show The PTL Club. By the early 1980s the Bakkers’ empire was growing rapidly with their own theme park, Heritage USA, and a satellite system to distribute their network 24 hours a day. Their revenue was enormous and their lifestyle was one of greed, glitz and pure shamelessness, topping it all with ‘his and hers’ gold Rolls Royces.

  the empire falls

  In March 1987 it came to light that Bakker had had a sordid affair with a former model, actress and church secretary, Jessica Hahn. Apparently, Jim had paid her $265,000 of the ministry’s money to keep quiet about the affair, and that he had allegedly raped her. T
o add to the scandal it was known that homosexuality was also rampant within the PTL studio, with a leading evangelist, John Wesley Fletcher being caught in the act of giving oral sex to a man in a room at Bakker’s own mansion. It was also alleged that Bakker had been seen naked with three of his male staff in the steam room at his house, and that they had been fondling one another. Whatever the truth about Bakker’s homosexual activities, the Hahn scandal was enough to start his empire crumbling.

  When the scandal broke, the media started to question his lavish lifestyle and excessive spending. It was eventually disclosed that Bakker had actually defrauded his ‘flock’ out of $158 million by overselling the shares in his religious theme park. Some of the money had been used to satisfy his own pleasures and in 1989, Bakker was convicted of fraud, tax evasion and racketeering. Bakker was sentenced to 45 years in federal prison.

  In 1992 the couple were divorced at the request of Tammy Faye,, just after a court commuted his sentence to 18 years. However, after serving only five years of his sentence, Bakker was released in 1993 for good behaviour.

  a new start

  When he was released on parole Bakker had expected people to ‘spit on him’ but instead, and to his surprise, he was welcomed back into the flock with open arms. In fact, Billy Graham bought him a house and a car and helped him start a new life for himself. When Bakker addressed a Christian leadership conference in 1995, he received a standing ovation from 10,000 clergymen.