Sex? Who Had sex? a.k.a. The First Time I Met Pastor Tom
Pastor Tom (not his real name) was easily the most screwed up individual I met during my time as a Christian. That guy had more issues than anyone else I knew both in and out of the church. Let me tell you about the day I first met him.
Not long after I joined Richmond AOG, I started dating a girl who was very shortly after to leave the church. I was trying to be a good Christian but she wasn't. She had just come out of a sexually active relationship with another guy in the church and was looking, I suppose, for someone to continue exploring her sexuality with. We ended up sleeping together twice. I was racked with guilt but she wasn't. To be honest, I was really surprised by her lack of remorse and, realising she wasn't the kind of girl I should be with if I wanted to try and live some semblance of 'holiness', we broke up.
A few weeks later, Pastor Tom , who was then one of the youth pastors, called me and said he wanted to meet, get to know me and have a chat. He came by in his car and picked me up and we went for a drive. For a few minutes we talked about my Christian conversion, my background, and a few other things of a similar topic. He then asked me about the girl and if I had been seeing her. I said that I had but that we had broken up. He then asked a few benign questions before finally getting the crux of the matter, the real reason why we were on that drive. He asked me if I had slept with her. Now I was new to the church and didn't know this pastor at all. I also didn't understand how it was any of his business and figured it was a moot point anyway as she and I had stopped seeing each other. So I lied and told him we had never had sex. He asked me if I was sure. I said I was. He then headed the car back to my house and the drive was over only a few minutes later. I got out of the car a little shaken having not expected the interrogation. Sure I was upset with myself on one hand for having lied, but at the same time I glad to have deflected whatever would have come had I admitted to the sexual realtionship.
Many years later I reflected on this episode and realised that Pastor Tom was not interested in me as a parishioner or getting to know me as a new member of his youth group. Rather, he was solely interested in the sexual nature of my relationship with the girl. Who knows how he had
even heard about me having had sex with this girl. I guess the rumour finally reached his ears, or maybe some well meaning parishioner reported the rumour to him. However he found out, he took it upon himself to get to the bottom of it. Pastor Tom made an appointment with me, drove to my house, feigned interest in my story...all to find out where my penis had been.
All this makes me wonder, why did he need to know or even ask any questions? Was he trying to keep his youth group 'clean' of sexual immorality and thus preventing Satan from getting a 'foothold' in his group? This doesn't make too much sense as he already knew the relationship was over. Was he somehow titillated by thinking about a young girl (or boy) in his youth group 'doing the do'? Was he concerned about someone in his flock having broken the rules? After all, nothing is of greater importance than the breaking of the rules, and nothing is of greater importance than the breaking of the sexual rules.
I was only 20 years old when this happened and I handled it the best I could at the time. I now wish I had simply said, "That is defintiely none of your business. Thanks for the drive Tom but how about you drop me home now and piss off!"
A few weeks later, Pastor Tom , who was then one of the youth pastors, called me and said he wanted to meet, get to know me and have a chat. He came by in his car and picked me up and we went for a drive. For a few minutes we talked about my Christian conversion, my background, and a few other things of a similar topic. He then asked me about the girl and if I had been seeing her. I said that I had but that we had broken up. He then asked a few benign questions before finally getting the crux of the matter, the real reason why we were on that drive. He asked me if I had slept with her. Now I was new to the church and didn't know this pastor at all. I also didn't understand how it was any of his business and figured it was a moot point anyway as she and I had stopped seeing each other. So I lied and told him we had never had sex. He asked me if I was sure. I said I was. He then headed the car back to my house and the drive was over only a few minutes later. I got out of the car a little shaken having not expected the interrogation. Sure I was upset with myself on one hand for having lied, but at the same time I glad to have deflected whatever would have come had I admitted to the sexual realtionship.
Many years later I reflected on this episode and realised that Pastor Tom was not interested in me as a parishioner or getting to know me as a new member of his youth group. Rather, he was solely interested in the sexual nature of my relationship with the girl. Who knows how he had
even heard about me having had sex with this girl. I guess the rumour finally reached his ears, or maybe some well meaning parishioner reported the rumour to him. However he found out, he took it upon himself to get to the bottom of it. Pastor Tom made an appointment with me, drove to my house, feigned interest in my story...all to find out where my penis had been.All this makes me wonder, why did he need to know or even ask any questions? Was he trying to keep his youth group 'clean' of sexual immorality and thus preventing Satan from getting a 'foothold' in his group? This doesn't make too much sense as he already knew the relationship was over. Was he somehow titillated by thinking about a young girl (or boy) in his youth group 'doing the do'? Was he concerned about someone in his flock having broken the rules? After all, nothing is of greater importance than the breaking of the rules, and nothing is of greater importance than the breaking of the sexual rules.
I was only 20 years old when this happened and I handled it the best I could at the time. I now wish I had simply said, "That is defintiely none of your business. Thanks for the drive Tom but how about you drop me home now and piss off!"
4 comments:
I love your blog, but I can't help being pedantic about "begging the question". I know the tide of language is unstoppable, but here you go anyway:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Begging_the_question
Agreed, superfluous and cliched language... Edited. Thanks.
I know this is waaay late, but this is what I believe to be true. He himself was involved with the girl in some way, probably a perversion of his "helping" her with her issues. Not only do I think this because a lot of crazy, power-hungry psychos go into the ministry, but because this happened to my husband and a girl he dated in high school. Some sick crap out there.
Hey I've only just read ya post and man I know some of those tools from that church and other churches associated. Ive been picked up in a car, asked a bunch of questions about my sins n dropped off again. I wonder if we've experianced the same Ps Tom. Maybe?
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