Story 02

In 2011 I had been married less than a year to a young man I’d met in church. By the time we married we were both on staff at an AG church. Me as the children’s ministry assistant, & he as the full time media director. This was the only boyfriend I’d ever had. Our first kiss was at the marriage altar. I got pregnant a month into marriage. We needed more income due to baby-related expenses, so my new husband began working for a secular litigation support company making media for the courtroom. He did that full-time & switched to part-time media director for the church. Shortly before my due date I quit my job in order to be a stay at home mom. Within 2 weeks of my due date, my husband lost his secular job, escorted out by police. He convinced me he was being persecuted and was fired over the owner’s love of money. Within days, he lost his part-time job at the church. Again, he was the victim. 

Fast forward years later, it’s found out that my husband was actually fired from his secular job due to suspected child pornography. The boss at his secular job notified the church, & that he why he was fired from that job. According to my husband, the senior pastor of the AG church we grew up in & were on staff at advised him to not tell me he was being investigated for child pornography if he was innocent. 

I was kept in the dark for years. Over many years I found things out in bits & pieces. The city police investigated & found probable cause with a need to continue the investigation in the county we lived in. The investigation was turned over to an investigator with the county. The next thing known is that that investigator is no longer with the department, & the file was lost. The AG church did report my husband, & eventually my husband did admit to his intentional viewing of child pornography.

He is now my ex husband. We separated in 2015 when he was fired from his children’s pastor job at a non-denominational church for child pornography. That church said they would pay for therapy for him as long as we agreed to not discuss why he was fired with any church members. They were afraid of a church split. My ex husband has still never faced legal consequences for his actions. Sometimes I wonder what would have happened if the church followed Biblical procedure for his correction instead of valuing the reputation of their “ministry” over their church. I felt that my children & I were thrown to the wolves. 

There are many more details, & the abuses from my ex-husband continue even today. This Monday we go for yet another custody battle. But this is my story in a nutshell. 

My children & I are still involved in church, but not either of the churches that my ex-husband was fired from. Due to other behaviors, I’m too afraid to ask the pastor of the AG church if he really did advise my ex-husband to not tell me he was being investigated for child pornography. My lawyer talked to him, though, & said “he had a curious case of amnesia & didn’t remember why [husband] no longer worked there.”