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CHRISTIAN BREAKING NEWS: Paul Pressler, Former Southern Baptist Leader and Republican Activist Accused of Sexual Abuse (June 4, 1930 – June 7, 2024) [#PaulPressler #PaulPresslerDeath]

Pressler, one of the most powerful evangelical preachers of the last 50 years, died 6 months after settling a high-profile lawsuit with a former member of his youth group.

Paul Pressler, a legendary Southern Baptist leader and Republican activist at the center of a huge sex abuse scandal, died on June 7.

He was 94.

It is unclear what caused Pressler’s death, but he was laid to rest on Saturday in Houston, TX.

Pressler was one of the most influential, if lesser-known, evangelical figures of the last half-century, co-leading a Southern Baptist Convention movement that pushed the nation’s second-largest faith group to adopt literal Bible interpretations, strongly condemn homosexuality, and align more closely with the Republican Party.

His death occurred just 6 months after he confidentially settled a high-profile case with a former member of his youth group who accused him of decades of rape.

As part of the lawsuit, at least 6 other men came forward, alleging that Pressler assaulted or sought sex from them in a series of episodes spanning 1978 to 2016.

Pressler rejected the charges and was never criminally charged.

Despite Pressler’s monumental legacy, his death was mostly unknown until Saturday, when a Baptist media reported on the memorial event.

The Southern Baptist Convention conducted its annual convention last week, and no leader appears to have mentioned his death.

Herman Paul Pressler III was born in Houston in 1930 and attended New Jersey’s prestigious Phillips Exeter Academy before attending Princeton University.

After graduating from Princeton in 1952, he enrolled at the University of Texas at Austin’s law school and, at the age of 27, was elected to represent a Houston-based district in the Texas House.

He was later chosen by Texas Governor Dolph Briscoe to a powerful seat on the 14th Court of Appeals, where he served for 14 years.

While on the bench, Pressler helped plan and lead the Southern Baptist Convention’s “conservative resurgence,” a 20-year power struggle in which Pressler and his allies drove more moderate Baptists out of the denomination, successfully pushed for female pastor bans, and solidified white evangelical support for the Republican Party.

Pressler was also an early member of the Council For National Policy, a clandestine network of prominent economic, religious, and media elites that has pushed the Republican Party toward deregulation and the greater infiltration of conservative Christian values into public affairs.

President George H.W. Bush nominated Pressler to oversee the Office of Government Ethics in 1989, but his nomination was later withdrawn.

From 2000 onward, as the struggle for the SBC was won, Pressler became actively involved in Republican Party politics.

Louisiana College announced plans for the Judge Paul Pressler School of Law in 2007, however it did not open owing to financing and accreditation issues.

The school’s trustee board featured Family Research Council chairman Tony Perkins and David Barton, a Texas activist who has long asserted that church-state separation is a “myth.”

Mike Johnson, the school’s dean, was later elected Speaker of the United States House.

In 2012, when Mormon Sen. Mitt Romney led the Republican presidential race, Pressler assembled some of the country’s most powerful Christians to his West Texas ranch, encouraging them over 2 days to support fellow evangelical Rick Santorum.

In 2013, the Texas House recognized his contributions to the conservative, Christian movement with a resolution presented on the chamber’s floor.

A year later, Pressler joined the advisory board of incoming Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton.

Pressler was also an early and prominent supporter of Ted Cruz’s Senate campaign and presidential bid in 2015.

As Pressler continued to wield political power, he allegedly raped, groped, or solicited at least 6 men, including one who claims he was 14 when he was sexually molested while a member of Pressler’s youth group.

Those charges were laid out in a 2017 lawsuit, which also accused important Southern Baptist leaders and churches of concealing or enabling Pressler’s activities, which they denied.

The complaint prompted a large 2019 investigation by the Houston Chronicle and San Antonio Express-News, which discovered that more than 400 Southern Baptist church leaders or volunteers had been charged with sex crimes since 2000.

The series sparked SBC reforms, as well as an ongoing Department of Justice investigation into the denomination’s handling of sex abuse allegations.

Pressler had been a member of Houston’s First or Second Baptist churches for virtually his entire adult life.

NEWS SOURCE & LINKS:
Texas Tribune

PAUL PRESSLER, FORMER SOUTHERN BAPTIST LEADER, REPUBLICAN ACTIVIST ACCUSED SEXUAL ABUSE (1930-2024) | Christian Breaking News!