More Ecclesiastical Cover-Ups

https://coreyjmahler.com/adolf-hitler-christian/

I already touched on this issue a couple of years ago when LPR's Issues Etc. chose not to cover a story of an LCMS minister caught up in the attempt to overturn the 2020 election in favour of Donald Trump.

I didn't realize, but the same year LPR (Lutheran Public Radio) also chose to ignore a scandal surrounding a Hitler apologist within the LCMS. Corey Mahler was subsequently excommunicated. Reading his essays is pretty eye-opening but what is most striking to me is that his arguments are basically reiterations of clerical statements made at the time of Hitler. And what is even more striking is to see how contemporary American Evangelicalism is headed right down the same path. And yet as evidenced by the likes of Trump zealot Eric Metaxas - they're about the last people on Earth to realize it. I would add to the mix someone like Gene Edward Veith who has consistently (and since the 1990's) promoted the lie that fascism was a left-wing movement. He wrote several pulp books on the topic during the context of the Clinton presidency and I imagine did very well for himself as a result.

Of course the silly thing is Mahler doesn't have a Left-wing bone in his body. He's Far-Right and every Neo-Nazi, Bircher, Klansman, and modern fascist is more likely to look to the Republican Party - particularly that of Trump. The same was true during the Cold War when the GOP worked hand in glove with many ex-fascists from the war era.

I had to laugh listening to Chris Arnzen (of Iron Sharpens Iron) melt down over this Left/Right issue in a recent interview. The same phenomenon of Holocaust denial and Third Reich revisionism is emerging from within Calvinistic Baptist circles. I give kudos to Arnzen for have the courage to cover it and name names - but his own understanding of these issues is inadequate. Like Veith, Goldberg, and others on the Right, he has bought into the lie that World War II-era fascism was Left-wing and as such he cannot account for these Right-wing Baptists crossing the line and become Nazi sympathizers and apologists. To make sense of it he's had to create a a nonsensical category - Right-wing Woke.

If it wasn't so tragic, the only response is to laugh.

It's also worth noting that Doug Wilson's Canon Press has also published some of their works - works that may not have been explicit in their sympathies but were at best borderline. And given that their sympathies have subsequently become clear, it's noteworthy that Wilson has not felt the need to put any distance between himself and these men.

If LPR is trying to cover pertinent issues to the benefit of its LCMS audience, why would it ignore the Mahler scandal? Aside from the honesty and integrity which would require them to report on it - don't you want people to know? Shouldn't people be aware of what's emerging within the confines of their denomination? Why cover this up? If this about protecting and whitewashing the institution then all I can say is - LPR is a joke and completely untrustworthy.

And on a related note, I solved something of a puzzle regarding Reformed Forum. Several years back there was a rising star within their circles, an OP (Orthodox Presbyterian Church) pastor named Glen Clary that seemed to specialize in issues related to ecclesiology, worship, and so forth. I have to say, I never really cared for his opinions or teachings. I found his thinking to be unsound and less than Reformed. Not that this matters to me in particular but I thought it odd given the Confessional orientation of the website and the Christ the Center podcast. As one who (at one time) was fully committed to Confessional Reformed theology, I still take interest and it certainly raises my eyebrows when I hear non- and anti-Confessional positions being advocated.

Suddenly he just disappeared. I couldn't figure out what happened to him. And then I noticed in New Horizons (the OPC newsletter) than he had dissolved (or some other carefully worded bureaucratic term) his relationship with his congregation in Texas. Very odd, I thought. What's the story? Had he found something better? Had he gotten into some kind of trouble?

You couldn't find anything. It was like he disappeared. Now, I'm very familiar with Presbyterian practices and tendencies toward secrecy and cover-ups and I wondered if this wasn't the case?

Every once in a blue moon I'd look him up and see if anything turned up. I must have tinkered with my search terms or parameters because I recently stumbled in a discussion thread that provided the answer. He converted to Eastern Orthodoxy - but Reformed Forum has nothing to say about - at least nothing I've seen on their website. I did have to chuckle when just recently Camden Bucey did a series on Eastern Orthodoxy. Clary shows up in the YouTube comment thread - challenging some of the arguments and suggesting that Orthodoxy cannot be understood from without. He notes that he 'speaks from experience'.

He's not the first to swim the Tiber or the Bosphorus. There's been quite a few over the years and some suggest the tempo has increased as of late. I don't know but by all accounts Orthodoxy is growing rapidly as is Traditionalist Catholicism. How many of these converts are coming from the Reformed world? I don't know. I personally have known of some New Calvinist-types that turned to Rome and I've certainly interacted with plenty that have considered Orthodoxy.

But my question is - why cover this up? Isn't this a powerful teaching moment? The sins of elders are supposed to be declared before all. I grow tired of this 'circle the wagons' institutional-driven thinking that puts denomination or 'ministry' above everything else - including integrity. When I see this kind of stuff, all I can say is - it stinks.

And it destroys trust. It makes the leaders of these 'ministries' seem more like salesman than shepherds - men who think more about image and the bottom line than really promoting the kind of discernment that they claim.

See also:

https://pilgrimunderground.blogspot.com/2023/08/lprs-issues-etc-ignores-indictment-and.html