As a minister, I am very much aware of pain and betrayal that people experience in life. People feel betrayed by their jobs and so they talk to their pastor who helps them resolve issues and possible find a new job. People are betrayed in some marriages or through divorce and once again they seek spirtual counsel from the man or woman of God who tries to help them find a new grip on life and what direction they are going. Some even feel betrayed by God for the loss of a loved one or a infant child, once more the pastor is called upon to show spiritual leadership, love and concern for all involved while attempting to navigate that broken-hearted Christian back to the feet of Jesus and yet building a better and stronger relationship with the Lord.

The only question that I have is where does this super-human pastor go when he or she is challenged in a specific area? He cannot go to the sheep that he has preached to day in and day out. And depending on high up the food chain he/she is, they cannot talk to just anyone or everyone just as I am sure that Spitzer had his own time to reflect. I would like to see the Church and the community as a whole remember some of the good acts that he/she might have done. Remember when you wandered into the church, rejected by the world, bruised in the hands of men who claim to be your brothers and sisters.

Some pastor somewhere, did not reject you in all your filth but lovingly and patiently took his or her time and cleaned you up. Suddenly, you could face the world that rejected you. You moved from drug addicted to CEO, from girlfriend abuser to a wonderful and caring father and husband. From maybe a prostitute to a woman with a voice, all the time that pastor invested his time and his life to ensure that you could have a better one.

I am not an advocate for Haggard but I will say this much is that powerful men and women need an avenue that they too can vent what is their deepest pain and greatest challenge. The church needs to not readily throw them out, but try as much as it is possible to work with them and make them accountable for their actions as well as make room for possible mishaps and give them credit when they do right and rebuke them when they do wrong. I refused to watch the interview on Oprah as I am tired of the news parading what everyone is doing wrong, what about what they have done right? What about the impacts that they had made before their fall.

I can never forget Spitzer, the young prosecuting attorney in the late 1990s when large financial brokers were emblezzing the monies of retirees and individuals who were just starting out in life. I was one of them whose inheritance was emblezzed and I remember Spitzer telling me that he will do everything to get the culprits and they would be persecuted to the full extent of the law and he did what he promised that day. You see I did not have enough money to ride up to New York to witness what happened but something about him made me believe that he would do right by me and everyone else who lost money.

So forgive me if I am not quick to cast the stone at men or women who have fallen short, when what they have done and achieve speaks volumes more than the nasty pen of a writer or the rate crazed individual who wants high ratings. Maybe I will start watching documentaries when someone talks about what the person did before the fall and how the person needs to be helped so that they can continue and become better than what they were. Until then, I think I will let the Lord judge and we might be surprise to find out who comes out on top.

Of course you are right that everyone, even (and most especially) people at the highest levels, need someone to go to, to vent to, to seek counsel from. But Haggard's fundamental problem in the eyes of his own religion isn't that he DID something wrong, and needs to learn to behave more righteously. It's that he IS something wrong. A core aspect of his being is viewed as sinful, an abomination. There's no way to square that circle without leaving his version of his religion (although there are plenty of Christian churches who would welcome him). He can stay celibate, and try to pray the gay away from now until he dies, but he'll still be a gay man. This tragedy will be repeated as long as powerful churches stubbornly cling to an ancient view of this particular aspect of human morality.

Pastors have a choice. Many crave recognition and respect and so they hide their weaknesses. But they can reveal them to other Godly men and women. The can seek counsel and accountability from other leaders in the church. If the pastor is the only leader in the church than you have a problem right there. I don't believe that God ever intended his church to be lead by superhuman pastors who had to struggle against sin by themselves. It is impossible because superhumans don't exist. Pastors need to humble themselves. As to you babybear you are wrong in general and in this specific case your arguement is ridiculous. Even if Haggard was heterosexual he is a liar, arrogant, philandering, and he uses meth.

In the ground like most everyone else.

It'd be easy to end up distanced from their support group via pride and shame etc.

You ask why folks don't focus more on the good that these people have done.
A "club" that I used to associate with had a saying:

"The Good we do nobody remembers
The Bad we do nobody forgets..."

I was just gonna say "Away".