What’s at Stake Depends on Who You Are
Rumors and the persistent problem of power and boundaries among religious leaders
“Woman, thou art loosed,” a liberating declaration spoken first by Luke’s Jesus but more frequently associated with American megachurch pastor T.D. Jakes, was a linguistic fixture of my Evangelical-Pentecostal upbringing. Made iconic by “America’s Bishop,” the phrase gave life to what emerged as a brand — from a popular sermon to a well-attended annual women’s conference, best-selling book, and film.
While 2023 marked the conference’s last year — with Jakes encouraging followers to attend instead Woman Evolve, a conference hosted by his daughter Pastor Sarah Jakes Roberts — the message of “Woman, Thou Art Loosed” has cemented Jakes in the minds of many as a proponent of women’s empowerment and God’s redemption. No matter a woman’s past — or the past of any person for that matter — there was no wound that God could not heal, no bondage from which God could not deliver. For Jakes, redemption and rebirth are always possible, a message he has faithfully preached for years and one that foreshadows what he may now need.
Albeit limited by his moral myopia, Jakes’ typically compassionate approach, especially toward those with whom he disagrees, parts ways with purist hardliners. Such champions of myopic morality often rush to judge those who defy their behavioral proscriptions, pronouncing judgments that teeter on outright degradation of their opponents’ humanity.
Even the repentant can appear to be stained forever, but not so in Jakes’ world of redemption, forgiveness, and compassion — of which examples abound. Once counting himself among them, Jakes has long cared about people living in poverty as we see in his latest work on the housing crisis in Texas, Georgia, and Florida. In the recent past, Jakes invited pro-choice politician Beto O’Rourke to his Dallas church — to the chagrin of O’Rourke’s opponents.
Years prior, the bishop publicly “softened” his stance toward same-sex marriage, confessing that while his “message” that marriage is a union between a woman and man had not changed, his “method” had. Before that, he exercised what he called “restorative grace” toward his stepson Jermaine Jackson, who was arrested for indecent exposure in what some understood to have been a same-gender cruising encounter in a public park.
All of this to say, one reasonably could have read Jakes as a religious leader who, while limited by moral myopia, cares about the vulnerable and exploited on the one hand and the accused and judged on the other hand. Yet, we live in a world where defenders of the vulnerable and exploited can all too easily become exploiters themselves. And chief dispensers of redemption one day, a privileged position in the Christian world, can find themselves hoping for the very salvation they preach about the next day.
Surely a case and point is the unfolding controversy involving accusations circulating on social media that Bishop Jakes was a frequent guest at Diddy’s sex parties, had sex with men, and may be guilty of sexual abuse — never mind hypocrisy and deception.
Shortly after the bishop denied these allegations in no uncertain terms, cultural commentator Larry Reid cautioned that Jakes would have been wiser to stay silent unless he was truly certain that his innocence was irrefutable. One got the sense that Reid might know more than he was letting on. And sure enough, he eventually claimed just that.
Within days, a friend of Reid, Manasseh Jordan, a minister popular within Pentecostal and Charismatic Evangelical circles and son of the well-known Archbishop E. Bernard Jordan, posted a video to his Instagram account with the caption “2024 is the year of exposure.”
Jordan shared that in his early days in ministry he had been subjected to grooming behavior by an older, well-regarded minister, and asserted that it was God’s will for the harm to be named now: “The abuse of power within the church and with certain leaders will now be judged categorically.”
Whether Jordan was mystically inspired by God, socially encouraged by the examples set by Cassie and Christian Keyes, or empowered by the broader #metoo reckoning, his disclosure was brave, as is every truth spoken by someone about their experience of harm — especially against the backdrop of the particular Christian world of which Jordan is part.
It did not take much for followers to connect Jordan’s experience with accusations against Jakes, though Jordan did not mention his name in that video. Reid reposted Jordan’s video on his more highly trafficked Instagram account, and later released his own video making explicit the link between Jakes and Jordan: “Everything he discussed in this video, he experienced it at the hands of Bishop T.D. Jakes, and he told me it was Bishop T.D. Jakes.”
As could be expected, the responses — both to Jordan’s claims and earlier ones regarding the bishop’s connection to Diddy — have been diverse, revealing that what is at stake depends on who you are. As of the writing of this piece, no credible evidence of Jakes’ alleged wrongdoing has become publicly available, making the disparaging comments said about him akin to innuendo, hearsay, and rumor. (Curiously Jordan has named a “TD” as the grooming culprit but has not yet disclosed whether he is speaking about Bishop T.D. Jakes.)
Yet rumors have a powerful function, revealing crucial fault lines. They expose what we believe to be true (confirmation bias) and what we couldn’t possibly imagine could be true (consensus bias). They become reflections of our own experiences, inner demons, and hopes. They may say more about us than they do about the factual truth.
Rumors are manifestations of the collective unconscious, representing hidden, often-deeper truths that we may experience as too challenging or painful to face directly. In a way, rumors are always true, not because they are always factual but because they reflect something true about the state of human affairs. Rumors, whispers, and hushed voices, can provide an indirect pathway into our individual and collective shadows. In the Evangelical-Pentecostal world, the connection between silence, rumors, sexuality, and power is strong and enduring.
While some social media respondents went back and forth on whether to believe the claims or not, others rose above the fray to point to a broader truth. A respondent replied to Reid’s video on Jordan’s experience, “Grooming, Greed, and Manipulation”:
One thing I am disgusted with seeing are all of the “why now” comments and questions. When that becomes the main concern, it further produces fears and anxieties while simultaneously placing a muzzle on those who have been violated; and it is unfair. Imagine going through this at the point of violation, again when you do share, then again when it becomes public…🤧🙏🏼
This respondent highlighted the courage required to speak out about one’s own experience of harm, especially when the alleged harmer is a beloved public figure, anointed by adoring religious followers as well as politicians and celebrities alike. The respondent chided those whose automatic dispositions of skepticism make it harder for people to name the harm they have experienced — and ultimately further compounds the harm. Another respondent ended their comments with a clear expression of love and support for Jordan: “My God, prophet I’m so sorry that happened to you 🙏🏽🙏🏽🙏🏽🙏🏽🙏🏽🙏🏽.”
Some appear chiefly concerned with defending the bishop’s moral integrity and protecting his reputation against what they consider to be unfounded accusations and, ultimately, defamation of character. In response to Reid’s post, a respondent said:
Bishop TD Jakes has always been a man of integrity…. The law enforcers have already come for him. They dug in every rat hole they could to find some dirt on him. The church finances, his personal finances, the family’s finances…. If there was a thing about anything they would have exposed it then. He’s a squeaky clean black man doing well with himself and better than them.
Evoking the bishop’s racial identity conjures images of him as a victim of a kind of gendered anti-Blackness, of forces that have always mobilized against the lives of Black men. After all, there is a long history of Black men being falsely accused of sexual abuse. Yet, to be clear, there are light years between Emmett Till and Clarence Thomas.
For some, it is hard to hold in a single frame the possibility that a victim can also victimize others. In the land of rumors and unchecked loyalty, it is not Jakes’ innocence that should worry us as much as it is the inability or unwillingness of loyalists to accept the mere possibility of guilt.
But even defenses, upon closer inspection, can be more complex. Pastor Sheryl Brady, co-pastor with her husband to a church that is part of Jakes’ umbrella of congregational affiliates, took to her Instagram account right after the initial allegations surfaced:
I had no idea how God would use @bishopjakes and @seritajakes to change the trajectory of my life. They saw the best in me. They saw gifts in me that I didn’t even know were there. Not only did they see them, but they nurtured my gifts, grounded them, groomed them and ALWAYS made room for them. Thank you my Bishop, my First Lady, my Father and my Mother in the Gospel, for seeing into the future and taking so many of us into it with you! I, for one, would not be who I am, or where I am without your LOVE and your VOICE. I will cherish you both FOREVER. ❤️For that past 34 years, I’ve watched you blaze the trail, open doors and set the standard. I firmly believe that OUR best is still ahead of us.
Brady’s post can be read in different ways. Her assertion of gratitude can be interpreted as a statement of solidarity with the bishop and her belief in and willingness to defend his innocence. In this way, her post could function as a silencing or invalidating mechanism — her statement being true and all claims to the contrary being false.
Her use of the word “groomed” asserts the word’s horticultural and spiritual implications rather than its sexual and abusive ones, which could be understood as a deft rhetorical sleight of hand. Such a statement of solidarity would not be novel. Powerful people, regardless of identity or experience of marginality, often protect powerful people — and, as we know, identity is not ethics.
Yet Brady’s post could also be read less as an affirmation that Jakes possesses a moral integrity beyond reproach and more as a statement of commitment to see the bishop’s humanity regardless of the harm he may have done. In this way, her post could function as reassurance, not that she would follow Jakes unthinkingly, but that she would be there, should it all crumble, to help him pick up the pieces — that she would help him become accountable. This possibility is worth noting because all parties who are involved in a situation of harm need support — including harmers.
Accountability is hard, harder still if there appears to be so much to lose by practicing it. So while support is an ingredient of accountability, support for those who have harmed others should not mean an uncritical disposition. Rather, it should be the kind of tough love that pushes a person to own the harm they have caused and to commit to the work of repair, knowing that they will receive help and encouragement along the way. The fear of isolation — what we might call shame — is often a barrier to accountability, and love can be the antidote.
Yet love can cut both ways — it can secure us in our delusions or it can wrest us into grappling with truth. One would hope that if Jakes is guilty of sexual harm or predatory behavior, he would draw on the love of his community to step into moral courage, own his impact, and start the long road to repair.
As a conflict mediator, I’ve learned that conflicts are rarely only about the presenting issue; doctors often say the same about symptoms. Issues open up into other issues and symptoms become signs pointing to deeper sicknesses — begging for root cause analyses.
Conflicts often manifest in concentric circles. In this case, Jakes is as much a man as he is a symbol — the man as an individual in the innermost circle and the man as a symbol in the outermost circle. Jakes is an individual man with particular experiences, histories, and relationships who clings to the notion of his innocence while others cling to the idea of his guilt. His individual situation remains ambiguous and unresolved.
Yet Jakes is also a symbol standing in for a much wider contestation involving gender, sexuality, power, abuse, truth, and the church, which is why the rumors have circulated in the first place and why so many responses have proliferated as a result. Whatever the fate of Jakes as an individual, a wider, always-overdue reckoning within the church is necessary.
From Jimmy Swaggart to Eddie Long, from Ted Haggard to Jamal Bryant, the Evangelical Church in the United States is no stranger to scandals involving sex, sexuality, deception, and abuse — one of the latest involving darling of the 24/7 prayer movement, Mike Bickle. As one commenter on Reid’s post said, “Well Church ⛪ here we go again in 2024.”
In this world, the near-deification of religious leaders mixes with patriarchal masculinity, strident heteronormativity, racialized undertones, and exacting moral standards to which proponents themselves seem unable to adhere, to create a brutal cocktail of misery. So much suffering follows — and always has.
As one videoblogger put it: “TD Jakes wouldn’t have needed to find a safe place to be himself in Puffy’s dungeons if the black church embraced queer leaders. Christianity as a religion creates villains by making ‘the world’ the only safe place you can be yourself.”
Rather than just a problem in the “black church,” the gender-sexuality-racial politics of the church more broadly — be it Mainline Protestant, Evangelical-Pentecostal, or Roman Catholic — needs desperately to be exchanged for a true, liberative politics of Jesus.
Different theologies of what it means and looks like to speak for God notwithstanding, the church has often conceived of itself as the channel, arbiter, or facilitator of God’s voice in the world. The assumption is that the church, in fact, listens to God and is good at doing so.
Yet one wonders which god the church listens to most frequently. Could it be that the problem of abuse, domination, and deception within the church is connected to the failure of the church to listen truly — to listen to the voices of those Matthew’s Jesus calls “the least of these”?
Could it be that true reckoning and healing begin by listening — more expansively than we have and less restrictively than some say we should?
More than what we say, we are transformed by what we hear, a hard truth in particular for powerful ministers who regularly don sacred garbs to speak God’s word rather than to listen to it.
A dear childhood friend, a white Evangelical man, once skeptical of the claim that systemic racism exists, was shaken by the murder of George Floyd in 2020. It sent him on a listening tour, where he engaged with the voices and experiences of people who his upbringing had deemed unworthy of his attention. Following his listening tour, he texted me a reflection that moved me to tears and that reminded me that positive change — even transformation — is always possible. Here is what he wrote:
I know you and I talk about a lot of things but we don’t talk much about this kinda stuff but I feel really bad for what’s going on in this country and world with how much people of color are being oppressed. It’s not right and it hurts my heart and outrages me. None of the ppl [sic] who have been killed over the past months have deserved that no matter what they might have done. They’re human beings and they deserve better. I know I’m [sic] might be saying all of the right things but I want you to know that I’m trying. I look up to you in this area of speaking for the people who don’t have much of a voice. Sometimes I find myself jumping to judgment to [sic] quickly and I’m reminded of my friendship with you and a few others and I check myself because of the things you’ve taught me. Again I love you and am grateful to have you in my life.
As one of my favorite writers, Arundhati Roy, reminds us, “Another world is not only possible, she is on her way. On a quiet day, I can hear her breathing.”
What’s at stake, then, depends not only on who you are, but also on who you want to be.
Jason Craige Harris is a writer, educator, facilitator, and strategist specializing in crisis, conflict, and repair. He studied religion, ethics, and culture at Yale Divinity School and is on the board of Hidden Water, which organizes restorative justice responses to the impact of child sexual abuse. Jason lives in Brooklyn, New York.
