Monday, June 25, 2007

Pedophile pastor in Winston-Salem

Another alleged pedophile pastor has been arrested. This time the Reverend Rodney Keith Boothe was arrested for a having sexual relationships with two teenaged boys. The charges are intense:

Boothe was charged with six counts of sexual offense by someone in a parental role, 12 counts of statutory rape, four counts of indecent liberties with a child, one count of third-degree sexual exploitation of a minor and one count of attempted first-degree sexual offense.

What bothers me about these situations is the ease with which one becomes a pastor or reverend. It seems like one only need appear on the steps of a church requesting a job.

Booth was a pastor at the Greater Church of Deliverance. It is not clear if he abused his pastoral privilege while employed at the church. In this case, his Church is rapidly distancing itself from any association with him. Alvin Marshall, the COO, had these comments.

“He was at one time, a period of time ago,” Marshall said. “Those allegations and accusations - none of it occurred at our church. While he was a part of our church, it did not occur.”

Deconstructing this bit of misinformation - the specific acts of abuse did not occur on church property. I may be cynical, but this seems... somehow wrong.

5 comments:

The Exterminator said...

MoJoey:

You're probably gonna think I'm a big pain in the ass for doing this, but I'm tagging you.

Anonymous said...

Wait, what? Churches have COO's? WTF! Shows you how little I know about running a church eh?

Another nutjob close to home.

Anonymous said...

I know Mr Boothe and the total and complete truth will come out about this story. Just wait and see. Don't believe any and everything you hear or see on the news!

contact me at zipnada7@yahoo.com

Anonymous said...

I pray that this is not true. Remember that we are all innocent until proven quilty. We are praying for all parties involved.

Anonymous said...

I know Pastor Boothe personally and this is all a bunch of bullshit..excuse my french. He would never in a million years do anything like this. I know and believe he is a man of God and would never hurt any child. He has children of his own. God doesnt like ugly and the person or persons accusing him of these crimes are liars and will have to answer to a higher power when its all over with