Defrocked pastor promoting documentary about own gay sex scandal

[ccharles000]

http://www.365gay.com/news/defrocked-pastor-promoting-documentary-about-own-gay-sex-scandal/

(Washington) Disgraced evangelical leader Ted Haggard has agreed to help promote a new documentary following his life in exile after a 2006 gay sex scandal - no longer bound by an agreement with his former church that prohibited him from talking publicly about the events that led to his downfall.

“The Trials of Ted Haggard,” directed by Alexandra Pelosi, daughter of U.S. House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, is set to air next month on HBO. Haggard has agreed to take part in publicity for the project, HBO said.

“We look forward to presenting the film, Ted Haggard and his family at a press tour in Los Angeles next month,” a spokeswoman for the cable network said Wednesday.

Haggard’s latest return to the public eye comes after he re-emerged last month at a rural Illinois church, where he delivered guest sermons and said he was sexually abused as a second-grader.

Haggard, 52, resigned as president of the National Association of Evangelicals and was fired as senior pastor of New Life Church in Colorado Springs, Colo., in November 2006 after a former male prostitute went public with allegations that Haggard paid him for sex and used methamphetamine.

A married father of five, Haggard said he bought the drugs but never used them. He confessed to undisclosed “sexual immorality” and has said, “I really did sin.”

In February, New Life Church announced that Haggard prematurely ended a “restoration” process designed to help him heal.

[rockymountaindem]

1. This whole thing has been so surreal

Some people just don't have the decency to quit before they get farther behind. This guy's (former) church is 3 minutes from my house. Lots of my neighbors go there. He's the last person they want to talk about. In a way I feel bad for him, being stuck in a belief system which contradicts an important part of who he evidently is. But, of course, that didn't mean he had to buy meth from the "masseur" or continue to expound on the virtues of the traditional family while he knew he was living a lie. Yes, he wasn't in a good situation internally but he's also a hypocrite extraordinaire, so he gets no tears from me.

I think I speak for this whole city when I say we wish he'd just move out of town.

[ColbertWatcher]

2. I wonder why he's agreed to do publicity for this movie?

Is it because it doesn't question his belief that gays can be "cured," and if so, why is Pelosi (who seems to want to be taken seriously as a documentary filmmaker) is involved in it?

It doesn't seem to me to be a film that can sit on that fence for very long.

I would be interested to see how a "documentary" juggles Haggard's self-hatred and Pelosi's progressive cred.