By Joe Garofoli
San Francisco Chronicle
January 24, 2009
http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2009/01/24/DDV815FN8S.DTL&hw=church&sn=002&sc=662
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| Ted Haggard, sermonizing at New Life Church in 2002, four years before being ousted as a result of a scandal involving sex and drugs. Photo by Andy Rogers |
It will be impossible for many not to feel at least some schadenfreude watching the new HBO documentary "The Trials of Ted Haggard" that premieres Thursday, and Haggard knows it. It is a portrait of the disgraced conservative evangelical Christian leader and friend of the Bush White House in exile, and a pathetic exile at that.
After admitting in 2006 to buying methamphetamine from a male prostitute and confessing to "sexual immorality" amid accusations that he had a sexual relationship with the man, the Colorado pastor who once led the 30 million-member National Association of Evangelicals was banished from the state by church leaders and told not to publicly discuss his story. He resigned from the NAE and was stripped of his pastorship of the 12,000-member New Life Church in Colorado Springs. Haggard once was a staple of cable news shows, but for the past two years his large-toothed, wide, ever-smiling mouth has been silent.
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| Alexandra Pelosi shot "The Trials of Ted Haggard" after making a previous film about evangelicals. Photo by Phil McCarten |
With only a high school education - he called his college degree in "English Bible" worthless in the secular world - and his name a toxic Google search, the only job he can get is as a traveling health insurance salesman. After several scenes of schlepping his family from motel to rented home of a friend to cramped apartment in a moving van, he eventually looks at the camera and says, "I'm a first-class loser." He didn't think he could tell anyone his secret because he was afraid he would be ex-communicated and abandoned. "All that happened," he says. "And worse."
Over the phone a few weeks ago, Haggard, 52, says he realizes that some people will see his life spiral, recall his anti-gay marriage views and condemnation of homosexual behavior, and say he deserved it.
"I think they're right," Haggard told The Chronicle. "I think I did deserve it. I betrayed a trust. I did things that were not consistent with my role or my own belief system. So when people call me names or when people are harsh, that's justice. When people are kind, I think that's a gift."
But the 41 minutes that filmmaker Alexandra Pelosi creates out of a series of moments with Haggard shot during his exile has a more ambitious aim. The Emmy-nominated ("Travels With George") documentarian and San Francisco-raised daughter of House Speaker Nancy Pelosi aims for a tale of forgiveness and understanding, and an examination of the duplicity of the church's teachings of forgiveness.
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| Ted Haggard talks to his wife, Gayle - he says now that he is content in his relationship with her. Photo by Nora Feller |
"Why the gay men and women of S.F. should forgive Ted Haggard is because there's nothing wrong with being gay," says Alexandra Pelosi, 38. "The Christians are condemning him for being gay and that's not who we are. We liberals are supposed to forgive that and say it's OK."
The point, Pelosi said, isn't whether Haggard is gay or not. (She says she thinks he is "somewhere in between, and I know my gay friends hate when I say that.") It is that while organized religion preaches forgiveness, at Haggard's darkest hour, they turned their back on him.
Haggard says he hasn't heard from any big-name evangelical leaders - or anyone from the Bush administration - since his fall. Only Chuck Colson, the chief counsel for President Richard Nixon who became an evangelical Christian in prison, reached out to him, he said. (However, the New Life Church paid Haggard a year of severance pay and $26,000 toward health insurance for his adult disabled child.)
Not in San Francisco
"He's battling his inner demons and he went through publicly what lots of Americans go through privately," Pelosi said. "Maybe not in San Francisco. You can be out and happy there in San Francisco. But not in a lot of other places in America where sexuality is a big thing."
What makes the movie compelling is how it was made. "I like to say I stole this film from Ted," Pelosi said.
Pelosi got to know Haggard while making her 2007 documentary about evangelicals, "Friends of God: A Road Trip With Alexandra Pelosi." She took his downfall personally "because he helped me understand the evangelical world. So I was confused. I was like, wait a minute, you told me all of those things, does that mean you were just saying all of those things?"
Pelosi was visiting her sister in Scottsdale, Ariz., a few months after the scandal broke when she learned that Haggard lived nearby. Her husband, Michael, wondered if Haggard's old cell number worked. Haggard picked up the phone. Pelosi and her husband, who had also grown to know Haggard, found themselves at his home for nine hours that day discussing what had happened.
She continued to visit him, and brought her video camera. Haggard invited her to go on job interviews with him and later on health insurance sales calls. There are no sit-down interviews or talking heads in the film, just what appear to be home movies of some of the lowest moments of his life. Once, Pelosi films her husband helping Haggard move yet again.
"I love that you come from a church of 12,000 people and the day you have to move you have no one but my husband to help you move," Pelosi recalled. "It's one of those weird ironic moments where you say, 'Oh my god, I have to film this.' "
She showed a 10-minute teaser of the snippets she had to HBO leaders, who suggested adding some background context to turn it into a short documentary. Then she called Haggard and asked him to come to New York with his family to see it. After checking with his children, he agreed that HBO could air it.
Why?
Answering questions
"Since I wasn't allowed to speak to the press, there's been a huge accumulation of questions and speculation and legitimate concerns have risen up. And I thought the documentary said so much," Haggard said. It was the first time he had seen much of the press coverage - or the reaction of his congregation after he left. And he knows there are some who will think he is using the documentary - and resulting press interest in him breaking his silence - to vault back into public life.
"I just want to answer questions now," he said. "That will create some spotlight type things. If that develops, I'll try to be responsible with it, honest with it. If that doesn't develop, I'm trying to build an insurance business. And I'm OK with that. I didn't ask HBO to do this."
In the film, he talks about how the church could have used his story as an example of how to preach forgiveness. But churches are a business, too, he said, and he acknowledged that he was bad for business. He said the church told him to "go to hell."
"No question," Haggard said. "I became a major liability for them. But I betrayed them first."
Didn't Jesus say turn the other cheek when you're struck?
"He did, but things like that are things that you have to say, I can't say it," Haggard said. "You're on the right track. But I can't say those things or it's me the sinner being judgmental about others. You're seeing it. You're on the right track. I just need to just be grateful. This isn't spin. This is me trying to get my heart in line. Because I've been through hell."
Asked if he's had any wayward sexual experiences since his exile, Haggard responded with an answer that sounded a bit rehearsed.
"I have thoroughly discussed my sex life with my wife and my therapist," he said. "I am very pleased with where I am today and I am completely contented with my relationship with my wife."
And is she?
"You'll have to ask her," Haggard said, and laughed.
The Trials of Ted Haggard: Documentary. 8 p.m. Thursday on HBO.
E-mail Joe Garofoli at jgarofoli@sfchronicle.com
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