UNITED STATES
The Daily Beast
David Sessions
A pastor whose family was murdered in New Mexico belonged to a large association of evangelical churches that, critics allege, stands behind misbehaving pastors and looks away when they are accused of sexual abuse and other misdeeds.
Greg Griego, who was slaughtered along with his wife and children, allegedly by his 15-year-old son, Nehemiah last week near Albuquerque, was a beloved minister. A born-again gang member, he seemed to serve anywhere he would be had: as a minister in Albuquerque’s fire department, at a detention center, and in the prison ministry at Calvary Albuquerque, a megachurch affiliated with the Calvary Chapel network of over a thousand similar churches. After allegedly committing the horrific crimes, Nehemiah reportedly spent hours hanging around Calvary Albuquerque, telling church members his family died in a car accident.
The Albuquerque massacre wasn’t the first time lately that a Calvary Chapel-affiliated church found itself part of a grim news cycle. Calvary is one of several large evangelical denominations beginning to draw national attention as lawsuits pile up over abuses allegedly covered up by pastors and church leaders. Over the past decades, Calvary has been plagued with accusations ranging from unaccountable leadership to covered-up sexual abuse, raising questions similar to those faced by Roman Catholic hierarchy about what kind of role the church’s top leaders were playing behind the scenes.
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