Mars Hill pastors only exposed Driscoll’s abuse after his empire faltered

Evidence

MARK DRISCOLL WAS PERHAPS the clearest embodiment of militant evangelical masculinity in the early 2000s. Ruling his Mars Hill empire with military discipline, he inspired a generation of conservative pastors and young Christian men. But in 2013, his empire started to come undone. The first sign of trouble came with accusations of plagiarism. Then came World magazine’s revelation that his church had spent $210,000 to buy his book Real Marriage a spot on the New York Times Best Sellers list. Only then, when Driscoll no longer seemed invincible, did twenty-one former Mars Hill pastors have the courage to come forward to accuse Driscoll of an abusive leadership style, of lacking self-control and discipline, of being arrogant, domineering, quick-tempered, and verbally violent. — Kristin Kobes Du Mez, Jesus and John Wayne, 618

Categorization

• CANDY: The detail that a church spent $210,000 to buy a New York Times bestseller slot is a striking, tweetable fact.
• SEED: Driscoll’s fall as a case study in how patriarchal authority systems shield abusers until external collapse reveals them — an essay on the sociology of whistleblower courage.