The church that Min pastored operated without a board of elders or denominational oversight, which allowed him to create a system with few checks or balances. I would guess the numbers will continue to collapse keep up the good work PCA. Dr. Min J. Chung is the founding and lead pastor of Covenant Fellowship Church, an In contrast, a team of whistleblowers have alleged that the incident was sexual assault. The Korean Central Presbytery called it sexual harassment.. He is the ultimate judge who will make right all wrongs and the one who will both save and destroy. We know this may cause pain for many people, and we deeply regret that CFC has chosen this path.. A Presbyterian oversight group refused to defrock a Korean American minister following allegations of sexual misconduct, reports Ministry Watch. The motion requires two-thirds vote. Copyright 2023 Christianity Daily. But its especially disappointing because now theyve shown that they do have the tools and resources to make better decisions.. WILL and the Illinois Newsroom are committed to bringing you in-depth, relevant coverage that keeps you informed and engages you with our community and state. They were also concerned that other victims may exist, she said. Sin has real and lasting consequences and should be dealt with appropriately with discipline and repentance, not in spite of the gospel, but precisely because of it. Join with thousands of others to keep this important public media-based resource available to all. The SJC decision stated there can be no reasonable hope of just proceedings with no cooperating victim, although Chung himself had admitted to sexual misconduct. } WILL and the Illinois Newsroom are committed to bringing you in-depth, relevant coverage that keeps you informed and engages you with our community and state. The victim was suicidal and traumatized by her initial and continuous interaction with Pastor Min, the friend stated in testimony included in the report. } In your pain and in your healing, may you be comforted and strengthened by the presence of Christ, your advocate, your protector, and your savior. He was in his own words his neighborhood's "all-purpose Asian" and did not feel he had a culture of his own. Pastor Kim also promised that church leadership would add more layers of accountability and would humbly listen, learn, and grow so we can be a healthier church moving forward.. Web1215 W. Lambert Rd. } Some members of the allegation group also said they lacked confidence the KCP would handle any future cases differently, given the ties many of the pastors had to Chung. Powered by Church Plant Media He also spoke at youth and college-aged events, counseled university students, and preached in several countries. Chung founded the church in 1990 on the University of Illinois-Champaign Urbana (UICU) campus and welcomed students to join. Chung showed Minari to his parents around Thanksgiving 2019, a couple of months before its Sundance premiere. } At the same time as former and current members of CFC were being interviewed by GRACE, the case against the figure at the center of the controversy Min Chung made its way through the PCAs judicial system. She says he then began to force himself on her and pull his pants down until she pushed him off and ran into the bathroom, locking the door until he left. Last weekend a sermon by Evangelical pastor Francis Chan went viral, as in the sermon Chan shared about Communion and his discovery of the scriptural and historical basis for transubstantiation - that the bread and the wine become the literal Body and Blood of Christ. . URBANA A former assistant pastor at a Champaign church has been criminally charged with sexually assaulting a teen who was a member of the congregation. Anne Rhee (not her real name) recalled when she began to kiss a male friend from church. .mytheme-mejs-container .mejs-time-loaded, WBEZ uncovered multiple other allegations against CFC, including pastors at the church making sexual comments to teen girls, church officials brushing off women who were sexually assaulted who went to them for help, and an overall culture that diminished women. Chung was also an adjunct professor at Urbana Theological Seminary from 2005 to 2018. Despite the procedural errors, the SJC also declared the case would effectively be terminated and not sent back to the KCP to be retried. Even though many doubt that enough change has happened, some are finding healing beyond CFC. tricked into sending Asian Texans drivers licenses to fraud scheme, Everything Everywhere All at Once nearly sweeps SAG Awards, Elon Musk uses Asians in defense of Dilbert creators remarks about Black people, Michelle Yeoh wins SAG Award for best actress. LeCroy said victims of abuse, who cannot get redress via the means provided by the church or denomination, can take to various means to seek justice. We remind him to abide by the BCO (Book of Church Order), and we believe that he should return to ministry.. In addition, CFC vowed to be clear and transparent with members by providing regular updates on the probe on its website. At that meeting, however, the KCP instead considered a motion to rescind the April 2021 judgment and to hold a retrial, according to a July 15, 2021, statement from the presbytery. .mytheme-mejs-container .mejs-button > button { For almost 20 years, Chung kept the alleged sexual assault from church leaders and his wife, Park said. Commissioners for the Presbyterian Church in America approved a motion to leave the National Association of Evangelicals on Wednesday at the PCAs, The Presbyterian Church in Americas (PCA) highest ecclesiastical court is taking over a case allegedly mishandled by an Indiana presbytery, a letter, The Rev. .mytheme-mejs-container .mejs-time-float-corner, } Covenant Fellowship Church is nondenominational, has no elders, and is not a PCA member. .mytheme-mejs-container.mejs-container, We lost our church family and community, she said. Meanwhile, Chung maintains a presence and continues to attend KCP meetings, according to sources. Former members of Covenant Fellowship Church (CFC) of Champaign-Urbana, Illinois, where Chung pastored, say the whole church system breeds abuse. We at the SOLA Network respect and believe in the due processes of member denominations; we encourage the work that our PCA brothers are pursuing to bring the appropriate denominational actions for proper discipline. And in August, CFC hired GRACE. After that, he was The churchs website says that as of July 2021, CFC is under the leadership of Reverend KJ Kim and a lay oversight board and is in the process of particularizing or becoming a fully organized church with the Presbyterian Church in America (PCA). transform: translateY(445%); The decision came before an investigation by WBEZ of Pastor Min Joshua Chung of the Covenant Fellowship Church on the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign campus. Chung is also accused of covering up accusations of sexual abuse against a fellow pastor as well as admitting to inappropriately touching a female congregant for a The report accuses Chung of orchestrating a cover-up of sexual abuse allegations against another Korean-American pastor of a church with close ties to CFC. Although banned from preaching at CFC by the Korean Central Presbytery in which he was A July 13 vote narrowly missed that threshold, with 22 in favor of rescinding the decision, 12 against, and one abstaining. Those who looked deeper discovered sexual misconduct and abuse of power by Chung, former long-term church members, pastors, and leaders state in a 67-page report released to The Roys Report (TRR). To Thyatira: Hold Fast What You Have Until I Come | Revelation 2:18-29 (Pastor Min Chung) joe 2019.02.19 43. CFCs main ministry is to the students at the University of Illinois and the church recruits heavily during new student week, said Tim Ma, former CFC member and 2014 Illinois graduate. 500K PCA and other conservative denominations. In September 2019, a member of the new leadership team, Pastor KJ Kim, said Chung had admitted to touching a female over the clothing for a brief moment about 20 years ago but had immediately stopped when she asked him to, per a recording obtained by WBEZ. Pastor KJ Kim acknowledged that Chung has been accused of a pattern of abusing his authority. A year later, the group of 14 whistleblowers submitted their report to the PCAs Korean Central Presbytery and called for the KCP to investigate Chung, arguing CFC associate pastors had failed to discipline him, said Park. Chung began private counseling sessions with the victim, using that time to urge her to keep silent about the assault, the report states. Follow her on Twitter @estheryjkang. Yet whistleblowers, who knew about the alleged assault, pressured Chung for a decade to confess to the church. TRR reached out to Min Chung for comment, but he did not respond. We are accountable to our congregation and the denomination that has charge over its leaders and we believe that this is best for our church and its future. Check out our new Instagram account. Sean Park, who said he experienced hazing and burnout at CFC, said hes finding his way to a healthy relationship with God. The report doesnt offer explicit details of the incident, but states that the touching was in a way that could be constituted as sexual assault under Illinois law. font-size: 11px; Many CFC members are students there who hail from the Chicago area. Hi. Nine teaching elders protested the KCPs ruling, saying they didnt think Chung was truly repentant, and called for indefinite suspension. Women in many Korean churches are told to be submissive, former CFC members said. He has either founded or served in leadership for several youth and college ministries throughout the country, and was a board member for international missions organization SIM from 2006 to 2019. It requires public forms of accountability and repentance. He also said that, for sexual harassment of a member of the congregation, the KCP should have dealt Chung a suspension of a period of years, and perhaps even defrocked him. Illinois Newsroom gets stories from public radio stations from across the state, including WBEZ-Chicago, WCBU-Peoria, WGLT-Normal, WVIK-Rock Island, WIUM-Macomb, WNIJ-DeKalb, WSIU-Carbondale, WUIS-Springfield, and St. Louis Public Radio. But that system broke down: Oversight entities had limited power and the denominations governing rules proved to be inadequate for addressing the issue of abuse in the church. CFC came under fire last summer for its alleged mishandling of sexual misconduct by church founder and former head pastor Min Joshua Chung. The World Economic Forum ranks the country 115th out of 145 countries in gender equality. We grieve that this incident will cause many to experience confusion and lose trust in their pastors and elders. But now were not really given that chance.. It What remains is for the regional body that originally adjudicated the case to respond about procedural steps needing correction for the future.. But TRR said that the ruling may still be appealed to the Standing Judicial Commission of the PCA's General Assembly. In September 2019, two other whistleblowers met with Kim as a final step to urge leadership to take proper steps, the report states. There was never a feeling that this should be reported.. However, there have also been a number of accusations of abuse of power and harsh treatment towards others that continued to surface regarding this same pastor, Kim continued. Editors note: This story has been updated to clarify when the KCP received the whistleblowers allegations and to more accurately state certain charges. /* Current track progress and active audio volume level bar */ Also, any comments with profanity, name-calling, and/or a nasty tone will be deleted. That is the message of Esther Lius book Shame: Being Known and Loved. The presbytery is a ruling body of the Presbyterian Church in America (PCA), the denomination that ordained Chung. Prominent Korean-American congregation Covenant Fellowship Church (CFC) in central Illinois has terminated its nearly complete independent investigation into alleged spiritual and emotional abuse at the church, according to Godly Response to Abuse in the Christian Environment (GRACE). Get new articles and breaking news delivered to your inbox. top: 19px; According to sources, in the past few months, CFC has terminated the assessment with GRACE and wiped any trace of the leadership updates from last year (as seen on a web page accessed by WBEZ on Sept. 21). He also referred WBEZ to Tim LeCroy, a pastor who chaired the PCAs committee that wrote the domestic and sexual abuse report. Chung turned over leadership of the church he founded in 2019 to a team of associate pastors, according to Ministry Watch. We recognize that some have suffered, often silently, because of our church, states CFCs letter. But a vote on the matter failed to achieve the necessary two-thirds majority, meaning Chung remains a minister, WBEZ reported. During the subsequent year, the SOLA Council learned that: Furthermore, in recent weeks, it has become public knowledge that Min Chung was found guilty by the Korean Central Presbytery (KCP). After troubling times during the Depression, he was able to open a grocery store in an African-American neighborhood. What Happened To Marco From Next In Fashion? .mytheme-mejs-container .mejs-time-marker, Under the previous structure, CFC was an independent church, with just Chung and the associate pastors, as individuals, belonging to the Korean Central Presbytery (KCP), one of the regional bodies within the PCA. /* Progress and audio bar background */ CFC had been regularly updating the church on GRACEs investigation. Over the years, Chung rebuked whistleblowers who tried to confront him for causing dissension in the church. They either left or were forced to leave by the leadership they loved, the report states. 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