“For your example to hold up, Mr Sitler . . . would need to have seen Doug Wilson . . . in the act of molesting children, then justify his actions by saying “Well Doug did it, it must be OK for me to do it.” Since this was not the case, Doug Wilson cannot be held accountable for Mr Sitler’s actions, in the sight of man, of law, or of God.”
Of course, this is absurd because it ignores the overwhelming testimony of Scripture, which clearly holds teachers to a higher standard, “for in many things [they] offend all” (James 3:1, ff). And the “many” includes all the little things that encompass a man’s doctrine and that illustrate his sermons on a daily basis. Consider these examples of the influence of Wilson’s doctrine on Steven Sitler:
Pedophiles rely on manipulative deceit to capture and silence their victims, and Steven Sitler sat under the master of manipulation — Douglas Wilson — when he preyed in Moscow. Rest assured that by reading Wilson’s blog and observing his interaction with the public, Sitler learned cunning beyond measure. Yes, indeed, he watched his pastor twist other’s words into meaning something that no one intended, in order to manipulate them into giving him what he wanted (do kirkers really believe the stories that Wilson peddles about Duck? He fabricated every one of them while he applied enormous economic and emotional pressure on the Schulers, hoping they’d cave). Sitler learned from Wilson how to create opportunities by misrepresentation and then pounce on weakness the moment he saw it. And not ironically, Sitler arrived in Moscow in fall 2003, just in time to witness Wilson and Jones deceitfully manipulate the thesis of Southern Slavery As It Was into a book about non-violent emancipation. He saw Wilson dismiss the capital crime of manstealing and manipulate its proceeds — slavery — into a “life of plenty.” Wilson taught him how to manipulate words so that oppressive slaveholders became “noble Christians” and stolen labor became a lifestyle of “mutual affection.” Yes, know for sure that Wilson taught Sitler the deceitful art of manipulation.
Pedophiles are typically narcissists and Sitler sat under the poster child of narcissism — Douglas Wilson — during his stay in Moscow. Indeed, his parents educated him on the Wilson classical model, praising all things Wilson, with the hope they could send him to New Saint Andrews College where he could fawn over every word that fell from the master’s lips. And as saw the master encourage the worshiping multitudes to adore him, know for sure that he learned self-love exceeds self-denial as the preeminent Christian virtue.
Pedophiles act in contempt of all law — God’s and man’s — in order to obtain their desires, and Sitler’s 18 months in Moscow forever embedded the principle in his mind that if the law stands in your way, break it. Steven Sitler was an eyewitness to Douglas Wilson’s public defiance of state property tax law as well as the City Zoning Code, and he learned firsthand that Christian dominion Wilson-style provides for self-willed antinomianism, if necessary. Wilson taught Sitler that the law does not represent a gift from God, rather it is a tool of the godless intoleristas to persecute the godly kirkers whose reign shall be for ever and ever. No doubt Wilson’s wholesale contempt for authority encouraged Sitler to disdain any authority who would check his impulses. (If you disagree with this assertion, please show me one example in the last five years where Wilson exemplified humble Christian submission to the civil magistrate pursuant to Romans 13.)
Finally, pedophiles see children not as humans but as objects, and the most important lesson that Steven Sitler learned in Moscow was in the field of anthropology. Douglas Wilson taught Steven Sitler to take joy and satisfaction in dehumanizing and humiliating human beings made in the image of God. And just as Wilson strips people of their dignity, taking sadistic pleasure in flaying them alive with his serrated edge, so Sitler stripped children of their dignity, scarring them for life with his naked flesh. No surprise that victims of pedophiles usually suffer acute shame — inexplicable feelings of humiliation and embarrassment — as a result of their molestation. And Sitler learned the chief article of his faith in Moscow, Idaho, where Douglas Wilson, pastor of Christ Church, taught him the ABCs of dehumanization. (This is also perhaps the best explanation that accounts for kirkers’ lack of horror at Sitler’s crimes; Wilson has successfully desensitized them from feeling compassion for their fellowmen. They are “without natural affection.”)
No, Christian doctrine is not limited to a set of credos; rather, it is a system of beliefs lived out each day. And while Douglas Wilson never approved of pedophilia or taught Steven Sitler how to rape a child, he certainly helped the serial pedophile hone the deviant personality traits necessary to commit the unspeakable, and Wilson did it in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ. Welcome to Christ Church, Moscow.
Herodotus
