April 25, 2022
This is the second part of my review of the documentary Hillsong: A Megachurch Exposed, in which I discuss my reaction to Episode 2. To start at the beginning and read my reaction to Episode 1, click here.
Carl Lentz & Purity Culture
After twenty-three-year-old Carl Lentz finished the Hillsong College, he returned to his hometown of Virginia Beach and began working as a youth pastor at Wave Church.
I’d never heard of Wave before, but apparently it was very similar to Hillsong since they emulated Hillsong in a lot of what they did. Pastors from Hillsong would also regularly preach at Wave, so the two churches were tight.
The documentary surprised me with something I hadn’t heard before: during his tenure at Wave, Carl Lentz was apparently highly concerned with purity culture. Some of Lentz’s “rules” were to date for a year before you have your first kiss and to not say you love someone until you propose.
Lentz didn’t reserve this only for the youth kids. He apparently also gave the other church staff members an earful during their meetings, hammering into them over and over not to have sex before marriage.
The reason it surprised me is not because of the scandal that would eventually unfold (which I’ll cover later in this article) but because it seemed one of the big things that made Hillsong successful was its careful avoidance of topics that made the congregation “feel bad.” They didn’t want to make their congregation feel “convicted” of their sin.
Lentz had a harsh way of dealing with couples who were brave enough to confess to him that they’d had sex. One of the victims of this was a girl featured in the documentary who tells her dark story of being shamed by Lentz for wanting to express the love she shared with her boyfriend at the time.
However, after watching a bit further, it all makes perfect sense now—Lentz was projecting.
According to an anonymous source interviewed in the film, it was well known that Carl Lentz made advances toward women at Wave church, and that he possibly hooked up with some of them (possibly many of them). This person said it was something that was just “known” about Lentz. In my mind, I cannot fathom going to a church where it’s just “known” by all that the youth pastor who never shuts up about remaining “pure” until marriage is a serial womanizer.
The Scandal
I became aware of the Instagram post in November 2020 along with the rest of the world: the one where Carl Lentz posted a picture of his family, announced their departure from Hillsong, and admitted to moral failings, including being unfaithful in his marriage. When this news broke, literally no one was surprised.
The details would slowly emerge online a bit later from Ranin Karim, the woman with whom Lentz had an affair with (in this instance). She makes an appearance in the documentary and gives her side of the story.
They met in the park, Carl chatted her up, and she seemed into it. She recounted that she thought Carl was familiar to her, but Carl told her not to google him. I’m thinking, “What the hell, Carl, don’t you know when you tell someone not to google you that’s the first thing they’re going to do?”
So of course Karim googles him and remembers that he’s the pastor of that big church in NYC she went to a couple times.
When they met up again a few days later, Karim asked Lentz if he was married, and Lentz responded yes. She asked him if there were problems in his marriage, and he said no.
Pause. I don’t give Carl Lentz credit for much, but at the very least he was honest at this point.
Messages between Karim and Lentz were found on Lentz’s computer at the church. My speculation was that he had iMessage synced to his phone. I’ve never understood why people do that…
Anyway, once the word got out, Brian Houston fired Carl Lentz. When I heard about this back when it was all going down, I didn’t think much of it. Normal, standard stuff, and I set my timer to see when Lentz would reemerge and start preaching again, as they all seem to do.
But the documentary offered a secondary perspective to this situation that I had not considered at the time that makes a lot of sense to me:
The film suggests there were rumors floating around that Carl Lentz was preparing to leave Hillsong. And everyone—including Brian Houston—knew that wherever Carl Lentz went, thousands of people would follow him, even if Carl did not ask them to. That’s a big red flag for businessman Brian Houston. I inferred from the film that Brian Houston knew about Lentz’s philandering ways all along and chose to do nothing about it—until the time was right. Houston took advantage of the scandal (or declined to bury it, or amplified it, or possibly even arranged for someone to dig into Lentz’s computer knowing there was likely something incriminating there). With the firing, Brian Houston was able to terminate Hillsong’s relationship with Lentz on their terms and damage Lentz’s brand at the same time, ensuring the church got to keep the audience (and the tithes).
I don’t know which is true, and the film doesn’t take a firm side, but it does present this alternative that I hadn’t considered at the time, and it’s very believable to me. Why? Because Brian Houston isn’t an idiot. He has to know his golden boy Carl Lentz is fucking around. And he’s happy to let Carl do that as long as he doesn’t get caught and as long as he keeps being the face of Hillsong NYC that continues to funnel new people through the church’s doors.
Churches—not just Hillsong—have financial motivations when it comes to who gets fired and for what. If the church stands to lose too much money or will sustain too much damage to the brand, they’ll work hard to cover things up. The same thing happens in politics. And since Brian Houston’s first priority is the business, it makes perfect sense to me that the move he made against Lentz at the time was the best for the business. He essentially used Lentz until it served him to cast him aside.
I’m not coming to Carl Lentz’s defense. Hell no. That dude had this coming and literally everyone knew it was only a matter of time. However, I appreciated the film’s exploration of the situation’s layers because I suspect other churches do the same thing—investigate scandal and misconduct through a lens of finances and damage control. If it benefits them to cover it all up, then they will. I wrote more about this here.
More Scandals to Come
Carl Lentz’s scandal was not the last Hillsong would deal with. In fact, it was pretty tame considering what was to come. Episode 3 of the documentary explores the crimes of Brian Houston’s father, Frank Houston, and I’ll write about my reaction to those sordid stories in the next installment.