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When a pastor falls sexually, his church responds like a wife betrayed by her husband, experts say. The news of his pastor's infidelity slammed into Jim Brown, spurring "every issue that I've ever seen."

The pastor who baptized Brown's children, preached God's Word, and served Communion had deceived him. Months after the news, the Starkville, Mississippi, pca (Presbyterian Church in America) congregation that Brown attends stills holds late night counseling sessions to process the event, a must-do according to experts.

"People have to struggle with the fact that here was somebody who had been the mouthpiece of Christ, standing up in the pulpit as the representative of Christ," says Brown, a medical doctor. "Members keep saying, 'He did my marriage counseling,' or, 'He buried my brother.' He had been intimately involved with all the important aspects of my life."

Admissions of sexual immorality by megachurch pastor Ted Haggard, following allegations by a male prostitute, rocked his 14,000-member New Life Church, as well as the National Association of Evangelicals, which Haggard served as president. Many other churches have faced similar situations, though no comprehensive statistics exist. In the last 15 years, psychologist Mark Laaser, author of Healing the Wounds of Sexual Addiction, has seen "an escalating crisis in the church" so that "rarely a day goes by that I don't get a call about a 'fallen' pastor."

Churches can heal, experts say, but the process has obstacles that aren't easy to navigate.

"All trust has been broken," says former Bethel University professor Nils Friberg, a psychologist and pastor of care at Salem Baptist Church in New Brighton, Minnesota. "This person held a position that led members into the highest spiritual places and now those sacred spaces have been sullied."

The malignancy eats at laypeople's worship, daily use of time, and devotional life. Other relationships wear down. Friends turn on each other. Churches fracture. Splinter groups start.

"The basic fabric of life gets torn," says Friberg. "God seems to have let us down, since God was perceived as palpably absent during those negative events of life. In the battle between good and evil, evil seems at the moment to be winning."

Some bodies, however, stay together and grow stronger with time, says Nancy Hopkins, an early researcher in the field and author or coauthor of several books, including Restoring the Soul of a Church.

"You are presented with a dangerous opportunity when this kind of thing happens. It is possible, if the congregation really engages and works through it, that they can emerge on the other end spiritually stronger than they were."

After the initial shock and feelings of betrayal, other predictable initial and long-term reactions to a fallen pastor include:

• Anger and depression among most church members.

• Difficulty letting go of the fallen pastor or believing the truth of his tryst.

• Suspicion toward new leaders charged to clean up the mess.

• Irrational sympathy or antipathy for the fallen pastor.

• Blaming the predicament on support staff or on oneself for not seeing it sooner.

• Burnout among leadership or members over-invested in the event.

• Resentment and backlash toward a newly called pastor.

• Questioning personal faith or one's faith in the church.

Laaser says at least three groups can emerge: those who want their fallen pastor back, those so angry they would never have him back, and those hoping to replace their pastor with a quick-fix, similar persona.

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January 2007, Vol. 51, No. 1