Pastor with full-blown AIDS admits adultery with parishioners and drug use inside church
WSFA.com Montgomery Alabama news.
By RYAN GORMAN
An Alabama pastor made a shocking revelation during Sunday service this week.
Rev. Juan Demetrius McFarland told worshippers gathered at the Shiloh Missionary Baptist Church, in Montgomery, that he had sex with parishioners inside the house of worship while knowing he had full-blown AIDS - and that he'd done drugs and stolen from church coffers.
"He made it public. He shared it, and I'm just saying what he said," Deacon Nathan Williams Jr. told the Montgomery Advertiser.
The troubled pastor originally revealed to church members last month that he contracted HIV in 2003 and tested positive for AIDS in 2008, according to WSFA.
McFarland's (now former) horrified flock fled to local media to reveal the sordid details.
With each Sunday services came yet another disturbing revelation. Church members flocked to media to tell their side.
"The church was very accepting of Reverend McFarland and was willing to help him in any way possible," a church member, who wanted to remain unnamed, explained to the station.
The admissions of adultery, drug use and misappropriation of church funds were the final straws.
"He concealed from the church that he had knowingly engaged in adultery in the church building with female members of Shiloh Missionary Baptist Church while knowingly having AIDS," Williams told the station.
Church leaders voted 80-2 to have him removed as pastor, sources told the Advertiser.
"Who does this to people, and you are the leader? Who does this?" another unnamed church member asked in comments to WSFA.
"I know a young lady who is a member of the church who says she has slept with him and that she didn't want this to go public, and she running out now trying to find out if there is anything wrong with her," the member continued. "My heart goes out to her because she's been a wonderful church member, and then for something like this to happen, the fact that he didn't tell them at all, that's a crime in itself."
Staffers then changed the locks and switched church bank accounts, he said.
Church administrators are now consulting with lawyers over how to proceed.
"If it calls for a lawsuit, it calls for a lawsuit. We're going through the process," Williams told the paper.
Another congregant insisted to WSFA that McFarland "should be put on trial."
The parish pariah confirmed everything in comments to WSFA.
No charges have been filed, but knowingly transmitting a sexually transmitted disease is a Class-C Misdemeanor in the city.
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