RELIGIOUS LEADERS WHO FELL FROM GRACE 

Did you know that among the fallen religious leaders include famous Tony Alamo, who was sentenced to 175 years in prison for pedophilia and marrying an eight-year-old girl?

The Biblical Samson was the strongest man to have ever lived, yet he came crashing down when he fell for Delilah. The story today hasn't changed. The Bible loves a good redemption story, but forgiveness only goes so far. The religious leaders who fell from grace shocked the world when their crimes and scandals became public. From sex scandals to abuse, here are ten of such religious leaders whose fame was blown away by the whirlwind of temptation.

1. TED HAGGARD 

Evangelical pastor Ted Haggard ranted against the evils of premarital sex, adultery, and gay marriage. That is, until he was caught in a gay sex scandal in 2006. A male escort named Mike Jones publicly claimed that Haggard had been a client for years. Not only that, Haggard had allegedly used crystal meth in front of his male lover. Ted Haggard was forced to resign from his church. 

2. JIM BAKKER 

Jim Bakker was perhaps the most popular televangelist in the 1980s, though his wife Tammy Faye gave him a run for his money. That all ended when Bakker was brought down by an enormous scandal that included sexual abuse and fraud. In 1987, Bakker's secretary publicly accused the televangelist of raping and drugging her. After Bakker resigned from his ministry, he was charged with accounting fraud and sentenced to 45 years in prison.

3. BILL GOTHARD 

Bill Gothard is famous for his homeschooling ministry, known as the Gothard Institute of Basic Life Principles. He promoted extreme submission of women and ordered them to dress modestly. Gothard was also close with the Duggar family and a number of Republican politicians. In 2014, more than 30 women accused Gothard of molestation and assault, including underage girls. The allegations included sexual harassment, inappropriate touching, molestation, and rape. Gothard was forced to resign from his ministry, though he resurfaced on the Internet with a blog in 2016.

4. SHOKO ASAHARA 

Shoko Asahara might better be called a cult leader. He founded Aum Shinrikyo, a Japanese doomsday cult, in 1984. He preached an end to marriage and sexual relations, but it later came out that Asahara was having sex with many of his female followers––and collecting glass bottles filled with their pubic hairs. By the mid-'90s, Asahara was apparently no longer willing to wait for the apocalypse, because in 1995 he was the mastermind behind the deadly sarin gas attack on the Tokyo subway. 13 people died and thousands were injured. In 2004, he was convicted and sentenced to death by hanging.

5. TONY ALAMO 

Tony Alamo rocketed to fame in the 1970s for preaching a fundamentalist interpretation of Christianity. When his wife died in 1982, Alamo went a little crazy. He displayed her embalmed body for months and claimed she would rise from the dead. And it only got worse from there. In 2009, Alamo was sentenced to 175 years in prison. The charges included sexual abuse, transporting underage girls across state lines for sexual purposes, pedophilia, marrying an eight-year-old girl, and child rape. Alamo's defense: he was framed by the Vatican.

6. BOB COY 

Bob Coy was the most famous evangelical pastor in Florida. His Fort Lauderdale megachurch had 25,000 members, and George W. Bush even visited Coy. But it all came crashing down in 2014 when he admitted to multiple affairs and a pornography addiction. He resigned in disgrace–but the worse was still to come. In 2017, Coy was publicly accused of molesting a four-year-old child. Police sat on the accusation for months and dropped the inquiry without interviewing Coy.

7. FRED PHELPS 

Fred Phelps founded the Westboro Baptist Church, a fundamentalist ministry that became notorious for protesting the funerals of gay people and gay pride events. It is classified as a hate group by the Anti-Defamation League and the Southern Poverty Law Center. Phelps had a brush with the law in 1994 when he was convicted of disorderly conduct, and 1995, when he was convicted for assault and battery. In 2009, the United Kingdom banned Phelps from entering the country. But ironically, it was Phelps's 2013 excommunication by his own church that probably felt like the biggest fall from grace for the minister. He was voted out for having a "change of heart" about his religious beliefs, and he died a few months later.

8. DAVE REYNOLDS 

Dave Reynolds was a pastor at Cornerstone Bible Fellowship Church in Sherwood, Arkansas, until he was caught looking at child pornography. Reynolds was 40 years old when the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children found evidence that someone in Sherwood was visiting child pornography websites. The culprit was none other than Pastor Reynolds. In 2016, Reynolds was charged with 70 counts of possessing or viewing child pornography, a felony charge. 

9. DOUG PHILLIPS 

Doug Phillips was president of an extreme Christian-right group called Visit Forum Ministries... Phillips argued that women must be completely submissive to their husbands and fathers. Daughters should not even have a say in who they marry, according to Phillips, and women should have as many children as possible. In 2013, he was forced to resign after being publicly accused of sexual abuse and assault against a woman he met when she was only 15 years old. Several years later, Phillips had moved the woman into his house as his nanny and sexually abused her multiple times.

10. JIMMY SWAGGART 

Jimmy Swaggart, a Pentecostal televangelist, got his start on television in 1975. In the 1980s, he teamed up with Reverend Jerry Falwell, Reverend James Robison, and Reverend Pat Robertson to use the Christian Right to shape the Republican party. Satan's agents are everywhere, according to Swaggart, and include feminists, Democrats, and rock musicians. Swaggart's fall from grace happened in 1988 when it became public that he was cheating on his wife with a New Orleans prostitute. Not only that, Swaggart was an avid consumer of porn and experimented with BDSM, all while condemning such "immoral" acts.