Category: Eric Metaxas

Ecclesia College Benefited from Arkansas Bribery Scheme

UPDATE: Ecclesia College president Oren Paris III tonight issued a statement denying any wrongdoing in this case.
A news report out of Arkansas sounds ominous for some of the blog’s favorite people.
Ecclesia College received $200,000 from an Arkansas government agency to build a building on campus. According to the report a sitting State Representative took a $18,000 bribe in order to funnel the money to Ecclesia.
This isn’t the first time Ecclesia benefited from public funds. The school received $592,000 via the same discretionary fund in calendar years 2013 and 2014. Only the Arkansas Energy Office received a higher amount of funding over the same period.  Despite lack of regional accreditation, Arkansas tax dollars have been spent lavishly on Ecclesia.
David Barton and Eric Metaxas are on the Board of Regents at Ecclesia, although there is nothing in the report suggesting they knew anything about the matter.
According to the plea agreement, the president (not named in the agreement) of “Entity B” was aware of the arrangement. The president of “Entity B” (Ecclesia College) is Oren Paris III.
According to a contact at Ecclesia president Paris is meeting with the board about the plea agreement this afternoon.
Here’s part of the agreement involving the only named participant, Representative Micah Neal:

Honest Services Fraud Concerning Entity B
v. In or around 2014, Senator A told NEAL that if NEAL, as an Arkansas Representative, authorized and directed GIF money to Entity B, then Person B would pay NEAL a portion of the money in exchange for EAL’s official action.
w. NEAL and Senator A agreed to authorize and direct a total of $200,000 of GIF money to Entity B in exchange for kickbacks from Person B. Of the $200,000, NEAL agreed to direct $50,000 of the GIF money to Entity B, and Senator A agreed to direct $150,000 of the GIF money to Entity B.
x. On or about December 18, 2014, the NWAEDD issued a check in the amount of$200,000, and drawn on the NWAEDD’s Arvest Bank account ending in 8611, to Entity B. The check constituted GIF monies that had been appropriated by NEAL and Senator A, and was awarded pursuant to a GIF grant application signed by Person B that had been emailed, via interstate wire communications, to the NWAEDD from Entity B in Springdale, Arkansas, on or about December 5, 2014. The application requested a $200,000 GIF grant and listed NEAL and Senator A as sponsors.
y. On or about December 19, 2014, the $200,000 check from the NWAEDD to Entity B was deposited into Entity B’s Centennial Bank account ending in 0681. Arvest Bank subsequently settled the check totaling $200,000 with Centennial Bank via an interstate wire communication.
z. The spreadsheets maintained by the NWAEDD for NEAL and Senator A showed a deduction in December 2014 of $50,000 and $150,000, respectively, for the GIF grant awarded to Entity B.
aa. A check dated January 5, 2015 and drawn on Entity B’s Centennial Bank account ending in 0681 in the amount of $65,000 was issued to Person C’s company and deposited that same day into Person C’s company’s Arvest Bank account ending in 7761. The check was issued at the direction of Person B. Over the following three days, Person C made three cash withdrawals per day totaling $53,700 from his company’s Arvest Bank account ending in 7761.
bb. Between approximately December 19, 2014 and approximately January 30, 2015, and following Entity B’s receipt of NEAL’s and Senator A’s GIF money in the amount of $200,000, Senator A contacted NEAL and told him that Person C would be bringing $18,000 in cash to NEAL in exchange for NEAL having authorized and directed the appropriation of the GIF money to Entity B.
cc. Between approximately December 19, 2014 and approximately January 30, 2015, and following NEAL’s communication with Senator A, Person C met with NEAL and, on behalf of Person B, paid NEAL $18,000 in cash.
dd. NEAL agrees and stipulates that he conspired with Senator A and others in the Western District of Arkansas and elsewhere to deprive the citizens of the State of Arkansas of his honest services as an Arkansas state legislator by taking official actions and using his official position to appropriate and direct funds to Entity A and Entity B in exchange for kickback payments, and that the conspiracy and scheme to defraud the citizens of the State of Arkansas of his honest services involved the use of interstate wire communications and mailings that were sent and/or received in the Western District of Arkansas.

Stay tuned…

Update on a Spurious Bonhoeffer Quote: Not to Speak is to Speak, Not to Act is to Act

Silence hands version
In late August, I published an examination of a popular quote commonly but incorrectly attributed to Dietrich Bonhoeffer:

Silence in the face of evil is itself evil. God will not hold us guiltless. Not to speak is to speak. Not to act is to act.

The quote cannot be found in Bonhoeffer’s writings and no other primary source has been found.  The first appearance of the entire quote I can find is in a 1998 American Interfaith Institute newsletter. The newsletter reported on a museum exhibit featuring Bonhoeffer. The quote was placed on the Bonhoeffer exhibit with quotation marks as if Bonhoeffer said it but without any citation. The quote has been popularized by Eric Metaxas who still attributes the quote to Bonhoeffer even though he has refused to provide a primary source for it.

Today, I want to present a source for part of the quote which is earlier than 1998. In Robert K. Hudnut’s 1971 book, A Sensitive Man and the Christ, he makes a case that even a sensitive man must act when the need arises.

Hudnut speak act 1971
There are two aspects of this passage which may link it to the eventual misattribution to Bonhoeffer. One is Hudnut’s challenge for the church not to be silent in the face of social evils. The second is the reference to Niemoller and resistance to the Nazis. Through the frailty of memory and lack of citation, someone could have reworked this into a quote about the church not being silent and attributed it to Niemoller’s colleague, Dietrich Bonhoeffer.

For “Not to act is to act” by itself, one can go back to 1945 when Francis McPeek said church inaction was a form of political action in an essay titled, “Not to Act is to Act.”

For “God will not hold us guiltless,” one can find many references to that sentence by going to Google books and entering the sentence in quotes. The links returned go back to 1681.

The Hudnut quote was pointed out to me by a Twitter user. I would like to thank him but I can’t find the tweet. If my helper is reading, please identify yourself in the comments.

UPDATE: Found! See below:

Eric Metaxas Illustrates What Evangelicals Need to Correct

As the Donald Trump saga nears the end, it will be good to reflect on what can be learned. One thing I hope for is a backlash against false or misleading information being used by evangelicals to make their political points.
Case in point:


Of course, this kind of thing has been going on for years. However, after so many people have been repeatedly misled by so called thought leaders, I hope more evangelicals wake up to the need for simple fact checking.
On this story, Michelle Goldberg contacted the source.

So I called him. Masada told me that on Nov. 11, he got a call from a man named John—he doesn’t remember the last name—who sounded “distinguished, like an attorney.” John said he represented the Clinton campaign. He asked Masada “who had put him up” to posting the video. In a menacing voice, he told Masada, “This is not good for your business.” John then asked for the email or phone numbers of the five comedians who were featured in the video. “I told him, ‘Eff you,’ and I hung up,” says Masada.

That’s it. That’s all I could find to support the story. Even if this “John” had some connection to the Clinton campaign, it doesn’t mean Mrs. Clinton put him up to it. In any case, this hearsay is not sufficient evidence to go with a news report or even an advocacy piece (as Judicial Watch did).
Metaxas should be ashamed to spread around unsubstantiated reports in this manner and then indict the media over it. We do have a free press and Michelle Goldberg did her job. Apparently, Metaxas didn’t check it out or only believes those who report what he already believes.
To be taken seriously, evangelical leaders must become more skeptical and better fact checkers.
Update: Let’s not forget that Donald Trump doesn’t appear to have a sense of humor.

Eric Metaxas Complains about Clinton Misquotes, Refuses to Correct the Quote He Misattributed to Bonhoeffer

During the debate between Clinton and Trump last night, Eric Metaxas tweeted the following:


Hillary said in passing that “America is great because America is good.” Although the quote is commonly associated with Tocqueville, it can’t be found in his works.
During the debate, Clinton did not attribute the quote to Tocqueville. However, Metaxas himself attributed that quote to Tocqueville in an advance copy of his new book If You Can Keep It. The attribution of the quote was corrected before publication.
I understand the analogy he tweeted. However, it is noteworthy that Metaxas complained about Clinton’s use of the quotation because he has his own quote snafu to resolve. Metaxas has yet to provide a source (or acknowledge the quote isn’t Bonhoeffer’s) for the following quote:

Silence in the face of evil is itself evil. God will not hold us guiltless. Not to speak is to speak. Not to act is to act.

This quote is attributed to Bonhoeffer on the back flap of Metaxas’ biography of the German pastor. He also has referred to it in his speeches and tweets as well as his book on Miracles and a study edition of the Bonhoeffer bio. However, it cannot be found in Bonhoeffer’s works. I have contacted Metaxas and publisher Thomas Nelson but have yet to receive the courtesy of a reply.
Silence hands version
There is no disgrace in getting a quote wrong. Scholars do it frequently. The mark of a scholar is to correct the record quickly. To me, this seems especially important since Metaxas has lately taken to advancing Bonhoeffer in the cause of presidential politics. Despite our differences, I urge Metaxas to do the right thing and either provide his primary source for the quote or acknowledge the quote doesn’t come from Bonhoeffer.

Eric Metaxas Uses Odd Term – Fascistic Globalism – Twitter Howls

If it hasn’t happened already, this may be Eric Metaxas jumping the shark.


I can’t respond any better than the numerous commenters who are really taking him to task. Click the tweet and read the comments.
Before a couple of months ago, I did not follow Mr. Metaxas and so I can’t tell if this was coming or has recently shown up perhaps in relationship to Trumpism. In any case, I hope it is a curable condition.
On the term “fascistic globalism,” my impression is that it is a far right term with a less than admirable pedigree. It often is written “fascist globalism” and appears on numerous alt-right and far right websites. One has to wonder what well Metaxas is drinking from.
Here is on example of a use of “fascist globalism from the conspiratorial Centre for Globalization Research.

The NATO Treaty, therefore, is, from its inception, a Treaty against Russia. It is not really – and never was – a treaty against communism. The alliance’s ideological excuse doesn’t hold, and never was anything more than propaganda for a military alliance of America and its allies, against Russia and its allies. Consequently, the Warsaw Pact had to be created, on 14 May 1955, as an authentic defensive measure by Russia and its allies. This had really nothing to do with ideology. Ideology was and is only an excuse for war – in that case, for the Cold War. For example, a stunningly honest documentary managed to be broadcast in 1992 by the BBC, and showed that the US OSS-CIA had begun America’s war against «communism» even at the very moments while WW II was ending in 1945, by recruiting in Europe ‘former’ supporters of Hitler and Mussolini, who organized «false flag» (designed-to-be-blamed-against-the-enemy) terrorist attacks in their countries, which very successfully terrified Europeans against ‘communism’ (i.e., against Russia and its allies). As one of the testifiers in that video noted (at 6:45), «In 1945 the Second World War ended and the Third World War started».
The ‘former’ fascists took up the cause against «communism» but actually against Russia; it wasn’t democracy-versus-communism; it was fascists continuing – but now under the ‘democratic’ banner – their war against Russia. This operation was, until as late as 1990, entirely unknown to almost all democratically elected government officials. The key mastermind behind it, the brilliant double-agent Allen Dulles, managed to become officially appointed, by US President Eisenhower in 1953, to lead the CIA. Originally, that subversive-against-democracy element within the CIA had been only a minority faction. Dulles had no qualms even about infiltrating outright Nazis into his operation, and his operation gradually took over not only the US but its allies. His key point man on that anti-democracy operation was James Angleton – a rabid hater of Russians, who was as psychopathic an agent for America’s aristocracy as was Dulles himself. But the CIA was only one of the broader operation’s many tentacles, others soon were formed such as the Bilderberg group. Then, the CIA financed the start of the European Union, which was backed strongly by the Bilderbergers. This was sold as democratic globalism, but it’s actually fascist globalism, which is dictatorial in a much more intelligent way than Hitler and Mussolini had tried to impose merely by armed force. It relies much more on the force of deception – force against the mind, instead of against the body.

Are we to understand that Obama and Clinton are dictatorial in a much more intelligent way than Hitler and Mussolini?
Now think about Trump’s glowing words about Russia and his halting support for NATO and then remember that Metaxas has become quite the Trump apologist of late. It appears that Metaxas may be moving toward the conspiratorial far right in more than just his support for Trump.