In January of this year, Brian Houston announced that he would step down from his responsibilities as Hillsong Church’s global senior pastor for the remainder of 2022, to focus on defense and prosecute him in August 2021 for allegedly harassing his father. Dad they’re hiding. Kids sex insults.
A Ausso published by the Hillsong Global Board on Friday (March 18) has now revealed that there was more to the story. According to the Board of Directors, Houston’s year-long sabbatical is also the result of disciplinary issues related to Houston’s moral indiscretions.
“When he resigned in January this year, the reasons he stated were genuine,” the statement said, referring to the personal toll that Houston had taken on his legal battles against him. “At his announcement, the Hillsong Church Board of Directors did not make a public statement because we were still working privately with Pastor Brian on a number of issues.”
RELATED: Hillsong’s Brian Houston Announces ‘Apart from Church Leadership’ in Wake of Court Proceedings
The statement further said that now that these issues have become public, the board of directors wanted to address them immediately. According to CrikeyHillsong staff members have previously provided information on these topics at an 800-person staff meeting led by interim global senior pastor Phil Dooley.
At that meeting, Dooley Hillsong informed staff that after a conference at the Qudos Bank Arena in Homebush, New South Wales in 2019, Houston had drinks at the hotel where the Hillsong leaders were staying with a group, including a woman who was not in Hillsong Personal was. At the time, Houston was taking anxiety medication and was taking more than the prescribed dose.
After being disoriented and unable to open the door to his hotel room, Houston knocked on the door of the woman who had been drinking with the group and entered her room.
“The truth is, we do not know exactly what happened next,” Dooley told the Hillsong staff. “This woman did not say whether it was sexual activity. Brian said there was no sexual activity. He was in the woman’s room for 40 minutes. Due to the mixture of the anxiety pills and the alcohol, he did not have much memory. This. Woman had also been drinking, so her memory is not very coherent.
After the Hillsong Global Board learned of the incident, they appointed a task force to investigate the matter, after which they concluded that Houston had violated the Hillsong Pastor’s code of conduct and should take three months out of the ministry in alcohol.
After the incident, Hillsong reimbursed the woman for her conference ticket and a donation she made. Houston then reimbursed the church out of its own pocket. However, Houston did not fully adhere to the terms established by the Board of Directors for him in the coming months.
RELATED: Hillsong’s Brian Houston pleads not guilty to cover up his father’s abuse
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