Man Charged With Terrorism For Threatening Church Members, Priest Arrested for Rape of Minor
Church Crime Watch: Violence, Abuse, and Threats Facing Christian Communities This Week
CRIMES AGAINST PERSONS
Armed Father Kills Suspect During Daycare Drop-Off at Milwaukee Church
On the morning of March 26, 2025, a father fatally shot a man who approached him and his three children with what appeared to be a handgun in the parking lot of Covenant Lutheran Church in Milwaukee, Wisconsin. The church operates a daycare on-site, and the incident occurred during routine drop-off around 8:40 AM. According to police and church officials, security footage confirmed that the 23-year-old suspect pointed a facsimile firearm at the family, prompting the 24-year-old father to retrieve a legally owned firearm from his vehicle and open fire. The suspect was pronounced dead at the scene. The father was taken into custody as the Milwaukee County District Attorney's Office reviews the case, though initial findings suggest he acted in defense of his children. No one else was harmed in the incident.
Watch my breakdown of this incident and what your church and you as a concealed carrier can learn from this incident.
Man Arrested for Assaulting Catholic School Staff Member in Maryland
On the morning of March 25, 2025, a 58-year-old man was arrested after allegedly assaulting a staff member at Little Flower School, a Catholic institution in Great Mills, Maryland. The suspect fled the scene on a bicycle, but responding deputies quickly located him. Upon contact, the man reportedly charged at law enforcement, resulting in a brief struggle with deputies and a Maryland State Trooper before being taken into custody. Identified as a resident of Callaway, the man was also linked to a separate incident moments earlier involving erratic bicycle behavior near Holy Face Church. He now faces charges including second-degree assault, resisting arrest, disorderly conduct, and disruption of school activities. The St. Mary’s County Sheriff’s Office continues to investigate.
Man Charged with Terrorism for Threatening Memphis Catholic Church
On March 20, 2025, a 30-year-old man believed to be homeless was arrested and charged with commission of an act of terrorism after allegedly emailing a threat to a music minister at St. Louis Catholic Church in Memphis, Tennessee. The message warned that unless specific demands were met, the man would "butcher" people in the church with a machete. Authorities confirmed the suspect had previously caused a disturbance at the church by throwing trash into the baptismal font and was known to refer to a machete he owned. He is currently being held at the Shelby County Jail on a $200,100 bond, and a court hearing is pending. The Diocese of Memphis emphasized that the incident occurred outside school and work hours and affirmed that the parish, along with all churches and schools in the diocese, maintains strong security protocols.
SEX CRIMES
Director at Ohio Church Charged with Multiple Sex Crimes
A 59-year-old Director of Worship at St. John Bosco Catholic Church in Parma Heights, Ohio, has been charged with multiple sex crimes, including rape, sexual battery, and unlawful sexual conduct with a minor. The alleged offenses occurred between February 2013 and February 2018. The individual also worked part-time at St. Joseph Parish in Avon Lake and had volunteer roles at Incarnate Word Academy and Our Lady of Angels. He was arrested in connection with an outstanding warrant and later released on a $50,000 bond following a not guilty plea during his March 19 arraignment. Both parishes have placed him on administrative leave pending further investigation by the Diocese of Cleveland.
A $50,000 bond is pitiful. All of these churches need to reach out to their congregations and look for other victims. Where there is one there are 10 or more. You just need to find them because they are too ashamed to come forward.
Click here to read the full story
Matthew 18:6 (ESV)
"but whoever causes one of these little ones who believe in me to sin, it would be better for him to have a great millstone fastened around his neck and to be drowned in the depth of the sea."
Former Baltimore Priest Arrested and Charged with Child Sexual Abuse
On March 24, 2025, William “Bill” Mannion, a former priest of the Archdiocese of Baltimore, was arrested by Baltimore County Police and charged with second-degree child abuse and multiple sex offenses related to incidents that allegedly occurred between 1991 and 1994. The reported abuse took place at a location on St. Agnes Lane, corresponding to the grounds of St. Agnes Catholic Church and School. Mannion, now 62, left the priesthood in the late 1990s and was formally laicized by the Vatican in 2004 for reasons unrelated to abuse. The Archdiocese of Baltimore stated it is fully cooperating with law enforcement and encouraged any additional victims or individuals with knowledge of abuse to come forward. Authorities believe there may be more victims and are continuing the investigation.
ARSON/FIRES
PROPERTY CRIMES
Megachurch Pastor Convicted of Burglary and Stalking in Lynchburg, Virginia
A pastor at Thomas Road Baptist Church in Lynchburg, Virginia, was convicted of two counts of burglary and one count of stalking after being caught on CCTV breaking into a female parishioner’s home on two separate occasions. The incidents occurred in 2023, with footage showing the pastor entering the woman's home late at night, including accessing her teenage daughter’s basement bedroom. The victim, who had previously reported the pastor's troubling behavior and left the church in 2016, testified to a pattern of harassment and unwanted visits dating back years. Despite her repeated attempts to distance herself, the pastor continued to track her, even allegedly accessing her online accounts via a Liberty University email. Thomas Road Baptist Church, a megachurch founded by Jerry Falwell Sr. and affiliated with Liberty University and the Southern Baptist Convention, has not publicly commented on the conviction. The pastor now faces up to ten years in prison, with a pre-sentencing hearing scheduled for August 20, 2025.
INTERNATIONAL STORIES
Attack on Catholic Sisters Highlights Ongoing Church-Targeted Violence in Congo
On March 18, 2025, the Missionary Sisters of Santo Domingo in Kimbanseke, a municipality in Kinshasa, Democratic Republic of the Congo, were attacked when intruders broke through the wall of their residence and stole money, phones, and computers. The incident is part of a growing pattern of violence against Catholic religious sisters in Congo, where church leaders and missionaries are being increasingly targeted amid widespread poverty and political instability. Church authorities, including Cardinal Fridolin Ambongo Besungu of Kinshasa, condemned the attack and called for increased vigilance. This latest act of violence comes as the Catholic and Protestant churches engage in peace efforts through shuttle diplomacy with the government and M23 rebels, despite backlash and accusations of conspiracy from government allies. The Church's involvement in dialogue has led to government scrutiny and harassment of its leaders, further intensifying tensions. Past incidents of violence against nuns in Lubumbashi, Goma, and Bukavu underscore the long-standing danger faced by religious women in the region.
Young Christian Man Brutally Attacked in Pakistan for Refusing to Convert
On March 22, 2025, a 22-year-old Christian man was brutally attacked by his supervisor at Subhan Paper Mills in Punjab, Pakistan, after reportedly refusing to convert to Islam. According to Aid to the Church in Need (ACN), the attacker accused the victim of desecrating pages of the Quran found in the trash, then assaulted him, causing severe neck injuries. The suspect was arrested and charged with attempted murder. The incident highlights ongoing religious intolerance in Pakistan, where Christians make up only 1.9% of the population. Church leaders and human rights advocates are urging international awareness and stronger protections for religious minorities amid repeated cases of violence and blasphemy accusations targeting Christians.
"The Church's involvement in dialogue has led to government scrutiny and harassment of its leaders, further intensifying tensions."
This just tells us that the government doesn't care about the Christians being attacked and killed. Lord, protect your remnant. 🙏🏻
Male victims of sexual assault or rape are still more hesitant or unlikely than female victims to report their offenders. They refuse to open up and/or ask for help for fear of being perceived by peers and others as weak or non-masculine.
Men can take care of themselves, and boys are basically little men. One might see some of that mentality reflected in, for example, a New York Times feature story (“She Was a Big Hit on TikTok. Then a Fan Showed Up With a Gun”, February 19, 2022).
Written by Times reporter Elizabeth Williamson, the piece at one point states that“Instagram ... [has] been accused of causing mental and emotional health problems among teenage female users.” A couple paragraphs down, it is also stated that, “Teen girls have been repeatedly targeted by child predators.”
Why write this when she must have known that teen boys are also targeted by such predators? And if mainstream news-media fail to fully realize this fact in their journalism, why would/should the rest of society?
It could also be the same mindset that may explain why the author of Childhood Disrupted included only one male among her six interviewed subjects, there likely having been such a small pool of ACE-traumatized males willing to formally tell his own story of traumatic childhood adversity, especially that of a sexual nature.
To get anywhere, males need to have the same strong mainstream-media (news, social and entertainment) support that females have had for decades, and still do. Males have instead observed thus known that for the most part they haven’t been taken seriously.
It might be yet more evidence of a continuing yet subtle societal take-it-like-a-man attitude, one in which so many men will choose to abstain from ‘complaining’ about their torturous youth, as that is what ‘real men’ do.
... I read a shocking article, headlined “‘Grave Sexual Abuse’: When the Word Rape Doesn’t Apply To Boys” [by Zahara Dawoodbhoy, 21 Sep 2020], about a South Asian nation/culture in which men have been raping boys with impunity. There, girls’ vaginal virginity is traditionally/normally verified before an arranged marriage takes place. The ‘virginity’ of boys, however, is never even questioned, and therefore they cannot be sexually ‘spoiled’ or considered raped.
The following relevant segment is taken from the extensive article:
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.... “I think there is a myth that it only happens to female children, and that has to do with the cultural aspect of people feeling that rape is a female-related issue,” Sonali Gunasekera, Senior Director of Advocacy at the Family Planning Association (FPA) told Roar Media. “That is probably why this archaic law is still in place — because that's how it was seen from afar.”
Despite this myth, the fact remains that instances where young boys are raped in Sri Lanka are surprisingly frequent. Director of the Child Protection Force, Milani Salpitikorala, says that 90% of her current cases involve young boys, and the idea that the boy child is somehow less susceptible to sexual abuse and rape in this country is completely false.
“Our mindsets are set in a culture of ‘Don’t worry about your child if he is a boy,’ but the boy child is as unsafe in the hands of perpetrators as much as the girl child is, if not more,” she said. ....
Source website: https://roar.media/english/life/features/grave-sexual-abuse-when-rape-does-not-apply-to-boys