Pastor Helps Young Parishioners Achieve Sexual Purity by Having Sex with Them
Stories of priests and other religious figures engaged in sexual misconduct, abuse, and rape are so prevalent and commonplace these days that we can almost predict the stories before we’ve even read them. But every once in a while, there’s an exceptional case, such as ex-pastor Brent Girouex, who engaged in these behaviors for the…
By Dan Hoffman
Stories of priests and other religious figures engaged in sexual misconduct, abuse, and rape are so prevalent and commonplace these days that we can almost predict the stories before we’ve even read them. But every once in a while, there’s an exceptional case, such as ex-pastor Brent Girouex of Council Bluffs, Iowa, who engaged in these behaviors for the sake of purging young male church-goers of their homosexual urges.
Girouex was released on bail this past month; he was charged with 60 counts of suspicion of sexual exploitation by a counselor or therapist in February of 2007, when he confessed to having had relations with four young men. He turned himself in at the insistence of Reverend Lonnie Parton, Girouex’s colleague at the Victory Fellowship Church. Since Girouex’s initial confession, as many as eight more victims have come forward, according to Pottawattamie County Attorney Matt Wilbur.
The pastor told Wilbur that he had engaged in sexual activity with the young men to help them achieve “sexual purity in the eyes of God.”
According to one of the victims, Girouex had sex with him between 50 to 100 times over the course of a four year period, beginning when said victim was fourteen.
Girouex allegedly claimed that it was his duty “to help [the teen] with homosexual urges by praying while he had sexual contact with him,” according to investigators. Other victims who spoke with detectives reported similar stories of being “sexually purified.”
Girouex’s misconduct was not limited to the underraged; one man, aged twenty-three, claimed that Girouex touched his genitals when he came for counseling about relationship troubles with his wife, and yet another twenty-year-old found himself receiving oral sex from Girouex after a series of sexually charged correspondences.
According to court documents, Girouex claimed that all of these encounters were about the sexual purity of his parishioners.
“When they would ejaculate, they would be getting rid of the evil thoughts in their mind,” Girouex allegedly told detectives.
The comprehensive story on Girouex is available here. 
