Leigh Hollingsworth

[Leigh Hollingsworth @UM8891]

"The depth and realism here is palpable and revelatory of real life. How could Rowling have foreseen this? ... [T]he drama that has unfolded in our own times might actually create a template of understanding to reveal many common themes throughout history."

[Jeffrey A Tucker @jeffreytucker]

Order of the Phoenix Reveals All https://t.co/uMzFgj4EwY via @epochtimes

[Ron Paul @RonPaul]

Trump/Vance was presented as "the peace ticket," and was voted in with the expectation of focusing on America instead of the rest of the world.

But alas, the addiction to Empire has proven to be too strong once again. The Trump Administration has been laser-focused on foreign nations, while our own nation continues to struggle quite substantially.

Yesterday, the president even proposed a $1.5 TRILLION military budget. Are we reaching the mania phase, or what market traders call the "blowoff top" of Empire?

Watch @RonPaul & @ChrisRossini below:

[Leigh Hollingsworth @UM8891]

The irony is staggering: they demand the full benefits of male headship (the authority, the deference, the prestige) yet recoil from the responsibilities...protection, accountability, humility. When a woman dares to speak truth to that authority...the machinery turns...upon her.

[Kaeley Triller @KaeleyT]

WARNING: Long post ahead. I'll probably convert it into a blog entry at some point, but I just wanted to start the conversation here.

I'm admittedly a terrible spokesperson for this topic given my own sordid history, so if you would rather hear this from someone else, that's fine. The question that ultimately matters here, is "What is true?" not "Who's the one saying it?"

In any case, if you've been following the SBC abuse saga, you're probably familiar with the name Jennifer Lyell. In 2019, Jennifer alleged that David Sills, then a professor at The Southern Baptist Theological Seminary, groomed her (when she was in her early 20s and he was approximately 23 years older) into a sexual relationship shaped by severe spiritual, academic, and institutional power imbalance, and that SBC leaders later minimized or obscured the abuse rather than hold him accountable.

Sadly, Jennifer died this past June at the age of 47 after suffering a series of strokes and before the matter could be fully litigated.

Her case is the linchpin for SBC abuse accountability because it exposes how abuse was not only perpetrated, but institutionally managed, minimized, and protected at the highest levels. It is not just an abuse case, it is a systems-failure case. It involves SBC leadership at the highest level and implicates SBC seminaries, SBC Executive Committee leadership, SBC legal counsel, and SBC public communications.

There is documented evidence of institutional knowledge and cover-up.

So much of the public debate around the Jennifer Lyell case keeps circling the same question: Was it consensual? That fixation already tells us how far the conversation has fallen.

Consent is the world’s favorite moral escape hatch. If two adults said yes, the case is closed. But that standard is not Christian, it’s minimalist. Scripture does not ask leaders merely to avoid illegality. It demands holiness, restraint, protection of the vulnerable, and fear of God. The question was never,” Did she consent?” The question is “What does God require of those with power?”

That question becomes unavoidable when we acknowledge that Jennifer Lyell was a survivor of childhood sexual abuse. This is not salacious detail. It is morally relevant reality. Trauma reshapes how authority is experienced. Survivors are more vulnerable to grooming, more likely to confuse attention with safety, and more susceptible to manipulation by men who cloak themselves in spiritual authority. A leader who encounters that vulnerability and proceeds anyway is not navigating neutral ground, he is crossing a line.

When Christians make consent the gold standard, we shrink God’s ethics down to the size of secular permissibility. We forget that Scripture repeatedly warns that power corrupts, that shepherds can wound, that teachers will be judged more strictly. The Bible does not treat authority as morally neutral. It treats it as dangerous in the wrong hands.

Even if someone appears willing, consent given within a hierarchy (under spiritual authority, professional dependence, psychological pressure, or unresolved trauma) is not morally cleansing. Consent and exploitation are not mutually exclusive. A prostitute may technically consent to sex with a john, but that hardly means he's not exploiting her. A person can say yes and still be harmed.

And even if one insists on flattening this into “mutual sin,” Scripture refuses to distribute blame evenly. The greater the power, the greater the responsibility. The one who sets the tone bears the weight. The shepherd answers for the sheep.

Obsessing over whether Lyell was “complicit” is a diversion. It shifts scrutiny downward, away from the man with authority and the institutions that protected him. It is a tactic as old as abuse itself.

"But letting her off the hook denies her agency and short circuits her need for repentance!" the accusers cry. "You must hold her accountable! She has equal power here!"

Does she? Really? In the Southern Baptist Church, where women aren’t allowed to address the congregation without a male chaperone? Where women like her are taught from childhood to submit, to stay silent, to defer their voice and judgment to men? Where the very system that elevates male authority simultaneously strips her of the tools, the platform, and the power to defend herself?

The irony is staggering: they demand the full benefits of male headship (the authority, the deference, the prestige) yet recoil from the responsibilities it entails: protection, accountability, humility. When a woman dares to speak truth to that authority, to name abuse, the machinery that claims to uphold righteousness turns not toward the offender, but upon her. Her “agency” is invoked only to punish her courage, while the man’s misuse of power is minimized, rationalized, or ignored.

"Woops! We're all human. Let he who is without sin cast the first stone. Touch not the Lord's anointed. This is just another reason why women don't belong in seminary in the first place. Nothing but trouble."

In the end, the consent debate is a smokescreen. It asks whether something was technically allowed instead of whether it was righteous. And Christians who settle for that question are not defending holiness; they are defending power.

God’s standard was never “Did she agree?” It was always “Did you love, protect, and do no harm?” If you're one of the most influential men in one of the most powerful seminaries in the world, the standards are higher for you. They have to be.

[Tóbi Bítàn🌻 @Tobi_Bitan]

Please, read books. Not just captions, or carousel posts, or what made it to the top of your feed. Read books. Long ones. Complex ones. You cannot build a mind with weight on the back of social media ephemerals. Intellectual depth demands patience.

[Nicole Shanahan @NicoleShanahan]

The line between good and evil is more clearly drawn now than it has been in a long time. We’re in the midst of a spiritual war—it’s all around us—and C.S. Lewis’ Screwtape Letters speaks into this moment with a relevance and foresight that’s striking.

[Naomi Brockwell priv/acc @naomibrockwell]

“People will be on their best behavior because we’re constantly watching/recording everything.”

A breathtakingly naïve response to surveillance/digital IDs. It assumes govt is always benevolent & its rules always just.
History shows the opposite.
It's a fast-track to tyranny.

[Leigh Hollingsworth @UM8891]

"In 2014, for example, a Fusion Center in Washington State mistakenly released records detailing government interest in “psycho-electronic” weapons—remote mind control tactics allegedly capable of controlling people or subjecting them to varying degrees of pain from a distance."

[The Rutherford Institute @Rutherford_Inst]

The battlefield is no longer physical—it is psychological—and the American people are the targets.
___
The U.S. Government Is Waging Psychological War on Its Citizens | By John & Nisha Whitehead
https://t.co/sRK3bq1Mp4

[Leigh Hollingsworth @UM8891]

"when symbolic outrage is used as a political smokescreen for militarization and constitutional erosion, it distracts Americans from the machinery of control being built in real time. The fight over flags and museums is not just about culture— it is the smokescreen ..."

[The Rutherford Institute @Rutherford_Inst]

President Trump’s flag burning fight is a constitutional bait-and-switch—a diversion to distract from the Deep State's authoritarian power grabs.
___
Burning the Flag or Torching the Constitution: Only One Destroys Freedom | By John & Nisha Whitehead
https://t.co/nrMraHfFL2

[Leigh Hollingsworth @UM8891]

@naomibrockwell Paranoia is not the answer just bc prosecution to fullest extent of law of the govt creeps didn't happen ... 01, 08, 13, etc. Didn't anticipate close reach o/ CNs but if you're a target you can't escape USAPs. Better to believe in something irresistible while they watch & plot.

[Whitney Webb @_whitneywebb]

I've warned about the pre-crime push to "stop mass shootings before they happen" for years, especially during the first Trump administration.

I don't think it's a coincidence that this happens just as the full extent of the Epstein-Thiel-Carbyne911 relationship is being revealed.

I wrote about Epstein, Thiel and Carbyne as well as Trump's previous pre-crime push after a spate of 2019 mass shootings (which then-AG William Barr, who launched a DOJ pre-crime program called DEEP, seemed to predict in an odd speech) together in the same article.

Check it out below and don't fall for the latest tragedy being used to coerce you into signing away your remaining freedoms to a pre-crime surveillance state.

https://t.co/1fuJMRE5FW

[Leigh Hollingsworth @UM8891]

@naomibrockwell Privacy IS dead for some.
Acknowledging is not acquiescing.
Christian response/nonresponse, is disturbing. Assuming Christians should "expect" police state & 24/7 surveillance, do they address liklihood of same being exploited to hinder saving faith, esp in hyperpatria cultures?

[Naomi Brockwell priv/acc @naomibrockwell]

Privacy isn't about having something to hide, it's about having space to grow.

[Whitney Webb @_whitneywebb]

Anyone who still thinks that putting the Big Tech bros that contract for the military + intel agencies in charge of the govt would somehow slow down the rollout of techno dystopia are sure in for a big surprise.

[Leigh Hollingsworth @UM8891]

@Independent_Mnd @RepThomasMassie "Ma'am, you're confusing an existential threat to the manhood of pajama boys with female chattelization. Get your husband to mansplain it to you."

[George @BehizyTweets]

DOGE Advisor Ron Paul has announced that one of his recommendations will be to totally ELIMINATE foreign aid.

"It’s taking money from the poor and middle class in the US and giving it to the rich in poor countries - with a cut to the facilitators in between!"

It's about time we defunded the dictators all around the world. The billions we send overseas are responsible for the corrupt people remaining in office for so long.

Nothing our foreign policy establishment has done since World War II has benefitted us or the world at-large in any way.

[Thomas Massie @RepThomasMassie]

REAL ID was sold to conservatives as a way to prevent people who are here illegally from traveling or using taxpayer resources. It’s fairly obvious now that was a ploy to take more of your civil liberties.

The next scam is national E-verify. Will you fall for it?

[Ron Paul @RonPaul]

Deporting illegals is the government's job.

But...

Putting military on America's streets is illegal and would open the door for future abuses of power.

[Leigh Hollingsworth @UM8891]

@ggreenwald @RepThomasMassie I ❤️everything about @RepThomasMassie except his evident belief that women don't have equal rights under the law.
Where is he on weed?

[Glenn Greenwald @ggreenwald]

Anyone who appoints Mike Rogers to run the FBI - after he's arguably been the single most ardent, blind and extremist defender of the US Security State and its surveillance and politicized abuses - should forfeit forever any claim to be interested in combatting those agencies: