DALLAS (RNS) — Four elders at Gateway Church, whose senior pastor stepped down earlier this year, have been removed after the results of a law firm’s investigation of sexual abuse allegations against the pastor were announced in a sermon on Sunday (Nov. 3).
The removals are the latest responses by one of the country’s largest evangelical Christian churches to allegations brought by Cindy Clemishire in June that Gateway’s founding pastor, Robert Morris, 63, had molested her in the 1980s, when Morris was in his 20s and she was 12.
Soon afterward, also in June, the church retained law firm Haynes and Boone to conduct an investigation, which, church elder Tra Willbanks announced on Sunday, had found that all but three elders had been aware of Morris’ history with Clemishire, now 54, and her age at the time of the alleged abuse.
“We now know that there were elders and employees at Gateway who knew before June 14, 2024, that Cindy was 12 at the time of the abuse,” church elder Tra Willbanks said. “Both groups are fundamentally wrong and simply cannot and will not be tolerated at Gateway Church.”
While Willbanks declined to identify the elders who were removed, the names of elders Jeremy Carrasco, Kevin Grove, Gayland Lawshe and Thomas Miller n …