Who is carl lentz

Lentz declined to comment for this story. In casting Lentz out, Houston exiled not only the leading avatar of the culture he built, but something of a son as well. For years, Hillsong experienced rapid growth as it offered itself as a house of worship and community for its young followers seeking what they needed—be that healing, fellowship, or grace. Its contemporary spin on Christianity, embodied by Lentz, packed a thriving network of on-trend believers into services across the globe every week.

Though Lentz came from a family of believers, by college at North Carolina State, where he earned a spot on the varsity basketball team, he had just about given up on his faith. During a visit home before his sophomore year, his parents brought him to a service at the newly established Wave Church.

That afternoon, the pastor gave out a clear call: If you want to change your life and serve Jesus and Jesus alone, lift up your hand. He left school and eventually made his way to Hillsong College in Sydney.

According to a interview with Lentz in The Christian Post, as early something students, Lentz and the younger Houston fantasized about someday teaming up to establish a Hillsong church in New York.

In class, Lentz established himself as a brash and discursive presence. He and Joel grew a joint reputation for their nightlife exploits.

He also met Laura, a native Australian whose parents are longtime friends of the Houstons. In his last year of school, Lentz interned for Houston, washing his car and picking up his dry cleaning. When Lentz returned Stateside in , he brought his wife with him. Carl and Laura took jobs at Wave, the site of his earlier epiphany, where he now assisted the youth minister with a Wednesday-night service for college-age kids. A Virginian-Pilot report noted that the service, Soul Central, kicked off at 8 p.

Strobe lights and stage smoke filled the church lobby. Crowds climbed to 1, per night in under a year. Lentz recognized right away that the offer made little sense for him and his family. And New York City had a reputation as a wasteland for new churches. But Lentz found the allure of having his own branch of Hillsong to run irresistible. Lentz moved his family to the Williamsburg waterfront. The building served as the locus of church business in the city and the site of boys nights, to the extent that the two differed.

Pastors held exclusive late-night parties that managed to make space for the models whose agencies put them up in the building and the young men of Hillsong who had proven their loyalty. Hillsong teachings reserve sex strictly for marriage.

They hung out at neighborhood bars, getting drunk and once starting a fight. A church spokesperson said its leadership was unaware of any inappropriate activity at the Kent Avenue address. Some congregants poked fun at the protective measures. In , Lentz undertook a life rite familiar to his secular peers: moving to Montclair. They joined a pool club and hosted cookouts with plenty to drink. Friends remember Lentz being in and out, returning late from the city or leaving just as the party got under way to play basketball with Drake.

Assistants answered his emails. The first two rows at church were reserved every week for VIPs and close friends. In , Brian Houston made a trip to the United States, where he met with pastors preaching the so-called prosperity gospel. The doctrine, popularized by American televangelists, holds that Jesus wanted health and wealth for his followers.

The prosperity doctrine is partly a financial proposition: If you donate to Hillsong, God will give you that money back. Hillsong, like many of its peers, recommends its congregants tithe 10 percent of their earnings. The church has locations across the world, mostly in large cities. The church offers a version of the gospel that can cohere with the rest of your urban professional life.

Houston describes Hillsong as one house with many rooms; each is imprinted in his image in some way. Lentz, an alumnus of Houston car wash duties, extended the tradition by elevating preferred members of his drive team to leadership roles.

And then he leaves. He never actually interacts with the people he ministers to. In , with his New York flock outgrowing smaller venues, Lentz began holding services at 1,seat Irving Plaza. On Sundays Lentz sometimes delivered six sermons a day, ducking out between services to minister to the homeless. Lines snaked around the block. Hillsong used a nearby hotel to simulcast for overflow crowds.

The creative element, especially in New York, is incredible. Sunday call time for volunteers is 5 a. The crew team unloads trucks. The tech team sets up the sound and projector. Before greeting guests and distributing literature, the host team checks the theater seats for vomit left over from the night before.

Volunteers with jobs farthest from the backstage areas occupy the lowest rungs of the Hillsong hierarchy, which, leaders often remind, is scalable. Lower overhead means higher profits. One pastor routinely asked Jones to replace singers, who had rehearsed, with celebrities including, once, Vanessa Hudgens and potential paramours.

The choir revealed other fault lines too. Hillsong permitted Canfield, who declined an interview request for this story, to remain a coach but banned him from singing. Kimes said in her statement that Lentz repeatedly physically violated her, including on two occasions, in a movie theater and while she was driving, with one or more of his children present.

Kimes wrote that she felt guilty about her discomfort and ashamed, and that she questioned whether anyone would believe her. Kimes said that she twice discussed the alleged abuse with the Lentzes. While working for the Lentzes, V.

Former congregants have said that, in part by instructing volunteers not to talk to or look at Lentz, Kimes helped maintain his status in the church. In a group of Hillsong volunteers emailed the Lentzes and the Houstons claiming that church staffers were engaging in unchecked sexual misconduct and bullying. According to Kimes, Lentz and his wife Laura addressed the harassment and abuse on two occasions: First in , when they "blamed and silenced" her, and in , when Lentz "took full responsibility for taking advantage of me.

He said his wife would come and talk to me about the boundaries we would have moving forward. When Laura came to speak with her, Kimes said she was dismissed from all household duties but kept on staff. When Kimes learned Lentz was leaving Hillsong, she said she confided in her husband about her treatment from the couple. She thanked the Houstons for treating her with compassion and urged readers to stay faithful to God without becoming "blindly loyal to an individual.

Hillsong is my church, and I will remain on staff, working toward a stronger future. Megachurch founder says ex-pastor Carl Lentz had 'leadership issues' in interview. Justin Bieber spent a month and a half living with Lentz and his family in during a tumultuous time in his life. Lentz has told the story of how he baptized the pop star in the New York bathtub of NBA veteran Tyson Chandler in the middle of the night.