CHICAGO (RNS) — Harvest Bible Chapel has apologized both privately and publicly to a freelance journalist and two bloggers whom it sued last fall.
The lawsuit, which also included the bloggers’ wives, had claimed the journalist and bloggers defamed the Chicago-area megachurch. The lawsuit later was dropped.
Not long afterward, Harvest fired founding pastor Rev. James MacDonald, who had claimed the suit was biblical.
“With a new church leadership team and new elder board now in place, along with this apology and the restitution Harvest has made/offered to each of you, we hope this will start the healing process between each of you and Harvest,” reads the apology posted on journalist Julie Roys’ website.
The move comes as Harvest transitions to a new board of elders this week and prepares to move forward under new leaders.
Roys — who was sued while investigating trouble at Harvest, which she later wrote about for World Magazine, an evangelical Christian publication — said she received the apology via email from church elders on Tuesday (April 30).
In the email, Harvest elders asked for forgiveness and admitted they never should have sued Roys, Elephant’s Debt bloggers Scott Bryant and Ryan Mahoney or Bryant’s and Mahoney’s wives.
“While at the time we thought we were acting in the best interests of the church, we now realize this lawsuit, while…
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