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Former Liberty University president and chancellor Jerry Falwell Jr. has accused multiple past and current members of the Evangelical Christian university's senior leadership team of sexual misconduct and self-dealing in an amended lawsuit. First filed in July, the lawsuit also alleges the exploitation of the trademark and image of his father, Jerry Falwell Sr. In his initial filing of the lawsuit on July 27, Falwell, who was forced to resign as president of the university in the summer of 2020 over a sex scandal, accused the institution founded by his father in 1971 of profiting from Jerry Falwell Sr.'s "brand...

(RNS) — The ongoing legal battle between Liberty University and Jerry Falwell Jr. has taken yet another twist, with the disgraced former president of the school alleging misconduct by its board of directors and attempting to ban the university from using images of his late father. In an amended complaint filed in federal court last week, Falwell Jr., who resigned from his post in August 2020 in the wake of multiple scandals, alleged that several board members, including former interim Liberty President Jerry Prevo and former Southern Baptist Convention President Jerry Vines, diverted university funds to their private causes. “During...

Jerry Falwell Jr. is suing Liberty University in Lynchburg, Virginia, claiming his former employer has withheld $8.5 million in retirement benefits that were previously promised to him. The son of the school’s founder and conservative activist Jerry Falwell Sr., Falwell has been credited with bringing Liberty University back from the brink of financial collapse while serving as its president from 2007 to 2020. However, Falwell’s tenure at the school ended amid scandal and controversy in 2020 after Falwell posted an image to social media of himself alongside a woman with their pants unbuttoned and unzipped. The image was meant to...

BEDFORD Co., Va. (WSET) -- A few days after resigning as Liberty University's president, Jerry Falwell Jr. was injured in a fall after drinking, according to a 911 call obtained by WSET. According to the 911 call, on Sunday, Aug. 30, Falwell was reportedly injured and his wife, Becki Falwell, called 911 to report he had fallen down the stairs and was bleeding. "It was night time and he fell from the stairs and there's a lot of blood right now," Becki told the Bedford County dispatcher. According to the call, Becki said that Falwell had been drinking but wouldn't...

Half of Christians say sex between consenting adults who are in a committed dating relationship is sometimes or always acceptable, and over half — with the exception of evangelical Protestants — say casual sex is OK, according to a survey by the Pew Research Center. Some 62% of Catholics, 56% of Protestants in the historically black tradition, 54% of mainline Protestants, and 36% of evangelical Protestants say casual sex between consenting adults is sometimes or always acceptable, according to the survey. Among those who are religiously unaffiliated, as many as 84% say casual sex is sometimes or always acceptable, Pew...

Becki Falwell confirmed Tuesday that she had an affair but denied allegations that her husband, Jerry Falwell Jr., was involved as one man has claimed. Both the Falwells denied that Jerry Falwell had been involved in the affair during a Tuesday interview with the Washington Post following news that Jerry Falwell resigned as president of Liberty University.

Disclosure: John Wesley Reid worked for Liberty University as a national recruiter for nearly three years and since moving to Washington DC has interviewed Jerry Falwell numerous times as a reporter. He currently contributes to Liberty University's Falkirk Center for Faith and Liberty as a writer and strategist.Over the past year or so, students and alumni of Liberty University have shared a common mantra aimed at Jerry Falwell Jr.:“The world is watching.”The statement surfaced routinely when Falwell made headlines from an off-color joke or poorly worded statement.Now in the wake of a photo-gone-viral taken of Falwell while on vacation, a...

Liberty University President Jerry Falwell Jr. is taking an indefinite leave of absence, the university said on Friday. In a brief statement, the Executive Committee of Liberty’s board of trustees said met with Falwell on Friday and made its request, “to which he has agreed, effective immediately.” The one-sentence statement did not provide a reason for Falwell’s departure from the post he’s held since the death of his father, famed evangelist Jerry Falwell, more than a decade ago. Falwell has also been a close friend and spiritual adviser to President Donald Trump. His departure marks a dramatic end to a...

Liberty University president Jerry Falwell Jr. joined "Hannity" Wednesday to explain why the school filed a $10 million defamation lawsuit against The New York Times over its coverage of the university's response to the coronavirus pandemic. "Not only are they a bigoted bunch of liars, and also [a] BuzzFeed type click bait publication now," Falwell told host Sean Hannity. "But they're also stupid, because they came on campus. We had 25, at least, 'No Trespassing' signs everywhere, and they were dumb enough to take pictures of the signs and publish them. "So we got warrants out for their arrest and...

Evangelical Christian support for President Donald Trump will be greater in 2020’s presidential election than in 2016, predicted Jerry Falwell Jr., president of Liberty University, sharing his comments on Tuesday’s edition of SiriusXM’s Breitbart News Tonight with host Matt Boyle. Ninety percent of Evangelical Christians support Trump’s reelection, according to a recent Democracy Institute/Sunday Express poll. Boyle invited Falwell’s remarks on the poll’s findings. Falwell replied, “There’s no question about it. The Evangelical support [for Trump] has strengthened. I have board members who travel. I have one board member who lost his legs in Vietnam. He travels from military base...

Real-estate mogul Donald Trump announced on Tuesday that his campaign was endorsed by a big-name leader in the evangelical community: Liberty University president Jerry Falwell Jr. "Great honor- Rev. Jerry Falwell Jr. of Liberty University, one of the most respected religious leaders in our nation, has just endorsed me!" Trump wrote on Twitter. ... "It is truly an honor to receive Jerry's endorsement. Not only is he a high-quality person, with a wonderful family, whom I have great respect for - I also consider him a very good friend and his support means so much to me," Trump said in...

Liberty University president Jerry Falwell Jr., the son of the late televangelist, endorsed Donald Trump on Tuesday, giving Republican front-runner the blessing of one of the evangelical community’s biggest names just days before the Iowa caucuses.

It's become a truism this election season that whatever you expect to happen with Donald Trump, you're probably wrong. So add this to the list of surprises: On Monday, the thrice-married Republican frontrunner, who described himself as pro-choice as recently as 2000, traveled to the heart of conservative evangelism only to be greeted as a conquering hero. Trump spoke at the Liberty University convocation on Martin Luther King Day. Liberty is the largest Christian university in the world... So one might have expected that Trump, who declined to name his favorite Bible verse on the campaign trail, would have received...

An email message sent out Friday morning by the campaign of Republican presidential contender Sen. Marco Rubio (R-FL) claims the junior senator from Florida "is leading the Billy Graham wing" of evangelical Christians, while Sen. Ted Cruz (R-TX) "is leading the Jerry Falwell wing," and GOP frontrunner Donald Trump "is leading the Jimmy Swaggart wing." The email was signed by Eric Teetsell, who was hired by the Rubio campaign in November to serve as its director of Faith Outreach. It began with a controversial quote made at Roll Call last week by Russell Moore, an advocate of amnesty for illegal...

In the wake of Liberty University President Jerry Falwell Jr. call to students and faculty to arm themselves against Muslim terrorists, Hillary Clinton accused the school's president of "hateful rhetoric." "This is the kind of deplorable not only hateful response to a legitimate security issue," Clinton declared Sunday to ABC's George Stephanopoulos. "But it is giving aid and comfort to ISIS and other radical jihadists." Falwell urged students and faculty during Friday's convocation at Liberty to arm themselves to help prevent attacks against terrorists intending to do harm on the American public. "I've always thought if more good people had...

Wednesday at a press conference after his remarks at Liberty University, Republican presidential hopeful Dr. Ben Carson was asked about what he would do with the 11 million illegal immigrants already living in the Untied States. Carson said proposed a six-month registration period to register, then after that the case would be made on the legal status. -snip- Carson said, "When you look at farming industries, I've talked to farmers with multi-thousands acres farms and they say their business would collapse, I've talked to hotel owners and they say that they would have a very difficult time without them. That's...

With the announcement of Ted Cruz's candidacy for the GOP presidential nomination and his speech at the convocation of the ultra-conservative Liberty University, the country finds itself jilted to the right on the ideological spectrum. Ted Cruz is quite the curious ideological torchbearer precisely because he is Latino. The general assumption in politics is that growing Hispanic Latino participation in politics will only mean an ideological shift to the left. This makes Ted Cruz' candidacy a welcome reminder that Latino candidates won't, for good or bad, necessarily stray from traditional American politics any time soon. The son of Cuban immigrants...

Mitt Romney: Mormon Candidate at Baptist Liberty University Moves Catholic Editor By Keith A Fournier May 15th, 2012 Full Story at: (THIS LINK) Governor Romney did not attempt to argue the compatibility of his own religious faith and that of most of the graduates. I was relieved. He told the graduates and their guests, "People of different faiths, like yours and mine, sometimes wonder where we can meet in common purpose, when there are so many differences in creed and theology. Surely the answer is that we can meet in service, in shared moral convictions about our nation stemming from...

In a statement issued by Liberty University Friday, a panel of four trustees announced they had found that Ergun Caner, dean of the seminary at the Lynchburg, Virginia, school, had made "self-contradictory" statements about "dates, names and places of residence" in his public talks following the events of September 11, 2001. However, the trustees found no evidence to question Caner's basic claim that he was "a Muslim who converted to Christianity as a teenager."

LYNCHBURG, Va. (ABP) -- Liberty University will investigate reports that its seminary president has misled the public in his testimony about converting from militant Islam to Christianity, officials of the school in Lynchburg, Va., announced May 10. Liberty Provost Ron Godwin is reportedly forming a committee to conduct a formal inquiry into questions surrounding Ergun Caner, president of Liberty Baptist Theological Seminary, that have circulated on blogs and more recently in media outlets including Christianity Today and Associated Baptist Press. "Liberty does not initiate personnel evaluations based upon accusations from Internet blogs," said Chancellor Jerry Falwell Jr., breaking weeks of...