PCA Arm Allows Pastor Min Joshua Chung to Return to Ministry Despite Alleged Sexual Misconduct

An arm of the Presbyterian Church in America is allowing Min Joshua Chung, described in the source as arguably the nation’s most prominent Korean-American pastor, to return to ministry despite allegations of sexual misconduct and cover-up.

Whistleblowers are now making their accusations public after several years of attempts to confront the influential pastor within what they describe as a tight-knit, shame-based community. Former members of Covenant Fellowship Church (CFC) of Champaign-Urbana, Illinois, where Chung pastored, say the church system breeds abuse. Frank Mesina, a former CFC member, said that in much of Asian culture, “you never want to look bad in front of the community and you never want to be the cause of someone else being shamed.” He added, “Especially in the Korean community, to call out a pastor, you’re going against God-given authority.”

Chung founded CFC in 1990. According to its website, the congregation now has more than a thousand members from more than 20 ethno-linguistic groups. His influence extends beyond the church, as he has either founded or served in leadership for several youth and college ministries across the country. He was a board member of the international missions organization SIM from 2006 to 2019, and an adjunct professor at Urbana Theological Seminary from 2005 to 2018. Tim Ma, a former CFC member and 2014 graduate of the University of Illinois, said the church’s main ministry is to students at the university and that it recruits heavily during “new student week.”

CFC separated from Chung on May 27 and has contracted a third-party investigation into his conduct. Many other ministries have removed him from their boards and speaking schedules. Calls for reform are spreading through the Korean-American community, even as whistleblowers fear retaliation.

According to a 67-page report released to The Roys Report, former long-term church members, pastors and leaders state that they found sexual misconduct and abuse of power by Chung. A 124-page extended version, which contained copies of texts describing one victim’s assault and subsequent intimidation, was submitted in November 2020 to an investigative team of the Korean Central Presbytery (KCP). It followed a five-page allegation letter the whistleblowers sent in August. The version released to the publication referenced and summarized those texts instead, in the interest of the victim’s privacy. The presbytery is a ruling body of the Presbyterian Church in America, the denomination that ordained Chung. Pursuing a fair hearing of the accounts is a matter of truth and fairness (Proverbs 18:17).

The report alleges that in 2001 Chung assaulted a woman in the back seat of a car. People close to the woman said she did not wish to speak to the publication. The report does not offer explicit details of the incident, but it states that the touching was “in a way that could be constituted as sexual assault” under Illinois law.

The report includes testimony from a friend of the woman, who said the woman called her after the incident and told her what Chung had done. The friend stated that the victim was “suicidal and traumatized by her initial and continuous interaction with Pastor Min.” At the friend’s urging, the victim told Chung she had not consented to his touch. According to the friend’s testimony in the report, Chung became upset that the victim had told someone and “told her to keep the incident quiet between the two of them.” The report further states that Chung began private counseling sessions with the victim, using that time to urge her to remain silent about the assault.

Former CFC member Janet Park said that when she confronted Chung in 2009, he told her he had kept the matter secret because the victim had insisted on it. Other whistleblowers said in the report that this is not true. The report states that Chung “bullied . . . into silence” those who knew of the incident.

Source: Read the original report