CeCe--er, Priscilla--Winans saw fit to speak at Gateway Church. That's not OK.

The gospel megastar apparently has no qualms about speaking at Gateway even after its founding pastor was exposed as a pervert and amid overwhelming evidence that this church is not safe.

CeCe Winans on The Kelly Clarkson Show (screenshot courtesy NBC)

For the better part of this year, we have been treated to an almost daily diet of outrages from one of the country’s most prominent megachurches, Gateway Church in Southlake, Texas—a suburb of the Dallas-Fort Worth Metroplex. In June, its founding pastor, Robert Morris, had a four-decade-old lie finally catch up with him. For five years in the 1980s, while he was an up-and-coming youth evangelist, he groomed and sexually assaulted a girl in Oklahoma. At the time the abuse began, the victim, Cindy Clemishire, was 12, while Morris was a 21-year-old evangelist under the auspices of Shady Grove Church, a then-prominent charismatic church in the Metroplex that is now a Gateway campus.

Clemishire had tried to speak out numerous times since 2005, only to be rebuffed each time. When she finally found someone willing to listen, Morris and the Gateway elders initially claimed he’d been fully restored to ministry after having “moral failure” with a “young lady.” However, in the face of vehement criticism from all sides, Morris resigned. Incredibly, according to NBC News, the elders actually hewed and hawed over whether to accept his resignation. In what world is removing a pastor who is guilty of such a monstrous crime even up for debate?

Since then, it has emerged that Morris’ depravities were the tip of a very large iceberg. In July, Metroplex CBS station KTVT reported that Gateway had settled two lawsuits, the details of which raise serious questions about the environment Morris created after founding Gateway in 2000. In April, according to KTVT, Gateway settled a lawsuit by a former member who alleged the church covered up the sexual assault of his daughter at the hands of a Gateway youth pastor. That same report revealed that shortly before Morris was pushed out, Gateway settled a suit by a former administrative assistant who claimed her boss, an associate pastor, sexually harassed and assaulted her. In July, the head of Gateway’s prison ministry was exposed as a child sex offender—and Gateway has been evasive at best on whether its members knew.

While Gateway has kept up a brave front, this situation has been well beyond the tolerance levels of many of its members. At the first Sunday service following Morris’ resignation, the main auditorium in Southlake was only half full. By August, weekly attendance at Gateway’s nine campuses across the Metroplex was down by as much as 19 percent. It’s hard to blame people for jumping ship. After all, they’ve had to ask questions that no one should have to ask about a church, ever. The answers to those questions should make it clear to any reasonable person that Gateway is not safe.

And yet, even though it has been proven that Morris is a child predator and a monstrous liar, he still has a fair amount of support. For instance, in August, abuse advocate Amy “Watchkeep” Smith discovered several members wringing their hands on Facebook at how they missed Morris.

But Gateway hasn’t just retained support from the rank-and-file. It still apparently has support from at least one A-list Christian personality—gospel singer CeCe Winans. For some time, Gateway elder Tra Willbanks has served as an emissary for updates from the Gateway board on the investigation into Morris’ depravities and other matters. On one of those updates, posted on September 5, Willbanks announced that coming weekend would feature Winans’ first-ever visit to Gateway.

This hit me from somewhere around thread level on the carpet. It was inconceivable that Winans wasn’t aware of Morris’ misdeeds, as well as the mounting evidence that he and several people close to him had known about their true extent for several years and lied about it. This was especially befuddling because less than two months earlier, Gateway had shelved its yearly Gateway Conference, an event that attracts some of the biggest names in the Christian world. This year’s conference, for instance, was due to feature such luminaries as Lisa Bevere, Jenetzen Franklin, and Phil Wickham. According to advocate Justice for Cindy Clemishire, Gateway told its members and staffers in late July that the 2024 conference was off. In mid-August, Gateway announced that the 2025 conferences was off as well.

There was another reason Winans’ decision to come to Gateway was hard to comprehend. At least two evangelical heavyweights pulled out of speaking engagements this summer—Joyce Meyer and Ben Carson. According to The Christian Post, Meyer and Carson were slated to speak as part of the “Let’s Dive In!” summer speakers’ series. However, Carson canceled his July 4th weekend talks at the request of church leadership “in order to allow the healing process to take place.” Meyer, whose experience as a survivor of child sexual abuse at the hands of her father is well known, went further. She announced that she was not only coming in late July, but wouldn’t be coming back to Southlake ever again.

So Gateway shelved its next two conferences, asked Carson not to come, and was rocked by Meyer cutting all ties with it. And yet, it not only invited Winans, but Winans kept the engagement. Don’t take my word for it. Watch a clip here. What is telling, though, is what she hasn’t said. In the absence of something I haven’t heard or seen, she hasn’t commented on the situation at Gateway, let alone offered an explanation for why she kept her engagement.

I know what some of you are thinking—“What’s the big deal?” Well, Winans, for those who don’t know, is the most decorated female gospel singer of all time. Her standing in the Christian world is comparable to that of her longtime friend Whitney Houston in her prime. In the current era, Winans’ standing is comparable to that of, say, Rhianna or Beyoncé. If either Rhianna or Beyoncé were in the company of Diddy after the video of him assaulting Cassie Ventura came to light, we’d rightly be asking questions. Winans’ decision to appear at Gateway in the face of overwhelming evidence that Morris not only lied about his depravity, but fostered a toxic environment at his church, is no different.

There are only two possible explanations for this, neither of which allow Winans to look good. Either Winans knew about the horrors at Gateway and still saw fit to stand by that church, or she didn’t make it her business to know. That means at best—AT BEST—Winans is disengaged in a way that an entertainer of her stature simply cannot be. Now that’s bad, brother.

As much as this reeks in and of itself, it’s especially outrageous considering that Winans is a Black woman appearing at a church whose former pastor stands credibly accused of grooming and molesting a child. While domestic violence and sexual assault are scourges in this country, they are especially so in the Black community. In 2020, the National Center on Violence Against Women in the Black Community revealed that Black women are at disproportionate risk for sexual assault. The numbers are absolutely staggering. For every Black woman who reports being raped, 15 women (!) don’t report. Some 20 percent of Black women are rape survivors, a total likely boosted by the whopping 25 percent of Black girls who are sexually abused before they turn 18.

It’s a near-mathematical certainty, given Gateway’s size, that when Winans took the stage, there was a survivor of sexual assault in the audience. Imagine if that survivor was thinking of coming forward—only to see Winans show up and in effect publicly stand with Gateway. That would be a punch in the gut—especially so if that hypothetical survivor was a Black woman. Given the numbers, that’s not being woke. That’s based on cold, hard facts.

Based on those facts, it’s only fair to ask, “What the hell were you thinking, Priscilla?” Yep, you read that right. Winans’ real name is Priscilla Marie Winans. She owes the world an explanation for why she saw fit to come to Gateway. Until she does so, she isn’t deserving of her nickname in my book.

And yet, in the absence of something I haven’t heard or seen, this has been the response to Winans’ appearance.

That’s right. Silence. Given the context, that silence is unacceptable. And it’s outrageous enough that I had to find the time to call Winans and Gateway out despite having precious little free time this year.

As many of you know, I haven’t been nearly as active as I intended to be since starting this newsletter. However, I’ve been hit with the one-two punch of helping my mother recover from a nasty fall and supporting my wife as she helped her mother in West Michigan battle cancer. Indeed, we had reluctantly decided before my mom fell that we were going to have to move to Michigan sometime this year. Virtually every scenario that would have allowed us to stay in Charlotte would have required my wife to shuttle back and forth to Michigan several times—in some cases, with no timetable for her return. That just isn’t sustainable in the long run, though it was only in late August that my mother’s recovery had moved along enough that we felt comfortable making final plans to move. Unfortunately, my mother-in-law lost her fight for life late last month, but we’re still moving later this month because my father-in-law has issues of his own such that he can’t be alone.

But in the absence of something I haven’t heard or seen, Winans has faced no blowback whatsoever. That’s too outrageous to ignore, especially given how quickly accountability has come in similar situations outside the Christian world. In 2022, Art Briles tried to wangle his way back into college football six years after being pushed out of Baylor in disgrace for turning a blind eye to sexual assault in his program. That February, he signed on as offensive coordinator at historically Black Grambling—in its prime, the Alabama or Ohio State of the Black college world. However, the criticism was so fierce that he was forced to resign only four days later. More recently, Diddy lost millions in endorsements within days of Ventura suing him for sexual assault last year, and was all but forced to apologize two days after video surfaced of him beating up Ventura at a hotel. Shouldn’t we, as believers, hold Christian celebrities to a higher standard?

Indeed, it makes one of the few things you can still say for Gateway look even sadder. By all accounts, Gateway is sincere in its commitment to diversity. I first heard of this church by way of videos from its worship ministry depicting yearly events in which worship leaders from around the world come to Southlake. But instead of applauding Gateway for continuing its commitment to platforming people of color, I find myself questioning whether Gateway and/or Winans have any moral compass at all.

As I write this, no media outlet, secular or otherwise, has sought answers from Winans. That’s especially surprising given that the secular media has given Gateway the full treatment since Morris’ depravities broke. It’s not too late, though. Winans owes us an explanation for why she saw fit to come to Gateway, even though at best she reasonably should have known it was a toxic waste dump. And she owes it in short order.

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