Gateway Church congregants take up Morris’ offer to get ‘money back’ on tithes

FORT WORTH, Texas (RNS) — Katherine Leach’s stomach churned while she was driving to Saturday worship at Gateway Church early this summer.

Leach, who has been attending the nondenominational North Texas congregation for the past three years, has also tithed — a practice of giving a tenth of one’s income to a church or religious organization. She was also considering joining Gateway’s prayer team.

Then, on June 18, Gateway’s founder and senior pastor, Robert Morris, resigned after accusations made by an Oklahoma woman named Cindy Clemishire, who told the Wartburg Watch that Morris had sexually abused her on multiple occasions in the 1980s, starting when Clemishire was 12 years old.

Since Morris founded Gateway church in 2000, it has grown into one of the largest megachurches in the nation, with roughly 100,000 active attendees at its main campus in Southlake, a Tarrant County suburb, and nine campuses across Texas and two others in Missouri and Wyoming.

“This is an unthinkable and painful time in our church. Our church congregation is hurt and shaken, and we know that you have many important questions,” Gateway Church elders said in a June 21 statement, saying the church hired law firm Haynes and Boone LLP to conduct an independent inquiry on the matter.

The following service, on June 22, as Leach pulled up to the church, a group of protesters carried signs reading “She was only 12” and, citing the Gospel reading forbidding the corruption of children, “Matthew 18:16 Millstones not cover ups!”

Leach also made a sign, but she wanted to hear what leadership would say at the service. After handing water bottles to the protesters, she went in and watched from the balcony. “I was going with the anticipation that there would be this sense of grief as a church body,” Leach said. “It was heartbreaking, and it made me sick to my stomach, quite honestly, because it was just business as usual.”

That was the last time, Leach said, she’s been to a Gateway worship service, but she didn’t add her name to the 25% of congregants who have officially left the church since June. Instead, Leach has been asking questions, asking for a copy of the church’s bylaws, financial statements and how her tithes have been used.

In 2022, Morris, during a visit to Willow Creek Community Church in Chicago, spoke about a deal he made with Gateway Church members. “I’ve told our church on multiple occasions, I’ve said to them … ‘If you’ll try it for one year — if you are not fully satisfied — at the end of that year, I’ll give you your money back,’” Morris said. “With 22 years of church, no one has ever asked for their money back.”

Leach is now one of several congregants trying to take Morris up that offer. On Sept. 9, she submitted a letter to Gateway Church requesting her tithes back. Almost a month later, she and other congregants filed a lawsuit alleging that Gateway Church committed financial fraud with congregants’ tithes.

The suit alleges Morris and other Gateway leaders told their congregation that 15% of all tithes would go toward foreign missionary work. Leach and the suing congregants allege the promise wasn’t upheld and that they don’t know where the tithes — which could amount to more than $15 million annually — went.

Lawrence Swicegood, Gateway Church’s spokesperson, said the church “does not comment on pending litigation,” but he added: “These are serious allegations. Some of these concerns were brought to us recently, and we are actively investigating them. Funds donated to our church are sacred, and it is important that we hold ourselves to the highest biblical standards of ethics and integrity.”

Said Leach: “The more the onion gets peeled, the more things are discovered, the more concerns are raised — and transparency is a huge one. Members have the right to know where their tithe is going.”

Morris is not the only pastor who has offered congregants “money back” on tithes. Life.Church, one of the largest churches in the U.S., instituted its 90-day tithing challenge in 2007. If a giver doesn’t “see God’s blessings” after tithing for three months, the church claims to refund their tithes entirely.

NewSpring Church, in South Carolina, also offered a 90-day tithing challenge in 2016. If “God doesn’t hold true to his promises of blessings” to worshippers giving 10% of their income or more, they can request the money back.

Money-back offers, said Russ McCullough, an economist at Ottawa University in Kansas and co-host of the school’s “Faith and Economics” podcast, signal “that you fully believe in what you’re doing, so much so that you know you’re to offer this money-back guarantee,” McCullough said. “It’s either used to lie, or if it’s being used truthfully, it’s being used to signal quality.”

Ben Witherington III, a professor of New Testament at Asbury Theological Seminary, said Morris’ giveback promise may suggest he realized he had a credibility issue. “One of the possible reasons Morris would say that in the first place is he wanted to make clear that he could be trusted, but that already suggests there’s suspicion that he’s not trustworthy,” Witherington said.

But Witherington said there are deeper concerns with money-back offers, because of how funds are seen in the Bible. “They’re not given to the church. They’re given to God,” Witherington said. “They should know better than to make such an offer, because once you give it, you’re not supposed to take it back. It’s supposed to be a gift to God, not a gift to the church.”

Tithing, or the concept of giving a tenth of what one had such as money, crops or livestock for religious purposes, dates back to the Hebrew Bible. The money or resources would be used to support clergy, maintain churches or help the poor.

Emily Nelms Chastain, a Christianity history professor at Southern Methodist University, said that before the 20th century, a primary way churches in many denominations collected funds was by renting pews. Families who sat in pews closer to the altar were seen as higher on the social and economic scale.

“There were questions about where the money was going and how people were paying their way into heaven or paying their way into some kind of benefit in the church,” Nelms Chastain said. “When this kind of ethical conflict comes up in the church it really shakes people’s spiritual foundation in terms of their believing.”

How tithes are used can impact a congregation’s trust in its leadership, said Elisabeth Rain Kincaid, director of the Institute for Faith and Learning at Baylor University, and in turn can be used to hold leaders accountable. “They’re supposed to be faithful in their faith and responsible in the use of the money.”

On Oct. 5, Gateway church elder Tra Willbanks stood in the pulpit and told attendees that the church’s financials have been “independently audited since 2005” and assured them: “At this point we are not aware of any financial wrongdoing. We, your elders and church staff, understand and embrace the sacred and biblical duty we have to steward the dollars given to Gateway.”

The church is also in the process of joining the Evangelical Council for Financial Accountability and publishing its bylaws after they are updated, he said.

The ECFA requires churches to have an independent, governing body that would review annual financial statements. A copy of the statements would be available upon written request.

Leach said her concerns about Gateway Church’s financial state go “so much deeper” than getting her money back. If that does happen, she said, she plans to reallocate the funds to other ministries.

“This is not about money in our pockets. This is about biblical stewardship. This is about transparency, and the concerns that we have about the lack of transparency and what’s going on behind closed doors,” Leach said. “At the end of the day, I want to make sure that I handle God’s money with excellence.”

This article was produced as part of the RNS/Interfaith America Religion Journalism Fellowship.