Another day, another sexual predator in evangelicalism: Michael Tait has become the face of the newest scandal in evangelicalism. He’s not just any evangelical, though. He’s the former frontman for the long-running, super-popular evangelical singing group the Newsboys! Not only that, but one evangelical watchdog site calls this revelation “Nashville’s worst kept secret.”
Once again, we discover that within evangelicalism lurk huge networks of people who find it morally acceptable to keep the secrets of their tribe’s worst predators.
WWJD? We’re about to find out—today.
(This post and its audio ‘cast first went live on Patreon on 8/5/2025. They’re both available now! From introduction: 2nd Chapter of Acts album “Roar of Love“; Keith Green’s “Make My Life a Prayer to You“. Also, ALPHA COURSE WATCH PARTY: Saturday August 9th, 6pm PT, and a Discord invite if you need one: 8pkasaySuD (case sensitive.) It should last about an hour tops and we have a great time razzing terribad apologetics! Join us if you can <3)
SITUATION REPORT: The Newsboys’ Michael Tait turns out to be a sexual predator going way, way back
Way back in the 1980s, I was a sweet, pure, starry-eyed (briefly) Southern Baptist teenybopper who loved Amy Grant’s music. Back then, I had no idea just how corrupt the entire evangelical music industry had always been, nor would always be.
The Newsboys are one of the most popular bands in the genre of evangelical music. Even after becoming Pentecostal, I knew about them! Starting in the 1980s in Australia, they achieved global status in the 1990s. Michael Tait was their lead singer from 2009 until unexpectedly leaving in January 2025. Last year, the band released their 21st album, Worldwide Revival Nights, with a deluxe version coming out this in May 2025.
According to The Roys Report, four people accused Michael Tait of sexually preying upon them. (The total number of accusers rose last week to eight, mostly men; one or two of them were also minors at the time.) They offer similar stories of how he dazzled them with his wealth as well as plying them with alcohol and illegal street drugs. One of them, a woman, claims he drugged her so another band worker could rape her—and that not only Tait knew, but also the band’s tour manager, Steve Campbell.
These allegations have proven to be an absolute PR nightmare for the band, obviously. Some radio markets and stations, which started small but now includes K-LOVE, have even decided to stop playing Newsboys music. Capitol Christian Music, a major label, has dropped the Newsboys. Some concert dates have been canceled and at least one music festival has replaced the band.
If anything, though, Michael Tait’s response to the accusations has only made him and his band look worse.
But there’s an even worse side to this scandal—and it shows us one of the biggest weaknesses of evangelicalism itself.
Background: The Newsboys
The Newsboys have come up before in the skept-o-sphere. In 2015, their co-founder George Perdikis announced his deconversion from Christianity. At the time, it was one of the most prominent deconversions ever. As you can imagine, evangelicals at the time got very fired up and angry about it.
In 2014, as well, a Newsboys concert became the ending set piece of the hilariously bad God’s Not Dead. (We even mega-reviewed it; here’s the series tag.) At about 1:30:00 into the movie, streamable on Tubi, we see Michael Tait and his bandmates awkwardly evangelizing a news reporter. A few minutes later, Tait awkwardly leads that reporter through the so-called “Sinner’s Prayer” before the Newsboys dash off to their performance. It is spectacularly cringey.
In their official music video from God’s Not Dead, Michael Tait sits down in a coffee shop and gives a crinkled-brow expression of befuddlement at a newspaper headline announcing that “God is a myth.” How very dare they!
Despite their poor acting skills, the Newsboys enjoyed wide approval within evangelicalism. In 2024, Christian Post lauded them for their ability to stay “rooted in biblical truth for over 30 years.” Another site, Crosswalk, praised them for condemning hypocrisy.
Now the Newsboys are in the press for a very different reason.
Michael Tait attempts some damage control
Despite the Newsboys’ squeaky-clean image as true-blue Christians and Michael Tait’s hilarious condemnation of hypocrisy, his private behavior spoke to a different and very dark reality.
On June 10th, Michael Tait published an Instagram post (archive) containing his response to these accusations. In his response, he admits that the accusations “are sadly, largely true.” He admits to abusing cocaine and alcohol—and to groping men “in an unwanted sensual way.” He most assuredly does not admit to drugging anyone to knock them out for another guy to rape, nor to grooming and sexually assaulting three men over a period of 20 years. By coyly implying at least one accusation isn’t true, but not identifying which, he distances himself even further from accountability.
Instead, Tait Jesus-shields himself by calling what he did “sin.”
Unsurprisingly, the statement also tells us that his abrupt departure from the Newsboys in January—a move that mightily confused his bandmates, according to their own statement, and caused utter chaos for them—happened because he wanted to “get help” and “was tired of leading a double life” of complete hypocrisy. (Jessica Morris’ report on Julie Roys’ site alleges that Tait quit right after being outed as gay, though his January Instagram post doesn’t mention that.)
The last three paragraphs of his 7-paragraph statement are there solely to remind evangelicals that they’re obligated to forgive anything called “sin.”
It’s an absolutely repulsive and hamfisted attempt at damage control, one that seeks to distance Michael Tait as far as possible from any semblance of accountability. He committed crimes against his victims. This wasn’t just an oopsie-doodle thought-crime offense against Yahweh’s delicate sensibilities. He sexually assaulted people. It’s not Yahweh’s love and mercy he needs now, but accountability before the law.
It wouldn’t be evangelicalism without identifying with the wrong Bible character
His last paragraph, quoting King David in Psalm 51, is ironic for many reasons. He explicitly casts himself as King David here. David supposedly composed this Psalm to beg for Yahweh’s forgiveness for committing adultery with Bathsheba, then personally arranging for her husband to die so he could marry her himself. In retaliation, Yahweh murdered their newborn son (how very pro-life!) and cursed David with misfortune. The entire story can be found in 2 Samuel 11-12.
The worst part of Michael Tait’s Instagram post isn’t that it’s going to work on countless evangelicals. Obviously, it will. We take for granted these days that evangelicals can forgive and forget any amount of any kind of hypocrisy in their idols. They’ve been taught to view predators as simply “bad apples,” not the fault of the evangelicalism tree at all.
No, there’s something even worse going on here here.
‘Nashville’s worst-kept secret’ protected the Newsboys’ reputation
The worst part is that this scandal could not possibly have happened without the collusion and protection of countless individuals in the evangelical music industry (often called CCM, or Christian Contemporary Music). Not for nothing does Jessica Morris say Michael Tait’s behavior “[has] been called Nashville’s worst-kept secret.”
The Newsboys attempted their own version of damage control, of course. Their own statement, released on Instagram on June 5th, stressed their utter shock, but that’s a lie. A June 8th story by Jessica Morris says that the band’s current lead singer, Adam Agee, doesn’t find this scandal surprising in the least. He says they’ve heard rumors about Michael Tait for years. They can’t have been that shocked!
No, the band always trusted Tait to tell them the truth about his behavior. As he denied each rumor, they felt that was more than enough for them. They had plenty of reasons to accept his denials at face value, too. Their reputations and millions of dollars were at stake.
As for Tait’s victims, they felt scared to say anything. The sheer tribalism of the evangelical music industry cowed them into silence. Michael Tait and the Newsboys network had enormous influence in that industry, enough to ostracize anyone for any reason. It wasn’t until January, when a TikTok influencer outed Tait as gay, that cracks appeared in that network’s wall.
As Tait’s usefulness to the industry came to an end, his protection did likewise.
The Newsboys/Michael Tait story isn’t just a one-off but a systemic fault
In her initial story, Jessica Morris found “more than 50 sources” to interview about what Michael Tait was doing.
Now imagine how many more must exist besides those 50, especially now that the number of victims has grown. Imagine how many people these victims told about their experiences. And how many people must have been involved in silencing all of them.
Over and over again, we encounter the utter lack of surprise in those in the know. One guy even said on Facebook that anyone who’d ever interacted with Michael Tait’s former band, DC Talk, “could have seen all this coming a mile away.”
Now imagine how many other evangelical performers have their own worst-kept secrets.
Imagine how many thousands of people in CCM and ministry and politics, how many workers at venues and hotels know those secrets. They guard these secrets out of self-interest or fear, but they guard them nonetheless.
I’m with that Paramore lead singer, Hayley Williams, who denounced the entire industry. Paramore isn’t evangelical, but Williams grew up around CCM and ran adjacent to it for years. So she’s got a very good idea of how many people must have known this secret. She responded to the Tait story thusly:
I hope the CCM industry crumbles. And fuck all of you who knew and didn’t do a damn thing. [Source: Variety]
Indeed.
The evangelical music industry has always been about image over truth
Long before Michael Tait became a big name in CCM, the industry was already well-versed at hiding performers’ hypocrisy. And I can personally attest to how effective they were at it.
In 1986, Amy Grant’s Unguarded tour arrived in Houston. And I loved it. Amy Grant represented the kind of Christian I wanted to be. Countless young Gen X women wanted the same thing. She enjoyed effortless popularity with evangelical girls and young women.
Of course, her husband Gary Chapman wasn’t just some behind-the-scenes person that nobody knew, either. On his own, he was incredibly successful. Of his 10 albums, he’s won Dove awards and Grammy nominations—and four of his songs have hit #1 on multiple charts. At the height of his marriage drama, in 1994, he released what might be his best and most successful album, The Light Inside.
Back then, we all thought these two were the perfect Christian powerhouse couple. They were #goals for us years before the concept of #goals even existed!
Just like Newsboys fans these days, we couldn’t even imagine the reality of Amy Grant’s life.
The truth differs quite a bit from the image
Behind the scenes, Amy Grant’s life wasn’t idyllic. Not at all. She met Chapman in 1979 when she was about 18 and he was about 22. At the time, he was the big star and she was just hoping. They married in 1982, then divorced in 1999. Chapman turned out to be a drug addict and nightmare partner who love-bombed her—and then put her through hell as his career waned and hers rose.
In public and onstage, he threw tantrums at the mere thought of being compared to her. In private, he spiraled and went on coke benders and apparently fought nonstop at his wife for daring to eclipse him.
At the time, none of us little evangelical teenyboppers suspected any of that stuff was happening.
Looking back, the real surprise is that Amy Grant lasted as long as she did in the CCM woodchipper—not that she left it. Nobody with a conscience could have stayed long. The same people that would later protect Michael Tait were protecting Gary Chapman from the consequences of his own behavior. They’ve been doing it ever since the heyday of one of the industry’s earliest megastars, Larry Norman!
The ‘worst-kept secret’ that keeps getting told
Michael Tait is nothing more than the latest example of a long-running trope. The evangelical music ministry was built to protect predators like him. It’s perfect for the job. Its artists sell a pretty picture of life as a Christian. Their audience is oblivious to how impossible that life is even for their favorite performers. Powerful industry insiders protect those performers at the expense, always, of those who are victimized.
So we come full circle.
I’ve gone from being an oblivious teen fan to an ex-Christian who can finally see evangelicalism for what it actually is: Jesus frosting over a rotted tree. And Michael Tait’s gone from an evangelical music golden child to reporters exposing his scandal as “Nashville’s worst-kept secret.”
What, another worst-kept secret?
If that phrase brings to mind the Paul Pressler scandal in the Southern Baptist Convention (SBC), it should. His scandal was called “the worst-kept secret in Houston!” Yes, the main schemer behind the conservative takeover of the SBC turned out to be an alleged serial and prolific sex abuser of young men. And similarly, a great many people clearly knew what Pressler was doing. Those people protected his secret. He couldn’t have gotten away with his behavior for so long without them and their protection!
The worst-kept secret in this case isn’t about Michael Tait, any more than the SBC secret was really about Paul Pressler in particular. It’s about the entire evangelical music ministry, just as the SBC’s secret is about the SBC itself.
The secret is that evangelicalism is a rotted tree inside and out. Nothing divine inhabits it or its believers. Its fruits—everything created within that system—are sickening and poisonous. But they look so pretty that Christians keep reaching for them and consuming them!
Christian consumers will never guess that their religion’s dysfunction comes from the tree itself, not the individual fruits. The tree nurtures toxic fruit and pushes it out to consumers. And so nothing can change, even if one individual leader within the system gets exposed as a predator.
NEXT UP: Reading between the lines of the resignation of the newest person driven out by the SBC’s hardliners. See you soon! <3
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