The grand irony in cases such as that of Christian Conservative radio host John Balyo is that that those people who shout the loudest are oftentimes the very people participating in the activities that they themselves spend years railing against.
This fact has been repeatedly reported on in countless stories over the years and was actually the primarily subject of the 2009 documentary ‘Outrage’.
Let’s now turn our attention to Mr. John Balyo, the [now-former] host of a “family-friendly” Christian radio station who was arrested on first-degree criminal sex charges involving children, having admitted to raping a 12-year-old boy.
Balyo was arrested Friday at the Big Ticket Festival, one of the largest Christian festivals in the U.S and when federal authorities raided his private residence earlier this month, he was allegedly found with a 12-year old boy and child porn on his hard drive.
Balyo was ordered Monday to be held without bond after prosecutor David Gilbert said Balyo made incriminating statements to investigators.
"The defendant did make admissions to count one of the complaint," Gilbert told Calhoun County District Court Magistrate David Heiss during Balyo's arraignment.
Mr. Balyo's online biography has since been removed from the radio station’s website, but a cache of it remains online. A cursory glance at his biography reveals that he graduated from the Christian Conservative Cornerstone University in 2003 and soon began work in social commentary from a “family-centered perspective”:
"The most important part of my story is how CHRIST found me when I was about 8-years-old as my mom led me down the Romans Road one night....I'll never forget how excited I was while trying to evangelize all the neighbor kids! My walk with Him has been - and continues to be - a great journey."
Mr. Balyo allegedly paid a defendant, who is the subject of a separate child-exploitation investigation, to arrange sexual encounters with minor victims. Further details about the investigation are being withheld pending the defendant's appearance in court to answer to the charges," a release from the Department of Homeland Security explained on Friday.
Ironically (though not surprisingly), Cornerstone University requires students to sign a "Lifestyle Statement" in a promise to abstain from “every form of immorality, including immoral sexual behavior, homosexuality, lying, stealing and cheating.”
Which all leads one to wonder, why is it often the case that those who spend their lives and careers in the Religious Right movement are the most likely to be caught taking a ‘wide stance’ [credit if you know the reference] when truths about their personal lives finally come to the surface? And for that matter, if he had been asked about his political leanings toward the LGBT rights movement just weeks before finally being caught with his pants down, what do you think he’d have said?