Hillsong founder 'accused sex abuse victim of tempting his paedophile father'..., by Amy Ziniak And Nelson Groom, Daily Mail (UK) (October 7, 2014)

Hillsong founder 'accused sex abuse victim of tempting his paedophile father'...

Hillsong founder 'accused sex abuse victim of tempting his paedophile father' as hearing is told of $10,000 hush money offer scribbled on a McDonald's napkin

Hillsong Church senior pastor Brian Houston accused a child sex abuse victim of tempting his father Frank, a royal comission into institutional paedophilia heard.

The hearing was also told evidence would be given about a meeting at McDonald's in Sydney's north between Frank Houston and the victim, known as AHA, where the church leader asked for forgiveness and allegedly offered $10,000 and passed him a napkin to sign.

AHA told the commission Frank Houston would stay with his family when he came to Sydney from New Zealand in the 1970s.

AHA was seven when Frank Houston would come to his room, lie on him, fondle him and masturbate him, he told the commission.

'I would wake up petrified and I would stay very still,' he said.

He said the abuse left him feeling ashamed, and he now suffered depression.

AHA said his family was very involved in the church, and when he eventually told his mother in 1978 she told him he did not 'want to be responsible for turning people from the church and sending them to hell'.

He said the Houstons 'were considered to be almost like royalty' in the circles in which his parents moved.

The witness said when, in 1998, his mother told another church pastor of the abuse, Frank Houston apologised.

Houston later offered $10,000 as compensation and AHA was asked to sign a 'food stained' napkin at a meeting they had in a McDonald's restaurant.

He was told if there were any problems to contact Frank or Brian Houston.

He said after two months he rang Brian and said: 'What is happening with the money I was promised? I agreed to forgive your father.'

AHA said Brian Houston said "'Yes, OK, I'll get the money for you. There's no problem. You know it's your fault all of this happened. You tempted my father".'

AHA said he replied, 'Why, did he molest you also?' He said Brian got very angry after that.

'He slammed the phone down with words to the effect "You'll be getting money".'

While acknowledging AHA's courage in appearing at the commission, Brian Houston rejected the claims that he accused him of tempting his father.

'I disagree with his perception of the phone call with me and I strongly refute that I - at any time - accused him of tempting my father. I would never say this and I do not believe this,' he said in a statement made outside the commission.

'At no stage did I attempt to hide or cover up the allegations against my father.'

Earlier on Tuesday, the hearing was told of a special executive meeting of Pentecostal churches was held at the Qantas Club at Sydney Airport in 1999.

The meeting heard Frank Houston had confessed to abusing a seven-year-old boy in Sydney decades earlier.

The information was conveyed by Brian Houston, a senior pastor at Hillsong Church and who was at the time president of the Assemblies of God (AoG) - the affiliation of Pentecostal churches which investigated complaints against ministers.

Counsel assisting the royal commission Simeon Beckett said the commission would hear 'no allegations of child sexual abuse' against Frank Houston were referred to police and 'no civil proceedings have been commenced in Australia'.

Brian Houston was told of the allegation in May 1998, and later told Pastor Barbara Taylor he was in 'shock'.

Pastor Taylor would tell the inquiry Brian Houston said his father had admitted to a lesser incident and he would be stood down from preaching, Mr Beckett said.

The minutes of the December 1999 executive meeting at the Qantas Club would show AHA did not make a formal complaint, but that Frank Houston had confessed, Mr Beckett said.

The minutes also noted Frank Houston was already suspended and it was agreed he be invited to enter the 'AoG restoration program'.

Frank Houston was fired by his son from all church roles in 2000.

Hillsong, in Sydney, was created when separate churches run by father and son merged under the leadership of Brian Houston.

Frank Houston died in 2004 at age 82. Further allegations against him have come to light since his death.

The charismatic preacher had been a Salvation Army officer in his native New Zealand before founding his first ministry at Lower Hutt near Wellington in 1960.

The commission will also hear of allegations against two other men and will be looking at the response of the ACC to those allegations.

In a statement issued when the inquiry was announced Encompass Church pastor John Spinella said the church, based at Bundoora, Victoria, welcomed the inquiry.

'As a church we have recognised these past failures and take the opportunity to apologise for the suffering and pain endured by those who were abused,' he said.