Summary
J.C. Philpot condemns pastoral abuse of authority, arguing that ministers who use the pulpit to attack congregants they avoid confronting privately transform it into "a coward's castle." He contends that publicly denouncing identifiable individuals without private conversation or opportunity for defense violates biblical principles of justice and fairness, placing the pastor as sole judge and jury over defenseless members.
A pastor has no right to turn the pulpit into a coward's castle, and from there attack those in the congregation, whom he is afraid to meet face to face privately.
It is cruelly unfair to attack an individual who cannot defend himself—to hold him up, as if on the horns of the pulpit, before the congregation, (who generally know pretty well who is meant), and to condemn him without hearing his side, with the pastor being the only judge and jury.
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