01-06-2025
Gateway Church welcomes new senior pastor amid ongoing controversy
Gateway Church has a new senior pastor, Daniel Floyd, who delivered his first sermon Saturday after relocating from Virginia.
"I just want to say a big thank you to our elder team — just men of humility, character, integrity, and impatience, because we had a lot of questions, a lot of meetings, and a lot of prayer," Floyd said during the service.
Gateway Church has a new senior pastor, Daniel Floyd, who delivered his first sermon Saturday after relocating from Virginia.
CBS News Texas
The leadership transition comes nearly a year after Gateway founder Robert Morris stepped down following allegations of child sexual abuse.
Newly obtained court documents, reported Friday by CBS News Texas, reveal that Gateway's leadership was aware of Morris's alleged inappropriate behavior "as early as 2005 and most certainly by August 2007." The allegations stem from incidents in the 1980s in Hominy, Oklahoma, when Morris was a traveling preacher. Cindy Clemishire, who says she was 12 years old at the time, is among the accusers.
"Really, the only thing that kept going through my mind was all the way back to when we first met him, thinking, 'This isn't how it was supposed to turn out.' Like, he should never have done that and ruined everything," Clemishire said.
Robert Morris
Gateway Church
The court filings also include a proposed 2011 announcement, written by Morris, that was never shared with the congregation. In a letter to the board of elders, Gateway's president advised that Morris "should not mention the family or Cindy specifically by name as this would violate their privacy."
Gateway Church responded to the latest developments, stating: "We have consistently and publicly said that there were elders and employees at Gateway who knew about this issue before it became public — and either didn't take action or didn't inquire further. That was fundamentally wrong. The church elders took action, and none of those individuals are a part of Gateway Church today."
Morris's attorney disputes the church's narrative, claiming it falsely portrays Morris as lacking transparency. The attorney also noted that Gateway continues to work with the same law firm that was aware of the allegations.
