Editor’s Note: The Baylor Line is the publication of the Baylor Line Foundation, which is an independent organization for alumni of Baylor University. An earlier version of this post described it as the student newspaper of Baylor, which is The Baylor Lariat.
It appears the release of the Jeffrey Epstein files will keep journalists and pundits busy for years. It may take a similar period to reckon with the fallout. Already, individuals in business, politics, education, and even the British royal family have been implicated.
That doesn’t even include the current president, whose name occurs many thousands of times in the files.
Apparently, the president’s sycophants at the Justice Department—and I use that language advisedly because he seems to regard the Department of Justice as his personal law firm to defend himself and to wreak havoc on his perceived political enemies—have obliged the convicted felon-in-chief by obscuring any context to his references. As someone on Facebook has noticed, even the word “don’t” is redacted in the Epstein files; the department’s search-and-redact tool seems to dislike any reference whatsoever to “DONald Trump.”
Sadly, the collateral damage of the Epstein files reaches into the realm of religion as well. Some intrepid reporting by the independent publication for Baylor University alumni, the Baylor Line, reveals that the university’s president, the late Kenneth W. Starr, maintained robust correspondence with Epstein.
“My friend, my brother – all is well. Come see me. Otherwise, I’ll come knoc=ing [sic] on your door,” Starr wrote to Epstein on March 15, 2012.
Epstein obliged, traveling on his private jet, landing at Texas State Technical College, and was escorted to the Waco campus by two Baylor employees, both of them holding the title Special Assistant to the President.
“That was the strangest person we ever met,” one of the assistants said about Epstein. “It was odd to me, even in the moment, as young as I was, that [Starr] had maintained a personal relationship with a former client who was accused of sexual misconduct,” he added.
The visit to Baylor’s campus occurred on July 30, 2012. Epstein was convicted of “soliciting a prostitute and procuring a child for prostitution” four years earlier, in 2008. He served just under thirteen months in prison.
And it’s probably worth remembering that Ken Starr came to national attention as the special prosecutor investigating the so-called Whitewater scandal involving Bill and Hillary Clinton, which morphed into a prosecution of Bill Clinton over his Monica Lewinsky affair. For years, Clinton and Starr were locked in a death grip.
Sadly, Starr, now deceased, cannot speak for himself. Still, it would appear from his continuing “Hugs, Ken” relationship with Jeffrey Epstein, a registered sex offender, that he regarded Epstein’s transgressions as less egregious than Bill Clinton’s.
The Epstein files also disclose Epstein’s curious interest in the Roman Catholic Church. According to reporting by Religion News Service (RNS), Epstein and Steve Bannon, the former Trump aide and right-wing podcaster, consulted with one another on strategies to undermine Pope Francis.
The two men discussed the possibility of producing a movie based on Frédéric Martel’s controversial 2019 book, In the Closet of the Vatican, which asserted that 80 percent of Vatican clergy were gay.
Bannon wrote to Epstein and claimed that the film, which was never produced, would take down Francis as well as “The Clintons, Xi, EU—come on brother.”
On the face of it, it’s not clear why Epstein, a man of Jewish heritage, would evince such interest in the workings of the Vatican, other than to promote a political agenda.
“Emails between Bannon and Epstein dating to 2018 lament the Vatican’s push against xenophobia, racism and populism, as well as the Holy See’s relationship with China,” according to RNS. Epstein also seemed interested in the workings of the Institute for Works of Religion, better known as the Vatican Bank.
When Francis visited New York in 2015 and was staying near Epstein’s Manhattan residence, Epstein joked, “I thought id [sic] invite him for a massage.” That remark was followed by a lewd comment.
It appears there’s no limit to the tawdriness contained in the Epstein files.
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An Episcopal priest, Balmer is John Phillips Professor in Religion at Dartmouth College and the author of more than a dozen books, with commentaries appearing in newspapers across the country. He is a contributing correspondent at Good Faith Media.