Former Gateway Church pastor Robert Morris released a lengthy statement Tuesday asking for forgiveness following his release from jail in Osage County,...
The founder of Gateway Church in Southlake was released from jail Monday after serving six months and pleading guilty to five charges of child sex abuse.Texas megachurch founder Robert Morris is escorted out of the building after pleading guilty to lewd and indecent acts with a child at the Osage County Courthouse in Pawhuska, Okla.
, on Thursday, Oct. 2, 2025. in Osage County, Oklahoma, where he served a six-month sentence on five counts of lewd or indecent acts to a child. In June 2024, Cindy Clemishire publicly accused Morris of sexually abusing her as a child, from the ages of 12 to 17, in the 1980s. The former Southlake megachurch pastor was indicted on child sex abuse charges in March 2025. Following his guilty plea in October, his attorneys read a statement in which Morris apologized to Clemishire and her family and asked her forgiveness. In a statement provided through his attorney Tuesday, Morris asked the Clemishires for forgiveness once again and apologized to the larger Christian church. To the numerous signs clogging up the entrance to the Garvin Cemetery, add these additional ones courtesy Dallas City Hall.I am grateful to have had time to reflect carefully on what I want to say, so I will keep this brief and speak plainly.First, to the many friends, family members, and people I have never even met who wrote letters, who prayed, and who held me in their thoughts during these months — thank you. I read all those letters, and they meant more to me than I can express.I want to speak directly to Cindy Clemishire and her family. What I did to Cindy decades ago was wrong. There is no other word for it, and there is no excuse for it. I am deeply sorry. I have carried the weight of that wrong for a very long time, and I am grateful — genuinely grateful — that the Clemishires had the courage to bring this into the light. It is only in the light that things can truly be addressed and healed. Many years ago, I sought their forgiveness privately, and as Cindy’s father recently noted, he extended that grace to me — a grace I did not deserve and have never taken for granted. I ask again, publicly and sincerely, for the forgiveness of Cindy and her entire family. Whatever healing lies ahead for them, I pray for it with all my heart. I also want to speak to the Body of Christ. I am sorry. I am sorry for the pain, the confusion, and the damage that has come upon so many believers because of my actions. That is a weight I carry, and it is right that I carry it. I have thought a great deal about what it means that this was brought to a legal resolution. At first, that was a hard thing to handle. But the more time I spent in that jail cell, the more clearly I could see that what the Clemishire family set in motion was an act of integrity, and that it gave me something I needed — a moment of true reckoning in the eyes of the law, not just in my own heart or before God. It opened my eyes to things I had not fully seen.I want to say a sincere word of thanks to the Osage County Jail staff. They treated me with professionalism, fairness, and genuine decency, as they did for all inmates. Their work is hard — harder than most people realize — and I came away with a deep respect for what they do every day. I am grateful for the protection and the dignity they extended to me. Being inside also gave me time to think about the men and women around me who did not have what I have — a spouse like Debbie who has walked beside me faithfully, people who stepped into my life when I was young and in a troubled place and pointed me toward something better, a community that, even in its imperfection, held me accountable and helped shape the path I tried to walk from my late twenties onward. Not everyone in that facility has that. My heart goes out to the men and women who are in there without a single letter, without a single person to call. I pray they find their way. As I look ahead, I do not have a grand announcement to make about what comes next. What I have is gratitude — for Debbie, for my family, for those who loved me when I was hardest to love, and for the mercy that I do not deserve but have been given. I intend to live quietly and with integrity, and to be the kind of husband, father, grandfather, and man who reflects that mercy in how he treats others. Scripture has always been my anchor, and it remains so now. The apostle Paul wrote in Galatians,"Do not be deceived: God cannot be mocked. A man reaps what he sows." That verse has been with me through these months. The harvest from seeds I sowed long ago in sin was real, and it was just. But I believe equally in what follows — that when we turn, and when we sow differently, a different harvest is possible. That is not wishful thinking. That is the promise of grace. I am counting on it, and I am committed to living up to it.
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