Pastor and Beloved Professor Who Was Outed as Ashley Madison User Commits Suicide

A pastor and seminary teacher who was exposed as a member of Ashley Madison — the dating website that facilitates hookups between married individuals — has taken his own life.

Dr. John Gibson (New Orleans Baptist Theological Seminary)

Dr. John Gibson, 56, a communications professor at New Orleans Baptist Theological Seminary in New Orleans, Louisiana, was among millions of individuals who were listed in the highly publicized Ashley Madison hack last month, according to the Daily Mail.

Gibson, a married father of two, was found dead on August 24 by his wife, Christi, just six days after millions of names were publicly leaked by the hackers.

"It was a moment that life doesn't prepare you for. I had to call my kids," Christi Gibson told CNN Money. "How do you tell your kids that their dad is gone and that he took his own life?"

In a suicide note, Gibson mentioned Ashley Madison and apologized over the fact that his name was found in the member list. He also addressed some of the other issues that he had been facing, including depression; the pastor had struggled in the past with addiction as well.

"What we know about him is that he poured his life into other people, and he offered grace and mercy and forgiveness to everyone else," Christie said. "But somehow he couldn't extend that to himself."

His wife said that she would have forgiven him, but that the revelation that he was a member "carried such a shame" for Gibson.

An article released by New Orleans Baptist Theological Seminary two days after the professor's death described him as a "beloved professor," recounting how Christie Gibson had discovered her husband unresponsive in the couple's campus home August 24, before calling emergency services, who were unable to revive him.

"Gibson served as youth minister and senior pastor at numerous churches in Louisiana and Mississippi," the statement read. "At the time of his death, Gibson was pastor of First Southern Baptist Church in Pearlington, Miss., a community located on the banks of the Pearl River."

(H/T: Daily Mail)

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