Florida:

At the bustling Church by the Glades in Coral Springs, FL, pastor David Hughes usually preaches the gospel, the good news. But Sunday, the news was bad. "There is brokenness, anger and a lot of hurt. This is an ugly story,'' Hughes told a sanctuary packed with several hundred worshipers for the 11:15 a.m. service. The story broke Saturday when Coral Springs police arrested one of the church's youth pastors, Russell Dion Lewis, 28, and charged him with custodial battery and 10 counts of lewd and lascivious molestation.

Police said Lewis molested a 14-year-old girl and tried to rape her. Investigators added that the contact between Lewis and the girl, even if it was consensual, was illegal because of the girl's age. Lewis was held Sunday in the Broward County jail on $20,000 bond.... "We are all about forgiving,'' Hughes said. "But when it comes to our children, we're pretty hard-nosed around here.''

Maryland:

A former Germantown youth pastor was sentenced to 10 years of probation on Monday for sexually abusing an altar boy in 2001 and 2002. The Rev. Aaron Joseph Cote, 58, who was a pastor at Mother Seton Parish at the time of the abuse, was found guilty of third-degree sex offense in July.... Cote abused Brandon Rains, now 22, and living in Florida, when he was 14 and 15 years old but still denies what he did was wrong, according to county prosecutors. The abuse included sexual touching and watching pornography, and Cote bought Rains gifts, took him to dinner and gave him money for marijuana, prosecutors have said. After Rains' allegations were made in 2003, the Dominican order sent Cote for psychological evaluation, conducted an investigation and cleared him of any wrongdoing, church officials have said.... Cote then was assigned a position as youth minister and associate pastor in Providence, R.I.

Georgia:

Police in Pooler have arrested a local teacher and youth minister on allegations he molested a 13-year-old boy six years ago. Mark Kit Lucas, 47, was booked Friday into the Chatham County jail on a felony charge of aggravated sexual battery in an assault reported to police earlier this month.... At Woodlawn Baptist Church in Garden City, Lucas was recognized in 2004 for going beyond his duties as youth and education director, according to Savannah Morning News archives.

California:

Three former Sunnyvale residents announced today they have sued the Mormon church, the Boy Scouts of America and their stepfather in San Francisco Superior Court for alleged childhood sexual abuse. The three men, who are brothers now aged 39, 41 and 43, claim that William E. Knox, 65, a Mormon church and Boy Scouts leader, molested them repeatedly in Sunnyvale between 1977 and 1987.... The lawsuit alleges [that] Knox used his position as a church elder and youth leader to begin abusing them when they were members of a church-chartered Boy Scouts troop for which he was assistant leader. The molestation began during individual sleepovers at Knox's Sunnyvale apartment, according to the lawsuit. [Knox eventually married the mother of the three boys and] the sexual assaults allegedly continued at the family's Sunnyvale home, in Knox's car on trips to church and Boy Scouts activities, and during Scouts camping trips, according to the lawsuit. The alleged abuse included fondling, child masturbation and oral copulation, the lawsuit said.