Christie Rizk: The news of Rev. Ted Haggard’s problems has been greeted with a kind of glee by the left-leaning community. Here is this infuriating, bigoted man, who rants against gays and calls them sinners, who speaks out against gay marriage as if it could bring about the end of the world — and it turns out he’s not only had an alleged affair with another man, but he’s also (allegedly) snorted methamphetamines. Could it get any better?

The narrative begins here as it usually does during a scandal of this magnitude — deny everything. Haggard denies he even knows Mike Jones — the former gay prostitute who semi-outed him — he denies that he has ever been unfaithful to his wife, he denies ever buying drugs.

The White House denies their connection to a man who is known to speak to the president or his advisors every Monday by downplaying his actual influence, as reported by the Associated Press.

Everyone is in denial. Especially the members of Haggard’s church. He couldn’t have done this, they say. This isn’t the man we know, he didn’t do anything wrong, and we’re not going to judge until all the facts come out. The Rev. Richard Cizik, one of Haggard’s colleagues, is quoted in the New York Times, saying, “It doesn’t comport with the man that I know. Let’s not crucify the man before we know the facts.”

To the New York Times, to the Associated Press, to MSNBC, to anyone who asks — deny, deny, deny.

And then, ever so slowly, the narrative changes — more facts start to emerge, and just as slowly, Haggard admits pieces of the story are true — he did buy the drugs, but he never used them; he did meet Mike Jones, but never had sex with him; he is stepping down, but it’s only temporary until he can be cleared of these vicious charges.

But no one except Jones mentions the real irony — all the while that Haggard is working hard to deny gay couples the right to marry, he is indulging in secret gay sex. Even as he proclaims that gays are sinners, he denies his own sin. Now comes the crescendo of the whole story — Ted Haggard is removed as senior pastor of the New Life church for “sexually immoral conduct,” though he still denies that he ever had sex with Mike Jones. “The accusations that have been leveled against me are not all true,” Haggard writes in a letter to his congregation (and through the press, to the entire evangelical community), “but enough of them are true that I have been appropriately and lovingly removed from ministry. I am so embarrassed and ashamed. I caused this and I have no excuse. I am a sinner. I have fallen.”

And still, the members of his church deny he is hypocritical. We understand now, they say, why his sermons about sin were so powerful – it’s because he himself was struggling with sin. It’s a good thing everything came out, they say. Now Pastor Ted can take some time to heal.

The media narrative for this story was so predictable — downfall-of-a-powerful-figure stories usually are. The simplicity of the deny-everything-until-evidence-comes-to-light-and-then-ask-for-forgiveness narrative arc is too much to resist, especially when it involves a figure like Ted Haggard — a man so powerful and infuriating and beloved and outspoken and hated, all at once. We want him to fall so that he can go away — and we’ll even forgive him a little since he’s shown us that he’s only human after all.

Here’s the problem with this kind of story: it’s too small. Maybe Ted Haggard is a closeted gay man, maybe he isn’t. Maybe he actually did drugs, and maybe he threw them away before he tried them. Maybe his wife really does love him and wants to stick by him, as she writes in a letter to the New Life church congregation. Maybe she’s waiting to be out of the spotlight before she divorces ol’ Ted.

Haggard is definitely guilty of some of these accusations. As has been extensively reported, he confessed everything to the board of the New Life church; and though he isn’t willing to admit that he had sex with Mike Jones, he is at least admitting that Jones gave him a “massage” in a Denver hotel.

But the story here is even bigger than Ted Haggard and his sexuality issues. The story here is even bigger than the issue of gay marriage and what Haggard’s new tarnish will mean when it comes time to vote on the issue.

The story here is about all the closeted gay evangelicals who can’t come out because their religion forbids their “perversion.” It’s about these men who have to clandestinely have sex with strangers or prostitutes, and who then go home to their wives and children. It’s about an epidemic of closeted gay men having to get high on methamphetamines to have sex, to drown out the voice that tells them what they’re doing is wrong. It’s about how their families have to cope if “the secret” ever gets found out.

The story here is about whether the most powerful religious institution in the United States — the evangelical church — can learn a lesson of tolerance from having one of their most powerful figures brought down in this way.

The story is about hypocrisy — and that goes so far beyond Ted Haggard that it’s almost impossible to grasp.

In the past few days, the headlines have changed almost hourly — Haggard steps down, Haggard denies he’s gay, Haggard is forced to resign.

The narrative is so focused on Haggard that it misses the bigger story. What happens when the media is bored with Ted Haggard? What happens the next time Pat Robertson calls down the wrath of God on his whipping-boy-group of the week? Will the bigger themes of the story go away as well?

Maybe the story is too big, and Ted Haggard is definitely a big part of it anyway – but he is not the only part. This is about more than a scandal or an election.

Does anyone see it?

More importantly, will anyone write it?

Christie Rizk is a graduate student at New York University.