The sin of theft knows no bounds. Just like the traitorous Judah, one of 12 chosen to be a close confidant of Jesus Christ, betrayed our Savior, so too do thefts by church members and pastors in today’s society. Granted that 99.9% of Christian and other religious leaders are strong and morally upstanding citizens, still even Christ’s soldiers fall victim to sin. Here is one such case.

A former director of finance for a historic District church was sentenced to eight years in prison for embezzling nearly a million dollars from the institution to pay for an extravagant lifestyle.

Forty-year-old Jason Todd Reynolds was convicted of 12 counts, including the theft of more than $850,000 from the National City Christian Church, the national congregation of the Christian Church (Disciples of Christ).

The congregation has included two U.S. presidents, James Garfield and Lyndon B. Johnson.

Reynolds, of Bowie, used the congregation’s money from 2002 to 2008 to buy three cars — a Lexus SUV, a Range Rover and Nissan Maxima — a $12,000 diamond ring, a porch addition and home theater for his house, and season tickets to the Washington Wizards basketball games.

Mr. Reynolds’s crime is beyond offensive — he stole more than $850,000 from a church, even diverting money intended for a food bank and a battered women’s group.

Because of Reynolds’ theft, staff had to cut their salaries by 15 percent and pay for a quarter of their health care. Other positions were eliminated or reduced to part time.

Reynolds used several methods to defraud the congregation. Reynolds used his NCCC-issued American Express credit card to pay for entertainment and vacations for himself and his family; he used a dormant church bank account to pay off his mortgage, credit card and vehicle payments; and he wrote checks to himself from a church account.

Reynolds continued to steal from the church even as it fell behind in its bills, and then he borrowed money in the church’s name to pay for his ongoing fraud. The church and its congregation were left with a $450,000 debt that it did not know about until the loan came due after Reynolds had been fired for mismanaging the church’s finances.

The National City Christian Church has Presidents Garfield and Johnson immortalized in stained glass windows in the sanctuary. Garfield was the only ordained minister to be U.S. president, and he was an elder in the church until his assassination in 1881.

Sad story. A good 8 hour theft class might have prevented this greed.