Abingdon Press is pulling the book “Strong for a Moment Like This: The Daily Devotions of Hillary Rodham Clinton” by Hillary Clinton’s pastor and spiritual advisor, Rev. Bill Shillady, citing the discovery of extensive plagiarism. Clinton wrote a foreward to the book and appears on the book’s cover.
The plagiarism was initially discovered when CNN ran an excerpt of the book that bore similarities to another pastor’s blog. Shillady apologized at the time, citing absentmindedness in attribution, but Abingdon Press told CNN Tuesday that they were "alarmed to discover other content unattributed by the author."
Rev. Brian Milford, the president and publisher of The United Methodist Publishing House, which owns Abingdon Press, told CNN that "Abingdon Press has zero tolerance for plagiarism. Consequently, we have discontinued sales, will remove existing copies from all sales outlets, and will have them destroyed along with our existing inventory."
The book was based on emails of spiritual guidance that Shillady sent to Clinton from April 2015 through December 2016.
"I deeply regret my actions," Shillady told CNN Tuesday. "I was wrong and there is no excuse for it. I apologize to those whose work I mistakenly did not attribute. I apologize to those I have disappointed, including Secretary Hillary Clinton, Abingdon Press, and all the writers and others who have helped me publish and promote this book. I ask for everyone's forgiveness."
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According to CNN, Clinton was scheduled to appear at a Thursday event in New York promoting the book.
Shillady has an intimate relationship with the Clintons, officiating Chelsea Clinton’s wedding in 2010. He told The Atlantic in August that Clinton herself was considering becoming a lay Methodist minister.
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