I know he is quite the authority, yet he has been caught up in what has shaped up to be the zeitgeist.
How is the man understood by his intentions and by reality?
I don't think this post is a helpful beginning. It is nonspecific innuendo, on top of innuendo, that has been built up from "associations" and largely acontextual commentary. I don't think this forum is an appropriate one for evaluating the alleged stains on the garments of this man (Zech.3).
There's not a single reference to anything here, just an insidious doubt raised about his fitness to speak to a graduation at a Seminary, where one would expect that the leaders and decision makers were as well--if not much more than ourselves--positioned to judge the quality of their choice. I think several good men, and at least two institutions in danger of having their reputations impugned by a rumor.
So, addressing the last line and question, I think it has not at all been proven that LD is a man of "soft raiment" or a "reed shaken by the wind" (cf. Lk.7:24-25). Few if any here are in a position to offer investigative journalism, or even informed editorializing. The PB has only a handful of Seminary professors teaching at any school, and no high administrators I know of; meaning peers close to the kind of position held by LD, whose insight into the demands of his job make them insightful, informative (as opposed to gossipy) commentators.
Please do not interpret this comment as a statement from the PB about "untouchable" persons, a show of favoritism for parties or institutions. Public entities offer themselves up for praise and blame, simply by existing. But reputation is something we are required by Scripture to preserve (not at the expense of the truth, of course). There isn't anything here to critique.
