Gibson at the Guy’s Choice Awards on Saturday. Credit: Kevin Winter/Getty Images

Mel Gibson took to the pulpit with a bizarre rant at Sunday services in the church he founded in Angoura Hills, California. The 53 year-old father of seven and devout Traditionalist Catholic is divorcing his wife of 29 years and expecting a baby with his 39 year-old mistress, Russian singer Oksana Grigorieva. Apparently all the gossip among the congregation is getting to Mel as he felt compelled to address it with an angry tirade:

In what is being described as a “crazed rant,” Mel Gibson, fed up with gossip among the congregation about his personal affairs, chastised his fellow churchgoers during Sunday services at his Holy Family Chapel in Agoura Hills, California on Sunday, RadarOnline.com has exclusively learned.

“Mel’s completely lost it,” a source told RadarOnline.com. “[His] holier than thou world is falling apart around him — all these years he’s been preaching the good holy word, and now that the wizard’s curtain has been pulled back, we find that Mel hasn’t been practicing what he preaches.”

In front of two priests and a visiting bishop, Gibson made a huge scene when he “paced back and forth, furiously telling the congregation that he would not stand by and be judged and scrutinized,” a source told RadarOnline.com.

“Mel got up on his stage — the altar — and went off. He tried to intimidate the parishioners by staring at everyone with his angry eyes. Mel even threatened to shut down the church if people kept gossiping about him. The bottom line is that if Mel hadn’t cheated on his wife and gotten his Russian girlfriend pregnant, there wouldn’t be much to gossip about – he created this mess, and now he’s trying to control it.”

[From Radaronline]

Mel is hardly controlling the gossip by bringing it up and freaking out about it in front of everyone. He was probably much more convincing on The Tonight Show last week, when he confirmed Oksana’s pregnancy and told Jay Leno that he’s been separated from his wife for three years, which means he wasn’t cheating – at least in layman’s terms. He was undoubtedly still cheating under that strict Catholic doctrine he follows. I read up a little on Traditionalist Catholics, and they don’t accept any changes made by the Roman Catholic Church after 1962 under the Second Vatican Council. Since the Second Vatican Council helped establish the annulment process to declare marriages non-existent, that would probably mean that Traditionalists don’t annul marriages. (People who are more familiar with theology or Traditionalist Catholicism are more than welcome to correct me on any of these points.) Mel can of course get an annulment under a non-Traditionalist Catholic church, which would allow him to marry Oksana in a church wedding. (Here is a good description of the annulment process as it could apply to Mel.)

He should have kept his mouth shut, but he must be under a lot of pressure from the people in his church. It’s one thing to get a divorce and father a baby with your mistress. It’s an entirely different matter when you’re also famous and founded a church that expressly forbids the behavior you’ve publicly acknowledged.