LCG and World Vision

As Bereans Did is reporting that Spanky Meredith's LCG sect is still on schedule to present their public meeting at World Vision Canada's HQ; only the date has changed. Perhaps they were obliged to carry through on the agreement. Perhaps lawyers' letters were exchanged. Who knows? In any case, Martha's report is carefully written and fair-minded. Other than turning up with placards, there doesn't seem to be a way forward from this point.

Clickable

As usual there are some great postings on other blogs concerned with the Churches of God. Gary's comments on PCG's latest big-money building project (here) provoked additional comments on the Living Armstrongism blog. Could it be that Flurry is digging a financial hole he'll never be able to climb out of? Forgive me for saying so, but here's hoping!

Kevin's recent post here on AW has also ignited some debate. Lonnie Hendrix has an excellent summary of some of the early crossfire.

More on Quest/77; the 1981 walk-out of editorial staff following interference from Herb and Stan (New York Times story) involving a promo feature for Anwar Sadat's proposed vanity peace monument at the base of Mt Sinai ("Anwar Sadat's Daring New Dream").  Despite the disruption, Herb inevitably got his way. The article - written by the apostle - appeared in the May 1981 issue. Shortly thereafter the plug was pulled and Quest disappeared forever. Whatever happened to the Sadat Peace Center I wonder? ... oh, apparently it never happened.

Forgotten History: 1976 - Fools' Quest

1976, and the Worldwide Church of God was anticipating a great leap forward with the launch of the glossy magazine Quest/77 under the auspices of the AICF (Ambassador International Cultural Foundation). It was an expensive PR effort designed to gain credibility among the shakers and movers, the kind of people who wouldn't give The Plain Truth a second glance. The acquisition of Everest House Publishers followed, with offices in New York; a further vanity project that quickly proved prohibitively expensive.

The following article and accompanying photograph appeared in New York magazine, August 2, 1976.

Forty years on (has it really been 40 years?) and nothing remains. Quest magazine was short-lived, Everest House is long forgotten, Ted was to be ousted the year following Quest's launch, and even the Hall of Ad has now gone... in a cloud of demolition dust earlier this year.

Which leads one to wonder about the durability of the various vanity projects among the competing sects of COGdom today.

After Ambassador

Original AC logo

Once upon a time there was something called Ambassador College. One campus in Pasadena grew to three. Then two closed and Ambassador University had a brief existence at Big Sandy. Then it all collapsed.

But not to worry. Now there are slavish imitations operated by the squabbling sects that claim Herb Armstrong's mantle. They all have at least one thing in common - none of them are accredited. Nor do any of them seem to have key faculty with experience beyond the Armstrong gulags.

United Church of God: Ambassador Bible College.

COGWA: Foundation Institute.

PCG: Herbert W. Armstrong College.

Living Church of God: Living University.

Restored COG: Ambassador Center.

Obviously, there's an awful lot of duplication of resources, but these guys just don't trust each other. Granted that PCG and RCG are in something of a category of their own theologically, you'd have to wonder at what significant differences of substance exist between the other three (other than competing egos).

Lots of photographs of smiling, compliant young people. Add them all together and multiply by ten and it'd still be hard to justify just one tertiary operation. What real price for a junk qualification?

Hanging out in Plato's cave

In a high school English class, we worked through a textbook titled, "Philosophy & Literature: Truth, Beauty, Goodness, Commitment". It opened with Plato's "The Allegory of the Den" which asserts that most individuals are victims of illusion when it comes to recognizing Truth. At the time, I thought all of the time and effort spent on discussing what is or what isn't Truth was pretty silly, a waste of my time.

I knew the Truth, my family knew the Truth, after all our home was filled with stacks of the Plain Truth. We had no question about what was true or false because we were members of "The Church", the one true church that Christ was personally leading through his sole end-time Apostle, HWA. We had grown certain of this fact because HWA reminded us of it over and over again and we felt blessed to know THE TRUTH! If his claims had not been enough, we were also living in a bubble where all those around us reinforced this concept with repeated expressions of gratitude for how 'fortunate' we were to know the Truth.

And furthermore, there were the booklets... Yes, the booklets. My father, thinking he was doing us a favor, made a list of the 40 or so booklets that he had at the time and put columns for each one of us kids. Well, once one brother started checking a few booklets off the list, we were all jumping head first into reading them as well. It didn't matter what they were about, we were going to check off all the boxes. So, reading, "How to Quit Smoking" at age 10 didn't seem that odd to me. Come to think of it, this may have been the most valuable one for me as it did make smoking very unappealing. It's probably good that he hadn't included "The Missing Dimension in Sex" on the list.

To make a long story short, we lived in that bubble of common believers for decades without hardly having a clue that our reality was distorted in many ways. Even with the distorted reality, our lives were pretty good, fortunately. Most of our ministers were reasonable men and our parents maintained a balanced perspective on most issues. They took us to doctors, they made their own decisions, they did not 'over-discipline' us, and they saved for retirement rather than giving all they had to WCG. We also weren't pushed to go to Ambassador College. Overall, we were lucky.

Nevertheless, my bubble eventually popped. It wasn't one, dramatic moment but a gradual deflation that occurred for various reasons. In part, the accumulation of so many inconsistencies between various teachings and between what was taught vs. what was practiced tended to make people like me become cynical.

You stop and think about it and realize that WCG had dogmatically taught us many things that were later changed, or once examined, proved to be completely false. A few examples:

1. HWA was the first to preach the true Gospel in 1900 years
2. HWA learned from no man and he restored 18 truths to the church
3. God specially trained HWA for his unique, end-time mission
4. HWA was given key to prophecy (Identity of Israel) from God
5. HWA was highly accurate in foretelling future events
6. The WCG was God’s government on earth; HWA was God’s sole end-time Apostle
7. WCG was the one, true church and could trace its’ roots back through the ages
8. All universities are bad because they turn almost all students into God denying atheists
9. Members that were not donating enough money would go to the “the lake of fire”
10. Petra was the place of safety, the final training ground
11. HWA completed his work in 1972 (...but, oh, um, well, actually HWA was given a special
commission to “preach the Gospel to heads of nations”)
12. HWA preached the gospel to world leaders
13. Existing members would go to “the lake of fire”; existing ministers were deceived and rebellious
14. Doctors, modern medicine, and make-up were; divorce was unacceptable
15. The church would not compromise 1/100% of the Truth
16. HWA’s marriage with Ramona was God’s will
17. Divorce was ok, makeup was a non-issue, and doctors and medicine were ok as well
18. The State of California’s investigation into fraud was “the most MONSTROUS conspiracy and
attack Satan ever launched against God's Work!”
19. WCG knew what positions David, Moses, Joshua, HWA would hold in the kingdom of God
20. God would not let HWA die before Christ returned; loyalty to HWA was paramount
21. Post HWA, Mr. Tkach would lead us into the kingdom and loyalty to him was now paramount

One could have a lot of fun expanding such a list but better to get back to the point. Other things that helped be "break the spell". The continual splintering of the church. After theUCG/COGWA split, it made sense to start digging around to try to determine, "What is wrong with us?" Here I'd like to give credit to all of those that many of us had previously looked down upon. Thank you to all of those that had caught on years before and then documented what had really been going on at headquarters to help wake up others and try to stop the idolatry of a man. I read books like Armstrongism, Religion or Rip Off, Ambassadors of Armstrongism, The Broadway to Armageddon , Herbert Armstrong’s Tangled Web, and The Armstrong Empire and found websites like Ambassador Report, The Painful Truth, Banned, and Keith Hunt's). I may not have appreciated some of the attitude and over-generalizations here and there, but the well-documented history and thought provoking questions were eye openers. It was time to put down the cool-aid, wake up and start smelling the coffee.

About thirty years after discounting Plato in my English class, I was ready to give him some well-deserved respect. I located the same textbook online and reread that introduction with new eyes... Yes, now it made much more sense. The author summed up Plato's Allegory of the Den quite well - "If one has been a prisoner in a den, condemned to see only reflections of the truth, he will assume that these reflections are really true. He will believe so firmly that he will not believe a fellow prisoner who has escaped his bondage, has seen Truth and has returned to inform the prisoners of their mistaken confidence in the "truth" of their shadow world."

Exactly! Much like those of us in the past and those still in HWA's Den.

Truth is not always so easy to discern and any given statement is not the Truth just because an arrogant man is able to confidently claim that God revealed it to him. However, now comes the hard part... What of my beliefs are true and which ones are false? When a man borrows from others, he may be borrowing truth or he may be borrowing lies. Most probably, he will have borrowed some of each. But for those who lived in HWA's Den for most of our lives, it may not be easy to rapidly discern one from the other, nor to recognize what part or our confidence comes from our present examinations vs. our bias from the indoctrination of the past.

I must admit that when I read the Bible, keeping the Sabbath still makes sense to me. Is that because of what the Bible says or because of my decades in WCG? Hard to say at this point. Like Ian, whom I respect, my overall experience has been good and I'd like to think that there is a way to make some of the basic teaching work without the corruption of the past, and most certainly without relying on or giving credit to one man. My wife comes from a primarily Catholic country and her family had learned of the Sabbath and Holy Days completely independent from HWA, any COG, or even another splinter from the Millerites. Just the Bible. Is this belief Truth or error? One day it would be nice to know for sure. It is easy for her to ignore HWA completely.

For me, it is more complicated. Reading HWA's own writings led me to conclude he was not sincere as others continue to believe. Therefore it is hard to accept the position that even though HWA was incredibly flawed, God still worked through him to reveal new truth. I could better understand that a man was going to profit from the ministry (as many do) and he got lucky with a few things that he borrowed from others. To me, there is a big difference between these two assumptions. A question for my friend Ian. Hypothetically, what are the odds that a greedy, dishonest man who had abused his own child would be the one that God would select to work with to reveal new understandings? And for this case, the greed and dishonesty were ways of life, not just occasional slip ups. And the abuse was not a single incident followed by acknowledgement and repentance but more along the lines 10 years of abuse during the critical, initial years of a 'ministry' while the revelations were coming from God... and followed decades later by an extremely odd gesture - the gift of a signed copy of the "Missing Dimension in Sex" to the abused child). Extremely unlikely in my view. Perhaps I do need to visit you in Jamaica where we can talk face to face as we adjust our eyes to the true light outside of the Den?

God has choices. It seems that, in terms of character, it is reasonable to assume there is a type of Bell curve just as there is for intelligence or physical agility. Nobody is perfect for sure but there seems to be those we can confidently identify as being above average and others that are below average. Doesn't it make sense for God to select an individual with above average character rather below average? That would be consistent with the Bible's instructions when it comes time to select deacons and elders. As a parent, I'd place anyone that abused their own child, lied to and stole from the poor to enrich themselves, and made repeated huge false claims about their own purpose and abilities well towards the left end of the scale.

There is a lot of gray in life but child abuse by a self-proclaimed Apostle of God seems to be one matter that remains in the black or white category.

-Kevin

(Postscript: This post was submitted to both AW and Gary's Banned blog. After being published here it subsequently appeared on Banned under the heading "What is Truth?")

Gold, guilt and lifestyles of the rich and shameless

They will hurl their silver into the street,

    and their gold will seem unclean.

    Their silver and their gold won’t deliver them

        on the day of the Lord’s anger.

They won’t satisfy their appetites or fill their bellies.

    Their guilt will bring them down.

Ezekiel 7:19

Gary has a powerful post on his Banned blog about Herbert Armstrong's taste for the finer things in life.

Much of  the fine art and metalwork were purchased during the time HWA was mailing out letters to the membership demanding that they cut back and send in more money.  The "Work" was always in a state of distress. Many members did indeed sacrifice and mailed in more money.  The result - HWA was on treasure hunting trips to Harrod's in London and other UK locations buying treasures for his three homes and college campuses (St Alban's, England, Big Sandy, TX and Pasadena, CA). 

While Mrs. Armstrong was alive and in the early years of the church they lived in a modest house on Hill Ave (now owned by Cal Tech).  When Loma Armstrong died Herb began shedding his 'simple' life style for the extravagant one.  This was also the time Gerald Waterhouse and Dean Blackwell started blabbering that HWA was an Apostle.  And as you all know from the Bible, Apostles were meant to travel around the world speaking to world leaders, give them gifts of Steuben crustal, and play host to them at extravagant dinner parties at the various campus homes.  Apostles were ordained by God to live lives with the finest the earth and humankind has to offer.  This easy justification lead to multiple millions of dollars in extravagance by HWA,  evangelists, faculty, certain department heads and many ministers.

Sadly for Herb, the alcoholic apostle was unable to "take it with him", and the baubles were sold off after his death. Some legacy.

Donald Trump in Prophecy, or Here Come the Germans

It takes a Don to know a Don and Don Billingsley seems to think he has the prophetic 'real oil' on Donald Trump. You might even say that the latest issue of his Philadelphia Remnant mag is "the Trump issue". Trump is - according to Billingsley - playing into the winds of prophecy.

Yeah, right.

There's also a lot of huff and puff about those darn Germans coming to put your loved ones in concentration camps, with more of the same promised for the next issue. Can't wait. Don even writes of "the inherent nature of the average German".

German agents are currently active within the United States as they were before World War II! They are operating behind the scenes in many ways without anyone realizing their mission! Consider and seriously think about the recent massive riots in Chicago against Donald Trump with the foregoing writings of this book in mind; people used, such as George Soros a renegade Jew; instruments used by the unseen underground power players in Germany. 

With all this in mind, we would do well to remember the promise of Germany that is yet ongoing and will soon be realized: “One day we shall come back. Until then, A’ bientot (= goodbye A’ Soon)” (p. 41)

Looking at the cover you might think that you've seen it before. You have. Billingsley, one-time college chauffeur, keeps things simple by using the same cover art over and over again. Not a particularly smart strategy, but as you can see that's nothing compared to the contents.

Don has kindly provided access to his ravings in flipping book format (so that should render it almost completely unreadable to most folk.)  Dig around and you'll find you can download it as a PDF, but you'd be best advised - for sanity's sake - to avoid doing so. Be advised that there are formatting errors throughout the publication. Not a professional look.

As for "prophecy", all these years and Don has learned... nothing. What a waste. Just regurgitating nonsense he heard from Herb and swallowed whole back in the 1950s.

Isn't it a bit ironic that with all the inane drum beating over Germany and a return to Naziism, the real Nazis - authoritarian leaders in the "government of God"-type COGs - get a free ride. How many times was the CAD referred to as the Gestapo?

It's undoubtedly true that Don is an embarrassment to many good, thinking people involved in more moderate COG fellowships. And yet it's also true that such profoundly stupid extremist views were once mainline in Radio Church of God/WCG days, and that a bitter aftertaste remains even in the more respectable bodies. Would it be too much, for example, to expect that the more balanced COG groups should explicitly reject this perverse mixture of racism, cultural myopia, exceptionalism and twisted prophecy?

Apparently it is. If UCG or CGI (for example) were serious about presenting their message in a meaningful way, they'd long since have publically washed their hands - no weasel words - of this hogwash. The cost, though, would involve lost tithe-payers. The benefit? Some modicum of credibility.

The PDF is available to download

The FB format is available here

The not-so International News

Those of us who are sufficiently long in the tooth may remember the days when Ted Armstrong struck out defiantly from his father's dominion, and the heady sense of  "a new beginning" in East Texas. The good (and not so good) and the great (sometimes just grating) gathered to the new ensign. Guest preachers in Tyler included Al Portune, Wayne Cole and David Antion bearing the 1978 equivalent of gold, frankincense and myrrh. Ron Dart became second in command. The Church of God, International was launched with high hopes and tasteful offices on the shores of Lake Palestine.

Ted knew the power of publishing as well as radio and TV, and moved quickly to create a stock of new booklets, and a rival for The Plain Truth was launched, Twentieth Century Watch, under the guidance of Alan Heath.

It wasn't to last. Ted had a blow-up with Heath, leaving the magazine project in jeopardy. It's fair to say that it never recovered. Portune, Cole and Antion distanced themselves, and Ted settled down to his old dark habits. All now ancient history. A seedling of the sect in New Zealand withered quickly. Jim Bennett, who was instrumental in beginning the process of setting up CGI in the country returned from a trip to Texas disillusioned. The little group (of which I was, if I remember correctly, secretary), quickly folded.

So what happened to CGI? Ron Dart walked, Ted was finally given the order of the boot and, having snatched back his toys, started all over again with the wonderfully-named Intercontinental Church of God. CGI continued in downsized and understated mode. Today it continues to publish The International News which, unsurprisingly, began under Ted as a clone of WCG's Worldwide News.

All of which is merely a tiresomely long introduction to the current issue of the IN, now reduced to a quarterly tabloid. As someone who still has a copy of one of the early issues in his files, volume 1, number 1 no less, I have to admit to a degree of sadness. But enough of the history. Grumpy old men love to recount rambling tales from olden times, and when we get started it's best to just nod and think of today's shopping list.

This issue (Vol. 37, no. 1) is 16 pages long, overseen by Vance Stinson. It features articles by Bill Watson, Adrian Davis, Lloyd Cary, Ian Boyne, Robert Giovi and a lengthy series of obituaries. A bit like a block of cooking chocolate, solid but hardly exciting.

The PDF is available to download.

A University backs BI

Yes brethren, British Israelism at a university level. The course code is THL 215 and it's entitled "The Lost Tribes of Israel."

Description: 

This course examines what is known about the Israelite people from the Bible and other historical sources. Emphasis is on the diaspora of the Ten Tribes after the fall of the Kingdom of Israel in 721 BCE, the material culture documenting their migrations, and the historical sources detailing their unique contribution to the development of the contemporary world. Upon completion, students should be able to demonstrate the biblical keys and identify and explain the material culture and historical resources that enable the identification of the lost ten tribes of Israel, the tracing of their migrations, and their place in biblical prophecy.

I hope we're all excited. Do you think they'd offer a discount for a group enrollment? (Douglas, this has your name all over it!) No time to waste; here's a link to the eleven page course prospectus. Let's have a quick look at the required reading list.

• The Bible, preferably the NKJV [The NKJV is preferred mainly by proof-texting fundamentalists with little or no grasp of biblical scholarship.]
• Bennett, W. H. The Story of Celto-Saxon Israel. Heber Springs, AR: The Covenant Publishing Company of North America, 2002. (ISBN 0818702907). [Can any good thing come out of Heber Springs? Call me cynical, but this doesn't sound much like an academic textbook.]
• Capt, E. Raymond. Missing Links Discovered in Assyrian Tablets. 13th ed. Muskogee, OK: Artisan Publishers, 2010. (ISBN 0934666156). [Capt was the author of a variety of crackpot works including A Study in Pyramidology and The Great Pyramid Decoded: God's Stone Witness. He was also a fervent BI apologist.]
• Ogwyn, John H. The United States and Great Britain in Prophecy. USA: Living Church of God, 2008. [This is on the reading list? A 48-page booklet? Not even an ISBN number.]

Of course, you've probably already guessed that the 'university' concerned is none other than Living University, the non-accredited training school operated by the LCG. Your instructor is Douglas Winnail.

The prospectus includes this challenge: "We welcome your input for improving this course."

Where to begin?

(Related thought. Isn't Michael Germano doing an outstanding job maintaining such high academic standards at LU!)

LCG, booking cancelled

Rod Meredith's Living Church of God will need to hire new facilities following a back-out by World Vision Canada. The As Bereans Did site has the details. " ... Gary Moore, GCI's national director for Canada, straightened things out about LCG's history with World Vision." Suddenly World Vision has a problem with cleaning schedules.

HT to Redfox.