Get GIC'd

Tkach sect becomes GRACE COMMUNION INTERNATIONAL.

The bearded patriarch and unelected Pastor Generalissimo has climbed off the fence. WCG has been renamed.

http://www.wcg.org/events/new09/april2009letter.htm

Much good may it do him. The April letter is, IMHO, a manipulative, condescending piece of patronizing PR.

No announcement, you'll note, that Pope Joe is stepping down from his position and re-establishing the church on non-hierarchical lines.

COG sites in the top half-million

How goes the battle? Latest Alexa ratings for 17 COG sites in the top half-million on the Web.

1 (1) UCG's The Good News - 78,088
2 (3) PCG's Trumpet - 86,903
3 (2) Weinland's The End - 98,050 [slip-sliding down another place]
4 (4) Ruth's Bible Study - 104,054
5 (5) UCG - 110,575
6 (10) LCG's Tomorrow's World - 141,362 [on the rise]
7 (6) Ritenbaugh's Bible Tools - 151,281
8 (7) Pack's RCG - 160,746
9 (8) Thiel's COGwriter - 165,051
10 (11) Tkach & Co's WCG - 190,400
11 (15) LCG - 220,199 [on the rise]
12 (9) Hulme's Vision - 271,103 [dropping like a stone]
13 (13) Ritenbaugh's CGG - 320,186
14 (12) Sielaff's ASK - 362,743
15 (-) Albrecht's PTM - 368,546 [below the half-million last time!]
16 (16) Flurry's PCG - 438,208
17 (17) AW - 465,770
18 (14) Kubik - 569,852 [above the half-million last time]

Links are in the sidebar. Some observations:

• UCG continues to dominate, but PTM must be the big winner this time (though heaven alone knows why) along with the LCG.
  
• Weinland continues to slip, and David Hulme has plummeted some 100,000 places since the last check.
  
• AW has made a modest overall improvement, up from 496,521.
  
• Ron Dart's Born to Win site was offline (again) when we hit the link, and unsurprisingly with its on again/off again act, Alexa shows it has now dropped below 800,000.
  

Women in WCG and its Daughters

The following ad appear in the latest issue of The Journal. Click to enlarge.

For those with long memories, there was a time when AW suggested Mrs Graham would make a fine WCG church president if and when Joe Tkach ever decided to do the right thing and surrender his sinecure. The project outlined in the ad seems a worthy and long overdue one, and the questions Sheila asks deserve consideration.

The front and back pages of The Journal are available as a free download. More on this issue of The Journal in a later posting.

Dreaming in Arabic

Travel writing. It's not my thing. Bill Bryson is the exception. So the idea of an AC-Big Sandy student from the eighties writing about her experience in the Middle East - and we're talking "Big Dig" here - didn't exactly press all my buttons.

Jennifer, I repent of prejudging your writing. It's excellent, and I thoroughly enjoyed it. And as it turns out, there's a lot more than travel writing involved. You might find yourself saying "snap!" as often as I did as Jennifer and her husband dealt with their post-WCG issues. You might also be challenged by her advocacy for the Arab people, and the history of Palestine which she relates.

Jennifer Armstrong's free online book, Dreaming in Arabic, was drawn to my attention by an old Pasadena-based friend of AW who keeps tabs on WCG's Internet legacy with much greater thoroughness than I'm remotely capable of (yeah, I know, hard to believe, but still true.)

Over the Astarte weekend, if you're at a loose end, or looking for strength to avoid chocolate eggs or marshmallow bunnies, you could do worse than dip into Jennifer's story.

Date Line Lunacy

Well, dusk has turned to dark and the Passover has now "passed over" New Zealand, the first major country in the world to meet each new day as it emerges out of thin air over the International Date Line.

Of course, our Aussie brethren might want to challenge that assertion about "major country," but we'll bide our time: if the cane toads don't get them first then global warming will eventually.

But seriously, how do people outside "the Holy Land" know that they're observing their sacred days on the right days? Why not have the date line in the middle of the Atlantic instead of the Pacific?

Regrettably, there's no proof text at hand. The problem of where to plonk the changeover line never occurred to the biblical writers. As far as they were concerned the earth was flat: heaven above (with Yahweh somewhere beyond the starry canopy), hades below. When the sun went down it passed over bare rocky nether regions that opened out onto nothingness before ascending once more into the bright domains of humankind.

Apparently Yahweh, despite being omniscient, was unaware of the problems that migration to the "Down Under" zone would create. Or the New World for that matter. The International Date Line was eventually set by mere mortals over a few gin and tonics.

Then there's the issue of the kink in the dateline over Tonga. Being sensible, intelligent and perceptive people the Tongans naturally wanted to be on the Kiwi side of the line, but the cartographers wanted to put them in company with the Americas. No wonder they objected! Thus the dateline was amended - and a bump was created to put Tonga on the civilized side of the temporal chasm.

As I understand it, Seventh-day Adventists in Tonga keep two sabbaths each week as a result: both Saturday and Sunday. Why? Well, the LORD seems not to have spoken specifically on the dented dateline, so they play safe... just in case!

I'm not sure whether there are any Adventists on Kiribati, but there the problem is even more glaring. Until January 1st 1995 Kiribati was on the Western side of the date line, but the micro-nation decided - again, who can blame them - to grab a day's march on the rest of the world, and thereby become the first place on the planet to welcome in the new millennium (and grab a lot of free publicity.) Boy, I bet the heavenly Department of Holy Days was cheesed off about that one!

And what about the long-suffering Samoans, forever doomed to keep the sabbath almost 24 hours after their nearby Tongan brethren.

Among the calendar fanatics who want to argue about solar/lunar/360 and suchlike, I've yet to come across a single one of these geniuses who can give a poor Tongan, Kiwi or Aussie a bit of biblical assurance that they're not a day out.

In the absence of a solution to this enigma, the whole concept of "Holy Time" outside the Middle East becomes meaningless.

SDA's are given to statements like: "Some people believe the placement of the International Date Line was achieved under divine guidance." Yes, doubtless, but it also logically follows that "some people" don't. What's needed is proof - or failing that, at least a nice proof text. Bob? Rod? Gerry? Willie? ... Anybody?

None of this has much to do with the spiritual significance of a eucharistic celebration. The Lord's Supper would be the Lord's Supper for observant Christians anywhere. But let's be clear, there is a real problem if you shackle it to a legalistic calculation of "holy time."

Herbert Armstrong always postured about sending a certified bank cheque to anyone who could mail in a Bible verse that commanded Sunday observance. I'm tempted to repeat the offer on the dateline issue. Clearly I won't need to go running to the bank anytime soon.

But if you do come up with a proof text, please be sure to mail it with a Kiribati stamp.

Passover 2009 - The COG Observance

For the curious, the committed and the de-converted, here are 2009's traditional holy days dates in the former WCG tradition.

* Passover: April 7*
* Feast of Unleavened Bread: April 9-15
* Pentecost: May 31
* Feast of Trumpets: September 19
* Day of Atonement: September 28
* Feast of Tabernacles: October 3 - 9
* Last Great Day: October 10

*Observed at sundown.

Frankly, I preferred them to the liturgical calendar of my upbringing. The mainstream observances have long since been appropriated and rubbed smooth by Western culture. Easter? Chocolate eggs, bunnies, hot cross buns, and a much appreciated long weekend. That's about it for most people... except in pockets like Poland and the Southern Baptist heartland.

So, is there any place for those observances? What enduring value do they have? Strangely enough, COG members tend to ignore those questions and get derailed on postponements: not focusing on the why but the how (which, when you think about it, is a characteristic by no means limited to the Holy Days.)

And then, when we do talk about the why, it all turns on proof texts and alleged symbolism in God's putative Master Plan.

I'm doubtful about "Master Plan" thinking, even when mad Calvinists dress it up as "metanarrative", German scholars wax lyrical about heilsgeschichte, or Seventh-day Adventists try to pass off copies of "The Great Controversy." But to each their own.

How about in terms of making sense of your faith, grounding you on the shifting sands of everyday life, meaning something to you, not just as a correct tenet to be believed and practiced?

Passover? Unleavened Bread? Easter? How meaningful? Over to you.

No insults, no proof texts... "Bah, humbug," and "a curse on both your houses" posts will be held over for a week until those who have less strident views have had a chance to contribute. The same applies to any discussion on postponements and the technical intricacies of calendar calculations.

The Eternal Word has been Revised

The statement struck me as unintentionally funny: The Revised Edition of God's Eternal Word is now available.

Someone's idea of a joke? Intrigued, I hit the link and discovered that Fred Coulter has competition in the one-man Bible translation field. What Fred has done for the tiny CBCG sect, some Aussie bloke called Clarence Priebbenow has done for the fundamentalist fringe of Australian Lutheranism.

But, unlike Fred, Clarrie makes his translation available as a free MS Word download. Actually, it's not too bad, all considered, though I doubt it'll ever become known outside the tiny circle of the AELC, a truly COGish Lutheran body which split some time ago from the Lutheran Church of Australia and has now just split down the middle itself over an obscure dogma.

Unfortunately some AELC pastors and their congregations chose not to submit to the public doctrine of the church and are consequently no longer members of our synod. In fact because they have departed from the Confessions of the Lutheran Church, we believe that they are actually no longer Lutheran...These folk are not permitted to receive communion in the congregations of our synod, nor are they to be accepted as sponsors for Baptism, whilst they knowingly and willingly condone this erroneous doctrine error and practice in spite of frequent Scriptural admonition. It is our duty to warn you of this sectarian group operating under the guise of being authentic Lutheran churches and pastors. They are in fact neither. As the Holy Spirit says through the Apostle Paul, “… they have a zeal for God, but not according to knowledge (Rom. 10:2). [AELC February newsletter]

Aw shucks, and I thought this kind of love and forbearing was the exclusive specialty of the WCG and its splinters. Somehow it's gratifying to see somebody else slugging it out... why should we have all the fun?

Regardless, I'd recommend "Pastor" Priebbenow's not-so Eternal Word over the Fred Bible. Not that it's much of a recommendation, as there probably isn't a translation in existence that I wouldn't recommend over Fred's, but with the gratis status, who can complain? And just think how impressive those ABC or Living University students' essays could be if they chucked in a gratuitous reference to the authoritative-sounding "Priebbenow translation" among the hardy favorites of Moffatt and Goodspeed!

Crumb Alert!

Hard on the heels of the release of the Wolverton Bible comes news that its evil doppelganger is soon to follow. Robert Crumb, the counter-culture cartoonist, is set to release his version of Genesis on an unsuspecting world.

Crumb is said to have been inspired by the style of Wolverton, but unlike Basil he relished openly sexual content, and anti-establishment values. If Basil was COGwriter, then Robert would be I Survived Armstrongism. On the campuses of the seventies his artwork often appeared in student rags.

"Four years in the making, Crumb worked from the King James Bible and Robert Alter's translation to reinterpret the Book of Genesis, from the Creation via Adam and Eve in the Garden of Eden to Noah boarding his ark."

Crumb's publisher is predicting it will "provoke the religious right." I daresay it won't end up on Clyde Kilough's coffee table either.

For now I'll be content to leaf through my copy of the Wolverton Bible which, I say with some delight, fully lived up to my expectations (though the proof reading was atrocious in parts.) The article by Monte is excellent and it is a pleasure to see some content that has never appeared in print before. Long after Herb's books, booklets and articles have disappeared, I suspect Basil's cross-hatched masterpieces will continue to provoke both admiration and revulsion. At least, I fervently hope so.

Related link: Robert Crumb's website.

The cost of "Cry Wolf"

Okay, I repent. I shouldn't have said positive things about Earth Day. Environmentalists are all communists, or maybe even Canadians. Ronald Reagan was a great president, George W. Bush was tragically misunderstood. Global Warming is a myth from evil Greenie extremists. The polar ice-caps aren't melting, and besides, the world has warmed and cooled before so why all the fuss?

It's a bit weird really. Here we are, most of us, ex-apocalyptic nut-jobs in recovery. We've heard the cry of "Wolf!" one too many times. Forget that the Plain Truth magazine once claimed to be an early consciousness-raiser on ecological issues. Forget that yellow-covered booklet Our Polluted Planet (for those of you who hark back to the seventies.) Forget all those references to the Club of Rome. Nope, now we know better. Nothin's gonna turn to custard; pass me another beer.

Yes, Hoeh, Armstrong, Spanky and their gang were total cretins, and completely deluded. Yes, they jerked us all around with their fear religion. Only trouble is - Global Warming is happening, the ice-caps are melting and the scientific consensus is growing. I guess you might not know that if you listen to conservative squawk radio rather than read New Scientist.

The big surprise to me is that the current crop of apocalyptic nut-jobs - the Flurry and Meredith groupies - are just as likely to be in denial as the jaundiced malcontents and drop-outs. Maybe they figure that Global Warming is just too slow to be a sign that the knee-capping Hosts of Heaven will be riding in on the clouds in three-to-five years.

The thing with apocalyptic beliefs is that they encourage passivity. The End Times are almost here, ain't nuthin' you can do about it 'cept dig deep to fund the Work, study your Bible proof texts and hope like heck. The thing with science, on the other hand, is it encourages activism: it says we can change the future, it gives us strategies. Not the same thing.

The comments on the previous thread excluded some really nasty ones. It was, I thought, a moderate post, but I am apparently a commie, an Obama supporter and even worse. The World Wildlife Fund is a Marxist front. These folk have just morphed from apocalyptic nut-jobs to run-of-the mill, vanilla-favored nut-jobs. I think I prefer the apocalyptic types.

If you think Global Warming is just a liberal myth, go down to your local library and dig out the March 28 issue of New Scientist. Turn to page 32 and read the article called Meltdown. It isn't written by an apocalyptic nut-job, and it may just change your mind...

Fast or flick?

It's an interesting contrast. Saturday March 28 is a day of hope as millions of humans across the planet take the symbolic step of turning off the lights for one hour - Earth Hour - beginning at 8.30 PM wherever they are, a project developed with the World Wildlife Fund. It won't solve our ecological problems, but it isn't designed to do that. It will raise our consciousness about an important issue, and maybe inspire us to work harder to conserve this precious planet on which we live.

But those who've bought into the apocalyptic package are unlikely to "get it." Why bother? Things are prophesied to get worse. Why waste the energy - or in this case, why not waste the energy... The one thing that puts a smirk of superiority on any sect member's face is a contempt for activism. Bah, humbug! Let the world go to hell in a handcart, I'll keep my nose clean and focus on the really important stuff, like, er, not eating ham and turning up for services on the Sabbath.

Saturday March 28 is also, apparently, a designated fast for members of the Living Church of God. Exactly why isn't immediately apparent. Guru Rod Meredith calls these things with little reason, other than perhaps whether he's feeling a bit depressed. Rod is on the wane, mind and body are letting him down - alas, the fate of all who are fortunate and blessed enough to live a life to their three-score and ten and beyond. What to do? Let's call on the brethren to share the misery! That'll show God that we're good people and deserve a break!

The whole concept is infantile. What's more, it's introverted. It does nothing for anybody outside the ghetto. I suppose it does help shore up the sense of identity, specialness and separateness from the wicked world - and those in deviant Laodicean pseudo-COGs. But then, is that a good thing?

Earth Hour, on the other hand, is an act of solidarity with all people who want to leave their ghetto for a while - regardless of nationality, culture or even religion - and work toward a greater good. Contrast that with the apocalyptic mind set which throws up its hands in horror and sulks and mumbles in a corner, hoping for "a strong hand from someplace" to reach down so the real work of building a better, sustainable world can be avoided. It's the equivalent of a petulant nine year old (a subject on which I have some experience.) If you want a little kid to learn to care about the world they'll inherit, I suspect that getting them enthused about getting some candles out and turning off the lights during Earth Hour wouldn't be a bad place to start.

It's not enough to cry "thy kingdom come" while burying the proverbial talent in the back yard. What kind of logic is it to decry the observance of Lent (because it isn't biblical) and then observe a twenty-four hour fast at Rod's behest (which also isn't biblical)?

In any event, Earth Hour has now passed over New Zealand, and in this household the lights were turned out only after the preparation of a little snack.