"We" Were Worng...
I have met a lot of people who are never wrong. They never take back that
which they spoke which proved to be either stupid, inane or simply wrong. They
waffle, redefine and deny, but they are never wrong. These people are incapable
of saying "oops," much less, "I'm sorry," You find them everywhere. They might
be a pastor, a politician, a CEO or a President. They might be your mother-
in-law, father-in-law, dad, mom, brother or sister. Of course, it could be you,
but you won't notice that.One common thing they share is that they are NEVER wrong. Of course they are wrong, misinformed or just plain stupid in the way they view and filter their world, but they are never wrong in fact. Their inability to say "I am sorry," or "I was wrong," is legendary in the family, the church, the office or the government and the damage inflicted on those that fall victim of these people can be humorous, mildly annoying or catastrophic.
In my WCG experience, "I was wrong" was not something one was used to hearing. Now I do recall when some genius figured out a Monday Pentecost should be a Sunday one the phrase "WE were wrong," came up. However, that is not the same as the one who gets the final say in such things saying, 'I was wrong." "We" was a common word inserted in the rare "were wrong" moments, but in fact it was not We but He that was actually wrong. It is easier to be collectively wrong than individually wrong. Very rare.
So in WCG "We" were wrong about makeup, Divorce and Remarriage, Baking soda is leavening, and many other such earthshaking topics. In fact, this all was a "He." However, "we" were not wrong about Jesus not coming in 72, but rather it was 'He" being wrong about it.
We all know Politicians who call people names and then say they didn't, or knew it was an insult but claim being oblivious to the fact, are this kind of which I speak. Men who can't come up with anything better to say than "she's ugly" and then waffle around trying to come up with another reason as to why they say such stupid things fit the bill too. "Im sorry, I was rude and wrong," will do just fine. After years of being told we are going to "stay the course," we now are being told that never meant this or that when it did as it was thrown back in the faces of those that asked about rethinking the course.
The average American is not stupid when they hear the answers given to questions by those that really don't want to give the answer. We even mostly know the answer before we ask the question and we certainly can tell when the answer given is not the real answer. How many "oops, sorry about that," have we heard after these great observations and declarations? How many White House press briefings can you listen to before you realize either, "the guy is lying," waffeling or they must think we are absolutely brain dead and stupid.
Poor Herman Cain can't bring himself to say he was wrong in his past judgements and relationships. He can't even admit they happened. Now he knows these relationships that never happened have taken him out of the Presidential race, but that is only because of the rumors and not the facts of the matter. He talks a lot of "we" as well.
Let's have some fun seeing where "I'm sorry, I was mistaken," never seems to reveal it's graceful presence.
Concerning the now obviously mistake of going to war with Iraq which had NOTHING to do with 911...
"Now that the combat phase of the war in Iraq is officially over, what begins is a debate throughout the entire U.S. government over America's unrivaled power and how best to use it."
(CBS reporter Joie Chen, 5/4/03)
"Congress returns to Washington this week to a world very different from the one members left two weeks ago. The war in Iraq is essentially over and domestic issues are regaining attention."
(NPR's Bob Edwards, 4/28/03)
"Tommy Franks and the coalition forces have demonstrated the old axiom that boldness on the battlefield produces swift and relatively bloodless victory. The three-week swing through Iraq has utterly shattered skeptics' complaints."
(Fox News Channel's Tony Snow, 4/27/03) I think we can see why Tony may have gotten the job White Press Secretary...
"The only people who think this wasn't a victory are Upper Westside liberals, and a few people here in Washington."
(Charles Krauthammer, Inside Washington, WUSA-TV, 4/19/03)
"The war was the hard part. The hard part was putting together a coalition, getting 300,000 troops over there and all their equipment and winning. And it gets easier. I mean, setting up a democracy is hard, but it is not as hard as winning a war."
(Fox News Channel's Fred Barnes, 4/10/03)
"The war winds down, politics heats up.... Picture perfect. Part Spider-Man, part Tom Cruise, part Ronald Reagan. The president seizes the moment on an aircraft carrier in the Pacific."
(PBS's Gwen Ifill, 5/2/03, on George W. Bush's "Mission Accomplished" speech)
"We're proud of our president. Americans love having a guy as president, a guy who has a little swagger, who's physical, who's not a complicated guy like Clinton or even like Dukakis or Mondale, all those guys, McGovern. They want a guy who's president. Women like a guy who's president. Check it out. The women like this war. I think we like having a hero as our president. It's simple. We're not like the Brits."
(MSNBC's Chris Matthews, 5/1/03)
"If image is everything, how can the Democratic presidential hopefuls compete with a president fresh from a war victory?"
(CNN's Judy Woodruff, 5/5/03)
"It is amazing how thorough the victory in Iraq really was in the broadest context..... And the silence, I think, is that it's clear that nobody can do anything about it. There isn't anybody who can stop him. The Democrats can't oppose--cannot oppose him politically."
(Washington Post reporter Jeff Birnbaum-- Fox News Channel, 5/2/03)
Often those who find it difficult to say "I was wrong," or "I am sorry," are very quick to accuse everyone else of that inability, only to later have to eat the proverbially crow, though it still always tastes like steak to them.
"I'm waiting to hear the words 'I was wrong' from some of the world's most elite journalists, politicians and Hollywood types.... I just wonder, who's going to be the first elitist to show the character to say: 'Hey, America, guess what? I was wrong'? Maybe the White House will get an apology, first, from the New York Times' Maureen Dowd. Now, Ms. Dowd mocked the morality of this war....
"Do you all remember Scott Ritter, you know, the former chief U.N. weapons inspector who played chief stooge for Saddam Hussein? Well, Mr. Ritter actually told a French radio network that -- quote, "The United States is going to leave Baghdad with its tail between its legs, defeated." Sorry, Scott. I think you've been chasing the wrong tail, again.
"Over the next couple of weeks when we find the chemical weapons this guy was amassing, the fact that this war was attacked by the left and so the right was so vindicated, I think, really means that the left is going to have to hang its head for three or four more years."
(Fox News Channel's Dick Morris, 4/9/03)
"Well, the hot story of the week is victory.... The Tommy Franks-Don Rumsfeld battle plan, war plan, worked brilliantly, a three-week war with mercifully few American deaths or Iraqi civilian deaths.... There is a lot of work yet to do, but all the naysayers have been humiliated so far.... The final word on this is, hooray."
(Fox News Channel's Morton Kondracke, 4/12/03)
"This will be no war -- there will be a fairly brief and ruthless military intervention.... The president will give an order. [The attack] will be rapid, accurate and dazzling.... It will be greeted by the majority of the Iraqi people as an emancipation. And I say, bring it on."
(Christopher Hitchens, in a 1/28/03 debate-- cited in the Observer,
3/30/03)
I'm sure some of these commentators have since admitted to having been a bit prematurely enthusiastic for that which, to date, has proven to be one the biggest miscalculations in American history. The "V" word has even been spoken by the man who we may have hoped had learned something from his generations experience with Vietnam. Of course most of us are not privy to other agendas besides spreading freedom around the world.
But I digress...
Ministers are not above the inability to say I am sorry or I was wrong as well we know. I pastored in a denomination that was never wrong from the top down, but always wrong from the bottom up. Come to think of it, that sounds like the government too at the moment or maybe all moments. Countless, and I mean countless ministers have predicted the exact time that Jesus would return and have been wrong, oh let's say...100% of the time.
Will Ron Weinland of the PKG apologize for either his Swiss stashing of member funds or his mistaken view of Jesus returning at this or that time? Don't hold your breath. Will Gerald Flurry see the lack of wisdom in building a very expensive replica of the Ambassador Auditorium in a corn field during a depression? Nope. Will David C Pack ever admit that his stupendous, overarching, amazing, incredible self and church is just another blip on the radar screen of one man shows? Nah. Would Joe Tkach Jr. ever apologize for sucking the spiritual brains out of tens of thousands and telling one minister that other ministers who leave would only find work at Walmart? Prolly not. Would his father ever have admitted he was not well trained enough in theology to travel around in a 737 thinking he was? Nah again. Would HWA ever to admitted he was wrong about anything? Nope...it was always 'we'.
Even the Apostle Paul was never wrong. After years of telling people not to marry, time was short and send it in, nothing happened that he predicted. Rather than "I was wrong," he just said "oh well, I fought a good fight, I kept the faith, therefore there is laid up for ME, oh and others too,......" Actually Jesus himself was wrong a few times but I won't torment you with that.
Whole denominations have mislead the faithful on a myriad of topics but to say "We're sorry, we were wrong," is just not something even the humble in Jesus can come up with very often.
Saying one is sorry is usually something that occurs only after one is caught or trapped. It's has taken over 400 years to absolve the then heretic Galileo from thinking the earth revolved around the sun and that the sun, not the earth, was the center of the solar system, but maybe not the universe.
Churches hold on to their fables and apologies way beyond what most normal institutions do. How long will it take to apologize when Church officials decide that Limbo is not the place where the unsaved babies go, like they know, when they announce this reality to the faithful? You can bet you will hear things like, "It was never a doctrine," or "It never was an official teaching," but you won't get away with that kind of "we're sorry," with the average person who was either tormented or only mildly comforted by this when they lost a child prior to the arrival of the sprinklers. Too many ministers have the subconscious belief that if they are wrong, God will correct them and, of course, any apologies or admissions of wrongness will be spoke privately to the deity. They will, however, announce to you that they have done this, but you will never really know. Ministers need to apologize to people for it is people they offend at times.
Some of us can't say we are sorry or we were wrong because we falsely believe that somehow it a weakness to admit such things. More than one psychologist has noted that "Fool me once..shame, shame...on...you," is not so much a gaff as the deeply psychological inability to say "shame on me," which is another way of not being able to admit to being wrong or a committing a misstep. To choke on the words expressing shame, sorrow, apology or being mistaken is not a good sign when we are talking about mature leadership. To come across as anything less than human is not going to win points with the not as stupid as one might think average church goer or American.
We lie when we can't admit we are wrong, mistaken or perhaps have another agenda that we do not wish disturbed. I think Americans are beginning to believe that this last reason is more the case with Iraq and perhaps Iran. Even church goers are beginning to question the motives of those that demand too much of their money for the Lord and remind you that you can be "dismembered" when you ask uncomfortable questions about doctrine or the Bible itself. "Just trust me," is no longer going to work among the informed. Lie Snickers, the Internet is a gift from God Himself.
We live in a time where Presidents, Politicians and Pastors who have the inability to say that they have been misguided, unguided, mistaken and plainly wrong is endangering not only our intellectual health, but our lives on the planet. Suck it up guys. Just say it when it dawns on you. Allow it to dawn on you from time to time. "I was wrong, I am sorry."
When was the last time you heard your executive, judicial, senatorial, congressional or pastoral leaders say "I was wrong," "We were wrong," "I am sorry"? From "I did not have sex with that woman," to "those weapons of mass destruction must be around here somewhere," just saying "I'm sorry," seems the hardest thing to do. The problem is that most of the time, it is others who pay dearly for such mistakes.
Now I noticed the title should say "Wrong" and not "Worng." Opps...my staff didn't catch that and we made a mistake... :)
13 comments:
Another great thought provoking article, Dennis.
Your quotes from 2003 regarding the Iraq War illustrates the new trend in American warfare: wars that seemingly never end - even after conventional sources declare the war over.
It is more pronounced in the war on terrorism. Think of the billions of dollars spent on Homeland Security fighting an enemy we cannot see, in countries we are not sure. Let's not forget the loss of freedoms here domestically since 9/11. It is estimated that there are only about 2,000 al-Queida operatives in the world dictating the USA war on terrorism and loss of freedom.
Which leads me to say without apology (pun intended) that there are other political agendas behind the scenes in which we are unaware.
Richard
I think I may have mentioned this before, but I did receive an apology from a WCG minister - 35 years later.
This WCG minister is now in the UCG. He apologized to me for a sermon he gave in 1969 in which I emailed to him my notes of his sermon contained in my Sabbath Services notebooks.
Here is his apology:
Dear Richard,
I'm sorry to not have replied sooner. I have been in Nigeria and just returned late last night. I turned on the computer about an hour ago and found over 250 emails waiting.
I would like to apologize for the comments that you mentioned. In 1969 I was just 29 years old, too young to be a pastor. Many of the things I said and did in the first years of my ministry are a great embarrassment to me. I was a young fool. I apologize to both you and God.
END OF E-MAIL EXCERPT
I thought this apology spoke highly of this former WCG minister. Consider he didn't have to respond to my e-mail at all, and could have ignored it.
Richard
Dennis,
You wrote: "...Even the Apostle Paul was never wrong. After years of telling people not to marry, time was short and send it in, nothing happened that he predicted. Rather than "I was wrong," he just said "oh well, I fought a good fight, I kept the faith, therefore there is laid up for ME, oh and others too,......"
Paul appears to be very confident with the words he spoke there and if that weren't enough, Paul was not going to hold himself accountable for the sin in his life for he tells us this:
"Now then it is no more I that do it, but sin that dwelleth in me." Romans 7:17
Saying that once wasn't enough for Paul as he must have had the idea that repetition is one of the best forms of emphasis, because he then went on to say it again in Romans 7as follows:
:20 "Now if I do that I would not, it is no more I that do it, but sin that dwelleth in me."
It's all very interesting and assuming what Paul said is true, then how did that sin come to dwell in Paul? Other verse seem to give some hints: I John 3:8; James 4:5; 2 Tim 2:26 and Ephesians 2:2, etc.
John
Glad to see things returning to normal after the big wind.
Another great article, Dennis. I hope I've put away that syndrome from myself. I was definitely wrong for many, many years and probably am still wrong and mistaken in some things. We humans have imperfect understanding in so many areas no matter how hard we try.
Dennis, with Roderick Meredith claiming he never committed a "major" sin since baptism, one would not expect any "I was wrong" from him. In fact, in a recent posting by Thiel, the blame for bankrupting Global was put on Larry Salyer, not Roderick Meredith -- Meredith being the one who actually bankrupted Global.
In Moral Mazes by Robert Jackal, there is a chapter "The Magic Lantern" where the author shows how corporations use their imagery, smoke and mirrors to "recast" history and ameliorate the bad PR. In fact, Moral Mazes well describes the Church Corporate with which we are so familiar, without being specific to the details. "What is right and moral [in the Corporation]," Robert Jackall explains, "is what the guy above you wants from you...." Leave your morals at the door and take the hit for the "good of the team".
The whole thing is reminiscent of The Lucifer Effect, yet another explanation of the Ambassador College / Worldwide Church of God Church Corporate Corruption.
And I will add: I was wrong to be so soft on exposing Armstrongism in the past. I take full responsibility. I want to make it right if I can: Perhaps I can be even more vicious in attacking the evils of Armstrongism, once I get my second wind.
"Some of us can't say we are sorry or we were wrong because we falsely believe that somehow it a weakness to admit such things. More than one psychologist has noted that "Fool me once..shame, shame...on...you," is not so much a gaff as the deeply psychological inability to say "shame on me,""
Great point. Hadn't thought of that before.
This reminds me of something Richard Dawkins wrote about:
"A formative influence on my undergraduate self was the response of a respected elder statesmen of the Oxford Zoology Department when an American visitor had just publicly disproved his favourite theory. The old man strode to the front of the lecture hall, shook the American warmly by the hand and declared in ringing, emotional tones: "My dear fellow, I wish to thank you. I have been wrong these fifteen years." And we clapped our hands red. Can you imagine a Government Minister being cheered in the House of Commons for a similar admission? "Resign, Resign" is a much more likely response!"
There's something special about science and the people who do it. They aren't perfect, but the self-correcting mechanisms in place seem to go hand-in-hand with the majority of the personalities who find it a pleasure to deal with them.
It really is inspiring to graduate from Armstrongism to a scientific worldview. Despite the claims often indulged in here that paint atheists as morose and confused (surely a defense mechanism among those who rightly suspect their own philosophies have no merit), the philosophical atheism most scientists enjoy--besides being an eminently defensible position--is a source of great wonder and meaning for them. The naysayers, if they were honest and courageous folks, would do well to look into the other side of the story. They might even find the strength to admit they were wrong--maybe even go so far as to apologize for their former stupid bigotry against atheists.
Another great scientific admission of wrongness came in the 1960's when plate tectonics were shown to be true (Even as a kid I could see the map of continents would fit back together if you went back in time). The professor, in his 80's who defended that plates do not move and taught it for decades looked at the presentation and asked to speak. He stood up and said, "I was wrong, they move."
He got a standing ovation and the respect of all his peers for that is the essence of good science.
On Paul:
"All those in Asia have forsaken me, I pray God will not hold it to their charge." = "I alone am correct of course and I will not wonder why ALL forsook me nor wonder why NO ONE followed me."
Paul is responsible from turning "SIN" into something that happens and we do into a condition for which we need redemption.
Also Paul made great to do about him being the worst sinner and doing the things he should not and not doing what he should etc, but conveniently never tells us what specifically he was doing or not doing. Millions would love to know what Paul felt he had to beat himself over to keep from thinking or doing lest he be a castaway.
Personally I think Paul was a repressed gay thinking male who did not practice what he felt plagued him but neither did he understand it or want to talk about it. Many of Paul's admissions like "let every man posess his "vessel"' hint at such things. Even Paul noted his weak presense and strong letters. He was not an attractive man and there is no hint that any relationship was in his life. But rather than say "I'm lonely," he says, "It is better that all men be like me..." You know like when Pee Wee falls of his bike and says, "I meant to do that!"
Let's face it. Sex is the big thing on human minds in one form or another or all of the above.
You kinda tell but you mostly don't.
This way you get the credit for youor open humility without the stress of "you did what!" And the dis-illusionment of the masses.
I don't understand Dawkins position on disintrested altrusim; where, by cultivating it, we can overcome our selfish genes. But why should we, if it's not our best intrest?
And, if it is in our best intrest, wouldn't we attribute it to our selfish genes?
Dennis: Paul and Timothy, you suppose?
Nah.
Maybe.
"And, if it is in our best intrest, wouldn't we attribute it to our selfish genes?"
And why bother thinking over it in the first place? Remember, The Great Pumpkin controls every aspect of reality and this, not selfish genes and EVILution, is the only answer to life's puzzling questions. Have a PersonalRelationshipWithTheGreatPumpkin. Everything else is mental masturbation.
Paul Ray
If a false prophet comes up with a wrong date for the end of the age, it is HE who is wrong.
However, if the false prophet gains some followers who believe him, then THEY are also wrong.
If the foolish followers financially support the false prophet and thereby help him to ensnare yet others, then ALL have done a great wrong. There will be plenty of guilt to go around.
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