Most of us have heard the horror stories over the years about the broken relationships caused by Armstrongism. When you entered the church you were expected to leave the world behind, associate with fellow believers and mark as 'Satan's own' the rest of humanity. We have seen the families in the church ripped apart by its divorce and remarriage doctrines. By parents refusing medical treatment for children causing deaths. The mindless rantings of Rod Meredith that lead one of his parishioners to go on a shooting rampage during church services. And more recently with Gerald Flurry's asinine rantings prohibiting PCG members of having any contact with parents, children, brothers, sisters, and relatives who had left a COG.
Looking back I can see that one of the most effective ways our church controlled people was by controlling their relationships. If a leader could convince the followers that loyalty to the group was actually loyalty to God, then that leader had the ability to control everything about the followers from something as big as personal relationships to something as small as whether or not they shaved.
One way relationships were controlled was by encouraging members to rat on each other. Of course, this was masked in Scriptural language like, “exhort one another to love and good works.” But what it really meant was that there was no confidentiality. This made for guarded friendships, at best. It was simply impossible to build deep, meaningful friendships when I wasn’t sure if my “friend” was going to report on me to my grandparents.
All this violation of personal boundaries was justified by our belief that we were literally responsible for each other’s souls. If we failed to “stand up for God” in the lives of our brethren (aka, get involved in their personal business), we would answer for that at the judgment seat of Christ.
Fear of God, fear of man, fear of eternal repercussions dictated and motivated much of our relational interactions.
From Friendships In High Demand Cultish Groups
4 comments:
I believe we are all scripturally savy enough to understand that the Bible itself is the source of relationship control. From the Chosen People to False Brethren, all is geared towards control of the mind and relationships as dictated by those who think they know.
Women are good as baby factories and to say 'yes sir', but can't ask an intelligent question of the minister so ask your husband. As one women, who I really respected for this crack, said...."Can I just ask you anyway. .. my husband is stupid?" I fell out.
Paul told people to stay single or act as if they were. He told them who to see and who to avoid. He felt his way of being was best and they'd do well to imitate him. He told them time was short and send it in. He ruined lives of the day with misinformation and false hope. The Bible does not record the other side of his mistaken Jesus is coming soon and the damage he inflicted in the name of control.
It is the Bible + Ego Inflated humans that go from the archetype of Wizard and Prophet to "And yes brethren, I am an Apostle" or "I am that prophet or "We are the Two Witnesses." The Book gives them permission to do so.
Now that humanity is finally coming to understand that morality is hardwired in the brain, completed by training with society, it is clear that "genetic epistemology" shows that cognitive growth occurs in consistent major stages.
Kohlberg constructed three levels of moral development. The first is preconventional where the "don'ts" are seen as responsible for punishment. To the individual at this level, social rules and expectations are not internalized: They are imposed on the "child" by others.
In Armstrongism, no one reaches postconvential where social rules are critically examined against the backdrop of universal human rights, duties, and general moral principles, let alone reaching the conventional levels.
Herbert Armstrong was immature. The fiery angry tirades of his temper was just one of one indicators of his lack of social development. He had no concept of cooperation except to gain selfish interests from those who demanded it, such as world rulers. He was never properly socialized and was in terms of morality, an infant. He didn't listen; he didn't have to.
In this corrupted world of artificial authority based morality, the only thing which was moral was what your "superior" expected of you. There was no spiritual depth, and, indeed, the entire venue was in a stranglehold of rigid control to prevent anyone from deviating from some of the most silly, stupid, restrictive strictures possible.
Such an environment is insane, rife with distorted perceptions, not at all in keeping with any kind of reality or normalcy. Herbert Armstrong was simply a pervert who insisted on getting his own way and bullied people until he got what he wanted. It certainly wasn't healthy by any measure.
In time, the same thing will be said of Gerald Flurry, David Pack, Ron Weinland, Roderick Meredith, and all those who rise to being heads of nothing much.
This will be their legacy
Well, the good news is that we already have Stephan Flurry, don't we?
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