For all of you here that call the followers of Herbert Armstrong, "Armstrongites" or his belief system as "Armstrongism" you had better look at your personal life. You say those words because you have a bad marriage or had family issues while part of the church. Oh, and you are bitter too....and emotionally immature...
This is from Facebook and this person was serious....
When I hear a person resort to the term "Armstrongism" I begin to feel very sorry for them. All too often they are bitter angry people that have had severe difficulties within their marriage or within their family lives while being members of the WCG.
Due to their bitterness they use the term "Armstrongism" as an attempt too maliciously hurt others as a way of taking out their pain on innocent people. It's clearly a very pitiful and emotionally immature way of dealing with their own personal problems. Doing that will not help them forgive the people they need to forgive!!!!
Armstrongism: Belief in the silly doctrine of British Israelism with false church history and false prophets; entirely daft.
ReplyDeleteNot so much people with bad marriages, just people familiar with science, logic and math.
Which I would guess would be even more insulting to the nonscientific kooks who believe in science fiction alternative world history based on the silly ideas of a dud who barely squeeked by 8th grade in the 19th Century.
Or, if you prefer, people call it Armstrongism because they are really tired of the false prophets who lie to you and then take your money.
Feel sad for us?
How do you think we feel about PKG members?
All too often? What about the rest? What about people who came from stable homes, who are either single or have good marriages, but are just tired of beinsh iton by people who aren't family members, even though they refer to themselves as "brethren." What thefu kiss wrong with those people?
ReplyDeleteWhen XCG apolosists make statements like that show that their mental ability to process empathy and compassion is very weak. This has been shown on this blog and others before that proves this point.
ReplyDeletehttp://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NL0uxDscjdo
Funny but that fb commenter sees it as "in general, bad marriage/childhood = amrstrongism (phrase)" Most of us that are out see it as "amstrongism (belief system) = bad marriage/childhood and/or faulty thinking in general"
ReplyDeleteThere will never be an agreement between people who see HWA as God's mouthpiece and those of us who see him as a man speaking for himself.
This person's attitude is another by-product of...ARMSTRONGISM!
ReplyDeleteHA-HA-HA-HA-HA-HA-HA-HA!!!
His argument is totally flawed. Looking at the "theology" as promoted by WCG and its offshoots e.g. UCG, LCG, COGWA, CGG, PCG, RCG, etc. from a critical perspective and labelling it as Armstrongism isn't meant to insult followers of this worldview anymore than labelling Catholicism "Papism" or the various strains of Protestantism as Lutheranism, Calvinism, Arminianism etc. The majority of belief-systems that exist in today's society have predominantly originated from a single individual who is looked upon as if s/he is a "saint" or "divine" e.g. Adventist doctrine could be labeled "Whitism," Jehovah's Witnesses could be labeled "Russellites," Mormonism could be labeled "Smithism" etc. So labelling a group this or that doesn't change the facts of the group's founder, history and theology no matter how you choose to color it. And all religious ideologies have directly or indirectly led to abuse in some form or another. But, an individual's experience within a religious group is personal to them and to belittle or dismiss their experience as inconsequential is to only add to the abuse, in my opinion.
ReplyDeleteI loved it when Flurry's brigade started referring to "Tkachism" as a way to snipe back at the post-HWA hierarchy.
ReplyDeleteAll Tkach & Co. did, of course, was to embrace the evangelical approach. It wasn't their "ism," at all, and Flurry and his lieutenants looked childish using the term.
Armstrong, on the other hand, took a few snippets of ideas here and there, mostly from Adventism but also the BI confusion, and developed his own system. Tagging that with an "ism" is totally appropriate.
Flurry, on the other hand, merits no "ism" of his own -- yet. Although, his "that prophet" gobbledygook might get him there.
Very true, John. But, the label "Armstrongism" takes on a pejorative sense since it's used only by outsiders, people who have either gotten out, or else would never consider joining in the first place. Insiders would never use term, for two reasons. First, they don't like to lump together their "one true church" COG splinter with other "apostate" COG splinters, and second, they call their splinter group just "the church" as in "the one true church." Besides, it sounds cultish to call yourself and Armstrongite.
ReplyDeleteWell, we've tried to be accomodating by calling it so many different things, but it seems that the people still inside are offended by virtually any collective name we can come up with. They only want it to be called "God's Truth", and we know from so many factors that it is anything but.
ReplyDeleteI'm going to continue to call it Armstrongism, and if it helps them be happier to believe that the stigma they've now created for me applies, then so be it.
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